Monstrum (34 page)

Baer's shrill scream fills the cabin.

Cortés throws himself against Baer, tackling him to the ground and smothering the flames before they can reach his head. Then I grab Cortés's hand and yank him up. He, in turn, yanks Baer up. Baer stands and sways, moaning weakly. The rocket launcher is, miraculously, still strapped to his back and hasn't ignited and blown all of us to kingdom come. The side of Baer's body is a charcoaled mess, but he's alive and mobile.

Cortés jerks his head at my feet. “Get the rifle!”

Bending quickly, I grab the thing's strap and sling it over my shoulder with the panga. Now is not the time for me to learn to shoot a rifle; we need to get out of here and regroup.

Just then, flames hit one of the rifles on the floor. It shudders and pops, bursting with orange fire as the bullets explode from the clip and shoot in all directions.

We turn and run, sprinting for the cabin door. But the fire has already spread everywhere, with no real rhyme or reason, and the only way out of here is through it.

Without slowing, I blink the sweat and acrid smoke out of my eyes and shoot a last glance over my shoulder.

The chimera finishes with another stream of fire, this one aimed at the ceiling. The cabin is an inferno of dancing purple flames that spread wildly. I realize, with a sickening lurch in my stomach, that it's only a matter of time—and very little time, at that—before the entire ship goes up in flames.

Utterly unaffected by the inferno and keeping its triumphant gaze fixed on me, is the chimera.

And I have the wild thought, just as I turn away and focus on making the leap through the ring of fire, that I can read the chimera's thoughts . . . that the chimera's thoughts are following me . . . that the chimera's single, overriding thought is:

How do you like me now, bitch?

T
he three of us hit the column of fire together. I'd hoped to leap through it before the flames could do much damage, but Cortés and Baer are both badly injured, so that's impossible. Our leap is more like a stumbling shuffle that gives our clothes and hair time to ignite, and we all scream with pain.

Keep going
, I tell myself, focusing on hanging onto Cortés's crushing grip.
Almost there
.

We hurtle through the cabin door and out into the corridor, but the fire comes with us. It sears up and down the front of my body and across my scalp. The smoke stings my eyes and scorches my lungs. I cough, smacking the purple flames that cling to me. My hands sizzle from the unrelenting heat, but I ignore the pain. Cortés smothers the top of my head with his hands, but I focus on Baer, who's patting his torso and shoulders because he's flaming too.

“It's okay.” Baer's face is red and blistered, and his voice one huge croak. “We've got to get out of here. Let's go.”

It's not like we have a choice. The flames have followed us out into the corridor and trail after us with the single-mindedness of a lit fuse trying to reach its bomb. They climb up the walls and ring around the ceiling above us until we're engulfed in a flaming tunnel. We run and stumble, spurred by the massive explosions behind us that tell us that some of the fire has diverted into the weapons room and is destroying what's left of the ammunition.

My sole focus is the metal fire door at the end of the corridor. If we can make it through that door, we have a chance.
Ten more steps
, I think.
Eight more steps . . . seven . . .

I hang onto Cortés, half-dragging him as I sob with relief. I just have to get to the door. We're almost there.

Two steps . . . one step . . .

I reach the threshold and hit the door's handle. The door stays shut.

Is it . . . locked? When it was never locked before?

Behind us, the chimera chitters. The sound cranks me higher because I could swear it's laughing at us. Panic swallows me whole as I pound on the door with my blistered palms, agony shooting through my body.

The door doesn't budge.

Frantic, I pump the handle.

The door doesn't budge.

“Let us out!” I shriek. “Let us out!”

Baer sags against the door, as though he could possibly shoulder through it in his condition. “Cortés,” he says weakly. “We have to break it down.”

“Oh, God,” I whimper, panic making me helpless and stupid. I am drenched with sweat, certain the fire is about to consume us. “Please, God.”

Cortés leans into the door. “On three,” he begins. “One . . .”

The chimera chitters again.

At the sound, something chimes in my brain and an idea shakes loose.

“It's not really locked.” I don't know where this new certainty and calm come from. But I know I'm right. “It's only a glamour to trick us. Get out of the way.”

They gape at me, not budging. Meanwhile, I can hear the clatter of the chimera's many feet racing up the corridor, and the flames are blazing at our backs. So I put my back into it, shove Cortés to one side and push the door's handle.

The door swings open easily.

“Nice, Bria,” Baer says as we edge through the door and onto the deck. He's unsteady on his feet, swaying with the effort of staying upright and managing what has to be unimaginable pain. The side of his face is burned raw, the livid red of a deli ham that's been left under the heat lamp for too long. “How'd you know?”

“No idea,” I admit. “But maybe the glamours lose their power once you realize they're glamours. Let's hope.”

The deck is no more welcoming than it was before. The howling wind carries water with it, and we are hit from every direction. Rain lashes our heads and faces, as relentless as Niagara Falls, and huge waves splash our feet, threatening to knock us down and slide us overboard every time the ship hits a trough. Desperate for any sign of rescue, we hold the railing and stare out into the darkness, but there are no lights from an approaching ship. There's nothing to see except yet another inhospitable environment waiting to kill us at the earliest opportunity.

