by HD Smith
“Don’t be fooled by Gizelle,” Omar warned, interrupting my thoughts. “She’s clever and cunning. Only give her what you must.”
“Right—don’t trust the mother,” I said, as if I’d ever trust the woman that had me kidnapped and sent to Purgatory.
Chapter 31
The Deeps—Purgatory’s hell of hells—a place I couldn’t believe I was trying to revisit. Mab had tossed me in there last spring, expecting me to forget my own name. Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on how you looked at it—I’d cast a spell that made it impossible for me to forget. I remembered every detail. The seemingly endless time I spent walking through barren wastelands. Time that lasted only moments in the real world, but took me seven years to escape. Each memory haunting—and all of it in my head. It was memorable to say the least, but was it something I could connect with physically?
I thought back to the events before Mab’s guards dragged me through the castle, down the long spiral stairs, to the door that led to the pit of nothingness that was the Deeps. There was no connection to those events or the physical location they represented. I’d been scared, but not enough to form anything that connected me to that place.
I shook my head, clearing it of these thoughts for a moment. There had to be a way to link my presence to that hell. Scanning back through my time in Mab’s castle, I shivered, remembering how Quaid had pulled me through the entrance on my first visit. He’d forced me down on my knees to kneel in front of her. I could almost feel the warmth of the stone on my knees.
In a blink, a line snapped taut to that event—that place in the past. Oh shit! My presence was there, looking at myself from last spring as I kneeled in the great hall. Mab approached and lifted me to my feet.
I quickly opened my eyes, staggering back from the rush.
Omar stared. “Did it work?” he asked.
“Sort of,” I said, catching my breath, “I’ll try again.”
Not the past, not the past, I chanted, closing my eyes.
I concentrated on the hall. I could see the line I’d used before, but I didn’t want to go to the past. I wanted to go to the present. I tried to imagine the hall empty, as I assumed it was now since Mab was still at the museum. Again the thought of Quaid popped into my mind. I remembered him hanging there by his wrists. She’d whipped him, leaving bloody lines on his back. Without meaning to, my presence slipped the line back to the hall in the past.
Mab stood there holding a whip in her right hand. Blood was clearly visible on the braided leather. Quaid hung by his arms, his face contorted with pain. She smiled as she brought the whip down across his naked flesh.
I sucked in a sharp breath. No more than a whisper of air, but Mab turned, as if looking for me. Crap.
I opened my eyes. “I can’t do it.”
“What’s wrong?” Omar asked.
“It’s not working. I can’t seem to get out of the past.”
“You must focus. Try to see the time. Put it into context—a calendar perhaps—visualize it, then manipulate it.”
Was he serious? “It’s not that simple.”
“Once you can see the time, you can control it. You can move it back and forth like...” He paused as if trying to think of an analogy. “Like a playlist. You can decide where you want to stop and start. Try again. This time focus on figuring out how to see the time. Then try to manipulate it.”
“Mab almost sensed me that time.”
Omar closed his eyes and grabbed the bridge of his nose. After a moment he opened them. “Just be careful.”
I nodded.
I had to make this work. I closed my eyes and thought of the Deeps. Mab hadn’t been there. If I arrived in the past I should be alone. If I was in the present, Gizelle would be there.
Because I had no strong feelings about the trip from the hall to the Deeps, I pictured the tray of food that was there waiting for me when I awoke. It was meant to bind me to Mab. I licked my lips as I remembered the succulent fruit and how it glistened with drops of moisture. My mouth watered just thinking of it.
In a blink the line formed and I was there. This time I noticed the pull on my presence as I slipped into the past. I tried to focus on that feeling, to sense the time—when it was, not where it was. The sense was faint at first, but slowly I started to place it in my mind, as if I instinctively knew what the date was. I’d had a similar sense when I was trapped in this hell the first time. I knew the time passing wasn’t real. Just as the idea occurred to me, the sense of time disappeared.
“No,” I muttered.
Looking up, I noticed my body for the first time. It was there floating in mid-air.
The door opened, startling me. One of the guards entered, carrying in the fruit tray. He set it down beside my floating body and left. I concentrated on the tray. Remembering the pull on my presence as I slipped into the past, I tried to determine if it were still there. Perhaps the force of the tug would indicate how far in the past I’d traveled. But could I go back to that point, before the fruit was delivered?
Omar was right about one thing. If I could visualize it, then I could control it. I just had to figure out how to see the time. The line that brought me here was a connection point, the time that I arrived was something else. The time was represented by the pull on my presence, the taut rubber band that I imagined was fixed on one end at present time. I was on the other end, pulling it to my location.
Omar had thought of it as a playlist, but it was just a string of days perpendicular to the line that brought me here. Was this what it meant to walk through time?
I visualized moving my presence down the string of days. The force of the pull on the invisible band at my core increased. I only wanted to slip back a few minutes, but I over-jumped the mark by at least two days. I tried again, this time hitting it just right. My time sense felt oddly accurate now that I understood what to look for. The idea of slipping ahead to the future reminded me of the old 1960’s movie The Time Machine, the way the main character watched the world evolve in front of him from that one fixed spot in his bubble of time.
