This Eternity of Masks and Shadows

by Karsten Knight

  “I tried …” Cairn sobbed into the water, but only bubbles came out.

  Ahna floated even closer. “This is what you wanted, wasn’t it? You and me down in Adlivun, drifting through the underworld into eternity? Only you forgot one thing: I’m a god, and you’re a mortal. I’ll be reincarnated, but once you’re dead, that’s curtains for you. Let’s move the process along, shall we?” Her skeletal fingers closed around Cairn’s neck.

  The last air bubbles escaped Cairn’s mouth as her mother’s grip tightened. She released a silent scream into the water as Ahna’s sunken eye sockets loomed closer.

  A stabbing pain tore through her thigh and—

  Back in reality, Cairn awoke with a heavy gasp. She sucked in breath after breath of fresh, precious air.

  Vulcan withdrew the epinephrine syringe from her leg. “I had to pull you out,” he explained as he quickly unfastened her restraints. “You were hyperventilating. Any longer and I was afraid I would lose you.”

  Even after Cairn was finally liberated and brought her aching body upright, she could still feel the sharp pain of the spikes puncturing her flesh, the burning ache in her oxygen-starved lungs …

  Her mother’s fingers around her neck.

  Vulcan handed her a glass of water. “Drink this. You’ll feel better.” He settled across from her with a pen and a notebook. “I need you to tell me every last thing you can remember from the dream before it fades. No detail is too small or irrelevant. What did you see over there?”

  Cairn stared down at the ice cubes melting in her glass. “Hell,” she whispered.

  Message in a Bottle

  “What do you mean I can’t come?” Cairn asked Delphine. Her voice squeaked with outrage.

  It was their first real fight since they’d reconciled weeks ago. Things had been going so well between them. While Cairn’s investigations had reached a frustrating impasse, and her dream confrontation with Phobetor had revealed no useful clues, she had taken solace in knowing that her relationship with Delphine was growing into something special.

  But now Delphine had dropped a bombshell on Cairn.

  Two weeks earlier, a music producer had listened to one of Delphine’s sets at the Coconut Grove. Apparently, he’d been so bewitched by her performance that he had approached her afterward.

  His offer: to record a jazz Christmas album at the Coconut Grove in front of a live audience. It was an amazing opportunity, and Cairn had been truly excited for her girlfriend. After all, Delphine had deferred her admission to Juilliard to be there for Cairn, and here was an opportunity to advance her music career forward in a big way.

  Only now, hours before the performance, Delphine had shown up on Cairn’s doorstop and asked her to stay home.

  “Please don’t take this personally,” Delphine pleaded as she followed Cairn into the Delacroix’s kitchen. “I’m just so nervous, and I’m worried that seeing you there in the front row will throw me off my game.”

  “Then let me lurk in the shadows of the back of the club. It will be just like old times.” Cairn rummaged through the fridge, in search of something—anything—to stress-eat her feelings away, but she only found a few boxes of Chinese takeout, well past their expiration. She slammed the fridge door in frustration.

  “Any other night, you know I’d want you right there in the front row,” Delphine said. As she watched Cairn comb through all the cabinets, she added, “Have you eaten anything but takeout since your dad left? You do realize it’s the 21st century and you can get groceries delivered now, right?”

  Cairn knew she was being melodramatic, but she couldn’t help herself. “Maybe I don’t feel like cooking for one.” Squall pounced onto the counter and glared at her. “One and a half,” she amended.

  Delphine came up behind her and placed her hands on Cairn’s hips. Softly, she began to sing “The Very Thought of You,” one of Cairn’s favorite songs, while she rocked them back and forth.

  Cairn sighed. “That is not fair.”

  “What isn’t?” Delphine asked innocently, though her fingers had started to roam dangerously along the waistband of Cairn’s jeans.

  “Intimately serenading me with Billie Holliday while I’m trying to stay mad at you.” She felt her rigid body melting back into Delphine’s arms.

