by Martha Carr
Ember smiled at the halfling. “Are you reading my mind, or am I reading yours?”
“I don’t know. That depends on what you say next.”
“I was already working on it. Come here.”
Cheyenne leaned toward her friend, and Ember whipped her arm back to land a vicious slap on the halfling’s upper arm. A burst of purple light and tingling energy raced across Cheyenne’s arm and chest. She straightened and rubbed her arm. “Ow. Did you have to slap it onto me?”
“No, the slap was for luck, and because we both know you probably shouldn’t leave, but I can’t stop you. By the way, if you use any magic or go drow mode, the charm’s done. Then magicals will be able to find you.”
“Then I won’t power up anything.” Cheyenne grinned. “Thanks. Oh, and by the way, let me know if you get any notifications, yeah?”
“From Glen?” Ember looked at the back of the computer tower in the mini-loft. “Why would they come to me?”
“’Cause I just synced them to your phone.”
“You have a phone too.”
Cheyenne cocked her head. “Yes I do, and it’s back in my possession, thank you. I have a few small searches running. Just tiny stuff I put up real quick in case anything pops up about those war machines, their handlers, whether or not Corian’s managed to take care of the problem.”
“Seriously? You’re monitoring them now?”
“Yes. And if you’re thinking about lecturing me on the morality of said monitoring, I’ll quickly remind you that Corian’s been spying on me my entire life.” Cheyenne grinned. “This doesn’t come close to paying him back for that.”
“Okay.” Ember quickly shook her head. “But why did you hook your fancy computer up to my phone?”
“I’m going out to get a prophecy, Em. Something tells me an unexpected alert would ruin the mood. Who knows? Maybe even get in the way of whatever this raug thinks I should hear.” Cheyenne stuck her hands in her pockets and paused. “Unless you’re totally against the idea.”
“Stop.” Ember said, “I’ll monitor your spy alerts from the computer you named Glen.”
“Thank you.”
“Wait, but what if there’s something important? Texting you would interrupt you just as much as an alert.”
“Right.” Cheyenne fingered the keyring in her pocket and headed for the door. “But I trust your judgment. Only text me if something’s life-or-death, okay? I mean, if anything even shows up.”
Ember squinted at her friend. “Why do I have the feeling you set all that up just to distract me from the rest of my movie marathon?”
With a sharp laugh, Cheyenne opened the door. “I trust you. And I kind of like the idea of having a fae partner in crime keeping an eye on things for me.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And yeah, maybe you’ll find another hobby you like a little more than watching movies all day.”
Ember pointed at her. “If I want to watch movies all day, I’ll watch movies all day. I’m a grown-ass adult.”
“True. Then think of it as payback for magically stealing my phone. Bye.” Cheyenne slipped into the hall and pulled the door quickly shut behind her. Ember’s laughter followed her down the hall toward the elevators.
Chapter Eighty-One
Cheyenne pulled her black Panamera to the curb outside Gúrdu’s apartment building. The high-pitched chirp when she pressed the automatic lock made her smile as she headed down the walkway to the building’s front door. Her smile faded a little when she glanced at the browning grass in the corner formed by the walkway and the sidewalk. That’s where Maleshi puked her guts out. Great memory to bring up, coming into this.
Two chickens clucked somewhere behind the building, but the raug’s irritated magical neighbor didn’t have an objection to the noise today. Cheyenne pulled open the grime-coated glass door and walked down the breezy hallway of the rundown apartment building. When she reached Gúrdu’s front door, she paused for a quick glance around, then knocked.
The door opened immediately, a puff of dust raining down from the top of the doorframe. The huge raug behind it didn’t seem to notice but stared at Cheyenne instead with glowing orange-brown eyes. His thick, muscular gray jaw worked on crunching a mouthful of something Cheyenne didn’t care to know about. Makes him look like a bull chewing his cud.
“You’re interested.” Bits of black sludgy something spilled from the corner of his mouth.
She tried not to stare or let her nostrils flare at the smell. Like copper and steamed broccoli. “Wouldn’t have come all this way if I wasn’t.”
Gúrdu grunted and waved a meaty gray hand tipped with thick, sharpened red nails. “Then let’s get to it.”
