by Lyn Benedict
“Your turn,” she said, gesturing to the living room.
“What am I guarding against?” he asked. His voice was delicious with sleep, a low rumble in his chest. She wanted to shuck off the clothes, drop the gun, crawl into his arms, and listen to his voice from up close. She didn’t.
“Anything,” she said.
“Something,” he corrected. “You’re afraid of something specific.”
“Snakes,” she said. “I see them, hear them. They’re not there. Not yet. Maybe it’s some warning.”
She waited for him to give her grief, to play the paranoia card, the exhaustion, the hallucinations; instead, he touched her cheek and slid out of bed.
“Put the gun on the nightstand, huh?” he said. “Not beneath the pillow. Be stupid to shoot yourself by accident.”
He stood over her until she laid it down, the soft thunk of it leaving her hand, and kissed her hair, still shower-matted and sex-tangled. “Go to sleep, Sylvie.”
The bed beckoned; she slid into his warm spot and nearly moaned at how good it felt, the smooth cotton, the lazy heat lingering, and his scent, sandalwood and lime, steeped in it. Sleep dragged her down like a sinkhole opening beneath her.
“It’s about time,” a woman said. “Stubborn creature.”
Blue skies arched above Sylvie, a blue so pure and deep that the heavens looked hot to the touch, and shot through with veins of gold fire. Lapis lazuli, she thought, but freed from cold stone; lapis lazuli, alive.
Her eyes watered; she blinked but couldn’t check the tears. She raised her arms before her to block it out and nearly fell from her seat when it proved to be backless.
“Too much, hmm?”
The world shifted. The sky fell in and darkened, turned teak netted with fishermen’s floats in worn and pitted glass. Sylvie’s stone cup of a chair turned to leather and grew a back and arms. The walls shifted from white marble to plaster, and Sylvie smiled. She knew this place, the Mucky Duck, a vacation restaurant she used to go with her family, when she was still young enough to giggle over the waiter’s bottles of string ketchup that they pretended to squirt on customers.
“A dream. This is all a dream. But you’re not,” she said to the voice. Familiar voice. It hadn’t been a wrong number after all. And Erinya had said that Kevin was smart, that he’d find a way to contact her. Guess this was it.
“Quick,” the woman said, making her appearance. A tiny woman wearing something out of Sylvie’s onetime art-history book approached. A toga, Sylvie thought, the woman’s arms bared from fingertip to shoulder bone, showing multiple semicircular scars. No, chiton. But as soon as she identified it, the fabric changed, adjusting itself to the setting. The woman, now sundressed and sandaled, sank onto a stool next to her. “I’m Mnemosyne. Kevin Dunne sent me.”
19
All Gone to Hell
SYLVIE SAID, “DOESN’T HE GET AROUND,” BUT HER ATTENTION WAS gone. Outside the plate-glass windows, beyond the scrubby parking lot, two girls played on the narrow shell-strewn beach, one all gawky legs and windblown hair, racing into her teens, the other a toddler, chasing after her sister so fast that she fell. The older girl turned, dusted the child off, and comforted her with a hug and a smile.
“Things change,” Mnemosyne said, and waved her hand irritably. The window closed over, turned into another netted wall. “You cannot go back. That is the nature of history, that it is in the past. All that can be done is study it, to see the seeds that were planted and anticipate the growth coming.”
“Shut up,” Sylvie said. “I’ve had a long day, and this might be a dream, but I bet it’s not helping my sleep deficit.”
Ignoring her, Mnemosyne continued, “I do not usually involve myself in these matters, but I owe Dunne a great debt.”
“Yeah?” Sylvie said. “Save your life did he? Like a god’s life is worth it. You’ve all lived your share and more.” Sylvie bit her lip and made a note to herself: Dreamworld equaled no rein on her mouth.
“He did,” Mnemosyne said, still placid, which, perversely, Sylvie found more irritating than a relief. “Do you know how we are created, what we are?”
“Power, flesh shell, broken or unmade, big puff of stealable stuff, got the gist.” Sylvie squinted into the dark corners of the empty restaurant and sighed. She was hungry. She was in a restaurant. Didn’t seem right. A waiter loomed out of nowhere, green duck on his white shirt, and asked for her order.
