Thunder sounded on the stairs. Outside, friends’ voices.
“Percy!” Alexi cried, bounding into the room and stunning Marianna’s body with a dizzying jolt of blue fire. The blast forced Percy’s release, causing her to fall forward. Her hand slid against the broken glass. Scarlet blood poured garish from her white skin, but Alexi dove to catch her as she collapsed. Snakes flaking grey ash slithered to lap Percy’s blood from the sill.
The ashen serpent hanging from Marianna’s mouth retracted into her throat and Lucille spoke with a gurgling hiss. “You again? Still failing your little sweetheart, Rychman?”
Another bolt aimed right for the mouth reeled Marianna’s body backward, ash and spittle flying everywhere. Percy was woozy from pain and loss of blood, but Jane’s lit hand was suddenly upon her, mending her deep gash with a tingling light.
“Our only failure is that we didn’t cast your ashes to the four corners,” Alexi roared, rushing forward and roughly grabbing the possessed body by the throat. Perhaps he couldn’t see who it was through his rage, and past the layer of ash covering Marianna’s face.
“Alexi, please,” Percy begged. “Look. It’s Marianna! She’s taken over Marianna. Take care!”
Alexi stared at his quarry and scowled. “Damn it. Bind!”
The rest of The Guard hurried into their circle.
Bound by blue fire, Lucille Linden screamed within Marianna’s body, the fact that she was now a possessor giving Alexi’s fire some advantage. But Lucille was doing what she could, spitting hot ash to scald them, snakes lashing out like fanged whips. Marianna’s eyes, ears, nose and mouth were fountains of clotted ashen fluid, a horrific sight Percy forced herself to watch because it was her fault.
“Cantus of Extinction!” Alexi cried. Notes of music rose beautiful and fearsome as The Guard encircled Marianna’s body, Jane at her side. Wind whipped their clothes, and the music of the Grand Work crested in the air.
Percy forced herself to stand and give them energy, trying to siphon off her light, which still felt unwieldy in her body, offering it into the torrent of blue fire that Alexi wreathed around Marianna’s body, trying to suffocate the possessor. Michael breathed loudly, forcing them all to remember to do the same.
“Extinct? I’ll never go extinct,” Lucille shrieked, flapping Marianna’s jaw like a grotesque puppet. The blonde girl’s eyes rolled back in her head, ashen tears still streaming.
Josephine stepped forward, holding an image on a locket before Marianna’s shifting, gritty eyes. “Dear girl—”
Marianna’s mouth twisted and Lucille gurgled from within. “Your pictures are meaningless to me. I’ll kill this girl. And your dear girl, finally, finally dead.”
“Hush!” Alexi bellowed, a crackling bolt of fire sizzling Marianna’s body, causing her to lurch violently and vomit more ash. It was good, perhaps, to see the offending substance purged, but Percy feared they were killing her in the process.
“We’re losing her,” Jane cried.
Percy panicked, her chest suddenly a white blaze.
A familiar ripping noise announced a portal. Aodhan came rushing out, either sensing danger from beyond or summoned by Percy’s reactive light. “It’s the Gorgon, Aodhan, taken over my friend!” Percy cried in his Gaelic tongue.
Jane eyed her beloved. “I don’t know that I can do this all m’self,” she admitted. “Please help if ye can.”
Aodhan floated close, brushing a transparent hand over the Irishwoman’s shoulder, staring grimly down at Marianna. He passed his other hand—glowing, healing—over Marianna’s eyes, which fluttered. She moaned but remained unresponsive. To Percy he admitted, “Alas, spirits such as these will take revenge at all costs. The body will die.”
“No!” Percy sobbed.
“Unless…” Aodhan’s expression darkened.
“Unless what?”
“I take her in. Into the Whisper-world.”
“Then she’ll certainly die!”
“Not exactly. For a hapless mortal, not a Guard, there’s time before damage is irreparable. Beatrice can help me. But you must come, my lady.”
“I could rescue her from there once healed, and return her to the living here?” Percy asked, speaking still in Gaelic.
“Translate!” Alexi demanded.
One of his hands clamped upon Percy’s shoulder, the other tightened around Marianna’s blonde-turned-serpentine curls. The Guard struggled to keep her possessed body still. It kept seizing up and going limp, ash snakes champing at whomever was closest.
