Thrall (38 page)

All of this happened in a fraction of a second.

I saw Karayan’s couture bag, tossed aside on the couch. She had left it behind as she went to slaughter my family. I upended it and found what I was looking for. A cell phone. I dialed Dad’s cell by reflex, my hands shaking on the keys. When it went straight to voicemail I hung up. I was halfway through punching in the next number before I realized it was Lucas’.

“What do you want?” I heard Gretchen’s voice and felt a surge of hope.

“They’re coming for you now! Get everyone up!”

I heard movement on the other end, then a sharp intake of breath. “I see them. Lucas! Your daggers!”

“My dad,” I said. But Gretchen must have dropped her phone; no one responded. Dad was alone in our house. I hung up and dialed our home phone.

It rang only once before he picked up. “Hale?”

“No, Dad, it’s me.” As soon as I heard his voice, tears blurred my vision.

“Braedyn? Where are you? Are you all right?”

I had to force the words through a choking sob. “Get out of the house. The Lilitu are coming for you right now!”

“What?!”

I heard a crash on the other end of the line. “Dad? Dad?!” And then I realized that alone, without a spotter, he would be as helpless as a gnat. He was blind without me.

The world rocked, and I felt the walls shift around me. I recognized this feeling. I was fainting, pulling the ripcord of reality to escape - another Lilitu instinct, kicking in when I least wanted it. I forced Dad’s face into my mind, pictured him alone in his room, unarmed and unable to face what was coming for him. A surge of emotion rose in me, strong enough to clear my vision, even if only briefly. I felt my will kicking into gear, like an emergency brake engaging on a car that’s falling off a cliff. Helpless, useless, and yet... something changed.

I held Dad’s face in my head; it was the only thing keeping me from passing out. But the walls around me were still shifting, bending in a weird kaleidoscope. I briefly wondered if I was going insane. When the walls of Dad’s room seemed to unfold in front of me, I feared I’d lost the battle to sleep after all. But as I staggered forward, my feet catching in the plush carpet, the world resolved. This place felt too solid, too real to be a dream. I was - incredibly - standing in my father’s room. And I was alone.

A wave of weakness hit me and I stumbled, catching myself on the edge of the bed and dropping my daggers onto the bedspread. My arms and legs felt like the stuffed and useless limbs of a doll, barely responding to my will. My vision crossed, blurred, and finally cleared. As a child, I’d gotten a flu so serious that Dad had had to take me to the emergency room. They’d hooked me up to intravenous fluids for a day while I battled a fever, delirious and weak. That’s what this felt like, only I wasn’t delirious. Just thoroughly and completely exhausted.

I heard something from the hallway. I forced myself back to my feet and stumbled through Dad’s open door. What I saw stole my breath. Dad stood at the top of the stairs. His daggers had fallen to the floor at his feet. Ais was walking up the staircase, so powerful that she had only to smile to enthrall him.

Ais’ eyes shifted from Dad to me, and her smile faltered. Suddenly, her threat became clear to me. These human feelings would be the end of me. She wanted to hurt me. She’d read my thoughts. Nothing she could do would hurt me more than killing my dad.

“Dad!” Dad didn’t even flinch. He was completely absorbed by the vision of Ais before him. I ran to him, grabbed his arm, and pulled with all my might. Dad stumbled backwards, and his eyes shifted away from Ais. In an instant, he came back to himself. He glanced at me, turned back, and saw Ais clearly for the first time. He gave a little yell, and pushed me back toward his room. We retreated inside, slamming the door behind us. It wouldn’t do much to stop her, but it might buy us a few precious seconds. Dad had lost his daggers. They were sitting out there, useless, at the top of the stairs. I looked around and my eyes landed on Semangelof’s sword. “The sword!”

Dad’s head snapped up. He ran for the sword and returned to my side. But his eyes snagged on the daggers I had dropped onto the bed. “Are those your daggers?”

I nodded and he picked them up wordlessly. They would do us both more good in his hands than mine. He thrust the sword at me and I took it. But when I started to set it down he caught my arm with his free hand.

