They reached the north shore. Diamond had already taken the bigger boat, but he’d also evacuated the mystery prisoners. The mud was so churned up that it told him a lot of feet had gone through here already. Dan Garrett and Ian Wright were waiting at the remaining boat. “About time!” Ian shouted.
“Heinrich!” Dan exclaimed at the sight of his closest friend. He ran over and clasped his friend by the arms. “What did they do to you?”
“I was the winner. You should see the other fellows.”
“Nothing Jane can’t fix. Hurry up and get in.”
Something hit the ground hard far behind them. Tree trunks cracked and mud came raining down. A demonic roar pierced them all to the soul and sent shivers down their spines. “Crow’s back!” Sullivan shouted.
Toru hoisted the 1919 and immediately ran to the side. Sullivan unceremoniously tossed Carr into the boat, then turned back and unslung his BAR. He was about to order Dan and Heinrich to get the Coordinator out of here, but there wasn’t time. The demon was coming too quickly. Trees were being pushed over, and the noise of splintering trunks was closing too fast.
Crow had Summoned something nasty this time.
“Fan out!” Sullivan ordered. Toru was already out of sight. Dan, Ian, and Heinrich hurried down the shore. Sullivan tested his Power, felt it there, reliable and true, and got ready to face down the demon. They’d come too far to die now.
From the noise, he was expecting something massive, but instead, it was only a normal-sized figure running through the trees. Yet, it was as if he was drawing a mass of smoke around him, and as he passed down the trail, the smoke was smashing the trees flat or tearing their roots right out of the ground like it massed the same as a herd of elephants.
Crow stopped twenty feet away, appearing to be a normal man in a black suit, but he was surrounded by the seething cloud of evil smoke. It seemed to coalesce around him in a vague animal shape. “I’m back, Heavy,” he hissed, “and this time, I’m wearing the greatest demon of them all.”
In the distance behind him, the void was growing larger. If the demon didn’t get them, then the black hole would.
Oh, Francis! Faye found him lying on the grass behind the back of a truck on the Washington side of the river. He’d been shot several times and from the dead bodies, it was obvious who’d done it. Luckily, Pemberly Hammer and Whisper had gotten there first.
Hammer had looked up long enough to say, “Tourniquet isn’t stopping the bleeding.”
“We must get him to the hospital,” Whisper said. “Too bad I had to use our car to block the bridge.”
“He needs a Healer or he’s dead.”
“Healer’s on the other side of the river.”
“Out of my way!” Faye shouted.
“Faye?” Hammer asked. “Where-”
She was glad that her friends had tried to save him, but everybody else was just too darned slow. Faye took Francis by the hand. It was cold. Her grey eyes could see well enough in the dark to tell that he was deathly pale. “Hang on, Francis. I’ve got you.”
She didn’t know where the handsome Healer was, and Jane was clear on the other side. That was a heck of a long jump with carrying the weight of another person, and it would take a much larger burst of Power, but she was feeling especially feisty tonight and figured she could do it. She checked her Power and was excited to discover that it had grown since the night had begun. It was counterintuitive, but her magic was getting stronger again. She could probably get Francis over there in one hop, but the island was still a safer waypoint first. Faye subconsciously ran the math in her head in the time it took anybody else to blink. She studied her head map, only to realize there was only a hundred yards or so left of the island that wasn’t dangerously close to the sucking void, picked a spot, and Traveled.
She and Francis appeared an inch above the ground and landed in the mud. It was better safe than sorry. To the north, the other knights were fighting something, and she recognized the human form of that no-good Crow. There was no time to help though. She’d come back for them once she saved Francis. Her head map picked out the spot on the west side of the river where Jane and Mr. Browning were, so she focused, looking for a safe spot, and… Clear.
Jane Garrett was only ten feet away and had her back to where Faye landed. She was watching an incoming boat, filled with knights and bedraggled, scared prisoners. “Jane! Jane! I need you!”
The Healer’s reactions were honed. When somebody called her name like that, she responded immediately. Grimnoir Healers were used to being needed in a real hurry. “Francis! Oh no…” Jane got on her knees and studied her angle of attack. “Three entrance holes. Two exits. Some fragmentation and multiple wound channels. Lung damage. Liver damage. Femoral artery is severed. Blood pressure dropping.” She put her hands on Francis’ chest. “Heart will stop in forty seconds.”
“Fix him!” Faye cried.
“Shhhh.” Jane closed her eyes and her hands began to glow. “I’ve got this.”
“Don’t let him die, Jane. I love him,” Faye blurted out.
Jane was exasperated. “Do I tell you how to teleport? No. I don’t think so. So go do whatever it is you do and quit fussing at me so I can concentrate.” The hole in Francis’ chest made a sizzling noise and he moaned.
Faye stood up. Jane was right, and she was the very best Healer ever. There was nothing else she could do for Francis…
Except punish the organization that had hurt him.
Crow was pleased. This new body was amazing. He couldn’t believe that he’d waited so long to try it out. He’d been foolish to be so scared of the greatest of all Summoned. It hadn’t even taken much coaxing to bring it to Earth. It had been eager. No Summoner had ever dared call on it before. They’d been too frightened. Only Crow had the nerves to tame the fiercest beast that had ever existed on a very fearsome world.
It hadn’t even fought him for control. He’d expected more of a struggle, but it had simply accepted his demand and let him take charge of its body. It had been surprisingly accommodating, and had gone obediently to the back of its mind. Crow could sense the savage brutality of the creature, but it was also cunning, it might not have understood humanity, but it understood that its master had a need for strategy and discretion.
He was only allowing a tiny percentage of its true physical form to manifest, but even then, Crow had never felt so mighty. He forced it to look like his regular, chosen, human shape, but its abilities and strength were off the charts. It was sorely tempting to let the true form free, but he was afraid. Not of another embarrassment like what had happened in Oklahoma, but rather that once he started, he would not be able to stop. Crow didn’t know if he, or the demon, could handle that much freedom.
In fact, he was far more worried about the growing darkness behind him than the Grimnoir in front of him. He did not understand what it was, but it was all-consuming. There was only death inside the darkness. He did not know if even the great one would be able to pull itself out of the darkness should it get too close.
The Grimnoir attacked. They were powerful, but they were nothing compared to this form. The Heavy struck him with waves of crushing gravity, but he simply shrugged them off. Up became down and down became up, but the Greatest Summoned did not care, and it willed itself to stay connected to the ground. The Iron Guard hosed them down with bullets from a belt-fed machine gun, but it was like being pelted with handfuls of sand.
They had a Mouth. He hurled words at Crow. The words were filled with magic, but they were feeble human words, and they made no sense. In fact, he was having a very hard time understanding any of the words the Grimnoir were saying. That gave Crow pause… Was the demon affecting him more than he’d thought? If it was, it was very subtle, and as Crow thought about that, the words began to make sense again and the garbled nonsense the Grimnoir were shouting turned back into English. That was better.