Tempt the Stars

Page 40

And in his wake, he left a bloody line across Pritkin’s stomach, where his sword would have gutted him if war mage reflexes were a little less sharp.
But that wouldn’t help for long. More than a dozen guards were massing along the roofline, about to overwhelm us with numbers. And it was too late for anything but screaming as they jumped—
And went flying backward, like a bomb had been set off in front of them.
Pritkin’s and Rosier’s voices had risen together in a spell that not only saved us, but cleared the other rug, as well. Caleb had hit the carpet at the last second, and now stared up, looking both surprised and vastly relieved.
He’d been battling two of the creatures alone, and it hadn’t been going great.
But then, neither was this. Because they’d be back. And I didn’t think we’d last long with the air full of deadly blades kamikazied straight to their target by a bunch of immortal warriors.
And I guessed Rosier didn’t, either.
Some of the Allû were still falling when he muttered something low and harsh and vicious, with enough power behind it to make the hairs on my neck stand up.
But that would have been fine; that would have been awesome.
If it had actually done anything.
“Was that supposed to help?” I asked as Rosier and Pritkin stared at each other blankly.
And then Rosier tried again, and this time, the power of his words prickled across my skin almost painfully. And kept right on prickling until Pritkin shot out a hand and grabbed his father’s arm. “They aren’t coming!”
“They have to,” Rosier said, looking almost comically indignant. “I’m a member of the council!”
“The same one that’s preventing you from shifting back to court?” Pritkin asked acidly.
“That’s not them; it’s her,” Rosier said, gesturing at me. “She wants to force my hand—”
“Are you mad? She doesn’t have that kind of power!”
“You know who her mother was! There’s no telling what she’s capable—”
“Face facts! The council would rather see you dead than risk their precious necks! They won’t call off their guards until they’ve killed me—and anyone with me.”
Pritkin’s eyes focused on me with that last sentence, and I shook my head. Because I knew him. “No. No! I’m not leav—”
Which was as far as I got before he grabbed me and threw me off the rug—and into Caleb’s arms.
“Pritkin! Damn it—”
“Listen to me! I need you to find Casanova. Tell him to have his men—”
But I didn’t hear whatever he wanted Casanova to do. Because two very scary things happened at once. The crowd below gave a huge roar, like their favorite team had just scored a touchdown, and an almost solid sheet of scimitars came slicing through the air from the other side of the street.
I didn’t even have time to scream before I was eating carpet, with Caleb’s hand on my neck, holding me down. I saw Rosier pull a red-sheened blade out of his side, felt our carpet buck hard beneath me, heard Pritkin curse as he was jumped by the two guards who had just used us as a springboard. And then we were moving.
But not very fast. It looked like the spell was having problems, maybe because the Allû had practically hacked to pieces the platform it was trying to use. But despite the poor treatment, it didn’t look like they wanted it going anywhere.
We, on the other hand, were another matter.
Something smashed into my side, and for the second time in less than thirty seconds, I felt myself flying.
And Caleb couldn’t catch me this time.
Because he was right there with me.
But a second later, something did catch us, something I promptly fell off because it was the size of a smallish dish towel.
No, not a dish towel, I thought, as Caleb came rolling after me. I yelped and tried to make room for him on a carpet fragment the size of a single stair, only to fall again—onto another one. I looked up, and saw Pritkin hanging off the side of his carpet, Rosier and the Allû battling all around him, his hand outstretched and an intense frown of concentration on his face—
As he formed a staircase out of woolen fragments, in some case all of a foot wide.
And then Caleb fell into me again and we were rolling and bouncing and falling down four “flights,” with pieces of rug managing to catch us every time I was convinced we were about to run out.
And then I hit something with my face that was a lot harder than wool. And looked up to find Casanova staring down at me. And then snatching me up and flinging me to the side.
Right before an Allû crashed into the space where I’d been lying.
“Take it apart!” Casanova screamed, practically hysterical. And his men didn’t waste any time. But they were hotel security, not soldiers. They didn’t carry grenades or percussion bombs, and while somebody had thought to break out the handguns, they weren’t too useful against something with no internal organs.
