Chapter 18 The Highest Power
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE HIGHEST POWER
I was running through the moors.
Climbing sloping hills and rounding rocky tors as the castle dwindled in the background. Grass clawed at my legs, pebbles embedding in my bare feet. The air was stale. Where was the fresh breeze? The scent of purple heather, the acidic twang of the peat?
It didn’t matter, I was leaving.
My body was thrust left, and my foot sank into a deep pit, my ankle snapping. Icy air seeped into my skin, crystals solidifying like diamonds on my clothes. A dull ache radiated up my leg, spreading in a fiery circle.
I kept moving.
Another thrust. This time as if a rope had been coiled around my waist, snapping taut and severing my momentum.
I glanced behind. A winding cord, glistening in the moonlight like an umbilical cord trailed behind me.
It snaked over the grass, looped the gray wall, and slithered up the central parting right into the claws of the castle gargoyle.
I fumbled to rid myself of it, hands slipping and sliding over the mucus. The gargoyle tugged, and I flew backward, landing heavily on the frozen ground. Inch by inch it dragged me back toward the wall.
My magic sputtered. I fought to release it, clawing at the cord, but it dangled just out of reach.
The line slackened, and I pitched forward, moist moss smearing across my lips and coating my tongue making me gag.
I turned. Right behind me a saber speared into the line.
My eyes flew up the silver blade and over the diamond hilt colliding with Siobhan’s.
She wore the sapphire tunic of the castle guards with black trousers, her blonde hair raked into a neat bun.
She tsked, her full lips curving in mock disappointment.
I was running away, but I’d failed. I'd barely made it a mile, and she was on me.
She looked over my head and nodded at the two figures who stood barely feet away.
Burlap sacks were knotted under their chins, their faces smothered, but their necks elongated, pulled back and fully exposed. One male and one female, the clothing as familiar as the press of their arms into one another for comfort. It was a stance I’d seen for years with a pang of happiness.
My Collectors.
My chest constricted, my heart thumping against my ribs, unable to pump fast enough.
The air tickled past my ear, warm and powerful. The gust hit both people at the same time. Identical, deep gashes sliced across their throats, red smiles leering at me in the darkness.
I shook my head, slamming my fists into my eyes trying to rid myself of the images.
The Collectors had died once already on my watch.
They were my responsibility—my failure. The slashes carved themselves onto the inside of my eyelids, replaying again and again, the skin everting like ruffled pages, blood seeping down, down, down. ..
Siobhan tugged the saber out of the cord, and it snapped taut. I flew backward, hurtling toward the wall. Grass sliced through my hands as I clawed at the earth, the gray stone and jagged sparks of diamonds looming behind me.
I spun around and kicked. The surface of the wall cracked, spiderwebs fracturing like a sheet of ice. The cord jerked me forward, my shoulder slamming against the stone. A shriek emanated from deep inside me. I kicked out again, my foot plunging through the jagged shards and into frigid water.
A howl pierced to my core.
It wasn’t mine. It wasn’t me screaming. I wasn’t here.
I wrenched away, slipping the cord down my legs. The tension flew away, and I plunged backward into a chasm where the wall had been.
Ash fell around me, cobwebs and dust floating in the air. I landed on a threadbare mattress, shaking the dream or illusion away, but this wasn’t right either. Rusted springs and ripped goose feathers poked into my back, trying to spear into my flesh. The night was thick and the room windowless.
I crawled from the mattress, blindly feeling rough wooden floorboards before immediately hitting a wall.
I edged around the perimeter, hitting wall, wall, wall.
Reaching up, the ceiling hovered inches above my head hewn from the same gnarled wood.
I sank into a corner, barely able to sit. Where was I?
A candle flickered across from me. The red taper melted, drops congealing like blood down its side. Cold forms danced on the walls behind the light, bony fingers, sinewy limbs, all twisting toward me as the flame advanced.
I pressed back into the wall. The wood creaked, releasing a rotten, mildew scent into the air. I slid my hand down my thigh looking for the knife. All that remained was a faint divot left in my skin where the holster should be. A similar indentation marred my wrist where the bangle had been.
