A last spurt of energy flared through him. He had lost his knife and his muscles were quivering, but as Iago swung down, he lunged up, jamming his fist into the Xibalban’s solar plexus, holding the star demon so the pointed statuette protruded between his fingers. The statuette drove up and in as the serpent staff cracked into his shoulder. He felt sickening pain. But Iago, too, was hurt.
The Xibalban reeled back with a high, keening scream that was neither human nor makol. A wave of darkness rolled over Dez as he pulled the star demon out and stabbed his enemy, over and over, sticking him in the gut until the final blow when he left the bitch inside his enemy’s abdominal cavity. Ichor ran over his arms, hot and acrid.
Iago went down hard, flat on his face. He began regenerating immediately, but not as fast as before; the star demon was slowing the process. The solstice thrummed in Dez’s bones, and he was suddenly conscious of the ominous rattle of dark magic, just at the threshold of his serpent’s hearing, coming from the stones that made up the temple itself. Which was a big “oh, shit” because it made him think he was going to be standing right on top of a hellmouth real soon. Or maybe a vulture’s nest.
Time was running out. He couldn’t stop now.
Dragging himself to his feet, he found his knife where it had skidded beneath the throne. He hefted it and looked at Reese, who still stood pressed up against the shield, watching him. He didn’t know how she had gotten there, or what her presence meant for the two of them, but Jesus, gods, he didn’t want to do this in front of her. Not again. Her lips moved; he couldn’t read them, but it didn’t really matter. He didn’t have a choice. Feeling suddenly empty, he turned to where Iago lay facedown, halfway regenerated. Movements automatic, heart heavy, he got a hand across the Xibalban’s forehead, pulled back his head, and carved a wicked slash across his throat.
Ichor fountained, mixed with blood. And he was back in the nightmare.
It was gruesome work. He clamped his teeth together and didn’t look at her—couldn’t bear it—as he sawed off the ajaw-makol’s head, then flipped him, cut away his body armor, and carved a deep furrow below his ribs, where the skin had started to knit around the earlier wound. Steeling himself, he punched through the diaphragm and jammed his hand up inside Iago’s chest. Broken ribs scraped his knuckles as he felt for the beating fist of his enemy’s heart, found it, and yanked it from its moorings.
He recited the banishment spell through gritted teeth.
Nothing happened.
“No!” he shouted as his heart plummeted. “Godsdamn it, no!” Darkness clouded his vision; rage suffused him. He lunged to his feet, ready to shout at the sky, to curse the gods to—
He saw Reese. She was just standing there with her palms pressed to the shield. And her eyes shone like they used to, with the look that said: you’re my hero, my cowboy. It had to be an illusion, a delusion. But it pushed back the darkness far enough that he could see the light again.
“Motherfucker.” He dove for Iago, jammed his hand back inside, fished around, and found the star demon. You are the Triad mage, she whispered the moment he made contact. And he is a warrior of your bloodline. Take his powers and his knowledge as your own. His is yours. Everything is yours.
Green washed his vision for a second and he could feel the powers buzzing just beyond his reach as the offer came clear. He was the Triad mage; he could take the talents from a dead mage of his bloodline, and Iago was certainly that. What was more, he could do so many things with the Xibalban’s magic. He could open the intersection at El Rey; he could teleport; he could borrow the talent of any other mage he touched. And the Xibalban’s skull harbored the demon’s memories as well as his own; he knew spells the Nightkeepers didn’t. With him as part of the Triad, Dez would be . . .
The guy I don’t want to be, he thought, looking up at Reese and feeling his heart turn over and then settle with the good, solid weight of decision.
“She’s mine.” He gave a convulsive yank, pulled the statuette out of Iago’s corpse, and sent it skittering away. “You’re not.”
Something wrenched inside him—a tearing pain in his heart and head, like his magic was being ripped away as the demon dug in her claws and fought. But he didn’t give in to the pain; he wasn’t going to let her fuck up his life this time. Gritting his teeth and forcing the words through the agony, he repeated the banishment spell.
