Gates of Thread and Stone

by Lori M. Lee

  “In your current form, yes,” he said. “But you can free yourself. You’re his daughter. Time wouldn’t bind you permanently to a mortal body.”

  “You’re crazy,” I said, because it was the only way to make sense of his words. I glanced at Avan and Reev. Reev remained unresponsive, but Avan was glaring blearily at Ninu. “I’m not one of you.”

  He gave me a pitying look. I couldn’t tell if it was real or more mockery. “We’ll see how long you can cling to that lie. It was cruel of him, allowing you to know a human’s life.”

  “I am human.” I was different. A freak. But I was still human. I wouldn’t let him take that away from me.

  “For now. It was cruel, but also clever. It hid you from me. I needed a favor that Time refused to grant,” he said, his expression stony. “I almost trapped him; he escaped and hid you with the humans. But you were meant for more, because here you are. And now I will ask of you what I wanted from your father.”

  I didn’t know why he pretended I had a choice. Not with Reev and Avan here.

  “Throw away your mortal body, Kai. Claim your true powers, and give me back my past.”

  I could hear the longing in his voice. It was real, as wistful and desperate as what I felt when I thought about my brother and a freight container we had called home only because we had each other to fill it.

  If I closed my eyes, I could see Ninu’s longing take shape: Towers of shimmering stone and crystal, not like the buildings in the White Court but older, like the ones from the history texts. Trains that spat plumes of smoke, speeding across green fields that stretched for miles. The vermilion robes of the mahjo, magic heavy in the air and carried along the wind like spices. And the Sun. The Sun ever present in a blue sky more vivid than any poster. Beautiful and clear like a cherished memory.

  Maybe he was still weaving magic. I shook my head. The last thing I wanted was to understand him.

  “The world then—my world—wasn’t paradise. But it was better than this,” Ninu said quietly.

  “But you’re Infinite,” I said. You’d think they would be used to changing times.

  He laughed again. “Now, yes. But not always.” He gestured to Reev and Avan. “So? What do you say, Daughter of Time?”

  I still wasn’t sure what he wanted from me. I had no idea where the River was or how he expected me to stop being human—which I had no intention of doing. Did he really think I could just drop him into the past? While I couldn’t argue that it would benefit all of us to get rid of him, I didn’t exactly have instructions for how to rewind time.

  “Do you want to think it over?” Ninu asked. “I’m sure I could find something to entertain us in the meantime.”

  The sentinels released their hold on Avan’s arms and retreated from the room. Avan wavered, but he remained standing. I started forward, but Ninu’s voice stopped me.

  “R-22,” he said. Reev’s vacant eyes focused on Ninu. “Are you armed?”

  “Yes,” Reev answered.

  Ninu must have given him an unspoken order, because Reev withdrew the torch blade from his belt. The blade was a foot and a half in length and glowed as if the metal absorbed light instead of reflected it. He wielded the weapon in a flowing series of arcs. I wasn’t sure what Ninu had ordered him to do until Avan cried out and dropped to his knees.

  A red line appeared along the length of Avan’s arm. Blood ran down his skin, outlining his knuckles in red. Then the bleeding stopped and retraced its path up his wrist and forearm, and the wound closed. Gasping, Avan bent over.

  I lunged at Ninu. The torch blade cut into my path. I jerked back. I looked from Reev’s blade, which he had thrust between me and Ninu, to Ninu’s expressionless face.

  I will kill you, I silently promised. For Avan and for Reev, I will kill you.

  “Would you like to see another demonstration, or have you decided?” Ninu asked.

  Reev lowered his sword. I looked down at my knife and the red streaks across the chipped blade. What was it Irra had said about the blood of mahjo? The price paid for stripping them of their magic: the sentinels and the hollows—their blood was poison to their Infinite ancestor.

  What was the likelihood that Ninu’s puppet had been one of his descendants?

  Worth a shot.

  “Fight me,” I said. I made a point to tuck the knife into my belt.

  Ninu’s brows rose.

  “If you win, I’ll do whatever you ask. But if I win, then you let me, my brother, and Avan go free.”

