To the Power Born: A Tale of the Slayers

Part 45: Flint and Steel

Jocelyn:

I glanced back and forth between the double steel doors behind us and the big, bank-vault-style door that Piper was examining, and I bit my lip to keep from telling Piper to hurry. She knew the situation, she wouldn't dawdle— but that door was freaking quadruple-locked with two spin-dial combination locks, a number pad, and a qwerty keyboard controlling the various locks. I couldn't open any of them, so hurrying the specialist trained in it would be seven kinds of stupid. Or more.

But I really did have to bite my lip. I didn't like this setup, didn't like the time constraints we were on— and couldn't even be sure of, we had no idea when Catherine Madison had started her attempt at the Ritual of the Gaping Way, how long it would take her, if the results would be instantaneous once she did complete the ritual. Would there be a building-up of forces, could we still stop the Hellmouth she was attempting to open here from opening once she finished the spell, or would it be "spell done, Hellmouth open, good-bye world?"

"I don't like this," Joyce Harris said quietly. She was behind me, on my left, between me and Piper at the big door. "Why aren't there monsters attacking, trying to stop Piper from opening that door?"

"Hey, don't jinx us!" Ian said from behind my right shoulder.

"She's right, though," I sighed. "I don't like it either, Joyce. It's like the Madison woman is… letting us get this close, and that can't be good."

"Guys, I've almost got this first lock," Piper called. "I'm on what I think is the last tumbler… got—"

Blue light flashed, I mentally kicked myself in the ass— and monsters appeared between the big double doors at the end of the hall and us, maybe fifty creatures in I don't know how many types.

"Crap!" I snarled, pulling my sword. "Open a lock, trigger a trap, just like upstairs!"

"Hang on, I—" Piper started.

"We've got it, keep working!" I ordered. "No time, Piper, just keep working!"

The first of the monsters reached me, then, a Ba'an demon, built like Arnold Schwarzenegger's bigger brother, covered in short, spiky blue hair that felt like needles if you hit it with bare flesh (or cloth, or even leather armor, if it wasn't thick leather), and too darned quick for something so big.

But my feet were adequately covered. I jumped in, did a replacement sidekick, packing all my mass and magically-enhanced muscle into the kick, and sent it flying back into the front rank of demons behind it, causing three or four to roar in pain.

Then I pulled an explosive crazy disc off of my bandolier and flung it at the Ba'an even as I backpedaled, arms outstretched to push Joyce and Ian back behind me.

We got bowled back by the blast, all three of us, and Joyce— the smallest of us all— landed barely six inches from Piper's feet.

"Neat." Ian bounced to his feet. "That took out a bunch of them, Jocelyn, cool."

Then he charged down the hall, glowing blue, his staff held across his chest, and leapt at the front couple of surviving monsters as they staggered to their feet. He caught both with his staff, and the three of them knocked down the several demons that were just standing.

"Your boyfriend," I said to Joyce as we charged in after him, "is crazy. Or too damned brave for his own good."

"Both, probably," Joyce said— and she leapt over Ian's now-crouching body, planted a jumping sidekick in the chest of the big, pissy werewolf that was just reaching its feet, knocked it back and down, landed right in front of Ian, and started punching the hell out of a Wendigo that was reaching for him.

"Well, then," I muttered as I waded into the trio of vampires on Ian's left, sword spinning in tight arcs around my body, "you two are a perfect match for each other!"

We killed a lot of demons before one of them— a Gleven, which are almost too pretty to be demons (they look like D&D elves)— suddenly did the unexpected, and did it too fast for any of us to react.

It had been fighting Joyce very cautiously, retreating before her kicks and slashes (she'd drawn the light longsword she favored) letting her drive it to the wall—

—and suddenly, it swept aside Joyce's walk-up front kick hard, wrapped its arms around her as she landed with her back to it, and cried "GOT HER!"

The wall maybe a foot and a half to the Gleven's left slid open, a six-by-ten foot section sliding into the ceiling, and I had time to see that the section that had opened was at least six inches thick before the damned elf-wannabe-demon managed to duck through the opening in the wall— which closed behind it before Ian or I could even get close.

"JOYCE!" Ian cried, even as I slammed into the wall at least a half a second too late.

