I shared life essence with Sanguina. My mother really had fused her eyes into me somehow. The Silvers, as I’d always called them.
The strange part was that I’d had several supernatural factions try to claim credit for the Silvers. And now I knew they had all been lying to me. Even angels had tried to take credit for them.
I’d even spoken with them before, which sent a deep shiver down my spine, now knowing that the Silvers were actually Sanguina’s eyes. Had I been talking to her, or some other Beast? Had the Silvers acted like some kind of Police Scanner out in Celestialtopia?
Now that I thought about it, I’d used the Silvers in any number of ways before—from trapping an angel to navigating the Doors. Silver tears even marked my Horseman’s Mask.
How much of me was Beast and how much of me was Callie?
As alarming as that question was…
It also gave me a boost of confidence.
Because I’d done all of those things with my Silvers. And I’d done it all by myself. Without even knowing what they truly were. Which meant my willpower must be pretty fucking strong. Stronger than I would have thought. I was a natural at being a Beast.
More of a natural than I had been as a Horseman, anyway.
Xylo gasped, pointing at the mirror suddenly. I glanced over to see a horizontal, Silver crescent moon—points up—in the center of my forehead. And Silver tears—three from each glowing eye—streaked down my cheeks like rays of moonlight. The dried blood from the inverted Mark of the Beast I had drawn seemed to have vaporized in that first wave of pain I had felt.
I stared at the symbol on my forehead and I suddenly knew what it said.
“Despair,” I murmured, smiling devilishly, marveling at the Silver warpaint on my face.
Okay, maybe I was getting a good handle on the Horseman thing, too.
Before I could say anything else, the stone floor began to rumble and quake, and I heard a furious scream from far, far away—a vaguely human sound.
Dracula must have caught onto my ploy and thrown a vamper-tantrum. Because that had not been the cry of a man whose sinister scheme had gone according to plan.
That had been the cry of a man at the end of his rope, willing to abandon everyone he had once loved unconditionally and everything he had once held dear, because his heart and soul were now only desiccated husks of ash and regret. A man ready to burn his house down from the front lawn—wearing only his tighty-whities and knee-length dress socks—in full-view of his neighbors.
Because he’d just lost a four hour game of Monopoly to his wife and kids.
It was music to my ears.
I straightened my shoulders and gripped Xylo’s hand, giving it a tight squeeze to let him know I wouldn’t abandon him to his old master. We were bonded by blood, but also friendship.
I wondered which big bad would show up first—Dracula, since I’d ruined his plan and stopped playing his game, or the Beast—who I’d just woken up.
I opened my mouth and cried out at the top of my lungs. “An eye for an eye, Sanguina! Come get some!”
The Beast obliged.
Chapter 30
I found myself standing in a frozen clearing surrounded by a forest of strange, illuminated trees. Except they definitely weren’t trees. They looked more like they had been pulled from a coral reef near the equator, plopped onto dry, frozen land, and then had grown thirty feet tall. They emitted a soothing, pale-blue glow.
Snowflakes as large as bottle caps swirled all around me as if I was in the center of a shaken snow globe, but I felt no wind.
And it wasn’t as cold as I would have thought.
Despite the obviously winter climate, hundreds of flowers grew from the mounds of snow, in vibrant, almost painful, colors that I hadn’t ever seen in nature before. Neon purple and green ribbons of light danced across the twilight sky in a world that had…three moons.
I double-checked to make sure I wasn’t imagining things.
Yep. I’d definitely made a wrong turn somewhere. I’d slipped into a new solar system or something.
At least I could still breathe.
I was unstoppable, now.
“How are you holding up, Xylo?” I asked, my voice echoing across the frozen world. He didn’t answer. I turned and instantly gasped. He stood beside me, but he was entirely encased in a block of dark, purple ice, along with my shotguns. I could vaguely make out his embers and sparks trying to fight off the cold, but they weren’t hot enough to free him from his prison.
I gritted my teeth. “Hold on, buddy. I’ll get you out of there.”
