Nan cut Mimi's arm with her blade, her weapon finally drawing first blood.
Bitch!
That hurt!
Mimi forgot to feel afraid, and sprung forward with no thought to her safety. She screamed a battle cry, one that came to mind only at that instant. One that Michael himself had used to rally his armies to battle.
"NEXI INFIDELES!" she roared. Death to the Faithless! Death to the Traitors! She was Azrael. Golden and terrifying. Her hair and face and sword aflame with a blazing, incandescent light.
And with a powerful sweep she cleaved the false Warden in two.
Then she staggered backward. Black smoke was filling her lungs. She had to get out of there. She felt her way to the front door and yanked it open - just as a black-haired man was entering from the other side. In seconds he held a knife to her throat.
Her heart dropped.
The man holding her captive was Kingsley Martin.
The Silver Blood traitor.
This was her doom.
Lawrence had insisted he drive, and as they made their way along the dark curvy highway, Schuyler couldn't help but notice the tiny, flickering lights against the hillside and how beautiful they were.
"Yeah, but they're probably from the slums, which means the electricity infrastructure wasn't set up correctly. And is a potential fire hazard," Oliver pointed out.
Schuyler sighed. The city was rich in juxtapositions: poverty and wealth, crime and tourism in a heady, dizzying mix. It was impossible to admire the beauty without also noticing the ugliness.
They rounded a particularly sharp corner when Lawrence suddenly pulled the car to the side of the road and slumped forward in his seat.
"Grandfather!" she cried, alarmed. She saw his eyes begin to dart back and forth, as if he were asleep but not asleep. He was receiving a sending.
When it ended, his face was ashen. For a moment Schuyler thought he was going to faint.
"What happened? What's wrong?"
Her grandfather shook out his handkerchief and pressed it to his forehead. "That was Edmund Oelrich before he passed. The entire Conclave. Massacred. Those who were not burned were taken."
"They're all dead?" Schuyler gasped. "But how? Why...?" She clutched his arm. "What do you mean, they're all dead?"
In the backseat she turned to Oliver for help. But he was shocked into silence, his face a mask of helpless confusion.
"The Almeidas were Silver Bloods," Lawrence said, stammering uncharacteristically. "They showed their hand tonight. I had suspected it, which is why I stayed in Rio for longer than I intended, but Alfonso had passed the test. He did not have the Mark. I was deceived." Lawrence was shaking. "But they had help. Edmund said Nan Cutler was one of them."
Schuyler bit her lip.
"Nan Cutler!" Lawrence sounded crushingly wounded. "During the crisis in Rome she had been integral to the Silver Blood defeat. I was blinded by her years of loyalty to the Conclave. This is my fault, I was overconfident and trusting when I should have been guarded and wary." Abruptly Lawrence turned the car around, causing the car in the opposite direction to swerve wildly to get out of his way. "Kingsley was right - I put too much faith on old allegiances," he said as he floored the pedal and the car shot forward.
"Where are we going?"
"To Corcovado."
"Now? Why?"
Lawrence gripped the wheel tightly. "The attack on the Conclave can only mean one thing: the Silver Bloods are planning to free Leviathan."
They parked at the base of the entrance to the Statue of the Redeemer and ran out of the car. The parking lot was empty and quiet, and they could see the statue lit up by floodlights from below. "Disguise yourself," Lawrence ordered Schuyler. "And you, stay here," he told Oliver.
Oliver began to protest, but one look from Lawrence silenced him.