Chapter 49 When We Need Them Most
WHEN WE NEED THEM MOST
SAERIS
ONE SHADOW GATE turned into another, and then another, and another. My head swam as we leaped between them, barely taking three steps after exiting one swirling portal before Fisher called another into existence and pulled me through it.
Five hundred leagues. That’s how far we could travel without Belikon sensing Fisher’s magic and following us.
But by the twelfth shadow gate, I’d had enough.
I needed a moment. I needed to breathe. I needed to sit down and fucking cry.
When my feet found solid ground, the soles of my boots sinking into powdery white snow, I tugged against Fisher’s hand and shook my head. “Enough,” I pleaded. “Please. I . . .”
He drew me to him and hugged me fiercely, his heart thundering behind his chest plate. “It’s okay, Osha. We’re here,” he said.
I didn’t give a fuck where here was. I sank down into the snow, and I ran my fingers through Onyx’s thick fur, hating the way that he was growing cold.
“I should have listened to you,” I whispered.
“Back at the Winter Palace, when you said he’d make a terrible pet.
He wasn’t supposed to be around any of this.
He was supposed to be free.” I sniffed, wiping my nose with the back of my hand.
Fisher sat down heavily in the snow beside me.
Gently, he put his hand on Onyx’s head and left it there.
“We believe,” he started. But then he stopped.
He looked up at the stars—more stars than I had ever seen—drawing in deep, slow breaths.
The night was so cold that you couldn’t even feel it.
Twin plumes of fog formed as he exhaled down his nose.
“We believe that animals are too pure for this life. They are all ascended beings who live in the after. Everything is perfect there. No pain or misfortune or heartbreak. But sometimes, they peer beyond the veil between this life and the next, and they see us here in the depths of our suffering, and they choose someone. One soul they want to help over any other. They come to us as . . . dear friends”—he cleared his throat—“when we need them most. You needed Onyx when you first got here, Saeris. He saw that perhaps, and he came. But now—”
I shook my head, blind with tears, refusing to hear him. “No. I still need him. I still—” I tried to continue speaking. I failed. The loss was too great.
Fisher leaned against me and shared in my grief. His hand, so much bigger than mine, remained on top of Onyx’s head as shooting stars traced banners of light overhead. The sight would have been spectacular if it had been any other night, but it was this night, and all was terrible in the world.
I held Onyx’s paw until ice crept along my bones and hoarfrost formed in my blood-drenched hair. “I thought he was in Ballard,” I whispered. “I hoped . . .”
“I’m so sorry, Saeris.”
I brushed away his apology, fighting to swallow the lump in my throat so I could talk again. “It wasn’t your fault. It was him. Belikon. It was . . .”
Bad luck?
A cruel twist of fate?
Horrible timing?
None of it made me feel any better.
I stroked the broken little form in my lap, wishing harder than I’d wished for anything since my mother had died. I was sinking deeper into the depths of despair, hoping I would reach the bottom soon, when I stilled, staring down at the hand that I had buried in Onyx’s fur.
One of the runes on the back of my hand was shimmering.
It hadn’t flared before. Not when I’d used it on Taladaius.
Not when I’d used it to undo the magic that gave Fisher’s name power, either.
But . . . was I imagining it? Was there a faint blue glowing line, slowly tracing the outline of the Hazrax’s rune?
I held my hand up, heart stalling behind my ribs.
“You see that?” I gasped.
“See what?”
Of course the light would fucking go out when I tried to show it to Fisher.
I bit on my bottom lip, staring at my hand, willing it to reappear.
Nothing happened. I knew what I’d seen, though.
It had been there. My mind wouldn’t play tricks on me just because I wanted something badly.
It just wouldn’t. “Here. Take him a moment.” I handed Onyx over to Fisher as carefully as I could, trying to calm my breathing as I got to my feet and spun around.
“I—oh.” Fuck. We were on the side of a mountain. A steep one, at that. At the top of the slope we sat on, an entire city lit up the night, its two white towers so tall that I had to crane my neck back to find the top of them. It was beautiful. It was . . .
“Ajun,” Fisher said quietly, twisting to look back over his shoulder. “We should head up to the gate. This far north the sun rises later, but it’ll be here soon.”
Ajun.
Ajun Sky.
