The Arcana Chronicles 3: Dead of Winter

The spear’s trajectory didn’t arc, just sped in one line. Like a bullet.

He hunched down, covering me right before it hit. The blast reverberated from the door.

The mountain quaked, the ground rumbling. Gravel rained from the ridge shielding us. As the percussion subsided, smoke billowed.

Had we succeeded?

The air began to clear . . . revealing the warped door. Metal had melted, leaving a huge hole.

Aric had done it! I wanted to hug him, but I quashed my excitement. This was only step one.

Besides, he looked anything but celebratory. “Don’t make me regret that, Empress.”

We approached the entrance with caution. Foreboding red emergency bulbs flashed from the interior, the only source of light.

Jack had his bow at the ready in one hand, Milo’s jacket collar in his other. Aric had unsheathed both swords. My claws dripped.

We stepped inside an industrial-looking transition area. Bulky pipes, oversize bolts, welded plates. Orange graffiti covered gray metal walls. In Goth lettering, someone had repeatedly painted:

SMITE STRUCK FALL MAD

In the flashing red lights, those ominous words appeared to move. The same words Matthew had told me.

Jack shoved Milo forward. “Only one way in.” The room had no doors, just an elevator.

“This must be a trap.” Aric swept his gaze.

“Come on, Reaper? You want to live forever?”

“I don’t recommend it.” To me, Aric said, “When we face them, you can’t hold back.”

“I won’t.” Much. I made my way to the elevator. “The twins wouldn’t have expected us to get in so they might not have traps in place. They could be rushing to do something as we speak.” I pressed the call button. “We should hurry.”

The doors yawned wide. Inside, fluorescent lights flicked on and off like those red bulbs.

Aric hastened past me to enter first, sheathing his swords. “Let me look around.” After a few moments, he motioned for me to join him. Behind us, Jack booted Milo inside.

Lit buttons showed thirteen floors. The numbering was reversed; the second floor was below us.

So many levels? This place was like a subterranean hive.

“Should we torture Milo for their floor?” Aric yanked the man’s gag away. “Do you have something to tell us?”

We didn’t have time. “Aric, look at the buttons. Hard.” With his superhuman sight . . . “Can you see which one’s been used most?”

He scanned them. “The six button has the most wear. Fitting, since it’s the Lovers’ card number.” He pressed it.

Milo went ballistic. “You trespass—you have no right! We’re the just defenders, the righteous in this game. We are love’s destruction!”

As the doors slid shut, Aric moved closer to me. Under the crackling lights, Jack and I shared an uneasy glance.

My heart thudded when we began to descend, seeming to inch to the next floor. “I am the lizard’s tail. I am the tail.” Milo kept blathering that. “I’m shed when we’re caught.” He’d said the same thing last night.

What could he mean? Sometimes when a tomcat caught a lizard, the creature would shed its tail, allowing it to escape.

My eyes widened. “Push the emergency stop!” The twins were going to sacrifice their father. We had entered some kind of trap. They would bet on me surviving, regenerating for their torture. “We have to get out of here!”

But Aric was looking up—at the access hatch that had just opened.

A girl peered down, a replicated tableau glimmering over her.

With a giggle, the Violet clone dropped a grenade into the cab—and slammed the hatch shut.

37

Jack had told me about grenades. Once you pull the pin, a grenade is not your friend.

And most exploded within five seconds.

One thousand one . . .

Aric dove for it, just as Jack did. Collision. Cursing. I couldn’t see what was happening in the wavering lights.

One thousand two . . .

Milo kicked at their faces, so I slashed him with my claws. Aric caught the grenade.

One thousand three . . .

He vaulted upward, punching that hatch so hard it flew off the hinges. The Violet clone shrieked. Jack snatched me in his arms, pressing me against the wall. “Brace yourself.”

One thousand four . . .

With a yell, Aric lobbed the grenade straight up through the opening. The only place he could.

Where the cables were. The brakes.

One thousand five—

BOOM!

We . . . dropped. Free fall. That feeling of weightlessness wrenched a scream from my lungs.

“I got you, bébé! We’ll get through this. We’ll get through—”

Landing.

Bone-jarring impact. Grinding metal. Stabbing pain?

The force pitched Jack from one side of the half-crumpled cab to the other. I was held fast. With a swallow, I peered down. A piece of metal had skewered my waist, just over my hip.

Stone and debris plummeted onto the top. The clone gave a cry. More rocks bounced, then spilled through the opening, blood-smeared from the girl above.

I needed to move. Stifling a scream, I stepped forward, nearly collapsing.

“Evangeline!” Jack’s hands searched me for injuries. “Christ, you bleeding?”

“I-I’ll be okay. Are you hurt?”

“Non.”

“Aric?” I asked.

“I’m fine. Milo’s been better.”

He was rolling on the floor, moaning in pain. Stones continued to fall.

Jack gazed up. “We got to go before we get buried.”

Aric unsheathed a sword to pry open the mangled cab doors. “Or before another carnate drops more explosives.” He wrenched one of the doors from its track; it clattered to the floor.

Holding my side, I gazed out into a dimly-lit warehouse. Were those pallets of canned food?

Over the falling rocks, I heard snarling.

Jack snapped a glow stick from his coat pocket, tossing it. The tube skipped across the floor.

When it stopped, I lost my breath.

Bagmen. What must be hundreds of them. All branded.

Milo laughed. “The tail. The tail. Now the cunning lizard gets away.”

With crazed snarls, the horde charged.

Jack shoved me at Aric. “Get her out!”

As Aric lifted me to the hatch, Jack hauled Milo up and tossed him to the oncoming Baggers.

Ignoring the pain in my side, I scrambled to the roof, past the dying clone. A boulder rested on her crushed torso, like she’d caught it.

She smiled at me serenely, as if she were on a train, heading off on an adventure.