Zephon, and Jericho… and so is Zoze.”
“Zoze. You found her?”
“Of course I did. I’m amazing.”
“Good. That’s good. Is she going to help?”
“I think so. She’s reluctant, but she’s on the run from some angry cyclops gangster whose eye she stole. Maybe we can help her with that, and she’ll summon the sword for us. She said it was stealing, though. Is that true?”
I sighed. “Yes, technically. But God is dead. The rules are different.”
“I’m going to let you explain that to her when you get here.” She paused. “You are coming, right?”
“We are. Where are you right now?”
“At a motel near Seattle. Just north of the city. It’s called the Jamison Inn.”
“Seattle… that’s quite the distance. You’ll have to wait for me to get there.”
“I wasn’t planning on going anywhere. How long do you think you’ll take?”
“I’m not sure. I was brought back to LA through a portal, but I don’t think we’ll be able to use a portal to get to you this time. We may have to go the old-fashioned way.”
Another pause. “You keep saying we.”
“Isla is coming with me. She wants to help.”
“And you can trust her?”
“I can. Like I said, we wouldn’t be speaking if she hadn’t saved my life. Sabriel thinks she’s dead, so it’ll be good to have her on our side just in case we need an ace in the hole.”
“Alright, I trust your judgment. Just get here, okay? Once you hit Seattle, reach out to me again. We’ll figure out how to meet then.”
I nodded. “I will. And Cari, it really is good to hear your voice again.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Yeah… ditto.”
The connection ended abruptly, and with it went a little pressure I’d been feeling at the base of my skull. I hadn’t noticed it until our conversation ended. I rubbed the back of my neck, easing the discomfort before turning to look at Isla, who had been patiently waiting for my psychic conversation to end.
“Well?” she asked, her eyes hopeful.
“They’re doing well,” I said, “No casualties. But she told me there’s trouble on the horizon. We need to get to her as quickly as possible.”
Isla glanced at the sun. “Fat chance of Annika hijacking another portal for us.”
“That’s what I thought.”
She turned her eyes to the street. It was still quiet down there. The garbage truck had vacated the area, leaving only the chirping of morning birds as they zipped from nest to nest. “How far do we have to go to get to them?”
“Seattle.”
Isla peered out of the window, now, and started carefully surveying the street. She was looking for something—that was the impression I got. “Seattle’s pretty far. And if we wait too long before leaving, traffic is going to slow us down even more.”
“The sooner we leave the better, agreed. But how are we going to get there?”
Isla looked at me, her eyes narrow, sharp, cunning. “You’ve already broken a bunch of rules… how do you feel about breaking a law?”
I frowned at her. “What do you mean?”
Without warning, Isla pulled herself through the open window and leapt into the air, spreading her wings wide and using them to catch the updraft and hold herself aloft. Her descent toward the street was careful, controlled, and silent. Shaking my head, I followed, abandoning the attic we had slept in and descending to the street behind her.
When she landed, she dashed toward a row of parked vehicles, quickly moving toward one vehicle in particular; a motorcycle. It was parked in an alley, behind a chain-link fence. With a touch of her hand, she blasted the lock on the fence, shattering it into two pieces and pulling the fence open.
“What are you doing?” I asked, keeping a hushed tone.
“What does it look like?” she said, “I’m stealing this bike.”
“You know how to do that?”
“I do. Are you going to stop me?”
I frowned. “I want to.”
“Sure you do. You’re a Prince, one of the good ones.” Isla hurried to the motorcycle and placed her hands on the handlebars. “But we’re talking about the end of the world, here. We need to get to Seattle if we want any hope of stopping what’s coming, right?”
“Right.”
“This material possession isn’t more important than our job.”
I paused. “I suppose you have a point.”
Isla’s wings radiated with Light, casting a warm, white glow on the body of the motorcycle and the alley around her. A moment later, the motorcycle grumbled to life, roaring as she tugged on the accelerator.
“That… is impressive,” she said.
She whipped a smug