“I don’t know,” his fire replied. “It will feel … mortal. But your death won’t be painful. Not like mine.”
“I’m so sorry—”
“Stop. You’ve apologized for my death a million times. It’s time to let go. We both must let go. Go unto the vessels awaiting us.”
“I love you,” she gasped.
Blue fire wrapped her tight. “So you do, and so you shall. And I shall love you in return. Eternity awaits.”
Persephone turned to the Liminal edge once more, silver tears glistening. “Dear Liminal. Show me how to proceed. I know you require sacrifice, so tell me—”
“My Lady,” Beatrice murmured in sad realization. “You are the sacrifice.”
Persephone stood on the threshold, wavering. “Ah.” She swallowed. “So I am.”
The shadows nearly exploded around them. A roaring sound, rattling bones. A flash of red. Darkness was nearly upon them. They had to go.
“I beg you, Liminal, who needs me?” the goddess asked the portal in a small voice.
There was a sparking, answering light to counter the growing abyss.
“Now!” Beatrice cried, and grabbing hold of the divinity, she threw them both into the void.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN
With a deafening roar and a coruscation of light, Beatrice and Persephone found themselves lying on hard stone. They opened their eyes and struggled to their feet, gasping, for they were surrounded by fresh human blood. Beatrice had enough of the sight, smell, and feel of blood to last lifetimes. A shaking woman lay next to them.
“Oh my,” Persephone breathed, looking down at the source. The divinity’s fear seemed to vanish, replaced by the need to be luminous and strong for the woman before her. “Who did this to you, dear girl?” she asked. In the mortal world, the goddess was again clean, clad in swaths of red silk.
Before them lay a broken woman in a threadbare dress. She was young, redheaded and sickly pale. She stared up in wonder at the two women who had quite literally fallen from the sky to land beside her. The Liminal remained open; its light was strong at Beatrice’s back. Its humming vibrations felt much the way phoenix fire once had in her veins.
Suddenly Beatrice felt a shock—the woman’s position mirrored Jean’s, lying in his own blood on the Cairo stones. A hand flew to her mouth and she turned away, unable to look.
“It was Bill,” the woman said in a light Irish brogue. “He’s in the drink again. I-I don’t think he meant to push me.” She took a shaking breath. “They all ran when I fell. I can’t … feel my legs. But you’re surely angels so I’m just fine now, come to carry me…”
Beatrice glanced up. They were in the courtyard of an old inn; three floors of whitewashed balconies rose above them. There was no one there; the doors were all closed and the shades drawn. An eerie, deadly hush had fallen.
Anger swelled in Beatrice’s heart. Had this woman been left to die alone, abandoned by cowards who feared danger or the law? Not that women fared well under the law; abusers were the ones more often protected. Damn the miseries and injustices of the Whisper-world, there was plenty of that and more on Earth.
“We are here to help,” the goddess stated. Persephone’s anxiety, pain, and madness were entirely forgotten; all her attention was on the injured woman. Beatrice was oddly touched by this selflessness.
“Think of someplace important to you…” The goddess paused, kneeling at her side cycling colors, touching her cheek gently and in doing so, intuiting something. “Iris. You’re Iris, aren’t you? Lovely name.”
The young woman nodded, grateful to be known.
“Someplace safe, think of it now,” the goddess continued, scooping the young woman into her arms. An instant later, the Liminal blazed bright, and they were transported.
The sensation was again whirling and light-filled, but this time when they touched down, Beatrice was steady on her feet. They were in a stone room furnished only with a chair and a cot, upon which Persephone settled her burden.
She urged her patient back onto the pillows, imploring her to relax and lie still. The young woman obediently did so. Persephone’s prismatic shifts of light grew more subtle, less manic. Iris’s blood vanished.
“Tell me about this place,” Persephone said, sitting on the edge of the bed and brushing the hair out of the young woman’s face. “Tell me where we are and all about you.”
