Page 9 of Ride or Die (The Body Shop #5)

A gleeful whoop split the air, jerking me back from the edge, but I couldn’t tear my eyes off Ankou as he fell, hitting every rock on the way down. All the way down.

“I can’t believe you did that.” Josie leaned over so far Carter hooked a finger through her belt loop, just in case.

“I can’t believe you didn’t let me do that.

” She pumped her fists in the air. “God, I wish phones worked here. I would have recorded the shit out of that, rewatched it a million times, and never gotten tired of it.”

There was no satisfying smack when he hit bottom. He got lucky, well, lucky ish , and bounced off a ledge. His broken body got wedged in a shallow crevasse before he could hit the barren stone plains where the mirashii roamed in search of me.

“I didn’t plan it, or I would have let you do the honors.” I could kick myself for causing the delay. “He pissed me off, and I reacted.”

“Like when you reacted earlier and punched his lights out,” Carter drawled, her eyes alight with the thrill of secondhand violence. “I’ll go out on a limb and guess he was talking about your sister.”

“Something along those lines.” As tempted as I was to climb down, unstick him, then toss him the rest of the way to the bottom, I had to be practical. Too bad I hadn’t come to that conclusion three minutes ago. “Now what do we do? We can’t just aimlessly wander. Do we go help him?”

“Nah.” Josie lifted a shoulder then dropped it. “He’s twitching, so I’m sure he’s fine.”

“I will fetch him.” Anunit whipped her tail. “I do not wish to wait.” She smiled at Harrow, all teeth. “The Harrow has agreed to feed me crawfish we will hunt together and then boil alive.”

“You claimed you only highjacked Harrow so you could savor tastes one last time before you passed on.” I eyed her with a healthy dose of suspicion. “Has that changed for you here?”

“Yes.” Her dark eyes sparkled with ravenous delight. “These flavors are not as rich as foods at the buffet of eat it all, but it is invigorating to experience these sensations with my own tongue.”

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself.” I didn’t get out more than that before she began leaping nimbly down to Ankou’s level. “So.” I speared Harrow with a look. “You agreed to take your kidnapper fishing then feed her from your crawfish boil.”

“She kept licking my fingers.” He suppressed a shudder. “It weirded me out, okay?”

Not as much as it would weird him out if she body snatched him again for the sake of tasting her food.

“And your knee-jerk response to having your fingers licked was…” Josie snickered, “…to reach for your fishing pole?”

“Josie, behave.” Carter, still gripping Josie’s belt loop, yanked her back to safety. “I know it’s hard, but you can do it.”

“I bet Harrow’s fishing pole is hard,” she cackled, waggling her eyebrows at Harrow.

“Stop saying hard .” Harrow smoothed down his shirt. “And quit talking about my fishing pole.” Shivers rippled through his shoulders as he shrugged off his unease. “Besides, I set traps for crawfish.”

“I bet you do.”

“She should have been spanked more as a child,” Carter informed me like it was my fault.

“I’m willing to make up for lost time.” Josie shook her butt at Carter, who rolled her eyes skyward as she released her with a long-suffering sigh. “Your face.” Josie dissolved into laughter. “You’re adorable.”

“I’m a redcap.” Carter glowered at Josie. “I’m not adorable.”

“Agree to disagree.” She tweaked the grumpy redcap’s nose. “Hey…”

“Hey what?” I dipped my gaze to Anunit, expecting the problem to be there. “What is it?”

“Do you guys hear that?” Josie stepped around Carter. “It sounds like running water.”

“I haven’t seen any water sources since I got here,” I admitted, “but there must be one somewhere.”

Next to me, Harrow scanned the terrain for clues. “Whatever it is, it’s getting closer.”

Straining my ears, I finally picked up on the noise, but it was more of a rustle than a rush to my ears.

“I don’t think that’s water.” I rocked back on my heels, away from the edge. “Carter?”

“Definitely not water.” She nudged Josie behind her, tucking my sister between her and the rock wall we had been skirting for hours. “It’s almost like someone dragging something, but that rhythmic shushing…”

“I’ll check it out.” Harrow located a solid handhold, prepping to climb, when a serpentine head emerged above us, gazing down at us with fangs as long as my torso on display. “Or maybe it will check us out.”

“It’s got a spade-shaped head.” Josie peeked over Carter’s shoulder. “That means it’s venomous.”

