Betrayal (19 page)

He had betrayed me. Who did he think he was? I
made
him. I blasted him again as Neos cackled, discordant and bone-chilling.

The siren whispered to me,
He's nothing to you. Another meddler who plagues you with demands and problems
—

The ghost jocks deflected my blasts with their bodies, flickering as I chipped away at their spectral forms. Then Coby punched the siren hard in the stomach, and she released her hold on me. My mind began to clear.

Coby hadn't betrayed me. He'd pretended to side with Neos so they wouldn't see him as a threat—to get me close, close enough to kill Neos. It was brilliant. He'd played his role so well, I'd believed him. But I should've known he'd never betray me. He was Coby, and I could trust him to the very end. And the strength in that was enough to lift the siren's haze and propel me forward.

I drew my dagger and leaped at Neos, but he rose in a flash to the ceiling, crowing loudly.
The final rite is happening as we speak
—
and feeding me more power than you can imagine.

He lifted his arms and summoned, and more wraiths swirled into the room in whirlwinds of filth and decay. They took form and started savaging Coby and the ghost jocks.

I flipped my dagger in my hand to throw at Neos, and three more wraiths rose in front of me. I kicked one in the throat and stabbed another in the gut and felt the chill fingers of the third clawing at my back.

I dropped and rolled and snapped its neck, but more formed even as the dead ones dissolved into greasy oil slicks on the Oriental carpet.

I heard Coby and the jocks losing their battle, and felt the siren clawing at my mind again—but she couldn't find a toehold. Maybe she couldn't slip into my head unless she preyed on my self-doubt, my fear. Right now, all I felt was anger.

Coby swore and Moorehead screamed, but before I could help, Neos flew at me.

I dodged, then spun to return the attack, but wraiths filled the room. I couldn't help Coby and the jocks—I couldn't even see them. I heard Moorehead scream again, and fought my way through the writhing mass of wraiths toward the sound. I stabbed two more wraiths before someone stepped through the door—shining with power and a rage that equaled my own. He wielded spears of light as easily as a couple of chopsticks.

Bennett.

Still wearing the faded-blue long-sleeve T-shirt and jeans. Still looking strung out. Still gorgeous enough to stop my heart, even now. He skewered four wraiths before they knew he was there. They hurtled at him, shrieking in hunger, and he burned them away into reeking wisps of smoke.

“Emma!” he shouted. “Finish him!”

His lance of light turned into a blade and sliced through the wraiths—and cleared an opening for me, to Neos.

I sprinted at Neos, jumping from a chair onto the desk, my dagger flashing as he fired spectral blades at me. I deflected them and fought closer and closer. As the battle raged behind us, Neos's power oozed at me from all around, oily black tentacles groping toward me, but I pressed forward, closer to those glittering black eyes.

Then Neos shouted a command, and a ghost dropped from the ceiling to hover between us. For a moment, I didn't recognize him; then I saw his big eyes and Dickensian outfit, and froze.

Nicholas!
I said.
Are you all right? Did he hurt you?

No, mum.
He glanced fearfully at Neos.
Not yet.

Sheathe the dagger
, Neos sneered.
Or I will introduce your friend to places in the Beyond that can drive even a ghost mad.

A wraith screamed behind me. I heard Coby grunt with effort, and Craven gasp. Dispelling lightning rods of power flashed. Yet all of that felt very far away—my whole world shrunk until nobody existed but me and Neos and Nicholas.

You'll pay for this
, I said.
He's just a boy.

Darling Emma
, Neos said.
He's been a ghost for two hundred years. It is you who is the child. Sheathe the dagger. Oh, you
are
special, my little girl. I've never seen a ghostkeeper use a knife like that.

Please, mum
, Nicholas said, shaking with fright.

I lowered my dagger, my heart thundering in my chest.

“Emma!” Bennett yelled from behind me. “Whatever he's saying is a lie! Nicholas betrayed you—he's been spying for Neos.”