He turned away and left the door open for her. Cheyenne slipped into the dark, dusty entryway of the raug’s large and neglected apartment, pulling the heavy metal door shut with a low echo.
Gúrdu’s hulking figure disappeared between the dangling strands of wooden beads hanging from the hallway’s ceiling. Cheyenne pressed her lips together when she saw the last four strands dangling without any beads at the end of the wooden rod. Good thing Maleshi’s not here with me this time to pick another fight with that thing.
She swept away the clacking strands of beads and turned left into the long, wide room that stretched the entire length of his apartment. Low natural flames flickered in the lanterns hanging from the ceiling. Cheyenne almost tripped when her shoe caught on a frayed strip of fabric dangling from one of the dozens of cushions scattered across the dusty floor. She kicked off the clinging tatters and sent a puff of yellowed stuffing bouncing across the other pillows.
The large wooden platform at the back of the long room creaked and groaned beneath Gúrdu’s tremendous weight as he climbed onto the stacked cushions of his Oracle’s throne. Making her way toward him, Cheyenne paid more attention to where she stepped and ignored the dark shapes skittering across the floor beneath the cushions. “I’m guessing these messages you were talking about are more like prophecies, right?”
Gúrdu stopped chewing and swallowed his huge mouthful with another crunch and a wet gurgle. “It’s dangerous to assume that type of thing, hidna.”
The warning growl in his voice made her stop ten feet from his platform. “My bad. You surprised me by sending me a message on the forum, so I will admit being a little hasty to jump to conclusions.” Cheyenne cleared her throat.
The raug growled again, but this time it rose into a dark, heavy chuckle that echoed around the room. “You weren’t nearly this hasty to back down the first time we met. You should see your face right now.” A louder laugh burst from his meaty gray lips before dying quickly.
Cheyenne sighed. “There’s nothing wrong with my face. You just like to screw with me.”
He spread his thick arms in a slow, sweeping gesture. “I stood witness to the Nós Aní binding of the Aranél. It’s a rare opportunity to screw with a drow, hidna.” His lips peeled back in an eager grin, exposing yellow teeth with plenty of sludgy black food bits still clinging to them.
“Well, I’m glad you find that so amusing.”
“I find many things amusing.” Gúrdu’s smile disappeared. “That doesn’t include what you came to me to hear, just so you’re not assuming anything else about this visit.”
Cheyenne slowly navigated her way through the remaining cushions toward him and shrugged. “Kinda hard to imagine anything having to do with a prophecy is amusing.”
“You’re right about that.” The raug’s glowing orange-brown eyes fixed on the drow halfling as she found the least-disgusting cushion and lowered herself to sit on it. “Take off the charms, hidna. You have nothing to hide in here. Not that you can hide it, obviously.”
“The charms? Oh.” She quickly removed Ember’s illusion earrings and stuffed them into her pocket. “Not much of a difference.”
He studied her pale skin and black-dyed hair. “This time, you’re not trying to be wholly something you’re not.”
; “The first time, I was trying to get answers from a raug Oracle and figured showing up at his front door looking like a human wouldn’t even get me inside.”
Gúrdu chuckled again. “You’re smarter than you look.”
Cheyenne snorted. “Thanks. Are we gonna keep chatting like this is a social call? Totally up to you. I just put a few other things on hold so I could get over here for these messages of yours.”
“Yes, doing nothing in your apartment must have been very disappointing to leave behind.”
The halfling narrowed her eyes and lifted her chin. “If I didn’t know you’re an Oracle, I’d think you’ve been spying on me.”
“All Oracles are spies, hidna. But for whom? That’s the question so many greedy little magicals try to fit into the right box.” Gúrdu’s thick gray tongue poked between his lips as he slurped more gooey black leftovers from his last meal back into his mouth. “I spy for myself, and on occasion, for those I would like to see reach a certain outcome.”
“Like me making the crossing with L’zar.”
“That is one such outcome. Should we keep discussing my motives, or do you want to stop talking and receive the threads I’ve pulled out for you?”
Again with the thread-and-tapestry analogy. “Let’s go with the threads.”
