Nightkeepers

by Jessica Andersen

  Instead, they started without him, which proved Leah’s point. While he’d been wrestling with his own demons, he’d lost track of what the others needed. Not only was he not their leader, he wasn’t even part of their gang.

  ‘‘Damn,’’ he said, which seemed to sum things up.

  She took his hand and tugged him toward the barbecue. ‘‘It’s fixable.’’

  Is it? he thought, but didn’t say. Instead, he allowed himself to be led to the small barbecue, where he made a concerted effort to engage with the other magi, putting faces and impressions to Jox’s and Red-Boar’s reports, and trying to channel what he remembered of his father’s public persona, which was all he knew of how a king should act.

  But as the night wore on and beer and wine flowed, and Jox even broke out the potent ceremonial pulque— one shot each, no more—and everyone else relaxed, Strike grew increasingly tense while he fought the red haze that threatened to coat his mind with anger, hatred, and vicious sexual frustration. A single thought kept pounding through his skull, chasing itself around in endless circles.

  How in the hell was he supposed to lead the Nightkeepers when he couldn’t even manage what was inside his own head?

  As dinner and dessert wound down, Leah got more and more keyed up.

  She’d gone into alligator-infested waters after bodies the gators considered theirs. She’d faced down gang-bangers. She’d been shot in the leg and kept up the foot chase. Hell, she’d escaped being a human sacrifice in an ancient Mayan temple. There was no reason for her to be nervous about what she had planned next.

  Or so she kept telling herself. But she was getting a seriously weird vibe off Strike, one that had her thinking she should’ve waited on the second part of her scheme, the one Jox didn’t even know about. Problem was, they didn’t have the time to wait. A barbecue would get them only so far. They needed an identity, something to rally behind. Something that was theirs alone to protect.

  So she stood up and cleared her throat, and waited until she had everyone’s attention. Feeling like a total freak-show fraud to be telling a bunch of magicians how they should run their own universe, she said only, ‘‘I’d appreciate it if you’d all come out to the front of the house. I have something for you.’’

  For a few seconds nobody moved. Then Strike nodded and rose. ‘‘Lead on.’’

  His words were neutral, even encouraging, but his expression was closed and cool, like he thought she’d already done enough damage for one night. And maybe she had . . . but she’d never known how to quit while she was ahead. Why start now?

  So she led the way around the side of the mansion, conscious of Strike’s lethal warrior’s grace right behind her, the others following behind him, including the winikin , and even the sleepy-eyed twins, who tagged on either side of Rabbit, babbling in incomprehensible twinspeak.

  She stopped by the front door of the mansion, where she’d hung the polished brass plaque earlier in the day, still covered in brown paper wrapping.

  Sucking in a deep breath to settle her nerves—like that was going to happen—Leah said, ‘‘Some of you don’t think I belong here, that having me here breaks tradition.’’ She looked at Jox and Red-Boar, standing off to one side of the main crowd, and could all but hear them thinking, Yeah, so? ‘‘And maybe you’re right. I don’t have the same magic that you do, I wasn’t raised in your culture, and I’m not related by blood. But I am a trained cop, and a good one. I can shoot. I can fight. And I know, for better or worse, how to manipulate people.’’ That got her a few shuffles, and even some frowns. She held up a hand. ‘‘I’m giving you honesty here. And honestly, what I see is a bunch of strangers with similar goals. You’re not a unit yet. You’re not the team you’re going to need to be in order to fight whatever’s coming through at the equinox.’’

  She deliberately used ‘‘you’’ rather than ‘‘us’’ because she wanted them pulling together, and if uniting against her was what brought them into alignment, then so be it.

  ‘‘What do you suggest?’’ Strike asked, but she got the idea he was playing along so the others would think she had his support, not because she actually did.

  ‘‘Team Building 201,’’ Leah answered. ‘‘You need a name. Not you as a people, or your bloodlines,’’ she said quickly when the dirty looks started. ‘‘For this place.’’ Her gesture encompassed the mansion, the training compound, and the wide box canyon lost in the darkness. ‘‘For your home.’’

  ‘‘This isn’t—’’ Jox began, then broke off.

