Never

by K. D. McEntire

  “But it's looking at us,” Eddie hissed.

  “It may yet be only curious,” Lily replied evenly and Piotr envied the way she held perfectly still. His every muscle screamed at him to flee but Lily was like a predator herself, poised and waiting for the perfect moment to move.

  “Be still,” she continued. “Be calm. Whatever this beast is, it senses our fear, it smells your panic.”

  The monster growled low in its throat and Piotr groaned in pain, hands reflexively jerking up to his torso, pressing hard against his ribs and belly.

  “Piotr?” Wendy asked, untangling her fingers from Eddie's. “Piotr, are you okay?” Her voice dipped down. “Is it the…?” She gestured to her gut.

  “Push past the creature, go slowly but faster than this,” Piotr gasped, writhing on the seat as if his very guts were going to come spilling out his belly. “It…it's not from this world, it doesn't understand…it doesn't understand what we are yet. It's…it's…from the space between the worlds…”

  “What? How do you…” Jon hesitated. “I don't—”

  “Listen to the man!” Chel snapped and shoved Jon over. Before he could protest Chel lifted her left leg high and jammed it down on the accelerator, missing Jon's foot by half an inch. The car shot forward, swerving as Jon tried to steer around his sister and the beast, confused, darted to the side, sliding against the steep slope and scrabbling for an instant for better purchase on the street.

  “You're gonna hit someone!” Eddie yelled, but the way, miraculously, had cleared before them. Cars honked, dimly, from the living lands, but the Never was so thick here Wendy could only just make out the outline of the living world. All around was nothing but death and decay, the spirit webs draining the vitality from every living thing. Here, in the heart of the forest, nothing moved except them, and the Never itself seemed twisted, wrong, like it was bleeding out into the living world.

  How had Wendy lived like this, juggling the sight of two worlds laid atop one another, for so long? The double-world vision always made his head ache violently.

  Using Piotr's shoulder as leverage, Wendy lifted up in a crouch and twisted to stare out the back of the rear window. Piotr followed her lead and saw that the beast had vanished into the foggy mist, the ropes of spirit web obscuring it from view. They were alone—them, the webs, and the Shades being devoured like flies above them.

  “How much longer?” Chel whispered, voice trembling. “I can't see anything but the Never right now.”

  “Pahzhalstah,” Piotr commanded. “Stop. Here.”

  Shrugging, Jon obliged, no questions asked. Piotr could tell that Wendy's brother was unnerved but was attempting to act tough. The spirit of her family impressed him; they were a tough lot, that was for sure. Once upon a time he would have been proud to call all three of them Riders.

  “There,” Piotr said at last, when movement in the mass caught his attention. “Look.”

  The Lady Walker was backlit against the fog; her cloak a dirtier shade of the same heavy white that crept across the world, curling through the streets on eddies of breeze.

  Wendy swallowed thickly. She hated the tremble in her voice as she said, “Okay guys. It's go time. What do we do? How do we want to handle this?”

  “We can't run her over,” Jon said. “At least…can we?”

  “We could try,” Chel said grimly, but Wendy shook her head.

  “No. Use your eyes,” Wendy said, hearing her mother's arrogance creeping into her tone. It was a tone she loathed, a know-it-all texture to every word she said. Wendy tried to temper the urge to imperiously demand that they look closer and instead gently explained, “See how she's—oh, I don't know how to describe it—see how she's firmer than the landscape around her? She's more solid than the car here. We'd slide to either side of her at best.”

  “Wendy?” Chel's voice was high and tight but pitched soft, speaking as quietly as she could manage. ”Dreamspace stuff can affect the real world, right?”

  “Yeah,” Wendy said, not taking her eyes off the Lady Walker. She reflexively ran her tongue against her teeth, missing the comforting clink her tongue ring would have made if the White Lady hadn't ripped it out. “Why?”

  “What about stuff that happens in the Never? Can that affect the real—the living—world?”

  Wendy thought of her answering machine, the only voice recording she'd had of their mother, and how it'd been crushed in the hands of a Walker—a Walker who'd been sent to fetch Wendy by the woman in the mist before them.

  She shivered. “Yeah, Chel,” Wendy whispered, allowing herself a moment's mourning for her mother's mutilated message. “Sometimes…sometimes, yeah it can.”

