by Karen Chance
“Yes, Lady!” Rhea scribbled fiercely.
“And arrange for Elias’ body to be sent back to the Circle. Tell them he deserves a hero’s funeral. He died in the line of duty, helping me.”
“Yes, Lady.”
“And call a guy named Augustine—he has a shop downstairs—and tell him I want clothes for the kids. He can pony up or stop calling himself couturier to the Pythia!”
“Yes, Lady. And—and what are you going to do?” she asked, looking worried, as I stood up and shoved the Tears back into my pocket.
“Get some insurance.”
• • •
The great seat of the demon lords still looked like a municipal building, and a run-down one at that. There were boring benches framing a utilitarian lobby, ugly beige carpet fraying in spots, and a ficus-in-a-tub struggling not to die. Or at least, that’s how it appeared to me. What it really looked like was anyone’s guess, since the lords had their meeting place in the Shadowland, the demon realm closest to earth. It was near enough that my power worked, if only intermittently, but far enough away that nothing about it would have made sense to a human’s mind. Or to anyone else’s, apparently, which was why the beings who controlled this place had glamouried the city to make it appear blandly familiar.
A little too familiar.
I didn’t look at the spot on the carpet where Pritkin had fallen. I could see it in my mind, like the whole thing had just happened, could see him hitting down and then lying there, so motionless. As pale and frozen as a statue.
Or a corpse.
But I didn’t look, because it didn’t matter. Any more than any of the other places he’d been injured did. He was coming back and this would all be over soon and it didn’t matter.
I also didn’t try to see behind the glamourie. It was boring, but considering the alternative, I was okay with boring. And it was my fault anyway. The spell pulled images from the viewer’s own mind, because thousands of people came here from all over the demon realms, making “normal” subjective. Supposedly this was what I found nonthreatening.
Like the disguise worn by one of the two demons who entered a moment later, through the swinging doors in the back.
“What are you doing here?” Rosier demanded, striding over and looking annoyed. Whether that was because I’d showed up where humans weren’t supposed to be, or because I hadn’t waited for him at the hotel like a good little girl, I didn’t know. I also didn’t care.
“I didn’t come to see you,” I told him, my eyes on his companion.
Adra, short for Adramelech, was a being so old that he figured in earth’s earliest mythology. And he didn’t figure well. It was hard to know which of the horror stories told of him were true, since I hadn’t had time for more than a quick Google search. But I’d read enough to doubt that he actually looked like an elementary school teacher.
The current head of the demonic council was blond and round-faced, with the deceptively bland features of someone using a glamourie as a courtesy, to keep people like me from having nightmares, and not because he was actually trying to fool anyone. His only concession to credibility, or possibly vanity, was a cleft in his chin. It was deep and round and made him look like somebody had poked the Pillsbury Doughboy in the face instead of the tummy. And it didn’t even help, since it only highlighted how fake the rest of the face was.
He smiled, and it was bland and unassuming, too. “Pythia.”
“I have a problem,” I told him abruptly.
“One that you have solved, it would seem.” He was looking at the pocket with the Tears, although there was no way he could have known what was in there.
“I’m talking about my acolytes.” I pulled out the bottle. “I took this away from them while they were searching for more.”
“For what purpose?”
“What is that?” Rosier interrupted, eyes narrowing on the little vial in my hand.
“That’s the problem,” I told Adra. “I don’t know for sure—”
“You don’t know?” Rosier repeated. “Where did you get it?”
“—but they might be trying to use it to bring back one of the gods.”
“How?” Adra asked mildly.
“Let me see,” Rosier said, and snatched for the vial, before I yanked it back, glaring at him.
“I don’t know that, either,” I told Adra. “But they have to be dealt with, and there’s five of them, and only one of me, and there’s a chance that they’re not all staying together—”
“They would be wiser not to.”
I nodded. “One was already missing when I saw them, and after what happened, they might have scattered even farther. But I can’t sense them, which probably means they’re hiding out in faerie, like Myra. But their power doesn’t work there, so they’ll have to come back to earth to do anything—”
“You want us to find them for you,” he guessed.
“We can’t find them for her!” Rosier exploded, before I could answer. “My people have been searching all day, ever since you mentioned the damned things, and there’s not a vial of Tears to be had for love or money anywhere. And I mean that literally!”
I ignored him, because that’s the only way to get anywhere with Rosier. He loves the sound of his own voice so much he often forgets to listen to anybody else’s, treating them like background noise. I decided to do the same with him.
“It would help,” I told Adra. “I have to do this, but I can’t let them run amok in my absence, and there’s no one else who can deal with them—”
“I am not certain we can deal with them,” he said quietly.
“But you’re the demon council—”
“Something that is less than useful when dealing with the crooks of the merchant class!” Rosier spat.
“And they are channeling the power of one of the old gods,” Adra pointed out, without so much as a glance at Rosier. He must have been used to him.
“But they’re not gods,” I reminded him. “They’re human.”
