by Kresley Cole
He gave me a gallant bow, self-satisfied smile in place. He knew his strike had already found its target.
"What the fuck?" Jack paced the tent, hitting that flask like nobody's business. He could barely look at me, hadn't managed more than cursing.
"I told you that Death and I had a history." With shaking hands, I pulled the tent flap aside, peeking out.
Aric was cooling down Thanatos, his creepy white stallion. The red-eyed beast looked like a cross between an Arabian--and a tank. It even had its own black armor.
Cyclops snacked nearby. Crunch. Crunch.
From a distance, the other Arcana gawked at Death--Tess especially seemed entranced by his divine good looks--but their attention didn't appear to disturb him in the least.
I tensed when Matthew wandered over to Aric. The last I'd heard, Matthew had broken ranks, reneging on some deal the two had made.
But he and Death talked calmly. What could they be discussing?
"Christ, Evie, you can't take your eyes off him?"
I closed the flap, then headed for Matthew's cot.
"How much history can you and the Reaper have? You never met him before three months ago."
I sat with my hands folded. They wouldn't stop shaking. The fear I'd felt for Aric bewildered me. "We were together in a past life."
"Dis-moi la verite! " Tell me the truth!
"I am. Arcana are reincarnated."
His mouth opened, then closed.
"Whoever wins gets to live as an immortal. The rest of us reincarnate for each game. Death has won the last three, so he's lived all this time. But I have memories of being with him."
Pacing, pacing. "That bastard ain't acting like this is a past thing! You sleep with him?"
"You have to understand: I thought you and I were over."
Jack's eyes grew crazed. "Did you--sleep--with him?"
"No, but I was . . . with him." The night he'd saved me from Ogen, I'd decided to have sex with Aric. But I hadn't gone through with it.
"I ain't hearing this!" Jack heaved in breaths, like he couldn't get enough air.
"I believed I'd never see you again. But then I couldn't stop thinking about my promise to you, to give you a chance to reach me. So I didn't go any further with him. I told him I was going to get your side of the story about everything."
Jack tipped that flask up, swiping his sleeve over his mouth. "I'm out here, nearly dying every day trying to find you or make it safer for you. And you were almost screwing the man who nearly killed me!"
"I can't explain what it was like when I found out about your lies. It was like something broke in me." I thumped my chest. "Died in me. I felt so betrayed by you. By Matthew too. Then I learned that in a past game, I married Death. I tried to poison him--on our wedding night. In another game, I got him to trust me again, then struck once more."
Jack slowed his pacing. "Then you were with him this time out of guilt?"
At one point with Aric, I'd thought of it as penance. At another point, I'd been rocked by our connection. "I don't know."
"You came back here--for me. You told me you loved me! Was that just bullshit?"
"No!" I pinched my temples. My nagging headache had turned into a pounding migraine.
"You love that bastard?"
"I care about him. If not for you, I probably would." And if not for his deal.
"You always liked the rich ones." Jack's pacing and drinking resumed at full speed. "The blue bloods. Figures you'd go for a knight."
"That's not fair!"
"I can't even wrap my mind around this! He abducted you. You think he's not here to do it again? Maybe you want him to?"
"He can't force me away. I have my powers back."
"That's right--he stole your powers for months, and you reward him. He tried to kill me and your friends, and you reward him. Damn, Evie, where's your loyalty?"
"What about Selena? Have you forgotten that she planned to take me down the night we met her? If you hadn't been there, I would be dead. Beheaded."
I guessed all that had been swept under the rug. "Things change, Jack. This game makes us all villains at some time or another. And besides that, Aric didn't try to kill any of you. Ogen demolished the mountain. Death could have ambushed us earlier."
"Why didn't he?"
"I think deep down he hoped I wouldn't be evil. He knew I would never forgive him if any of you died. He considered taking you out in the mine, but didn't."
"You believe he could've? You got a lot of confidence in him."
"He's Death--killing is second nature to him." Some would say first nature. "I used my arsenal against him, fighting with everything in me. And I couldn't defeat him."
"But you still let him kiss you? Touch you?" His voice was whiskey roughened, his accent thicker. "Even when I thought you were lost to me, I never turned to another!"