  The Lady Walker beckoned, one long, bony hand curling in their direction, an open invitation. Then—so close it raised the hairs on the back of Wendy's neck—the wet snuffling-sniffle of the beast broke the silence. Its gargantuan head parted the mist and webs to the right of the Lady Walker. It sniffed the air.

  “Lovely,” Chel said, the despair creeping beneath her words. “Well, it's been nice knowing you all. I'd say have a nice afterlife, but we all know how that turns out.”

  The Lady Walker's hand slashed down, a cutting motion, and the beast stilled beside her. Then it growled, but only faintly, and retreated back into the mist.

  “That thing listens to her?” Eddie moaned. “Just fabulous, she's got the hell-Fido trained up good and proper. I wonder if it piddles on the paper, too?”

  “Okay, enough! Stop being so damn negative. I'm going out there,” Wendy said, forgetting her ethereal state and reaching for the door handle.

  “No!” Eddie said, grabbing her wrist. “What is meeting up with the rotting wonder going to accomplish?”

  “Anything is better than this…this dread, Eddie,” Wendy replied, shaking him off her arm. “Stay here.”

  “I shall go with you,” Piotr said.

  Rolling her eyes, Wendy shook her head. “Stay here. Protect the twins.”

  “Hey,” Chel protested, “we don't need our big sist—”

  “Shut up,” Wendy said kindly. “Listen to Piotr. Understand?”

  Chel, mutinous, tried to look away. Wendy poked her sister hard in the shoulder, ignoring the sizzle from Chel's living flesh. “Michelle. Do you understand me?”

  “Yeah, fine, whatever,” Chel grumped, rubbing her shoulder. “Hurry it up, Suicidal. We don't have all day.”

  Wendy waited until Eddie, scowling, sat back and allowed her to pass without further incident. Then she was outside, leaving the mud-splattered car behind, lost amid the swirling fog and facing the Lady Walker down in a world like a washed out western. Wendy, amused, paused to picture tumbleweeds blowing past as the Citibank clock struck midnight. Even in the Never it was hard to walk up the steep slope of the street. Wendy hid her struggle by walking sedately toward their meeting, smirking the whole while.

  The Lady Walker, seeing her smile and sensing her amusement, hesitated. “You find this funny, Reaper?”

  “Not even close,” Wendy assured her. She sighed and thrust her hands in her pockets. “Do you have anything to do with that rip in the sky, by any chance?”

  The Lady Walker grinned, the sagging and rotten half of her face sliding loosely over her bones, exposing yellowed teeth and shredded tendons. “If I did? What would you do about it, girl?”

  “Nothing,” Wendy said, shrugging. “But I hear that the Reapers are ticked off over it. Elise even tried to bribe me to ‘take care’ of you a few days ago.”

  Surprisingly, the Lady Walker began to laugh, a broken, rusty sound, as if she'd spent her entire life with a three-pack-a-day habit. “Did she now? Good.”

  Smirking, so that Wendy could see the wriggling things moving behind her terrible smile, the Lady Walker wiggled her fingers at Wendy. “You Reapers amuse me. You are family, a clan, yet you fight among yourselves, attacking from the shadows, and laying blame on nature running its course. And all the while I taste your tears and laugh and laug
h and laugh.”

  “Nature…do you mean that vortex thing up there?” Wendy glanced over her shoulder. They were deep in the spirit web forest—Wendy had no idea why she kept expecting to see clear sky above and the rip in the distance—but all she could see was the sagging shapes of cocooned Shades twisting in the breeze.

  “I mean the old woman, and the fretful way they fuss and blame you,” the Lady Walker said. “It was simply her time. It comes to us all. Except Piotr. Except me.”

  “Because you're the Unending Ones,” Wendy said, wondering how the Lady Walker already knew about Nana Moses’ death. “How'd you two manage to land that gig?”

  The Lady Walker patted her hip and for the first time Wendy realized that the Lady Walker had a swatch of fabric hanging there, a thin curl of cloth that hung nearly to her ankles. “The how of things is of no matter. It is the why.”

  “Are you going to let us keep going?” Wendy snapped, suddenly tired of this rotting woman and her horrible riddles. She reminded Wendy unpleasantly of the White Lady, not because she was rotting and awful to look at, but because even the cadence of her voice had a lilting, tortuous rhythm to it. Every conversation with them both was nothing but riddles and rhymes and Wendy was sick to death of it. “Or is that animal thing going to block the way?”

