He brushed his lips across hers. “That’s the only thing you lied about?”
“You mean the other part?”
“Yeah. That one.”
And, with the Nightkeepers and their consorts, and the winikin and their shadow-creatures looking on, Cara smiled up into Sven’s eyes and said, “I love you. I may have crushed on the boy you were and resented the adventurer you became, but I’ve fallen in love with the man you are today.”
He exhaled a long, relieved breath. “So you’ll give me one last chance to get it right?”
“You already did.” She tapped his arm. “This is more of a sacrifice than I ever would have asked for.”
“It’s not even a fraction of what you deserve.” He hooked an arm around her waist and lifted her to her toes to plant a real kiss on her, one that involved bending her back over his arm, elicited a few good-natured whistles, and lasted until Dez cleared his throat.
“If you two are finished…”
Sven let her go, grinning broadly. “I’d say we’re just getting started.”
“Then put it on hold for now. We’ve still got work to do.” The king hefted the screaming skull in one hand and gestured toward the center of the cave. “If we could try this again… all of us this time?”
A few minutes later, distinctions forgotten, the end-time warriors—Mac and the nearly recovered sable coyote included—all linked together to form a double circle around the king, with the shadow-animals ringing the outer edge. And they set out to call the First Father back to earth.
This time the resurrection spell worked flawlessly. And Sven, with Cara—his mate, his love—at his side and their familiars at their heels, was in a perfect place to add his power to the whole and watch the magic unfold.
The winikin were the key, as Cara had predicted, along with their shadow totems. Dez had barely gotten past the second line of the spell when the animals began to move. They filtered through the double line of the blood-link and into the center of the space, where they started circling, moving ever inward and kicking up the sand, until there was a whirl of dust, shadow and light in the center of the circle. And all the while, Dez recited the resurrection spell and the magic amped from mage to winikin and back again, growing ever hotter, ever stronger.
The shadow-animals spun faster and faster; the power ratcheted up to a buzz and then a high-pitched whine that itched along Sven’s jawbone, and then boom! There was a thunderclap and the shadows fled back to their winikin, went insubstantial, and disappeared into their holders. At each entry, the winikin’s eyes glowed briefly gold and then went normal again.
Cara smiled and said softly, “They’ll be with us when we need them.”
Sven nudged Mac with his toe. “Some more obviously than others.”
Her smile went bright and brilliant, and made his heart turn over in his chest. He was so damn proud of her, proud to be with her, and proud to wear her mark, that he thought he might explode like the tunnel had. And he was psyched for her to have a familiar of her own, a thought-link of her own… and for neither him nor Mac to spend their nights alone anymore.
When the last of the shadow-animals disappeared, leaving only the coyotes behind, the storm clouds eased away and the sun finally shone through the overhead gap, chasing away the last of the mist… to reveal a brown-robed, hooded man kneeling in the center of the circle.
The resurrection was complete.
Despite not being much for religion, Sven got a shiver as the figure straightened.
Hands shot from the long sleeves of the brown robe, and marks flashed—too quick to be identified—as the man reached for his hood, pushed it back… and glared at the double circle with hard eyes.
Shock rattled through Sven. “What the fuck?” He was pretty sure everyone else was thinking it. He was just the first to say it. Because the sharp-featured man with the big hooked nose, heavy brow, and buzz-trimmed skull was no stranger. “Red-Boar?”
Because that was who it was. Rabbit’s father, who had died in one of their earliest skirmishes, was back.
Gods help them all.
Cara’s hand squeezed his and she pantomimed a holy crap! face that Sven returned.
Red-Boar scowled. “Who the hell else did you expect?” His eyes went to Mac and the new coyote, and his eyebrows drew together. They nearly touched as he looked around, seeming to be counting up the new faces, only two of whom were full magi.
A low-level hum of whispers caught fire and spread, and headed quickly for hubbub territory.
“What are you doing here?” Strike asked, voice a little shaky, though Sven wasn’t sure whether that was from shock or trying to suppress hysteria-tinged laughter.
The grizzled mage’s scowl deepened. “Don’t ask me. I wanted to stay dead. But the boar nahwal said my idiot kid got his ass in trouble again and I’ve got to bail him out if I want to get to the real afterlife rather than just the fucking in-between. So what’s the deal?”
The air went tight as hell and everybody clammed up.
Silence.
More silence.
Red-Boar zeroed in on Anna and stabbed a finger at her. “You. Start talking. Where is he?”
Something flashed in her eyes, but she said simply, “We don’t know.”
“Then why the hell did you summon me?”
“We didn’t. We were trying to get…” She trailed off. “The Father. Oh.”
More like, Oh, shit, Sven thought. But if Red-Boar had come back with a message about finding Rabbit, they must have summoned the right Father.
He hoped. Because if not, this was a serious fucking train wreck.
A little while later, once the sheer what-the-fuckery of Red-Boar’s return had died down and Dez declared it time to head for home, Sven caught Cara’s hand and tugged her to the sandy spit to steal another kiss.
