Charmed, page 22
“We don’t have time for this,” Zeke says. “Where is the Chief? Where is the ceremony being held?”
I turn to face the rebels. “Get him out of these chains,” I demand. I don’t wait for them to answer before I start frantically pulling at Cruz’s chains, as if I have enough strength to break two inches of solid metal. I wheel around, searching for support, but no one’s looking at me.
“Hello? Why are you all just standing there. Help me get him out!”
“Stop,” Cruz whispers.
“What do you mean?” I say, giving a bitter laugh. “Don’t be stupid. You’re not thinking straight. You’re sick.”
“They’re not regular cuffs.”
I stiffen at the sound of Pixie’s voice. The rebels part to reveal the small girl standing in the entryway to the alcove.
“The only person who can remove them is the person who put them on,” she says.
The ground sways underneath me. It can’t be true. I look at the faces around me—everyone except Bishop, who pointedly looks away. And then I look at Cruz. His head is slumped against his chest again.
“Then blast the wall! If you can’t break the chains, just dig them out of the wall. We can’t just leave him here—he’ll die.”
“Of course he’s going to die,” Sporty says. “Look at him.”
I flash my eyes to her. She grins, and it makes such intense anger rise up in me that I could probably kill her with my bare hands.
Cruz mumbles something.
I reluctantly break my stare from Sporty’s. “What did you say?”
He licks his lips slowly, then takes a big breath, as if what he’s about to say requires all of his energy. “Go,” he mutters. “Save Paige.”
I shake my head. “No. We won’t leave you here. We’ll get something for your wounds. We’ll stop the bleeding and get you out. It’ll be okay. You just have to hold on.”
He coughs then, and blood spurts out of his mouth. Hot tears spill down my cheeks. I squeeze his cold hand.
“The Hollywood B-B-,” he whispers.
I lean in closer. “What did you say? Cruz, stay with me.”
He doesn’t answer.
“The Hollywood Bowl,” Bishop says. “That’s got to be what that drawing in the Chief’s office was of.”
Murmurs rise up through the alcove.
“Cruz.” I shake his shoulder. “Cruz, wake up!”
He doesn’t answer.
I press a panicked finger to his neck, feeling for a pulse the way they do in the movies.
Nothing.
He’s dead.
27
The world goes out of focus. The ragged hole in my chest rips open and a choked cry pushes out of my mouth.
Arms wrap around me.
“Come on. We have to get out of here.”
Bishop’s voice brings me back to reality long enough that I realize he’s pulling me out of the room.
“No,” I say. I become dimly aware that the rebels have left, and we’re alone.
“Time is running out,” he says.
“You don’t understand,” I say, shaking my head.
“I think I do.” Though his voice isn’t entirely unkind, I can’t help but notice that it’s cut through with pain. “We need to go. There’s nothing we can do for him.”
I want to fight him, tell him that he’s wrong, but I know what he’s saying is true. That doesn’t make it hurt less.
I gulp for air as Bishop leads me back through the tunnels, supporting the weight of my body. Cruz tried to help me, and because of that, he’s dead. Everyone who cares about me ends up paying a price.
Bishop stops short and holds me by the forearms.
“Enough,” he says. His fingers dig into my arms more roughly than I’m used to. “Listen to me,” he continues, shaking me until I look up at him. “What the Chief did to him? That or worse could be happening to Paige and those other teens right now. Okay? So get it together.”
My mouth falls open at his harsh words, but he doesn’t soften his grip.
He’s right. Of course he’s right. Still, a part of me can’t help but wonder what he’s really mad at.
I take a shuddery breath and push all the pain and hurt back to that place in my chest where I keep memories of Mom. It will haunt me in my dreams, but right now, I can’t think about it. Paige needs me.
I give a terse nod, and Bishop lets me go.
We hear them first.
We’re barely to the parking lot of the Hollywood Bowl before the sound of hundreds of people chanting in time with a drumbeat spills through the open windows of the rebels’ car.
My first thought: Cruz was right.
My second thought: I wish he wasn’t.
In Los Angeles, the Hollywood Bowl is a popular venue for outdoor concerts. I can already picture the white domed amphitheater that sits in a giant crater dug out from the scrubby mountaintop, wooden benches rising up all around the hillside. It seems crazy that the last time I was here I was watching Lady Gaga strut around in a bedazzled leather bikini, and now I’m back to stop evil sorcerers from sacrificing my best friend.
Zeke slams on the brakes just outside the lot—any closer and our headlights might be spotted shining over the top of the sunken amphitheater.
Bishop and I hop out of the backseat as the rest of the caravan screeches up behind us.
The acrid smell of smoke fills the air, black clouds of it rising up toward the fat moon. Anxiety grips my chest. The rebels start running toward the wide stone steps that lead down to the theater.
“Stop!” Zeke hisses. “We go through the trees. It’s sparse cover, but it’s our best chance to get close before they see us. This is the closest we’ve ever come to crushing these guys—let’s not ruin it because we didn’t think it through.” She raises her eyebrows at her people. They nod. Sporty huffs, but thankfully she doesn’t spend twenty minutes arguing and just follows orders.
