“So,” the shaman said, her dark eyes moving over each of them. “Tell us what you seek.”
“The forces of Heaven wish to cleanse the earth,” Pestilence said. “We are not interested in being tools for that purpose.”
“What does interest you?” Atsa asked. His wolf sat beside him, her yellow-moon eyes bright in the firelight.
“We are going to find the seals,” Pestilence said. “In order to stop the Apocalypse. One of the Fallen has offered to place them somewhere safe.” She shrugged. “We are not sure we trust him.”
Nascha was silent for a moment, her eyes glimmering with tears. “So, all is not lost, then.”
“Some things,” Pestilence said, locking gazes with her. “But not all.”
The shaman dropped her emotion like a cloak, her gaze becoming impassive. “And what makes you think we know the location of the seals?”
“You said before you knew of the coming darkness. It seemed a wise place to start,” Pestilence said. “The Fallen told us to find the demon Sassafras. Do you know her?”
Nascha exchanged a glance with Atsa. “Sassafras is a nomad, so she is not easy to find. But we do know someone who can help to locate her. She is the keeper of many secrets.”
The fire flickered and the gazes of all four Riders rested like mountains on the old woman.
Nascha said, “We call her Spider Woman. She is the creator of the world, according to our people.”
“Where do we find her?” War asked.
“She lives in a place far beneath the ground.” Nascha picked up a stick and poked the fire, sending a swirl of sparks up through the hole in the apex of the hogan. “You can find the entrance to her lair, but once within, she finds you. If she wishes.”
“And if she doesn’t?” Famine asked.
Nascha shrugged. “She might eat you. Though mostly she prefers children.”
Death let out a laugh. “I don’t think she’ll find us appealing.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Nascha said, her tone holding no humor.
“I can take you to the entrance of her realm,” Atsa said. “It is west of here.”
“Thank you,” Pestilence said, her dark eyes meeting his for a moment. “You’ll need to ride well ahead of us as we travel.”
He blinked. “Ahead of you? Why?”
“Because we can’t let the angels know our plan,” Pestilence said. “And that means when we ride, the Apocalypse unfolds with us.”
Chapter Four
Famine/Felicity
As Famine watched Pestilence speak to the shaman, she felt a war brewing inside her. A shiver of dissonance. The thoughts and feelings of the woman she had been, and the new knowledge of the being she had become. What exactly she was now… who exactly she was now… she didn’t know.
She twisted the silver ring that Beziel had given her. Memory tugged at Famine. She remembered a ring her father had once given her, as a small girl. It felt strange to think of her life before. That time when she wore perfect white dresses with mother-of-pearl buttons, rather than the black corset and collar of raven feathers she now wore around her neck. That time when she was afraid all the time. That time when she was weak.
Now she was strong, so very strong.
Famine felt eyes upon her and looked up to find the shaman staring.
“You fight a battle in your soul,” the old woman said.
Famine said nothing, only dropped her eyes to the flames burning in the center of the hogan.
“Each of you has undergone a great change,” the shaman continued. “As the caterpillar goes into the cocoon and emerges with wings.”
Famine saw Pestilence flick her eyes over to the shaman. The other two did as well.
“It doesn’t matter that you now have these wings. What is important is the direction you choose to fly.”
“We made our choice already,” Famine said softly. “We already told you, we’re not acting under Heaven’s orders.”
And Famine remembered the angel in the church—well, she had thought him an angel at the time. Beziel had hidden his true form from her. She realized that everything she had ever known, every lesson of right and wrong and good and evil that her mother had taught her, none of it had been true.
Or maybe it had been. Her mother had taught her that God was vengeful. It made sense that his angels were the same. They had given her—given them—these powers to destroy the human race. They called it a necessary cleansing, but it was an annihilation. And what was worse, this new part of her, the part that was powerful and strong, it wanted nothing more than to carry out that mission. It fought against her, not in a violent way, but like a sweet note of song, wrapping around her, tugging, seducing. She didn’t know sometimes which part of her was in charge, and she could feel herself treading water against the incoming tide within her.
The shaman nodded. “You made a choice, yes. Many more choices lie ahead. That journey will be all the more difficult if you continue to fight within yourselves.”
“But how can we not?” Famine said. She didn’t know if she had the strength to choose again. “I feel as if…as if two people live inside me.”
Pestilence nodded in agreement.
“You fear the darkness,” Nascha answered. “But we all have darkness within us. Embrace the darkness. Don’t fight it. But also embrace the light. Without one, the other cannot exist.”
“How can we embrace both dark and light?” War asked, raising a brow.
“Life is balance,” the shaman said. “You will need both your darkness and your light to overcome what lies ahead.”
Silence fell around the fire. Famine could feel some of what the other Riders felt, through the connection that spanned between them. She hadn’t known them before the transition. She’d only known Death. Dynah. And even her just barely. But what they felt mirrored her own turmoil: confusion, power, exhilaration, fear, and beneath it all, that ever-present burn of fury. The core of it all that had brought them together.
She wanted her power. She couldn’t go back to being the scared, helpless girl she was before. She wouldn’t. But she was also terrified of losing that part of herself she recognized.
