Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The barn was dry and warm enough. We’d found some old blankets and distributed them. People were huddled together at the back of the structure, fast asleep, while our monster escort guarded them like precious cargo.
Bastian, Javier, Jamie, and I camped as close to the exit as possible, wanting to keep an eye on the monsters as they guarded the barn.
My father hadn’t regained consciousness; instead he’d developed a fever.
Sarq and Tumiel took it in turns watching over him, and the wrapped-up sword remained in Tumiel’s possession, strapped to his back.
I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Shem since our little altercation, which was fine by me. I glanced at the door as a shadow passed, expecting to catch a glimpse of him, but it was Zaqiel making the rounds. My heart sank and anger bit at my chest.
“They’re different,” Javier said.
“Intelligent, yes,” Jamie said. “Which makes them more dangerous.”
I ignored the flutter in my belly, a flutter that was part fear, part curiosity.
“We have a plan,” Bastian said. He looked at the guys as if asking them if he could divulge.
The guys nodded.
“No.” I speared each of them with a hard look. “You’ll do nothing that might get you killed. Our people need you.”
Bastian pressed his lips together, eyes flashing with annoyance.
Jamie ignored me, recounting their plan.
“Once everyone gets to the golden city and through those gates, they won’t need us anymore.
You’re an anomaly, Rue. You wielded a celestial sword.
The celestials will want to know about that.
It should be enough for them to mount a rescue. To take you from the monsters.”
His words spawned hope that I couldn’t help but latch on to. “Do you think so?”
“We’re sure of it,” Bastian said. “Humans aren’t meant to be able to wield celestial swords.”
He had a valid point, but the question was, would my existence be enough for the celestials to mount a rescue mission?
I leaned my head back against the wall. “I can’t get my hopes up and I don’t want you guys to either.”
“You want us to just let that monster have you?” Jamie asked. The turmoil in his eyes made my stomach hurt.
I kept the fear off my face. “If it comes to that, then yes. If it comes down to it, then I’ll fend for myself, and if possible, I will find a way back to you guys.”
“Stop.” Javier shook his head. “Stop talking as if we could just walk away from this. Trust me, Rue, we will do whatever it takes to make sure you end up with us. With our people. No man gets left behind.”
Shem’s hulking figure appeared in the doorway. “Herald claw incoming. Stay quiet, stay inside.”
He slammed the doors shut, leaving us in relative darkness. The only light was from the moon, shining in from gaps in boarded-up windows.
Some of the people at the back of the barn stirred, but Jamie stood and approached them, finger to his lips.
“What’s a herald claw?” Javier whispered.
“I don’t know,” Bastian said.
I crossed the barn to the boarded window, moving on the balls of my feet and keeping low. There was enough of a gap to see out, to catch the dart of shadow that could be our monsters or these herald claws Shem had mentioned.
Jamie joined me, standing so close I could smell his cologne mixed with his sweat, an aroma that made my belly clench with familiar desire.
The farmhouse was visible several yards away, sitting dark, abandoned, and wreathed in shadows. I caught a glimpse of something pale.
“Jamie, did you see that?”
He didn’t have the chance to answer before the creature detached itself from the darkness and crawled into the moonlight.
It looked like a huge misshapen dog with an oblong head and powerful haunches, but its front legs were more like elongated arms bent at the elbows with huge, clawed hands for grabbing and manipulating.
I’d never seen anything like it before, but then we’d never been this far away from base before. These were the deadlands, and this was our first encounter with a Type X.
The creature prowled forward and raised its head, twin slashes for nostrils opening and closing.
It was sniffing the air. Sniffing us out. More pale monsters crept out from behind the farmhouse to join the first. Six in total.
The first continued to sniff, moving closer to the barn, and then it turned its head to the side so one flat, dark eye was looking right at us.
I bit back a gasp. There was no way it could see us, right?
It tipped back its head and its wide mouth fell open, revealing rows and rows of teeth before a trumpeting sound erupted from its maw.
It echoed into the night like a beacon.
My scalp tightened with fear and foreboding, which were answered in the next moment when several more heralds came into view atop the farmhouse. They clung to the slate, moving sinuously and with purpose.
Where were our monsters? Where were Shem and his minions?
An awful thought occurred to me…What if they were gone? What if they’d left us here as food for these creatures?
But before I could voice my concern, an epic winged figure swooped down from the night sky and snatched up one of the claws on the roof.
There was no mistaking Shem’s epic wings tipped with talons as they beat at the night air, no tearing my eyes away from his triumphant expression as he ripped off the herald’s head.
The creature’s body dropped onto the roof, and for a moment there was deathly silence.
Then all hell broke loose.
Our monsters descended on the heralds with talon and claw, faster and stronger than these beasts, tearing into them with cold, ruthless precision, as if they knew just where to strike, knew exactly where these creatures’ vulnerable spots were.
There was no way we’d have been able to fight these monsters. If not for Shem and his minions, we’d be dead.
The realization that we needed them, really needed them, made my chest tighten.
Behind me people were waking up, disturbed by the sound of battle outside.
“Hush,” Bastian ordered. “We have to be quiet.”
I kept my eye on the scene ahead, on Shem as he took out another herald, tearing its spine from its body as easily as deboning a fish. Something stirred inside me, excitement…heat.
