Soulless (Maiden of Time Book 2)

by Crystal Collier

  Ethel grabbed the woman and misted, whisking her back to the inn. She left the woman wobbling on her feet and returned.

  Sybil threaded through the mass, dispatching the enemy with precision. A gray-bearded elder bent the light to blind his enemies while a soot-covered man pounded the ground with a fist, knocking the creatures off their feet. A short-haired woman faced two Soulless who crashed to the ground unexpectedly, pinned by an invisible weight.

  Sybil appeared next to Ethel and threw a teenaged girl into her arms. Gaunt hollows cut into her sister’s face. She was exerting herself too much. “Go!”

  Ethel zipped back and released the girl, returning empty handed and grabbing the nearest Passionate. Twice more she whisked someone away, taking two on the last trip. Seven now. She returned.

  A sickening cheer deafened her. The light caster had disappeared. The dirty man who rattled the earth was missing, and Sybil...

  Her sister stood in the street, a chain wrapped around each arm, being pulled both directions at once.

  Ethel shrieked. Heads turned her way.

  She misted and grabbed the nearest weapon, pruning shears. Without thinking, she solidified in front of the Soulless creature holding one chain. She slammed his arms with the shears, knocking the chain free and fazed. The second guard tensed, waiting for her. She appeared, skidding across the ground on her hip, and smacked his knees. He crumpled.

  She misted.

  Sybil dropped to her knees, tearing at the links still squeezing one wrist. Her skin was a sallow yellow. Shrouds swooped inward.

  Ethel popped between them, grabbed the dropped chain with a sleeve-wrapped hand, and whacked a line of them in the nose. Barbs cut through the cloth and into her fingers. She dropped the chain.

  The creatures tumbled backwards. Metal links shot past her ear as she bent away. She misted across the ring, called the winds, and rocketed five of the Soulless onto their backs.

  Panting, she emerged next to Sybil who dug clumsily at her manacle. A blade flashed overhead.

  Ethel misted out.

  A Soulless creature swung the weapon downward.

  Sybil lifted her gaze.

  The blade glistened, reflecting Sybil’s surprise.

  A scream tore from Ethel’s lips. She popped in on the creature’s back, but her weight wasn’t enough. A sickening crunch rang in her ears. Fueled with rage, she locked an arm around the enemy’s neck and yanked. Its neck snapped.

  Black cloaks descended. She fazed away. She leaned on a chimney, unable to process what she was seeing. Sybil lay in a pool of growing crimson, metal piercing her stomach as she gasped and choked.

  The Master could heal this.

  Ethel misted to her sister and tore the weapon free. She wrapped Sybil in her arms and tugged toward the void.

  It wouldn’t open.

  Creatures turned on them. Iron links still anchored Sybil’s wrist. She locked eyes with Ethel, hers wide with the love they had always shared, no matter the disagreement. “Go,” she whispered.

  “Never.”

  Sybil shoved her away and cried out as blood oozed from her center, curling in on herself.

  A hand came down on Ethel’s shoulder. She misted and landed on the other side of her sister. The links had cut into the flesh.

  “Go!” Sybil shouted.

  “No!” Ethel reached through the mist for her shears. She latched onto them and pulled them to her. Soulless creatures jumped away to avoid the weapon as it shot through the air.

  Ethel drove the sheers into the metal links. They dented. She felt the presence behind her and burst. The creature landed on the shears, carrying his weight and momentum downward.

  The links snapped.

  Ethel seized Sybil and shot away. She didn’t know where the Master was, but it didn’t matter. She would find him.

  She emerged on a mossy bank, the place she and Sybil had spent many a day dreaming about their future. Never had they imagined, as best friends, their paths would diverge. How many years had she been begging Sybil to join the Master? If she had only listened!

  Lazy branches shaded them from detection, the soft gurgle of a stream filling the air. They would shield Sybil until Ethel could return with the Master. She rose, but Sybil grasped her skirt. “Do not leave me.”

  “Sister.”

