Then, rising up from where William’s body lay, came Tarn, a long slim blade in one hand. “No,” he said.
“So you’re fool enough to abandon Underlight,” said Nightwell, surprised. “You sacrifice everything for a human’s whim.”
“I abandon nothing that is mine. Branwyn, get out of here. Open a door.” His sword, glowing like a distant star, cut through Nightwell’s darkness.
Branwyn opened her mouth to explain she couldn't, then caught her breath as she looked at what she held. “Oh.” She reached into the Backworld with the Key and twisted it.
The curtain melted away around her. She tumbled out into the world.
-twenty five-
She fell six feet, landing on the roof of a car and rolling off heavily. As she sprawled on the pavement, she tried to figure out where she was. A parking lot beside a busy city street. It was familiar. She limped to the shadow of the nearby building and worked to turn the sense of familiarity into an actual place. Her head was fuzzy. She still held the Key, but it was excited by the recent use, and it sang to her. It was ready to open bigger things.
“No,” she whispered to it. “Maybe later. There’s something else now.” She blinked in the early morning light and realized she was only a few blocks from Penny’s hospital, at a strip mall with a bank and a coffee shop. William had almost gotten her there. She just had to stagger across the street and there she was. Easy.
Except that the coffee shop down the street was playing music out over the sidewalk tables, and a new song had begun. Branwyn recognized the chords she’d heard Jaimie practicing days ago, and a moment later, heard his voice singing. Up and down the sidewalk, people appeared out of thin air. Tall, slender, beautiful people. They’d been in all the videos lately, showing off magic that faded whenever their leashes snapped them back to their prison. And as one, they turned to the Key Branwyn clutched tightly.
No time to stagger, then. Branwyn ran to the curb, ignoring the pain that screamed in her ankle and knee. Even this early, there were too many cars to ignore; she’d be flattened. She punched the crosswalk button, then, in desperation, pushed the Key into the light post—it sank in like the post was an illusion—and twisted it the other direction. The light controlling traffic flickered from green to red without pausing at yellow. A moment later, traffic going both directions was at a standstill and Branwyn limped across the street, waving at the puzzled drivers.
She was limping; the faeries were not. It wouldn’t do. She ran as she’d never run before, sure she heard the sound of dogs baying behind her. It was a game, she realized. They didn’t know where she was going, or why. So when she zagged into the door of the hospital as a man stepped out, they didn’t expect it. She grabbed the door from the man leaving and pulled it shut, then locked it behind her before staggering to the elevator and using the Key to demand priority service. It was a useful tool and she was really going to miss it.
In the elevator, she caught her breath for a moment. She was going to make it. They weren’t going to stop her. She was almost there.
Then she walked into Penny’s room, and came face to face with Simon and Marley.
They were glaring at each other, but Branwyn hardly noticed, unable to imagine any reason for Simon being there other than stopping her at Senyaza’s behest. “What—No! Get out of my way! Marley, help me!”
Simon blinked and looked away from Marley, who was hovering protectively over Penny’s bedside. “Bran—” he began.
Then all hell broke loose.
Darkness flooded the room as Nightwell arrived. A hand reached out of the shadows for Branwyn and a dimly radiant blade batted it away as Tarn rose from the floor. The hospital room was suddenly much too crowded and Branwyn dropped to the ground to get past them. She felt Marley’s shield drop over her as her friend grabbed her and pulled her into the tiny space where she was wedged between the IV stand and the hospital bed.
“What did you do, Branwyn?” shouted Simon. He had his knife out, and it flickered with an electric glow as he stared at the two faerie lords battling. As a sword almost clipped him, he ducked and swore.
It started to rain in the hospital room. At first, Branwyn thought it was a sprinkler system accidentally set off, but she could smell the freshness of the rain. An alarm went off, and another one. “Protect Penny,” she told Marley urgently. “I need some time to work, so if you can—” she gave the chaos in the room a speaking glance, then crouched beside Penny. Her friend’s breathing was rapid and shallow.
