by Laken Cane
“But you are here now, and that’s all that matters.” She didn’t seem concerned with Rune’s silence. Rune lay upon her slight breast like an infant, her stare glued desperately to the witch’s face.
Yes, some part of her realized the crawlers had broken her.
No part of her cared.
“You are to destroy me, so the tale goes. To redeem the worthless people of Skyll.
“But you know the tale is a lie. The truth is, you are meant to rule with me.” The witch’s smile was familiar. So familiar.
Rune averted her eyes, uncomfortable.
“You’ve always longed for your family. I know that. You’ve pined for your roots. For the love of a mother.” She shrugged, then lifted a lock of Rune’s black hair, rubbing it between her fingers. “You look so much like me. You see that, don’t you? Don’t you, baby?”
Damascus looked nothing like the apparition Rune had met in Rock County.
She looked…
Like Rune.
“No,” Rune whispered, when Damascus waited. “I don’t see it.”
Damascus laughed. “You drank of me and survived. I remembered you then. But I forgot again immediately. Not only was that a curse of this fucking world, but those who spirited you away managed to sneak a potent little spell upon me. I would not remember you.” She laughed again, but that time, it was full of bitterness. “They stole you, and they stole my memory of you.”
Rune had to ask. She entwined her fingers with Damascus’. “Why?”
“You were created to defend Skyll. That’s what I believed. But to the ones who plotted against me, you were created to destroy me. They knew someday I’d take it all.” She shrugged, and tightened her grip on Rune’s fingers. “You’re my match. No one else is.” Damascus lifted her chin. “No one else ever could be. But you are of my flesh.” She leaned closer, grinning when Rune’s eyes widened. “You are exactly like me.”
“I’m a protector.” Rune’s heart was beating so hard it hurt her chest. She pushed her fist against the pain. “I’m not a murderer.”
“How do you feel?” The witch smiled, waiting.
And Rune realized she was completely healed. The things the crawlers did to her lived only inside her head. Her body was better than ever.
The witch had withdrawn the power she’d sent gushing into Rune to heal her, to make her strong.
It didn’t matter.
“Better,” Rune said, and sat up slowly. She released Damascus’ hand. “Tell me how I exist. Skyll is…”
The witch made a dismissive gesture. “Skyll is your spirit. Skyll…animates you, you could say. All the shimmer lords shared parts of themselves to give that spirit a home. A body. You were made to be so very special. And whether I survive you or not, this is where you belong.”
“Can I travel back and forth without losing myself?”
“No. But you already knew the answer to that.”
“I have to go back. I have people there.”
“Listen well and heed my words. I will not repeat them.” She put her face close to Rune’s. “You have people here. Your story, your legend, will grow. There is one here who is destined to kill you and yours, Rune.”
Gooseflesh arose suddenly and painfully upon her bare skin. “Who?”
The witch’s smile was mocking. “You know, don’t you?”
When Rune remained silent and confused, Damascus pressed the tips of her pale fingers into Rune’s temple. “You call her the little black-haired baby.”
The shock hit Rune square in the chest and left her gasping for air. Disbelief and a hateful knowledge squeezed her brain.
It couldn’t be.
It wouldn’t be.
“You’re wrong,” she said, finally.
There may have been some pity deep in the witch’s cold eyes. “I felt the same when I was told of your eventual…betrayal.”
But Rune shook her head. She pressed her fist against her stomach, where an agonizing lump grew larger and larger. “No.”
Damascus lifted an eyebrow. “Baby.” Then she sighed. “We’re nearly home.”
There were no windows, but Rune could feel the contraption speeding along with surprising smoothness. She turned her face away from the witch and said nothing.
But there was something she needed to know. “Tell me about Gunnar.”
