by Tom Early
“Great,” I said, relieved. “But now I’m guessing there’s something else going on?”
“You’ll hear about it as soon as no one can overhear us.”
“Ah, so it’s that kind of thing. Excellent.”
“Just open the damn door, Fay.”
As soon as it swung shut, Sam practically shoved the piece of paper she was holding at my face. I had to take a quick step backward to avoid getting brained. Once I had it safely in my hands, I took a look at what it said.
The paper appeared to be a printout of what essentially amounted to a mugshot. A woman’s face stared out at me, her dark hair and wide brown eyes framed from the front and both side angles. I noted absently that she was quite pretty and seemed somehow strangely familiar, and then I saw her name and froze. Leanora Gray. I knew where I’d seen her face before, and that was in a small picture frame at the very top of Sam’s bookshelf in her room.
I glanced up at Sam, and she looked at me with something in her eyes I couldn’t quite recognize. “Keep reading,” she said, her voice clipped. “You haven’t gotten to the good part yet.”
It turned out I wasn’t wrong when I described the piece of paper as a mugshot. A list of crimes were spelled out in short, efficient sentences beneath Sam’s mom’s face. Several counts of magical arson, blackmail, treason, and murder. They didn’t go into any more detail than that, but there were letters and digits next to each charge that probably pointed to more detailed files. Down at the bottom was a set of incomprehensible signatures, and mention of a sizable reward for information leading to her arrest.
God, that was horrifying. I tried to imagine picking up a file with my mom or my dad’s name on it, just spelling out every awful thing they’d ever done. I couldn’t. I’d break down and scream. I’d feel betrayed. I… I wasn’t sure what I’d do.
“Sam?” I said cautiously. “How are you feeling about all this?”
“I’m managing,” Sam said, her voice still too clipped, and now I could see that for what it was, and I needed to be hugging her like three days ago. Oh God. I stepped forward and finally, Sam let me embrace her, and wrapped her arms around me in return, holding me tight as I listened to her too-fast breathing.
“When did you find out?”
“About an hour ago,” Sam said shakily. “I mean—I knew it was going to be bad, and I was ready for it, but still….”
“I don’t think anyone can ever be ready for something like that,” I said. “I know I wouldn’t be able to handle this. C’mon, let’s sit down.” Sam let me lead her over to my bed, and we half sat, half collapsed onto the soft comforter.
“Nick didn’t know what he was doing at first,” Sam said. “While he was giving me that talk about having to let things go and apologizing for having to give it like half the time, he also asked about the ercinee. Apparently having one as a familiar is incredibly rare, since nobody knows how many of them there are and they live forever, essentially. Then he told me that the last one who had an ercinee as a familiar was some famous revolutionary called the Dawn’s Hand, or something like that. I asked who that was because, well, if I want to be a cop I should know about the major terrorists and stuff. He said he didn’t know, only that she’d disappeared like twenty years ago and nobody had been able to find her.” She looked down at her hands. “So, I… I asked the ercinee if it knew anything about this person. Maybe if I could find out about a famous killer, Professor Laherty would let me into his class without it feeling like I cheated my way back in.”
“And it told you who the Dawn’s Hand really was,” I said, my stomach churning. “Because that stupid bird just fucking delights in causing pain.”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “It did. But I didn’t want to just leave it at that, so I went to the library today to see what else I could find, and the Librarian got this for me. I knew what I’d find, but to simply see what she did spelled out like that makes it so much worse.” She turned to look at me, and I could see the tears threatening to spill over. “You know, Mom always told me that her job was to protect people too. That she’d met Dad when she was on a secret mission and just couldn’t stay away.” She looked down. “I can’t believe she lied to me like that.”
“Sam….” I had no idea what I could say, so I just sat there, my hand on her back, as she carefully kept whatever she was feeling under control. I could feel the tiny tremors running along her spine, but this wasn’t uncontrollable anger or frustration like earlier. This was grief. It wasn’t my place to say what for or why, but I could recognize it after the Trials. And whatever she needed to do to get through her grief, I would be there for her.