“A fact that does not make their power any easier to counter.”
“Those bastards would sell their own mothers for what I’ve been offering,” Rosier grumbled. “And probably throw in their daughters, too, yet not a single one has so much as seen the formula! It’s of no use to anyone here—”
“It’s a lot easier than it will be dealing with the real thing,” I told Adra. “If they succeed in bringing him back—”
“If. They’ve had long enough to try. Your predecessor died more than three months ago.”
“But Apollo didn’t.”
“Not that it stopped one of the crooks telling me he could find some, if I ponied up enough to pay off the right people,” Rosier complained. “When everyone knows he’s rich as Croesus! I told him, if I was desperate enough to hire mercenaries for a raid on the Circle’s supply, I could do it myself without paying him an exorbitant fee as a go-between!”
Adra’s eyes narrowed. “What does Apollo’s death have to do with this?”
“The Tears only work on earth,” I said, “or somewhere with a link to earth. Or a crack—”
“You think Apollo’s transition through the barrier weakened it, making it possible to shift someone through?”
Damn, he was quick. “I don’t know,” I repeated, because I didn’t. “But one of the acolytes mentioned that she’d been talking to Ares on a regular basis and she shouldn’t be able to do that. She shouldn’t be able to talk to him at all. Apollo could talk to Myra because the Pythian power was originally his, and he always maintained a link to it. But none of the other gods were ever able to get messages through before. Yet suddenly Ares is communicating with earth all the time? Something changed.”
“What is all this?” Rosier asked, finally waking up to the fact that no one cared about his useless search. “What are you talking about? The
gods aren’t coming back.”
“One of them already did.”
“Yes, and fat lot of good that did him!”
“But he got through—”
“Only to be eaten by Rakshasas.” He looked disgusted. “The mighty Apollo taken down by filthy scavengers—”
“But he got through,” I ground out. “That’s the point—”
“No, the point is that we need some of those so-called Tears. Now, do you have them or not?”
“Yes!”
Rosier blinked, as if surprised that I’d yell at him.
Adra’s eyes narrowed slightly. “If the barrier is weak enough for your acolytes to shift Ares through, why haven’t they already done so?”
“Maybe they don’t have enough strength yet. There’s five of them, but their ability to access the power is limited—”
“Unless they find some Tears to boost it.”
I nodded.
“We will find your acolytes,” he told me abruptly. “If they remain within our reach.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t known I was holding. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me, Pythia. Just return from this errand of yours quickly. Unless I am much mistaken, we have a war to fight.”
Chapter Fourteen
My epic journey fifteen hundred years back in time ended on something cool and wet, with stars spinning wildly overhead. For about a second, until I collapsed. And was treated to the sight of a dozen pissed-off faces circling me in a merry-go-round of annoyance.
Or maybe that was just one, because they all wore Rosier’s sneer.
He really did look like Pritkin sometimes, I thought vaguely, and then I passed out.
I came around what I guessed was a while later, since the sun was now shining in my eyes. It was intermittent, though, like it was flirting with a bunch of clouds. I finally realized that it wasn’t clouds but ancient demon ass, and I wasn’t flirting with it so much as rhythmically smashing into it. It seemed that Rosier had decided to act like his son for once, too, and had thrown me over his shoulder.
I bounced along what did not appear to be a road so much as a rock-strewn hillside, and thought about throwing up. But breakfast had been a while ago, and it decided it liked things where it was. So it and I continued to jolt along, because the many things Rosier got others to do for him must have included hauling around half-unconscious women.
’Cause he sucked at it.
Fortunately, I was only awake occasionally over the next few hours; either that or the head lothario of the incubus clan wasn’t in nearly as good shape as his son. Because the next time I opened my eyes, he was struggling through some marshy field and cussing up a storm. And then later panting across some sort of hill. And then finally dropping me at the edge of a wooded area, with all the care of a guy hauling a bag of sand.
And then cursing some more, because he appeared to have lost a shoe.
It was dark again, so I watched the stars through my lashes and vaguely wondered what some ancient Celt would think, coming across a half-decomposed Ferragamo in a week or three.
I decided I didn’t care.
The cursing finally slowed down, and I risked turning my head to the side. And was greeted by the unlikely sight of a usually elegant demon lord furiously rubbing two sticks together.
I blinked, but the image remained the same. And—bonus—it was mostly steady. I decided to try offering an observation.
“You could always just use magic.”
My voice cracked alarmingly, but the idea got through. Because a malevolent green eye stared at me through a fall of sweaty blond hair. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
The stick rubbing recommenced.
I watched it for a few minutes before clearing my throat and trying again. “Is there a reason you’re doing that the hard way?”
“Yes! I forgot the matches!”
“And you need them because?”
“Because I don’t have magic right now, as you know perfectly well!”
“But you have that.” I nodded at the man purse he’d been dragging around, along with me, an overstuffed backpack, and an attitude from, well, you know.
“That is for emergencies!”
