Black Heart (8 page)

There was a long sort of sofalike thing made of branches that stretched out against a wall. I lay down on it. My mind was racing, and I was still pumped full of energy from using my magic during the battle with the Cimice. I didn’t think I would be able to sleep, but almost immediately I drifted off. My body knew what it needed even if I didn’t.

My baby fluttered inside me. My son. The last tangible evidence that I had of my beloved. In my mind were Gabriel’s eyes, Gabriel’s mouth, Gabriel’s touch. Gabriel’s voice whispering in my ear. For now and forever they would only be in my mind, only in my memory. Since he had died, I’d had only fleeting moments to remember.

I chased monsters. I battled demons. I felt the shadow on my heart growing larger and larger with each passing day. But the grief was always there, the pain that was unyielding and unending. Even when I tried to hide from it, to find solace where I could, my sadness chased me down and overtook me.

I woke with the wetness of my tears on my cheeks, salt in my mouth, and Litarian standing above me, an indefinable expression on his face. He held my sword in one hand.

I sat up quickly, scrubbing my cheeks. “What did Batarian decide?”

“Despite my arguments to the contrary, my lord feels you cannot be trusted,” Litarian said. “He has ordered me to bind all your limbs, heedless of any possible harm to myself, and remove you as far from the village as possible so you can do no damage here in retribution.”

“Under normal circumstances I would consider that a threat,” I said, studying him carefully. “But I don’t think you’re going to carry it out.”

“No,” he said. “I am not.”

“You don’t agree that I am a threat to your village?” I asked.

“I believe that you could harm us all greatly if you so chose,” Litarian said. “However, I also believe you would not choose to do so unless necessary.”

“I don’t want to hurt you at all,” I said. “I just want to be free.”

Litarian nodded and indicated I should turn around. I did so, hoping he was going to release my wings and not slit my throat with my own sword when my back was turned.

He murmured low in his native language, and the bonds were released. My wings stretched, unfurled—and immediately cramped from being held in a fixed position for so long.

I eased them out slowly, until they were at their fullest extension, arching my back like a cat as the blood flowed though the tight muscles. I felt a touch on the silver feathers and closed my wings, turning to Litarian in surprise.

He drew his hand back, his cheeks coloring. “I’m sorry,” he said. He handed my sword to me to cover his embarrassment. “They are just so beautiful. It must be an incredible feeling, to soar above the trees.”

“It is,” I said, thinking of how free I felt when flying. “Well, listen, thanks for letting me go.”

“You go to destroy the Cimice,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

“Yes,” I said. “I can’t let them get to my city.”

“I will go with you,” he said.

“Um,” I said. I could travel a lot faster without him, especially now that I had my wings back.

“I can show you precisely where the colony is located,” Litarian said. “My life is forfeit, in any event. My lord will certainly take it hard that I released you.”

“I could knock you out,” I offered. “Make it look like you tried to hold me here but I escaped.”

Litarian shook his head. “Batarian would see through such a fiction. I argued too ferociously in your favor.”

I didn’t want to bring Litarian with me. But it seemed a poor repayment for my freedom to leave him here to be executed.

“All right,” I said finally, although I had no idea what I would do with him once I’d taken care of the Cimice. “Take my hand.”

Litarian hesitated.

“If you want to come with me, you’re going to have to trust me,” I said impatiently. “If I wanted to hurt you, I could have done so a hundred times over.”

Litarian nodded and took my hand. There was a supple strength in his fingers, honed from years of pulling a bowstring. I spoke the words of the veil that would cover us, and heard him gasp.

“You disappeared,” he said, his voice full of wonder.

“Yes,” I said. “And so have you. We’re more or less invisible now.”

I kept a firm grip on his hand so he wouldn’t go wandering off.

“What is ‘more or less invisible’?” Litarian whispered.

“Most things can’t see us. Some can,” I said. “It kind of depends on how magical the being is that’s looking.”

I didn’t know whether the spell would actually hide us from the fae on this world. I figured if it didn’t, I could always fall back on my usual crash-and-burn routine.

