I did my best to tuck and role, forcing the right side of my body to take the brunt of my fall. Mel was pulling me to my feet and out of harm’s way as Grace followed me over. Dion came screaming after her. As their bodies hit the grated floor, the entire fire escape vibrated beneath us.

  “Come on ya’ll,” Mel urged, jerking me towards yet another set of stairs.

  As we proceeded down, Chip’s body zipped passed us faster than I could blink, His head banged off the side of the fire escape, the impact so hard it sent a clang echoing through the air and left behind a smear of blood. His terrified screams followed him all the way down, ceasing when his body hit the ground with a nauseating, audible crack and splat.

  “Holy shit,” Dion croaked.

  I risked a glance up, seeing one of the masked figures above. They had more than likely pushed him as he attempted to jump.

  We kept moving, going from one landing to the other, the physical efforts beginning to take a toll on all of us. Once we reached the very bottom, there wasn’t any time to stop and process or discuss a next course of action. Our pursuers knew we’d gotten away and exactly where we would’ve come out.

  A few feet away from the final set of stairs was Chip. He lay in a puddle of blood with visibly broken limbs and a large portion of his head dented inward. I don’t think any of us stopped to consider where to go, we just kept moving, putting much needed space between us and the complex.

  Coming up on an intersection we slowed as another two women dashed across it, attempting to cross the road. Within a moment of me blinking, one was hit by a blacked-out truck. Her body lifted entirely off the ground, going up onto the hood before bouncing off and landing in a motionless heap on the street.

  Her companion began to scream hysterically, all the while smart enough to back away from her friends’ body.

  “Over here,” Grace breathed harshly, just loud enough for our group to hear.

  She positioned herself between a storefront’s two walls and awning, her body obscured from view. We joined her, placing our backs flat against the glass windows. I placed a hand over my mouth to try and quiet down my breathing, thinking if anyone heard me that I’d give away our location.

  The girl must have retreated because her screams and the eventual sound of the truck’s engine faded simultaneously.

  “What the fuck do we do now?” Mel asked, her voice raspy and dry.

  “How do we get to this carnival place with all these freaks prowling the streets?” Dion followed-up with.

  I almost pointed out that we too, were freaks, ultimately deciding against it.

  Our overall position wasn’t the greatest. Standing beneath an awning that provided dismal cover at best wouldn’t keep us in the okay for long. We couldn’t stand here until the fireworks Ciaran mentioned started. There was also this Helios thing with Grace to figure out. She had yet to mention it and Chip clearly wasn’t going to be of any more help—not that he was much of any to begin with.

  Mind racing, I scanned our surroundings. The road was empty and fragile silence reigned once more.

  “We shouldn’t hold still,” Mel voiced the obvious.

  “Does anyone know how to hotwire a car?” I asked.

  A few solid beats passed before Dion answered. “I know which access point to go in at.”

  “Um, I’m sorry. Access point?”

  “Yeah. Most cars don’t get hot wired like they did back in the day.”

  I glanced over at him. “So, yes?”

  “…I guess?”

  “Good. There’s our temporary solution.”

  “Won’t that draw too much attention to us?” Mel questioned.

  “It’s better than being completely in the open, and we’ll cover more ground.”

  “Let’s just do it,” Grace intervened. “I can’t run all over this city like a track-star.”

  When Mel took a good look at her, I think she had the same realization that I’d had—something wasn’t right. It had her changing up her tune and agreeing that a car was a better way for us to travel.

  I don’t know why no one ever suggested this back in Goetia. Maybe it was due to the way we had to go from place to place. Those checkpoints had been way closer together than the ones inside Devil’s Playground.

  I stepped forward and poked my head out from behind our faulty cover to get a better look at the street and surrounding area. I didn’t see anyone—silence still lingered, but here nothing could ever be taken at face value. We may not have been in open view of anyone happily playing along with whoever was responsible for this, but that didn’t mean an audience wasn’t still tucked safely away watching us partake in round after round of mayhem.

  “Okay.” I stepped back and swiped my hair out of my face before turning to face Dion. “Pick one and do your thing. We can keep watch.”

  He used the edge of his shirt to wipe excess sweat from his brow and inched forward to peek out like I had.

  “Any of them?”

  “Preferably one with a quiet engine and that doesn’t have an alarm,” Mel replied.

  “Oh, and has a full tank of gas,” Grace quickly added.

  “Any specific colors?” he retorted bemusedly.

  “I’ve always been a fan of sky-blue,” I joked.

  “Cool. That black 150 should do the job then.”

  He darted across the street, using the other few vehicles as makeshift shields. We followed him in a triangular-like formation, making sure we had eyes on both ends of the road and the intersection that was now completely empty. Not even the woman’s body remained. Whoever ran her down must have taken it with them.

  Unsurprisingly the truck Dion chose was locked. He wasted no time rounding around to remove its antenna and then begin breaking and entering. As he worked at securing our ride the familiar feeling of being watched crept down my spine.

  I rechecked the road, all the nearby windows, and tops of buildings but there was no one around. At least not visible to the naked eye.

