Chapter 10
X.
The Lost
Shlock, went the sound of a scythe.
She walked into the forlorn chapel of Death’s house, wearing her old brown tunic, her wheat-colored hair unveiled, just as I remembered. I cried and ran to her, my footsteps slapping against the cold, slabbed stone.
I didn’t stop to think or question my sight. She blinked at me, as if surprised. We both were! She was here. Returned! I could have sobbed with joy, but just as I closed my arms over her, she was gone. I embraced nothing save empty air.
The loss tore like a knife through my chest, as if I were feeling it all again, for the first time. I screamed, the sound resounding under the yawning buttresses of the chapel ceiling.
Light movement like the fluttering of a brown bird caught at the corner my eye and I spun. There she was again, standing between the few remaining pews. I forgot all about Death, my task, anything at all but my sister.
“Rochelle,” I cried, my hands up, pleading with her. I walked slower this time. My gaze bored into her, unblinking. “Rochelle, don’t move!”
She made no answer, but she looked at me—looked right at me.
“How are you going to save her?” I heard a voice somewhere that tugged in my mind, trying to remind me of something.
But I could only see Rochelle. I could only think of Rochelle. I would not lose her again. I was almost to her. “Rochelle,” I cried again. “It’s me, your sister, Salomé.”
I thought I would reach her. I was so close, my eyes burning with unshed tears. I stretched my hand for her wrist. And she was gone. Nothing but the wind and the chapel dust before me. I screamed again—this time out of frustration.
“That won’t help you,” Death said.
I snapped my gaze to him, my rage leaping ahead of my better judgment. “Is this your trick?”
“How will you save her?” he repeated, insistent.
“Rochelle!” I called. I ran across the chapel. But she didn’t appear. I felt split somehow, half in the past and half in this strange present. My heart pounded a rhythm of her name. Maybe she was in another part of the house. Wild-eyed, I turned for the door.
“Salomé.”
Her voice, her dear voice! I had not heard it in five years. I spun and nearly wept. He could trick me with her image, but not her voice. But when my gaze landed on her, I froze in uncertainty.
It was Rochelle, but not as I’d seen her only a moment before, in her drab brown tunic. This Rochelle was different.
She stood behind Death’s chair, where he still lounged, unaware or uncaring of her presence.
Her hair was darker than I remembered and bound up in silky braids.
Her arms were pale and strong. She was nearly naked, clothed in some kind of silken garment and a belt of twinkling stars.
I’d never seen such a dress and did not have the words to truly describe it.
To describe her. She seemed my sister, but older, harder, unveiled in some way. The look of a stranger about her.
“Salomé,” she said. “Sister.”
“Tell me how to find you,” I said to her. I didn’t move this time. Didn’t even breathe for fear she would disappear.
“You must surrender,” Death’s voice rumbled between us.
“How do I save you?” I asked.
“You cannot save me,” she said.
“No. I can’t accept that. Tell me what I must do.”
“Surrender,” Death demanded. But I was focused on my sister and my sister alone.
“You are reaching into a world you do not understand, like a bear’s paw into the trap, thinking only of the bait,” Rochelle said. “You are in danger.”
“I don’t care,” I said. I took a careful step.
Death rose out of his chair.
Rochelle moved back. I could see it then, all around her—the same moving edges as the first time she was taken. In the corners of my vision, the world began to swirl and change and alter. I was going to lose her again. She would disappear.
“No!” I whispered. I ran.
But I had learned. I was not going to make the same mistakes twice. I cast my gaze away from Rochelle and the swirling magic around her, keeping it out of focus as I moved up the altar toward her.
I climbed the steps, and she was still visible, still there as long as I did not look directly at her. Death put his arms up as if to stop me, but I pushed past him.
Do not look, I ordered myself. Out of the corner of my eye, Rochelle winked out of the air.
But I was faster. Just as she disappeared, I followed.
My hand sank into the unseen, and something dark and strange changed in the air, in my body.
I felt her hand. She pulled, as if to leave me behind. I gripped her tight.
I had barely thought of what might come next when something smacked across my side, tearing Rochelle from me. With a thump, I fell back into the chapel and hit the ground.
The chapel arches rose overhead, showering stars on the edges of my vision as I tried to catch my breath.
Something slid and dropped heavily to the floor beside me, but all I could think about was the feel of her being torn from me again and the utter loneliness in my chest. “Rochelle!” I gasped.
Death shouted for me, but I ignored him.
There had to be a way. I opened my eyes and rolled over, trying to stand, only to find myself gripped firmly around my waist.
I had been so focused on losing Rochelle, I was lost to what had followed me.
A great, smooth coil held me tight, surrounding me quicker than I could escape.
I pushed—wiggling, flailing, confused as to which direction I should fight as it circled tighter, faster, cinching me breathless.
Pain descended as a red haze over the world, and a last sob escaped from my chest. I tried to scream for Death to help, but my cry died in my throat, the air punched from my lungs.
I could have followed Rochelle. I could still find her.
I thought suddenly of fire consuming Valerie and the way Death came as a darkness.
My vision went black. I saw the creature and me, suspended in the dark.
It was a kind of Ouroboros of golden light, spinning itself faster and brighter, keeping me from Rochelle.
But there, in that place, I felt no pain and knew, somehow, it couldn’t hurt me.
I pushed it lightly. One edge of the circle wobbled and then it spun, erratic, fading and dimming as it fell away.
Down into the dark it went until it blinked out.
I didn’t remember to breathe until my eyes opened on the ceiling. “Where is she?” I gasped. “Did I save her? Did I use my power?” I was still on the floor. No creature. No shifting stone. I could hear again the slow mourn of the wind outside.
Lord Death stood over me, a long black shadow. “No,” he said. “She’s gone. I had to save you.”
I closed my eyes in despair.