Books by Maggie Shayne (335 page)

The man nodded once and bared his teeth. “Yes, I am. And might I ask who the hell you are, before I put you into the ground for good?”

Nathan nodded weakly. Blood was running from his nose, and this man knew by now that he was an immortal from the shock at contact. Probably didn’t know if Eannatum was Dark or Light, and even more probably didn’t care.

“I’m Eannatum,” he said. “I’m your father.”

Nidaba dragged in her next breath, her
first
breath, the breath of life itself. It jolted through her, arching her back and filling her lungs to near bursting with storm laden air and rainwater. Someone leaned over her, patting her face.

She opened her eyes.

“George. Oh, George, you’re really okay!”

“So are you,” he said. Beside him his dog wagged her tail, and for a moment she went stiff with fear as memory surged.

The roof.

The pigeons.

Eannatum . . . the dog . ..

“Natum
...” Her voice was raspy. She wondered why. And then she knew, even as she struggled to sit up, to stand. Still weak, not yet healed, she staggered to the edge of the rooftop, looked down over. The car in the driveway hadn’t been there before. But it was a familiar model.

“Nicodimus! Oh, Gods, he’s here.”

Her hands went to her throat, and she felt the gaping wound. At least it was no longer bleeding as it slowly healed itself. But the damage within still made every breath a tortured wheeze. It hurt to breathe. Hurt more to call out. Yet she tried all the same. But the sound that resulted was barely as loud as the contented chuckling of the pigeons.

“It’s okay, Nidaba. Come on, I’ll help you down.”

George pulled one of her arms around his shoulder and held her as she made her way toward the stairs. Stumbling, she fell to her knees once, but he pulled her right back up. He was not, she realized, in much better shape than she was—he was dripping wet, freezing, probably suffering from exposure, as well. He was cut and bruised and scared to death. “What happened after you and Sheila left here, George?” she asked as he slowly helped her down the stairs.

“The bad lady ... she must have followed us. She ran us off the road and made us get into her car and come right back here. We never even got to go to the beach like Sheila said we could. And then ... oh, it was bad. It was so bad, Nidaba. That lady, she said she was gonna take us into the house, so you and Nathan would know she meant business, and Sheila, she tried to get away.”

“And Puabi killed her,” Nidaba said. They had paused in the middle of the stairway.

“No. Sheila tripped, and she hit her head.” His face contorted. “And then she just didn’t get up anymore. Did she ... did she ... die?”

Nidaba pressed a hand to his cheek. “I’m so sorry, George. She did. She went to be with Lisette.”

“I wanted her to stay with us,” he said.

Beside him the dog whined softly, as if she too were mourning Sheila’s death.

“I was scared,” George said. “So I ran. I went and hid in the woods, and then I sneaked back here. Because I knew Sheila wouldn’t be able to take care of her pigeons.”

“So you came to take care of them for her.”

He nodded and went back to helping her down the stairs. “Then I was too scared to come down. But I thought the bad lady would never find me on the roof.”

They finally reached the ground, and the doorway. She peered inside, and saw someone holding Natum against the wall by his shirt and pounding on his face. “George, the bad lady’s in there, and she has made herself look just like me. You stay away from her.”

“How will I know which one of you is which?”

“Code word,” she told him. “I’ll know our secret code word.”

“What is our code word?” he asked, wide-eyed.

“Sheila. It’s Sheila.”

He smiled, nodded, and Nidaba threw open the door and rushed inside, pouring every bit of strength she had left into her attack. She reached out, grabbed Nicodimus by the back of his shirt, and yanked him off Eannatum with so much force that he lost his balance and fell on his backside. She looked down at her son and said, “Hello, Nicky. I see you’ve met your father.”

He stared up at her in shock, then turned his head to look across the room. When she followed his gaze, she saw the impostor, looking just like her, with her arms around Arianna.

Nidaba stared at Nicodimus. Then at Natum, who was fighting to remain conscious as blood ran from his nose and split lip. He’d sunk to the floor, where he kept blinking, shaking his head.

But there was no time to help either of them, because Puabi was already in motion.

“Arianna, look out!” Nidaba shouted, but it was too late. Even as Arianna sent a confused look her way, the false Nidaba swung her clasped fists as one, clubbing Arianna on the head so hard she went down at once.

