Page 141

His voice broke, and even though we didn’t have time for it, I put a hand on his arm.He’d suffered so much to put his family back together, tried so hard for so long—it couldn’t all be for nothing.“This isn’t over,” I said, and the dark brown eyes met mine.

“That is what Dorina said.That she would come back to me, would find a way—”

“And you think she did.”

“I think they let her, followed her, used her, and then killed her!”Mircea said, his eyes suddenly flooding red.“They played us—”

“Maybe they got through another way,” Alphonse said, only to have an enraged master vampire turn on him.

“There was no other way!And what do you think happened to her as soon as she opened that gate for them?Thinking she was coming home to me?”

“The same thing that is about to happen to us,” Æsubrand said, as the scholar came in again, screaming.Only it sounded more like a warning now.

“Billy—”

“Ahead of you,” he said, but Rhea grabbed my arm.

“Remember, if you win, you lose!”

“I don’t need to remember; you’re coming with us!”

“I’m already there,” she said and stepped back before I could stop her.And then Billy pulled the rest of us into the Paths of the Dead.

“No!” I screamed.But it was too late.The gods were suddenly everywhere, a boiling, clawing mass of them, and the last thing I saw was Rhea disappearing under their weight before the white nothingness took us.“Rhea!”I screamed.

“Cassie!Cas!”Billy was shaking me, and I was trying to focus, but I couldn’t—

“Why would she do that?”I yelled as Æsubrand grabbed me and started dragging me away.“Why would she—”

“She was under a curse,” Pritkin reminded me.“She couldn’t leave.”

“Cas!Listen to me!”Billy yelled.

“No, we have to go back!We have to help her!”

“Maybe she’ll come to us,” Butch Cut said.“If she’s a ghost now…”

“The gods feed onlife energy!” I said savagely.“There won’tbea ghost!”

Billy slapped me hard.“Where.Do.We.Go?”

“What?”I stared at him.

“Go!Go!‘Cause we’re about to have a shit ton of gods in here, and with that many, it won’t take ‘em long to find us!”

“Her father,” Pritkin said suddenly.

“What?”

“Take us back to Roger Palmer!He is about to cast a spell to return to the past; we’re going to ride it!”

Everybody looked at him like he was crazy, maybe because dear old Dad was more likely to throw us in the Hole to help power the spell than take us along.But I didn’t see an alternative, and I guessed they agreed.Because nobody argued when Billy started off.

And then sped up when screams of rage burst into being behind us, as the gods realized that most of their prey had eluded them.

“Fuck!”Billy said, because there was no time for anything else.And we weren’t far enough inside the Paths to hide, evade, or do anything—

Except that, I thought, as he pulled us back out again.