The young woman glanced around the room, then down at her body, now whole and unsoiled. She stared at the goddess and spoke softly, in awe. “M-my name is Iris Parker, and we’re in the north of England, where my family landed after a failed time in Ireland. This is the convent where they sent me before I ran off and fell in with sinners. Oh, Holy Mother, I beg your forgiveness of all my sins!”
“You are forgiven everything, child,” Persephone said, assuming the identity Iris needed her to be. “A child named for the rainbow. Beautiful Iris, God loves you.”
Beatrice hung back in the shadows as Iris wept; the scene was too intimate to disrupt.
“No need to cry, unless it is for joy,” Persephone said with a smile. “You’ve been chosen for a great task.”
“I have?” the young woman asked.
“Yes, Iris. You shall bring something great into the world. I give my rainbow unto you, and all my colors together shall be a bright and brilliant white.”
Iris seemed much younger than Beatrice, though they were about the same age. The responsibility of the Guard had put aeons between their hearts and minds. “Why me?” the redhead asked.
“Because when I asked, the heavens responded that you needed me,” Persephone replied. “And I need you, too.”
The goddess stood. Her light brightened, though it left Beatrice shrouded in shadow.
“You shall bear a child,” Persephone said, and Iris’s expression bloomed. Beatrice had only seen such transparent emotion on Ahmed’s face, and she found herself caught off guard and inordinately touched by Iris’s joy, as if a child were all she’d ever wanted. Perhaps by watching other people’s emotions, she encountered her own.
Persephone continued. “A child like no other, she will offer hearts peace, and she will triumph against Darkness despite obstacles and iniquity. She escapes a prison of her soul to be reborn in love. She will make a life of pain into a life of love, a life that she was denied.”
As she spoke, the goddess wept, glistening tears rolling down her cheek. She cupped her hand at her sternum, and Beatrice saw her palm glimmer silver as the tears pooled in her palm.
“Wh-what shall I call the child?” Iris breathed, not for a moment questioning her destiny. Beatrice wondered at that. Though perhaps if she’d had her own life so obviously saved, she wouldn’t question fate, either.
The goddess blushed. “I ought to be more original, but I am too fond. Call her Persephone as … it is my favorite of all names. And now, dear girl, sleep. In the morning you will not be alone.”
She opened her hand, revealing what her tears had made: a silver chain bearing a glorious phoenix pendant, wings boldly outstretched and fiery tail arched artfully. The silver talisman faintly glowed.
Persephone kissed Iris’s forehead and clasped the pendant about her neck. As the girl’s eyes closed in sleep, the goddess said to Beatrice, “I need you to listen very carefully to what I’m about to say. If you fail, perhaps all we’ve done will be for naught.”
Beatrice stared. Fear of her own limitations seized her, and she echoed Iris: “Why me?”
The goddess returned her stare. “Why not you? Are you not capable of great things? Did you not think that, when you asked the heavens to clarify that most grand of all human questions, ‘Why am I here, and what is my purpose,’ that the heavens might actually respond?”
Beatrice swallowed. She had not. But she did not back down from the goddess’s gaze.
Satisfied, Persephone continued. “I cannot be too careful. Darkness has sentinels and might take drastic measures when he realizes what
I have done. It’s why I’ve never done this before. I’ve been too scared about what it might unleash upon the earth.”
Beatrice shivered. “What sorts of things?”
“Terrible things. Hounds of hell that your lot, thankfully, has had never to deal with—and that I pray he doesn’t let loose. Horsemen, riding up from the river of Death itself. What you see as a violent storm, I see as dread horsemen seeking to drown souls in an undertow of misery.”
“Do you mean all these things will pursue poor Iris Parker?”
Persephone shook her head. “Time in the Whisper-world is different. Darkness will not perceive my absence right away, nor will he pinpoint exactly where I have gone. Iris, and you, will be safe. Though I fear you’ll be quite haunted.”
“But when he realizes you’ve abandoned him—”
“Yes, Beatrice. Then, there will be war.”
“War.” Beatrice’s already cold blood froze. “War is a good time to cast aside divinity and become mortal?” She checked on Iris, but the woman slumbered on, undisturbed at her raised voice.
