Invincible Read online

  Joy flattened against the wall as a group of bird-masked guards rushed the Bailiwick. Graus Claude roared a battle challenge—halfhearted at best, but enough to stall the horde and push them, stumbling, back. He clambered to his feet, propping himself up on his knuckles like some great silverback beast. Filly grabbed the Minotaur’s nose ring and yanked down sharply, kneeing him in the face once, twice, then wrenching him sideways, bowling over two fairies with a shout of triumph. Ink skipped out of reach, lithe and limber as a swallow, dancing along the edges of the mob, dodging his way between the trees toward Joy.

  She watched the attack with a strange, distant awareness. A tingle crawled up her arches and the backs of her calves, deliciously burning up her thighs, warming her vitals, boiling her blood. Her head felt heavy and she turned her chin to one side, considering the masked faces of those rushing nearer. Her neck cracked. A smile came easily to her lips. The voice in her head—the one that seemed to resonate from deep within the earth, pitched ten times louder and surer than her own—thrummed in her rib cage and echoed in her brain.

  THEY CANNOT DESTROY US NOW.

  Filly staggered as an antlered man materialized out of the foliage and fastened his arms around her chest. She gave a grunt and smashed the back of her skull into his pointed chin. The horse head mask split, the mane flung wild.

  A face appeared in front of Joy, hanging upside-down from a low tree branch.

  “Got you!” Hasp hissed, his impossibly long fingers wrapping around her wrists and yanking her arms above her head. The aether sprite laughed from his perch, drawing her face closer to his. His breath smelled of exhaust and malice.

  But her feet still touched the ground.

  She could feel the tingling afterburn of the world beyond the Bailiwick and beneath that, the tempting whispers of land and stone, rock and soil, metal and dirt and old, old ice. The voice inside her snarled as Joy latched on to Hasp’s knuckles and pulled.

  She felt his hands crack in her palms. He howled a high-pitched scream and let go.

  Joy dropped to the ground as giant stick-like creatures snapped their wrists, shooting barbed splinters through the air, slicing birds sideways. Ink torqued his body, evading the shower of darts. Filly twisted, using a Green Man for a shield. Joy drove her arms into the ground, grabbing something sharper than the scalpel, older than stone, hotter than hell; the taste in her mouth was copper and blood.

  A wave of darkness fell around her, muffling the cacophonous roar inside her head. A voice hissed at her from under a fluffy shield of white feathers. Avery, she thought dimly. The Tide’s courtier and Councilman Sol Leander’s spy.

  “Go!” he said. “Go now, Joy Malone!”

  The world slowed to a crawl. Avery’s voice dulled to a hum and the screams blurred into a distant din. Faces turned comical as lips curled, cheeks stretched, brows furrowed and mouths formed words. Butterflies waved lazily by like water weeds and Ink soared between two trees, suspended midleap, ballet-like and beautiful, his naked blade sweeping in one hand like a scythe. Joy watched another bird explode, its soft blue and pink feathers puffing in a burst of arterial red.

  Joy turned her head. Graus Claude extricated himself from his size-thirty shoes, his giant webbed feet unfurling and slapping wetly across the floor. Joy watched in fascinated horror as he drew claws down the seams of his trousers, slicing them lengthwise, freeing long, bowed legs from their tailored confinement. His knees bent outward, exposing striped limbs banded in black. His sharp toes gripped the dirt as the long muscles bunched beneath him.

  One arm shot out, grabbing Joy, and clamped her to his chest. A second hand gripped Ink’s forearm and yanked him out of his arc. The Bailiwick folded his upper arms over their heads, shielding them under a helm of rubbery flesh. His jowls trembled. His body tensed.

  He sprang, leaping hard and fast through the eastern window, shattering the glass with the force of his skull. The crash was deafening. The cold was a slap. The impact was enough to choke out all breath. Joy gagged as they soared upward through a cloud of spliced light and broken glass, the wind whistling in her ears and flattening her hair across her face. Gravity tossed her stomach as they crested and fell, time rushing up to greet them at fast-forward speed.

