The pendant broke.
The flies died, falling to the ground like thick black raindrops. Catarina shrieked and threw Lindsay off her back. This time Lindsay let go and closed her eyes, wincing against her anticipated impact. Water and mud splashed around her, but the pain was nothing like holding that burning pendant. She opened her hand and her half of the raven pendant fell into the mud.
Lindsay felt Lucian’s consciousness flicker in the back of her mind, guttering like a candle. He wasn’t dead; she knew he wasn’t dead. His thoughts were confused, and he didn’t try to shield his mind from her. He struggled to his knees and vomited flies. Lindsay swallowed her own bile and looked away.
Rachael turned to see what happened. Cerberus’ eyes glowed in the night. With a snarl, he launched himself at her. The demon feinted right, but when she turned to meet his attack, he dodged left with uncanny speed. She couldn’t reverse her turn. The demon’s talons caught her shoulder and they went down together.
The pair landed a few feet from Lindsay. Rachael fell on her back and released her sword. The blade landed a hand’s span out of her reach. Cerberus snapped at her face. Lindsay screamed Rachael’s name, and the woman whipped her head to the side in time to keep her nose.
Lindsay forced herself to her knees and saw Catarina stand beside Lucian. Her coal black eyes glittered in the night and her glare pinned Lindsay to the ground. Never had the girl seen such hate roil off another human, and she realized too late that Catarina’s power went deeper than an amulet. She was once Katharos too. Lindsay’s mouth went dry. She may have hurt Catarina, but she hadn’t stopped her.
“Cerberus! Stop!” Catarina approached Lindsay. “You foolish girl.”
†
Lucian felt his sister’s skirts brush his cheek. She reeked of ashes and death. Lindsay’s fear joined his, and he shielded his mind from her. His head ached and his throat was on fire. He glimpsed the pale outline of Catarina’s leg and reached out to snag her ankle. Catarina tripped and fell to the muddy ground. She kicked backwards and Lucian barely dodged her blow, but he didn’t let her go.
“Release me or Rachael is dead!”
He saw Rachael sprawled beneath the demon, her sword out of reach, and his heart withered. He released Catarina.
“Come home, Lucian.” She stood and looked down at him. “I’ll let them go.”
She wouldn’t. She had no intention of allowing any of them to leave. Not now. Not ever.
His twin opened her hand and he saw his scarred prism. “Do you remember when you showed me the colors? Do you remember the garden, Lucian?”
He looked into the glass and recalled laughing with her when the prism’s light had danced on the wall. Her hair had smelled of sunshine, and he’d thought of Rachael. “I remember.” Hoarseness distorted his voice.
“You said it wasn’t magic, but surely it must be.” An eerie calm settled over her, and a tear flowed down Lucian’s cheek.
His twin stepped closer. “I can’t bring forth the light without you, Lucian. Come home.”
He slouched forward and put his hand over his eyes. Only one thing would make her stop. He couldn’t stand to see the hurt in Rachael’s eye again. “Forgive me.”
“What?” Catarina bent down. “Did you say something, Lucian?”
“Lucian,” Lindsay said, “don’t.”
He screwed his eyes shut and extended his hand to his sister. God help him, he was the worst kind of coward. If he intended to do this, he should at least have the courage to look her in the eye. Lucian met his twin’s stony gaze. “Cate, please.” The words were gravel in his throat. “Forgive me.”
Catarina smiled and took his hand. He drew Caleb’s knife and yanked her down. With one quick thrust, he drove the blade into her chest. She fell against him with a small gasp. He wrapped his arms around her. “I’m so sorry, Cate,” he whispered against her hair. “So sorry.”
Lucian rocked her gently. When she struggled against him, he held her tighter. He had promised to take care of her and he failed. He couldn’t save her from herself. A sharp pain spread through his chest as he took her agony for his own, but he didn’t heal her. This time he would not heal her.
Her breath tickled his ear. “We are never the same,” she said as she slid her bloodied thumb across his forehead, “without you at my side.” Her dark eyes were afire with moonlight and madness. “I will come back for you, brother.”
