The Burn (15 page)

Anger darkened his expression. "How could you buy into that? How much sense does that make? You exist only here, dressed in a tight little bikini outfit, running around like a whore and fucking some metal sculptor you met only a few days ago? Think about it."

Miranda clenched her teeth. "It's not like that."

"You got too close to these guys. You got careless. You left your back-up behind. You broke the rules. And now they've got their claws into you. Now you don't know up from down, dead from alive. Now you have to deal with what they've done, learn to get past it somehow. That's not going to be quick or easy, but it's better than being this."

"I can't take back what's happened. I need you to accept that and move on. I need you to leave while you still can."

"Leave you here? With them? You think I could fucking do that. I care about you, Andie. No matter what's happened, no matter what."

"Logan, I can't come with you."

"I don't remember asking," he replied, grabbing onto her wrist and pulling her forward against him. "It ends now. You're coming home."

"Logan!"

"I'll tear this place apart if I have to!" he snapped back, his fingers flexing and tightening on the handle of the .45. "I'll destroy it piece by piece."

The whisper of symbols rose in response to the threat, slipping excitedly from the metal. The air turned thick and electric, the floor grates chilling underneath them. The metallic smell of blood seeped from the walls.

"You have to get out," Miranda insisted, pulling him toward the exit at the end of the corridor. "Now!"

A hard vibration shuddered through the floor grates.

Miranda focused on the exit in desperation.
No, no, no, don't trap us in here! Don't take his life for this!

The grates dropped underneath her with a hard crack. For a moment, she felt herself suspended above the darkness, stretched and reaching for the light. Then Logan tumbled into her, his hands hard and grasping, and she fell.

They crashed into the blackness, colliding with each other and smooth metal as they slid through a narrow duct. Miranda cursed, spilling out onto another floor grate. She rolled onto her side, the impact still spinning her vision. Logan hit the grate beside her, issuing a harsh whisper of pain.

Miranda shook her head, wincing as she pushed up onto her shoulder. She glanced at the small chamber around them. It was dark and tight, lit only by the faint glow of an overhead lamp, a round room with no doors.

Golden symbols adorned the walls, their intricate patterns larger and more threatening than any she had seen in the upper levels of the Gate.

"What the?" Logan pushed to his feet, breathing hard through his teeth. A cut bled from his temple. "What is this? What are these marks supposed to mean?"

"They're Rathvam, but I don't know—"

"This is a chamber for the damned," the Necromancer interrupted, his voice soft with menace. "The Rathvam souls that reside here do not sing."

He materialized from the wall before them, his cloak heavy with shadows. His pale eyes focused on Miranda, ignoring the man beside her.

"Jesus," Logan breathed.

The Necromancer granted him a knowing smile and moved slowly along the wall, his cloak trailing darkness behind him. He paused before one of the curving symbols. "The Khagan," he said, as if it were an introduction.

"The what?"

"Titles are important among the Rathvam. Humans cannot speak the language of the symbols and earthly names bear no reflection of a soul's position in the sequence of the Gate. This soul's position, I assure you, is significant."

Miranda grimaced, cutting her gaze back to the symbol.

"The Khagan was a formidable man," the Necromancer said. "Ruler of a great empire, his intellect matched only by his talent for conquest. The blood this soul has shed could fill an ocean."

Miranda took a step back, sensing a dark chill of energy emanating from the symbol. It seemed to call to her, a murderous luster caught in its violent lines.

"He reaches for you," the Necromancer noted with satisfaction. "I have gone to great trouble to wake him. He now waits for a command."

"Enough!" Logan raised his weapon, squaring the barrel of his gun on the Necromancer's chest. "Where is the exit?"

"There is no exit," the Necromancer said.

"I will empty this clip into you without hesitation."

"It will not save you," the Necromancer told him. "Your name is not written on these walls. Your blood will be spilled here and you will pass out of this world, only to be recalculated into something else and cycled through, again and again with no significance, the same as any animal under your earthly skies. The real universe is too civilized for you."

Reaching under his cloak, the Necromancer drew his dagger from its sheath, its mirrored blade flashing in the dark.

