Alterant (Belador #2)(75)

Another new secret about Tristan, but he kept looking past her to the tunnel, clearly wanting to go.

“Fine. Let’s go get them, but I’m not completely sold on your plan. We may revise it.” She turned to head in the only direction offered and had an odd moment of feeling bad about tracking dirt on rugs. Some were the old braided styles, and others were expensive-looking designs.

“Revise my plan in what way?” Tristan stepped up next to her. The tunnel had an easy six feet of width.

“It may take two of us to get them out of here. I’ll think of Plan B by the time we get there. Any chance Kizira has converted some of these spirits into dangerous ghouls, like that one you had attack me in Piedmont Park?”

He flinched this time at the reminder and muttered, “That was unavoidable at the time.”

“Oh, really? Sort of like my having to send you back to South America?” Before Tristan could go off again on how he’d gotten the shaft, she said, “Just answer the question. What are we up against?”

“I haven’t seen any rabid ghouls. I don’t think the Medb want to piss off these ghosts, with all this energy concentrated into one place. I’ve met some benign spirits, but there’s a few hostile ones down here, too.”

She sized up the slashes in his jeans and shirt, which could have been made by claws. “What’s your next step?”

“To ask the soldier spirit to take a message to Kizira that I’m ready to trade me for the hostages.”

Evalle cast a wary glance at the strange mix of decorations along the tunnel. Junk furnishings had been placed alongside pieces Sotheby’s would salivate to represent. She rubbed her arms against the chill that had settled in her bones, and not entirely from the temperature change. Working back through Tristan’s plan, she remembered something he hadn’t explained. “How am I supposed to get those three Alterants out of here if I can’t teleport?”

“I’ll tell you when it’s time.”

“That’s if you live long enough to tell me.”

“Then you better make sure I stay alive.” He grinned, enjoying having the upper hand. For about five seconds.

An unearthly howl pierced the air. The guttural sound picked up volume quickly as it headed straight for them.

He yelled, “Ah, hell.”

“What is it?”

“The spirit of some guy with a pitchfork who thinks everyone is trying to steal his pigs.”

“Can he hurt us?”

“No, but the damn pitchfork can. Don’t use your kinetic power in here.”

“Why?”

“Been there, done that and got the claw marks to prove it doesn’t work.” Tristan swung around and cursed ghosts, tunnels and the day he was born.

She turned around and saw why.

The tunnel behind them had vanished, hidden by a brick wall that had formed right down to where it cut across the middle of a rug.

The bellowing got louder and echoed everywhere.

She spun back around, and the corridor they’d been walking through originally had now split into two directions. What the . . .

Evidently this maze changed shape and direction at the will of the ghosts down here.

Each length before her appeared identically black, endless and filled with the blood-curdling banshee sound of the spirit racing toward them.

With a pitchfork.





TWENTY-FIVE




In order to be heard over the bellowing spirit, Evalle yelled, “Can’t I even throw up a wall of protective energy?”

They had to do something to stop the crazy ghost she expected to burst into view any minute holding a pitchfork like a weapon.

“Kinetics won’t stop him,” Tristan shouted. The high-pitched screeching could make a human’s ears bleed. “Energy just ricochets and hurts like hell when it hits you.”

Hesitation got you killed. She stared down the long corridor to where in thirty yards the tunnel split like a Y into two directions. “How do we tell which tunnel he’s coming at us from?”

“We can’t.”

“Then what do we do?” Where was a ghost buster when you needed one?

“Run.” He grabbed her hand and ran straight toward the split for the tunnels, dragging her with him.

She jerked her hand away and kept up with him.

Shrieking drilled the air with the power of a warning siren cranked to high in a small space.

Ten feet from the tunnel divide, Tristan veered off into the left vein.

Splitting up would be of no help if either one of them got stabbed. She followed him. Fifty feet into the dark void, gas lanterns started appearing on the wall. Flames danced into view, lighting a passage draped in flowering vines.

Thick patches of clover covered the ground.

Peacefully silent.

Evalle swept a look over her shoulder, then back at Tristan. “Will he follow us?”

“I don’t think so. The two times I saw him he was always running in one direction and only stopped once.”

“What made him stop that time?”

“His pitchfork buried in my chest.”

Was Tristan joking? No. There were three holes in his shirt. “What’d he do after his pitchfork got stuck?”

“Yanked it out and took off running again.”