Do you have any idea what damage this could do to my family name? That was what Charlotte had said, but I sensed it went deeper than that. It wasn’t just the Basani name at stake, but the entire Institute. Magical authorities would have to get involved, and they’d be forced to assess the safety of this place and the students therein. It could get closed down. And that would all be because of me, if I opened my mouth and spilled the beans to the wrong people. But where did that leave me? Alone, with no one to talk to, that was where.
“This is ridiculous!” I yelled, punching a pillow. “Why couldn’t you have picked someone else, you bastard! I liked my life! I didn’t mind being ordinary! Why did it have to be me?!” This curse was merciless, without a single silver lining. I wondered how Echidna had endured it. How long had she lived, watching her creations get rounded up and put into glass boxes? I imagined it hadn’t always been that way. Once upon a time, monsters must’ve roamed the Earth freely. It was only when the covens were created, and someone realized that Purge beasts could power them, that they’d lost their liberty.
You must’ve been so sad all the time. Perhaps she’d considered it a blessing when Tobe put her on ice, so she wouldn’t have to stand by and watch anymore. I’d never expected to sympathize with my predecessor, but it was hard not to, given the circumstances—and I’d only had this curse for a short time.
What is wrong, my Persephone? That voice echoed in my head, making me jolt in surprise. It came through bright and clear this time. A direct line from Leviathan himself—not like before, when he’d told me to sing. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It paid to be careful what you wished for. Had I wanted someone to speak to so badly that I’d opened up a telepathic link to Leviathan?
I shook my head. Is this a trick? You can’t be in my head—you’re at the SDC. I went away so you couldn’t do this anymore.
I felt your pain and came to ease it. You should not suffer like this. His words were alarmingly soft and soothing. Exactly what I needed, but from the wrong person.
I picked up the pillow and wrapped it around my head, like that would do any good. This isn’t possible. You’re an ocean away.
I pressed my hands harder against my ears, pushing further into the pillow. None of this made any sense. When he’d told me to sing, that voice had been far away, like a message that had been left some time ago. But this came through crystal clear and gut-wrenchingly present. Unless… everyone had been wrong about how far our connection could reach. Like the Purges, maybe it took extreme emotion to get the link to work like this, my anguish and misery somehow forcing the transmission across greater distances. The possibility stunned me for a second, equal parts terrifying and incredible.
Do you want me to leave? He let the words linger in my skull, putting the ball firmly in my court. Part of me wondered if he would actually go, if I told him to.
I’m not sure, I replied. He might have been the monster who’d done this to me, but he was the only person I had right then. And, sometimes, something was better than nothing.
He chuckled quietly. Then I will stay until you decide.
I didn’t know what to talk to him about. He wanted to know if I was okay, but he likely already knew the answer, or he wouldn’t have struck up a telepathic conversation in the middle of a nervous breakdown. So, I did the only thing I could do. I put the pillow back down and watched the sunrise, the vivid orange and sunflower yellow splintering the aquamarine sky.
What are you doing, my Persephone? he asked.
I shrugged, even though he couldn’t see me. Watching the sun come up and fretting about my friend and the pixies I Purged.
He made a noise of intrigue. Pixies? How thrilling. I have not seen their kind in many a year.
So everyone keeps saying. I sighed, closing my eyes to the brightness.
You do not care for them?
No… I do. That’s why I’m sitting here, locked in a room. Eyes squeezing tighter, enveloping me in a self-darkened world, a few questions popped into my head. Ones only he would be able to answer. Is there a reason I didn’t Purge for five days?
I thought I heard him shrug. Your ability does not want to kill you. It wants you to succeed. It was likely allowing you to recover from your last Purge.
Oh, so it played nice then it made me Purge a horde. I puffed air between my teeth. Not what I’d call considerate.
Has it killed you? Has it destroyed you? As you are speaking, I think not, he replied with a muffled chuckle. He was clearly enjoying himself.
