The Crossing (Immortals) (26 page)

He took a swaggering step; the crowd gave a collective
gasp and shrank back. Charon's head swiveled. Searched.
He waded into the throng.

As the distance between the boatman and the Norton
increased, Mac maneuvered Artemis toward the cycle's
front tire. Brilliant. Charon had left the Norton idling.

The demon let out a roar. Mac's head snapped toward the
demon, but luckily, the blighter wasn't looking in Mac's direction. As he watched, Charon ripped off his helmet, revealing a visage shining with death magic. Coarse white
hair stuck out in all directions, like an old bristled scrub
brush. Thin pink lips pulled back to reveal sharpened yellow teeth; a hawklike nose curved in a sharp slash. But it
was Charon's eyes, Mac thought, that most inspired the terrified sobs and whimpers rippled through the cowering
corpses. The sockets ran red with blood.

"I will take only one," Charon boomed. "Who?"

The corpses, still and silent, quivered in anticipation.

"Ready?" Mac whispered to Artemis.

"When you are."

Charon's arm rose. One long, white finger extended,
pointing at a shaking corpse. "You. Come-"

"Now!" Mac leaped into the Norton's saddle. Artemis
jumped on behind, wrapping her arms around his midsection.

Charon jerked as if stung, an unholy shriek on his lips.
Mac gunned the engine; Charon spun about and lunged.
His massive hand closed on Mac's forearm. Mac put the
cycle in gear and stomped on the accelerator. Tires spun,
the Norton shook, but the vehicle didn't move.

Mac bit off a curse as Charon's death magic assaulted
Artemis's shielding. He could feel Artemis probing,
searching for a weak spot in the demon's power. There
wasn't one-at least Mac, with his amateur death-magic
skills, couldn't detect any vulnerability. He willed a blast
of hellfire in the brute's direction. He managed an anemic
stream of red sparks that fizzled almost as soon as it ignited.

Bugger it all. He hadn't felt this helpless since he was a
child. Seven centuries ago. He hoped like hell that
Artemis could knock the blighter on his arse, because it
was all Mac could do to keep Charon from ripping the
motorcycle out from under them. He could feel her weaving a complicated death spell. She needed time.

He fisted his free hand and smashed it square in the
middle of Charon's ugly face.

Blood and flames shot from the demon's eyes. His
mouth gaped open, spewing an odor like rotten anchovies.

"You," he roared. "You are not dead!"

"Bingo, mate."

The demon's grip on Mac's arm tightened. His gaze
flicked to Artemis. "She is also alive."

"So what if we are?" Mac said, desperate to distract
Charon's attention from Artemis and her burgeoning death
spell. Gods in Annwyn. Couldn't she work a bit faster?

He winced as another blast of Charon's breath bathed
his face.

"The living are not allowed on the far bank of the

"Thanks for the notice, mate. Now get your hands
off me."

"Insolent slug." Charon's free hand shot out and clamped
on Mac's neck. "You cannot cross. It is not permitted."

A hot wave of death magic hit Mac's shielding; the barrier rippled dangerously. For one heart-stopping moment,
he thought it would shatter. Any time now, Artemis, love.

Charon's pink lips parted on a cackle of laughter. Red
eyes blazed; yellow teeth glinted. Fleshy fingers crushed
Mac's windpipe. Mac gave up on breathing. He was immortal; he could hold his breath indefinitely. What really
had him worried was the possibility of Charon's ire turning on Artemis.

Damn it, woman, what's taking so bloody long with that
spell?

He felt her bristle and almost laughed, despite their
precarious predicament. She might not have heard his
precise thought, but their lingering psychic connection
had transmitted his frustration loud and clear. In answer,
her spell notched up a level, the tension winding tighter,
and tighter, until...

Finally.

She shouted a truly hideous word-it felt like a nail
driving through bone. Bloody hell. Could he ever bring
himself to even think such a syllable, let alone utter it?

