Disciple: DreamWalkers, Book 2 (34 page)

Now they were all going to die.

An exultant cry shattered the heavy silence, unidentifiable but piercing. Something had made it through the rubble. How long before the horde arrived?

Maggie considered the ramp. The ladder and the tube. The climbing wraiths. The curator. Zeke.

She made her decision. She drew her sword with her good hand and faced the door.

“No,” Zeke repeated, his voice cracking. “Maggie, please.”

“Even if I scale the ladder, I don’t have a shot,” she said gently. “How long before the climbers out-climb me? At least down here I can swing a sword.”

“I’ll hold them off.”

“They can sense me, remember? Topside. We could already be cut off. Hell, they could be on their way down to get me.” On field missions to collar neonati, manifested wraiths had been able to locate Maggie wherever she’d hidden. Their team just hadn’t realized it was on Karen’s orders at the time.

The only place she’d be safe right now was a place these wraiths couldn’t access—like Honolulu. Unfortunately, she had no way to get to Honolulu.

“The monsters trail Karen like she’s the pied piper. They might all be underground by now.” He touched her jaw, and his hand trembled. “This could be your only chance. I’m begging you. Go.”

“If we can’t all go, we need to stick together.”

Zeke hoisted her bodily toward the ramp, trying to force her to ascend. Her sword clattered to the ground as she resisted. His eyes glittered in the dancing beam of the penlight, since the curator seemed disinclined to give them privacy for a goodbye. Well, the room was small, and the curator could hardly step into the hallway.

“Zeke, stop.” Maggie brushed her fingers through his eternally messy hair. “It’s too late. I need my sword.”

“Don’t say that.” He quit goading her up the ladder and rested his forehead against hers. “None of this is worth it if you don’t live, Maggie. I want to think I did something right.”

Dust gathered in the laugh lines beside his eyes, the scowl line between his brows. That was who he was—a perfect combination of wry and serious and sexy. She’d never expected to find someone like him or become someone like she was now.

Maggie closed her eyes, because looking at his face made her imagine foolish things—like hope. And love. And reasons to live. “I love you, and I’m standing beside you. That’s the right thing to do. It’s worth everything to me. We’ll guard the curator until we can’t anymore.”

“You could crawl into the tube and be partly protected.” His voice cracked as he pleaded with her. “You help him, and I’ll protect the bottom.”

How long could Zeke last against a T-Rex? “Let’s find a room with a door. That will buy us time.”

“So will going up the ladder.”

“I already said I can’t handle the climb, son. Heroics aren’t necessary.” The curator patted Maggie’s shoulder. She wished she had an iota of his composure, but her whole body was a knot of panic. “Leave me here. While this does disrupt my schedule for the immediate future, I bet I can convince Ms. Kingsbury I’m worth more alive than dead. I do have a few tricks up my sleeve.”

“You’re a billion years old…sir. You’re not a field agent anymore, and you cannot handle this. Get your ass in the tube, and quit causing so damn much trouble.” As Zeke’s frustration and fear bubbled over, even the curator seemed daunted. To Maggie’s surprise, the old man took two hobbling steps to the ramp and peered up the ladder.

Zeke continued, “Karen wants you almost as much as she wants Maggie.”

“That’s right,” agreed a raspy voice in the doorway. “The Master will be so happy with his new pet curator. You’re going to free me from bondage, old man, and in a few minutes, the whore is going to be dead.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

Zeke drew his sword and jumped between Maggie and Karen. How had the psycho silently crept up on them with a contingent of squalling beasts on her heels?

And who cared? She’d placed herself within reach.

He attacked.

Karen squeaked with alarm and stumbled into the hallway. Zeke barely missed. She was a millisecond too quick for him.

“Stay here. It could be a trap,” Maggie exclaimed, but Zeke pursued Karen out the door, retribution on the brain. If he killed her this time, like he should have earlier, the horde would lose focus. Then he might have a shot at saving Maggie and the curator after all.

The darkness in the hallway concealed Karen, but he could hear her angry huffing.

He jabbed. Encountered something soft. Karen squealed like a wraith.