  Delphine gave Cairn’s earlobe the lightest of nibbles. “Even when you’re not in the audience, it’s always you who I’m singing to.”

  “The love ballads or the you-done-me-wrong songs?”

  “Honestly, with you, it varies by the hour.”

  Cairn spun around, lips hovering just inches from Delphine’s. “And what kind of hour is it right now?”

  Delphine pushed Cairn up against the cabinets, then lifted her so that she was sitting on the countertop. Cairn wrapped her legs around Delphine and drew her in.

  Cairn found every detail about Delphine intoxicating—the lingering taste of chamomile on her tongue, the sharp intake of breath whenever Cairn kissed her neck, the callouses on her fingertips as they slipped under Cairn’s shirt.

  When their lips finally separated, Delphine glanced at the clock. “You know, I don’t have to leave for another hour …”

  “Intriguing proposition.” Cairn leaned forward and whispered into Delphine’s ear. “But don’t assume this means I’ve let you out of the doghouse.”

  Later that afternoon, the two of them reluctantly untangled from each other and Delphine gave her one last kiss before she walked out to her car.

  “Break a leg,” Cairn called after her. “And don’t leave a dry eye in the house when you hit that high note in O Holy Night.”

  After Delphine had driven off, Cairn sat in the bay window of the Delacroix’s library, watching the snow starting to come down outside.

  In search of a distraction, she had tried to watch television—only to find herself staring at Senator Ra’s image. She’d completely forgotten that his Boston Tea Party celebration was scheduled for today as well. While she still hadn’t worked out what part Ra had played in the deaths of the Pantheon’s members, the last thing she wanted was to party with thousands of Bostonians worshipping the senator while he chugged champagne on a gilded stage.

  Apparently, several anonymous sources had warned of a potential terrorist attack at the event, but Ra just dismissed these with the wave of his hand. “The FBI and Homeland Security deemed none of those threats to be credible,” he told the reporter interviewing him. “And besides, this is a day to celebrate our courageous forefathers, who stood up to the tyranny of those who thought they could intimidate them into submission. What would they think of we caved to a hoax probably phoned in by some disgruntled teenager? This is Boston—we cower in fear to no one.”

  At least the Coconut Grove was several blocks from the Tea Party celebration. Still, she sent Delphine a text reminding her to be careful.

  No longer able to stomach the sight of senator’s smirking face, Cairn turned her attention to the vexing questions that continued to elude her: What was Columbia’s end game? And why had Sedna, as a contingency of her own death, left Cairn the journal from Sable Noir, with no explanation, knowing full well that would only tarnish her daughter’s final memories of her? Was it guilt, a desire for atonement? Had it been to clue Cairn to Columbia’s true identity?

  Cairn reread the journal once more, then again, futilely scouring it for clues. With a frustrated, sigh she dropped it and picked up the other object her mother had left inside the hollowed-out copy of the Odyssey: the spherical silver bell. At the sound of it jingling in her hands, Squall came scampering into the room. He pounced onto the seat beside Cairn and batted at the bell like a boxer pummeling a speed bag.

  “At least someone is getting some use out of this,” she said to Squall. Her mother couldn’t have been more cryptic if she’d bequeathed her a magic 8-ball.

  Cairn tossed the bell across the room for Squall to play with while she went back to brooding. But as the lynx bounded across the carpet, she noticed two
things:

  The bell that hung from the collar around Squall’s neck was identical to the one her mother had left behind.

  And even as Squall blundered around the library, his own bell made no noise.

  Cairn snapped her fingers, beckoning the lynx over. He approached expectantly, assuming there was a treat in store for him, but instead, Cairn groped through his neck scruff until she found the latch of his collar. It slipped off into her fingers. Squall bristled, then danced happily in a circle that translated to “I’m free, I’m free!” before loping out of the library.

  Cairn shook Squall’s bell. While it didn’t jingle like its companion, she could feel something moving soundlessly about inside where the clapper should have been. She held it up to the light and peered into the X-shaped opening. The object inside was beige and round.