“Lead the way,” I said. “And remember, you’re invisible but people will still be able to feel you if you bump into them.”

“I will be cautious,” Litarian said.

I put my hand on his shoulder so we would stay close together, and followed him out of the room. There was no one in the hallway, which was a surprise. Either Batarian completely trusted that Litarian would follow through on his orders without question, or else he didn’t care about the possibility that his son might be killed by me.

It seemed foolish to have sent Litarian without a guard to back him up. The whole settlement seemed unusually quiet. I must have slept longer than I realized. Still, why was Batarian not more vigilant? He was so concerned that the Cimice would send the horde down on their heads.

There was something strange going on here. The more I considered it, the more I realized that Batarian’s response to my aid during the battle didn’t make any sense. I’d just been too tired and out of sorts myself to realize it.

We moved out of the hall and onto the walkway. Some guards were posted at intervals, but not nearly as many as I thought there would be. I wanted to ask Litarian about it, but first we needed to get away. The guards would still be able to hear us even if they couldn’t see us.

Litarian led me to a staircase that went to the ground. The stairs were narrow, and I hoped that we wouldn’t encounter anyone on the way down. I would be able to fly out of the way, but I didn’t think I would be able to lift Litarian. I was stronger than an ordinary human, but not strong enough to lift a man twice my size. But there was no one on the staircase, and only a few guards posted at the perimeter at ground level. The guards seemed preternaturally still, almost like dolls or statues.

We slipped easily out of the village and into the dense forest. Once we were out of sight I dropped my hand from Litarian’s shoulder and lifted the veil.

“Something isn’t right,” I said, keeping my voice low in case it carried back to the village.

The light was faint under the trees but I could easily read Litarian’s troubled expression. “I agree,” he said.

I sensed the tug that pulled him back toward the village, toward his people, but he seemed to shake it off.

“First, the Cimice,” he said.

He started through the forest, moving with the smooth stride of an experienced woodsman. I grimaced and followed as quietly as I could.

Litarian looked askance at me when he heard me clomping through the woods like a team of horses, but he didn’t say anything.

We walked in (relative) silence for some time. “How far is the colony from the village?” I asked.

“Several hours’ walk,” Litarian said.

“Do you think Batarian will raise the alarm and send men after us?”

“Perhaps,” Litarian said. “Perhaps he will not consider my safety a priority.”

“Your relationship with your family is more confusing than mine,” I said. “It seemed like Sakarian had to obey you when you came to arrest me. Batarian seems to have given you a lot of power, as well. But you’re saying he wouldn’t come after you if he thought you’d been kidnapped or thought you’d disobeyed him.”

Litarian was silent for a while after this. We continued moving through the forest. I figured Litarian wasn’t going to comment, and I wasn’t going to push it. I didn’t need to get involved in anyone else’s weird family dynamics.

Finally, Litarian said, “My father has mixed feelings about me.”

I could sympathize. “Yeah, so did my father.”

“Did?” Litarian asked. “What happened to him?”

“I, uh, blew him up,” I said.

Litarian paused, his gaze assessing. I could almost hear the calculations in his head, his rapid reconsidering of both my ruthlessness and my abilities. “I will be very cautious around you.”

“He was gathering an army to destroy humanity at the time,” I said. “Also, he was really, really mean to me.”

As in trying-to-kill-me-multiple-times kind of mean.

“I will certainly make every effort not to be ‘mean’ to you,” he said seriously.

I laughed, but it was without mirth. People who were mean to me had an unfortunate tendency to die in horrible ways. Chloe had said something to that effect once, when we were arguing about my methods. I’d told her I wasn’t a monster.

But then I’d destroyed every vampire in the city in one fell swoop. I’d tortured Bryson. I’d condoned and acted on morally questionable impulses. And Beezle had left, because I was changing.

Maybe if Gabriel still lived, it would be different. But he was gone, and I was left to fend for myself, to muddle through, to do whatever was necessary to preserve my life so that I could keep my child safe. So first I would destroy the Cimice, even though they hadn’t invaded my city yet. But before that . . .