  Sybil choked and coughed up blood, her entire body seizing.

  Ethel caught her and held her steady against her chest. “Hush. He can heal you.”

  A halted chuckle. “Not this time.”

  “Sybil—”

  “Felice. You were always smarter than...” Her body shook, every limb trembling. “Promise you will...”

  Ethel lifted Sybil’s hand and placed it against her own cheek—the way they had done as children, always when words failed.

  Bury me with our parents. The request sent shivers down to her toes. Tears spilled free.

  Sybil’s head tilted back. She sucked in half a breath. Her chest lifted. Her mouth widened to pull in more air, but never did.

  Pain speared through Ethel’s body, a ripping as her very soul tore in half. Wind gusted about her, ripping her hair loose from its braid.

  She couldn’t feel it.

  It whipped and spiraled, slashing the branches above her head and tattering the ends of her gown.

  She didn’t care.

  The torrent launched into the sky. Dark clouds gathered overhead, drenching the moss in shadow and blacking out the sky.

  She wanted nothing more to do with sunlight. Her sister was dead.

  Kiren held the listless woman. He didn’t need to know how she’d spent the afternoon digging a grave, or how she’d laid her sister’s body to rest with nothing more than a silent vow for retribution. She was changed. That much he understood.

  “I am so sorry.” His whisper was futile. She had needed him, and he hadn’t been there. They had all needed him, and he was too weak to answer the call.

  The Soulless had never attacked during the day before, and certainly not with such unity, but was it only his medallion’s capture that had spurred this brashness? If they were attacking with weapons in the sunlight, what was next?

  The loss of Ethel’s sister was one they would all feel. Sybil had been the guardian of her settlement, the rock for twenty Passionate lives. She had given the others a reason to believe—no matter what her affiliations. More than that, she had been his friend before she learned of his true heritage and sided with the Breeders.

  A hole opened up in his chest. One more empty space. One more loss.

  He tightened his embrace around Ethel. Tears slipped down his face, and he prayed for strength—for them both. How could they survive another death? How could they continue when he no longer had the power to save them?

  Because someone else has that power now.

  He swallowed a lump. The stray thought was far from welcome. He’d known this was coming, but he didn’t want to face it. Not yet. Give me more time, just a few more precious days with her.

  Life was too short.

  He straightened up. “It is time. No more running.”

  Ethel shifted in his arms, silent.

  Miles tensed in his periphery. He nodded at the boy. “You and I will discover what intelligence we can, and the Soulless will have their war. We will utilize those who are assembled at the inn to spread word of our gathering and launch an offensive. There is no more time for us to be a separate people.”

  And there was no more time for him to be a separate person.

  Forty

  Sisters

  Alexia leaned back on her pillow, unable to slow the pounding of her migraine. With the arrival of so many guests and refugees there was no quiet. Mae was a sergeant right out of hell, demanding, never compromising, pushing, and constantly barking new commands. She did achieve results, however, and Alexia could leap twenty seconds without thinking about it. It was how she’d avoided John all morning. Since learning of his sad story, she couldn’t see him withou
t aching for all he’d lost.

  This morning Mae demanded that she jump back to before breakfast, nearly half an hour, and here she lay, paying for it.

  The door creaked open, and she pulled the blanket tighter over her head. She didn’t need Mae teasing her about being lazy with her head threatening to hammer a hole into the floor. And heaven forbid the woman should start in again with that abhorrent old English. It was nigh impossible to discern her meaning when she started snapping with the rough Germanic brogue.

  The mattress dipped, shifting her. New agony burst through her temples, like the stampede of a hundred horses. She groaned.

  A hand brushed over her curls. “You are so brave.”

  She flipped the blanket back. Sarah’s bulbous form weighed down the mattress, her head tilted, eyes a wreath of Christmas contrasts.

