by Laken Cane
And from the looks of him, healing would be slow in coming. Even with her blood.
Owen Five’s entire life seemed to have been made up of pain. She wasn’t adding to that. Not on purpose.
Maybe that made her soft, or crazy, or just plain dumb.
She didn’t give a fuck.
Not one.
Who am I?
You’re Rune Alexander.
And that’s all that matters.
Only it wasn’t.
“Your army is just around the bend,” Ian said. “They stand in the holding corral and it will dissipate upon your command. The shimmer lord will have readied them for you.”
“How long have they been standing around waiting?” she asked.
He met her stare. “For a lifetime, Your Highness.”
“This is surely going to piss me off,” she muttered.
“You look like you’re used to being pissed off.” The speaker was one of the guards Ian had chosen to travel with them.
He was average height and slender, with bright black eyes and a quick smile. And obviously he was either fearless or stupid.
She was going with stupid.
“I don’t need your mouth,” she told him. “Just your blade.”
“My blade is yours. As is my mouth.”
“Knock it off,” she said, not even a little amused.
He grinned.
Perfect. Ian had chosen a clown to accompany her to Magic.
He didn’t seem intimidated by her or alarmed by the trials to come.
“My name is Jim, my lady,” he said, bowing from atop his horse. “And I am at your service.”
“Go back with the other two,” she told him. “I want you behind Owen’s wagon guarding him.”
He saluted, wheeled his horse, and rode off without another word.
She frowned at Ian. “Seriously? That’s the best you could do?”
He smiled, just a little. “He’s not the fool he pretends to be, Princess.”
“My name is Rune.”
He gave a stiff nod. “Yes, ma’am.”
She sighed and shook her head.
Honestly, anything was better than thoughts of Z in the hands of the witch.
“Why call me Princess, anyway? Why not liberator or redeemer or something that makes more sense?”
“You don’t know?”
“Just answer the question,” she growled.
“You were made from kings and queens, Princess. The shimmer lords. All of them. Skyll is your kingdom. There is no one else in any world like you. You’re made of blood, flesh, magic, death, and…” He hesitated, and left his sentence unfinished. “You are the redeemer. You’re the dream. You’re the one who will free us.” His voice had gotten stronger, and fierce. Very fierce.
She frowned, but he went on.
“The witch has always caused problems. But in the last few years she’s become so strong. So very wicked. The things she does…” he trailed off, shuddering. “It—she—is getting stronger. There is one shimmer remaining between her and our complete and eternal slavery.”
He met her gaze, finally calm. “And you. You are a match for the witch. You are made of her—but you are the good. The witch’s good. You must save us. If you don’t and we’re lucky,” he paused. “Or unlucky, depending on how you look at it, we’ll spend our lives in Skyll, slaves to Damascus. And when she has finished with us or we have displeased her or she grows bored and decides to have us slaughtered, we will know the true death.
“There will be no more life for us. Skyll will be the end. And,” he continued, when she started to interrupt, “it will not only be Skyll. She will infiltrate all worlds. Even the one in which you were hidden.”
She’d already been told nearly everything he was saying. Already knew it. But each time it was repeated to her or hinted at or whispered about, each time someone called her Princess, it became more real.
And they expected her to stay. To rule Skyll.
Her. The witch’s fucking—
“Princess,” Jim called. “Your charge wants to speak to you.”
She nearly fell from her horse in her hurry to reach her broken friend. Had she ever really expected him to recover, to speak?
No. Not really.
She climbed into the cart, her heart pounding. “Owen?”
He lifted a hand and she grabbed it hard. Too hard, but she couldn’t help herself. His face was still ravaged, and his eye sockets were still empty.
She’d had a blanket thrown over his shattered body, as clothing him would have been too painful. Spots of fresh blood appeared on the snowy blanket, but he was healing.
Healing.
His bones were knitting.
“Fuck me,” she whispered.
He wet his lips. “You’re really here.”
His voice was hoarse and quiet, but in it she heard something that amazed her, something that took her breath.
He hadn’t given up.
She slipped an arm under his neck to lift him for a sip of water. “I’m really here.”
“I thought I’d dreamt you.”
“No, baby.”
“You know?” he asked.
She swallowed hard and nodded, then realized he couldn’t see her. “Yeah. I know.”
“I had hoped…” But he didn’t finish his sentence.
There was no need.
She said nothing.
“You saved my life,” he said, instead.
She expected him to damn her for that. Had their situations been reversed, she would have damned him. She would have hated him.
“Thank you,” he said. “I don’t deserve your mercy.”
She grabbed his hat, eager to leave the heaviness behind. “I got your hat back.”
He might have grinned. His swollen, mutilated lips twitched. “I’ll be okay, Rune. It’s just going to take a while.”
She nodded. “Yes. You will be.”
“Go kick ass. I’ll help you as soon as I’m able.”
She hesitated. “Owen.”
“Yes?”
“I will always fight for you.”
