David’s sword was another of the Order’s creations, and though David pretended not to believe in the superstition Deven clung to and insisted Deven not name it, she had indeed been forged with a name, the letters carved in among the ornaments Deven had commissioned so that it wouldn’t look like there was anything written on her at all . . . but Deven could see the script and knew what it said.
Deven’s sword was Ghostlight, for the way he moved, a will-o’-the-wisp, barely seen but deadly to follow. Miranda’s was Shadowflame, for the Queen’s bloodred hair and the fire in her heart. David’s . . .
Deven and Jonathan had laughed about it, because if David didn’t want to know, there was no reason not to name the blade something they believed would suit the Prime—both by reputation and by enthusiasm. Deven had it christened “The Oncoming Storm.”
It was one of the names given to the Time Lord in
Doctor Who
, who never died, but regenerated into a new form over and over, and whose power and brilliance were known and feared throughout the universe. Deven liked to imagine how hard David would roll his eyes if he knew the sword’s name, even if he would appreciate the nerdy reference.
And David Solomon, Prime of the Southern United States, had died here, in this place, with The Oncoming Storm at his side . . .
. . . but where was it now?
It would not have burned or melted. It would have been left on the ground amid the piles of ashes.
Someone had taken it.
That someone might even have been Miranda.
His heart was in his throat . . . but all this meant was that someone had taken the sword from the roof after David’s body had burned. It could have been anyone, from one of Hayes’s henchmen to a human worker. And if someone out there had it . . . Deven’s hands clenched with anger. No mere mortal, or vampire trash, had the right to lay hands on such a thing.
He called one of the Red Shadow operatives he had in town, 2.2 Alizarin. “I need to divert you from your current objective.”
“What is your command, my Lord?”
“Start making inquiries about a stolen sword. It will look very similar to my own, but the grip is larger in diameter, the blade about two inches longer; it’s balanced for a left hand and, last I saw it, was carried in a black scabbard. I doubt anyone in the District will have it, since they’ll know it’s hot, but try pawnshops and dealers in the area. The second you find it, bring it to me.”
“Yes, my Lord. Consider it done.”
Deven rose smoothly, straightening his coat. He should get back to the Ambassador and read Monroe’s files on Jeremy Hayes. There were simply too many questions that continued to go unanswered . . . and he made it his business to hunt down answers. He collected knowledge like he collected weapons, and there was no question which was deadlier in the right hands. If they had known what the Awakening ritual was really for . . . if they knew now . . .
Deep down, however, he had a feeling he
did
know.
He took the remains of David’s Signet from his pocket and held it up by the chain, concentrating on it; then he let it go.
It hung in midair, suspended, the way the entire Shadow World seemed suspended to him right now, between one reality and another, one set of impossibilities and another.
Lifetimes ago, Eladra had been fond of saying there was meaning in everything. She had seen omens in the stars and heard whispers in the trees. The world, she said, was a holy instant, a thousand thousand possibilities merging into one reality. Every action was fraught with consequence. Nothing happened by chance.
Meaning . . . meaning in a sudden connection among a handful of Signets when for centuries they had all been sundered. Meaning in David’s death. Meaning in all their lives colliding. Meaning in the slaughter of twenty-eight innocents.
Meaning in a missing sword.
Deven sighed. The Signet fell back down into his outstretched hand.
Eladra would have been amused by his thoughts. Worse yet, she might have found hope in them that he was at long last coming around to her way of thinking. She had tried for so long to help him believe again . . . in God, in miracles, in love.
She had failed on all counts . . . but a hundred years later, David had made him believe in love, and that, in itself, was a miracle.
And now David was gone.
As much as he wished he could find meaning in any of it, Deven knew that there was none. This was how their lives went. Signets died all the time. At least one went down per decade, and he was replaced, and the world carried on without him, uncaring. If there was a god’s hand pulling the strings, he—or she—was a clumsy puppeteer indeed.