I wouldn’t be taking that journey today, nor would I want to watch the endless parade of people that Mab trapped down here stream by. Instead, I let my sense of time guide me. I jumped ahead of present time by a few hours, just to see that I could, then slipped back along the string of time as if watching a movie rewind.
I stopped dead when I saw myself standing next to a very beautiful pagan. She was holding my hand. I—my real self—was here in the Deeps—in the near future. Omar was right, she knew a way for me to get to Purgatory, but why the hell would I have come here?
I backed up time to the present. I couldn’t worry about the choice I was about to make. I had to trust that learning how to get here was worth the risk.
Gizelle was floating above the ground as I had been last spring. I moved closer to her. She was flawless—beautiful and probably just as deadly as Cinnamon. I stopped my presence beside her body, in the same place I’d seen my future self standing.
I jumped when she spoke. “Don’t be afraid, my dear.”
Without opening her eyes, she held her hand out to me.
“Can you hear me?” I asked.
“Don’t be afraid.”
With some hesitation, I placed my phantom hand in hers, just as I’d seen my future self do.
A white light flashed as my presence touched her. As it dimmed, I found myself in a Roman bath. The men and women around me were in various states of undress. The few in full clothing were wearing barely decent togas. I jumped as one eager couple nearly ran into me, then gasped as another man walked right through me from behind.
I looked around, amazed at how different this was from my own experience when I was in the Deeps. I heard a woman laugh, drawing my eye to the person I recognized as Gizelle. She was enjoying a private bath with a much older man.
Her strawberry blonde hair was piled high on her head. Beautifully curled tendrils escaped the doo in a see
mingly perfect way, as if someone hadn’t spent hours getting that exquisite just-twisted-up look in place.
She flirted with him, lightly touching his arm, tucking his silver hair behind his ear, and leaning in to whisper something. He threw his head back and laughed, his gray eyes enchanting. It was all so surreal.
I stepped forward to call her name—at least, I hoped she could sense me here. Before I could speak, a large man in a blue waist wrap brushed passed me, bumping me from behind, which was when I realized I was now physically part of this place. He grunted something unintelligible, and staggered on toward a dark-haired woman holding a goblet full of mead. Quickly I imagined myself in a similar toga. I wasn’t sure it would matter, but I didn’t want to stand out in the crowd now that I could be seen.
When I looked back to Gizelle and her silver-haired, gray-eyed companion, I noticed her slip a small dagger from behind her barely-there bathing suit. I caught the faintest flash of metal under the water as she leaned in and shoved the blade between his ribs.
He gasped in mid laugh, his gray eyes shocked. He moved his hand to his side. She helped him find the blade. “Don’t move it,” she cooed in his ear. “You’ll only die faster if you do.”
The man stared, frozen in shock.
Smiling, she stood, kissing her finger tips then laying them sweetly on his head as if she were just walking away for a moment. There was a faint hint of blood in the water, but not so much that I’d have noticed if I weren’t looking.
Gizelle glided from the pool in my direction, grabbing a tunic on the way out.
“I—”
“Not here,” she said under her breath, then smiled and blew air kisses to a nearby couple in the bath as she calmly strolled away from the man dying in the water behind her. “Follow me.”
I glanced back at the gray-eyed man. Agony twisted his aged face, although no one seemed to notice. Gizelle nodded politely at a woman who was walking in. The woman looked toward the man in the pool. With a wicked gleam in her eyes, she slipped Gizelle a small leather pouch. “Thank you,” she breathed as they passed.
Gizelle quickened her pace once she was outside. I ran to catch up. After turning down a few blind allies, I lost her.
“Damn,” I cursed, then turned back around and ran right into her.
She shoved me against the wall, pulling a knife from her belt and pressing it against my throat.
“Who are you?” she hissed.
I winced as the blade drew a line of blood on my flesh. I considered my options. Queen of the Fallen, no. Enemy to your children, no. “I’m Claire, the Devil’s assistant,” I answered, deciding on the simplest choice.
“Did he send you?”
“No, a seer named Omar said that I must speak with you. I need your help.”
“Omar,” she scoffed. “He can’t be trusted.”
“Can anyone, really?” I asked, giving her a pointed stare. After all, she was the reason I was in this mess.
She smiled, then released me and put her knife away. “No, I guess not, but Omar is a special sort. His end game has never been very clear, but he doesn’t often risk his own life—just the lives of those that trust him.”
I reached up and touched the small cut on my neck. My fingers came away bloody. “Really? Kind of like a mother that calls in a debt to have a Bounty Hunter kidnap a girl to save her children. You mean like that?”
She laughed. “Not the same, my dear, and you will do well to heed my warning about Omar.”
I considered her words, but why would I believe her? Although I’d been put in danger the last time Omar gave me advice, I didn’t see how he did it to help himself. “He said you could teach me how to walk through time. I need the ability so I can stop Raven.”
She arched an eyebrow.
“The Name Caller,” I said.
She shrugged, as if the name meant nothing. “And why should I care?”