“Where are you?” she screamed. “Protect me at once.”

Clearly, Zeke wasn’t going to protect her, so she must be yelling at…

A surge of light blinded him as several wraiths galloped through the intersection and caught up to their mistress. Skittering at the forefront was a glowing, radioactive spider, which cast a neon pall the length of the corridor.

Spiders were eight times the hassle as most wraiths, and their climbing abilities were unparalleled. He had to dust that bugger before it reached the tube. The spider was accompanied by two Nosferatu, a banshee, and a werecreature.

Karen had had a hell of a lot more than five wraiths aboveground. Where was the T-Rex? The rest of the horde?

“What in the world?” Maggie’s voice, behind him. Her blade gleamed as green as the advancing spider.

“Get inside,” he ordered. “I can hold the room against this bunch.”

As long as he could take them on one at a time through the doorway.

Karen lifted a finger, practically a claw, and pointed at Maggie. “You might as well give up, Zeke. This is the end. You can’t protect her anymore.”

Karen’s other hand clutched her upper arm as she threatened them. Blood speckled the tattered remnants of her baggy sweat suit. The wound didn’t look deep enough to slow her.

Damn.

He feinted, hoping to get lucky, but the monsters closed ranks. They protected Karen with their bodies and menaced Zeke. The giant spider’s abdomen quivered as it crouched.

Did it use webbing? Some did, some didn’t.

He hated both kinds. Creepy fucks.

“They’ll do anything for me,” Karen bragged. “I’m going to make sure your stupid whore gets what she deserves for putting you at risk. For bringing you to the Master’s attention.”

The monsters milled around her, a wall of barely restrained wrath. The banshee crooned, soft and high and eerie. Its long, gray hair drifted like seaweed. The spider skittered sideways, away from the banshee. Green radiance fluctuated on the walls and floor as if they were underwater, in the fish tank from Hell.

“You’re the one putting me at risk.” Zeke didn’t take his eyes off the spider. It was the wraith most likely to jump, the deadliest of Karen’s entourage. There was no way he could get to Karen until Arachnobeast was dead. “You’re the one summoning wraiths and killing people.”

The werecreature blocked Karen from Zeke’s view. She shoved it aside and stared at him. “I have to get free of him, don’t you understand? I can’t let him possess me anymore.”

“Nobody is using you. He’s not real. You have a split personality, and you’re killing people because you want to,” Maggie told her.

Karen turned her attention to Maggie. Her teeth bared as she snarled. “He is real, and this is your fault. You’re the one I’m going to kill because I want to.”

With Karen focused on Maggie, some of her power over the wraiths seemed to slip. They skulked forward. Hunger blazed in their eyes, or whatever approximated eyes. The banshee’s croon increased in pitch.

Zeke tensed. If they all came at him at once, he’d have to shove Maggie into the bunk room to defend the doorway. Screw her vow to stand beside him. As much as he loved her, she hadn’t trained long enough to fight with two good arms—and she only had one.

He needed to stick her and the curator into the damned ladder tube. Provided nothing slithered down from above, maybe, just maybe, he could fend off the climbers and other monsters long enough for the reinforcements to reach them.

If the reinforcements were alive. The reduced size of Karen’s entourage, the static on the walkie—and the fact he’d spotted no one during his foray through the blast doors—worried Zeke that the wraiths had taken out the humans.

“How is your situation my fault?” Maggie was asking Karen. To her credit, she didn’t charge forward yelling a battle cry. Some neos did in their first trial by fire. “I didn’t awaken to the sphere until a couple months ago, and you’ve been—”

Quick as lightning, the spider broke free of the monster brigade and catapulted toward them. Zeke was ready. He pivoted, sword spinning, and sliced off a leg at the first joint. The spider landed hard and bowled across the floor. Legs flailed. It came at him again but flinched away when he defended himself with the blade.

“Stop it!” Karen demanded. “Not him.”

The spider crouched near Karen as the werecreature growled and a Nosferatu flapped its cape.

“Do as I say.” She kicked the spider. Its mandibles snapped as if preparing to bite back. For a moment, Karen appeared frightened, before her eyes narrowed to a glare.

