Order of Chaos (The Pendragon Agency) Read online

  “There are rivers everywhere,” Sasha said.

  “Right. So they could just go to…They could go to any side of Manhattan and get it done,” I said disappointedly.

  “We can’t drive around the whole island. There’s no time.”

  I rushed to the first book mentioning the Destruction Deities, still open on my desk. I skimmed through the open page, searching for anything that mentioned water. There was nothing. “How did Maury even know?” I muttered.

  New York was big. Too big. And that was just the city. For all we knew, they could have gone upstate. Either way, there wasn’t enough time to drive all over in hopes of finding hooded figures. Especially now that they’d proven they could be operating underground.

  “There must be some way to find them,” Sasha pleaded.

  I leaned against my desk, two fingers pinching the bridge of my nose. “There are two ways. One is using my Teleport-Locator Lens, which I can’t find. But even if I did, there’s not enough time to drive all the way back to the construction site where they last used portals.”

  “And the second way?”

  “Not really an option.” Because using locator magic would only bring out the warlord and thus bring about the end of the world. Something we were trying to prevent in the first place. It was bad enough Maury had spilled the beans on that one. I couldn’t tell her about the world ender part, too. It was my own little secret and needed to stay that way.

  “I should have just told you in the first place,” she said. “If I had done that, then maybe they wouldn’t have found me and then we wouldn’t be here.” The rest of her words were hard to understand in her rising panic and quickly forming tears. All I wanted to do was make her feel safe. But there wasn’t enough time to console her. This was something she was going to have to get over on her own. At least until we knew how things were going to turn out.

  The alarm from my phone went off. It was an annoying sound like nails on a chalkboard and screeching cats at the same time. “I didn’t set an alarm.” I pulled out the phone and checked it. There was a thunderstorm warning on the screen. I looked up at Sasha, very cockeyed. “Did you see any cloud out there?”

  The suddenness of the irritating sound must have pulled her back from the brink of a full-blown panic attack. “No, it’s clear,” she said, wiping away tears.

  I showed the notification to her.

  “That’s weird,” she said.

  I looked at the alert again, desperately trying to figure out why it would be there. This whole case had me so messed up, I was taking time out to investigate a weather report instead of keeping my focus on preventing the destruction of everything.

  I walked to my window and peered through the blinds. The city and street lights made it hard to see much of anything in the sky. That was one of the drawbacks of city living. But if there were clouds, the lights would reflect off them. As far as I could see, the sky was clear.

  A single drop of water hit the window. “I guess it was right,” I said as I turned back to Sasha, keeping my eyes on the phone screen. “That’s weird. I’ve never seen a rain storm just show up like that. But, sure enough, it’s starting to—” The realization hit me like a brick house. They weren’t at any of the rivers because they didn’t need them. Not anymore.

  I don’t know what the look on my face told her but Sasha suddenly seemed frightened. “What is it?”

  “They’re starting the ritual,” I said. “I only know one way a storm just pops up like this. The Acolytes…They have an elemental.”

  CHAPTER 19

  I floored the accelerator of her car, pushing it into speeds Sasha seemed fairly uncomfortable with on the narrow streets. Especially considering the weather conditions. I kept my head down and eyes forward to keep the rain from getting in my eyes. It was hard to see with the hole in the windshield John had dragged me through. Lucky her, Sasha’s side was mostly intact.

  I felt a strange relief that she hadn’t mentioned the state of her car. Being kidnapped and bled probably occupied her mind so that she didn’t notice. Besides that, I wasn’t quite ready to consider waiving my fee in lieu of auto repairs.

  “It makes more sense than oceans,” I said.

  “I still don’t understand,” she said with one hand clutching the door handle as an added security measure to the speed we were going at.

  “I didn’t understand it, either, at first. But like Maury said, the Chaos Bringer isn’t necessarily a demon. Even the minions aren’t demons so conventional magics won’t work. You saw John fight the minion in the cavern. What kind did you think it was?”

  “I haven’t seen that many. I guess, fire?”

  “Right,” I told her. “It seems like they’d be based around fire, so water should combat them. Now, I tried ice against one of the minions. Even a head shot didn’t work. That tells me they aren’t demons. At least not how we know demons. And if the minions aren’t demons then the Bringer definitely isn’t one. It’s from another realm.”

  “Like the elves?”

  “Exactly. But since it lives, breathes—the thing probably eats chaos—it has to come from chaos. And what’s the most chaotic thing we have here?”

  “Water?” She drew the word out, not sure if she was correct or where I was going with things.

  “Water. Right. And what is the most chaotic form water can take?” I glanced at her.

  She stared back with an empty expression. I knew shock when I saw it. And this night had plenty to shock her.

  I motioned toward her windshield. The wipers were doing their best with the crack on her side of the windshield. Or rather, the crack John had caused. Naturally, they did nothing for me. It had yet to become a full-blown storm but that hadn’t stopped a fair amount of rain water from bouncing off the hood and hitting me in the face.

  “Rain?” she said tentatively.

  “Bingo. It can fall gently or it can flood and destroy. And it does it all without any rhyme or reason. And if the Acolytes have an elemental, they can make it rain indefinitely.”