No.
I made to back away from the window but movement to the right of the fight caught my attention. Two heralds, unnoticed by Shem and his crew, were creeping toward the barn. One was bigger than the others with blue markings on his face.
“Jamie!” I grabbed his arm.
“It’s okay, they can’t get in,” Jamie said.
The heralds were out of view now, somewhere around the side of the barn.
Where were they?
My question was answered a moment later when we heard their claws scraping on the roof.
Jamie, Javier, and Bastian ushered everyone to a safe spot beneath the loft, and for once the group listened, staying silent and compliant.
I guess they’d learned that panic got you killed.
Jamie and Bastian drew their swords, heads tipped back as they tracked the heralds’ movement above. The glow of their tattoos joined the moonlight lancing across the hardwood floors.
“Rue, come on.” Javier grabbed my hand and pulled me beneath the loft.
I grit my teeth against the impotence of my situation. If those fuckers got in, then it was two on two, which sounded fair until you took into consideration the size of the monsters. I needed the sword I’d found. I needed to be able to help.
Instead, I crouched in silence with the rest of our party, hoping that the monsters who’d agreed to protect us would notice the heralds on the roof before they—
The splinter of wood was followed by a rush of air and the two heralds landed on the ground with a crash.
The silent party broke into screams.
One of the heralds trumpeted while the other attacked Bastian and Jamie.
It moved so fast, whipping between the two, using its head to snap and its tail to thrash.
Jamie and Bastian barely had time to strike, too busy using evasive maneuvers, and when the second herald joined in, they were simply working as a team to stay alive.
They couldn’t last much longer. I had to do something.
We needed a distraction, something to draw the monsters’ attention and give the guys a chance to strike a blow. I spotted a rusty rake in the corner of the barn.
“Rue, don’t.” Javier grabbed my arm.
I shook him off. “I have to.”
I made a break for the rake. The heralds didn’t pay me any attention, too fixated on the sweepers and their glowing swords. Plenty of time for me to grab the useless weapon and charge the monsters with a battle cry worthy of a warrior.
Javier let out a bellow from behind me, but it was the heralds I was focused on, specifically the one with prongs of my rake in its ass. It twisted with a roar, teeth snapping at air as I leapt back, taking the rake with me.
Jamie took the opportunity to stab the herald in the neck and the beast turned on him, snarling and snapping, moving too fast to be seriously wounded.
Fuck.
“Rue, get back!” Bastian and Jamie cried in unison.
The second herald, the one with the blue markings, spun toward me and its tail whipped round, smashing into Bastian hard enough to send him flying across the barn.
I jabbed the rake to ward it off, but it advanced, head low, body moving with lethal intention.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. My gaze flicked to Bastian, out cold against the barn wall. There would be no assistance from him, and Jamie was busy trying not to get his face bitten off.
Yeah, my assessment that we’d have been fucked against these monsters was spot-on, and now I was going to get my ass eaten by one of them, and not in a nice way.
Stop it. Not the time for internal jokes.
“Rue!” Javier rushed forward waving a pitchfork. The herald didn’t take its eyes off me, but its tail whipped out to slug Javier with a sickening crunch that sent him flying.
“No!” I backed up, body slick with sweat as I resisted the urge to turn and run, because turning my back on this thing was not an option.
I noted the tension rippling through the herald’s body, the way its haunches bunched. It was about to pounce.
Then it did, arcing through the air toward me, fucked-up claw hands splayed, ready to curl into hooks on contact.
A strange calm settled over me as I looked death in the eye, but instead of the sting of talons piercing my flesh there came a gust of icy air. A winged figure landed between me and the herald.
“Shem…”
His wings flared wide, catching the air and grounding him as the herald slammed into him. I staggered backward, giving him the space he needed to bring the beast down.
But this herald was wily, stronger than the ones Shem had encountered outside. The blue markings on its snout had to mean something.
Shem’s wings snapped and folded against his back, arm muscles bulging as he held the herald in a headlock. The monster bucked and scrabbled, claws digging into the hardwood floor to give it purchase and drag Shem back and forth.
The barn doors flew open and Tumiel barreled in. He rushed to Jamie’s aid, grabbed the herald’s open maw with his bare hands, and ripped its face open with a roar.
Jamie fell back, nursing a bleeding arm.
“Shem!” Tumiel took a step toward his leader but the sharp crack of the herald’s neck breaking halted him. “Fuck.” He stood, chest heaving, hands coated in blood. “Fuck.”
Shem dropped the herald and rounded on me. His gaze dropped to the rake in my hand and the next moment he was advancing on me, rage coloring his features.
“What were you thinking, hmmm? You think you can go up against a herald claw with a rake?”
“I was trying to distract it.”
“Shem…” There was warning in Tumiel’s tone.
He ground his teeth, fists clenching and unclenching. “She could have been killed.”
“But she wasn’t,” Tumiel said. “She wasn’t.”
Shem’s eyes narrowed, still fixed on me. “Let me get something straight. You die, they all die. I’ll make sure of it. Do you understand?”
I nodded mutely.
He grabbed the herald’s corpse and dragged it out of the barn.
The crisis was over.
For now.