“We should go,” she said, standing in one swift movement, cloak swirling. “They’ll wonder why we aren’t riding.”
The others nodded. Pestilence turned to Atsa. “Ride out ahead of us. We will follow behind at a safe distance.”
The shaman’s apprentice nodded and rose to his feet. Famine watched as the shaman pulled him to the far side of the dwelling, whispered something in his ear, embraced him. She watched as the shaman approached Pestilence as if to also embrace her, then went rigid and kept her distance. Atsa cast a glance over each of the Riders, then ducked out of the tent. A moment later she heard hoofbeats as he galloped away.
Stars had popped out overhead in the darkening sky when the Riders stepped back outside. They mounted back up, and the shaman stood in the doorway, eyes glimmering with tears. The smell of sage smoke wafted out into the night. Atsa’s wolf howled as if summoning them.
And they rode. As soon as they cleared the homes of the Navajo, they let loose their powers once again. Ahead of them by a good quarter mile rode the shaman’s apprentice. They gained on him quickly. He glanced back at the beginning, only once. Famine knew what he saw. Her own magic cutting ribbons through the sky. War’s flames flaring out like a shooting star, Death’s skeleton army, Pestilence’s drain on the colors of everything she passed, leaving strange white paths in the darkness.
He did not glance back again.
Chapter Five
Death/Dynah
Full night fell not long after they left Navajo lands, and darkness kissed the red earth. Nothing but sand and cactus and the occasional butte jutting up like a blade. Coyotes howled in the distance as if mourning their passage. They passed no other living thing.
Death—no, it was more Dynah—thought of how Atsa had looked at her sister, back in the shaman’s home. She knew P
enelope had met him right before everything changed. What had occurred between them? She regretted not being closer to her sister, not until the very end. They had only just begun to build a relationship. Was there any hope of it continuing, now that they shared this dark burden?
When the moon reached the apex of its journey across the sky, they stopped out on the plains to rest. Or really, for the Navajo man to rest. The Riders and their horses did not need a break. They got off and let their mounts free. The flames of War’s red mare dimmed, Pestilence’s white gelding ceased to glow like a star, Famine’s black mare no longer had universes swirling within her coat, and the swirls of mist encompassing her own pale horse faded away. In the dark of night, standing huddled together, they looked like four perfectly ordinary horses. She wondered if they realized the change that had overcome them; if they battled with it as their Riders did.
“Rest as long as you need to, but no longer,” War said to Atsa. “Time is of the essence.”
The shaman’s apprentice nodded and slid off his horse, then started collecting wood for a fire. The temperature had dropped drastically since the sun had fallen.
Death saw Pestilence and War standing apart speaking softly to each other. Had her sister told her best friend about what happened to their mother? To Roy? She felt the swirl of torment within her again, and for a moment, in the darkness, she could see the faces of her parents floating before her. Dead faces, gray like marble. She flinched and closed her eyes.
“Something’s bothering you.”
Famine stood at her side. She hadn’t heard footsteps approaching.
“I think we all feel a bit… unsteady,” Death responded.
“I feel a lot of things.” She paused, as if contemplating saying more, then added, “It feels good not to be afraid anymore.”
Death looked over at Famine. The other Riders’ eyes were lighter now, just a shade. As if the chocolate brown now held a hint of gold. “Afraid.” She snorted. “Looking back, I think I was more afraid than I let on. Even to myself.”
“How so?”
“My father…” She couldn’t get further words past the crushing tightness in her throat.
Famine nodded slowly. “I understand. That’s how I felt about my mother.”
They looked at each other, not as the beings they were now, but as the women they had been.
“Also… I was afraid after we spoke with the fortuneteller,” Death said. “A coward. I left you there, and I shouldn’t have done that.”
Famine nodded. “It hurt,” she said. “At the time. But we’re not those same women anymore. We’ve become so much more.”
“More…” Death said, her tone both wistful and triumphant.
“It’s been hours, but it feels like a lifetime,” Famine said.
Death nodded. “The things I now know… it wasn’t just magic that we got. It’s history. It’s an understanding of earth and sky and Heaven and Hell and how everything fits together. I feel like…like a clockmaker. As if suddenly, I understand each cog and spring and dial of existence.”
“I know exactly what you mean.” Famine knelt down and touched the dirt. “I can feel the heartbeat of the earth. Every line of energy, every source of power.”
“The stars…” Death turned her head skyward once more. “I can sense them. Hear them, this faint hum at the back of my jaw. Taste them even…”
Famine cocked her head to the side. “I can’t taste them.” She frowned.
“Maybe we each have different powers, different things we connect to. Maybe I can—” She reached out a hand and laid it on Famine’s bare shoulder, closed her eyes. “Now?”
“No.”
Death stepped closer, moved her hand to the soft pulse on Famine’s elegant neck. “Now?”
Famine shook her head.
Death moved two fingers to Famine’s lips, right in the center, as is shushing her. She felt an unexpected rush of heat, and Famine’s eyes locked on hers. And she saw Famine’s eyes flare wide as she tasted what Death tasted. Could feel both her own sense of it and Famine’s.
