The Deadliest Bite (33 page)

Get it together, Jazzy
. Granny May’s warm voice had never been so welcome in my head. I saw her standing on her front porch, hands on her hips, the way she did every time I got ready to leave.

Now I understood that she’d always despised those moments the same way she hated this one. But she’d get me through it, just like she’d helped me go back to a home ful of raised voices and mistrust. Because I needed her to.

I turned to Raoul. “I don’t suppose you’ve got an inflatable raft tucked into a secret compartment of your belt or anything?”

“No,” he said. “But I have this.” He pul ed out his sword, banged it against the ground, and
voila
!

It became a long staff that would be the envy of every one of Robin Hood’s men.

“Did you learn that trick from what’s-her-face?” I whispered, referring to Kyphas’s old habit of transforming a regular human item like a scarf into a local y made and lethal y sharp weapon.

He blushed. “A good idea is a good idea,” he muttered.

“Okay. But I don’t get yours.”

He sighed. “And you ran track in col ege!”

“Wait.” I held up my hands. “You want us to pole-vault over this river?”

“Not this stretch,” he said, waving at the wide water before us. “But my scout said that it narrows radical y down there.” He pointed to our left.

I looked at Vayl, expecting a slew of logical and valid objections. He stared at me quietly, waiting for me to see the bril iance in my Spirit Guide’s plan. At which point I grabbed the pole and stomped off in the direction Raoul had pointed, suddenly, unaccountably, furious. At some point Astral had jumped from her perch on Raoul’s arm, and now she trotted beside me, flicking her ears toward me as if she wanted to catch every word.

“He thinks we’re just going to graceful y vault over the water, like we’re Olympic gymnasts or something. Can you believe that? I’m trying to save my damn mind and I don’t even get the respect of a boat ride for my final mission. Because you know what’s going to happen, don’t you, Astral? My pole is going to get stuck in the mud. And if it doesn’t sling me straight down into the waiting jaws of a sharkogator, I’l just end up stuck there, Jaz-on-a-stick, until I final y lose my grip and slowly slide down into the muck, which is probably worse than quicksand, at which point I wil drown. Dumb damn Eldhayr.” And yet I stil strode on, because I couldn’t think of a better plan, and part of me thought it’d be great fun. Especial y if none of us were eaten alive.

Which led to Astral’s dilemma. “Can you pole-vault?” I asked my robokitty. She shook her head.

“I didn’t think so. Okay, I guess you’l have to ride. But if you dig in those claws, I wil have them chopped off. Just remember that. Now where the—oh. I see.”

The bank pinched in on itself before me as if it were trying to bite into a particularly luscious piece of pie. Made, no doubt, of four and twenty blackbirds just like in that craptacular nursery rhyme my mom insisted on chanting to us right before lunch every damn day until we final y screamed at her to stop.

I halted at the narrowest spot, probed the water, and found it satisfyingly shal ow while I waited for the rest of our merry band to catch up with me. Vayl came to stand beside me, brushing his shoulder against mine in the way he knew would instantly soothe me. I looked up at him. “I can’t tel you how much this is sucking. Brude is tap dancing across my frontal lobe like he’s wearing steel-soled work boots. I have no idea if we’re going to be able to open up the Rocenz, so my stomach has shrunk to the size of a walnut. And yet my intestines have shifted into ful gear, so if I don’t shit myself before this is al said and done it’l be a goddamn miracle.” He smiled at me. “I adore you.”

“Likewise.”

“I have no idea how this wil al end.”

“Me neither.”

“But we have been through other hel s and survived. I believe that raises our odds somewhat astronomical y. And as long as we are together, I think we can triumph over nearly anything.”
Even death?
I wanted to ask as I gazed into his eyes. And then I decided.
Damn straight!

Nothing’s stopped us yet. Why should I suppose hell itself could stand in our way?

I handed him the pole. “You first, twinkletoes.”

“I never told you I was considered something of an athlete in my day.” I looked his broad, muscular body up and down. And then took another, slower tour. My mouth had started to water. I licked my lips so the drool wouldn’t escape as I said, “I’m not surprised.” Another quirk of the lips to let me know he knew what I was thinking and felt I should think it some more at a later date, out loud, when he could react in a more physical y pleasing manner. Then he backed away from the bank, ran at the sucker like he meant to overpower it with his bare hands, landed the pole in the middle of the water and vaulted himself to the other side without even a grunt to show that he’d exerted himself in the process. He pul ed the pole out and threw it across to me.

