I’m in a city I don’t recognize, wandering among empty buildings. The only light comes from the moon, which is big and bright and full. The street is broken and torn, with large chunks of pavement and cobblestones tossed into piles, as if there’s been an earthquake, or perhaps a monster sprung from the deep.
The buildings are made of stone, too, and they appear ancient, which narrows things down. There aren’t a whole lot of ancient cities in America, and the ones there are—those built into the hills by the Anasazi, or the Pueblo’s Mesa Verde, even Santa Fe—do not look like this. The architecture reminds me of photos I’ve seen of Savannah or St. Augustine; although I’ve never been to either of them, I can’t believe they’ve ever been this deserted. If the Nephilim have their way, however, every city might become quite similar in the future.
The night is cool, but not cold, so either summer anywhere, or anytime in the South. I wear what I always wear—jeans and a knife, tank top and a gun, tennis shoes and silver bullets.
Strangely, I’m not hiding. Instead I walk right down the center of the street, letting the keen silver light of the moon flow over me like gilded rain.
“You wanted me,” I shout. “Here I am.”
No one answers. I turn in a slow, wary circle, gaze touching on each building, the windows, the roof, the doors. Who, or what, am I searching for?
“Let her go,” I order.
Laughter slithers through the air like a slug, leaving a damp and oily trail behind. Gooseflesh rises on my arms, and I shift my shoulders as the invisible bull’s-eye pulses between them.
The rasp of my knife leaving the sheath thunders through the eerie silence. “We had a deal.”
The laughter comes again, bringing to mind a cartoon red devil with a spiky black goatee and curling horns.
“Me for her,” I say, though my voice is weaker. I’m starting to see what I’ve known all along—deals with the devil aren’t deals at all.
A door creaks open a few yards ahead of me. A shadow moves inside. A thin white hand slides through the opening and beckons.
I swallow, my throat clicking with a cold, murky fear that nearly chokes me, and go in.
Jimmy hangs on the wall.
The laughter swirls through the room like a midwinter wind, but no one is here but us.
I want to run to him. I want to run away. Instead I stand there, just inside the doorway, and stare. They’ve crucified him.
Turning, I stumble back outside and throw up.
When there isn’t anything left inside me but fury, I tighten my hand on my knife and return.
I stride across the room, my teeth clenched, and try to take the nails out of his feet. They’re gold, of course, otherwise they wouldn’t hold him at all.
He moans, opens his eyes, and, seeing me, curses. “Get out,” he manages. “Take her and run.”
“In hell,” I say, and use my knife to yank out the first nail.
Jimmy draws in a sharp breath. “Baby, where do you think we are?”
“Not hell. Not yet.” Though you wouldn’t know it by looking around. “Where’s the kid?”
“I don’t know.”
Fear flickers. “She all right?”
“I think so. Saw her when I got here. Heard her crying since.” He gentles his voice at my flinch. “They wouldn’t hurt her. Permanently. But I don’t think they ever plan to let her go. They need her dead almost as much as they need—”
“Me dead,” I finish.
“You shouldn’t be here. If they kill you, Doomsday’s back. Is that what you want?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why did you come?”
“For Faith. But I’ll take you, too.”
“Idiot.”
“You’re welcome,” I say, and yank out another nail.
Jimmy’s mouth tightens, and his face pales. But he doesn’t pass out. It would take a lot more than this to kill a dhampir. “I had it covered, Lizzy. Me for her. That was the agreement.”
I lift my gaze. “Same one I made.”
“Double-dealing assholes,” he says without heat.
I have his feet free and reach up to work on his right hand, sliding in the blood on the floor. My stomach lurches. The scent is nauseating.
Odd. Lately, the scent of blood has been anything but.
Suddenly I realize that my collar is gone.
I jerked in my sleep, bumped my head against the side of the plane, my elbow against the arm of my chair, and the image shimmied, almost fading. What did the absence of that collar mean?
Was this only a dream, not a prediction of the future? Because in any true future, if I wasn’t wearing that collar I’d be licking Jimmy’s blood not only from his wounds but the wall.
Was it a vision of loss or the hope for a future without a demon inside me? I had no idea, so I fought my way back into my head.
“You can’t save me,” Jimmy says.
“Of course I can. Saving people is what I do.”
“You won’t be able to save us both. You’ll have to choose.”
I hate choosing who lives and who dies. But the Nephilim seem to get their jollies out of making me do just that.
“I’m the most powerful being on this earth,” I whisper.
Jimmy’s eyes meet mine, and in them I recognize good-bye. “Won’t be enough this time. You’d need two beings just like you if you wanted any kind of chance at all.”