Redeemed (House of Night #12)(96)

They will do this thing for me. I know they will. My children love me as I love them.

Neferet stopped in the foyer before the wide brass and crystal-paned door, directly under the beautiful clock that was so artfully suspended from the ceiling.

“Children, come to me,” she called. They rushed to her. Bloated and throbbing with power gained from their feast, they filled the foyer, eager to respond to her next command. Neferet knelt, gathering them to her, stroking their familiar, beloved skin, marveling at their strength—at how they truly had become her children.

“I know how to break Thanatos’s spell and free us,” she told them. Their eyeless faces turned to her, their writhing bodies surrounded her. “But I cannot do it myself. You must help your Goddess, your Mother. Lynette made it clear, the crone Thanatos hasn’t the power to hold the spell; even she believes it will eventually break. As you know, my darlings, I am not a patient Goddess. And why should we wait?” She petted those children closest to her fondly as she explained to them, “Well, we needn’t wait at all. The White Bull’s words inspired me, and I know the answer. He said, Throughout eternity I have found that the more something is desired, the dearer the sacrifice must be to attain it. I have never desired anything more than to be free of this imprisonment so that I may reign over this mortal realm as Goddess of Darkness, once and forever to be in complete control of my own destiny. And there is nothing dearer to me than you, my loyal children.”

Neferet stood. “So I am going to ask you, not command you. Will you save me? Will you break this spell and free me? If your answer is yes, not all of you will survive this night, but those of you who do will go with me, first to the betraying House of Night, where we will feast on fledgling, vampyre, and human alike, and then we shall go forth together to rule the mortal realm! Know that:

I swear by my immortality,

beside me you forever shall be.

The air around Neferet rippled with the force of her oath. Her children stilled in their writhing. It was a listening stillness—a waiting stillness—and it filled Neferet with joy.

The Goddess whirled around and faced the doors. “Open them!” she cried.

Her children rushed to obey her, holding wide open the Mayo’s double doors so that Neferet could see the quiet, dark night beyond. As she spoke, the power within her began to build, amplifying her words, lifting her hair, skittering under her skin, and pulsing with Dark magick all around her.

I charge you,

oh my children

be my blood

surge forth

to me always true.

I charge you,

oh my children

be my sword

strike forth

with me make the world anew.

I charge you,

oh my children

be my life

carried forth

so that finally, eternally, I receive what to me is due!

Neferet flung her arms wide, and like dark lightning bolts, her children shot forth. The wall of fire flamed, engulfing the first wave of her children. Neferet shrieked her loss as they died. But their deaths did not stop the others. Her children surged forth, battering the flames. Where one burned, another took its place, and though tears washed down Neferet’s face, her shrieks of rage and loss turned to cries of victory as slowly, inevitably, the flames burned lower and lower, until finally, with a hiss of ice covering a candle, the protective wall was extinguished.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Shaunee

“It’s hard to stop thinking about it, isn’t it?” Shaunee said, as she and Erik had fallen into another silence while they stared at the spot Grandma Redbird and the other women had covered with sage and lavender—the spot where Kalona had died.

“It was amazing. I know Zoey and the rest of you guys have seen Nyx a bunch of times, but it still has my head spinning.”

“Hey, I totally understand. Yeah, I’ve seen Nyx before, but it’s not like I’ve gotten used to it. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it.”

“Kalona and Erebus—wow!”

Shaunee nodded, agreeing with him, and happy that he was still so awestruck by what he’d witnessed. She watched him out of the corner of her eye. He’d changed, and she liked the change.

“Thanks for sitting here with me,” she said, glancing at the four mounds the human women made in their sleeping bags, and then looking inside the tent at Thanatos, who had gone back into her silent meditation not long after everyone else had left. “It’d be lonely out here by myself if it wasn’t for you.”

“I’m glad I’m here,” Erik said. “I like being with you and—”

Waves of heat and pain slammed through Shaunee, and she doubled over with a terrible cry. Use me—channel through me—let me strengthen the spell, Shaunee recited over and over to herself as she rocked back and forth, trying to get control of the heat and the chaos and the pain that had exploded through her.

“It’s okay. You can do this, I know you can. Just focus and breathe. Try to relax, just like before,” Erik was saying.

“No!” Shaunee gasped. “Different—from—before! Bad.” She moaned and fell to her side. “Can’t—control.”

“Shaunee, listen to me!” Erik’s voice had gone from calm to concerned. “You can do this. Fire is your element. Remember that. Focus on that.”