Ascension (The Gryphon Series) (14 page)

Terin’s
hand clamped down on my shoulder, causing it to sizzle like a fresh sunburn. “We’ll keep them safe,” she promised and took to the sky.

I inha
led a deep, cleansing breath and let it out slow as the hollowness of those words echoed through my mind.

Chapter
16

Distraction was key. Otherwise I was going to use a burst of super speed to catch up to the Buick and try out my first ever Hulk-smash to prevent them from leaving. Fear of Gram’s reaction to such a display drove me to pursue other options; namely seeking out the chorus of voices emanating from the backyard. As soon as I rounded the side of the garage, I spotted Caleb and Rowan huddled by the treehouse, pointing at a clipboard and discussing training techniques. The Glee Clubbers were spread across the quaint, but lovingly landscaped yard, humming the
Rocky
theme and throwing air punches. 

“
Ahem.
”
An awkward silence fell as seven sets of eyes stared with the same widened shock I’d expect if I pranced into the backyard in a banana suit. I curbed the impulse to double-check for potassium-packed attire and squared my shoulders instead. “I burned through my first set of recruits already this morning. You guys want some help with these yahoos?”

Both men, who had recently vied for my attention, stared at me like they were choosing teams for kickball and I was the last player standing.

“Actually
Mo Ch
… Celeste.” Rowan’s cool façade faltered momentarily as his tongue betrayed him. “Caleb and I have wanted to stock pile some weapons and get our troops armed. This could be the perfect opportunity.”

“Aye, maybe you
lads could work with her so we can sneak off fer a bit?” Caleb posed the question to the band of misfit demons, not to me.

Poor, hapless beings sa
ddled with the burden of the Chosen One.   

Eddie peered at me out of the corner of his eye
. Anxiety tensed his narrow shoulders. “We … we don’t mind as long as she’s okay with it,” under his breath he tagged on, “and doesn’t take this out on us.”

“No, it’s
fine. We’re good.” Even I heard the brash, sharp clip of my words and forced a tight smile to counter their sting. “You guys go get weapons, that’ll be good. We’ll train here and it’ll be … good.”

Stop saying good!   

For a moment
, Caleb’s gaze caught mine. Despair lurked in those emerald pools, threatening to swallow him whole. “We’ll be back soon. Promise.”

I barely had time to nod before Rowan clapped a hand on Caleb’s shoulder and the two vanished in a cloud of black smoke. 

Red sucked air through his teeth and cringed.
“Wanna talk about it?”

“There’s nothing to talk about.” I bristled
as the Glee Clubbers swarmed around me.

“Just
sayin’.” Eddie’s expression dripped with pity as he walked a slow circle around me. His gaze searched me up and down. “If both the guys
I
was interested in suddenly treated
me
like something they needed to wipe off the bottom of their boot, I know I’d need a group hug.”

“If you hug me
, I will end you,” I stated in no uncertain terms.

Eddie
jerked to a stop. Whatever idea suddenly brightened his face filled me with nothing but dread. “
You know what you need
?”

“
To make today’s lesson Face Punching 101?”

“A makeover!”

“I like my idea better.”

“Yes!”
The twins chorused and clapped their enthusiastic response. “We’ll take a page from the book of Timberlake and bring her sexy back!”

My arms folded over my chest.
“A world of no.”

“
Seriously, think about it.” I flinched away as Eddie clasped a lock of my hair and turned it over to inspect my split ends. “Right now, they see you as the chick that single-handedly launched the war of good versus evil. Maybe it’s time you reminded them that under your hard warrior exterior is a moderately attractive girl that happens to suffer from violent tendencies.”

“
I’d like to revisit the face punching option.” I scowled and slapped his hand away.

Red st
epped in front of me and blatantly stared at my chest. “I know an incantation that can give her curves like Monroe. There’s not even a hint of boob here.”

I dropped my hands to my sides and glared daggers at the fire demon.

“Not that your boobie nubbins aren’t lovely.” He gulped.

“Okay, we’re done here!” I shouted
, pushing my way out of their smothering huddle.

“
Wait! Give us a chance!” one twin begged.

“
We really
are
good! That’s how we mask ourselves to blend in to society so well,” his brother finished.

“And Boil Face over there is supposed to be a shining example of that?”
I scoffed and jabbed a thumb in his direction.

“You call me Boil Face?
” His expression registered his aghast reaction to this revelation. “That’s just plain
rude
. My name is Sherman.”

“What do you call the rest of us?”
Red inquired.

I squeezed
the bridge of my nose between my thumb and fore finger, mentally counting to ten to thwart off an impending headache. Slowly, I brought my head up. “We don’t have time for this. You boys wanna be part of the team? Now’s your chance to prove it. We’re heading out into the field. It’s time for a little recon work.”

“Stop squirming! You’re invading my personal space!” Each word was emphasized by a shove or slap.

