Black City (11 page)

Could Nathaniel really be Puck’s child? If he was, then Puck had done a good job of not betraying the relationship in Titania’s court. He’d acted like he was meeting Nathaniel for the first time.

Of course, if Lucifer found out—or even suspected—that Puck had a child inside Lucifer’s organization, then Nathaniel’s life wouldn’t be worth squat.

Maybe all of this was in my head, anyway. I had no proof of my suspicions, and nothing to go on except Nathaniel’s expression in the moonlight.

But maybe, just maybe, that was why Nathaniel’s mother had been killed. Maybe she hadn’t been plotting against Lucifer, but had simply borne a child that had not been her
husband’s. There were plenty of examples in human history of queens whose lives had been forfeit because they had betrayed their kings. The sanctity of the bloodline must always be preserved. That was treason enough if Lucifer was looking for a reason to take revenge on Cassiel.

But Lucifer couldn’t have suspected that Puck was the father of her child.

And he moved differently,
I thought. When he’d killed Focalor’s creature, Nathaniel had moved more quickly than he ever had before. And he could suddenly hear the vampires moving all over the city, a skill I was only just realizing was notable. It wasn’t precisely a smoking gun, but a lot of circumstantial evidence was there.

None of these abilities had manifested before I’d kissed Nathaniel. Had I somehow unlocked powers he was not even aware of? And would that make him more recognizable to Lucifer as Puck’s child? Had I inadvertently put his life in greater danger?

“You seem very troubled,” Nathaniel said. “The frown on your face would terrify a demon.”

I made a concerted effort to unfurrow my brow. “Just worried about the vampire problem.”

“And about the situation between you and I,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said, because it was sort of true, and because I didn’t want him to ask any more questions. I might betray myself.

Somehow we’d managed to walk almost to Navy Pier without my noticing or without encountering any monsters. We approached the double-decker bridge that connected the lakefront path to its continuation north of the bridge. The upper deck of the bridge was Lake Shore Drive.

There was a slight grade here, and we both paused, assessing the situation. The path took a soft turn at the strut
that supported the bridge, and the lack of streetlight made the blind turn ominous.

“Can you hear anything up there?” I asked very quietly.

“No,” he said. “However, that does not mean something isn’t there.”

“It doesn’t feel right,” I said, and Nathaniel nodded. “But I can’t tell if it’s because the whole city doesn’t feel right, or because something specifically is wrong up there.”

“We have no other way of getting home,” Nathaniel said. “We cannot fly. If we go west, we will walk right into the thick of the vampire horde.”

I looked dubiously at the river below. “Swim in the very cold water?”

Nathaniel shook his head. “I think it would be very unwise to get into the water at this time. I have noticed the lake is changing.”

I’d been too wrapped up in my thoughts to notice anything special about the lake. Now I observed that a light, phosphorescent fog rose above the surface as far as the eye could see.

“That can’t be good,” I said.

“Something is awakening. Something ancient,” Nathaniel said, and it was almost as if he were in a trance. “I can feel it in the back of my mind.”

“And is this ability to feel primeval creatures in your mind a new thing?” I asked casually.

Nathaniel frowned and looked at me. “I have never sensed its presence before.”

Great. More new powers. “Handy that you can now,” I said quickly, before he thought too deeply about why. “So we don’t want to jump in the river, as I’m assuming whatever’s in the lake would not be impeded by the locks.”

“The creature gives an impression of great size.”

“That would be ‘no,’ then. The bridge it is.” I drew my sword, and Nathaniel followed suit.

We approached the bridge slowly. As the girders rose above us, it was hard not to feel like we were being enclosed in a cave. Lower Wacker was to our left, and connected both Lake Shore Drive and Wacker Drive via ramps that were just south of us.

Lake Shore Drive was silent above, a cemetery of abandoned cars. Strangely, there was only one vehicle on our level—a yellow cab. It looked like the driver had simply stopped in the middle of the street and jumped out.

There was a dark stain in the road beside the open door of the car. It might not have been blood. It might have been an oil stain. A really big oil stain.

The wind picked up and blew my hair in front of my eyes, and that distracted me for a second. I touched my hair, which Chloe had neatened into a pixie cut for me only last week. Now my curls brushed against my jawline.

