Slayer(105)

I punch him in the face.

“Ouch,” I hiss, mindful we need to keep our voices down. “That really hurt!”

“It hurt him more.” Artemis gestures to Sean, slumped unconscious on the floor. She sounds . . . impressed. I try not to let it go to my head.

Rhys reaches into Sean’s slick suit jacket, pulling out a master key. “Bingo. Come on, Imogen. I’ll tell you which ones we need.” They hurry off in the opposite direction of the voices. Artemis and I head toward Eve.

We’re nearly to Sean’s office when Honora slides backward along the floor, slamming into a cage and slumping brokenly to the ground.

“No!” Artemis limps to her.

“Nina, Artemis! Run!” Our mother gestures with her gun back toward where we came from. A shadowy form grabs her by the waist and throws her against the wall. The form sharpens, and suddenly Eve is standing in front of us.

“Did you not understand my generosity in leaving you alive?” she asks me, incredulous. “I did it for Leo’s sake. I do try to be a good mother. But you’re making it difficult.”

Honora presses something into Artemis’s palm. Artemis pops it in her mouth and stands, cracking her neck and flexing her fingers. She rips off the splint, taking a stake in either hand. Then she launches herself at Eve. She’s a flurry of fists and kicks. Eve shifts and moves like smoke, but Artemis moves just as fast. Not knowing what Artemis took worries me, but right now we need every advantage.

I hurry to our mother. She presses the address book into my hands. “We’ll keep her busy. Get out of here.”

Artemis flies across the room, slamming into Honora, who does her best to catch her. There’s a gash across Artemis’s side; her shirt is already slick with blood. More is pooling out on the floor.

“Artemis!” I scream.

“Enough,” Eve snaps, her voice distorted. If she was shadows before, now she is night. She is dreams and nightmares and darkness personified. My power is like a cloak on her shoulders, pulsing and seething.

Without another word, Eve punches a hole right through reality.





34


ONE OF US WOULD MEND the world, and one of us would break it.

I kneel on the floor next to my mother, watching the hole Eve made in the world using my power. It starts small, but the air blurs around it, cracking and shimmering. And behind the hole, nothing. No, not nothing. Like the magical purple flames from my nightmares, only worse. I can’t make my eyes look at it. They refuse. The darkness burns within the hole. It’s hungry.

And something is moving there. A hand reaches through, grasping Eve’s. If Eve is shadows, this hand is tar. She didn’t start out as a demon. Whatever Leo’s father is, he definitely did.

She croons with delight. “Only a little longer, my love.” She releases the hand, then grabs either side of the hole and pulls. It tears slowly in protest as our world resists giving way to hell. But it’s losing the battle.

“Why?” I ask.

She laughs. “This is the only way in or out of the world now. Everything that comes through will have to go through me. Nothing will happen unless I let it. I’ll be the ultimate Watcher.” She tugs again, straining, and the hellmouth opens a little more. The waiting darkness writhes in anticipation.

I expect heat, but biting cold radiates from the hole.

“It won’t be a large hellmouth.” Eve switches sides, trying to get a better grip. “Nothing like Sunnydale, or even Cleveland. But it will be our hellmouth. The Dublin Hellmouth. And we’ll take a tithe of power from every demon who crosses. My son and I will never be hungry again.”

“Why do you need the other Slayers, then?” I ask.

“You’re the best thing I’ve ever had.” She smiles, teeth showing white through the shadows of her face. “I’m going to drain every Slayer, and then this world will truly know power. It will know safety and protection. Because I will protect it.” She pushes, and the hole widens. “For a price.”

A figure barrels into Eve, knocking her away. The hellmouth is almost big enough for a person to slip through. The air around it crackles, brittle and freezing. The tar hand reaches through, grasping at the air, pulling at the edges. But it can’t rip the hellmouth larger. Only Eve is strong enough to do that. Because of me.

Eve screams in rage and frustration. I see who knocked her to the floor, who is keeping her down.

Leo hits his mother’s clawed hands away as they rake against his chest, then pushes his own hand against her ribs, holding her on the ground. She bucks, trying to throw him off, but I know from experience that Leo can’t be budged. A shriek echoes through the space. The shadows shift, swirl. Leo begins to glow like a black light.

“Nina,” Honora says, panicked. She’s holding her own shirt against Artemis’s side. “She’s bleeding too much.”

I rush over to them. There’s nothing I can do down here. The cut is too deep, too long. “Can you carry her?”

“I don’t think so. I’m out of my pills.” Tears stream down Honora’s face as she looks at Artemis, now alarmingly pale.

“Allow me.” A pair of toxic-yellow hands reaches down and gently lifts my sister. Doug cradles her to his sticky chest. “Come on, little Slayer. Let’s run.”