"Put your weapon down!" Logan yelled at him, lowering his stance, the .45 held straight in front of him.

"This is how I killed her," the Necromancer told him. "I slit her throat."

"Don't listen to him," Miranda warned.

Logan grabbed her and pushed her out of the way. Training the .45 on the figure before them, he pulled the trigger. The gun blasted in the confined space, hot and deafening. Logan kept firing, each shot ringing from the metal around them.

The Necromancer took two hits in the chest and collapsed to his knees. He glared up at them, his blood spilling across the floor grates, his white hair loose at his back. Dropping on his shoulder, he smiled, whispering a soft prayer against the metal. The hum of power thickened. The ceiling above them clicked and rotated, slowly grinding into a new position.

A soft murmur of anticipation rose from the walls.

"Khagan," the Necromancer said, his teeth stained red. "My blood is your strength."

A shadow rose from under the grate. Spiraling upward, it spread and thickened, the dark mass at its center taking solid shape. The figure of a medieval warrior formed within its vaporous coils, his shoulders rising above them.

A nightmare in a battle mask, his body appeared strained and yearning for violence, his corded arms visible under the sweep of a cloak, a long sword glinting at his side. The rest of his armor was tightly secured over the muscular length of his torso, a ghostly trace of markings visible on his skin.

Logan shook his head, backing toward the wall. "Not real. Nothing's real in this place. Nothing!"

The Khagan stared at him, drawing the sword from his side. It scraped free of its sheath with a hollow sound, its long blade shining and lethal.

Miranda grabbed onto Logan's wrist and forced the gun down. She stepped in front of him, drawing her dagger from her side. "He'll leave," she offered. "Let him go. They'll only come after him if you don't."

The warrior before her said nothing.

"He must die," the Necromancer replied from the floor. "Only the dead can leave this chamber."

"I won't let you do it!" she yelled.

The Khagan lunged forward, charging for Logan. Miranda leapt back and kicked him in the gut. He grunted. She danced from foot to foot in a kickboxer's readied stance, waiting for him to attack. There was no way through his armor, but his arms were vulnerable, if she were quick enough.

He seemed to consider her a moment, then lunged again. She leapt out of his way and plowed into his side, throwing him off balance. He pivoted and caught her, slamming her against the wall with enough force to blur her vision.

She let out a pained cry.

"Goddess," he hissed from behind the cold metal of the helmet, his accent a heavier and cruder version of the Necromancer's. "Why do you defy your master?"

Miranda tasted the blood in her mouth. She looked at him, seeing nothing but darkness behind the eye-slits of his mask. He had her pinned. There was no way to move, no way to fight. He jerked her roughly again and the dagger fell from her hand.

She glared at him. "I have no master."

"Let her go," Logan yelled, raising his gun again. "Now!"

The Khagan pushed her higher against the wall and she twisted, kicking against him to free herself. He staggered back. She dropped to her feet. The Khagan turned and ran the blade of his sword through her stomach.

Miranda froze, the pain shocking and unbearable, the skin of her stomach suddenly wet with blood.

"Miranda!" Logan yelled.

The Khagan yanked the blade free. Miranda dropped to the floor, curling onto her side in agony. She heard the sound of Logan firing again from behind her. Rounds exploded in the thick air, passing through the warrior without effect and sparking from the metal walls behind him.

The Khagan raised his sword again.

Miranda shut her eyes.

Logan screamed once. A wet slash of noise cut the sound short, blood misting in the air. Miranda heard a heavy thud hit the grate behind her. The .45 skittered across the grate.

Logan was dead.

She made a soft sound of anguish, tears welling hot.

The Khagan stepped over her again, pausing to crouch by her side. Blood coated the blade of his sword, dripping thickly from the blade. He reached down to touch her face and she flinched.

"I know your sign and its location," he said, his accent sharp and quick. "You do not suffer in vain, Goddess, though I am destined to kill both your lovers."

Miranda felt herself trembling, her breath catching and uneven. She couldn't think, couldn't move, couldn't focus on him anymore.

