Chaos Choreography (InCryptid, #5)(114)

There was an explosion above me as the grenade went off, and warm wetness splattered over the world, marking the giant snake’s demise. That was a good thing. I had succeeded.

Then I hit the edge of the stage, and stopped thinking about anything but pain, even as the stage shook from the impact of the snake’s body, which fell beside me and mercifully not on top of me.

“Verity!” Dominic’s shout was loud and terrified.

I opened my eyes and pushed myself up on one hand, trying not to look as sick and disoriented as I felt. “Anybody get the number of that freight train?”

“You’re alive!” Dominic dropped to his knees, wrapping his arms around me and setting off a whole new cascade of exciting agony.

“Your ex-partner isn’t,” said Malena. I turned toward the sound of her voice. Her dress was shredded, but she was relatively clean, presumably because she’d been outside the blast radius when the grenade went off. She wrinkled her nose before continuing, “Snake landed on him. Asshole deserved it.”

“Clint!” I pulled away from Dominic, scrambling to my feet. Everything hurt. I had never let that stop me before. “Where is he?”

“Here.”

Alice sounded pleased with herself. As well she should have; she was standing over Clint’s body, tying his hands behind his back. She beamed when she saw me looking her way. “Hi, baby girl. I’m going to take this back to my home base with me, if that’s okay. I have some friends who have strong opinions about pulling endangered super-snakes through the walls of the world.”

I blinked. “Oh. Okay.”

Pax came trotting up. “We have a problem.”

“Of course we have a problem. Is there ever a time when we don’t have a problem?” I looked at him. “What’s the problem?”

His face was a grim mask, streaked with blood and lacerated where he’d been sliced by the snake’s scales. “We’ve been on the air this whole time.”

Slowly, I turned to the nearest camera. The red light was on. The red light had never gone off.

“Oh,” I said.

“We need to get out of here,” said Malena.

“Too late,” I said. Dominic and Alice had both appeared on camera. Even if the Covenant didn’t include any fans, someone would put this on the Internet. Someone would already have put this on the Internet. The Covenant would watch. They would see.

They would know we were still out there.

As if in a dream, I walked toward the camera, reaching up with one hand to pull my wig off. It was so sodden with blood that it felt like a dead animal in my hand. I dropped it and kept walking.

Then the red light was right in front of me, and I was looking straight into the lens. I pulled the gun from the back of my dress.

“My name is Verity Price,” I said, enunciating each word clearly and distinctly. “This is my continent. Stay the hell out.”

The sound of my gunshot was somehow softer than the sound of the lens shattering.

Silence fell.





Epilogue




“Everything changes.”

—Frances Brown

A cavern underneath Manhattan, surrounded by dragons

Two weeks later

OSANA AND CANDY WERE LOCKED deep in negotiations, the members of their respective Nests milling around them. The L.A. dragons were trying to act like they weren’t awed and speechless in William’s presence, while the Manhattan dragons were trying to act like they weren’t prepared to commit murder to protect their husband. Good times all around. I was sticking close to William, staying out of the way and observing the chaos without involving myself in matters that didn’t involve me.

“This is really okay with you?” I asked, for what must have been the tenth time.

William chuckled. “Yes,” he said, in a cultured English accent that would have sounded perfectly reasonable coming out of a human man, but was a little weird coming from a lizard the size of a Greyhound bus. “This is as it has always been for us. I was sold shortly after I was hatched, to a Nest capable of sustaining me. Our ways may seem odd to you, but I assure you, they’ve worked for a long time.”

“I believe you,” I said. I was leaning against the cavern wall, trying to look casual and hide how much the descent had taken out of me. I was still healing after my fall from the giant snake. I’d managed to crack my pelvis when I hit, in addition to leaving bruises along the length of my legs and hips. It was a good thing the rest of the season had been canceled after our little “special effects display.” There was no way I would have been able to dance.

Adrian was in a lot of trouble with the network, since we’d violated more than a few FCC rules during the fight—but the show’s ratings had been spectacular, and he was going to be all right. He was a human cockroach. He always found a way to come out ahead.

“Are you well, Miss Price?”

“As well as I’m going to get.” I closed my eyes.

Malena and Pax had gone home to their respective families, melting back into the therianthrope communities they belonged to. Pax would be fine. He could live in the water until all this blew over. I was more concerned about Malena, but she’d assured me she’d be okay, and I was choosing to believe her. She had my number if things got bad.