Crescendo

the path, trying to avoid getting trampled on.

“He’s getting away!” I heard Vee shriek. “Someone get him!”

Rixon fired several shots, but this time nobody dropped. In fact, the rush to get out intensified. I pulled myself to standing and looked back to where I’d last seen Rixon and Vee. The echo of the shots still pealed in my ears, but I read the words as they fell from Rixon’s lips. Over here. He flagged his free arm through the air. In what felt like in slow motion, I fought the stream of traffic and ran to him.

“What the hell?!” Vee shrieked. “Why did you shoot him, Rixon?”

“Citizen’s arrest,” he said. “Well, that, and Patch told me to.”

“You can’t shoot people just because Patch says to!” Vee said, her eyes wild. “You’re going to get arrested. What are we doing to do now?” she moaned.

“The police are on their way,” I said. “They know about Scott.”

“We have to get out of here!” said Vee, still hysterical, flapping her arms and pacing a few feet, only to spin back and come back to where she’d started. “I’ll take Nora to the police station. Rixon, go get Scott, but don’t shoot him again—tie him up like last time!”

“Nora can’t use the gates,” Rixon said. “That’s what he’ll expect. I know another way out. Vee, get the Neon and meet us at the south end of the parking lot, near the Dumpsters.”

“How are you going to get out?” Vee wanted to know.

“Through the underground tunnels.”

“There are tunnels under Delphic?” Vee asked.

Rixon kissed her forehead. “Hurry, love.”

The crowd had scattered, leaving the pathway empty. I could still hear panicked shrieks and screams echoing down the walkway, but they sounded a world away. Vee hesitated a moment, then gave a resolute nod. “Just hurry, okay?”

“There’s a mechanical room in the basement of the fun house,” Rixon explained to me as we walked in a hurry down the opposite pathway. “It has a door leading into the tunnels under Delphic. Scott may have heard of the tunnels, but if he figures out where we’ve gone and follows us, there’s no way he’ll find us. It’s like a maze down there, and it goes on for miles.” He gave a nervous smile. “Don’t worry, Delphic was built by fallen angels. Not me in particular, but a few of my mates helped. I know the routes by heart. Er, mostly.”

CHAPTER 23

AS WE DREW CLOSER TO THE GRINNING CLOWN’S head leading inside the fun house, the distant screams were replaced by creepy music-box carnival music, tinkling loudly from the bowels of the fun house. I stepped through the mouth, and the floor shifted. I reached out to steady myself, but the walls turned, rolling under my hands. As my eyes adjusted to the traces of light filtering through the mouth of the clown behind me, I saw that I was inside a revolving barrel that seemed to stretch on forever. The barrel was painted with alternating stripes of red and white, and they blurred together into a dizzying pink.

“Here,” Rixon said, guiding me through the barrel.

I put one foot in front of the other, sliding and blundering forward. At the end, I stepped out to solid ground, only to have a jet of icy air shoot up from the floor. The cold licked my skin, and I jumped sideways with a startled gasp.

“It’s not real,” Rixon assured me. “We have to keep going. If Scott decides to search the tunnels, we have to beat him inside.”

The air was stale and humid, and smelled of rust. The clown’s head was a distant memory now. The only light came from red bulbs in the cavernous ceiling that blazed to life just long enough to spotlight a dangling skeleton, unraveling zombie, or vampire rising from a coffin.

“How much farther?” I asked Rixon over the distorted cacophony of hoots, cackles, and wails that echoed all around.

“The mechanical room is just ahead. After that, we’ll be in the tunnels. Scott’s bleeding pretty bad. He won’t die—Patch has told you all about Nephilim, right?—but he could pass out from loss of blood. Chances are, he won’t find an entrance to the tunnels before he does. We’ll be back above ground before you know it.” His confidence sounded slightly inflated, a little too optimistic.

We pushed on, and I felt the eerie sensation that we were being followed. I spun back, but the darkness was consuming. If someone was back there, I couldn’t see.

“Do you think Scott could have followed us?” I asked Rixon, keeping my voice low.

Rixon stopped, turned back. Listened. After a moment, he said with certainty, “There’s no one there.”

We were continuing our hurried pace toward the mechanical room, when I once again felt a presence behind me. My scalp tingled, and I cut a look over my shoulder. This time, the outline of a face materialized through the darkness. I almost cried out, and then the outline solidified into a distinct and familiar face.

My dad.

His blond hair was bright against the darkness, his eyes shining, yet sad. I love you.

“Dad?” I whispered. But I took a cautionary step back. I reminded myself of the last times. He was a trick. A lie.

I’m sorry I had to leave you and your mom.

I willed him to disappear. He wasn’t real. He was a threat. He wanted to hurt me. I remembered the way he’d yanked my arm through the townhouse window and tried to cut me. I remembered how he’d chased me through the library.

But his voice was the same gentle coaxing he’d used that very first time at the townhouse. Not the stern, sharp voice that had replaced it. It was his voice.

I love you, Nora. Whatever happens, promise me you’ll remember that. I don’t care how or why you came into my life, only that you did. I don’t remember all the things I did wrong. I remember what I did right. I remember you. You made my life meaningful. You made my life special.

I shook my head, trying to sweep out his voice, wondering why Rixon wasn’t saying anything—couldn’t he see my dad? Wasn’t there anything we could do to make him go away? But the truth of the matter was, I didn’t want his voice to stop. I didn’t want him to leave. I wanted him to be real. I needed him to wrap his arms around me and tell me everything was going to be all right. Most of all, I longed for him to come home.

Promise you’ll remember.

Tears dripped down my cheeks. I promise, I thought back, even though I knew he couldn’t hear me.

An angel of death helped me come here to see you. She’s holding time still for us, Nora. She’s helping me speak to your mind. There’s something important I need to tell you, but I don’t have much time. I have to go back soon, and I need you to listen carefully.

“No,” I choked, my voice coming out strangled. “I’m going with you. Don’t leave me here. I’m going with you! You can’t leave me again!”

I can’t stay, baby. I belong somewhere else now.

“Please don’t go,” I sobbed, clutching my fists against my chest as if I could stop my heart from swelling. A certain desperate panic seized me when I thought of him leaving again. My sheer sense of abandonment outweighed everything else. He was going to leave me here. In the fun house. In the dark, with no one to help me but Rixon. “Why are you leaving me all over again? I need you!”

Touch Rixon’s scars. The truth is there.

My dad’s face receded into the darkness. I reached out to stop him, but his face turned into a ribbon of fog at my touch. The silvery white threads dissolved into the darkness.

“Nora?”

I started at the sound of Rixon’s voice. “We have to hurry,” he said, as if no more than a ripple of time had passed. “We don’t want to meet up with Scott in the outer ring of the tunnels, where all the entrances feed.”

My dad was gone. For reasons I couldn’t explain, I knew I’d seen him for the last time. The pain and loss