A few minutes passed before Sam sniffed sharply and looked up. “But you know what’s the worst thing about all this?” she said, in a light, almost conversational tone. It was out of place enough to send chills up my spine.
“What?”
“Aiden said the university knew about me because of my mom,” Sam said. “Janus University knew exactly where I lived, which means they knew exactly where my mom was. And that means they have to know about the cancer too.”
I frowned. “Where are you going with this?”
“You know what’s missing from this sheet, Fay?” Sam said, jabbing her finger at it. “Anything about her death. There’s nothing. As far as Janus University’s records are concerned, my mom is still alive. And I find it pretty hard to believe that someone as obsessed with control as Didas is would let a little detail like that slip by.”
“And that means—”
“It means my mother might still be alive,” Sam finished, a hard note in her voice. “I’m guessing if you have magic, it would be easy to fake your death. And if she’s alive, that means she might still be out there, hurting people.”
The “she might have abandoned me” might have gone unsaid, but I heard it just as clearly. “So what are you planning to do?” I asked.
Sam shook her head. “Nothing yet. You’ve got your merging thing tomorrow, and as far as I’m concerned that’s my top priority.” Her eyes glinted. “But as soon as things here calm down a little more, I’m going to look into this some more. If she’s out there, I’m going to find her, and I’m going to stop her from hurting anyone else.”
I privately hoped that Sam’s mom was dead. Sam might have been putting on a strong face for me, but if her mom was still alive and as bad as this report made her out to be, I didn’t think it would make things better, or anything even close to good.
“You know I’m with you on this,” I said. “Whatever the plan is, count me in.”
Sam gave me a little shoulder nudge. “Thanks, Polar Bear,” she said and then straightened up. “Anyway. Enough about me and my bombshell revelations. Tell me what you’ve been up to, and then let’s get you ready to be as you as you can for the ritual.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Really? That easy?”
“Well, no,” she admitted. “But talking about it more isn’t going to help, so let’s not and focus on you instead. Sound good?”
I smiled. “Sounds good. So, want to hear about how I dropped like ten pounds of dirt into my hair?”
“Of course you did. Tell me what happened.”
“Well, it started with a tulip. At least it sort of did….”
Chapter Fifteen
BY THE time Sam let me sleep, I was thoroughly exhausted. Sam had taken the ideas Alferon had given me about how to rework my Ward and put them to practical use over and over again.
“Didas said the best chance you have is being familiar with your own magic, right?” Sam had said, flinging yet another orb of whirling air at me. I blocked it with a sudden plume of earth and let it back down as soon as it had finished.
“I think that was the gist of it,” I’d replied, ducking the next one she sent. “Mostly in that the magical ‘knowing yourself’ concept is really best applied by actually figuring out what I can do on my own.”
“Then let’s hit all the angles,” she said, and I dove behind a
thick wall of earth to avoid her sudden burst of fire. Suffice to say, I’d earned my leaden limbs. Pretty much as soon as I hit my bed, I was asleep. And in one of the weirdest feelings I’d ever experienced, I opened my eyes as soon as I closed them, and I was somewhere else entirely.
I was standing, and yep, okay, also bright red because wherever I was, I apparently hadn’t brought my clothes with me. My scars were shining silver in a light source that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, and that was what led me to noticing the strange dark void I was floating in. It felt a little like Limbo, but somehow even less… real. I wished I had my clothes to at least feel somewhat comfortable in wherever I was, and then I was clothed. The hoodie I’d been picturing was draped across my shoulders, and I was wearing that comfy pair of jeans I’d forgotten back at home. That was… weird.
