by J. M. Frey
Two on one, and one of my opponents is someone I would prefer not to harm.
Blast, shit, and fuck!
Pip steps forward, I step back, the Viceroy steps up, and we are waltzing. The three of us are dancing and ducking, limbs flying, spells sizzling, and my blade flashing. I am getting tired. I have never had such an extended bout, and never without breaks before. Adrenaline has given me what boost it can, but I feel myself flagging. My cuts are slower, my sword drooping, and I am making stupid, amateur mistakes that not even Pointe would make.
I stumble backward and land hard against the desk. My hip drives into the edge, and I swallow my yelp of pain. I pant, gasping, grasping for air, lungs and forearms and biceps burning. The Viceroy and Pip have me at an impasse.
“Surrender,” the Viceroy hisses, glee crawling across his mouth but avoiding his eyes.
“How about no?” someone behind us says, and something fast and hard slams into the side of the Viceroy’s head. He is on the ground before I can blink, head bleeding profusely from his temple.
“That’s for all the times you threatened to pull out my eyes, you creepy twat!” Bevel snarls down at him, fingers flexing on the branch that he’d used like a club. The end of it is splintered and splattered with gore, and he tosses it away from him.
I look over to Pip, but she has fainted also, and is hanging limply from Kintyre’s arms.
“Good fighting,” my brother says to me. “Never seen anyone get close enough to score any hits, not with his magic.”
“Do you concede that all of my ‘flighty’ style is worth something now?” I pant, unable to suppress my smile of triumph.
“Perhaps,” Kintyre allows, but he is smiling too.
In his arms, Pip stirs. He sets her on her feet just as her eyes open and she lifts her hands to her head. “Ow. Christ. Forsyth?”
“I’m here,” I say, and reach out for her. Instead of just taking my hand, as I thought she might, she curls herself against my body, tucking her shoulder under my arm and her cheek against my heartbeat. Her face is wet with sweat and tears, her eyes screwed shut, her breathing harsh.
I shoot a startled look at Bevel and Kintyre over her hair. Kintyre looks satisfied, but Bevel has such a look of pity in his dark eyes that I cannot help the feeling of guilt that curls in my gut.
I want to comfort Pip, but I can’t. I don’t love her. Not anymore.
“Pip,” I say softly.
She straightens stiffly, pulls herself away. Her eyes are brown when she opens them.
“Are you well?” Bevel asks.
“Well enough.” Her mouth is pink and red and white, not glowing, not green.
Kintyre kicks the Viceroy’s shoulder, and the monster’s head lolls, his eyelids fluttering. “He’s alive.”
The blood still pumps from his wrist, slowly, sluggishly, but continuously. An hour longer, and the Viceroy won’t be alive anymore.
“Shoulda hit him harder,” Pip says.
“I can finish the job easy enough,” Bevel says and draws his sword. For all that Kintyre is the one the Viceroy has sought to destroy all these years, Bevel is the one he has tortured most. It feels right that Bevel should end him.
“Wait,” Pip says softly. “Wait. No. Don’t kill him. I have a better idea.”
✍
Kintyre and Bevel truss the Viceroy with vines pulled from the cavern wall. Pip laughs mirthlessly with the appropriateness of the rope. We do not treat any of his injuries—he is still slowly bleeding to death—but we don’t need him to live. We just need him to be alive for now.
When he is secured, we prop him back against the desk, sitting, with his legs bound together before him. Bevel stands guard over him, eyes refusing to leave his frame, determined that the Viceroy will not escape this time, no matter that he is certainly in no condition to do so. The Viceroy’s face is gray and slack, his head lolling, the bruise around his temple already a nasty black. I would lay even money down that his skull is fractured. With any luck, perhaps even his brain is bleeding. I can only hope.
“Are you sure you’re ready?” Kintyre asks as Pip pulls both of our sacks over to the desk.
“I don’t have anything to stay for,” Pip says quietly, without looking up at either of us.
