He turned to Les, then slowly pulled himself to his unsteady feet.
Les popped the lock and rushed in to Marcello. Les tried to put my uncle’s arms over his shoulder, but Marcello swatted him away before he grasped Les tightly in an embrace.
“Oh, my boy,” Marcello mumbled as he patted Les’s back and then examined his mask. “They’d told me they’d killed you. Both of you,” he added as he pulled away. His lips were cracked, and his hair was tangled and matted.
“We did kill them!” Nik shouted from where he sat on the floor, using his leathers to tightly bind his thigh. “It wasn’t even hard.”
“You shut your fool mouth before I shove a knife down your throat,” Les spat at him.
Marcello looked at me, questions racing through his eyes. I nodded.
“But how?” he asked.
“Have you forgotten that She is a god of resurrection as well?”
Marcello rubbed his face, wrinkled hands coated in dried and flaking blood.
“You’re damn fools, both of you,” he said quietly. “You shouldn’t have come here. You shouldn’t have come for me.”
“But we did. I wasn’t going to let them end us all.”
“I’ve never seen such stupid, ignorant pride,” he berated me. Les stepped between us and pushed his mask up.
“Master, shut up,” he snapped.
Marcello glared at him, but Les put up a hand. “You don’t have a say in it. Lea is the head of the Family, our Family. I side with her in this and all things from here on. Don’t make me choose between you two, because all the love I have in my heart for you won’t make me choose you. If you have a problem with that, you’ll have to speak to Safraella on your own time, but right now we are saving you, saving the boy, and then getting out of here before any more Da Vias stumble upon us.”
From the top of the stairs, the door creaked open.
Nik laughed. “Too late, Saldanas. Too late.”
forty-two
THE THREE OF US RUSHED OUT OF THE CELL. FROM THE top of the steps a shadow tumbled down the stairs.
“Hello?” a voice called. The voice of a child, maybe no more than eleven or twelve. “Uncle Nik? Are you down here?”
“Raise the Family, boy!” Nik shouted. Les swore and swung toward him, his boot lashing out and connecting with Nik’s temple. Nik slumped over, unconscious.
The boy’s shadow vanished as he fled from the dungeon entrance, yelling as loud as he could.
“Well.” Marcello brushed his hands on his pants. “That’s done it.”
“Let’s move!” I said. We ran up the stairs and out of the dungeon.
The hallway was still blessedly empty, but I could hear the voices of Da Vias as the boy raised the alarm. I passed my sword to Marcello. We were in for a fight now. But if we could reach Emile quickly, we could flee the house and escape into the night, into the dead plains if we had to. Les and I could keep the ghosts away. I hoped . . .
We turned the corner. Two Da Via clippers raced at us, noiseless as they pulled out weapons, their faces hidden behind their masks.
Les swung left and I swung right, each of us focusing on a clipper, our communication silent yet completely understood.
I lunged at my adversary. He brought his sword up to block me. I dropped to my knees and stabbed him in the gut with my stiletto. He grunted. I hooked his ankle, pulling him off his feet so he crashed to his back.
Les swung his cutter at his adversary’s mask. The Da Via pulled away. Les followed with a quick elbow to the face. The Da Via’s bone mask cracked. A final swing with his cutter and the second Da Via lay on the ground beside the first.
Another entered the hallway. I jumped to my feet, ready to meet her. Marcello rushed between Les and me.
Once, for my birthday, Rafeo had taken me to see a show of traveling fire dancers. The women and men swung on ribbons and ropes that burned with flames. They ducked and weaved and spun through the air as it rained fire around them. None of them were burned.
Marcello fought like the fire dancers. All grace and silent movement as he danced around the clipper who wanted to kill him.
A moment later the Da Via was dead and Marcello turned to face us, his chest heaving.
“Master . . . ,” Les said.
“What?” he snapped. “Just because I’m old doesn’t mean I’m feeble.”
We ran down the hall once more, Marcello’s breath wheezing in and out. I felt fresh. It had to be the resurrection, my stamina. Les’s stamina. Perhaps She had given us this so we could do what needed to be done.
A figure stepped from a room, a tall cylindrical hat on his head, staff clutched in his grip. The priest of Daedara.
“Stop!” he commanded. He held the staff before him, and the crystal at the top flared white. Marcello covered his eyes and cried out, forced to step back from the light.
I felt nothing. The light was bright, I could see it in Marcello’s reaction, but it didn’t burn my eyes, didn’t push me away. I stepped up to the priest and yanked the staff from his hands.
The priest stared at me, so shocked he didn’t even fight me for his staff.