  ‘‘It wasn’t your home before,’’ she agreed. ‘‘It was a place where you gathered for feasts and training.’’ Personally, she thought it should’ve had a name back then, regardless. ‘‘But wake up. It’s a new day, and things are going to need to change. Starting now. So I’m giving this place a name.’’

  Without further ceremony, she ripped the paper free, baring the intricately engraved plaque.

  There was a collective indrawn breath, and in the moment of silence that followed, one of the twins laughed, the sound rising into the night high and sweet and pure.

  Finally, unable to stand it one second longer, Leah turned to Strike, who’d frozen and gone pale. ‘‘What do you think?’’

  I think you humble me, Strike thought, but he couldn’t get the words out. So he took her hand and held it while he stood and stared at the name she’d given the Night-keepers’ home.

  SKYWATCH.

  It was engraved in big letters above a line drawing of a ceiba tree, with three Mayan words inscribed below, the letters formed from the tree’s spreading root system.

  Skywatch. It clicked. It was right. The sky was the realm of the gods they served, the gods who’d charged them with watching over the barrier. More, waatch was the Mayan word for ‘‘soldier,’’ though she might not have known that. Or maybe she did, he thought, looking at the words carved below the tree of life.

  She’d not only given them a name; she’d given them a motto. A coat of arms. A battle cry in modern Quiche Mayan. Waquqik—to fight. Cajij—to protect. And—

  He frowned. ‘‘What’s kuyubal-mak?’’

  ‘‘It means ‘to forgive,’ ’’ Jox said, his voice rough. ‘‘But there’s nothing to forgive.’’

  ‘‘I think there is,’’ Leah countered. ‘‘If there weren’t, you would’ve pressured him to take charge long before this. You would’ve dragged him out of the pool house and locked him in the royal suite, and you sure as hell wouldn’t have let him hide out in the library for the past two months. You would’ve forced him to take the crown— or whatever it is that your king wears. But neither you nor Red-Boar did any of those things. Thus, I have to assume there’s a reason.’’ Taking a deep breath, she said, ‘‘I’m thinking it’s because, deep down inside, you’re not sure you want him to be king.’’

  Strike didn’t know which was worse—that she’d said it, or that there was dead silence in the aftermath.

  Finally, Jox said, ‘‘You presume too much, Detective. You don’t know us, and you sure as hell don’t know Strike.’’

  ‘‘I think I do.’’ Her eyes met Strike’s. ‘‘And I don’t think he wants to be king. If he did, he’d be arguing with me right now.’’ She closed the distance between them, said softly. ‘‘I think you’re afraid you’ll make the same mistakes your father did. And I think you’re figuring that if you don’t become king you’ll nullify the thirteenth prophecy. No king, no greatest sacrifice.’’

  Strike told himself the rage wasn’t him, the hatred wasn’t him. But that was all he could see or feel, all he could be just then. A scream built in his soul, and he felt the darkness closing in on him. Suffocating him. He tried to find words to tell her—to tell any of them—what was going on, but he was afraid that if he opened his mouth something terrible would come out, something vicious and violent.

  So he didn’t say anything. He just closed his eyes and imagined being someplace else, someplace alone. He was so revved on anger, on
power, that he zapped blind before he’d intended to, the world dissolving around him before he’d envisioned the travel thread or picked a destination.

  Then the universe jolted sideways, the floor fell out from beneath him, and he dropped with a yell.

  He fell too long, and hit bottom too hard, but the spongy surface yielded beneath him, cushioning the impact. He felt the feathery touch of mist on his face, and knew where he was even before he opened his eyes and saw a world of gray-green.

  He’d zapped himself into the frigging barrier. And the anger—oh, the anger rose up, gripping him, tearing into him. He arched and screamed with the rage, with the bloodlust and mad hatred that came from outside him, from within him, until he wasn’t sure where he left off and the craziness began.

  Gods. His mouth drew back in a rictus, his eyes rolled wildly, and his heart stuttered in his chest. Darkness blurred the edges of his vision, and he was pretty sure he was dying. Panic closed in.

