Her lips formed a flat line, not exactly a smile and not exactly a grimace either. “I am home. After putting up with humans all that time, I’m finally where I should be.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying. I know you think you want to be here, but it’s wrong. You need to come home.”
“No, Eugenie. I’m saying what you should have been saying all along. I recognized my birthright, and I came for it. Whereas you…” She shook her head, anger kindling in her words. The intensity of that hate seemed absurd with her young, high voice—as did the fact that she’d actually used the word “birthright.” Too much time with the gentry. “You became the biggest rock star around here. You could have had it all, but you couldn’t handle it. You spent all your time bitching and moaning, acting like it was so hard to be you. It was stupid, but they all ate it up. Even Aeson did.”
She sounded near tears, and a lump formed in my throat. Not because I felt sorry for her but because I knew with a deadly certainty what she was going to say.
“He thought because you were the oldest and had your stupid warrior thing going that you’d be the one to have the heir, not me. He was going to toss me aside, even though I’ve been faithful to him the whole time—even before he brought me over. It didn’t even matter. He was ready to get rid of me for you.”
I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to block out her eyes. Those enormous gray eyes, gray like the sky on a rainy day. Just as mine were the violet of storm clouds gathering. Wil’s words came back to me, lamenting their childhood: Our dad was always off on some business trip, and our mom was constantly sleeping around on him. Their mom had indeed slept around—with one of the gentry, on one of Storm King’s assorted liaisons in the human world. There had been a reason Jasmine reminded me of myself.
“Jasmine…please. We can deal with this….”
“No. I’m tired of you, Eugenie. You’re the worst sister ever, and you aren’t going to be the one who gets to have the heir and start the conquest. I am.”
I glanced over at the lanky form beside her. “Finn…?”
He shrugged, as chipper as ever. “Sorry, Odile. I gave you the chance. I spread your identity around, hoping you’d see reason. You think I wanted to be some shaman’s toadie? I picked you because I thought you were going places. You blew it, so I traded up.”
My shock over these developments shot into anger. Finn had betrayed us. He’d let Aeson know we were coming. He’d even tried to stack the deck against us by separating Dorian from me earlier.
Before I—or anyone else—realized what I was doing, I strode over to where my captor had tossed my assorted weapons. In a flash, I held the wand. I touched Persephone’s gate and said the banishing words. Finn’s mouth dropped open in astonishment, but he was such a weak spirit—never meant to be more than a toadie, after all—that his resistance was a nonevent. My will, channeled through the wand, pulled him through the pathway I’d created. A moment later, he vanished, transported into the Underworld.
Banishing him didn’t really fix the mess I was in, but it made me feel better.
Jasmine’s face darkened, her eyes narrowing with bitter hatred for me. Christ. I still couldn’t believe this. She was just a kid.
“Your staff got downsized,” I told her.
“I’ve got more.”
I felt a surge of water in the air and a dozen translucent, feline forms appeared beside her. They reminded me of lions, but their bodies moved like water swirled inside them, dynamic and restless, just underneath their translucent skin. Their eyes glowed an almost neon blue, and their teeth and claws looked about ten times longer and sharper than a normal lion’s.
“Yeshin,” Dorian murmured in my ear. “More water creatures.”
I caught the implied message. Maiwenn had had nothing to do with the fachan or nixies. Jasmine had sent them, using the power inherited from our father to attempt to kill me. She’d wanted to get me out of the way so she’d be the only one in line to fulfill that crazy prophecy. Maybe I should have been outraged, but mostly I felt jealous. Jasmine could summon water denizens, and I could not.
The yeshin moved toward me with a sinuous grace, saliva—or was it simply water?—dripping from their fangs. For a moment, I couldn’t act. Then Kiyo moved in a golden-orange streak beside me, tackling one of the yeshin to the ground. Their limbs and claws bit into each other as they wrestled, rolling over and over in the dust.
I came to life, grappling on the ground for my gun. Finding it, I ejected the clip and dug through my coat pockets until I found a silver one. Meanwhile, four other yeshin advanced. Dorian waved a hand, and a small dust cloud rose up and swirled in the creatures’ eyes. With his other hand, he pointed at me and yelled at the guards.
