by Rhys Ford
Crossing into the mosaic was a costly mistake.
Through the haze, I made for the door. I took four steps and slammed into something invisible, bashing my head against it.
“What the…?” Stretching my arms out, I tried to find the end of the field, walking half the circle before turning around to try again. The light was beginning to burn, a searing pain spreading over my eyes as I sought a way out. “What the hell is this?”
I couldn’t get out of the circle. The light held me in, burning when I tried to cross it. I’d walked right into a web spun by a very old spider.
Opposite the door, a shape crossed the room. With my lashes wet with tears, I barely recognized it as a woman. I blinked, wiping at my face, and the throbbing light receded somewhat, leaving me with an echo of runes and lines across my sight.
She spoke in sidhe, as whispery as the mists outside. It startled me, even though I should have expected it, but I’d trusted Alexa when she said Singlish would be used. I was even more surprised when the rivers of words kept coming, waves of sound slamming into me as neatly as a stormy sea’s tide. I couldn’t escape the flood. Even placing my hands over my ears to drown out some of the words seemed futile, and I fell to my knees, my stomach turning inside out as I buckled over.
It was a spell, close to one I’d heard before, its silences punctuated with the rises and valleys of the chant. The echoing nothingness held more than the lack of her voice. It held a power capable of tying me fast to the stonework; each loop of words became another rope to anchor me in place.
It lacked the thorny prick of my father’s voice but was effective just the same.
More words and the sickness hit again, punching through my abdomen and into my spine, closing over my groin and squeezing until I threw up the spoonful of bile I had in my empty stomach. The green smell of my innards fouled the floor, and the fluid began to smoke, boiling as the lit runes ate through my waste.
“Let me out of this thing.” I pounded at the barrier, hearing it ripple with the blow. The twang reverberated, the echoes lessening as the sound moved away from me.
“It’s no use.” A leathery whisper penetrated the low pain of my aching eyes. “You won’t be able to break free until I release you. I saw what you were from the towers before I came down. The spell is attuned to your kind—to your filthy blood.”
“My blood?” Talking was hard, but I made the effort to speak, pulling myself up to stare at the woman now sitting in the chair. “What kind of sick game are you playing, old woman?”
I could see her more clearly after I wiped my eyes. She was ancient, a bleached, stretched woman with bones sticking out at her joints. Her triangular face was pointed, a cutting sharp skull under her ivory skin, and her deep-set gray eyes burned with a feverish glow. Long strands of white hair floated around her, falling from a center part and trailing on the stone floor at her feet.
A dark gold sheath covered her thin body, narrow straps leaving her arms and shoulders bare. Twin slats winged up over her flat chest, her collarbones overpowering the press of her sternum, her breastbone visible over the scooped neck of her loose dress. She gripped the chair’s arms, skeletal hands heavy with signet rings and jewels, the blood gone from her knuckles as she bent forward to study me.
“Hello, darkling. Or are you used to being called changeling by your kin? Did they call you that? Or did they just call you what you are? Monster.” Her Singlish was flawless, not a trace of an accent and spoken with a round tonal lilt that would not be out of place in a news broadfeed. “That’s what you are. An unnatural monster.”
“Bitch.” I didn’t care if Ryder was damned to sitting at the kiddie table for the rest of his life. My back burned along the hard ridges of the scarring on my shoulder blades, and my shirt clung to my spine, wet from sweat and possibly blood. Lifting my chin, I swallowed my pain. “Fuck you. I’m not the monster here.”
“You will address me as the Sebac.” Raising one hand, she clutched at the air, and the light flared, digging its claws deeper into my belly. “Or my lady, if you must speak.”
“I’ll stick with bitch for right now.” I refused to give under the pain and swallowed my vomit, spitting out what I couldn’t onto the floor. “I like how it sounds.”
“Stubborn. And angry. Like all your kind.” Stroking her cheek with a long fingernail, she followed my pacing with keen eyes. “You are so responsive to binding spells. Your master has a strange sense of humor, or perhaps it was the only way to keep you subdued.”