“Someone’s directing the Cimice,” I told Litarian. “If we can, I’d like to find out who.”

“Why do you think that?”

“It’s too much of a coincidence that they’re here and that one of them came through to Chicago. One of my enemies is giving them pointers.”

“You make it sound as though you have many enemies,” Litarian said.

“Probably more than I can count,” I said.

“Then how will you determine who is leading the Cimice?” Litarian asked. “They do not speak our language. They do not feel pain the same way that we do. You will not be able to bargain with them, or torture them.”

“They speak my language,” I said, remembering the metallic voice telling me that its brethren would descend upon me, destroy everything I loved.

“They have never indicated such to us,” said Litarian, sounding vaguely insulted.

“Maybe that’s because they don’t want to converse with you,” I said. “They want to kill you.”

“Still,” he said. “If we had known they could speak with us, we would have tried to negotiate, to save—”

“You couldn’t save them,” I said, cutting him off. “There is nothing you could have done. Just as no amount of fae fighting ability would have defeated the Cimice if they had chosen to advance. Your people are nothing but pawns in some larger game.”

Litarian said nothing to this. I knew it was a bitter pill for him to swallow, to think that there was never anything that could be done to save his people.

We passed through a particularly dense patch of trees and into a clearing. The moon had risen high while we walked, and the light danced on the surface of a sparkling stream. I pulled up short.

“I’ll be flying over that, thank you,” I said. “Come on, I can hold you up for a few seconds.”

Litarian turned toward me, a question in his eyes. “Why would I need to do such a thing?”

“Because of the creepy, grabby water creatures that live in there,” I said.

Litarian shook his head. “The gods in the water will not harm you if you show them respect.”

To demonstrate, he walked to the water’s edge and knelt there. He spoke what sounded like a prayer in his own language, then stood and offered me his hand. “Come. It is safe to cross now.”

“I think I’ll just stay and watch,” I said, waving him away.

Litarian shrugged and stepped into the water. I tensed, expecting the creatures to rise up and grab at his legs. But he crossed without incident. When he was done, he turned back and gave me an expectant look.

I rose up into the air, muttering to myself. “Of course. I should have thought to say a prayer in a language I don’t know. How stupid of me.”

I didn’t care what Litarian said. I’d destroyed one of the water “gods.” I didn’t think any amount of respect from me would let them allow me to pass unharmed.

Sure enough, as soon as my feet crossed high above, the surface of the water broke, filling with hissing faces.

I landed beside Litarian, who goggled at me. “What did you do to them?” he asked.

“It’s not worth getting into,” I said briskly. “Let’s go.”

Litarian didn’t press. That wasn’t his way. I’d figured that out pretty quickly. I was again strongly reminded of Gabriel. Gabriel was never one to press, either. He just waited, with his infinite store of patience.

I swiped at the tears that had risen to the surface, the unwanted proof of a grief that seemed to creep up on me more frequently since my arrival here. I was glad Litarian walked in front of me. He wouldn’t press, but I didn’t want to feel obligated to explain anything to him. Gabriel belonged to me. He had nothing to do with this place.

Litarian suddenly held up a hand to halt me. “What is it?” I whispered.

“The dragon approaches,” he said, very still.

I didn’t see or hear anything. “How do you know?” I asked, moving up to his side. His eyes were closed.

“Can you not feel him?” Litarian said, and his voice didn’t sound like his own.

I looked at him sharply. For a moment, I thought I’d heard . . .

But the thought faded as the presence of the dragon filled my mind. Litarian was right. I could feel him approaching, like a flame-lit shadow that covered the night.

“I know you,” I said into the darkness. I felt that inexorable pull that I had experienced in the dragon’s presence before, felt something buried deep in my blood that drew me toward the creature. I took a step forward.

LITARIAN GRABBED MY ARM, HIS VOICE ANGRY. “WHAT
are you doing? Do not draw it to us. I told you to halt so that we would not attract its attention.”

“It won’t hurt me,” I murmured, my head full of fire and darkness.