At least I knew he couldn’t die, but it was apparently much colder than I’d first thought. Was I able to survive it only due to my shared life essence with Sanguina? Speaking of…
I scanned my surroundings and instantly noticed that we weren’t alone. A single creature stared at me from across the clearing. The fact that it looked like someone had taken a soldering iron to her eyes let me know this was Sanguina.
And seeing her in person, I wondered exactly how the hell I was supposed to physically fight such a creature. We were entirely different in every way imaginable. It simply wasn’t physically possible. Period. At the same time, I’d always known this would be more than a physical confrontation. Lily had told me it would be a battle of wills.
I squared my shoulders and glared at her. Then I drew my katana very slowly and pointed it at the Beast. “You. Are. Mine.”
Sanguina—although blind—curled her lips at me but did not speak. That meant she recognized the Silver sword, which had been my intent.
I took a step to the side, and Sanguina tracked me. Not entirely blind, then. That was a disappointment.
“I CAN SEE POWER, HUMAN. EYES SEE ONLY SO MUCH, BUT POWER SEES POWER,” her voice screamed directly into my mind.
“What do you want, Sanguina?” I demanded, trying to duplicate Lily’s authoritative godmotherly tone. I’d also decided I was going to speak out loud rather than risk embarrassing myself by trying to converse telepathically. I knew my limits, and Xylo had taught me how bad I was at reading minds. “Why all of this? Why ally yourself with a cowardly snake like Dracula?” I demanded, truly wanting to understand.
Because the Beasts I’d heard about had always partnered with individuals who had already been strong in their own right. Dracula’s only source of strength seemed to be his bond with Sanguina. It didn’t seem like a give and take relationship.
“I WANT AN ALLY. A PARTNER. BUT YOU ARE ALL TOO WEAK.”
I smiled invitingly. “Step right up, honey. You won’t find any weakness from me. I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass, and I’m all out of bubblegum.” Sanguina stared back at me, killing the punchline, so I tried a different tactic. “That means I came here to finish what my mother started. Do you remember my mother? She looked just like me—oh. Wait.”
“YOUR MOTHER COULD HAVE BEEN WORTHY. BETTER THAN HARKER OR THE OTHERS, BUT SHE TOOK MY EYES AND FLED. WEAK. DISAPPOINTING.”
I blinked at that. Harker? Others? What was she talking about?
I felt a sudden blazing fury raging up within me. “Did you know I was inside my mother’s womb when you fought her? That she battled you while pregnant with me? That was the only reason she fled. Not out of fear for herself or any measure of weakness, but to keep me safe,” I snarled savagely. “That isn’t weakness. That’s the strength of a mother. Something you will never understand, you poor, deluded, parasitic worm!”
Silence rang out in the clearing, and I could see I had stunned Sanguina. I realized I was panting, and that I had slammed my katana into the frozen earth. It crackled and flickered with Silver light—something I had never seen it do. I took a calming breath, going back over my words. I hadn’t ever actually thought about my mother’s decision like that before. I’d just been thinking out loud, running on autopilot.
But it was true.
And it was pretty damned cool, actually. In a totally unhealthy, psychotic way—like all true
love.
“I THOUGHT YOUR MOTHER HAD FAILED,” Sanguina finally said. “THAT SHE HAD BEEN WEAK. BUT I SEE SHE HAS GIVEN YOU WHAT SHE STOLE FROM ME, BONDING US IN A WAY I HADN’T THOUGHT POSSIBLE. WE ARE THE SAME, YET DIFFERENT. AND I SENSE OTHER POWERS WITHIN YOU. GREAT POWERS…” She trailed off, cocking her head as she studied me from across the clearing. Her lips didn’t move when she spoke, almost making her look like she was wearing a mask. “WE COULD DO GREAT THINGS TOGETHER. JOIN ME.”
I set my boots into the snow, readying for a fight. “I’m a fan of pants, Sanguina, so you better own a nice dress.”
“THEN WE SHALL DANCE, HUMAN.”