“Hmm.” Gúrdu reached out with a red claw toward the bowl of water on the closest table. The bowl flashed with silver light and hovered through the air before settling gently beside the raug’s crossed legs. The silver tray came next from a different low round table scattered among the cushions on the floor.
And here’s the part where he picks up all the sticks, dips them in the water, and eats them.
The Oracle grunted as he chewed, splinters of wood flying from between his mouth. He dipped his clawed finger into the bowl of water, then raised it to his forehead and drew a clear wet line down in the bridge of his nose, over his wood-flecked lips, and down to the underside of his chin.
“You will hear, hidna.” The bundle of dry twigs plinked onto the silver tray. “So many things have been woven around the Aranél of the new Cycle, and only one is worth sharing with you for free.”
Cheyenne sat straighter over her crossed legs, listening intently. Finally, someone’s about to tell it to me straight, even if it’s mixed up in a prophecy.
“The threads are re-weaving, drow.” Gúrdu swallowed his mouthful of sticks and closed his eyes. “Sometimes they snap. Sometimes when we thought they vanished, they reappear. In all my time of reading the weave, I have only seen one such thread unchanged. Maybe it means something. Maybe it’s bullshit. But I am one of the forsaken who wishes to turn the Cycle anew. If you find anything useful in this, I’ll be glad to know it helped you do what you’re already preparing to do.”
He’s talking about making the crossing with L’zar again. That has to be it. Not gonna ask for clarification. Cheyenne pressed her fists into her lap and stared at the raug Oracle, who’d now fallen silent but for the slow, steady breath filling his massive chest and rushing out of him again like an ocean tide.
Gúrdu’s next breath wheezed out of him as he set the backs of his gray palms on his knees. Then he gasped and opened his eyes. They were pure white now, seeing only the prophecy, but the flames in the lanterns hanging from the ceiling surged to two feet tall and took on the same eerie green glow.
“Blood bonds with blood. Blood flows both ways.” The Oracle’s voice rose in a thick growl in dozens of voices, echoing through the room as if they sat in a stone cavern instead. ‘The black rivers of Ambar’ogúl thicken, waiting to herald the last scion and the first phér móre. The ancient ones howl in their shards of stolen prescience as the young ones are turned inside-out, outside-in. The heart rots. The heart beats. The heart will bleed in both ways.”
Gúrdu started swaying from side to side as he took another wheezing breath. The green flames in the lanterns flared again, whipping and sputtering in a wind that didn’t exist anywhere else. A low, growling hum rose from the raug’s throat.
“The Cycle will not turn for the Cu’ón as was foreseen. It will break beneath the fires of return. She will shatter the bones of the darkpool cages and will not remain to see the world rebuilt. Blood runs both ways. To choose one is life. To choose life is chaos.”
A wet, hacking cough wracked the Oracle’s chest. He struggled to draw another breath as his huge body trembled, every muscle taut and rigid.
Cheyenne gazed around the room. This doesn’t look good.
“To shed her skin.” Gúrdu coughed again, but his next breath never came. In its place was the same wet gurgle.
How do I know if this is normal or if he’s choking on fucking sticks? She tightened her fists and leaned forward, ready to jump up and at least try the Heimlich if things didn’t get better soon.
Then the raug’s head whipped back, and a shrieking howl in all those otherworldly voices burst from his gaping mouth. “The Cu’ón delivers his scion into ruin and decay. Blood bonds with blood. The phér móre is the sword. If it does not sail true, the scion will be their doom. The bridges and the river will both fall. Destiny runs both ways. The rot runs blood-deep. The rot shadows the bridges. The rot is her blood and her only path to claiming what was always hers from what he had no right to freely give!”
Another howl came from all around them now. Gúrdu’s body bucked and convulsed on his huge wooden platform.
“Shit.” Cheyenne leaped to her feet. “Gúrdu? You can—”
“This is the only way! And you will tremble before the sacrifice, daughter of L’zar, daughter of the Cu’ón, the Dark Grinning Weaver.”
Gúrdu’s meaty hand jerked away from his knee and swiped across the room, sending out a spray of hissing orange sparks. Cheyenne leaped back over the cushions. “Hey!”