  “So, the Chaos Bringer is going to come out of the rain?”

  “Right.”

  “But how does that let us know where specifically?”

  “The elemental will need to be somewhere high. A place where they can be as close to the sky as possible. And there’s only one building in the whole city where they can do that.”

  “One World Trade Center,” she said. “But that area is going to be full of people. There will be guards. Even at this time of night.”

  “I know.” It was a fact that had me worried.

  We raced past a few people on the sidewalk. Two of them looked like they were arguing about something. I checked my side mirror after we passed and saw one of them punch the other. It could have been a basic argument. It wouldn’t be the only one in New York on any given night. But as we passed a denser group of people who all seemed to be arguing, I knew it wasn’t just a regular New York City night.

  “The ritual is already starting to take effect,” I said, wishing the car could go faster despite the rain in my face.

  We pulled up to the tallest skyscraper in town. It also happened to be the only one that wasn’t being rained on. The car seats were quickly soaking up water. What little coverage Sasha did have no longer mattered. We were both drenched before we got out of the car.

  “They put a magic barrier around the building!” I shouted over the downpour, pointing at the blue hued magic wall surrounding the skyscraper. “We gotta get on the roof!”

  Sasha nodded.

  We ran to the front plaza of the building, pushing past people arguing and some even fighting with each other. Someone had even worked a street sign from the sidewalk and was swinging it at three other people. The sight grated on me. It took much focus to ward off the effects that everyone else was feeling. I looked at Sasha who was shaking her head. She was feeling them, too. And with her heightened senses, it was probably worse. We needed to get behind that barrier. I
had a theory that if it wasn’t raining there, we’d probably be safe from the rituals effects, too. If the Acolytes were going to pull this off completely, they were going to have to keep their own wits about them.

  We dashed to the barrier and Sasha made it through. I wasn’t so lucky.

  The guy felt like a bull ramming into me. I hit the street, sloshing water everywhere. I could hear Sasha yell my name but it sounded so far away. My vision was blurring and changing color. It was a lot like when the warlord was coming out except I could still see through my own eyes.

  It wasn’t even a conscious thought when I pulled my gun. I was ready to shoot the man dead. But even that threat wasn’t enough to stop him. The large man stomped his way toward me. I felt like a robot that was trying to fight against a new program ordering it to do something it didn’t want to do. The Chaos Bringer wasn’t even here, yet, and its pull was so strong. If it actually showed up, we were all done for.

  Suddenly, a black cat launched onto the big man’s face, clawing at it before leaping back behind the barrier. I had just enough wit about me to roll behind it myself.

  “What happened out there?” Sasha asked as she shifted back to her human self.

  “It’s the ritual. Everyone is losing it. It’s that bad. We have to stop them.”

  We both looked up at the sight of the strange glow emanating from the roof.

  “It’s just like you said,” she told me.

  “I hope you don’t mind heights,” I said.

  We rushed toward the front doors while people inside the barrier ran around like chickens with their heads cut off. All of them were panicking but it was normal fear. I didn’t blame them. If anything, I feared for them. We were all safe from the outside chaos as long as we stayed behind the magic barrier. But once anyone ran past it, they’d have to face both the coming storm of chaos and the thunder-storm. Scary as it all was, at least I knew what was going on. None of these people would ever understand and all of them would just think the sky was falling.

  The four Acolytes that had stepped out of the doors weren’t entirely unexpected. The two rock monsters that formed from the asphalt, though, were. Sasha shifted and easily dodged a rocky fist. I had a little more trouble. A near miss was still a miss but when it was that close, your pulse was bound to race.

  All the dodging was keeping me from thinking of a solution to our problem. Sasha had already moved on to the Acolytes and was doing a pretty decent job of keeping them occupied. Cat claws were vicious things.

  I tried to take aim at the spell-casting Acolyte, figuring on it being the one keeping the golems on sentry duty but a rocky leg stomped in my way. This was going to have to be the hard way. And why shouldn’t it have been? Everything else about this case was the hard way.

  I took a step back toward the barrier wall as the concrete giants lumbered toward me. Sasha had managed to take out one of the Acolytes. The other two kept the puppet master safe while Sasha tried to get to her.

  I dashed to the side, staying near the wall but never crossing it. All the while, I was trying to think of the opposite of concrete. Unfortunately, there was no such thing. Like any rock, sure you could wear it down over time. You could crack it with steel but these things were made of already broken pieces of the stuff. They would just reform. I wasn’t going to be able to destroy them, only stop them. That’s when an idea formed.

  I whispered to my gun and could hear the changes being made inside the magazine. I chambered a round and fired twice at the nearest golem. The bullet hit and the monster was instantly covered in tar. The stuff got in all of its cracks and joints, making its movements sluggish. I fired one more shot for good measure. Tar took time to dry. The nice things about my bullets was that they instantly supplied a solution based on the need. Ice bullets would freeze instantly. Fire would burn up its target. And now the tar was already drying, stopping the concrete monstrosity in its tracks.

