Incubus (52 page)

She collided with me before I could do more than block her punch. The force of her blow sent me

staggering back a few steps. I faced her, frantic, but hard as I wracked my brain I knew I’d never seen

this woman before in my life. Could she be a spotter? Maybe a member of the Guard from a different

unit? I held out my hand—a gesture of truce.

“I’m not your enemy.”

She lunged for me again, swinging her other arm with more force. I saw the tire iron with just

enough time to drop. It sailed through the air where my head had been moments before. Ice gripped

my stomach. Whoever this woman was, she was not playing around. That blow was meant to end me. I

tried to run past her but she caught me by the scruff of my shirt and jerked me back, hard. I hit the

ground with a sickening thunk, red and black swirls overtaking my vision. When they cleared, I saw

her standing over me, tensing to swing the tire iron for my head.

Lucas hit her like a freight train, bowling her over before the killing blow could fall. A wave of

nausea rose in my throat but I pushed it down and forced myself to roll to my knees.

Lucas was wrestling with her for the tire iron beside a bank of stained glass windows. She released

the iron suddenly and Lucas, unprepared, lost his balance. Before he could recover, she turned,

punching him savagely in the solar plexus. Lucas dropped the tire iron. It struck the ground, impacting

with the sound of a clanging bell. Something was wrong—Lucas gasped for breath with a horrible, wet

sound. He dropped to his knees, unable to do more than struggle for oxygen.

The woman picked up the tire iron and turned back to Lucas, hunched over on the ground before

her.

“No!” My voice sliced through the sanctuary. The woman turned toward me, and I saw again the

lifelessness of her eyes. My breath came out in a ragged hiss of realization. “No.”

The woman left Lucas, bearing down on me. I realized that I had to end this fight, and I had to do

it now. Nothing would make her stop, and the next time I went down, there would be no one there to

save me.

I charged toward the woman. She lifted the tire iron to strike, but at the last moment I dropped,

skidding toward her across the slick, polished stone, feet first. I connected solidly, the force of my

kick shoving her up and back.

No surprised flickered through those dead eyes as she hit the stained glass window. The glass

exploded behind her like a shower of multi-colored gems, clearing the way for sunlight to flood the

sanctuary with blinding intensity.

I skidded to a stop beneath the window and threw my arms over my head protectively. Tiny

fragments of stained glass showered down. The silence was profound, but brief.

Screams sounded inside and outside the sanctuary. I couldn’t summon the energy to look up.

“Braedyn!” Lucas called, voice hoarse.

I moved my arms away from my head gingerly, and slivers of glass tinkled to the ground. Glass

littered the floor around me. Lucas was half-crawling, half-scrambling forward to meet me. I dragged

myself up into a sitting position.

Lucas threw an arm around me. In seconds we were surrounded. Mr. Landon was shouting, his

usually jovial face a mask of panic. Annie was screaming into the phone, eyes streaming. And beyond

them, a shell-shocked crowd of my classmates watched in horrified fascination.

The only thing that felt real was Lucas’s arm around me. I realized I was clinging to him

ferociously when Mr. Landon tried to pull us apart.

“Are you hurt?” he was asking. “Braedyn, are you hurt?”

“Don’t,” I whispered, tightening my grip on Lucas’s shirt. Mr. Landon pulled back helplessly.

“How long?” he asked Annie. “How long until the ambulance gets here?”

I didn’t hear Annie’s response. I was looking at Lucas’s face. “Did you see?” I whispered. “Did

you see her eyes?” Lucas nodded grimly. So I wasn’t crazy. The woman who’d attacked us?

She was a
Thrall
.

We were still clinging to each other 15 minutes later when the paramedics arrived.

Chapter 2

As far back as I could remember, the moon had been a comforting beacon in the darkness. But tonight,

the thin crescent sliver seemed distant, unfeeling. My shoulder ached. A student who’d seen the attack

reported that the woman had leapt for me, clubbing that tire iron across my shoulder. I supposed I was

lucky that the fracture was my only serious injury from the day. Most of the large stained glass shards

had fallen out of the window with the woman. The few smaller fragments that had rained down on me

left only superficial cuts on the skin of my hands and my lower back. My jacket had ridden up during

my slide across the floor; otherwise, I might have escaped with even fewer cuts. My arm was bound

up in a complicated sling, but I knew I’d only have to wear it for a few days, not the month or more

the doctors had prescribed. There were a few perks to being Lilitu. One good night’s sleep would ease

the pain, three or four would heal the fracture completely.

I glanced out the window to the Guard’s house next door. Lucas’s drapes were closed, but I could

see the light was on. It was close to midnight, but he was still awake. Probably getting grilled by

Gretchen again, going over the whole attack in excruciating detail. As the Guard’s resident spotter in

Puerto Escondido, Gretchen would have been on high alert just knowing there was a Thrall in town.

But the Thrall had just attacked Lucas, the last family Gretchen had in this world. She’d drive herself

to find the Lilitu responsible, no matter what it cost her.