  “I contracted with Jane to bring you to me. She failed and yet, poof, here you are.” The Lady Walker's fingers played with the rotting hole in her face, drifted up and brushed the horror that had once been her eye. “I am lucky.”

  “Maybe,” Wendy said, resting her weight on one foot, prepared to run like a rabbit if she needed to. “Maybe not. Why did you want to talk to me?”

  “I have heard…many things, girl. Many whispers make their way to me. I have heard that you do not reap the unwilling spirits anymore. Is this true?”

  “Yeah, it's true,” Wendy said, narrowing her eyes. The way the Lady Walker was swaying back and forth was giving her the heebie-jeebies. “What of it?”

  The Lady Walker tilted her head far too far to the left, looking at Wendy quizzically through her ruined face. “Why? Do you hope to gain from the remaining spirits the way Elise and the Reapers do?”

  “Because I think maybe it's not my job to force souls to do what they don't want to do.” Why was the Lady Walker asking these questions?

  The Lady Walker laughed shortly. “Oh, flesh, how you amuse me! The words that spring from your mouth dance in the air as if they were butterflies and yet…they are meaningless and dead.” She spat on the ground. “They are filth.”

  “Look, creepy, all I want is to get to Nob Hill.”

  The Lady Walker pursed her ruined mouth. “I see.”

  “Everyone wants something, Miss…Lady.” Wendy squared her shoulders. “What do you want? What will get my friends and me out of this forest and up the hill? Jane says you want to gnaw on my bones or something, but I'm thinking that if that was your deal you'd already be chewing. So what's the plan? What do you want?”

  “My greatest desire is within my grasp, scratched out of nothing with my own two hands. I want for nothing…except one thing,” the Lady Walker said, fingering the curl of fabric. She pulled it off her dress and flung it at Wendy's feet.

  “What is this?” Wendy asked, kneeling down and picking up the fabric. It was a sensible gray swatch, shiny satin but durable, frayed only where some dull blade had sheared it from a larger bolt.

  “Give it to your boy,” the Lady said, grinning her snaggletoothed smile. “With my compliments. Then return and hear my price for your passage.”

  Flipping the foul woman off and tucking the odd fabric away, Wendy turned and realized why the Lady Walker was so amused. The spirit webs had dropped down behind the car, draping the road completely in a curtain of writhing white. There was no way to push through them, even in the car. They'd all be stripped of will and essence within seconds.

  Close…so close…Wendy could hear the wet snuffle of the beast as it stalked through the weft of webs.

  “That was suspiciously fast,” Jon joked as Wendy, balancing carefully and ruing her already aching shins and calves, returned to the vehicle. “How much was the toll?”

  “She gave me this.” Wendy handed off the swatch of fabric. “She wanted me to give it to Piotr and then go back.” Wendy ran her hands along her arms. “The forest…”

  “Closed in behind us while you were jabbering,” Elle said, taking the swatch. “We noticed.” She examined the fabric before handing it over to Piotr. “I have no idea what this is. Do you know, flyboy?“

  “Da. This is…this is Ada,” Piotr said running a thumb along the frayed threads. “A part of Ada's dress, I am certain of it.”

  “Your scientist buddy? What's she got to do with it?” Chel asked.

  “She is still in one piece,” Lily murmured, taking the swatch from him. “This is part of her essence; it has not faded so Ada still exists. The Lady Walker is telling us that either she has Ada, or she knows where Ada is being kept.”

  “Like kidnappers sending a finger to prove the victim is still alive,” Eddie mused, sticking his tongue out and grimacing. “Twisted.”

  “I will go,” Piotr said. “Wendy ne—”

  “Bullshit, you'll go!” Wendy snapped. “We don't negotiate with crazy, Piotr. She wanted me, I'm going back out there. Not you.”

  “Without weapons? Are you nuts?” Eddie demanded. “She put up with your bravado once, but if you tweak her nose again that dog'll eat you whole!”

  Wendy rolled her eyes. “Please. I'm the Lightbringer—”

  “Without abilities! Without Light!” Eddie crossed his arms over his chest. “Are you trying to get yourself killed? I know the way you work, Wendy. Is this a guilt thing?”

  Surprisingly, Piotr took her side. “Let her go say her piece,” he said. “Wendy is competent.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Eddie demanded. “You're her…sort of her boyfriend! You should be yelling the loudest! Don't you care?”