  WHUMPH!

  Graus Claude’s massive legs absorbed the landing, bobbing them up and down like a spring. Releasing his grip, he dropped Joy and Ink and then staggered, his six limbs trembling, his torn clothes hanging off him like rags. The Bailiwick blinked watery blood from long scratches above his eyes.

  “It’s been a while...” he muttered, glancing back at the gaping hole in the Hall. His flat frog feet slapped the ground uncertainly. His empty hands shook.

  “I guess that answers the question of how it went.”

  Raina emerged from behind Ilhami’s shiny black Lamborghini. Luiz and Ilhami stared past them, up at the broken windows in the Atrium wall. The three lehman—Joy’s friends and Inq’s human lovers—slowly lowered their bottle of champagne and thin glass flutes.

  Luiz frowned. “Where’s Inq?”

  “She’s still inside,” Joy gasped, peeling her purse from her skin—the beading’s imprint would leave an interesting bruise. “She—”

  “Tell us later,” Raina said. “Now you go.” She grabbed her thigh holster and aimed her gun into the air. Ilhami and Luiz popped the trunk and pulled out more guns to follow suit.

  “What are you doing?” said Graus Claude, alarmed.

  “Providing a distraction,” Raina said, shooting six times in quick succession. Thick clouds boiled out of nowhere, coating the underside of the world. “Iron triggers the Hall’s defenses,” she said. “It’s attempting to cloak.”

  “The Avalon mists,” Graus Claude stammered. “Brilliant.”

  Raina smiled, flipping back her Pantene hair.

  “Time to go!” Joy said. She fumbled with the clutch, dug out her keys and punched the fob’s blue button. The Ferrari materialized right where she’d left it.

  Ilhami cackled. “I knew you’d love that car!”

  Raina slapped him good-naturedly upside the head. “Circle around in formation, punctuate fire every five, rendezvous at high noon. Go!” The Cabana Boys split up, diving into the mist. Raina waved at Joy before the clouds swallowed her up. “Good luck!”

  “Bailiwick!” Ink urged the great frog forward as Folk began pouring out the hole in the Atrium windows, leaping, running and flying through the misty sky Under the Hill. “We must leave.”

  Graus Claude’s head shook with more than its usual palsy quiver. “I cannot.”

  “Not arguing,” Joy said as she popped the locks and flung open the door. “Get in.”

  The Bailiwick sighed. His voice a thin baritone compared to his normal rumbling bass as he spoke carefully through clamped shark’s teeth.

  “I cannot fit, Miss Malone.”

  Joy groaned. He was right—the Ferrari couldn’t accommodate the massive, four-armed frog. She fell into the driver’s seat and wrenched at the seat belt, swearing and trying to think. Ink dropped into the seat beside her and cracked the windows.

  “Get on,” he called out as something ricocheted off the hood.

  Graus Claude leaped, belly flopping onto the roof and splaying across the back windshield. Four sets of claws sank into the plastic molding through the partially opened windows and his toes gripped the trim above the back wheels. A thin trickle of blood dripped down the windshield.

  �
�Go!” ordered Graus Claude.

  Joy floored it. The wheels spun beneath her. Zero to sixty—gone.

  She shifted quickly, flying through three gears, the heavy chunk-thunk almost lost in the roar of the wind by her ears. A howl chased them just behind the exhaust. Joy didn’t bother checking the mirror; she pressed her foot firmly to the floor. Graus Claude’s claws tightened. His nails popped through the metal. She winced and gritted her teeth. Enrique would never forgive her for wrecking his car. Then she remembered—Enrique was dead. Inq was unconscious. Kurt and Filly and Stef were back at the gala. Ink was in the passenger seat, and Graus Claude was on the roof.

  “I imagine that’s not the way a traditional Welcome Gala is supposed to go?” Joy’s voice, high and hysterical, sounded alien to her ears.

  Ink glanced at her as if weighing her sanity against his. He gripped the seat cushion as if unwilling to let go.

