This could get worse before it got better. Zoe needed to get out. And now. Layla had to convince her to leave while she still could.
“I'll take care of Abigail,” Layla offered. “It's my time to go, too.”
“I can't. She's all I've got.”
“No, you've got a whole life to lead. When Shadowman comes, you need to go with him. This place will mess with your head.”
“She's my
sister.
” Again, the sound of an open wound, a heart so ravaged that even if it managed to heal it would be deeply scarred forever.
“I had a sister once, I think.” Layla had her own heart scars.
“Did you lose her?”
Layla didn't remember, but that didn't seem right. She recalled a pressure on her hand and a stubborn refusal to let go, like a tether to life. “I think she lost me.”
Light drew Layla's gaze up, glittered in the trees, moved closer. So bright it made her eyes prick and tear. Someone was coming.
The odd creatures around them rose to attention, then scattered into the trees, leaving only their voices behind,
Coming, coming, coming.
Angels? They'd work, too. Custo could get them out of here. Send word to Shadowman.
Saved.
But from the dark emerged a man of incredible beauty, each step an artful placement. His hair was rich brown, his fae eyes black. He was clothed in gossamer threads, but might as well have been naked for all they did to cover his glorious body. And with the soft smile he threw her, Layla knew that the other creatures might have been part of Faery, but this man was fae.
“Oh, shit,” Zoe said.
A young woman joined him. She had magnificent golden hair, a pair of scissors at her waist, and a waterfall of a skirt spilling around her. Gorgeous.
And another female, naked and sleek. She spoke in a fluid language that came out in a kind of running-free verse song.
Scissor Lady answered, while the man settled his gaze on Zoe.
Layla had no idea what the language was, but she understood everything that was said. They were divvying up the spoils. Scissor Lady wanted her.
Shit was right.
Layla hated name-dropping, but what the hell. “Shadowman is our friend. He'll be here any minute.”
“Friend?” Scissor Lady asked. “Aren't you his lover?”
Layla pushed her shoulders back. If Scissor Lady knew so much, she should know enough to keep away. “Yeah, that, too.”
“He'd have to find you first.” The fae man slowly stroked the line of his collarbone. Then his pectoral muscle. He feathered his fingers down his belly. Looked like he'd have a good enough time all on his own.
The naked woman clapped, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “A game! A game!”
Layla was less enthusiastic. They needed time. Eventually Shadowman would come for her. He'd built a gate to Hell; he wouldn't let her lose her mind in Twilight. Right? Right.
“Anytime soon would be good,” Zoe said.
But what if he was angry? He had reason to be. She'd demanded the worst, and then forced his hand by coming after Zoe.
No. He wouldn't abandon her like this.
The fae moved forward, barefoot and splendid, gods in their own world. A hunger in their eyes.
Layla needed time.
“Run!” she said. Every second counted.
Where is he?
She turned and grabbed hold of Abigail's other arm. Zoe was just as quick and they lunged into the trees together. Branches scraped Layla's arms and roots stubbed her feet, but she pushed forward. Running, running.
Which way? Didn't matter.
Just deeper into the trees. One minute, five minutes, as if time had any meaning there.
When Layla looked back, she'd opened no distance from the pursuing fae, who walked at leisure through the trees as if on a stroll.
The forest grew more dense and dark as they ran, an endless growth of magic.
“Shadowman!” she screamed, but the air swallowed the sound.
Her foot caught and she fell, flat bellied, barely breaking her fall with a palm skid to her elbows. She flipped over, ready to fight. Only stupid girls in bad horror movies fell when chased by monsters. At her feet, she found a long staff was the culprit. The straight length of dark wood was so incongruous with the trees that even with the approach of the fae, she spared a glance to see what it was.
At the staff's end was a severe curved blade, glinting in the twilight. It could only belong to one person: Shadowman.
Layla gripped the shaft with both hands and heaved the blade upward. The scythe was sized for the beast in him, huge, wide, the moon-shaped metal an unwieldy weight for her frame.
