Chapter 25
PALOMA, PURPLE LIPS & BETS (RHIANNON AND SEREN’S)
She was speaking to Ceridwen when she felt it. As if the light had gone out somewhere inside of her. Her hands got colder, and chills ran up and down her spine. The room had not changed—Ceridwen stood just as relaxed next to her. But Paloma could swear she could see her breath.
Something is wrong. Something is terribly wrong.
She must’ve spoken because suddenly Ceridwen was looking at her, touching her. And when their hands collided, Paloma knew she was not imagining it.
“Your skin is like ice. What’s happening?”
“I don’t know. I can’t feel…everything is so cold, and it’s as if something inside me shut off. I can’t explain it.”
Paloma looked at her fingers: they were trembling.
“I can.” Ceridwen pulled her out of the fray of the large ballroom where the party was taking place. A second later, the Headmistress was by their side.
“Your lips are turning purple. What’s happening?” Magdalene Nox’s voice was calm, but there was an edge to it. Paloma just stared at her. The bicolored eyes looking back were filled with concern.
Ceridwen took Paloma’s hands in hers.
“Headmistress, will you make our excuses? And send my sisters to follow? Time is of the essence.”
Magdalene gave them a curious glance, one that said more than her words did.
“Of course. Please be well, Ms. Allende. I’ll deliver your apologies. And congratulations again.”
Ceridwen’s arms were surprisingly strong as she all but dragged Paloma down the hallway and out the side door toward the small parking lot. The night was heavy, despite a clear sky, alight with stars. Paloma felt like the air had spikes, tearing her throat with every breath she took.
Once they cleared the building, Ceridwen pushed her in the direction of the parking lot. After a quick look around, she linked their fingers and murmured a quiet incantation. Paloma could hear the words mingling with her own exhalations.
“Come, Earth, give her strength, hold her safe…”
Paloma blinked, and suddenly her skin had life in it, her breathing no longer painful.
“What’s wrong? Nox sent us outside. What’s going on?” Seren was the first to reach them, her dress shoes giving her an advantage over Rhiannon’s stiletto Louboutins. But it was Rhiannon who took one look at what was happening and joined her hands over Ceridwen’s.
“Come, Wind, bring her comfort, hold her safe.”
Seren’s face was emotionless when she laid her palms over Rhiannon’s, but her eyes were an azure storm as she whispered.
“Come, Water, wash her pain, hold her safe.”
They breathed in unison for a few heartbeats, and Paloma could feel her body respond to the comforting magic. She swayed with it, the blanket of peace covering her, securing her.
“We need to go. Rhy, where’s your car? This can only be one thing.” Ceridwen’s voice was tinged with a note of desperate urgency.
Rhiannon pushed the fob button, and a few steps away, the dark Porsche answered the call.
Paloma saw little of their journey. Ceridwen held her hand in the back seat. But her heart hammered double-time in her chest.
With warmth returning to her body, she could finally trust her brain to process what was happening.
Deryn. Deryn is in trouble.
She could no longer feel Deryn, the flame they had lit now the stab of a spike of ice in her palm. She nearly expected it to bleed.
Ceridwen’s thumb kept rubbing at it.
“She will be fine. I promise.”
“You can’t promise that, Ceridwen. You heard that bitch Dagmar at the New Year’s Ball. So you can’t promise anything—” Paloma hated how weak she sounded, how terrified.
“She can,” Rhiannon threw over her shoulder as she broke every driving law in the state.
Paloma did not even consider that the car could go this fast, and she had a similar model.
“She’s Ceridwen Crowhart. Dagmar or no Dagmar, Ceridwen can do anything.
” Rhiannon’s voice was full of conviction, a soul-deep certainty.
When Seren’s jaw dropped, and Ceridwen’s fingers spasmed in Paloma’s hand, she knew something monumental had happened.
“The Tavern, right? I’m driving to the Tavern?” Rhiannon did not stop at the red light at the crossroads that took them into town.
“Right.” Ceridwen’s answer was more a puff of air than a word, her face still shocked. But her fingers returned to making circles in Paloma’s palm, the magic keeping Paloma warm.
When they heard sirens behind them, Seren winced.
“Trust these assholes to be actually patrolling tonight of all nights.”
“Sheriff Redding issued orders, in light of the break-ins, to double traffic patrols,” Ceridwen spoke matter-of-factly.
“Fuck Redding. Like he has done anything effective or helpful to figure out this whole damn situation or to keep anyone safe!” Rhiannon pressed the accelerator again, and the little Porsche left the patrol car in the dust, salt, and snow.