They tasted… cold. Like ice from the rivers in spring, when the freeze up in the mountains finally releases and lets loose blocks of it like diamonds in the water. But also, they tasted like time. She closed her eyes and lost herself in the sensation. It was a sense of memory, of life and death and rebirth, of permanence and impermanence simultaneously. The passage of the ages with no beginning and no end.
Famine shuddered and stepped back.
“What is it?” Death asked.
“The stars…do you think we’ll live forever, like they do?”
Death went still, so still she did not breath, nor did her blood pulse or her heart beat. “Live forever,” she echoed, just a murmur. “It might be kind of wonderful, don’t you think?”
Famine shivered again. “No. Not if it’s like what the stars feel.”
“I think maybe we tasted different things.” She said the words, though she knew they hadn’t. They’d felt it together.
Famine said, “I haven’t had time to get used to this. To even think about the path before us, let alone what lies afterward.”
“The world was so small before. And now, it’s endless.”
Famine let out a snort that was very much not befitting a Rider of the Apocalypse. “The world was not so small for Dynah Johnston. Though it may have seemed that way to you.”
“You think so?” Death narrowed her eyes. “Being viewed as nothing but your skin and your hair and your eyes. Your shell. Talk about confining.”
“Skin!” Famine scoffed. “Don’t talk to me about skin. My entire world was defined by my skin. But it didn’t open doors for me. It closed them. All of them.”
Death fell silent a moment. Then she raised her hand, ran her fingers down the side of Famine’s cheekbone. “I always thought you had lovely skin. Beautiful because you didn’t look like everyone else in Hawk’s Hollow.”
Famine suppressed a shiver. “I think you’re the only one who thought that.”
“Perhaps.” Death shrugged. “Perhaps not.” Her fingers moved down to Famine’s collarbone; she ran them along the length of it, one way and then back again. “Now the earth radiates inside you. Makes you glow even more than you did before.”
Famine sucked in a breath. “You’re different, too.”
“How so? Is it the crown?”
Famine laughed. “You were always wearing a crown, even when you weren’t.”
Death chuckled. “That’s fair.”
“No, it’s…” Famine paused as if she fought for the right words. “Before you threw your beauty around, waved it like a banner. Now, you’ve settled into it. It’s more… natural, I suppose. You’re not trying so hard. Not that you needed to before.”
“I’m not sure if you’ve just complimented me or insulted me.”
Famine shrugged. “The past is behind us now. We don’t ever have to go back.”
“I suppose you’re right, though,” Death said. “I think I realize now that there’s more than beauty. There’s magic. And that’s infinitely better.”
“It certainly is.” Famine’s eyes flashed in the night. “I’m not afraid anymore. I’m never going back to that scared girl I was before.”
“You were braver than you thought,” Death said. “Before we knew what was happening to us, you were the one who wanted to figure it out. To meet it head on.”
A cool desert wind blew between them, carrying the scent of Atsa’s fire.
“I liked that girl,” Death continued, looking into Famine’s dark eyes. “Don’t forget her entirely.”
And as she said the words, she prayed they could find that balance the shaman had spoken of before they slipped into darkness and lost themselves entirely.
Chapter Six
War/Willow
War helped Atsa start a fire with a spark from her fingertips, then she headed out into the desert alone. She needed time in her own head. Time to think of everything
that had happened in the span of a half-day that felt like eternity.
Coyotes called in the distance, and the moon rose with a salmon tint to it. Sand crunched beneath her boots, and her duster swirled around her ankles. The coolness of the air kissed her skin, contrasting sharply with the heat coming off her. She felt like she’d swallowed fire. As if her anger had become a living thing within her, something nestled in the place where her organs used to be, something coursing through her veins.
She’d wanted power her whole life. It was why she competed with the boys, why she adored guns. That sensation when her iron came to life in her hands, when a bullet exploded from its chamber, shattered its target. The ability to take back some of what had been taken from her. And the power residing within her now… it was so far beyond that it was laughable. It was everything she’d ever wanted. Wasn’t it?
Part of War wanted the world to burn. So much pain, so much disparity. Humans were mostly awful to each other. Didn’t they deserve to be punished? A great cleansing, as the angels asked of them? The other three wanted to save humanity. She could take it or leave it.
There were good things, of course. Mostly her horse. Sunrises and sunsets. The smell of the earth after a light summer rain. Wild blackberries. Her and Penelope coming up with new horseback tricks: riding backwards, running mount-up, teaching Bullet and Domino to bow. Lyla, covered in engine grease, lying under her airship. She felt a tightening of her heart on that last one: where was her mother now? Was she safe?
War shook her head. All memories from before. A life she no longer had. Feelings that made her weak, foolish. Vulnerable.
And then, as if her thoughts of helplessness had summoned him, he was there. Skin so tan it looked like brown-sugar, hair the black of the night sky, eyes the blue of the river by her house. He looked exactly as he had before. Except for the wings. They were blue, too, but a few shades lighter than the eyes. The color of the sky with a storm on the horizon.
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