Marley said, “Right. I’ll do what I can.” The visual brightness vanished and Penny’s breathing stabilized. Then Marley stepped between Branwyn and the rest of the room.
Branwyn laid the Key on Penny’s chest. “Souls are key,” she whispered. AT had said that. Music opens doors, Rime had said. There were probably fewer figures of speech in the world than people thought. Or at least, there would be with faeries around.
Her own breathing quickening, Branwyn tried to shut out the chaos and look at Penny with maker’s eyes. She’d done this the last time she visited, when she saw that the two-part key wouldn’t be enough. Now, with the complete tripartite key, the Key that could open any door, she looked at Penny’s ravaged soul. The fit wasn’t perfect, not yet. She thought, when dealing with a prosthetic soul, the fit should probably be perfect. She had to work. She had to concentrate.
The noise in the room was incredible. Even on their worst days, her family had never been this bad. Some of the hospital staff had shown up to add to the noise. There was screaming, and Simon cursing, and probably the gnashing of teeth, too.
“Will you all just be quiet!” she shouted, unable to stop herself.
The mark on her collarbone burned, and silence fell across the room like a switch had been flipped. Severin said, his voice cutting across the silence like a bad dream, “I’m here to help, cupcake. You’ve served me admirably, after all.”
Branwyn looked around, wild-eyed. Everybody seemed frozen. She spotted the kaiju, standing amidst panicking medical staff at the entrance to the room. He touched three of them on the foreheads in rapid succession and they collapsed. She met his bright gaze, then looked with panic at the two faeries. They were moving very slowly, as if caught underwater.
“Ah, well, I didn’t think it would last. Work fast, cupcake.” Then everything sped up again, sans alarm and screaming humans. Severin insinuated himself between Nightwell and Tarn like a dancer, flung Nightwell away with a quiet, “Mine,” then turned and knocked Tarn flat on his back. Nightwell bounced off the wall and sprang forward again, then seemed to realize that Severin had stolen his opposition and turned toward Branwyn.
“And what are you doing?” Nightwell asked, almost politely, but Branwyn couldn’t spare any attention for him. She couldn’t seem to pull her gaze from Tarn and Severin. Severin straddled Tarn's chest, kneeling with his hands on both sides of Tarn’s head, his forehead pressed against the faerie’s. Severin’s teeth were bared in savage glee, while Tarn had his eyes closed. He wasn’t struggling at all, but the clashing of celestial auras rose, the black diamond rain damping for a moment even the thrum of the Key Branwyn still held. Something warm and oceanic flickered around Tarn, then faded under the dark onslaught.
Strands of light glowed to life around Tarn, tying him down. Something glinted in Severin’s hand, and Marley said in a hushed voice, “He’s actually going to kill him for real.”
Something tickled Branwyn’s throat. She didn’t want Tarn to die, not because he’d stepped out of safety, not because she’d been Severin’s pawn, not because of her. The tickling grew to a burning and she screamed, “No!”
Simon, who’d been standing stock still alongside the wall, glanced down at the knife in his hand. Then he shrugged, stepped forward, grabbed Severin’s head by a handful of dark hair, and dragged the lightning-sparking knife across his throat.
There was a thunderclap that rattled the IV stand, and for the second time, almost everything froze.
The kaiju's black diamond aura throbbed twice, like a beating heart, then vanished as blood gushed out over Simon’s hand. Severin twitched, turning his head. Then his body collapsed, freezing and crumbling just as Rime’s had.
The white light binding Tarn vanished and he scrambled backward, out from under the disintegrating statue. He caught something that fell amid the dust, and pulled his own sword out of nowhere.
“Damn thing’s been after me to do that since you fixed it,” muttered Simon. “It told me he’d be here.”
Something dark twisted painfully within Branwyn. She looked down at Penny and crushed her feelings away. She had work to do.
“Very interesting,” said Nightwell courteously. “But I’d like the Key now. Don’t make me kill you. You’re a treasure. It would be a shame.”
