Adamant (27 page)

“You don’t believe me, do you?” He dropped in the air so suddenly that my head spun and windows rushed past in a blur. “That Skyla’s been in the Alliance as a spy? I think she enjoyed it. She’s been working there two years, trying to figure out what they did to her. But there’s more than that. She was willing to work for my family, to give us information, in exchange for a shot at revenge. And she brought us that information. You. You have a potent magic source inside you, implanted inside you when you were just a baby. You’re what we need. You can give us the Multiverse. Never mind Skyla’s petty revenge plan.”

I was silent. My heart hammered, like I was free-falling all over again.

“Turns out my foster dad’s pretty pissed at the Alliance for putting up restrictions on offworld trade. He thinks they need a reminder that they’re not the only people with power. We needed a weapon, and now we have one. We have you.”

“You don’t have me,” I gasped, my mind roiling. He was mad, totally insane, and so was his father by the sound of it. A weapon? Me? And Skyla—she had a life, a job, she’d helped us for years. She didn’t have anything to do with the Alliance.
Sure, I’d always known Delta’s family weren’t exactly law-abiding citizens, but this…

We were slowing down, heading for the ground. We hovered alongside the cars on a crowded street where people swarmed in and out of a glass-fronted shopping arcade alight with bright-coloured holographic images. A few people whistled and waved; clearly, hover boots were still a novelty. Delta waved back. I tried to elbow him, but couldn’t move my arm. I was stuck to him, a reluctant passenger.
Let go!
Anger burned through me, potent and sizzling. Like static. Like magic.

Wait. Valeria had a higher level of magic than Earth. I braced myself, and
pushed.
Delta didn’t seem affected by the shot, though it was second level and should have shocked him, but I pitched forwards. Delta swore as my feet hit the pavement. I staggered forwards but kept my balance. Magic tingled through me.

Now I had another weapon.

“Oh no, you don’t!” he shouted after me, as I whirled around and ran. Stupid, stupid idea. I heard Delta curse behind me. There was a whirring sound, then he was at my side. “Super speed, Red. You can’t run away.”

I felt for the magic pulsing in the air. It was thick as smoke here on the main road; they used magic-based engines to power their vehicles. There was no shortage of power to draw on. Problem: too many people, swarming in and out of the arcade, waiting in traffic while a series of lights flashed overhead and every hover car glided to a stop. Our altercation went unnoticed for now, but if I used magic, anyone could get caught in the backlash. Plus, the obvious problem. I had no idea how to get back to Earth, and the Passage Delta had used was miles up in the air.

Delta grabbed for me again, and I punched him in the face. The impact bruised my knuckles, but Delta almost flipped over in the air, his hover boots knocking him off balance into a group of shoppers. As they scattered, exclaiming in shock, I lunged and grabbed his foot.

“Stars, Red!”

I tugged, hard, ducking as he righted himself and tried to hit me back.

“Bastard!”

The boot came free, and I stumbled back, turned, and ran for a gap in the traffic, Delta swearing colourfully as a gleaming blue hover-car zoomed across his path. With only one boot, he was forced to hobble, while I pelted through three lanes of hover cars in a zigzag, feet skidding on the odd metal they used in place of tarmac. I reached the other side of the road, tugging my laces undone, and slid my foot out of my own shoe and into the loose metal-plated hover-boot.

Damn, how does this thing work?
I fumbled and found a switch on the back. And screamed as the world dropped away, pavements shrinking to grey rivers, Delta to a tiny dot. I let go of the switch and dropped, my yelp drawing stares from passers-by when I flipped over in midair.

Somehow, I managed to right myself before my foot slipped out of the shoe, and laughed at Delta’s incredulous expression on the other side of the road, past rows of gleaming hover cars. The boot was a couple of sizes too big, but I could feel a switch under the heel. I pressed down, and accelerated. Now this was more like it. I took control, steering myself away from the arcade, past the green expanse of a city park, and into a cluster of towering office buildings.
Think, Ada.
Swooping around the city at random wasn’t the best plan, but I did have my phone back, and it had built-in offworld GPS. Ironically, that had been Delta’s idea.