I yearned for something, something elemental and just out of reach.

Litarian came around to grab both my shoulders, to shake me. The jolt snapped the connection between the dragon and me. Litarian and I stared at each other. Something shifted behind his eyes, and just for a moment I thought the color of the iris changed.

It must have been a trick of the light. Then he was speaking, more harshly than I had heard him speak before.

“Are you mad?” he asked through his teeth. “That creature would destroy both of us in an instant. What were you thinking?”

He punctuated this with another little shake, which made me angry. I slapped his hands away from my shoulders.

A headache was brewing behind my eyes as the darkness in my mind retreated. It felt like this when I was first coming into my power, my legacy from Lucifer. There had been the same sense of a door opening just a crack before it slammed shut again. And because the door hadn’t opened all the way, pain streamed in its wake.

There was a mystery here to be solved, something else I needed to discover before I left this place. And Litarian was keeping me from that discovery. He was preventing me from finding the source of fire deep inside me.

“I told you, he wouldn’t hurt me,” I said.

“But he would hurt me,” Litarian said. “He despises all of us.”

“He wouldn’t if I asked him not to,” I said, still angry, still longing for the thing that was just out of reach.

“Can you communicate with the dragon?” Litarian asked suspiciously. “I thought you said you had not been here before.”

“I haven’t,” I said, now feeling defensive. “It’s just . . . a feeling I have when I see him.”

“A feeling,” Litarian said flatly.

“Look, I don’t have to explain to you,” I said, pushing past him.

“I think you do,” Litarian said, following me. “I have a right to know if you’re going to draw the dragon down on my head.”

“Don’t be stupid,” I said. “Look, just forget it, okay? The dragon isn’t coming anywhere near us right now. Let’s just focus on the Cimice.”

He wanted to pursue it. There was a quality of expectation in his silence. But he didn’t. Maybe he’d decided to trust me. Maybe he’d decided not to pursue the issue so long as he wasn’t in immediate danger. All I know is that we did not speak another word to each other for all of that long night.

The fae from the village did not pursue us; nor did we encounter any animals in the wood.

I don’t know what was in Litarian’s head, but I was brooding on my seeming connection to the dragon. Had the dragon been left here by Lucifer, created by Lucifer’s magic long ago? Was that why I was drawn to him, and him to me?

As the moonlight began to fade and the first rays of sunlight showed pink in the sky, I noticed the forest had changed. We were no longer surrounded by lush vegetation. Everywhere I looked the trees were stripped of their leaves, the underbrush similarly denuded. The back of my neck itched. I felt exposed.

“I suppose we’re getting closer to the colony,” I said.

“Yes, we are very near now,” replied Litarian. “We must proceed with caution.”

“Let’s get under a veil,” I suggested. “We’re too easy to see here.”

Litarian hesitated, like he wasn’t certain he wanted to be that close to me.

“I won’t attract the dragon while we’re under a veil,” I said impatiently. “That doesn’t even make any sense.”

He stepped closer, his expression embarrassed. I summoned my magic, settled the veil over us.

“Stay close to me,” I warned.

“I remember,” Litarian said.

We moved forward again, proceeding more cautiously. Neither of us wanted to be surprised by the Cimice. The landscape grew bleaker, more barren, as we walked.

“They’ve completely destroyed this part of the forest,” I said. “I wonder if it will ever even grow back.”

“We cannot allow them to encroach any further on our village,” Litarian said.

I agreed, but I wasn’t thinking of the fae. I was thinking of Chicago, and what would happen if these creatures appeared in my city. They would destroy every thing, every person in their path. And when they were done they would move on to the next city, and the next. All the while they would breed, until their numbers were impossible to comprehend.

Once they had wiped every last trace of life from Earth, they would move to another world, presumably through the power of whatever architect had brought them here in the first place.

I gradually became aware of a buzzing sound that filled the air. It was like the persistent hum of cicadas, only a lot louder and after a while a
lot
more irritating. The headache behind my eyes spread. I found myself growing angry. I was hot, tired, thirsty. I hadn’t showered in a couple of days and I was desperate to get out of my clothes and wash.

