Arcana Rising (The Arcana Chronicles #4)(76)

Gabriel cocked his head. “Wait.”

“What do you hear, friend?” Joules murmured, producing another baton. Though he usually sounded like a streetwise bruiser, sometimes when he spoke to Gabriel, he seemed younger, not as coarse.

Made me wonder what the Lord of Lightning had been like before the apocalypse. Before Calanthe’s gruesome death.

“A . . . helicopter is, in fact, approaching us,” Gabriel told him. “Somehow, Zara has our location.”

“Leave me, Gabe.”

The Archangel shook his head. “If I had a dollar for every time you have said those words . . . And I give you my customary reply: Never.”

I frowned at my feet. A tremor? I heard the copter in the distance and . . . crackling asphalt? The need to fight and kill blistered me inside, the heat of battle burning as hot as the flames I’d nearly walked into four months ago. But without a plan and prep, we couldn’t take on a military copter and earthquakes.

Aric snapped, “Into the truck, sievā!”

I hurried toward it. Across the lot, fissures forked out like Joules’s lightning. My jaw dropped as Finn’s abandoned sedan plummeted into one. An explosion rocked the area.

I reeled, clutching the door handle. Aric appeared behind me to shove me into the truck. As he raced to his seat, the back door opened on my side.

Joules and Gabriel piled in! The falcon screeched when Joules elbowed Finn to move over.

Aric slid behind the wheel, his demeanor lethal. In a low tone, he said, “I’ve been known to grant Death wishes.”

Gabriel retracted his silky wings, but they were still huge in such a confined space. “We respectfully request a trues.” As Matthew had called an Arcana truce.

Another quake. More fissures snaked around our truck.

Four voices cried to Aric, “Go!”

With a muttered curse, he gunned the engine. “If we escape, I will be tossing you from this vehicle, and when I do, I’ll most likely slit your throats.”





46





Aric sped through the parking lot, his quick reflexes adjusting our course as quakes continued. He expertly veered toward the exit, then out onto the highway. The engine roared as the truck raced forward.

He narrowed his eyes at the rearview mirror, telling Joules, “One of Fortune’s missiles takes out five of us. Five. She will unleash everything in her arsenal to hit this truck.”

“Looks as if you drive like you do everything else. So don’t bloody let it take us out!”

Finn cast his former friends a glare, then turned from them, speaking to the falcon in a hushed voice.

Joules swiped a hand over his face. “How the feck did they find us? The Sun’s Baggers?”

“I didn’t scent any,” Gabriel said. “They have a very distinctive scent.”

Joules asked Aric, “Can the Sun disguise it?”

Aric glanced at me. “Empress?”

“Maybe. If he washed their skin. The slime is what stinks.”

“Oi, what makes her the expert?”

Eyes on the congested highway, Aric absently answered, “She spent several days in the Sun’s company.”

“Damn, Empress. You move fast.”

I stiffened.

Aric grated, “You do wish to die, Tower.”

A new crevasse opened up not two feet away from the truck. “Uh, Aric.” I stared down. “Fissure directly to our right.” It ripped along as fast as we drove.

He answered, “And one on my left.”

I craned my head around and got my first look at Zara’s terrifying new weapon. The helicopter’s shape was angular and sharp, with huge guns mounted beneath it. The painted nose looked like a dragon’s roaring mouth, fangs glinting.

Zara hovered above the fiery remains of Finn’s car. “She’s checking out the explosion. Maybe she’ll think some of us were in the car. . . .” My words trailed off.

The copter smoothly rotated in a controlled circle, like a roulette wheel. Where she stops, nobody knows.

Carousel. Roulette. Tourniquet.

Symbols. Waypoints . . .

The copter stopped swiveling, the creepy nose pointing straight at us. “Floor it!” I cried. “They’ve seen us.” The nose dipped down as the copter accelerated.

Gabriel’s black wings twitched. “What’s that sound?”

I blinked, disbelieving my eyes. “She’s fired a missile!”

“Hold on, sievā.” Aric’s intent look scared the hell out of me.

I faced forward. “Cars, Aric.” A pair of wrecks were too close to each other—no way he could squeeze through that tight opening. Yet he accelerated as he headed right for them. His expression was cold focus, his jaw clenched.

Oh. Shit.

“Out of me way!” Joules cried, scrambling for the door.

Falcon in his arms, Finn dove for the back.

Joules lengthened a javelin. Before I could warn him, he’d cracked open the back door and tried to lob a bolt—

Metal on metal shrieked. Side mirrors tore away. A shower of sparks lit the night, and the door slammed shut on Joules; his javelin recoiled and jabbed Gabriel’s wing.

Zara’s missile struck the wreck on the left, sending pieces high in the sky. Aric dodged a plummeting wheel. An axle.