The Woken Gods (26 page)

I’ll have to come back and buy a ticket for one of the long distance coaches parked nearby, but I have to decide where to go in the meantime. Up the street, the front window of a one-story office building is painted over, identifying it as the
Hell & Co Insurance Tavern
. Opposite it is a church that gives every appearance of being well funded, a fancy blue-and-white sign deeming it the Church of Two Worlds.

The thing about religion in a world full of gods is that it gets even more complicated. All of the religions are true and none of them are. Two worlds, without a doubt.

I make my way behind the church, where I shrug off my backpack and remove Vidarr’s shoe. As soon as it leaves my foot I stagger and have to press a hand against the brick church to steady myself. With the relic gone, I can barely stand. I put both hands against the wall and fight to stay up, breathing deep.

Not yet. I haven’t gotten away yet.

I root through the pack and find the Ramones T-shirt. It’s not exactly clean, but I want to put it on anyway. For strength, for a reminder of why I’m doing this, to feel connected to Dad. I put on my jacket, and stash the shoe.

What to do with the Was is a bigger problem, now that anyone can see it. I take one of the plain black T-shirts Ann bought me and wrap it carefully around the headpiece, knotting it at the bottom. Then I slide it through a split in my backpack strap. It should come off as a walking stick, like I’m any average traveler. I strap on the pack.

Food, then ticket, then getaway and sleep. I can do this.

In the dark inside of
Hell & Co
, people are playing pool and dancing too close together for the metal pouring out of the speakers. I choose a corner table, and the waitress who comes over wears a short denim skirt and a T-shirt knotted at her waist. She has a tattoo of a cross at her throat.

“Tourist, I take it,” she says. “We have one fish sandwich left. From not far away, so it shouldn’t kill you.”

“Sold.”

She hesitates. “You have money to pay for it?”

I give her the twenty. “Keep the difference.”

Every time the front door opens, I tense, ready to run.

The table I’m at used to be a desk. There are a few cubicle walls scattered around the room, too, and more desk-tables. A couple of people are wheeling around in ex-office chairs. It’s a grim scene. When the sandwich comes, I wolf it down and then leave.

The dark street is deserted now, except for the coaching stand up the street. There’s a waiting carriage, the one I need, with a handful of people gathered around it, luggage being loaded onto the top. Time to go.

The ticket stand has a couple of rows of bare bulbs around its edges to make it visible, one side white and the other red. I make my way up the sidewalk to the dead traffic light, staying alert for anything out of the ordinary. At the intersection, I stop to check the street. Nothing is coming, and I step out into the crosswalk.

When I reach the middle of the street, a familiar shape wings down through the dark and lands in front of me. Anzu, and he’s angry.

He growls up a storm, and his long claws scrape the asphalt as he advances on me. I should let him drive me back. The people outside the coach are calling out in alarm. They’ll take off without me, or refuse to sell a ticket to me, if they decide I come standard with a monster.

“Go,” I tell him, planting my feet where they are, dead center in the faded white paint.

He roars and the air from it ruffles my hair. His breath heats my face and if I had the energy, I’d be terrified. OK, I am
still
terrified.

“I don’t need a guard. I’m leaving. Thanks for the effort,” I try to calm him.

Anzu scrapes forward and lowers his shoulder to nudge me with it – firmly. I push back against him with everything I have left. It’s not much, but I won’t give up now. I won’t. Not when Dad’s life hangs in the balance.

“What are you
doing
?” I ask.

I’m beginning to lose ground to him. He’s screwing up everything.

But when he snarls again, louder, it’s not at me anymore. He takes a step back, his lion’s head shaking side to side with the mightiest roar I’ve heard from him yet. It’s a warning that puts an instant chill in me. That is the sound of a predator warning away another predator. I look around and understand. “Oh no, oh no. No, no, no.”

I’m standing in the middle of an intersection. It’s where the street that runs to the ticket booth hits the main highway, the one we came in here on. A crossroads.

I’d bet anything that Anzu was trying to drive me out of it. The oracles told me to avoid them, and what did I do? Stumbled blindly into one, convinced what lay on the other side was salvation.

“Is he already here?” I ask Anzu, voice shaky. “Is it too late?”

