Then finally, she came to the point of no return. She didn’t know how she knew, but she did. One more step and she would not have the strength to get back. Brambles of fear wormed through her. How much farther? Could she last? Would she be worth anything if she did?
She swayed. The magic wrapped her head and she could only see shimmering blue-white shadows. She felt parched and brittle. Her tongue was like a stick in her mouth. She couldn’t even blink her eyes anymore, and inside, she felt her organs like hard lumps of clay.
Did she go back?
The decision was already made. Giselle had made this entrance just for Max. If she’d foreseen the need, then she also foresaw Max using it.
She shuffled forward. A moment of crystal silence, and in that drop of stillness, the sudden knowledge that something was there, waiting for her.
Max didn’t have time to think of what to do. She was ripped out of her body. Claws pierced, skewering deep inside her. She was shaken, whipped from side to side like a squirrel in a dog’s mouth. Then she was slammed against something. She felt cracks creeping across her mind, across her soul. Bits of herself flaked away. Now something squeezed her, then turned her inside out.
The violation was more than she’d ever suffered at Giselle’s hands. She could hide nothing. She screamed without sound. She struggled to fight, to hold herself together.
Then the magic tightened, coiling and crushing. She shattered. She drifted in pieces like petals on a lazy wind. She had no name, no purpose, no hungers, no dreams. She was nothing. The petals curled and faded from blue-white to gray and sifted away into nothingness.
Horngate.
The word stirred something. Where did it come from? What was it?
Need.
A thrust of urgent desperation.
Danger.
Suddenly the dried petals drifted back from the nowhere place beyond reason. They curled and fluttered, condensing around the immutable core that was all that remained of the one who’d sought passage.
Max.
The one had a name.
More bits of herself streamed back, attaching themselves, fitting together like puzzle pieces. Each one brought back a memory, a feeling, a flavor. Slowly she coalesced out of the destruction of herself until she found herself back in the cave. She lay on the ground. She sat up. She felt fine’no pain, no weakness. She rolled to her feet. Behind her was the passage. In front of her was a door.
All around her was that feeling of something or someone waiting, watching.
“Hello?”
You are the one I was told would come. The one whose heart I could not break.
The voice resonated all the way through Max. It was like standing in the middle of a drag-racing track with engines roaring all around her. She staggered and steadied herself against the wall.
“You’ll let me through to Horngate?”
Always.
The smugness and warm tenderness in the word made Max tense. “Who are you?”
“I have no name. I was born of Onniont, the horned serpent, and Nihansan, the spinner of webs. I guard. I wait for you. You are my gift.”
Max’s mouth went dry. “Your gift?” she repeated, hoping she’d heard wrong.
“You alone in all the world can withstand my powers. You alone can walk through my webs and live. You are the one I have waited for. It has been so long.”
The yearning in the creature’s voice made Max want to weep for its pain, even as fear thrust skeletal fingers around her heart.
“What do you want of me?” she asked carefully. She didn’t want to anger it. She didn’t know if she could survive another bout with its webs.
“You.”
“Me?”
“Yes. You will come to me. You will walk the web roads with me. You will speak to me truth and you will share your fire with me.”
Max swallowed. She didn’t know what any of that meant. What had Giselle promised this creature? Not that it mattered. At the moment she needed to fetch the others and get into Horngate.
“Sure, Scooter. Whatever blows your dress up,” she said, not knowing if she’d just agreed to bear its children. “I have friends I need to bring through. Will you allow them passage?”
“Yes. For you.”
A web of magic spun into being before Max. As she watched, it formed a vaguely human shape. The weaving tightened and grew dense, and the shape became more pronounced. Then suddenly, between one blink and the next, the milky-blue light flared searingly bright. When the brilliance faded, a man stood before Max. He was neither young nor old. His skin was red mahogany, his hair long and blue-black. His features were sharply etched like wind-scoured stone. He was beautiful. And naked. Max let her eyes drift down his well-muscled body. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad having his children.
“You might want to put on some clothes, Scooter,” she said, wondering if this was his natural form. She was pretty sure it wasn’t.
A moment later he wore a buckskin vest and pants. They were soft and worn. His feet remained bare.
Without another word, Max led the way back to where she’d entered. Her companion padded along softly next to her. His skin radiated heat.
“Do you know what’s happening in Horngate?”
He nodded. “There is war. The warriors of Giselle fight. They cannot win.”
“I’ve brought help,” Max said, her voice edged in steel.
“It will not matter. You cannot win.”
For him it was an observation. Arguing with him would be like arguing with a tree.
“I’m damn well going to try.”
“But it is not the solution.” Now his voice was admonishing. It sounded ancient. It probably was. She was going to have to look up his parents in her library when all of this was done. If she was still alive.
“Then you tell me, Scooter’just what is the solution?”
“You are.”
Max stopped and whirled on him. “Could you be a little less cryptic? I don’t have time for puzzles.”
