by Cutter, Leah
It would be so easy to just give in.
Kai had never done easy, though.
Despite the eerie call undulating through the marble halls, Kai still heard the footsteps of the guards coming from the adjoining hall. She stepped up to the corner and peered around it. Two older men with large guns walked toward them, both Asian and mean.
Kai turned back and held up two fingers. Caleb nodded, and Orlan pulled what looked like a slender black wand from a side pocket, connected to his equipment with a curling cord. He beckoned for Kai to stand behind him.
What the hell was he going to do? Kai had no idea, but merely nodded and moved behind him.
The two guards had no idea what hit them. Caleb backed up, then galloped toward the corner, hitting the guard closest to the wall with full speed, tearing his throat out.
Orlan pointed his wand at the other guard’s head. The man dropped to the floor, drooling.
“Siren’s call,” Orlan whispered as he put the wand away. “Fully amplified.”
Kai gave a sigh of relief that Orlan could defend himself—but she’d have to talk with him later, make sure he was just amplifying the sound and not keeping a recording.
They didn’t meet any other guards as they crept to the doorway of the room, though Kai did spot more just on the other side. A weird watery barrier covered the threshold. Mama had said the room needed to be in two places, both in the city for the sirens to call the storm and in the summer palace so the priests would be safe.
Kai reached out and took Orlan’s hand, while laying her other one on Caleb’s head, between his ears.
“Well, boys, here goes nothing,” Kai said as she stepped forward.
* * *
Freight-train winds swirled around the two sirens still bound to their stakes. Men and women writhed at their feet, pinned there by another barrier. Their howls matched the wind, desperate and angry. One by one more people floated up, dragged through the bubble, drawn from the French Quarter into the Summer Palace.
Rilke and Gisa looked more like fish than women. Gills gasped on the sides of the neck, their faces ridged and lined, their gorgeous blond hair turned into dark scales. Their black-on-black eyes held only misery and need.
The prince stood on the edge of the madness, his feet encased by a glowing gold crystal. He openly wept, his arms open and flailing. He, too, was captured by the sirens’ call, unable to move toward them or get away.
Kai pushed through the air in the doorway, feeling it stretch like cellophane, then pop once she took another step.
Of course, with that step came that stupid, unsettling feeling of falling.
Kai couldn’t afford to be distracted, though. She shook it off, fighting to keep herself in the thin sliver of sanity that surrounded the bubble of insanity at the center of the room. She marched up to Bao Deng standing on the sidelines, skirting the guard who tried to detain her.
Bao Deng’s red eyes drank in the misery gleefully. Jagged teeth filled his red, panting mouth.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Kai demanded, yelling over the loud wind. Rain whipped by her, spattering her back.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw two of the magicians turn toward them. Good. She needed all their eyes on her.
“Isn’t it obvious?” the priest asked, his grating voice still sounding whiny despite all the other noise. “We’re gaining power for the king. Your king.”
“Does he know his son is here?” Kai asked hotly.
“Who do you think gave him to us?”
Kai snorted. “Y’all are a lousy liar, did you know that? That boy’s supposed to be celebrating his engagement tonight. Something the king did approve.”
A look of uncertainty flashed across Bao Deng’s face. After a moment, he shook his head and said, “You are the liar. The king needs us, more than he needs him.”
“The king needs a grandson,” Kai said. She rubbed her own belly proudly. “And y’all know how fertile my kind can be.”
“No,” the priest said. He actually took a step back.
Kai eagerly stepped forward, into his space, raising a finger as if to drill into his shoulder. “There are other powers here at play,” Kai assured Bao Deng. “Y’all ain’t the only game in town anymore.”
Most of the mortals in the room now listened to her, or at least watched if they couldn’t hear her over the winds and the loud cry of the sirens. Only the attention of the priests remained unwavering, focused on the sirens and the misery of the people held in their thrall.