There was a click from overhead, and Warren's voice said, in a tone so filled with glee that he was laughing around his words, "Thanks, kids— you made my best revenge happen just how I want it!"

I screamed in pure frustration— and something hit me from behind, slammed me into the wall hard enough to knock almost all the wind out of me.

I turned to face the humanoid-triceratops-thing that had hit me, slammed my sword into its throat, and stayed where I was, marking the place where Buffy's daughter had disappeared the only way I could right now, and trying to think of a way to get her back— before Warren killed her.

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In the Trap:

Joyce froze when she heard Warren talking, listened to his words and realized how much trouble she might be in. At that point, instincts that came with the Slayer power kicked in— and Joyce Summers rammed her head backwards with all of her strength, just as the Gleven bent to set her on the floor. Her head impacted with the demon's face hard enough to break bones, and it let go of her. Immediately, she spun, slashed its throat with the light longsword she carried, and as it fell to the floor and bled out, she examined her surroundings.

Twenty foot by twenty foot room, ceiling ten feet high and made of the same metal as the walls, a simple metal door on each of the walls that weren't the one she'd been pulled through to get here.

"Hi there!" came Warren's voice from a speaker overhead. "My name is Warren, and I'll be your Dungeon Master tonight. Here are the rules, kiddo (and all rules will go into effect after I recite Rule Number Six):

"First rule: One minute in a room, then I fill it with poison gas. Takes about thirty seconds to reach the point where you'll go unconscious, but you'll suffer ill effects before then, so I wouldn't dawdle, if I were you.

"Second rule: No going back, only forward.

"Third rule: No incapacitating. You have to kill a creature before you move on.

"Fourth rule: Every five rooms you make it through, I'll add five seconds to the timer before I start the gas. This is cumulative, so at ten rooms, you get a minute and ten seconds before the gas starts a minute and fifteen at fifteen rooms, etc, etc.

"Fifth rule…." Warren's voice trailed off, and Joyce could practically see the smirk on his face as he said. "Every five rooms you make it through, I will decrease my body's power generator's output by ten percent. Cumulative, and I won't cheat.

"Sixth and final rule: If you make it through twenty-five rooms without dying, you get to fight me— I'll be at fifty percent power, so only a little stronger than you, and utterly unable to use any of my morphing abilities.

"One minute timer starts… now.

"I'd wish you luck, but I'd be lying to you!"

Joyce hesitated for a moment, then started for the door to her left, thinking to stay close to the wall that she'd come through, just in case she could find a way back to the hallway, back to Ian, Jocelyn and Piper.

She took two steps towards that door, saw movement out of the corner of her eye, over by the door that had been straight across from her, and spun that way.

What she saw was so completely impossible that she simply stood and stared, and never mind the time before Warren released poison gas into the room she was in.

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Another Earth:

Starpulse felt cold and dizzy, then he felt himself drop a few inches to a floor in one full gravity, and before he could so much as look around—

—POWER flooded him, his own, familiar power, slammed into him so fast that he gasped in surprise, filled him to full as quickly as though he were in his home dimension—

"Starpulse!?"

—because he was in his home dimension.

He knew that electronically filtered voice, and when he looked around, he recognized the incredibly high-tech lab that he stood in, so he wasn't surprised when he spun around and saw Cyber Knight, with Jason— no Armsman, he was in costume— standing beside him and staring.

"I— what the hell, the portal generator is on standby!" Cyber Knight gasped. "I didn't do anything, Armsman, I didn't!"

"He's right!" Starpulse said, and very carefully didn't move. "He didn't do this, Armsman— I ran out of power, and that's why— look, my friends, they're in danger back there, there's no time to explain!

"Knight, can you send me back? Right to where I vanished from? Now!?"

"Pretty sure, yeah," Cyber Knight said, his voice calm and confident. "Dude, with the portal on standby, that means— well, it recorded the transit, so I know right where you came from. We were getting ready to send you a package, and— no, never mind.

"Hey, you said there's trouble— can you use some more backup? I'll come along, and I don't even need to ask Armsman."

"Can you get back?" Starpulse asked, even as he saw a familiar look on Jason's face, a look that said he was looking forward to a fight. "Both of you?"

