Via satellite view, we knew the northern reaches of the cemetery were heavily treed—an untouched forest that would eventually be chopped down to make room for more graves. Kind of a waste, I mused, as we jogged along a paved path, fields of flat headstones on either side of us. I didn’t want any beautiful old trees dying so my corpse could lie beneath mowed grass.

“Hey guys,” I whisper-called. “When I die, put me down for cremation, ’kay?”

“You’re not gonna die,” Aaron called back grumpily.

“I just meant in general.”

“Oh. In that case, fine—but I’m not doing the cremating.”

“Why not? Isn’t that what a good pyromage friend would do?”

He grumbled something under his breath.

The cemetery grew darker as we jogged away from the developed sections. A wall of trees rose in our path, and we came to a halt. Plucking my flashlight off my belt, I shone it at the forest. Several types of conifers were jammed so tightly together that my light wasn’t penetrating more than a few inches into the foliage.

“That’s … extremely dense,” I muttered. “Anyone bring a machete?”

Kai shook his head. “Even if we could bushwhack our way through there, we shouldn’t have to. The cultists need access to the location too.”

“It’d help if we knew what we were looking for.” Aaron scrubbed his hand through his hair. “This could take all night.”

I cast a sidelong look at Makiko. “Can you just, like, fly up in the air and look around?”

“Levitation is more draining than combat.”

“Oh.” I puffed out a frustrated breath—then snapped straight as I realized we didn’t need Makiko to get an aerial view. “Hoshi!”

She uncoiled from my back pouch. Undulating through the air as if it were as thick as water, she dipped her head to sniff at my braided hair.

“Hey girl,” I murmured. “Can you help us out? Will you fly around this place, then come back and show me what you saw?”

With a snap of her long tail, she soared upward, fading from sight as she went.

Aaron and I headed one way to search for paths into the forest, and Kai and Makiko moved in the opposite direction. The minutes ticked by, and my skin prickled with growing nerves. The longer we wandered around, the greater the chances were that someone might notice our suspicious activity. Getting the cops called on us would be annoying, but a spy alerting the cult could be disastrous.

As I squatted on my heels and shone my flashlight under the boughs of a conifer to check for a hidden path, Hoshi appeared in a swirl of endless tail and bobbing crystal antennae. She bumped her nose against mine and a dizzying maelstrom of images filled my head.

“Whoa, whoa,” I gasped. “Slow down, Hoshi.”

With an apologetic flicker of rose-streaked violet, she replayed her surveillance flight at a more sane speed. She’d soared over the trees, finding several dirt tracks and one gravel pathway. Trees, trees, more trees, a clearing with a small structure, then—

“Wait, what was that last thing?”

She showed me the image again: a vaguely gazebo-shaped structure constructed of gray stone, with a domed roof supported by pillars. It sat alone in a small clearing of overgrown grasses and weeds.

“Well, hel-lo,” I breathed. “Guys!”

Aaron had already backtracked to join me, and Kai and Makiko jogged out of the darkness.

“There’s a mausoleum-ish thing back there,” I said, rising to my feet with Hoshi hanging off my shoulder. “All alone in a little clearing. Seems like a good place to check out.”

Kai and Aaron nodded.

I patted Hoshi’s nose. “Can you lead us there?”

She nuzzled my palm, then undulated straight into the trees. Guess we’d be doing some bushwhacking after all.

Thank goodness for all my leather clothes, otherwise traversing a hundred yards of woodland would’ve left me in a worse state than our recent battles. My flashlight flickered wildly as I wrangled past bushes and boughs with dead leaves clinging to them.

Just when it seemed it would never end, I burst out into the clearing. The guys and Makiko tumbled out after me, and we spent a moment picking leaves and twigs out of our hair and clothes before focusing on the structure in the center of the treeless glade.

Far smaller than the remains of the temple in Enright, it looked like a fairly generic stone monument with carved pillars, a peaked roof, and an octagonal base.

Aaron and Kai followed behind me as I cautiously approached and shone my flashlight between the pillars. Several steps led to a raised floor, where a life-sized statue of an angel stood, weathered and crumbling.

Her wings had broken off, leaving rough stumps running down the folds of her simple dress, and the delicate features on her upturned face were so worn down they were almost indiscernible, giving her a mask-like visage. She held a bronze chalice in one hand, the metal blackened with age, and her other hand was curled as though she’d once been holding a second item.