“What the hell!” Nicodimus leapt to his feet and lunged toward her, but Puabi was faster. She snatched up a paperweight and hurled it at him with deadly precision, and then he was on the floor too.

And it was down to the two of them. Nidaba and Puabi. Nidaba focused, knowing she could not match this woman alone, in her weakened state. She was still not fully recovered from Puabi’s most recent attack. She needed help. And as a High Priestess of the Goddess, she knew where to get it. Nidaba focused her energy, drawing it up from the earth below and down from the sky above. Feeling the power pulsing in her body, she mentally contained it, directed it, forced it upward, to her eyes, and to the spot above them in the center of her forehead. “First sight, second sight, third eye, never lie.”

She opened her eyes, and saw the vision, the glamour, begin to ripple. Like heat waves shimmering over the false face Puabi wore.

“You’ll never make it work, Nidaba. I’m far more powerful than you will ever be,” Puabi taunted.

“It’s my face, you foolish sow,” Nidaba whispered. “You might have been able to sustain any other form but this one. I know myself too well not to see the truth beyond the glamour.”

“Then why are you still squinting so hard?”

Beyond the ripple, Puabi’s hand swam higher, lifting a dagger. Nidaba was still unarmed. Her own dagger lay on the floor ten feet to her left. She took a step toward it, but Puabi moved into her path.

Nidaba eyed the woman coolly. “You cannot hope to defeat me, Puabi. Dagger or no. I am a High Priestess of Inanna!”

“Your Goddess turned her back on you long ago, when you betrayed her by falling in love with her chosen king, Nidaba. And you know that as well as I.”

For a moment Nidaba’s will weakened. And Puabi’s glamour solidified again before her eyes. But then she glanced sideways at Eannatum, and his eyes met hers, though they were slitted with pain and he was barely conscious. She saw the love in his eyes, and she knew. She finally understood what he had been trying to tell her before. Her Goddess had never abandoned her. And neither had her Natum. Nidaba, had never done anything wrong. She and Eannatum were simply meant to be.

Nidaba lifted her hands and her head, closed her eyes, trusting utterly. She heard Puabi rushing forward and yet she didn’t move. She only chanted the sacred words she’d learned at Lia’s feet so many years ago. “
Inanna me en, Inanna me en, Inanna me en!
I am of Inanna, I am of the Goddess, and she is of me. We are one, and you cannot stand against us.”

The blade came down. Nidaba heard it slicing the air close to her body. Calmly, guided by a force beyond her, she brought her hands down, palms outward, and opened her eyes to see the blade stop in mid-air. As if it had hit a brick wall. She saw Puabi as she truly was. Small, slight. Short dark hair framing her pixie-like face. Her round lapis blue eyes gleamed with hatred as she tried to force her blade to move, and looked stunned and confused when it wouldn’t. Her fisted hand gripped the dagger more tightly, and her face contorted as she drew back and swung the blade again. But it was blocked by an invisible shield.

“Be gone!” Nidaba commanded, guided by a force that was beyond her. A bolt of pure energy burst from her palms, slamming into Puabi. She flew backward, airborne, her blade sailing harmlessly across the room. Her body crashed into the wall and she slid to the floor. But she scrambled to her feet almost immediately. Nidaba was so stunned by the power she had just channeled, that she was not ready for the second attack. She stood looking in awe at her hands, half expecting to see burn marks in her palms from the searing force that had burst from them.

Puabi bent low and charged, driving into Nidaba headfirst like a rampaging bull. The two rolled in a tangle of arms and hands and clothes. Furniture crashed to the floor, knickknacks shattered. Queenie raced around them, barking and growling.

They pounded, kicked, clawed, beat one another, until finally, Nidaba landed a roundhouse blow that sent Puabi reeling. In the split second before she attacked again, Nidaba scrambled to grab a dagger from the floor, and sprang to her feet again, crouched and ready. She glanced down at the weapon in her hand. Puabi’s jewel encrusted dagger.

Puabi, too, had used the opportunity to arm herself. She squared off, facing Nidaba, and in her hand, she held the gold-handled dagger that Eannatum had given to Nidaba.

