by Eileen Wilks
He took about every last drop of hope with him.
Take the next step, she’d been telling herself. What did you do when you ran out of steps?
Even if she’d been willing to endanger an investigation into the demonic control of highly placed national officials, there was a chance Cynna’s old teacher was behind the official ban on looking for Rule. She wasn’t likely to change her mind just because Cynna said pretty please.
Karonski wasn’t going to help them open a hellgate. Cullen didn’t know how.
God, she was tired. She closed her eyes and thought about keeping them closed. Just not opening them ever again. She heard Cullen push to his feet and start pacing, muttering to himself. It sounded like Latin.
“Cynna,” she asked without opening her eyes. “Is there any chance you could summon the demon who took Rule? Force it to take us to him, or bring him back?”
“No.” She sounded miserable. “I don’t have enough of its names.”
“Okay.” Cullen took a deep breath, let it out. “We’ve run out of other options.”
That startled her eyes open. “Other options? As in, you have one I don’t know about?”
“You know about it. Sort of.” He stopped in front of her. “It’s a long shot, but the only shot we’ve got left. You said the Rhej wanted to talk to you.”
Baffled, she nodded.
“That’s what you should do, then. Go talk to the Rhej.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
CULLEN wouldn’t explain. He wouldn’t tell her why talking to the clan’s historian or priestess or whatever might help. He wouldn’t even tell her the woman’s name. It was customary, he said, for the Rhej to choose who would receive her name, and she was never referred to outside her presence by anything but her title.
He had the jitters. He kept pacing, but when she asked why the idea of talking to the Rhej made him nervous he raised his brows, astonished, and told her he was a jumpy fellow. He’d thought she knew that.
So she took a shower.
She was careful. Getting her burn infected wouldn’t help her or Rule or anyone, so she kept her bandages dry. But she needed the shower. She craved water, the feel and sound of it, and the notion, however foolish, that she could wash away some portion of last night.
She used Rule’s shampoo. Standing there with her hair lathered and the water beating on her feet, she suddenly understood why she’d needed this shower.
The sobs hit fast, and they hit hard. She put her back to the side of the shower stall and slid down until she was sitting on the hard tiles, head back, hands hanging limp between her knees, suds dripping on her shoulders. And wept.
No one, not even Cullen, would be able to hear her. She couldn’t hear herself. It was safe to let go, let the pain and helplessness wash up through her in huge, terrible waves.
The weeping ended more gradually than it had begun. She was still leaking slightly when she stood and carefully rinsed her hair. She washed her face and underarms, looked at her razor, shook her head, and shut off the water without shaving.
She wasn’t sure she felt any better, but maybe giving in to tears now would keep them from sneaking up on her later.
The mirror was fogged. She didn’t bother to clean it, combing her hair out quickly. It could dry on its own this time. In the bedroom, she pulled on her bra and a pair of bikini panties and then grabbed a plain silk sheath she seldom wore. Her burn would be happier now, with nothing touching it. She folded up Cynna’s things and took a breath.
Time to pull herself back together. Or fake it. She opened the door.
Cullen had stopped pacing. He stood at the window, frowning out the parking lot.
“Where’s Cynna?” she asked.
“Went to pick up some lunch for us. Harry left with her. At least he went out. I doubt he’s headed for Sub Express.” He turned. His frown deepened. He started toward her.
Lunch. She’d eat, of course. However little she wanted to. “I don’t suppose you’ve thought of anything else to try.”
“No.” He stopped, standing a little too close. “You’ve been crying.”
“Shit. Couldn’t you at least pretend to be tactful? I know it isn’t your strong point, but at your age you should have some grasp of the basics.”
“Crying’s okay. I hear it reduces stress.” He reached up and took one wet strand of hair between his fingers, rubbing it with his thumb. “There are other ways to destress.”
“Tell me you didn’t mean that the way it sounds.”
His mouth kicked up at one side in a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. “I’m making you an offer you’re free to refuse.”