Branwyn raised her head again.
Tarn said, just as politely, “Go ahead, Branwyn. What you’re doing does look very interesting.” Then he connected the glittering thing he’d taken from Severin’s remains to his sword and pressed the flat of the blade against Nightwell’s abdomen, wrapping his arm around him from behind. “I’m feeling generous, cousin. Nobody should die the Machine death today. So just stay quiet and watch. Or go home. I don’t really care.”
Nightwell stiffened, his gaze sweeping across Marley and Simon. Branwyn stopped watching, then. She turned her attention back to the Key. It lay quiescent, a multidimensional piece of celestial machinery folded into a shape made for opening doors. It could do other things, too. It could do this.
Working carefully and slowly, she touched the Machine here and there. She introduced it to Penny, showed it Penny’s ragged soul. Silently, she told it about Penny, about Penny’s reaction to her first kiss, and her feelings about her mother. It responded. It knew what to do.
Then, gently, she started transferring the tendrils the Key sank into her into Penny, drawing them snug. It was detailed, complicated work. But as she worked, the Key began to work as well and for a few endless moments, she and Penny were connected to each other. She saw Penny’s dreams and caught her breath in grief.
But with time, Penny could heal. The Machine would see to that, see she had time, see she would heal if she chose to. Branwyn was sure she would. And so, delicately, she moved the last connection from her chest to Penny’s and the Key sank into Penny’s torso. The glow that spread out from Branwyn’s hands faded and, wearily, she lifted them away.
She was sitting in a chair beside Penny’s bed. Not much time had passed, she supposed; almost everybody was still there. Nightwell had vanished, and Tarn stood at the door chatting quietly with some people just beyond. He looked, she thought muzzily, like a doctor. He had more magic now, and more freedom, despite the fact that she’d used the Key for something else. Rhianna wouldn’t be happy about that.
The pile of dust on the floor that had been Severin was gone.
Marley touched her shoulder and offered her a glass of water. She looked as tired as Branwyn felt. “Are you okay?”
Branwyn drank the water, then stretched stiff shoulders. “That depends. How is she?”
“I don’t know. You did something, I can see that, but—”
“Ah, but you can’t expect something like that to work all at once. It was amazing, but you’re not a miracle-worker, Branwyn,” said Simon.
Tarn turned, closing the door behind him. “Actually, I think she is.”
“Nope. She can’t be. Mortal hands, right there.”
With a faintly amused smile, Tarn shrugged. “I owe you my life, so I won’t argue with you.”
Simon rose from where he was sprawled on the couch. “He’ll be back, you know. That wasn’t anywhere near permanent. He’ll be back and he’ll remember.” He sighed.
“Does it worry you?” asked Tarn.
“I’d be an idiot if it didn’t,” said Simon bluntly. “I don’t usually like to do such a poor job of things. It’s dangerous. The question is, who’s he going to be angriest at? You? Me? Her?”
An odd expression crossed Tarn’s face. “Me, certainly. He might hunt you down, I suppose. Not her.”
“You think? Possibly so. Still, she made the knife awfully angry at him. I couldn’t have hurt him enough without it, not so quickly. I wouldn't have been here, either. Damn thing knew where he'd be. Strangest thing.” Simon shook his head.
“She's an Artificer,” said Tarn. “It's what they do.”
Marley reached over and squeezed Branwyn’s hand. “Don’t worry about him.”
“I’m not,” said Branwyn, and meant it. She never had been. She was much more worried about her own ambiguous feelings about the kaiju. Then, because Marley was looking at her with a thoughtful gaze she didn’t like, she said, “I’m a little worried about Nightwell, though. Will he or other faeries come after Penny?”
“That will be interesting,” said Tarn, with unexpected cheer. “I think she may be able to defend herself if they do.”
Branwyn focused on Tarn and realized something. “You’re here. What’s happening in Underlight? What’s happened to the door?”