“Nathaniel, my hair grew back,” I said, and looked down at the missing fingers that had so recently reemerged. The scabs on my back itched.

“Hmmm?” Nathaniel said. He was scanning the area for threats, which was probably the smart thing to do.

“My hair grew back. And my fingers grew back.”
And you have powers that you never had before.
My conviction that something had fundamentally changed inside both of us during the spell was getting stronger by the moment.

Nathaniel stopped and focused on me. His eyes widened as he took in my new hairstyle. “Your wings…”

“I thought of that, too,” I said. “But so far my back is just itchy.”

We were about halfway across the bridge. A metal fence separated us from the river below. I couldn’t see anything lurking in the shadows ahead, or above.

I wasn’t really thinking about the possibility of something coming up from below. So when the vampire struck, neither Nathaniel nor I was prepared.

7

THE VAMPIRE’S ARMS CURVED OVER THE FENCE AND took me off my feet before I had half a chance to think. Before I knew it the vamp had bound me tight to its side with a fiercely strong grip and nestled me against its cold body. I couldn’t move my arms. The world stank of blood and meat, and the vampire chittered wildly, sounding like an insect.

It was skittering upside down on the underside of the lower deck of the bridge. I faced downward, but I couldn’t see anything except the blood-soaked jaws of the vampire. My head and stomach whirled. Nausea was an inevitability. I was already exhausted, but I had nothing in my stomach to throw up. I was plastered to the side of a vampire, gagging on my own bile.

I’d dropped my sword on the bridge—I’d heard it clatter on the pavement—and my magic was still burned out and useless.

Then there was a tremendous roar of rage, and the whole bridge shook. The vampire paused, the way spiders will when they know they’re about to get crushed under somebody’s heel. I could see nothing, but there was a sound of cracking pavement, and chunks of street smashed into me.

There was the ozone smell of nightfire. The vampire screamed, started to fall. I was falling, too, and then Nathaniel’s hand was somehow wrapped in my coat, holding me fast while the vampire descended into the river below. He pulled through the hole he’d smashed and rolled me into his arms.

“That was close,” I said, my voice muffled. My face was pressed against his bare chest.

He didn’t say anything. He just held me tight. It might have been pleasant under another circumstance, but I couldn’t move my arms and it was a little difficult to breathe.

“Nathaniel,” I said. “Nathaniel! I need oxygen.”

He finally released me, and I took several deep lungfuls of air.

“I should have been more cautious,” he said. “I am sorry.”

“Are you apologizing for not predicting the unpredictable?” I said. “I wasn’t looking for the vampire under the bridge, either. Although I probably should have been, given that I encounter monsters with abnormal frequency.”

“I feel like a fool,” Nathaniel said. “I had only just declared myself to you. I’d pronounced that I would protect you and your child, and a monster stole you from beneath my nose.”

“Don’t beat yourself up about it. It happens to me all the time. You know what’s weird, though? Why didn’t the vampire just eat me right away?”

“Perhaps it had gorged itself earlier and was planning on saving you for another meal,” Nathaniel said.

I shook my head. “I don’t think so. Don’t you think it would have at least drained me a little so I would be more compliant? It seemed it wanted to take me somewhere.”

“To its master, perhaps?” Nathaniel asked.

“That would be logical. If it was fetching me for a higher-ranking vampire, then it probably wouldn’t want to offend its boss by taking my blood.”

“Which then begs the question of why the vampire wanted you specifically.”

“Yeah. That’s not really a question I’d enjoy answering. I’m sure I won’t like the result, whatever it is.” I looked around. “Where’s my sword?”

“There,” Nathaniel said, pointing back toward the place where the vampire had grabbed me. “I could not lift it. It would not allow me to touch it.”

“But you gave me that sword,” I said. “It belonged to your father.”

“The sword seems to have given itself to you completely.”

Or maybe the sword of Lucifer recognized the blood of the Morningstar’s sworn enemy, but I wasn’t going to say that. Not yet, anyway. Not until I was 100 percent sure—but I was getting there. I wondered how Nathaniel would react if I was right. It might unhinge him. He put a lot of stock in the quality of his bloodline.