And my head hurt. And that sound was so pervasive, so damned annoying. It wasn’t just in my ears. It was in my teeth, and the sockets of my eyes. It vibrated up and down my spine, crawled over my nerve endings, made me madder and madder until I felt like I would explode.

“Stop,” Litarian said, his hand going around my upper arm.

“Quit manhandling me!” I shouted.

The veil had fallen away at some point. I’d lost track of the magic, become preoccupied with the noise.

“You need to stop. You need to breathe,” Litarian said soothingly, the kind of tone that you use on a child throwing a temper tantrum.

“No,” I said angrily, wiping my face with my sleeve. I was covered in sweat. It poured from me like I’d just run a very long distance. “I don’t need to breathe. I need for this damned noise to stop. I need it to stop.”

I scrunched up my eyes, covered my ears, but it was still there, inside me.

“Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop,” I said.

Litarian closed his arms around me. “
You
stop,” he said insistently. “Relax. Breathe. The Cimice will make you insane if you allow them to do so.”

I kicked at him, flailed, but he was strong, much stronger than he seemed, and he held me fast.

“Breathe,” he repeated. “Breathe with me.”

The low, steady insistence of his voice was finally breaking through the haze of madness. I tried to push away the noise, to focus on the steady rhythm of his inhalations and exhalations. I let my breath go, let it fall into the same pattern as his.

The buzzing of the Cimice continued, but it receded from my body. My nerves felt scraped raw. I was a hollow thing, ready to be born anew.

I opened my eyes and looked into Litarian’s—and saw what he had tried to hide.

“You!” I said, wrenching myself from his embrace as Litarian’s green eyes bled blue—the merry sapphire blue of Puck.

“Are you not pleased to see me?” he said, grinning.

I punched him in the face.

Last time I’d hit Puck, he had tried to strangle me to death. This time he was so pleased with his trick that he just shook off my blow, still smiling.

“I’d have thought you’d be pleased to see a family member in this strange place.”

“What the hell are you doing here pretending to be a faerie?” I demanded. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Chicago with Alerian and Lucifer?”

I had a sudden thought that chilled me to the bone. “Oh, gods above and below. You didn’t let him take over the city, did you?”

“So many questions. Which to answer first?” Puck said, tapping his finger on his chin.

“I don’t care which you answer first so long as you do answer,” I growled. “Are you the reason I’m here in this thrice-forsaken place?”

“I may have given dear Nathaniel a little nudge,” Puck acknowledged. “Although when I did so I didn’t realize the dragon was here.”

“What’s the dragon got to do with anything?” I said, my mind generating more questions before he could answer the first ones. “Have you been here all along, playing the part of Litarian? Or is that just something new for me? Does Batarian know who you really are?”

Puck held up his hands. “I will tell you all.”

“I doubt that very much,” I muttered. “But you will answer my questions.”

“Or what?” Puck asked, raising an eyebrow in challenge. “We both know you can’t kill me.”

“I won’t,” I said. “I’ll call the dragon to me.”

It was a calculated risk. I was pretty sure that the panic I’d seen in Puck’s eyes was real when we had sensed the presence of the dragon.

It was very satisfying to see him pale a little, even though he was careful to maintain his expression of merriment. “Ah, well, it suits me to satisfy your curiosity in any case,” he said offhandedly.

But I had seen, and I knew. Puck was afraid of the dragon. I would find out why. But not yet. First I wanted to know why I was here, and why he was here, and what web he was spinning.

“So start talking,” I said.

“And where shall I begin?” he asked.

“Tell me why you pushed Nathaniel into sending me here,” I said.
I’m sorry for doubting you, Nathaniel.

Puck feigned a look of surprise. “Why, to protect you from the Retrievers, of course. I knew they had no dominion here.”

“Where is
here
, anyway?”

“A planet that is light-years from yours, in time and space. Long ago a war was waged here between Lucifer’s armies and the fae that live here. Lucifer won, but he did not particularly care to keep the spoils. He simply wished to prove that he could win, that he was stronger than his opponent.”

