I clutched the edge of the table, bracing myself as if for an injection, torn between a desire to run away and a guilty sense of obligation.
The pain, when it came, was almost instantly over. Alec jerked back with an astonished look on his face, a smear of blood on his lip, which he quickly wiped off.
'Is something wrong?' I started to ask, but at that exact moment, several things happened in a whirlwind of action.
Two people who had been strolling toward us stopped, one of them pointing and calling out, 'Dark One!'
The waitress, hearing that, dropped her tray and snatched up a steak knife, vaulting a table as she lunged toward us.
Alec leaped to his feet and jerked me after him, literally dragging me out from behind the table. A slight shimmer to one side resolved itself into the form of Marta, who clutched at me with intangible hands.
'Pia! You must come! The Ilargi has found us! He's taken Jack the sailor, and now he's trying to get Karl!'
Chapter 14
'Stay back!' I ordered Marta, which was utterly foolish because no one but me could see her, let alone harm her.
'The light must purge him!' the man who had screamed out the warning about Alec shouted as he, his companion, and the waitress closed in on us. 'We must take him back for cleansing!'
'Run!' Alec said, pulling a gun from his jacket. He shoved his cell phone into my hands. 'If I am captured, Kristoff will help.'
'But—'
'Run, my love!' He pushed me to the side as he waved the weapon at the three oncomers. The other people in the restaurant, alerted by the scene, leaped to their respective feet at the sight of the gun, stampeding to the door with various startled cries and warnings.
'I'm not going to leave you,' I said softly, assessing the three people who were now warily eying Alec's gun. I didn't recognize them, which meant they likely didn't know who I was. 'If I can explain to them who I am—'
'Don't be stupid—they'll kill you before you could get the words out of your mouth. Get out of here now, while you can.'
'You don't understand,' I said, reluctant to explain that in the Brotherhood's eyes, I was the new Zorya. 'If you let me have a word with them—'
'Go!' he bellowed, and threw himself forward, knocking down two of the three Brotherhood people. The waitress rushed me with a frenzied look in her eyes, one that, coupled with the sharp knife in her hand, triggered my flight instinct. I leaped over the ball of writhing men on the floor, and bolted for the door. Pain burned deep as the waitress lunged at me, the knife slashing into the flesh of my arm.
She yelled something at me, but Alec, in a supreme effort, kicked out with one of his legs and sent her flying.
'Pia!' Marta cried, running alongside me as I hared down the sidewalk, ignoring the startled glances of passersby. I spun around a corner and headed for the busy center square, panic spurring my flight.
'Pia, what was all that about?' Marta asked as I dashed into a covered alley that featured arts and crafts booths.
'It's a long story,' I panted.
'You must come,' she wailed, and I pulled up, dropping to my knees to hide behind a tarp-covered stack of soft-drink boxes that was located next to a food booth. 'Jack, the sailor who was always looking for rum, he is gone. The Ilargi has taken him. And now he's back for Karl.'
'I can't come right now,' I gasped, trying both to get air into my lungs, and to keep my breathing down to a dull roar so any pursuers wouldn't hear it. 'I'm a little busy.'
'But you must!' Tears were evident in her voice. I looked up to see her standing before me, transparent as ever, but her face torn with anguish. 'The Ilargi will claim Karl's soul just as he did Jack's if you do not stop him.'
'They'll kill Alec if I don't find help,' I told her, my heart torn in two.
Her lip trembled as fresh tears spilled down her face. 'I love him, Pia. I love him so much. Please save him.'
'But Karl is already dead, and Alec is… technically undead, I think, but still…'
The look of betrayal in her eyes wrung my heart.
'Marta,' I said, hoping she'd understand, but she stopped me with one word.
I couldn't turn my back on her. I had sworn to the dying Anniki that I would take on her responsibilities, and I couldn't ignore that oath now just because Alec was in trouble.
'Let's go,' I said, getting back on my feet and peering cautiously out down the line of vendors. No one seemed to be paying me any attention.
'Thank you,' she said with a throb of gratitude. 'We must hurry. The Ilargi will not be held off for long.'
'Alec has lived several hundreds of years without being caught,' I muttered to myself as we dashed off toward the library, winding our way around strolling sightseers and shoppers. 'He won't let them catch him now. I hope.'
'Hurry,' Marta urged as I paused for a traffic light. 'There is no time.'
I don't know what the librarians thought as I flung myself through the doors. I only had a glimpse of startled expressions as I waved a friendly hand at them before heading to the back study area.
'The Zorya has come!' one of the women-ghosts yelled out from her spot at the end of one of the stacks, evidently acting as sentry. 'She has come!'
'About time, too,' Dagrun sneered.
'Karl!' Marta screamed, rushing past me in a flurry of ghostly nothingness. 'Is he… Karl!'
Just as I emerged from the stacks there was a loud crashing noise, followed immediately by the tinkle of glass.
'There! He's there!' Ulfur cried, rising from the ground and pointing at a shattered window.
'Karl?' I asked.
'I'm here,' came the shaky, somewhat muffled reply. I ran to the window and looked out, voices calling behind me indicating that other library patrons had heard the crash.
'Did he take anyone else?' I asked softly.
'No. We wouldn't let him,' Hallur said with grim victory in his voice as he faded to a translucent state. He limped slightly and appeared to be bleeding, but grinned. 'He'll know better than to attack the lot of us again, he will.'
A woman behind me, assumedly a librarian, stopped next to me and started pelting me with questions.
'I'm sorry, I'm American, I only speak English,' I told her, clutching my side where a stitch pulled painfully.
'What has happened here?' the librarian asked, switching into flawless English. She waved a hand toward the window as others arrived, all of them viewing the display with confusion and ire.
'It looks to me like someone went through the window,' I said, peering out of the shattered window to a tiny patch of greenery. A few people who evidently had been strolling through the area were clustered together, pointing at a direction opposite the library.
'I will call the police,' the librarian said with thinned lips. She gave me a piercing glance. 'You will not leave.'
'No, of course not,' I lied, giving her a bright smile.
She evidently issued orders to the other librarians, herding the patrons out of the bits of shattered glass. I waited until they had gone about fulfilling her commands before turning back to my ghosts.