“No matter,” Bao Deng said after a moment. “So many lives, lost in the storm. The king can grow a new son who will be able to father heirs. He doesn’t need you or your kind.”
Kai tried to avoid the priest’s hand as it shot out, lurching to the right, but he was damned quick. His grip on her arm was like iron, and though he looked scrawny, he was awfully strong.
“No!” Kai screamed, thrashing.
Bao Deng pulled harder, intending to thrust her into the circle that held the sirens.
“Stop it, you bastard!” Kai shouted, leaning back, digging at his hand. He was going to have to drag her every inch.
“Not in there! Please! I beg you!” Kai sobbed. “I don’t want to die!” She put her heart and soul into her act. She really, truly, didn’t want to die. And hopefully that emotion was enough to draw the eyes of even the focused priests.
“Yes, you must go,” Bao Deng grated out. “I will enjoy watching you drown.”
“Only if you go first!” Kai called. She took two steps forward, pivoted, and tried to fling Bao Deng through the bubble first.
“Clever girl,” Bao Deng said, staggering forward a step and then stopping himself. “But I will never let go of you.”
The words chilled Kai like nothing she’d ever known, not even when Orlan and Caleb had left her alone.
However, she wasn’t truly alone now.
“Still not going through,” Kai said through gritted teeth. “But you are! Now, Mama! Now!”
Mama tumbled through the far door. She looked different now. Her dark eyes had gone rust brown, with elongated pupils. Black covered the tip of her nose, and her face had pushed out, giving her snout and a wide mouth filled with sharp teeth.
From under her long silver robe flowed a river of red-and-white fox tails, bushy and vibrant, glowing with magic.
She held a slender knife in her hands. In seconds, the silver had been marred with blood.
Jake and Blue raced in after her, dogs that had grown to the size of small ponies. They attacked the nearest priests, who fought them with their own claws and fangs. Caleb joined the melee, fighting his way in from the other door. Orlan also joined in, dropping humans with the power of the siren’s song. He kept near the doorway, shaking with the effort.
Bao Deng shouted, “It isn’t enough, my dear.”
Kai tried to break the priest’s grip on her arm, but his hand held onto her as if their skin had been fused together.
“No, my dear, if you go, I go,” he said gravely as they continued their dance, and he pulled her closer to the barrier where the sirens were.
“Let go of me!” Kai said as she hit his hand again with her fist.
“Never. Your sacrifice will be appreciated by the king, not mourned,” Bao Deng said gleefully.
A strange cracking sound made Kai look away.
The odd tree creatures she’d seen at the court, the ones with twigs for fingers and spiderweb vests, came through the far door that Mama had come through, crashing into the nearest fight. Following them came more beings, creatures of wonder and nightmare: pelican men with overly large heads and beaks balanced on delicate necks; tall women with elegant bobcat fur and tufted ears; a matched couple who had golden gator eyes and snouts to match.
“The king needs us!” Bao Deng howled. “He needs our magic to survive!”
More creatures filed into the room, attacking priests, magicians, and gun-wielding humans alike.
�
�Didn’t I forget to mention that Mama found another way for the court to sustain themselves?” Kai said as sweetly as she could, considering she was still shouting at the top of her lungs.
The entire room lurched, as if they were in a boat that had just hit a sandbar.
“The storm just made landfall,” Bao Deng said smugly. “Y’all are too late.”
Rain crashed into the room, whipping Kai’s face with hard, cold pellets. The howling of the wind doubled.
Kai tried to get Mama’s attention where she fought a human magician. “We need to free the sirens!”
But it seemed Mama couldn’t hear Kai over the wind and the other sounds of battle.
Everyone was fighting their own battles, engaged with the army at hand.
It was up to Kai to let the sirens go.
“Shit,” Kai said.
Bao Deng looked at her with a gleeful smile. “Be my guest,” he said, releasing her arm.
