Rachel was growing increasingly uneasy by the way the shadows deepened over time. It seemed to be getting darker much faster than usual. Was it natural? Or was Rachel just increasingly paranoid in a world where she had no idea what was actually possible anymore? Case in point, she was watching a little girl in a black dress and a pink unicorn rain jacket currently whispering to a wolf easily three or four times her size and ordering it around. Rachel didn't really have grounds to question anything anymore.
Natalie had called them to a halt once again as the wolf looked up and sniffed the air. After a few moments, it turned to face Rachel, as did the rest of the group.
"What?"
"Don't you hear that?" Natalie asked. Rachel strained her ears, and finally she caught a faint humming sound coming from her bag.
"How did you hear that?" Ryan asked her incredulously.
"My ears are better than yours, and I don't smell so bad."
"Kid, when you get older, you'll fuckin' love somethi—"
Josh clapped a hand over Ryan's mouth before he said anything further, and Lily shot him a dark look. Rachel dug into her pocket and withdrew her phone, which was indeed buzzing away with the third or fourth attempted phone call. "Will, I'm so sorry, I was out of signal range."
"I know," Will's voice crackled through the speaker. It wasn't great quality, but it was enough, and Rachel felt warmth spreading from the speaker through her brain. Just hearing his voice was enough to bring a measure of comfort. "Are you okay?"
"Yes. I'm with Natalie, Kendra, Josh and Ryan. You sent them?"
"Kendra, Josh and Ryan, yeah. I also called Jackie, Boris and Cinza, but I think they're both a bit busy with what's going on here."
"What's going on?"
Will sounded like he was running, which was already unusual. In an emergency he was usually at his computer, where he felt he was most useful. "There's a lot of shouting and people are looking for a fight. I heard more than a few people yelling 'justice for Jenny' and some brutal stuff about Cinza's people. Rachel, I don't think they're gonna back down this time."
"Did you get anything back from Jackie?" Rachel asked, as a sense of impending doom settled in the pit of her stomach.
"Nothing. Listen, Rachel, there's something else too. I just felt a massive spike of magical energy in town at Boris' shop. Bigger than anything I've ever felt. It's gotta be him. I think something serious is going down there right now."
Rachel's thoughts were split in half. She was thinking at a mile a minute, but every single time she leaned toward one approach, she began arguing herself back toward the other path.
Did she go to Cinza and help her? The greycloak leader had become a friend, and one she trusted more than almost anyone in the world these days. Rachel wanted to help her and protect her. She was brave and kind and she deserved better than to face a lynch mob alone and unsupported.
On the other hand, what Will had just told her was the first real lead they'd had on Omega ever. He was in town, in a location she knew and could reach. It might be her only chance to stop him before real permanent damage was done, may Smith and Jenny rest in peace. The riot and the mob were borne of problems Omega had created. If she could bring him low and lay him before the town, give them the malevolent they'd been hunting, couldn't that be enough to stop the bloodshed?
Rachel didn't know what to do. She wanted to curl up and cry. The shock of seeing the reverend broken and burned still hadn't left her, and she wasn't sure it ever would. She was being asked to make impossible choices and it wasn't fair. All she'd wanted to do was help the save the world. Why did the world have to make it so difficult to be saved?
"Rachel?" Will's voice crackled again. The group was watching her with baited breath. She was the leader, after all. She had to make the call. Rachel had chosen to take that responsibility.
What sort of idiot asks for this?
Cinza's people were well-trained and well provisioned. The majority of them had magic, and Rachel had no doubt that she'd taught them combat techniques in preparation for a day like this. Rachel could send Natalie to back them up—the girl was a skeptic like the rest of them, but she wasn't unfriendly to the group as a whole. With her terrifying new friends, Rachel could see Natalie scaring away the more timid of the mob. As soon as even a portion began to falter, the group was that much more likely to break down. Mobs thrived on cohesion and feedback loops; as soon as anything external broke the loop, the mob was poisoned.
But if Rachel was going up against Omega, she was going to need all the help she could get. Ryan and Josh weren't the sort of powerhouse duo she'd have preferred, and they still didn't exactly get along. Natalie was one of the rare few Rachel had noticed with a talent for magic that seemed to be far beyond the usual means. Kendra (or is it Lily? Rachel mused) was another, and Hector was a third. If she was going to go toe-to-toe with a god, Rachel wanted them at her side.
The group wasn't paying Rachel any attention, busy getting outraged at a tasteless comment from Ryan. Rachel dialed Hector's phone, but only got a full voicemail message. She didn't really have any more backup she could call on. All she had were the people in front of her, and she needed them all with what she could be walking into.
With a heavy heart, Rachel made up her mind. As much as she'd grown to like the girl, Cinza would have to fend for herself.
"We're going back into town."
"We're what now?" Josh asked.
"Omega's there, right now, in Boris' shop."
"Hell no," Ryan shouted. "I'm out."
"Fuck you too, Ryan," Josh snapped. "Rachel, are you sure?"
"Ninety-nine percent," Rachel answered. "You don't have to come with me, but I can't do this alone. If I go in by myself, I'm probably dead."
"And now you're gonna guilt-trip us? Fucking hell, Rachel," Ryan grumbled.
"If you don't want to come, don't. I don't need you." Rachel turned and walked across the clearing to Natalie, who was busy scratching behind the ears of her wolf. She knelt down cautiously in front of the girl—but with her height, Rachel still felt like she towered over the kid. It was a stark reminder of how young Natalie was, still growing and changing.
Rachel faltered. How could she ask Natalie to follow her into this? She was still a child. She wasn't responsible for any of this. Rachel's plans were predicated on having the firepower of Kendra and Natalie at her back, but could she really send a twelve year old girl into a battle with a murderous god and live with herself afterward?
"What?" Natalie asked. Her eyes were still bright and warm, while Rachel felt impossibly cold and afraid. She felt like she was about to step over a line that she could never return from.
"Natalie, I need you to come help me fight someone."
"Rachel, no—" Lily started, but Rachel held up a hand. Lily fell silent, but her eyes were narrow and blazing with disapproval.
Natalie brushed her hair back behind her ear casually. "Is it the bad guy? The one who killed Jenny?"
"Yes," Rachel answered, and the pit in her stomach grew tenfold. It wasn't a lie, but... "He's at Boris' bookshop right now. I don't know why or who else is there, but we have to stop him before he hurts anyone else."
She nodded. In a smooth motion that would have put any professional equestrian to shame, Natalie took up her spot on the back of the gray wolf. It growled in a low menacing rumble that made them all wince, but Natalie scratched at it again and the growl became almost a purr. Natalie's cat sidled up next to the pair and rubbed against the wolf, but the wolf's fierce eyes were locked on Rachel.
"For Jenny," Natalie said. Rachel nodded, while echoes of the war cry of the mob flitted through her ears. Visions of Cinza's people being run down and attacked in the dark night blazed in her mind, but Rachel fought back against her own conscience with thoughts of Omega blasting the town apart and killing them all, one by one.
He had to be stopped.