Tempt the Stars

Page 41

“Between its eyes! The one between its—”
“It doesn’t have any eyes!” he screeched as the creature threw Caleb into the line of vamps and launched itself at us—
And exploded into a bunch of bronze-colored junk when Casanova got off the shot of the century.
He looked even more surprised than I was, and his hands started to shake. But when I grabbed him and screamed, “Shoot the jewels, tell your men to shoot the—”
He did.
At least, I assumed he did; I don’t hear vampire communication. But I saw it when vamps who had been standing around, worrying about crowd control, suddenly spun and started shooting every Allû in sight. And while humans might have had a problem with fast-moving targets smaller than M&M’s half a football field away . .
These weren’t human.
For a second, I just sprawled there on my bruised butt. And watched as suits of armor exploded while leaping off buildings or standing on rooftops or getting thrown off the remains of two once-nice rugs by a couple of enraged demons. And despite the fact that everything hurt, and a migraine was pounding at my temples and I felt like I might possibly throw up, a slightly manic grin spread over my face.
And then the lights went out.
Chapter Twenty
The neon cactuses dancing on a bar sign opposite us abruptly went dark. The couple of dozen cell phone screens, which people had been holding up to record the show, went dead. The strings of Christmas lights draping the fake donkey winked out. And then all of it was replaced by a huge blue-black nothingness that tore at my mind.
And a presence that screamed of age. It was old, old, so very old; I could usually guess vampire ages, but this . . . I didn’t have words for this. Or air, when its power slammed into me.
I struggled just to gasp in a breath, and didn’t have to ask what was happening.
If this wasn’t the demon council, it damned well ought to be.
A voice that spoke every language and none came from all directions at once. “You summoned us?”
“How kind of you to finally notice!” Rosier snarled as I climbed to my feet.
And then went back down again when what felt like an invisible fist tightened around my throat.
Rosier was saying something, something I couldn’t hear over the vast ocean crashing into my ear canals.
I would have thought I was being strangled by a disembodied Allû, come to wreak vengeance, only they couldn’t without bodies. And anyway, I knew that hand. I just didn’t know what it was doing down here since the bastard of a demon lord it was attached to was on a carpet five stories up.
Pritkin was shouting something, but I couldn’t tell if it was at me, at his homicidal father, or at whoever was speaking. All I could hear was the rushing of waves and the pounding of my heart, a slow, sluggish beat like I was about to pass out. But if I did, this would all have been for nothing. If I did, Pritkin would go back to his prison, if not face a worse fate for daring to leave it. If I did, the creatures who had sent their damned guards after him might find something else to finish the job, and remove a problem permanently.
So I didn’t.
I didn’t try to stand again, since that was about as likely as flying right now. I didn’t even try to follow whatever was being said, because that clearly wasn’t happening, either. I concentrated everything I had on just getting my damned tongue to quit lolling around my mouth and do something besides drool. To somehow form the words I’d dragged Pritkin across three worlds to say.
And I guess I managed, even though I couldn’t hear my own voice. Because suddenly, the dark was eclipsed by a light, like a single star glowing in the distance. And then right in front of my face, blindingly bright and uncannily beautiful this close, showering me with a prism of changing colors.
I stared into it, half-mesmerized, and would have had to fight an urge to reach out and touch it, if I had been able to move. As it was, I swallowed and tried again, unsure if I’d spoken aloud, or only in my head. “Artemis . . . would address the council.”
“The one you call Artemis is no more,” the light informed me. “How would the dead speak to the living?”
I tried to answer, but the only thing that came out was a gagging wheeze. It felt like the horse that had been sitting on my chest had just been joined by an elephant. Rosier really didn’t want me to speak, which only made me that much more determined.
“She gave me . . . a message,” I gasped. “She said . . . there are things . . . you need to under—awk.” My little speech was abruptly terminated when the elephant was joined by a couple of its buddies.
And okay, that was it. I couldn’t talk anymore, couldn’t even breathe. It felt like my chest had just been caved in.
Until the light moved forward and engulfed me, its shining rays blocking out the rest of the room, and the power that went with it.
“You . . . you’re the council?” I gasped as the pressure abruptly eased.
“I am the Gatekeeper, child. I summon the council, if the need is sufficient. Tell me, why should I summon them for you?”
“To hear . . . my mother’s message.”