“All of you! You know your duty. Defend her.”
The guards stayed fixed, staring uneasily between the yeshin and me. Then, one stepped forward, sword raised. He let out a battle cry and charged forward to the yeshin nearest him. A moment later, the others followed suit.
“Stay back from this, your majesty,” I heard Shaya say. “You’re too weak now.”
She was right. Dorian was pale beneath his burns, barely able to keep himself upright. Giving me a brief glance first, Shaya closed her eyes in concentration. Seconds later, two saguaros ripped themselves from the earth and lumbered toward a yeshin. Their weight and grappling helped immobilize it. I took aim and fired until the yeshin moved no more. Straightening back up, the saguaros plodded on to their next victim. I followed them, ready to repeat the process.
Nearby, Kiyo looked to be on his third yeshin. I watched as he pinned it down, his sharp teeth tearing into its skin. Liquid leaked out, not blood but water. Still, it made a valiant effort to fight him, one clawed paw snaking out and gouging his side. Blood appeared on him, but it didn’t seem to faze him. He kept moving, tearing into the beast until it died. Then, without hesitation, he moved on to the next one.
The guards—my guards?—fought yeshin in small groups while Volusian aided with his magic. Shaya had created another set of moving saguaros but looked tired. She had her sword drawn and hovered near Dorian, watchful and protective through her fatigue.
The saguaros had another yeshin pinned. I fired and heard only a click. I’d run out of bullets. This was my second silver clip; I’d brought no more. Swearing, I stuffed the gun away and pulled out my wand. Fixing on the yeshin the saguaros held, I sent the creature out of this world. It took more energy than firing a gun. Working my earlier magic had apparently tired me out. No wonder Dorian and Shaya were weakening.
Three yeshin were left. Kiyo was moving onto one of them; I swore he’d taken down half the group himself. Blood covered him, but he bared his teeth and lunged at his next foe. One of the saguaros went down to a yeshin’s attack, but the cactus’ partner distracted the cat enough for a banishing. The guards had encircled the third and were having a rough time of it. One of them was thrown from the fray, landing roughly and painfully. Another fell in the way of the yeshin’s claws and screamed.
I still didn’t entirely get why they fought for me, but I moved to help them, trying to get a good fix. Suddenly, as I approached, I heard a horrible, strangled cry from where Kiyo fought. I knew it wasn’t the yeshin, but I couldn’t turn around. I had the guards’ yeshin in sight already and had started the words. Forcing myself to stay on task, I drove it from this world. The guards turned to me in surprise.
“Thank you, your majesty,” one said gratefully. I didn’t dwell on the fact that he wasn’t thanking Dorian.
The last yeshin was stalking away from an inert form—a fox-shaped form. My guards were on the cat in a flash, and it succumbed almost immediately. It had already been severely weakened.
Jasmine, I barely noted, was nowhere in sight.
Without giving her another thought, I fell to Kiyo’s side. He wasn’t moving. I rolled him over to his back, trying to feel a pulse or breath. Nothing. I screamed his name, wondering what to do. Could you perform CPR
on a fox? Desperate and hysterical, I shook him, saying his name over and over. A hand reached out and took my arm, moving it away.
“He’s gone, Eugenie,” Dorian said quietly. Shaya knelt beside him, face sober.
“No,” I whispered. “No.”
“Can’t you feel it? His spirit left this body. It travels to the next world.”
I blinked, suddenly back in control. Traveling. Maybe not there yet. A banishing sent the spirit on instantly. Real death had a slight delay; that was how people had near-death experiences.
“But not quite there,” I said, relaxing my body and clearing my mind. The butterfly burned as I reached out to Persephone. I was already in the Otherworld, one step closer than usual to the world beyond it.
Dorian shot me a look of alarm, recognizing what I was doing. He reached for me. “Damn it, don’t—”
He stopped abruptly, realizing I was already gone. Disturbing me in that state would be deadly. I vaguely saw his hand drop as he stared helplessly at my entranced body, the body that no longer held my spirit.