Mnemosyne squeaked and made the moment sweeter. Guess she hadn’t expected the dream to be more Sylvie’s than hers. But just because she set the stage didn’t mean Sylvie couldn’t control it.
The waiter turned around, her food instantly ready; Sylvie sank her teeth gratefully into the French dip, but it tasted nothing of food and everything of memory. Of sandy days, of salty air, of skin gone sticky with seawater, and the ever-present scent of coconut oil and rubber flip-flops. It exploded in her mind like a little bomb, and she set the sandwich down, near tears. Innocence tasted strange on her palate now. Inedible.
“I apologize,” Mnemosyne said. “History lives around me. It is my task to keep it, to record it, to watch it. I am the Muse of history, and I see all.” The bare skin of her arms rippled, and what Sylvie had taken for dozens of tiny scars blinked open into eyes. In each of them, in the heart of the pupils, Sylvie saw bits of her past.
“Stop it,” Sylvie said. Mnemosyne turned her palms up, showing two moments that Sylvie could only identify as Before and After, Then and Now. In Mnemosyne’s right palm, Sylvie saw herself striding across campus, determined, head held high, and anger in her eyes. Portrait of Girl with a Cause.
In the left palm, Sylvie saw a woman with a gun, eyes blacked by shadows and rage, but a curling smile on her mouth. The face of a murderer. L’enfant du meurtrier.
Do you like what you see when you look in the mirror?
“Stop it,” Sylvie repeated, and Mnemosyne closed her hands. Sylvie felt heat in her own palms and realized she’d brought the gun into her dreams, had it pointed at the Muse. “Dunne sent you. Let’s leave the psych tests and parlor tricks behind and get down to business. I’ve found out who’s behind this. Lilith, the Lilith. If he wants to lend a hand, maybe prove his ability to find anyone he’s laid eyes on, he could drop by.”
“Dunne’s busy,” Mnemosyne said.
“I’ve reached a dead end,” Sylvie said. “I need his help. If you’re all about history, you know I don’t say that often or easily.” Her hand tightened on the table edge; a crack ran from side to side, widening. Sylvie tucked her hands in her lap, like a chastened child. Her dream. Her temper.
“Dunne is trusting you to do what he cannot, while he defends your world and himself. Dunne is not a loved god.”
“No one loves a cop,” Sylvie said. Some of her temper faded. History, huh. Mnemosyne might be able to give her some of the answers that eluded her, questions about Dunne.
“Especially not petty-minded greater gods,” Mnemosyne said. “Whose wives were turned inside out and drained to fuel Dunne. Zeus hates him, and he has never been the most rational of gods. When Dunne first came to power, Zeus had to be coaxed into accepting him, and he laid in a caveat: As it was love that allowed Dunne’s ascension, it was love that kept him there. Should love ever leave Dunne, then he was fair game to be destroyed, the power reclaimed, Hera restored.”
“And now his love’s left him, not by choice, but gone all the same,” Sylvie said. “I don’t suppose Zeus had a hand in arranging that with Lilith.”
“No,” Mnemosyne said. “Zeus would rather concentrate on their rivalry than admit any threat could be poised by a human. It’s shortsighted. If Lilith gains power because Dunne is weakened fighting Zeus, the results will be wars across the multiple heavens.”
“Better than on earth,” Sylvie said. “Look, I’m doing my job. Don’t expect me to care or cry for gods. I like Dunne—sort of—but it’s the man he was, the glimpse I get of that, that I like. Not his opinionated justice-freak
god act. And I’m hunting Bran because he’s an innocent, and I’m hunting Lilith because I—”
Beneath her hand, the crack in the table widened, and scales rose to touch her fingers, the faint flicker of a tongue. “Fuck!” She threw herself back and watched the snake slip free, a beautiful, deadly swath of red, gold, and black that poured itself over the edge of the table and vanished.
“Do you see that?” she cried.
“It’s a curse come searching,” Mnemosyne said. “You do make enemies, don’t you?” She reached down and collected the serpent. The coral snake coiled and thrashed in her grip. The eyes along her arm opened to better look at it.
Another sleek head began to protrude from the table crack, and Sylvie said, “So what do I do?”