Luminous green flashed like sheet lightning, the ajaw-makol crumbled to greasy ash, and thunder cracked in the temple, detonating a green-tinged shock wave that smashed away and down, tearing through the serpent shield. Reese cried out as she was thrown backward and slammed into the ground. The shock wave flattened the Nightkeepers, rolled through their shield, and plowed into the makol lines, rippling through them as luminous green winked out and the villagers collapsed, unconscious.
The pain vanished, leaving Dez hollowed out. But he didn’t give a shit.
“Reese!” He grabbed his fallen knife, and bolted for her, all too aware that the dark-magic vibrations beneath his boots were getting steadily worse.
She lunged up off the ground as he reached down for her, and they slammed together, mouths fusing. He dragged his hands down her body to grip her hips, hold her to him, then back up to band his arms around her, lifting her up against his body. “You’re here,” he said between kisses. “Thank the gods you’re here.” He pulled away to look into her eyes. “You’re my compass, Reese. My sanity. I promise you that—”
She clapped a hand across his mouth. “No promises. I don’t need them, because I trust you. I believe in you. What’s more, I believe in us.”
The hollowness the star demon left behind began to fill back in with another kind of greed. He leaned into her. “Thank Christ. I thought I had lost you. I thought—”
A jolting shudder ran through the ground beneath his feet and the sound of grating stone suddenly surrounded them with a harsh rattle of magic, like the tail of a giant rattlesnake gearing up. Beneath that, he heard a terrible stone-on-stone screech that sounded like a giant bird. A vulture. Gods.
“Take the staff,” an unfamiliar voice said. “Become the serpent king.”
He spun to find Anna standing there. Only it wasn’t the Anna he had known for the past year—instead of the fog he’d gotten all too used to seeing in her eyes, he saw clarity. Wisdom. Prescience.
“Where did you come from?” But before she could answer, her words sank in and his gut clutched. “Shit. Is Strike—” He broke off when he saw him standing strong and tall, with his arm around Leah’s waist, looking better than he had in months.
“It’s a long story that we don’t have time for,” Strike said. “But you still need to do this. You’re the king we’re going to need for this war.”
Dez wasn’t sure how his heart was still beating, given the ice in his veins. “I won’t sacrifice you, damn it.”
“You don’t have to. You already killed your rival. I’m giving you this of my own free will, as demanded by the thirteenth prophecy.” Tears gleamed in Strike’s eyes. “There is no greater sacrifice for a king to make than to give up his throne on behalf of his bloodline. After today, the jaguars will no longer be the royal house.” The ground shifted, trembled. “The serpents will.”
Jesus gods. This wasn’t happening. Dez closed his eyes for a moment, growing even colder when Reese moved away from him. He turned toward her. “Reese—”
She was holding out the star demon. The idol wasn’t covered with ichor anymore; it had dematerialized along with the body. But it oozed with Iago’s psychic stink.
For the first time, instead of being swamped with possessiveness, he was vaguely repulsed. “I don’t want it.”
A smile broke across her face like the dawn, though her eyes stayed serious. “I saw. You beat her just now. You used the demon to kill Iago, but you didn’t let it use you. But . . .” She took his hand, flattened it out, and dropped the statuette in his palm. For the first time in a decade, it didn’t feel like anything ot
her than an artifact—cool, smooth, with a buzz of power. There were no whispers, no words. “She’s part of the staff, just like shaking things up is part of being a good leader. She balances off the others. You can’t have light without dark, or else it’s all just one big twilight.”
Like the twilight Lord Vulture would bring if he didn’t take the serpent staff and fulfill both the thirteenth and serpent prophecies. The ground trembled with another birdlike shriek of stone-on-stone that had the others checking their weapons.
Reese closed his fingers around the idol. “I’ve overreacted to so many things over the past couple of weeks because I was scared of what I was feeling, scared of how much more you could hurt me than you did before. And I was so busy being scared, I forgot to trust myself, especially when, deep down inside, I knew you weren’t the guy who became the de rey anymore. You’ve beaten that part of yourself, just like you beat the star demon. I should’ve seen it, should’ve believed that sooner, but I didn’t. Stupid of me.”