  “I’m not a fan of bargaining. And I’m fairly sure I didn’t leave room for it.”

  “Why not? Afraid you’ll lose?”

  He gave Kalla an amused look. I had almost forgotten she was there, still lounging on the sofa. To my surprise, she said, “What harm is there in indulging her? She can’t possibly win.”

  “I think he’s afraid of a human girl,” I said, hoping Ninu’s grudge with Time would make him too proud to back down. “Daughter of Time, right? Bet you never beat my dad, either.”

  Ninu began unbuttoning his tunic. A mix of triumph and anxiety shot through me. He shrugged off the sturdy black material, revealing a loose gray undershirt, and folded it neatly over the table. “I’m willing to play along. Feel free to use your powers if you think they’ll help you.”

  The knife felt heavy against my side, but I didn’t grab for it. Not yet.

  I planted my feet and waited as he approached. I would probably lose. But I would make sure to kick his ass in the meanwhile.

  CHAPTER 37

  NINU KNEW HOW to fight me. Whenever I slowed time, I felt a vibration through my body and my grip slipped too soon. While he couldn’t affect the threads, he could still affect me, and I didn’t know how he was doing it.

  He also knew how to take advantage of my powers. Because he was aware of time slowing, even for the mere second I could hold it back, he could calculate how to counteract the rebound. As soon as the threads flung us forward, he attacked, striking at my openings. I was trapped in that sliver of increased time, and I had a split second to react. It wasn’t enough.

  My tailbone struck the floor, followed by my shoulder blades. I hissed in air, back arching. Biting down on a groan, I rolled onto my side and glared up at him. He was faster than his sentinels.

  “I’ve fought your father,” he said. “He was more of a challenge.”

  I stood, the knife jostling against my hip. I had to be patient. Wait for an opportunity. Movement to my right drew my eye, and I glanced at Avan. He was on his feet again. Reev had him by his upper arm. I wasn’t sure if it was to restrain him or hold him up. Avan watched me, a line between his eyebrows. He mouthed a word: Mason.

  End it quickly, Mason had said. My powers weren’t the advantage I thought they’d be, so how could I use my speed instead?

  I charged Ninu, pulling at the threads but releasing them an instant later, this time without Ninu’s interference. I dived left, plucked at time again, and then cut right and aimed for his side.

  Ninu caught my wrist and wrenched my arm up behind me. My shoulder screamed.

  “Better,” he said, his voice low against my ear. “But still clumsy. Try again.” He laid his palm against the middle of my back and gave me a light shove, releasing my arm.

  I stumbled for a moment but found my footing—and my knife. I spun, fist jabbing out. He stopped my punch again and then ducked. The knife in my other hand missed his throat. Drek.

  I panted, forcing my thoughts to focus. Time slowed. I flipped the knife, blade side down. Again that vibration through my mind. The threads sprang free too soon. I swiped upward. His arm rose. The block jolted through my shoulder. His knuckles rammed into my gut.

  All the air left my lungs. I hit the floor, curling around my stomach, gasping. Nothing else existed but the pain.

  “Kai.” Avan’s voice. “Get up.”

  My nails clawed against the smooth tiles as I pushed up onto my hands and knees. I rose unsteadily to my feet.

 
; Speed is my ally. Breathe. In and out. Focus. Time is my power.

  Ninu spread his arms wide in invitation.

  I rushed him. I didn’t think about where to hit next; my body moved on instinct. Punch, duck, kick, block. Don’t stop. Don’t stop. Ninu’s head snapped to the left. My knuckles throbbed, but grim satisfaction fueled my next strike.

  His hands snatched my wrists. His grip was unforgiving. His eyes narrowed. Then he let go, and I darted back to avoid the hit that barely missed my chin. His attacks came fast, pushing me across the room. I tripped. Pain stabbed my face. My vision went dark at the corners. I found myself back on the floor, looking up at the glass ceiling. I blinked rapidly, letting the rising heat in my face burn away the daze.

  I let the humiliation feed my anger. Think, Kai.

  “You are your father’s daughter,” Ninu said. He tugged at the loose sleeves of his shirt and smoothed down the wrinkles. “But he was a better strategist. It’ll come with experience.”

