Skykeepers

by Jessica Andersen

  “What. The. Fuck?” The harsh, explosive question came from Strike. He glared from Rabbit to Sasha and back. “What did you two know about this? How’d you know how to shut him down like that?”

  Rabbit, looking drawn around the edges, said, “Whatever that shit was that he was channeling, it kicked on my hellmagic. I was just using the mind-bend to try to turn him off.”

  When Strike turned on her, Sasha shook her head and spread her hands to indicate bafflement. “I knew he was hiding something, but I didn’t have any idea it was . . . whatever that was.”

  “You grabbed him.”

  “That was instinct. I had some idea of diverting enough of his ch’ul to knock him out, but the second I touched him, he started pulling the energy from me.” Shaking inside now, she looked around at the others. “I felt like he was sucking the life out of me, and from all of you through me.” And when she’d tried to cut the flow, she’d managed to stop drawing from her teammates but hadn’t been able to sever the connection with Michael. He’d kept pulling her ch’ul, draining her, sapping her. Almost killing her. She shuddered, trying not to look at the dust piles inside the collapsed red robes. Trying not to think she could’ve been a dust pile of her own. “Lucky for me, Rabbit’s hellmagic repelled the ch’ul and bounced me out of Michael’s head.” Which probably explained why she couldn’t find Rabbit’s or Michael’s ch’ul song. They were blocked by hellmagic . . . or whatever it was that Michael had inside him. Gods.

  “We should get out of here,” Nate said urgently. “If Iago figures out that Michael’s down, he might try again.”

  “I think we can take that as a given,” Strike said, expression grim. “He’ll want to get his hands on . . . whatever that was. We can’t let that happen.” But he didn’t jump to the uplink. Just stood there, staring down at Michael as if trying to figure out what to do with him.

  At that moment, Sasha was afraid of Michael. But she was also afraid for him. The silver magic and the thing inside him weren’t the man she knew. Was there any way to separate them once again? “We’re taking him with us,” she said firmly.

  Strike’s expression went to that of the king, the man who sometimes had to make terrible decisions for the greater good. “He killed the red-robe during your rescue from the Survivor2012 compound. It wasn’t Iago, after all. It was Michael.”

  “I didn’t know.” Yet she met her brother’s eyes, jaguar stubbornness rising up inside her as she tipped up her chin. “Killing in battle isn’t wrong.”

  “But he lied about it, and gods know what else. And according to his own story—if we pick through the lies—he did it through the guy’s shield. If he can do that, he can get through the wards we’ve got on the storeroom.” He paused, dropping his voice. “I can’t have him inside Skywatch without some sort of guarantee. I can’t.”

  “I’ll stay with him,” she said immediately. “He won’t kill me. Not even at his worst.”

  Strike shook his head, but more in indecision than negation. “We don’t know that we’ve seen him at his worst.”

  “We don’t know what we’re seeing,” she countered, desperation increasing as the seconds slipped beneath her skin, and her warrior’s mark warned that they were running out of time. “And you can’t tell me you’re willing to sacrifice one of your own without knowing for sure.”

  “Is he one of mine?” Strike asked. “That wasn’t Nightkeeper magic.”

  “It wasn’t Xibalban, either,” Rabbit put in. “It was more like . . . I don’t know, a mix of the two.” He paused. “Strong as anything too. If we can figure out how to use it . . .” He trailed off in the face of the king’s glare

  “I can’t risk it.” Strike shook his head. “He could take us out from the inside.”

  “I’ll vouch for him,” Sasha said, feeling the moment slipping away. “I’ll blood-bind myself to him. Whatever you want.” Give him to me.

  “I won’t let you endanger yourself for a guy who’s treated you like he has,” Strike snapped, sounding more like a big brother than a king. “He’s done nothing to earn your loyalty or affection. He’s a godsdamned walking dysfunction!”

  “I’m not talking about him and me,” she countered quickly, though it wasn’t entirely accurate. “But you have to admit that this explains a whole lot of how he treated me. He was trying to keep me from getting caught up in whatever he’s going through.” Which sent her thoughts down a road they were probably better off not traveling, because whether or not he’d been doing what he thought was right in that regard, the fact was, he’d lied to her. He’d lied to all of them. Was her defense of him now just another brand of clinging?