I had moved on—on to the land of death.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Traveling in spirit is a lot different than traveling in the body. The body gives you more strength—and more risk—but the spirit can see things beyond normal physical senses. As I rose up and up from the Otherworld, I saw it in all its beauty and power. People and objects were ringed in light, some brighter than others—like Dorian, who shone like a small sun. All around him and the others, the Alder Land glittered with its own aura, an aura that called out to me in a funny way. Leaving it felt strange, like part of me was being abandoned back there.
As for me, my soul grew wings as I crossed into the Underworld. I was dark, nearly black, and wore a graceful, avian shape. I was the Dark Swan, my totem, the shape my spirit naturally traversed the worlds in. I hadn’t had to use this shape in some time. I’d first developed the ability to move my spirit into the Otherworld wearing a shape nearly identical to my physical presence; I’d later learned to go over entirely in my own body. But this was not the Otherworld, and I needed the protection of my swan shape. The land of death did not like to give back its souls, and the closer I got, the more risk I faced. I could only pray Kiyo hadn’t fully entered it yet.
Feeling him was easy. My physical body was still close to his, and he and I had enough of a mental and spiritual bond that I could track him. But, as it turned out, he was far ahead of me. Too far. He had crossed the black gate. If I wanted to follow, I would have to enter the land of death in earnest. My return was doubtful.
And yet…I couldn’t just let him go. Not yet. Not when he’d died because of me. Not when he’d still followed, despite my rejection of him. Not after what we’d shared together.
Onward I flew, my wings sweeping over currents of power. I saw no gate per se, but I felt when I crossed it. The connection to my physical body trembled, and I knew I had just endangered it. Too much time here, and it would sever altogether. With that knowledge came another sensation as I crossed over, one so sharp and sudden that I might as well have been slapped in the face. It felt like a belly flop into a freezing pool—remarkable considering the soul did not feel physical sensations. Well, at least that was what I’d been taught. I’d never known any shaman who crossed over and survived to tell about it. Once I actually entered the world, I was suddenly awash in tactile feelings. Warmth swirled around, mixed with those streaks of icy cold.
For just an instant, I saw a world so beautiful, it made me ache inside. Color and light and wonder. Glimpsing it, I felt my connection to something much greater than myself, something I had never understood in the worlds of the living. I was drowning in it, in that burning bliss that made the euphoria of magic seem trivial. And just for a second, I nearly grasped all the meaning to life and death.
Then, in a blink, it was all gone, and I was plunged into darkness. I silently cried out, longing for the return of that beauty. Where had it gone? Why wouldn’t it come back?
A voice answered me, vaguely female. It spoke in my mind, reverberating through me and my being.
This world becomes what you bring to it. What do you bring?
The blackness shifted and became solid. I saw no light source, yet I could just barely make out the area in front of me. Ground appeared, cold and dead. Black rocks jutted out at odd angles, sharp and ugly. A chill wrapped me up. My field of vision was limited in that weird illumination. Everything beyond it was unfathomable darkness. In front of me, I made out a deeper blackness, surrounded by a faint gray outline. A doorway or a tunnel.
Was this what I was? Had I shaped my surroundings into cold darkness?
The voice spoke again: This world is what you make it.
Inside the tunnel, I could feel Kiyo. With no more thought, I took flight again, moving forward.
The darkness swallowed me once more. Then I emerged into an empty clearing. It looked like I was in a cave, surrounded by that same cold stone. An indeterminable source illuminated the room with stark light. There was no way out. I felt Kiyo ahead still but saw no way to get to him. Behind me, the path I’d come from was gone.
And then I wasn’t alone anymore. Shapes materialized around me. I recognized almost every one of them. The keres. The fachan. Finn. Some of the yeshin. An assortment of spirits. Countless other monsters. Countless gentry. Every being I had ever banished to this world. They filled almost every inch of space in the enclosure, crowding around me.