Another question pressed at the forefront of my mind. Would there be a reason a monster couldn’t turn into black mist if I held it in my hands? I caught one and it was like it… couldn’t get away, but the ones I didn’t get a hold of had no problem misting out of reach.
You created them. Your touch is powerful. They may feel dutybound to maintain their physical form if you make contact with one, until you release them again, he explained. Although perhaps it would be better if you told me everything. I must have full understanding of these developments.
I flopped back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling while I told him the whole story. I had nothing better to do, and part of me hoped he might be able to give me some more advice, or a snippet of information that would help in the grander scheme of things. I wouldn’t be able to convince Victoria, of course, but it might clear things up, once and for all, in my own mind. If I knew my path was just, it’d spur me to continue. Twisting the sheets around my index finger, I decided to add the bit about the glass-box dream to explain why I was constantly on edge.
A perplexing thought came to me, halfway through the story. Hang on… Did you have something to do with that dream? If you did, you can leave my head right now and never come back! He’d put dreams into my head before, after all.
Leviathan sighed, as though he were sad. I did not. You may choose to disbelieve me, but I assure you I had no part in it. I give only pleasant dreams that I construct carefully. Fear created this. I understand the feeling within it—it is your worst nightmare, literally and figuratively. And your fears are justified. No one else can understand your situation; no one but me. People are terrified of what they cannot comprehend. They choose to imprison it, instead.
He needed a lesson or two in how to be comforting. I didn’t want to hear that my loved ones could turn against me, or that my fears were justified. I wanted him to tell me that it meant nothing—just an anxiety dream that had no basis whatsoever in reality. But this was Leviathan talking, and he had all the subtlety of a bull in a china shop. Plus, I didn’t know if I actually believed him. He sounded sincere, but that didn’t prove a whole lot.
I frowned. How come you didn’t try to talk to me after I had the nightmare, then? I was pretty freaked out the first time it came.
I did not know if this would work. But it did and I am pleased. It sounded bizarre, but I could’ve sworn I heard him smiling. I could picture it, his razor-sharp rows of teeth crammed together in a grin. Nor do I always know if such a visit would be welcomed. I had a sense it might be, on this occasion.
I snorted. You mean you’d like to think that.
Yes. He sounded sad again. I wasn’t sure what to do with sad Leviathan. I was so used to cocky, irritating, in-your-face Leviathan. But I think you will be pleased that I contacted you.
Oh? Why’s that? Did he have some information for me? I sat up sharply and perched on the edge of the bed, leaning forward as if he were actually there. I could’ve used a breakthrough, right about then.
I know where your magicals have gone.
My heart hammered in my chest. You do?
There is ancient magic where the Institute rests. It predates even the ruins that the Institute scavenged. His tone took on a bitter note. Magic of the Primus Anglicus, the Celtic contingent, if you will. Monsters know of it. It is part of why they despise the Institute, for it sits on sacred ground. Namely, the doorway to the land of Tír na nÓg, a mythical gateway. Though it is more f
requently referred to, by our kind, as the Door to Nowhere.
Why do you call it that? I felt like I already knew, but my exhausted brain needed it spelled out.
He laughed coldly. Because of the many people who walk through it and do not come back. The magic of the Door has been dormant for a long time because of the Institute. It needed awakening, a spark of raw Chaos to ignite it. You have awakened it, my Persephone. He sucked in a deep breath, as though the prospect thrilled him. I can feel the Door to Nowhere through you. My Persephone, what a wonder you are.
What? Are you saying that this is all my—
But at that moment, Victoria burst into the room, the door slamming into the wall with a bang as it opened, and the connection dissipated. She crossed to the center of the room and paused there, stiff and straight with purpose. Heavy silence blanketed the bedroom, and I found no hint of softness in her eyes. She stared at me, the silence getting thicker and more suffocating by the moment.
I had nowhere to run to… and the head huntswoman looked truly, madly furious.