“You’re a Siamese twin
! Someone is
always
invading your space!”

“Him I’m used to. You’re bony and all elbows!”

The sounds of scuffling between the twins and Red intensified. “Stop hitting me! I can’t help it, okay? I have to pee.”

“So go!”
the twins chorused.

Red’s voice dropped to a whisper
. Of course I could still hear him since I was only about three feet away. “I’m afraid to ask. Sherman sang one line of a Carly Rae Jensen song and she knocked him out. Took him forty-three minutes to wake up. I timed it.”

I pulled the binoculars away from my eyes and rest
ed my forehead against them. A bout of insanity was the only plausible explanation for why I would think bringing them was a good idea.

Before the threat to see if we could break Sherman’s record could leave my lips, Eddie intervened
, “Guys! I have a pocketful of sleep sand. The Conduit won’t have to lift a finger.
I
will knock you out! Now zip it.”

My arms fell to rest on my legs with the binoculars dangling beside my knee
. I cast a sideways look of appreciation at Eddie.

“What? We have a lot of
making up to do and if inflicting a little pain on these goons proves we’re serious than that’s just a bonus,” he declared with a lopsided grin.  

Harsh reality sloshed over me, dousing me with its chilling truth.
The end was rushing toward all of us with the lethal force of a tidal wave. Self-preservation had become the biggest motivator to make allies out of the most unlikely of sources.

Despite fears tightening grip on my throat,
I managed a forced, “Thank you” to Eddie before refocusing my binoculars on the school. “This isn’t grade school, Red. If you have to go, go.”

“
Oh!
Thank you
!” he gasped and leapt out of the truck bed.

He’d only been gone a second when the twin
s popped up. Their bespectacled eyes scanned the school grounds. “What’s that sound?” 

“Don’t listen! I have a nervous bladder!” Red squawked.

“Not that!” one twin snapped.

Both their necks lengthened with a reptilian roll. “It sounds like screaming,
lots
of screaming.”

I strained my ears, but hear
d nothing. Thankfully, I had a method even more effective. I drew my energy in, centered it, then cast an empathic net out toward the school. A crushing boulder of terror and panic immediately slammed into me. I caught myself on the edge of the truck bed before the force of it sent me tumbling.

“I
should’ve known,” I cursed under my breath. “The Countess wanted a big enough audience.”

“What do we do?”
My tiny truck shook as Sherman jumped to his feet, awaiting orders.

My still clasped hand
allowed me to propel over the side of the S-10. “Gabe and Keni will already be in the thick of it, guaranteed. You guys split up. Terin’s circling overhead. Someone flag her down. One of you go find Cal and Row. Get them here now, if not sooner. Whoever’s left, give Big Mike back up guarding Grams. I don’t want her vulnerable if something big is going down.”

I didn’t look back to confirm my orders were being followed, but plowed toward the school with
resolute strides. My gait only faltered when I noticed I had a tag-along. I spun on Eddie so abruptly he stumbled back to avoid slamming into me. “What are you doing?”

“You doled out three jobs. That’s enough for them, which means I’m with you?” It would’ve been a bold statement if fear and uncertainty
hadn’t raised the octave of his voice enough to morph it into a question.

My inner warrior
mentally snarled at his offer to extend a helping hand. I didn’t know what I was about to storm into, but could I really accept the help of a demon that had tried to kill me on
numerous
occasions?

“I know we’ve had our differences,” Eddie shifted from one foot to the other a
nd ruffled a hand across his mohawk; the gelled spikes sprung out in a chaotic mess of directions, “and you have about a million reasons not to trust me. But, right now, I’m pretty much all you’ve got.”

As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. “
Don’t
make me regret this.”

Chapter
17

No hordes of teens flooded the school halls. The chatter and shouts of lively youths buzzing with the day’s gossip was noticeably—and frighteningly—absent. Instead, Eddie and I found ourselves creeping through a tomb that smothered with its heavy silence. The air around us buzzed with palpable tension. In the distance, sirens wailed. Their urgent call growing louder by the second.

“Maybe we should let the mortal law enforcement handle this?”
Eddie gulped. His clammy arm brushed mine as he tucked himself tight beside me.

“And let them have all the fun?”
My tennis shoe squeaked against the linoleum floor. I paused. My head snapping in one direction, then the other. When no motion was detected, I pushed on.

We made it h
alfway down the corridor when I caught a flutter of movement in a classroom. I held up a hand to halt Eddie. My chest rose and fell with quaking breath as I inched my way to the door and peered in the tiny window. High school students, not much younger than me, huddled under tables. Some held their fear in check. Others openly wept.
All
wore masks of abject terror.   