The light reflected on this for a moment as I struggled to reinflate my lungs. “Give it to me, and I will relay it to them.”
And maybe it was me, but the nonvoice had taken on a sly note I really didn’t like.
“She said . . ” I licked my lips and forced out the words. “She said . . . it would only work . . . if I play it in front of the full council.”
“Play.” The light fluctuated. “It is a recording?”
“Yes. Sort of.” I wasn’t really clear on that part, but this didn’t seem the time to bring it up.
“From she whom you call Artemis . . . to us?”
“Yes. And it’s about more than Pritkin . . . John . . . Emrys,” I gasped, my oxygen-starved brain finally coming up with the name Rosier used for his son. “There are other things . . . you should know.”
The light flickered again for a long moment, or maybe that was me. I was starting to have trouble seeing now, too. I reached for my last reserves of strength, only to find that I didn’t have any. This needed to be over. . .
And then it was.
“We will hear what the Huntress would say to us,” the light told me. “You will be summoned.”
And then good old-fashioned electricity came rushing back, and a wave of furious clapping and whistling broke over me, and a couple of empty rugs spiraled out of the sky, their contents gone like the star, like the Allû, like the whole room as I fell into nothingness.
I woke up with a gasp, my hand on my throat, feeling like I was being choked. And that I was stuck in some twilit nothingness, waiting for a verdict that was so important, it meant everything, but that I couldn’t control. Or even predict . .
But I wasn’t in dim light; I was in no light. And if anybody was here with me, they were being damned quiet about it. I stared around, panting, but as far as I could tell, nothing stared back. There was only velvety darkness, the soft shush of air-conditioning, and the familiar scent of the fabric softener the hotel used on my sheets.
I relaxed back against the bed with a relief so profound it made me dizzy.
Or maybe that was something else. It felt like the bed was slowly revolving beneath me, a faint, drifting feeling, like the lazy roll of the carpet before Rosier arrived. . . . Rosier.
And suddenly, everything came rushing back.
Pritkin, I breathed, and started up—
Which was when the lazy drift became a tidal wave threatening to sweep me off to some other shoreline altogether.
I lay back slowly, carefully. And the crashing waves gradually diminished to nauseating undulations. Which wasn’t a great improvement, but at least I was conscious. But lying there, trapped by my body, virtually helpless when I had about a thousand questions to ask—
I almost wished I was unconscious.
Because this was torture.
But, slowly, my eyes adjusted. Enough to see a strip of light leaking in under the door, some night-in-the-city faux dark sifting in through a minuscule gap in the blackout curtains over the windows, and the soft glow of my alarm clock, too dim to read. And a small rectangle gleaming on the nightstand, just below it . .
And I found I could move, after all, because it was my phone.
My hands were shaking so much that I almost dropped it, and the light from the screen was blinding up close. But my fingers somehow found the right buttons. U K?
I hit SEND. And then I waited, feeling dizzy and sweaty and hopeful and sick. And keeping an eye on the door because the vamps usually knew when I’d woken up. Changes in my heart rate and breathing told them, even when I wasn’t about to hyperventilate.
For a long moment, there was no response. And my breathing started to get ragged, which was stupid, because it wouldn’t help. I told myself to calm down, that signs of distress were only going to get me noticed faster, that the last thing I needed was a bunch of questions I couldn’t answer. . .
But it wasn’t working.
And then I got a text back, and felt my spine unknot slightly.
Until I read it.
Yes, now let me sleep.
Sure, Caleb, I thought viciously, jabbing in a response. S P K? tel me [email protected] hapnd!
There was no response for a long moment. My hand flexed and I had to almost physically restrain myself from throwing the phone at the wall. And then—
I am too old for this shit.
I stared at the little screen: [email protected]?!
Stop doing that.
I took a deep breath. Caleb rarely used text speak, and he hated when I did. He was also a grammar Nazi, so I tried to be careful as I translated.
Is P. okay? What happened?
H & r dis. tt C. P held. U sum.
I just stared at that bit of nonsense for a long moment, wondering if I was going crazy or if Caleb was. No wonder he hated text speak. He sucked at it.
In English?
I waited while Caleb typed. And typed. And typed. Was he trying to give me a heart attack?
He and Rosier disappeared. I talked to Casanova. He said P. is being held until the hearing. You’ll be summoned.