He stared at her, his eyes the color of polished onyx. Flecks of milky-blue swirled in their depths. “You are the riddle. You are the answer that no one expects. You are the only answer.” He said it like the words weren’t actually complete gibberish.
Max growled and speared her hands through her hair, grabbing and pulling it hard. She shook her head. “Fuck this. I don’t have time.” She stormed away, aware that he stayed right at her side. She didn’t slow down when she reached the entrance, but marched through the illusion out into the smoky night.
Outside she was instantly surrounded. She looked for Alexander. He rushed to her side.
“Are you okay?”
His eyes went past her as her mystical new friend emerged. Instantly Alexander reached to push her out of the way. Max waved him off. He held himself still, quivering with restrained ferocity.
“This is’” She broke off. There was no explaining him. She took another tack. “This is Scooter. He’s going to walk with us through to Horngate. But first everyone lay down your weapons.”
Selange laughed shrilly. “I don’t think so. We are not going unarmed into another witch’s coven.”
“Then stay here and cook.” Max glanced pointedly up the ridge. The fire was spreading down into the valley. She started to turn back to the cave.
“Move an inch and my people will drop you in your tracks. Make your choice. We go in armed, or you don’t go in at all. I’ll take my chances with the hailstone and leave Horngate to deal with its own problems.”
“Try it, bitch, and I’ll rip your throat out,” Max said. It was an empty threat. She was unarmed and Selange’s Shadowblades had brought their weapons to bear.
“My gift,” Scooter whispered, his voice like grinding rocks. His milky-blue magic thrust up from the ground all around the Shadowblades. In seconds their weapons had been torn from their hands. A handful of gunshots rang out, but the bullets were caught in a tightly woven web.
Max bared her te
eth at Selange. “Here’s the way the game is played. You can go running back to Aulne Rouge with your tail between your legs and wait for the Guardians to come knocking at your door, or you can come inside and make a stand here with us. Decide now. I’m not waiting.”
She motioned for Alexander to put down his weapons and follow. Once again Scooter walked at her shoulder. A moment later she heard footsteps and low, vicious swearing. Selange was enraged, but she was coming.
Alexander followed so close on Max that he was nearly trampling her. He didn’t like her new buddy. She wondered what he’d think of the bargain she’d struck’not that she knew what the terms really were. She rolled her shoulders to loosen them, dismissing the problem. It only mattered if she survived. No sense worrying about it until then.
In a few minutes Max realized the passage had changed. It was wider and somehow more menacing. It dead-ended in a wide hollow in the rock. There was no sign of the door she’d seen before.
“What’s going on?” she demanded. Was this a trap?
Scooter turned to face the others as they filled the small space. His expression was cold. “There are those here who mean harm to Horngate.”
As if Max didn’t know that already. “Yes. But for now they are allies. They have come to help me fight.”
He looked at her. Nothing she or they could do would win the battle. But he did not say it. Instead he turned his attention back to the others. Slowly he paced forward to Alexander, who stood still as if he couldn’t move. His jaw flexed and the cords of his neck tented, and Max realized that he had in fact been frozen in place.
“You belong to Horngate,” Scooter said after a moment, and went to the next person. It was Selange’s Prime. “You are an enemy.” He lifted his hand and touched his forefinger lightly to the other man’s cheek. In blue magic, he drew a bar with two dots above and another below. Slowly he went to each of Selange’s Blades, then to the witch herself. Her eyes bugged with fury and fear, but she was as helpless as all the others. Max grinned at her.
Scooter judged each and made the mark on their cheeks. When he reached Thor, he was slower. Finally he made the mark. It was a squiggly line with four dots below and none above. He said nothing and returned to Max’s side.
“What belongs to Horngate belongs to me. Her enemies are my enemies. Know if you hunt here, if you harm those who belong to me, I will flay the skin from your bones and eat your hearts and livers before I cast you into the abyss between worlds.”
Max felt the words shudder through her like blows. She had no doubt that Scooter could do as threatened and more. With a graceful spin that seemed too fluid for anything human’which Scooter definitely was not’he faced the wall. The stone faded to a thick web of blue magic. Then the strands of magic untied themselves, shriveling away until all that remained was the iron-bound door Max had seen before. He looked at her.
“You are the gift and the answer. I will wait for your return, and we will walk the web roads together.”
Max nodded with no idea what she was agreeing to. It didn’t matter. If she could see Horngate safe, she’d pay whatever price was required. She reached for the door. Time to go to war.
19
ALEXANDER DID NOT KNOW WHO OR WHAT Scooter was, but he knew he did not like the creature, nor did he trust him. He smelled powerfully of the Divine, and when he looked at Max, his gaze was intensely possessive. What had Scooter meant when he said she was the gift and the answer? Foreboding sluiced through Alexander. What had Max promised in exchange for help in getting back into Horngate?