  “And you want to solve that by binding yourself to him?” Strike said. “He’d be pissed. And so would I.”

  “I—” Sasha broke off, caught in her own logic. “Shit.”

  “We need to make a decision,” Nate urged. The other magi were ranged around the argument, facing out, ready to defend if—or rather when—Iago sent reinforcements. “We need to get Sasha back behind the ward. He wants her by the solstice, and time is running out.”

  “He wants Michael too,” she argued desperately. “You can’t leave him here. You can’t.”

  “I wasn’t going to,” Strike said, his voice flat with grief.

  Sasha’s soul shuddered at the implication. “Don’t. I’m begging you.”

  “I’ve got to do what’s best for all of us,” he said, back in king mode. “I’ve got to follow the writs.”

  “Except when it suits you,” she threw back at him, anger kicking against what she was coming to recognize as the innate stubbornness of a jaguar. “Then you rewrite. Well, then—”

  “I can help him,” Rabbit broke in. He’d crouched down, was touching Michael’s wrist, his eyes gleaming with magic. When they both looked at him, he said, “He’s got some sort of blockade in his head. It’s busted, but I think . . . no, I know I can fix it.”

  Strike considered the offer for the longest five seconds of Sasha’s life. “Can you guarantee that it’ll stay in place?”

  She saw the lie form in the young mage’s eyes, saw it drain away as he shook his head. “No. No guarantees. But I promise I’ll do my best.”

  Steeling herself, Sasha crouched down beside Rabbit and took Michael’s hand. She didn’t feel the ugly rage or the tempting silver magic now; she felt the man beneath. The one who’d rescued her, who’d made love to her. “Please, brother. Please give us a chance to figure out what this is, who he is.” And whether there’s any hope for the two of us.

  As Strike wavered, a faint rattle touched the air.

  “Time’s up,” Nate warned. He waved the others to link up, leaving a gap in the uplink, where Sasha hadn’t left Michael’s side, hadn’t let go of him.

  Logic and heartache told her to let Strike decide, that she didn’t owe Michael anything. Her magic and heart, though, told her to hold on to him and never let go.

  “Shit,” Strike said. He reached down, grabbed her free hand, and brought up the ‘port magic.

  As they slid sideways into the teleport, she heard Iago’s roar of rage, his shout of, “Mictlan!” Then he was gone, the temple was gone, and they were back home.

  And now, she knew, things were going to get complicated.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  December 15 Three years, six days to the zero date Skywatch

  Michael swam back up through the fog of unconsciousness, and was vaguely surprised to find himself back at Skywatch. And alive. Given those two things, though, and what he remembered of the Xibalban ambush and his use of the muk, he wasn’t at all surprised to find himself locked in one of the storerooms.

  The hand holding his, though, was unexpected. As was his sense that Sasha was nearby. He wouldn’t have expected her to want to get within a mile of him after what had happened.

  He squeezed experimentally. “Hey.” His voice was rough and drowsy. “I didn’t think—” Realizing that it wasn’t Sasha’s hand he was holding,
he broke off, eyes flying open to glare at the young man sitting beside his cot. “What the fuck?”

  Rabbit scowled and broke the grip. “You’re welcome, asshole. If I hadn’t put your brain back together, you’d be a guest at Chez Xibalba right now. Or maybe Mictlan.” He paused, eyes going speculative. “Did my old man put those blocks in? That’s some seriously high-tech shit you’ve got going on in your head.”

  It took Michael a few seconds to figure out what he was talking about, another few to check his own brain and realize he was alone. The Other was gone. More, it was gone gone. There was no hint of its presence, no dark pressure anywhere. He felt like he had before he’d undergone his talent ceremony, with the critical difference that he remembered everything about his alter ego, and what it had done.

  Rabbit had bent his mind, resurrecting, not the dam and sluiceways Michael had constructed on his own, but rather the conditioning Dr. Horn had used to erase his other self from his conscious mind. “Holy crap, Rabbit. You’ve got mad skills if you did that without the drugs and other garbage.”

