“Kids, out!”
They scrambled out of the car. She shoved her door open. A large metal dart smashed into the hood and shivered, stuck upright, its end glowing. Audrey grabbed the rifle and dived out of the vehicle. Behind her, the car exploded in a flash of white magic. The explosion punched the inside of her head, and her skull rang like a gong being struck. Suddenly, everything was quiet.
The world swam.
Move, move, move. To stay in one place was to die. Audrey scrambled away, blindly. Someone caught her and carried her off. Pain bathed her legs. It hurt to breathe. The haze dropped from her eyes. She realized that she sat propped against Kaldar’s body, his arm around her. He had grasped an arrow sticking out of her thigh and was pulling it out.
She couldn’t feel her legs.
The two boys crouched next to her. Everyone was looking at the door.
A giant man with pale hair stood in the church’s doorway. She’d seen him before, peering at them over the blond blueblood’s shoulder as the wyvern carried them off. Karmash, she remembered.
The giant stared at them. A dark-haired man crawled over the top edge of the doorway and moved up the wall onto the ceiling like a fly. A woman crossed the threshold. Her long, tattered cloak fluttered about her. Her hood was down, and the exposed skin of her face was a bright, unnatural orange. Her hands held twin narrow swords.
A third man stalked through the church entrance. Or at least he might have been a man at some point. This creature looked more like a beast. Massive, slabbed with heavy muscle, he crouched in the doorway, his huge claws digging into the wood.
The Hand had found them. Kaldar’s lips moved, but she heard nothing. George nodded, his pale face smudged with dirt.
On the ceiling, the lizard guy had crawled all the way over and paused, directly above them. His skin turned pale brown, matching the wood beams. Jesus Christ.
Karmash pointed at them.
The freak on the ceiling let go and swung down, hanging as if his feet had suckers.
“Now!” Kaldar barked. She didn’t hear him, but she read his lips.
The lizard man’s hands glowed. She blinked and realized his fingers held darts, the same kind that had pierced the hood of the Cherokee.
The darts rained on them and dimmed behind a glowing white translucent shield. George’s eyes bled white lightning. It spilled from him in long, twisted ribbons and fed the semicircle. Ripples pounded the flash shield. The floor around them shuddered. George clenched his fists.
It’s possible to die from expending too much magic, George’s voice said from the recesses of her memory.
The darts kept pounding the shield.
George, kind, quiet, calm George. She looked at him and knew he would rather die than stop shielding them.
Her hands were full of something. She was still holding the rifle. She checked the magazine. One shot left.
The lizard freak couldn’t shield and hurl the dart at the same time.
“Drop it!” she yelled, hoping her voice held. “Drop the shield!”
Kaldar looked at her. Understanding sparked in his eyes. He yelled something.
George shook his head. Blood spilled out from the corner of his mouth.
Kaldar’s voice snapped into a rigid mask. He was biting off words.
George took a deep breath.
This was it. One shot. She made it, or they died.
The shield vanished. Audrey fired.
The lizard man’s head exploded in a wet blossom of blood and pale chunks.
The last dart fell straight at her. Small price to pay . . .
Kaldar lunged. His sword slashed in a wide arc, its edge shining bright blue. The two pieces of the dart fell harmlessly on the floor.
Suddenly, sound exploded in Audrey’s head, as if someone had the volume turned up all the way and had just pressed the unmute button.
“Mar!” Karmash roared. “Face me!”
Something smashed into him from behind. Karmash flew forward, rolled over, and jumped to his feet.
In the doorway, Gaston landed on the carpet. His black hair spilled over his shoulder like a mane. His eyes flared silver, reflecting the flames. Muscles bulged on his exposed shoulders. He looked demonic, like some prehistoric monster.
Karmash hesitated, unsure.
“The Mar family says hello,” Gaston growled.
The giant roared and charged. Gaston leaped, catching Karmash head-on. They collided and rolled down the aisle.
The orange woman slipped out of her cloak. Chain mail covered her body from neck to mid thigh. She dashed toward them, leaping over the overturned broken benches.
“I believe this is my dance.” Kaldar flicked his sword and lunged forward, blue magic flaring about him in a flash shield. They collided. Steel rang against steel, and Kaldar and the woman danced across the ruined church like two whirlwinds.
The beast man stared at Karmash and Gaston, locked in battle, then looked at Kaldar and the orange woman. His gaze fastened on her and the kids. A predatory focus claimed his face. Oh shit.
“Run!” Audrey tried to get up, but her legs were still numb. “Run!”
“No.” George shook his head. He was bleeding from his nose and his mouth.
Jack just stood there. He looked so young and lost. In shock, Audrey realized.
The beast man charged toward them.
“Run! Save your brother, you idiot!”
George thrust his hands out. Magic pulsed from him. The nearest corpse in the aisle jumped to its feet and clamped onto the beast man, trying to rip him apart. Another corpse joined the first. The third and fourth followed. They clawed at him, gouging the skin, ripping at his hair.
He ripped one dead guard off and hurled him aside. The body flew across the church and crashed against the wall.
“George, I order you to go! Do you hear me! Go!”
George’s hands shook with strain.
The second corpse fell into the aisle, torn to pieces. The beast man kept coming.
Twenty yards.
The third corpse fell apart under the savage blows of the massive claws.
Fifteen.