"Piece of cake," Cyber Knight said. "We'll get pulled back buy our natural frequency within, oh, a maximum of ten hours or so, minimum of three, maybe. If your witch-friend is right, anyway, since my power source is artificial, and Jason's is internal, unlike that weird para-spatial-wormhole thing you've got that connects you to… whatever."

"Then, yes!" Starpulse said. "Please, both of you!"

"Armsman, go stand next to Starpulse, on his… left, yes." Cyber Knight looked at the console before him, then looked to one side, picked up a small taped-closed box and said, "Oh— here, catch."

Armsman grinned, caught the box and handed it to Starpulse, said, "Put that in a pocket— pouch pocket should hold it."

Once Starpulse had done as asked, Armsman grabbed his friend and hugged him fiercely. "It's good to see you, 'Pulse, damned good. I wish things hadn't had to get dangerous for it to happen— but I'll take it.

"What are we facing, anyway?"

"Good question," Cyber Knight agreed as he adjusted the settings of the interdimensional transporter that he'd designed. "Monsters and such, like Armsman said were common where you're living now?"

"Yes," Colin said, nodding. "Pretty much a bunch of pissy demons, maybe some robots, though I think I got all of those.

"If it doesn't look human, beat the shit out of it— kill it, if you can without feeling bad, this is not a case of 'human bad guy, can be reformed,' you know?"

Cyber Knight finished his settings, flipped a switch, and somewhere, a generator shifted into high gear, its nearly-unnoticed low-pitched whine cycling higher (reminding Starpulse uncomfortably of the Warren-bots cycling up their generators). Cyber Knight came and stood on the opposite side of Starpulse from Armsman and said, "Got it, no problem— I always did like the Castlevania games, even the antiques from, what, the late eighties?

"It'll be a blast to kill some monsters for real!"

Before Starpulse or Armsman could even sigh at the techno-hero's geeky exuberance, there was a flash of light— and they dropped into the room that Starpulse had vanished out of a couple of minutes before, startling the hell out of the Station Security man who'd come in to see what had happened to Starpulse.

The security man jumped backwards with a cry of "Jesus Christ on a purple pogo stick!" and slapped his hand over his sidearm.

"Easy!" Starpulse said, glancing around at the inert robot bodies in the room (even as Cyber Knight went to examine one). "They're friends of mine— they're here to help."

"I— okay." The man gulped and took his station-safe cell phone from the pouch opposite his sidearm. "I guess I'd better tell someone that you're back— I think Ms. Killian was freaking out."

"Do that," Starpulse said. "They're still near the main lock at radius two-seventy?"

"Yes, sir!" the man said as he dialed. "Sounds like things were getting heavy again, too— another incursion near the lock at radius zero."

"Oh, hell yes, killing supernatural critters on a space station!" Cyber Knight muttered as he straightened up from playing the sensors in his gloves over a destroyed Warren-bot. "I can die happy, now!

"What's the gravity here on outer rim, thirty-three percent? I'll need to adjust my power output, or I'll be bashing myself into walls. A lot."

"Yes, sir, thirty-three percent," the security officer said. Then he turned his attention to the phone and said, "Sergeant Gendron, Starpulse is back, and he brought two… uh, other heroes with him. Designations…?" He looked at Starpulse, who said his friends' names. "Armsman and Cyber Knight. They're coming with him, you might want to let Ms. Killian know."

Starpulse waited until the man looked up and gave him a nod, said, "She says, 'thank god, I don't have to tell Jocelyn,' sir. Also, 'get down here, it's nuts.' "

"We're on our way," Starpulse said, and led his friends out into the station and back towards the main airlock at radius zero.

"Killing demons in outer space," Cyber Knight laughed as they flew off. "That's so cool that I may have to figure out a way to stay here!"

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Eastland Mall, aboveground:

Things had started to slow, finally— Buffy didn't know where the demons were coming from, but they just kept coming, and with Dawn working on getting to Joyce, there was no telling where they were coming from, or putting a stop to it.