She left him there, her heart lighter.
She’d done the right thing by saving him. By forgiving him.
That was the one decision she’d ever made that she was completely sure of.
She would never forget, and she’d never completely trust Owen Five again, but she’d already forgiven him.
He’d been punished enough for what he’d done.
She gave the order to continue, and marched with her men to the enclosure that held her army.
Her army.
There were so many uncertainties ahead that she couldn’t breathe if she thought about them.
So she didn’t.
There was only that moment, and she would try her best to worry about it and nothing else.
She grabbed her horse’s reins and strode ahead, determined and almost cheerful.
Ian dismounted and fell into step beside her.
And then, she saw her army.
She stopped dead in her tracks and pushed her fist against her chest. “What the fuck?”
“Your army,” Ian said, and took a quick step away from her. “What displeases you?”
“My God,” she whispered.
Sensing she wasn’t going to spear him with her claws, he walked closer. “They were created for you. For the attempt at neutralizing the witch.”
“But this isn’t right,” she said, barely able to get the words out. The buzzing in her head grew louder. She could see nothing but the army. Could barely think.
Standing in an invisible enclosure, their faces blank, bodies showing the stillness of very old vampires, were rows and rows and rows of…
Her.
“How can this be?” she said, or wanted to say. She wasn’t sure she was actually speaking until Ian answered her.
“But…they were made just as you were, Princess. You were made. They were made in your image.”
/> She pressed her fingers to her temples.
He’d known, Brasque Dray, that the shock would be enormous. Surely, he’d known.
Ian touched her arm. “They’re not exactly as you are. They’re simply machines, of a sort.” He pointed toward Owen. “Like Five is. They have no emotions, no heart…”
“Owen does,” she murmured.
“Sure.” He nodded a little too quickly. “Sure he does. But the only thing your army can feel is pain, because that keeps them motivated to succeed. To protect themselves. Do you understand?”
When she said nothing, only stared at the army, he hurried on. “They will follow any command you set them.” Then he shrugged. “But they know what to do even without your commands.”
She walked closer until she was standing right in front of them. “But what are they?”
“They are—”
“Zombies,” she said. “They’re zombies.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “Princess zombies. But they will not be slow to move. They will kill. That’s their only desire.”
“My monster.”
And she knew it was the truth. Her monster was standing there before her, in the flesh, multiplied.
Bloodthirsty.
Deadly.
Empty.
She couldn’t cry. It was too big for tears.
She shivered, suddenly freezing.
They were her.
She’d been…made. Not born. No one was truly her mother, and no one was truly her father.
She had contributors. And every single one of them was…shit. Just shit.
She’d been put together with pieces and parts from all four shimmer lords, and all four shimmers.
Built.
“Tell me…”
“Anything, Princess.”
“Nicolas Llodra,” she said.
“He was Blood Shimmer lord. It is said that he and the witch were in love. That she was obsessed with him. She grew jealous and in the end, she captured him. Forced him to live as her slave for…” He shrugged. “For I don’t know how long.”
“Who’s the Blood Shimmer lord now?”
“His name is Rand. His shimmer was overtaken by Magic and no one knows if he was taken by the witch, killed, or managed to escape. They were a secretive bunch anyway.”
“Death Shimmer lord,” she said.
“Nikolai Czar. He is at the mercy of the witch. It is unknown if he lives.”
“How long has he been the Death lord?”
“Not long, Princess. Nikolai is of my time.” His voice softened. “He is not one of your makers.”
“Then who was the Death Shimmer lord at the time of my creation?”
“A man named Ariessin. He disappeared over twenty years ago. Deserted his shimmer, his people…and no one really knows where he is hiding.”
“Fuck it,” she said. “It doesn’t matter.”
There were worse things than to be made from shimmer lords.
Surely.
She shuddered. “How long have you been here?”
He hesitated. “I…I lost count.” His voice was hoarse. “I don’t remember.”
Nothing was normal. Nothing.
That’s all she’d wanted, just something halfway normal.
A mother, a father.
But all she had, really, was a fucked up title in a fucked up world.
And Z, who was missing and who could never, ever return to her world to be with her.
Not ever.
“Fuck you,” she said, shaking so hard her teeth rattled. “Fuck you.”
He drew back, his face pale. He couldn’t know the words weren’t really directed at him.
She didn’t enlighten him, just clenched her fists, ground her teeth, and went with dread and something close to fear to meet her army.
Her army of Rune zombies.
Chapter Twenty-Five
She gave them the command to follow her, and they left their pen eagerly, claws out, fangs dropped, eyes glowing red.
After that, she tried not to look at them.
They’d barely left the Flesh Shimmer when Ian pointed at something ahead. “Princess. It’s…what is that?”
She urged her horse closer, her mouth dry.
Crows. Hundreds, thousands of them. They appeared to be corralled in their own invisible holding pen, a mass of unmoving and silent birds.