This is about to get worse, isn’t it?
Twenty-One
Persie
“I need answers.” Victoria didn’t bother with any niceties. “Now.”
I looked up at her, my mind still fuzzy from the connection to Leviathan. “I’ve told you everything I know, Ms. Jules. What else is there?”
We’d already gone in several circles during this interview-slash-interrogation. And it looked like the record would keep skipping, until I could verify what Leviathan had told me about this weird doorway and show, once and for all, that the pixies had no part in the disappearances. But it wasn’t as if I could just go ahead and tell her that she’d walked in and cut off a mental call from the ancient monster who’d caused all this. That would just add a layer of fault to the trifle of blame already jiggling over my head.
Victoria sucked in a sharp breath. “I need to know everything about these pixies. Nathan has done his best, but there’s not enough lore to go on, and the records from the Cornish coven were destroyed in a fire some years ago.” She paced uneasily, reminding me a little of my mom. I sensed it was taking all of her willpower to stay calm.
“I’ve told you everything!” I insisted, fidgeting with the bedsheets.
Victoria shot me a dark look. “I don’t think that’s true, Persie.”
“Then I’m going to need you to be more precise.” I wasn’t deliberately being sassy, but she was more or less asking me to read her mind.
“Did anyone ask you to do this? Did someone speak to you before you came to the Institute? Did someone put the idea of coming here in your head, or did it happen organically?”
I said nothing, thinking… Did she mean Leviathan?
She paused, her brow furrowing. “Can you remember anything else from the evening you Purged? Were you aware you could Purge extinct monsters, prior to coming here?”
I stared at her. “No! Of course not!”
“I think you ought to be more precise,” she replied coolly.
“Nobody put the idea of coming here in my head.” I shuffled nervously at the edge of the bed, trying to figure out where she was going with all this. “As for the evening I Purged—I got sick, same as every other time. There wasn’t anything different, apart from the fact that I expelled a bunch of monsters instead of one. And no, I have no idea what I’m going to Purge before it happens.”
Victoria went to my desk and absently picked up a few items. “But you understand where your ability comes from, don’t you? You were the one who told me about it.”
So she did think Leviathan had a part in this. Being vague about it didn’t minimize the accusation, that, somehow, the monster had prodded me into this Institute and made me release an army of pixies. But for what purpose? Did she think he wanted to punish the hunters because of the nature of their job? Was I supposed to be the conduit in this scenario?
“Leviathan doesn’t have any say in what I do, if that’s what you’re getting at.” I stood, anger rocketing through me. “He gave me this ability, sure, but that’s where it ends. I’m not his spy or his puppet. He’s frozen in a glass box on the other side of the Atlantic.”
Which doesn’t stop him from whispering in my head, but still… He didn’t control me. He’d tried that in a dreamworld, and it hadn’t worked. My subconscious might have slipped momentarily, but his influence over me was nowhere near as potent as he would have liked. And I wasn’t going to let anyone else tell me otherwise.
“If I had control over the pixies, do you think they’d still be out there?” I waved a wild hand around me. “They don’t listen to me! They might, if you’d let me try and speak to one of the ones I captured, but you had your hunters take them away. So, that’s out of the question, isn’t it?”
Victoria looked unconvinced by my outburst. “And what if you’re not the one with control over them? What if you’re not even in control of yourself?”
“Leviathan? Tobe has him under lock and key, and even if he could contact me, he still wouldn’t have a say in what I do. My decisions are my own.” I shivered with anger, a chill prickling up the back of my neck. “And he can’t bend monsters to his will, either. If he could, he wouldn’t have been trapped all these years. He’d have just ‘controlled’ the other monsters in the Bestiary and staged a mass breakout. Do you hear sirens? Have you heard about any high alerts from the SDC? No, because there’s nothing going on. Leviathan has no power as long as he’s imprisoned.”
