my sister there. “Floor it.”
Honora blows a huge gum bubble. It pops. She grins, and then she does as she’s told. I’m thrown off the hood and roll, tumbling hard against the asphalt. The truck wheels squeal as Honora careens out of the alley, the back doors flapping wildly, several demons still inside.
Artemis. What is she doing?
I stand with a groan. I can still catch them. I can—
A blinding jolt of electricity freezes me. Someone has a shock stick against my spine. They hold it there. The edges of my vision start to go fuzzy and black. And then I fall to my knees as the current is cut off. The cloaker slumps to the ground next to me. A neon-yellow hand reaches out to me, and I take it.
“I got Jason in a cab,” Doug says. “He’ll be fine. And I didn’t see any other trucks, so they’re not going to be hauling off more demons. But we should get out of here. I don’t like any of this, Nina. This wasn’t Sean’s MO at all. Too big. Too coordinated. Something else is going on. And I don’t think it was about me, either. They grabbed Jason, yeah, but so many others.”
“It was Honora,” I whisper. “And Artemis. In the truck. They’re helping.”
Doug doesn’t say anything. But he puts his arm around me for more than just balance as I limp and stumble back to our car.
12
DOUG EYES ME CRITICALLY. “ARE you sure we should be doing this right now? We have no idea what kind of threat Von Alston is, and you were jolted with so much electricity you could power the castle for the next month. Plus, you ran through a wall and got thrown off a moving vehicle.”
I pull down the sun visor and look in the little mirror there. There are bits of brick and plaster still in my hair. A bruise is forming on one cheek—I don’t remember what caused it—and now that it’s been an hour and all my adrenaline is gone, my shoulder is so stiff I can barely move it. “It’s fine. Except for my shoulder.”
“That’s why people generally use doors instead of walls.”
“I’m a trendsetter.” I pick as much of the rubble out of my hair as I can. Doug is probably right. This Von Alston might be more than we can handle right now. If he was behind everything and can launch an offensive that big, I don’t feel safe about the castle being without my protection. I thought Sean was our biggest foe. It could still be him—the Honora connection, plus the symbol from his tea. But the last time I saw the ponytailed wonder, he was running a drug-dealing business out of the basement of a health-food store. No cloaked zealots in sight. He had mentioned something about powerful allies, though. Maybe it’s Von Alston.
All I have to go on is the triangle symbol on the necklace, which is still on the kitten curled up asleep on our backseat. I should never have let Artemis take that book. I thought I was making it easier for her to come back. Not easier for her to hurt me.
We need more information on everything. But going home means reporting on what we found. And that means telling everyone that I’ve seen Artemis twice now and let her walk out with one of our books. Rhys will never forgive me—or her. And slightly graver than taking a book—though Rhys will disagree—is that apparently she’s working with Sean’s crews. And she told Honora to throw me off a moving vehicle.
Saying it out loud will make it hurt so much worse than my shoulder does. For so long it was Artemis and me against the world. And I can’t let go of the idea that we can return to that. Like if I can figure this out fast enough, I can get her out of whatever she’s mixed up in and no one will ever have to know how she’s betrayed us.
How she’s betrayed me.
I’ve lost so much. I refuse to lose Artemis or the hope that she’s going to be my sister again. We’ll rule Von Alston out or in, and then we’ll go from there. I’ll find Artemis before she’s in too deep. No one has to know but me. We let the Watchers tell us who to be and how to be it for so long. I’m keeping this just the two of us.
I sigh and try to rotate