Rune didn’t look at the witch but heard the surprise in her voice when she spoke. “The ghoul.” Her voice was thoughtful, but its softness couldn’t hide the thread of angry darkness beneath it. “Gunnar. He was my doctor. Did you know that? My very best doctor. He was born with the sight. Could see into the future—how far remains a mystery. Gunnar the Wise, he was called. I called him Gunnar the Stubborn.” She laughed.
Rune was still trying to process that Gunnar wasn’t imprisoned by the witch. He wasn’t a slave.
Gunnar had worked for the witch.
Her doctor. Her wizard.
Hers.
All the spit in her mouth dried up and she couldn’t swallow. “I’d like some water.”
“It’s in your hand.”
Rune looked down at the silver cup that had appeared in her hand, hesitated, then turned the goblet up and drank. The water was cool and fresh and tasted better than blood, even, as it slid down her throat.
“He wasn’t always a hideous ghoul,” Damascus said. “When he displeased me, I had him made into one. I couldn’t kill him—death is too easy. Too forgiving.”
“And you wanted him to suffer,” Rune said. “The way you want everyone to suffer.”
Damascus shrugged. “He helped me capture my Nicolas. But that was a mistake on my part, because in the end they were the ones who plotted and schemed against me and they were the ones who took you away.”
“Because you were going to kill me,” Rune said. “Snow told me.”
“Shame,” the witch corrected. “And it is the most fitting name imaginable for that one.” But she didn’t disagree that she’d been preparing to destroy the infant Rune.
Why should she? As far as she was concerned, Rune was hers. Rune was trapped, broken, and hers.
“Did you give me a name?” Rune asked, and she held her breath as she waited for the answer.
Damascus smiled. “I called you Sinister. I meant that name in the most flattering of ways.” Then she gestured impatiently. “But then I was informed that my baby Sinister would grow up and end me. You can understand how that might have hurt my feelings.”
“Maybe you were lied to,” Rune said. “Maybe that was the lie that set this whole thing in motion. I wouldn’t have needed protection against you had you not tried to kill me, and you would have groomed me into being the child you wanted.” And she shuddered at the thought.
Sinister, indeed.
She was growing stronger, mentally. The crawlers no longer had her.
And Damascus was no more her mother than the shimmer lords were her fathers.
I was made, not born.
I have no parents.
Part of her didn’t want to believe it, but there it was.
The truth, at last.
“It was not a lie,” Damascus said. “My doctors told me. Gunnar was a wise wizard but he wasn’t my only one. When I asked him if the others spoke the truth he lied. But I could see into his strange little brain.” She giggled, and Imp put small fingers over her red bow of a mouth and giggled with her.
“That’s when he became the ghoul?”
“What? Oh. No. I hit him with that little spell when he…”
Damascus’s hesitancy was so peculiar that Rune couldn’t leave it alone. “What? He did what?”
“We arrived home some time ago,” the witch murmured. She leaned across the small aisle and took Imp’s fingers in hers. The act seemed to calm her and she continued on with her story. “I demand total devotion from my doctors. From those who mean something to me.” She nodded toward the strange creature across from her. “Like Imp. You would never betray me, would you, my lo
vely?”
“Never,” Imp said. “I love you above all else.”
“Yes. You do. But Gunnar…he began slipping around with a kitchen maid. A kitchen maid!” She shook her head and gave a sharp laugh that still held, even after all the time that had passed, total disbelief. “I noticed he was slacking in his work and neglecting everything. Especially me. I had him followed and when his duplicity was discovered, I dealt with both him and his little whore.”
“Dawn,” Rune whispered.
“Had he been merely satisfying his physical desires, I would have overlooked it. I had women sent to him regularly. But he fell in love.”
Damascus jerked away from Imp and began gnashing her teeth and beating her own legs with her fists.
Rune decided right then and there she would never, ever hit herself again.
Damascus wasn’t just a cruel, evil soul eater. She was insane.