“It’s the only way, Beatrice. Phoenix was right. I cannot foil Darkness otherwise. A stranger can, so that stranger I shall become. I’ve been knitting the worlds, readying for the phoenix fire and the time when that eerie little girl we saw becomes a woman, ready to receive her fate.”
Beatrice was amazed by the change in the goddess’s demeanor. Her faltering youth and naive fear had evaporated, replaced by determination.
“For safety’s sake,” Persephone continued, “cover traces of the child’s birth. Make sure that Iris Parker arrives at that convent in York, the one from the vision. The reverend mother there will know what to do, I’ll make sure of it.”
She displayed a different chain, a silver key sparkling in the moonlight. “From the Guard’s sacred space, this key will reveal the terrain of the Whisper-world and the location of the Guards’ prison. Conceal it in a false infant’s grave next to the real grave of Iris Parker.”
Beatrice started. “Grave?”
“You saw the girl I am to be, she appears an orphan. I do not think Iris survives the birth,” Persephone said sadly. Moonlight surrounded Iris’s sleeping head like a halo.
“You’ve saved her only to kill her?”
“You saw me ask the Liminal what mortal needed me most. Who am I to question?”
Beatrice couldn’t find words. This work defied right and wrong, joy and sadness, life and death. She supposed that dying alone in a heap of blood and broken bones was far worse than dying as the mother of a prophecy. This way, Iris could perhaps go more directly to that heaven for which she pined, feeling like one of its angels.
“You must go now,” Persephone said. “Take Iris someplace safe. You cannot stay here where the Liminal deposited us; Whisper-world agents may trace the scent of me.”
The divinity’s expression grew very sad, and her voice was hollow.
“I thought I could come to him now, matured,” she murmured. “I thought I’d simply take a body, knowing who I am and what we’re to do. Now I see the timing’s off. In those first visions I just didn’t see it or realize. I should have tried sooner.”
She couldn’t mask the pain in her voice, but steeling herself, Persephone continued: “I’m going to go appear to that reverend mother and proclaim that an odd child born like starlight and snow shall come into her care, and when she is a woman, she shall take her place at Athens. And I’ll pray that she’s loved by he who is meant to love her. I’ve prophecies to proclaim, and I must also … say good-bye.”
Beatrice stepped toward the goddess. “Please, my lady. Be mindful of mortal time,” she cautioned. “Remember you’re not good at it.”
“When it matters, I am.” The goddess placed her hand on Beatrice’s shoulder, and Beatrice felt how it trembled. “Can I trust you to remain here and wait for me?”
Beatrice swallowed and nodded. She had little else to live for.
“I’ll return before morning. Thank you. Thank you for pushing me out into this world. I needed it. I needed you.”
Beatrice nodded again. It was nice to be thanked and needed. It eased the sting of the bittersweet wound that had defined her life. Thinking of Persephone, she wondered if the Grand Work would also define her death.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
Persephone stood over Alexi’s sleeping form.
“This is the last time, Alexi,” she whispered.
Phoenix fire responded to her presence, rising up from his host in protest. “I have warned you, take care with him. Remember he is but mortal youth. He doesn’t react well to your mitigating his memories. I daresay you cause more pain than pleasure. We’ve a vested interest not to break him prematurely.”
Persephone winced. “May I say good-bye in a dream, then?”
“Yes, just…” Phoenix hesitated as Beatrice had. The divinity realized she was losing trust.
“I’ll return to you, and do what must be done…” the goddess promised.
* * *
Alexi dreamed that he stood at the edge of a moor at twilight. At his side stood the goddess. His goddess. Heather rolled away from them in gently bending waves, rustling; while the flower was subtle-scented, in a mass their odor was powerful, yet pleasant. There was nothing in view save the field and her, all light and color and breathlessness. She wore a red silk gown. Her eyes seemed tired.
Stretching her limbs, she closed her eyes, breathed in the heather, and sighed.
