by P. C. Cast
“Stark, when a fledgling Changes, there is some kind of ritual he has to go through.”
“Do you know the ritual?”
“No, only vamps do.” Then I had a thought. “You have to go to Dragon Lankford.”
“The fencing instructor?”
“Yeah. He’s on our side. Tell him I sent you to him. Tell him you’ve pledged yourself as Warrior in my service. He’ll know what to do for you.”
“Okay, will do.”
“But don’t let anyone see that you’ve Changed.” I didn’t know why it was important to me, but I knew he needed to keep hidden until after he reached Dragon. I looked around the storage room until I found a TU trucker’s cap, which I stuck on Stark’s head. With a little more searching I found a towel, which I rolled up and tucked around his neck. “Pull this up”—I tugged the towel into place—“and keep this brim down. You won’t look too weird. I mean, there’s an ice storm out there. Just get to Dragon without being seen.”
He nodded. “What’ll you be doing?”
“I’ll be planning our escape from here. Dragon and his wife are in on it, and I think the Horse Master, Lenobia, is, too. So get back here as soon as you can.”
“Zoey, don’t wait for me. Get away from here. Get far, far away.”
“What about you?”
“I can come and go whenever I want. I’ll find you, don’t worry. My body won’t be with you all the time, but you’ll always have my heart. I’m your warrior, remember?”
I smiled and touched his cheek. “I’ll never forget. I promise. I’m your High Priestess and you’ve pledged yourself to me. That means you have my heart, too.”
“Then both of us better stay safe. A heart’s a hard thing to live without. I should know. I’ve tried it,” he said.
“But no more,” I said.
“No more,” he agreed.
Stark kissed me with such gentleness that he took my breath away. Then he took a step back, fisted his hand over his heart, and bowed formally to me. “I’ll see you soon, my lady.”
“Be careful,” I said.
“And if I can’t be careful, I’ll be quick.” He threw me his cocky grin and ducked out of the door.
When he was gone I closed my eyes, fisted my hand over my heart, and bowed my head. “Nyx,” I whispered, “I was telling him the truth. He has my heart. I don’t know how that’s going to turn out, but I ask that you keep my warrior safe and thank you for giving him the courage to make the choice for good.”
Nyx didn’t suddenly appear before me, and I hadn’t expected her to. But I did feel a brief, listening silence in the air around me, and that was enough. I knew the Goddess’s hand was on Stark. Protect him…strengthen him…oh, and could you please help me figure out what I’m going to do about him… I prayed silently until the sixth-hour bell rang.
“Okay, Zoey,” I told myself. “Let’s break out of this place.”
CHAPTER 29
When I rushed into the stables late, Lenobia gave me a chilly look and said, “Zoey, you have a stall to muck.” She tossed me a pitchfork and pointed me toward Persephone’s stall.
I muttered my apologies and my “yes, ma’am—right away, ma’am” and hurried into the stall of the mare I considered my own for as long as I was in school at the House of Night. Persephone whickered a soft greeting to me and I went straight to her head, stroking her face and kissing her velvet muzzle, and basically telling her that she was the prettiest, smartest, best horse in the known universe. She lipped my cheek, blew in my face, and seemed to agree with my opinion.
“She loves you, you know. The mare has told me so.”
I turned to see Lenobia standing just inside the door of the stall, leaning against the wall. I sometimes forget how exceptionally beautiful she is, so at times like this, when I really look at her, I’m surprised again at her uniqueness. She is strength packaged delicately. Her silver-white hair and slate-gray eyes are the most striking things about her, well, except for the incredible tattoos of rearing horses that Marked her as a vampyre. She was wearing her usual outfit of a crisp white shirt and tan riding slacks tucked into English riding boots. Except for the tattoos and the silver goddess embroidered over her heart, she looked like something that should be in a chic Calvin Klein ad.
“You can really talk to them?” I’d suspected as much, but Lenobia had never been so blunt about her abilities before now.