I scrambled up and grabbed Casanova’s arm. “Pritkin wanted me to tell you something—”
Casanova swore. “I’d like to tell him something—”
“No, listen. I think it was about how to fight these things! And he ought to know. He used to have a golem once—remember? And they’re not that different!”
“Well, what is it?”
“That’s just it; I don’t know! We have to get somebody back up there—”
Casanova said something that looked pretty profane, but I couldn’t hear it. Because the crowd was really getting into it now. They screamed in mock terror as bullets riddled the fallen warrior, then yelled approval when it got back up, the neon glow from a nearby storefront streaming through the hundred or so holes in its body.
They were also pushing against the line of vamps Casanova had strung across the street, which would have been okay. Since there was no way they were breaking through that. But then the warrior sent a group of security who tried to rush him crashing back into their buddies, and opened up gaps that the crowd started to surge through.
“Push them back, push them back, push them ba—” Casanova was yelling, before he got backhanded, too.
I saw his men stare at him fearfully, unable to help and control the crowd at the same time. I saw him sail through the air and hit a wall. I grabbed a gun off a nearby vamp and scrambled after him, because I didn’t see the Allû—
Until I was suddenly on my back again, with a blank bronze face staring into mine.
Its weight was threatening to crush me, the jagged edges the bullets had torn in its torso were stabbing me like tiny knives, and the heat from several blackened places on its armor was trying to scorch me. But I barely noticed. Because that blank bronze faceplate was maybe two inches from my nose, reflecting my own stunned features back at me.
And, insanely, the only thing I could think of at that moment was Daisy, peering at me out of the side of her bucket, her eyelash drooping over one shiny cheek.
And the fact that that was a damned weird last thought to have.
But then Caleb proved me wrong, jerking the bullet-ridden body off me and sending it sliding over the ground. Which wouldn’t have helped much, except that he slapped a shield over it before it could get back to its feet. I scrambled after it, a half-formed thought hammering at my brain, and found the creature lying on its back like a bug caught in amber.
But not for long.
War mages are tough, and if the training Pritkin put me through was anything to go on, they emphasize endurance above everything. Because you can’t channel magic if you pass out from exhaustion. But Caleb had been fighting all day, and part of that time had been somewhere that required added effort. The strain was all over his face, and I didn’t think I was the only one who noticed.
There were no eyes, no mouth, nothing to form an expression of any kind on that piece of burnished metal. Just blank determination as it pushed inexorably against the shield. So why did I get the definite impression of malice staring up at us?
These things might not feel pain, but they clearly felt something.
Like for the woman who had blown a bunch of them to pieces a couple of weeks ago.
Too bad I didn’t have any of those weapons now. And the one I did have wasn’t likely to do enough damage to matter. I didn’t have anything—
My thoughts stopped, screeching to a halt at the sight of a small, diamond-shaped jewel glittering in the middle of a sea of bronze—what would have been the creature’s forehead, if it had one. I hadn’t noticed it before, because it was tiny, maybe half the size of my little fingernail, and reddish gold, almost the same shade as the metal surrounding it. It was virtually invisible at any distance. . .
But I wasn’t at a distance, and I saw it clearly.
Like I heard my father’s voice saying, “Do you see a control gem in his forehead?”
Yeah, I thought dazedly, I kind of thought I did.
I also thought I knew what Pritkin had been trying to tell me.
Casanova came running up, and I grabbed him. “Do you have a gun?”
“Yes,” he said sarcastically. “Of course. I keep it in my underwear!”
“Then get one!”
One of his vamps tossed him a Beretta, and he snagged it out of the air even while glaring at me. Vampire senses never ceased to amaze. At least, I really hoped this wasn’t going to be the first time they let me down.
“I don’t know what good you think this is going to do,” he crabbed. “We’ve wasted a hundred rounds on that damned thing already—”
Caleb cut him off with a roar. “Casanova! Get her out of here!”
But it was too late.
The shield burst and we all went flying, and then landing, in the case of Casanova and me, a good five yards away and on our asses. It hurt, but not as much as it was about to. Only Caleb recovered almost as fast as the creature, tackling it around the knees as it went for me.
“Shoot the jewel!” I yelled, grabbing Casanova.
“What jewel? What are you—”