I inhaled for calm. “Aric is a good man.” When free of Paul. “I hope one day you can see that. But no matter what, we’re going to need every Arcana we can round up to fight Richter.”
Kentarch said, “She’s right about the Emperor. Besides, I will protect the Reaper as long as I’m able. He helped me after the Flash hit.”
“Fine.” Joules grumbled. “But I vow to you, Empress—once Richter’s gone, all bets are off with Death.”
I’d have to handle this later. Kick the can down the road. Jack used to say that. With each mile, was I getting closer to him or farther away? Of course, he might be dead.
“What’s all this gear?” Joules pointed to the dash.
“Equipment I’ve sourced since Issa and I first came to this continent and found this truck.”
Joules reached for a sort of joystick control, fiddling with it. A roof-mounted spotlight beamed over our surroundings. “Get the hell out!” He was like a kid with a toy, shooting that beam all around. “What is this? A thousand lumens?”
“It’s three thousand lumens. And it is critical equipment.”
“I’ll use it critically.”
Kentarch seemed obsessive about his chariot, so I was surprised Joules didn’t get his mouthy mouth popped.
“Folks must try to boost this rig all the time.”
Kentarch said, “I have an ignition sequence that must be entered to start the engine.” I’d noticed a row of tiny rocker switches under the steering wheel. “Also a hidden lever locks the axles, making it impossible to move. So if either of you thought to overwhelm me and take the truck, you wouldn’t get very far.”
I frowned. “Overwhelm you?”
“It’s difficult to imagine someone like you killing.” You haven’t met the red witch. “But your icons remind me.”
“I acted in self-defense in both cases. This guy”—I pointed out the Hermit’s lantern icon—“liked to kidnap girls for sadistic experiments. I found the remains of a previous subject congealing in the chains he’d made her wear. This guy”—I tapped the Hierophant’s two-finger icon—“was the leader of a horde of cannibal miners. He kept victims in his belowground ‘pantry,’ carving on them bit by bit while they were still alive to keep the ‘meat’ fresh.” I met Kentarch’s gaze with my chin up. “How you like me now?”
“It makes me wonder what I did to merit your wrath. Right after the Flash, Death told me to beware of you, that you’d killed me before.”
“I did. But I’m different now.” As long as I could keep a leash on the red witch. That no longer seemed much of a concern—she hadn’t so much as stirred when I’d been on the wolves’ meal plan. “Aric just hadn’t realized it yet.”
Kentarch looked unconvinced.
Joules asked him, “How’d you and the Reaper hook up?”
“He sent me a sat phone before the Flash. After the apocalypse, I contacted him. He answered many questions about my abilities and invited us to this country.”
Joules spotlighted a bridge. Then a burned-out car. “You teleported over?”
“Yes. The plains in Africa had little protection from the Flash. I knew our only shot at survival was to find the mysterious Death. But I’d been to the United States just once, for a tech seminar in Washington, DC.”
I said, “And you can only teleport to places you’ve been.”
“Precisely. I can ghost anytime—”
“Ghost?” Each Arcana seemed to have his or her own lingo. The glowing markings on my skin were glyphs. Vines and trees were my soldiers.
“Make myself and other objects intangible, walking through walls and such.”
Joules said, “Or exploding bears. Too grand, that was.”
Kentarch shrugged modestly. “But teleportation must have an endpoint. Though we had no idea what we would find on a different continent, I gathered as much strength as I could, then we took a leap of faith.”
Joules murmured, “Jumping off into nothing.”
I added, “With no wings.” The Tower and I shared a look. Both imagining Gabriel’s leap?
Kentarch nodded. “We materialized to Washington. Barely. Long distances and great weights are equally difficult to teleport or ghost.” So what had ghosting this ginormous truck done to him tonight? “Once we arrived, finding enough fuel and water for the trip from DC to the mountains proved nearly impossible. Then I got separated from Issa. She must have been taken from me.”
Joules said, “Seems to me that no one could take a damned thing from you.”
Kentarch merely stared out at the road. Lost in memories?
I nudged him. “What happened?”
He blinked. “Keeping her safe from Bagmen and marauders as I sourced strained the limits of my ability. Finally I took her to an empty penthouse. I cleared the building of threats, then teleported debris to block the stairwell—after all, we’d never need the steps. Once I felt she was protected in her refuge above the city, I went farther afield for supplies. Water was our most pressing concern back then. One day, I located a well. I returned to her, intending to celebrate. But she was gone.”
“Who could have gotten to her?” I asked.
“That’s what has tormented me. Who? I’ve questioned survivors for months but have hit a true dead end.”
“Maybe your old lady dumped you.” Prickly, prickly Joules.
“Never. And even if she had decided to leave me, how could she have? My impenetrable barricade remained in place.”
“It sounds like a magic trick,” I said, reminded of Finn. My God, I was going to miss him. Even during the apocalypse, he’d retained his happy-go-lucky attitude. His words drifted through my mind: I’ve never been more stoked about life than I have been over the last two weeks.
They’d literally been his last two weeks. At Fort Arcana, he’d told me he was convinced he would die young, that he’d made peace with it. He’d thought we all should . . . .
Kentarch tapped the GPS map to zoom in on our current location; then he turned onto a new road. “There was a military force that mobilized not far outside the city. Maybe a helicopter landed on the roof and forced her away at gunpoint.” More to himself, he said, “Though I blocked the roof access as well. Perhaps they rappelled.” Shaking his head hard, he said, “Not knowing has all but maddened me.”
“If anyone can find her, it’ll be Lark,” I said, hastily adding, “once Paul is defeated and she’s fully recovered. So our first step is Circe.”
As the game wanted, we were following a MacGuffin, which meant we would surely cross paths with other Arcana.
But would we find Circe—before Richter found us?
13
“Stop the truck!” I cried. We were a few hours into our drive, and Joules had just spotlighted a legless Bagger eeling its way across the road up ahead. “I need to get close to it.”
Kentarch barely let off the gas. “Pardon? I always run them over.”
I quickly told him about the Sol and Empress shit show, relaying how the Sun had betrayed me but ultimately redeemed himself. And how we’d communicated through his Baggers.
The Chariot looked disbelieving. About which part? “If he can command Bagmen, why allow them to harm humans?”