Kissed by Eternity (20 page)

The Marid stepped forward, derailing my train of thought. Not that it needed help. "Soulshifters are extremely rare," he rumbled.

"And they're what, exactly?" I asked.

He tilted his head and stared at Zip as if he could somehow pull her apart molecule by molecule and see the truth within. "Our physical bodies are nearly impossible to kill, as you know, but since our natural state is energy, our 'souls' as you call them, remain conscious after the body dies. It is possible, though rare, for the soul of a djinni to become stuck in the body of a mortal being. And when that body dies, it shifts to the next, and the next."

"Mortal. You mean a human."

"Among other species, yes. It can only happen if the host's previous soul has already fled but before any kind of, er, deterioration has set in." He meant decomp. Ew.

"You're telling me Zip's soul is stuck in that girl's body?" I peered at her as if I could see Zip's Marilyn Monroe figure somewhere in the slight girl.

Abbie giggled. "Don't feel bad. Imagine how long it took me to come to grips with it all, and I knew what I was."

"You're really Zip?" I asked.

"In the flesh." She winked and giggled again, a light, tripping sound. Yep. That was Zip all right.

With a cry I wrapped my arms around her, squeezing her tight. Tears welled in my eyes and trickled down my face. "I thought you were dead."

"The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated, I assure you. But it's nice to see you, too. Would you please let go? I do believe you're strangling me."

I gave a watery chuckle and let go. "I still can't believe you're alive. And you found Mikey? I mean Mick."

"Long story." She shrugged. "I'll tell you sometime. But Kabita says you need my help."

I nodded, managing to force my scattered mind to focus. "We have a spell that requires a Soulshifter."

"Well, I have to admit, I'm not really that great at being a Soulshifter yet. Still trying to figure stuff out. Do you know what I have to do?"

"Ah, no. We haven't translated the spell yet." Only the queen could do that, and I sure as hell didn't trust her.

"Can I see it?" Zip asked.

"You read obscure Ancient Atlantean dialects?" Kabita asked with a lifted brow.

Zip laughed. "Not exactly, but I've come across some weird shit lately. Oh, hi, Emory." She waved. Emory waved back. So, they knew each other. My worlds were colliding in a very odd way.

Kabita handed Zip the grimoire, and she studied the pages with a furrowed brow. "Oh, this isn't an Atlantean dialect," she finally said.

We all stared at her. "It's not?" I asked.

"Nope. It's djinn. Very old djinn." She handed it to the Marid.

"It is, indeed, an old dialect of our language." His voice was a low rumble. "I can understand the mistake. The djinn did not have their own written language, so they borrowed one from their neighbors, the Atlanteans. We came from the same planet, after all."

"You can read it?" I asked.

"Of course."

I shot a glare at the queen, who was looking decidedly pissed off. "It's not something a Sidhe could read?"

"Definitely not. This language died with our planet. I am one of the few djinni left who can read it."

Which made absolute sense. The High Priest had deliberately written the spell in a language so ancient only the Marid could read it. Clever boy.

"Can you tell what the spell does?"

The Marid opened his mouth but before he could answer, there was a shout from Trevor. "Morgan, quick!"

I hurried over to where Trevor was guarding the chained Alister. Something was wrong. Kabita's father was doubled over, and his skin was doing some weird thing like it had worms in it or something.

"What the hell?"

Trevor shook his head. "I think he's changing."

Alister's back bowed, and I caught sight of his face. His lips were pulled back in an ugly grimace, his canines suddenly longer than they should be. His eyes had gone strangely cloudy. No doubt about it. He was definitely morphing into a vampire.

"Shit. The sun is still up. If he changes here, he's going to die."

"Let him." I hadn't realized Kabita had joined us.

I gave her a startled look. "Are you sure?"

Her face was blank. I couldn't read her feelings at all. "Dead sure. Let him dust."

"Kabita," Alister moaned. "Please…"

"Please, what? Forgive you for all the damage you've done? For the evil you've created in this world? I don't think so. You're about to become a vampire. A
vampire
. One of the things you hate most. One of the creatures we hunt. It's time to end this once and for all."