Kai wanted to run—to find a safe bolt-hole from the storm. She did not want to get closer to that sound, as much as it drew her. Some part of her knew that way lay madness.
She had no choice.
“I’m going in!” she called, knowing no one could hear her, no one would see her.
No one could help her.
With a running start, Kai jumped from the sliver of sanity into the bubble that held the sirens.
And, of course, she fell.
* * *
The sound of the sirens’ call overwhelmed Kai. She threw herself at them, climbing over the backs of the others, desperate to get to the sirens. They needed her, they wanted her. She had to get to them.
When Kai hit the barrier separating the siren’s prey from the sirens themselves, she hit it hard enough to knock some sense into her.
She needed to get to Gisa and Rilke. Not just to be with them, though. To help them. To free them. She could do this.
They must escape before the storm overwhelmed the city.
The bubble encasing all of them floated just above the Quarter, near Royal Street. People on the ground floated up to join the pile, dragged up by magic and song. Black clouds filled the sky and the winds were louder than rocks tumbling together in a dryer.
Kai stood up, then shoved her shoulder against the barrier. It didn’t budge. She had to get through it. But how?
She pulled out her talisman.
Behind Kai came a terrible howl.
Bao Deng stood, staring at her with shock.
He hadn’t realized she was armed.
Shit, now he was coming in after her.
Kai focused on the jade piece at the top of her ponytail. Through the barrier. Through it. Move me to there, goddamn it.
Kai took a step, then another, pushing hard against the solid air.
It felt like pushing against a rusted-shut gate. The barrier gave a little. Kai focused and pushed, gaining another inch.
Bao Deng had almost made it through the barrier on the other side.
Kai tried to push harder, faster, but she was fighting a mountain of Jell-O.
Before she could get all the way through, Bao Deng had grabbed her arm again.
“You see?” he said smugly. “I told you. Never letting go.”
Kai’s anger flared, white-hot and blinding.
He was like ever bad date she’d ever had, every bad boyfriend she’d ever heard about, every abusive asshole she’d ever read about, all rolled into one.
“You asshole!” Kai yelled. How dare he touch her? How dare he assume she was helpless?
Without thinking, Kai used her talisman and whipped it across Bao Deng’s hand.
The inhuman cry Bao Deng gave sent chills down Kai’s spine. Bao Deng released her arm, holding up his hand, shrieking in pain. The flesh had already peeled back, revealing blood and bone.
Still screaming, Bao Deng tottered to the side, stepping out of the bubble containing the sirens and falling to the street below.
Shit. How did she do that? Kai held up her talisman. It looked the same, but wisps of dark smoke still curled around the end of it. The talisman itself felt darker and heavier to her as well.
Kai couldn’t worry about that now, though. She had to get through to the sirens. She pushed through the last of the barrier.
Luckily, being closer didn’t increase the strength of the sirens’ call. Kai wasn’t certain how much more she could withstand. She walked behind the women and looked at their bindings. Luckily, they’d been tied with modern zip ties, not old fashioned ropes.
Kai knew how to deal with those. She dug her keys out of her bag and made quick work of the plastic, freeing Rilke first.
Of course, the siren turned on Kai immediately, clawed hands extended, swiping at Kai.
“Whoa! Hey, no! I’m here to rescue you!” Kai said as she dodged another clawed attack. “Rilke! It’s me! Kai!”
The siren paused, lurching. She worked her jaw, transforming it into something less rounded and fishlike, something more human.
“Kai?” Rilke asked, her voice as rough as boulders grinding together.
“Can you move this place? Get us to over the Mississippi? It’s just a few blocks south,” Kai asked as she went to remove Gisa’s bindings.
Rilke swung her head from one side to the other, seeing, then she pushed the air with both her hands, slowly, all the muscles along her bare arms bulging as if she pushed a great weight.
Gisa didn’t attack Kai as soon as she was freed. She collapsed instead, falling as gently as a leaf.
Rilke gathered her sister up as if she weighed nothing at all, then turned to the side.