  Mel, who was standing a few feet away looked over at me with a slight frown on her face. “I think there’s someone close.”

  I nodded my agreement.

  “Yeah. I feel like that too.”

  “I’m in!” Dion announced after about five minutes.

  Well, now he just had to start this bad boy and we’d be good to go. Catching movement from the corner of my eye, I swiveled and found myself staring up at one of the masked men I’d seen earlier. Once again, he was watching from the top of a roof.

  “What is he doing?” Mel wondered aloud.

  I didn’t care as much what he was doing, rather more interested in how long he’d been up there.

  He was in a leisure stance, arms crossed, and head slightly bowed as if he didn’t have a care in the world. I wondered if we knew him too. His green LED mask and all black hooded ensemble hid any hints of who he might be.

  “Guys, people are coming,” Grace quietly alerted us.

  I looked in the direction she was staring to see the man with the large bow gun casually walking towards us. His mask too—wasn’t like the others. It was off white and horned, like a devil. The pig-tailed blonde we’d encountered at the high-school was with him. I wasn’t sure if they’d noticed Dion or not since he was mostly obscured by the truck.

  They gave no sign of having realized what he was doing until he drew direct attention to himself.

  “What are ya’ll doin? Get in the truck!” he demanded, a hint of urgency making his voice pitch.

  Grace immediately back peddled, keeping her back to us—fumbling with the rear passenger door of the truck. I jogged to where she was and helped her climb into the backseat, leaving the front for Mel.

  Once she’d slid over far enough for me to fit, I climbed in and slammed the door shut. Twisting to see out the rear window, I noticed the man that’d been watching from the rooftop was no longer there.

  Mel made it to safely inside and Dion followed seconds after. The man with the bow chose then to begin loading a bolt, drawing closer to where the truck was parked.

  “We need to go!”

  “Working on it!” Dion called back, fumbling with something beneath the steering column.

  “Get down you two,” I directed Mel and Grace, sliding from my seat to the floor of the truck my damn self.

  What felt like long, agonizing minutes passed by before the truck’s roared to life.

  “Just a second,” Dion said to himself.

  He shifted into reverse and began maneuvering out of the parking spot. The truck inched forward, and then backward. As he was reversing for a third time, the rear window shattered. An explosion of tiny glass shards scattered all over the seat and rained down on Grace and me. There was a loud pop from the front cabin, where a solid metal arrow now protruded from where the stereo and thermostat controls were.

  “Fucking drive!” Mel shouted at him.

  The truck lurched backward, its bed colliding with the car behind it.

  Dion slammed the gearshift into drive, gunning us away from the curb with a loud squealing of tires and burned-out rubber. At the intersection ahead, he took a sharp right. I grabbed the passenger seat’s back pocket to keep myself grounded and from flying like a ragdoll.

  “Where do I go?” he asked, not letting off the gas.

  I repositioned myself so that I was sitting in an upright position, cognizant of the glass shards all over the backseat. Ciaran said we needed to follow the fireworks. He never mentioned when those would go off or from where.

  I didn’t know if we should even listen to him. Mel and Grace seemed certain he wasn’t against us, but I couldn’t be sure he was on our side either. In fact, I bet he had his own agenda entirely. Plus, we still hadn’t told Dion what went down in the bathroom or about the picture in my rear pocket.

  The carnival Ciaran spoke of had been presented to us purposely. So, I suppose the part about needing to get there wasn’t a lie. I just wish I knew what would be waiting for us there when we arrived.

  “Just drive for a minute,” Mel prompted.

  Dion followed her instruction without comment. The truck remained silent, all of us lost in our own thoughts, unaware what was occurring in the part of the city we were heading towards.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  As the clock remained stuck at the devil’s hour, the full moon and city lights lit up his debauchery. I didn’t have words to convey what I witnessed as Dion drove us further into the Devil’s Playground.

  Things were getting brutal.

  Not only that, but there were also far more people here than I originally thought. When I considered all the columns and list of names on the maps, though, this all made more sense. It further revealed how intricate this situation was. For every single person here, whether they be alone or in a group, a path had been laid for them.

  We were all experiencing a different level of chaos. All at risk of dying from either failing to solve these complex riddles or by the masked assailants that seemed to have doubled in number since Goetia.

  Dion was forced to slow and yield, maneuvering the pick-up around various scenes of mayhem, trying to stay as far away from them as possible. As we passed by another intersection, a man surrounded by a small gang of misfits was set on fire, sent running away from his mortified group who could only watch as he screamed in agony before being forced to flee for their own safety. Before he vanished from my line of sight, I saw him fall to the ground a few feet away, his screams dying off as he burned alive.

  “This is so fucked up,” Dion muttered.

  I clenched my bloodied palm. The skin was still stinging from the glass I’d brushed off the seat so that I could sit down again.

  A black van bypassed the driver side of the truck, making no attempt to stop us or stray from their lane. I expected it to be being driven by someone who’d had the same idea as us, but the business decal on the side of it proved otherwise.