Suddenly, a face popped up on the other side of the glass.
A very un-hero like squeak
eek
ed past my lips. The round-faced woman, that bore a striking resemblance to Mrs. Clause, jerked her surprise and slapped a hand over her heart.
Mrs. Cartwell
. I’d met her a couple of times when I picked Grams up from Bingo.  The two often sat together and made the younger bingo-ers uncomfortable with their bawdy humor and antics. Recognition widened her eyes. Emphatically she waved me inside.

I shook my head with one finger pressed to my lips
. With the other hand I pointed toward the floor, signaling her to stay hidden. Reluctant concern cut deep creases between her brows as she hesitantly sank from sight.    

My
pulse drummed a foreboding chorus in my ears as Eddie and I ventured further down the hall. “Can you teleport faster than a bullet?” I asked.

“
Never tried. Why?”

“There’s a chance we’ve assumed demon where
there may be a twisted human.” Up ahead the hallway split. An icy chill skittered down my spine at the thought of what horrors could lurk around that bend.

“Isn’t that out of your jurisdiction?”

I pressed my back against the wall and motioned for Eddie to do the same. “Doesn’t matter. If someone or something is hurting people, I’m putting a stop to it.”

A soft smile curled the edges of
Eddie’s thin lips. “It’s kind of a nice change to be on the good side. Inflicting mayhem gives me reflux.”

I opened my mouth to respond
, but was cut off by a high-pitched scream that shattered the thick silence. A succession of bangs followed that shook the wall we leaned against.

“
That concludes cautious time.” My hand grasped Eddie’s wrist hard enough to make him yelp. In a burst of speed, I bolted around the corner, dragging a frazzled Eddie along for the ride.

We
pulled up short right outside the girls’ locker room.

“
Annnnd
, there’s the reflux.” Eddie belched into his closed fist. The pallor of his skin morphed before my eyes from chalky white to Kermie green.

A solid kick delivered to the dead center of the door made it fling open and grant us wide access. We followed the
familiar ruckus of a skirmish past three identical rows of pale yellow lockers.

Eddie rounded the corner first and
sucked in a ragged breath. “
She’s magnificent
,” he gasped as he stumbled back in awestruck wonder.

I ducked around behind him to get a better view.
Kendall’s beautiful face crinkled in an angry scowl. Behind the fortress of her ivory wings, six uniform clad cheerleaders clustered together crying. At Keni’s feet, two three-foot tall mole beasts chattered their bucked teeth hungrily. The pointed snout of one wiggled. It sniffed the air then gave an appreciative hiss that made its wiry little whiskers dance. That was all the notice it gave before darting in with its black marble eyes fixated on Keni’s shin. The cheerleaders shrieked and shielded their eyes as Keni lobbed the creature back with a forceful wallop of one wing.

Mid-motion
, her head jerked our way. “Hey, Cee?”

The
mole one bounced off the wall and skittered right back. Meanwhile, its cohort dove at Keni’s wing and chomped down hard enough to crack its front incisor.

“Yes, Kendall?”
I asked and calmly folded my hands in front of me.

“Remember when you said school might be a bad idea?”
Three violent shakes and she still couldn’t free herself of the wing-nipper.

I pressed my lips together and
mocked contemplation. “I seem to recall that conversation.”

“I’
ll take that ‘I told you so’ now.”

I craned my neck to watch Mole One sneak past her and get kicked back by
the long leg of a black-haired cheerleader. “With the way that little dude is nipping at your wing, I don’t think I need to say anything at all. He’s making my point … and slobbering all over you. So, do you want me to jump in or is this a learning moment for you?”

Keni caught the little sneak by the scruff of its neck and
frisbeed him across the room. “I learned a valuable lesson and feel I’ve grown as a person.
Now, please kill these things
!”

“Why, Kendall, I would
love
to.” I beamed then leapt into the air to intercept the rebounding mole with a low-kick delivered with deadly accuracy to the center of its barrel chest. Bone crunched and black ooze splattered over my leg.

“See?”
I landed on the balls of my feet and tried to shake the sludgy remains of mole off my shoe. “That wasn’t so hard now was it? Gross, but not hard.”

The second mole’s furry head snapped up
. Its beady eyes darted here, there and everywhere in search of its friend. Finding itself alone, its hackles rose. The toddler-sized monster released Keni’s wing and backed away with its apprehensive stare locked on me.

“I don’t think I caught it the first time.” Keni
grinned and flicked her bangs from her eyes. “Maybe you could show me again?”

The mole
spun around and scampered out a clearly marked back exit fast enough for me to deduce mole’s have a firm grasp of the English language … and may be able to read.

“I suppose we should stop it before it
terrorizes anyone else.” I sighed before taking off in hot pursuit, with Keni and Eddie close behind.

We
hit the door mere seconds after the creature, but already it was lost. Swallowed whole by the violent bedlam that surrounded us.

Keni’s
jaw dropped open. Panic swirled in her eyes as her gaze locked with mine. “Uh … too late.”