“What shall we do with her?’ asked the Huntsman called Ipa. He was standing at Ion’s shoulder.
“She rejected us,” said Ion. He grinned again. “Kill her.”
Alastor cleared his throat, but before he could say anything, somebody else did.
“So stupid, Ion. That’s your solution to any rejection,” Tala cut in sharply. She was holding my arms behind my head.
Silkily, Ion said, “You survived.” He dropped his other hand onto Heart’s head and twisted at her soft ears.
Tala said coldly, “Despite rather than because of what passes for wisdom in your mind. Do think, bright star. Three dogs are hardly a pack. Let her live and she will eventually make more spirit dogs for us.”
“Indeed, it is wisdom to not slay the golden goose,” said a Huntsman I didn’t know except that his hands on my legs were very cold.
Ion looked at me dismissively. “She will refuse.”
Tala held both my wrists in one hand and twisted her fingers in my curly hair. “She won’t be able to help herself, in the end. She is so very lonely. Look at how her heart aches,” she crooned.
Ion looked disgusted. “You will never get over the taint of your sex, Tala—”
“That’s you,” she flashed.
But he ignored her, kept going: “But so be it. Release her.”
“This way, it’s a gift that her sire will repay,” observed Alastor. “That may be valuable.”
With a sneer, Ion said, “More valuable than your service, I’m sure.” Both of them moved away, their voices fading under my distracted pain.
The hands on my legs and torso went away, until it was only Tala holding me. She leaned forward and whispered in my ear, “Don’t disappoint me, precious.” Then she gave my head such a savage jerk that red darkness exploded across my vision.
By the time it faded, they were gone. I was alone. Really alone. Alone in a way I hadn’t been since I was five years old, and at least then I’d had my mother. I felt cut off from everything, even my own body. I couldn’t believe they were actually gone, but I felt so strange. Even when they’d been in my shadow, part of my power had been theirs. And the Wild Hunt had pulled my dogs away and returned the power. I hated it. I wasn’t hungry anymore. My stomach felt full of bile and churning, destructive energy.
I rose to my feet and stumbled out of the dead end where they’d caught me. I wanted to find them, throw myself at them until they did kill me. The Wild Hunt had done what my father had never been able to do. And oh, he’d tried. He would have paid a high price to strip me of my dogs, my triune soul. Only silence my mother and steal my dogs, and I would have been exactly what he wanted to mold me into. How could I have resisted, with nobody to cling to but him?
I fell onto the paved street and crawled forward a few feet before pushing myself to stand on two legs again. My magic wanted to change me and only habit led me to resist. I knew, fuzzily, that I was human, or at least I wanted to look like one, pass as one. But what was I? Was lying to the world any good at all?
My father lied to the world all the time.
I was so alone, and so confused. The city loomed around me, full of shadows that moved like they were independent. I kept seeing my dogs and my father both, just from the corner of my eye. A clocktower hidden behind other buildings played a carillon of bells and I jumped and hid against the wall, afraid it was the sound of the Horn again.
I tried to summon Heart from within my shadow. Maybe it had all been a bad dream. Maybe this aching emptiness inside was just a trick of the sandman. But nothing happened, because it wasn’t a bad dream. It hadn’t been a bad dream when Hunter killed my mother and my friend, and it wasn’t a bad dream when the Huntsman stole my dogs.
I really wanted to wake up.
I ran into the corner of a building, the sharp edges of the bricks slicing into my forehead. The building had moved. It was breathing. Suddenly, I was sure the city itself was alive. Alive, and waiting. I fell back, staring at the building. Maybe I wasn’t as alone as I thought.
Maybe being alone would be better? I could barely imagine what my senses were now screaming.
Maybe I should have been terrified. I didn’t know. I couldn’t think about it.
Blood ran into my eye and I wiped it away. Maybe I’d have a scar to match Yejun’s.
Yejun. The name made me feel hot and angry. I wanted to find him and make him understand how I felt. I wanted to find the others, too, and stop repressing everything. I wanted them to know.
