Roman scrambled to his feet and fled back to the hallway because Cormac was pointing his crossbow at him. He fired; I didn’t see if he hit or not.
I was holding the bag, weighed down with what I hoped was the Dragon’s Pearl.
“I’ve got it,” I breathed around panting breaths. Wolf was clawing at my gut.
“Then go!” Sun said, picking himself up, readying his staff. “I’ll take care of this one!” He went back to fighting Hundun, blocking the creature with his staff while he dodged blows.
I’d have been worried about Sun and his ability to keep fighting, except he was wearing this big silly grin like he’d never had so much fun in his life. In fact, his blows seemed particularly nonfatal. He’d knock the monster on the side of the head to rattle him, trip up his feet with the staff, make him hop and dance as he avoided the hits, and Sun jumped out of the way in time to avoid the monster’s blows. The creature didn’t look any more frustrated or angry than he had when he entered the room. He simply kept going, his head low, jaw set, determined. They were two actors playing their roles.
Then the room blew up.
It began with a few pops and white sparks, then turned into an explosion that raced around the edges of the room—fire traveling along the strings of firecrackers, igniting them all within seconds. Grace must have set hundreds of them. They cracked, banged, bounced, flew, threw multicolored sparks, and trailed clouds of acrid gray smoke behind them, until the room filled with the stench of the stuff, stinging my eyes and burning my nose. Not to mention the noise, which turned my head to cotton.
The eyeless, earless creature moaned in agony, the sound muffled by his sealed mouth. How could he even tell what was going on?
Someone grabbed my arm. I almost whirled and took a swipe at the person, my fingers bent like claws. Then Ben came close, bringing himself nose to nose with me. Even that close I couldn’t smell him for all the smoke and burning. My lack of senses put me on the edge of panic. The firecrackers were still going off, like sporadic pops of popcorn. Still loud, still producing smoke and fire. Something pounded against the walls hard enough to shake them and make the floor tremble. Mortar and dust shook from the ceiling.
I grabbed Ben’s hand; he’d be my anchor.
“Where’s Roman?” I hollered.
“Ran,” Cormac said. “Let’s go that way.” He pointed to the opposite doorway from where Roman had been.
The smoke cleared some, drifting out of the doorways. The monster held his wounded head in his hands, groaning as he crashed into the walls, looking for a doorway, trying to escape. Again and again, he slammed against the stone, rattling the room. Sun Wukong stood back, holding his staff defensively in front of him, watching.
“Go,” he said. “I’ll be fine, really!”
Who was I to argue?
More debris rained on us.
Coughing through the dust and smoke, Ben and I made our way to Grace and Anastasia. Henry still lay near the wall. His clothing seemed scorched by the fireworks, but he seemed otherwise okay. I pulled the chain with Roman’s coin over his head and threw it away.
“We’re going,” I called, and Ben and I took charge of Henry, grabbing his arms and pulling them over our shoulders. He seemed much lighter than he should have. We hauled him across the room after Cormac, who led the way, jacket and stakes in hand. Grace and Anastasia were right behind us. The vampire was looking ashen. Like the sky outside, if we had a window to look out.
As the room cleared, the blinded monster’s senses seemed to come to focus, and he turned to Sun and roared. The Monkey King faced him, staff in hand.
We fled down yet another brick and stone corridor. I had Henry on one arm and the bag with the Dragon’s Pearl on the other.
Chapter 16
WE KEPT MOVING.
Henry didn’t twitch a muscle. I was hoping he’d wake up after Ben and I bounced him around in our efforts to keep from dropping him. But no, he was dead weight. No pun intended. Since I was a little shorter than Ben, Henry’s head kept flopping toward me. He smelled like himself—not any more ill or damaged than I would have expected. Maybe charred from smoke and firecrackers.
Behind me, Anastasia stumbled. She recovered quickly, putting a hand on the wall to steady herself. But she should never have stumbled in the first place.
“Anastasia?” I said, trying to glance over my shoulder at her. “How close to dawn is it?”
“Very,” she said, with astonishing calm. “The sun is rising.”
“At least that means Roman’s not likely to come back,” Ben said. He had a point.
“Grace,” I said. “We need to get back to Xiwangmu.”
“There’s no time,” Anastasia said.
“Okay, then we have to get to a room, someplace with just one door and no windows, no access to sunlight.”
“And defensible,” Cormac added.
“I can’t just
Anastasia slumped against the wall. “I need to rest, just for a moment.”
“Just a few more steps,” I said blithely, staving off panic.
If she collapsed here, we could stop and try to protect her. At least there wouldn’t be any sunlight—I hoped. I didn’t see any vents or storm drains. But in the open corridor, anything could find us. We’d already been awake all night, and we hadn’t been completely rested when we started. I wasn’t looking forward to trying to guard anything for another eight-plus hours. The monster’s grumbles still echoed down the corridor.
Ahead, Cormac stopped. A narrow wooden door was set into the wall. Grace pushed forward, fumbled in her bag for a moment, and drew out a ring of keys, which she began fitting, one by one, into a rusted lock. Her hands were shaking.
“Take your time, Grace,” I murmured.
“I wasn’t ready for any of this, I didn’t agree to any of this, my
“Careful, girl,” Anastasia said. “They’re watching.”
Grace’s shoulders slouched. “I’m sure they knew what they were doing. But—times are different, it’s not like I have Mongol hordes to battle, it’s just
“You are, and you honor them,” she said.
After pausing a moment to draw breath and maybe say a prayer, Grace returned to trying the dozen keys on the chain.
Meanwhile, Anastasia slumped against the wall and slid to the floor.
I helped Ben prop up Henry and knelt at her side, hand on her shoulder. “Anastasia—”
She shook her head weakly. “I really didn’t think I’d go out like this.”
So, she agreed that if we stopped here we were done for. “It’s not over yet.”
“I should have let the pearl go. It isn’t worth all of this. All of you. Kitty—thank you. For what’s left of my life. Thank you.”
Maybe we should have all cut and run a long time ago. Like, at sunset. Momentum had carried us all night long.
“Anastasia, we got the pearl back, it’s going to be okay.”
“Li Hua now, I think…”
The door popped inward with a high-pitched squeak of rusting hinges. A cloud of dust rattled loose from the
