But I could feel my uncle’s magic curling toward me, wrapping its coils around me again as he woke up.
I had to move. I had to get away, even if I didn’t know what direction was best. I bolted, running down the middle of the street, sliding between cars, feeling the threat at my back increasing with each second as Ash circled back toward me.
“Crap, crap, crap!”
What I wouldn’t have given for my dad’s rifle. Or a bow and arrow. Maybe a rocket launcher since I was making ridiculous wishes. I could almost hear Wally’s voice whispering my odds of knocking the gargoyle out of the sky, based on which weapon I had.
Ducking around a furniture-moving truck, I used it for cover as I slid down an alleyway to catch my breath. Back pinned against the brick wall, I stayed still, listening not only with my ears but with my body.
The cut along my left arm throbbed a little, but it was already scabbing over a bit. I checked it out, but it wasn’t too deep and wouldn’t require stitches at least. I flexed my left hand, the pull of the muscles on the open wound a bit bothersome but not too bad.
Slowing my breathing, I looked up at the buildings around me. They blocked out much of the light from the streets, covering me with shadow.
As far as I could tell, I’d lost Ash and my uncle. I sucked in a breath and then took quick stock of myself. Exhausted from the spell, yes. Not sure where I was? Also, yes. I could feel my friends in the distance, and that would lead me to them.
But if I did that . . . did that mean Ash could find them through me? Worse, whatever bait I represented meant I’d play right into his hands if I let my group come to me.
“Stay away,” I whispered, sending that sensation through to my friends. “I’ve got this.”
Hell, I knew I didn’t ‘got this,’ but if I was bait, then I had to stop them.
My guts twisted as I thought about what would happen to my friends if they came after me. I had ties to Ash, whether I wanted them or not; my friends; and on a lesser scale, my uncle.
Eyes closed, I searched for that connection between me and Ash. There, like a pale blue mist behind my eyelids. Next to it was another set of ties, golden, strong. That was my bond with my friends. And underneath both, a very thin red line. A tie of blood to my uncle.
“Okay, okay, I can do this.” I loosened my shoulders and tried to shut off my connection to Ash first.
I thought about stuffing the blue mist into a gunnysack.
It worked . . . only it took all the other connections with it. I grimaced and rubbed at my face, silently wishing that Ethan were there. Only because of his understanding of magic, of course.
“Again,” I whispered. I pulled out the three different threads that were bound to me, took the blue misty one and stuffed it away. Once more, they all went.
“Damn!” I snapped and whacked the flat of my hand against the building behind me.
I couldn’t shut off just one connection. I had no idea how, nor did I have the luxury of time to try to figure it out.
Which meant I had to cut them all off. The one upside was that it would keep my crew from tracking me down.
I closed my eyes and focused on that feeling of my friends, pushing them away one by one into the gunnysack I could see in my head. Wally, Orin, Pete, Gregory, and even Ethan though I’d tried to cut him out of our crew, each blinking out like a lightbulb switched off. With them, I pushed the blue mist connection to Ash and the thin red line to my uncle.
Which was all well and good, only it was too late. I’d taken too long.
A whoosh of leathery wings and the sound of feet thudding on the ground spun me to face the darker end of the alley. I couldn’t see the full details of the gargoyle, but his outline was clear enough.
“I told you I could find you anywhere,” Ash said, “and you still ran? Why? We need you, Wild. Your uncle needs you.”
There was no spell on me, nothing holding me in place. “Is he dead?”
Ash shook his head. “It will take more than a car wreck to kill Nicholas, though he is slightly injured. He waits for me to bring you back. Come.”
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my knife. Not the curved one made by my uncle during his time at the academy, but the one my father had made me. The knife that had helped me survive this far.
I settled into a fighting stance. “I’m not going, and if you think you can make me, then good luck to you. You’re going to need it.”
His wings tucked in close to his body. “Ah, young one, you are full of passion, just like your mother was. But passion can lead you astray, and we are running out of time.” He snapped his fingers at me.
That same blue mist I’d seen inside my head? Yeah, it curled out from his hands and went straight down, disappearing into the cement.
“That’s all you got?” I said.
The ground below my feet hollowed out, and I yelped as I fell through concrete, through layers of dirt, down until I hit the hard bottom of something, knocking the wind out of me.
I rolled to my belly as I fought to breathe and my eyes adjusted to the semi-darkness. A deep tunnel stretched out in front of me. My ears picked up the faint creaking sounds of electricity trying to click on, the buzz and snap somewhere to the right of me. Where the hell was I?
Ash dropped down beside me, landing on the wrist of the hand holding my knife, sending a blinding song of pain up my arm. He bent and scooped the blade up.
“Your father made this? Interesting, I wouldn’t have thought he’d be capable of such a weapon.” He tucked it into a leather backpack, then slid the strap over one shoulder.
I swung a leg out and kicked him in the back of the knee, sending him sideways and off my wrist. Move, move, I couldn’t stop. I had to get away from him. Even if it meant leaving my knife behind.
Up and running, I bolted deeper into the tunnel. Maybe it was the wrong way, but right then, it didn’t matter. I had to get away from Ash, from the Shadowkiller, and find a way back to my friends.
Because I had a feeling the longer my crew and I were apart, the more danger we were in.
2
Wally
The cab driver seemed more than a bit discomfited by the fact that six people—a couple of them big guys with wide shoulders, and one seriously grumbly honey badger—had crammed themselves into his rather small car. “Pier 36, you said? That’s where the bombs went off a few days ago, isn’t it? You sure you want to go there?”
“Yes,” I said softly, turning the key over and over in my fingers. It had been in Wild’s possession, but she’d dropped it when the Shadowkiller took her. Right after Colt died.
The flag of the key was intricate, and I ran my thumb over it. Colt’s death had hit the boys hard. Ethan especially, by the way his grief and horror were barely contained. I . . . well, I had a different view of death. Colt being gone was sad, but death wasn’t the end in my world. Not by a long shot.
I was in the front seat, the four boys crammed in the back. Pete was curled up at my feet in his honey badger form. As we drove, he let out little snarls here and there. I reached down and put a hand on his back. “We’ll find her, Pete. Just don’t . . . you know.” Shift. Shifting would be bad right now.
He grumped and curled up, his nose tucked close to his body. If I concentrated, I could feel his irritation through whatever bonds tied us to Wild.