I drew up my Silvers in a way I hadn’t ever done before. A column of flowing silver that stabbed at the Heavens suddenly erupted before me, swirling and spinning like a vortex of molten chrome.
I fed thoughts of all my victories into it, all my wins, all my accomplishments—and how I had done all those things despite usually working all by myself and always having only half the answers or explanations I should have had—because I hadn’t known the truth about my past, the truth about my ties to Heaven, the truth about my parents, the truth about my Silvers.
Yet I had still taken home the victory trophies.
I built upon my tower of power, my tower of victory, drawing up every proud aspect of myself that I could think of.
I had never let myself rely on others to carry my weight. I had welcomed help at times but had never expected it or depended on it.
Long story short, I had always been my own woman.
Never, ever, having to submit or subjugate myself to another person or group or master. Not a church. Not any of the supernatural factions in my city. Not Nate Temple and his gang of monsters and gods from St. Louis. Not even angels or demons.
It was simply part of my spirit. I was not the type of person to curtsy, bob my head, and shuffle about meekly.
I’d never needed someone else. Sure, I’d wanted or desired help from others at times, but true need had never been a motivating factor.
Simply put, I was the antithesis of Sanguina. She needed a host, an ally. Because she was a parasite.
I just needed a goddamned mirror, baby—and someone ballsy enough to tell me that I couldn’t do something.
Because I craved the challenge. The thrill. I wanted a mountain to scale. Some teeth to sink my knuckles into. I wanted a D.i.D. to save—whether that was a Damsel or a Dude in Distress, didn’t really matter to me.
I hungered for a fight. A cause. Someone to avenge.
Hell, it was why I’d briefly gone postal and earned the moniker the White Rose in Kansas City—going vigilante on criminals and putting them six-feet-under when they tried to abuse loopholes to escape justice.
Which makes it pretty clear that I wasn’t infallible. I also wasn’t arrogant and didn’t think I was better than anyone else. To be blunt, it was just that I never really thought to compare myself to others or to care what they might think of my actions. Roland Haviar had taught me to be self-reliant and to have a strong moral code, and I had welded those tenets deep into the foundation of my soul. I’d adopted his code of ethics so strongly that I’d even taken him to task—almost killing him—when he’d broken that code.
Less than two days ago.
So if I found myself stuck between a rock and a hard place, it rarely occurred to me to stay there crying out for help—even if that was the smarter, more efficient, solution.
If I had to wiggle out one centimeter at a time, then that’s what I would start doing. I probably wouldn’t even think of calling out for help until hours later. So, you could definitely say I was stubborn.
Although orphaned on the steps of a church, I’d been lucky enough to have a handful of father figures in my life.
And each of them—in their own unique way—had taught a spindly, snot-nosed, white-haired, orphan girl that if she learned how to define her I, she would own her corner of the world one day.
So I had defined my I.
And it had made all the difference. Because if you had that, you rarely needed anyone else’s opinion. You were only competing with the strongest person you knew.
Yourself.
Just like I’d told Lily.
And as my mind raced with these thoughts and layers of self-analysis, I very pointedly tried to use my limited experience with telepathy to show Sanguina that she had none of these virtues or strengths. That in a vacuum, she was nothing. Because she had never defined her I, choosing to instead measure the value of her existence based on the strength of her partnerships.
Her we.
Which was a recipe for disaster.
Every. Single. Time.
My tower of power screamed as it seemed to reach the stratosphere, climbing out of sight through the wisps of clouds miles above.
I was surprised to see Sanguina’s own tower rising up on the opposite side of the clearing.
Surprised at how itty-bitty it was.
But it was strange, because I could sense the immense level of power she was hurling into it, which meant it should have been significantly taller or wider.
A closer look revealed the reason. Vines of Silver light were actually peeling off her tower and braiding into mine—abandoning Team Sanguina and forcing her to work twice as hard to maintain her tower.
I watched as she panted desperately, refusing to give up, refusing to accept the spears of truth I had mentally thrown at her about her flaws and weaknesses.
The despair I had peppered her with.
That I trumped we every time but one.
When the we was actually comprised of two people who had solidly defined their own I and had joined forces.