  He was barely conscious of the mist swirling nearby, thickening and taking on the shape of a stick-thin Nightkeeper with obsidian eyes and a ruby stud in one ear. The nahwal.

  ‘‘Father!’’ he shouted, though he wasn’t sure if he said the word aloud or only thought it in the small corner of his mind that was still his to control.

  ‘‘It is time,’’ the nahwal said in its voice-of-many-voices. It leaned down and gripped Strike’s wrist, and its touch burned like flame and acid, the worst pain he’d ever known.

  He threw back his head and screamed.

  The gray-green mist disappeared.

  And he was home, reappearing exactly where he’d left from, standing in front of the main door, staring at the sign that said, SKYWATCH: TO FIGHT, TO PROTECT, TO FORGIVE.

  The others were gone. The anger was gone, too, leaving him hollow and drained. He only had the strength left to whisper, ‘‘Forgive me, Father.’’

  Then he collapsed on the welcome mat and passed the hell out.

  After Strike pulled his disappearing act, leaving Leah standing there looking like a complete idiot, she held it together until she reached her rooms. His rooms. Whatever.

  The moment she was through the carved double doors, though, she let go of the control she’d been holding on to by the last thread. She halfway expected tears, though she’d never been a weeper, halfway expected destructive, lamp-throwing anger, which was more typical for her. But either the two canceled each other out or she’d used up all her emotional space and had nothing left.

  She sank to the couch in the sitting area, exhausted. Empty. There were no skitters of warmth or electricity. She doubted she could kill a gnat, never mind a coffeemaker. Her supposed powers were long gone, leaving her as nothing more than what she was—a cop with a big mouth and zero subtlety who didn’t really belong in Skywatch.

  Skywatch. She hoped the name—and the motto— stuck. Her timing and delivery might’ve sucked, but she was right, damn it. They needed something to rally around, and Red-Boar and the winikin needed to accept that the past was gone and it wasn’t going to repeat itself, no matter what their writs said about the cyclical nature of time. The trainees weren’t going to fight because their winikin told them to. They needed to believe in the cause, in themselves, and in one another. And more important, they needed to believe in their leader. She didn’t care if he called himself king or Papa Smurf; he needed to step up.

  Instead, he’d brushed her off and then freaking zapped himself straight out of the argument, which was against the rules of fighting. And he’d been really pissed, too, like he hated the fact that she was standing up to him.

  ‘‘Which is way too bad,’’ she said aloud. ‘‘If he doesn’t like a woman who gets in his face and tells him where to get off occasionally, then he can—’’ She broke off, because he didn’t have to do a flipping thing. The decision was going to have to be hers.

  She could stay—if they’d let her—and add whatever weight she might have to the coming battle. Or she could go home, fast-talk her way back onto the job—which would undoubtedly include some serious shrink action— and keep hammering at Survivor2012.

  She didn’t want to go back . . . but she wasn’t sure she could stay, either. Strike was using her as an excuse to avoid the others—which wasn’t fair to any of them— and his disappearing act suggested he wasn’t looking to change that strategy. Besides, she knew how to kill Zipacna now; she just had to find him, and she could do that as effectively from the outside as she could in the compound. She could defend herself. She didn’t need to stay.

  More important, she didn’t have any reason to. She wasn’t Strike’s Godkeeper, and she wasn’t his mate. Hell, after tonight, she probably didn’t even rank as a friend.

  ‘‘Shit,’’ she said, hearing the single word echo in the too-big suite. Then she started packing.

  Twenty minutes later, figuring she’d ‘‘borrow’’ a car and call Jox later to let him know where to pick it up, she slung her duffel over her shoulder and headed out without saying good-bye to anyone, because she didn’t particularly want to see the looks of relief when she said she was leaving. Telling herself she wasn’t going to cry, she swung open the front door, slamming it into something lying on the welcome mat outside.

  It took her a second. Then her heart stopped in her chest. ‘‘Strike!’’

  She dropped down beside him, scrambling for a pulse. She found it—sort of—but it wasn’t the thready beat that held her attention as she raised her voice and shouted, ‘‘Jox! Need some help here!’’