“I don’t have a master.” I spat again, the yellow-tinged globule hitting the barrier between us. Instinctively she jerked her head back.
“Did he stitch you together? She cocked her head; a long slither of her hair fell over her spindly arm. “If I strip you, will I find your joints marked with black silk and punctures? I’m always curious about others’ work. How did he animate you, monster? With electricity, like that human legend? I applaud the sickening of your body at being bound; it is ingenious. I’m impressed.”
“Maybe it’s not your damned spell making me sick. Maybe it’s just you.”
“Such a growling little puppy. Does my grandson know what you are, golem?” she asked, resting her chin against one fist. “Does he know he’s brought an unreal creation to soil the ground at my feet?”
The pain subsided in my guts, and I stood up straighter, meeting her glare. “Let me out of this sorceress trap and I’ll let you feel how real my hands are when I put them around your neck.”
“And so violent. Did you kill your master, darkling? Is that why you’re roaming free?” The Sebac waved away anything further I had to say. “Never mind, Ryder said he trusted you, even though he lied to me when he said you were sidhe. Now that I’ve seen you, I can understand why. You keep those secrets deep in your blood, hoping none of the Clans find you, or they’d kill you for what you are.”
“Well, now at least I know why he wanted out of this hellhole,” I responded. “Didn’t quite understand it, but, oh, now it’s really clear.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said derisively. “Ryder is one of my heirs. Once he tires of playing lord to his backwater court and pets like you, he’ll return, leaving your kind behind him.”
“My kind?” I said. Anger seemed to help push her magic back, and my blood burned less. “You don’t know shit, bitch. You sit behind your damned walls and count the clouds or the stars or whatever it is that you do to pass the time until your body finally dries out. You know crap about me, but you can sit there and judge me on what? How I was born?”
“How you were made, darkling. You were not born,” she sneered, peeling her thin lips back to show me her ground-down teeth. “There was nothing willingly given in your making. Your existence is repugnant. In this you are merely a tool, just like your maker intended. I can see that just by looking at you.”
“So what? You brought me up here to let me know… what? That you know what I am?” I was running out of spit. My mouth was dry, and the anger I used to hold myself up was ebbing, but I’d be damned if I fell down at her feet. “Big deal. That you have more power than me? More magic? I knew that before I came through the city gates. I know what I am. I don’t need something like you to teach me that. If it makes you feel bigger and badder than me, great. We’re done.”
We stayed like that for a heartbeat, or maybe an eternity. My panting filled the room, and it was a hard struggle not to start crying. Men don’t cry, Dempsey always said. I couldn’t count how many times I’d reminded him that I wasn’t a man. I’d barely leaked a tear the last time I was skinned. I wasn’t going to let the bitch see me weep over a few stabbing pains.
“Let me go,” I finally said. “You brought me here to sniff my ass like some stray dog. You’ve done that, so there’s no need to keep me here.”
“I do,” she said, slowly rising from her chair. “Have a need, that is.”
“Couldn’t find an eye of newt? Or wing of bat? Or do you need help pulling your b
roomstick out of your ass?”
“Is that some human insult? Because it’s lost on me, monster.” The woman sighed, staring down her nose at me. “I had you brought here to offer you a job of sorts, something that won’t violate any word you’ve given to Ryder.”
“You pull me into this, pull apart my insides to offer me a job?” I slapped the barrier with the flat of my hand. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Ryder is having you transport a fecund human woman to the South.”
“I think she’s past fecund.” I snorted. “From what I hear, she’s ready to pod out.”
“I need you to end that.”
“End what?”
“The pregnancy. What she’s carrying, monster.” She stood, crossing to where I was stuck, trapped behind her spell. “I need you to kill it before she gives birth to something. Something even more of an abomination than you.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“SEBAC!”
He was loud, bossy, and commanding, golden soft against the sharp pain in my head. Ryder sounded a bit out of breath and pissed, but his voice was steady, echoing around the chamber.
