Tempt the Stars

by Karen Chance

  And then I was being pulled up the stairs by three maniacs, who were cursing everything in sight. And getting cursed right back as the mages in the hall figured out we weren’t there anymore, maybe because a bunch of their fellows had just fallen on their heads. But they were behind us, and the landing and a hallway were ahead, the one Rhea had just disappeared into.

  Something hit the wall beside me, leaving a heavy scorched mark, and something else lashed my back, turning my arm numb even through the coat’s protection. But then we were in the hall, and Jasmine—Zara—was throwing a shield over the end of it, like a plug.

  Which sent three mages staggering back when they ran straight into it.

  We pelted down the hall, where small people in white nightgowns were already spilling out of several rooms. Or maybe it was their day-wear, since who could tell the difference? But it looked like Rhea hadn’t lost it as much as I’d thought, because she appeared at the door to a room down the hall, breathing a little funny, but with a child in each hand.

  And screamed, “Behind you!”

  Damn, that hadn’t lasted long, I thought, and hit the floor, just as something blew out a light on the wall beside me. Glass scattered and children screamed, but to my amazement, they didn’t run amok. Not when Rhea snapped out a command and started them moving in orderly lines down the hall, even as the witches cursed the shit out of everything behind them.

  But the odds were ridiculous, and we were getting tired. The next time Zara tried a shield, it was popped almost immediately, under a barrage of spells so thick it looked like a miniature sun had gone off in the hallway. The only thing that saved us was the fact that this wasn’t one of those made-to-look-old kinds of places, but the real deal. And the hall was narrow, not allowing us to be rushed by everyone at once.

  But it let through enough, more than enough. Zara took a hit to the arm, screaming half in pain and half in fury. And something hit me, catching one side of my coat on fire that didn’t go out. I had to shed my only protection or go up in flames with it, throwing it down the hall at the mages.

  They batted it away, but it distracted the ones in front for half a second, which was long enough for Evelyn to throw a spell—not at them, but at the ceiling. And there was enough power behind it to bring half the hallway down, cracking it along the center and spilling a load of billowing plaster and falling debris on our pursuers. Along with a bunch of water pipes, dripping and then spewing on their heads, which didn’t seem to bother them much.

  Until Beatrice sent a plume of flame down the hall, and turned the water to blistering-hot steam.

  And it seems that even dark mages have an aversion to being boiled to death. Some got up shields, but more panicked and tried to turn around, crashing into those behind them. Creating enough of a temporary bottleneck that we were able to get the last of the kids out of the dorm rooms, pushing them down the hall as fast as small legs could move.

  I didn’t know where we were going, but everyone else seemed to, with the older kids helping the younger. Down the hall and around a bend, to a back stairway. Which would have been great, except that it was as narrow as the hall that fed into it.

  I stared at it, not even needing to do any mental math. And the looks on the faces of the witches would have told me the truth, even if it hadn’t been obvious. I didn’t know how long it was going to take all those kids to get down all those stairs, but it worked out to more than we had.

  A lot more.

  And then the dark mages were coming again, around the bend, with shields initially, and then dropping them to fire when they realized the truth. A mass of spells like the one they’d done before, that had shattered Zara’s shield, only this time, we didn’t have a shield. But the spells stopped anyway.

  Or, to be exact, they slowed to a crawl, because I didn’t have enough power left to stop them completely.

  “You have six minutes,” I told them. “Get them as far away as you can.”

  Beatrice nodded, grasping Zara, who was panting and shaking and pale as a sheet, firmly by the arm. But Evelyn just looked at me. “And what are you going to do?”

  “Buy you time,” I choked, because talking was . . . hard right now.

  “I’ll stay with you,” Evelyn said staunchly.

  “That . . . wouldn’t be a great idea.”

  “And why not?”

  I was panting now, my vision blurring. And the stupid woman was still talking to me. “Because I won’t . . . have enough . . . to shift you out.”

  “And you’ll have enough to shift you?”

  Okay, maybe not so dumb.

  “I’ll be okay.”

  “You’ll be dead! And then the power will go to one of those miserable adepts—”

  “No, it won’t,” Rhea said. She’d wisely sent the older children down first, and was now shepherding the smaller. But she paused for a second, to look back at me.

  “And how do you know that?” Evelyn demanded. “They’re next in line!”

  “Because the power chooses the Pythia,” Rhea said, fierce pride on her face as she looked at me. “It was what you needed to understand today, what I needed to remember these last weeks. It doesn’t just go to the next in line, whoever people think is best. It goes to the actual best, the very best choice out there.” She dropped another of those perfect curtsies. “Lady.”

  I stared at her, and for the first time, and I guessed the last time, I was proud, I was damned proud, that it had come to me.