The spell exploded in Charon's face. The demon let out
a piercing shriek, and his magic wavered. It was all the
opening Mac needed. "Hold on, love!"

The Norton's motor whined. Mac shot into the nearest lane of traffic like a bullet. It was like being sucked
into a vortex around a drain. Artemis clung to his neck. If it were possible, he thought she might have climbed
into his skin.

"Steady, love. We've got, what-?" He peered to his
right, counting. "Twelve more lanes to cross."

Her forehead pressed against his spine. "I'm okay. Just...
hurry."

He banked around the endless curve, spinning a counterclockwise circle. After a minute or two, they completed
the circuit, whizzing past the hotel. Charon stood at the
curb, shaking a fiery fist.

Mac gave up on waiting for a gap in the traffic. Bending
low over the handlebars, he flung the Norton into the next
lane. Horns wailed, brakes screeched, but at least he completed the maneuver without crashing. The next lane
change went worse, sparks flying as a low-slung Lamborghini scraped metal. Mac accelerated, hot wind whistling in
his ears. His speedometer topped out, and still he was in
danger of getting run over.

He gunned the Norton for all it was worth, giddy excitement pouring through his veins. He was flying in a
tornado-in Hell-and he was actually enjoying himself.
What did that say about the state of his soul? He wasn't
sure he wanted to know.

One by one, he conquered the next nine lanes, laughing
out loud at one exhilarating near-miss. The speed boggled
his mind. Behind him, Artemis groaned.

"Just one lane to go," he shouted over his shoulder.

"Thank the gods."

The Norton shuddered between his thighs, emitting a
bloodcurdling, almost human whine. Mac's excitement
bled into anxiety. It wouldn't do to have the machine come
apart in his hands. He eyed an inch-wide gap between a
Ferrari Scuderia and an Alfa Romeo Spider. Releasing a
prayer, he launched the Norton through it.

Metal flashed and sparks showered, and then they were skidding across an expanse of black asphalt, tires smoking.
He hit the brakes hard and spun a tight three-sixty. Artemis
slammed into his back as the Norton squealed to a halt.
Mac grabbed her arm an instant before she pitched headfirst onto the macadam. "You okay, love?"

"Just dandy," she muttered, scrambling back into the
saddle behind him. "Gods. What is this place?"

A dingy sea of cars, aligned head to head in arrowstraight rows, stretched into the distance.

"Looks like a car park."

Artemis shot him a look. "No kidding. It looks like the
mall parking lot back home. On Black Friday."

"Ah yes. You Yanks do love your automobiles, don't you?"

"There has to be a million spaces!"

"And every one of them taken." Countless cars circulated the aisles at a snail's pace, as if searching for an
empty parking spot. A red Ford Pinto reached the turnabout nearest Mac and Artemis. The driver's face was a
study in hopelessness.

"This must be Limbo," Artemis said. "A place for souls
not corrupt enough for Hell. Can you imagine? Looking
for a parking space for all eternity?"

11 It's not so bad. The drivers aren't in any pain, at least."

"That's something, I guess. Does that look like a building on the other side of all these cars? What do you suppose it is?"

"Harrod's? Marks and Spencer?"

Artemis snorted. "You're right. Not exactly what I'd expected."

He regarded her with interest. "What did you expect,
love?"

"Hard to say. So few living humans have been to Hell,
let alone returned to tell about it. As far as I could determine, Dante Alighieri was the last human to make the
journey, in the 1300s."

"Ah yes. That bloke. I saw his book in your car. I met him
once, you know. Bloody depressed wanker, he was, living
in exile. Personally, I wouldn't trust a word he wrote.
Dipped into the church wine a bit too much, in my opinion."

"No. I believe Dante really did visit Hell. He drew the
definitive map of Satan's realm. Nine circles, each deeper
level worse than the one above it. Ptolomaea, and Satan's
personal sanctuary, exist at the very bottom of the pit.
That's where I have to go."