†
Rachael turned her face away from the stench of Cerberus’ breath. The demon pinned her arm so she couldn’t move her knife. Water splashed her face and Cerberus twisted. The hilt of her sword bumped against her hand.
Cerberus growled and his tail lashed out. Rachael heard Lindsay yell in surprise and pain. Rachael grasped her weapon. Before she could lift it, Cerberus leapt away. She slashed wildly with her knife, hoping to hit the demon. Cerberus howled when the blade flayed open a length of his hide.
From her knees, she stabbed at the demon a second time with her sword and her weapon glanced off his ribs. He turned on her. She stood and her next blow took him across the jaw. Cerberus shrieked and ran for the Hell Gate.
Rachael let him go; she’d never catch him, not in her condition. He wouldn’t be back. Not tonight. The Hell Gate crackled and the demon disappeared.
Lindsay sat on the wet ground and cradled her arm.
“What happened?” Rachael went to her and examined the long welt that went from Lindsay’s elbow to her wrist.
“He was so occupied with you, I was able to get close enough to push your sword to you. He whacked me with his tail.”
The burn didn’t look serious, although Rachael knew from experience how painful a demon wound could be. She examined the girl’s palm and frowned.
“It’s okay. It hurts, but I’m okay.” Lindsay pulled her hand away and looked toward Lucian.
“Yes,” Rachael whispered. “Yes, you are. You did well. Lucian will be proud.”
Lindsay didn’t answer, but went to Lucian. Silence pealed across the meadow, and the girl stood beside him, rubbing his back. She looked up when Rachael neared. “He promised me he wouldn’t kill anybody unless he had to.” Lindsay’s glare dared Rachael to contradict her. “He said God wouldn’t be mad if we defended our lives and that’s all he did. He defended us.”
Rachael struggled to make her thoughts work but exhaustion numbed her mind. Her tongue felt thick and useless. “Lindsay.”
“I can’t feel him anymore,” she said as she brushed dead flies off his shoulders. “He’s shut me out and won’t let me see his thoughts.” Lindsay looked up at Rachael, her gaze no longer defiant. “He’ll listen to you. Just tell him he’s not going to be in trouble so he doesn’t feel bad anymore.”
Rachael rested her hand on the girl’s shoulder to stop her words. “All right.” She knelt in front of Lucian, and Lindsay remained beside him, a ragged and dirty angel. When Rachael saw Lucian’s grief, she forgot the girl was there. She wiped his face tenderly. “Lucian?”
“It was the only way,” he whispered and stroked his sister’s cheek.
“I know. Let her rest.” She helped him ease Catarina’s body to the ground. “Let her go.” Let her go. She’d said it enough times when they were young, but tonight he finally listened to her. He released his twin and folded Catarina’s hands over her chest.
She didn’t look peaceful. Even in death, hate scarred her features; she’d harbored no emotion but rage. Rachael had known when Catarina rode up on the demon’s back that she’d paid the ultimate price for her power. Dry as a husk, she had no love left in her. Even now, Lucian couldn’t see his twin’s faults.
He smoothed her hair and gasped, jerking his hand out of her tangled locks. A diamond hairpin fell into the mud, one stone winking in the moonlight.
“It’s all right.” Rachael turned his hand to better see the wound. The cut was small, a pinprick.
A drop of his blood seeped from his thumb to trickle between Catarina’s parted lips. A p
all passed over Rachael, but in her fatigue, she shrugged it off. Catarina was dead and the dead don’t come back.
Lucian didn’t notice. He removed his cloak and wrapped it around Catarina’s corpse. “She was always cold.”
Lindsay stood back, her face ghostly in the moonlight. Rachael glanced up at her; the girl didn’t need to see this. “Can you find his cane?”
Lindsay nodded and left them to their task.
To keep her hands busy, Rachael helped him secure the mantle as a makeshift shroud. “We’ll build a cairn for her in the morning. When we get to the Citadel, I’ll send some Katharoi back for her body.” Not for Catarina. Rachael didn’t care if Catarina went back to Hell, but Lucian would never forgive himself for leaving his sister here. “We’ll bring her home.” For Lucian’s sake.