“Not in words. Horses communicate in feelings. They are passionate, loyal beings with hearts big enough to hold the world.”
“I’ve always thought so, too,” I said softly, kissing Persephone’s forehead.
“Zoey, Kalona must be killed.”
The abruptness of her statement shocked me to my core, and I quickly looked around, worried that Raven Mockers were lurking close by, as they had been in all of my other classes.
Lenobia shook her head and waved away my fears. “Horses despise Raven Mockers as much as cats do, only earning a horse’s hatred is more dangerous than a cat’s. None of the abominable bird creatures will dare to enter my stables.”
“What about the other fledglings?” I asked softly.
“They are entirely too busy exercising horses who have been cooped up for days because of this storm to eavesdrop on us. So I repeat, Kalona must be killed.”
“He can’t be killed. He’s immortal.” My frustration at this unfortunate fact showed clearly in my voice.
Lenobia shook back her long, thick hair and began to pace from one side of the stall to another. “But we must defeat him. He lures our people away from Nyx.”
“I know. I haven’t even been back one whole day and already I can see how bad things are. Neferet is in on all of this, too.” I held my breath, waiting to see if Lenobia would remain blindly loyal to her High Priestess or if she would see the truth.
“Neferet is worse than any of them,” she said bitterly. “She who should be most faithful to Nyx has betrayed her utterly.”
“She’s not what she used to be,” I said. “She’s become something that’s focused on evil.”
Lenobia nodded her head. “Yes, a few of us have been afraid of that. I’m ashamed to say we looked the other way instead of confronting Neferet when she first began to behave strangely. I no longer consider her in Nyx’s service. I plan on pledging my allegiance to a new High Priestess,” she finished, giving me a knowing look.
“Not me!” I practically squeaked. “I haven’t even Changed yet.”
“You’ve been Marked and Chosen by our Goddess. That is enough for me. It is also enough for Dragon and Anastasia.”
“How about the other professors? Are any of them with us, too?”
A terrible sadness crossed her face. “No. All of the others are blinded by Kalona.”
“Why aren’t you?”
She took her time answering me. “I am not sure why he didn’t blind me, as he has most of the others. Dragon and Anastasia and I have spoken of it, if only briefly. We do feel his allure, but a part of us was able to stay untouched by him enough that we were able to see him—really see him—and recognize him as the destructive creature he is. There is no doubt in our minds that you must find a way to defeat him, Zoey.”
I felt terrible and helpless and breathless and too darn young. I wanted to flail my arms around and scream, I’m seventeen! I can’t save the world—I can’t even parallel park!
And then a sweet, meadow-filled breeze caressed my face. It was warmed by the summer sun and moist as dew at dawn, and my spirit lifted in response.
“You aren’t simply a fledgling. Listen within, child, and know that where that still, small voice leads you, we will follow,” Lenobia said in a voice that reminded me of my Goddess.
Her words mixed with the elements soothed me, and suddenly my eyes widened. How could I have forgotten?
“The poem!” I blurted, hurrying over to where I’d hung my purse by the door of Persephone’s stall. “One of the red fledglings has been writing prophetic poetry. She
gave me one that had to do with Kalona right before I came here.”
Lenobia watched me curiously as I searched through my purse.
“Here it is!” It was wadded up with the poem that must have been about Stark. I grabbed the other poem and focused on it.
“Okay…okay…This is it. This tells me how to make Kalona flee. It’s just…just written in poetic code or something.”
“Let me read it, too. Perhaps I can help shed light on it.”
I held the poem out so she could see it, and she read it aloud as I followed the words.
What once bound him
Will make him flee
Place of power—joining of five
Night
Spirit
Blood
Humanity
Earth
Joined not to conquer
Instead to overcome
Night leads to Spirit
Blood binds Humanity
And Earth completes.
“When Kalona rose from the earth, he wasn’t being reborn, as Neferet tried to get us to believe, was he?” Lenobia said, still studying the poem.
“No. He’d been trapped there for more than a thousand years,” I said.
“By whom?”