Beatrice sidled into view at the threshold of the portal, gazing grimly down upon the situation. “So, it was her. I’m sorry, dear. We didn’t know. But like Orpheus came for Eurydice, you may come, a god disguised. It’s nearly all in place. They won’t stop, things such as these,” the ghost explained, gesturing disdainfully to Marianna’s messy body. “Not until you settle it once and for all. Let the Healer and I deal with this. You and The Guard use the map and the doors. Knock, and the door will be opened.
“The time is upon you,” Beatrice said, addressing them all. Percy murmured the translation. “Your beloved Athens changes. There’s no stopping it. If you want to blame someone, blame a goddess and her hapless guard, but do not punish yourselves by doing nothing. Percy, you are the key. You must attend the destiny that awaits you.”
When Alexi heard, he roared. “I told you, I’ll not allow her in! Take me.” A bolt of blue fire hurtled from his hand toward Beatrice, his intent unclear. But she held up a hand and the fire congealed, clearly now hers to command.
The rest of The Guard gasped.
“It isn’t your choice, leader! You can’t go in or you’ll fall to pieces! Allow for the fact your wife is built for things you are not,” Beatrice bellowed, Percy fumbling the translation in choking murmurs. “Possessed as you are, a living Guard cannot step across—shall I regale you of ugly tales the goddess told me of those who tested this? It isn’t a matter for discussion! Your stubbornness, however massive, cannot stop fate!”
Marianna’s body convulsed, giving a horrific sound and a pathetic cry. The life was being choked out of her, the monster within desperate for someone to die. What was left of Percy’s friend was begging for mercy, her eyes still spewing ash—and now a new horror: blood. Jane wiped her cheeks only to see them wetted again. Percy wept, clutching her fists at her breast as if she could hold the light there and cast some spell of salvation.
“Cantus of Extinction,” Alexi growled, showering blue fire upon the mane of snakes, which squealed and spat. “Resume it.”
The Guard joined hands, but Aodhan voiced caution. “Such a cantus may kill the girl. This is no ordinary possession.”
“It may kill her, Alexi. Please,” Percy spoke up, seizing his hand. The blue fire tingled up her wrist.
“Well, then, what do the spirits advise?”
“Tell Jane to give me a lock of her hair,” Aodhan stated, and floated back to the threshold of the Whisper-world, where his transparent body darkened to grey solidity. Percy furrowed her brow and repeated the request.
“This isn’t the time for romance,” Alexi growled.
“I’m not being romantic. I need a tether. Do as I say,” Aodhan insisted. Percy translated.
Jane stared at her beloved. A practical woman who thought to carry practical things, she pulled a penknife from her jacket pocket and without hesitation cut a long lock. Aodhan gestured for her to bring it close. She moved toward the portal, offering the lock in her open hand, and Aodhan’s hand became transparent across the threshold as it reached toward hers. A draft drew the hair across to where his hand was able to clutch and raise it. Both the lock and his hand glowed with healing light.
“We lost our gifts long ago, but they live on in Athens, and in you.” Jane was visibly moved as Aodhan kissed the lock and wound it about the leather band over his shoulder. The locket around Beatrice’s throat pulsed with Phoenix fire.
“Now the girl,” Beatrice murmured, gest
uring to bring the victim closer.
“Take good care of her,” Percy said.
“Take good care of yourself,” Beatrice countered. “And wear grey. We can’t have mortal colour giving you away. Don’t forget.” She pointed a finger at Percy.
As The Guard encircled and gingerly lifted the body, Alexi placed himself between his wife and Marianna. “Percy, stay back.”
They got the body unsteadily onto its feet, ashen snakes snapping at them, catching a strand of Josephine’s hair and a corner of Elijah’s fine suit. A burst of fire flew from Alexi’s hands, flinging Marianna’s body toward the portal. Aodhan and Beatrice stood with waiting arms. They caught Marianna, their forms solid in the Whisper-world. Snakes flailing and sputtering, they dragged the body in. The portal closed.