I should never have trusted him. Nell trusted no one at all, and no one ever blindsided
her.
Lesson learned. Even Kay Walker had lied to me. His father had ruled against helping Enzar. I
should
have made the connection.

Cursing the Multiverse, I slowed enough to fire up the ‘Maps’ tab on my phone and wait for it to connect. A birds-eye view of the city not unlike my own view from the sky appeared on the screen.

Where Delta had brought me in was a platform on the roof of one of the skyscrapers, labelled “Landing Dock.” Odd place for a door to the Passages, I thought, turning in that direction. I flew lopsidedly above the crowded roads, like a particularly ungraceful bird. But at least I was moving. It took everything I had to stay upright, and the boot was so loose around my foot that if I performed any crazy acrobatics, I was pretty sure it’d fall off.

Speaking of birds… several black shapes were rising between the buildings, dots growing bigger by the second. Not birds. People. Flying up. Flying right at me.

I hit the switch on the back and sped up, rising higher.
Where the hell is this supersonic switch?
I groped with one hand and pressed another indentation in the heel. The world zipped by so fast my ears popped and my hair streamed back, my eyes aching, a scream jammed in my throat. I’d lost all track of the direction, and when my hand fumbled the switch, I stopped so abruptly I nearly went careening into an office window.

Holy shit.
I spun around, the wind whipping my hair across my face. I’d barely kept hold of my phone, and the GPS was telling me to head north. I turned that way, using the switch on the back of my heel to readjust the speed. Okay, this would be seriously fun if I had two shoes that fit. And if I wasn’t being chased by men in black.

They surrounded me, dark figures amongst the low clouds. I recognised a couple of them as Delta’s cousins, who I’d met before when he couldn’t meet me in the Passages. What were their names? Gregor and… Josef. Though they wore hover boots, they looked like serious businessmen in pressed suits, a sight that ought to have been ridiculous, but was somehow frightening. Plus the material of the suits had an odd, scaled sheen that gave me the sinking feeling it was magicproof.

No way out. I hit the descent button and they followed me in a circle.

“Come quietly, Ada, and we won’t have to hurt you,” said Josef, smirking. He’d always given me the creeps.

“No way,” I said.

A fist slammed into the side of my head, then another. I yelled, losing control of the boot altogether, dropping like a bullet. But they were dropping, too. A fist caught me in the stomach and knocked the breath out of me. I struck out blindly but I was falling, we were falling, far too fast.

And then we reached the ground. Hands caught me before I could hit the pavement. Held my own hands behind my back while one of the other men struck me across the face. My teeth sank into the inside of my mouth, and I spat blood at him, squirming to escape. Someone pulled the hover boot off my foot.

“Let me go!”

“Cooperate with us, girl, and we won’t hurt you.”

“Like hell.”

The next slap hit me so hard, my brain slammed into my skull. The world went hazy.

“Stop, now,” said one of the men, presumably the leader. He looked the oldest anyway. His neatly combed hair was streaked with grey. “She won’t be any use to us if you hurt her too much.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I said. “I’m not helping you, not for anything in the Multiverse.”

“You don’t get a say. We need a weapon. Skyla isn’t strong enough, though she’s done an admirable job stirring up trouble.” He must be Delta’s father.

“So what was all that about helping the refugees from Enzar?” I asked, stalling for time. “A cover-up? You’re despicable monsters.” Josef smirked at me, fuelling my anger. My nails bit into my palms.

“I expect your guardian concealed the truth from you because she wanted to keep you safe,” said Delta’s father. “As a Royal on Enzar, you’d be a pitiless assassin, or the future ruler of the Multiverse. This isn’t just about revenge for us, Ada, it’s about stopping Enzar. You think the war will stay on the Empire’s worlds forever? They’ll find a way out, and they’ll destroy what’s left of the Alliance. You weren’t alive when the war broke out, Ada, and the Royals decimated ten worlds overnight. The Alliance might well have crumbled, were it not for the council’s quick intervention.”