They watched her, big crows with tiny cold eyes and shiny black feathers.
When she drew closer to them, the crow that had burst from her chest cawed, drawing her attention.
She knew him as well as she knew her monster.
He’d perched on one of the invisible rails, waiting.
He’d found her an army.
“An army of zombies and crows,” she muttered, her stare on the birds.
When the army flew in pairs from the corral, marching below them was Sorrow’s pup, his head high, his steps jaunty.
Her pup.
She didn’t even wonder how he’d gotten there.
“Someone’s going to have to take care of him when I go back,” she told Ian.
When he didn’t answer her, she glanced at him. “Why are you staring at me like that?”
“You’re not going back,” he said, as though she’d lost her mind. “You can’t go back.”
“Someone has to take the antidote back, dude. There are Others dying. Rotting.”
“You would desert your people?”
She stared straight ahead. “No I would not. And that’s why I’m going back.”
He said nothing. The judgment was there, in his silence, but she didn’t care. Couldn’t care.
It wouldn’t take a lot to convince her to stay.
And that would be a terrible thing.
She bellowed into his heavy silence, “Find me a way to get it back, then. If you can’t, shut the fuck up about it.”
“You don’t want to leave,” he said, slowly, as though he finally understood.
“I don’t want to leave Z.”
He didn’t ask her who Z was. Maybe he was too afraid to.
The crows flew overhead, adding darkness to an already darkening sky. They looked like a huge, rolling storm cloud.
“It’s coming a storm,” Jim called, as though reading her mind.
She glanced back at Owen. “We’ll need to find shelter when it rains.”
“No need, Princess. There’s a tarp in the cart. It attaches to the corners and will keep him dry. If you want to continue on, we can do so.”
She nodded. “See to it.”
He rode away, leaving her to her thoughts.
The crows called back and forth to each other, and Owen’s cart wheels squeaked and groaned as the horse pulled it over the bumpy, hard ground. The quick steps of the zombies were surprisingly stealthy—the lookalikes seemed to flow instead of walk.
The electricity in the air made her press a hand to her uneasy stomach. She breathed shallowly, anxiety clouding her mind.
Ian rode back up beside her and she was a little relieved, happy for the company. Maybe he could distract her from the sharp feeling of impending doom.
Then she turned a curve in the road and surprised a band of legislators, whose messy camp was strewn across the road.
She turned her head and called, “Jim, keep the wagon back.”
One of the legislators stood, stumbled drunkenly, and then laughed. “A woman and a man. We’ll have some fun with you.” He turned toward his left. “Capture them but don’t kill them. I want to eat my dinner before having them for dessert.” Again, he laughed, and his men laughed with him.
Rune grinned. “Hello, you ugly fuck.”
The legislator pointed at her. “You won’t laugh when I’m finished with you.”
“Don’t you know who she is?” Ian yelled. His voice shook only a little.
It would have been hard for a normal person to see the legislators’ expressions in the gloominess of the fading day, but she could see just fine.
&nbs
p; The one who’d spoken narrowed his eyes. “I don’t care who she is.” His voice sounded like sharp shards of glass were caught in the tender meat of his throat. “I’m going to rape her with my horns and rip both of you into little pieces for my men to play with.”
He took a step closer. “You please me,” he said to Ian. “I might not kill you.”
Ian, despite his paling face, kept his horse still. He lifted his shotgun.
“You and your men are dead,” Rune said.
The legislator lifted a meaty arm, readying himself to give the signal that would send his eager men after Rune and Ian.
But then, his mouth fell open and his arm stayed frozen in the air.
Rune smiled again and glanced back over her shoulder. The zombies had turned the bend in the road and stood behind Rune, a backdrop of death that frightened even the legislators.
She pointed to the sky. “Look up.”
He glanced at the sky and stumbled backward when the massive cloud of crows suddenly broke apart.
“Who are you, then?” he asked.
She shot out her claws.
“She’s the princess,” Ian said, before she could reply, and he pulled the trigger of his shotgun.
The legislator exploded.
“Dude,” Rune breathed. “I’m going to want me one of those.”
The legislators who remained roared with rage and stomped toward Rune and her army, their running steps making the earth shake.
The zombies poured around Rune and Ian like lethal water and ran eagerly to meet them.
The crows screamed and began to dive, dropping like black hail from the sky.
And Rune, her heart beating hard with delight, leapt into the middle of the battle. That was what she needed, wanted, craved.
The fight.
So she threw herself into it with her whole heart, and there was nothing but the feel of her claws ripping through the tough flesh of the legislators and hot, fresh blood splashing against her skin.
No emotions or worries or responsibilities to the worlds. Just mindless killing.
She ran at the legislators and drove her lethal claws into their throats, brains, eyes—whatever they left vulnerable.
And God, did it feel good.
All too soon, the witch’s men lay scattered and dead upon the ground, and Rune stood with her people under the full moon, regretful that there were no more legislators to kill.