by T. A. White
Could the guardian of the lake have kicked them out here? Was the act intended as a help or hindrance?
The fox took a step toward her, stopping when Tate shifted. "Did you visit the lake?"
Tate tightened her grip on her rock. She didn't answer, just fixed the fox with an expressionless stare.
She hated this feeling of uselessness. Seeing Ryu still and silent, unable to protect himself, had added another element to a situation that was already high pressure.
His unconsciousness limited the actions she could take. Awake, they could have run. Right now, she couldn't even attack for fear the fox had friends hiding out of sight.
The words of the fake Jaxon came back to her. He'd survive if he could make it back. Vague words meant to confuse, given Ryu's body was right here. Unless his mind was the piece that needed to make the journey.
After all, the lake’s entire purpose was aimed at deceiving the mind, testing it as it peeled back the layers of a person to pry loose their core self. She wouldn't be surprised if the lake hadn't really existed at all except as a shared hallucination.
The Saviors had accomplished stranger things with their ancient technology.
It was possible Ryu was locked within his own mind, unable to get out.
"Tate, don't be stubborn," the fox said.
Tate stilled, a sudden suspicion filling her.
"Remove your mask," she barked.
The fox's irritation had been all too familiar. This person knew her, which meant there was a good chance she knew them too.
"Tate."
"Now, or I summon an elemental."
There was a heavy sigh as the fox reached up, sliding the mask up to rest against the top of her head.
Distinctive hair spilled out from under the mask. Multicolored strands of brown, gold, and black escaped from the sloppy braid she'd pushed into the collar of her shirt.
Shock and disbelief hit Tate as she fought not to take a step back. She should have known. She should have recognized her. There weren't that many Silva with hair so distinctive. Somehow with everything else going on, she'd missed it.
"We both know you don't know how to do that," Gabriella said. She pressed her lips together, her gaze unhappy. There was no shame there, but she didn't look like she was proud of her subterfuge either.
"Why?" Tate asked, pain and sadness strangling her words.
Gabriella started to explain. Her face blanched as a pained cry escaped her before she collapsed to her knees and fell forward. Blood spread along her back.
Christopher gazed at Tate expectantly. "Took you long enough. I've been expecting you for days."
Tate stood frozen, staring in dismay at Gabriella's motionless body. Why had he taken Gabriella out?
Uneasiness spread through her. She felt even less safe in his presence than she had facing Gabriella down.
"What? No thank you?" he asked.
"Why did you do this?"
She didn't wait for an answer, moving across the sand and falling to her knees beside Gabriella. She pressed her hand against the raw puncture as blood seeped out of the hole. It was a nasty wound, with scorch marks on the clothes around it.
From the corner of her eye, she kept Christopher's hands in sight, caution heightening every sensation. It felt like death crouched at her back, breathing down her neck.
A soft, nearly inaudible groan came from Gabriella. She was alive. For now.
Christopher had seemed sane when they'd been in the glass lake. He’d been clear and sharp with no hint of his normal madness. Now it felt like they were back to square one.
"I saved your life. I think that calls for a little gratitude." His tone was genial as he crossed his arms. On one hand was a chain of metal, each finger tipped in a silver claw. Tate had a feeling that was his weapon. Its properties were still unknown. She hadn't gotten a good glimpse of how it functioned when he shot Gabriella.
Tate's movements were quick and sure as she worked to staunch the blood. The Silva woman might have betrayed her, but she still contained information on the enemy. She might be the only one who could explain just what in the Savior's name was going on.
Tate held a bloody hand out to Christopher. "I need a strip of your tunic."
A snort escaped Christopher. "I don't think so. I have no intention of helping you save her life."
Tate resisted the urge to snarl at him. This version of Christopher was too dangerous to risk angering. Instead, she reached for the bottom of Gabriella’s tunic, tearing off a narrow strip.
She slapped the wad of cloth against the wound, taking another strip and winding it around Gabriella before tying it tight over the wound. Hopefully, it would help staunch some of the blood.
"I don't know why you're bothering. Even I can see how her betrayal has affected you.”
"She's a lead. One you might have destroyed." Tate couldn't help her subtle dig.
"Pity that."
"Why did you hurt her? We weren't in danger. She was talking to me," Tate asked, channeling a calm she didn't feel.
"Was she? Or was she stalling? You’re not always good at telling the difference." Christopher wandered over to Ryu and peered down.
Tate bit her lip to keep from objecting when the hand with the gauntlet strayed in Ryu's direction.
"Where's Peter?" she asked abruptly.
"Around. He should be back soon enough."
Likely with more weapons and back-up.
"What happened to you after the avatar sent you away?" Tate asked as she rolled Gabriella onto her side. She bent her head, placing it close to Gabriella's nose to check her breathing. It was strong despite the wound.
Tate sat back in relief, nearly swallowing her tongue when she found Gabriella's eyes open, watching Tate with unexpected alertness.
Tate started to ask her a question but stopped at an abrupt shake of Gabriella's head. Gabriella flicked her eyes at Christopher in explanation.