“Nothing,” Mnemosyne said, and dropped the snake. It curled and hissed, tongue flickering. Sylvie aimed the gun, but hesitated; Mnemosyne didn’t seem concerned, and while gods couldn’t be trusted to care about human lives, they needed her.
“Nothing?”
“It’s questing. It can’t see you. Not cloaked as you are in the scents of others, splashed with inhumanity, and dreaming under my aegis. It’ll vanish with the dawn. A limited sort of curse, all spite and petty arrogance. Borrowed power fuels it.”
Sylvie watched the snakes slipping around her ankles and growled. “A curse on me.” The satanists, she thought, scavenging Dunne’s bleed-off in Miami. The curse alert going active, and Alex on the run. “Can I shoot them?”
“They’re not real to you, as you’re not real to them.”
“I want to hurt them,” she said. They’d made a mistake. Their being human had kept Sylvie from her guns, but now, by stealing power, they’d forfeited that status. She killed monsters.
Mnemosyne shook her head. “Better to elude—”
“No,” Sylvie said. “I’m not going to wait around for them to try again. I want them to see me, feel me, fear me.” At her feet, the coral snakes merged and melded, doubling, tripling, growing in size, until it rivaled the mass of an alligator. Her heart pounded in her ears, panic and rage mingled together.
“Do as you will.”
“I always do.”
The snake suddenly rose and struck, and she dodged on pure nervous reaction. She leveled the gun, and the snake raised itself again like a cobra, and hissed her name, “Shadows.”
“Go away. I’m too much for you to handle,” she said, and pulled the trigger. The bullet blew its head into spatter, and it dissolved back into a dozen or more regular coral snakes, all retreating through the cracked table. “What, giving up so soon?”
Mnemosyne said, “Many people throughout history have taunted their enemies. Many learned to regret it.”
“Shove off,” Sylvie said. “You’ve delivered your message; I’ve given you mine. So the sooner you go, the sooner I can wake up and get back to work.”
Mnemosyne raised her hands, and Sylvie turned her head. “No. No more pretty pictures. Just go. It’s my dream. I don’t want you in it.”
When she looked back, the Muse was gone. Sylvie propped her feet up on the table and noticed that the window to the beach had returned, though the girls were long gone, and night had fallen. Phosphorescent waves curled lazily across the sea, and Sylvie leaned back and watched the sun rise over the water.
Maybe, when all this was done, she’d take a vacation. Make it a long weekend, and pull Zoe out of school. Take Alex, too. They could lie out, watch the tourists burn, and count license plates from around the country. Alex could teach her to parasail, and Zoe could whine when Sylvie wouldn’t let her trot off after cute lifeguards. Maybe it wouldn’t be the carefree time of her childhood, but it wouldn’t be bad at all. Hell, maybe she’d even invite Demalion, if he could be convinced to give up his suits for board shorts.
Sylvie woke to noise with the sensation of having been smiling in her sleep; before she could enjoy it, the ringing phone was answered, and Demalion’s voice, first sharp, went quiet and furtive.
Maybe I won’t invite him, Sylvie thought. ISI, secretive, son of a bitch. She never even considered that he might be keeping quiet out of basic courtesy; he knew the phone would have woken her, hair-triggered as she was.
She ghosted to the door, leaned into the dim hallway, and heard, “. . . condition?” He listened for a long moment, and the answer didn’t please him. He swore into the phone, still at a whisper, then said, “I told you to watch her. What about the other?”
Watch who? Sylvie wondered, though the prickling heat of her resurgent anger suggested a name or two. You trusted him, the dark voice gloated. You thought you and yours were safe with him.
“No, no, there’s no help for it. Bring her in. But discreetly! And be careful with her, she’s an innocent. She’ll be scared.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t send men to scare her.”
Demalion jerked; his eyes widened, and he looked away despite himself. Guilty, Sylvie judged. But of what?
“Got to go,” Demalion said, and set the phone down.
“Why do I think that I’m involved in that conversation? Why do I know I’m not going to like it?” She crossed her arms across her chest, tucked her hands away when he reached for her.