  Lily laid a calming hand on his arm but Eddie flung it off. “No! If he really loves her he shouldn't be shoving her out the door to piss on that lady's parade! Especially with Hell-Fido out and about!”

  “What Wendy and I are to one another is none of your concern,” Piotr retorted pointedly. “She is the Lightbringer. She is aware of her own capabilities. And the Lady Walker will not harm Wendy. If she were going to, Wendy would be gone by now.”

  “You know an awful lot about this chick, Pete,” Eddie snarled. “Got anything to share?”

  “I knew her in life,” Piotr said, not bothering to disguise the disgust in his tone. “My lost memories are slow in returning, but when they do they come in full. The Lady Walker destroyed my family and laughed as they died. Do not claim I do not wish her terrible suffering.”

  Eddie stilled. Wendy knew that he was struggling with what to say, that he was tempted to simply turn away and drop the fight but instead he humbly said, “Man…man, I'm sorry. I didn't know.” Her heart swelled with pride for him.

  “How were you to know? Your body still lives and my bones are as dust.” Piotr smiled bitterly. “A word of advice: choose your flailing words wisely. You might cut yourself with them.”

  “Look, guys,” Chel said, “not to break up the machismo marathon, but the webs are getting thicker. Will someone go out there and pee in her Cheerios already?”

  Wendy patted Chel on the shoulder and pushed past Piotr and Lily, shaking off Eddie's half-hearted grab at her wrist, wordlessly sliding through the door.

  “Lightbringer! Take this and be well,” Lily said, slipping through the door and hurrying after Wendy. She paused to draw a bone knife from its sheath.

  “This is your favorite knife,” Wendy said as the girl pressed the handle into Wendy's hand. “I can't—”

  “Bring it back in one piece. Make it taste the essence of the beast. For such honor, I shall lend you my blade.”

  Wendy nodded, feeling like she and the ancient fighter were
finally seeing completely eye-to-eye. “I'll do my best.”

  “Do better,” Lily instructed, and stood back.

  Wendy nodded and, ignoring Eddie's muffled yells from within the car, she strode into the middle of the street.

  “YO! HALF-FACE! COME OUT, COME OUT, WHEREVER YOU ARE!” Wendy wiped her mouth with the back of one arm; she couldn't shake Piotr's words—he'd known this woman when he was alive. She was the reason he was dead. The Lady Walker had killed members of his family. And now Wendy was going to talk with her again, this time with the knowledge that whatever she did might affect how Ada was being treated.

  Wendy couldn't help wondering if she'd lost her mind. What sane person actively sought out someone capable of not only surviving centuries of death and destruction on their own, but seemed to flourish from it?

  She did, apparently.

  The Lady Walker stepped from the nearest clump of webs and approached Wendy, her cloak sinuously sliding along the littered ground as she walked.

  She smiled her sharp smile and Wendy felt a burning flutter in her gut, as if her Light were flaring brighter as the Lady Walker approached. “You taste…like death,” the Lady Walker whispered, leaning in. Her breath puffed out in a sickly-sweet wave.

  “Well, you smell like death,” Wendy retorted. “Guess that makes us even.”

  A single finger brushed down Wendy's cheek, cold and sharp as honed ice. “Proud. So proud, and yet unaware that you have done me a great favor. The Reapers would have tracked me down, and pulled up the spirit webs ages ago, but instead they waste their time on the likes of you! Elise thinks I wish to devour you, to take your strength in and make it my own. She is…a fool, girl. A foolish, stupid woman.”

  The Lady Walker held out a hand that was mostly bone and sagging, blackened flesh. She took Wendy's hand in her own and Wendy fought the rising of her gorge at the feeling of the ungloved flesh sliding beneath her fingers.

  “I don't want your power. You can offer nothing to me that I cannot claw out for myself, girl! You've seen what I can do. Leave this city, death-dealer. Turn your face east and do not stop. That is my price to allow you to visit the Council. When you are done I want you to run. Run fast. Run far. Leave the Reapers—leave Elise—to me. I will free my hosta—I mean, your friend Ada—after I am done with the Reapers.” Snickering at her fake verbal slip, she released Wendy's hand. “After Elise, your new matriarch, kneels begging at my feet, then you shall have your scientist back.”