Tate nodded. Good point. If Christopher realized Gabriella was conscious and alert, he might take steps to rectify that.
"We woke up a couple of miles from here at the base of the cliffs," he explained.
She'd been right. The guardian had been responsible for where they'd been placed. She supposed it was a good sign they'd landed near the cliffs instead of the middle of the dunes.
Still, it didn't explain how he'd managed to find a relic of the ancients so quickly. For she had no doubt that’s what the gauntlet was. A relic designed to create or destroy based on the user's whims.
"It's been a couple days since he ejected us from your visions." Christopher held up his hand. "I picked up a few accessories nearby. Peter knows all the best Silva stashes."
"How is that possible? It's only been a half an hour at most."
"Time is not always linear. The minor gods have always been good at manipulating it and our perception of its passage." There was a hint of bitterness in his words which she suspected had to do with the shadow creature she'd seen from his vision.
Perhaps the Jax lookalike wasn't the first or second minor god he'd come across.
She sensed poking at this wound further would make him more unstable. To distract him, she asked, "Can you check the area to see if there are more of her companions waiting?"
Christopher looked up from where he studied Ryu. "Why do I sense you're trying to get rid of me?"
Tate's smile was hard, the look in her eyes flinty. "Because I am. I should have listened to Ryu when he said kill you."
"Probably." He lifted his gauntleted hand for her to see, letting the sun dance across the metal. "But now the tides have turned once again and you'll find I'm not such easy prey."
"I took your last little toy from you. There's nothing to say I won't take that from you too."
He studied her, his face expressionless. A quicksilver smile dawned as he swept her a courtly bow. "As the lady wishes."
Tate didn't release the breath she was holding until he was out of sight.
She flipped Gabriella onto her back. "That won't distract him long. Talk, or when he comes back, I'll let him finish what he started."
Gabriella's eyes were considering as she met Tate's gaze. Tate let her see the depth of her resolve. This wasn't the time for niceties or mercy. If Gabriella didn't start being useful, she'd let Christopher have her. She might have nightmares about her actions later, but this was bigger than just her. Ryu's life hung in the balance. She wasn't going to let him down.
"There's a prophecy handed down to us by the Savior known as Jaxon Kuno. My people have passed it from mother to daughter and father to son for more generations than we can count."
Tate waited.
"In it, we were told two people would come to us. One would be someone Jaxon trusted with his life but who deceived and betrayed him in the end. The other would be the person Jaxon had selected to carry the hope of the new world."
It didn't take a genius to figure out the Silva had identified Tate as one of these two people.
"And which were you told I am?"
She already knew the answer. She just wanted to hear Gabriella say it.
"The deceiver."
"Is Tala part of this?" Tate put her own feelings aside. This was bigger than her. She needed to know how deep the deception ran.
"No. Neither of us knew this was coming until you were already taken," Gabriella said around a wince of pain.
Tate couldn't summon any regret for her discomfort. She felt numb and detached from her feelings. It turned out Ilith wasn't the only one who could think like a predator while sinking deep into the cold rationality of logic, divorced from emotion. It brought her little comfort.
"All signs point to the deceiver having risen." Gabriella struggled to sit up, relaxing when Tate pressed her back down. "If you passed through the lake unharmed, it means you're not that person."
To Tate's surprise, there was relief in Gabriella's face at this revelation.
"Thin logic," Tate said, unable to let it go.
Gabriella's huff of amusement was tired and pain-filled. "You never would have made it out of the sand if you were. The guardian at the heart of the glass would have destroyed you."
"You assume the deceiver isn't more powerful than one of Jaxon's constructs," Tate observed.
Gabriella grimaced, her eyes sliding shut as pain filled her features. "I choose to believe you are who I thought you were. It is enough."
Perhaps for Gabriella, but maybe not for the rest of her companions.
"The minor god tested you. The others will have to believe now." Gabriella let her head fall back.
Tate wasn't so sure. Zealots were unpredictable. It was there in the name. Uncompromising fanaticism against all logic and reason. It was why she was so suspicious of the guardians. Faith was a powerful tool. It held society together in times of strife, but it also compelled people to commit heinous acts they would normally abhor. When blind faith inspired you to compromise your ethics and morals, Tate thought something might be wrong in the belief system.
The chances of the rest of the Morain giving her a pass simply because she walked through the glass lake were small. She wouldn't want to leave the fate of Ryu or herself up to such nebulous odds.
"Why did you think it might be me in the first place?"
That was the part Tate didn't get. Gabriella and Tala knew Tate. They might not be the type of friends who met each other for gossip over tea and cookies, but she had thought they knew her character better than this.
"The Harridan isn't as she was," Gabriella said. "Our kind are long-lived but occasionally our oldest protectors become clouded in the mind. They gradually cede control to the animal that rests in all of us until little of the human is left. "
"And you think your Harridan suffers from this?"
Gabriella's laugh was humorless and painful. "I know she does. Most of her inner circle knows. It's only been out of respect for her and the great person she once was that she hasn't been challenged to let the next Harridan ascend."