“That sword is more powerful than all our daggers combined.”

I stared at the sword, and then tried to thrust it back into Dad’s hands. “Then take it!”

“No. You keep it.”

“Hale said...” I started, but he interrupted me.

“Sansenoy didn’t give it to me. He gave it to you. That has to mean something.” Before I could argue, Dad put his hand on the doorknob. “Stay by my side. I might need you to snap me out of it again.”

And then we were rushing through the door. Ais was waiting for us. Dad lunged, slicing the daggers toward her. She had to jump back to avoid the blades. Her eyes glittered and she smiled. A shadowy mist spooled in the air around her. Dad’s movements became less focused.

“Dad!” I screamed. His grip tightened on the daggers as he fought off her influence.

Ais’ eyes cut to me, lips peeling back over her teeth in fury. Her wings snapped tightly around her, cloaking her from Dad’s sight. She made a move forward, her eyes fastened on me.

“Straight ahead!” I shouted.

Dad moved, his daggers flashing in his hands. It didn’t seem to matter that he couldn’t see her. His moves were confident and powerful. Ais tried to slip past him but as he flowed through the form one of the blades sliced into her forearm. Ais hissed and jerked back, becoming visible again. The close space of the hall didn’t give her much room to maneuver. Dad sensed an advantage and pressed his attack. Ais fell back, eyes calculating. There was no way to pass him in the hallway, and he was gaining ground.

The front door banged open and I heard something that made my blood run cold.

“Murphy? Murphy! Are you okay?” Lucas. He was in the house.

Ais read the horror in my face and turned. Lucas ran into the foyer below, daggers in his fists.

Ais glanced back at me, eyes burning with malice. All pretense of humanity fell away from her. She stood at the top of the stairs, completely revealed in her Lilitu form. Giant bat-like wings snapped into physical existence with a leathery crack. I could just see past her as Lucas looked up at the sound. He gave a strangled yell and stumbled back toward the front door. Ais jumped off the top of the stairs, her wings catching the air like sails. She sped down toward him, a hawk diving for a mouse.

Lucas brought his daggers up reflexively, but Ais knocked them aside. She grabbed Lucas with one clawed hand. He screamed as pitch claws pierced the flesh of his right shoulder. With inhuman power, she lifted him off his feet and leapt through the front door. Lucas’ eyes caught mine for a fraction of a second, wide with panic and pain. I scrambled forward, driving my sluggish body with every ounce of strength I had left, but just like that, they were gone. The snapping beat of Ais’ thick wings faded into the night too quickly to be believed.

I stumbled down the stairs. By the time I made it outside, Ais and Lucas had vanished into the sky and only the stars remained.

I stared up into the sky, numb. Dad joined me, and we heard a commotion next door - the battle was spilling out of the Guard’s house and onto their front lawn. Their overgrown hedges screened most of the lawn from the glow of the streetlights and cast deep swaths of shadow over the battle. Despite the darkness, I could see the fight clearly.

Marx and his soldiers fought seamlessly with Hale’s crew. They managed to hem the demons into the center of a circle of soldiers. Dina and Gretchen shouted directions, and the soldiers pressed closer to the enraged Lilitu, seeking to divide them. Deliyan and Naya fought with insane power. I saw one of the newcomers fall as Deliyan struck out. Bright blood coursed over his back as he rolled aside, arching in pain. Naya struck another soldier, raking her claws across his face. He dropped away, momentarily blinded.

I had to pull my eyes away from the fight. I forced myself forward, stumbling, exhausted, to the sidewalk. I scanned the sky, but there was not even a glimmer of Ais or Lucas against the starry blackness. Dad caught me as I fell. The sword clattered out of my hands.

“Lucas,” I managed. “She has Lucas.”

“I know.” Dad’s voice sounded tight, thin.

“We have to find them. He’s alive.” I stared at the sky, eyes wide. I was afraid to blink in case I missed some flicker of shadow that might save Lucas’ life. My head seemed filled with a weird static; I couldn’t process what Dad was saying. He shook me, hard. I tore my eyes off the sky and stared at him, a numb surprise bubbling up through the shock.