  Joy caught a glimpse of movement in the rearview mirror—a lot of movements, too many to count. “They’re coming after us,” she said, turning deeper into the mists. “I’m starting to lose track of exactly who wants us dead.”

  “The Tide, Hasp, Briarhook,” Ink began. “Sol Leander, possibly the Council, probably the whole of the Twixt now that you’ve broken the Amanya spell and they’ve realized that you’ve kidnapped the only means to reach their King and Queen...”

  “Yes. Thank you. Very helpful.” Joy interrupted him, slamming into fifth gear. A red dragon curled the mists under the mighty beats of his wings. It seemed to spy her through the mirror, its reptilian eyes glinting. A chill ripped down her spine. She yanked the car to the right, plunging them into the frosty fog. Silence enveloped them as they sped through the soft blanket of white. Only the car’s engine purred.

  “I need a little distance,” she said more to herself than Ink. She remembered that terrifying ride with Enrique after they’d rescued Ilhami from Ladybird’s drug den. This was worse. She thought about the tiny switch that lay just under the dashboard lights. She didn’t know what it would do to the Bailiwick clinging to the roof of the car, but it was the only way they were getting out from Under the Hill.

  “Ink,” Joy said to the dashboard. She didn’t dare take her eyes off the lack of road. The eerie fog parted around them like ghosts. “I need you to flip the switch next to my knee when I say so.” She tried to keep the squeezing panic out of her voice, but she couldn’t pry her death grip off the steering wheel. She could all but feel the dragon breathing down her neck. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the tips of Ink’s hair barely move as he shook his head. His hands stayed locked. He’d stiffened, immobile and silent.

  “Ink, you have to hit the slip drive!”

  Ink didn’t move.

  The fog parted. Pointed teeth filled her rearview mirror.

  “Ink!” she cried. “Hit it!”

  His hand darted forward and flipped the switch. The indicator light blinked. The back of the car ignited with a roar.

  Joy’s shoulders tensed. Her ears popped. The windows went dark, then everything went white.

  TWO

  JOY SCREAMED AS THEY swerved into the parking lot of her apartment complex. Her legs locked as she hit the brakes, the back of her head slamming into the headrest and turf flying into the windshield as the car’s buffer field engaged, bouncing them off the nearest Honda and spiraling to a stop. The engine rumbled threateningly.

  “Out!” Joy barked. She hit the cloaking shield. “Off!”

  There was a creaking snap as Graus Claude pried his claws out of the molding, leaving deep, pointed gouges in the padding and frame. He groaned from where he appeared to be hovering several feet above the ground, flattened against the roof of the now-invisible car. Joy stumbled onto the asphalt, knees shaking, still wondering what was real.

  There was a sound in the bushes.

  Joy froze.

  Ink appeared beside her, grabbing hold of the Bailiwick’s elbow and flicking his straight razor free.

  “Come,” he said.

  Ink grabbed Joy’s hand. The Bailiwick grunted. There was a flash of spliced light, the scent of limes, and the three of them appeared inside the condo’s foyer, the house alarm set, the wards sparking gold and Joy’s head spinning.

  Ink marched quickly around the kitchen, checking the wards he had placed to keep Joy safe inside her home. His face was stern, gaze piercing, tense and intense.

  “Ink?” Joy tried to follow, but she felt dizzy, her thoughts whirling. “Graus Claude?”

  The Bailiwick sagged against the closet door. His glistening frog’s feet were red and weeping, blisters standing out against the thin webbing between his swollen toes. Joy ran to grab towels as the giant amphibian sat heavily on the floor, half in the foyer, half in the kitchen. Her brain took quick inventory: it was barely Monday morning, Stef was supposed to be driving to U Penn, Dad was visiting his girlfriend, Shelley, and therefore they were alone in the house, protected by Ink’s wards. Safe, for now.

  She hoped that her brother was somewhere safe, too.

  She dropped the pile of towels and knelt before the Bailiwick, wrapping his feet gently in layers of fluffy cotton. He’d gone from pale to ashen.

  “Water,” he croaked through cracked lips. Joy ran to the fridge and shoved a tall glass under the spigot, filling it with water. She filled another glass with ice.