The street wavered ahead of me. The road widened while the buildings neatened themselves, becoming smaller and more polite and connected together. The city glared at me balefully and the locks on every door rattled.
I was afraid of being alone. But I was also afraid of being with my friends. Oh, my friends. I wasn’t afraid for them because of my father anymore. I was afraid for them because of me. My father had known what he was about when he’d tried, over and over again, to tear my dogs away from me, to force me to reject them. He’d guessed how they kept me from being the daughter he wanted. But now, nearly blind with rage and despair, I wanted more than anything not to feel helpless. I was willing to take what I could get.
I thought of the imaginary enemy I was constructing in the city itself—anything to not be alone, right?—and I tried to find self-control. In the distance I saw the glowing tower that had appeared after Yejun had borrowed my power. That had been there before. It was probably real, and distinct from whatever I sensed in the city. It was far from the plaza where my friends waited, too, as much as distance meant anything in this surreal place. If there were lights, then there were probably people. Maybe it was even the Wild Hunt’s stronghold. I could find where my dogs were kenneled, crawl in with them. Maybe they’d bite me, but they’d bitten me before. Maybe they’d kill me, but then they’d eat me and I’d be with them again.
I was on my knees again, staring at the cornerstone of an ashes-of-roses building, when something moved in the air over me. I looked up, slowly.
A large brown owl had settled on the edge of the roof. It peered down at me, then hooted softly.
My lower lip trembled and my eyes filled with tears. I stretched out a hand to the owl, imploringly, hoping against hope it would come to me. I didn’t know where it had come from in this horrible city, but I didn’t much care. It didn’t hate me and that was all that was important.
But a winged shadow passed overhead and the owl glanced up at the giant eagle circling. The owl mantled, and I saw the flash of injuries under its soft feathers. One of the feathers slipped loose, and then the owl flapped into the air again, darting low between the buildings as the giant eagle looking for it soared overhead.
The brown and white feather drifted down until it landed in my outstretched hand. I wrapped my fingers around it.
Instantly, I remembered Tia: remembered her saucy wink and her laughing smile as she promised me she could talk my father into letting me go. I remembered her hand tousling my curls as she waited with me at the airport for the Senyaza representative who was going to give me a place to stay. I remembered her hug goodbye, her perfume a tickle in my nose. She wasn’t human, she was a demon, but she’d been arms around me and that had meant so much.
Heart and Grim bayed somewhere in the city. Nod never barked like that; it was either a snarl or a howl with him. They were together, as I was alone, and they were hunting something. Maybe they were hunting my friends.
It was weak and shameful, but I couldn’t stand the thought of my dogs against my friends. If that’s what was going on, I couldn’t be there for it, not now. Whatever I did would be wrong. Whatever I tried would fail. I held the owl’s feather close to my face, then ran the other way, to the tower with the glowing windows.
It was a tall building, a skyscraper. And while the top glowed brightest, it shimmered all over. In this strange semi-real city, there was a truly dreamlike element to the tower, like it was a painting on the walls of a soap bubble. I touched on
e wall hesitantly, but the cool, smooth steel didn’t vanish away.
It was also different from the other city structures because it didn’t have a closed door. Instead of an ordinary entrance, an elevator stood open and waiting. Warm light shed by a small chandelier spilled over the threshold invitingly, and the walls of the elevator were upholstered in burgundy leather. Faint chamber music drifted out.
I stumbled into the elevator. There was a panel with a single button, already lit. The doors closed as I leaned against the soft corner and the elevator began to rise.
It was a slow, steady ride. I sank into a haze, letting the gentle vibration carry me away from the horror of the streets below. After a while, I realized I wasn’t alone. A translucent figure stood in the other corner, facing the doors, ignoring me. I could hardly make out details on the ghost, but it only took a moment of staring to realize that it was Emily. Emily, who had befriended me in junior high, and died for it. Emily, whose ghost had never once spoken to me.