The two faced each other, panting, breathless, daggers at the ready. A flash of movement caught Nidaba’s eye, and she glimpsed Nicodimus, Arianna, and Eannatum standing together, staring at them. George cowered in a corner, apparently too afraid to watch. Nidaba realized that to their eyes, she and Puabi still looked exactly the same.

“My Goddess, what’s going on here?” Arianna asked. She drew her dagger, eyeing the two women who circled each other amid the rubble of the room.

“Her name is Puabi,” Eannatum explained slowly. “She was responsible for your first death, Nicodimus, some four thousand years ago. And she’s come back now to try to kill you again.”

“I can’t imagine why she would want to,” Nicodimus murmured, his gaze darting from one of the women to the other. “I don’t even know her.”

“Mostly, she just wants to hurt your mother,” Natum told him grimly. “But she’s also a Dark High Witch, so I suppose your heart would be an added bonus.”

“So which one is she?” Arianna asked, looking from one woman to the other in bewilderment.

Eannatum frowned, his eyes sliding to the Nidaba on the left, as she sent him a pleading look, brimming with love, begging him to recognize her. He then turned to look at the Nidaba on the right. Her eyes met his only briefly, and if looks could kill, he figured he would be breathing his last about now.

Eannatum nodded toward her with a slight smile. “That one’s your mother. She’s mad as hell because she thinks I don’t know which is which.”

“Be gone,” Nidaba said in an intense, resonant tone that filled the entire room with an unnatural reverberation. She held her palm out toward her enemy, her dagger clasped in her other hand. “Be gone, Puabi.”

Puabi shrieked and drove forward with her blade, but again, it hit that unseen resistance. Eannatum blinked and looked again, because for a moment it seemed there was another woman in the room, larger than life, her form like an aura around and above Nidaba’s. Her eyes were like winking bits of lapis, and the rest of her as faint as a breeze. Her hand seemed to meld with Nidaba’s as she held it out, palm facing her attacker.

There was a blinding flash of light that seemed to emanate from Nidaba’s palm, and Puabi flew backward as if hit by a wrecking ball. Her blade flew from her hand, and landed in the fireplace, burying itself amid the coals. Puabi slammed into the wall with such force the plaster crumbled as she sank into a broken heap on the floor.

As her hold on the spell weakened, the glamour faltered, and Nathan saw Puabi for the first time in well over four thousand years. Ever young, beautiful, selfish and utterly ruthless.

Her dazed eyes met his for an instant. “I only wanted your love,” she whispered. “That’s all... that’s all...” And then those vivid blue eyes fell closed.

Nathan turned away from her and sought Nidaba. She was standing on the other side of the room, her body nearly limp with exhaustion, bruised and bleeding. He rushed to her, caught her up in his arms, and held her tenderly against him when it seemed she could barely stand on her own.

“You were right,” she muttered. “About the dog. There were two—part of the time, at least. George was on the roof, and I went up there. One dog attacked me ... and the other ... she saved me.”

She sagged against him, stunned, he thought, at the events that had just transpired. Finally, though, she steeled herself, stood straighter, and looked up at him. “Tell me you knew which was really me?”

“I knew, Nidaba. From the very start. If you doubt me, you can ask your... our son.” He offered a small smile, which died at Arianna’s cry.

“Nicodimus!”

Nathan turned and for an endless moment, could only watch in horror. Puabi had roused unnoticed, and retrieved her blade from the coals of the hearth, where it had landed. Its blade glowed red-hot as she rose slowly, drew back her arm, and flung it at Nicodimus. It seemed to happen in slow motion, and yet too suddenly to prevent. Nic, hearing Arianna’s cry, turned as the fire red blade whirled end over end toward him, and Nathan knew it would set his son’s heart aflame if it pierced his chest—destroying him utterly.

Reaching out for his son, Nathan shoved Nicodimus away, stepping right into the path of that blade to do so.

It sank deeply into Nathan’s chest, burning, searing him. He dropped to his knees as a cry of undiluted agony burst from his lungs. Flames leapt from the fabric of his shirt, from his skin. From inside him! Puabi’s eyes widened. “No! No, not you, Eannatum! Not you!”

Arianna backhanded the woman, and her head connected with the hearthstone. Then she slumped into silence.