Guilt ate at my insides. I had done this to him. I had turned another person, a human, into one of the monsters. By accident, of course. I'd no idea my blood still carried the virus, that I could create a vamp. I felt sick.

"Don't you dare feel guilty," Kabita whirled on me as if she could read my mind. "He made his bed. He can freaking well dust in it." And with that she stormed away.

"You promised a cure," Alister moaned.

"There is no cure," I told him softly. "There never has been."

He whimpered. "I don't want to die."

I felt almost sorry for him then. He was so far gone, he probably hadn't had a true plan in months. He'd just been going through the motions as his brain slowly deteriorated. He was a shell of the man he'd once been.

Helpless, Trevor and I watched as Alister Jones began the inevitable change from human to vampire. I saw the moment it happened, the moment the creature in front of me was no longer Kabita's father or my nemesis, but became the mortal enemy of human kind. And then his skin caught fire, and he burst into so much ash and dust.

I would like to say I didn't cry. Alister Jones didn't deserve my tears.

But I did.

Chapter 25

I returned to the group with Trevor. They studiously avoided looking at me, except for Inigo, who wrapped an arm around my shoulders and kissed my forehead. The warmth of his love wrapped around my heart, and I sent the emotion back, knowing he'd feel it too.

"I think I know this spell," Zip squealed, clearly unfazed by watching someone like Alister go up in smoke. "Kabita, remember when you helped us stick that demon from my school into one of those bubble things between worlds?"

"Excuse me?" I said. "Demon at your school? What?"

Zip shook her head. "A long story. We'll do coffee. I tried calling you for help, but you were in Paris."

Chasing after Alister Jones. My heart gave a painful lurch. "Right."

"So Kabita helped out. She stuck the demon into this bubble thing."

"Interdimensional pocket," Kabita muttered.

"Right," Zip chirped. "This is like the reverse spell, but badass."

"So, we're pulling something out of an interdimensional pocket," I said.

"Not just anything." Zip grinned. "Something major. Something old. Like super old. Whatever is in there has been there for, like, thousands of years."

Okay. That was terribly unspecific. "No clue as to what? Or who?"

"No," said the Marid as he leaned over Zip's shoulder. "But the priest wanted whatever it is out. So out it is."

Mick was giving the Marid sidelong looks. Couldn't say I blamed him. The Marid was getting awfully chummy with Zip, and I knew for a fact she'd been in love with him once upon a time. Unfortunately, having a guy's claws rip through your chest, even by accident, tended to put a damper on amorous feelings. Besides, Zip was human now. Mostly. Her new heart beat for one man: Mick. I couldn't be happier for them. For the Marid it was too little, too late.

"All right, then I guess we do this. Who and what do we need?"

"I need to perform the spell along with Emory," Zip said. "The initial spell is fairly simple. Shouldn't take long. When we release whomever is inside the bubble, we start part two."

"There are two parts to this damn thing?"

"Yep. Second part is where the others come in. It's… a little more complicated."

"For now," Emory spoke up, "everyone clear the area and let us set up."

It was a quick matter of Emory closing the circle and calling the four corners. Then Zip did an invocation in what I could only assume was the djinn language. It sounded odd to my ears, sort of sing-song with lots of rolling
R
's. My brain couldn't compute it as a language. Then the two joined hands and began chanting.

The space between them grew opaque. I saw a human-shaped figure as if far off in the distance, clouded with fog. It drew closer and closer. Then, with a loud
pop,
someone appeared in our dimension, kneeling between Emory and Zip. The two of them backed up, giving the newcomer room.

Slowly the person stood up. It was clearly a woman, her side to me, long hair covering her face. She was dressed in odd clothing: a tight band of leather binding her breasts and snug leather breeches covering her legs. Was she an Amazon? How could an Amazon help us?

The figure turned to face me and tilted her head back. Dark auburn hair fell away from her face, and I froze.

"Hello, Morgan." Her voice was as I remembered it, as was every line of her face.

It was the princess from my dreams. The last of the royal bloodline of Atlantis.