“If Raven succeeds, we’re all doomed. Including Thanos,” I said, remembering Cinnamon’s assertion that saving him was her mother’s real goal.
Her eyes widened a fraction at the mention of his name. “We shall see if you speak the truth.” Before I could comment, she closed her lids. In a sickly sweet voice, she said, “come to me, sweetling.”
I was fairly sure she didn’t mean me.
A moment later her eyes popped open. I followed her gaze, but saw nothing. A second or two passed, then the air above us rippled.
A blue jay materialized, and instantly turned into a ball of bright white light.
Oh, shit. It was the bird Sage had been talking to, the one that made my ears bleed. I took an involuntary step back. Before I could open my eyes and return to my body in the fourth realm, Gizelle grabbed my arm, somehow preventing me from leaving. I tried again to have my body physically open my eyes, but they wouldn’t budge.
“Let me go,” I yelled. I couldn’t be here when the damn thing started screeching.
Gizelle tightened her grip on my arm, keeping me in place. I struggled to free myself, but it was as if I had no power here, which was probably true, but my body in the fourth realm had more power than I knew what to do with.
Concentrating on my physical form, I willed myself to open my eyes. I heard the crackle of energy as white wisps of power ran across my skin. Gizelle didn’t know who she was dealing with. I would not let her trap me here.
As I pushed to make my body respond, I realized I could hear Omar cursing. I sensed my physical form bend double as I strained to open my eyes and force my return.
Focusing on Omar’s voice I attempted to snap a line to his location. It formed, but whatever Gizelle was doing was also preventing me from slipping the line.
The power at my core was building. I willed myself to straighten, and tried to calm the roiling beast within. Gizelle was still oblivious to the powder keg she was holding.
“What news do you bring?” Gizelle said, in that same sickly sweet voice you might use with a child.
I’m not sure if it was the fear of what the bird could do to my ears or that the uncontrollable buildup of power had finally reached its zenith, but the power wanted out. The wisps of energy running along my skin flared around me, finally allowing me to open my eyes. Only, I wasn’t in the fourth realm.
Chapter 32
My eyes were open, but I wasn’t back in my body. I could see Gizelle waiting for the bird to speak, I could see her body floating in front of me in the Deeps, and I could see Omar staring at me with fear etched across his newly beautiful face.
I was somehow everywhere at once, but I wasn’t anywhere, not really. My senses flexed against reality as the energy began coalescing in my palms.
I tried to connect with the fourth realm and cycle the excess power, but that didn’t stop the balls of hellfire forming in my hands. With the new awareness I regained some control, but the calming feedback loop I’d experienced in the fourth realm was no longer intact. I felt the coolness of the pendant against my neck as it tried to absorb the energy but it appeared to make little difference.
Omar took a fearful step back as the white energy rolling over me lapped out toward him.
“Pull yourself together,” he yelled.
My eyes flared green, and he took another step back. His words ran through my thoughts. I remembered how easy it had been to simply change my clothes. I pictured myself as one being and slammed my hands together.
Unfortunately it didn’t have quite the desired effect. I yelped as my body was ripped through time and space to merge with my presence in the Deeps. I felt a pull against Gizelle’s hold, but her grip was unbreakable. I wasn’t even sure she noticed I’d just jumped my body to Purgatory. After all, I had no awareness of the state of my body the first time I was trapped in the Deeps; it must be the same for Gizelle.
Trapped with no way out, I braced myself for the ear-splitting agony of the bird’s screech, but heard a soft childlike voice instead.
“Mistress,” the bird chirped, “your son is in
trouble. He and his twin, and your daughter, are trapped in the dungeon.”
How was I able to hear this? Was it because of the Deeps? Did it somehow let me experience it?
“Trapped? What of Mace?” Gizelle asked.
“He is lost to the child, Mistress.” With hesitation, the bird added, “as is the one we do not discuss.”
The bird was obviously talking about Thanos.
“He has returned?” Gizelle whispered, putting one hand to her mouth. She sighed as if a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.
Why would she care if her nephew—Mab’s and her dead brother’s son—had returned? I could see her wanting her nephew safe, but Cinnamon was sure the mother had sent me to save Thanos. Why?
“Yes, Mistress,” the bird chirped, “he has returned.”
“Go,” Gizelle said, and the bird turned back into a ball of light and flew away through the ripple of air above our heads.
Gizelle pushed me back against the wall, pressing the knife to my throat again. “What do you know?”
“Cinnamon thinks you sent me to save Thanos. Why? He’s only your nephew. Wouldn’t you care more about your own children?”
She laughed. “You know nothing.”
“I know you’re the chimera twin of Thanos’s father. I know you’ve never even met Thanos.”
Gizelle tightened her hold. “When a chimera is born, their soul is entwined with the trapped twin. They are one. I was there at Thanos’s birth, not in this form, but as my twin—seeing through his eyes as he now sees through mine. I am as much Thanos’s parent as his father was. He will recognize me as such. He will see my soul and know me for what I am.” Leaning in close, talking through gritted teeth, she said, “now tell me what you know.”