The Book Eaters(117)

In her dream she was a lone wolf lost in a labyrinth filled with the bodies of the people she’d killed. The brambles and briars rose in thick, prickly walls, heavy with fetid leaves and braced by toothy roots. Her weapons lay broken, her body ached with injuries, and the princess she’d tried to protect was dying in a white stone tower, slain by dark knights.

A drop of wetness stung her face. Then another, and another. Devon blinked. Not tears, only freezing December sleet. This wasn’t a dream. This was reality and she was awake.

Painfully, she sat up.

The hedge shears had left a seven-inch slice down her ribs. Blood loss was making her light-headed again, and disoriented. Black streaks stained her already-filthy shirt, running in rivulets to mix with rain and dirt into a hideous, iron-scented mud.

She turned her head. Nearby, Ramsey sprawled in the grass. Dying or dead, not yet crumbled to paper.

Her son, meanwhile, lay snuggled against the man’s inert form, drowsy and sedate despite the rain.

“Cai!” She crawled over and shook his shoulder. The memory of how overloaded he’d been the last time he’d eaten a book eater was gnawing at her, worse than any of her injuries. “Are you okay? Do you need anything, do you—”

He opened his eyes. “Devon the Destroyer,” he slurred, tongue lolling awkwardly from his mouth. “You are … phenomenal, in your way.”

Relief warred with abhorrence, and she laughed through her tears. She had succeeded wildly tonight, and still managed to fail her son in the final test. Because despite her promises and her murders and her fanatical commitment to protect him from the world, she hadn’t been able to protect him from his own choices, his own crimes that were his to commit.

The sins he chose to bear, for love of her.

Love was sometimes a terrible thing, and he had discovered that just as she had. No words left so she opened her arms, terrified of his rejection but unsure what else to offer or do. He was still her son—wasn’t he? She didn’t know if that still meant anything or not.

Cai crawled into her embrace, folding his scrawny frame against her battered flesh and burying his face in her ruined shirt. She hugged him close.

Someday, Devon thought, her promises would have worth. Someday, she would have enough strength to force the world into the way it needed to be. She would be good, and so would Cai. Somehow, in a place far from here.

“Never again. Please. Never do it to yourself again. Not once we get free.” Devon breathed him in. At least his scent was his own, unchanged from birth and unchanged despite the myriad souls inhabiting his mind.

“Okay,” he said, then released her suddenly to look up with a worried expression. “Dev, what about Hester? She’s very hurt. We’ve forgotten about her.”

Guilt, so much guilt. “I haven’t forgotten. But I had to check on you first.” Devon peeled off her damp shirt and wrapped it tightly around her midriff. She wasn’t sure how to compress a slice across the ribs, it wasn’t like a limb where you could tie a tourniquet. “Sit here. I’ll go have a look, if you’re all right.”

“I’m … all right,” he said. “I’ll be reet, Dev.”

She nodded and wiped her eyes, a futile gesture in the increasingly heavy sleet, since her face was soon wet again. He wasn’t sick, at least. Confused, certainly. Overloaded, probably. But not screaming, in pain, or at risk of stroke.

Ribs bound, tears all wrung out, she climbed agonizingly up the tower steps where only ten minutes ago she and Ramsey had tumbled down in a murderous fury. Her brother; Christ. No, don’t think of him. Hester first.

Devon turned the final step, reaching the observation platform.

Alone on the platform, Mani crouched over Hester, who was still curled over. One crossbow bolt in her right shoulder, and a second protruding from just below the ribs. Black blood spattered the walls in Rorschach patterns.

Not good, Devon thought, nauseated with panic. A limb was one thing, but there were no good organs to hit in the torso. Why hadn’t she ever eaten a first aid manual, all these years? Stupid oversight.

“She’s fine,” Mani said, shaken. “She’s … Good God, what a night!”

Devon said, confused, “She is?”

“For a given value … of fine.” Hester unfolded with a gasp. “I’ll live. I think.”

“How are you alive?” Devon said, dropping to her knees. More from tiredness than anything else. “That bolt should have…” She trailed off.

Ramsey’s bolt had struck the black Chanel bag. A good half inch of quality leather had skewed the shot sideways. Little more than a shallow cut and a bad bruise along Hester’s midriff, though that hadn’t been possible to see until now.

“You,” Devon said, awestruck, “are very lucky. I guess it’s true that you get what you pay for with purses.”

“Luck? I pulled it in front of me … perfect timing. Got to … make your own luck!”

“Clever girl,” Devon said, grinning from relief, and scooped her up again. For the third time that night. “Hang in there, Hes. The nightmare is almost over.” Surely that was true. This couldn’t go on forever; nothing did.

“Yeah? Are you kidnapping me?”

“Nah. I’m rescuing you, princess.”

“Much appreciated,” Hester murmured. When Devon next looked down, the other woman had passed out.