He met her gaze with a look so lost her heart broke for him. No words could give comfort to his grief. She wrapped her arms around him so she wouldn’t have to see his eyes. He took a low shuddering breath.
“There’s nothing wrong with mourning her,” Rachael whispered into his hair. Several minutes passed and he remained tense, locked tight in his memories; Rachael knew she’d never touch him. Just when she thought she should release him, a sob racked his body. She could only stroke his neck and speak the magic words John had once said to her. “It’s all right. They have no power over you now. It’s all right.”
A flicker of movement caught her eye as Lindsay edged close. She held Lucian’s cane tight against her chest and watched them, obviously unsettled by the intensity of Lucian’s sorrow. Rachael drew the girl into their embrace.
Lindsay put her arm around Rachael’s neck. “Is it over?” she whispered.
The tin box holding the sigil thrummed with a pulse all its own against Rachael’s breast. She wasn’t done. Not yet.
PART III
I have wandered home…
—Edgar Allan Poe
“Dream-Land”
CHAPTER TWENTY
cross creek
The deer trail branched before them, and Rachael guided the mare down the left track. Lindsay followed on the gelding, and Lucian guarded their rear, his countenance grim. As they neared the Citadel, he’d made no secret of his displeasure with her plans. Rachael wouldn’t be swayed.
She had to have Catarina’s Psalter. When the complicit saw Lucian, they would scatter to the four winds, but with the Psalter, Rachael could find them. There was power in a name, and a name written in blood was doubly potent. With the Psalter, she could chase them through their dreams and bring them to justice.
Lucian thought Reynard kept the book at the Citadel. That made no sense; the Psalter would carry its own taint from the Fallen. Reynard was no fool; he wouldn’t keep such a damning piece of evidence at the Citadel. No, it was at Cross Creek—at her house. All so Reynard could implicate her if his plot was discovered.
Rachael stifled her need for revenge and surveyed the land before her. The pale afternoon sunlight drifted behind a mist that seemed to have followed them from the Wasteland. Through the foliage, she glimpsed a boulder; flecks of moss marred the dark gray stone jutting out of the ground between two oaks. The rock marked one of Cross Creek’s boundaries. She reined the mare to a halt.
Lindsay stopped the gelding and rubbed the horse’s neck, probably more to calm herself than the animal. The slash on her cheek was healing nicely, but the same couldn’t be said for the burns on her arm and palm. Lindsay didn’t complain of any pain, but Rachael could already see she would carry the scars for life.
In spite of Rachael’s efforts to keep Lucian and Lindsay apart, the girl had drawn closer to Lucian, sharing his grief for a lost sibling. The dark circles beneath Lindsay’s eyes bore mute testimony to the nightmares she endured after her encounter with Speight and Catarina.
“Why are we stopping?” she asked.
Rachael gestured at the stone. “We’re at Cross Creek.”
Lindsay glanced at the boundary marker and twisted the reins in her fingers. “Is your house near here?”
“Half a league that way,” Rachael said as she pointed through the trees.
Lucian navigated Ignatius around Lindsay’s gelding. The new homespun shirt and brown cloak he wore were nowhere near as fine as his old woolen shirt and ermine-lined mantle. Yet Catarina’s blood had covered his old shirt, and Rachael couldn’t bear the way he’d kept wiping his hands over the stains. He’d buried her in the mantle and Caleb’s coat had barely fit him, but the jacket had kept him warm until they’d reached a border town.
Unsure whether she could trust the Katharoi at the Eilat outpost, she’d avoided all contact with other people. Her only foray into town was to secure more provisions and purchase the clothes for Lucian. She’d been surprised at his gratitude and rather than complain of the quality, he’d treated the gifts with reverence.
“I don’t like this, Rachael,” he said. “We should stay together.”
“I have to go on foot. That automatically rules you out.” She hated how pitiless the words sounded. “Lindsay needs to be with someone who can protect her. That’s you.” She dismounted and handed him the mare’s reins.
“You should go to John. He will order Cross Creek searched.”
