Path of the Horseman (24 page)

I saw Maddy, crying and bleeding. Trying to
escape. Getting pulled back. Fighting uselessly. Being tortured.
Screaming for me to save her–

I snapped.

Black smoke filled my hand as I threw it at
Kade. Just what he’d been waiting for. He tilted his head to the
side, letting my fist fly past him. Then he slammed the heel of his
palm into my solar plexus.

I went sprawling, skidding back along the
floor and landing hard on my back. I coughed, trying to breathe.
Kade punched like a freight train full of rocket fuel. It only took
one hit for him to beat you. But he took more when he could get
them.

I stayed on the ground to make sure nothing
inside me was seriously damaged. I was fine, though I’d have a hell
of a bruise under the scar Ciaran had given me. I grunted and
rolled up, seeing Kade standing over me. Simon was in the
background, watching with wide, nervous eyes.

“Keep pushing me, Pest,” Kade whispered
dangerously. “Please. It’s been so long since I’ve had a real
fight.”

Kade leaned back and crossed his arms,
grinning.

“Not that I think you’d beat me, but who
knows? You might get a lucky shot in.”

The fear and rage he was funneling into me
nearly shattered my control. More images of Maddy in pain raced
through my mind. How was I supposed to know if these were
hallucinations, or memories of what he’d already done?

I closed my eyes.
No. Stop thinking that.
Kade’s just fucking with you. She’s okay. She has to be.

I got to my feet, exhaled steadily, and
stared at Kade. “Are you done?”

My brother frowned. “You’re no fun.”

I waited for him to torment me again. I
wasn’t entirely ready for more of Kade’s sadism, but I would take
it. The only way to beat him was to resist.

Kade finally sighed. “Fine. Let’s see if your
friends decided to do something useful with the last days of their
lives.”

He started for the stairs. I followed him,
but kept my distance in case he tried another trick. All he did was
walk. I could sense Simon’s eyes on my back, but I didn’t waste my
time on looking or talking to him. I was still pissed, and I
figured he was too.

I was really starting to hate family
reunions.

There was no working power any more, so to
get to the top floor of the hotel, Kade replaced the elevators with
a pulley system. It looked like a metal cage designed to drop us
into the deepest pit of Hell, but Kade assured us that the elevator
cables pulling us up were secure.

I hated having to trust him on that.

During the slow, rickety ride, Kade explained
that when new humans arrived, he took a look at them and decided
what they would be best for. There were a lot of open spaces for
work, though his theory was that if he ever started losing
manpower, he’d make the people he had work even harder.

During the ride, Simon asked him what he did
with people who didn’t want to be slaves, Kade chuckled and said,
“Don’t worry, Slime. I have a special place in the basement for
them. It’s the same place I put the people who want to be my
assistants.”

Kade had a small town and a cult/army, but he
worked alone. It made him look like even more of a god.

When he told me that two of the humans,
Ricardo and Laurel, had already offered to work for sanctuary, I
was disappointed but not surprised. Ricardo could do a lot with the
engineers and mechanics. Laurel would be distracted by gardening.
Staying under Josh’s command had brought them nothing but grief,
though I couldn’t see them growing to love Kade when their muscles
burned and their backs gave out.

But what the fuck did I know about the human
mind? I had part of one, the memories of one, but that didn’t make
me one of the mortal bipeds.

It seemed like forever before we reached the
top floor, but the moment I stepped out of the metal cage and
looked at the suite with four Vermilions standing in front of it, I
was nervous.

Maddy would have a lot of questions. Josh
would think I was Satan himself. How the fuck was I going to
explain everything to them? Was there even a way for me to lie?

Fingers flicked my ear hard. I rubbed the
side of my head and glared at Kade, wishing I could rip the smug
look off his face.

“What’s wrong, Pest? Don’t you want to see
your cute little pet?”

I shoved past him. Kade laughed and let me. I
stormed toward the guards, all four of whom were holding crude
spears made from golf club staffs with butcher knife tips. Two of
them crossed their spears in an X over the suite doors, and the two
on the far side by the walls pointed their spears at me.

“Get the fuck out of my way,” I told
them.

“Our orders are not to let anyone into this
suite,” one of the Vermilions said. The emptiness in his voice made
me want to snap all of those spears and shove one half up their
asses. I wasn’t picky about which half.

I crushed my nails into my palm. Kade
laughed, then got out of my head. He stepped forward and put his
hand on my shoulder.

“Relax, boys. I’ll look after him.” Kade
jutted his chin at the doors. “Are they co-operating?”

“They haven’t caused any problems and aren’t
shouting or breaking things anymore, but they refuse to join your
gracious community,” answered another Vermilion.

Kade shrugged. “That’s okay.” He squeezed my
healing shoulder, knowing it would hurt when he did it. “I’ve got
someone to sweet-talk them.”

The guards relaxed and pulled their spears
up. They weren’t going to question their glorious leader. The
Vermilions closest to the door grabbed the handles and pushed the
two halves open. I pushed Kade’s hand off me and ran inside.

And felt the cord of a lamp tighten around my
throat.

The person holding the cord was strong,
twisting the cord at the back to cut off my windpipe and pull me
deeper into the room. Someone on the opposite side of the door
moved, and Maddy finally came into view. She was holding a small
side table by the legs and preparing to swing. She stopped when she
recognized me.

She hesitated, like she wasn’t sure if she
should stop Josh, or let him choke me to death.

I didn’t wait for her to make up her mind. I
drove my elbow into Josh’s ribs. He grunted and I hit him again in
the stomach. He stumbled back, losing grip on the cord. I pushed it
over my head and coughed, twisting to face Josh again. I heard
footsteps behind, followed by a yelp of pain.