  And then they were gone, Evelyn still complaining, bringing up the rear as the last of the children faded into darkness in front of them. I went to my knees, because it was easier. And because it didn’t matter anymore if I looked good, since there was no one to see me but a bunch of guys who were about to die with me.

  Because I didn’t think they’d be so enthusiastic if the adepts had mentioned what was about to happen to this place. But I had no way to tell them, and no strength to do it if I had. The corridor was dimming even as the spells sped up, noticeably moving now, about the pace a person could walk casually. And painting the floor and ceiling with lines of unnatural spell light.

  I watched them come, and thought it was funny. Because they looked strangely familiar. Like the ones in the skies over Rosier’s court. Dangerous, but so beautiful. Like the moon-flooded sands of an alien world, like the endless stars in the council chamber, like the flash of attraction in a pair of green eyes.

  Pritkin, I thought, feeling gold spangled light on my face. And shut my eyes.

  Epilogue

  I opened them again in bed, with a blond demon sitting nearby.

  I bolted upright and grabbed him, before my eyes focused on the three-piece gray business suit, the thin blond hair, and the cleft he’d added to the chin. The one distinguishing feature in a bland mask to make it easier to pretend that’s what he really looked like. Adra, I thought, staring into calm gray eyes.

  “So I ended up in hell, after all?” I croaked in disgust.

  He smiled. And then apparently decided it deserved better, and laughed. “I think you’re safe,” he confided as I flopped back against the bed. “I don’t know of too many that would volunteer to take you.”

  I swallowed, because my tongue felt fuzzy. And blinked around at what was either a damned fine illusion, right down to the pinkish stain on the carpet from a glass of wine I’d spilled a week ago, or was my room in Vegas. And I didn’t know why anybody would waste an illusion that good on me.

  “Why are you here?” I demanded. “Why am I here?”

  “You are here due to us pulling you out at the moment your spell collapsed. It was quite close. For a moment, I did not think we were going to manage.”

  “You pulled me out,” I repeated, because that didn’t make a lot of sense.

  He nodded.

  “But . . .” I frowned, trying to think past a massive mi
graine. “How did you know . . .”

  “That you needed assistance?” he asked, leaning back and crossing his legs. “That would have to do with the Seidr spell your mother cast.”

  “What?”

  “The spell that she used to speak with us is one the gods used to communicate with each other. It creates an illusion that many minds can inhabit, similar to what you would term a conference call. Admittedly, I do not think it has been used to dial across time before, but then . . . she was always clever.”

  “Yes, so?” I asked harshly. Because I’d decided I didn’t care.

  “Well, it is a very old spell. A very rare spell, since the gods are now gone. Few people these days know how to cast it . . . or how to end it.”

  That took me a minute, but I got it. “You were spying on me.”

  “Essentially.” At least he didn’t try to sugarcoat it. “When you were in council chambers, we noticed the existence of several other Seidr links in your mind. Neither of which you seemed to be aware of, and neither of which you had bothered to close.”

  “Several—” I stopped, because suddenly a couple of things made sense. “Mircea and Jules.”

  “I do not know about the vampire. The first bond was tightly closed off; even we could not explore it without risking injury to you.”

  Mircea, I thought grimly. He had mental gifts he didn’t talk about, but which were kind of hard not to notice. I wasn’t sure how far they extended, but maybe . . . maybe they’d been enough for him to hang up on his own. Maybe that’s also why he’d suddenly gone incommunicado. Finding out your girlfriend was half goddess would be bad enough, without having her suddenly start spying on your brain.

  I freaked Mircea out, I thought dizzily.

  “But the second,” Adra was saying. “Yes, it is to a human named Jules. He has been having rather uncomfortable dreams, of late, thanks to you.”

  I bet. “So between the time my mother laid the first spell on me at her house, until I actually got to the council, there was a period when I was making other calls on my own, not knowing that’s what I was doing?”

  “So it would seem. I would wonder why your mother did not better inform you about the spell she planned to use, but . . . I think I know. In any case, we hardly thought someone would deliberately choose to keep open three distinct lines, when even one is somewhat debilitating. It therefore occurred to us that there was a chance you had not been taught about the workings of the spell, and that you would not know to close ours, either.”

  “But I felt it close. I felt relief—”

  “From your mother and most of the council leaving. Only a few of us stayed ‘online’ with you. The burden was still there, but it was less with fewer minds communicating. After the power you had been forced to channel before, it seemed like relief.”

  I scowled at him. “So you hoped to do what? Discover what kind of revenge I was planning?”

  He sighed. “Cassandra—may I call you Cassandra?”

  “No!”

  He sighed again. “We have, it would appear, gotten off on—the wrong foot? Is that the term?”