She had nothing to say now, either. She didn’t even seem to be aware I was there. She just stood in the corner, waiting for the elevator to finish its journey. Maybe I was imagining her just like I’d been imagining the city was alive. She was a lot more translucent than most ghosts.
“I’m so sorry,” I told her. I’d apologized so many times before, and just like all the other times, there was no response. I was sorry for befriending her, sorry for failing her. Sometimes I was even sorry I’d never tried to avenge her. It was a fairy tale concept, vengeance, and I wasn’t sure she would have cared. But she was also dead. That made a difference in priorities.
I edged over to her, felt the chill radiating from the space she occupied. It was very comforting. It took the edge off the hot pain in my heart. I thought that if I could just get her to occupy the same space I did, then I wouldn’t feel any pain at all. But I couldn’t bring myself to step into her space, to invade her like that. I just took what little numbness I could from her company. I was grateful for that small gift.
The elevator came to a halt so smoothly I didn’t realize it until the doors slid open. Emily stayed behind me like my shadow as I crept out from the elevator just enough to see where I’d ended up.
I recognized the penthouse suite that Jen and Cat occupied, although it seemed no more real than Emily. It wasn’t exactly translucent the way Emily was. Instead, everything was rimmed with light, Cat and Jen included.
They didn’t seem to realize I was there. Maybe it was a projection, something like what Yejun had done in the cave. Maybe I was hidden behind a wall. Or maybe Emily’s close company had made me into a ghost, too.
I rather liked that idea.
Cat sat at the table, looking at a beautiful knife placed there. It had a long, thin, shining blade made of folded metals, and a wooden hilt burnished to a glowing chestnut. Cat leaned his chin on one fist as he tapped the blade thoughtfully. After a moment, he transferred his gaze to Jen.
Jennifer sat on the couch where she’d been sitting when I first met her. This time she had a book. She stared at it like she could still read, but her eyes didn’t move across the page. She never looked up at Cat, but her entire posture showed that she was aware of him.
A portable alarm clock on the table buzzed. He stood up and said, “You should eat. I’ll reheat some leftover Chinese.”
She shook her head at the book. “I’m not hungry. And it would be rude to our guest.”
To my numb half-surprise, Cat looked directly at me with an eyebrow raised. “Would it?”
-seventeen-
Emily vanished, taking away all the numbness I’d been borrowing from her. I gasped at the rush of loneliness. It made me stumble further into the room before I caught myself. Cat held out an arm as if to steady me, but his fingers passed through my skin like he was shadow.
“What are you doing here?” I whispered.
Jen closed her book on one finger and looked at me. “I think something unexpected happened the last time Yejun tried to call us. We’re not really where you are, you understand. Our windows look out on the Far City, but the door leads to the hotel. You drifted through a wall a while ago.”
“The Far City? You know this place?” I sank down to the floor, then wished I hadn’t. I sat on the floor to be with my dogs, and my dogs were gone. Instead, I held the owl’s feather to my cheek.
“I’ve read about it in books,” Jen said. She held up the book she’d been looking at. “It’s a strange place.”
Hesitantly I asked, “Can you read now? Yejun said...” and I trailed off, afraid of upsetting her.
“No,” she replied calmly. “The letters don’t mean anything anymore. But I can remember very well when I focus, and the habit of holding a book focuses me.”
“Will you be all right if Jen eats something?” asked Cat patiently. “She’s trying to use you as an excuse.”
I put a hand on my empty stomach. “I’ll be fine.”
“I don’t want to eat, Cat,” Jennifer said gently, still looking at me.
“That’s too bad,” said Cat, just as pleasantly. He went to the fridge and started scooping some noodles onto a plate.
I looked between them, puzzled. Jennifer looked wan and thin, like she hadn’t eaten well in days. I would have given her a good meal, too. But I didn’t like Cat insisting Jen eat the food he gave her. It was too much like my father handing me a plate. And that comparison made me want to head back down to the streets. I wasn’t ready to go home yet, even though I knew I would eventually.
