Shadows Before the Sun (20 page)

I glanced down and covered my arm with my hand, not that it helped. The markings glowed blue from my hand to my shoulder.
Shit, shit, shit. Calm down. Must calm down. Think of the bakery.
But that only made me see red because I was starving, and that was another strike against them.

I never had the chance to calm myself because they approached me like I was some kind of interesting bug. A specimen. They began jabbing at me, pushing me to lose control; they wanted to see what would happen.

“Stop it!” I yelled, hearing the panic in my voice as I backed away until my foot slipped in the water. I struggled to retain my balance, going deeper into the water until it covered my calves. “You don’t know what you’re doing!”

Before I could blink, I was grabbed by the neck, hauled out of the water, and shoved against the altar. The tablet was stuck in my face. “Read it, then.”

“I can’t!” I cried.

“Try,” they all said at the same time. With my defenses down, there was no barrier, yet I was brimming with divine power. When I looked at the words . . . I knew them. I began reading, not knowing what I was
saying. I was just a vessel, a conduit from the words in front of me to a language that was eerily similar to the way Sachâth had spoken to me and Ahkneri had spoken in my dreams.

I spoke the words and then collapsed onto the altar, but was given little mercy as I was grabbed once again and shaken. “But what does it mean?”

“I don’t know,” I answered tiredly.

“Liar! You just read them! You know!”

I straightened, my endurance at an end, feeling drunk and reckless off their voices. I held my hands wide in a gesture that said I really didn’t care whether she believed me or not. “I don’t. Get over it, Ephyra. Now feed me because I’m hungry.”

That really got under her skin, as I knew it would.

A vein popped out on her perfect forehead and a growl erupted in her throat, which turned into a screech as she came at me. Arethusa stepped in front of her and said very evenly, “We have much to discuss. Let us convene with the oracle once more.”

That got my attention. “Alessandra isn’t part of this. She doesn’t take sides. She didn’t know—”

“Oh, but the oracle knows everything.” Ephyra smirked. “She’s ours now. Just like Panopé, just like Niérian, just like the Malakim, just like the king.”

“Full of yourself, aren’t you?” I shot back, but her words were burned into my brain and I had a very keen sense that something terrible had happened to Alessandra. I turned my attention to Calliadne, who seemed like the nicest of the three, if such a thing
were possible. “What did you do to her? I swear . . . Please . . . just . . . don’t hurt her.”

A dimple formed in Calliadne’s cheek as she considered my plea, met the eyes of her sisters, and then shrugged. “See for yourself if you’d like.”

“Perhaps granting you this wish will encourage you to grant us what we wish,” Arethusa said.

They led me down the passageway to the chamber with the three doors, through the center one and then instead of going right toward the cells, they turned left, the same way they’d gone earlier with Sandra.

As we walked, I tried to prepare myself. She was probably just in a cell, or shackled to a comfortable couch or something. Who’d hurt the oracle? She was one of the most famous people alive. They wouldn’t do something so foolish as to harm her.

I’d all but convinced myself of that when the Circe opened a beautifully carved door leading into an equally beautiful room that resembled the palace in style, art, and architecture. There was power in this room. Old power. In the center was a circular hole, a huge chasm in the ground, and in the middle, in a smaller ring, was a rock jutting up from the depths of the chasm. On the rock was a statue, a female figure rising out of the waves reaching for the sky. She looked like glass, water somehow made solid, but not. A gold, glittery sheen sparkled in the glass and from her hands a shower of radiant gold light spilled upward and disappeared into a round disk in the ceiling that also glowed.

As we drew closer, I saw that the chasm went all the way around the statue. A small bridge connected the main floor with the statue; the chasm was too wide to jump.

The drone that came off the statue and the shower of pearly gold was enormous, like a heartbeat filled with energy and power, much like the spheres and the henge in the Grove.

We kept our distance, moving around the centerpiece and into the next room, which was smaller than the vast main chamber. The room was round with niches built into the walls. Some niches were empty, some held pedestals with relics, objects, and statues.

We went up two wide steps at the end of the room and into another yet smaller round room. “Ah, here we are.”

My instincts screamed at me not to look. I knew this wasn’t right, them bringing me here to see, the feeling in the room. But I had to look for Alessandra’s sake because whatever they had done to her I had to know, so I could figure out how to save her.

But as my eyes found her, I realized with a sickening turn that saving her would be impossible.

“Hungry
now,
human?” Ephyra whispered as she breezed past me to park herself next to the pedestal in the center of room.

I struggled to stay standing. To stay conscious. Horror warred with such overwhelming grief that I could do nothing but stand there in shock and stare at my friend’s head perched on the pedestal like some goddamned trophy.

Oh God, Sandra. No.

I slapped my hands over my open mouth so I wouldn’t scream or vomit, but tears flowed instantly from my eyes and down over my hands.

Her eyes were shut. Her skin gray, lips purplish blue . . . Her beautiful black hair fell around the pedestal like a curtain. A crack drew my attention. In the back corner of the room a griffin fed on her
headless body. “Oh God.” I stumbled back, dazed, sickened, falling and then scrambling up, crawling away, but getting trapped in the folds of the gown. Tears streamed down my face as I sobbed and gasped for air.

Keep crawling. Just get away. Oh God, Sandra. Sandra . . .

I was vaguely aware that someone pulled me up. A siren guard. I could barely see for the tears clouding my vision. The Circe stood behind Alessandra’s head. I turned away but rough hands grabbed my face and forced me to look. A groan burst from me. Hadn’t I seen enough?

“Let us consult the oracle, shall we?” Arethusa said.