Another. Selena. Jack was telling me he'd never gotten with her. Yet Selena had admitted, "Things between us are different."
"I've had cause to hate in my life; I never hated like I do Death." Aric had said the same about him. "How can I not kill him?" Jack had hit his limit.
I was nearing mine as well. Just over a week ago, the Devil had strangled me. "Pretty meat," he'd sneered as his drool had coated my face. I put my head in my hands. "I need to slow down, just long enough to think." I wished Tess could make time stand still.
"We doan get that luxury. Not since that bastard showed up here. We got a grenade in our camp, with the pin pulled."
On the road, Jack had taught me about grenades: Once you pull the pin, a grenade is not your friend.
"What do you want from me, Evie?"
"I want you two not to fight each other. To give me time to sort through things." I met his eyes. "I'm asking you not to hurt him."
"I can't . . . I can't do this now, no. You're fucking gutting me." He rubbed that bandage. "I'd had this hope of being with you again, only thing keeping me goan." He gazed past me. "But now, can't even look at you."
"Please try to see this from--"
A yell sounded across the camp.
Great. What had Death done now?
20
When Jack and I ran outside, we found Aric standing by his horse. Matthew was no longer with him.
Jack eyed the knight with a withering hatred; steady and still, Aric kept his gaze locked on me--
"She's gone! She's been taken!"
"Was that Finn?" I asked.
Jack made for the Magician's tent, while I tried to keep up.
Inside, Finn sat on his cot, Matthew beside him. By the light of the low fire, I couldn't tell which boy looked worse.
Gabriel, Joules, and Tess rushed in right after us.
"What happened here, podna?" Jack asked Finn. "Tell me nice and slow."
"Selena was taken! Two soldiers did it. I walked in on one of them giving her an injection. His partner sneaked up behind me and shot me up. I just came to."
Gabriel's wings snapped open. "How did they get her out of the fort?"
"You tell me," Finn said, baffled.
"We suspected we had traitors planted in this camp." Jack bit out a vile curse in French. "How long ago was this?"
"Five or six hours?" Finn turned to me. "Right when I was going under, one of them was bitching about the wolf guarding you. I think you were also a target."
"Whose target?" Jack said.
I feared I knew. "It might be General Milovnici. The Lovers told us they wanted to take me and Selena north to someone they called 'the First.' Maybe they meant their father?" The thought nauseated me as much as it had last night.
"I can catch them by air," Gabriel said, "before they reach the other half of the army."
Jack shook his head. "They'll be spotlighting the skies for you. They've got truck-mounted rifles that can cut you in two."
Gabriel turned on Matthew. "You had to have seen this, Fool!"
Finn raised his crutch to defend Matthew, but Jack blocked the archangel. "Ju
st back off, Gabe! We're goan to get Selena back."
Right at that moment, a staticky call sounded in my head. --We will love you. In our own way.--
Every Arcana stilled in shock.
"W-wasn't that the Lovers' call?" Tess adjusted her baseball cap, her still-thin body trembling.
"That can't be," I muttered, though I'd heard it.
"Are you sure you guys ganked them?" Finn glanced from one of us to the next. "Yeah? Then I guess their Arcana power is resur-freaking-rection."
Matthew gave a low cry. "They're calling." He stiffened and his voice changed, seeming to vibrate as he vocalized a message: "Empress, we'd planned to make you a prisoner of our love, but it didn't work out. Luckily we'll have Selena to keep us company. Will you let her suffer for you, for the crimes you committed?"
"What crimes?" Joules asked, but everyone shushed him.
Matthew continued: "If you're truly as different as you say, you'll come for your ally. We'll release her in exchange for you--and the hunter. We camp outside the Dolor Salt Mines; be here within four days. No Arcana can travel with you. If we sense another's call--like the archangel's--we'll give Selena to our army. It's your choice, a test of your 'alliance.' When to enter, when not to honor . . . Four days, Empress. We will love you ever so much."
Matthew slumped, the message delivered.
"Vincent and Violet are alive? They have her!" Gabriel started for the exit.