My heart thudded. I hadn’t known the specifics. Hell, I couldn’t have. It wasn’t like Nell had given a blow-by-blow account of the war. Even Josef’s smirk faded as his father spoke.

“The Alliance think they’re prepared for anything, Ada, but they’re mistaken. The only way to stop Enzar conquering the entire Multiverse is to have an equal force to oppose them. Imagine my surprise when I found out we’ve had one of their own in front of us all along.” Delta’s father’s mouth curled into a grim smile. “The Alliance need a reminder, I think, of the danger of a full-scale magical assault. The current council is incompetent, so we’ll take them out first. Luckily, we already have an implant in the Central Headquarters in London. As a known Earth landmark, a targeted attack will make the worlds pay attention.”

Central.
Kay.

“You want
me
to be your assassin? To kill everyone at Central?”

“I was thinking something a little more dramatic,” said Delta’s father. “Like a bomb.”

Magic. Numb horror pulsed through my veins. He intended to use me as a living bomb. But that level of magic would do more than take out Central. It’d knock the Balance across the Multiverse—magic would go haywire, low-magic worlds like Earth would be overrun, and others would end up like Enzar.

“You can’t be serious.”

“Ada, I am terribly serious. Adamantine? That was a poor choice of name on your guardian’s part.”

“Go to hell.”

I squirmed and kicked at the man who held me. But he anticipated it and drove his knee into my spine. Agony radiated through my body, and my last thought before losing consciousness was that Nell would be seriously pissed.

KAY

Lights flashed overhead, and I glanced at Markos. The elevator had halted under the first floor, and the entrance hall glittered below. Too far below. Easily the height of a three-storey apartment building.

“Damn,” I said. “I can’t make
that jump if we break the glass.” Not in one piece, anyway. Even I wasn’t idiot enough to try it.

There was a humming sound, subtle at first, but rapidly growing louder. The stunner vibrated in my pocket, and that unmistakable static meant magic was somewhere nearby.
On Earth?
I scanned the inside of the square glass box, looking for the source.

Sparks jumped out from the corner of the glass box, seemingly from nowhere at all. I took a step back, instinct warning me of a danger I couldn’t see.

“What in all gods’ name is that?” Markos said.

“Magic,” I said, as more sparks danced out. Sparks generally meant a stored energy source. I stepped back, running a hand through my hair, thinking–

“Shit,” I said. My fingers had brushed the invisible device clipped to my ear, the one Ada had given me. Chameleon. “I reckon I know what killed Alan. It’s a disguised magical device.”

“Like a bomb.” The centaur’s face had gone deathly pale. “Like—firing a rocket in an elevator.”

“Or shooting a gun in the Passages,” I said grimly.

Without warning, Markos reared up, and kicked at the front doors with two hooves. I ducked to avoid the shower of glass. But there was still a hell of a drop between us and the entrance hall.

More sparks danced across the ground, and I tingled all over like I’d run headlong into an electric fence.

“God.” What a way to die. I glanced at Markos. “Sadly, my stunt double’s not available. Guess this is it.”

Markos cursed. “
Gods,
human, if you mention this to anyone, I’ll kill you. Get on my back.”

“I—what?”

“You heard me.” I could almost see the device now, surrounded by a halo of red light. A warning. Markos didn’t have to tell me to get a move on.

“This is fucking weird,” I said, vaulting onto the centaur’s back.

“Hold on tight,” was Markos’s response.

And he jumped, clean through the newly shattered doors. I gritted my teeth and hung on for my life.
I’ll bet no human’s ever done this and lived—
and that was all I had time to think before we were plunging towards the ground.

“Holy
shit,”
I gasped, flat against the centaur’s back. Behind, I heard a tremendous, earth-shaking blast, and the static grew to a fever pitch. There was a shattering, several crashes, screams, and we hit the floor of the entrance hall with enough force to send my heart slamming into my ribs. I hung on and half-lay there, gasping out curses.