  The younger man raised an eyebrow. “Not the old man, then?”

  Michael thought of Horn’s pasty, pinched face, comparing it to the hawkish ferocity of Rabbit’s sire. “Not even close. Long story. It was—” Michael broke off, not because he couldn’t talk about what had gone on inside him . . . but because he could. Rabbit’s blocks hadn’t just shut the Other away; they’d shut off whatever the hell had kept him from talking about it.

  “Save the story,” Rabbit advised, oblivious to Michael’s inner oh, holy shit moment. He stood and headed for the door. “I’ll go tell the others you’re awake, get set up for an all-hands-on-deck. In the meantime, I think you’ve got some ’splaining to do.”

  Even without that warning, Michael had known Sasha was outside, waiting to talk to him. He’d felt her there, a stir of warmth and sensual awareness that was so very different from the angry lust he’d been battling for weeks now, though no less urgent for the differences.

  Pulse kicking, he swung himself upright on the narrow cot. He was wearing his combat pants and muscle shirt from what he guessed was the day before, and could’ve used a shower. A sore spot twinged in one shoulder, and a glance showed a healed bullet wound. He thought he remembered one of the Nightkeepers—Nate, maybe?—taking a shot at him when he’d turned on Sasha. Didn’t blame him. If her and Rabbit’s combined magics hadn’t been enough to bring him down . . .

  He shuddered at the thought, and when Sasha came through the door on the backswing of Rabbit’s exit, he snapped, “That was a dumb-assed move you pulled, touching me. I could’ve killed you.”

  She was wearing jeans and a button-down that followed the curves of her body, along with lace-up boots and a neutral expression. “You’re welcome,” she said. Which, come to think of it, had been Rabbit’s first words, too.

  “Don’t think I’m not grateful to you both, but you damn well should’ve left me there,” he said bluntly. “There was no guarantee Rabbit’s mind-bend would work.” There still wasn’t, he knew; the control felt stronger than ever before, but who knew what would happen when he went for his magic?

  “Iago wants you,” she said, equally bluntly. “He can’t have you.”

  “Then you should’ve finished me.”

  He expected an immediate denial. Instead, he got a long, cool look. “Is that what you would’ve preferred?” She held up a hand to stop him. “And no more lies, damn it. Not of commission, not of omission. I want the truth from you, even if it pisses one or both of us off.”

  Letting out a breath, Michael nodded. “Deal. And the first truth I’ll tell you is that it was never about whether or not I wanted to tell you. I physically couldn’t.” He touched his temple. “They used drugs and posthypnotic suggestion to shut me down.”

  “They?” she asked, then shook her head. “No, don’t answer that. You can tell it to everyone in a few minutes.” An edged smile touched her lips. “Rabbit says you’re safe to release back into the wild.” The words “for now” hung between them, unspoken.

  “Before we go, I need to tell you something.” He reached out to her, though she still stood across the room, near the door. When she didn’t move, he let his hand fall. He didn’t stand and go to her, though. Didn’t want to loom over her, didn’t want her to fear him any more than she already must, after seeing what he was capable of, what was inside him. And it was only going to get worse when he told them the real story.

  Her expression stayed guarded, but she nodded. “I’m listening.”

  He hesitated, trying to find the right words. He couldn’t tell her everything at once, didn’t even know where to start, so he went with the piece of it that belonged just between the two of them. “You’ve probably figured out that a big part of what’s happened between us has been dictated by what’s inside me, and me trying not to let it touch you.”

  “I’d already figured you were hiding something. I’ll admit that what we saw yesterday . . . well, that was more than I’d been thinking.”

  She might as well have said, beyond my worst nightmare , because that was what he heard in her words, in her voice. He opened a hand, stared at the white scar-stripe across his palm. “I tried to stay away from you, but by the gods . . .” Giving up any pretext, he looked straight at her, let her see what she would in him. “The good parts of me want you more than anything. Unfortunately, so do the bad parts. Sometimes having you near me unsettles the balance and makes it harder for me to hold it together. Other times you bring me back to myself.”