  She wanted to embrace her aunt—no, sister—and pretend nothing had come between them, that Sarah had not joined the Soulless, that their lives had not been turned upside down. She yearned for the simplicity of the days they’d walked Father’s grounds and laughed about pranks they’d pulled on their nanny, or the calm that had encircled them after Mother’s loss, as they embraced and pledged to be ever constant to one another—when their greatest concern had been keeping Father from drinking or finding Alexia a suitable match.

  And here they sat. Enemies.

  “What is it?” Sarah’s brows squeezed together. “Have I lettuce between my teeth?”

  Alexia laughed and groaned, pressing her forehead against the pillow. She had missed Sarah’s wit and good humor, but laughing was not a wise choice. It killed her that her nearest relative must be so close, and yet the very object of her constant worry and fear.

  She loved Sarah.

  She could not afford to love Sarah.

  Her sister’s brow lowered, the hopeful smile disintegrating. She sighed, placing a hand on her belly. “You will not shun your cousin, will you?”

  Alexia grated her teeth, forcing the pain to dim. “Nephew.”

  “If you insist.” Sarah beamed.

  “How can you know it will be a boy?”

  Sarah shrugged. “I am always right, as you well know.”

  Always—so intuitive about people and their behaviors, so observant and ready with the right word. But she had been wrong once, and that single choice had taken everything.

  Her sister’s lips trembled. “I am scared, Alexia.”

  She scowled. John had no right to impregnate Sarah owing to his Soulless nature, and she had no words of comfort to offer, because Sarah should be scared. She should be terrified.

  “What if I should not live through this child’s birth?”

  Alexia sat up. Pounding spots slammed through her head, but she spoke through them. “But you will.”

  “And if I do not?”

  This was the thing killing Alexia most. Her sister had become so serious since John took her, naught but the mere appearance of her best friend who laughed at the idea of ghosts and taunted her with horrible nicknames.

  Sarah hugged herself. “Will you take him, if I do not—?”

  “Sarah, stop.” Alexia placed a hand over her sister’s mouth. “You are going to raise this child, and he will be the sun for you.”

  Sarah bit her lip and nodded. “You are right. Dumonts are made of sturdier stuff.” She huffed and wiped away a tear. She was no longer a Dumont, and apparently she’d forgotten that fact. Her face crumpled as though the realization had hit. “And you, are you worried?”

  Of course she was worried. Alexia shook her head, jaw clenched. She watched the sky and hoped for Kiren’s safety. He had not sent word of his efforts, which meant either he had been unsuccessful and captured, or was too far away to reach her. She tried not to think of it.

  Sarah laughed. “All we do for them, and the men in our lives bring us nothing but turmoil.” She sobered. “Perhaps we would be better off without them.”

  Alexia patted her sister’s hand. Knowing what she did now, she might be able to go back and save Sarah from this fate. Why did that no longer feel like enough? Sarah was her sister, and the person who mattered most in the world, but John had been a good man. He didn’t deserve this eternal hunger. And Miles’s parents? Countless others she did not know? How could she feel indifferent toward them—all victims to nature’s cruelest trick?

  But it was not possible.

  Alexia seized her sister’s fingers. “If something should happen to you, I will protect your child.”

  “Then he will be safe.” Sarah’s shoulders relaxed, as though she’d been holding up the weight of the moon with them, and it now slipped free. “How did you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “The night I...” Her voice choked off. “When I changed, how did you defeat the Soulless?”

  Alexia scowled. “My future husband was the one who defeated them.”

  Sarah frowned.

  “But...” Alexia recalled that evening, black wraiths flooding into her father’s estate and the seemingly normal sword in her hands. “I hear tell it is not possible to slay the Soulless, and yet...”

  “And yet?” Sarah leaned forward, her eyes bright.

  “The sword mounted in Mother’s room, you remember the one—with the red ribbing about the handle?”

  Her sister nodded.

  “I slew one of them with it. I have relived that night a hundred times trying to decipher the reason, and it must have been the weapon.”

  Sarah blinked. “You are saying there is a weapon that can slay the Soulless?”