She jerked her head away and stepped back. “God. I can’t believe this. Rule’s missing and you’re—”
“Offering to help you feel better for a little while. No permanent cure, but physical ease benefits the mind, too.”
“Is sex on demand your notion of comfort?”
“Yes.”
She’d been sarcastic. He was serious.
“Rule wouldn’t object, you know, or feel hurt. Not under the circumstances.”
“I would.”
He shrugged. “Okay. I’ll admit I don’t get the guilt thing. I assume that’s what’s put that look on your face? Rather as if you’d stepped in a pile of dog doo, which I must say is not the usual reaction. If you change your mind—”
“I won’t.”
“—just let me know. But if you think sex would make things worse for you, then we won’t go there.”
“Good.”
“I’m not lusting after you, you know. Except in a general way, because you do have—”
“We aren’t going there, remember?”
“Right.” He turned back to the window. “Have you reached a decision?”
For a second she thought he was still talking about having sex, which was stupid. He’d rattled her. “How do I go about setting up a meeting with the Rhej?”
“You show up at her lair. She said she wants to talk to you, so she’ll probably be there.”
He was looking out the window, so she couldn’t see his expression. And his voice sounded normal—lightly mocking, though it wasn’t obvious whether the mockery was directed out or toward himself. Yet still she had the sense that he was … not sad, exactly. Lost.
Rule had been his friend, perhaps his only real friend, for many years. Years when he’d been clanless, leaving him alone in a way no human could fully grasp.
Had he thought having sex with her would make him feel closer to Rule?
Yech, she thought and tried to push the idea away. But it clung the way a good hunch will, and gradually the disgust melted, leaving her a little disoriented. And hurting for him. “Cynna might not mind the idea of comfort sex.”
He smiled at her over his shoulder, his eyes blue and sharp and somehow knowing. As if he’d guessed everything she’d been thinking … and maybe a few things she hadn’t quite wrapped her mind around yet. “There’s a notion. She’s annoying, but she smells good.”
Lily blinked. At times she almost forgot Cullen was lupus. He was odd in so many ways that had little to do with his wolfish part. “I hope you won’t put it to her quite that way.”
“I speak fairly good western human when I have to, but I don’t think Cynna would require that.”
“In other words, you’ll say what women expect, but you won’t mean it.”
He was amused. “I think of it as an imprecise translation. I don’t lie. I don’t have to.”
No, he probably had more women making him offers than he could properly attend to. “That,” she said after a moment, “is deeply annoying.”
“It’s all in your point of view. I find it convenient.” His head turned. “Lunch is heading up the stairs.”
“Already?” Funny. A few minutes ago she’d had no interest in food. She’d have eaten, just as she’d take care of her burn, because it was necessary. Now … it was weird, but she was hungry. Actually hungry. “I’ll get
the pickles. No one ever puts on enough pickles.”
She had a next step again. And if the Rhej couldn’t help, she’d think of something else. Lily headed for the kitchen, thinking about steps and friendship and what kind of ammo would be most likely to stop a demon.
CLANHOME. It rested in the mountains outside the city, sprawling over nearly two thousand acres. They weren’t regal, these mountains, like their grander cousins to the north, nor garbed in towering pines. The slopes were steep but not terribly high; valleys were mostly narrow, cut by small, seasonal streams. This was chaparral country, with scrub oak, juniper, sage, and here and there the tough, ugly mountain mahogany tangled together on the rocky slopes.
It was cooler up here, downright nippy compared to sea level. The air smelled of dust and sage. At least that’s what Lily smelled. She didn’t know how much more the werewolf in front of her was smelling.
“So,” Cynna said, “is this Rhej person a bit of a loner? She lives up here away from everyone else.”
They were following a narrow path up one of those scrub-covered slopes. Cullen led; Cynna brought up the rear.
“Lots of people prefer to live slightly apart,” he said. “They enjoy the contact with the wild. It doesn’t make them loners.”
Apart in this case meant away from the commons—a loose cluster of homes and small businesses along the only real road in Clanhome. The Rhej’s home was less distant than some, being only a couple of miles away from the end of the gravel road.