I smiled and lifted my palm into the air and gently blew across it.
And my titanic tower of power exploded into a billion Silver butterflays—razor-winged butterflies—that swept out like a tidal wave to utterly annihilate Sanguina’s tower. It collapsed and then evaporated like mist before sunlight.
Sanguina turned to stare at me incredulously with her soldered, empty eye-sockets. I sat down on the snow and slowly, distinctly patted the ground beside me three times in a silent command. Sanguina slowly approached, shuffling her feet as if still reeling over her crushing defeat.
As I watched her approach, I forced myself not to laugh giddily with joy, and instead tried to further analyze her earlier statements.
She wanted a partner. She really was a parasite. She’d spent her life looking for a worthwhile host, only to be repeatedly disappointed.
Did that explain where vampires came from? Some effect of her bond?
She lifted her head, her eyeless face staring straight into mine, having apparently read my thoughts.
“MY HOST WAS NOT STRONG ENOUGH TO KEEP ME SATED. I HAD TO FIND AN ALTERNATIVE SOURCE OF NOURISHMENT. HAVING MY HOST FEED ON THE BLOOD OF HIS BROTHERS AND SISTERS SUSTAINED ME. I DID NOT KNOW IT WOULD BE CONTAGIOUS.”
I nodded in understanding, masking my disgust. She’d accidentally created vampires. Whoopsies. I was just so hangry.
So Dracula hadn’t been strong enough to keep her in line, and she’d been forced to fend for herself in the food department.
And like a child, she’d discovered the joys of snacks.
Taking a little bit here, a little bit there. Some sweet. Some spicy.
But she was malnourished, never having gotten her full-course meal from a partner strong enough to handle her—one who could give her a quality relationship of give and take.
This whole thing was a cry for help. A child demanding attention.
I’d once spoken with Nate Temple, who knew a thing or two about Beasts. The three he had met hadn’t needed blood to survive. But…they’d had a strong partner. A Tiny God or a Maker, as they were also known.
Sanguina had no Tiny God.
She was…Godless.
And as far as I knew, I wasn’t either of those.
But…I was a genetically hybrid Beast, thanks to my m
other’s experiments. And I had access to lots of power in my own right. Maybe that was even better than having a Tiny God for a host. A little bit of home and a little bit of the exotic.
Still, Sanguina had needed proof. In a strange way, it had almost been like those old martial arts movies where the student had to prove they were worthy of being taught by the master.
Except in our case, I had been the master and had needed to prove to the already naturally-talented student that I—unlike the other masters who had disappointed her lately—could help her become the best martial artist the world had ever seen.
Sanguina really was an unruly child, not knowing how else to get what she needed. And the fact that she was naturally powerful only made her more dangerous.
She sat down meekly before me, a faint smile tugging at her cheeks. She’d finally accepted her defeat, and now she was practically radiating eagerness for us to team up. I grunted. This was definitely the strangest altercation I’d ever had.
And this was only Round One. I had plenty more still to do.
“First, you’re going to unfreeze my buddy, Xylo.”
She glanced over at him and the ice abruptly melted. Xylo stumbled, looking around frantically before seeing me seated on the ground with Sanguina. His jaw dropped so fast it fell entirely off.
I reached over, scooped it up and handed it back to him. “Grab my sword and sit down, Xylo. I might need your knowledge of Castle Dracula to ask Sanguina, my new buddy, some questions.”
He nodded stiffly, slamming his jaw back into place and pulling my sword from the ground before sitting down. He stared at Sanguina, fascinated by the majestic creature.
I gathered my thoughts and leaned forward. “Here’s what I want to know…”
Sanguina had no problem answering my questions—no matter how grim some of the answers were. To put it into perspective, Xylo lost track of his jaw three more times during the course of our conversation. And I didn’t laugh about it even once. I was too busy staring at Sanguina in stunned disbelief.
And I had been saving all of my big questions for after I succeeded in reducing Dracula to a sooty smear.
Godless: Feathers and Fire Book 7 Page 19