But it’s a stupid question, pointless if I have to ask.

Legba’s laughter is the answer, the sound of him preceding the reality of his presence. He
pops
into view. Not in the poorly lit intersection one moment, right in front of me the next. I can still be surprised, though.

Bronson is with him.

I am
so
screwed. Instinct kicks in, the need to get out of here. But Legba reaches out an impossibly fast hand and catches the back of my jacket as I bolt. He hauls me back and tosses me at Bronson. Who grabs me and holds on tight.

“Deal with her,” Legba says, and turns to Anzu. He holds his hands palm up like you do with a cop or a dog, to make nice. “Old one, it doesn’t have to be this way. I have no quarrel with you.”

Anzu issues an ear-splitting roar, and hurls himself toward Legba. The god easily steps aside. “Oh, I see it does.”

Legba blocks Anzu’s next attempt with his twined walking stick. When Anzu grabs it, Legba shrugs and lets Anzu’s wings carry them both off the ground.

With Legba occupied, I might be able to get away after all. I struggle against Bronson’s grip and kick at him with my boots. His training kicks in, though he must not have much call for it these days. He moves his legs out of the way before I can connect.

I try pulling his hair, but he just grabs my wrists, holds me still. He stands on my boots. I can’t do anything but twist my torso and rage at him.

The sounds of Legba and Anzu above us aren’t comforting. Legba is still laughing. Anzu is no longer roaring.

I try to think of fights I’ve seen, of how people win them. But I’m a runner. I’d use whatever dirty tricks it takes, but I don’t know them. Legba played Mom. He played me, too. He was in on this with Bronson the whole time. Bastard.

Just like the man holding me. I consider trying to use my stripes again, flatten my palm against his hand, but the moment I say “
Ka
” he spins me around so my back is to his chest, and slaps his hand over my mouth.

He speaks near my ear. “Stop fighting and I won’t have to do what you did to Oz, something I would never let you do to me. The boy is not nearly as understanding as I am, I’m afraid. But then, he’s not your family.”

That Oz isn’t going to forgive me isn’t news.

The people across the street – the few dumb enough to stay outside – are gazing into the sky at whatever Legba and Anzu are doing. No one tries to help me. No one even seems to notice Bronson.

I’d bet anything he’s wearing some kind of invisibility relic too. Vidarr’s shoe can’t be the only one around.

Which means no one will report anything except two gods tussling. It’ll make the Skeptics’ next eyewitness column. But no one will see the head of the Society in the middle of it. And no one is coming to help me.

“Kyra,” Bronson says, “I’m not upset with you. I’d have done the same thing. That’s obvious. But I am going to need my relic back.”

That’s why he and Dad are so different. Why they hate each other, I realize. Bronson’s not upset with me, because he only cares about one thing. He only cares about himself.

“Good girl,” Bronson says, because I have stopped struggling. There’s no way to, with how he’s holding me. I’m pinned, stuck, captured. “This will all be over soon enough. I have plans.” He’s speaking with an urgency I can’t quite understand, as he pulls out a knife and cuts the Was out of the strap. He shoves me away, and removes the T-shirt from the headpiece. He stares at it reverently.

“Plans to picnic by the firelight of the world going up in flames?” I ask. “What will keep the gods from killing
you
? Have you thought about that?”

“Besides the fact I’ll be their favorite person, before they start trying to burn the Society?” Bronson shrugs. Smiles. He pets the head of the staff. “Your father has a death sentence for treason already. Now I have the scepter back, and no one saw me take it. In fact, everyone saw me presiding over a meeting when it disappeared. I’ll be the only Society member at the execution. It’s time for me to play everyone else the way we played you, Kyra.”

The way we played you
.
Him and Legba.

“You gave me the stripes so I’d use them,” I say. “All those grandfatherly talks were bull too?”

“I gave you everything I thought you’d need. Well done on stealing my key. That I didn’t even know until I got it back.”

“But why does it have to be Dad?”

“Henry’s the only person who wouldn’t let me out of this alive. That means it has to be him. I hope you can forgive me, when this is all over. You have to understand. I need to see Gaby. To talk to her. Find out why she did it. This time, she’ll stay. We’ll rebuild the world.”

