Automatic fire rained from above onto the zombies coming out of the entrance. The area was quickly becoming a bottleneck, and the zombies were creeping ever closer. Jono spat out a foul-tasting limb and kept fighting. Down the street, Órlaith and some of her fae were regrouping, having somehow made it off from the viaduct without killing their steeds.
Even with the bottleneck in play and Spencer’s magic breaking souls free and leaving bodies behind, the sheer number of zombies coming out of Grand Central Station was a problem. The soldiers in the forward barricades abandoned them for the next one closer to Órlaith’s position, a calculated retreat that Jono covered with a violence that left pieces of the dead scattered all around him.
It wasn’t a sustainable approach. Even Jono, with his lack of military expertise, could’ve told Reed that. But then Reed’s full plan came into play when shouted orders had shields going up around the barricades and anyone on their side in the field, including Jono. The incineration spell that hit the street nearly melted the pavement in areas.
The zombies stood no chance.
Fire broke all sorts of magic, and Jono remembered how Patrick had used it in London to kill the drekavacs in Tottenham. It burned through the zombies like an inferno, licking at the stone and viaduct near the entrance. But even as the fire faded, the zombies kept coming.
The fire stopped, and the shields were lowered to conserve magical strength. Lucien landed beside Jono, the vampire joined by Carmen without her glamour.
“If Reed wants his kill box, he can have it, but we can’t stay here,” Lucien said.
“We’ve secured extra ammunition from him that will get us to the next cache,” Carmen said.
Lucien had dipped into his Night Court’s inventory of weapons and set up locations all around downtown they could feasibly reach to reload in an ongoing and moving fight. The cartel he owned had moved the weapons through the southern border at the beginning of October, and Jono knew the inventory was large.
“Clear us a way south past Pershing Square,” Fenrir said, repeating Jono’s thoughts.
Lucien and Carmen left in a blur. Jono swung his head around, ready to face off against the next wave of zombies, when the ground bucked beneath his paws.
“Earthquake!” someone yelled.
Jono planted himself firmly, rolling with the motion as the ground seemed to shake itself apart. A crack appeared in East Forty-Second Street, splitting wide. What lifted free of the shadowy hole had Jono howling a warning with Fenrir’s help.
“Do not shoot!”
Fenrir’s voice roared through the air louder than Reed’s, and whatever power he’d poured into the words stilled fingers on triggers of those around them as Baba Yaga rose up on her floating mortar made of bones, pestle in hand.
She whacked her pestle on the mortar, her keen hunter eyes fixated on the second wave of zombies clawing over the bodies building up near the bridge. Her mortar floated away from the hole, and what came up after her would’ve made Jono gag if he’d still been in human form.
The man was little more than a corpse, intestines hanging out of a wound that was only half-closed, skin rotten around it. The rest of his skin was chalk white, as if he’d lost all the blood in his veins, but the manic brightness in his eyes and the crackle of ozone on the air hinted at a god hell-bent on ignoring death, even when it knocked on his bones.
“Peklabog,” Fenrir growled, to Jono’s surprise. “So you are not dead.”
The god of the Slavic Underworld smiled, revealing blackened teeth. “My Patriarch of Souls betrayed me, but he could not keep me dead after the staff broke. My godhead was set free and came home.”
To a walking corpse, it seemed.
Baba Yaga pointed her pestle at the zombies coming their way. “Is time to feast.”
Jono was reminded of what Baba Yaga ate, and if she wanted to gorge on the dead, he wasn’t going to stop her.
The god and immortal rushed forward, Baba Yaga letting out a gleeful cackle that people would remember in their nightmares.
23
Leaving Pershing Square was brutal,even with Peklabog and Baba Yaga on the street to aid them. Because of their presence, Reed had made the decision to remove the shields on the corner entrances of Grand Central Station. That meant drawing the soldiers and officers farther down into the foggy streets so they weren’t overrun.
The immortals bought everyone time, and Spencer helped. Piles of bodies and bones remained on the street, none yet resurrected by whatever magic had given them temporary life. The flash of dark green magic erupted through groups of zombies like spot fires, leaving the dead in its wake. Jono didn’t know where Spencer was, but he knew Emma and hopefully Takoma would keep him safe.
Órlaith’s steed used its hind legs to kick a drekavac in the face, sending the fast-moving zombie flying. That gave her space to ram her spear into the drekavac’s chest when it threw itself back at her, half its head caved in. When she jerked the spear upward, it split the body in half, and it fell to the ground. Seconds later, it rose again, stumbling their way.
Órlaith snapped her fingers and set the drekavac on fire. “We are losing ground.”
“Manhattan was already lost when the veil tore,” Fenrir replied before biting down on a zombie and shaking his head so rapidly the bones flew apart.
Jono hated the taste of zombies. No wonder Wade complained so much about eating them and demons. Thinking of Wade made worry rise to the forefront of his mind again. Jono didn’t know where they were or how they were doing, and the uncertainty ate at him.