He held her gaze steadily as he said, “The door is drifting unanchored through the mists of the Backworld. And Underlight will reform. If you would return the courtkey to me, that would help quite a bit.” He held out his hand, his fingers closed over something. “We can trade.”
“Of course,” she said, and, “I’m sorry,” as she found the courtkey in her pocket and offered it to him.
He took it and said, “Doubt is deadly for a faerie lord, Branwyn. But life is beautiful. I’m glad to be reminded of that.” Then he deposited what he'd been holding into her now-empty hand.
She stared down at it. It looked very much like an actual black diamond and it whispered like a Machine fragment. “Where—?”
“He had it, as well as the spirit tethers. The Destroyer. He was very determined that I die. I wish I could remember why.” Regret moved over his face, and a hint of a profound sadness. But it was gone so quickly Branwyn might have dreamt it. Lightly, he finished, “I have no idea where he got it. But I thought you might find it useful.”
Branwyn hesitated, thinking about the kaiju, then tucked the black diamond away. “Yes, I will.”
She transferred her gaze to Simon. “Are you supposed to kill me for stealing from Senyaza?”
“Nope,” he said. He yawned, like somebody who’d been up all night.
“Nope?” she asked suspiciously.
“Nope. I’m supposed to kill you to stop you from freeing the faerie scourge. You might want to—” and he stopped talking, suddenly.
There was movement under the blanket below Branwyn and Marley’s linked hands. Branwyn’s breath caught in her throat and she looked down.
With a little sound, Penny opened her eyes.
For a long moment, she stared up at Branwyn. Then her eyebrows furrowed. “Branwyn? What are you doing in my—” She looked around and said, “Oh. Oh. What happened?” She coughed and Marley gave her some water. “I remember going to sleep after my date with Jeremy.” Her face darkened. “I had dreams.”
Branwyn smiled and stood up, pushing Marley into the chair. “Marley will tell you all about it.” She leaned over and gave Penny a hug.
“Where are you going?” Marley demanded.
“I’ve got to write up a rate sheet for Senyaza,” Branwyn said cheerfully. “And fill in my siblings. And maybe sleep a little. Busy, busy.” Marley scowled at her, and Penny looked at her in just-woken-up bemusement. “Besides, your mom is going to be here soon. You know how I hate crying moms.” She winked and walked out the door Tarn had just opened, the whole world ahead of her.
The End
For a preview of the third Senyaza book, Wolf Interval, turn the page.
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Finally: Infinity Key is the second book in the Senyaza Series chronology. The next book, Wolf Interval, takes place around month later, and follows AT. For a preview, turn the page....
Being the daughter of a supernatural monster makes it hard to have friends, especially when your father is determined to make you follow in his footsteps. It’s especially tough at Halloween, but AT makes do with her magical dogs and the local ghosts. And this is almost a life…
…until the Wild Hunt shows up.
On this All Hallow’s Day, they’ll finally be released to pursue their ultimate ambition: hunting down every ghost in the mortal world. The only way to stop them is to venture into the heart of a cursed city and steal the source of their power. That’s hardly a problem for the daughter of a monster–until she realizes she needs more than her magical dogs to get where she’s going. She needs friends, too.
That’s a lot scarier than a cursed city, but if she wants to save the ghosts, she’ll have to find a way.
Wolf Interval
“Oh, AT,” sighed my mother. “I thought you’d finally escaped.” Four times she’d said that since I returned to my father’s house. But she was dead, and it takes a while for the dead to learn anything new.
I pressed my cheek against the trophy case where my mother’s locket was on display and thought patient thoughts. Ghosts couldn’t help having trouble learning new facts—it’s a side effect of having a mind but no brain, I think—but my mom was being even more stubborn than usual.
My father was out of the house for the morning. Without his presence to stifle us, I’d figured it was a great time to work on updating my mother and the other ghosts on my return home. I’d been hiding in my room whenever my father let me for days now, and the idea of doing something for myself had been exciting. At first. I missed my mom. Alive or dead, she’d always been awesome.
Infinity Key (Senyaza Series Book 2) Page 30