  No, what drew her attention was the new mark on his forearm, one that hadn’t been there an hour earlier . . . and which looked a hell of a lot like a flying snake.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Strike awoke profoundly pissed off, which was unusual for him. Even more unusual was the fact that he was holding a woman’s hand.

  He cracked an eye and took stock. He was in his bed in the pool house, and it was well past dawn. He was naked save for a pair of cutoff shorts—Jox’s idea of sleepwear?—and Leah was sitting in a chair beside his bed, her head pillowed at the edge of his mattress on one folded arm. Her other hand was holding his. The sight of her face smoothed out in repose and their fingers intertwined atop the covers softened the edge of anger that rode him for no good reason.

  ‘‘Hey,’’ he said quietly, wincing at the crack in his voice, and again he remembered the events of the night before.

  She opened her eyes and stared at him for a moment, unblinking. Then she straightened and slid her hand from his, trying to make it seem like no big deal. But the withdrawal was intentional, he knew. And it stung.

  Worse, he deserved it.

  ‘‘You were right,’’ he said before his mood could take over and make him say something stupid. ‘‘About me hiding in the archive, about us needing something to rally behind. You were right about all of it. And the name is perfect. The motto’s perfect.’’ He levered himself up and swung his legs over the side so they were sitting facing each other, knees bumping. Leaning in, he caught the hand she’d just reclaimed. He raised it to his lips, then pressed it against his cheek even though he was about a day and a half past needing a shave. ‘‘Thank you.’’

  Her eyes filled. ‘‘You took off. I felt like an idiot.’’

  More than that, he realized, she’d felt rejected. And why wouldn’t she? It wasn’t as though he’d bothered explaining what had been going on inside him. What still was going on inside him, he knew, feeling the anger roil within. He glanced at his arm, at the mark of the flying serpent, and wished he knew what the hell it all meant. It was probably a reference to the creator god Kulkulkan, but beyond that he was clueless. Worse, he couldn’t settle his brain enough to think it through.

  How was he supposed to lead the others when he could barely control himself?

  ‘‘I’m sorry.’’ When she tried to pull away, he pressed his hand over hers on his cheek, which was as much of a hug as he dared give her until he got said what needed to b
e said. ‘‘Over the last few days I’ve been having . . . moods, I guess you could call them. Anger attacks. Only it’s not my anger, not really me, like it’s coming from outside me.’’

  Her eyes sharpened. ‘‘From the barrier?’’

  ‘‘Or something.’’ He wasn’t yet ready to verbalize his deepest fear: that somehow the Banol Kax had gotten a foothold inside his head. Looking at his forearm, he said, ‘‘And then there’s this. The flying serpent.’’

  ‘‘Jade couldn’t find that specific mark in the archive, and none of the winikin remember having seen anything like it before,’’ Leah said before he could ask. ‘‘Red-Boar thinks it probably means you’re bound to the creator god Kulkulkan through your Godkeeper mate.’’ She paused. Grimaced. ‘‘You know, the Godkeeper mate you don’t have because one, the god didn’t come through the barrier during the solstice because I’m ‘only human’ ’’— she emphasized the phrase with finger quotes—‘‘and two, because neither of us is sold on the predestined-mates thing.’’ Her grin went a little crooked and she didn’t meet his eyes. ‘‘I’m not looking for long-term, and we both know that a couple of dreams and some hot sex does not necessarily a lasting relationship make. And besides—’’

  He touched a finger to her lips, cutting her off. ‘‘Don’t,’’ he said, as a whole bunch of messy emotions crowded around inside him. ‘‘Don’t talk yourself out of believing in what’s happened between us.’’

  To his surprise, her eyes filled. ‘‘Why not? What good does it do me to keep thinking about something that’s going nowhere? You’re afraid that if we’re lovers then the gods—the prophecies, whatever—are going to demand me as a sacrifice. I get that. I even appreciate it, because I’m nobody’s sacrifice. But if that’s the case and we can’t even talk to each other, never mind sleeping together, what’s the point of me being here at all?’’ Her voice went thin. ‘‘It sucks going to bed alone every night, knowing you’re right across the pool deck, and knowing that you’ll buck tradition by having me here, but you don’t want me enough to take it all the way.’’