We move through the cover of the ash trees on the hillside. Some areas are thickly wooded, some are so barren we have to dash ten feet across open land before we’re covered by another patch of trees. Adrenaline courses through me as we crest the top of the hill. The Hollywood Bowl finally comes into view through the trees.
Wooden benches wrap around the mountainside like in Los Angeles, but here, where the amphitheater is supposed to be, are a dozen or so massive rectangular stones in a large circle like some sort of Stonehenge. Hundreds of sorcerers holding torches that send huge orange flames into the sky form a second circle around the stone formation.
I don’t see Paige, or any of the other humans.
“We need to get closer,” I whisper.
Silently, we move across the hill. It’s pretty amazing how well we work together when everyone shares the same goal: stop the Chief.
The closer we get, the louder the chanting becomes. I don’t recognize the strange language they’re speaking, but I know it’s the same one the Priory used in the swamp ceremony after homecoming. I shudder.
We need a plan. Though we have the rebels on our side now, we’re only just over a dozen people against hundreds of sorcerers. Like Bishop said, we can’t go in guns blazing and hope for the best.
We reach a point in the hillside where the tree cover ends abruptly. There are a few single ash trees sticking up here and there, but nothing that could hide a baker’s dozen of rebels. We hunker down and look out over the hill.
What I see sends a chill into my bones.
The sorcerers sport the same dark brown robes that the Priory wore during the ceremony in the swamp, except over their heads are the skins of dead animals. I spot a wolf, a bull, a bear. Something about the sheen of the pelts, the dead, glassy eyes, and the mouths opened in perpetual roar tells me they didn’t pick these up at a costume supply store.
Their bodies jerk and sway in a strange, primal dance that makes my stomach clench.
I still don’t see the humans. And then one of the sorcerers moves just enough that I catch a glimpse into the inner circle.
And there they are.
My heart sinks. Now that I know what to look for, I can make out the distinct shape of dozens of people crowded around what looks like some sort of altar.
But they’re not dead. We’re not too late.
The sorcerers sway in time with their chanting, the slow drumbeat pounding hard as their voices rise to a crescendo.
Bishop and I huddle with the rebels, watching the sorcerers through a break in the trees. This would all be so much easier if the sorcerers weren’t crowded around the humans, making so many options—namely, bombs and guns—too dangerous to try.
“What are they doing?” Eminem asks. “That looks like some weird shit.”
“They’re trying to open a portal to another dimension,” I answer. “And they’re going to sacrifice all those kids to do it.”
“That’s bullcrap,” he says. “No way can they do that. That’s creating energy.”
“Well, something tells me they’re going to try it anyway,” Pixie says.
They bicker back and forth, and I can feel my blood pressure mounting by the second.
But before I can suggest they sort this out later in couples therapy, a blast of heat and light flashes up into the trees. I cover my eyes from the searing white, as screams from below pierce the air. The sorcerers’ chanting sputters to a halt. Through my spotty vision I can make out the robed men and women shielding their eyes. The light winks out, the air still pulsing where it had been.
All of us gape down at the scene.
Holy. Crap.
The sorcerers resume their chanting.
“We need to do something,” I hiss.
“All right,” Bishop says. “We split into two groups. One goes around the side of the hill and creates a distraction. The Chief will send sorcerers to investigate, and while their numbers are down, the second group will attack.”
“That’s a good idea,” I say. “Zeke?” I look over my shoulder at her. She’s watching the sorcerers thoughtfully, almost as if she hasn’t heard us.
“Zeke!”
She looks up suddenly.
“What do you think of the idea?” I say.
“It’s good.”
“All right, let’s do it,” I say.
Bishop reaches up to brush a big branch out of our way, but his hand pauses in the air.
“Move it.” I give him a little shove. “There’s no time to waste!”
He doesn’t respond. Doesn’t move an inch.
“Bishop!” I hiss. It’s too dark to tell for sure, but it looks as if his face has taken on a bluish-white sheen. A quiet crack and pop comes off his skin.
I have just enough time to register that something Very Bad has happened before a chill races through me, as if my veins were made of ice. I can feel my blood suck into my core as icicles spread over my skin and frost mists off my body. My teeth chatter involuntarily before my jaw locks and even chattering becomes impossible.
We’re frozen. Someone has frozen us.
I try to scream, but with my jaw locked, all that comes out is a zombielike moan.
Zeke passes in front of me.
“We hate the Chief, but we really hate Los Demonios,” she says. “Sorry to go back on our word, but we can’t let you ruin our only chance of getting out of this place.”
The truth hits me.
“You traitor!” I growl, but it’s hardly effective when it comes out just a mumble of gibberish.
I want to lunge at her and rip that stupid eighties Mohawk right off her head, but I can’t move. Despite my frustration, my heartbeat slows and my breath turns shallow. It’s like my body is shutting down.
The rebels chortle quietly as they move around in front of us. I spot Sporty. She gives me a pouty face as she passes.
“Don’t worry,” she says, walking backward. “You’ll thaw in a couple of hours. Hopefully, you’re still alive by then.” She winks at me, then turns on her heel to watch the ceremony with the rest of the rebels.