“That was a good spot I found,” he cal ed to us. “Do you think you can set it down in the same place?”

“Absolutely!” Lotus was the one who’d replied. She grabbed the pole from my hand, so happy to have discovered her niche in the netherworld that she’d leaped across the river before any of us could give her a serious lecture about how she should approach this jump. Raoul caught the pole when Vayl sailed it across the next time. He tried to hand it to me but I said, “You go next. I’ve got to get Astral zipped into my jacket just right. Plus, with you three over there to catch, I’m pretty sure I’l have something soft to land on.”

With a smal grin and a nod he took the leap. Leaving me and the metal cat to consider our immediate future.

“You got an appropriate song ready for this one?” I asked her.

She poked her head out of the top of my jacket, pul ed her lips back, and said, “Metamorphosis in five, four, three, two, one.” Suddenly she went flat enough to slip down and curl around my belt.

“Oh, great, thanks for the vote of confidence. Now if I squish you, you’re already only an inch high.

Smart move, genius.”

Maybe it was just my imagination, but I real y thought I heard a round of tinny laughter accompany me as I walked to where Vayl had begun his run. Then I gave myself ten extra yards, which put me beside an arm whose hand gently waved in the breeze caused by its captured soul. I stared at it for a second. Then my sick sense of humor got the better of me. “I’d ask you to clap for me, but I can see that’s out of your grasp. Maybe if you just snapped your fingers?” When the hand slowly lifted its middle finger I began to laugh. The feeling lifted my feet into the fastest run I’d managed since a satyr named Lil yzitch had chased me through the Mal of America. I knew my speed was perfect when I hit the bank. I had my eye on just the spot Vayl had picked and Lotus and Raoul had fol owed. I’d aimed the pole true. Then a monster the size of a half-ton pickup rose out of the water, blocking the pole’s path.

“Shit!” I yel ed as Lotus, Raoul, and Vayl howled my name.

I rammed the pole into the hel spawn, whose slime-covered bel y had rol ed toward me during its ascent from the water. It punctured skin and muscle, throwing blood so high into the air that I felt the spatter blanket my skin as I flew over the top of it.

I landed in the water twenty feet from shore, stil holding the pole since I knew Raoul would need it as his sword later.

“Change this pole into something I can use, Eldhayr!” I cried out, and the pole immediately transformed into a, wel , a scarf. Damn. Didn’t that guy have any imagination? I tied it around my neck and began to swim toward shore.

Vayl began yel ing, “Fin to your left! Swim, Jasmine, swim!”

He ran to the bank, his cane sword unsheathed, as Raoul and Lotus slapped their hands on the water twenty yards to his left, trying to convince the creature they tasted better even though they were harder to catch. I put al my energy into carving my arms through the water as if it were a solid mass I could push myself through and paddling my legs like twin boat motors.

“It is gaining on you!” Vayl cal ed. “Faster now!”

But I was already pul ing top speed. Every muscle in my body was burning. I could sense the creature, hungry for my flesh, zeroing in on the section of meat it would tear away first. I began to wonder how bad it would hurt. Or if, maybe, my brain would be kind and send me straight into adrenaline overload and shock. I thought not.

Suddenly something splashed right next to me, startling me so much that I frog-jumped at least a foot forward. It was the body of the demon who’d sucker punched me. Vayl had hurled it into the path of the water monster. I risked a look as I moved back into escape rhythm and saw a maw ful of jagged white teeth open wide and then sink into the corpse floating beside me.

That sight was enough to propel me into Vayl’s arms. He held me tight, lifting me out of the water and pul ing me so far ashore that my feet didn’t hit land until we stood right next to the fence. I felt him shudder. Heard him whisper, “You are al right. Yes. You are just fine,” and realized he was comforting himself as much as me. Then Raoul and Lotus were there, and Lotus was jumping up and down, slapping me on the shoulder. Raoul was hugging me so hard I couldn’t breathe anymore.

