MORTAL COILS (98 page)

It
screamed in pain and anger.

Fiona
only registered a blur as its left fist came up and hit her in the chest with a
force of a pile driver.

Her
world exploded into black stars. She flew into the air, landed head-first on
the street, tumbling through broken glass, and slammed to a stop against the
bumper of a VW bus.

Unlike
her dreamy disorientation when the Maybach ran over the beast and flipped,
Fiona remained acutely conscious for every bit of this. She felt each pebble of
asphalt and bit of broken glass as she rolled over them. And she definitely
felt the impact against the solid-metal bumper.

Every
bone in her body should’ve been pulverized. All she felt, though, was her blood
pump faster and hotter, carrying unquenchable anger to each cell.

She
stood.

Only
peripherally did it register that while her gray sweats were tattered and torn,
she did not have a scratch on her body.

All
she understood was that this fight was far from over.

She
started toward the beast again.

It
grinned fangs and chuckled.

Which
just made her more mad.

It
held both its wings high, poised for an attack, and it fixed her with its fiery
gaze. “Feel how strong your blood is? You are one of us. Born to fight and cut
and kill. I can indulge you as much as you like . . . or you can come with me,
and I can teach you how to always feel this way.”

Fiona
halted.

She’d
never felt so strong. And it did feel good. No one would be able to tell her
what to do again. She would be in control of her destiny.

Then
she remembered that she had felt this way before.

She
lowered her arms.

The
first time she’d eaten the chocolates from the heart-shaped box . . .

that
had felt this good. So much pleasure, and so much power. She felt as if she
could have done anything.

Just
like now.

But
if she felt like this all the time, what would happen? There would be no
Robert, no Eliot, and no real family for her. She would be one among a pack of
murderers and liars with only broken pieces surrounding her.

Eliot—she
had entirely forgotten him.

She
spotted him limping away. Not running from the beast, but moving toward his
violin up the street.

Fiona
maneuvered to the edge of Midway Avenue. The beast tracked her motion, but did
not yet move toward her.

“What
shall it be, child?” it whispered. “You will never best me.”

Fiona
kept moving, turning so she faced the beast as she backed toward her brother.
She caught up to him and wrapped an arm around his waist to steady him.

“Thanks,”
Eliot whispered.

They
moved together the last few steps to his violin.

“Maybe
I can’t win against you,” Fiona said. “But we can.”

The
beast stared at them and shook his head. “So be it.”

It beat
its wings once, twice, three times, and the wind rushed around it and into a
great spiral, sucking in paper and glass and smoldering ash. The roofs of the
nearby stores disintegrated into clouds of debris that caught fire and made the
air a pillar of flame.

Fiona’s
ears popped. The wind pulled at her and drew her a step closer to the vortex.

Eliot
set his bow on his violin and played a long, scratchy note.

The
air about them calmed a bit, enough so Fiona regained her footing. The beast
roared and its wings clapped together, aimed directly at them.

The
airflow reversed—a hurricane-strength furnace blast that struck Eliot and
Fiona.

Eliot
covered his face as bits of glass pelted him.

Fiona
tried to move in front of her brother to protect him, but the rush of air
forced her back. She had to lean into the wind to stay standing . . . but even
that wasn’t enough, and it knocked her back onto the street.

The
air screamed over her head. It got hotter and carried with it the laughter of
the beast.

She
clutched for purchase on the road. If that gale got ahold of her, it could
carry her off.

The
atmosphere near the ground was comparatively still . . . but so thin. It was
getting harder to breathe.

She
had to do something. The anger she had felt before was, however, draining.

She
gasped. Her lungs burned. She couldn’t think straight.

Was
this how it was going to end? She struggled to raise her head. The air was a mix
of tornado and fire and dust. Behind her, Eliot clutched the leg of a securely
bolted mailbox. If she could only get to him. Cee had said they were stronger
together. . . .

She
lowered her head, unable to move. All the strength had been sucked from her.

The
wind abruptly ceased.

Panting,
she tried to get up and managed to rise to her knees.

A
foot was planted squarely in the middle of her back, forcing her down. “I don’t
think so,” the beast whispered. He reached down with his black claws and slid
up along her wrist.

Fiona
tensed, expecting them to cut her flesh.

They
pulled instead on her rubber band, snapping it, then plucked it from her grasp.

The
beast hauled her up, feetfirst, and dragged her down the street to her brother.

It
kicked away Eliot’s violin, crouched, and ran a claw over its strings— severing
them with explosive twangs.

Eliot
still breathed, thank goodness, but he was out cold. The beast picked him up
and threw him over his shoulder.

It
then set Fiona down, yanking her to her feet. She had the strength to stand
again, but barely.