He hesitated. The dregs of Hell, a breath from Lucifer's
lair, was the very last place he wanted the woman who
was carrying his child to go. Mac's instinct was to take
Artemis to safety, and go after her son himself. Except...
that he didn't think he could rescue Zander. Not alone. Not
with his present fledgling death-magic skills. Not without
Artemis's help.

There. He'd admitted it. The great Manannan mac Lir
needed help. How humiliating.

Because of his weakness, he might not be able to fully
protect the child growing in Artemis's womb. That thought
rankled. If he told Artemis about the pregnancy, would
she turn back? Abandon her quest to save her first child in
favor of protecting her unborn one? He already knew the
answer to that. She would never abandon her firstborn.
She was going to Ptolomaea regardless. And Mac wasn't
about to let her make the trip alone.

He weighed his options. Tell Artemis about the pregnancy? No. That would only stir up her anger, making her
less likely to trust Mac during their journey. And she
needed to trust him, if they were all going to get out of
this trek alive.

"All right, then, love. If Ptolomaea is at the bottom of
the pit, that's where we're headed."

"Thank you," she said quietly. "You can't know what it
means to me to have your help."

He searched her gaze. "You should have accepted it a lot
sooner, love. That was quite a close escape you made from
the Sidhe Council chamber."

"I know."

"You should have confided in me from the first. What
were you thinking, going to Malachi? Dealing with Old
Ones is a thousand kinds of deadly."

She bit her lip. "I thought I could handle him."

"Demons can't be handled," Mac said. "My sister learned
that lesson," he added bitterly.

"You have a sister?"

A ripple of tension ran through him. "A half sister.
Leanna. Niniane is her mother, but her father was a human.
Her Sidhe magic was potent, and her human blood allowed
her to call death magic. She... became quite adept at it.
She summoned a demon, the same Old One the Immortals
and I fought last year. She thought she had the upper hand."

"She didn't, did she?"

"No. She turned demonwhore, and worse. No human
ever wins against an Old One. Remember that."

Artemis was silent, but he sensed her disagreement, and
it angered him. She was strong, but Leanna had been
strong as well. Demons were bound by the contracts they
made with humans, but they were masters of deceit. In the
end, they always twisted the agreement to the detriment
of the human party.

That part of Artemis's life was over, though. Once they
returned to the human world, she wouldn't come in contact with another demon ever again. He'd personally ensure it.

He gunned the motor and set off down the nearest
aisle. "No more loitering. Faster down, faster out."

The lane must have been a mile long. Mac slowed as he
neared the end of it. An ugly, squat building rose before
them. A bank of doors glazed with reflective glass provided the only break in the facade.

Mac abandoned the Norton at the curb, directly under
a NO PARKING sign. He gave the cycle one last loving
glance. He didn't expect to see it again. Crossing the sidewalk, Mac and Artemis confronted their distorted reflections on the face of the entry doors. Mac tried each in
turn, until he came to one that wasn't locked.

He paused and looked at Artemis. "Ready?"

"No."

"Me, neither." He yanked the door open.

Artemis walked into a darkened movie theater.

Heat wafted from a noisy overhead vent. Thick, cloying
perfume, slightly rotten, seeped into her nostrils. She and
Mac stood in the back of the theater, behind rows and
rows of seats, all taken.

A movie was running-a porn flick. Hard-core. Brutal.
Naked figures, copulating grotesquely. Surround-sound
speakers blared a sickening combination of moans, curses,
sobs, and cracking whips.

"A bit over the top, if you ask me," Mac commented.

A bit over the top? More like far into the depths of depravity. Pure revulsion closed her throat. In mute defense,
she shifted her attention from the screen and concentrated
on the audience. Not much of an improvement. The
corpses were naked, writhing and moaning with the actors
on the screen. The damned were clearly aroused, almost to
the point of insanity. But with their arms and legs chained to
their chairs, they could do nothing but watch the film.

Artemis's stomach gurgled. For a split second, she
thought she'd heave. She spun around, needing to get out.
Away. Somewhere, anywhere. Even back to that hellish
parking lot.