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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.