Percy loosed a sob. The Guard’s shoulders sagged in a group sigh, failure threatening to consume their spirits. Backing away, Percy slid down the wall into a heap on the floor, shaking her head. “This is all my fault! I’m a disaster,” she cried, tears flowing. “I’m a danger to all who come near, to all who are close to me, to all whom I lo—”
“I’ll not hear another word,” Michael barked, immediately on his knees at her side. “This is beyond any fault of yours, and you must accept that or we cannot move forward with power—only fear, which is what the enemy would want!” He placed a firm hand on her collar, and she felt a gust of peace.
“Friends, thank you,” Alexi said quietly. “Give me leave to calm her. Don’t go far. Make yourselves at home.”
The Guard nodded and filed downstairs, Rebecca at the rear. Alexi moved to grab her arm. “Bless you, Rebecca. If you hadn’t felt the call when you did…” He faltered. Overcome with emotion neither of them did well expressing, she nodded curtly and exited.
Alexi eased Percy into his arms from the floor. Supporting her, he led her down into the parlour, where he swept a roaring fire into the hearth. He heated tea with another gesture, and forced a cup into his wife’s shaking hands.
“I am a danger to those I love,” Percy stated, guilt threatening to undo her sanity.
Alexi stared at her with both consternation and adoration. “This work means danger.”
“But I—”
“What, shall you go and leave us? Try and lure the danger elsewhere? It follows us, Percy, and you were sent to us. This is our lot.”
“I…” Percy’s mouth moved to protest, but she had no words.
Her husband’s face was grim. “The day I was chosen to lead The Guard, an ill force swept through this house, paralyzing my sister and frightening my grandmother to death. It was, perhaps, a warning, an early taste of the trials that would come. My parents left me this house and a bit of money at the age of sixteen. They never said why, but I know it was because I frightened them. They thought I was ill luck. That I doomed the family name.” He eyed her, his expression as tortured as she’d ever seen. “This work will make you question everything, Percy, and make you despair. But you must persevere.”
She nodded. They both had been dealt shares of pain, and she better understood his zealous protection. She’d chosen to take that doomed name, she was choosing him, this house, this life; and with her vow of marriage she’d promised never to abandon him.
He pressed her against him, stilling her shaking body with the embrace. “We must persevere,” he insisted. “I am at your side.”
“Thank God,” Percy said. “Yet…don’t be angry for what may be asked of me, what I cannot control. What must happen.”
Alexi stared at the fire and held her tighter.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Inside the Whisper-world, Aodhan and Beatrice were hard at work saving the body and soul of an innocent victim.
They ferreted Marianna away to a dim chamber where Beatrice mustered their hallowed fire, grateful her time at Athens had given her a store of power; otherwise she’d be useless.
At any other time, Beatrice admitted, brushing ash out of Marianna’s curls with a comb, her actions would have caught the attention of this entire spectral world. The molten, ashen liquid seeping from the girl’s facial orifices was a truly gruesome sight. But she and Aodhan went oddly undisturbed, for the whole arrangement of the Whisper-world was like a door hanging on one hinge. Beatrice didn’t blame the current Guard for their hesitation. Their new task went against everything they’d all fought for, their whole, thankless lives. She herself had fought destiny to only in the end acquiesce. Bleeding the Whisper-world onto Athens was dangerous, but it was the only way to regain balance.
Mortal and Whisper-world edges rubbed with freshly combustible friction. Long-sealed walls had cracked open, forgotten vaults now spewed fresh venom. Spirits never before mixed were now fighting and cursing along the river. All that remained a fortress unbroken was, unfortunately, the prison room where Darkness had corralled his sworn enemies. But that, too, was scheduled to soon crack open. So long as Mrs. Rychman kept her head.
Only a pile of restless ash evidenced their painstaking work, oozing grimly from Marianna’s mouth with every healing burst Aodhan managed. He continually brushed the offending substance into a ceramic jar. Other jars lined the edge of a yawning hole like the stacked skulls of an ancient crypt.
It was bound to happen, Beatrice realized as she heard his distinctive howl. It would seem he’d been the monster’s lackey from time immemorial and he proved her champion yet.
“What’re you doing?” the Groundskeeper cried, shuffling into their grim workplace. “That’s my Lucy in there. You let her go. You let her out. That host is alive! What are you doing? You’re breaking every rule—”
“Be my guest and please retract your Lucy. We’re just trying to return her,” Beatrice offered graciously.