Then wherever I was, and I was leaning toward this being yet another weird-as-hell dream, began to change. Three points of light showed up in the distance and started to move toward me. One of them was a bright, lively green with hints of pink and purple and vibrant yellow in small flickers. Another was a luminous gold, radiant enough that I couldn’t look at it directly. The other was swirling brown and reds and yellows, and a dozen other colors and shades that never seemed to stay still. There was still another light, though, pale and white and silver and a blue so light that it made me shiver. I looked around for the source, and then looked down to see it shining out from the scars crisscrossing my body.
The other three pillars of light were close to me now, forming a triangle around me. I could hear hushed voices, just at the edge of my range. They were talking about something I couldn’t quite catch, but the way one of the voices was bright and melodious sounded almost familiar. Every so often the vibrant green pillar would flicker and brighten temporarily, as if emphasizing a point. The golden one would then flicker in return, while the coruscating one seemed mostly still, at least as far as its edges were concerned. Eventually, whatever they were discussing seemed to reach a conclusion, because I could feel the attention being turned on me. It made me feel incredibly small.
The pillar of golden light was the first to approach me, and for a moment I swore I could see the outline of a person inside it, though nothing more than that. Whatever it was, its eyes were on me, and I felt like every last inch of my character was being weighed and judged, as if nothing I’d ever done or felt or thought was hidden from its all-encompassing light. Somehow I couldn’t do anything except let it, and my scars were starting to hurt as more of that silvery white light began to force its way out of me. I could feel it inside me, hungry, raging, reacting to the presence of the other three. Then the golden pillar seemed almost to reach out and touch me, a burning presence that forced Winter back even further, beaten down by the blaze of light. The light behind my scars dulled and dimmed to almost nothing, and the golden pillar retreated, satisfied. I got the feeling that whatever the pillar had done, it had been a conscious decision, the merits of doing so carefully weighed. Then the pillars swept away, the green one the last to go, pulsing brightly at me in a way that almost seemed like encouragement.
Then the oddest feeling swept over me. It felt like I was supposed to wake up—the lights were gone, after all, but instead I could hear something else in the dark with me, breathing heavily, like it was tired or in pain. I turned to find the source of the noise, and all of a sudden there was a staircase in the darkness with me, leading down. I headed down slowly, not sure what else to do, and then I was there again, in the strange room with the man who had two faces, Janus. As before, he was chained to the wall, but this time he was bleeding heavily from wounds that absolutely covered his body. He lifted his faces until his eyes met mine and managed a weary smile.
“It’s not so bad,” Janus said, with two voices in perfect harmony. “After a while in ‘service’ to Didas, you get used to it.” He gave me a look filled with pity. “He’ll do this to you too, you know. Make you useful, no matter the cost.”
I wanted to ask him what he meant, who he was, really, but my mouth worked and made no sound. I couldn’t speak. I wasn’t real enough, in my own dream, if this still was my own.
Janus dropped his head again. “I suggest you save yourself, child. I can see it in you. You are kind, open—this world will not be good to you.” He lifted his head one last time. “But if you want to come out the other side intact, find me. I will free you from his clutches.”
I started to fade away, Janus growing faint and distant as the dream left. His last words came to me in the barest whisper. “And maybe, in doing, I may finally be free as well. It’s nice, to hope again.”
I woke with a start, my memory of my dreams perfectly intact. Unlike the last time my dreams had gotten bizarre on me, I didn’t wake up terrified or in pain. My scars weren’t bleeding again, and I felt oddly refreshed. Even the thought of having to go to Didas pretty much right after this didn’t scare me as much. It felt like whatever I had to do, I would be okay. I made a note to talk to Sam about Janus later—if I could find him, maybe he really could do what he said. It was worth looking into.
Since I didn’t know when Didas was going to call me for the ritual, I got dressed and headed out for breakfast. Naturally, the other side of the door didn’t lead to the hallway, and the whole breakfast plan was swiftly abandoned.
“Good, you’re here,” Didas said from where he was slowly opening the locks on an ancient-looking case. “Are you prepared for this?”
I looked around at the rune-scarred room and the series of circles lying beneath my feet, humming with enough power that even I could tell with my minimal experience that they were meant to keep me from going anywhere. “Do I have a choice?”