“My grandmother’s Cherokee ancestors.”
“This seems to imply that whatever it was that your grandmother’s people did to bind him won’t work the same way again. This time it’ll make him run away. And that’s good enough for me. We must rid ourselves of him before he completely erodes the ties that bind us to Nyx.” She looked from the poem to me. “How did the Cherokee people bind him in the earth?”
I blew out a long gust of air, wishing with all my heart that Grandma was here and could lead me through this. “I just—I don’t know as much as I should about it!” I cried.
“Ssh,” Lenobia soothed, touching my arm as she would a nervous filly. “Wait, I have an idea.”
She hurried from the stall and returned shortly with a thick, soft, curry brush, which she handed to me. Then she left the stall again and came back carrying a bale of straw. Putting it in against the inside wall, she sat on it. Leaning comfortably back, she pulled out a long piece of golden straw and stuck it in her mouth.
“Now, brush your mare and think aloud. We will find the answer between the three of us.”
“Well,” I began as I stroked the brush down Persephone’s sorrel neck. “Grandma told me that Ghigua women, uh, those are Wise Women, from several tribes got together and created a maiden out of the earth, made especially to lure Kalona into a cave where they trapped him.”
“Wait, you said women came together to create a maiden?”
“Yeah, I know it sounds kinda crazy, but I promise that’s what happened.”
“No, I do not doubt the truth of what your grandmother reported. I’m only wondering how many women came together.”
“I don’t know. All Grandma told me was that A-ya was basically their tool, and each of them gave her a special gift.”
“A-ya? That was the maiden’s name?”
I nodded and then looked over the mare’s shoulder at her. “Kalona calls me A-ya.”
Lenobia sucked in a shocked breath. “Then you are the instrument through which he will be defeated again.”
“Yes, but not defeated, just chased away,” I said automatically, and then my instinct caught up with my mouth and I knew what I’d said was true. “It is me. This time he can’t be trapped because he’s expecting that. But I can make him run away.” I spoke more to Persephone than to Lenobia or even to myself.
“But you’re not just a tool this time. You’ve been given free will by our Goddess. You choose good, and good is what will make Kalona flee.” Lenobia spoke with a confidence that was infectious.
“Wait, what was that part about ‘five’?”
Lenobia retrieved the poem from where I’d laid it on the floor of the stall. “It says ‘place of power—joining of five.’ And then it lists the five: Night, Spirit, Blood, Humanity, Earth.”
“They are people,” I said, feeling a rush of excitement. “Like Damien said, that’s why they’re capitalized, because the poem is talking about people who symbolize those five things. And…and I’ll bet if Grandma was here, she’d tell me that there were five Ghigua women who got together and created A-ya.”
“Does it feel right to you, deep in your soul? Is the Goddess speaking to you?”
I smiled and my heart soared. “It does! It feels right.”
“The most obvious place of power is here at the House of Night,” she said.
“No!” I spoke with more emphasis than I’d intended, causing Persephone to snort nervously. I petted and soothed her and in a more reasonable voice said, “No, inside the school the place of power has been tainted by him. It was his power joined with Neferet’s and mixed with Stevie Rae’s blood that released him and—” I gasped, realizing the implications of what I’d just said. “Stevie Rae! I would have thought she’d represent earth. I mean, that’s her affinity and all, but she’s not earth: she’s blood!”
Lenobia smiled and nodded. “Very good. One down. Now all you must name is the other four.”
“And the place,” I muttered.
“Yes, the place,” she agreed. “Well, places of power are also tied to spirit. Like Avalon, the ancient isle of the Goddess, is tied in spirit to Glastonbury. Even Christians felt the pull of the power of the place and at one time built an abbey there.”
“What?” I came around Persephone to stand excitedly in front of Lenobia. “What did you say about an abbey and the Goddess?”
“Well, Avalon isn’t literally of this world, though it is a great place of power. Christians felt it and built an abbey dedicated to Mary there.”
