“She had kids, like me,” he muttered. “She was there when we rolled aside the stone to the vampyre nest. Forty girls, eyes vacant and sores festering. When I felt for Colleen’s heartbeat, Ae Cha was there.” He couldn’t continue, and I couldn’t bear to hear it. “Glad your sis is okay, at least.”
“Thanks to your daughter. Colleen saved her life, Kaelan.”
He nodded gruffly and turned away, face lost in the shadows.
A shrill scream pierced the darkness. Raina clapped a hand to her mouth before she screamed again.
“What is it? What do you see?” I bounded to her side.
“A vampyre prince!”
We followed her finger. A wraith-like shape drifted along the fog currents, not caring if he were seen. From the way his belly hung low beneath his bat-like wings, I knew who it was.
“Crispin. Maya’s fourth son.” I cautioned us back until we were hugging the glacial face. “Keep going, but for God’s sakes, be quiet.”
It might have worked; we wolves made no sound, and Raina walked like a ghost herself, tears streaming silently down her cheeks. I knew how badly she didn’t want to return to the Vampyre Court again.
The red staircase capped off at a long catwalk. It meandered its vulnerable way across a sheer drop, and then vanished around the bend. Clouds rolled in, completely obscuring our way except for a few feet in front of us.
Jaehoon gave us a knowing look with warm brown eyes, silencing our frightened whimpers (or in my case, unleashed profanity). He gave that strange Korean saying: “I will go first.”
He padded out across the creaking metal, and the rest of us relaxed enough to follow. Kaelan and I brought up the rear, keeping a wary eye on our flank. Raina groped along with one hand on the wall. Black ice coated these metal planks, and nothing short of ice skates would have stopped my human self from falling flat on my ass.
We were over halfway across. Raina slipped and caught herself on Jaehoon’s tail. She glanced back at me questioningly, as if asking permission. I snorted, bucking my head toward Jaehoon. It was his grandpa hairs she was picking out. Jaehoon merely twitched said tail in amusement. Beneath his next step, the metal groaned louder than normal.
In the next second, several things happened at once. I noticed an odd black stain, still visible against the thin dusting of snow, and barked my head off in warning. Jaehoon shoved Raina back as the metal squealed wildly and fell a good foot down the cliff face. Jaehoon clawed for safety, but his own paws scrabbled helplessly against the glassy ice coating the grating. There came another loud wrench as the bolts snapped off the wall, and then Jaehoon fell off the edge.
“Juin-nim!” I leaped helplessly toward the gap. No, no, no, this couldn’t be happening. We weren’t that high up.
I watched as the great gray wolf smacked his head against a protruding rock. Slid down the snow cushioning the gulch. Tumbled to the very bottom.
But then I saw him stir. I saw the muscles in his neck straining to lift his head. Enough to see them coming.
“Oh, God,” Raina whispered.
“No!” I lost my head and began to howl madly. The Dark Dogs were on his body in seconds. The clouds swept over the drop-off again, and now it was Kaelan’s turn to pull me back, urgent barks warning me of danger from the sky.
Crispin came swooping down with a horrible grin twisting his pudgy face. A man-sized-long spear rested in his hands.
“He did this!” I barked, eyes snapping to the black stain. It had left streaks down the wall. Vampyre blood. Of course. Why hadn’t we Weres picked up on it?
“Then we don’t want to mess with someone who can rot things from the inside out!” Kaelan’s shoulder bumped me. “Citlalli! Think of your sister!”
That snapped me back to reality. I made the leap across the broken bridge. My stomach twisted horribly for a second, but then I thudded on the other side. I barked at Raina.
She couldn’t jump nearly as far, but Wolf’s jaws snapped out, catching her by the back of her jacket. I hauled her over the edge. We both looked up to see Crispin throwing his spear at us.
Up came Raina’s hands, and an icy draft of wind blew up from the chasm, pinning the spear directly above our heads. Crispin spluttered in the air quite rightfully with shock; Kaelan made the jump.
“GO!” We ran helter-skelter for the shelter of sparse trees beckoning up ahead, heedless of the ice. Pulling ourselves up on stunted spruce trees and barren pines, we at some point realized there was no higher place to go. Wind blasted up from deep pockets, rising and crashing over the mountain ridge bone like an Artic sea. Blustery clouds tore past, sucked into the luminous eye boring down on us from the height of the sky: the Moon.