A Thrall in town. We hadn’t seen one since Ais’s death. It hadn’t surprised either Lucas or me to

learn that after she’d fallen through the stained glass window, the Thrall had rolled to her feet and

stood up. What did shock us was that instead of returning to the sanctuary to renew her attack on us,

the Thrall had fled the scene. Thralls don’t give up. Once they have their orders, they pursue their

objective until they are killed or incapacitated—or until the orders are rescinded. I couldn’t guess

what the Lilitu who’d sent that Thrall intended. I only knew that it meant a Lilitu was back in Puerto

Escondido.

I tried to tell myself we’d all known it was just a matter of time before the Lilitu resurfaced. Ais

had made it pretty clear that a growing number of Lilitu were hell-bent on breaking through the Wall

that separated our worlds. This war was ancient, but the final battle was coming.

Knowing it was coming and seeing it begin were two very different things.

I shivered under the blankets, wishing Lucas would fall asleep. I needed to see him, to feel his

arms around me in the only safe place we could embrace—in the dream.

I heard a voice downstairs, full of tension. I tried to push it out of my mind, assuming Hale had

come over to talk about the attack with Dad. Hale might have been the leader of this unit of the Guard,

but he sought out Dad’s advice often. More and more often, it seemed to me. I heard another muffled

voice. This one sent a jolt down my spine. Thane was here, too?

I pushed the blankets back and crawled out of bed, slipping my feet into the cozy moccasins Dad

had given me last Christmas. While the September days were still warm, the nights had grown

sharper, heralding the coming New Mexico winter. I edged out of my room and walked down the hall,

stooping to kneel at the top of the stairs.

I couldn’t see into the kitchen from here, but I could hear the three men talking as distinctly as if I

were sitting around the kitchen island with them.

“Marx split his unit into three groups,” Hale was saying. “He’s leading the search into Canada, but

it’ll still take some time to gather everyone together.”

“How much time do you think we have?” Thane asked, his voice clipped even more than usual.

“Enough,” Dad said.

“Even if we can gather everyone,” Thane shot back, “that’s only about 100 soldiers. If this

intelligence is correct, and the Lilitu have found the way to open the seal—”

“We play it safe,” Dad said. His voice was steady, but there was an anger behind his words that

sent a shiver of alarm down my body.

“We don’t even know where this seal is located,” Thane growled.

“You’re the archivist,” Dad snapped back, losing his calm. “Isn’t that your job?”

“How exactly do you suggest I go about finding information that’s—as far as we can tell—all been

destroyed?” Thane’s voice grew softer, dangerous. “She is our secret weapon, but that only helps us if

we use her.”

A chair scraped the floor. “She’s been through enough,” Dad said hoarsely. “She and Lucas,

they’ve already had to deal with more than any kid should be expected to handle.”

“What do you suggest?” Thane asked, a mocking edge to his voice. “Asking the Lilitu politely if

they wouldn’t mind waiting a few years so our children have time to mature?”

“Thane’s right,” Hale said. “That Thrall went after her, Murphy. Keeping her out of the loop won’t

protect her.”

“I’m not suggesting we keep this from Braedyn,” Dad said. “I’m just asking that we not throw her

directly into the lion’s den.” Hearing my name sent a jolt of anxiety through me. It drove the

exhaustion out of my head in an instant. I strained to hear everything.

Thane made a disgusted sound. “This is what she was raised for, Murphy! Or have you forgotten

that? She needs to be training. We’ve got a very limited amount of time to push her to discover what

she’s capable of.”

“If it were up to you, she’d have no social life at all,” Dad said. Warmth spread through my

stomach. No matter what we’d been through, Dad still fought for me to have a life—a life as normal

as we could make it under the circumstances. I bit my lip, suddenly feeling the urge to tell him about

the angel’s promise. He deserved to know.

“If it were up to me, she wouldn’t even be attending high school,” Thane snarled back. “What does

she need with an education? There’s very little chance she’ll survive the final bat—” But Thane’s

words choked off abruptly. All the warmth that had flooded through me a moment ago vanished.

“Murphy.” Hale’s voice rang with authority. After a moment, I heard Thane drag in a ragged

breath.

“You see this, Hale?” Thane hissed. “He’s not fit for this task. He’s let his feelings for the demon

overrule his common sense. Give me charge over her training and I guarantee—”

“Go home, Thane,” Hale said quietly.

“Hale,” Thane began.

“We all need some sleep. Things will seem clearer in the morning.”

There was a long moment of silence, then I heard another chair scrape the floor. I ducked back into

the shadows at the top of the staircase as Thane marched to the front door. He placed a hand on the

doorknob, then hesitated. He turned toward me, as though he’d known all along I was there, listening.

His eyes found mine, steely and calculating. He lifted two fingers to brush his temple in a mocking

salute, and then he was gone, pulling the door closed behind him.

I shrank back against the wall, frozen.

Hale and Dad walked to the front door a few moments later. They both looked exhausted.

“You know it’s time,” Hale said. “She has to start training again.” Dad didn’t answer. Hale put a

compassionate hand on my dad’s shoulder. “I give you my word, Murphy. I’ll do my best to prepare

her.”

Dad nodded slowly. Hale opened the door and walked into the night. Dad closed the door, then

leaned his forehead against the solid oak. After a few moments, I drew back into the hall and returned