“Yeah, I . . . yeah.” Reaching up on tiptoes, she kissed his cheek, and slipped through the door without looking back.
He moved to the window and watched her go, trying to memorize all of it: her curves, the swing of her hair, the natural swagger that had gotten more pronounced as she had gained confidence with the magic, and with herself. And, watching her, he knew the sad truth. She said she wasn’t brave, but of the two of them, he was the coward. Because only a coward would keep secrets from the woman he loved.
It was just that he’d fucked up so many things in his life, he didn’t want to fuck up the doomsday, too.
* * *
Myr cut through the rock garden behind the mansion, hoping to slip into the mage’s wing unseen. She didn’t notice Anna sitting there with her eyes closed and her amulet cradled in her palm until she had tromped halfway across the stonescape, totally disrupting the peace and quiet.
She crunched to a stop. “Shit. Sorry.”
Anna raised an eyebrow. “Problem?”
“Rabbit,” she said, figuring that was explanation enough. “But it’s stupid to be upset over him today of all days.”
“Maybe not. Maybe this is exactly when we need to be thinking about ourselves.”
“Hello, blasphemy.” But part of Myr thought she was right. At the same time, though, she was afraid that thinking about her own problems would only confuse her more right now. She wasn’t sure which was worse—how hard it had hit her to realize Rabbit was keeping secrets from her, or the fact that she’d gone from “what the hell” to “okay, I understand” in two minutes flat, and wasn’t sure if it was fear or logic talking.
Anna let her amulet fall to hang from its chain. “Look, I know I’ve told you to use your head and be careful you don’t confuse leftover emotions with the real thing. But I’ve seen you and Rabbit together, and it doesn’t look like leftover anything to me. And as for using your head? I’m starting to think there’s a lot to be said for following your heart, too.”
“Are you talking about me and Rabbit or you and the outbreak doctor?”
“I don’t have a clue. And you know what? I’m okay with it.”
“You’re not worried about being distracted today?”
“No. I’m giving myself something to fight for. The potential for things. Maybe nothing will happen between me and David. Maybe we’ll ride off into the sunset together, maybe we’ll fizzle out. Who knows?” She made a face. “I’m sorry. You’ve had a fight with Rabbit, and I’m going on about my new crush. That’s not cool.”
“It’s okay. And we didn’t fight. We just . . . I don’t know. Things don’t feel right.”
“Nothing’s going to feel right today. Not until it’s all over.”
“Good point. And thanks.” Myr was suddenly reminded that Rabbit wasn’t the only one she might not see again after today. “I mean it. Not just for this, but for being there for me the past few months. I’ve liked . . . well, I haven’t had many friends. It’s been nice.”
“Same goes. Seriously.” Anna stood and came over to hug her, squeezing tight enough that Myr felt the hard bump of the crystal amulet between them. Then Anna drew back and tipped her head toward the side door. “Now, go. You’ve got twenty-five minutes before we meet for the ’port.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Four hours to the Great Conjunction
Skywatch
Dez had been afraid to hope for a full army, but that was what he got. And as more and more of his fighters showed up at the ball court meet-up point, striding in wearing their full combat gear and holding their heads high, his chest tightened with emotion.
“They’re all here,” he rasped as the crowd grew, eddying among the piles of equipment.
Reese nodded, but since she was the one who’d been keeping tabs, she said, “Carlos, Shandi and Sebastian left. That’s it as far as I know.”
“Three out of almost eighty. That’s good.” And two of the three were older, more tradition-bound winikin who hadn’t been granted their magical shadow-familiars, and likely wouldn’t have been much use in the actual fighting. As for Sebastian . . . well, he’d always been on the borderline. He’d had a tougher life than most, even among the survivors of the massacre. Apparently he’d decided to go it on his own.
To Dez’s mild surprise, he wished them luck.
“Red-Boar stayed,” Reese said, making a face.
“No surprise there. I didn’t expect him to go quietly.” When she raised an eyebrow, he added, “Don’t worry. I’ve got him covered.” At least he hoped he did, just like he hoped he wasn’t about to trigger a second, even more devastating Solstice Massacre. Scarred-Jaguar had followed a message from the gods and led his teammates to their deaths. What if he was doing the same damn thing, just dressed up to look different?