Her colors were shifting more slowly than usual and her breathing was strained, Alexi realized. Could a goddess grow ill? Perhaps there was a limit to how long a being of light could live in a dark world for which she was not meant.
“Heather,” she said at last. “It can grow in dim, gloomy climes; its loveliness refuses to submit to shadow. It is a flower that represents me well.”
He stepped toward her, close enough to feel her shifting temperatures, warm then cool, depending on the color, and took her hand. He strained to stay sensible, was choked with fear of saying the wrong thing, even in a dream.
“This is the last time I can ever come to you, Alexi,” she whispered, squeezing his hand, pressing it to her lips. “In person or in a dream, save for what your imagination may fashion.”
“When you go,” he murmured, “and take memories from me, please do me the courtesy of taking my heart as well. Cut it from me. It’s a pointless instrument without you.” He tried to suppress desperation and speak with the dispassion he retained in his day-to-day life, but such detachment was impossible around this being.
She shifted her head to look at him, smiling in that maddening way that combined love, pity, and sorrow. “You’ll need your heart. For her. Her breath will whisper of me,” the goddess said softly. “Her light will call down my strength. Her love will be boundless.”
Alexi furrowed his brow. “But she will not be you? You are what I need.”
“She will be what you need, and you what she needs. Shall you yet argue? You break my heart as you fight me, eroding my resolve to do what I must.”
It would seem expressing his true feelings only made things worse. Choking back a torrent of declamations, he resolved to say nothing, withdrawing his hand from hers.
Her resulting chuckle was almost more maddening. “Oh, Alexi, look at you! Such impassioned intensity, my brooding, tormented hero. I daresay your enigmatic nature will make some young romantic fall quite helplessly in love with you.”
Alexi frowned. When she giggled, his frown became a scowl.
“Have I offended you?” she breathed. “Oh, come now, such a face!”
“I’m practicing,” he retorted. “For that brooding hero role you suggest.”
She studied him for a moment before laughing, turning him to face her, running a hand through his mop of black hair. “There’s hope for you yet.”
“Well, I’d like to be fallen for helplessly, so I’ll do whatever you suggest.”
Persephon
e grinned. “You shall be successful.”
Alexi grabbed the goddess by her arms.
“Promise me that when Prophecy comes, she won’t be taken away. Promise me something that’s mine, a haven I can rely on. I’ve been abandoned by my parents; my beloved grandmother is dead. Everyone looks to me for answers and asks something. Let me have something of my own. If she will be taken away, as you take yourself and these memories, I swear to you I’ll go mad. Give me something I can keep.”
“I have seen your future,” the goddess replied. “I promise.”
“So, why not tell me everything? If there is a plan, how are we to follow it if we do not know it?”
She fought back silver tears. “That is for you to learn. But be careful. I’ve been warned of betrayals, that mortal hearts are fallible. I dare not pin your hopes on anything that may yet change, not when your capacity for choice is what makes Prophecy come true. Divine machinations agree that two lonely mortals must find and love each other, on their own, or none of it will take.”
“Why can’t you just stay with me?” he asked plaintively, moving to embrace her, clutching her with tight, trembling desperation.
“Because this form is rotting, Alexi, I don’t show you the damage and I won’t, but I’m broken and I am at my last gasp. I am tied to the Whisper-world. I must break those bonds.” She leaned over him. “You’ll be wonderful. You’ll have something wonderful. I promise. Now let me go.”
* * *
“I love you. She’ll love you. Let me go,” Persephone whispered to the slumbering Alexi, extricating herself from his consciousness.
Now that she did not need to be strong for him anymore, her shoulders fell, and she wept.
“I need to change that letter.”
Ascending the stairs, she wandered to the little room she had seen in her vision, withdrawing her and his parents’ note from its hiding place, fumbling for a fountain pen. Her silver tears wiped clean the ink, and she began again, adjusting for new knowledge, speaking to the woman she would become as a stranger. Finished, she folded the sheets and wrote The Rychmans on the outside before tucking it back into its hiding place.
Perilous Prophecy Page 25