A subtle movement drew my eye toward the door, making my heart jolt—a pixie had snuck in during the conversation, fluttering up to one of the bookshelves. This pixie looked bulkier than the she-pixie I’d first caught—instinct told me I was looking at a male of the species. His coloring was darker, with navy blue wings and emerald green banding across his body. He wore a nutshell hat on his head and was covered in dark red spots that pulsated gently, his dark eyes fixed on me from between two books. I tried to pretend I couldn’t see him, for his sake. Victoria would have had him in a puzzle box faster than he could say “I’m innocent!”
Victoria plucked up a sketchbook and flipped through the pages. My fingertips itched to snatch it back. She might as well have been looking through my diary, peering into my innermost secrets. But I resisted; I was already in trouble.
“I have to do my job, Persie. I don’t like interrogating you, but nothing like this has ever happened before during my entire tenure at the Institute. We have fifteen people missing now, and I have to suspect foul play. And, since we have untold pixies still on the loose, it follows that they’re our top suspect—our only suspect, actually. My people are in grave danger, and I have to see them rescued as soon as possible, which means I have to pursue every avenue.”
Fifteen?! The number had shot up while I’d been hexed into this room. All this time, I could’ve been out there, getting the pixies to help. We might’ve stopped that number from getting out of hand. Victoria and her hunters had prevented that possibility. I could only imagine the authoritarian state out there, right now. Hunters stationed in every hallway, armed with magic. The corridors would be deserted, and those still stuck in their rooms would probably be on the verge of mental breakdowns. With no way to get in touch with the outside world, the Institute had started to feel very isolated and frightening, indeed.
I side-eyed the pixie, and he shook his head solemnly. He pressed a tiny hand to his chest, and the pulsating red spots turned blue, as though he was sad. This gesture confirmed what I’d already deduced—these creatures were sentient and playful, and nowhere close to evil. Maybe Leviathan hadn’t been pulling my leg about this Door to Nowhere business. It meant that we were at the center of a very different, much scarier kind of mess, but it also meant that I was right about the pixies’ innocence. Still, I didn’t want to add that idea to the mix until I had evidence.
“I’m not disagreeing that it’s foul play, but Nathan knows plenty about the pixies. I’m willing to bet he
doesn’t think they’re responsible, either.” I moved to the center of the room, so I could see easily both Victoria and the pixie. “You said he did his best, but the truth is that he just didn’t give you the black-and-white guilty verdict that you wanted from him.”
Victoria’s right eyebrow twitched. “He found enough to maintain the theory. Accounts of tricks going awry. Vengeful schemes.”
The pixie shook a clenched fist at the head huntswoman from between the two books and received a warning look from me. He sank back into the shadows with a furious expression on his tiny face, squatting down where I couldn’t see him anymore. I had to clear my throat loudly to cover the quiet grumblings from the bookshelf. Victoria definitely wouldn’t have been happy to hear the crude sentiments coming out of the pixie’s sharp-toothed mouth.
“That’s nonsense and you know it!” I shot back. “Fifteen disappearances is more than ‘tricks going awry,’ and far beyond the scope of anything Nathan could have found.”
Victoria turned her back to me, her eyes presumably fixed on the horizon. “For the safety of the Institute, you will continue to stay under lockdown until further notice. We may not know the pixies are guilty, but there is enough evidence to consider the creatures hostile and dangerous.”
Another round of savage grumbling came from the bookshelf, causing me to feign a full-blown coughing attack. Victoria didn’t even turn to check that I was okay.
I lifted an angry finger to my lips and hoped the pixie understood. He stuck out his bright blue tongue but retreated back into the books, sulking. And not a moment too soon. Victoria turned back around, and I made some dumbass attempt to pretend I was rubbing my lips. “It’s not them, Victoria. You’re making a mistake.” I put my hands behind my back to avoid any more awkward charades.
Harley Merlin 19: Persie Merlin and the Door to Nowhere Page 21