  I shut out the questions that rushed forward. I didn’t know what to believe, but whether Ninu was telling the truth or not, I couldn’t let him or anything else distract me.

  It took me longer to regain my footing this time. As he waited for me, I trailed my mind along the threads, deliberating. Time flowed in a current that didn’t ebb or swell but was constant. I could push against it, slow it down, slip free of its net. But what would happen if I tried to break it?

  “Giving up already?”

  I ignored the taunt. I imagined my hands skimming the current the way I once had at the river’s bend in the North District. Then I slid my left foot back and sprang forward. Ninu blocked before my fist could land, dodged before the knife could find skin. He deliberately didn’t retaliate, and whatever powers he possessed, he wasn’t using them except to interfere with mine. His restraint was insulting.

  I imagined pressing my hands against the threads, letting them tangle around my fingers. Around me, time slowed. I imagined digging my fingers in and pulling. Wrenching. Ripping. The threads were so tightly knit that they barely gave. But it was enough.

  Time warped around us. Motion became a dizzying whirl. For one brief moment, the threads dragged me backward.

  I immediately altered my attack. I dropped to my haunches and struck.

  I think I was as shocked as Ninu when my knife sank into his stomach. Red bubbled up around the blade. His hand lifted to grab mine. I let go of the handle and twisted out of reach.

  His fingers replaced mine around the handle. He regarded me with the same air of approval that Mason had after I’d managed to hit him.

  So. Not his descendant then. Drek!

  I had stabbed him, but was this enough to win? I shifted my weight, considering another attack.

  “Good job,” he said. “You’re a fast learn—” He stopped. His eyes lowered to the knife.

  With a quizzical tilt to his head, he pulled the knife free. Blood rushed from the open wound, blossoming across his shirt like one of Irra’s roses.

  In his hand, beneath the fresh coat of red, the blade glowed. He dropped it. Instead of falling, the knife hovered in the air. I watched, stupefied, as the blood on the blade thinned, then disappeared, as if the glowing metal had absorbed it. Light encased the weapon. I had to squint to look at it.

  Avan called my name, but I couldn’t look away. The shape of the knife changed, elongating into a staff and then flashing brightly as a curved blade materialized at one end, translucent and shimmery like starlight. When the light receded, I realized it was a scythe.

  I reached out tentatively, then flinched when it flew away.

  There was a muffled smack as the staff hit its owner’s palm. Both Ninu and I looked at Kalla in confusion. Kalla rested her weapon against the floor and traced a glossy fingernail along her alabaster cheek. Her features shifted. Her eyes grew larger, chin sharper, red lips plumper. Her hair spilled down her shoulders in a tumble of white waves.

  “You,” I said, backing up. The memory of her reeled through me—a nervous and pale young woman, half dressed, her thin arms offering me a battered knife and a map. “You’re from the Raging Bull.”

  Ninu sank to his knees, his bloodied hand pressed against his stomach. Then his gaze lifted to meet mine.

  “I wanted my life back,” he said. “It wasn’t a great life. But it was mine.” He closed his eyes.

  Kalla twirled the scythe in her hand, and it vanished in a flare of light. She didn’t look at her brother.

  “The Infinite are incapable of killing one another directly,” she told me, brushing her long hair over her pale shoulder.

  “Your knife—”

  “My scythe,” she corrected me. “I am the second oldest of the Infinite. My weapon can kill anything.”

  “But why?” I asked, inching toward Avan and Reev. Avan looked as bewildered as I felt, but Reev hadn’t reacted in any way to seeing his Kahl stabbed. “You’re Ninu’s right hand. Why would you help me?”

  Death smiled. “Time has ever been my ally.”

  CHAPTER 38

  I SKIRTED AROUND Ninu’s body, now sprawled on the floor, and rushed to Avan.

  “Are you—?” I cut myself off. It was an idiotic question. Of course he wasn’t okay. “I’m sorry.”

  He gave me a rueful smile. “Why are you apologizing?”

