“So instead of killing him they exiled him here? To Mexico City?”

Deven scowled. “No! That would have defeated their purpose. They needed him stripped of power. And of course, human blood only strengthens the lords. Since they couldn’t defeat him, they worked together to align two tricky calendars and forced Night Axe to the realm of light, hoping he would weaken without darkness and starve without human blood or Aztaw food.”

“Clearly it didn’t work.” August snapped open a bottle of water and took a deep gulp.

“I don’t know how he managed to escape the realm of light, but he’s here.” Deven shook his head. “It shouldn’t be possible. There are no natural calendar alignments between the realm of light and anywhere else. It was the perfect prison.”

August arched an eyebrow. “The Irregulars have a report on the realm of light. From the way it was described it isn’t a prison, rather a place full of peaceful, bodiless beings.”

“No body means no blood. That’s hell for an Aztaw lord.” Deven shook his head.

“What were those veins floating all around him?” August asked.

“I don’t know, but it must have something to do with how engorged he was on human blood,” Deven said, frowning. “None of this makes sense.”

“Night Axe needs sacrifices to fuel his magic, yes?”

“Of course.”

“If he’s trying to keep a low profile here, it would draw attention to him if he murdered dozens of people to extract their blood,” August said.

“You think he’s developed another way of collecting sacrifices?”

August shrugged. “Hell if I know. Can you use your mirror to look into the future and see?”

“I can try, although I doubt it will help.” Deven pulled his obsidian mirror fragment from his pocket. He unwrapped its cloth and dipped a corner of the mirror into the puddled remains of their mixed blood.

Deven spat on the mirror. He didn’t expect to see much. Premonitions were murky at best and subject to change. He’d rarely found anything worth learning when peering into the cloudy uncertainty of the future.

The opaque surface of the mirror shimmered and cleared. He looked at the image. From a pool of darkness glowed the bones of a horde of Aztaw soldiers, running full speed, weapons raised as they charged.

Deven pulled out his knife and shouted to August, “Run!”

Chapter Seven

The air snapped like exploding light bulbs. The corner of the warehouse ripped open to reveal a jagged pool of darkness. At least a dozen Aztaw soldiers poured from the breach between realms, raising dart blowers, swords, and batons spiked with obsidian blades.

Deven caught August’s sleeve and pulled him to the front door. Adrenaline tensed the muscles of his body into flight mode.

August stared at the coal black crack in the air, then seemed to finally comprehend the danger. He pulled his new shard pistol from a holster hidden under his jacket.

“Too many! Run!” Deven urged.

“There are civilians out there!” August cried. He grabbed another object from his pocket, a powdery white ball that resembled something for a bath. He hurled it at the soldiers. It hit the Aztaw in front and a fine white powder burst out explosively, shooting upwards to coat all of them in glittering fragments of light.

“What the hell is that?” Deven cried. He yanked open the door.

“Glamour bomb!” August shouted. Half a dozen poison darts flew past their heads, embedding in the door. “We can’t have them seen here.”

“Go, go!” Deven pushed August out into the street. He broke into a run.

The hot midday sun blinded Deven. He followed August down a narrow side street. Something knocked over behind him and he heard angry yelling in Spanish.

Deven glanced over his shoulder to see what looked like a mob of angry Mexican men charging him.

The masking spell was good—from afar, they appeared rough, unapproachable, but undeniably human. But the masking spell hadn’t applied evenly and at certain angles Deven saw their Aztaw bodies poking through the deception.

In their natural form, the soldiers were slightly larger than humans, with pale skin like rice paper stretched over their glowing bones. Skirts of cotton and feathers covered their waists and armor of finely braided, enchanted husks protected their bony chests like bulletproof vests. The fierce black and yellow markings of the Lord of Hurricane’s house darkened what could be seen of their skulls underneath the human camouflage. One of them had obviously protected his face from the glamour bomb and his lidless eyeballs rolled in his skull sockets.

They moved as if drugged, slower than August and Deven, but their determination to follow didn’t waver.

“We’ve got to get away from all these goddamn people!” August gasped, sprinting from a busy intersection and down another side road.

The Aztaws continued doggedly in pursuit. Glimpses of raised spears and batons shimmered into sight and disappeared as the masking spell failed under the heavy sunlight. The range was too far for Deven’s knives but maybe not too far for his new freeze balls.

But as he pulled one from his pocket, August barked, “No! Too many civilians.” He stopped for a moment, concentrating, as if discerning their location. He pointed to the left. “This way. Hurry!”

Deven did as he was told, racing to keep up. Up ahead a temporary fence cordoned off a vacant construction area. Vaguely he remembered it was a Sunday.

But there was a guard for the site, who yelled and rose as if to physically restrain them from entering the property.

“Corre!” August shouted at the man. The guard picked up his phone. Then his mouth went slack as he saw the dozen angry men chasing Deven and August. The guard dropped the phone and ran toward a trailer on the periphery of the site.

“Where are we?” Deven panted.

“New subway tunnel drilling site. Come on!”

“Good thing I took up running!” Deven shouted to August. To his surprise, August barked a short laugh.

At the poorly barricaded tunnel entrance August paused to pull out his utility knife and quickly selected a tool that came off the knife. He cradled the small metal sliver in his hand.

The masking spell was wearing off the soldiers. They looked more like a furious attacking Aztaw army. But it wasn’t as if Deven didn’t have practice running for his life from Aztaw soldiers. He knew what to expect. Aztaw soldiers were fierce but unimaginative; they hunted in formation and never strayed. Normally, Deven would do anything but flee in a straight path from Aztaws. But he was stuck following August into the tunnel.

They entered the smooth, cylindrical shaft, lined with concrete walls. The ground was roughly hewn rock and soil. Dim emergency lighting lined the ceiling, but as they plunged deeper, shadows overpowered the light. The tunnel entrance gaped like a minstrel’s mouth, a circle of light in swallowing darkness.

Once the soldiers entered the tunnel, August tossed the sliver he held in his hands and it spun like a propeller. August shoved Deven hard against the concrete wall and covered Deven’s body with his own.

An explosion rocked the tunnel. A blast of hot air knocked both of them over. August held him tightly underneath him as another wave of heat threatened to blow them into the darkness. Deven’s nostrils burned with the stench of scorched ozone.

After a moment, August pulled himself off Deven and stood. Deven blinked, feeling stunned. “What was that!”

“Mage grenade.” August stared intently at the tunnel entrance.

Deven stood to watch as well, bracing his hands on his knees, catching his breath.

August leaned against the tunnel wall, breathing hard. “Goddamn Aztaws are scary.”

Deven nodded, remembering the first time he’d met one, age ten; he’d thought his father had dragged him down to the hell his grandmother had always been going on about.