Frustration laced her tone. “And they will have plenty of time to destroy the evidence. Reynard keeps the book away from the Citadel for a reason. He’ll be the first to know if John orders a search. Then it’s just a matter of his messenger beating the constables to Cross Creek.” She rested her hand on his thigh. “It’s my house, Lucian. I know every pitch and angle. I’ll be fine. Do you remember where we used to meet at Bear Creek?” He nodded and opened his mouth, but she didn’t give him time to speak. “Take Lindsay and meet me there.”
His frown deepened. “They will have wards to protect the Psalter. Don’t move anything without checking for traps.”
“I will be on my guard.” She reached in her pocket and placed the box holding the sigil into his hand. “I’ve done this before, you know.”
“I know.” A whisper of smile touched his lips.
Nothing she said would ease his apprehension. He wanted to be beside her, and she wanted someone to watch her blind side, but he couldn’t be with her and Lindsay both. Rachael licked her lips and continued. “If I haven’t joined you by morning, take Lindsay and go to the Rabbinate. Ask for Adam Zimmer. He’s a good friend. He’ll give you shelter and will know what to do.”
Lucian bent sideways and touched her cheek. His hand looked naked without his father’s ring, but neither she nor Lindsay had been able to find it. Lucian hadn’t cared, and even now, she didn’t believe he missed the burden the signet represented; he seemed lighter without it.
“If you’re not back by dawn,” he said, “I’m coming for you.” Before she could answer, he straightened and tucked the box containing the sigil into his breast pocket. “Lindsay, let’s go.”
Rachael moved aside as he nudged Ignatius to a slow walk.
Lindsay didn’t immediately follow him. She looked down at Rachael with a worried gaze. “Be careful, okay?” She made a fist.
“I will.” Rachael touched knuckles with her. The girl smiled and her weariness momentarily dissipated to reveal the child beneath the sorrow. She must have been a joy to her parents on Earth. Rachael wished she could leave Lindsay with a reassurance. Instead, she said, “Protect him like you did in the Wasteland. We’re not safe yet.”
The child faded to reveal the young woman Lindsay would become. Her fragility was a guise; Lindsay Richardson would one day make a fierce Katharos. No fear laced her words. “I will.” She brought her heels against the gelding’s sides and the horse ambled after Ignatius.
Rachael waited until they were out of sight before she turned to walk toward the farmhouse at Cross Creek. She didn’t hurry; she didn’t want to arrive before dusk. The path she took went down a small hill and she recognized the place where she and Caleb had found Peter’s cell phone. There she had seen Lucian for
the first time in sixteen years.
No, that wasn’t true. She had first seen him in her dream. The Hell Gate hadn’t been the only thing he’d opened that dawn. He’d resurrected her memories and had drawn her back into the vortex of his days with a sorcerer’s skill.
During their journey back, every word he’d uttered, each familiar gesture had triggered a remembrance, a conversation, a touch. Yet the poised man she remembered was gone, buried beneath this new Lucian, who now seemed so unsure of his place in the world.
In the distance, a cow lowed, and the sound jarred her from her thoughts. Long expanses of meadowland were visible through the trees. She was at the edge of the farm.
Shades of dusk feathered the gray air, and a mild breeze rattled the autumn leaves. Stephan would be finishing the chores while Sara prepared their dinner. Rachael stopped beneath a gnarled oak on the border of the field. A row of apple trees stretched halfway between the woods and the house. About a hundred yards behind the house, the horse barn rose out of the gloom.
The pungent odor of horseflesh drifted beneath the tart smell of ripe apples. A simple longing rose in Rachael as she inhaled the scents of home, a place where she had once belonged. Before her possession, she’d loved visiting Cross Creek, taking her coffee on the porch while the world awakened around her. She hadn’t been alone then; friends sometimes joined her, and Lucian often came to visit.
Rachael rubbed the patch over her missing eye. Everything circled back to Lucian. All those years, she’d lived with her fury directed at him when his sister and Reynard had played them both for fools. Catarina had devised the perfect scheme to drive Rachael away from Lucian because Rachael would never forgive a lie.
Except Lucian never lied. Rachael had analyzed the transcripts of his trial like some Katharoi studied Revelation, and he had never lied. He accepted his culpability in the plot and begged for a chance to redeem himself.
Miserere: An Autumn Tale Page 28