Problem was, there wasn’t really a plan B. This was it. This was the war.
Taking another look around, he said, “Looks like they’re all here.” And they were burning daylight.
She squeezed his hand. “We’re behind you one hundred percent, and this is the right thing to do.”
“Gods, I hope so.”
“I know so.”
He looked down at her—tiny, compact, kickass, and armed to the teeth, his mate and his beloved wife, ’til death did them part—and he felt his I’m in charge face falter. “Reese—”
“Don’t.” Eyes flashing, she caught his collar and hauled his face down to hers. “Don’t even try to leave me behind.”
He pressed his forehead to hers, taking strength from her fierceness. “I wish I could.” It killed him that he couldn’t protect her the way he wanted to, and he knew he wasn’t the only one. All throughout the gathering throng, the mated pairs were huddled together, eking out the last few minutes here on home ground.
She gave him a shake. “I wouldn’t let you. We’re a team, Mendez. You and me, always and forever.” She eased back and held up her left hand, so the light glinted off the coiled serpent ring, with its gleaming ruby. “See? I’ve got proof.” And, bless her, she cocked an eyebrow and grinned.
Warmth washed through him like sunlight finding its way into the shadows. Gods, he loved her. He kissed her softly, and then again deeper, with more heat than finesse, until she made that sexy noise in the back of her throat and stopped holding him down by his collar and started using it to hold herself up. Then, he drew back. “You really don’t think I’m repeating history here?”
“No,” she said, and he didn’t see a shadow of a doubt in her eyes. “I think we’re breaking new ground. We’re all here voluntarily; we’re undoing five millennia of corruption by the kohan and the kax; and we’re putting things back the way they were supposed to be, back the way your long, long ago ancestors meant for them to be.”
“Then why am I afraid?” He hadn’t meant to say that, not even to her.
She didn’t bat an eyelash. “Because you’re not a fucking moron.”
He snorted. “Thanks, I think.”
“No problem. Oh, and for the record? If you try to say good-bye, now or at any point today, I will kick you in your royal jewels. We’re going to make it through today, we’re going to get back here in one piece, and when we do, we’re going to lock ourselves in the bedroom and fuck like minks on crack.”
He laughed in spite of himself. “It’s a date.” He leaned in and kissed her one last time, then turned away. He was still chuckling—and on the borderline of squeezing out a tear—as he moved away from her to hop up on top of a stack of equipment crates, putting himself above the crowd, and pitched his voice to project. “Okay, gang, listen up!”
The crowd quieted instantly, leaving behind an eerie hear-a-bullet-drop silence.
He continued. “I know that right now I’d usually go over the op, battle plans, contingencies and that sort of thing. I’m not going to, though, because we all know the plan.” He paused. “This is it, folks. It’s the day we’ve been training for, the one we were bred for, down through generat
ions going back way farther than I can really comprehend. All leading up to this.”
He took a long look around, trying not to think that he was memorizing faces. “What I am going to say is this: Thank you. Thank you all for being here, for choosing to do this. Some of you may be here because I’m your king, some because you believe Bastet’s message, some because you couldn’t turn away from your teammates. But you’re here, and that’s what matters.” He paused. “I don’t know what’s going to happen out there today. I wish I did. But I do know that if you look to your left and right, if you look in front of you and behind, those people are going to be there for you, no matter what. Human, winikin, mage, the distinctions don’t matter worth a godsdamn. We’re all going to have each other’s backs, and we’re going to fight until we can’t fight anymore. And then we’re going to keep fighting, because there isn’t anybody else to do it. We’re it, gang. We’re going out there to save the fucking world.”
He tried not to see how pitifully small the group really was, tried not to think of how many more of them there should’ve been. Tried not to think that there might be far fewer of them in four or so hours . . . if hours even existed by then.
Lifting a hand, he pointed at the mansion in the distance. “And after we’re done fighting . . . after we’ve defeated the kohan and the kax and sealed the barrier for good, we’re going to meet back here, up at the mansion. And we’re going to have the biggest fucking party this place has ever seen!”
