Witch's Pyre (Worldwalker #3)(57)

“Great,” Lily mumbled. She took out a long-sleeved hoodie from her pack and put it on, opting to swelter rather than burn.

Tristan counted the remaining water bottles and glanced at the map. “It’s not bad news, but it isn’t great,” he told Rowan. “We have enough to get us to the next gas station across the dunes, but that would be pushing it.”

“We’ll push it, then,” Rowan said. He didn’t have to remind them that they couldn’t wait a few hours for the sun to set. They had to keep moving.

Rowan took one of the water bottles and shook a combination of herbs into it. “Here,” he said, pulling Lily aside and giving her the spiked water. “It will give you a temporary burst of energy.”

Lily drank it down and felt a jittery lightness quicken her muscles and widen her eyes. The coven set off into the dunes, gliding with unnatural speed over the sand.

Carrick heard the crackle of speech coming through the black device on Simms’s hip and adjusted his uniform to cover the spot of blood on the collar. So many officers had come and gone while Simms plowed on without sleep that she hadn’t noticed when Carrick “replaced” the former occupant of this particular uniform and made himself a fixture at her side.

“A group of teenagers that fit the description was just seen heading toward Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado,” said the disembodied voice. “They had California plates.”

The voice went on to recite the number and letter combination that Carrick had seen on the van. It was Lily’s coven. Somehow Simms’s face lit up with recognition, although she hadn’t seen the plate number as Carrick had.

“That’s them,” she said into the device. “I want them followed, but no one is to approach until I get there.” Simms turned to another officer in plainclothes. “Start the chopper,” she said. Her eyes were dilated and Carrick could smell adrenaline-tinged sweat starting to seep up through her pores, but the other officer balked.

“We’ve gotten a dozen of these calls,” he argued. “Half the high school graduates in the US are taking road trips to the national parks right now. Why don’t we have the locals pull them over and send us pictures for our informant to identify?”

“Abbot, it’s them,” Simms said. “I know it. We’re just wasting time.” Her irrational vehemence only weakened her position in the other officer’s eyes.

The officer sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “It’s been a really long couple of days.”

“It’s them,” Simms promised quietly. “Something’s been wrong with this whole situation right from the start. Strange disappearances. Ritual murders. And now talk of a nuclear weapon. We need to stop them before they do something . . .” Simms trailed off, unable to pinpoint what it was she thought they might do.

“We don’t know it’s even them,” he began.

Simms didn’t stay to hear the rest. She stepped around the other officer and went outside to order the chopper for herself.

“Damn it,” Abbot said, giving in. “Send backup to her location.”

“How much?” another officer asked.

“All of it,” Abbot answered, throwing up his hands.

Carrick followed Simms outside. She was shouting at the helmsman of a small aircraft that had rotary blades on top. The blades seemed to chop the air, and Carrick put two and two together.

“I am in charge here, not Abbot,” Simms was yelling at the helmsman, “and I don’t think I need to remind you that these are terrorists we’re dealing with, and—” She noticed another figure approaching the aircraft. It was Miller, the informant. “What are you doing here?” she shouted at the desperate young man.

“I’m coming with you,” he said. “It’s her, we both know it.” Miller shifted from foot to foot. “I have to come with you.”

Simms looked at Carrick as if noticing him for the first time. “And you?”

“Chief Abbot ordered me to go with you,” he lied smoothly. Carrick looked at the helmsman. “He said we’d better get moving,” he said with the hint of warning that two underlings would use while dealing with petulant superiors.

The helmsman threw up his hands and starting hitting buttons. “Everyone in,” he said.

Carrick jumped up into the back row of the chopper and let Simms take the place in front of him. Not that she noticed him, anyway. Both she and Miller were too intent on being near Lily’s power to care about anything else. Carrick smiled slightly and stared at the back of Simms’s head while the chopper took to the sky.

People always looked the wrong way when they were looking forward to something, he thought.

Lily. Simms has found you. She’s in flight and approaching rapidly with many people in uniform following behind. They heard you discussing Alaric’s bombs and they gave you a special name that has swelled the ranks of your opposition.

What name?

Terrorist.

Lily stopped and looked across the street at the gas station that was just a few hundred yards away, the word still whispering ominously in her head.

“What is it?” Rowan asked.

“Simms found us. She’s close.”

The coven looked down the narrow strip of asphalt until it shimmered in the distance. It was a back road, seldom used. The only car they’d seen on it since they’d emerged from the dunes was a big-rig truck that sped by with a roar and a gust of baked air.