She was smiling when they parted, but her eyes held worry. “I wonder if the gods knew what they were letting us in for, bringing Red-Boar back.” She glanced to where groups started forming, mixing winikin with Nightkeepers to make sure the teleporters would have enough magic to get them home. “And how he’s going to deal with everything that’s changed since his time.”
“He’ll adjust,” Sven predicted—though, remembering the irascible old mage, he wasn’t so sure about that. He covered it, though, with another kiss. “All the changes have been good ones… especially this one.” Another, deeper kiss.
“And this one.” She dropped a hand to the top of the sable coyote’s head in a gesture that was both proprietary and loving, and somehow sexy as well. All three tugged at his heart. He loved that she had a familiar, that she had magic of her own. And that she loved him back.
“What are you going to call her?” he asked with a nod to the sable female.
“Pearl.” The answer was immediate and final. “I’m going to call her Pearl.”
It took him a second before he got it. “As in ‘Black Pearl’?” When she nodded, he made a face. “You’re going with Pirates of the Caribbean? Really?”
“Says the guy who named his coyote after a character on CSI: New York.”
He shrugged. “It’s the eyes.” When she rolled hers, the laugh that bubbled up out of him felt free and easy for the first time since… gods, since he didn’t know when.
And, for the first time in just as long, he wasn’t looking forward to the next adventure, the next destination. He was content right now, in this place and time, with the woman he loved. They would deal with whatever came next, and they would do it together.
That was a promise he would keep… or die trying.
EPILOGUE
September 24
Eighty-six days left until the zero date
Coyote Cave
Despite her sunglasses, Cara had to use her hand to shade her eyes from the sun’s glare, trying to see across the rolling hills that surrounded the mouth of the empty cave. “He said for me to meet him out here.”
Out. Pearl’s tail whisked the hard
pan, stirring little dust devils. Although she was adjusting to life inside the compound, she still preferred the wide-open spaces beyond the canyon. Risky or not, she liked being free.
“I don’t see another Jeep, though, and he’s not in the cave.” And the flat, barren expanses between the hills weren’t talking. “What gives?”
She was trying not to read too much into Sven’s message—gods knew textspeak sucked at nuances—but he’d been gone since early that morning and he’d been furtive on the way out. She hadn’t pressed, but she had definitely noticed. They were still feeling each other out in the relationship department, still figuring out how it was supposed to work. It wasn’t like either of them had any practice at it.
He was trying, though; they both were. And her warrior’s instincts—the gut feelings she had learned to trust even before she knew they were real—said they would get the balance right eventually. He would still need time alone and it would be a while before letting him in became second nature for her, but they would make it work.
There. Coming. Pearl rose to her feet with smooth, lethal grace and stood at alert, body quivering.
Cara didn’t quite quiver, but it wasn’t far off. Anticipation tightened her stomach as a big shadow came out from behind a nearby dune. “What the…?” Then she burst out laughing at the sight of a contraption straight out of Mad Max, driven by the man she loved.
Sven, wearing surf trunks, wind goggles, and a huge grin, wrestled with a big wind sail set off-center on a two-person surfboard that rode on big, wide wheels. As he came around the corner and headed for her with Mac barking his fool head off and nipping at the tires, a gust caught the sail and sent the vehicle heeling over onto one set of wheels.
“Whooo!” Sven counterbalanced and rode the breeze right to her, then made a wide, braking turn that he managed to make look ridiculously elegant. Then again, he was ridiculously elegant, completely at home in an element that had nothing to do with magic or the war, and everything to do with him. With them.
Fun! Pearl sent. Fun-fun-fun!
Yes, it is, Cara thought, and went to meet her mate.
Love shone from his eyes as he dropped down from the wind sail and collected her for a sweaty, satisfying kiss that had her blood humming and tugged at the connection between them. When they parted, his eyes were dark with promises, and fully focused on her, on the moment.
“I like your new toy, sailor.”
“Our new toy,” he corrected. “Skywatch needs to remember how to have a little fun. Besides, I want to take you sailing, and thought this would be a good compromise for now.” He was breathing lightly and grinning like a kid. “After the war we’ll get ourselves back out to sea.”
“It’s perfect. And so are you.”
“Can I quote you on that?”
“We’ll see.” Stepping away but linking their fingers to tug him along with her, in the easy contact that had become second nature, she went over to the contraption. “Take me with you?”
He moved past her to right the sail and turn the thing against the wind, but he looked back over his shoulder, met her eyes, and said quietly, “Always.”
That one simple word lit her heart with joy. Things weren’t perfect, but she wasn’t waiting anymore; she was living in the moment with the man she loved, the one who stood there now, bare chested, tan, and laughing as he held out a hand to her in invitation with a quirked brow that said, I dare you.
And she dared. Oh, she dared. And as they sent the wind sail screaming across the desert, pressed together, laughing, kissing, and just being, with their familiars galloping behind, she couldn’t imagine a more perfect moment, a more perfect man, a more perfect love. It was a world—and a life—worth saving.
Forever after.
Don’t miss Rabbit’s book,
Spellfire
Coming in November 2012 from Signet Eclipse!