Tate didn't have to ask what would happen to the old one. Roslyn had been very clear about Silva politics. They were often bloody and savage. The new Harridan wouldn't be able to afford to keep the old one alive, even if it was someone they once respected. Too many would seek to use the old Harridan's life against the new one. There would never be any peace, just endless challenges.
"A stranger came to our lands. He planted suspicion against you before Tala and I were even aware he was a threat."
Tate stiffened. A stranger arriving and whispering in the Harridan's ear secrets designed to threaten Tate. There were a few people she could think of who might fit that description.
It couldn't be Christopher. Not with the way he'd upset the Morain’s plans, but the man her life's blood had resurrected under Aurelia? She could see him playing such a role.
Gabriella continued, unaware of where Tate’s thoughts had wandered. "I don't know how, but he managed to become the Harridan's Ayer. He convinced the Morain you were the deceiver. It wasn't hard. A woman who appears out of nowhere, bearing a dragon of all things." Gabriella bared her teeth in a strained smile. "You see where I'm going with this."
Tate hated to admit it, but she did. In the Silva's place, with their traditions and myths, this prophecy handed to them by someone they probably trusted inherently, she could see why some might have leaped to that assumption.
"I'm sorry you got caught up in our upheaval," Gabriella confessed. Her skin was pale and waxen. Tate checked the bandage for signs of more bleeding, relieved when she saw no new evidence of blood. "I didn’t know about any of this until after you were taken, and by then it was too late. We had our part to play and I could only hope you would survive the lake."
There was the smallest sound from above. Tate knew what she'd see if she looked. The guardedness on Gabriella's face and the way she stiffened as if she wanted to rise but knew better told Tate the situation had shifted again—and not in their favor.
Tate braced as she rotated, glancing up to where Christopher crouched on the rock like a giant, wingless bird of prey.
"Oh dear, what are we to do now?" he asked, peering at them with a clinical detachment. "Your kind has always been ridiculously hardy. It's what makes you so difficult to kill. I'll have to make sure I take that into account next time."
Gabriella reached up and squeezed Tate's wrist in warning. Tate didn't know if it was by accident or design but the Silva's grip rested on the relic of the ancients Tate carried embedded in her skin. It was a reminder Tate wasn't as defenseless as she might seem.
"Christopher, I didn't expect you back so soon." Her arm slid out of Gabriella's grip as she rose, her focus locked on the dangerous man in front of her.
He shrugged and glanced around. "Not much to see out here but rock and sand."
"Are we going to have a problem?" Tate asked.
He fixed her with a stare. "I don't know. Are you going to try to protect the creature at your feet?"
They were going to have a problem, Tate concluded.
Her right arm burned, the ancient artifact there heating as it prepared for use.
"Would Peter understand you killing one of his kind?" Tate asked as pain burned through her skin and a gossamer thin thread of silver liquid seeped from one of the geometric designs.
It slid down her finger, dripping onto Gabriella. The Silva made a small sound as the silver beaded before rolling to the edge of Gabriella's bandages and disappearing under them.
Christopher shrugged. "Peter knows what I am. It wouldn't be the first time I've had to kill in pursuit of our goals. The Morain are zealots, blindly following a thousand-year-old doctrine from a man whose motives were unclear at best. They never question and never stray."
"I don't know. I can see a definite resemblance between you and them," Tate muttered, careful not to present a threat.
Every geometric shape in the small chain of tattoos wrapped around her wrist and forearm, ending in the web between her t
humb and pointer finger, heated in anticipation. Under normal circumstances they resembled an interesting and slightly unusual tattoo.
So far, the relic had been only intermittently helpful in dangerous situations as Tate struggled to figure out how control it.
That was about to change now that she'd seen the use of a device similar to it in the lake—especially since a few things had worked their way free from the shadowed edges of her mind.
"You disappoint me, Tate. I thought we were finally getting on the same page, our goals similar."
"I thought so too." In the last few days, she'd seen a different side of Christopher—the man he might have been if not for the event that changed the course of his life. "But I'm not going to let you kill someone just because she's an inconvenience."
Christopher straightened, a strange wistfulness in his features. "It's too bad. I think we might have been friends under different circumstances."
"I think you might be right."
She'd seen the pain on his face when he was confronted with his past, caught the barest hint of what tormented him. She didn't quite understand everything he was doing or why he was doing it, but she got the sense his motives were pure—if misguided.
They both stared at each other, the chasm between their beliefs seemingly untraversable.
Tate released a long breath, letting go of all her tension as she reached deep for a sense of calm, if not peace. Peace wouldn't allow her to do what she needed to do, but calm would.
Her hand and arm tingled, the need to materialize the weapon building until it buzzed through her senses with a siren's demand.
Her body settled, expectation pressing in around her. She didn't let herself feel fear or dwell on the knowledge of what would happen should she fail.
None of that mattered.
Only she and Christopher existed in this moment. Everything else was a distraction.
He'd try to end her in one shot. He was nothing if not predictable. He'd want to keep his distance, too. The chained gauntlet on his hand was capable of defense, though Tate doubted he knew that.
He'd be hampered by the newness of the relic, not quite synced yet. She could use that.