START soldiers had the front line, at least for the moment, so Buffy went to check on Dawn and… whoever the redhead was. The woman— she reminded Buffy of Rose— was kneeling next to Dawn, and they had their heads together, so Buffy figured her for a friendly— looked grim, and Buffy's heart sank as she approached. She swung wide around Judith, River and Giles, coming in from the other end of the concrete path, passed (and gave friendly nods to) Mal Reynolds and Jayne Cobb. Those two were still shooting the occasional demons, and seemingly making some sort of competition out of it….

"Dawn?" Buffy asked as she got close enough to be heard.

Her sister looked up, and Buffy's heart sank at the expression on Dawn's face. "I'm sorry, Buffy, but— I can't get through this damned thing, even with all the tricks Fiona— she's an incredible witch, Buffy, just— she could give Willow a run for her money, and she can't even see a way past the damned spell that's locking us out."

"Dammit." Buffy closed her eyes for a moment, then said, "Okay. What about physically breaking in?"

"No," Dawn said, shaking her head. "The material here— concrete over steel, and lots of both. We'd endanger the kids badly breaking through."

"I can't even get there through shadow," Fiona said, and at Buffy's odd look, she said, "My family and I can… do things with reality, change it, warp it, move from world to world. But this… whatever this Madison woman has done, it's so wrapped up in the stuff of this particular shadow that breaking her barrier would… it would endanger your world.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Harris."

"Buffy." The Slayer said it absently, then said, "There has to be… something, dammit! Warren! There must have been a way in for him, so maybe we should get the START Forced Entry team on it—"

"By the horn of the Unicorn, I'm an idiot!" Fiona said suddenly. She stood, looked around the bit of fight she could see, then shouted, "MERLIN! GET OVER HERE!"

"Merlin?" Buffy managed to croak. "Seriously?"

"Not the one you're thinking of," Fiona said, waving at a handsome young man in black and gray as he worked his way to them, slashing at the occasional demon with a golden saber that he carried, and nearly always killing the monsters. "Named for him. And a damned good wizard in his own right."

The man— his age was hard to judge, he looked to be late twenties or early thirties, moved like a teenager, and had eyes that were old— arrived and said, "What's up, Aunt Fi?"

"We need Ghostwheel," Fiona said. "There are some kids that got separated from the group, they're in danger, and we can't get to them physically or magically. Do you think Ghost can—"

"One way to find out," Merlin said, nodding. He pulled a beautifully made wooden box from a leather pouch on his belt, slid the top off, and shook out what looked like a deck of antique playing cards. As he shuffled through the cards (some of which seemed to have paintings of his family on them— Buffy saw Fiona's form on one of them quite clearly) he said, "But… look, Aunt Fi, everything Ghost does, he does in ways a lot like we do, so…."

"I know— but we should try." Fiona shook her head a little and added, "Maybe the Logrus magics?"

"Maybe," Merlin agreed as he drew out a card that had a painting of many balls of light and occult symbols gathered around a bigger sphere of light. "One second, please."

The young man focused on the card, holding it down in front of him at about the level of the bottom of his sternum, and after a long moment… the largest ball of light seemed to just grow three dimensional and hover above the card's surface.

"Yes, Merlin?" asked a voice that sounded like Sir Ian McKellen while he was playing Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings.

"Ghostwheel, we have a problem involving a magical portal that's sealed itself up," Merlin said, apparently to the light. "There are some kids in danger, and we aren't able to get to them."

"Can you be a bit more specific about either the children or their location?" Ghostwheel— whoever he was— said. "My sensors can find most anything, but I do need something to work with."

Sensors? Buffy thought. What, is Ghostwheel a starship?

"Um, one of the missing children is my daughter, uh, Ghost… wheel?" Buffy said. "Does that help? And if it's not being rude or anything… what are you?"

"It does help," said the ball of light, chuckling. "As for what I am… I'm an artificial intelligence that combines both technology and magic to function, can work through shadow, and can find most anything.

"May I scan you, madam, so that I may attempt to find your daughter?"

"Yes, absolutely," Buffy said, puffing a breath upwards to get a lock of hair out of her eyes. "Anything! And call me Buffy."

"Thank you." A beam of light shot out of the ball of light, ran once from the top of Buffy's head to her toes, and vanished. "This is… you are infused with a significant level of an unusual kind of magic— unusual to me, anyway.