“And this isn’t one?”
“No.” He threw the sticks down, panting. “A little cold won’t kill you—”
“Neither would some heat.”
“—but other things might!”
He paused to stick his head in the massive backpack and root around. And I decided to see how propping myself up on one elbow went. It wasn’t comfortable—Rosier had dumped me on the hard bit near the trees while keeping the nice soft grassy stuff for himself. But I didn’t pass out again, so okay.
“Such as?” I asked as he emerged with a canteen.
“Such as that damned madwoman from Amsterdam,” he grumbled, after taking a long swig.
And oh, shit. I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to ask Rhea how Cherries had found us. I’d forgotten, what with Jonas and the acolytes and the forty-seven other things I’d had to do.
“Oh, don’t look so guilty,” Rosier told me sardonically. “While you were lying around the suite, I took care of it.”
I was about to respond to that the way it deserved, but then he passed the canteen over. And I drained half of it before I came up for air, then pulled it back protectively when he tried to snatch it again. Oh God, that was good.
“Took care of it how?” I gasped, after another drink.
“By knowing who to ask!” Rosier snatched it back, frowning at the weight. “Did you have to drink the whole thing?”
“I didn’t, and took care of it how?”
This time I got an answer, maybe because it allowed him to show off.
“I discovered that witches—of whom the Pythia is one, despite current appearances—are drawn to magic,” he told me, starting to saw away with the sticks again. “Any magic. And the more power that is expended, the brighter the signal.”
“And the Pythian power—”
“Is about as bright as it gets. That’s what tripped us up in London, and again in Amsterdam: we stayed too close to the entry point. We put a big spotlight on ourselves, and then stood right by it. No wonder they found us!”
“So this time, you hauled me away.”
He nodded. “Far away. It seems that the Pythias are especially sensitive to the use of their own magic, as you might expect, although anything might be enough to put them on the scent—”
“Them?”
“—and the last thing we need is a posse of pissed-off Pythias—how’s that for alliteration—”
“Posse? What posse?”
“—on our trail. But thanks to me, they now have to find us the old-fashioned way, don’t they? And they may find that a bit more of a trick,” he finished, looking amazingly smug.
Smug and clueless.
“Who is ‘they’?” I asked carefully. “You mean the Pythia of this era?”
“Among others.”
“What others?”
He looked up in order to roll his eyes at me. “The Pythias whose times we just violated the hell out of—what do you think?”
“What?”
He nodded. “All the Pythias. From all the times you just dragged me through—”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No!”
“Yes. Did you really think you could expend that kind of power and no one would notice?”
I looked at him in horror. “But . . . but they couldn’t . . . But we didn’t . . . We only stopped here—”
“But it’s like a freeway, isn’t it?” Rosier asked, sawing away and looking insanely unconcerned. “You get on, you get off, but it’s not as if you disappear in between. Not as if that part doesn’t count. Y
ou can’t tell the officer who pulls you over, Yes, sir, I know I was speeding, but it doesn’t matter since I’m just passing through—”
He broke off, possibly because I had just reached out and grabbed him. And dragged him through his nicely arranged pile of twigs and moss, scattering it everywhere. And causing a couple stray sparks to flare and then abruptly go out, making him curse, but it didn’t matter. None of it mattered, because we were about to be so very, very dead—
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded.
“What is wrong with me? You! You are what is wrong with me! You and a dozen Pythias—”
“Be quiet!”
“Like hell I’ll be quiet! I can’t fight—”
“No, you can’t! And right now, neither can I. And there could be brigands in these woods—”
“Brigands? Who cares about brigands? Did you hear me? I can’t fight a dozen Pyth—”
A hand came down over my mouth. “Shut. Up.”
“You shut up!” I tore away from him. “You didn’t mention—you didn’t say anything about—”
“Why should I have to?” he demanded. “You’re the Pythia—”
I pointed a shaking finger at him. “And you know damned well—”
“That you know nothing? That you’re the most ridiculous choice to hold that office in memory? To have the power of a goddess wielded by an incompetent child . . .” He broke off at my expression. “Oh, what?” he demanded, throwing out his arms. “Have I dented the divine pride? Hurt the heavenly ego? Offended the omnipotent—”
“Shut up!”
“And if I don’t? What are you going to do, little goddess? Kill me?”
If I’d had any strength, I don’t know. I honestly don’t know what would have happened. Fortunately for both of us, if there was something below empty, I was sitting on it.
Which, of course, meant we were going to be dead even faster than normal as soon as the posse caught up with us.
“I don’t have to,” I told him unsteadily. “There’s a couple dozen women on the way to do that already.”
Rosier looked at me for a moment, and then sat back on his heels. And craned his neck backward to look at the vast, glittering band of the Milky Way, high above, unobscured by our nonexistent fire. The darkness hid the differences in the face, the slightly more aquiline nose, the slightly less rugged jaw, the completely different expression that separated two men who usually looked less like father and son and more like identical twins.
