Bound (The Divine, Book Four) (6 page)

It was quiet inside, the only patron another traveler who looked like he was resigned to the choice as well. He stared down at his burger, taking a bite, grabbing a few fries, and taking another bite. It was almost enough to make me turn around and walk out.

I stayed because I needed Elyse, and more importantly I needed her body, even more than she needed my possession. I stepped up to the counter, set to order a meal large enough to keep us going for another twenty-four hours if needed. The cashier was talking to someone else in the back, and pointing to a spill on the floor. He turned to face me, and froze.

The look was too frightened to be one of admiration. Could he see me? Did he know what I was? I didn't have much time to wonder, because I felt a wave of hot breath wash over the back of my neck.
 

"You'll do," the voice said from behind me. A clawed hand grabbed my left wrist from behind.

I took a deep breath and shook my head. "I recommend you let me go, dog. I'm hungry, and not in the mood to deal with a mongrel like you."

Another huff of fetid air, followed by a soft growl. "Not scared of me, eh? Come on then sweetheart. Give it your best shot."

The machismo was familiar. Another changeling? Or the real thing? There was an easy way to find out. I stepped backward, stomping the heavy riding boot down on the were's foot and being rewarded with the crunch of bone. He started to howl, but I used his grip on my wrist as leverage to turn myself around and slam him in the head with my elbow. The blow made him let go, and knocked him backwards. He fell to all fours and looked up at me, his damage already healing.

"Not bad," he said. "You'll be a fun one."

He didn't back down, so I was going to assume he was the real thing. Even so, he was being incredibly brazen. I reached into the pocket of the jeans, finding the black stone and taking it out. It grew warm in my hand, and when I thought about the spatha, it materialized in place. The were was on his way, claws aiming to take me apart, leaving me almost no time to react. I ducked and twisted, using the weapon to smack his hands away. He crashed into the counter and over, sending the cashier running.
 

I had the blade ready by the time he came again, and he lost his left hand on the way by. He shrieked in pain, and watched it begin to steam.

"What the hell?" he asked. "You aren't a seraph. That isn't a seraph's sword." His eyes were wide. He knew what would happen. It was inevitable.

"It's better than that," I replied. "Well, worse for you. Better for me." I walked up to him and kicked him in the head. He tumbled over, howled one last time, and turned to dust. I was right, he had been the real thing.

I turned back to the counter, rendered into nothing but splinters after the were had gone through it. The employees had fled, so I returned the sword to wherever, and then grabbed a few burgers and some fries from the rack. I had my eye on the door when I remembered I would need some hydration, so I took a cup and filled it with soda. I walked out without looking back, giving a small wave to the other diner when I passed him. He was crouched under the table, a puddle of urine pooling around his leg.

"You're safe now," I said.
 

I was going to get a good night's sleep.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Landon

We were in a jungle. At least, I think it was a jungle. Dense vegetation surrounded us, thick canopies of trees hid us from the sunlight, and it was raining. Even if it wasn't a jungle, it sure felt like one.

"Do you think we lost him?" Charis asked.
 

We were sitting together behind the massive trunk of some tree or other, trying to catch our breath. We had managed to slip the wolves he had sent after us when we had fallen into a river and let it wash us downstream. I could still hear them howling in the night. I could hear him whistling.

"For a minute, maybe," I said. "But this is all part of the game. He's been toying with us for how long now?" I had lost track of how many times we had died. It had to be in the hundreds. At first, I had thought I would remember each one, but now I only remembered the pain, and the fear.

"I don't know. I've lost track." She sighed. "I don't want him to catch us again."

It didn't matter. We both knew he would. Maybe that was the point of this. Keep chasing us, keep catching us, keep killing us until we were nothing but broken souls. He wasn't just out for revenge, he wanted to destroy us - in heart, soul, body, and spirit.