We huddled beneath a lone rock. Raina rubbed her gloves together while I licked her face; yes, no one likes wet and sticky dog breath, but it kept her warm. Kaelan wrapped around her, tighter than a scarf. The lotus lantern burned dimly between us, our sole source of light.
Something heavy thudded on the outcrop above. Two pairs of eyes met mine: Kaelan’s alert, and Raina’s tired. I got up and ventured outside without a word.
I nearly didn’t pick him out of the darkness, what with his wings being as black as the night. He stood with his back toward me, gazing up at the moon as if it were the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. Then the Prince of Sorrow turned and actually smiled at me.
“You did it, mongrel,” he praised, his eyes silvery sapphire oceans. “She’s very angry. I can feel it.” He turned again to throw his arms open to the wind, daring it to blow him away.
I bared my teeth against the cold. “We brought the last soul, Khyber.”
The vampyre prince nodded. “Bring it here, then.”
I padded toward him, suddenly wary, and making sure not to glance over my shoulder and give my pack mates’ position away. I joined Khyber at his camp on the peak. Six ice-encrusted lotus lanterns clattered loudly, half-buried in the snow. Duck Young’s soul beat against my body urgently, like a frightened heartbeat. I reluctantly parted with it.
Aaron’s. Donovan’s, thanks to my sister. Crispin’s. Aleksandr’s and Santiago’s. And the trapped souls of the long-dead Takakazu and Duck Young. We had them all.
Khyber did nothing. We sat side-by-side, as if waged in some mad polar plunge contest to see who could survive the bitter night the longest. I lost. Khyber felt nothing, didn’t bat an eye at the icicles caking his lashes—although he did seem slower. Less fluid. His jet-black wings drooped, blown ragged by the winds. I felt heartened.
“Well?” I growled. “The night isn’t getting any warmer.”
Instead of doing something useful, he asked me: “Do you know why we climb this high on Lunar New Year, Citlalli?”
“You secretly desire to spend the rest of eternity as an ice sculpture?”
“It’s the closest we come to the moon’s power.” Khyber drew in a deep breath, and his wings beat more fiercely.
“So you’ve reached your badass potential?” I asked eagerly. “You’re strong enough to destroy the souls now?”
Khyber cocked his head toward the lone outcrop, as if he could hear my sister’s teeth chattering. “I’m strong enough,” he said slowly, “to summon them.”
Strange whistles and bells tinkled in the air, and I saw the ghostly procession from the north crest the ridge. The ghosts carried the brides-to-be within golden litters. They had been dressed from head to toe in white gauze stitched with a lotus flower pattern, like some eerie imitation of a wedding dress. These were the girls intended to wed the vampyre princes tonight. I recognized Raina’s frenemy, Natalya. The Italian beauty must have wormed her way into another vampyre prince’s heart even as the clock ticked down, fighting to the very last like a true survivor. They were, as my sister had said, too few.
It appeared that in a vampyric wedding ceremony, it would be the groom who arrived last. I shuddered to think where the husbands-to-be were.
The cold was hurting the ghosts badly. They couldn’t ca
rry the girls much further. Their entire bodies turned blue, and they began to splutter violently. The next blast of wind blew them away.
The girls ran to hug each other, frightened to be alone on top of this tall, dark peak. My heart froze. Black clouds rumbled like a giant’s footsteps in the distance, as if reminding me of how small I really was. When I finally spoke, it was the small voice of the scared girl I’d prayed none of them would ever see:
“Khyber?” I asked. “Who? Who is it that you’re summoning?”
He casually turned, and I saw the head of a great gray wolf swinging between his fingers. Upon the matted forehead was a horrible maze-like insignia inside a hexagon, drawn in blood.
“The Dark Spirits,” he said, and before I could stop him, Khyber tossed the head into a similar hexagonal ring of stones. Jaehoon’s blood seeped into the snow.
Chapter 37: The Dark Spirits
I had been gone too long. The others were worried. I saw Kaelan and Raina out of the corner of my eye and bayed wildly for them to keep away. Other barks, far off in the distance, answered my call.