The Groundskeeper pointed. “You’re the troublemaker.”
“Why, so I am.” Beatrice bowed. “Are you going to help your beloved or not? We could make sure she never leaves this body.”
The Groundskeeper’s face twisted, staring at the fire that sparked around Beatrice’s neck and had leaped into her hand. He was clearly wary of her power. “No!”
“Then allow us to take care of this. Here are some of her parts—by all means, take them away.” Beatrice gestured to the arched hole in the stone behind them and all the jars.
“I’ll expect more,” he threatened, counting.
“Indeed.” Beatrice nodded, standing aside as he rushed to scoop Lucille’s remains into his arms. He soon scurried away, singing. “Lucy-Ducy wore a nice dress…Lucy-Ducy made a great mess!” His voice faded down the hall.
The two Guard went back to work. When the next jar was half full of ash, Beatrice lifted a rock, placed it inside and sealed the lid with twine and a burst of blue fire for good measure. She handed the hissing contents to Aodhan, who vanished, well aware of what do to with it.
From the moment the sun broke across the horizon, a heavy dread rose within those of The Guard who’d spent the night at the Rychman estate. Alexi was gentle, taking his wife into his arms, but the weight of failure was there between them as they woke, like a cold chill.
“All I can think of is Marianna,” Percy murmured. She nestled into his shoulder, his nearness her only comfort. “Let the world pass us by, Alexi, just stay and hold me.”
“Would it were that easy. I’d love nothing more. But the call is strong in my blood. There’s work to be done at Athens; our safe house no longer safe. We put our students at risk if we tarry.” He kissed her temple, then commanded, “Stay close to me today.”
Percy nodded. But, what if there were a door? Would she take it at a run, to speed this inevitable dirge onward? Uncertainty must drive her mad. She had to trust Beatrice: she’d know when it was time.
Josephine had prepared cold breakfast and tea, and the others sat quietly in the parlour, eyeing Percy with funereal expressions. She graciously accepted the tea Jane hurried to offer as she entered.
Alexi broke the dreadful silence. “Friends, you feel the weight of Athe
ns as I do, do you not?”
Everyone nodded.
“The storm gathers,” Rebecca agreed. “We’ve a war to weather, friends. We must go and save those beloved bricks.”
Michael nodded. “May the congregation say amen.”
Their anchor of a building was on a fault line ready for a fearsome quake, a shifting mystery. Athens was proving to have a character of its own, and none of The Guard could be sure whose side it was taking, its changes taking their sacred number or no. A luminosity grew about the stately bricks that gave students pause, as if they could not trust their own eyes. The sad truth was that they couldn’t.
Staff and students were not sleeping, and many stated they were seeing things like ghosts. The Guard could not disagree: the Athens spectres were plentiful and particularly active. Percy heard them babbling as if only recently dead, jarred into a new awareness of themselves.
Elijah was most taxed by the trying morning, adjusting the minds of the academy’s residents, who understood only that neither themselves nor the hairs on the backs of their necks could rest. All seven of The Guard crowded into Rebecca’s office. She handed Elijah her flask and no one even raised an eyebrow. “We can’t run a school like this,” she said.
Percy stared at the carpeting—a sensible and ordinary grey, like most of the headmistress’s wardrobe, grey like what she’d don in the Whisper-world—nightmares coursing her mind like a grim carousel. She’d stood silently at Alexi’s side all morning, and they’d examined each new door Beatrice had erected about the grounds, each emblazoned with some variant of the number seven.
“We have no choice but to close the school,” Alexi replied.
“I’ve done my best—a thorough wipe of every mind, but their fears will grow again. I can’t be everywhere at once,” Elijah said.
Rebecca shook her head. “I’ll gather them into the auditorium. I’ll tell them…”
“That you’re giving them an extra bit of holiday,” Michael said. “For being smashing students. I realize you never allow yourself holidays, Miss Thompson, but the world loves them. So do students. We’re not too terribly far from Christmas. It’s soon the season of love.” He pounded his fist on a bookcase and smiled, and the others couldn’t help but feel the stale air of the office seemed a bit easier to breathe.
The Darkly Luminous Fight for Persephone Parker Page 24