But what matters most right now is the watch. It’s in the middle of the room, on my side of the barrier, about forty feet in front of me, hovering just above the raised birdbath altar. The timepiece’s hinged cover is open, and a bright cord stretches up from the center of its face directly into Collin’s heart. He floats fifteen feet above the altar’s silver dish, struggling like a fish on a hook, while the tentacle-like siphons coming from the kids plunge into his torso from all sides. Their lavender magic doesn’t seem to be stopped by the barrier at all.
He can’t see me because his gentle, beautiful eyes are squeezed shut, his brows winced tight. He looks like he’s in pain.
I want to keep staring at him, desperate to find out how hurt he is, but then I notice that the vibrating Hell wall next to the altar is crazy distorted. It bulges outward to the left, away from the silver-and-marble pedestal, half of a giant bubble easily several yards in diameter. As it stretches, a large oval section in its center lightens and thins, like a membrane about to rupture. That must be the tear this ritual is creating—the death god’s way in. I see something shadowy shift behind the rip that’s forming. Something not in our world. Something big.
That’s definitely disturbing. But warmth is quicklyfilling my ravaged guts. I’m healing. I’ve made it back to Collin, just like he said I would. And seeing as he’s out of the watch, I’ve even arrived at just the right moment to stop the ritual. From a glass-half-full perspective, everything’s going to plan.
All I need now is for the vampires to give me a minute to, you know, not be paralyzed and stuff.
That can’t be too much to ask for, right?
19
Doesn’t looklike I’m going to get that minute.
The vampires underneath me aren’t moving, but Valiente doesn’t play. He crooks his finger at the one standing vampire on my side of the barrier—it’s the big one with the beard, from before—and the creature jerks around the mind-controlled kids and comes trotting at me, leaning forward, picking up speed. With where I came to rest, the toxic magic is only a few feet away from my left shoulder. The tight, frightened grimace on Bluto’s face lets me know what Valiente’s got planned—he’s going to use the rhino-sized Hunter to ram me, kamikaze-style, into the lethal Hell wall. Apparently, Rafa’s dad is done testing my healing ability against gunshots and doesn’t have any qualms using his amulet to create cannon fodder. So much for him actually caring about his old buddies.
It’s only been a few seconds, and I am nowhere near recovered, but by the time Bluto is halfway to me, I am able to twitch my arms. Panic rising, I try to will as much healingwarmth into my ability to move as I can. My power does seem to listen, and that charging-up feeling quickly fills my muscles. I just don’t know if it’ll be enough. It’s a hella large room, but at this point, Bluto is just a three-count away.
Now,two…
One…
The vampire titan leaps from his loping gallop directly at me, making it now or never. Chest and stomach shrieking with pain, I fling my hand out, grab hold of one of his arms, and swing him up and toward the barrier with a wild twist of my torso.
It’s more of a spasm than a smooth throw. The only thing that saves me is the fact that Bluto is being controlled robot-style. Valiente doesn’t have the time or maybe even the finesse to give him any effective reflexes, which means I get to use all of Bluto’s momentum against him. As I release the lunging vampire into the air, my own momentum spins me off the other vampires below. Slapping down hard with the palm of my hand, I just barely break my fall against the stone floor. My nose lands inches from the deadly force-shield.
Bluto, on the other hand, continues on into the magical equivalent of a vat of acid. Like the vampire in the hallway, all it takes is one touch for him to completely stick against the crackling barrier between Earth and Hell, and then the corrosive energy swarms over him. This guy doesn’t even get a sound out before he’s completely annihilated.
I remain prone for a few beats, feeling the electric buzz of the magic in front of my face and listening to my ownbreath shudder in and out. One more inch and I’d have been dissolved, too.
But I need to get it together and fast. There are still two more vampires beside me. I can hear them stirring, and I’m still a long way from being fully healed. (Apparently shotgun blasts do a lot more damage than small arms fire—who knew?) I do my best to stagger to my feet. (Away from the barrier! Away!) I get about halfway to standing and don’t fall into certain death, which feels about as good as it’s going to get right now.
