“Pray that you do not further attract the All-Father’s ire by attempting to slay him. Retrieve your significant other, then flee.”
I shook my head, groaning. “Easier said than done.” I looked at the anomalous hole in the side wall of Mama Rosa’s restaurant that paradoxically led into the Boneyard. “V?” I thought. “You’re coming with. We’re going up against the head of a pantheon. Gonna need you around.”
“Right,” he blustered as he came floating out of the Boneyard. “Today’s as good a day as any to die.”
I rushed to collect him, wrestling him into submission when he resisted, because the last thing we needed on top of normals seeing a muscular lunatic truck-driving Santa Claus was them seeing a flying sword.
“You sound unsure of yourself,” I thought to him when he’d settled down. “Even nervous, actually.”
Vanitas sniffed and said nothing. A woman came down the sidewalk, glanced momentarily at the twisted metal of the lamppost, then trotted up to the restaurant. She clasped her hands together hopefully, directing her question to Mama Rosa.
“Hi, are you guys open? I hear you do some really good fried chicken.”
Rosa sighed and ushered her in. “Come. Come.”
In the distance, sirens wailed. The Lorica would be showing up soon, too. “Right,” I said. “Time to go.”
“We’re coming with,” Mason said, slipping his body between me and Carver, staring down our boss with all his boyish defiance. Carver looked between him and Asher, then sighed.
“Go, if you must. It would be folly to send Dustin off on his own. I will contact our allies at the Lorica.?
? Carver dug around in his pockets for his phone. “Help will come when it can.” He looked around himself, his false eye glowing as he pierced blocks, miles of Valero to follow Odin. “A warehouse, at the Gridiron. Gods, but I hope Igarashi is well. There’s no telling what the All-Father might do. Dustin, you will need to transport the three of you yourself.”
“I’ll do that,” I said, sweat already trickling down my temples. “The Gridiron. Got it.”
“I will remain here, with Rosa. I must consume my energies repairing the walls of the Boneyard.”
“Roger,” Asher said. “We’ll help with rebuilding when we get home.”
Carver nodded at him slowly. His lips parted as if he was about to say something else, but he hesitated. I knew that look. It was a father’s concern. But hey, Asher needed to leave the nest some day, right? This was Carver trying his undead damnedest to be supportive.
“Right,” Asher said, tugging me by the wrist into the shadow of Mama Rosa’s restaurant. “This should be about the right size.” He pulled Mason in, too. Mason looked between the two of us, confused.
“What’s going on?”
“Remember teleporting?” I said. “When Carver used magic to send us to Brandt Manor?”
Mason nodded. “Yeah. I felt sick afterwards.”
“Well,” I said, holding his hand as we sank into the darkness, “this is worse.”
Mason groaned.
Chapter 25
Threads of darkness fell from my skin and hair as the three of us appeared in the Gridiron. I felt woozy, and a little bit sick. It’d been a while since I’d used the Dark Room to shadowstep something bigger than, say, two apple pies. This was two whole people.
Vanitas stayed tucked under my arm, shifting around quietly, saying nothing. Asher stumbled out of the Dark Room, but gained his footing quickly. Mason wasn’t doing so hot, though.
“I’m gonna barf,” he choked out.
“Rough ride?” I said.
“That’s not funny. I seriously think I’m going to hurl.”
Asher wrinkled his nose. “Do it there, over by those crates. I don’t need your gross noises distracting me. I’m not as good at this as Carver is.”
He tapped the side of his temple, in a way that I’d sometimes seen Carver and Royce do, like they were pressing a button on some invisible surveillance device. Asher blinked, his eyes misting over with a ghostly green glow.