  After procuring the tool chest from the kitchen, Cairn slipped the flat head of a screwdriver through the bell’s crack and carefully pried it open, peeling back the metal folds until the mystery object dropped into her lap.

  It was a sphere of cork, no bigger than a ball bearing. Six digits had been branded into its surface: 11.17.01.

  November 17, 2001—the date of the journal’s last entry.

  With an eerie sense of understanding, Cairn ran through the house and down the stairs into the wine cellar. She wandered through the chronological shelves, counting off the years—1997, ’98, ’99—until she arrived at the beginning of the 2000s. The bottle that matched the date from the cork was opaque, making it impossible to see what kind of wine was concealed within. She freed it from the rack and cradled it in her trembling hands as she attempted to read the faded yellow label.

  Cairn took a blind step back, and her heel snagged on an uneven groove in the stones. Next thing she knew, she was tumbling backward. As she went down, the bottle slipped from her sweaty hands. Before she could make a grab for it, she watched it shatter on the stones.

  Instead of wine, black sand exploded out of the broken bottle. As it fanned out across the floor, two pieces of paper fluttered across the ebony grains and over to Cairn’s feet.

  She picked them up with trembling fingers. Both pages she recognized as her mother’s handwriting. One, yellowed with age and perforated along one side, had to be a missing page from the Sable Noir journal—a new entry she hadn’t yet read, torn from the end of the book.

  The other, dated on her 18th birthday, was a letter addressed directly to her.

  After she had finished reading both pages—

  After the shockwave of each revelation had rippled through her—

  After she managed to wipe the tears from her face and pick herself up off the stone floor—

  Cairn found that the façade had melted from the life she thought she knew, leaving an unfamiliar, alien landscape in its place.

  The door to the wine cellar burst open. Vulcan thundered down the steps, looking out of breath. He had a digital tablet under his arm. “There you are,” he panted, relieved. “I really need to show you something.” He noticed the pall on her face and the streaks of tears through her mascara. “What’s wrong?”

  She waved a hand, unsure where to begin to explain what she’d just read. “Seriously long story. What was so urgent?”

  “I’ve been thinking about your dream confrontation with Phobetor,” he explained. “And then it came to me. When you were underwater, and the ash was cascading down around you, I don’t think those were cremated remains like you thought.” He held up the digital tablet and played a video for her. It was a documentary, with dramatized footage of historical reenactors standing on the deck of a ship in colonial-era clothing.

  Vulcan didn’t even have to explain. The realization hit her like a kick in the teeth.

  Everything that had happened on that island nineteen years ago had led to this very moment.

  As they raced out to the boat behind the house, she dialed Nook’s number, only to be sent straight to voicemail.

  “You have to get to the Seaport!” she yelled into the phone. “Something terrible is about to happen …”

  Sable Noir, Part V: Castaway

  Nineteen Years Earlier

  “Sedna, you’re being absolutely crazy,” Ra chided her for what felt like the hundredth time. A bloody medical patch covered the hole in his cheek. “You have to get on the boat.”

  But Sedna planted her feet in the black sand. The others were waiting on her to board the Dreadnought, which they had miraculously freed from the shallows with a little help from Tane’s plant magic.

  “I’ve made up my mind,” she insisted quietly. “I just need a little time alone here to meditate and reflect before I face the real world again.”

  Ra threw up his hands in exasperation. “Fine. Suit yourself.”

  “Ramsay …” Njörun put a calming hand on his arm, but he jerked it free.

  “Let her be a martyr if she wants,” Ra snapped. “Some of us have real lives to get back to.” He stormed off toward the rope ladder Comstock had lowered from the deck and ascended it without another look back.

  Njörun shrugged, face as placid as ever. “We won’t come back from this,” she said cryptically as she walked away. “Stay here as long as you desire. And if you need anything, just find me in your dreams.”

