by Chloe Neill
We walked in a lump.
You could call it a knot, or a tangle, or a collective. But mostly it was a lump with Malachi in the center, the rest of us jabbing one another with knees and elbows as we tried to move as a unit and stay within the halo of his magic.
It was uncomfortable, and we’d walked nearly ten miles through more glades and over rolling hills, and without another Paranormal in sight. But after the nymphs, it seemed obvious that our not being able to see them didn’t mean they weren’t there.
It still felt like we were being watched. Evaluated and found unremarkable, and generally left alone, just as we’d wanted. But the feeling was still unnerving, as was the really, really manicured state of our surroundings.
“Too perfect,” Gavin muttered.
“Cosign,” Liam said. “Like every tree has been arranged just so.”
“We’re nearly to the city,” Malachi said.
“In which case, we’ll need to be prepared for what?” Rachel asked.
“Soldiers.”
“Of course,” Gavin muttered. “You’re a commander, right? So you can take care of that?”
“I don’t think they’ll take up arms against us. At least not at first,” he added, just when we’d begun to relax. “The city is just over this rise.”
So we paused, adjusted our packs, looked at one another, nodded when we were ready, and began to climb.
My legs ached by the time we reached the top. It had been a long time since I’d made this many miles on foot, and a dull ache had taken residence in my thighs, a sharp pain in my heels where I knew blisters had set in. But we were nearly there. And adrenaline kept me walking past my stopping point.
I wasn’t sure what I’d see over the crest. An emerald city, a world of skyscrapers and flying cars, or Greek-style temples and columns.
It was none of those. But it was magnificent all the same.
The buildings—tall and slender cylinders of pale stone—gleamed beneath the deeply blue sky. The roof of each building was covered in greenery, in trees that reached toward the sky and flowering vines that trailed down the sides like icing. A lake smooth as a mirror was nestled between them, the shore crowned with more flowering shrubs and trees.
“It’s beautiful,” Rachel said, with awe in her voice.
“It’s lush,” Liam agreed, but his tone said he wasn’t sure if what he was seeing was good or bad.
What appeared to be a park spread out before us. A lake on one side, a square of stone in the middle with a fountain, and stands of flowering shrubs and trees at pretty intervals. Green lawns were intersected with narrow channels of sparkling water; children with tiny wings floated small paper boats on the water while their parents lounged nearby on golden blankets.
There were Paras on the sidewalk, on the shores. Some obviously different; others I couldn’t distinguish from humans. They wore gowns and capes of thin and fluid fabric that gathered and twisted in the cooling breeze.
It was impossible to deny that the scene looked perfect. The weather was perfect. The landscaping was perfect. The buildings were perfect. The people—clean and healthy and diverse and beautifully dressed—were perfect.
Where was the trash? The dead stalks of grass? The messy hair?
Not here. And that increased the vague sense of discomfort I’d had since stepping foot in this place.
“Paradise?” Gavin asked quietly.
“Something,” Rachel said, gaze appraising, and not a little suspicious.
“Elysium is not paradise,” Malachi said. “Unless you define it very, very narrowly.”
On the other side of the square was an enormous building, several rectangles of pale pink granite that gleamed in the sunlight around a taller central cube. Recesses in the structure formed balconies edged with tall gray columns, and the first level on the front of the central building was open through to the other side, so the green sweep of a soft hill was visible even from the front.
Trumpets sounded, the sound ringing like crystal through the air, while beings with enormous ivory wings descended from the sky.
“The hell did they come from?” Gavin muttered, and Liam shook his head.
There were three angels—two men and a woman. They were all trim and handsome. The woman had pale, freckled skin and a mop of dark curls; the man on the left, dark skin and shorn hair; the man in the center, tan skin and long dark hair gathered in a topknot.
The woman wore a dress with a snug and sleeveless bodice, a column of linen, above a skirt made of strips of earth-toned fabric. They all wore brown leather boots or sandals.
“Commander!” said the man in the center, and he held out his arms. He stepped forward, and he and Malachi exchanged forearm-to-forearm handshakes; then the others repeated the gesture.
“It has been a long time,” the man said, then glanced behind Malachi to look at us. “And you have brought guests.”
His English was perfect and unaccented, like that of someone manning a customer service line. And there was no anger in his tone, no apparent concern that strangers had entered his land. No surprise that humans had made it through the Veil, or that Malachi had brought us here.
Was he confident, or dissembling?
“I have,” Malachi said. “I thought they should have an opportunity to meet the men and women who irreparably changed their world.”
Well, that wasn’t the diplomatic opening I’d anticipated.
The man in front lifted his brows. “We have irreparably changed their world?”
“They are from the nonmagic land,” Malachi said. “You’ll have heard that war has begun again. That the Court have renewed their attacks.”
“Only rumors,” the man said, and looked at us appraisingly. “If you’d introduce the Terrans?”
“Claire, Liam, Gavin, Rachel,” Malachi said. “Camael, Uriel, Eae. They are the Precepts, the leaders of Elysium City.”