“You've found his weapon,” Scissor Lady said, “but you lack the power to use it.”
If he would just come, the scythe would be waiting. All the pieces were here, ready. Where was he?
Layla swung the scythe in a clumsy arc, but the blade passed right through the fae as if they weren't even there.
“Tickled,” said the naked woman, giggling. “Do it again.”
“We're screwed,” Zoe said. “He's not coming. He's not coming!”
Or not coming quickly enough.
Then it was down to fists and feet and teeth. There was power in mortality; Layla just had to find it.
“Poor little girl,” Scissor Lady said. She reached out her hand, and in a jerk of perception, she was suddenly right in front of Layla, stroking her cheek. Except Layla wasn't an adult; she was a child again. Lost and alone. “It's safe here under my skirt.”
“I'll pass, thanks,” Layla answered, stumbling back with revulsion. She shook her head to clear the illusion. To grow back up. Already her mind was going.
The naked woman had a grip on Abigail, while the fae man petted Zoe.
“So many things I want to try with you,” he said.
Abigail let up a wail. The naked woman pulled strands of light from Abigail's skin, like ghostly marionette strings. “Feels good.”
“We get so few with both the body and soul intact,” Scissor Lady said.
“Get off my sister!” Zoe cried.
Layla dropped the useless scythe and lunged for the naked fae toying with Abigail. Tumbled her off and set the creature shrieking with laughter. Layla went to punch the fae in the face, but her wrist was captured by Scissor Lady, who effortlessly lifted her and dragged her some paces away. Layla's kicking legs scored the earth, and her hands swatted the air to find the woman behind her. The effort was wasted.
“Now, pet,” Scissor Lady chided, “you belong to me, not her.”
Layla was nobody's pet.
The naked woman straddled Abigail's fallen body. Abigail moaned, turning her head to the side. Layla perceived a brief shift, a blurring of flesh and light, of disengagement between Abigail's soul and body, the same that Layla had experienced in the grip of the ghost. Abigail's body was expiring, yet her soul was still pinned between the naked woman's legs.
Zoe was scrabbling on the ground, working for the scythe. The fae man stood back for a moment, making a show of admiring Zoe's backside.
They'd all just have to hold out, endure, until Shadowman came. Kathleen had been an expert at enduring; surely the nugget of that skill was somewhere in Layla, as well.
“You're supposed to be dead, too,” Scissor Lady murmured in Layla's ear, as she looked on Abigail's death.
“Not today,” Layla said through clenched teeth, jerking hard to free herself. Scissor Lady's clamp on her hand was unperturbed.
The naked woman, still astride Abigail, arched her back and laughed at the sky.
Zoe's grasp found the scythe. She stood, chest heaving, the weapon in her hands. “Get off my sister.”
A wind riffled through the trees. The naked fae looked over cheerfully. Ready to play.
A tremor started in the ground. Layla braced in Scissor Lady's grasp, but Zoe didn't seem to notice. Rage burned in her eyes. “I said,
Get. Off. My. Sister!
”
The darkness of the forest convulsed. The scythe gleamed. The tremor rose to a rolling earthquake, and even Scissor Lady drew back, though she dragged Layla with her. Shadow grew dense around Zoe as she bore down on the naked fae woman.
With each step, blackness filled Zoe's gaze. Her expression was fixed in anger, tilting the structure of her features much like a fae's. The force of her feeling leached into her skin, making it shine with an eerie glow.
Twilight was a place of emotion, dark and bright, both extremes on fire within Zoe. Here was the power of mortality. Layla knew she was witnessing a transformation.
Zoe sliced through the air with the huge weapon, and in the rainbow arc of its sweep, the scythe, too, changed to match its new wielder. When Zoe struck down the naked woman, cut the laugh from her face, the scythe was a part of her, mastered by rage and love. The fae gasped into a cloud of Shadow.
Zoe swung around to face the male fae, and in terror and confusion, Layla knew Zoe was the new face of Death. The first soul she'd shepherd would be her sister's.