There was a moment of silence, like an indrawn breath. But then somebody gave a whoop; someone else started clapping. Then things got rolling with a cheer that started out ragged, but then gained and grew, until it was loud and raucous, with lots of waving hands and promises of mayhem. Maybe there was an edge of desperation to the war cry, but he would take it. He would fucking take it.
“Okay,” he said, “everybody ready to synch up?” Lifting his wrist, he programmed the countdown that would be sent to their comm devices. It read 3:45:30. Three hours and forty-some minutes until the hard threshold, when they would really feel the magic of the Great Conjunction and the barrier would start coming apart. Ten minutes after that, according to legend, the barrier would fall, beginning at the intersection.
Which meant that in four hours, one way or the other, the world would be a very different place.
He waited until it read 3:45:00, then hit “send.” Seventy-some units beeped and seventy-some readouts lit, then flickered as the seconds counted down.
Shit. This was really happening.
Gesturing for Strike and Anna to take their positions on opposite sides of the group, Dez said, “Everybody link up. It’s time to go.”
* * *
Coatepec Mountain
The temple atop Coatepec Mountain was open to the air, with jaguar pillars at the corners symbolizing that Strike, Anna and Sasha were its guardians. But where before the site had thrummed with the deep, sustained magic of a hotspot, now there was only the background hum of solstice power. The Nightkeepers had looked long and hard to find another intersection after Iago destroyed the tunnel system beneath Chichén Itzá, knowing that when the Great Conjunction hit its zenith, the barrier would fall at the intersection and the Nightkeepers would go to war. But this sure as shit didn’t feel like a battlefield.
“Something’s not right,” Rabbit muttered. “There should be way more juice than this. It doesn’t even feel like an intersection.” Which put a nasty churn in his gut, matching the one that came from knowing he hadn’t had nearly enough time to work on his mental vault. His head buzzed with a faint rattle of dark magic and his emotions were way too close to the surface, leaving him feeling snarly and reactive, and way too ready to blow something up.
And now this . . . they had been expecting to ’port into the middle of a magical hotspot like he’d never felt before, maybe even into an ambush. But the mountaintop temple was throwing off less power than the average Denny’s, and there was no sign of the kax or kohan. Not even a xombi guard or a couple of ’zotz to use for target practice.
He glanced at his wristband. The conjunction was just over three hours away. Maybe they were massing behind the barrier, waiting to attack all at once.
It didn’t feel right, though.
“Do you think they’re going to come through the barrier somewhere else?” Myr asked. Wearing combat black and bristling with weapons, she looked every inch the sexy, kickass warrior he’d fought beside so many times before. Now, though, there was an added sheen of magic surrounding her, a subtle sparkle of power that stroked along his own. But there was also a hint of shadows in her expression, an unusual reserve.
He didn’t know if she was still upset about what happened earlier, or if this was her war face, didn’t know if he dared ask when he was feeling so twitchy. So he said, “It’s the only intersection that’s left. Where else would things go boom?”
“Maybe this is just the calm before the storm,” Brandt said, speaking up as the others muttered the same questions, the same concerns.
“Or maybe the kohan are already here, waiting to see if we’re going to renounce them or not,” Dez added grimly. An uncomfortable silence followed that statement, but no lightning bolts came down to blast the temple, no tornadoes dropped down to do a Wizard of Oz on them. And after a moment, the king said, “Okay. It’s time.”
“Let’s go.” Rabbit caught Myr’s hand, and together they moved into the shadows of the temple, where he would summon the sacrificial fire.
The others formed a big, loose circle—Nightkeepers, winikin, and humans all mixed together, all of them ready to renounce their gods.
All except one.
“Where’s Red-Boar?” Myr asked, like she had read his mind.
“Gone,” Rabbit said flatly. “He slipped away right after we ’ported in.” He paused. “Dez saw. He’s got our backs.”
She stared toward the scrubby tree line. “Maybe he’s running.”
“I wish.” Rabbit shook his head. “He’s still here. I can feel the blood-link.” Along with Red-Boar’s rage against the king, and his mad glee at the thought that Rabbit was going to back out of the ceremony at the last minute, screwing over his teammates and throwing the crossover’s power onto the other side.
