Kicking It

eye.

“Apollo!” I yelled. “The sun?”

He looked desperately around, and I thought I saw him nod at me before something skittered across my face, and I squeezed my eyes closed in reflex, swatting desperately at the multi-legged menace. I heard something explode and forced my eyes open again. Another explosion, and glass rained down from the ceiling, from the inset lights there, and the light itself flared. I swatted and bashed and whirled, noting that my left arm wasn’t doing any more than flopping at that moment, but I had to expose enough of my shiny foil farce of an outfit to catch the light. I felt like a Dutch oven as I started to heat up. There were inhuman shrieks from the arachnids all around, and I whirled like a possessed disco ball, throwing off light and spiders in equal measure. I was smoking . . . literally. So hot I had no idea whether it was the lights on my shiny spots or a fever from all my spider bites. My leg gave out, and I went down hard, falling at an awkward angle, limbs not working well enough to catch me, but nothing jumped on my face, and in a moment I realized that the tone had ended and that the spectators were on their feet, roaring with elation or anger . . . I didn’t know. Didn’t care.

But I looked up at the dais and saw through swollen eyes Apollo, still standing, looking down at me with sadness and approval.

Arachne rounded on him, as if to take out her anger, but he clocked her right between the eyes, snapping the bridge of her glasses so that they fell to the ground along with her. Spider lady was down for the count, which I thought meant that I could finally pass out.

No, I couldn’t. There was still Gareth to save. I had to make sure . . .

My brain wasn’t working so well. I felt hot and slow and numb and hurt all at the same time, but I forced myself to sit and then to pull off my one remaining boot . . . clumsily. It took me three tries before Apollo was there to help me.

“You okay?” he asked.

It was a stupid question and I didn’t dignify it with an answer. Instead I pointed at the man cocooned in the web. He rushed to Gareth, and I saw him tear the webbing away, saw Gareth’s face start to appear and could confirm that it was the missing scientist. Then I passed out.

* * *

I woke some time later in Apollo’s arms . . . in Apollo’s bed, even, when he shook me awake with, “Here, eat this.”

I blinked my eyes open and realized only one was willing to stay that way. It didn’t matter. I didn’t need sight to know that what he offered was ambrosia and that it would heal me faster than any hospital. Also, that it was highly addictive, and that like any addict, I was always ready to quit, but not right now. Not when I needed it so badly. I didn’t fight it.

“Saved you,” I said a second later, through still-swollen lips. “That make us even?”

“Oh, did you now?” he asked, his gaze ridiculously tender. “And who put me in danger in the first place?”

“Splitting . . . hairs,” I answered.

“Uh-huh.”

“What am I doing here? Where’s Gareth?” Already, talking was easier, and if I wasn’t mistaken, my other eye was starting to open.

“The police raided the place before I could get him loose, so I grabbed you and got out. I knew if they saw you first, they’d insist on paramedics and the hospital, and I didn’t know if you had that kind of time or whether you could even recover from all the spider bites without the ambrosia. But I left the panel open in the elevator and Arachne’s own key in the lock so that they could find him.”

And the audience . . . What had they seen? How much of it would they believe?

He shrugged. “I was more worried about you.”

I was breathing easier now, and the numbness that had overtaken my body was starting to burn off like the morning fog.

“Thank you,” I said finally. It was long overdue. I was usually too busy being pissed off at him for something or other.

“You’re welcome,” he said, looking down at me with something a lot like love. But those he loved tended to meet bad ends . . . worse than becoming spider food. Turning into a tree or ending up with an arrow through the heart or the power to see the fate of Troy but not affect it . . .

I looked away, wondering whether Detective Armani had been in on the raid and what he’d think when he heard the tale of the fembot who’d kicked spider ass.

RED ISN’T REALLY MY COLOR BY CHRISTINA HENRY

This story takes place between the events of Black Night and Black Howl.

The envelope sat in the middle of my dining room table. It was creamy white, made of some kind of fancy paper that I would never be able to afford. My name, Madeline Black, was written on the front in beautiful calligraphy.

Beezle, my gargoyle, perched on my shoulder. We both contemplated the envelope in silence.

“So, are you going to open it or what?” Beezle finally said in his gravelly voice.

“I’d prefer not to,” I said.

“Okay, Bartleby. Then can we stop staring at it like it’s a bomb that’s about to explode and do something productive, like make dinner?”

“Dinner?” I asked, glancing at the clock. “It’s only one o’clock. You just ate lunch twenty minutes ago.”

“But the arrival of an unexpected messenger with a missive from your great-great-grandfather has disturbed the delicate balance of nutrition to energy inside my body, and now I’m starving again,” Beezle said.

“I’ve got news for you. There’s nothing delicate about your body,” I said, approaching the table. “And pizza is not generally considered a nutritional superfood.”

“I wasn’t going to say we should eat pizza,” Beezle said.

“Yes, you were,” I said. “If it’s not pizza, it’s wings, doughnuts, cinnamon rolls, Chinese food, or popcorn.”

“Ha!” Beezle said, floating off my shoulder on his little wings. “Popcorn is a superfood. It’s whole grain and everything. I think Rachael Ray or Katie Couric or Oprah or somebody said it was good for you. I’m making some now.”

“One bowl!” I called after him. “And adding half a pound of butter does not mean it’s still health food.”

I reached for the envelope with my right hand and turned it over. The coiled snake tattoo on my palm tingled, an exact match of the symbol pressed into the seal of the envelope.

The mark of Lucifer, my many-greats-grandfather.

I’d gotten the mark by using a sword made by Lucifer and tapping into some long-buried power inside me that tied me to his bloodline. I didn’t love having it. It identified me as one of Lucifer’s own, and there are many good reasons why an association with Lucifer is less than desirable. Starting with his list of enemies, which was far too extensive. And all of them liked to find ways to hurt him by hurting me.

Thanks to my unwanted family ties, I’d recently gotten sucked into a major diplomatic-mission-gone-wrong in one of the local faerie courts. In the process I’d managed to make a personal rival out of the faerie queen, Amarantha. I had enough on my plate without being chased down by angry fae every time I stepped outside of the house.

And now there was an envelope from Lucifer. I was sure that I wasn’t going to like what was inside. I tore the seal and withdrew the folded paper.

The paper was actually made of linen. Where does one even find linen paper?