Deven knew that Jonathan was right; they should leave, let nature take its course and go back to the way things had always been. David and Miranda had caused tremors in their world, but in the end, the earth would grow still again, and they would be another Pair of names in a long list, footnotes in vampire history. There was no reason to stay here and prolong the inevitable. It wasn’t Deven and Jonathan’s problem. Perhaps they’d be allies with the new Prime, perhaps not. Same shit, different decade.
He spoke quietly, wondering if David’s soul—assuming such a thing existed—was anywhere it could hear him, or if the Prime had moved on to whatever torment or oblivion awaited vampires after death.
“Tell me how to let you go,” he said. “Tell me how, after all this time, I should say good-bye to you.”
A light wind picked up, catching a handful of litter and scattering it across the rooftop. Deven heard a rustling, fluttering noise and lifted his eyes to a power line about fifty feet from where he stood.
An enormous raven perched there, watching him, its glittering gaze steady and unblinking.
Deven rolled his eyes. “I wasn’t talking to you,” he said, and turned away, intending to Mist off the roof and head deeper into downtown for a late-night hunt before returning to the hotel.
Just before he reached into himself for the power, however, he glanced back over his shoulder at the bird, inexplicably uneasy under its watchful eye.
It was gone.
Two
For a while, Miranda wanted nothing more than to die.
Her dreams were full of fear and grief, the pain of so many others leaking into her head like rain through a rotting ceiling. Each drop eroded a tiny bit more of her, until there was nothing left but a raw, exposed emptiness, a void where there had once been warmth.
Please don’t leave me here alone. Please.
Finally, she felt herself shutting down. Her heart simply couldn’t take any more. She had nothing left—no power, no love, no strength, no will to continue. There was no reason to fight her way back from the abyss. The agony of the world was all she had; perhaps it was all she had ever truly had. In the end all her power had changed nothing. She was dying alone in the dark the same way she almost had in that alley so long ago. The circle was at last complete.
She could sense something at the edge of her being: something trying desperately to reach her, to catch her. Something kept trying to wrap itself around her and draw a veil of peace over the gaping wounds.
She turned away from it. She couldn’t fight anymore.
“. . . trying, Lark. But this isn’t really my area. She’s too strong for me—even both of us together aren’t enough.”
A familiar voice, a thousand miles away on the other side of the flood, tight with fear and exertion:
“Come on, Miranda. Don’t give up. You can do this.”
The thought of letting go and sliding down into the black was so inviting, promising silence . . . yet she was curious . . .
“Damn it, Stella, you’re going to kill yourself—”
It was true. The first voice was growing weaker, the energy that was attempting to hold on to Miranda failing. That power was considerable, and the talent was there, but confronted with the enormity of the damage to Miranda’s shields and psyche, it simply couldn’t succeed. A mortal hand wasn’t strong enough for this, but the Witch had thrown herself into it recklessly and fully, not realizing that it was too late, that Miranda was too far gone . . .
And now Stella was, too. The young human was willing to give her life to save someone she didn’t even know, purely out of love.
“Stella! Stell, stay with me, goddamn it, don’t you fucking leave me—”
Please don’t leave me here alone. Please.
So much fear, and so much pain in the world she wanted to leave behind . . . but so much love, and courage . . . and no matter what she had lost, no matter how much she was bleeding and screaming inside, she had taken up the responsibility . . . she wore it around her neck.
She had chosen once to return from the edge and claim the Signet for her own. She had fought her way up through freezing cold water, lungs burning, and hauled herself onto the riverbank to save those she loved.
It was who she was. She had told Cora—what felt like a thousand years ago—that nothing could take that away from them . . . and nothing could . . .
. . . not even death.
She wouldn’t allow it. Not in that alley, not in the black water, and not now.
She came back to herself in a roar, a surge of strength filling her and spilling over into the frail young creature who lay unconscious beside her.
Miranda sucked in a deep, hard breath and sat bolt upright, her fingers clenched in Stella’s. She poured energy into the Witch—and through her into her friend—replenishing what Stella had so selflessly given her. Then she kept pulling, drawing more and more power into herself from a seemingly inexhaustible source somewhere beyond any place she could name, until her entire being sang with it.
