Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles #2)(20)

“Weaknesses?” Finn asked.

“One,” Selena answered. “The Empress.”

“Yeah, so I keep hearing,” I said.

Finn frowned. “If he’s a swordsman, what’s to stop him from chopping down your trees, going all Paul Bunyan on your ass?”

Had Jackson eased closer to us? To me?

Selena said, “It must be her poison, then.”

“So how do I get close enough to him to deliver a toxin without getting stabbed myself? How do I get past his armor?”

Selena pinned me with her gaze. “We’ll have to figure that out if we want to live.”

After a moment, I looked away. “To think I used to feel sorry for him.”

—I do not want your sympathy, creature!—

You no longer have it!

—I’ve missed our times together. Missed touching you.—

Because he killed with his touch.

You’re sick!

“Evie?” Finn snapped his fingers in front of me.

“What? What’d you say?”

“Your card.” He held it up.

The Empress sat upon a throne with her arms opened wide. In the background were rolling hills of green and red, from crops—and blood. A waterfall cascaded in the distance.

“You look scary. And sexy.”

I was about to say, Not me. But it had been me, in a previous life.

Finn showed the card to Jackson, whose gray gaze flicked from the card to me and back.

“Okay, so you’ve got poison in your claws,” Finn said, “and a lotus thingy that pops up from your palm to choke and paralyze people, and a tornado of thorns, and your blood revives dead plants. Oh, and wound regeneration. Did I miss anything?”

Toxic spores from my hair. I could lay waste to an entire city with them. Hearing someone else outline these things, I felt even more like a freak. I gazed at Jackson, wishing he could understand that no one wanted to be a monster, to be feared. Hell, even a fiend like Death called me creature.

One of the good things about going full-on Empress? When I was burning with that white-hot battle fury, there was no room for doubt.

Now, as Jackson tilted his head at me, I was awash in it.

Selena happily added, “She can also mesmerize guys.” Revealed, no doubt, for Jackson’s benefit.

He narrowed his eyes, his expression saying, Son of a bitch! That explains a lot.

Finn looked excited. “Mesmerize? Really? It goes with your eerie Arcana call.” Making his voice breathy, Finn said, “?‘Come, touch, but you’ll pay a price.’?”

Jackson gave a bitter laugh.

Though the Empress’s arms were welcoming on the card, her gaze was menacing—as if she was thinking her call right at that moment. But then, that was her—my—MO. To beckon, to allure, then to strike.

“Mesmerizing is not something I do every day,” I hastily explained. “Just when I’m in full Empress mode. It doesn’t always work, and not for long anyway. I went all-out against the Alchemist, and he was still keen to slice my tongue out and pickle it in a jar!”

Selena nodded. “Uh-huh, whatever you say, Evie.”

I turned on her. “And what about you, La Luna? You have the power to seed doubt and to lure people to you with moonlight!” Beware the lures. “You set a trap for me at your house in Georgia, but Jack was with me so you held off attacking. You know, I’d bet that wasn’t even your place—I never saw a single photo of you on the walls.”

As she’d told me once before, she said, “Prove it.”

Everyone fell silent.

“What are your weaknesses?” Finn finally asked me.

Again Selena was happy to answer: “When there are no plants around to feed her energy, she taps out quickly, even more so if she has to use her blood to revive or create plants. She needs the sun. Her power is collaborative—some cards are more dependent on the environment than others.”

Keen to get the attention off of me, I said, “And what are your weaknesses?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Selena pointed to her thigh quiver, which held one real arrow and two makeshift ones. She’d been trying to replenish her supply, but, as she’d explained, there wasn’t any green wood to carve new ones from.

I supposed I could help her with that—open a vein, coax a sapling to life—but I didn’t yet trust her enough to weaken myself just to make her stronger. And it wasn’t like I had a lot of juice on tap.

Just as Matthew had warned, my powers continued to deteriorate in this rain.

“Eventually, I will always run out of arrows. Then I have to depend on my enhanced speed, endurance, and grace.”

Rolling my eyes, I picked up the Devil Card. “So, this is Ogen, a.k.a., El Diablo. He allies with Death. He’s got horns and hooves like a goat man, but his body is all ogre—with superhuman strength. His call? I’ll make a feast of your bones.”

“Ogen, the ogre?” Finn raised his brows. “Really?”

I shrugged. “I don’t make the news, I just report it.” I picked up the Judgment Card next. “You guys have met Gabriel as well. He can strike like a missile from above.”

Selena added, “And he’s got animal senses. That’s why it’s so dangerous that he’s hooked up with Joules. Gabriel can scent us even through Finn’s illusions, then Joules could just wait up on some vantage, pointing and shooting, picking us off.”