"What do you remember?" I asked. We had done this every time, recapping what we could capture from our previous go-rounds in the Box. The memories had been coming faster for a while, but just when I thought we had them, they would ricochet away like a rubber band.

"I remember Clara," she said. "He gave us a daughter to torture us with."

That was the first memory. Somehow, he had discovered how much it had hurt me, and so Clara had been coming back, subjected to more suffering and agony, tortured in front of both of us. Watching someone torture a child was beyond disturbing. When it was your own, even if it wasn't real, it was the truest form of anguish I could imagine.

Charis was crying, her body shaking from her sobs. "I underestimated everything about this," she said. I could feel my own tears welling up, mirroring hers. We were both trying to be strong for the other, but the truth was that his efforts were succeeding.
 

We
were
breaking.

"What else? Think Charis. We put him in here. We're holding him in here. How? How can he have all of the control, if we're keeping him trapped?"

Those were the questions we tried to commit to our minds, to ask one another every time we came back. I knew there had to be an answer, that we should be able to do something against him. It didn't make sense that his power could be absolute, because if it was he would be able to escape.

She wiped her eyes and set her jaw. "Our power was his power. We don't have anything on our own."

"That can't be true. We're Divine. Diuscrucis. We have the blood of angels, demons, and humans in our veins. That has to count for something."

I heard barking echoes through the growth. They were getting closer.

"We were the only ones who could absorb his power," she said. "We were the only ones who could use it."
 

I nodded, my mind racing along that path. "So we should be able to use it, shouldn't we? It's the same power. We're just in a different place."

She smiled. "Yes, I think that's it. We need to remember that. Come on." She got to her feet and grabbed my arm. We ran through the greenery, pushing past thick, heavy plants and through brush and bushes. The snarling and barking of the wolves was getting louder.

"Why should we run?" I asked.
 

"We need to last as long as we can," she replied. "We need to remember."
 

His power was our power. We could take his power. We could use his power. I kept repeating the words like a mantra, committing it not only to my mind, but to my soul. An ingrained message, an instinct. We needed to do better than to run. We needed to be able to fight.

We pressed on, dodging trees, seeking another escape. The wolves couldn't be far back, and now I could hear the laughter carried on the wind. He knew we were running. He was amused.

"There," Charis shouted, pointing at a climbable tree. "It won't keep us alive forever, but it will buy us some time."

I followed her to it and we scrambled up, finding a resting spot in a branch thirty or forty feet off the ground. A minute later the wolves arrived, barking and growling, claws scraping against the trunk of the tree, six in all.

"The power," I said. My breathing was heavy from the run and climb. I closed my eyes and focused, trying to find that river of energy I had grown to depend on. It wasn't there.

"It isn't in Purgatory," Charis said. "It's here. It has to be. It's all around us."

I looked up, trying to find the sky behind the trees. Was there a sky here, inside the Box? Or was it all a trick, a lie? I kept my eyes focused on it, refusing to blink though they became dry and scratchy. Was it like those posters that seemed to be just a pattern of color, but turned out to be the Statue of Liberty, or a sailboat? Was the power out there?

"Oh, Lannnnndddoooonnnn!" His voice echoed loudly, and he appeared at the base of the tree.
 

I didn't look down at him, but I knew he was there. I kept my eyes on the sky.
 

"Helllloooo?" He put a hand to the tree, and it began to shake. It took immense effort, but I didn't let it break my concentration. I could see a spot of blue through the canopy, and as I stared, it began to fade away, turning towards a dark purple.
 

"I've almost got it," I whispered, hoping Charis would hear me, and the Beast wouldn't.

"Hey, kid! What gives?" He kicked the tree, shaking it wildly.
 

I grabbed onto the branch I was sitting on for balance, but I didn't shift my eyes. They burned and teared, but I refused to break again.

"I'm going down," Charis said. "I'll see you soon."

We both knew he was going to kill us again. The only question was how much we would remember. The further we got, the better we might do. I felt the tree shift as she jumped down.