“Do you really want Redding involved in this business?” Ceridwen was remarkably calm, given that Rhiannon was probably breaking the speed of light at this point. Seren’s grip on the door handle was nothing short of deathly, her knuckles turning from white to pale blue.
“I expect an elected official to do something and keep people safe,” Rhiannon mumbled through gritted teeth as she shaved a corner a touch too sharply. Paloma could swear the tires of the right side of the car left the road for a brief moment.
“Well, here we have an elected official, and she is doing something,” Ceridwen said, and Rhiannon grunted, taking another turn, and the left wheels were definitely all the way in the air. Paloma gulped. Among the chaos, Rhiannon turned slightly to Seren and winked.
“Well, Ceridwen is right. You definitely are.” Rhiannon’s voice was full of self-satisfaction. “Doing all of this. Feeling Deryn, that is. So, Rennie, I expect my hundred dollars by tomorrow.”
Paloma stared. Ceridwen looked as if she had sucked on a lemon. Seren’s expression was nothing short of thunderous.
“This doesn’t prove shit, and you know it.”
Rhiannon cackled, not at all dissimilar to Victoria.
“It proves everything, and you know it.” She turned to Paloma in the back, and her voice held none of the glee from earlier. “Just a minute more, and we will be there, and I hope it’s at the Tavern.”
“What’s happening?” Paloma stared at Ceridwen, since she really wanted Rhiannon to focus on the road, and Seren seemed pissed as hell.
“I think you can answer that question, Paloma. What are you feeling?” Ceridwen kept her hand in hers, her thumb still circling the spot where Deryn’s Fire once burned.
“Dread. Cold. Deryn…”
Rhiannon shot Seren another sideways glance before the wheels hit the curb, jostling all of them.
“And that, right there, is why I won that hundred fair and square, Rennie. All this pouting is totally useless.”
Seren rolled her eyes. Paloma bit her lip.
“I don’t feel her… I don’t know how to explain… I didn’t even know I was feeling her…”
Paloma trailed off, expecting Rhiannon to slam on the brakes. Instead, she parked the car smoothly right in front of the back door to the Tavern.
“These two might not know, and I think it’s half the reason Seren is pouting, but I know exactly how you feel. And if at any time in my life I stopped feeling Prudence, I’d be just as terrified as you.”
Paloma tried to grasp the deeper meaning of Rhiannon’s words even as Ceridwen was hauling her out of the car, still holding her hand. They reached the entrance first. It was locked. Ceridwen gave the handle a few extra jiggles to make sure.
Rhiannon looked around questioningly, but Seren was having none of that.
“Move!” was all she said. Paloma did not know what she was expecting Seren to do, but smashing the door open by kicking it in was not it.
Rhiannon shook her head and followed her inside, Paloma and Ceridwen on her heels.
“Deryn? Victoria?” Seren called as she ran ahead of them.
“Der! Aunt Vicky?” Rhiannon clacked in on her amazing heels, easily managing to keep pace.
“She really hates that name…” Paloma did not know why she said it. Yes, she’d heard Victoria say “never Vicky” so many times in their not-all-that-long acquaintance that it felt like not saying it would be a jinx.
“Maybe that will piss her off so much that she will hear it and come out?” Rhiannon huffed out a breath and finally stopped in the middle of the pristine, dark dining room. “Aunty?” she called once more, her voice echoing in the quiet space.
Seren peeked her head in from the kitchen.
“It’s empty in here as well, but…”
Ceridwen again pulled Paloma’s hand, and Rhiannon took the other one. They entered the kitchen together, the stainless steel surfaces gleaming. The silence was deafening. And yet… Paloma stopped and turned to the side, the emptiness inside suddenly lifting, becoming smaller, easier to carry.
“She’s here. Lynnie…”
Ceridwen lifted an eyebrow.
“That’s a name I haven’t heard in ages. Lynnie was our great-great-grandmother. She died in 1876—”
“She died?” Paloma felt her palm heat up, the pain almost unbearable.
She had known it from her visions, from the anguish that Isamar—that Paloma herself—had been in, watching the events unfold, reliving the emotions…
She knew. She had known all along, and yet the grief was just as terrible as it had been the first time.
“Her husband killed her. He beat her to death after she tried divorcing him. She was leaving him for a woman… No. Oh, no! Paloma… That woman…” Ceridwen’s face contorted, compassion and understanding filling her eyes.
“Isamar Moreno,” Paloma whispered. “Her name was Isamar Moreno.”
Seren sighed.
“Hell… Yeah, Rhy, I owe you the money.”
“You bet on what, exactly?” Paloma wondered.