All That Lives Must Die

Nature, or simply Little Red. . but before all these she had been dark and full of wrath, and cataclysms and destructions had followed in her wake.

And they had all forgotten.

She was the Waning Moon, Hecate, and the Storm Which None Survived.

She was once more Artemis the Huntress.

89 NO REST FOR THE WICKED

Robert kept his eyes closed and wished the world would go away. Behind his lids the sun beat on him-a nice, natural sunshine. The surf churned thirty paces from where he lay in the sand. He smelled the open cerveza and limes wedges in a nearby ice bucket.

He should’ve been 100 percent chill.

But all he saw when he closed his eyes with that swollen red sun in Hell. . the flash of swords and shadows. . and Fiona’s tear-streaked face as she cradled Mitch, watching him burn and die.

He felt his gut twist because the one girl he’d been hooked on now hated him.

He wasn’t in Hell anymore, though; he was in his hidden fishing cove near Puedevas, Mexico-a six-pack and lobster enchiladas from the cantina, and him lounging in the sand.

So why feel lousy?

Maybe living people weren’t supposed to come back from Hell. How had Dante Alighieri done it? (Inferno was one of the books Robert had read and actually enjoyed in Miss Westin’s class.) Dante Alighieri had walked through Hell, into Purgatory, and then into Heaven. He’d been able to do that because he got a hand from the poet Virgil, and his one true love, Beatrice.

Robert’s spirit guide, Marcus, hadn’t led him anywhere-except smack into a war. And he sure wasn’t no poet or Beatrice.

Robert also felt bad about Amanda. He should’ve gone back to look for her body. But how to get past all those angry dead in the Blasted Lands? The thought of her soul suffering in the fires of Hell made him shudder, despite the warm sun.

And what about Eliot? Now that he had Jezebel and was an Infernal Lord, was he staying in Hell?

Robert grabbed a chunk of ice from the bucket and pressed it to his forehead.

Trouble hadn’t miraculously stopped when Robert got back to San Francisco, either. There’d been a note on his apartment door: a summons to the Headmistress’s office.

Like any of that mattered anymore. Robert wasn’t going back to school.

There were also three voice mail messages from Henry. Robert had responded to these by ripping the answering machine out of the wall.

Sure, Henry could find him. He knew Robert’s hiding spots. But Robert thought he might be strong enough now to refuse Henry’s subtle suggestions and his not-so-subtle threats.

Robert curled his fist until bones cracked and sinews popped with tension. His new strength was from Henry’s Soma. How long would that last? And he wasn’t just physically stronger. Robert felt something hard in his mind now, too.

He grabbed a bottle of beer, but just held it, the cold glass sweating in his hand.

So now what? Robert was unemployed, maybe with no living friends on Earth, and certainly with no girl to worry about.

He laughed. This emo-feeling-sorry-for-himself thing just wasn’t him.

Okay. . he did feel a little sorry, but Robert knew he was going to be fine. He’d get over Fiona. Heck, he could stay right here and do a little fishing. With the cash that Henry had given him for school he might carve out a nice life on the Sea of Cortez. Maybe learn how to surf.

His fishing line tugged and the bell tied to it tinkled. His pole bent toward the water.

Robert got up. All this deep thinking stuff was fine-but not when it interfered with the barbecued sea bass he was counting on for dinner.

He blinked as his eyes adjusted to the sunlight. . and saw something was wrong.

No, not a something-a bunch of somethings.

There were fish in the water, hundreds of them: perch and damselfish, and even a bluefin tuna or two thrashing in the surf. Behind them were sharks-white-tipped reef and nurse and even a flashing set of great white jaws-all frothing and fighting along the beach.

Tuna and great whites never got that close to shore.

There had to be a freak storm or a tsunami to get them all here at once.

A girl stepped from the blood-tinged surf as nonchalant as if she were stepping out of a chlorinated swimming pool.

She had all the right curves, and the sun glistened off her tanned skin. Her hair was red and gold and snaked down her neck, curling about her breasts. . which was when Robert realized that she only wore a few strategically placed bits of clinging seaweed.

He took a step closer-but halted, realizing that besides the weird fish something was very wrong with this male fantasy come to life.

First: whenever he’d been attracted to any girl recently there’d been trouble. So that immediately set off alarm bells.

Second: the color of her skin wasn’t anything he’d see before-bronze mixed with gold that glimmered like molten metal.

Third: she was wearing something, an obsidian knife strapped her shapely calf. A knife coated with blood.

And fourth: he got it, finally. He knew her. It’d just taken a moment because she wasn’t in armor, and she wasn’t supposed to be here-on Earth, that is.

This was Sealiah, Queen of the Poppy Lands.

She moved across the sand toward him, her steps crooked, and her body swaying and switching back and forth. Far shorter than Robert’s six feet, she somehow managed to make it feel like she towered over him-naked and slight, but radiating enough regal confidence that he felt like dropping to his knees and kissing her feet.

He wasn’t so stupefied, though, that he’d forgotten his manners.

He hitched his thumb at the bucket of beers. “Thirsty?” he asked. “Help yourself.”

She smiled. Robert noted her blood-rimmed lips.

Sealiah took one of the beers and chugged, rivulets of foam dribbling down her chest and stomach. She finished and grabbed the lime and wiped her lips with it. “Ahhh. .,” she purred. “Your hospitality is appreciated.”

Robert stared unabashedly at this performance (what else was a guy supposed to do?) and he struggled to remember that this wasn’t a woman standing before him. She wasn’t even human. Not even close.

He could smell her now, though, and it was like every flower that had ever bloomed. Her perfume teased and pulled at him.

“So. .,” he said, drawing on some supernatural cool from the center of his soul. “You just swimming by, or was there something you wanted?”

“Oh, there is very much something I wanted.” She inched closer and her lips parted. “But I thought we would discuss business first, and then we could see to the pleasure part of the transaction.”

Robert backed up an inch, although it took a great deal of effort.

He tried to see the monstrous creature with tendrils and horns and bat wings inside her, but instead, all he could see was a woman that would make every supermodel on the planet weep with jealousy, and he found himself staring at her-all the way to the tiny down blond hairs that covered her red-gold flesh.

“I’ve come to offer you a job,” she said.

That snapped him out of it.

Yeah, she was gorgeous.

Yeah, she was close enough to grab.

And yeah, she smelled great.

But she just wanted what every other otherworldly creature had ever wanted from Robert: to stick him in a