“The lifeboat's this way!” Cortés shouts over the roaring storm. He grabs Baer's arm, but I can't tell which of them is holding the other up. “Let's go!”

He's steering us toward a giant wooden boat with oars and no motor, something that looks like a relic from
Titanic
. It's hanging on the other side of the rail, covered with a tarp and secured with a complicated system of ropes and pulleys. Below it, the water is seething and frothing like a direct pipeline to hell.

I look back to Cortés, who's watching me with wary impatience.

“Bria,” he begins.

“We can't put that boat in the water,” I yell over the wind, shaking my head. “Even if we manage to lower it, it'll capsize in thirty seconds. We'll drown way before the other ship can get here.”

Baer groans and leans into the rails, panting and making me really nervous. He can barely stand up as it is. One more good pitch from the ship and he'll go overboard for sure, never to be seen again. I let go of the rail, grab his arm and lift it over my neck, ignoring his weak protest.

“I'm fine,” he says, his head lolling.

“You're barely conscious,” I snap, looking to Cortés. “What's Plan B? You know the ship best. Is there somewhere on deck we can hide until—”

“We can't stay here, Bria,” he bellows. “You think this ship isn't on her way to the bottom of the ocean?”

I don't answer. There's no need.

Without warning, the corridor door crashes open. Purple flames shoot out, take a fortifying hit from the raging wind and are suddenly everywhere at once. They bleed across the deck, climb the steps leading to the wheelhouse on the level above us and quickly cover every visible surface, whether it's flammable or not.

We cry out, terrorized as we back up to the lifeboat and watch for the chimera's arrival. I realize, through my panic, that this fire isn't normal. This fire drives itself, surging forward over metal and wet surfaces with impunity, as though everything it touches is covered with an invisible layer of gasoline.

And Cortés is right. We can't stay here. With the fire closing in on us, I have to fight the rising urge—raw and primal—to escape the flames any way I can, even if it means jumping overboard without any boat at all.

“Jesus.” Cortés does a full turn, craning his neck as he looks in all directions. “Where's my father? We've can't leave him here.” I watch, heartsick, as his rain-spattered face crumples with poorly controlled despair. I feel as though I'm experiencing the tragedy with Espi and her mother all over again. “Papi!” he shouts, his voice hoarse.
“Papi!”

“Cortés.” It seems to take every ounce of strength Baer has to latch onto Cortés's collar and give him a hard shake.
“Focus
.
”

Cortés tries to break free. “My father—”

“Your father will meet us here if he's still alive. He can take care of himself.” Baer flinches, his features contorting with pain as he pauses to take a couple of shuddering breaths.

“We need to get off this ship.
Now
. The chimera is trying to burn us out of here. We don't have any other options.”

Cortés hesitates, then resumes his frantic search by calling over his shoulder. “Papi!”

“Cortés!” My shrieking voice seems to penetrate some of his panic, and he pauses again. “Listen!”

There's a lot to listen to at the moment—the wind, the rain, the creaking protest of the ship as the waves rough it up—but we all go still and zero in on the most worrisome sounds of all:

The distant bellows of the chimera, rampaging somewhere below deck;

The ongoing explosions from the ship's interior, one on top of the other now, like fireworks; and

The ship's metallic protest.

I don't know why the chimera isn't on top of us already. Maybe we're only getting this small reprieve because it's busy destroying the ship, burning it out from under us.

But it's coming.

In the brief period that we stand there listening, the chimera's roar grows louder, as though it's gotten bored with torching everything on the lower levels and has decided to amble up here to finally finish us off. And I could swear that we're standing at an angle now, as though the back end of the ship is starting to sink underwater.

“Cortés,” I say again.

I watch as Cortés slowly begins to calm and see reason. His shoulders lift and lower on a deep breath. His eyes do one final sweep across the deck, and then he nods, swiping his dripping hair back from his forehead.

“We need to get out of here,” he says.

I nod grimly. “Let's do it.”

Wincing, Cortés starts to climb through the rails so he can remove the lifeboat's tarp. Watching his slow, pained progress is more agony than I can stand at the moment. I duck out from under Baer's weight, sling Baer's elbow over the rail and put a hand on Cortés's arm to stop him.

“You work on the winch,” I say, swinging a leg over the bottom rail and hooking it on to the tarp. It's a heavy canvas, stretched tight atop the lifeboat, covering the seats and collecting pools of cold water. “I got this.”

“No!” Cortés's voice is sharp. In one swift move, he clamps his hand on my upper arm, leans halfway through the rails after me and hangs on with a bone-splintering grip. “You're not going out there first. You'll slip.”

Right on cue, the ship sinks into a trough, juddering with the force of a bomb and sending the lifeboat swinging away from the deck. My one leg slips off the tarp, my hand slips off the wet rails, and suddenly I'm dangling against the side of the ship and Cortés's iron hold is the only thing keeping me from careening into the ocean.

“Oh, God!” My feet scrabble but wind up kicking thin air. “Don't let me fall!”

“Bria.” Cortés's face appears through the rails. He stares down at me with flashing dark eyes, his expression calm and implacable. “Don't panic.”