I didn't turn my head; I didn't move an inch—but my mind worked furiously. I remembered the jolt of fear when Nicholas had approached with that icicle. I remembered him hovering in the hallways and at team meetings, always listening. And I remembered Nicholas had given me the metal disk that stank of Neos, and had lured us away from the museum. I looked at him and saw the truth in his eyes: Nicholas
was
working for Neos.

But we're family
, I said to him.

My sister is my only family
, Nicholas told me.
And Master Neos will bring her back.

Master Neos is going to die
, I said, feeling the force rumbling in my chest.
For the last time.

Then I imbued my dagger with dispelling power and launched myself at Neos. I batted away his streams of perverted energy and slammed him into the wall. We fell to the floor and I slashed with my dagger—

And Nicholas flitted between us.

I pulled the blow at the last moment. I couldn't hurt Nicholas. After everything, I still couldn't hurt him.

Neos slammed me with a backhand that sent me reeling into a bookcase, and Nicholas streamed toward me, his face a mask of violence. A lance of Bennett's light flashed from behind me and hit Nicholas in the center of his narrow chest. He looked faintly surprised, and said,
Oh, mum …
Then he crumbled into gray ash and vanished.

“Nicholas!” I cried. “It isn't fair.”

But there was no time to mourn as Neos roared.

He exploded with an avalanche of power that hurled me across the room, shredded his wraiths into nonbeing—and tore through Coby and Moorehead and Craven. They faded in an eyeblink, leaving the siren huddled on the floor, and even Bennett stumbled backward, his arms lowered after having dispelled Nicholas.

The final rite
, Neos purred.
Nothing fancy. Nothing you haven't seen before. Taking power by sacrificing ghostkeepers. Well, I've got a stock of them in the basement
—
and three more just died to my wraiths. The Knell is gone, and I grow stronger with every sacrifice. And once I kill you
—

I rose into a crouch, and the siren, unmoving in the corner, spoke into my mind:
Wait. Emma, wait.

“Just him and us,” Bennett said, wiping blood from his split lip, not realizing the siren was still conscious.

“Yes,” I said.

Bennett killed Nicholas
, the siren sung in my mind.
A little child. He likes dispelling too much
—
he's not a ghostkeeper, he's a murderer. He's on drugs, look at him. He's a killer of children.

Bennett circled the room, fists crackling with energy, until we flanked Neos. “Whenever you're ready, Emma.”

Whenever I was ready? For what?

I knew it. I knew I couldn't trust him. My parents were right. He'd left me when I needed him most, taken Asarum, and now he'd killed Nicholas, a member of my family. I was responsible for Nicholas, and Bennett had taken him away from me. He always had enjoyed dispelling too much.

I sprang at Bennett. He was so focused on Neos that he didn't see the blow coming. I kicked his feet from under him, and he hit the ground hard. I put my right boot on his wrist to keep him from dispelling.

My dagger felt heavy in my hand—heavy and strong and purposeful.

I knew how to use a knife. A strong blow didn't come from my wrist, but from my whole body. And now the blade slashed through the air toward Bennett's chest and I couldn't stop myself. He'd killed Nicholas, so I'd kill him.

The blade sliced downward, and I saw his face and remembered something he'd once said:
There are powers stronger than ghostkeeping.
I watched myself stabbing Bennett, and I saw his eyes widen with shock and fear … and love. Even as I killed him, the love shone undimmed in his eyes.

Neos crowed as my blade cut through Bennett's shirt and sliced his chest. But I never once stopped staring at his eyes. Those cobalt blue eyes that I dreamed of every night. Those eyes that I would never stop loving, no matter what Bennett did.

And an instant before the blade plunged into his heart, I pivoted and flicked my wrist. The dagger flung through the air and buried hilt-deep in the siren's throat.

She vanished instantly. I'd silenced her forever.

There are powers stronger than ghosts and ghostkeeping. There's love. And there's anger.

Bennett lay sprawled on his back with blood seeping from his wound, and I stood and faced Neos, unarmed. I'd always thought that anger felt hot. When I'd lose my temper, my face would flush—I'd want to scream as I boiled with rage, everything tinged with red.