He followed hard on her heels. He wanted to demand answers. But she was Prime and he had no right. Nor was there time. For a fleeting moment he let himself regret the end of their time alone together.
They entered a stone chamber. The walls were glassy smooth with streaks of quartz, copper, and gold running through the black basalt. A shimmering, translucent screen of magic cut the room in half. On the opposite side were ranks of tall steel cabinets. To the left was a doorway, and to the right a flight of steps going up. Max did not slow down, but marched through the screen as if it were not there. Alexander and the rest of her companions trooped in, none daring to try the curtain themselves. The door shut behind them with heavy finality, and there could be no doubt that Scooter was standing guard.
Alexander glanced at Thor. The mark Scooter had rubbed onto his face had faded as if it had never been. The same with the others. Cleo was red with rage and couldn’t tear her eyes from Alexander. He ignored her. The others hardly paid any attention to their former Prime at all. Selange’s face was a mask of hard-held emotions. He knew it was taking everything she had not to simply explode.
Max slapped a hand against a fractured starburst of quartz. The wall bloomed with brilliant light and the curtain evaporated. She did not look behind her as she sprinted for the stairs. Alexander and Thor were a split second behind. She bounded upward, bursting through a set of double doors when she reached the top some eighty feet up through solid stone.
The room they entered was cavernous. The walls were the same polished basalt as below, with a groined wood ceiling layered in gilt. The walls were hung with a dazzling array of art. Balls of golden witchlight bobbed against the ceiling, casting a light that was as bright as sunshine. In the center was an anneau floor. The circle and star were lit, and eighteen of the coven witches stood in position, hands stretched out to each other. They looked weary and wasted, held in place more by magic than by their own will. A handful of others milled in the corner of the eerily silent room, looking both strained and resolute. It took a moment for Alexander to realize that they hovered around Giselle. The witch was slumped on a padded chair. She was gaunt, her eyes sunken and rimmed with black. The bones of her skeleton prodded sharply beneath her skin. Beside her someone plied her with a glass of water. As Max raced down the hall, Giselle slowly raised her head, rubbing a shaking hand over her eyes as if to clear away a mirage.
“Max? Thank the spirits. I knew you were alive, but’” Her lips snapped shut and a wave of something akin to pain rippled across her expression.
Her bindings had told her Max was alive, but not her condition. For all she knew, Max had been captured. Alexander marveled at Giselle’s demonstration of feeling, and he wondered at it. Max hated her. Yet Giselle clearly did not feel the same. He had seen it in her concern after the Conclave and again now. For her, Max was far more than merely her Shadowblade Prime.
Max strode forward, dropping to a crouch and gripping the arms of the chair. She wasted no words. “What’s going on?”
Giselle straightened in the chair and slowly came to her feet like a broken marionette. Her eyes flattened as she gazed past Max. “You brought company.”
Max rose to her feet. “They wanted to see what sort of party you were throwing.”
“I see.”
Alexander had no doubt that she saw plenty. Giselle was young by witch standards, but she had brains and an iron will. Selange did not cow her in the least. Giselle’s gaze shifted back to Max. Before she could say anything, the hall shook and a thundering rumble grated through the silence. Alexander felt a sudden wash of heat and heard a faint crackle’of fire or stone he could not tell. Neither was good.
Giselle scowled, her eyes cold and hard. “Hekau sent Xaphan’the fire angel’to get my answer on her offer. When he didn’t like it, he started lighting the forest on fire to give us some incentive. But then another angel showed up. Seems the Guardians are having themselves a pissing contest. They can’t agree on the best way to fight this war they’ve decided to unleash on the world, and they are playing tug-of-war with Horngate as the rope.”
Max nodded. “So I heard.” Giselle’s brows rose in a question. “Alton mentioned it when he tried to attack me. He’s the reason the coven can’t let go of the shields.”
Fury swallowed the witch, and in an instant magic crackled around her in a nimbus of black lightning. Everyone but Max jumped away
“That bastard,�
�� Giselle said, and her eyes went coal black and started to glow. “I’ll kill him.”
Alexander stepped back, feeling the magic of her rage hammer at him. Every hair on his body lifted, and fear dug hard hands into his gut. She was much stronger than he anticipated. He glanced at Selange, who swallowed, her hands locked together, staring at her rival.
“Pretty show, but you’re wasting energy and time,” Max said. “Mind if we get back to saving Horngate? You can go postal later.”
Giselle shuddered and her eyes locked on Max. Slowly the cloud of energy seeped back inside her. But her eyes continued to glow with ebony light.
“Shortly after Xaphan began burning the forest, Tutresiel arrived to challenge Xaphan. We invoked the shield wards to try to protect ourselves against the fires and the fallout of the angels’ battle, but we can’t shrink them down. I’ve done everything I can. The circle and star are trapped. Alton’s doing, no doubt. Did he say how?”
Bitter Night Page 27