# # #

I chugged down an entire bottle of water almost without taking a breath. Then I sucked air into my lungs. I was feeling marginally less dizzy. I'd had to get away from the rest of the group for a bit before I had a meltdown.

"Easy." Inigo rubbed my back. "Don't overdo it, or I'll be peeling you off the ground."

I leaned against the tree trunk and closed my eyes. Gods, I felt like I was going crazy.

"Are you all right? What happened?"

"It's not every day your dreams come alive," I said, wiping a hand across my forehead.

"Remember my dreams about the last Atlantean princess? The half-blood that escaped the massacres at the palace and the Temple of the Moon?"

"That's her? How is that even possible?"

I told him about my dreams of Michigan and the Amazons. "I think they brought her here to keep her safe. When they realized this outpost had been destroyed, too, and the vampires and Hunters were already here, they stuck the princess in that interdimensional thingy to keep her safe. That was probably Plan B or whatever."

"So she was stuck there, unageing, for thousands of years?"

"Exactly."

"Then how did she know your name?"

"No freaking clue." I was definitely going to have to ask her about that.

"Morgan, can we talk?"

We turned to find the princess approaching. Her accent was musical and like nothing I'd ever heard before, but not heavy. She spoke English quite well. Gods, it was weird as hell seeing her outside my dreams.

I nodded to Inigo. He handed me another bottle of water and then strode back to join the others.

"All right," I said. "Talk. Let's start with how you know my name."

"The amulet."

I touched my necklace. "This old thing?"

"While it was in your possession, it sent me information. Images, knowledge, experiences so I would know what the world had become."

I wasn't sure how to feel about the amulet as an eavesdropping device. "Princess— sorry, do you have a name? I can't just keep calling you 'Princess' all the time."

She seemed to ponder that. "Sharai."

"That's not your name." I don't know how I knew that, but I did.

She lifted one bronzed shoulder. "My true name would be impossible for you to pronounce. Sharai is close enough. Besides, I… like it." She said it as if liking something were a foreign concept.

"All right, Sharai, what the hell is going on?"

She smiled. "Amaza said you would be powerful. I just didn't realize how powerful."

I narrowed my eyes. "Amaza told you about me?"

"Of course. You are her descendent, after all. She knew every one of her bloodline from the day her first daughter was born until the end of time."

I blinked. That was a bit much to grasp, so I focused on one clue. "I'm a descendent of the Moon Priestess?"

She inclined her head. As her hair caught the sunlight, I realized it wasn't the auburn I'd assumed, but more of a dark plum color. I doubted it was Lady Clairol. She was half alien, after all.

"Um, I think I need to sit down." I let myself slide to the ground. "Okay, start at the beginning."

"You are not the Key, Morgan."

"Excuse me?" All this time, everyone had been going on about me being the Key. And now the princess—Sharai—was telling me the opposite?

She shrugged. "Not the true Key, anyway. More like a temporary one. You've been holding the power of the true Key until they could return."

"Let me guess. You're the true Key."

"Yes."

"And all these crazy super powers belong to you."

She nodded. "They were never meant to stay in the amulet as long as they did. The amulet was meant to be delivered to me, but it got waylaid. The powers needed a human host, and so they found Jack, and through him, you. Part of the spell is to return those powers to me."

I felt both relieved and oddly sad. I'd gotten used to my powers. They came in handy on a Hunt. "I don't know you."

"But you do. You've dreamed of me, as I have dreamed of you. You have done your task well, but a human was never meant to hold power like this forever."

"According to those in the know, I'm not truly human."

She smiled. "Not entirely, no. But mostly."

I thought about it. Everything was clicking together. I nodded. "Okay."

"It's true, you know."

"What is?"

She stared at me for a long time. Finally she said, "Sunwalker Sentinels could pull energy from the sun and use it to boost their power during battle. When they turned, they took that ability with them, becoming Sunwalkers."

"I am not a Sunwalker." My tone was less than convincing.

"No," she agreed. "You are something else. That is the thing that is true."

# # #

I don't know if I stopped breathing or passed out or what. The next thing I knew, my head was swimming and my vision had fogged over.