  The end result distracted the Acolytes long enough for Sasha to get around them and attack the spell-caster who made the rock monsters in the first place. The second golem crumbled into a pile of asphalt. The tar-covered one remained, stuck in its current state. If we made it out of this, someone at the building was going to have some explaining to do about why there was a giant concrete statue of a monster outside on the plaza. Maybe I’d have a chance to read about it in the morning.

  I shot the other three Acolytes and put one in the golem master for good measure. Sasha shifted back and we both went inside.

  It was my first time inside the building. The art on the walls was interesting to say the least. Not really my kind of thing. Random shapes and colors were a sensitive subject in light of all the chaos going on outside. I had enough chaos in my life that night. I didn’t need it in my art as well.

  It was a very spacious lobby but, despite the art, something about it was cold and sterile with its nearly all white walls. The elevators sat in the middle of the lobby, creating a center shaft that went up the entire height of the building.

  Two Acolytes appeared on either side of the elevator banks. One of them placed his hands on the largest painting and started muttering something. The whole art work warped as small bubbles formed on the tapestry. I first thought it was going to catch fire and readied my gun to react accordingly. But there was no fire. Instead, the bubbles burst and multicolored arms sprang from the canvas, like tentacles, whipping and grabbing for anything nearby. One of the tendrils wrapped around Sasha’s waist and pulled her toward the painting. My first thought was disgust at the sight. My second thought was how much easier this was going to be than the monsters outside.

  I took aim and fired. The single shot rocked the art-loving Acolyte’s head back. Before the man could hit the ground, the painting reverted to normal, releasing Sasha. I turned toward the second Acolyte who must have only had the skill of bravery. There were no monsters and no structures coming to life around him. It was just him and his fists.

  Now some people might say rushing someone with a gun was fool-hardy but I think it was admirable. No one would expect it and there was a good chance the gun user would be frightened by the act and run away. I was only one of two of the types. I absolutely did not expect it, but I wasn’t afraid of it either. I saved the bullet and cold-cocked the guy with the butt of my gun. Just like the one I shot, his head rocked back and he fell to the lobby floor. For what the Acolytes were trying to do, I really didn’t want to leave any of them alive to try again. But like Prime had said, there were a lot more of them than I knew. Taking out one when there were bound to be more above us wasn’t worth the time.

  We made our way to the elevators with little other opposition. Sasha pushed the button and slicked her wet hair back, getting it out of her face. I stared at her for a moment. It might well have been the last time I got to see anything so pretty.

  “What?” she asked, staring back at me.

  I only smiled, feeling a strange sense of calm. It had suddenly occurred to me that we might actually pull this off. Of course, there was the possibility that my calm was really just acceptance that we wouldn’t pull this off at all and that we were all going to die.

  I checked my gun’s bullets. I was low. It was then that I started thinking that my calm was probably based more on the latter.

  CHAPTER 20

  We both stood in silence while the elevator car ascended the building. Even after all we’d gone through that night and whatever we still had left to deal with, being in an elevator was an awkward experience. I looked at her. She looked at me. And we both forced smiles that were obviously fake. We were like two strangers who had to share a confined space. It would have been easy to chalk it all up to nervous tension over the end of the world. I thought, for a second, about making some sort of small talk. But we both already knew about the weather and I already knew she was a princess. It kind of only left the end of the world to talk about. And neither of us could actually say anything new about that. Even if I took that moment to bring up t
he warlord, it would still be an end of the world conversation. Normal people discussed that sort of thing in an abstract way. The rest of us lived it. It really was no different than any other time inside of an elevator car. We both just wanted to get the ride over with so we could get back to the real work.

  Thirty stories up, the car stopped. That time, we both looked at each other with expressions of concern. Sasha clenched her fists and I clutched my gun, hoping we could use the cramped space to some advantage if a group of Acolytes appeared when the doors opened.

  The doors opened and two people just as normal looking as anyone else were standing there. But their eyes were vacant and they seemed to stare right through us.

  “Are you two—” With no warning, they both charged right in and attacked us.

  The man’s fingers gripped around my throat like an iron vice. I hit his arms, trying to break the hold but it wasn’t working. Whatever spell they were under was dampening their pain receptors. The man’s eyes were still blank. I don’t even think he was aware of what was going on. It was as if they were both sleep-walking. Or in this case, sleep-attacking.

  I hit the man in the face with my gun and noticed Sasha strike her attacker with her fist. Neither of the people reacted to it. They just kept their grip on us. My first thought was to shoot them both. But they were innocent in all of this. Whatever spell they were under, hurting them was out of the question. Well, hurting them in any permanent ways.

  I finally pushed back, shoving the man against the opposite wall, and grabbed his arms. I pulled as hard as I could, trying to free myself but there was just no unclenching his fingers. Neither of them were particularly imposing or muscular from what I could see. But I couldn’t believe how strong the two of them were while under someone else’s control. At that point, the hardest battle we’d faced, was two normal people. I stuck a foot in the man’s gut and pushed. It was a long shove and I was getting a neck burn from his fingers sliding over my skin but based on the reclaimed ability to breathe, it was working.