Redeemed (House of Night #12)(99)

I went to Shaunee and took her hand. Stevie Rae joined me, completing our circle. “I love you. All of you. No matter what happens to me, if our circle breaks, get the hell out of here. Go to our tunnels under the depot. Stevie Rae, get them there. Use earth to seal yourselves in until you can regroup.”

“Not without—” Stevie Rae began.

“No!” my voice was filled with power, making the four of them jerk in surprise. “You have to listen to me. If the circle breaks, I’ll be like Thanatos. It’s my circle, my spell. It’ll kill me.” As I said it, I knew it was true. My gaze found Aurox. “If I’m dead, protect them.”

Aurox said nothing, he only nodded once.

My eyes met my Stark’s. “If you’re still alive, help Aurox get them to safety.”

“I will, my High Priestess, my Queen, and then I will follow you to the Otherworld,” Stark said, bowing somberly to me.

“At least this time you’ll know where to find me.” I smiled at him. “At the entrance, under the wishing tree. I’ll wait for you.”

A shrill scream sounded in the distance.

“Neferet’s coming,” I said. “I’m your center. Circle around me, but hide! Now! And may all of you blessed be.”

My circle scattered north, south, east, and west, leaving me alone with Aurox and Stark. I took the Seer Stone out from under my T-shirt and pulled the thin platinum chain over my head. Holding it securely in my hand, I looked from Stark to Aurox. “If this thing starts to change me, kill me before I’m like her.”

“It will be as you say,” Aurox said.

Stark looked pale, but he nodded. “I won’t let it make a monster of you.”

“Thank you,” I said. “And now let’s stop this bitch before she hurts anyone else we love.”

Stark and Aurox followed me as I walked quickly down the stone path. I felt a weird sense of déjà vu. Had it only been a few days ago that I’d stomped down this path, pissed at the world? It seemed a century ago, and I seemed a totally different person.

I am a different person. What happened here changed me. What happened here made me grow up. I realized.

I came to the top of the wide stone stairs and stopped. Pointing down over the lip of the ridge, I said, “There, see it? Inside that rounded stone area over there is the grotto. That’s where we’re going to trap her.”

We heard another scream, this one closer to the park.

“I’m going down.” Aurox pointed. “I’ll hide behind the stones at the base of the stairs. Neferet will expect to see Stark. She won’t be looking for me.” He looked at Stark. “I’m going to change. If I lose control and turn on any of you, do whatever you have to, but stop me.”

“Aurox, you will not lose control.” Words whispered through my mind and I repeated them aloud. My voice didn’t even sound like my own—it was older, wiser, stronger, and utterly filled with love. “Your bull has changed. It is no longer a creature of Darkness. Your Old Magick is now that of Light.”

“Who are you? How do you know this?”

The whispers left me, and in my own voice, I said, “Well, I’m a Priestess of your Goddess. She tells me things. This time she also told you.”

“It will have all been worth it if that is true,” Aurox said.

“Then it’s been worth it, because our Goddess never lies,” I said.

Stark extended his hand to Aurox. “Good luck. I’m glad you’re here with us in the end. It’s only right that you help me protect Zoey.”

Aurox grasped his forearm. “When this is over, I’d like it if we could share a beer, or six.”

Stark grinned. “It’s a deal.”

“Great,” I said, shaking my head at them both. “Death—destruction—our Goddess speaking—and you guys want beer.”

“Not right now, Zo. Afterward,” Aurox said in Heath-speak, and then he went down the stairs, taking them three at a time.

I turned to Stark, but before I could say anything he pulled me into his arms and kissed me. “Just live,” he said when he finally released me.

“I will if you will,” I said.

“It’s a deal,” he repeated.

Then a movement over his shoulder caught my eye. Under the streetlight at the Twenty-first and Peoria Street intersection, tendrils of Darkness swarmed.

“She’s here,” I said. I gripped my Seer Stone, thinking … thinking … And then I knew—at least part of what I needed to do. “It has to be like on Skye. The Fey are attached to Old Magick!”

“What can I do to help you?”

“I need something sharp.”

“No worries. I got this handled.” Stark sprinted to the Hummer, yanking open the door and taking out the duffel bag full of arrows he’d brought. Then he was running to me. He paused and took one of his arrows from the bag. “Be careful. It’s real sharp.” He kissed me quickly, pulled his bow from his back, and took a position three stairs down from me. He smiled grimly and said, “I can’t kill her, but I sure as hell can hurt her.”

“She’s vain. Remember that. Aim for her face,” I said. “That’ll really piss her off.”

Then all my attention was focused on her tendrils of Darkness. They were swarming into the park, like black oil spilling over the ocean’s surface. In the center of them, being carried forward with their tide of evil, was Neferet.