Khyber had begun to hum. It was eerie and reminded me of deep, lurking waters. Then he turned to the moon and sang. His eyes hung wide and innocuous, and everyone was hypnotized by him. In his hands: a prayer wheel. The four faces of the animals remained dark as he twisted the wheel, counter-clockwise.
I saw a face, the color of rice cake powder, appear behind the girl Natalya. It vanished in an eye blink. When the thing next appeared, it was close, much too close. It tilted its head up to sniff the air, and rain drops dripped into the black holes where its eyes should be. A Dark Spirit.
It stepped into the circle of light from the moon, one foot dragging. Its deflated breasts swung to its belly, and its thick black mane of hair rustled unpleasantly in the winds, as if concealing snakes. I suddenly felt viciously, unexplainably ill in its presence. Maya’s girls began shrieking, but the wind stole the screams from their throats.
Once the Dark Spirit drank its fill of the blood-splattered snow, more joined it. They had us surrounded, now, and I couldn’t keep track of them. They disappeared in and out of the gusting winds. One appeared behind Raina, but before I could bark a warning, Kaelan spun around, growling and jerking, as if an invisible hand had touched his back. Finally, they all coalesced into an indistinguishable writhing shadow, blocking out the moonlight.
The Dark Spirits asked of Khyber:
–Have you brought us what we asked–
I shot up in alarm. The stone hit me in the bottom of the stomach. Betrayed. As Rafael had warned.
“Yes,” said Khyber, and he knelt behind the seven soul lanterns. “Here before you sit the souls of seven cursed princes. You will be able to influence the rulers of Eve however you will. In exchange,” he continued, voice shaking, “you will release my soul from this devil life trap with Maya and return it to me. As we agreed.”
The Dark Spirits converged on each other, a frightening storm cloud of hisses and guttural snorts. They finally spit a blackened skeleton out on the ground, its bones still smoking. I didn’t know what the fuck had happened, if they’d just eaten one of their own, but the sickening scent overwhelmed me again.
–As we agreed. You have arrived before your mother. We will hear your deal first. But, you must settle her debt with us–
The voices rose in wretched longing, caressing the bare shoulders of the shivering girls. –We are so hungry–
“And I have it.” When Khyber grabbed the scruff of my neck, I stiffened in shock. I searched his downcast eyes, frantic to uncover some hint of what game he was playing at. I couldn’t see anything except him shoving me closer to those things, and I thrashed around more furiously in his hands. Then his eyes filled my world, blackness leaking from them. He touched my forehead. It was immediate. His command shook my very bones with thunder: “Show yourself.”
I collapsed on the snow, frail and human.
“Why?” I whispered, through purple lips.
“Tell me,” he said, just loud enough for me to hear, “do you love your sisters as much as I loved mine?”
Our gazes met. That night when Maya came for them, Khyber had climbed the rope last after all of his siblings, even though he was the fastest and could have gotten away. He’d made the ultimate sacrifice, and now he was asking, would I do the same?
He’d already known I would.
“I give you the Changeling Soul.”
Raina was crying somewhere in the darkness, but I couldn’t see anything except the cold. Laborious, heavy footsteps crunched toward me. I could see them hungering over me now; beneath their curtains of black hair, their empty eyes bore into my skull. They were both curious and confused by my power.
–She is not the one– They raised their heads to look at Khyber. –You have made a mistake–
Khyber struggled to stay calm. “I don’t understand, Great Spirits. Her soul can change its shape and persona—”
–Tainted by wereblood. She smells of Her– Black fingernails wandered over their lips. –But. Hush, now. Someone else is here. The one that we want–
The fingers slowly pointed toward Raina.
–Give us her, too. And we will agree to your backstabbing deal, little bastard. We shall release your soul–
Their eyes shrank into sly slits, the way Fred’s did when he was holding unknown information above your head. –That’s not a problem, is it? You and the weeping girl…smell almost alive with pheromones–
Khyber, backstabbing to a fault, didn’t even hesitate. “Can you blame me for lusting after a soul of such power? No, I care not. Return my soul to me. First. And I shall agree to the deal.”
Their rasping laughter sounded like hissing dry ice.
