Page 11 of Ride or Die (The Body Shop #5)

T he second my foot touched down on flat ground, a mental picture of the mirashii formed, and I wanted to yank my leg back and climb to a safer height.

Anunit swore there were none nearby, and I trusted her, but I had met enough creatures eager to murder me to be fine with skipping an introduction to this particular one.

Especially reliving the part where it called out my name in a creepy voice that promised my doom.

“You are safe, Frankie Talbot.” Anunit rumbled her amusement when my muscles locked. “I swear it.”

“I trust you.” I braved my first full step onto the barren plain. “I’m just nervous.”

“You have every right to be.” Harrow gripped my shoulder, and I almost jumped out of my skin at the unexpected contact. “But we’re not going to let anything happen to you.” He glanced to Carter and then Josie. “We’ve got your back.”

Ankou strode off without checking to ensure we followed, certain curiosity would win out over caution.

A wavering distortion in the air guaranteed our interest was piqued and that we would stick close.

Without a word of caution, he led me through a barrier with the resistance of a bowl of gelatin fresh out of the fridge. A shiver blasted down my spine as I forced through the cool pressure out to the other side.

Light exploded behind my eyes, and I blinked away the glare of a midday sun as my heels sank into white, powdery sand.

The familiar roar of the ocean filled my ears, and a distinct brine tang tickled my nose.

For all that I knew we were still in Abaddon from the same grim otherworldliness clinging to my skin, we could have been on the beach in front of Dis Pater’s coastal Massachusetts home.

“This was a greenhouse dedicated to carnivorous plants for centuries.” Ankou filled his lungs, tipping his head back.

“The sand and sea were a nice surprise, but they’re recent.

Maybe a decade ago? It appeared sometime after the first Kit Gato book was published.

Or maybe it was after it hit a bestseller list? ”

Meaning Abaddon reflected the gods who inhabited it, going so far as to evolve along with them.

“Too bad we missed the previous incarnation.” Josie let the hot sun beat down on her face. “That would have been a sight to see.” She cracked open an eye. “Dis Pater would still be a murderous dickface, but I would have awarded him bonus points if he’d had any plants for me to pinch.”

“You would have stolen a leaf off every plant,” I countered, “and then torched the place.”

“I hadn’t thought of it until you said it, but yeah. I like how that sounds. Thanks for the idea.”

“None of this is real.” Carter studied the water as if seeing more than the rest of us. “It’s an illusion.”

As hard as fae leaned into glamour, I trusted her to see through even a god’s attempts at fabrication.

“A convincing one.” Harrow scooped up a handful of sand and let the grains slip through his fingers. “I’ve never seen—or felt—anything like it. Does this mean the gray plains are the true face of Abaddon?”

“No one knows.” Ankou spread his hands. “Too many gods have landscaped it to suit themselves. Any of the gods old enough to know are gone, and the new ones only care that their vassals obey their whims.” He heaved a dramatic sigh. “Gods.” He shook his head. “What can you do?”

“Not be an asshole,” Josie suggested then frowned at me. “Make that not be a murderous asshole.”

“All that power,” Carter mused, reeling in her focus, “wasted on folks who won’t use it for good.”

“Good is a lot harder to accomplish than bad.” Ankou attempted to sound wise. “You get tired of putting in the extra hours after a few millennia, and it becomes easier to just go with the flow.”

“How long did it take you to give up?” Harrow pegged him with a flat stare. “Minutes or hours?”

“After you’ve accepted a bargain from a death god to survive a mortal wound on a battlefield, then we’ll see how tight you clutch your pearls.

There’s a reason evil wins so often.” He sank into hot sand up to his ankles as he turned his back on us and trudged on.

“We’re all fucking tired of fighting the inevitable. ”

His fit of temper pushed him ahead of us, but I decided to let him tire himself out rather than chase him.

Walking through sand was its own fun. As in, none whatsoever.

I wasn’t one to run on the picturesque beach at Tybee Island because I preferred solid ground beneath my feet.

Maybe that had something to do with my childhood, the uncertainties that arose from keeping our small family together.

Or maybe I simply hated grit worming into my socks, sandpapering my skin with every step.

“There for a second,” I murmured to Josie after he was out of hearing range, “he sounded genuine.”

“That’s when you know he’s lying.” She stared twin holes through his spine. “Trust me.”

“I don’t like how he keeps angling for the pity vote.

” Harrow fell in step on my other side. “He took you, but we’re supposed to feel sorry for him?