Pixie passes me. I try to catch her eye, but she refuses to look at me. Eminem pulls my knife and dagger out of their sheaths. He grins at me. “Thanks. These might come in handy.”
The rest don’t give us even a second glance. They hunker down just yards away, watching the ceremony with scary intensity.
Why did we for a second think we could trust prison inmates to be good on their word?
The chanting resumes. My heart beats weakly in rhythm with the slow drumbeat.
Oh God. We’re going to be forced to watch the ceremony—forced to watch Paige and the other teens die—and there won’t be a single thing we can do about it. I let out a frustrated groan. I try to look at Bishop, but the muscles behind my eyes are too sluggish to respond to my mental command and eventually I give up. I summon my magic with every ounce of concentration in me, but there isn’t a stitch of warmth in my body.
This must be what it feels like when you’re awake during surgery, I think. Completely alert and aware, yet unable to move a muscle.
The bright light flares again. I try to close my eyes, but my lids are frozen open. White light sears my retinas, which causes tears to slip down my frozen cheeks. For a minute I can’t see anything but spots of black and I think I’ve gone blind, but then the world comes into focus again. A ball of purplish-white light the size of a grapefruit swirls over the top of the stone formation, emitting a misty gas.
And then I see him.
A sorcerer wearing the head of a huge white ox with curling horns steps atop the altar in the middle of the stone circle. The Chief. He holds up a limp body in offering to the light. It blazes a bit brighter.
“It’s working,” one of the rebels says. He starts to move forward, but Zeke grabs his shirt and yanks him back.
“Not until the last minute,” she says. “The portal isn’t fully formed yet.”
The rebels lean forward on the balls of their feet, ready to pounce at any moment. They practically vibrate with anticipation.
The Chief tosses the body to the side. Another teen climbs shakily up to the altar. My mind screams out a plea for him to stop, but the rest of my body behaves like I’m going to sleep. The Chief lifts the boy up to the light.
A stir goes through the ranks of sorcerers. That’s when I notice a robed body slumped on the ground near the back of the huge group, his torch spilled in front of him and an arrow sticking out of his back. Another sorcerer quickly picks up the torch and stomps on its flame, but an arrow pierces his side too, and a second later, he’s fallen on top of the first downed man. Two more sorcerers go down within seconds. A dark shape whizzes across the sky.
“What the…,” Eminem mutters.
Someone’s picking off the sorcerers. Hope flashes hot inside my ice-cold body.
“Stop him!” the Chief yells.
Three sorcerers leap up from the ground and set off toward the mysterious archer. One holds out his hand, and a fireball blasts from his palm. It misses by a wide margin and strikes the mountainside so hard that the ground rumbles under my feet. Huge flames soar into the sky.
The figure moves fast, dodging his pursuers as he circles around the mountain so quickly I can hardly follow his movements. He swoops in close to the stone formation and picks off one, two, three more sorcerers in the span of a second. But in that short amount of time, the sorcerers in pursuit close the gap between them.
They launch another fireball—this time directed right at him. My heart moves to my throat, but the man zips out of the way just in time, and the fireball blasts into the mountainside.
“Who the hell is that?” Zeke asks.
Three more sorcerers fly up from the ceremony to help. They close in on the man from different directions. He’s completely surrounded—there’s no way he could dodge an attack now. I had dared to hope, but how could one person stop this many sorcerers, no matter how incredible his magic?
A half-dozen fireballs flash across the sky, all trained on the man. But an instant before the flames make contact, he disappears into thin air. The mountainside rocks from the blow of the fireballs, pebbles tumbling into the amphitheater. The sorcerers let out angry roars over the chanting still going on below. Flames lick fast along the dry scrub—pretty soon the whole place is going to be up in flames.
“There!” One of the rebels points at a spot on the hillside right behind the stone formation.
“We have to stop him before he ruins the spell,” another says.
Zeke leaps up from her hiding spot and soars into the sky after the man. The rest of the rebels take flight behind her.
I watch as the dauntless archer pulls arrows from a quiver on his back, picking off two more sorcerers before any of them have even noticed his new location. He’s too far away for me to see his face, but I notice a shock of blond hair that seems vaguely familiar.
Rebels and sorcerers alike descend on the man. He disappears again, bullets and arrows and fireballs landing on the spot where he had just been standing.
He appears again, only ten feet in front of me, crouched outside the line of trees Bishop and I are hidden behind.
Only it’s not a he.
It’s Aunt Penny.
28
She’s got a quiver of arrows strapped across her back, and she heaves for breath, sweat slicking the tendrils of hair that have escaped her ponytail against her face.
Who replaced my bar-star aunt with a freaking superhero? And more important, what is she doing here?
I moan as loudly as I can to get her attention. She glances behind her, and her eyes go as wide as saucers when she sees Bishop and me.
“Indie!” she gasps. She turns to face me. That’s when I notice the fireball hurtling toward her.
I moan frantically, trying to get her to move. Aunt Penny flicks her eyes over her shoulder just in time to put her hands up in front of her face. She’s blasted off her feet, the flames engulfing her. She disappears before her body hits the ground.
I let out a gut-wrenching groan.