“Why...?” I began, then wasn’t sure where to go.
“She wants to die,” said Cat, matter of factly.
Jen looked away, embarrassed. “Let’s be accurate. I want to finish dying. It’s not going to happen very quickly no matter what I do. Sen’s magic is strong.”
“I bet the Huntsman’s magic is stronger,” I said bitterly.
They both looked at me intently. Jen admitted, “Yes. That would be fast. And also a failure. A final betrayal of Sen.”
“You keep using that word,” said Cat lightly. “I do not think it means what you think it means.” He put the plate into the suite microwave and started it whirring. I stared as flashes of light burst silently out of the microwave, but the other two either didn’t notice or didn’t think it was unusual.
I thought about the exchange between Cat and Jen, decided it was more than I could think about right now, and tried to change the subject. “We did try to call you. Yejun borrowed some of my power. I guess that might have messed things up.”
“Ah,” said Jen, and picked up another book. “Where is he?”
Oops. I’d picked the wrong topic for casual chat. But maybe nothing would be easy to talk about again. “I left him with the Fiddler.”
Jen looked up from her book at me, compassion in her eyes. She touched the seat beside her, but I couldn’t. It took everything I had not to dissolve in tears, and moving would have broken that focus. Being so close and so far would have made it even worse.
“I had to get away,” I said brokenly. “I probably would have gone back. I’m not very good at doing the right thing. But the Hunt found me—” I stopped and shook my head. How could I explain what I’d lost?
Cat glanced at me over his round glasses, then brought the steaming plate to Jen. It didn’t smell like anything. The entire suite smelled like wind and cinders and lightning, not like a place where people lived. But that made sense. They were just an illusion of something far away.
She handed him the book and accepted the plate, like they’d done the exact same thing a dozen times before. Like she just had to argue so she wouldn’t be betraying herself. It didn’t feel like when I didn’t fight my father. It didn’t feel like she was afraid of him.
After watching Jen long enough to make sure she was eating, Cat went over to his knife. He picked it up and purposefully pricked his palm. As blood welled up and dripped down his hand, the light shining off the blade flickered and moved like the overh
ead fixture had changed position. Cat didn’t seem to notice as he put the blade down and turned to me. I stared up at him dully, unable to really process what was going on until he’d wrapped his bleeding hand around my arm and pulled me to my feet.
His hand was warm, and his grip gentle. The smell of the blood was almost overpowering, though. It simultaneously turned my stomach and reminded me of the hunger my grief had hidden. My hands spasmed and the owl’s feather drifted down to my feet. It wasn’t that I wanted to eat him, not really. It was just... the essence of living warmth. I was a meat eater. And apparently I was also a comfort carnivore.
“Sorry for the mess,” said Cat, his intense blue eyes glinting behind his lenses. He really was beautiful, and hauntingly familiar. “It was the only way for me to borrow a little bit of essence from the knife. So I could reach you. You looked like you needed a hand.” He guided me over to the couch beside Jen and I sank down beside her, still staring up at Cat.
“Is... is it a Machine blade?” I asked, wondering blearily if he could use the blade to make a steak real for me. Sometimes celestials and nephilim had little bits of heavenly Machinery they could use as tools and weapons.
“No.” His tone wasn’t unfriendly, exactly, but it didn’t invite more questions.
Jen touched my hair and I started. She wasn’t bleeding, wasn’t borrowing the essence of the knife, whatever that meant. She gave me a sad little smile in response. “Halfway between the worlds, they say.” She tucked a curl behind my ear. “You’ve had a rough time of it, haven’t you?”
The sympathy frightened me. My reaction to the sympathy frightened me more. I wanted to put my head into her lap and sob. But that would be such a waste. Instead I tried to pull away, my muscles trembling with the effort, and she let me.
“I’m alive,” I said. It was supposed to be light and cheerful, but my voice hitched, which made it sound more like a confession of my ultimate woe.
Wolf Interval (Senyaza Series Book 3) Page 17