There is a small, soft surge of possibility in my gut, like my body remembers loving her, but my mind has forgotten, and won’t be reminded. I feel like I should want to reach out, to protest, to fold her in my arms and kiss her into staying. To apologize for our fight, to soothe, to make it up to her with my lips and my hips. But I just stand there, frozen between conflicting yearnings, between instinct and intelligence, what I feel and what I know.
When I fail to protest, Pip begins to unpack the spoils of our quest.
Carefully, deliberately, Pip lays the objects on the desk, in order of our finding them. First, the sheet of paper with the Deal-Maker spirit’s sigil, then the quill, the cup, the parchment, and the knife.
“Now what?” I ask.
Pip shakes her head. “I’m not certain. Your prophecy didn’t really say what to do next. Just to get everything together.”
“Perhaps we were meant to collect the Deal-Maker spirit, as well,” I say.
“How do you collect a Deal-Maker spirit?” Pip asks.
“You don’t,” says a woman behind us.
We both turn, even as I hear Bevel and Kintyre draw their swords. There is a woman standing behind us, dressed as a serving girl with a scarf over her hair, obscuring her face. She wears Turn-russet livery.
“You’re the Deal-Maker spirit that brought me here,” Pip says softly, face slack with wonder. “I remember you.”
“Yes,” the spirit replies, and there’s something about her voice, something about the way she says it that itches against my memory. There’s also a bit of a sneer.
“Are you summoned?” I ask. “May we deal with you?”
“I am summoned,” she allows, and then raises her head so that her face is visible. “I am summoned, and you may deal with me, Master Turn.”
Beside me, Pip gasps in recognition and confusion. “You?”
“Ne-neris?” I stutter.
“Well, I had to keep an eye on my investment, didn’t I?” Neris replies, with a smile like knives.
Twenty
“Who is she?” Kintyre asks.
Pip rolls her eyes. “Exposition time. Of course. This is Neris. She was my lady’s maid in Turn Hall.”
“Your maid is a Deal-Maker spirit?” Kintyre says, eyebrows wriggling up into an expression of confusion that must be identical to the one I am wearing.
“But you’re Cook’s daughter,” I say.
“Cook has no daughter,” Neris replies, spreading her hands. “I made her think she did so you would welcome me to your household. Which is the first thing you said to me, if you’ll recall, Master Turn. You bid me well come, and to stay. And that was all I needed.”
“What did you do?” Pip asks. “What did you do to me, while I was . . . ?”
“Nothing,” Neris admits. “And do not forget, I cannot lie. I did nothing to you, Miss Piper.”
“And you did nothing for me, either.”
Neris pouts. “Was I not an excellent lady’s maid? I enjoyed it.”
“I meant Bootknife. The Viceroy.” Pip’s voice is shaking, but her hands are steady, her stance solid even though I know her back must still be a riot of pain from the Viceroy’s spells.
“Why would I?” Neris asks. “That would be interfering with the deal I struck with the Viceroy.”
“What did you exchange?” I ask, eyes narrowed, trying to decipher Neris’s appearance, use her gestures to guess at what she’s thinking, but she is a blank slate. She is unreadable. Because she is not real. Her body is not her, and it leaves me answerless and frustrated.
“Ah, ah,” she scolds. “That is my secret to hold.”
“It must have been something spectacular,” Bevel says, “to summon down a Reader.”
/> Pip and I both goggle at him.
“What?” he says, shrugging. “Did you think it was a secret? From us? Please, I’m not an idiot, for all that I’m in love with one.”
Kintyre shoots him a look that is part lust, part fondness, part exasperation, and wholly inappropriate right now.
“It was Kintyre’s soul, wasn’t it? Or his life? Something like that?” Pip blurts, suddenly. Neris makes a face, which means Pip has guessed correctly. “I thought so. Something was strange about the way the Viceroy talked about Kintyre’s death. Said it wasn’t his to collect.”
“So, why have you waited?” Kintyre growls.
“I cannot kill,” Neris sneers. “I can only take your death when it happens. But it has been promised to me. And I will keep it forever. I will make you relive it a hundred times, and then a hundred times again, just to savor the sensation.”
