This was a vast sepulcher for the soul, once Shadowman's, now hers.
“You want Shadowman?” Scissor Lady asked. “Well, here he is.”
No, this was the part of himself he'd wanted to cast away. With him goneâ
dead?
âthis was all that was left.
The brightness filled her eyes and parched her skin like sunburn. She could feel the place leaching from her the memory of color, the stuff of her dreams.
The Fates circled, buzzards awaiting the break of her mind.
Not going to happen.
Layla charged Moira, feet digging into the powder and lifting great billows into the air.
Bring the bitch down like a wraith. Grab for the scissors. Stab.
Her footfalls lifted huge clouds of lazy ash, obscuring the way. And when they thinned, the witch was suddenly on the other side of her, never changing the pace of her stride around her prey.
Layla coughed, choking on the powder.
A wasted effort. Blind violence would accomplish nothing. They were playing with her.
Layla shielded her eyes from the glare of the white. If she could just have a little darkness, maybe she could puzzle this out. A little warmth and her blood might reenergize her nerve.
“It's dark here under my skirt,” Moira called. “Warm, too.”
No, thanks. Layla pulled her hands away from her face and lifted her chin. Last thing she wanted was to find herself under there.
“You might last a little longer.”
Lie.
“You're fading already.” The three laughed.
“No. I'm still here.” She pushed her shoulders back to prove it.
Moira tilted her head in pity. “You don't even know your name.”
Layla blinked stupidly. Wracked her brain. Her heart stalled.
Moira was right. She had no idea.
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Shadowman sat in the passenger side of a vehicle, a “Hummer” some angel had called it. The driver said he was going as fast as he could, but Shadowman could still count every tree, dried leaf, and scrag of grass, or so it seemed.
This was powerlessness. Acute, miserable, an agony of utter dependence.
Climbing out of the cave had been a blur of hitching breath and clumsy, bleeding feet. At the mouth, clothes were waiting, though he didn't care if he went naked. He needed to get to Segue. He should have been there already, but Shadow would not obey him.
Mortal? Inconceivable.
He growled his impatience, but it did nothing to hurry their progress down the road.
He'd had to rely on Custo to hunt through Twilight for Layla. Custo. An angel. With his fae blood, he might do better than others of The Order, might be able to use his hunter's nose to scent her, but Shadowman had little hope. Twilight was trees upon dark trees unto Forever, and then still more. Not even he had covered all that ground, because it had no end.
Layla must be mad by now, her mind trapped in nightmare. He could only hopeâand what a weak power it wasâthat no fae had discovered her. If so, finding her would be impossible. Even the lowliest of the fae were cunning deceivers.
“Hang tight, we're there,” the driver said, slowing to a stop in front of the white sweep of Segue's main entrance.
Shadowman fought the door to get it open, ended up smacking it with his forearm to blow the thing clear off the vehicle. He cast his gaze around the edifice seeking Shadow, and finding none, he tripped going up the stairs for his lack of care. As far as he could see, the only Shadows on the building were the pale, stretched blotches of the coming break of day.
The door burst open and Adam jogged down to greet him. Shadowman watched Adam's gaze travel the length of his new human body. His expression was stressed with concern.
“It's true, then. You're mortal.”
“Where's Layla?” Shadowman scarcely knew his own voice. Everything an effort, the littlest combination of breath and throat and tongue delayed his finding her.
“I'm so sorry,” Adam said. If Adam felt sorry, Shadowman couldn't sense it, and so the claim felt empty. “When the Shadow came over Segue, she went to help Zoe with Abigail.”
The heat of anger that rolled over Shadowman's skin made him sway. “You said you'd protect her.”
“I had to get Talia and the children out,” Adam explained. “Layla said you'd come for her. How could I have known you'd become mortal? I didn't even know such a thing was possible.”
Shadowman pushed Adam aside and continued up the stairs. The boy was useless. “Where is my daughter? Where is Talia?”
“She's in an outbuilding. This place is too dangerous for her.”
“Get her, then. And
you
watch the children.”
“Don't talk to him that way,” Talia said from above them, a babe on each hip. She looked to her husband, shrugging. “I came in the back. I think the worst is over.”
“Be still your tongue!” If the worst were over, then Layla was lost. And the bitter, bitter irony was he'd do anything right now to grip his scythe. To hear its keen and answer it with a roar of his own. He'd bear the endless millennia as Death to see her safely through Shadow to the gates of Heaven. Becoming the Reaper again would be such a small price to pay to preserve her spirit. He should have listened to her when he had the chance. Now they were both lost.
Talia pressed her lips together for a moment. “What do you need?”
Shadowman reached the top of the stairs. “I need a wraith and then I need you to scream like you have never screamed before.”
They congregated again below the earth in the prison Adam had dedicated to the wraiths, where Death had revealed himself to Layla, and she had known the purpose to her second life on Earth. The angels they left aboveground, so as not to compete with Talia's call to Shadow. Talia's children were below as well, in a stroller for convenience. That Talia and Adam would permit them in this stinking grave spoke of their own concern for Layla. If this didn't work . . . If he couldn't cross . . .
At least, for all the devil's games, she had not set the wraiths free.
Two guards and some sort of mechanical arm conveyed a wraith to a movable slab. Binding metal bands restrained each of its limbs and a doubled cage crossed its torso. The creature writhed until blood dripped down the silver, so it must have known its death was coming.
