"Cam's right, Daniel," Gabbe said quickly. "Something's different this time… something about Luce. The cycle could be broken—and not the way we want it to. I mean… it could end."
"Someone tell me what you're talking about," Luce said, butting in. "What's different? Broken how? What's at stake with this whole battle, anyway?"
Daniel, Arriane, and Gabbe all stared at her for a moment as if trying to place her, as if they knew her from somewhere but she'd changed so completely in an instant that they no longer recognized her face.
Finally Arriane spoke up. "At stake?" She rubbed at the scar on her neck. "If they win—it's Hell on earth. The end of the world as anyone knows it."
The black shapes screeched around Cam, wrestling with and chewing on each other, in some sort of sick, devilish warm-up.
"And if we win?" Luce struggled to get out the words.
Gabbe swallowed, then said gravely, "We don't know yet."
Suddenly Daniel stumbled back, away from Luce, and pointed at her. "Sh-she hasn't been…," he stammered, covering his mouth. "The kiss," he said finally, stepping forward to grip Luce's arm. "The book. That's why you can—"
"Get to part B, Daniel," Arriane prompted. "Think fast. Patience is a virtue, and you know how Cam feels about those."
Daniel squeezed Luce's hand. "You have to go. You have to get out of here."
"What? Why?"
She looked at Arriane and Gabbe for help, then shrank away from them as a host of silver twinkles began to flow over the roof of the mausoleum. Like an endless stream of fireflies released from an enormous mason jar. They rained down on Arriane and Gabbe, making their eyes shine. It reminded Luce of fireworks—and of one Fourth of July, when the light had been just right and she'd looked into her mother's irises and seen the fireworks' reflection, a booming silvery flash of light, as if her mother's eyes were a mirror.
Only, these twinkles didn't peter into smoke like fireworks. When they hit the cemetery grass, they bloomed into graceful, shimmery iridescent beings. They weren't exactly human shapes, but they were vaguely recognizable. Gorgeous, glowing rays of light. Creatures so ravishing that Luce knew instantly they were an army of angelic power, equal in size and number to the great black force behind Cam. This was what true beauty and goodness looked like—a spectral, luminescent gathering of beings so pure it hurt to look directly at them, like the most glorious eclipse, or maybe Heaven itself. She should have felt comforted, standing on the side that had to prevail in this fight. But she was starting to feel sick.
Daniel pressed the back of his hand to her cheek. "She's feverish."
Gabbe patted Luce on the arm and beamed. "It's okay, sugar," she said, guiding Daniel's hand away. Her drawl was somehow reassuring. "We'll take it from here. But you have to go." She glanced over her shoulder at the horde of blackness behind Cam. "Now."
Daniel pulled Luce to him for one last embrace.
"I'll take her," Miss Sophia called loudly. The book was still tucked under her arm. "I know a safe place."
"Go," Daniel said. "I'll find you as soon as I can. Just promise me you'll run from here, and that you won't look back."
Luce had so many questions. "I don't want to leave you."
Arriane stepped between them and gave Luce a final, rough shove toward the gates. "Sorry, Luce," she said. "Time to leave this fight to us. We're kind of professionals."
Luce felt Penn's hand slide into hers, and soon they were running. Pounding up toward the gates of the cemetery as quickly as she'd bounded down on her way to find Daniel. Back up the slippery mulch slide. Back through the jagged live oak branches and the ramshackle stacks of broken headstones. They hurdled the stones and jogged up the slope, making for the distant ironwork arch of the gates. Hot wind blew her hair, and the swampy air still lay thick in her lungs. She couldn't find the moon to guide them, and the light in the cemetery's center was gone now. She didn't understand what was happening. At all. And she didn't like it at all that everyone else did.
A bolt of blackness struck the ground in front of her, cracking the earth and opening up a jagged gorge. Luce and Penn skidded to a halt just in time. The gash was as wide as Luce was tall, as deep as… well, she couldn't see down to the dark bottom. The edges of it sizzled and foamed.
Penn gasped. "Luce. I'm scared."
"Follow me, girls," Miss Sophia called.
She led them to the right, winding among the dark graves while blast after blast rang out behind them. "Just the sounds of battle," she huffed, like some sort of strange tour guide. "That will go on for some while, I fear."