I knew why they called it that now: This luminescent city had been built among the clouds. I’d wanted to see it for myself, but now that I was on its doorstep, I wasn’t ready to go inside. I spun around, feeling utterly helpless as I scanned the dark that surrounded us. “Where are you?” I shouted.
Where are you?
. . . Are you?
Where are you?
The question echoed back to me, far away, then near, then far again.
“Come on! I know you’re here. You got your way, didn’t you? I said that you could watch!”
Watch.
Watch . . .
WATCH!
“Osha, what are you doing?”
“Come on!” I screamed. “Show yourself!”
Every bit of hope I had left in me flared and died as I waited for the figure to come floating out of the dark. I had almost given up completely when it suddenly appeared on the snowy mountainside in front of us.
The Hazrax.
Fisher reached for Nimerelle, but I stepped in front of him, shaking my head. “No. Don’t. It’s okay.”
“What is it doing here?” he hissed.
I hadn’t kept the deal I’d made with the Hazrax a secret from him on purpose. Fisher was gone when it visited me in the forge, and there hadn’t been time to explain what had just happened with it in the dreamscape I conjured in Cahlish.
I’ll explain everything, I promise, I said into his mind. To the Hazrax, I said, “I need to ask you a question.”
The creature looked even more sickly and unnatural under the canopy of stars.
As always, its coal-black eyes were bottomless voids.
With its slitted nose, the gills at its neck, and its hairless, waxen skin, it looked like the kind of creature that lived in deep, inky waters at the bottom of an ocean.
I had seen something very similar to it in one of Foley’s books.
It was impossible to read its mood normally, but right now I could feel the anger radiating from it like heat.
“Our agreement gives me leave to watch you at my leisure, Saeris Fane. It does not give you leave to summon me and ask questions.”
“Then why are you here?” I demanded. “Why did you even come?”
“I will not come again. I am here now to make this very clear to you. I am not your subject. You do not command me—”
“Please. Just one question! I’ll never call upon you again, I swear it.” I would drop down on my knees and beg. I wasn’t above it. I’d make another deal. I’d let it watch me for the next ten years in return. I just needed to know one thing.
“Why would I help you, child? I have no interest in assisting you with your questions.”
I needed to hold my tongue. I just couldn’t. “You’re lying.”
Easy, Saeris, Fisher warned. It’s more powerful than the two of us put together. Can’t you feel it?
Oh, I felt it. The Hazrax’s power flooded the air with electricity and the distinct scent of ozone.
The creature was only just taller than your average Fae male, it was true, but the reek of strange magic that rolled off it was so strong that it turned my stomach.
But what else could I do? I had to try. “If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t have invaded my dream of Cahlish.
You wouldn’t have told me that I needed to change my favor. ”
The Hazrax pondered this silently.
“Just tell me. Please. Can you see the spirits of the dead?”
The moonlight threw wild shadows over the Hazrax’s face. It grimaced, displaying row upon row of curved, sharp teeth. “It would be blasphemy to admit such a thing,” it hissed.
“I don’t care about blasphemy. I care about my fox. Is he still here? Right now. I need to know if he’s already . . .” Sometimes, words were steep hills, so fucking hard to summit. “If he’s already gone, then I’ll leave him in peace. But if he’s still here . . .”
The Hazrax clacked its teeth together in a strange gesture that felt disdainful. “What does it matter either way, child? The fox is dead. It will move on eventually.”
The tenuous hope I had lost soared from the ashes of my grief and rekindled at once. “So you can see him then? He is still here?”
“I will not speak on it—”
“Please.” The request was quiet. It hadn’t come from me.
Fisher was up on his feet now and still holding Onyx’s lifeless form in his arms. He took a step forward, tucking his chin to his chest and bowing respectfully as he approached the Hazrax.
“You do not know me,” he said. “You owe me nothing. I won’t make you promises or strike bargains with you, but if it’s within your power to give my mate the information she seeks, I would be forever grateful.
I’m sure that means little to you, but—”
“Fine.” The former Lord of Midnight didn’t look at Fisher. It continued staring at me. “If it means so much to you, then I will answer your question. But in return for a question of my own.”
“Anything. Ask!”
The Hazrax made that perturbing clicking sound at the back of its throat. “What does it feel like . . . to lose something that you love so dearly?”