Kintyre lifts his sword, but Bevel stays him. “You can’t actually hurt her. Save your strength.”
Neris laughs.
“No, hold on, that’s wonky,” Pip says. “The Viceroy can’t bargain with something that isn’t his, that’s not how the rules of this world work.”
Neris’s expression clouds, her fists clench, and, from between her teeth, she hisses, “No, he should not have.”
“But you were forced to accept it,” I jump in. “Why?”
Neris shakes her head.
“Tell us the truth,” Pip demands. “You have to.”
“I can choose not to speak!” Neris snarls.
“Tell us, and maybe we can break it,” Pip says. She has her hands out before her, pleading, and I can see the marks on her wrists from where she first came to my world and cut them. Small, white pebble scars. I know how they feel against my tongue, even though I didn’t know what they were at the time. That same conflicted yearning pulls at my insides, and I squash it back down. Now is not the time.
Neris’s whole body slumps, liquid, and, for a moment, I fear she will splash down against the ground and vanish. She wavers like a water spout instead, and then rises back up. “Blood,” she says. “He obtained the blood of a Deal-Maker and used it in the spell. She was my sister.”
“I’m sorry,” Pip whispers. “I bet you want revenge.”
“Yes.”
“Is that something we can trade in?” Pip asks. She gestures to where the Viceroy is bound and gagged at the foot of the desk. “Can I give you him, even though he’s not mine to give?”
“I am still bound by the blood,” Neris says, and her voice has become sharp and horrific. “I must take that which is offered.”
“Then I offer the Viceroy,” Pip says.
Neris makes a high keening sound of animal joy. “I accept.” It is a low hiss. She reaches out and touches the top of his head, covetous and cruel. The Viceroy stirs, eyes fluttering open.
Within seconds, he understands his position, and he tries to scream. But Neris’s hand is on his throat, and no sound escapes.
“Will you hurt him?” Bevel asks, shifting, uncertainty flicking across his features.
“Oooh, yessssss,” Neris hisses.
Bevel nods, firmly, once. Decided. “Good.”
The Viceroy begins to buck and writhe, but he cannot wriggle away; he soon tires, the blood loss too much. Neris waves her hand over his face, and he slumps, sinks into the ground as if he was made of liquid, and vanishes.
Forever, I hope viciously.
Then, Neris straightens. “And what do you want in return?”
Pip is about to speak, but then she stops, hesitating. Before she can change her mind, I say, “Send Pip home. To her own world. Restore her to her place as a Reader.”
Neris considers, and then slowly, just once, shakes her head. “No. The payment is not great enough.”
“But it’s a whole person!” Kintyre protests. “Surely, one person for another is enough!”
“One person for one person, agreed,” Neris says. “But I never received payment for the first exchange.” She licks her lips at Kintyre, who balks and takes a step back, hand tightening on his hilt.
“That’s hardly our fault,” Pip says. “So renege! Send me back.”
“No,” Neris says. “I will accept the Viceroy as payment for bringing you here, and I will swap that only for Kintyre’s death.”
“That’s not fair!” I explode, but the look of relief in Bevel’s eyes stays the rest of what I was going to say.
Kintyre lets go and reaches toward his lover, and Bevel clings to him with deliberate desperation.
“No, it is fair. We accept,” Pip breaks in, eyes also on their clasped hands. “Kintyre’s death remains his own.”
“Agreed,” Neris says, and shakes Pip’s hand.
Pip stares at it after the spirit withdraws, fascinated, obviously, with the texture of Neris’s skin. Had Neris ever touched me in Turn Hall? I can’t recall. I want to experience it, too, but I daren’t reach out, in case I accidentally accept a deal as well. Neris is staring at me, smug, challenging.
“Now, about sending Pip home,” I say.
Neris smiles and shrugs. “I must expend a great deal to do so. I’m not certain there is anything at all which you could offer me that would make up for that.”
Pip bites her lip, thinking hard. Even Kintyre and Bevel look like they are considering it. I see Kintyre’s eyes flick to his hand, still twined with Bevel’s, and Bevel shakes his head viciously.