What about . . . ? “Shadowman!” Layla screamed.
“This way,” Scissor Lady said, dragging Layla into the trees. The last thing she saw was Zoe facing the male fae, Shadow crackling at her back.
“Zoe!”
But Scissor Lady put a hand over her mouth. “She'll never find you. Would you want her to? She killed your man Death when she possessed his scythe.”
Killed? Shadowman? “That's not possible.”
“His power was in his duty. He's left it for too long, and now another has taken it over.” Scissor Lady tightened her grip. “He's gone.”
“He's immortal.” He'd told her so.
“Not anymore.” Scissor Lady's mouth curled into a sneer. “Fool.”
Layla was hauled through the trees. She caught a glimpse of dark branches, a violet sky, a blazing streak of a star. Her heart clamored as her eyes filled with tears.
Shadowman?
She'd had her chance to save him. A second life to bring him back to Twilight. To steal a moment to love. She'd failed Heaven.
Much, much worse, she'd failed him.
Chapter 16
Decision made, Shadowman settled into a defensive wait. The angels prepared to strike, but they could not harm him. The gate would stand, no matter the cost.
kat-a-kat-a-kat-a-kat: So we'll be friends, you and I.
Hardly.
Custo groaned, trouble pouring out of him. The angels' minds were open to each other. The boy had to know their strategy.
“You need not betray them,” Shadowman said. “I know how they will approach. I have presided over many battles over the ages.”
“And you call me a mind reader,” Custo said, the unease abating a fraction.
“I'd imagine emotion is often more telling.”
The angels would attempt a divide and conquer: a contingent to busy Custo, a larger one to busy him, and a third to attack the gate. It would not work.
A long moment of silence, and then, as if on silent cue, the host attacked.
Shadowman thrust a wall of pitch between him and the gate, and the fast-approaching angels were flung back, bodies skipping on the hard floor of the cave.
Ballard lunged, wielding a blade, Heavenly in origin, so it seared as it sliced, but Death reformed just as quickly, unscathed. Ballard would have to do much better than that. Shadowman hit him, heard the snap of his spine, felt the shock of pain, as the angel flew back. At least the spine would take longer to heal.
A jut of Shadow and the angel grabbing for the hammer flew to the side, taking two more with him. Another burn, quick to heal. A spin, a dart, a thrust of darkness and none were near enough to touch him.
More would come.
Custo held off four of his own kind with no weapon, though the wounds he took soaked his shirt. Sweat and dirt streaked his face, but still he moved and struck with grace and force.
Darkness whipped around the cave in a frenzy. Shadowman cast his mind out once again to harness the storm as it swirled around him.
But . . . the hurricane of pitch did not obey.
He tried again and was instead barraged by cave dust and wetness, singeing his skin. Always in the presence of angels he felt a burn, but he hadn't expected Shadow to go astray.
Well, then.
With his fist he knocked an angel back from the gate. A blow like that should have sent the angel to the far depths of the cave, but he only fell a few paces. And rose to try again.
Something was wrong.
Shadowman took position in front of Hell. Kicked the angel back again. But the burn on Death's skin had grown to a maddening inferno, sending needles of fire deep into his muscles and igniting his bones. Within him, he sensed the rush and pull of Earth, relentless in its reckoning, rapturous in its claim.
His mind was ablaze. His vision blurred with echoes of movement. The pain brought him to his knees, and he screamed his agony, the sound reverberating through the cave.
“The wrath of God is upon Death!” Ballard cried. He darted forward with his silver blade to strike.
Shadowman reeled as Ballard slashed through the air. Felt a strange sizzle. Glanced down. Marveled as blood dripped from a slice across his chest.
Blood.
How? Death could not bleed.
Ballard whirled, kicking Death back against the gate. Shadowman heard a skull crack, but it took a moment for him to realize that it was his head that made the sound. A sharp taste was in his mouth, and the smell and texture told him it was blood. Again.
