Chain of Thorns (The Last Hours, #3)

And found themselves in a long corridor. Long was barely enough of a descriptor: witchlight sconces on both sides of the tunnel formed an arrow of light that receded until the distance was too far for human eyes. Something about it made Ari shudder. Maybe it was only that the rest of the Silent City’s tunnels had a more organic quality, often following unusual paths that Ari had assumed were accidents of geology. But this one felt alien and strange, as if a vein of peculiar magic ran beneath its floor of stone.

As they made their way down it, they passed runes carved into the walls: runes of death and mourning, but also runes of transformation and change. There were other runes too, bearing the sort of odd patterning that Ari saw when a Portal was made. They seemed to flare up as Anna and Ari neared them, before receding into the shadows. These, Ari suspected, were the runes that made the tunnel what it was: a telescoped version of real distance, a peculiar shortcut through time and space that would allow them to—at least, as they would perceive it—walk from London to Iceland in less than a day.

Every once in a while they would pass a door with a rune carved into it, or a narrow passageway that snaked off into the dark. There was no sound but their footsteps until Anna said, “You know, when I was a child, I thought I would be an Iron Sister.”

“Really?” said Ari. “It seems like quite a lot of routine, for you. And a lot of taking orders.”

“Sometimes I like taking orders,” said Anna, sounding amused.

“No flirting in the Silent City,” Ari said, though she felt a little shiver down her spine, as she always did when Anna teased her. “I am fairly sure that there is a Law about it.”

“I thought I would like to make weapons,” Anna said. “It seemed the opposite of wearing dresses and going to parties. In any case, it only lasted until I found out I would have to go live on a lava plain. I asked my mother if I would still be able to get my favorite chocolates there, and she said she doubted it very much. So that was enough for me.” She paused, all lightness gone from her voice. “Do you hear that?”

Ari nodded grimly. The sound of footsteps came from up ahead—many footsteps, marching in a regular tread. She narrowed her eyes but could see only shadows—and then a flash of something white. Watchers’ robes.

“Quick,” Ari whispered. They were near one of the narrow passageways leading off the tunnel; she caught hold of Anna’s sleeve and ducked into it, pulling Anna after her.

The passage was barely wide enough for both of them to stand facing each other. Ari could hear the sound of marching feet getting louder, an odd reminder that though the Chimera demons possessed the bodies of Silent Brothers and Iron Sisters, they were not them; they did not have their powers or skills.

She crouched down and peered into the corridor. There they were—a large group of Watchers, fifty or more, their death-white robes swirling around their feet as if they had been born out of smoke. They moved down the passage with blind determination, their jagged staffs in hand.

“Let me go,” Anna said, and tried to push past Ari. “We know how to kill them now—”

“No!” Ari didn’t think; she caught hold of Anna and yanked her back, nearly flinging her up against the wall. They had both doused their witchlights, and there was little illumination in the passage, but Ari could still see the fury in Anna’s blue eyes.

“We can’t just let them go,” Anna said. “We can’t just let them—”

“Anna. Please. There are far too many of them. And only two of us.”

“Not you.” Anna shook her head violently. “You need to get to the Iron Tombs. One of us does. I cannot kill them all, but think how many I could take before—”

“Before you die?” Ari hissed. “Is this a way to honor Christopher?”

Rage flashed across Anna’s face—rage directed at herself, Ari guessed. “I couldn’t protect him. I wasn’t ready for an attack. But at least I can stand against these creatures now—”

“No,” Ari said. “The responsibility for Christopher’s death is Belial’s. They are a horror, the Watchers, because of whose bodies have been possessed. But Chimeras are just demons. Like any other demons. They are the instruments of Belial, and it is Belial we must defeat.”

“Let me go, Ari,” Anna said, her eyes burning. If Ari turned her head just a little bit, she could see the Watchers, a white flood passing by the narrow mouth of the passageway. “It will not be my hand that slays Belial, if he can even be slain. Let me do this, at least—”

“No.” The determination in Ari’s voice surprised even her. “It may be Cordelia’s sword that kills Belial. But all of us stand behind her. Everything we have done, everything we have accomplished, has made us part of the force that drives her blade. Nor is our task done. We are still needed, Anna. You are still needed.”