"Buffy, would your daughter have this same magic bound to her?"

"Yes, and so would one of the other four kids we're looking for," Buffy said. "They passed through a magical gate that started here, on this path we're on, and the gate… closed up and won't re-open."

"Understood. One moment, please." The ball of light floated in place for approximately ten seconds— then let out a low, dismayed whistle. "Uh. Merlin? I've never seen anything like this… may I record the energies I'm scanning for further analysis at a later date?"

"Go ahead, Ghost." Merlin sighed, then said, "Any luck on the kids?"

"I have a location on them, though they've been separated somewhat— but I'm afraid that any attempt to bring them here or send help there would be fatal to the individuals attempting to leave or go to the location." Ghostwheel actually sounded offended by his inability to help. "There's a twisting of shadow that…. Living matter would suffer a fatal restructuring while passing in either direction. I'm afraid it's deliberate."

"Dammit!" Buffy muttered, her voice low. She turned her back on the others to gather herself for a moment.

Buffy took a steadying breath, banished the tears that were trying to overwhelm her control, closed her eyes and thought, Look, I could use some help, here, if anyone's listening. Please. I lost my son and I'm terrified for my daughter, so if anyone can hear this, if anyone can help… please! Please, help me save my child!

There was no answer— at least not in words.

The Scythe vibrated gently in her hands, and Buffy heard that soft, pleasant metallic ringing sound that the Scythe sometimes made when it was being used as it was meant to be used— and she gasped in relief.

"Thank you." She turned back to the others and said, "Ghostwheel— what about this?" She held up the Scythe. "It's solid metal and long-dead wood and leather, it's got the spirits— and minds, I guess— of several women magically bound to it, but it's not living."

"A moment… ah." Light played over the Scythe, then winked out, and when Ghostwheel spoke, it— he, he sounded male— actually sounded pleased. "That is the source— origin-point would be better, perhaps, since there is no flow of power from it to you and the others now— the origin-point of your power.

"Yes, Buffy, I can move that from here to the place where the children in question are."

"It should go to the one who's supposed to be on fire," said a voice from behind Dawn— and all of them jumped. River Tam smiled a little shyly, said, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you— but it should go to the one who's supposed to burn. It'll start the fire, help her understand what it means to blaze.

"Your daughter— Joyce, her name's Joyce— has got other help, Buffy, help— help that she never expected, but that she really needed. Help that will make her feel…." River Tam cocked her head as though listening to something only she could hear, and said, "It will make her feel complete again."

Buffy bit her lip for a moment, then sighed and said, "Okay. Okay.

"Ghostwheel, one of the kids— she's a little taller than me, long blond hair, currently in a ponytail and wrapped at the end. Her eyes are purple, and she's probably using a Chinese longsword.

"Give this to her." Buffy hefted the Scythe, felt it vibrate warmly, and knew that she'd made the right decision. "How do we do this?"

"Hang on a sec," Dawn said hurriedly. She looked at River Tam and said, "Are you sure that Joyce will be okay?"

"She has help," River said— and smiled a slow, sweet smile. "Someone she loves is there, helping her, and it's a secret— the bad-bot doesn't even know she has help.

"The blonde girl… the Scythe will help her help Joyce, help her… help her burn."

Dawn looked at her sister— and nodded, just a little.

"Okay, it's a consensus." Buffy smiled a little, looked at the light that was Ghostwheel, and said, "How do I do this?"

"Toss the weapon into the air, at least ten feet to give me time to align myself under it," said that Gandalf-like voice. "I will do the rest."

"Wait, wait!" Dawn patted furiously at her pockets, came up with a pad and a pen, and scribbled on it for a half a minute or so, then tore the sheet she'd written on off and wrapped it around the stake that made up the bottom of the weapon's handle, secured it there with a rubber band from another pocket. "Okay, now."

"Is that a secret?" Buffy asked, tapping the note.

"Not really," Dawn said, and smiled at Buffy. "But it won't mean anything to you, Buffy. It will to Jocelyn— I hope."

"Good enough." Buffy hefted the Scythe, took a deep breath, and said, "Ready, Ghostwheel?"

"I am ready, Buffy."