Strangely, I was on the floor, the stone digging into my back and the light pouring into my bones. Sebac’s pain stretched me apart, peeled me apart. Dizzy, I tried opening my eyes, but something weighted them down, and I closed them again, taking a deep breath before making another attempt. The light drilled straight through my pupils, hooking into my brain, but I ignored it, snarling as I tried to get to my feet. There was blood in my mouth, and my tongue felt chewed on, shreds of meat catching on my teeth as I swallowed.
At some point during her ranting, I’d crashed, unable to stay conscious. I remembered snatches of words, phrases, and her anger—mostly I remembered her anger. The Sebac railed at me, screaming in her lizard-whispery voice about unleashed horrors and repugnant atrocities, but I’d stopped listening when I smelled my eyes cooking in my skull. A few moments later, I hit the stone floor and blacked out.
The stone was hard and unforgiving. My knees complained when I moved, and I silently told them to shut up.
“This doesn’t concern you, Ryder,” the old woman said. I couldn’t see her through the haze over my eyes, but I could hear her breathing. “I am having words with… this thing.”
“He’s my guest.” The golden voice echoed in my ear, and I turned toward it, peering up into Ryder’s angry face. “Is this how you show our Clan’s hospitality? Ripping his soul from his body?”
“You have no idea what you’ve brought into this House. Into my Clan.”
“There’s nothing I could bring into this Clan that is filthier than what is already here,” he spat back. “You’ve made sure of that.”
“Argue later,” I mumbled, nearly toppling Ryder over when I grabbed at his shirt before I fell. “Leaving now.”
“We’re done, Sebac,” Ryder growled, catching me under my arms. “Whatever you hoped to accomplish here, you’ve managed to sever the last of my trust.”
They fell to arguing in sidhe, and the flow of words hammered cold and cut with an edge sharper than any of my knives. My vision cleared a bit, and the lights died down around us until only softly glowing glyphs remained, barely visible against the veins in the stone. I tried taking a step, but my legs wouldn’t cooperate, folding under me.
“Lean on me, muirnín.” Ryder slid his arm around my waist, as if suddenly remembering I was in the room. He turned to say one last thing to the ancient sidhe, and she spat back, harsh and brutal. I felt Ryder’s skin flinch, but his face betrayed nothing, stone hard as he stared at her. Mockingly bowing his head, he said in Singlish, “Good-bye, Sebac. The next time I see you, it better be to beg my forgiveness.”
Holding onto Ryder, I stumbled out of the room and into the hallway, wet with the sweat soaking my clothes. The corridor was dark, and I clung to the shadows like a drowning man to a pier. The stretch of stone was thankfully silent, devoid of the searing light that burned my marrow. Catching a snatch of dry heaves, I slid against the wall, curling into a crouch, and waited for the spasms to pass.
The last strands of the afternoon sun lit the end of the hall, and I closed my eyes, shutting it away. My skin hurt. My eyes felt like someone had taken a hot poker to them and touched the back of my skull with the burning tip, which was probably exactly what the Sebac had done with her little spell casting.
My hands sought out the plaster at my back, arms stretching backward to anchor myself on its rough texture. The birds outside sang, serenading the sun down into the ocean, and from what I could see framed in the far-off windows, a massive blue butterfly with black dotted wings sipped the last few drops of honey from a closing flower. I couldn’t have been inside that room for more than an hour, but it felt like eons had passed.
A shadow fell across my legs, and I jerked back, hitting my head on the wall. “Gods, what has she done?” Ryder asked.
“Bitch,” I swore one last time, choking on my own spit. “Whore bitch.”
“Look up,” Ryder said, squatting in front of me. “Let me see your eyes.”
He was close enough for our shins to touch, and I swallowed, pressed up against the wall with nowhere to go. I was torn between wanting to shy away from his body and punching his face for putting me within the spider’s reach. My mind whispered other options, but I ignored them, still pissed off at being played for a fool by Ryder’s Clan members.