Camael was the man in the center, Eae the woman, and Uriel the second man.
“We are pleased to have Terran visitors,” Eae said. She smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes, which made her seem more mannequin than living creature.
“You all speak English?” I asked.
“We speak in any tongue necessary,” Uriel said. “It is part of our gift.”
“We are glad to see you again,” Camael said. “It has been too long. Why have you come?”
“For the Abethyl.”
Camael looked at each of us. “You wish to see it? To learn of its past?”
“We seek to create the Devil’s Snare,” Malachi said.
Camael watched Malachi carefully for a moment, the way a male wolf might watch another newly arrived in its territory. With care, with consideration, and with no little suspicion.
“You are tired from your travels,” Camael said, his voice lower now. I guessed this wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have publicly. “We will retire to the Citadel. There we can speak freely.”
Without waiting for another response, they took flight and disappeared.
“Friendly,” Rachel said. “No concern that we’re strangers or invaders?”
“They are politicians,” Malachi said. “Ambassadors of the culture they have created. They have greeted us without violence, and expect we will follow them.”
“And will we?” Rachel asked.
“We will,” he said. “For now.”
* * *
• • •
The Citadel was the large building on the other side of the square. We walked across the park, feeling the curious gazes of everyone we passed, and then into the shade of the Citadel.
The columns of the open first floor were perfectly situated to frame the view on the other side of the square—soft, green hills beneath a brilliant sky, the grass interrupted here and there by low buildings of glass and marble th
at shone like diamonds. Water gurgled in narrow channels that cut through the marble floor, and two wide staircases stood sentinel along the sides. The ceiling was high, leading to an open balcony, where Paras with all-business expressions walked to and fro.
“Uncanny supernatural valley,” Rachel murmured.
I felt the tension leave my shoulders, relieved that I wasn’t the only one who found the perfection entirely creepy. “Thank you. It’s Stepford.”
“Concur,” she said with a nod. “The place, the perfection, the sameness. It feels very . . . unnatural.”
“It is unnatural,” Malachi said, but didn’t have time to elaborate. A small deer with immense eyes walked toward us on dainty hooves that clicked on the stone, then turned its wide eyes to each of us.
“You have been summoned,” it said.
Malachi looked unruffled by the sudden appearance of a talking deer. The rest of us, not so much.
“Follow me,” it said, and turned a circle, walked toward the staircase on the left.
“I have . . . many thoughts and feelings,” Liam murmured.
“Same page,” Rachel said, but Malachi fell in line behind the deer, so we fell in line behind Malachi.
The second floor ringed around the atrium of the first, then spilled into a long open space with a low marble bench on a dais in the middle of the room.
The angels were already seated on the bench, waiting for us to arrive. They were perfectly positioned so they looked like characters in a painting of classical Rome, angled so the light of a golden sunset hit them perfectly.
“They just . . . present themselves,” Gavin whispered. “Like a painting they only want us to see at a particular angle.”
“That’s exactly what they’ve done,” Malachi muttered.
We approached, but let Malachi take the lead, and formed a line of humans behind him. Humans who, it seemed, were to make their case to this particular jury—and then wait for the verdict.
“You speak of the Devil’s Snare,” Camael said, accepting a gleaming silver chalice offered by another winged creature.
“Eight years ago,” Malachi began, then told the Precepts of the first war. I watched their faces, wondering how much they’d known about the rebellion, and how much it had cost our world. None of them looked surprised, but then none of them looked guilty, either. Whatever they knew, they were careful to keep off their faces.
“Our magic has impacted their world irreparably,” Malachi said. “Magic poisons their soil, affects their bodies. Some, those called Sensitives, can feel and wield the magic from our world.”
“Impossible,” Camael said with a smile. “Human bodies cannot hold magic.”
“A certainty,” Malachi said. “I have brought Sensitives with me.”
The Precepts looked us over. Camael put down his chalice, sat up straight to look us over.
“You have proof?” he asked.
Malachi looked back at me, the question obvious in his eyes.
The thought of working magic in front of them made my hands sweat, and I could all but feel Liam’s radiating concern. But I trusted Malachi, even if I didn’t entirely understand the game he was playing. He wouldn’t have made the unspoken request if he didn’t think it was necessary.
So proof they’d get.
There was too much magic in the air to open myself to it completely, so I accessed that plane only slightly. The threads of magic—green and vibrant and shimmering with power—were so abundant here it took only a second to gather enough of them.
I extended my hand, caught guards flinching from the corner of my eye, and lifted Camael’s chalice in the air with a fingertip.
There were gasps around us as I swung it toward Malachi, who snatched it out of the air, took a long sip of the contents.
“Claire should get the wine,” Gavin murmured, and I appreciated the support, and the sentiment.
“Proof,” Malachi said, giving me a sly smile.
Camael’s mouth was an unimpressed line, and the other Precepts bore similar expressions. But in their eyes was something new. Something that replaced the smug forbearance, the tolerance of Malachi’s appearance and antics.
