Four Roads Cross (Craft Sequence #5)(136)

*

Abelard collapsed, laughing and weeping, when he felt the demon break. Cardinals and Technicians rejoiced, overcome by awe.

Then Abelard noticed the moon through the sanctum window, and felt the Everburning Flame warm against his neck, and heard—thought he heard—the clearing of an enormous throat.

“My masters and teachers,” he said. “Our Lord would appreciate a bit of, um. Privacy.”

In five minutes the sanctum was empty for the first time in Abelard’s memory. He was the last to leave.

That’s two I owe you now, the fire said to him.

Don’t mention it, he replied. What are friends for?

*

Cat was mostly conscious when the vampire crashed to the roof beside her.

She lay in the ruins of her own skin—the Suit ablated to break her fall. She had some broken ribs, one leg didn’t work, and she’d stuffed her fist against the hole in her side to keep the blood contained.

The vampire, fallen, made a crater in the roof. She crawled toward him, dragging her useless leg. He was very still. Then he coughed, rolled onto his side, and vomited a glassy fluid that evaporated as it left his lips.

“Sexy.”

He turned to her, his face a horror mask. She caught his wrist before he could pull out of reach, and held it.

“I’ll—Cat, I am so hungry. It wants to eat and eat and eat. I have to go.”

“Don’t.” She felt as weak as he looked.

“I can’t hold on, dammit. Your blood’s right there, I’ll—” Teeth, out, pointed, dripping. The eyes were Raz’s, and not. A new emptiness at their pits made their colors turn, like ruddy whirlpools. He seemed to be drawing inward toward a point not present in any physical geometry.

“I get it.” She winced. “Eternal hunger. Call of the deep. Here.” She reached for her medallion.

“Your Suit won’t help.”

“Shut up for one minute.” Took a second to work the thing out one-handed. The holy symbol swung between them: the blind woman enrobed.

One last chance.

Okay, Lady, Cat prayed. You win.

The blind woman looked up at Cat and smiled.

Cat was stone, was sky, was an insect beneath an enormous entomologist’s gaze. The Seril who addressed her in the shower, and on the city’s rooftops, had been smaller, conceivable almost as a kind of invisible person, who saw the world as mortals did. Not so this Being. Yet She had not changed, only grown more Herself.

That made what she was about to do better, and worse.

I offer myself to you, she prayed. Save him.

The light waited.

You called me priestess, before.

But Cat had denied it.

I fought for you. I saved you. I learned from you. I was pierced for you. I almost died for you. I was scared of the word, that’s all. Just keep him here, before he goes away forever. Please.

Nothing changed.

She would lose him.

Raz looked different. He was lit, she realized, by trebled moonlight: from above, and from her own eyes.

She set her hand on his forehead.

“I offer you asylum,” she said, not knowing how the words or gesture came to her, “under the protection of Seril Undying. The Lady will answer any liens against your soul. I give you back yourself.”

“You can’t,” he croaked. “They want me. They’ll take me.”

“They helped us, and you fed them in turn. The Lady will pay whatever more they feel they’re owed.”

“They won’t—” He broke off, coughing. “They won’t accept that. They want me. Father of a line. They’ll come for me, on land or sea. And for you.”

“And when that happens, we’ll be ready. Together. You can live here—at least some of the time. Seril’s protection’s strongest in Alt Coulumb. If you’re worried about the rent, I have a nice couch. And I could get better curtains.”

“I hate this city.”

“But not the people in it.”

“No,” he said.

He was silent for what felt like a long time, and so was she.

“You said you wouldn’t stop me from doing something stupid to save you.”

“I did.” She nodded. “But I never said I wouldn’t do something stupid to save you back.”

“I accept.”

His teeth receded. The whirl in his eyes stilled.

Far away, something ancient screamed.

He exhaled, and some of the animal left him, and some of a man she’d not yet come to know returned. “They’ll be after you, too, now.”

“Worth it,” she said.

Lights bloomed in the sky. Silver and red nets and circles, twining—like fireworks but not.

“Now come on.” She tried to sit up, and failed. “Drag me to the hospital. I’d like to beat the rush.”

*

Tara flew over the city. Over her city. Free.

Stone wings beat, and Aev approached her. “Shale?”

She turned from the flaw in the demonglass arch. “He’s trapped,” she said. “Out west. He—threw himself into a monster’s mouth to save us. I’ll get him back. Bring him home.” She heard the weakness in her voice and didn’t hate herself for it.

That’s new, she thought.