Nidaba jerked the knife from Nathan’s chest, and tossed it aside. It hit the floor near the window, still glowing red. Ignoring it, Nidaba pressed her hands to the blazing wound, but the flames kept coming. And then a large, hulking form lifted Nathan away from her. She looked up. “George! No, George, you mustn’t— George, wait!”

But George was hearing none of it. It looked bad, Nathan thought, as he clung to consciousness despite the screaming pain in his chest. His skin blistered and bubbled and he could smell the stench of his own burning flesh. George was scratched, bruised, his clothing torn, and soaked through. And he was limping even more badly than usual. But he shrugged off all the hands trying to hold him back, and loped toward the open door, and through it.

Nathan heard the others rushing out right behind them. George stood in the pouring rain, and lifted Nathan in his arms like an offering to the heavens, as the deluge came down.

Blessedly cool rainwater pummeled him, soothing the burning in his chest. Cooling the pain. Nathan opened his mouth to cry out in mingled anguish and relief. And the tongues of flame on his body hissed out their final breaths, and died. Nathan closed his eyes, certain he was about to do the same.

Nidaba raced forward, gasping at the sight of the thin spirals of smoke rising from her beloved Eannatum’s chest. She stared aghast at his scorched shirt, the blistered skin and gaping wound with its blackened edges. “Put him down, George. Right here in the rain.”

“Did I... did I help him?” the big man asked, dropping to his knees to lay Natum down on the wet grass. He leaned over his friend, his face contorted with worry. Beside him the dog, Queenie, looked nearly as worried as George did.

“Yes. You helped him more than any of us could,” Nidaba said. She knelt on Natum’s other side and framed his face with her hands. “Live, Eannatum,” she whispered. “Live. Damn you, you must. Do you hear me?”

“Nidaba ... Mother ... ?” Nicodimus knelt beside her, encircled her shoulders with his arm. “He saved my life.”

“He only wanted a chance to know you. He’s your father, Nicodimus. Or he was ... in the lifetime before.”

“I know. He ... he told me.”

“Live, Natum. Please, please, live. I can’t bear this to be the end, do you understand me? I can’t.”

She pressed her hands to his chest, wishing with everything in her that she would feel his heart beating strong and steady. There was silence, utter stillness, but Nidaba then felt something else. That sensation of another person embracing her. Another hand, surrounding hers. Another force moving though her.

Her hand grew hot, and a soft white light came from her palm, suffusing the entire area of Nathan’s wound in its glow. The heat intensified, grew, nearly scorched her, but she didn’t move. She just let it happen.

And then the light faded, and her palm cooled ... and she felt the beating of Natum’s heart against her hand.

“Oh, my Goddess,” she whispered as tears streamed down her face.

Exactly
. The word echoed in her mind.

Eannatum’s eyes opened. He stared up at her, lifted a hand, curled it around her nape and drew her face down to his. He kissed her, gently, softly.

“Oh, no, the house!” Arianna cried.

They all turned to look. The living room was fully engulfed in flames, and the fire was spreading rapidly, licking its way toward the roof.

“Puabi?” Natum asked.

“She was still inside.” Nidaba spoke the words with a hint of regret, even though she knew Puabi probably deserved no sympathy, given all the harm she had done in her lifetime. She also knew that she and Eannatum were partly to blame for what the woman had ultimately become.

Natum closed his eyes, bowed his head. “I wish ...”

“I know,” Nidaba said softly. “I know.” Drawing a breath, she looked up at her son. “Nicky, we need to get some help. The fire department. This is Natum’s home, he loves this place. We have to—”

“No.” Eannatum sat up slowly and reached up for a hand. Nicodimus closed his hand around his father’s and helped him to his feet. For a moment, the two remained that way, standing there, face-to-face, hands clasped. Natum looked into Nicodimus’s eyes, and his became moist. “Good to meet you ... Nicodimus. At long last. You make a hell of a first impression, you know.” As he said it, he rubbed his nose, which was already healing.

“So do you,” Nicodimus said with a grin. “Saving my life, I mean.”

“Natum... your house!” Nidaba tugged him around to face her, trying to get him to pay attention to his home. But he only looked at George, and smiled broadly.

“You okay, my friend?”