“Party tricks do not transform humans into something else,” Camael said.
Malachi put back a hand to stop me just before I jumped forward to tell Camael exactly what I thought of the “party trick” their magic had bestowed on Sensitives.
“The magic requires balancing,” Malachi said. “If they are incautious, the magic consumes them and they become monsters. Pitiable degradations. You have wrought this.
“And that is not all,” he added, before they could interject. “War has come again to Earth. The Veil was opened, and the Court have come through again, begun their reign of terror against humans. They are led by the Seelies.”
Uriel looked surprised. “There has been only peace here.”
He didn’t seem to realize the irony of that statement—that it was quiet in Elysium because the Seelies were in our world trying to kill us.
“Aeryth had been captured in the first war,” Malachi said, ignoring the comment. “Seelies came through the Veil and freed her from the prison where she was being held. And now, as in the first war, they have begun a campaign to destroy the Terran cities. They have destroyed property, burned land, killed humans. For the goal, as I suspect you already know, of conquering the Terran lands and claiming them for their own. And in the meantime, they plan to make the land uninhabitable for humans.”
“So they may raise it again in their own image?” Camael asked.
Malachi nodded. “The humans learned of the Devil’s Snare by interrogating a member of the Court who was captured.”
“The Court knew not of the weapon,” Uriel said, leaning forward with a hand on his knee.
“Incorrect,” Malachi said flatly. “They knew of the weapon, understood the plan. A sketch was prepared for the humans by the Court citizen. And that sketch was accurate. In a final effort to save their land, the humans wish to build the Devil’s Snare,” Malachi said. “They have the Inclusion Stone.”
Camael’s brows lifted. “The Inclusion Stone was stolen from us. Where is it?”
“In a safe location,” Malachi said, and his gaze went sly. “Would you like to leave the city to take it?”
Camael didn’t look thrilled about the question. “You refuse to return the stone to us, and you ask to also take the Abethyl. You must know that cannot be. It is part of our history—our shared history—and it is too precious to leave this place.”
“I don’t know that,” Malachi said. “It is, at best, a relic.” He looked at each of the Precepts, met their gazes frankly. “I suspect there are none here who need the reminder of the Abethyl’s power. Those who doubted your plan, your authority, have already exited this world, have they not? They are in the Terran lands, destroying what they will”
“Do the humans not have weapons to use against the Court?” Uriel asked, brow furrowed in what looked to me like fake confusion. Like he knew very well the dangers of magic.
“The Court is powerful” was all Malachi said.
It took me a moment to realize that he didn’t want to confess our weaknesses to the Consularis, and that he didn’t trust them any more than we did.
“We have no authority in the Terran lands,” Eae said. “How could we affect their behavior there?”
She looked like she mostly believed that was true. But there was something sly in her eyes that I didn’t like. Something that said they knew about our troubles, and either didn’t care or were relieved the trouble had migrated somewhere else. Maybe both.
“The Terran lands cannot concern us,” Eae said, “any more than our concerns should worry Terrans. We choose not to fight, not to have conflict. We’ve reached a higher form of existence here.”
“Have you?”
Liam asked, not bothering to hide his disgust.
“We have,” Camael said. “We are a unified people. We have no crime, no poverty, no illness. Our magic has cured those ills. And as for decisions that affect the community, we reach agreement on a chosen course of action before we act, and we share the benefits according to our rank.”
“What about dissent?” Gavin asked.
“There isn’t any.”
“Maybe not in deed,” Gavin said. “But you can’t control a person’s mind.”
“You misunderstand,” Camael said, and his patient smile had a condescending edge. “There is no dissent; it has been eradicated. Magic is not just a power. It is a biological force. It creates us, determines us. By application of magic, even the mind and heart can be changed.”
“You’re talking about genetics?” Gavin asked. “About manipulating who you are with magic?”
“Genetics is . . . elementary,” Camael said. “It ignores the role of choice, the impact of community.”
“The force of coercion?” Malachi asked, his tone dark.
“Do you see coercion?” Camael asked, patience wearing thin in his voice. “Our doors and windows are open because there is no foul weather, no risk of theft. Unification is our accomplishment, the great victory of an epoch of struggle and effort. And to return to your quest, the Abethyl stone is symbolic of the struggle. Come,” he said, and turned to the left, gestured for us to follow him.
A dozen yards away, atop a granite plinth, sat the Abethyl. A wheel of variegated stone about eight inches across and three inches deep. The edges were rough, but the front was smooth except for carvings that seemed to run in a spiral to the empty center. It was mounted at two opposite points on its circumference to a thin crescent of gold that rose from a golden stand.
We were ten feet away, and I could still feel the faint pulse of it. Not power, but the absence of it. A void in the warp and weft of magic that seemed to cover this place.
“What are the symbols?” Gavin asked.
“An incantation,” Uriel said. “In simple terms, it guides the power of the object.”
“And what is that power, exactly?” Rachel asked.