After all these years, his old man finally thought he was about to do something right.
Well, fuck him.
“Ready?” Dez asked, taking his position next to him in the circle.
“To set a fire? Definitely.” Rabbit shot a last “it’s okay” glance at Myr, hoped he wasn’t lying to both of them, and then faced forward, blocked off the darkness and summoned his Nightkeeper magic. Spreading his fingers, he said, “Kaak.”
Brilliant red fire speared from his fingertips and filled the middle of the circle. There was no rattle, no dark magic, thank Christ.
The others backed off a little, expressions frozen in dread, horror and resignation as the heat flared.
Dez, though, stepped closer, palmed his ceremonial knife, cut a deep furrow through his bloodline mark, and grated, “Pasaj och.” The magic amped as he jacked in to the barrier flux. Then, stone-faced, he held his arm out over the fire, so the blood sacrifice rained down into the flames. Sparks erupted when the droplets hit, then sizzled as the blood burned off to acrid smoke. Sounding as if the words were being ripped out of him, the king recited the renunciation spell: “Ma’ tu kahool tikeni.” I no longer recognize you.
Boom! A shock wave of red-tinged energy flared away from Dez, leaving golden sparks behind. The wave rolled through Rabbit like a tsunami in deep water—it rocked him but kept going without doing too much damage to his equilibrium. He was aware, though, that if something like that hit him in the shallows, he’d be fucked. They all would.
This was big magic, a big move. And he hoped to hell they were doing the right thing.
The king steadied himself against Reese and straightened, expression smoothing to relief. “It’s okay,” he said. “I’m okay . . . and i
t’s done.” He showed the others his forearm. “It’s over.”
There was a collective gasp—his bloodline mark had healed over and gone from black to gold.
“It fits,” Lucius muttered. “The Egyptians mined gold, but not the Mayans. I bet that was another way the kax and the kohan steered our ancestors away from the true gods.”
Dez wiped his knife and returned it to his belt. Then he looked around the circle. “Okay. Your turn.” And he didn’t just mean one at a time.
Rabbit kept the fire going, holding himself apart as the others pulled their knives and blooded their palms. Some of them hesitated; others moved quickly, slashing and getting it done. Beside him, Myr stared at her knife and whispered, “Please.”
She wasn’t talking to him, but he said, “I’ve got you. And tomorrow it’s pancakes for breakfast. Be there.”
She shot him a sidelong look, but didn’t say anything. Then, pressing her lips together, she drew shallow slices through each of her talent marks, because she didn’t have a bloodline. Moving forward with the others, she let her sacrifice fall into the fire, which sparked and smoked in answer.
“Pasaj och,” they all said in a ragged chorus, and then, “Ma’ tu kahool tikeni.”
BOOM! A stronger shock wave blasted over them, away from them, nearly blowing out the fire and sending up a billow of smoke. Rabbit was ready for the tidal wave this time, and kept a sharp eye on Myr, but although she gasped and went pale as the spell took effect, she stayed on her feet.
When the smoke cleared, she and the others stood, shaken, with gold bloodline marks in place of black. All four of Myr’s talent marks had gone gold.
“You okay?” he asked her as a buzz of similar questions rose up around them.
“Yeah. I guess I am.” She stared down at her forearm, then glanced up at him. “We’re really doing this, aren’t we?”
“We sure are.” And he would be going last, just in case all hell broke loose.
It was the godkeepers’ turn next—they had broken their allegiance to the kohan, but still needed to renounce their godkeeper bonds. He tightened the fire to a small, hot blaze in front of the temple as Strike, Leah, Alexis and Sasha took up their positions. Their ceremonial knives flashed and their faces twisted as they carved the godkeeper marks out of their arms. Leah whimpered and Strike went gray, more worried for his mate than himself. Myr made a muffled noise and looked away as blood dripped into the fire, turning the smoke to murk. Then the four intoned, “Ma’ tu kahool tikeni. Xeen te’ealo!” We no longer recognize you. Leave us!
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