The two undead Hunters I downed try to struggle up under Valiente’s glare. The Vampire King’s hand stretches out toward them, clawed, like some horror-movie puppeteer. His minions move in response, but mostly they just awkwardly convulse and flop in place. I clearly broke a bunch of their bones and stuff in my mad dash into the room.
To which I say hells yeah.Finally,something goes my way! And maybe it’s my monster coming forward, but at this point, after everything I’ve just been through, instead of my usual freak-out, I’m back to being straight-up angry. I’ve had enough vampire attacks to last me a frigging lifetime—which means if Valiente’s not going to play, then neither will I.
I lurch around to the other side of the mangled undead thrashing on the ground and viciously kick the two of them over to the barrier. Every movement sends a jagged jolt of pain through my mauled body, limiting me to short, choppy motions. I’m still incubus strong, though, so I’m able to knock them several inches forward with each truncated, pissed-off, grunting shove. It takes severalseconds before I get one part or another of the creatures’ bodies to touch the toxic magic, but then it’s all over. The black-purple energy surrounds them, and moments later, there’s nothing left.
Valiente, still trapped on his side, drops his hand and locks eyes with me. He looks coldly furious, and it’s not hard to understand why. He sacrificed all his old friends, so there aren’t any more vampires on my side of the Hell wall. No more pawns he can use to stop me from getting to the watch. He’s fresh out of cannon fodder.
Well, that’s what you get for not taking care of your toys, sunshine.
Nothing more is in my way, so I stagger toward the altar. Sharp pains stab into my stomach with every step, each one followed by an intense, maddening itch. I still can’t straighten fully, so I probably look like some extra from an undead horror movie myself. But I can tell I have juice left—40%, maybe?—and I’m still healing. Whatever I’ve got, it should be more than enough for me to finish this thing. And I amsoready to finish this thing.
I take the last few steps up to the birdbath-like vessel containing the watch. There’s a bright line of shiny mercury rising from the timepiece to plunge directly into Collin’s chest—that has to be the tether holding him here, the one Mom talked about. I reach down and carefully scoop up the open silver pocket watch from its hover. It rests easily in my palm. Up to now, I’ve only seen it closed, so I’m surprised to find there isn’t a dial with hands and numbers inside. Instead, rimmed by the round metal case, there’s a small spinning vortex full of stars that pull away from me at dizzying speed. The gleaming cord plungesdown into the center of this magical black hole. Like the first time I touched the artifact, I have this tremendous impulse to keep staring, to lose myself completely in what I’m holding.
But then I sense movement above. It’s Collin, and when I look up, his focus is on me.
He’s clearly still in pain, but his eyes crinkle with joy at seeing my face. And, fucked up as I am, I can’t help smiling back. He believed in me, and I’m here. I did it. I got past the worst that Valiente had to throw at me, and now I’m going to save him. I’m going to save everyone.
But I haven’t done it yet. I glance behind myself at the thinning bulge of toxic magic, and what I see sends ice through my veins. A humongous eye, larger than a tombstone, presses against the barrier and meets my gaze. The orb is cold and gray and filled with hate.Savadeva. The god of corpses sees me and knows I’m here to mess things up for him.
Behind that forming gate to Hell, the kids continue chanting away, still completely in Valiente’s power. Rafa’s mom stands robotic beside Emma, arms hanging limp. She’s still got her sidearm in a belt holster peeking out from under her Kevlar duster, but she’s not reaching for it, and Valiente is just standing on the dais next to the empty lectern, eyes narrowed. (Maybe bullets really can’t penetrate the barrier!) When I look again to Emma, the fierce girl with pink-frosted hair finally seems to notice. She meets my eyes, and emotion swells in her expression. Her sturdy, compact body gives a little jolt forward, like she wants to get away but can’t. She’s clearly scared. She’s trapped and wants out.
Right. Enough taking in the view. Time to end this.
While Valiente watches, impotent and angry, I remove the Ziploc with the folded-up paper from my back pocket. Turns out sealing it up was the smartest thing I’ve done so far. The outside of the plastic is literally a bloody mess, but the incantation inside is completely clean. I use my teeth to pull open the bag and, after wiping my hand on my lower pant leg to make sure I don’t get anybody’s guts on it, I take the sheet out while letting the Ziploc drop to the ground, shake the paper open, and try to reach into my own mana.