“Scream,” commanded Shadowman, looking over at his daughter.
He could tell Talia's thoughts were turned inward, focused on Layla no doubt, and summoning the required intensity of feeling for the task before her.
Please, child, draw deep.
She took a long breath and then shredded the veil with a shriek, a command, a misery, her arms lifting to her sides, fingers splayed with effort. The sound was a wail of her own pain, a lifetime of loss in the making, a hope found, then demolished. The feeling battered the room with its intensity and set the wraith shrieking with her.
And indeed, darkness swirled in a vortex of magic, a storm of great reckoning to call upon Death. The sound shook his mortal body, atom upon atom quailing, which didn't bode well.
Shadowman dived into the terrible center. Flung himself across the divide between the worlds. But only ended up a few paces from where he'd stood a moment before.
The wraith made muffled sounds of laughter, then cut off suddenly, its eyes wide with fear.
From the depths, the moon scythe gleamed. And soon a figure emerged, a girl, Zoe. The sister to the great one. Her gaze now had the black depth of Shadow, her skin the queer shine of the fae. She gripped his weapon, and when she took in the scene, her face contorted.
“Oh, fuck no,” she said, eyeing Talia, whose scream ended abruptly. “Ain't no way I'm coming when
she
calls.”
“Give me the scythe.” Shadowman held out his hand.
“Finders keepers.” But true to her nature, Zoe said one thing and did the opposite, handing over the weapon with a bored jerk.
He took the scythe and rolled the wood of the staff between his palms. Its texture and heft had always been second nature to him, yet it felt unfamiliar now. Too slim and light, the magic absent in his hands. A weak sensation pooled in his belly, dread, and stole what little strength he had.
He closed his eyes to be surrounded with his familiar dark. “Can you give me the power to wield it as well?”
“And how do you propose I do that?” The girl, the new Death, dripped sarcasm.
Shadowman opened his eyes again and handed the scythe back. His head pounded with the simple action. He'd denied the blade too long. It had cried for him from Twilight, begging to be lifted, and now when he needed it most, the thing had abandoned him.
“Do you know what happened to Layla?” Asking this chit for news of such import tightened his skin unbearably. He'd have shrugged out of his new flesh if he could have, but it clung to him, gloved him.
“She tried to help us,” Zoe said, her tone barbed. “She thought you would come. She screamed for you, but obviously you weren't listening.”
Layla had called his name. She'd needed him.
“What happened?” he snapped.
Zoe's expression finally mellowed to pity. “There were three fae. The one with the scissors dragged her away.”
“Moira.” Shadowman staggered. His mortal legs would not hold him.
“Who?” Adam asked, reaching out an arm to steady him.
“Fate,” Shadowman clarified. “Fate has her claws in Layla.”
The worst
had
happened.
Adam turned to Zoe. “Seems you've got his power now. Look for her, will you? Custo is already there. The Order may send more angels as well, but they won't value her soul over any other's, so they may not be much help.”
No help at all.
“Layla will be under Moira's skirt,” Shadowman said. As if Zoe would ever be able to locate Fate, much less bid the witch to lift her dress. “And she will be gone to madness, her soul light dimming.”
He'd brought this upon her. Cursed her and trapped himself in mortal impotence. This was why she had come back to life, to prevent this very thing from happening. He'd been a fool, vain in his power.
“Layla will be under Fate's skirt,” Zoe repeated, as if the combination of words made no sense to her. Then with false brightness, “Alrighty.”
Death's scythe swung out, and the wraith's head was severed, its body sagging into gore.
As Zoe evaporated into the void, Talia's black-eyed child reached a chubby hand after young Death.
“I'm getting them out of here,” Talia said and wheeled the stroller down the hallway toward the elevator.
Shadowman made to follow, his mind rapidly sorting all the places on Earth where the veil might be thin. Kathleen's paintings would not work, if this attempt at Shadow hadn't. But, water had always been a medium of transfer. Fire, too. Emersion or immolation. Or . . .
Adam fell into step next to him. “Listen, I know you've got no love for the angels, but they're an undeniable power that is at least somewhat accessible to us. I suggest you go to their headquarters, where information is more readily available. Maybe they can figure out what happened to you and give you some idea of how to reverse it.”
“They will not treat with me,” Shadowman said, boarding the elevator that would raise them to the surface. The angels had defied him at every turn, and as a mortal, he lacked the power now to force their compliance. They might even cut him down, if Ballard had his way. Shadowman had to try something else. A
Diné
ceremonial sandpainting, perhaps. Though that, too, would take so much time.
“I bet they will,” Adam returned. “Word is you might just be one of them.”
There was no way he was a mortal angel. The idea was preposterous.
“Try Luca, Custo's uncle. He's a little more reasonable. I'm sure he'll help in whatever way he can. And, they have their own access to Shadow.”
Shadow.
“How do I get there?” New York City, the nearest locus of The Order's power, was miles away. “The last vehicle went so slow.”
Adam pulled half a smile. “I think I can move you quite a bit faster than that Hummer.”
“Oh, no,” Talia said, as they stepped out into the sunlight. “Here he goes.”
Adam put a phone to his ear. “Kev, I'm going to need the Sikorsky five minutes ago.” He paused, then answered, “Make him as comfortable as you can. I'll be there to speak with him shortly.”
Talia rounded on her husband. “What now?”