“Where’s Alexa? Laughing her ass off? Is this what you guys do instead of having family picnics? Serve people up to that damned bitch?” Surprisingly, I sounded calm, steady even, as if having my core cracked open was an everyday event. “If Alexa’s left, she’s got one of my shotguns. I’ll need it to blow your grandmother’s head off.”
“Alexa couldn’t have known, or she wouldn’t have let you go in,” he insisted, turning my face with a twist of his hand on my chin. He pulled a silver flask from somewhere in his coat, and I wondered stupidly how long he’d been holding out on me. “Hold still, let me look at you. Stop fighting me. My cousin said you reminded her of an áinle. She’s right. You’re like that gargoyle you own.”
“Bitch.” I chewed on the word, liking it on my tongue. “Your grandmother is a bitch.”
“You’re not going to get any disagreement from me,” he commented, unscrewing the flask and offering it to me. I took a tentative sip, feeling the burn of whiskey on my raw throat. The sidhe lord waited for my coughing fit to stop, encouraging me to take another swallow. My hands trembled as I tilted my head back, letting the liquor soothe my nerves. “I was supposed to go in with you. I told the Sebac to wait until I got here before seeing you.”
“That definitely was not on her to-do list,” I said. The whiskey warmed the parts of me she’d left cold and numbed my intestines, which were on fire. “Not so much.”
“Damn her to all hells!” Ryder’s handsome face looked apologetic, and he took the flask from me, taking a gulp before passing it back. “What the hell was she hoping to accomplish?”
“You’ll have to ask her that.” Sitting up took too much effort. My bones ached, and my stomach rebelled. I rested my head back, watching Ryder through my lashes. In the dim sconce light, his hair shone antique gold, blending into the darker brown streaks underneath, and I shivered, wanting to lick off the whiskey sheen on his mouth. Another sip from the flask and I was done, passing it back over. If I drank any more, I’d be useless for the ride down.
And there was no way I was going to spend another night anywhere close to Elfhaine.
“Can you tell me what she did or said?” His hands were warm, moving over my legs as if checking for breaks. Ryder was used to taking care of people; that much was obvious. He acted concerned, and part of me wished it wasn’t a lie. “Why did she call you up here? I was told it was just to meet you.”
“I don’t think I stayed awake long enough to listen to it all. She’s crazy, Ryder. Your Clan’s led by a crazy woman.” I shook my head. “I walked into the room
, and she set my blood on fire. It hurt, and the bitch liked it.” I glanced up, trying to meet Ryder’s gaze, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t stop shaking, and the whiskey was hitting my empty stomach hard. “I passed out for a bit. When I woke up, you two were screaming at each other like angry iguanas.”
“You were falling to the floor when I walked in, so you weren’t out for long. Maybe a second or two.” Ryder remained on his haunches while I slid the rest of the way down the wall, bringing my knees up. “Did you tell her to shove it up her ass before you passed out?”
“I think so.” I rubbed my thighs, feeling the bruised muscles under my jeans. In a few hours, I was going to hurt more than I did now. “I just want to get out of here, Ryder. Out of here and into another shower. I can smell myself.”
“Let’s get you back to the pods. I don’t want us here any longer than we have to be. Can you stand?” he asked, holding his hand out to me when I nodded. I gripped it, and he pulled me up to my feet, nudging me with his shoulder. “Shannon’s ready to go, but I’m not done talking about this, Kai. I want to know what she said to you.”
“It’s not worth it.” I shrugged, shakily finding my balance. The whiskey was potent, fooling my legs into believing I could walk.
“No, it is. I brought you in here and promised you safety. This is on me.” The heat of his hand hovered close to the small of my back, but Ryder barely touched me, pulling back rather than herding me along. “She broke my promise to you.”
“I’m okay. Just need a little time.”
“I meant what I said, Kai,” Ryder growled, keeping close behind me. “I never dreamed she would try to hurt you.”