Keeping on the grass, I circled the structure until I was facing the angel.

“Look,” I murmured. “On her head.”

Atop her flowing hair was a delicate stone crown with three points—just like the symbol on the Praetor’s tapestry.

Gulping down my nerves, I placed my foot on the first step of the mausoleum. Hoshi clutched my jacket collar as though ready to pull me away. I braced for an explosion or spewing fire or some other horrific booby trap, but after twenty seconds, I relaxed and ascended the three steps. The others followed me.

“This isn’t a recent structure,” Kai murmured, brushing his palm over a pillar. “I seriously doubt the cult built this.”

I studied the angel’s weathered face, a foot above mine with the short pedestal under her bare stone feet, then lifted my gaze to her crown. Eyes narrowing, I tapped a fingernail against one point, then tapped the side of her face, then poked at the crown again.

“The statue is original,” I decided, “but I don’t think the crown is. It feels more like clay—like I could break it pretty easily if I tried.”

“I think the cult might’ve broken the wings off, as well.” Makiko, standing behind the angel, touched one of the wing stumps. “The damage doesn’t look as old as the rest.”

“That makes a twisted sort of sense,” I said. “Breaking her wings makes her a fallen angel—in other words, a demon. The Christian version, at least.”

Aaron stepped to my side. “Then this is likely a cult-ified mausoleum. How—”

“Cenotaph,” Kai interrupted.

“Huh?”

“A mausoleum has a body interred in it. This is a cenotaph—a monument.”

Aaron shook his head. “Okay, how is this cenotaph going to lead us to the cult lair? Could there be an underground room again?”

We all looked at the very solid stone floor.

“Maybe there’s a secret entrance,” Makiko suggested. “Do you see a hidden button or lever?”

Aaron peered around. “If this were a video game, there’d be a clue to solving the puzzle.”

I shot him a withering look, then returned my attention to the angel. This was the part of the structure the cult had marked. My gaze drifted to the chalice she held—and a vivid memory of the Praetor raising a silver chalice hit me. There’d been chalices in the hidden room in Enright too.

Grasping the angel’s stone shoulders for balance, I stepped onto the pedestal and peered into the bronze cup. The inside was far smoother than the outside—except for the bottom, where a geometrical shape had been carved, a spiky rune in its center.

I dropped back to the ground, my face scrunched with displeasure. Of course it couldn’t be a nice, simple “open sesame.” Oh no, the cult had to make it all weird and creepy.

“Theoretically speaking,” I began unhappily, “could blood be used to trigger a spell?"

Aaron shrugged, while Kai and Makiko exchanged uncertain looks.

“Possibly,” Kai said. “Alchemy and sorcery can be blended in many ways. None of us are experts to say for sure, though.”

“Then I guess I’ll try it. Can I borrow a knife?”

“What for?”

“I’m going to bleed in that chalice and see if anything happens.”

Everyone stared at me.

“You saw their blood-drinking ritual.” I held out my hand impatiently. “It’s worth a shot.”

“Then I’ll do it—” Kai began.

“You’re more likely to need all your blood, so let me do it.”

He shook his head, jaw set—then swore when Makiko held out a tiny knife. I blinked as I accepted it. Where the hell was she hiding knives under that skintight leather?

I clipped my flashlight to my belt, tugged my left sleeve up, and set the blade against my skin. Teeth gritted, I sliced the blade down, opening a shallow cut. As blood welled, I held my wrist over the chalice.

No one spoke as my blood dribbled into the bronze cup. I really hoped a magic word wasn’t required as well, or I was bleeding for nothing.

A crimson glow flared inside the cup, the light casting eerie scarlet shadows over the angel’s face.

My heart leaped in anxious excitement. I stepped back quickly, holding my breath, and waited for something else to happen. Running out of air, I inhaled and waited again.

The chalice continued to emit that eerie glow, but otherwise … nothing.

“Oh my god, seriously?” I snarled. “Why is nothing happening?”

“There must be an incantation,” Makiko murmured. “Or some other trigger.”

Swearing under my breath, I dug into the first-aid pouch of my belt and used a potion to stop the bleeding. Opening a vein for no reason. Ugh.

As I reached back to replace the potion vial, my arm bumped the scepter hanging from my belt. I peered down at it, then looked back at the angel—at her empty hand, fingers curled.

Could it be …?