Read on for a preview…
Rabbit’s father had always said that someday Rabbit would get what he deserved… and it turned out he’d been one hundred per-fricking-cent right. Shit, Rabbit could practically picture Red-Boar standing in the doorway, glaring at him from beyond the grave with a big-ass See? I told you so plastered on his mug, as leather whined through the air.
Then the brined lash cracked across Rabbit’s back, laying open another bloody ribbon, and the image exploded into white-hot pain. He twisted against his shackles as if it were the first time he’d been whipped rather than the thousandth, and he might even have screamed.
Maybe not, though. He wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure of much these days; his world had condensed down to the stone-block cell that had become his prison, and the golden-haired bitch who tormented him, tortured him, trying to make him give up something he’d already lost.
“Turn him around.” At her order, talons scraped on stone and he was hit with a foul stench. Claws swung him on his chains, and he went from having his battered face pressed against the putrid wall to staring into the equally putrid visage of a camazotz.
Nearly eight feet tall, with the body of an overendowed man and a face cursed with ratlike red eyes, a smashed-in nose, and a triangular mouth that held way too many fangs, the bat demon was ugly from a distance, and really fucking gnarly up close. It kept its ragged wings and barbed tail curled near its body in the narrow confines of the cell, but the oily drool and the way its beady-ass eyes went over Rabbit’s body said it was thinking about taking what little was left of his skin for wing patches.
A month ago, Rabbit would’ve told it to go fuck itself, and maybe even described the process in graphic detail. Now all he could do was groan as his spine grated against the sandpapery stone.
“Back off,” his tormentor said from behind the creature, and the camazotz ducked its head and gave way, returning to its post beside the door with a hiss that was its version of Yes, mistress, anything you say, mistress. That left Rabbit with a view that—to him, at least—was worse than a chorus line of camazotz doing Pirates of Penzance.
He didn’t know what the demon’s natural form looked like—the Banol Kax could take on many shapes, from humans to three-story-tall winged monsters that breathed fire. This one appeared to be a woman in her twenties, with long, wavy hair, high cheekbones, and pale eyes that were unnervingly like his own. She wore a long red robe and had the trefoil mark on the inside of her right wrist, just as he did. All that was the same as it had been before, when he had known her in the world outside his cell. But where before she had come to him, slipping through the protective wards around Skywatch to speak to him in visions where she seemed ethereal and ghostly, now she was flesh and blood, or at least pretending to be.
It was all lies, after all.
As she approached, he forced a sardonic smile through split lips that hadn’t even bothered swelling, as if his body had given up on any hope of repair, and said, “Hello, Mother.”
She wasn’t his mother, of course. She had played the hell out of the role, though, getting inside his head and offering him what he’d most wanted: a mother who had loved him and a reason to think that his old man had given a shit. She had sold him on the fantasy of having a real name—Rabbie—and a real family. She had cooed over him, coddled him… and then she had turned him, gradually and irrevocably, until he believed with every fiber of his twisted being that she was his only ally and all the others were his enemies, even the one person who had loved him unconditionally no matter what.
Myrinne. The word was a whisper in his soul, a cry of agony coming from the raw wounds of knowing what he’d done to her under the demon’s influence.
“Rabbie…” The demon tutted sorrowfully. Even now, with him imprisoned and the charade unnecessary, she stayed in character. She might not be able to get inside his head anymore—his mental powers had vanished along with his magic—but she knew it was a bitter reminder to see her like this. Cruel enjoyment gleamed in her eyes as she leaned in close, brushed her fingertips along his swollen jaw, and whispered, “My poor, poor Rab
bie. Why are you making me do this? You’re hurting us both, you know.”
His flesh quivered in muscle spasms that had him twisting away and then swinging back when he hit the ends of his chains. The scraping of the stone along his flayed back tore a groan from his throat.
Her eyes lit, though her voice stayed a purr. “Just give me what I want, and all of this stops and I set you free.”
If he’d been another guy, in another place and time—some other Rabbit who lived in a parallel universe that wasn’t a few weeks away from D-day—he probably would’ve taken the deal; anything had to be better than this, even death. But he knew that wouldn’t put him out of the demon’s reach. And he knew that if he couldn’t escape from his shackles—been there, failed that—he could at least stall by pretending he still had what they wanted. Better for them to carve him up trying to gain access to Nightkeeper magic than have them go after one of the others.
It was his sacrifice, though they would never know about it. He did, though, and it brought him a spark of grim satisfaction to dredge up bloody saliva and spit in her face. “Kiss my ass, bitch. You want what’s inside my head? Come and fucking get it.”
She hissed, her eyes briefly flaring demon red as the air around them crackled with the oily rattle of dark magic. The magic was useless against him, though, at least for her purposes. She bit off a vicious curse and waved to the camazotz. “More. I don’t care what it takes—I want him broken, damn you. We’re running out of time.”
Rabbit braced himself, knowing the first few blows were going to hurt like a bitch. He didn’t close his eyes, though—he’d learned it was worse not knowing when the whip was going to hit. Instead, he glared at the demon bitch.
But as much as he hated her, he was far from innocent in his sins. She had whispered, suggested, seduced… but he was the one who had failed to tell his teammates about the visions. He was the one who had listened when she said Myrinne wanted him only for his power.
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