“Manners,” Didas reminded me, carefully opening the case. “Don’t renege on a favor’s due.” He drew out and unrolled a scroll that looked like it had to be thousands of years old. Whatever rune was written on it with all those half-broken jagged lines, it made my head hurt to look at it too closely. “And yes, you have a choice. If you would prefer annihilation, please do tell me before I waste any more resources on you.”
Whoever said honesty is the best policy clearly hasn’t met you, I thought, but I kept it to myself. “I’m as ready as I’m going to be,” I said instead. “So what does this ritual actually look like?”
“This is the first of the seven runes from the horns used at Jericho, gifted to humanity by higher powers,” Didas said, holding the scroll up to the light. The swathes of ink on the page somehow looked more real than the scroll itself, and the effect was incredibly unnerving, like the ink had more depth than it should. “I will direct its effect onto you and begin to bring down the wall.”
“That’s all there is to it?”
“No,” Didas said, “but it’s all you need to be aware of. The function of this room is to better your odds of coming out on top once the merge begins, and to specify the wall the rune is to bring down. What comes after the ritual is begun, I cannot say.” I was surprised to see what looked suspiciously like excitement in Didas’s gaze, even if his voice was as colorless as always. “This is the first time such a thing has ever been attempted in known history. The results should be fascinating.”
Well. That was comforting. “And if things go wrong, am I just done for right away?”
Didas shook his head. “Unless things truly deteriorate to a point even I cannot anticipate, Winter will not be able to assert control until the ritual’s end. This rune is all about power, plain and simple. As long as your body can handle the strain, you will not die today.”
I took a deep breath. “Okay. I’m ready.”
Didas gave me an evaluating look. “Yes, I believe you are. Do not move.” He held the scroll aloft in front of him, and the air filled with tension as he began the spell. Didas opened his mouth and… the noises that came out weren’t human, not at all. It was like the sounds that made up the rune were being wrung out of him, only barely registered by my ears and absol
utely thrumming with power. The runes running along the wall and floor flared with gray light, throwing any shadows out of existence as they steadily increased in radiance. The scroll itself seemed to be burning away under unimaginable strain, leaving only the image of the rune behind, emblazoned in the air. And despite the insane level of power that had to be brought to bear for this, I wasn’t feeling anything at all, right up until all of a sudden I very definitely was.
It was agony, like being hit with a hammer in the center of my forehead and having it sink even deeper. Lines at the very core of myself that I hadn’t even been aware of suddenly splintered, sending shards of stabbing cold shooting through my body. I could feel myself shaking, feel the scream building, and then the pressure let loose, pouring out from me in waves, sending a blanket of ice and snow over the runes on the floor and hoarfrost spiraling up the walls, the runes sizzling with heat and melting the ice back. The silver lines my scars had left on my body were blazing and shifting in their patterns, some of them merging until they resembled more of a harness than a cage. The temperature of the room must have dropped nearly a hundred degrees, Didas’s breath coming out in short puffs of cloud, mine not visible at all. Everything had sharp, crystalline edges, each element coming out in more detail than my eyes could handle.
I looked at Didas and for a moment I could see his age, could see how he had sustained his life so unnaturally long, and in that moment I knew how I could take it away. It would be so easy. I brought the end, after all. I would kill him and revel in it, and then I would spread my gift over the rest of the world again, bring it winter the likes of which hadn’t been seen since my siblings had forced me away. Oh, goodness. How the little creatures had grown, like an infestation across my beautiful sleeping mother. I could see the split where my sister had taken them away, protected their remnants from my gift as best she could. This place lay somewhere in between—it was fascinating, the creature they had here to keep it that way. So old by their standards, a novelty by mine. I tried to kill the boy’s mind first, but I knew that golden light. He would have to wait. No matter. The fun I would have, the cold I would bring. I smiled and reached out to pluck the old man’s life from him, give him the rest he had run from for so long—