  “Maid For Retrieval,” Grace read off. “So, they just ride around and collect dead bodies?”

  “They’re probably one part of the system in charge for keeping this place so immaculate,” Mel responded, sounding completely unsurprised.

  “How are we on gas?” I asked.

  Dion took another turn and then slowed. “We’ve got seventy miles left on the tank.”

  I opened my mouth to reply, promptly cut off by a rainbow of fizzling light arcing through the pitch-black sky. As it faded away another colorful burst erupted, leaving behind a faint trail.

  “Go towards those fireworks,” I implored.

  “Huh? Why? What could be over there other than a celebration of people dying?”

  “We need to go that direction,” I reiterated.

  He twisted around to look at me. “I’m asking you; how do you know?”

  “We got a hint. Do you want me to drive?” Grace cut in.

  “A hint? Why didn’t anyone fill me the fuck in?”

  “I will. Right after you start driving. Unless that’s a yeah for me to take over…?”

  “Nope,” he quickly objected. “I got it.”

  He began turning around, cutting the wheel all the way to the left. Still in a partial U-turn, a blue car came screeching around the corner. This one was definitely driven by someone who’d had the same idea we had.

  “Look out!’ Mel warned.

  There was no time to move out of their way. Their car’s front end smashed into the already dented bumper of the heavy-duty pick-up. Dion and Grace both cursed as we fishtailed. She was nearly uprooted from her seat while he had to fight for control of the truck.

  Metal colliding with metal overshadowed the boom from the next set of fireworks. The blue sedan took way more damage than it could dish out, the hood of crinkled like an empty soda can.

  The driver lost control of the vehicle and veered towards the curb on the opposite side of the road, bouncing off another parked car and crashing through a glass storefront before ultimately coming to a stop.

  Dion jerked the wheel to prevent us from crashing into anything else. The pickup jumped the curb and seemed to bounce its way back into the street.

  He hit the gas as soon as were in the clear, wasting no time racing away from the scene of the crash.

  A wise choice on his end. That collision made an unmistakable carrying sound. For the sake of the person driving the blue car and whoever may have been with them, I hoped they got out and away before someone showed up to investigate.

  If they were even alive.

  Pulling into the parking lot was an experience within itself. I don’t know why I was so shocked to see a fully operative carnival in this place, but there it was.

  The grand finale of the fireworks occurred as Dion coasted into a parking spot and cut the engine.

  “You never explained the hint,” he said quietly after a solid few minutes of silence rolled by.

  Grace sighed and looked over at me.

  “Show him.”

  I raised a brow. “Show him what?”

  “What we found back at the apartment,” she hinted.

  I was thrown for a second. I wasn’t sure what she had going on inside her head, but she could’ve gone about this an entirely different way. I wasn’t ready to show him this photo. There was still way too much we didn’t know about it and him.

  “What’s she talking about?” Dion asked me directly.

  Grace was looking at me in a way that said she would tell him if I didn’t. So much for being on the same page as each other.

  Mel gave her a look I couldn’t read before nodding at me as if to say it was okay. I sucked in a deep breath and then quietly let it out as I removed the folded photograph from my back pocket and stretched it towards him.

  “I found this.”

  He took it gingerly. I gave him a minute to process and looked out towards the carnival. Without the fireworks going off screams could be heard from all the way where we sat. Not all of them seemed to be from terror, though. A Ferriss wheel turned slowly, the blinking lights like a welcoming beacon. Or in this case a warning sign.

  “When…where did this come from?” Dion spluttered. “I mean I felt like I knew you, but I can’t remember ever meeting before.”

  “You felt like you knew me?” I parroted. This was one of the last things I expected him to say.

  “It’s mutual,” Mel interrupted. “I thought the same thing. None of us remember meeting you or your girl, though.”

  What? Since when did she feel like she’d known him?

  “Who are all these other people?” he asked.

  “We don’t know. All we can agree on at this point was that we all knew Sainte,” Grace replied.

  “The same Sainte who just tried to kill us, so then you chopped off his head?” he clarified.

  “That would be the one.”

  I was lost among the conversation. They were mixing lies with the truth and there was already more than enough deceit to go around. We clearly needed to have a discussion but finding the time to sit around and do so wasn’t easily presenting itself.

  “It’s weird, right? How we all forgot whatever night this was,” I contributed.

  “It’s strange, but not impossible. That’s what makes it disturbing.”

  “What do you mean?” Mel asked.

  “Someone fucked with our heads,” I answered matter-of-factly. It was the only plausible explanation and knowing we all came from a founding family made it even more realistic.

  “We’re back to the overall question then. Why is this happening?” Dion stated.

  “Pretty much,” Grace quipped.

  “Then what do we do now.”

  I puffed my cheeks, letting them deflate as I reached for the door handle. “We go find out why we needed to come to a carnival.”

  Once back on solid ground, I brushed myself off and stretched my muscles while the others got out.

  “Your hand okay?” Mel asked, walking with me to the back of the truck where Grace and Dion were waiting.

  I examined the side of my palm and nodded. “It’s just a flesh wound.”