Don’t you dare, I say with my expression, when Kintyre levels a look at me.
Make him understand, his eyes say back.
I won’t let you do it, either, I reply. You’re happy.
I am. He relents, and Bevel presses closer, resting his forehead on my brother’s bicep, relieved.
Pip sucks in a great deep breath and tilts her head back, eyes on the small circle of blue sky visible at the top of the chasm.
“Everything,” Pip says. “I offer everything. My whole time here. My memory of all of it, my scars, any physical, mental, or emotional proof that I ever existed in this place. I give up the one thing that every scholar, every fan-girl has ever wanted—I will give you my adventure.”
It feels like a betrayal in the worst way. It feels like someone has reached into my guts with a hot iron and scrambled them all around. It feels like a punch in the face, and a punch in the sternum, driving all the air from my lungs, the oxygen from my blood, the joy from my heart.
“Pip,” I gasp, and it sounds like a drowning man begging for water, and I don’t care, I don’t, because I am.
I don’t love her anymore, but that doesn’t mean I want her to forget me. To forget any of us! All of this!
“Pip, no!” Bevel says, and the pain on his face seems to reflect the one that is shooting across the underside of my skin. “You can’t mean that!”
“What else is there? A person for a person, an experience for an experience!”
“I want that!” Neris snarls. “Yes, yes. Give that to me. I accept, oh, I accept! Give it to me, your time here. Give me everything that you were, everything that you felt!” Her eyes have become slits; her pupils elongate, and there is a tongue flicking between her teeth, black and long, licking her chops, her mouth watering for Pip’s life here, for her love, for her suffering, for her joys, and . . . no. No, this creature cannot have it. Everything that I felt is tied in with everything Pip felt, and this monster cannot take that away.
“Give it to me, I accept, give it to me!” Neris howls.
“No,” I shout over her squeals of excitement.
“It’s not yours to give!” Pip shouts back at me. “Or to deny!”
“But it is my life, and she can’t have that. I don’t want her to see how much I loved you!”
“You gave it up!” Pip shrieks. “You decided it was too hard, and you gave it up!”
“I gave it up because it was making you miserable!” I snarl back. “I gave it up to make it easier on you! I gave up my love for you because I love you, you fool!”
Pip rocks back on her heels, eyes wide.
“No, no,” Neris hisses, fingers grasping and long, clawed and ready to rip into Pip’s adventures, Pip’s memories, to rend and to tear and to desecrate, and I will not have it.
Before anyone else can make a move, I turn on my heel and snatch the sigil paper off the desk. “Spirit, we are done deal-making!” I snarl, and rend the paper in two, breaking the sigil.
“No!” Pip screams. “Forsyth, no!”
She lunges for Neris’s hand, even as the spirit wails, writhing and melting, sinking into the ground. Pip tries to follow her down, but Bevel grabs hold of her shoulders, hauls her off her feet and back, hugging around her waist. Pip kicks futilely at the air, her heels drumming against his shins, but he doesn’t let go.
“No, no, no!” Pip screams, wails, sobs.
And when Neris is completely gone—not even a wet patch on the pebbles to show where she was—Bevel releases Pip. She whirls around and socks him in the jaw. His head snaps sideways, eyes wide with surprise, and Pip dances backward, shaking out her fist and swearing.
“You son of a bitch!” she screams. “How dare you, all of you!”
“You have no idea what you were about to do!” I shout.
“I was going to go home!”
“No, you weren’t!” Kintyre snarls. He starts toward her, hands up as if trying to calm a skittering horse, and Pip stumbles back out of his reach. He stops. “It was a trick!”
“What are you talking about?” Pip snarls. “She has to tell the truth!”
“But she can still twist things!” I snarl back. My whole body is one great big ball of tension, unused energy, fear zinging along every nerve, leaving me nauseous and hurt. “She would have taken everything. Not just what you experienced. She would have erased you entirely from this world.”
Bevel sucks in a shaking breath. “Me and Kintyre?”
“Yes, that would never have happened!” I say, pointing at them.
“Forssy’s new self-confidence,” Kintyre says.