Very slowly, Anna nodded.

Carefully, Ari let go of Anna, praying she was right about the look in Anna’s eyes. Praying that Anna would not bolt. And Anna didn’t—only remained very still, her back flat against the wall, her eyes fixed on Ari, as the sound of the Watchers receded into the distance.



* * *



A cracked road, the remains of a once-impressive boulevard lined by shade trees, led Cordelia and Lucie to the base of the hill that loomed over Idumea. Before they started up, Cordelia glanced over at Lucie a last time. This was it—their final push, the final approach to Lilith’s palace. Edom and Idumea had already taken such a toll on Lucie. Did she have the strength for this?

Cordelia decided in that moment that if she didn’t, she would carry Lucie up the hill herself. They had come too far, and Lucie had pushed herself too hard, for Cordelia to abandon her now.

Lucie looked pale, strained, smudged with dirt. The encounter with the cursed ghosts seemed to have stretched her even thinner: her eyes looked huge in her face, and her expression was tight with pain. But when Cordelia glanced up the hill, a question in her eyes, Lucie only nodded and started up the uneven, zigzag path that led to the top.

The hill was steeper than it looked at first, and the terrain much rougher. It had been a long time since the path had been tended to, and petrified tree roots bulged through the dry scree that covered the hillside. Low stone cairns dotted the edges of the path. Markers of graves long forgotten? Had this been the last stand of the Nephilim in this world? Had they died protecting their fortress? Cordelia could only guess.

As they rose up the hill, the clouds thinned, and she could see what seemed like all of Edom laid out before her; she could see the plains where she and Lucie had taken shelter, and even the long line of the Wall of Kadesh in the distance. She wondered if it had once been a border with another country; she wondered what had happened to the Forest of Brocelind, with its deep wooded dells and faerie groves. She wondered, as the black clouds fell away below them, if Lilith had lied and they would find no way back to their own world from here.

She wondered where Belial was. In fact, not just Belial, but the demons who must surely serve him. She kept her hand on Cortana, but all was silent: only the sounds of the wind and Lucie’s ragged breathing accompanied their ascent.

At last the slope began to level out and they could catch their breath. Before them, black in the red glow of the sun, rose the high walls that encircled the fortress. A pair of massive gates was set into them.

“There aren’t even any guards,” Cordelia said as they approached the gates together. “It doesn’t make sense.”

Lucie was silent. She was staring at the gates with an odd look on her face. They were a dark mirror of the Gard gates in Alicante, gold and iron carved with swirling runes, though these were not the runes from the Gray Book, but a demonic language, ancient and disquieting. Stone statues of angels—decapitated and acid-eaten, only their spreading wings giving a hint of what they’d once been—stood watch at either side of the gates.

The gates had no handles, nothing to grasp. Cordelia put her hand against one—the metal was icy cold—and pushed; it was like pushing against a massive boulder. Nothing happened. “No guards,” she said again. “But no way to get in, either.” She tipped her head back. “Maybe we can try to climb the walls—”

“Let me,” Lucie said quietly. She stepped past Cordelia. “I saw this in a vision,” she said, sounding very unlike herself. “I think—it was Belial that I saw. And I heard him speak.”

She laid a dusty hand against the gate’s surface. “Kaal ssha ktar,” she said.

The words sounded like stone scraping against metal. Cordelia shuddered—and stared incredulously as the gates swung open noiselessly. Beyond them she could see a moat, filled with black, oily water, and a bridge that crossed it, leading directly into the fortress.

Before them lay the heart of Lilith’s palace.



* * *



After a very long minute and a half of listening to the Watchers tromp past their hiding spot, the marching had receded into the distance and silence had returned. Cautiously Ari poked her head out from the alcove and gestured to Anna.

“Where do you think they’re going? The Watchers, I mean,” Anna said.