Kai saw they now floated just south of Decatur Street. As the dark waters of the Mississippi came into view, Rilke walked off the platform, landing without a splash in the water.
Instantly, the tone of the howling winds lowered a notch, then another. The rain stopped driving itself into Kai’s skin, softening, no longer stinging.
Kai watched the bobbing blond heads of the sisters swimming away.
The storm slid down another step. Kai ran her hand over the short wet spikes on her head.
It was over. The city was safe.
Then she said, “Goddamn it.”
Rilke had only paid half her bill.
* * *
Kai sat in her office, contemplating the afternoon sunshine. Just outside, the sound of laughing tourists and the echo of thumping music floated through the clear, hot air.
The final damage reports for Ingrid included property damage—some roofs ripped off, some minor flooding—but no lives had been lost.
Kai still wasn’t sure what had happened to her talisman. It lay thick and heavy in the bottom of her bag and at the back of her mind. Instead of shining clean and pure, there was something dark and oily about it now.
Orlan had promised to tell her where he’d moved to, sometime. For now, they met at bars and went back to her place.
Caleb still called as well, but only to go out dancing and drinking, not for jobs.
Kai needed another job. Rilke’s money would only go so far.
After a long stillness, Kai looked up.
The prince—Jimmy—stood in the doorway.
Kai bit her tongue, restraining herself from asking what the hell he wanted. Papa had raised her better than that.
Instead, Kai told him, “Come on in,” indicating the chair opposite her desk.
“Thank you,” the prince said formally. He wore a tight-fitted green T-shirt, showing a surprisingly well-muscled chest, as well as jeans and his usual white socks and black sandals.
Jimmy sat on the edge of the chair, his back stiff, his eyes serious.
When he didn’t say anything, but merely stared at her, Kai finally asked, “What can I do for you?”
“Ah, no, it is—I—I need to thank you. For rescuing me.”
Kai shrugged. “Just part of the job.” He’d never been the main mission: that had been rescuing the city.
“But you also saved me. I didn’t di
e,” Jimmy said. “I fully expected to. Bao Deng…” He shivered. “He yearned for my death. Lusted for it.”
“You’re welcome,” Kai said simply. What else could she say? “Is Bao Deng dead?”
Jimmy pressed his lips together firmly before replying. “No. But he’s left the city. And the court will never welcome him back.”
Kai nodded. Bao Deng would come back some day. He was the type eager for revenge.
But she couldn’t worry about him until he turned up like a bad penny.
“So how’s the court?” Kai asked after the silence stretched between them.
“Still adjusting,” the prince said with distaste. “But it’s better.” He paused, then added, “It’s traditional to offer a reward for one’s rescue, isn’t it?”
“Reward?” Kai opened her mouth, then sighed. “You don’t owe me anything.”
“But I want to.”
“I probably wouldn’t say no,” Kai admitted. She needed the money, and she wasn’t too proud to admit it.
“Would you marry me?” Jimmy asked earnestly.
“Where the hell did that come from?” Kai asked, exasperated. Why did men she didn’t want to marry keep asking her that? Would it only ever be the xita who found her attractive?
“It’s what your Mama wants,” Jimmy explained sincerely.
“But not what I want,” Kai said gently.
“Not—oh,” the prince said, his face falling blank.
“You’re a nice guy, Jimmy,” Kai said hurriedly. “But you’re not my type.”
Jimmy nodded. “Your type would have rescued himself,” he said sternly.
“Jimmy, that’s not fair,” Kai said. “You were taken while you were trying to save me. So it was just my duty to save you. Turnabout. Like that.”
“No, it’s fine,” Jimmy said. “Money, then? Gold?”
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Kai admitted. She hated always being broke. And the court, well, the court could afford it.
“I’ll arrange for it,” Jimmy said, standing abruptly.
Kai sighed. She had to fix this. “Jimmy,” she said, standing.