His blood.
Shadow made no effort to restore him. It lifted away like a blanket of mist, leaving him naked and so cold on the silt of the cave floor.
Ballard leaped into the air, the dagger poised to plunge into Death's heart.
Shadowman raised a defensive arm and wondered again at the flesh of his body. He didn't fear the dagger, couldn't in his utter confusion. He knew in the abstract that the dagger meant death, but he was Death, so it made no sense.
And then Ballard was knocked out of the air by a boot to his gut and dropped like a stone.
“Look at him!” Custo yelled.
Look at whom?
Shadowman shook with chill and dampness. Put fingers to the red on his chest. Lifted his hand to his eyes, as if he'd never seen spilled blood before.
“He's mortal!” Custo announced.
“Who is mortal?”
Custo glanced over, pity in his eyes. “Oh, fucking hell. You are.”
Shadowman used the gate to climb to standing. His knees buckled and he slid right back down again. This must be gravity. Earth's breast smelled mineral sweet.
kat-a-kat-a-kat-a-kat: Open me quick before they cut you down. They will use your weakness to destroy Layla.
“But he's fae,” Ballard argued, standing.
“I am fae,” Death agreed. For once Ballard was right. Most other times the angel was too much of a zealot to think through what came out of his mouth. Passion alone should not put a man in a position of authority.
Ballard lowered his weapon, a look of consternation on his face.
kat-a-kat-a-kat-a-kat: Time is running out.
“Yes,” Custo said. “Can't we take a moment to think?”
Shadowman squinted as Ballard pointed an accusing finger in his direction, but he could not get a sense of Ballard's emotion. Dozens of mortals were in this cavern, yet it felt empty.
“This changes nothing,” Ballard said.
“Death, a fae, is now a man,” Custo returned. “This changes everything.”
A man.
The word made Death's heart beat faster, a breathless marvel in itself.
He couldn't wait to show Layla. She would mock him mercilessly, and they both would enjoy every moment of it.
Ballard shook his head. “There is still a gate to Hell right there.”
kat-a-kat-a-kat-a-kat: Here they come.
Of all times, Shadowman needed strength now, yet he was as naked and clumsy as a newborn foal. Next to him on the ground was the hammer. He reached for it with little hope and was incredulous as his hand closed easily, so very easily, around its shaft. He tried again to stand. Braced his legs apart.
No one would get near the gate while he lived.
kat-a-kat-a-kat-a-kat: Hurry! They will rip us both apart.
“Perhaps he was delivered to us in the flesh so that he might be killed,” Ballard said.
The gathered host murmured, considering this suggestion.
“At the very least, this bears new discussion, Ballard,” one of the host said. “He can't even stand.”
Shadowman had thought the cave was moving, but he guessed it must be him.
“Look at his chest,” said another.
Shadowman glanced down at the long slice of his wound. The blood had gone tacky, crusting at the edges. He touched the parted skin, which, yes, did not seem as raw as it had a moment ago.
“Holy shit. He's healing,” Custo said. “Does that make him one of us?”
“No,” Ballard said, his eyes narrowing.
“But he just fell to Earth. That
has
to meanâ”
Shadowman startled at a noise in the mouth of the cavern. All heads turned toward the opening. A scrabble of dirt. A knock of a fallen rock. An unfamiliar man descended, but Shadowman couldn't tell anymore if the person was angel or human.
“Keep it together,” Custo said to him, pitched low for warning.
The newcomer had to be an angel, then, and conversing telepathically with the others.
“What? What's happened?” Shadowman questioned.
“Apparently, Adam's been trying to get us a message.”
Shadowman shivered under a wash of cold sweat. “Tell me.”
“Do you know Abigail?”
“The oracle?”
Custo blinked. “Okay, whatever. Apparently Shadow overcame Segue to claim her.”
“Her talent was great.” So great it had ruined her youth and aged her body prematurely. Her sister had been holding on to her with everything she had, to no avail. If Abigail wouldn't pass into Shadow, then yes, Shadow would come to claim such a one as her. He was glad Layla wasn't filled with Shadow, or she, too, would eventually be overtaken.