“People have been plotting to end me for centuries,” Damascus continued eventually, as though her little fit had never occurred. “You were the biggest—and best—hope at success.” She peered at Rune. “But they underestimated you, didn’t they? You think for yourself.” She opened her arms. “You want nothing more than a mother. And here I am.”
Rune clenched her fists. She was face to face with the most vicious villain the worlds had ever known.
She had a job to do.
But she had to bide her time. Damascus was in control.
So she said nothing.
Blood ties. Roots. A beginning—even if it was a fucked-up, obnoxious beginning built on lies, cunning, and betrayal. Even if it was a beginning created by people who had not thought of her as an actual person.
It was all she had, and she would have to take it. At least she knew, and knowing was better than the nothing she’d had before.
Deep, deep in the depths of her mind, a tiny part of her wanted to be the witch’s daughter. Wanted to be loved by any mother, no matter how horrible she was.
The witch had saved her from the crawlers.
She could have left her to suffer a fate much worse than death, but she hadn’t.
No one else had come to help. Not Brasque Dray, or Gunnar, or the fucking Mother Skyll. No one.
Just the witch.
“I would rather be your mother than your enemy.” Damascus stared at her from eyes as clear and blue as Rune’s. “It’s your choice.”
But it wasn’t.
Rune let the cup fall to the floor of the carriage, her mind churning with thoughts she couldn’t sort.
Damascus squeezed her arm. “I don’t want to destroy you. I want you to rule with me. I want you to thrive. I want to fill you with power.” Her voice was soft, sincere. “Most of all I want to give you a family. Let me take you home.”
Home.
Home.
“Okay,” Rune murmured, finally.
She’d be the witch’s daughter.
But just for a little while.
Right then, she had no other choice.
Chapter Thirty-Five
They stood before the castle, and Damascus made a sweeping gesture. “Welcome to my home, Rune.” Then she shook her head. “Welcome to our home.”
The castle looked like something out of a fairytale. A very dark, grim fairytale.
Mist swirled around it, lighter gray than the cool morning. She shivered and rubbed her arms through the long, thick cloak Damascus had given her before they stepped from the carriage.
Before she’d been taken by the crawlers it had been so hot she could barely breathe through it, but right then the day was frosty cold. It was like she’d been held by the crawlers for an entire season. “How long did the crawlers hold me?”
“Three nights, I believe,” Damascus replied. She looked at the creature standing quietly at her side. “Isn’t that right, Imp?”
“Yes, my witch.”
Satisfied, the witch continued. “Word came to me that you’d disappeared and…” She smiled. “I was the one lucky enough to find you.”
Lucky. Right.
More likely the witch had sent the crawlers to grab her in the first place.
“Yeah,” Rune said.
Damascus grinned and took Rune’s arm. “Come inside and get warm.”
“Are there crawlers in all the shimmers?” She had to force herself not to jerk away from the witch’s strong grip.
“I’m afraid so. Different types with varying shades of brutishness, but crawlers, nonetheless.”
She watched Damascus as they walked to the castle. The witch might have made herself look like just another woman, but darkness swirled around her like smoke.
And Rune couldn’t attack her—no matter how much she needed the witch dead, she had to wait for the right time.
It was certainly not the right time.
Her people were everywhere. The grim darkness of the actual castle seemed to have no bearing on the people who lived and worked there.
They bustled about, bowing and scraping and grinning at Damascus and Rune before hurrying on to whatever task held their attention.
“It’s like a fucking cartoon,” Rune muttered.
Damascus took her arm and urged her from the courtyard to the entrance of the castle. Four armed men stood in uniform, stiff and expressionless, guarding the huge front doors.
The witch ignored them and led Rune into a vast, echoing hall. There were fireplaces large enough to lie down in, and five enormous tables made from thick, battered wood.
The hall was overflowing with people. Meaty, thick scents of food hung in the air. Big dogs lay under the tables and in the corners, playing and sleeping.