I turned at the same time Josh shouted,
“No!”

Kade was gripping Maddy’s wrists tightly,
holding her back from smashing the table into my back. She tried to
pull away, but Kade squeezed her wrists tighter. She grimaced and
dropped the table.

“Let her go,” I told my brother.

Of course, he didn’t listen. He was too busy
pushing fear into Maddy. I could see the red smoke lifting from his
hands and sliding into hers. Maddy’s eyes widened, and the panic
turning her breath into short, desperate rasps.

“Kade!”

Still holding Maddy, he gave me a bored look.
“You do know she just tried to break a table over your head,
right?”

“Yeah. I know. And I said to let her go.”

My brother blinked, then rolled his eyes.
“You and your noble heart.”

Kade shoved Maddy away, hard. She stumbled,
her back hitting the wall with a loud
thunk.
She stared at
Kade, holding her wrists to her chest. The red marks left by his
fingers would darken into bruises soon enough. I walked toward
Maddy. She saw me coming and gasped.

“Don’t!” she shouted. I stopped. “Stay the
fuck away from me!”

I froze in place, not sure why my chest ached
to hear her shouting at me. Or maybe it wasn’t her words that hurt
me, but the look in her eyes. Maddy was looking at me like I was a
monster, a creature no better than Ciaran himself. She looked
sickened by me. Scared, even.

I backed away, Josh nearly shoving me through
the door when he rushed over to stand protectively beside her.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Josh
snarled.

I was starting to ask myself that same
question.

Kade snorted. “I figured it was obvious.
Avery came to see you.”

Maddy glanced at me, flinched, then looked at
Kade again. It stung to know that she would rather look at my
savage older brother than at me.

“What the hell are you? Where did you take
Laurel and Ricardo?!” she shouted.

Kade watched her with a big smile and
predatory eyes.

“One thing at a time, sweetheart. I gave
those two humans a choice, remember? They said yes. They’re working
in my community as we speak. A mechanic and a gardener. You and
Captain America said no.”

He took a step closer to Maddy. Simon was
just starting to enter the room behind Kade.

“As for what we are? Rumor has it you already
know. Ciaran gave the hints, and my little brother Avery filled in
the blanks.”

Josh put his arms around Maddy, knowing it
was a feeble attempt to protect her, but unable to think of
anything else.

“Which one are you?” she whispered.

My brother grinned. “These days, I go by
Kade.” He held up his hand, opening his palm. Fire erupted and
danced over his fingertips. “But I think you can guess which one I
am.”

Maddy flinched, clutching Josh’s shirt. He
held her tighter. She looked past him at Simon. “You?”

Simon hesitated, like he didn’t want to
answer. Then he bowed his head and muttered, “Famine.”

Maddy cringed, and then she turned her eyes
on me. I forced myself to meet her denim blue gaze, though I wanted
to look anywhere else. I watched the hurt of my lies and betrayal
sink into her like a knife. She stared at me as though she couldn’t
believe it, didn’t want to believe it. But then she remembered what
happened in Ciaran’s basement, the things he’d said, and knew it
was true.

“You… You’re… you’re the reason for all of
this!” Maddy screamed. “How could you?!”

I could have told her it was my job, my
destiny, but that would have only made things worse. I killed
everything Maddy ever loved. She hated me now.

“You son of a bitch,” Josh hissed. “You
fucking asshole. I knew something was wrong with you, but I never
thought you could be something so terrible. What the fuck were you
planning? Were you going to poison us in our sleep? Turn us into
Plagued?”

“No,” I protested. “No, I was going to help
you–”

“Help us?!” Josh uncurled his arms from Maddy
and stepped in front of her. “How the fuck were you going to help
us! You
killed us!
You killed
everyone,
and they
helped you!” Josh pointed accusingly at my brothers. “Don’t you
dare
try and tell me you wanted to help us! Tell me what you
really wanted!”

There was no way to win against him. I was
giving Josh the truth, but now he knew I was responsible for
creating the Plague, he saw me as Public Enemy Number One. It was
pointless to defend myself.

“Following Avery was a mistake in the first
place,” Kade stated from behind me. I wished I had the strength to
punch the smug bastard. Too bad he was right. “He never had any
direction. All he likes to do is butcher Plagued and Soulless. He’s
a scrapper, not a warrior. I mean, he’s not as pathetic in a fight
as Slime over there is,” Kade jerked his thumb at Simon, nearly
stabbing in him in the eye, “but he’s not a leader.”

Kade put his hand on my shoulder and pushed
me out of the way.

“But I am. This is my little refuge for
humans that don’t want to be eaten or die. If you start playing
nice, you can belong here.” He looked Maddy up and down. “I might
give you the most pleasurable job, Goldilocks.”

Maddy crossed her arms over her chest, but it
didn’t change Kade’s leer.

“Don’t even think about touching her,” Josh
growled. “You’re not going to ruin any more lives.”

Kade’s laugh was harsh. “You think I took
away their hopes and dreams? They came to me, jackass. I didn’t
twist their arms very hard. In fact, they prefer this home to that
shit haven you morons are looking for.”

Maddy perked up. “You know about it?”

Josh was a bit more cautious when he asked,
“What can you tell us?"

“That everyone who goes there ends up coming
here,” Kade replied without interest. “Maybe you should take it as
a sign.”

“How do we know you they aren’t just looking
for supplies and that you threaten them to keep them here?”

Kade looked at Maddy intensely. “Good point.
I’ll consider doing that next time.”

She didn’t appreciate his honesty. “I want to
talk to the other people here. I want to talk to my friends.”

He shook his head. “No dice, goldie. You
don’t get to make choices like that under my roof. Besides, it’s
not like they’re chatterboxes.”