But there was a great deal she didn’t know about Nokolai and Clanhome. She’d only been here three times. Once when she was investigating a murder—the investigation that brought her and Rule together. The second time she’d come to take part in her gens amplexi, the ceremony when she was formally adopted into Nokolai. On her third trip here a little over a week ago, she’d just visited, trying to get to know some of the people she was now bound to.
“You holding up okay?” Cullen asked as they struggled up the last, steepest part of the path.
“I’m fine.” Utterly spent, actually, which was mortifying but not unexpected. A wounded body turned tyrant, insisting on channeling everything into healing. But her burn wasn’t hurting too badly. Looser clothing helped. “Why didn’t I meet the Rhej at the gens amplexi?”
Cullen stopped, though they weren’t at the top of the mountain. Maybe they didn’t have to go all the way up. He glanced over his shoulder at her, a small smile on his mouth. “You did. You just didn’t know it.”
“More secrets,” she muttered. “Your bunch is too damned fond of secrets.” She was breathing hard as she came up beside him.
The ground leveled out here, forming a small clearing. Not a natural clearing, though everything Lily saw was native and looked like it had just happened to sprout where it was. Bracken fern and spleenwort snuggled up beneath a small pinyon pine. Mock parsley and wild celery grew in a tangle with yarrow and some species of aster that still clung to a few small, bright blue blooms. But many of the plants she saw wouldn’t have grown on this west-facing slope naturally. Someone had planted them—after digging out the oak and juniper.
A huge job, that, without earth-moving equipment. Maybe she’d had lupus muscles to help.
The house was set smack up against the mountain, a tiny adobe building almost the color of the dirt behind it, but with a shiny metal roof. As Lily’s attention left the plants for the house, the front door opened. An old woman swept out a scatter of dust.
Lily stared. She recognized her, all right, though they hadn’t spoken at the ceremony or the celebration that had followed. The woman stood maybe five feet high, which was enough to make her stick in Lily’s memory. She was Anglo, over sixty, and fat—the roly-poly, happy-grandmother kind of fat. Her hair was white and straight and short. It looked like she cut it herself, maybe with hedge trimmers. Her eyes had once been blue.
Now they were milky. She was blind.
Those sightless eyes aimed right at them. “Well, come in,” she said. “You didn’t hike up here to watch me sweep my floor.” And she turned around and went back inside.
Lily gave Cullen a hard look. “Secrets,” she muttered, and headed for the little house.
Inside it was a single square room, its symmetry disturbed only by two bumped-out sections with doors that she guessed were the bathroom and a large closet. To her left was the kitchen area—open shelving above the single wooden counter with a tiny electric stove and a refrigerator straight out of the fifties. To her right was a round table and four wooden chairs. The bed, a double, was at the back, between the bumped-out portions. Two battered trunks lined up along one wall. Along the opposite wall was a cushy green recliner, a top-of-the-line stereo, and three large baskets. A gray tabby slept in the recliner.
No rugs. White plastered walls, dark wood floor … and an altar. Set smack in the center of the room, the rough-hewn stone held three white candle stubs, a scattering of sage, and a small silver saucer. Chiseled into the front of it was a symbol much like Lily’s missing toltoi.
The Rhej stood at her stove with her back to the door. She wore jeans, an old flannel shirt, white socks, and no shoes. “You’ll have tea,” she informed them. “I made cookies, too. They’re on the table.”
“We didn’t come here for cookies,” Cullen said.
The old woman clucked her tongue. “Still angry, eh? It wasn’t me said you were no Etorri all those years ago. Though as it turned out the Etorri Rhej was right, wasn’t she? It just took Nokolai a while to realize you were ours.”
“Ah …” Lily glanced from Cullen to their hostess. “Obviously you and Cullen know each other. He hasn’t bothered to introduce us, so I will. The woman with me is Cynna Weaver, and I’m Lily Yu.”