“Well, Shadow got her sister, Zoe, a few members of the Segue staff, and . . .”
Shadowman closed his eyes to stop the name from dropping from Custo's lips.
It dropped anyway. “. . . and Layla, too.”
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Layla went reeling into a tree as Scissor Lady released her grasp. The wood gashed her lip, and she held on to the harsh throb to keep her mind sharp. It was too easy to lose it here. The endlessness of the forest, the whispers of magic, all of it conspired to confuse and mislead.
“I don't believe you,” Layla said. Shadowman couldn't be gone. Death was eternal. He was a constant in the great scheme of existence. Necessary. That was the whole reason why she'd been born a second time, to convince him to do his job or the three worlds and everyone within them would be in jeopardy. For that great purpose she'd given up both him and Talia. A family. Her life. Shadowman couldn't be gone.
And yet she'd seen Zoe change in front of her eyes. Handle Death's scythe when she couldn't. Where was Zoe now? Was she still fighting off opportunistic fae? Hell, all fae were opportunistic.
“It doesn't matter if you believe me, does it?” Scissor Lady gave a sparkling smile.
Layla threw back her shoulders. She'd faced a devil. She'd faced a ghost. She could handle one measly fae.
“So much temper,” Scissor Lady said. “No wonder Death liked you. I like you, too.”
The feeling wasn't mutual.
“You know, many have tried to thwart Fate through the ages. But like Death, Fate always catches up with you.”
She must be talking about the doomed-to-die thing. “I'm still here, aren't I?”
“You've reached the end. I think you know that.”
The end, yes. Her mission was at an end, and so was this life. Twenty-eight years of loneliness, and then Shadowman and Talia. Was it worth it? Yes, a hundred times over. Was it worth this final capture by some vain fae? Yes, though she'd bet good money the worst was yet to come.
Layla sought deep inside for the core of her will: the endurance of Kathleen. She'd need that now where she'd mocked it before. It was rooted in her connection to Talia and Shadowman, wherever he was. They were everything she'd ever needed and so much more.
The only thing left to do was fight, though she had no hope whatsoever of survival.
“I cut the thread of your life myself.” Scissor Lady raised a brow, as if to coax Layla to some kind of realization.
“You cut . . .” Layla looked at the scissors again.
Oh, crap. This was bad.
Out of Scissor Lady's body, another woman stepped with engorged, exposed breasts leaking milk. She held a spindle in her hands, shining threads wound about her like spider's silk. “Layla Mathews née Kathleen Marie O'Brien. I spun your life.”
And this was where bad met worse.
“I measured the twenty-eight years of your life.” A third woman, an old woman, leaned out the other side, a rod in her hand. Her hair was a soft patchwork of cobwebs. Wrinkled and bowed, her hands gnarled with age, she seemed the weakest of the three. Until Layla got a load of the Shadow in her eyes.
Maid, mother, crone. And of the three, Scissor Lady was the leader.
This wasn't any old fae Layla faced. This was the bitch of them all. “You're Fate.” What had Shadowman called her? “Moira.”
“When I say your life is over,” Scissor Lady said, “then your life is over. Shall I show you the ragged end?”
“No.” Layla didn't want to see it.
“Or would you like to crawl under my skirt?” Scissor Lady swept up the material. “You can bide here as long as you like.”
It did look inviting. A dark, close space where she could hide.
The three women circled around her like witchy forest nymphs. At first their feet kicked up tree leaves, the colors dream bright, even in bits. Then they kicked up gray ash.
Smell went utterly dead. The air, cold.
Layla trembled but slowly lifted her gaze and found the treescape transformed into the black-and-white emptiness of Death's heart. The skeleton trees branched like great, ominous cracks in the universe. The ground was a snow of dust. Even the fae women paled, the color contrasts broadening, delineating into the nulls of dark and light.