The whimpered response could only be from the terrified human who cringed behind him.
“You groveled before an enemy. You begged for mercy. You are not worthy to serve your masters.”
“No, I’m sorry. I’ll do better. Please—” The man’s words were cut off by an agonized scream. A second later the scream, too, was cut off.
“I cannot abide weaklings,” Myrddin said, as casually as if he were expressing a distaste for broccoli. “Now, you, vampire. I can never remember all these ridiculous vampire names. Pull that silver out of your friend and have him help you remove the two shapeshifters.” A siren sounded in the distance. “Do it quickly.”
The crushing pressure on my windpipe shifted as the vampire stretched to reach the silver knives that impaled his companion. I arched my back a little, just enough to allow some space where my pistol dug in. With my left hand, I reached behind me, feeling for the gun. I touched its grip. If I could move my shoulder a little more . . .
Pain sharpened as the vampire stepped harder on my neck. “Stay still,” he growled, “or I’ll—”
There was a grunt. The pressure on my neck let up as the vampire toppled over. I grabbed the gun and sat up, my finger on the trigger, praying I could aim left-handed.
“Don’t shoot!”
Juliet raised her hands, still holding a silver stake. On the ground beside her lay the vampire, writhing, the other stake protruding from his chest. Juliet pouted. “You started without me.”
I exhaled. Then I turned the gun on the fallen vampire and shot him four times. At such close range, left-handed didn’t matter. The vampire jumped and jerked and then lay still. Four silver bullets through his heart would make sure he never got up again. Already, he was disintegrating into dust.
The siren was on top of us. Flashing lights splashed the landscape as a police car pulled onto the shoulder of Storrow Drive. Cops had arrived to assist the crashed cars on Storrow Drive, but it wouldn’t be long before they came over to check out Back Street.
“Where’s Myrddin?” I asked Juliet. “Is he still here?”
“That fellow with the jar? Is he the wizard? He’s gone. Disappeared. He moves fast for someone who’s not a vampire.”
“He went into the demon plane.” Mab’s voice issued from beneath the vampire who pinned her. I couldn’t shoot this vampire with the cops right on Storrow Drive, but I yanked him off her and tossed him over a couple of cars. Mab sat up, rubbing her forehead.
She looked terrible. Worse than before, like someone had stolen my aunt and replaced her with an ailing centenarian. Drooping eyelids and puffy bags turned her eyes into slits. Age spots mottled her skin, and wrinkles creased every inch of her face. Her head shook with palsied trembling.
She touched her chest where her pendant had hung. “Myrddin took the bloodstone with him. We must get it back.”
“We will. We know where to find him.” At the fifth and final point to complete the rune.
“There’s little time.” Mab’s voice was a mere croak.
More sirens were headed our way. Not a good idea to be found at a murder scene. I kicked the decomposing vampire at my feet. Let his friend take the blame. It would send human-paranormal relations back to the Dark Ages—and wouldn’t the Old Ones love that? But there was nothing I could do about that now. I needed to get Mab home.
I got Mab’s arm around my shoulders and helped her to her feet. She seemed a couple of inches shorter, as though she’d shrunken. She leaned heavily on my arm as we made our way out of the parking lot to Back Street. I lifted her over the body of the human who lay at the entrance. “I thought he was a vampire,” I said. If I’d realized he was human, I wouldn’t have shot him in the head.
The other human servant—what was left of him—lay on the pavement. Myrddin’s magical attack had blasted his head from his body. Fragments of skull, teeth, and brains littered the ground and stuck to cars and trees.
The sirens were getting closer.
“Juliet,” I said. “Take Mab’s other arm.”
“Ah, Queen Mab,” Juliet said. “‘Reach me thy hand, that I may help thee out.’”
“‘No strength to climb without thy help,’” Mab wheezed, taking her arm.
“Now’s not the time for your Shakespeare game,” I snapped at Juliet. “We have to go.”
“Take me to the taxi,” Mab said. “I need to look inside.”
The sirens sounded like they were a block away.
“Mab, there’s no time.”
“Don’t argue with me, child. Do as I say.”
Juliet and I carried her to the taxi between us.
Mab pulled open the driver’s side door. A body spilled out sideways and lay half in the cab and half on the ground. I stared into the blank eyes of Mack, the taxi driver who’d wanted to bomb Deadtown out of existence. His favorite talkshow ranter shouted from the radio.
I recalled a man hailing the cab down the block from us, when I’d tried to send Mab home. Had that passenger been the
Reaper? When the taxi crashed, I’d assumed the driver was drunk. I was wrong. He wasn’t drunk—he was under attack. The Reaper had done his work and run off, allowing Myrddin to trap the dead man’s departing life force.
I shivered, feeling like a cold gust had blown in from the river. Juliet gasped and stepped back. The sight of human death didn’t usually bother vampires, but I could see why this one might.
A crescent-shaped slash grinned across Mack’s throat. Symbols had been carved into his face and hands. Blood soaked the front of his sweatshirt. Mab lifted his shirt to reveal another symbol scored deep in his chest, over his heart: the eihwaz rune.
My own chest burned.
She nodded, as though she’d seen what she’d expected, and pulled Mack’s shirt back down. She straightened—as much as she could in her aged state.
I took her arm and turned to ask Juliet to take the other. She wasn’t there.
She wasn’t anywhere on Back Street.
Juliet’s gasp. That sudden cold. A chill lingered in the air, along with the stale smell of ancient grave dust. The Old Ones had snatched Juliet away, and I hadn’t even noticed.
The sirens were almost on top of us, and flashing lights splashed across the Berkeley Street intersection. I lifted Mab into my arms, ignoring the pain that gripped my wrist, and ran.
24
AT THE CHECKPOINT BACK INTO DEADTOWN, THE ZOMBIE guard eyed Mab’s ID. He flicked a glance toward her face, then blinked and stared hard. He looked at the ID then back to Mab. ID, Mab. ID, Mab. He typed into his computer and squinted at the screen. He waited, tapping his fingers on his desk, until the computer beeped. He squinted at the screen again. Once more, he compared Mab’s picture with her actual face. Finally, he shrugged. “You should update your photo, ma’am.” His polite voice held a warning. “It will prevent future delays at the checkpoint.” He handed both IDs back to me.
The photo on the card in my hand, taken yesterday, showed someone who could be the daughter of the woman at my side. With each minute that passed, Mab was aging almost visibly. A dowager’s hump had sprouted between her shoulders, and her spine curved like a shepherd’s crook. She clutched my arm with ropy, liver-spotted hands. She could barely walk; I picked her up again so I could carry her through the streets of Deadtown. She turned her face to my shoulder and let me.
At the door to my building, though, she insisted I put her down. “I’ll walk across the lobby myself,” she insisted. Even her voice had aged, to a thin, tremulous, almost-whine.