Wham. The creature’s fist punched through paneling a bare inch from her shoulder, effectively barring escape. Its body heat was a simmering wave, and its rough musky non-cologne wrapped around her as if trying to drown her own scent. It was disorienting to not evensmellherself, very much like vanishing.
The old biter clicked his tongue a few times, as if admonishing a naughty pet. “Now, now. Let’s see. I will name you Pandora, perhaps, or Philomela, though I do not wish you to sing. No, no. You will be Psyche.”
What. The hell. Layla lowered her hand from her mouth, slowly; the creature watched, its smile stretching, cheeks bunching up. The effect was at once angelic and deeply, utterly creepifying.
How could Max ever call this beingFather?
“She wants to speak,” it crooned, and did another round of huffing at her hair, snuffling against her cheek with dry feverbreath. “So good, such a sweet little piece. I’ll allow it.”
This thing is completely fucking batshit. The terror was deep, wine-red, and so overwhelming her legs went rubbery. If this was a father, she was deeply glad she’d never known hers.
“Yes,” it continued, and trailed off in some other language, rolling and rhythmic. But the red gleam lit its eyes once more, and she sensed it was working itself up to something. A coiled spring, winding tighter and tighter until something snapped.
Layla had the distinct idea she wouldn’t like whatever it had planned.
I thought they weren’t supposed to hurt lee-mons,she thought, inconsequentially, and a single spark lit in her midriff, exploding like the oil tank Max had yanked her away from.
Fuck this. I’m going down fighting. She lashed out, blurring-quick with every inch of her newfound strength, and felt her fingernails shear through cloth.
The creature gave a titanic, world-ending yell.
CHAPTER 24
For some whileNemesis followed his leman’s scent, twisting and turning—his nymph ran well, and the thread of rose-musk helped sharpen his swiftly blunting edges. Other predators were upon her trail, seeking to take what was his, and the rage was also a weapon to hold the numbness at bay.
He gave himself over to it, a fire fit to dwarf the other blaze now clearly spreading from the oilfields, helped along by a slow hot breeze. Much of the city was now awake, aware of one danger while remaining blind to another battle being fought in alleys and culverts, atop flat roofs offering a vantage of the false dawn, alongside their paved roads and byways.
True sunrise was still some while away. The sanguinant upon watch left their posts, for the firebreath breeze carried both smoke and an enticing tang of roses; those who did not scent the prize felt the excitement of others and streamed after their siblings, eager to join the battle and perhaps be the final victor after all others were weakened.
Now he was not merely hunter but also assiduously followed, and the risk of ambush while he dealt with those chasing lovely, fleeing Leila mounted. Another whetstone to sharpenhim against ossification; any tool was acceptable, so long as it worked.
Short sharp engagements or longer running duels, each ending with runnels of quick decay before final explosions or showers of glistening grit. He knew how to kill his own kind, for such was his function as Antinous’s eldest son, a prop to Father’s power, the once-faithfulstrategosupon whom an Emperor depended.
And every lesson over long centuries of battle was used.
The conflagration spread, sending long bright tongues through two residential areas lain cheek-by-jowl to the oilfields; the sanguinant, in their eagerness to draw him forth, had wrought far better than they could have hoped. Much thick humidity was sucked from the air, though the clouds pressed lower and jeweled glitters leapt between their billows, lightning dancing above columns of rising smoke.
Iuppiter was roused, lazily tossing his bolts from one hand to the other, waiting to see how the creatures below would fight. Were other divinities present as well, briefly called from their long slumber? The question of which had drawn a Persian-named nymph across a soldier’s path was unnecessary, unheeded.
If he survived to make a sacrifice of thanksgiving, he would need an oracle’s help to aim the smoke correctly. Or perhaps one of Leila’s stray utterances would grant him knowledge, though never absolution.
Mortals scurried to contain the catastrophe, shining red beetles of firetrucks accompanied by wailing ambulances, many swarming to predetermined points since flame, like water, followed preferred paths. Invisible messages hummed through a gasping-hot summer night—radio, television, emergency channels, news, and the far more subtle humming of sanguinant awareness.
Thunder rumbled behind the flashes; some mortals prayed for rain, but most of modernity knew better than to count on the divine for aid and so, more resources were mobilized, more personnel shaken from their beds.
As the night wore on, the ranks of the Blood thinned. They turned upon each other in phrenzy, seeking to lessen the competition for a miraculous prize most had now been granted a scenting of.
Among them Nemesis appeared, slaying all he found—until he found another trail, one he recognized.
He stood, head down, breathing harshly. The sandy, shimmering particles of dead sanguinant clung to his flesh and tattered cloth; the killroar vibrating in his chest had dropped to a range inaudible to mortals. The thrum spread for a good distance in either direction, however, maddening his prey just as each other’s presence did, and the killglow spread from his eyes in a band of crimson haze.
Yes, he knew this scent. It belonged to the one who had granted him the Gift, the one who had made him a weapon, the one who had named him Nemesis.
The one who had stolen his leman.
A moment later the empty lot was deserted again, air collapsing upon itself with a hard tearing sound as a soldier forgot every other consideration. Thrall and ossification swirled within him, vying for primacy as the oilfields fire leapt a freeway and sent a sheet of hungry flame through the northwest industrial district. Warehouses crumpled, more storage tanks exploded, and the city’s second, larger refinery serviced by a railroad spur felt the first touch of a hot breeze laden with cinders.
CHAPTER 25