“Your blood will burn in the Heartfire. Your blood will ignite the cleansing storm!” The raug’s other hand did the same, sweeping aside some unseen force but moving like someone else had taken control of a body that didn’t fit. The flames in the lanterns blazed higher and burst at the center with black light as Gúrdu’s gesture tossed the first two rows of cushions into the air with his uncontrolled magic.
Cheyenne batted aside a cushion that had flown at her and shook off the thick cobweb that clung to her arm. “Time to turn this thing off, Gúrdu. Can you hear me?”
“Your blood will bond to blood! Your blood runs through the heart! Cut out the heart! Cut out the heart!” The Oracle lurched forward and clapped his hands together with an ear-shattering boom. A ball of black fire churned between his palms when he drew them apart, the rest of his body still convulsing and making those awful sounds.
“That’s it. We’re done.” Cheyenne slipped into her drow form and conjured two churning orbs of black energy. “Sorry in advance.”
Gúrdu howled with dozens of voices and lurched forward again, his eyes and gaping mouth blazing with black fire as the flames between his hands grew larger, sparking with silver light. Cheyenne drew her arm back, meaning to throw an attack, then the dark flames in the lanterns roared into burning columns reaching toward the ceiling.
A loud crack came from behind Cheyenne, followed by a jagged streak of blinding silver light that raced for the prophecy-possessed Oracle. The shockwave made the halfling stumble forward, but she couldn’t look away from the sight of Maleshi dropping back into normal time and sending a fist wrapped in silver light into the side of Gúrdu’s face.
The screaming and howling cut off instantly, along with the Oracle’s black flames and the dark fire burning in the lanterns. The entire room plunged into darkness, and in the sudden silence, the heavy breathing of all three sounded incredibly loud.
Normal yellow flames returned to the lanterns, lighting the room again.
Cheyenne blinked and swept her gaze around the room until she stopped at the Oracle’s platform again. “What the fuck?”
Maleshi loomed over Gúrdu, who now lay on his back with his huge hands splayed ou
t beside him. She straightened, smoothed her hair away from her face, and let out a long, hissing breath. “I’ve been wanting to hit this Oracle for centuries.”
Chapter Eighty-Two
Gúrdu’s gray, clawed hand lifted and swiped at the general’s calf.
“Don’t even try.” Maleshi stepped back and glared at him. “You deserved it.”
“I wasn’t finished.” With a few light coughs, he groaned and pushed himself back up until he sat cross-legged on the cushions again, his eyes glowing orange-brown once more in the low light. “And you know better than to cut off the source before it’s done.”
“Spare me the pompous thread lecture, Gúrdu. You’re not in any position to be meddling with shit you don’t remotely understand.”
“Oh, but I see all of it, Maleshi. I do understand.” He wiped the corner of his mouth and chuckled at the nearly black blood smeared across the back of his hand. “And now so does L’zar’s daughter, I think.”
The general dismissed the raug Oracle with a sharp hiss and jumped off the platform. “Speaking of L’zar’s daughter, you can put that away now.”
“Yep.” Cheyenne killed the black spheres of drow energy in her hands, then shoved them into her pockets and looked at Gúrdu. If he had eyebrows, I might be able to read that expression a little better. At least I get a nod of approval. I think. She glanced at Maleshi and shrugged. “Any chance you won’t punch me in the face too?”
“You know, maybe I should.” Maleshi spun to point a warning finger at Gúrdu. “This was the last time you pull one of these little stunts, got it?”
“She deserves to know, Maleshi.”
“She deserves not to have her brain stuffed with cryptic tatters that could get her killed if she doesn’t know how to untangle them the right way. She deserves not to be dragged into a deathflame show arena, you masochistic asshat.” The general shot Cheyenne a quick, appraising look. “Come on. You’ll figure it out eventually.”
“Yes. We made sure of that, hidna. Didn’t we?” Gúrdu chuckled and reached for the wooden bowl of water to pour it into his mouth. Water slopped over the sides in thick streams and splashed the raug’s lap, his cushions, and the wooden platform. Cheyenne turned to follow Maleshi out of the room. “Ah. Only one thread unchanged, Aranél. Don’t forget. That one’s yours.”