“Not stupid.” He covered her hand with his own, trapping the small statuette between them. “Brave and independent.” He tugged her closer. “And the woman I love. My mate. My queen.” He lifted his free hand to her cheek. “I love you. You have my heart, my soul, and my power. Please say you’ll stay with me forever. Promise me.” He held his breath when her eyes darkened and her lips turned down, and he could almost see her draw inward as she realized what he was asking—a bond, a promise, a commitment with no exit strategy. Maybe even, in her perceptions, a box to trap her.
Then her eyes filled, and she launched herself at him.
He caught her against him, his heart hammering when she said against his throat, “Forever. Because I love you. I love who you are right now, at this moment. And I’ll love you tomorrow, and next year, and, gods willing, the year after that. You’re it for me, you always have been. And I believe in you, in us. Whatever comes next, we’ll make it through together. I promise.”
She kissed him. Magic flared and his wrist warmed, and she gasped against his mouth. Shock hammered through him as he pulled away and they looked at their wrists, where they wore matching jun tans. Holy crap, he thought. Holy, holy crap. Suddenly, everything he had never dared want before was right at his fingertips. Doubt shivered through him for a second at the realization that the only other time he’d felt that way was when he was under the demon’s influence. But there were no whispers, no compulsion. There was only love and magic.
Reese grabbed him by the collar and dragged him down for a kiss. “We might not have been destined mates, but I’d say we more than earned these marks over the years.”
Not years, he thought, because for him it had been love at first sight. Someday, he would tell her that. But not now. “I was lost,” he said against her lips, holding her, hanging on to her. “Thanks for finding me.” They kissed again, long and deep, sealing their promise and tapping into the core of the Triad’s light magic within him. Power spun, coursing through him, charging the air as the ground shuddered beneath them.
“Go ahead,” she said, stepping away. “Do it.”
He faced the strange limestone throne as light magic raged within him and lightning lit the air above. Strike brought him the serpent staff, which seemed heavier than its weight when he took it. Aware that the others were gathered in a semicircle behind him, the sun god’s firebird was perched atop the temple, and a thousand villagers lay beyond, waiting for a miracle, he started fitting the compass artifacts into the clever twists of the serpent staff, which was a puzzle without looking like one.
He started with north, the white wind god, bringing the light of truth and integrity to the reign of the serpents. South, the yellow two-faced mask, would bring balance and completion. East, the red skybearer, would help him inspire, lead, and spark new ideas. And then finally west, the black star demon, who carried the power of the shadows and transformation. He expected to feel a kick of new power when he fitted the last one into place. All he felt was the weight of new responsibility twining through him, interlocking with the fealty oaths. And maybe that was the way it was supposed to be, he thought.
Pausing, he turned toward Reese and mouthed, “I love you.” Then, holding her eyes, he said the spell that Keban had beaten into him so long ago.
The four artifacts melted and swirled, running up against gravity to spread along the twisting staff, bleeding colors across a center of green. A sudden thunderclap came from the cloudless sky, and a roar of denial rose up from the ground. The air shimmered around the temple, and then turned dark. A tremor ran through him at the deep, ominous color, but then it shifted, becoming a pure glowing white, and then cycled through yellow, red, and dark again, before returning to white.
The rattle of dark magic disappeared. The ground stopped trembling, and deep in his gut, Dez knew that the prophecies had been fulfilled, the dark lord restrained. There would be no twilight for Lord Vulture this time.
For a second he thought it was all over. Then the white glow shimmered again, unfolding outward to reveal gray-green fog, and a figure within it: a nahwal, an ancestral being—this one with shining cobalt eyes and a ruby stud in one ear. Anna gasped.
“Father,” Strike said, his voice a pained rasp, his face etched with grief over what he was giving up— for himself, for his bloodline. But the nahwal smiled as he held up a stone scepter carved into the shape of a rampant, large-nosed god. Then he brought it over his knee. And broke it.