“Blood and doom,” I tell him. “That’s what Mom says comes with that ritual, with Dad’s death. Blood and
doom
.”

“No. I’ll be a hero. Believe me. As soon as I have Gaby back, I’ll end this. I’ll raise the walls and put them all back to sleep. You’ll see. I’m not a bad man, Kyra. Everything
will
be put to rights.”

Anzu falls to the ground beside us, hard. There’s a red gash along his side, gushing blood. His golden eyes fight, then drift closed.

“He’s not dead.” Legba lands beside us. He wipes his walking stick clean with the tail of his jacket. He doesn’t even appear rumpled. “Just… sleeping for a while.”

Bronson narrows his eyes, as if he’s concerned Legba might have heard something he said to me. I
could
tell Legba about his crazy claim he intends to “raise the walls” – whatever that means – and put the gods back to sleep, but the last part is the only sane-ish idea Bronson’s had. Legba is clearly no friend of mine. Besides, how can it be true? I think this is part and parcel of Bronson’s evil genius. Self-justification. He believes he can do anything. By hell
and
company, maybe he
can
turn their lights out. Who knows? So I keep quiet on the matter.

“You lied to me–” I direct that to Legba.

“Shush,” Legba says, grinning, “don’t talk to your grandfather that way.” He must know I wasn’t. “The clock’s still going and we’d best be on our way.”

I move over beside Anzu. His sides shift up and down in a slow rhythm that tells me Legba isn’t lying about him, at least. He
will
wake up.

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” I say. “You’re the monsters.”

“Oh, sorry, you weren’t invited. I meant we, as in, the two of us.” Legba gestures to himself and Bronson. “Sorry if that wasn’t clear. You
are
fun to have around, but…”

Bronson gives me a sympathetic, regretful look. So easy for him to conjure those, I never should have trusted a one of them. He says, “I can’t bring you back with us, because it’s better if people are occupied with looking for you. You’ve proven yourself too resourceful. In another day, this will all be over, and I’ll welcome you with open arms. In the meantime, you stay safe out here, OK?”

“Like you care,” I say.

“That’s the strangest thing…” Legba speaks as he puts a hand on my grandfather’s elbow. “He does. We’ll be seeing you, Kyra Locke. Not sooner, but later.”

In another blink the two of them are gone. It’s just me and my unconscious monster and a few gaping coachmen on the street. I stumble across the intersection to the ticket window, but the red and white bulbs flick out. The men shake their heads, shut doors, disappear inside buildings. I could go to the bar, but the waitress doesn’t deserve
this
added to her tab. Even if she’d consider it.

I make my way back to Anzu’s side. I sink to my knees beside him and bury my face in his matted mane, and I weep like my father is already dead.

He may as well be. I’ve already failed him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Justin Pearson hears the front door slam and rushes out of his bedroom. He’s been waiting for hours to talk to Oz, the suspicions boiling in his brain like water in a pot. Like pages from books set ablaze, edges crinkling and disappearing in the heat. Like… He
needs
to talk to Oz or he’s going to come up with even worse metaphors.

What he knows – or what he believes he’s discovered – has made him jittery. He pounds down the stairs, only to slow at the bottom.

Ann is at the door, her hand on Oz’s arm. Oz’s expression is… dark. Darker than Justin has seen it in a long time. There’s a uniformed operative with him, which is even odder.

Justin found the note his friend left for Ann before she did, about how he and Henry Locke’s daughter were going out for a stroll. He doubted it was true – fresh air, after all, is overrated – but couldn’t imagine why a cover story would be needed. Oz isn’t stupid.

Nonetheless, maybe Oz
did
something stupid
.

Earlier in the evening, the phone rang and Ann picked it up. Justin lingered at the office door to listen in, beginning to worry that they hadn’t made it back yet. From her troubled murmurs of response and frown of concern afterward, he picked up that Oz and Kyra were somewhere they shouldn’t be. Wherever it was apparently is bad enough to get Oz sent home with an escort who isn’t Bronson. For that matter, where
is
Kyra?

Justin has bitten his tongue since they met her. Oz won’t listen to anything he doesn’t want to. He never has. But Justin can’t quite trust her.