“I’m not the nicest of rulers,” Damascus admitted, watching Rune with a small smile. “I’m not sweet and full of kindness. But I’m hardly the vessel of evil my enemies say I am.”
“Then prove it.” Rune pulled her arm free, unable to tolerate the witch’s touch a second longer. The power the witch had touched her with succeeded in not only healing her, but clearing her mind.
And Damascus was trying to confuse her. The witch was pure fucking evil. She was. “Free your prisoners,” Rune continued. “Stop attacking the shimmers, and let the people have their lords back. Take care of your own shimmer and mind your own fucking business.”
The witch gave her a sharp look. “Don’t be naïve. I’m a powerful, strong woman, and I know without a single doubt that I can make things better for this world, for these people. I want to rule. I will take my armies and defeat the enemy and someday…” She took a deep breath and made an effort to speak calmly. “Someday, I will be queen of the world.”
When Rune started to speak, Damascus raised a hand to halt her. “I want power. That doesn’t make me evil. It makes me ambitious.” She grinned. “Do you think the other shimmer lords want anything less for themselves? They lied to you. My ruling Skyll will not destroy all the worlds. I will simply rule Skyll. I want you to rule at my side. That’s the truth.”
“You wanted me dead when I was an infant. You tried to kill me in my world,” Rune said.
The witch’s eyes darkened as she frowned. “I had no idea who you were when I saw you in your world. And…” She shook her head. “My memories of that time are dim and as unfinished as a vague dream.”
“You were revolting. Full of cruelty…” Rune shuddered, remembering. “There were captured, screaming souls inside you.” And I intend to release those souls.
Damascus sighed and ran her hand over Imp’s hair as though the strange, small creature were her pet. And maybe it was. “You’re such a child. I have so much to teach you. I’m a warrior. I do things to my enemies that might be considered cruel.” She shrugged. “As do we all.”
“Did you know you’d be less powerful when you entered my world?”
Damascus lifted an eyebrow. “This is your world.” Then she gestured impatiently before Rune could argue. “You ask too many unimportant questions. But yes, of course I knew. We change when we travel from the edge
of hell to other worlds. Look at your ghoul, for example. When he was here, he was powerful, powerful man. And a very handsome one. He would have lost most of his power to your world. His looks…I took those.”
Rune stopped walking. “Gunnar was handsome?”
“He was the most beautiful man in Skyll, once upon a time. No one would love a ghoul, would they? No one would want him. He couldn’t bear to look at himself, but I made sure he looked in the mirror as often as possible. It was quite entertaining to see the horror in his once beautiful face.”
Rune pressed a fist to her abdomen to force back the pity and pain she felt for the ghoul she’d come to love. He’d been so tormented by the witch. Had he done terrible things for his wicked mistress? No doubt.
But Rune couldn’t hold that against him.
“You have his scent all over you,” Damascus snarled. Then abruptly she calmed and her bright smile reappeared. “He deserves his ugliness. I made him as foul and grotesque on the outside as he is on the inside.”
Rune changed the subject to something closer, more urgent. “I want to see my friends. I’m here. You have no reason to hold them.”
Damascus frowned. “I swear upon everything I hold dear that I did not capture your friends. I have taken no one, Rune.” There was no lie in her voice, no guile in her eyes.
“How am I supposed to believe you?”
“I have no reason to lie. I have taken no one since…” She hesitated, her frown growing thoughtful. “Since the march on a tiny village two days before I learned of your arrival. There was a man there.” She winked at Rune. “A man I very much wanted to possess.” She shrugged. “And now I do.”
The silence in the room was heavy.
Rune said nothing. Could she believe the witch? Had someone else—Brasque Dray, perhaps, taken Z?
“We will have many opportunities to talk. You need clothes and nourishment. Lawrence!” Then she gave Rune a quick look. “I will give you everything you want, sweetheart. Let me. Let me be your mother.”
She really, truly thought she had a chance at bringing Rune over to her side. The truth of it was in her eyes.