Buffy hefted the weapon that had been made for the Slayer, that had changed everything, made the Slayer into Slayers, made them a force, not a single girl, then flung it up into the air, nerves making her throw it higher than she'd been told, and it sailed a good thirty feet up into the air above the little circular patch of jungle— before the light that somehow was Ghostwheel zipped upwards, passed over it— and made it vanish.

"The blonde girl— Jocelyn, I presume— has it," the ball of light said as it zipped back down to hover in front of Merlin. "Unfortunately, the transition attracted hostile magical attention, and I can no longer penetrate the area, even to observe."

"Crap." Buffy stretched once, looked around, and said, "Okay. Monsters still on the influx. Dawn… see if you can do something about that, and if you folks can help, I'll be more grateful than I already am— and that's saying something. When this is all over? You're invited to my house for dinner, and my husband will cook, so it won't even be terrifying.

"Right now… it's time to go to work."

With that, Buffy Harris turned and charged back into the battle that was just starting to heat up again.

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Jocelyn:

I held my ground, refused to move away from the spot where a secret door had opened and swallowed up Joyce Harris, and not just because I didn't want to disappoint Buffy. Joyce is my friend, someone I'd loved as long as I'd known her, which had been longer than either of us could really remember.

Ian Matthias worked his way to me, and while he covered me for a moment, I used my sword to cut a big X into the section of wall that had moved to let the Gleven snatch Joyce, so that I could move, could work better with Ian to hold the demons, to give Piper room to work on that damned vault door.

If it came to it, I'd have to go that way, through that massive vault door, have to leave Joyce on her own. I'd hate every minute of it— but I'd do it, if it came to it, and I'd take Piper with me. If he'd come, I'd take Ian— but if he refused, I wouldn't blame him, wouldn't hold it against him at all—

No. No, I wasn't going there. One thing at a time, Jocelyn! Think too far ahead and you end up confused— this isn't a chess game, you aren't up against Giles. This is bigger than that, and a lot more unpredictable.

As the demons dwindled in number to maybe a half a dozen (holy crap, we'd whittled them down that much, just me and Ian, we were good) I saw a light pop into existence above my head, glanced up—

—and slammed my sword back over my shoulder and into its sheath, reached out and caught the Scythe as it tumbled neatly into my hands. There was a note strapped to the handle with a rubber band, and I jerked it off and stuffed it in a pouch on my belt to look at once these last few demons were gone.

Ian saw what had happened, and he let out a soft, "Yes! Game-changer!" as he moved a half a step closer, since the Scythe was nowhere near as long as my sword, and there would be more space between us.

I'd never actually used the Scythe before— and I felt so damned amazing, wielding a weapon that had been made for Slayers, the very thing that had made me a Slayer. I grinned like a kid on Christmas morning as I waded into the Chintor (kind of a chitinous snake, maybe thirty feet long, poisonous bite, tail-sting and spit) in front of me, cut it into four pieces as the Scythe sang a little victory shrill. I hit the vampire behind it in the chest with the stake in the butt of the Scythe, dusted it, kicked the Fyarl demon behind it sideways, so that it bounced off the wall and grabbed a still-glowing-with-the-power-of-Hope Ian to steady itself. Its hands caught fire, it staggered back from Ian, and he stabbed it in the throat with his short sword, killing it nice and dead. The Miquot behind it threw a bone knife at me, and I batted it aside with the Scythe, used the weight of the weapon to pull me into a spin, then snapped the Miquot's neck with a back round kick. A vampire charged past me, and Ian, seeing that there was only one more vampire and a were-rat behind it, went ahead and tackled that one, knowing I could handle the last two monsters.

When I finished those two off by beheading the were-rat (with delight— those things CREEP ME OUT!), I heard Ian coughing behind me, and turned to give him a hand up.

"You okay?" I asked as I thumped his back to help ease the coughing.

"I breathed vamp ash," he complained. "Disgusting!"

"I'm with you on that," I agreed. I glance back at Piper, still working on the second dial combination lock. "I hate to interrupt her, but—"

"Don't." Ian took a slow, deep breath, then said, "What was it that was attached to the Scythe when it… I'm guessing when Dawn sent it through?"