And Astral spoke loudly from somewhere around my bel y button, announcing, “Metamorphosis in five, four, three…”

“Aaahhh! I gotta get her outta my pants before they rip to shreds!” I reached inside my belt and pul ed the dripping robokitty from her pole-vaulting position just as she reinflated. It felt so bizarre to be holding her, like it might feel to hold a bag of popcorn as the kernels zapped into fluffly edible nuggets of goodness.

Final y I found enough breath to say, “Thanks for saving—”
What’s left of my life? Let’s not go
there, okay?
“Yeah. I’m good. In fact—” I smiled up at Vayl, reclaiming Cassandra’s positive attitude as I said, “When we get back we should probably get a pool and throw a shark or two in it to chase us around just to make sure we’re getting a good cardio workout every day.” When he chuckled I knew we were back in business.

He pul ed me toward the gate to our right, Astral trotting between us, Raoul, and Lotus as he said, “Come. Let us finish this before we discover that hel ’s swimmers have grown shore legs.” I didn’t quite yip, but I did nod and grab his hand tightly in mine as we hustled toward our ultimate goal.

I’l say this about journeys so important that old-fashioned dudes in armor cal ed them quests.

Somehow they always end too soon. Standing at the back entrance to hel , I wanted nothing more than to be a thousand miles away from it, stil trying desperately to reach it. Because now that I was here, with Brude banging against the wal s of my mind like his fists had transformed into ice picks while Vayl stood tal and grim beside me, reminding me of the price of failure, I’d never been so terrified in my entire life.

I squeezed his hand, feeling the ring I’d given him brush against my fingers, reminding me of the fact that I final y had a future worth fighting for. I’d even al owed myself to picture it in my mind, a dazzling piece of art built on remembered pain and new hope. As I stared at Satan’s bloody gate, I decided I was damned if I was going to let some megalomaniac slash my dream to ribbons.

I said, “Vayl. I keep getting nosebleeds just like the mutt on this gate.” He replied, “This is true.”

“Brude is slamming my synapses like he’s found a damn drum set that he’s just learning to play.

And I’ve had it.”

Vayl turned me toward him. Looked deep into my eyes. And kissed me, gently, as if we had al the time in the universe. He whispered, “I suppose, then, that is a sign that it is time?”

“I’m thinking so.”

“I love you, Jasmine.” He’d said it before. A lot. And maybe someday I’d get used to the words.

But, oh, how they sang off his tongue like a soul-felt melody, wrapping around my heart and pul ing it so close to his that I was sure they beat with the same rhythm.

I slid my hands around his waist, up his strong back, pul ing his chest to mine until my breasts heaved into his. “I love you too, Vayl.” I rose to my tiptoes and touched my lips to his, savoring the everlasting dance of soft skin and wet tongues as we sealed our own bargain. When I realized I’d gone breathless I dropped my heels back to earth. “What do you say we summon that cowboy?” I asked, managing a smile despite the pain behind my eyes and the fear in my gut.

“I like that plan.”

I nodded, recal ing the directions Kyphas had given me:
Stand by the gate, give it your blood,
knock three times, and shout his full name
.

I looked up at my lover. Cleared the sudden blockage from my throat. I said, “Are we ready?” He glanced over his shoulder at Lotus, Raoul, and Astral, who’d turned their backs to us to guard against attack. I was beginning to think it wasn’t likely, this side of the river. Then a howl, so far off we’d probably only heard the echo, made them swing in that direction. Raoul looked over his shoulder. “Hurry,” he whispered, as if the creature could hear us, even from that distance.

I nodded, drew my bolo, and sliced into the soft skin above my wrist. I made sure I had a generous supply of blood on my fingers before I swung around to the gate, drew a double slash across the mastiff’s jaw, and then rubbed my offering into it. The metal trembled at my touch, soaking up the blood so quickly that within seconds I couldn’t tel where I’d left my mark. Which I thought was weird, considering the generous portions flooding its face. But, of course, that was probably coming from hel ’s citizens. As an outsider’s, mine probably tasted a whole lot better.

I knocked three times and yel ed out, “Zel Culver! This is your summons! Come out and be questioned!”