–Suspicious, suspicious, ugly one. Very well. We have grown bored of playing with it. Do with it what you will–
I was so dizzy I swung toward the snow, but not before I watched an iron lantern wrapped in chains spin through the empty space toward Khyber, glowing with soft teal light. This was it. I knew how sacred deals were in Eve.
The moment it touched his fingers, Khyber spun toward me, and suddenly, every held breath, every desperate fear, was etched plain on his face.
“Citlalli, attack them now!” he cried.
Chapter 38: Lunar New Year
So this was the plan he’d so graciously kept me in the dark about, like a true partner in crime: Dress me up on a plate like a burrito with all the works, and toss Raina in as the free churro. Only one flaw in his masterful pimp-out scheme: I couldn’t have worked up the energy to take on a field of vengeful daisies.
Then Demon began to burn, and Her fire chased the cold away. She was eager to come closer, but I waved Her back, shakily clambering to my feet.
Khyber had seized the first of his brothers’ souls and was pulling no punches; blackness crawled out of his eyes, nearly eclipsing his entire face. At the last second, he sank his fangs into the soul, and it evaporated into the moonlight with a sigh. He lunged for the next one: Donovan’s.
Kaelan and Raina reached me, wordlessly offering me their clothes. We clung together as the Dark Spirits grew to a monstrous twelve feet in height. I had no idea how Khyber expected me to stop the Dark Spirits. Clutching the jacket Kaelan had draped around my shoulders, I darted forward and grabbed the dropped prayer wheel. I spun it clockwise as fast as I could, chanting the prayer with more heart than I ever had in my life: “Om Mani Padme Hum. Om Mani Padme Hum.”
The four animal figures remained silent. However, the barks from the valley grew louder. I heard a familiar one howl my name.
Then Dark Dogs came spilling over the lip of the ridge, tangled in thorns and black roses. The pack alliance pursued them, spearheaded by a trio of wolves: one white, one dark gray, and their leader, brown. Rafael dashed so fast that he caught the heel of the rear Dark Dog; the mongrel whimpered and squealed as the bigger wolf bowled him over and got hold of his jugular. He tore it out with neat speed; there were mo
re enemies to herd.
At their approach, the Dark Spirits lost their shape. The brown wolf dashed straight for us, unaware that he ran straight through one; its bottomless eyes bore into his back.
“Do not,” Rafael snarled at Khyber, “send dogs after wolves.”
“Raf, he’s—sort of, halfway, on our side,” I cried.
“Are you shitting me?” Rafael kept his bristling bull-muscled body between me and the vampyre, canines fully exposed. “Citlalli, he killed our juin-nim.”
“It wasn’t him—”
“The rot? On the catwalk?” His autumn-fire eyes flashed to me. “Only Khyber and Maya are capable of that. And there lies my maker’s head.”
Khyber’s mouth gapped soundlessly at Rafael; I don’t know if he could hear us in this state. Black ink dripped from his eyes like tears. His grip on Donovan’s soul wavered. The soul wriggled a little closer to open air in his hands, as if it sensed escape.
“Taeyang, destroy it now!” Raina spoke suddenly, and Khyber ripped the soul into a million pieces.
“TRAITOR!”
Through the flapping winds and whispering Dark Spirits, Maya appeared as Lover, cradled in Crispin’s arms. I felt Kaelan freeze beside me.
Maya took one wobbly footstep onto the brow of the summit, and then another. Her head had been hastily tied onto Ae Cha’s body with string. She lurched toward us like a dangerous drunk.
“You.” She spit in Raina’s face. “I would have taken your body, but I wanted to strangle you with my bare hands. You took my eldest son from me. Seduced him into turning his back on his family. Khyber, what are you doing to your brothers?”
Crispin crouched beside her like a horribly misshapen toad, awaiting orders. Khyber said nothing, and merely picked up the stagnant green soul next. Crispin’s nostrils flared; he recognized it.
“KHYBER! IT WAS YOU WHO TOOK IT!” Crispin bellowed, but he was too late. Khyber released a flash of emerald green; it shot across the face of the moon and faded somewhere in the dusky atmosphere. Khyber reached for the next soul, Aleksandr’s, but then Crispin’s favorite spear thudded into his wing.
Year of the Tiger (Changeling Sisters) Page 23