Pain tore into Dez’s biceps, high up where the muscles intersected. He gritted his teeth, smelled burning flesh. Sacrifice, he thought, and held Strike’s eyes, saw agony as the hunab ku, the king’s mark, transferred from one to the other.
Something shifted in Dez’s chest, then in his head and heart. And, suddenly, he felt the fealty oaths and responsibilities truly interconnect within him, felt the mark stabilize on his arm, felt the weight of generations past and future weighing him down and buoying him up. He locked eyes with Reese, with his mate and queen, as he became king. Lightning flashed and both the nahwal and the Manikin scepter disappeared in the brilliant flare of light. And the air went still.
Dez crossed to Reese, took her hands, raised them to his lips, and whispered, “Thank you for making it here in time.”
She rose up on her tiptoes and returned the kiss, ramping the heat to a humming in his blood. “Thank you for turning down whatever the star demon offered you when you killed Iago.”
He went still. “How did you know?”
“I know patterns. And I know you.”
Yes, she did. Better than anyone ever had or would. And she still loved him, which was the fucking miracle. He drew her in, crushed his lips to hers, and took them under with a kiss.
Reese’s thoughts raced almost as fast as her blood as they kissed, but there were no reservations, no regrets. He was arrogant and imperfect, yet perfect for her. And he was the only man she had ever loved, would ever love. And loving him wasn’t a trap. She wouldn’t let it be. That was what she put into her kiss, and what she took back from him.
“Look!” Anna cried softly, pointing upward.
High above the temple, the cloudless sky had begun to glow. The firebird screamed, launched itself from the highest pillar and took wing, spiraling joyously up into the sky, trailing flames from its wings.
Leah gasped and sagged, nearly hitting the ground before Strike could catch her. There was another flurry as Alexis lurched against Nate.
And then, as a clarion trumpet call sounded from far away, Leah and Strike laughed with joy, their faces lifted to the sky. “Kulkulkan!” she cried, reaching up as if to touch a flash of red, a slide of scales, a glimpse of the creator god she had been separated from for so long. Then, suddenly, the temple pillars brightened, becoming colors—not the compass points this time, but the full rainbow. The glows lifted, headed skyward, and then shot straight up to where the firebird circled, wheeling and dipping.
“Ixchel,” Alexis whispered, her face alight as she was ba
thed in the rainbow light of her goddess.
“Look!” Sasha gasped. “More!” And it was true: high above, through the glowing gap in the sky, they could see a wing here, a flash of scales, clothing, jewels, and stones as the gods acknowledged their lost children.
Then, as the height of the solstice passed, the sky solidified, the glow disappeared, and even the firebird was gone, the sun shining brightly where it had last been.
Reese gripped Dez tightly, then sucked in an awed breath as the rainbow light drew back into itself, returning to the temple. As it hit the pillars, the stone shimmered and changed . . . and when the glimmer faded, where the undulating serpent had been, there were four columns, one at each compass point. Each of them was a jaguar, with Strike, Leah, Sasha, and Anna standing ranged in front of them, looking stunned.
In the center, a huge chac-mool altar arched over a linteled doorway that led into the earth. As they watched, the doorway shimmered and went solid, closing until the next cardinal day.
“Holy shit.” Reese breathed, gripping Dez’s hand tightly and getting a squeeze in return.
In sacrificing his kingship, Strike had won them a new intersection. The Nightkeepers had fulfilled the prophecies. And their luck had finally turned.
Dez whooped, lifted her, and spun her in a dizzying circle while cheers rose up into the sky. Tears glistened, crazy grins flared, kisses met and melded, and Sven’s coyote tipped up his nose in a joyous howl. More, movement rippled in a concentric pattern moving outward from the temple as the villagers began to stir. Dez tugged Reese so they could look over the edge to where a clamor of noise was suddenly swelling. The villagers weren’t makol anymore. But from the looks on their faces, they were sure as hell confused, headed toward terrified.
“I’ve got this,” Rabbit said. He turned to Dez. “Cheech and his brothers are out there—I can feel his echo. They’ll help me translate.”
“And me.” Myrinne put herself next to him.
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