“Oh, Lenobia, that’s it!” I had to blink hard to clear the tears of relief from my eyes. Then I laughed. “And it’s perfect! The place of power is at Twenty-first and Lewis, the abbey of the Benedictine nuns.”
Lenobia’s eyes widened, and then she smiled. “Our Goddess is wise. Now, all you need do is to figure out who the other four are, and get everyone there. The rest of the poem tells how they join together…” She paused. Glancing down she read:
Night leads to Spirit
Blood binds Humanity
And Earth completes.
“Blood is there already, or at least I hope she is,” I said. “I told Stevie Rae to get herself and the red fledglings to the abbey when I found out Kalona was going to grab her.”
“Why would you think of sending her there?”
My grin was so wide I swear I almost split a lip. “Because that’s where Spirit is! Spirit is the head nun, Sister Mary Angela. She saved my grandma from the Raven Mockers, and she’s been taking care of her there.”
“A nun? To represent Spirit and conquer an ancient fallen angel? Are you quite sure, Zoey?”
“Not conquer—just banish and give us enough time to regroup and figure out how to get rid of him permanently. And, yes, I’m sure.”
Lenobia hesitated only an instant, then she nodded. “So you have identified Blood and Spirit. Think. Who have Earth, Night, and Humanity hidden within them?”
I went back to currying Persephone, and then I laughed and had an urge to hit myself in the head. “Aphrodite. She has to be humanity, even though most of the time she wants nothing to do with it.”
“I will take your word for it,” Lenobia said caustically.
“Okay, so, only Night and Earth are left.” I hurried on. “As I said before, my first guess for earth would have been Stevie Rae, because of her affinity. But I know in my heart she’s blood. Earth…earth…” I sighed again.
“Could it be Anastasia? Her gift for spells and rituals is often grounded in the earth.”
I thought about it, and sadly didn’t feel the twinge that told me I had the right answer. “Nope, it’s not her.”
“Perhaps we’re focusing on the wrong people. Spirit came from outside the House of Night, which is
something I would not have anticipated. Maybe Earth does, too.”
“Well, it’s worth considering when you look at it like that.”
“What person—not a fledgling or a vampyre—could symbolize Earth?”
“I guess the people I’ve known who are closest to the earth are my grandma’s people. The Cherokee have always respected the earth, versus using and owning and abusing it. The worldview of traditional Cherokee people is much different than today’s worldview.” And then I suddenly closed my mouth and rested my forehead against Persephone’s soft shoulder, whispering a small thank-you to Nyx.
“You know who it is, don’t you?”
I looked up, smiling. “It’s my grandma. She’s Earth.”
“Perfect!” Lenobia agreed. “Then you have them all!”
“Not Night. I still haven’t figured out who—” I broke off as I registered Lenobia’s knowing look.
“Look deeper, Zoey Redbird, and I do believe you will discover who Nyx has Chosen to personify Night.”
“Not me,” I whispered.
“Of course it is you,” Lenobia said. “The poem states it perfectly, ‘Night leads to Spirit.’ None of us would have ever looked to the Benedictine Abbey or its prioress to fill in the pieces of the poetic puzzle, but you led us straight to it.”
“If I’m right,” I said a little shakily.
“Listen to your heart. Are you right?”
I drew a deep breath and searched inside me. Yes, it was there, the feeling I knew came from my Goddess, the feeling that told me I’d gotten it right. I met Lenobia’s wise gray eyes. “I’m right,” I said firmly.
“Then we need to get you and Aphrodite to the Benedictine Abbey.”
“All of us,” I said automatically. “It has to be Darius, the Twins, Damien, and Aphrodite. If something goes wrong, I have to have my circle together. Plus, my reception here hasn’t been great, and if getting rid of Kalona doesn’t snap the fledglings and faculty out of their weird obsession, I don’t think I’ll be coming back to school any time soon. And, of course, we still have to deal with Neferet; I’m going to need a lot of help for all of that.”
Lenobia frowned slightly, but nodded. “I understand, and though it pains me, I am in agreement with you.”