I fetched the sword, and then jogged back to Nathaniel. “Let’s get home.”

There was the distinct click of a safety being released behind us.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said.

We turned around slowly to face Bryson’s furious glare. He held a semiautomatic pistol, and it was pointed at me.

“What is your problem?” I asked. “Has it escaped your attention that the city has been overrun by vampires?”

“Sokolov wants you brought in. So you will be brought in,” Bryson said. “He’s had enough of your defiance.”

“Does he know you tried to shoot us out of the sky earlier?” I asked, thinking of Nathaniel’s shredded wing, our terrifying fall through the air. “Or am I wanted dead or alive?”

Bryson smiled briefly. “I am supposed to bring you in alive. But if there were an unfortunate accident, I believe Sokolov would understand.”

I was suddenly angry, so angry that I didn’t know what to do with all that energy. I was sick to death of being hounded by the shortsighted Agency when there were more important problems at hand.

My magic leapt to the fore, and my power pulsed through the night.

Nathaniel put his hand on my shoulder. “Ease down, unless you wish to destroy the bridge while we are still on it.”

The darkness was filled with light, and it was coming from me.

“Hear this, Bryson,” I said, and my voice was different. There was a power and a promise in it. “If you attempt to take, threaten or harm me or my friends again, then I will destroy you so utterly that the world will not even recall that you ever existed.”

I could crush him like a bug. His gun was a toy, a meaningless thing that he used to feel powerful. I blasted his hand with nightfire and the weapon clattered to the ground.
I stalked toward him, and Bryson, super-soldier of the Agency, backed away from me.

“You have been broken by one of my kind before,” I said. “But obviously not enough. The pain you felt then will be nothing compared to what horrors you will suffer at my hands.”

I could do it. I knew I could. I could make him hurt. The power was in me. There was a dark shadow in my heart, and it urged me onward.

“Madeline!” Nathaniel said behind me, and his hand roughly pulled me back. “Madeline! You are not yourself. Think.”

He gave me a little shake, and I nearly blasted him before his urgent tone got through to me. The darkness receded as suddenly as it had emerged.

“What…what was that about?” I gasped. I looked to my left. Bryson had fled. Which was good. I didn’t think I could live with myself if I’d done all the horrible things I’d been contemplating.

“You must be careful,” Nathaniel said. “As more of Lucifer’s power is revealed in you, so, too, is his darkness.”

I had felt hints of this before, a sinister undertone to the magic that was emerging slowly inside me. But I’d always thought I was in control of it, that my own personality would overcome any darker impulses. Now I wasn’t so sure.

I tipped my head forward to Nathaniel’s shoulder for a moment, weary beyond belief. Now that the burst of power had receded, my whole being just wanted to lie down and rest. But I wouldn’t be able to rest until we were home.

“Let’s go,” I said, lifting my head. Nathaniel nodded.

It took us most of the night. My weariness was extreme, and while the vampires avoided the path along the lake,
there were plenty of other things that did not—demons, mostly, roaming for stragglers.

We avoided the creatures if we could, always mindful of the fact that neither of us could fly. When we could not avoid conflict Nathaniel’s newfound strength and speed tended to keep the encounters short. As we got farther away from the Loop, we felt safer cutting west and then north again on the city streets. As the day approached, we were on Clark, the distinctive curve of Wrigley Field’s façade before us.

The streets were so quiet. Many people had obviously fled, and any who had stayed behind were safely tucked inside their apartments and condos, cowering behind furniture stacked against doors.

In their hands would be Mace and hair spray and fire extinguishers and guns, for those who believed in that sort of thing. Others would be on their knees, hands folded and eyes shut tight, calling the name of their chosen savior.

All around us was the debris of a fallen world—a smashed cell phone, a Starbucks cup, a dropped scarf, a suitcase that had broken open and spilled its contents all over the street.

Inside the case were the things its owner had considered important—a wedding photo in a silver frame, the glass shattered; wool socks rolled in multicolored balls; lacy underwear; designer jeans; a stack of Fiber One bars; a jewelry roll that had already been stripped of anything valuable; a deck of cards.