Not this time. This fury was subzero. I didn't want to scream—I didn't even want to speak. Ice flowed through my veins.

They'd tried to make me kill Bennett. That was a mistake.

Across the ruined study, Neos grew denser and larger, still absorbing power as his wraiths sacrificed ghostkeepers in the basement. The air around him unraveled and formed a sword with a hungry keen edge, shining with blackness.

I stalked toward him bare-handed and he swung his sword. Shaped from shards of the Beyond itself, the blade could slice through life and death; I couldn't deflect it, not without my dagger.

I didn't need to. I was as powerful as Emma, the woman in the tapestry. I was as powerful as
me
. I stepped inside his swing—almost into his embrace—and for an endless instant we stood inches apart. His putrid breath touched my cheek, and power shimmered off him like heat off the sun.

I hooked my left hand under his elbow and drew him toward me, the last thing he expected. I imbued my right hand with dispelling power. Instead of imbuing my dagger, I imbued my flesh and blood that ran down through centuries, until my fist burned with a terrible white light.

Then I punched through the underside of his jaw. I wrapped my hand around the amulet embedded in his tongue and yanked.

Black blood spurted across the room and scorched through wood and cloth and leather. The howl as Neos faded into the Beyond was so full of agony and hate and power that it brought me to my knees.

Then silence. As everything evil faded away with him.

I shoved the amulet into my pocket and ran to Bennett. He'd been watching, his hands stanching the flow of blood. All I could see was the life left in his enormous blue eyes. He half smiled and said, “That was epic.”

Then he passed out.

The team found me there later, cradling Bennett's head in my lap. Simon had called the Knell's doctor, and she'd already put Lukas's arm in a sling and tended the others' cuts and bruises. When the doctor saw Bennett, she shooed me away, muttering something about “Asarum,” and began to disinfect and bandage the cut across his chest.

I told the team what happened, and Simon nodded grimly when I got to the part about Neos sacrificing the Knell ghostkeepers. He'd already found the basement with William's and Gabriel's bodies—and had refused to allow Natalie or Lukas inside.

“How are the ghosts?” I asked. “Coby and the boys?”

“They're in the Beyond,” Natalie said. “I can feel them. Coby will be fine. You made him. The others … I don't know.”

“What about Neos?” I said. “Coby betrayed him. Neos will go after him.”

“Dude, what've you been doing?” Lukas said, his face paling. “Neos isn't dispelled?”

I shook my head. “He fled into the Beyond. He lost the amulet and the siren—and I guess most of his wraiths. But he … he's still strong. All those deaths.”

“At least the siren's gone.” Natalie rubbed her forehead. “I don't think I could take another head-butting.”

I apologized and finished telling them what happened. Then Simon organized a search for survivors—both living and ghosts. I stayed behind, holding one of Bennett's purple-tinged hands.

When he finally stirred, he opened his eyes in panic and starting drawing on his powers, staring around the room with his fists clenched.

“Bennett,” I said softly. “It's over.”

When he realized I was there, the tension drained out of him. He smiled at me and said, “Hey there. I know you.”

I buried my face in his neck. “I can't believe I stabbed you.”

“Remind me never to get on your bad side,” he said, and took my hand.

My hands didn't ache anymore, as if they'd been healed by all the dispelling energy, which took the pain and left faint white patterns etched into my skin.

“Are you coming back with us?” My voice filled with hope.

“Neos is gone,” he said, with a slow, brilliant smile. “It's over. I wasn't kidding, Emma. Take my powers, take my past. All I want is you.”

I swallowed. He didn't know. “About Neos …”

As I told him, the excitement and warmth in his face faded until nothing remained but a hard knot of purpose. “So he's not dispelled,” he said. “And he massacred the Knell.”

I closed my eyes against the pain on his face.

He traced a lock of my hair with his finger. “I need you,” he said, “more than anything.”

My eyes flashed open. “Then come home.”

He showed me his purple hand. “Even with this? I can't stop, Emma. I still need to do what's right.”

“Do you know what's right?” I leaned forward and kissed him. “This is right. You and me together.”