This last was said with no small amount of bitterness. I sensed that Puck had been on the losing end of more than a few conflicts with his brother.

“After the war, Lucifer graciously agreed to leave this land to those he had defeated. He told them that as punishment for their defiance against him, they would not be able to pass freely from world to world, that they would be confined to this place always. He also told them that he closed all the portals between this and other worlds, so that none may enter or leave.”

“But he lied,” I said, thinking of the portal across the ocean.

“Yes, he does that,” Puck said. “He wanted to ensure that he had a way in and out if he needed it.”

“But why?” I asked. “What could he possibly want from such an out-of-the-way place, from a people he’d already defeated?”

“As you might say, do not ask me to explain what he is thinking,” Puck said. “And it was of no concern to me if he chose to have a bolt-hole on this planet. At least, it was of no concern until Titania chose this place as the launchpad for her invasion of Earth.”

“Titania,” I said. “I should have known.”

“Yes, you probably should have,” Puck agreed. “At any rate, once Titania chose this world, I felt it was a good idea if I were on the spot, as it were. Monitoring the situation. Since Lucifer closed the borders of this world, he might take Titania’s decision to open a portal here as an act of aggression.”

“So you—what? Presented yourself to Batarian as his long-lost son?”

Puck’s eyes twinkled. “Not exactly.”

Mine narrowed. “How was it, exactly, then?”

Puck shrugged. “I gave Batarian and all of his people a memory of Litarian. A memory that told them he was always here.”

“And how do you explain your absences to Batarian when you must attend to Titania?”

“I don’t have to. When I am here, they remember me as though I were always here. When I am gone, the memory of Litarian fades without a trace. I established the spell as such so that if I am unable to return, Batarian would not be haunted by the memory of a lost son.”

“Very thoughtful of you,” I said sourly.

I was very disturbed by the depth and breadth of Puck’s power. That kind of spell took more than strength. It took subtlety. It would also need safeguards built in so that the magic would continue even if Puck were not there to maintain it. I knew Lucifer and his brothers were strong, that their power was almost beyond comprehension. But it was one thing to know that, and quite another to be confronted with the proof of it.

“Yes, I am thoughtful,” Puck said in response to my comment. He sounded perfectly sincere.

“Does Titania know you’re here?” I asked.

Puck shook his head. “My queen does not monitor my every move.”

“Are you sure about that? If I were Titania, I would definitely keep a close eye on you.”

“I am certain,” Puck replied with a touch of arrogance. “Powerful the faerie queen may be, but she is not yet as powerful as I.”

And yet you pretend to be her inferior. Why?
I had always wondered about this, but now was not the time to try to get the answer.

“Okay,” I said. “Titania is using the Cimice to do what? Take over Chicago? Claim dominion over the Earth?”

“Those are side benefits. If she releases an army on your planet, it would be tantamount to declaring war on Lucifer, as my brother believes that world belongs to him.”

“Then why do it? Does she think she can defeat Lucifer with the Cimice?”

“Yes, she does,” Puck said.

I stared at him. “But she’s wrong.”

“I know,” Puck said.

“And if she brings her armies against Lucifer and he chooses to retaliate—”

“He will,” Puck interjected.

“Then there will be nothing left of the planet,” I said.

“Precisely,” Puck said. “Which is exactly why I brought you here.”

“And what am I supposed to do?” I said.

“Just what you intended to do when you thought I was Litarian,” Puck said. “Destroy the Cimice.”

“First of all, if you’re here, why can’t you do it yourself?” I asked. “And second of all, won’t Titania be pissed if she finds out you screwed up her plans? And finally, since when do you care if humanity is destroyed?”

“I like people,” Puck said lightly. “Existence was so much more fun once you came along.”

“That’s only part of an answer,” I said.

Puck sighed theatrically. “Oh, Madeline, you know me so well.”

“Why?” I repeated.

Puck tapped the tip of my nose with his finger. “What if I said it doesn’t suit my purpose to have the two of them at war just yet?”