But it was too late. It was too damn late. Rather than hinder him from pushing the last stone into place, she helped him, knocking Avis’s upper body into the pillar.
The click of that last stone falling into place, the burnt umber of the moon as it came into its own, resonated around the room, hissing a sigh of blissful satisfaction.
There was a small moment of eerie silence when the world stood still. When the horror of what had just occurred held its breath.
And that’s when the screeching started. Out of every corner of the lobby, out of the stairwell, from every closed window, black, insidious shadows appeared, their snarls and cries reverberating, echoing.
They dove for her all at once, snapping at her, opening their unhinged jaws until she stared into the abyss of blackness. Long, knobby fingers grabbed at her, tearing at her sweater, ripping her skin.
Screaming, she fought them off with a screech of fear, using her fists, kicking at them as they battered her, toying with her, scratching at her face.
“Poppy!” someone yelled over the howl of freezing wind and flying entities.
Her eyes sought the voice just as one of the spirits dragged her upward by the back of her sweater.
But then Rick was there, grabbing at her feet and yanking her from the clutches of the spirit, pulling at her legs until she thought they’d detach.
She landed in his arms, wrapping her hands around his neck and falling against him in semi-relief, until she heard Calamity’s voice.
“Rick! Get the fuck out of the way!”
Rick lobbed her over his shoulder, making her cry out from the pain in her ribs, and ran toward the entryway, but a spirit waited for him, one whose teeth gnashed as he sprayed drool.
A flash of Marty in werewolf form skidded across her line of vision as she attacked the spirit, sinking her teeth into it just as Darnell clapped his hands together, making the room shake, and turning the spirit to a pile of ash.
Wanda and Nina bum rushed a group of ghouls, their cackles racing around the room, whirring in her ears as they took pleasure in swatting the women down until January zapped them with her wand.
Poppy struggled to free herself from Rick’s shoulder so she could help as the world fell apart around them. The air, thick with the stench of death, grew more oppressive, choking her.
In the middle of this chaos, in the height of an all-out war, Avis appeared out of nowhere, that clown-like smile on his face. As flames burned behind him and the lobby began to crumble in chunks, he pointed at Rick. “Old chap—so glad you could join the party. You work too hard, old man.”
As though in slow motion, Rick set her down on the ground, his wide chest heaving, his thick thighs flexing before he said with dead calm, “I’m going to kill you, Avis. I’m going to kill you, and I’m going to enjoy the hell out of it.”
Without warning, without preamble, Rick let out a rebel yell, racing at Avis until their bodies made contact and he had him on the ground. His arm swung high, preparing to slug Avis—until Avis disappeared, leaving Rick’s fist to crash to the cracking marble floor.
As Rick howled his frustrated rage, Avis used it to his advantage, reappearing right in front of Poppy. There was no time for her to scream, no chance to send out a warning before he snatched her up like pulling a flower from the soft earth and ran.
Poppy clawed at his arm, using her nails to dig into the flesh, but Avis couldn’t be stopped. He headed straight for the stairwell, his arm around her waist, taking the steps two at a time as though she weighed nothing more than a sack of potatoes.
Her feet dragged painfully against the stairs, the backs of them bashing into hard metal until she lost her ballet slippers and her feet were bare.
Someone screamed, “He’s got Poppy, and he’s headed up to the roof! Don’t let him get to the roof!”
Which made her pause. What was on the roof?
Don’t panic, Poppy. Use what’s inside you, a voice whispered in her ear.
Debris from the falling chunks of the building hit them on their way up flight after flight of stairs, Avis’s grunts resonating against the walls, but he kept hauling her upward as the voice insisted she act.
It’s all there, Poppy—use it!
When they reached the top of the steps and pushed through the door, he dumped her without ceremony on the scratchy roof tiles, the glow of something far brighter than the moon forcing her eyes upward.
Poppy’s mouth fell open.
The spire she’d so loved had turned into a raging inferno. Screams tore through the sky, spirits clung to it, cackling their glee while their wispy bodies blew in the cold air like flags.
The spire. The spire was the center of all this—a portal. The clarity of the answer hit her. This was what January had been talking about. The spire was a portal to the spirit world.
As she attempted to scramble backward and away from the sight before her, Avis grabbed the back of her sweater and began pulling her toward the spire.