"Hey, asshole," she said.
 

"You're starting to like the pain, aren't you?" he said. "Have you ever been eaten alive before?"

The wolves snarled, and a moment later she was screaming, I could hear teeth smacking against bone.

"Landon, you really need to see this."
 

I felt his power, beckoning me to look. The sky had turned a deep hue of blue and red, and I could make out lines of power dancing along it. I focused there, like casting out a fishing line. I hooked one of the lines, and pulled.

I didn't look at him. I didn't have to. I brought my own power to bear, pressing it against his, and refusing him. Only then did I look down.

His smile was gone.
 

Charis was dead, her body a meal. It fueled my anger. I jumped down, landing lightly on my feet in front of him.

"That was faster than I expected," he said. He might not have been smiling, but he still didn't seem impressed. "Since you think you've got some balls now, let's see what you can do."

He stood there, hands at his sides. He eyed me calmly, waiting.

I felt the anger building, and his power with it. I felt it pouring into me, filling every cell of whatever I was in this place. I gathered it in, bringing it all to my hands. I held them out in front of me, and a ball of blue lightning began forming there, a bright ball of energy. His energy.

Ross waited, watching me with curiosity, but not fear. If I hadn't been so angry, I might have known better. If my heart hadn't been in control, I might not have made the mistake of throwing the lightning at him.
 

It launched forward, a solid stream of blue energy, arcing at him in a wide, round beam. It smacked into him, and vanished.

The laughter returned, deep and rich. He shooed a wolf away from Charis' head and lifted it up, showing it off to me. "It's still my power, kid. You can't hurt me with it."
 

He threw it at me. As it approached, the eyes and mouth opened, and a scream came out. I closed my eyes then, knowing it was over. The head exploded an inch away, converted to the lightning ball.
 

It washed over me.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Rebecca

I woke up around noon the next day with a terrible stomach ache. It was a new experience for me, to go through the weakness of human digestion, and I didn't enjoy it. I kneeled over the toilet, waiting for a sign that the burger and fries would be rejected, but in the end I was stuck with the discomfort.

It took almost ten minutes for me to shed all of Elyse's charms in order to shower. If I was going to get close to Sarah, I couldn't go in smelling like blood and fast-food. I washed the smells out, enjoying the feel of hands through long hair, and the sensation of the warm water on the body. I checked her over for cuts and bruises, finding only a small bit of discoloration on the wrist the were had grabbed. I shook my head, still not accustomed to the frailty of mortal flesh, and then shut off the water. Once I was dry, I let Elyse take over. I had taken the trinkets off, but I didn't know how to put them all back on in the right places.

"Nice work with that were," she said, once her voice was returned. She was fast putting her stuff back on. I assumed that was why she started talking. She wasn't ready to be an observer again quite yet.
 

"
He was as agile as a rock
," I said. The were really had been no match for anyone with skill. "
You would have handled him just as easily.
"

"Maybe. I think the more important question is - what was he doing in a McDonald's looking for a toy? It's brazen, even for a were."

The thought had crossed my mind last night, before I had fallen asleep. What had he been thinking, stepping out into public like that? Weres could avoid humans all day, but attract too much attention and the angels would come looking for you. Attacking a mortal in a restaurant was the definition of attracting attention, and unless you were Great an angel versus a single were was always a win for the angel. Always.

"
Something's happened to the angels
," I said. "
At least around here.
"

"That was my thought."

"
Okay, but what?
"

She wandered out into the bedroom and pulled a fresh pair of undies from the backpack. She slipped them on and then put yesterday's outfit on top. Traveling light meant wearing dirty clothes.

"The changelings?"

"
Can't be. You saw the vampire back in Japan. He wouldn't hold his piss against a seraph.
"

"True. Hey, do you mind if I drive for awhile. It's a little boring, being-"

I shut her up by taking control. We weren't friends, we were business partners, and I wasn't interested in any efforts to change that.