  “The wrong—” I just stared at him.

  “I’m sure that’s right,” he said, looking up as if referencing something. “Yes, yes, that is the phrase.”

  “That is not the—”

  “But you have to understand our dilemma. Ares and the other gods are actively working to return to earth, something a few of us have been at pains to keep quiet, to avoid a general panic. But you not only made that impossible, but appeared before the entire council demanding an army.”

  “My mother wanted the—”

  “Yes, and that was the point, was it not? Frankly, if our only choice is between Ares and Artemis, we would prefer the former. His skills are formidable, but his movements through the hells are restricted. His return would allow us time to consider . . . extreme measures. Your mother’s would not.”

  “So you killed Pritkin.”

  “It seemed prudent. Whether you intended to return your mother to her former glory, or to rule in her stead, you would need the incubus. Few are able to transmit power as his line can, and Lord Rosier’s antipathy for your mother is well known. I believe he would die before he would help her to regain her strength. But his son . . . we were not so sure of him. Or of you.”

  “So you spied on me.”

  “We wanted to know what you would do, once you were deprived of him. Some on the council were pushing for your death as well. But to others of us, that seemed . . . imprudent . . . with the gods attempting to return and your record of opposing them in the past. We required more information.”

  “Like what?”

  “We wished to know what you would do without the incubus. Would you try to find another strong enough to replace him? Would you visit your mother again, and formulate a new plan with her? Would you go to some heretofore unknown accomplice and strategize? What would you do?”

  “You know what I did!”

  “Yes. We know. And, for the first time in more years than I can count, I admit to a feeling of . . . astonishment.”

  I didn’t say anything. I just wished he’d go away. But apparently, ancient demons leave when they want to.

  “At first, we did not understand,” he told me, still sounding faintly surprised. “We thought you would shift out when the witches had gone. We thought you were . . . grandstanding? Is that the word?”

  “Look it up,” I told him harshly, and swung my legs out of bed.

  “But then, when you did not . . . when we realized you would not, even to save yourself . . . it occurred to us that perhaps it is possible to be too cynical. To forget that not everyone thinks as we do.”

  And he couldn’t have had that epiphany yesterday, I thought, pain twisting in my gut. I felt dizzy with it, aching. As if part of me had been carved out and left gasping on the floor. I wanted to scream, to rant, to throw things. I wanted to cry and never stop. I wanted him gone so I could curl around my hurt.

  “You said several reasons?” I rasped.

  “Yes. I wished, we wished, to give you this,” he said, taking out what looked like an eel-skin wallet, but probably wasn’t. And handing me something from inside.

  It was a piece of paper. A lined bit of notebook paper, which seemed kind of chintzy for an ancient demon, but I didn’t care. Because all it had on it were a bunch of meaningless squiggles.

  “What is this?” I demanded, thinking about tearing it up.

  “The counterspell.”

  I looked at it blankly for a moment, and then up at him. I don’t know what was on my face, but he searched it for a long time. And then smiled slightly.

  “That is what I meant. This is what I had . . . forgotten.”

  That meant exactly nothing to me. “Why . . .” I cleared my throat. “Why are you doing this?”

  “The council believes that it is unlikely that someone who aspired to world-altering power would so easily give up not only her quest, but her life,” he told me gently. “And for creatures who could be of no use to her.”

  “Then . . . this is real.” I looked back down at it, my heart starting to beat.

  “Yes, it is real. If you can find him before the curse concludes, you can save him. But I warn you—it will not be easy. The spell we used was specifically designed to thwart your power. His soul will pass through each year of his life only once and then never again. Afterward, you can use your abilities to return to the same moment again and again, but you will not find it there.”

  I clutched the paper in one fist, hearing it crinkle. “But . . . I can’t read this.”

  “It is an ancient tongue; there are few who can. Fortunately, one of them is pleased to accompany you.”

  “Pleased is not the word I would use,” came a scathing voice. Right before something hit me in the solar ple
xus.

  It was a backpack. And holding an identical one was—

  “Oh, shit.”

  “My feelings exactly,” Rosier hissed. “Now get dressed. We’re running out of time.”

  “Are there clothes in here?” I demanded.

  “Yes—”

  “Then I’ll dress when we get there. When are we going?”

  “Eighteen eighty. And you’d better damned well hope we catch him there.”

  “Why there?”

  “The curse gets progressively faster as it goes on, girl! And I’ve no desire to go larking around some barbaric era with the likes of—”

  Yeah, I thought. He still liked to talk. This was going to be hell.

  So why was a smile breaking out over my face?

  I clutched the spell in one hand, threw the pack over my back, and grabbed Rosier.

  “Shut up,” I told him.

  And I shifted.