“And see the human’s future for ourselves.”

They chanted a short phrase together. Dread slid down my spine and all the blood in my body felt like it had drained out of me, leaving me with nothing but the cold.

Alessandra’s eyes popped open.

I jumped and felt the siren guard jerk in surprise. Her eyes were vacant, but they were her eyes, the same earthy green, the same ones that had sparked with life and laughter.
Goddammit!

Her mouth dropped open and a voice came out, and I knew this was crafting at its worst and most powerful.

“One sleeps. One wakes. One weeps. One takes.”

She stopped and blinked. A frown wrinkled her
brow.
“Charlie?”
Her voice was lost, like a child in the dark, unseeing. Her eyes blinked, looking around wildly, but not finding me.

“I’m here, Sandra,” I said in a strangled voice.

Her gaze snapped in my direction, though it seemed to look right through me.
“I lied, Charlie. I have always been able to see my fate.”
A stunned whoosh left my lungs. “
Charlie . . . the answer, the . . .”
She gaped like a fish out of water, the instinct to breathe still with her.
“Accept yourself to make the shadow whole . . . together, together . . . but not by your hand,”
she warned,
“. . . and death will come to death . . .”

My heart hurt; the tight, aching squeeze unrelenting. I couldn’t watch her gasping for air she didn’t need, would never need again. Her words blazed a path into my memory and would haunt me forever. I squeezed my eyelids shut and forced away the image of her and the sounds of the griffin in the background, turning in the guard’s hands as much as I could.

Then I was being led away, past the statue and down the hallway to my cell.

It seemed like ages ago that I wanted desperately to leave it, and now I wanted nothing more than to go inside, shut the door, curl up on the floor, and just lose myself in silence.

Sandra was gone.

As I lay there curled on my side, my back tucked
against the wall, I wished time would reverse. So many instances played through my memory, times where if I’d just done something differently, she’d still be alive.

I stayed in that cycle, constantly replaying events, unable to stop until I exhausted my mind.

If Sandra was with me, she’d laugh and tell me I couldn’t escape Fate. One way or another, no matter what path I chose or decisions I made, I’d always come right back around to whatever significant event Fate had in store for me.

And she
knew
. That’s what was killing me inside. She knew! She’d walked right into that passageway
knowing
what would happen. And still she went. The image of her looking back at me, all the emotion, the flash of fear in her eyes, it all made sense now. Now, when it was too late.

Her convictions and beliefs were infuriating. How could she have given up her life like that? She hadn’t even tried to prevent it.
Damn it, Sandra! Fuck your stupid Fate!

And yet her bravery, to walk the path of her beliefs, to have such faith . . . It put me to shame.

And it all hurt, it hurt so much . . .

I cried until my face was dry and hot and my head pounded. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t sleep or rest my thoughts. After a time, I sat up, wiped my face with the end of the gown, and just stared at the bland stone walls in disbelief.

Eventually, her prophetic words seeped into the
numbness, and I let them roll around, repeating, listening, trying to make sense of what she’d said.

Far be it from me to guess the mind of an oracle, but it sure as hell sounded like Alessandra had been talking about Sachâth.

To make the shadow whole.
Death will come to death.

Sachâth was one of my biggest obstacles. In order for me to have any kind of power at all, I had to defeat it. And I didn’t have the answer on how to do that. Sandra knew, and the more I thought about it, the more I believed she was trying to give me the answer—how to kill Sachâth. But I had no clue what
not by my hand
and
together, together
meant.

My head fell back against the wall, wishing she was around to tell me.

•    •    •

The Circe had apparently decided to change tactics, because the next time the door opened, I was taken to a chamber where I bathed, put on a clean gown—this one also gathered over one shoulder—and was adorned with a circlet of gold placed around my left bicep.

The bath and the nice dress didn’t mean squat to me, but the food was extremely meaningful as was the use of a restroom. I sat at a table in a room off the bath and ate quickly, taking advantage of the reprieve.

After their little show-and-tell, the Circe were probably certain I’d cooperate and translate the tablet. And, if they felt this new tactic of “nice
game” wasn’t working, they’d play the “torture game.”

I had no choice but to play along until I could figure out my next move.

Once I was done eating, I didn’t wait. I got up and walked to the main door I’d been brought through to the guard who stood there. “I’m done. I’m sure you have orders to take me to the Circe, so let’s get this over with.”

He regarded me thoughtfully, then turned and opened the door, ushering me into the hallway.

The Circe had allowed me to see Sandra in order to intimidate me, horrify me, and make me think twice about refusing them. It was a clear message on the lengths they’d go to get what they wanted. Well, it had worked. I
was
horrified, but not intimidated—okay, maybe I was, but that wasn’t going to stop me from ending their reign. I took exception to murderous, power hungry witches who tortured and killed my friends, and I wouldn’t rest until Sandra, Hank, and the countless other victims of the Circe were avenged.

And my determination to do just that was stronger than their intimidation.

Ahkneri had been called an instrument of retribution and vengeance, her sword, Anguish by Fire. Holding Urzenemelech had done something freakish to my arm, had somehow imbued it with the same kind of power as the sword—at least with the siren in my room it had seemed that way.

Okay, Sandra. You want me to accept myself? Consider it done.
I’m about to become your avenging angel.

Unfortunately, my rousing internal pep talk only lasted the thirty seconds it took for the guard to lead me into another room.

I’d expected to go to the Circe’s inner sanctum, not a few steps down the hall. I knew immediately that the game had changed once again. Trying to brace myself for whatever they had planned, I went past the guard and into the unfamiliar chamber.