Their faces were horrible. Twisted reflections of what I used to know. They opened their mouths, screaming their terror and pain, reliving when I had killed or banished them. The group closed in, hands reaching out. They clawed at me, trying to gouge me and scrape away my skin.
Skin?
The feathers were gone. I stood in my human form, quite ordinary-looking in casual clothes. The hands and faces closed in tighter, and I screamed as the mob tore me apart. Agony shot through every part of me, a terrible and consuming pain. I sank to the floor, trying to ward them off.
What will you give us? they seemed to ask as one. What will you give us to let you pass?
“What do you want?”
You sent us here without thought. You ripped our essence out of one world and into another. Do you know what that is like? To have your essence torn asunder?
“Show me,” I whispered.
They did.
It started inside of me. Like a small spark, noticeable only by a faint twinge. Like getting shocked with static electricity. Then it grew, spreading out like a mass of wriggling worms, eating me from the inside out. Only it was more than physical. It was like…a spiritual cancer. I could feel everything about me disintegrating. First, all the superficial things. My love of pajamas and Def Leppard. This was followed by the removal of things that identified me, that made me unique: my physical abilities, my shamanic powers, even my newfound magic. Next, my emotional connections were stripped away, making me forget everyone I knew or loved. My parents, Kiyo, Dorian, Tim, Lara…they all vanished, their memories blown to the wind. Finally, my base essence disappeared. Me as a physical and mental being. Eugenie Gwen Markham. A woman. Half human, half shining one. It was all gone, and I was nothing. I wanted to scream but had no means of doing so.
And then, I was back.
I sat huddled in a ball, alone in the cavern. Unfolding myself, I saw that I was whole. My self-knowledge had returned. Still shaking, I looked up and saw that a doorway had appeared. It was a way out, a way toward Kiyo.
I walked into the next tunnel, again entering the darkness. When I emerged, I found myself in a cavern exactly like the other. Only this time, I wasn’t alone. A man stood on the far side, his back to me as he studied the wall. Sensing my presence, he turned around.
He had reddish hair, streaked with silver and just barely touching his shoulders. The features of his face were striking, a square jaw and sharp angles. Handsome in a harsh sort of way. He wore clothes like the gentry, most of him covered by a
sweeping cloak as rich as anything Dorian might own. Rich purple velvet. Jewels worked into the edges. A crown sat on his head, made of a gleaming metal too bright to be silver. Platinum, I thought. It was a masterpiece of metalworking, all scalloping and flowing edges, like a circle of entwined clouds. The edges of it met in a small point at the top of his forehead, like a faux widow’s peak. Diamonds and amethysts set among the lacy curves glittered in the weird lighting.
But it was his eyes that really seized me. They would not hold one color. They shifted, like clouds on a windy day. Azure blue. Silvery gray. Rich violet.
“Hello, Father,” I said.
The eyes held at a steady, deep blue as he looked me over. “You are not what I expected.”
“Sorry.”
“No matter. You will do. In the end, you’re only a vessel anyway. Your magic will grow, and those around you will eventually see that what needs to be done is accomplished, once your child is born.”
I shook my head. “I’m not going to have your heir.”
“Then you will not pass. You will die here.”
I didn’t say anything. Anger hardened his already fierce features, and whatever attractiveness I’d noted before vanished. I remembered my mother’s reaction, her pure and unwavering hatred for him. His eyes flickered again, turning from blue to a gray so dark it almost looked black.
“You are a stupid, foolish girl who has no idea what you’re doing. The fate of the worlds hinges upon you, and you are too ignorant and too weak to do anything about it. No matter. You are not the only one who can carry on the dream.”
“What, you mean Jasmine?”
He nodded. “She lacks your power and war instincts, but again, she is only a vessel. More important, she is willing. Aeson made sure of that. He visited her years before finally taking her. She knows her duty. She will see it through.”
A cold, heavy lump settled in my stomach. I had gone out of my way to avoid pregnancy, but Jasmine would not. She would be seeking it, purposely trying to have Storm King’s heir. All my smug contraceptive practices would mean nothing.
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