  “Maybe it’s not me,” she suggested diffidently. “Maybe it’s the three-year countdown. Big changes are coming, remember?”

  “Trust me, babe. It’s you.” Now he did take the chance of standing and crossing to her, compelled by the better parts of himself, and the gift of honesty. He moved slowly, waiting for her to retreat. When she didn’t, he stopped in front of her and lifted a hand to her cheek, cupping her jaw in his scarred palm and drawing his thumb across her smooth, pale skin. “It’s always been you, even back when you were just a couple of photographs and some dreams.”

  “Oh.” The word held a tremor, but not of fear. Eyes steady on his, she reached up to cover his hand, holding his touch against her face. But as she did so, she shook her head. “I can’t. You know I can’t.”

  “Yeah.” It wasn’t a surprise. But it was a lead weight in his chest. “You don’t do crazies.”

  “I need—” She broke off, as though it were her turn to find the right words. “I’m just starting to find myself, to figure out who I’m meant to be, what role I’m meant to play in this mess. I need someone I can lean on when things go wrong, someone I know is going to be there no matter what. I don’t have enough stability in me to stay strong when you start to spin off the rails. I’ve lived that life. I can’t go back.”

  “I know. I don’t want you to.” And that was the truth too. “I wish I could undo it all.”

  “Jox keeps telling me that I’m exactly the way I was meant to be, that I shouldn’t wish to rewind and change my relationship with Ambrose, or my decision to leave him.”

  “Jox is full of shit.”

  She looked away, snorting a laugh. “I don’t think I’ll tell him you said that.” But when she looked back up at him, the gleam remained in her eyes. “I wish you could go undo whatever it was, too. I think I would’ve liked the man you would’ve been.”

  “You would’ve loved him,” he said lightly, though he wasn’t sure that was the case. Needing the contact, the woman, if only for just the next few seconds, he leaned in. And kissed her.

  Sasha saw the kiss coming, could’ve moved away. She didn’t.

  He was unshowered and wearing his combat clothes; his scent was strong, though not unpleasant, as though his natural aura had been distilled to a potent, masculine jolt that fired her blood in her veins and tightened her skin, heightening sensation. His taste, too, was concentrated, his skin hot beneath the skim of h
er hands, his muscles bunching and flexing as he wrapped his arms around her, surrounding her with his presence.

  For the first time since she’d met him, she felt that he was present in the moment, entirely with her. He wasn’t sparring with an inner opponent, wasn’t trying to blunt his responses to keep from triggering whatever lay within him. He was there, with her. Kissing her.

  And oh, what a kiss.

  He slanted his mouth across hers, touched his tongue to hers, and then slid deeper, mimicking the thrust with the drag of his hands across her ribs and hips to her ass, where they fastened, cupping her up against him as he explored her mouth, her cheeks, the curve of her neck.

  Where before they had come together in a tumult, propelled by an inner drumbeat of lust and magic, now the magic was a background hum, seeming so much less important than the feel of his mouth making love to hers.

  And then, finally, she heard his song, a single electric guitar with a skirr of feedback that raised the fine hairs on her arms and the back of her neck.

  There you are, she thought, and gloried in the music.

  She nipped her way down the strong column of his neck to his collarbone, then touched her lips to the place on his shoulder where a bullet had gone in the day before, and his healing talents had pushed it right out again. Lips stinging with the salty potency of his skin, she returned to his mouth, kissed him and twined herself around him, feeling his thick hair brush the backs of her hands, the sides of her face as they kissed long and hard, deep and wet.

  An ache opened up within her, a hollowness she hadn’t been aware of until that moment. She drew back and sucked in a long, shuddering breath that did nothing to fill the emptiness.

  They stared at each other for a long moment, eyes questioning. Did you feel that? she imagined her expression said, with his answering, Hell, yeah.

  “We should get upstairs before Rabbit comes back down looking for us,” she said, though she would’ve rather stayed just as they were. The others needed to see him, see that he was okay. And they all needed to hear what he had to say.