  His hand came up, fingers grazing my sore jaw. You’d think I would be used to getting punched by now, but the pain felt new each time. I leaned into his touch. I didn’t know what any of this meant, but I prayed Kalla was on our side.

  Reev looked around, his eyes slow to focus. Then he hissed in his breath, reaching back to claw at his collar as if it pained him.

  “Reev, stop,” I said, tugging at his hand.

  Kalla’s heels clicked against the floor as she circled Ninu. He lay on his stomach, face angled away from me. No sentinels appeared to carry him away.

  “Ninu held ultimate control over the collars,” she said. “Without him, Reev will recover shortly, although Ninu’s mark should be removed from the collar as a precaution.”

  Relief made my body sag. I squeezed Reev’s hand.

  Kalla cocked her head, a sudden awareness in her eyes. I searched the room. I felt it, too. The threads, the current, time itself—had stopped. The view from the window revealed the smoke from distant chimney pipes caught in still-frame, like a picture, and Grays fixed in place like figurines amid a miniature cityscape. The entire city, everything outside this room, had been frozen.

  “Congratulations, Kai,” someone said. “You’ve liberated Ninurta.”

  The voice was worse than Ninu’s, not because it burrowed beneath my skin but because I knew, deep down, that it was familiar. I knew it the way I knew the threads that currently snared the city like a giant spider’s web, inescapable even by me because, while I could manipulate them, he had woven the threads and designed their pattern.

  The air in the room quivered, and then a man was standing next to Kalla. It wasn’t his presence that surprised me. It was the fact that I had felt him coming. Avan clasped my shoulder. I reached up to rest my hand over his.

  “This is Kronos,” Kalla said. “Although I don’t think an introduction is really necessary.”

  He didn’t look like anyone I remembered. But then I saw his eyes: watery blue like the icicles that formed on the tree branches in winter. He smiled. I didn’t smile back.

  Any sense of relief I had before disappeared. I brushed away Avan’s hand and released Reev’s. My body tensed, waiting.

  He extended his arm, the black folds of his cloak rustling in a current that only he and I could see. Kalla touched her fingers to his raised forearm, a simple but familiar gesture.

  “You have questions,” she said to me. “But the answers have always been there. Ninu assumed that when R-22 disappeared, Irra had taken him for his hollows. So how did Ninu find Reev again?”

  “The energy drive,” I said warily.

  “And who do you think told
Reev about the energy drive? Who decided to hold it there, practically on top of the Labyrinth?”

  My mind ran through the possibilities. “But you couldn’t have known. You couldn’t have predicted that I would be attacked, that I would need to—”

  I saw the face of the woman who’d attacked me that day in the alley. White skin, black-streaked Mohawk, and bright-red lips, the only splash of color against her pale features.

  I felt as if the air had been knocked out of me again. “It was all you,” I breathed.

  “You’re softhearted, Kai. I knew you wouldn’t leave me to die in that alley. And I made sure that the tax notice was delivered directly to Reev.”

  I cupped my head in my hands. The attack; the energy drive; tricking Reev’s boss in order to send me to the Rider, the only person with the means of sneaking me into the White Court. So I could—

  “You did all this,” I said, looking between Kalla and Kronos. “Why? To get me here to kill Ninu? How did you know who Reev was anyway? That he and I—”

  “You know the answer to that,” Kronos said.

  When he moved, his hair—as long as my own—rippled like water, its color shifting, liquid strands in constant motion. As with the rest of the Infinite, I couldn’t pinpoint his age. He was at once young and wizened. Looking at him was like trying to focus on stones resting in the riverbed beneath the swaying waves.

  “Who am I?” he asked.

  With absolute certainty, I said, “My father.”

  Someone grabbed my wrist. I started, backing away only to realize it was Reev.

  When our eyes met, I could see it was really him. A brief rush of joy filled me. “Reev.”

  He opened his mouth, but Kronos cut him off.

  “Welcome back, Reev.” He looked at me. “His final mission before his purification had been against me—Ninu needed his full force of sentinels to invade my palace. But I’d known at once that Reev was different from the others. His connection to Ninu had already begun to fray. I read into his past, his desire for freedom, and I granted it. In exchange, I’d left him a most precious charge.”