” The hypocrisy of his statement, if I had to guess, was why his cheeks flushed given he had kidnapped Matty not long ago.

“He’s mirroring.” He glanced away. “He sees you hurting for Kierce and beyond exhausted with the gods’ actions, and he wants you to believe you’re in the same boat.

He wants your sympathy. Your cooperation. ” He frowned. “What bothers me is why.”

“He may not realize he’s doing it.” Carter shrugged. “It may simply be part of his programming now, a survival mechanism.”

Sad as it was to admit, she had a point. “You might be right.”

Prior to his cliffside tumble, Ankou had confessed to tailoring his characters to suit the desired outcome.

“I scent your consort.” Anunit, who had been ranging ahead, loped to my side. “Through the trees.”

As if her words summoned them, a copse of palm trees appeared a few dozen yards away from us.

“The cage is just there,” Ankou confirmed. “Walk us through the plan again so there are no surprises.”

“Josie uses her vines to secure the cage door while I talk to Kierce. If he wants to stay, we go. If he wants to come with us, then you get to enact your pinball bone idea. Assuming that much goes right, we get to NOLA via Papa Legba and stick a Suarez in Kierce. Hopefully, that gives us another layer of control over him as well as a barometer for his condition.” I exhaled.

“Once he’s stable, we go for Dis Pater’s throat. ”

A glint sparked in Ankou’s eyes, one I generally associated with the days when Armie had a brilliant idea that was sure to blow up in our faces. I doubted this would end well, but we had come too far to back down.

“Everyone got that?” He rubbed his hands together. “We all know our roles?”

“Do you hear that?” Carter lifted a hand, angling her head to one side. “Sounds like voices.”

“Oh. Yeah. Sorry. Those are woes.” Ankou pointed toward a rocky patch of coastline. “Every time a wave breaks against the stones, it cracks open a woe. You’ll hear one every few seconds, but most aren’t loud enough to be a bother.” He dismissed them with flip of his wrist. “Ignore them.”

Anunit’s whiskers angled forward, and she tilted her head. “Another illusion?”

“They’re very real.” Ankou considered her. “Each one came from someone Dis Pater bargained with who now regrets their life choices. That’s why the tones are distinct. They’re an actual person’s actual voice.”

“That…” Josie shook with a full-body shiver, “…is creepy as fuck.”

“You took the words right out of my mouth, Mary.” I shuddered as we came near enough for me to hear them for myself. “Are there any normal gods?”

“You’re in the wrong pantheon for normal, Bijou. Death gods are, by definition, creepy fucks.”

The limited experience I had with death gods, and their associates, made me inclined to agree.

What had appeared to be a smattering of palms thickened into a dense, junglelike muddle as we trekked over the shifting sands. About the time I was ready to kick off my shoes and socks, I stumbled out onto a pristine stretch of beach and froze at the sight before me.

On a rope strung from the heavens hung a simple bamboo cage large enough to hold a Mardi Gras float.

All it contained was a pale figure, nude, curled on his side with his arms wrapped around his knees.

“Kierce,” I breathed his name, a world of hurt cracking open in my chest.

His head shot up, his gaze locking with mine, and a million emotions shadowed his features.

Then I was running. Straight to him. And all the careful planning flew out the window.

Halfway there, I was struck across the shoulders, and I went down hard.

A childhood spent wrestling with my siblings left me no doubt Josie had been the one who tackled me.

“Frankie.” Kierce clutched at the bars, heaving himself into a seated position. “Frankie.”

The weight on my back bounced a couple of times as Josie called out, “Hey, Birdfriend.”

There was nothing human in his eyes when he stared at her, his upper lip trembling with a snarl.

“Bind the cage,” Carter snapped at her. “Now.”

“Right.” Josie summoned her vine, shooting it across the remaining distance until it latched hold of the bars.

“Come on, baby. Do your thing for Momma.” She wove them with expert precision, zipping up and down the bars in zigzagging stitches until the cage was reinforced in living vine. “That ought to hold him.”

A pained exhale whistled past my lips, and hearing that pathetic groan tore a roar from Kierce’s throat.

“Maybe get off Frankie.” Carter hooked her hands under Josie’s arms and dragged her off, dumping her next to me. “We don’t want to upset him, and he clearly doesn’t want anyone touching her.”

As much as I wanted to believe that was a good sign, that it was evidence he cared, I couldn’t ignore the bars separating us. Remove those, put us face-to-face, and there was no telling what he would do to me.