“I know that, child.” She turned her head to smile at them. The smile fell away, wiped out by pure startlement.
Then she laughed. “Oh. Oh, my. I’m not half as clever as I’d like to think. Well, this will be interesting. You’re Cynna?” She spoke to Cynna as directly as if she could see her.
Cynna agreed to that.
“You’ll stay. Cullen, go run. It’s been too long since you’ve Changed. Go enjoy your four feet instead of your brain for a while.”
Cullen didn’t look happy, but to Lily’s surprise, he obeyed, giving the Rhej a single, stiff nod and leaving.
Nodding at someone who couldn’t see? But then, Lily didn’t understand how anyone could garden without sight. Unless … “Do you see the way Cullen does?” she blurted. “Second sight, or whatever it’s called?”
She snorted. “I’m no sorcerer, and that is not what ‘second sight’ means. Sit down, sit down.” She nodded at the table, already set with cups and saucers and dainty china plates. A larger plate held a dozen or more chocolate chip cookies.
Slowly Lily complied. Cynna sat, too, looking as clueless as Lily felt. The three cups had dried herbs in their bottoms. Cynna picked hers up and sniffed at it. “Are you a precog? You seem to have been expecting us.”
“I wasn’t expecting you.” She shook her head. “Lady help me, I sure wasn’t expecting you. I’ve spoken to Isen, of course, about last night, and the Lady said Lily would come. I figured Cullen would be bringing her.”
“You talk to your goddess?” Cynna asked.
“Talk, argue … now and then I even listen. But the Lady is just the Lady. She’s not into the god business anymore.” She turned, teapot in hand, and waddled over to the table.
Lily didn’t want to talk about goddesses, even if they weren’t in the god business anymore. “You’ve created a beautiful garden.” Though she couldn’t see how. How did the woman know what seedlings to yank, which plant was which? How could she enjoy her garden when she couldn’t see it?
The white eyebrows lifted. “Realized it wasn’t wild growth, did you? Not many would.”
“I like gardening, and I’m interested in native plants.”
“Rule mentioned that you enjoy grubbing in the dirt.” She found one
cup with her fingers and then poured steaming water over the herbs in it, releasing their pungent scents. Rosemary, Lily thought, among others.
“The cookies are just those refrigerator things, but they’re pretty good. Help yourselves. You probably won’t like the tea, but drink it anyway. It’s good for you.” She located another cup and poured.
She found things by touch, Lily realized. She found people by … “You’re an empath. A physical empath, I’d guess, because you aren’t tuning into the plants’ emotions. It’s their physical state you sense.” The Gift itself wasn’t rare, but was usually considered one of the weak Gifts. The old woman obviously had a triple dose of it—which was probably why she lived apart. “You don’t see me, but you feel me so clearly it’s almost the same.”
“Not the same,” she said. “Better in some ways, not as good in others.” She filled the last cup with water. “That’ll need to steep a few minutes.” She turned and padded back to the stove to deposit the teapot. “You going to tell me what you want?”
“You asked me to come.”
“I know that. I may be eighty, but my memory’s good.” She chuckled as she came back to the table and pulled out a chair. “Damned good.”
Lily looked at her dubiously. “Eighty?”
“Clan females don’t age as slow as the males, but we do weather well.”
“Ah …” Lily darted a glance at Cynna. “Are we going to talk about big, hairy secrets now?”
“That’s why you’re here. I’ll tell you some of my big, hairy secrets, and you’ll tell me yours. You’re wondering why I’m letting Cynna listen in. I’ll explain later.” She bent over the steaming cup, sniffed, and nodded. “Good batch. It’ll taste nasty, but it’ll work. Drink up.”
Cynna looked dubious. “What’s in it?”
“Rosemary, rue, chamomile, a few others. All properly harvested.” She “looked” at Lily. “It’ll be good for Cynna and me, too, but it’s mostly for you. Opens you up to the spell I’ll add to help your body mend. Not that I’m a healer, but I’ve picked up a thing or two over the years. You’ll need to sleep after.”