Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles #2)(14)

I couldn’t say anything about my slowness. Wasn’t like I could back-handspring my escape.

“Mountains. Or Bagger bait,” Jackson said. “That’s between you and your god. Me? I’m heading away from the closest danger.”

There were other things to be said, other questions to be asked—

“Have fun, Empress.” He sneered the word.

“Why are you so angry with me?” I knew anger was his go-to emotion, but he was shaking with it.

He whipped around and stalked toward me. “You. Ain’t. Right. None of you.”

I gasped, rocked to the core. “I-I can’t help the way I am.”

“Doan mean I got to deal with it. You doan need me to babysit you anymore.” He pulled up his hoodie, turned and trudged onward.

“Are you madder about what I am, or that I kept it from you?”

“Split it down the middle. Call it a day.”

“You—you made a promise to my mother to get me to Gran’s!”

He cast a narrow-eyed glance over his shoulder. “You’re goan to pull that shit with me? Fine. Try to keep up, ’cause I’m goan that way.” He pointed to the mountains, as if daring me to follow.

As if hoping I wouldn’t.

While I stood there in shock, Matthew drew up beside me.

“Should we follow Jack?” I asked him.

“I’ll lead you on the correct path. Let you know when you step off it.” He trotted past me, following the Cajun.

That was the correct path? The others looked at me, again like I was their leader.

“We’ll skate close to the edge,” I assured Finn and Selena. “Head south to the end of the range, then cut back for North Carolina. We won’t go deep into the mountains.”

“And if we lose our way?” Finn asked. “There are tons of mines up there. Each one’s filled with cannibals, like ants in a hill. I told you I’d never cross the Appalachians again.”

“I follow Matthew.” Jackson had nothing to do with my choice. Bullshit, Eves.

Selena almost disguised her relief that we’d stick with Jack for now. Finn almost hid his dread. Ahead, Matthew’s steps swerved as he caught rain on his tongue.

“Let’s go. . . .”

For the next half hour, we meandered through the burned-out ghost town, seeing no one, expecting no one. We did pass piles of bodies left over from the Flash, though. Stripped of clothes, they looked like stacked mannequins.

I gazed up at the mountains we were heading toward. The lower parts of the rise had once been covered with forest. The Flash had scorched the trees into charred trunks, resembling power-line poles without the lines. The ground was covered with ash.

Ash. The Flash-fried remains of trees, animals, and people. I shivered, phobic about it. Since the apocalypse, it’d swirled in the windstorms and settled in drifts against the face of that incline.

A low bank of fog poured down the nearest mountain, slinking around the base of it. When it closed in on us, that ominous feeling from earlier thickened till I thought I would choke on it.

Just when I was about to tell the others that I was rethinking this plan, a Bagman wailed behind us. Onward, Evie.

What awaited us in those dark hills?





6

We were being watched.

After trudging uphill in the mud for what seemed like hours, we hadn’t gotten anywhere near the center of this range, so it couldn’t be cannibals. Nor Arcana—none of their calls sounded close by. Nor was it Bagmen; we could hear them baying in the valley below us, held in check by the diluted sun.

For now.

As the afternoon wore on, my foreboding feeling grew and grew. I was dragging ass, huffing and puffing, the acrid scent of burned wood stinging my nose. I’d trained as a dancer for years, but compared to the boys and Selena, my stamina was laughable. The ongoing drizzle provided enough moisture for the ash and mud to congeal like glue.

I’d toppled over so many times, my hands were coated with globs of it, my hair as well. Remains. In my hair.

Finn was just ahead, Matthew at my side like a pilot fish. Selena and Jackson were staggered, far in the lead as we headed for the next valley to the south. She’d mentioned seeing a town there on her map; I supposed we were heading toward it. Jackson must have been as well.

So much had happened in the last twenty-four hours, I struggled to process it all. Arthur’s defeat, the return of some of my memories, the showdown with Joules, the dream of Death.

Jackson admitting what he thought of me.

Selena had been bang-on when she’d said he was disgusted. I would have given anything to talk to him, to explain that I might not be right, but it wasn’t a choice I’d made to hurt him. It wasn’t a choice whatsoever.

“You okay back there, Evie?” Finn asked with a worried look. “Maybe we ought to stop for a minute.”

“I’m fine.” I’m dying! “Got to keep moving.” I would chop off my right, marked hand to stop. We’d never had to contend with mud before. I hoped it would slow down any zombies—or Arcana—who decided to pursue us.

“Okay. Cool.” He carried on ahead as if I’d told him the truth or something.

I could barely talk, but questions were swirling in my head. Under my ragged breath, I said, “Matthew, last night I dreamed of a time when Death stabbed a past Empress with a sword. Did you send me that dream?”