"Sleep," he said, his fingers stroking Logan's blood across her cheek. "Soon, your master will need you again."

T
he wind had risen on the playa, streams of dust slipping across the desert, catching the soft glow of the moon. Cold swatches of neon burned between the camps, adorning entrances, art cars and costumes, creating a ghostly phosphorescent world in the middle of the desolate nowhere.

Seth walked past the glare of oil drum fires, focused on the Rathvam camp as it loomed before him, its gates shadowed against streams of colored light. Music pulsed from inside. Crowds had gathered at the entrance, leaving a dry river of bicycles parked in the harsh wind around it.

He grimaced, scanning the camp border in both directions for any sign of Pete.
Arrive separately, meet up inside. Right.
Letting a slow breath out through his teeth, he walked through the arena entrance.

Female fire spinners greeted him from the stages in garters and leather boots, their breasts bared to the firelight. They turned in circles as they arced and spun their poi, creating bands of flame around their bodies. Dancers on stilts swayed above the crowd in butterfly masks and flowing costumes.

He paused, glancing across the revelers, then up at the dark silhouette of the Divine Gate tent set against the night sky. Miranda was in there somewhere. He could feel her now.
Damn it, Pete, where are you?

Walking past the swirl of dancers, he found a dusty couch had been placed away from the speakers and sat down, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. He waited, watching the crowd from under the felt brim of his Stetson.

The air of eccentricity, of darkness and humor and excess, was thick around him. People swarmed around the art pieces on display, exploring mirrored mazes and starkly lit neon tunnels, their voices loud enough for all to hear. A screaming fight, an eruption of laughter, a giddy retelling of a story that made no sense, it all blurred together to create a bizarre intimacy between strangers, a closeness fueled by the loss of inhibitions and the light of the moon.

It occurred to him that the people here were all looking for something, for meaning, for identity, for escape, for a lover, for an abuser, for an audience. They were all looking for something, without ever realizing that something might just be looking for them too.

He narrowed his gaze through the crowd, recognizing one person in particular. A woman danced against a spill of blue light from the stage, her lanky outline moving with drugged confusion, her short hair damp. She swiveled her hips and rocked to a different beat than what came through the speakers, looking skyward before stumbling back in a move that was half rhythm and half loss of balance. Cecilia.

He pressed his lips together, watching her flounder in the flood of light. She was barely clothed in a silver bra and tight shorts, a neon shine glossing over the sweat on her skin. Men circled close by, some touching, some laughing.

Seth felt his teeth grind. Pushing up from the couch, he shouldered his way through the jostling throng of dancers, climbing up onto the stage to face her.

She didn't see him at first, her movements erratic, her eyes half-closed. In the harsh light, her thinness appeared skeletal, her cheeks sharply drawn, her eyes sunken. She turned in a motion intended to appear masterful, only to misjudge the steps. Her foot tripped and she fell.

Seth caught her before she dropped beneath him. She swayed back in his arms, her head dipping back on her shoulders. Looking at his face, she smiled, her eyes completely dilated, the pupils large and black.

"Seth," she breathed.

"What are you on?"

"Nothing," she grinned, unconcerned.

"I mean it. What did you take?"

Her expression turned churlish and vengeful. "What the fuck do you care? Maybe I feel good right now. Maybe I needed to."

He cursed under his breath. He could feel her tremble against him, her body weak and light. "C'mon." He steadied her on her feet and led her back to the couch. She held onto his hand, all smiles, pressing closer than she had to.

He sat her down on the dusty cushions and looked across the camp, searching for Pete. There had to be some way to get her out, someone who could take her to a safe place. She grabbed onto his hand, pressing it to her lips, then she looked up at him, her dark eyes imploring. She had glitter on the skin of her cheeks, sparkling from her hair.

"I still love you," she said, a drunken joy in her eyes. "I do. You're the best man, the best person I ever met."

"Don't."

"I love you. I really do. And I know you, Seth. I know you love me too, for the person I am, you know? Just because we fight, it only means we love each other, right? That's what it really means."