Chapter 38
THIRTY-EIGHT
Icarus’s bones rattled as the gas-guzzling SUV he rode in with Vincent and Atlas and the grumpy warlock whose name he’d learned was Brock rumbled onto the decrepit auto bridge that spanned the Bay between YB and Encinal.
Most folks who traveled from one side of the Bay to the other took the light rail.
Several miles north, it crossed the Bay at an angle, covering more distance and connecting more stable areas of land.
Their caravan, by contrast, was going from one iffy piece of land to another iffy piece of land over the iffiest of iffiest auto bridges left.
No other cars dared travel on it, but what choice did they have?
Vincent had insisted they roll out with a fleet of gas-powered SUVs, one in front of theirs, two behind them, so there they were, traversing a crumbling metal and cement mass that was one good shake from annihilation.
Icarus was tempted to extend his arm out the window, dig his claws into one of the pylons, and scream through the pain for her to take it all down.
Impossible, unfortunately, with his wrists in Atlas’s favorite pair of silver cuffs, looped through the passenger door handle to further restrict his movement.
At least the asshole had divested him of the too-tight suit coat and wrapped it around his wrists, preventing the cuffs from burning through Icarus’s pants where his hands rested in his lap.
Trapped, Icarus waited and watched, keeping his ears on Vincent and Atlas behind him, one eye on Brock the Rock beside him, and the rest of his attention on the road ahead.
On the island in the middle of the bridge’s span from which Adam and his team would launch their surprise attack.
“You seem tense,” Vincent said.
Icarus twisted as much as the cuffs would allow. “I’m in a tank, in a line of tanks, on a bridge that could fall into the Bay at any second. Of course I’m fucking tense.”
“But I heard you could fly.”
Three days ago. No time at all, and yet it felt like a lifetime had passed since he’d taken the biggest—best—gamble of his life.
He’d stared down at a smiling Adam, borrowed some of his confidence, and leapt, skipping across the water with the Devil in his arms, all the way across the Bay and north.
He’d used the last of his Daylight and had risked exposure and death because Adam was worth it.
Had proven as much every day since. Unlike the power-hungry murderer in the back seat. “You’re not worth flying for.”
Vincent laughed, and Icarus slumped in his seat, focused instead on appearing calm as they approached the quarter-mile tunnel that cut through the rocky outcrop that had survived the Rift.
The neighboring isle had not, but Huchiun’s bedrock—its spirit and ghosts—had held firm, prickling as they drove beneath the tunnel’s arch and lifting the hairs on Icarus’s arms. Atlas stopped speaking midsentence, Brock clutched the wheel so tight it creaked, and Icarus straightened in his seat.
Not appearing tense flew out the window.
Vincent noticed. “What’s going on?” he asked, a rare quiver to his voice. “What’s that smell?”
“Hush,” Atlas ordered his master in a rare show of defiance.
“Consecrated ground,” Icarus said. “It doesn’t like you.”
“Wha—”
The tunnel lights flickered.
A flash of green.
The car slowed.
Icarus steeled himself for the pain that would come from yanking against the cuffs.
The van behind them blew its horn, and Brock hit the gas. Icarus slammed back against his seat, and in the back, Vincent cursed. “Dammit, Brock!”
Atlas slapped the back of Brock’s headrest. “Go!”
Brock kept his foot on the gas, hurtling them through the short tunnel, so close to the lead van that Icarus couldn’t see the other SUV’s tires. Adam would have to time the attack just right. As the end of the tunnel neared, Icarus mentally ran through the possibilities.
A road blockade.
An assault from above.
An explosion, man- or magic-made.
Flickering median lamps outside the tunnel reflected off the roof of the lead car, then on the hood of their SUV, climbing the windshield.
They cleared the tunnel.
The cuffs around his wrists disappeared.
And then . . . nothing.
Their SUV continued charging forward, and it took everything in Icarus to not whip around in his seat and glance back, to confirm with his own eyes, what his mind was telling him. That Adam had deserted him. That he’d read her message wrong.
His heart rebelled.
His heart.
He closed his eyes and blocked out the other voices and heartbeats in the car, the rumble of tires over uneven concrete, the waves crashing below, and searched for Adam’s heartbeat.
Nothing.
He opened his eyes and shifted enough to see in the rearview mirror, the most he could do without being obvious.
Nothing still.
Just Vincent in the back seat, turned the way Icarus wanted to be, staring back at the now-deserted tunnel. “What the fuck was that?”
Bright green eyes clashed with Icarus’s in the mirror. Atlas was as confused as him as to why they were still moving forward without incident. His calm and even voice, however, didn’t give his shock away. “Like Icarus said, consecrated ground. Prepare for more of the same at the shellmound.”
Would the attack happen there? Icarus didn’t think so. He didn’t think she would risk the coven or the remains of the Indigenous people buried there either. What the fuck was going on?
Twenty minutes later, Vincent was screaming the same in his face, Icarus shoved against the side of the SUV, all of Vincent’s soldiers in a line behind their boss, ready to tear Icarus apart as soon as Vincent gave the order. “I told Atlas you were a spy. That you were still working with Devlin.”
“How do you get that?” Icarus shouted back. “Do you see him anywhere?” He would have spread his arms if he could, but the cuffs had rematerialized as soon as they’d reached the end of the bridge.
“I don’t see anyone!” Vincent roared as he did what Icarus couldn’t, spreading his arms and gesturing at the deserted mound of earth behind them.
The grass had grown over the layers and layers of shells and bones; this was one of the Ohlone tribe’s largest ancient burial sites, seemingly undisturbed by witches or otherwise.
“You lied to us about the message, about the coven being here.”
Icarus glared over his shoulder at Brock. “You and your recon team detected activity here earlier today, didn’t you?”
Vincent wasn’t hearing any of it. “You told them to leave.”
“When?” Icarus shrieked. He glanced at Brock again, then at Atlas. “When was I alone today?”
Vincent held a hand out behind him. “Stake.”
“Vincent,” Atlas started.
“Mind your place.”
Atlas promptly shut his mouth, back under his master’s thrall.
Fuck!
“Someone give me a fucking stake!” Vincent roared again.
The vampire from earlier slapped one into his palm. Fucking traitor. Vincent firmed his grip on the thicker end and drew back his arm.
Icarus closed his eyes and recalled the warmth that had enveloped him last night. Thanked whatever fate had put Adam—Gabriel—in his path and prayed the Devil would keep his sister safe when he was gone.
“Boss,” Brock spoke up. “I don’t think we’re alone.”
Icarus popped open his eyes and scanned their dark surroundings. No one in sight.
Caw.
He looked up and gasped. Crows were perched on every roof and eave of the buildings bordering the streets that surrounded the shellmound.
Watching. Waiting.
“Remember what you said this morning,” Atlas spoke evenly, as if any inflection would shatter the eerie stillness, would turn whatever was going on here into the battle they’d all anticipated.
“He’s bait. They’re watching him. For the Devil.
” Vincent’s raised arm wavered. Atlas continued to press.
“We can regroup and use him like we always intended. We can end this, and then no one will stop you from sucking the coven dry.”
Vincent lowered his arm but didn’t step back. Didn’t give an inch as he seethed in Icarus’s face. “Club Sutro, tomorrow night.” His brown eyes hardened, and Icarus didn’t think he’d ever consider the color lovely again. “You’ll die beside him if it’s the last thing I do.”