  “I do not know. Not for certain.” She almost confessed that the very blade was hiding beneath her mattress, but stopped short. Mae would not approve and she’d been so careful to keep it concealed. How would Sarah feel about such a thing in her presence?

  Hands wrapped around Alexia’s, Sarah’s eyes wide. “Then we have hope. Do you know where it is? I pray you have it near—for all our safety.”

  That was right—her sister was hiding from the Soulless as well. How would those creatures feel about her child?

  Still, Alexia hesitated. “It is here.”

  “Here?” Sarah gasped, leaning forward, a grin stretching her beautiful face. “Can I see it?”

  Alexia slid the sheath from under the bed. Her sister bolted upright, emerald eyes widening.

  “It is not a weight I like in my hand or life,” Alexia admitted. “But if it means the difference in our survival, I will use it.”

  Sarah’s head bobbed thoughtfully and she slid to her knees, a wicked smirk puckering her cheeks. “May I see the blade?”

  Alexia hesitated. It was a weapon against the Soulless, against Sarah. Although she hoped her aunt’s motives were nothing more than curiosity, she didn’t trust her entirely. Alexia slid the weapon out of its covering and lifted it.

  Sarah’s eyes glimmered. “It is beautiful.”

  Alexia scowled and looked the blade over. The metal was blemished and the blade chipped in several places. To call it beautiful was to admit a loss of sanity, but it was hers.

  Sarah reached out and ran a finger along the edge. She gasped and pulled her finger back, sucking on a cut. “Well, it did not kill me,” she uttered around her finger.

  Alexia had to believe she imagined the glimmer of madness in Sarah’s eye, but the fact she’d sliced her finger… Was she attempting to end her own life?

  Alexia lifted the weapon vertically, away from her aunt. Why did it feel so natural in her grasp? “I think it must be plunged right through the heart.”

  “I will not be testing that theory.” Sarah laughed.

  It was just her imagination. Alexia chuckled along, needing the laughter, but also more relieved than she dared admit. But of course! This was Sarah, the woman with more life in her than anyone Alexia knew!

  Sarah nodded. “You should name it.”

  Rising, Alexia gave the blade an experimental swing. “It seems wrong to name a weapon.”

  “Then I shall
name it.” Sarah got to her feet and curtsied at the weapon. “I hereby dub thee Slayer.”

  “Slayer?”

  “What else would you call a sword?” Sarah shrugged. “May I?”

  How rare it was that Alexia had something her aunt wanted. She tucked the weapon behind her back. “No.”

  “Oh come, Alexia.” Sarah rolled her eyes and reached for the hilt, her sliced finger catching the light. “I just want to feel its weight.”

  Alexia jerked it back, laughing as Sarah missed. “And cut yourself again? What kind of friend would I be, allowing you to come to harm.”

  Her aunt giggled and faked right, swerving left and catching the hilt.

  Alexia’s grip tightened. “You cheat!”

  “Just let me hold it.”

  “No!”

  Sarah yanked, pulling Alexia off balance, but she didn’t release her hold. Her grip slipped as laugher shook her frame. Her sister jerked again, both of them losing their clutch. The blade whirled free.

  Smack!

  It ricocheted into the bedframe and slammed into the wall. The metal crashed to the floor in two pieces.

  “Agh!” Alexia dropped to her knees, pulling the pieces together, heart crumpling. It split almost exactly down the middle, leaving a jagged dagger clinging to the too-large hilt. It had been old, the metal brittle, but...

  If she wasn’t on scorched earth, she would jump back in time and keep it from happening. It shouldn’t matter to her—it was a weapon after all—but it was almost like a piece of her had just broken.

  Sarah knelt next to her and offered the sheath, head bowed. “I am sorry.”

  Alexia accepted both, the sheath and the apology. It was just a sword, after all. She had her sister back.

  She picked up the broken portion and halted. “Now there are two.”

  They met gazes.

  Alexia lifted the broken end. “You should have this, to protect your child.”

  Forty-One

  Moonlight

  “...two weeks of travel is not enough? Someone else’s rump can take a horse-beating for now.”