  Nagual didn’t try to plead with her either. He just placed a handle of tequila in the sand. “My favorite reposado. Just in case.” He helped usher Dr. Sibelius toward the ship. The doctor still looked dazed and ashen from losing his daughter—who knew where in the world she had teleported, but the chances of her returning to Sable Noir seemed increasingly slim.

  That girl didn’t want to be found.

  Tane was the last to approach her. “Since I know there’s no changing your stubborn mind, then instead, here’s my counteroffer: let me stay here with you. Believe it or not, forest spirits can come in handy on a tropical island covered in jungle. If you get sick of coconuts, I can conjure you whatever you like.” He spread his hand over the trunk of the nearest palm tree and a grapevine spiraled around it.

  “Tane …” Sedna started to protest.

  Hesitantly, Tane took her hand, his touch delicate as a blade of grass. Longing simmered behind his emerald eyes. “I could use a little time away from the mainland to reflect myself, and I couldn’t ask for better company.”

  Though they’d never crossed the boundaries of friendship, Sedna had always sensed that Tane wanted something more. In a different universe, if she hadn’t met studious but charming Emile—if she hadn’t become pregnant with his child—maybe she could have felt something for Tane, too.

  But the events of the last few months, leading up to the moment when they had drowned that baby, had created a different destiny for her. She gave his fingers a squeeze, then withdrew her hand. “You are a loyal friend, and I appreciate the offer. But I truly just need to be on my own right now.”

  With a grim nod, Tane averted his gaze, sensing a deeper rejection. “How will you get back to the mainland?”

  “Don’t worry about me.” She pointed offshore. A fin whale breached the surface and a geyser spouted from its blowhole. “I command the creatures of the sea, remember? I’ll hitch a ride if I need to.”

  Tane hugged her, but before he left, he waved his hand toward a patch of fertile earth at the forest’s edge. A sprout rapidly emerged, roots spreading outward and leaves unfolding. When it had grown as tall as Sedna, green fruits populated its branches and expanded out like little water balloons. “Guava tree—high in Vitamin C and dietary fiber to keep you healthy,” Tane explained as he walked toward the boat. “Think of it as nature’s prenatal vitamin.”

  Stunned, Sedna opened her mouth to ask how he’d known, but he just laughed and pointed down at her stomach. Without intending to, she’d once again folded her hands protectively over her unborn child.

  After the Dreadnought had finally sailed away, after she’d waved at the ship until the others were just specks standing at the stern, Sedna took
off at a run along the beach.

  On the western side of the island, she arrived at a lagoon surrounded by a tall copse of mangroves. She followed the sound of dolphins chirping until she located two of them in a shadowy corner of the water’s edge, where it was almost too shallow for them to swim.

  They were guarding the bassinet they had retrieved for Sedna after it had floated away.

  At first, as Sedna waded across the cove, she feared the worst. But then the second dolphin nuzzled the side of the bassinet, and the bundle inside responded with a high-pitch laugh.

  A tiny dark arm emerged from the folds of the blankets.

  Sedna chirped. The dolphins cruised away, fins slicing through the water and out into the open ocean beyond.

  Sedna picked up the baby and cradled her. Mami Wata’s expressive brown irises gazed up at her.

  Because Sedna could not bear to kill a child—even one who might one day be responsible for the sinister vision Themis had shown her—she had forged a desperate plan. Her teammates had watched her drown a blanket-swaddled stone, while the real baby drifted away in the bassinet. If they hadn’t been distracted by Aether’s return, they might have noticed the two dolphins towing the bassinet to safety.

  The others could never know that the child lived.

  Sedna took one of the syringes from the leather case that Sibelius had left behind after Aether teleported away. There were only a handful left, but the baby was a fraction of Aether’s size, so Sedna would carefully ration the serum, suppressing Mami Wata’s abilities until she developed a more sustainable plan.

  Predictably, the needle had barely broken the surface of the child’s skin before she began to scream and bawl uncontrollably. Sedna felt Mami Wata’s shrieks raking at the fabric of her soul, filling her with dark, self-destructive whispers.