“Focus. We need you.”

“But... Lucas.”

Dad squared my shoulders to him. “We can’t help him if we’re dead! You’re in no shape to fight, but you can see them. Can you help Gretchen and Dina?”

I turned back to the battle next door. The Guard still ringed the Lilitu in the center of the front lawn. Deliyan and Naya fought back to back. Beneath the cloaking effect of their wings they glistened with the pearly blood of their wounds, but they had given as much damage as they had taken, and the human frame was by far the more delicate. Four soldiers were down in the lawn, which left a dozen others facing the Lilitu. But of those, two favored wounds that were definitely slowing them. Dina was one of the wounded. She and Gretchen had taken opposite sides of the circle to act as spotters, but the Lilitu weren’t giving the Guard an opening to attack.

Dad looked at the fight. I could almost feel the pull it had on him. “Braedyn, they need me. Are you strong enough to help?”

“Yes.”

He released me and I swayed with exhaustion. Dad reached out to steady me once more. “Are you
here?
” he asked, searching my eyes.

“I’m okay. I can do this.”

Dad nodded once, picked up the sword, and then ran to the fight. I followed, slower. It felt like I was forcing my limbs through sludge. Every part of me wanted to lie down and sleep. But we had to save Lucas. And in order to do that, we had to finish this fight.

As I reached the edge of the lawn, Dad was diving through the circle of soldiers, swinging the sword. It caught Naya across the shoulder as she twisted aside, trying to avoid it. As soon as the sword made contact, the shimmering cloak of Naya’s wings vanished and she stood revealed in her human form among the soldiers.

Marx sprang forward, daggers in his fists. “We’ve got this one,” he shouted at Dad. The soldiers closed in on Naya, who shrieked in fury. They drove her closer to the hedges on the side of the lawn, leaving the others room to fight the still-cloaked Deliyan.

Dad turned his back on them, trusting Marx to handle Naya. His eyes landed on Dina.

Dina stabbed a finger at Deliyan, who was edging closer to the house. “There!”

Dad moved and Deliyan staggered back, her eyes fixed on the sword in his hand. Dina eagerly stepped forward with the other soldiers as they closed in on the cloaked Deliyan. Deliyan’s lips peeled back in a snarl of rage. She lunged for the weakest link of the circle – which was Dina. Deliyan raked a clawed hand down the front of Dina’s torso. Dina screamed. Dad, preparing to lunge with the sword, recoiled in horror. To his eyes, it must have looked like the ragged claw marks just appeared across Dina’s chest. The closest soldiers reacted instantly, swinging their daggers through the air before Dina and forcing Deliyan back into the circle.

Dina clamped a hand over her wounds and fell back. Her eyes squeezed shut in pain. “We need a spotter!” Dina screamed. “We’re blind over here!”

Deliyan turned on Dad, who swung the sword wide, aiming for the place she had been standing moments ago. She slipped around behind him and moved to strike.

“Behind you,” I shrieked. Dad heard me and turned. But Deliyan was faster, and still cloaked. She struck Dad with one clawed foot in the chest, kicking him across the lawn. Dad hit the ground and rolled, coming to a stop three feet from the dilapidated mailbox.

Gretchen leaped forward, taking charge. She cried out directions to the soldiers ringing Deliyan as I turned away.

“Dad!” I ran across the lawn, dropping to my knees by Dad’s side. I eased him over, terrified at what I might find. He coughed weakly, and then pushed himself up on one elbow.

“I’m okay,” he said. “Help the others.”

I looked up. One group of soldiers clustered by the hedges at the side of the front lawn. The other was closer to the front porch. Both Lilitu were ringed by five or six soldiers. Naya, near the hedges, crouched in the center of a ring of soldiers that include Marx, Matt, and Thane. She looked ready to snap. Matt dove toward her. Naya turned to face him. She no longer had the claws or wings of her Lilitu form, but she looked fierce and capable nonetheless. As soon as she moved, Marx sprang, driving both of his daggers into her back. I turned away, unable to watch. Naya’s scream cut through the night like a siren.