The spider subsided, but the damage had been done. Karen was having trouble managing her herd.

“Getting a little much for your messed-up brain, are they?” Zeke taunted.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle.” Karen smacked the air, as if knocking aside doubt. “That bitch of a vigil shut me out of the sphere.”

“You need sphere access to control your friends?” Did that make what Karen did like confounding or another alucinator skill? If you could call communing with wraiths a skill. For all he knew, communing with wraiths was why she was so fucking crazy.

Karen scowled when she realized she’d shared information. This whole time, she’d dangled knowledge in front of everyone like carrots, but she’d given them nothing. She’d played sick and helpless, but she’d never been sick and helpless.

She’d confounded anyone who’d started to doubt her.

This was all Karen. It always had been. It was down to Zeke to end it.

“It doesn’t matter,” Karen said. “Sharma’s dying, and the lock will die with her. Besides, I don’t need to manifest more wraiths to kill your whore and deliver the curator to the Master.”

Adi was dying? Did that mean the whole team was dead—including Lill?

Zeke couldn’t afford to let it dismay or distract him. He adjusted his grip on his sword and waited for an opening. It would come. Karen needed to bluster. To seethe at them. She must be unsure of her control over the monsters. Otherwise, she’d have directed them to kill Maggie already.

“How exactly do you plan to deliver somebody to your nonexistent Master?” he asked, prolonging the conversation. “If only you could have proven he existed. You need to accept he’s a figment of your imagination.”

“I know he’s real because he possessed me. He made me do things. He hurt me.” Fury vibrated through Karen’s scrawny form. “He was there. He’s always there, watching us. And he has a plan.”

“Like a cylon,” Maggie muttered. She braced her bad arm under her good one, using her forearm to help support the long sword. The spider chittered, all eight of its glowing eyes focused on Maggie. Pus oozed from its stump.

Zeke would have to kill that seven-legged menace before he killed Karen. He also needed to convince Maggie it was a good idea to climb the ladder.

He wanted her to have a chance. A tiny chance. Then he could die less miserably.

“The Master is going to escape the sphere and take physical form. Then nobody will be able to stop him. That’s why there were corpses. He’s learning.” Karen paced back and forth, weaving through her crew, occasionally glancing toward the intersection. She never swerved close enough for Zeke to reach. But whenever she turned her back on the wraiths, they sidled toward him and Maggie.

“Let him. Any wraith with a physical form can be dusted.” Zeke inched back as the wraiths advanced. He bumped into Maggie and nudged her toward the bunkroom.

“The corpses showed up because I’m bellatorix.” Maggie copied Zeke’s delaying tactic, engaging Karen in discussion. “Zeke and I both are. That’s a known phenomenon, not some imaginary boogieman.”

“Is it a known phenomenon for wraiths to eat corpses?” Karen asked slyly. “The Master did that too. He needs a body to come through the barrier. He’ll get it any way he can.”

Zeke lowered the tip of his sword as if sidetracked. While he had no explanation for that, it was more important to defeat Karen than debate her. “Wraiths eat all kinds of things. Consider it from our point of view. Since nobody can sense the Master, why should we believe you?”

Such logic had no place in Karen’s frenzy. “You’re all fools. You’re falling into his trap. He doesn’t want you to know he exists until it’s too late.”

“I think it’s too late for you. Your honor guard is looking shabby.”

It was true that a watcher could have been in the sphere, like Karen had been the past year, sneaking around behind a curator’s camouflage. But the curator had taught Zeke, Maggie and Lill to crack that disguise, and they still hadn’t sensed an omnipotent wraith king. Nor had the curator, who’d possessed that skill all along.

How did Karen expect them to believe that an apparition no one in the history of the Somnium had identified was dictating her actions?

Then again, Karen was crazy. Bona fide nuts.

That didn’t make her less of a threat. While they argued, the size of her mob increased. Four zombies shambled from the intersection. Drool trickled from slack jaws.