I headed him off. "Just wait! You can't jeopardize her. We'll plan another rescue. Maybe Matthew can block our calls." I turned to him--sucked in a gasp at the blood pouring from his nose. "Sweetheart, what is this?" I reached for him.
Jack was right beside me. "Coo-yon?"
Matthew rocked forward and back, blood soaking his shirt. "Beware the lures . . . strike first . . . or be first struck."
I yanked a bandanna from my pocket and held it against his nose. His eyes pleaded; for me to do what? Why couldn't I figure out how to help him? When Matthew's blood saturated the material, I didn't think, just cried, "Aric!"
"Why you call for him?" Jack sounded like he was about to do murder. "I'm the one who's been looking out for coo-yon for three months. Me."
I sat beside Matthew. "Aric knows things. Arcana things."
An instant later, Death silently entered.
Joules went bug-eyed, producing a javelin. Gabriel's wings flared anew. Tess floated to the back of the tent.
Finn's recent illusions glimmered over him. "Wh-what the hell, people?" He'd been unconscious, didn't know Aric was here. Up went the Magician's crutch again.
"Death is in the trues," I said.
Jack's jaw clenched until I thought he'd grind his molars to dust. "You like to go where you're not welcome, Reaper."
"Often." Aric's pale blond hair shone in the firelight, his breathtaking face highlighted.
"This is actually happenin'," Joules sputtered. "We're in a tent with this rotten, bloody bastard." Speaking to everyone else, he said, "You realize he's killed us all at some point in past games."
Death's lips curled. "Some of you more than once."
Like me.
"Bugger this, I canna be in here." Joules cast Aric a look of scalding animosity. "That demon killed my lass, my Calanthe."
Death's amber eyes narrowed. "Your alliance attacked mine."
Gabriel reached for Joules's shoulder, saying under his breath, "Stay. Know thy enemy." He jerked his hand away when the Tower's skin sparked.
"Feckin' Reaper." But Joules did remain, directing his fury toward Jack. "You should have plugged his skull when you had a chance!"
"You think I doan regret that?"
I gazed up at Aric. "Do you know what's happening to Matthew?"
"In past games, the Fool occasionally did this--when someone was about to die. Someone he'd much rather not."
All eyes turned to me. Was I on the chopping block? Or Selena?
"Plus, he must be overloaded," Aric said. "I've seen this before midgame. His mind is simply full."
"What does that mean?" I smoothed Matthew's hair from his damp forehead.
"It's unusual for so many Arcana to converge for extended periods. Our calls would blare like constant megaphones in his head."
The Arcana switchboard.
"Not to mention that he's been seeing all of our futures, deciphering and acting on constantly updating information."
Matthew had tried to tell me he needed a respite. He'd known his mind would be hurt like this?
"Mad and struck." Saliva dripped from his mouth. "System the game. Eddy. Eddy. Now I go over the edge, the dog at my heels."
Jack clasped his shoulder, holding him steady. "Coo-yon, you got to rest now. Prend-le aise. Comprends? " Take it easy. Understood? "And press this against your nose," he added, handing Matthew another bandanna.
The boy stilled at once. "Comprends."
I'd seen Jack calm him before, but not like this. Matthew behaved like a soldier taking an officer's order.
"How is this possible with the Lovers?" Joules demanded of no one in particular. "I tossed their remains into the river!"
Death gave a laugh.
"What's so bleeding funny?"
"Just because you destroyed that pair doesn't mean they're dead."
Now he had everybody's attention.
It must be occurring to each of the Arcana that a source of information--a living, breathing, two-thousand-year-old champion--was talking to them. They would all have questions. He might have the answers.
And Aric could read us so well. "Aww, did I just become the most popular person in this tent?" He shouldn't be this amused. His typical I-have-power-over-all-I-survey vibe was in full force.
I got the feeling that he was making moves on a chessboard, and we were all luckless pawns. "Will you please explain how they can be destroyed but still be alive?" I guided Matthew to adjust the bandanna against his nose. Was the blood flow slowing?
"Have none of you truly looked at their card?" Aric gazed from person to person. "How it evokes the many-sided Gemini? How it resembles the Devil's card?"
Blank stares.