“Sylvie,” Demalion said. He licked his lips. “I—”
“What did you do?” Sylvie asked. “Bring her in. Who’s her?”
“Zoe,” Demalion said. “Your parents are on vacation, and she’s not safe where she is. Her school was canceled on account of snakes in the lockers—”
“She’s my sister. I’ll protect her. Or I’ll arrange protection for her. I thought we had an understanding—”
Demalion said, “Sylvie, please. I’m trying to help.”
“I don’t need your help,” she said. Her hands fisted. She wanted to throw herself at him, but held back, a little uncertain whether angry grappling wouldn’t lead back to the bedroom. And if he was going to betray her, she wanted it to be a point of pride that she walked away first—
“Alexandra Figueroa-Smith is dying.”
Sylvie’s entire body spasmed as if she’d been electrocuted. Cold traced her nerves, made her pant. Her brain locked, repeating those words. Not Alex.
“A curse of some kind. Or one hell of a freak accident. Her jeep overturned. They didn’t find her right away, and when they did, she was covered in—”
“Coral snakes,” Sylvie said through numb lips. She’d driven them off, feeling in control, feeling smug—it was her fault entirely.
Her breath seared her throat, and she realized distantly that she was hyperventilating. Her ankle complained, and Sylvie eased it out from under her, wondering when she’d hit the floor.
Beside her, Demalion crouched, still talking, empty words where one or two percolated through every so often. Paralysis. Neurotoxin. Ventilator. Antivenin. Hours. Sylvie’s mind raced. Shorted out. Started again. Swerved to vengeance. They were going to pay and pay. . . . Dunne could save her. No, Dunne couldn’t save himself at the moment. Mnemosyne had said as much. His attention elsewhere.
So get his attention. You know how. The one thing he can’t ignore. The one thing he’d die for. Sylvie closed her eyes. Impossible. But, if there were no other options, then the impossible had to be done. A scheme unfolded, bit by bit by impossible bit. Sylvie’s breath steadied, her pulse slowed. She looked at her plan through a sniper’s obsessive focus and found it acceptable.
“. . . you on a private flight to Miami,” Demalion said.
“What good would watching her die do?” She ignored the shock that lit his face. “I need clothes, I need your car. I need my phone and my gun.”
“What are you planning?” he said, eyes growing less concerned and more wary. “You’re upset, not thinking clearly.”
“I’m angry,” she said. “I find it clears the mind extraordinarily well.”
20
Waking the Oubliette
SYLVIE ABANDONED THE ISI SEDAN ON A SIDE STREET. DEMALION would figure out where
she had gone; he had all the pieces and had shown himself more than capable of putting them together. Abandoning the car was only a slowing device, but she wanted things played out before he hit the scene. Before he put himself between her and danger. He’d be furious, not only that she left him behind—again—but that she’d used a weakness he confided in her to do so.
She’d allowed his company as far as Dunne’s apartment, Sylvie driving the last mile when proximity keyed the return of Demalion’s blindness. They had changed places in a tension-ridden silence, and Demalion sank into the passenger seat, cradling his crystal “eye.” Once there, Sylvie had taken ruthless advantage of his blindness, of the effort it took him to see through the crystal; she collected what she had come for in a rush, too fast for him to make any sense of it, and hightailed it out of the brownstone.
Her actions had blown the hell out of their truce and set the ISI back on her tail, but it was the only thing she could do. The curse on her had rebounded onto Alex, who had been—mostly—safely out of the way. At her side, Demalion was nothing more than a walking target.
Another wary glance at the storm-churned sky, and Sylvie thought, Better hurry. Chicago was a shadow of itself, a town lit by tempest light, its borders girdled by towering dark clouds, and its people hunkered down in growing panic.
Lightning flickered and licked the clouds, coming not from within them, but from elsewhere. Dunne was on the run, hiding his own storm-cloud core of power somewhere within the sky tumult, and Zeus—Sylvie winced as another sheet of lightning crackled across the face of the cloud, red-violet, bruising the sky—Zeus was hunting. A bird splatted into the concrete near her, a twisted thing half scale, half feather, all writhing movement, before a passing cab smeared it into the asphalt. The cabbie slowed, backed up alongside her. “Car trouble? Lady, you need a ride?”