Zombies Zeke could handle. Rheumy eyes bulged at him and Maggie over the shoulder of their mistress. Several bore the signs of combat—missing limbs, splatters of gore.

Was this the entirety of Karen’s army?

“Where are you?” Karen screamed into the darkness. “I command you to come.”

No more wraiths appeared.

“Just can’t get good help anymore?” Zeke mocked. One thing he’d noticed—the angrier Karen got, the angrier the wraiths got. The more he pressed her, the more the wraiths strained to attack.

The more control over them she lost.

“Shut up.” Karen resumed pacing. Her hands fisted. She raved and cursed, describing what the monsters were going to do to Maggie. Her imagination repulsed him. Zeke felt his moment grow nearer with every furious stomp of Karen’s feet.

Behind Zeke, nearly in the doorway, Maggie urged the curator not to leave the dubious safety of the bunkroom. The wraiths became as agitated as an industrial concrete mixer. The banshee rent its gauze clothing and wept tears of blood. The spider climbed partway up the wall, bobbing wildly. Karen didn’t seem to care.

If she lost control of the wraiths, it would be a free-for-all, but they’d cease to protect her. They’d fight without unity, easier to kill. They might even converge on her. When he made his move, it was going to get deadly, fast.

Would Maggie take responsibility for the curator and climb the escape tube? He had to trust she would, or his sacrifice would be in vain.

“I won’t shut up,” Zeke said boldly. “I love Maggie. I’ll die for her if I must.”

Karen howled with rage.

This time it was the werebeast that leapt for Zeke.

Maggie gasped with alarm and bumped his sword arm. His swing went wild. The monster tackled him, and its claws dug into his arms. He lost his grip on the blade.

Karen screamed in the background as Zeke struggled to keep the grisly jaws from closing on his face. He squeezed its thick throat. The stench of the were’s coarse pelt choked him. Saliva dripped on his cheek, burning like acid. It would do no good to knee the fucker in the crotch. Wraiths were sadly missing several human weak spots.

The beast growled like a mad dog. Its head tossed from side to side as it tried to loosen Zeke’s grip on its throat, so he squeezed harder.

Footsteps, scuffles, surrounded him. Zombies moaned. The banshee wept its hair-raising cry. Maggie and Karen argued. The werebeast’s teeth gnashed frantically as it strained toward his face. The vest protected his torso, but it wouldn’t keep the wraith from munching on his head.

“To your left, Margaret dear,” the curator said.

What the hell was the old troublemaker doing out of the bunkroom? Damn his stubborn ass. A surge of anger helped Zeke crush the wraith’s windpipe. Bones popped, and the monster started to gag.

A solid object thunked to the floor beside him. Zeke glanced toward it—a zombie head—at the exact wrong moment. It puffed into dust, blinding him.

“Get off him, you useless hairball.” Karen’s voice. Nearby. The beast snarled, but it quit chewing toward Zeke’s face. What was going on? He blinked fast, trying to clear his vision of wraith dust.

At least it wasn’t pepper spray.

Karen continued to rant and yell. “You—kill the werewolf. Now.”

Zeke hurled the distracted werebeast aside. He scrambled to his feet, avoiding the spider, who pounced on the other wraith with excited chitters.

Wraith on wraith? This was different than the involuntary tussle between the T-Rex and the Cthulhu. This was deliberate. He rubbed his eyes, both to clear the last of the dust and to ensure he’d seen what he thought he’d seen.

The thrashing werebeast collapsed into dust beneath the spider. Its seven legs quivered as if struck by electricity. Holy shit. Just how much control over the wraiths did Karen have?

Enough to send them after specific people. Enough to force them to attack one another.

Enough to force them to eat human corpses in hopes of convincing everyone the Master’s bid for corporeality was real?

Karen, pallor evident even in the sickly green glow of the spider, waved a shaking hand toward Zeke. “I warned you. Don’t touch him. If you do, you die.”

The spider sprang away quicker than Zeke’s eyes could follow. The green glow vacillated. Zeke whirled, looking for the monster.

Behind him? No spider. Maggie slashed at two zombies. The banshee and the Nosferatu remained behind Karen, pacing and glaring.