  Graus Claude drained the first in a shot and grimaced, but healthy patches of olive gray bloomed on his cheeks. He opened his hands for another three glasses. Joy kept filling them, exchanging the empties, and tried not to think about the smears of blood on the floor.

  He drank six more glasses of water in quick succession, two of his arms alternating glasses and the other two hands fastening towels over his feet. Joy couldn’t believe he’d ever squashed them into human-shaped shoes. No wonder he limped.

  “Keep drinking,” Joy said. “You shouldn’t talk.”

  He swallowed. “Miss Malone, I assure you that if the King and Queen were to make their appearance, the strength of my jaw would do little to stop them. I can only assume from our current circumstances that they are not yet able to make their Return.” He rubbed his jaw near the crux of his eardrum. “Therefore, my being mute serves no overt purpose and there is much that needs to be said.”

  Ink entered the kitchen, the claw-toed boots of his gala costume clicking against the tile. There was no smile in his black, fathomless eyes. He stalked like a predator and Joy felt like prey.

  “Master Ink,” Graus Claude rumbled. “I trust the wards are in place?”

  “Yes, Bailiwick,” Ink said. He was as tense as a bowstring, nearly quivering in place.

  “Very well, then,” the noble toad said, attempting to gain his feet and wincing with the effort. “I would ask that you return me to my domicile so I might make necessary arrangements. I shudder to imagine what things have been like since my incarceration, not to mention after tonight’s festivities.” He cast a glance at Joy. “As your mentor, I feel that I ought to scold you for your actions, Miss Malone—from the debacle of your Welcome Gala to aiding and abetting a known prisoner of the Court.” He sighed and his demeanor relaxed around the pain. “However, I find myself quite at a loss to do so and confess that I am rather proud of your efforts on both of our behalves. Subtlety was never your strong suit and humility was never mine.” His wide head dipped perceptively. “I owe you many thanks, Joy Malone.” He repeated the gesture to his associate. “And to you as well, Master Ink.”

  Joy went to stand next to Ink, but he shrugged away, cutting off her touch. She hesitated, hurt and confused, but he purposefully ignored her as he addressed Graus Claude.

  “Then pe
rmit me to ask a boon of you,” Ink said with a tightly added, “sir.”

  Graus Claude slowed his ministrations. His browridge quirked. “Indeed?”

  “You must swear upon your honor and the honor of the King and Queen that you will not harm Joy Malone in any way. You will neither hinder or hamper her efforts nor will you aid any other party in their intent to do her harm, by word or by deed, else your True Name be forfeit,” Ink said all at once. “Do you so swear?”

  Joy and the Bailiwick both gaped at him.

  “What—?”

  “Master Ink,” Graus Claude said, his voice punctuated with his usual ire. “Why would you suspect that I would do anything that would necessitate such a terrible oath?”

  Ink remained resolute, as solid as a wall. “That was not a ‘yes.’”

  The great frog’s face darkened to a steely mottled gray. “Your ears appear to be in fine working order, although your sense of humor—not to mention propriety—may have suffered since our last meeting,” he replied. Joy might have imagined a twitch by Ink’s eye at the rebuke. She remembered his warning when she first met the Bailiwick: Humor me. Respect him. Always. Joy shook her head, wondering what Ink was doing.

  “You took an oath,” Ink said by way of explanation.

  Graus Claude lifted his head, the jowls at his throat stretching around his collar. “I have taken a number of oaths,” he said. “To which are you referring?”

  “First this one,” Ink said fervently. “To me. Do you so swear?”

  “I cannot—”

  “You must,” Ink insisted, his fingers curled into fists. “I will answer your questions when you grant me my boon. Or is your blind loyalty stronger than your word?” Ink was nearly shaking, his voice cut like a blade. “Swear it.”

  Graus Claude’s gaze slid between Ink and Joy through shaded eyes. “I do so swear.” The Bailiwick sniffed. Ink relaxed an inch, if that. “Now,” he said icily. “Which oath have I now countermanded by agreeing to this tidy charade?”