She drew her shields back around her like a raven settling its wings.
The room came into focus. A small apartment, shabby but comfortable, with the smell of night in the air. In one corner a gray tabby cat poked its head out from behind a pile of books, its eyes huge and frightened as it stared at her.
Slowly, Miranda turned to face the Witches.
Lark had dived forward to rouse Stella, who was sitting up, the two girls holding on to each other for dear life, their eyes as wide as the cat’s. They were both pale with shock, but Stella was otherwise unharmed.
Miranda looked down at her hands. Her flesh seemed to be glowing for a second as if it were white-hot, but it was returning to normal as the energy she had channeled finished healing her wounds and restoring her sanity. The stone in her Signet was glowing, too, as if a miniature star had woken in its depths, and as her mind began to clear from the haze of power, the light dimmed to its usual level.
She looked down at herself and blinked.
Hello Kitty pajamas?
“Where am I?” she asked softly, startled by the sound of her own voice. It was hoarse, scratchy, as if it had been dragged over broken glass.
Stella’s voice, however, was tremulous. “In . . . in my apartment.”
“What day is this?”
“Wednesday . . . Wednesday night.” Stella took a deep breath, and when she went on she sounded a little more steady. “You woke up on Monday for a minute . . . I’ve been trying to help you shield.”
“She almost died,” Lark said suddenly, anger sparking in the words.
“Lark, I’m fine,” Stella said. “I knew what I was doing.”
“No, you didn’t! Either that or you’re suicidal. I don’t know which is worse. You’ve spent the last two days barely sleeping or eating—”
Miranda lifted her gaze to Stella’s. “You’ve been doing this for two days?”
Stella blushed. “I didn’t want you to die.” She fiddled with a lock of her hair, suddenly seeming to remember whom she was talking to. “I mean . . . you haven’t even done your second album.”
Miranda smiled in spite of everything. It made her face hurt. “I take it the memory wipe didn’t work.”
Now the Witch snorted. “Not so much. Sorry.”
Lark, however, was not ready to back down. “So are you going to tell us what the hell we’ve gotten into here, or what?”
Miranda looked into the girl’s eyes, and Lark turned bright red and lowered her gaze, her hand tightening on Stella’s arm.
“How much do you know?” Miranda asked.
Stella replied, “I know what you are, and a little about
who
you are, but nothing really specific.”
“How did you find me?”
The Witch gestured vaguely toward a small altar set up on the other side of the room. “I was doing a reading,” she said. “Trying to figure out what to do about all of this. I got this vision that told me you were in trouble, and all of a sudden I had to go find you. I can’t explain it—I just had to. I drove downtown and there was this building . . . it blew up. There was a fire, and I found you out front.”
Miranda drew her knees up to her chest, putting her head in her hands. Flashes of memory came to her: chaos on the city streets. The Stone of Awakening. Faith bound to a drum full of explosives . . .
“Oh, God,” she said, shutting her eyes tightly. “Oh, God . . . Faith . . .”
The look on her Second’s face, so full of pain, her body wracked with poison and her heart torn with guilt . . . that last smile before the world burned . . .
Her mind was slowly cycling through the events of that night, the memory returning, each moment more wrenching than the last.
Arrows . . . the guards dragging her up the stairs, leaving a trail of her blood . . .
An altar . . .
“No,” Miranda moaned softly. “No . . . no . . .”
She heard Stella speak, but the words were meaningless in the face of the horror unfolding in Miranda’s mind.
She had fought with every last inch of her will to free herself from their grasp and run back to the roof, but she was too weak, too weak from blood loss . . . she couldn’t remember what she had felt first, the explosion or . . .
“No . . .”
She remembered. She had felt it. She had felt the life draining out of her, out of them both, felt the hammer fall . . . the impact of her body with the cold ground, her soul being torn from her, ripped in half, that kiss of warmth she had felt in her mind for the past four years violently torn away, the wound ragged, bleeding, bleeding . . .