"Oh, right," I said, reaching into my belt pouch as I started for the section of wall where Joyce had been kidnapped. "Thanks, I forgot about it."

I pulled the note out, unfolded it, and looked at the words that had been hastily written there by Aunt Dawn (I recognized her handwriting). After a couple of seconds, I read them aloud— Ian would want to hear the first part, at least.

" 'Jocelyn— don't worry about Joyce, we have it on good authority that she's got help coming, or there already,' " I read. " 'You can still help her, though: Be the Blaze, Jocelyn. I'm not sure what that means— but I know that it's what the Guardians want, why they wanted the Scythe to go to you right now.

" 'Be the Blaze!' "

For a long second, no one spoke— then Piper called, "Holy crap! Okay, I think I've about got it, one more tumbler… get ready for round two!"

"Wait!" I said, agonizing over that single word more than— well, maybe more than you can ever know. I hope more than you can know, because saying it actually hurt, actually scared me. "Wait… I think…." I looked down at the Scythe in my hand, and I frowned. "Dammit. I think I'm supposed to do something, but I don't have the first clue what!"

"It'll come to you," Ian said, his voice calm. "It'll come. Come on, Jocelyn, stay cool— it'll come."

"Okay." I looked back at Piper, smiled a little and said, "I love you, Piper."

"If I said 'ditto,' would you call me Patrick Swayze?" she asked, then smiled and said, "Love you, too.

"You ready?"

"Ready." I took a breath and turned back to face the way that the demons had appeared from last time. "Do it!"

Piper moved the dial of the second combination lock slowly, carefully— then stopped and stood up straight as something inside the door let out a heavy "clunk."

I tensed, gripped the Scythe more tightly, and waited….

No blue flash. No monsters. No nothing.

"Is it wrong," Ian said very slowly, "that the fact that nothing at all happened when Piper opened that lock makes me very, very, nervous?"

"If it is," I said, just as slowly, "then we're both in the wrong, at least.

"Piper— do you know what's next?"

"Number pad, and it's easy," Piper called back. "Screen above it lit up with the two-letter symbols for a buttload of elements— sixty-four of the one hundred and seventeen. I'm inputting the atomic numbers— I'm sure that's the combination."

"My god, smart women are sexy," I muttered. Then I said louder, "Honey, the next time you call yourself a geek, I'm gonna remind you of this moment, and your geekiness saving our butts, okay?"

Piper laughed and called, "Good point— okay!" and kept on inputting numbers.

After maybe a minute more, that massive door let out another "clunk," and again, nothing happened— at least as far as monsters appearing. However, a moment later, Piper let out a groan and said, "Oh, crap, why did it have to be this?"

The screen above the qwerty keyboard had lit up, and Piper was staring at it with a mildly disgusted look on her face. I went to take a look— and groaned along with her.

Forty-nine riddles had appeared on the screen above the qwerty keyboard, and I don't mean kid's riddles like "why do Indians wear feathers on their heads?" (The answer being "to keep their wigwam." Ow.) No, these were old riddles, or at least old fashioned— like the ones Bilbo and Gollum asked each other in the Hobbit, you know? But none of these were from there, I'd have recognized those.

Here's the first five (and their answers, which we certainly didn't get right away) to give you an idea of what we were dealing with:

1) What is in seasons, seconds, centuries and minutes but not in decades, years or days? (The letter "N.")

2) The person who makes it, sells it. The person who buys it never uses it and the person who uses it doesn't know they are. What is it? (A coffin.)

3) The more you have of it, the less you see. What is it? (Darkness.)

4) I know a word of letters three. Add two, and fewer there will be. (Few.)

5) Say my name and I disappear. What am I? (Silence.)

Ugh. Forty-four more like that, lots of them worse. Harder.

"The first one is the letter 'N,' but after that?" Ian shook his head. "After that, I got nothin' at all."

"I hate Catherine Madison," Piper muttered, and we started through the riddles, answering the ones we could get between the three of us. We went through the first twenty, solved eight of them—

—and white light flashed against one wall as something big appeared out of nowhere, almost seven feet tall, a staff in its hand, a huge cloak flapping around it as it roared in pain or anger.

Not my day, you know?