She
was shocked to see not a titanic winged beast before her, but a man. He was
tall, bare-chested, and wore a cloak of feathers. About his neck was a leather
thong and a hypnotically gleaming sapphire the size of her fist.

He
shoved her ahead of him, keeping one hand on her arm and twisting it up past
her shoulder blade. “Playtime is over,” he told her. “Time to go home.”

He
marched her toward Ringo’s . . . or what was left of Ringo’s All American Pizza
Palace. Two small sections of wall stood, charred and blasted. The rest of the
building was a jumble of splinters and twisted pipe and chunks of plasterboard.
It smelled of olive oil and roasted garlic.

In
fact, it seemed as if every building on Midway Avenue was either destroyed,
teetering, or on fire.

Far
away, she heard sirens.

Was
Oakwood Apartments still standing? Were Cee and Grandmother safe? If that place
caught fire, it was so old and dry, so packed with books . . . no firemen in
the world would be able to put it out.

She
struggled to pull free of the man’s grasp. He shoved her arm farther up, until
the joint popped.

They
halted in what had been the alley. The brick and cinder-block walls were
partially intact, stacked precariously. Lines of chalk had been scribbled over
them and glowed hot pink, lemon, and robin’s-egg neon. Arcs and symbols blazed
on the cratered asphalt as well. Static rolled up her leg as her feet crossed
the lines.

The
man set Eliot down next to her.

Eliot
stood, shaking his head as if waking from a bad dream.

There
was a metallic clink, and the man wrapped a large chain around both of them,
three times, binding them together while he kept Fiona’s arm immobilized behind
her back.

Eliot
wriggled next to her, but there was no play in the chain.

This
only annoyed Fiona. He was touching her, jamming his elbow into her ribs.

“We
have to get out of here,” Eliot whispered. “Louis made this diagram. He said it
transferred power, but I think—”

“Louis,”
Fiona spat back. “Like he knows anything. If you hadn’t noticed, getting out of
here doesn’t exactly look like an option.”

Eliot
blinked, taking in the sight of the ruins and the man standing before them.
“Beelzebub,” he murmured. Surprisingly, no fear was in his voice.

The
name sounded familiar to Fiona, as if she’d grown up knowing it all her life.

Fiona
stared into Beelzebub’s shockingly blue eyes. “What are you going to do with us
now?”

He
unsheathed a jagged obsidian knife. The glistening blade was as long as Fiona’s
forearm. “Now I shall sever any mortal flesh clinging to your souls. We shall
finally see what you are made of . . . Immortal or Infernal.”

Fiona
struggled against the chains, but to no effect.

This
seemed only to please Beelzebub. Smiling, he raised his knife over

his
head, but then paused, considering Eliot and Fiona. He pointed a finger at each
end and said, “Eeny meeny, miny, moe . . .”

Fiona,
for once in her life, didn’t mind Eliot’s being so near.

There
had to be a way to escape. Could she use the chains around her as a cutting
edge? No, even if she could, it might accidentally cut through her or Eliot. Or
maybe she could use the chain to cut itself?

She
couldn’t concentrate, though. Couldn’t figure it out.

Her
free hand found Eliot’s and held it.

“It’s
okay,” Eliot whispered to her. “We’ll get through this somehow.”

“Sure,”
she whispered back. “I know. Together, right?”

“And
I pick you.” Beelzebub’s finger landed on Fiona. “Ladies first, apparently.”

Fiona
stood tall. She wished she could spit in Beelzebub’s smiling face, but her
mouth was suddenly dust dry.

She
held her breath. She wanted to close her eyes, but she forced them to stay
open.

There
was a noise: the crackling of bone and splitting of sinew and skin. Fiona
inhaled, shocked . . . but didn’t feel a thing.

Beelzebub
stood before her, his obsidian blade still raised over his head.

A
different blade had been plunged through Beelzebub’s back, piercing him through
and through, protruding from his breastbone—the jagged tip of a broken sword.

He
looked down, his smile fading as a web of black poison spread across his chest.

Someone
had stabbed Beelzebub, someone standing behind him.

“Louis!”
Eliot cried.

Louis
Piper, Fiona’s supposedly estranged father, emerged from the shadow of
Beelzebub.

“Traitor,”
Beelzebub whispered as blood bubbled from his mouth.

“Thank
you, Cousin,” Louis replied. “I accept your most gracious compliment in the
spirit it was given.”

Fiona
didn’t understand this. Louis was a mortal stripped of all his power, a bum,
someone who scavenged pizza from Dumpsters . . . not this person standing
before her looking powerful, clean, and just having saved her and Eliot.