"Ah, I see. And why would I reveal their esoteric power? Because of our abiding friendships?" Death was practicing his own concealment. "The Lovers will probably defeat some of you. Aiding you against them would be unwise."
"Do you trust me when I tell you we won't fight you?" I asked him.
Joules snapped, "Speak for yerself, Empress," just as Jack said, "Doan count on it." Had his hand wandered toward his pistol holster?
Ignoring them, Aric told me, "Twenty centuries of experience is difficult to disregard."
"Your past with me is what got you into trouble in the first place." I'd told him that if he'd come to Haven in the beginning as a friend--instead of tormenting me for months--I would have fallen in love with him, before Jack had ever arrived.
"Perhaps I could share some details." Aric had once accused me of having a conniving glint in my eyes; well, I recognized the calculating gleam in his.
He turned to the others. "I will tell you about the Lovers, for a boon. I want each Arcana's vow never to engage the Empress in combat. A trues forever."
Protecting me? Of all the things Death could've demanded . . .
Even Jack appeared a shade less likely to shoot Aric.
"Far cry from a few months ago, Reaper," Joules pointed out, "when you were tellin' us we couldn't kill her because you were goin' to do the deed!"
"It is a remarkable turnaround," Death conceded with his customary frankness.
"My alliance already vowed never to hunt hers," Joules said.
"Obliging enough, but you won't have to hunt them. The game will make sure you encounter each other."
"I'd never hurt blondie," Finn told Death, apparently over his earlier shock. "But you got my vow."
Tess piped up, "I-I promise it too."
"A vow. To the Reaper?" Gabriel looked torn between his loyalty to the Tower and his desire to know his
enemy. "Joules, we need this information to save Selena." He faced Aric. "I vow it."
"Oh, for feck's sake!" Joules's skin sparked again. "Fine, I'll vow it, but only because I wasn't plannin' to anyway."
"Very well." After a dramatic pause, Aric said, "The Lovers can clone themselves."
"Oh, my God." The memory of my picnic with Gran surfaced in full. I'd been about seven years old. We'd spread a blanket under an oak. While she'd shelled pecans, I'd played with paper and scissors, cutting out a girl and a boy.
"Evie, what do you have there?"
"Twins," I proudly told her. "Or more." I pulled the paper apart like an accordion. Identical girls and boys stretched out, all holding hands.
"Very good." She picked up a sharp fragment of shell to slice her thumb.
"Gran!"
"Shh." Narrowing her gaze, she swiped blood on the front girl and boy. "They need to mix their blood to duplicate themselves."
I frowned. Sometimes Gran said weird stuff.
"What if you wanted to kill them all? How would you do it?"
I bit my lip, thinking about it for a few moments. I folded the paper back to the original pair. "Kill these two?"
Gran was pleased, her dark eyes sparkling. "Such a clever girl."
She'd been teaching me about Arcana without even mentioning the cards! How many other disguised lessons had I forgotten?
"The source twins are the 'First' or the 'heart,' " Aric said. "Their clones make up the 'body.' They're called carnates. You destroyed a pair of them."
Puzzle pieces were fitting into place. "The Vincent clone told me, 'What we hear is heard. What we see is seen. What we know is known.' The source twins see and hear through the carnates." As Lark did with her animals.
Questions erupted from the other Arcana: "If we take one out, can they just create another?" "How long does it take them to duplicate themselves?" "Do they have a hidden replicant army?"
Was Selena on her way to be tortured by the First right now?
"The Lovers make clones with their combined blood. They blood-let like some"--Aric indicated me--"but they don't possess accelerated healing. So the number of carnates is limited."
"What about their other rumored powers?" I asked. "Like mesmerizing? Holding hands and swinging their arms or whispering together in a victim's ears?" Had they done that to Jack? I glanced at him with a question in my eyes. Curt shake of his head.
"Swinging their arms?" Finn peeled another cat sticker from his crutch. "Like an Arcana version of the Wonder Twins?"
Aric raised his blond brows. If you say so. "The First possess those powers, but the carnates don't." He turned to me. "In any case, you'd be immune, since you broke the Hierophant's mind control over you." Only because Aric had helped me.