And our handy-dandy creature killer was several yards straight down with no hope of reaching us before the snake had a chance to strike. That left me. But I had to act fast. “I’m going to?—”

Before I finished the thought, vines shot from Josie’s pocket. They struck the serpent in the snout, wrapping its jaws, piercing its glinting scales. She yanked until she had muzzled the beast and forced its maw shut.

“Mary.” I swung my head toward her, impressed at her speed. “That was?—”

Impact drove me to my knees beneath a weight I had no hope of shifting off me, and I gasped as oxygen crushed from my lungs. An oddly warm pressure slid across me, rasping my skin with a metallic edge.

Oh no.

No, no, no.

That snake had not just landed on top of me.

Except, as it looped me in a coil and began to squeeze, I had to face the facts.

That snake had just landed on top of me.

And, apparently, it had decided that if it couldn’t swallow us whole, it would settle for constricting me to death. This must be karmic retribution for whining about how I didn’t get enough hugs as a kid.

With impending doom staring me in the face, I had no choice but to reach into that well of power at my core and let my consciousness drift.

The light seeping from the serpent stung my eyes with its brilliance.

I had never seen a soul this large, but I managed to frame it between my palms and focus my energy on snuffing out its spark.

Shrill screams rang distantly in my ears as ash flurried around me.

Then I was blinking away the fuzzy edges crowding my vision.

Black smudges marred my shaking hands, and a mountain of charred remains pressed down on and around me.

I clawed out an opening wide enough to suck in oxygen and locked gazes with Josie, who trembled in the unwavering circle of Carter’s arms.

“You didn’t need help coming back to yourself,” she rasped, searching my face for answers. “You just…”

“It’s easier here.” Tearing my eyes from hers, I swallowed hard around the truth. “To kill.”

“This is the land of the dead, and you’re a death demigoddess.” Harrow kicked a path clear, linked our forearms, and hauled me out. “Don’t make it deeper than it is, okay?”

“No promises.” I flexed my fingers. “Death shouldn’t be that simple.”

The first time I extinguished a soul, back at St. Mary’s, I lost myself to the magic.

To protect Josie, I killed one of the sisters.

I felt no remorse for it. Not then and not now.

But it had sucked me in, whispered the path forward meant letting go of the past, of myself.

To end a life that way, I had to break free of my physical self, to almost astrally project myself into my victim.

And, as Vi had warned me, the danger in my soul wandering was in how easy it was to lose that anchor to my body and drift into the unknown.

Terrifying as it was to endure that each time, I was grateful for the fear.

It kept me from falling back on a power that should never be used lightly or without careful consideration of the outcome.

Abaddon made dipping into that well of power easy.

Too easy. Death shouldn’t be as quick as clenching my fist.

“You’re…growing into…your powers.”

Whipping my head right, I watched as Anunit crested the outcropping that would bring her level with us. Ankou, bruised and bloodied, hung from her mouth by the scruff of his neck. “You survived, I see.”

“No thanks…to…you.”

With a horking noise, Anunit spat him at my feet, clearly stating he was now my problem.

“Yes, well, I would say I’m sorry, but I’m not.” I nudged him onto his back with my shoe, cataloguing his injuries. “How long before you can walk?”

“So…cold…Bijou.”

“Nah. Cold would be if I asked you to point in the general direction we needed to go then told you to catch up when you can. I’m offering to wait for you.

” Not out of the kindness of my heart, but because I couldn’t risk letting him out of my sight in case he lied about Kierce’s whereabouts. “For a reasonable amount of time.”

“Maybe an hour.” He tested each arm then his legs. “My left ankle is broken, and my right wrist is too.” He pressed his fingers to his abdomen and then his head. “If I can heal those, I’ll be good to finish this.”

“Okay.” I moved away from him, choosing to stand with the others. “I can spare an hour.” I gave Josie a side hug. “And if you’re not ready by then, Josie will use her vines to tie your ankles, and we’ll drag you.”

After the longest sixty minutes of my life, helped along by Josie’s insistence we play Truth or Dare, which was asking for trouble when you mixed two exes with two people in a situationship and granted them all permission to dig up dirt or embarrass one another on their turn, Ankou murmured the sweetest words I had heard since opening my eyes.

“I can manage now.”

Manage was a bit optimistic for how wobbly Ankou was, but Harrow consented to walking alongside the god blood with a firm grip on his upper arm to keep him from toppling over and—God forbid—tumbling over the edge.

Once had been cathartic. Twice was just gratuitous.

Not that I wouldn’t enjoy an instant replay, but I was itching to set my eyes on Kierce.

A small eternity later, Ankou shook off Harrow and began testing his strength and reflexes.