The candle pressed closer. Everything in the room reduced to an inky void as I opened my mouth to scream, but my throat seized like wax had been poured down my mouth and sealed it shut.
A light female giggle sounded.
I loosed my breath, hands balling into fists. I swiped for the candle, intent on ramming it down her throat instead. This was no nightmare.
Siobhan held it aloft, her cherubic face swimming into view. “Did I scare you, child?” She chuckled again. “I only wanted to remind you that I’m always here. In your dreams, in your life, in your wildest fantasies...”
My ankle throbbed. I reached down to rub it and caught the outline of soot-stained fingers branded upon my flesh. “What’ve you done?”
“Oh, Tam. It was not me. How could you accuse me of such a crime?” She reached forward and ran a fingertip down my leg. Her touch was warm, petal-soft, and achingly familiar.
I hated what she did to me. The comfort she gave always lingered but never erased the memories. If anything, the trauma was accentuated, and her role as savior cemented. As she lifted her hand, an inky shadow followed in its path, leaving my skin beneath unmarred.
“The spirits in this castle answer to the highest power, child.”
I tucked my leg back underneath me, cursing the cold that returned. “Will they answer to me?”
She giggled. “You really are my favorite, yes?”
I swallowed my retort. “So, it’s spirits that live within the walls?” I asked instead.
“Yes, my dear. The walls, the ceiling, every liminal space within the castle. I’m surprised you can’t see them.”
I glowered at her, not in the mood for her condescending tone. My ankle throbbed.
“No?” she asked. “Well, it’s for the best. If they decide to appear for you, you’ll see the whites of their eyes first emerging in the gloom, then the wispy shape of their human form.
By that time, it’s far too late and one of two things would have happened.
They’re ready to listen to you and bend to your will like you do to me.
” She giggled and tugged at a loose strand of my hair.
I jerked backward. “Or?”
“Well, or you’re one of them. The latter looks a much higher possibility at the moment. Haven’t you wondered where all those missing village women ended up? The bumps in the walls, the falling ash...”
I swallowed, trying very hard not to think of all the times I’d touched the ash.
“Anyway, onto more joyful subjects. Beautiful work with the Sheriff. Although, once again, the Collectors were sorry to have missed you. I thought bringing you back to your hometown would loosen your fonder memories, but anyone would think you were deliberately avoiding them?”
I pursed my lips but said nothing.
“Tut, tut. Well, at least I get to spend some quality time with you. Much earlier than expected too.”
“They’re okay though, right? You haven’t harmed them?”
“Of course not. You’re the only one who can harm them now. We’re all relying on you. Such a fun weight of expectations settled on those perfect shoulders.”
“Why didn’t you come when I called for you?”
She flicked her hand as if batting away my irritating question. “I must not have heard, I am incredibly busy, my dear.”
I held in my groan. She would’ve known, I’d even opened my veins to spill a drop of magic to summon her.
She would’ve felt it like an elastic pulled tight around her soul, or whatever lived in its place.
I took a steadying breath, it was time to broker the deal.
My intestines writhed deep within me. It felt as though they snaked up into my chest and squeezed my heart.
Thump. I swallowed, willing my voice to be strong. “I’ve paid my debt, though. Yes?”
The candle guttered as she heaved a sigh.
I forced the sarcasm down and tried again. “I want to make a deal.”
She backed away, lowering the flame until she merged with the twisting shadows. “I’ll think about it, child.” She paused. “Meet me at the Red Blush tomorrow night and we’ll discuss the details. Sounds awfully risqué, don’t you think?”
“Wait! Don’t leave me—”
The candle snuffed out, leaving a meager trail of crimson smoke suspended in mid-air. Goddessdamn her!
I crawled around the room hitting the walls and pushing at the ceiling. Was I inside the walls? In between floors perhaps? Please let there be no bodies in here. My knee caught on a rough board and pain seared through me as my flesh sliced open. Warm blood seeped down my leg.
I pummeled the wood, splinters embedding into my fist. It gave way beneath me, widening a small crack between the floorboards. Digging my nails into the grooves, I wrenched them back until I could fit through the opening and drop down into the dark room below.
A cool, sharp blade dug into my throat. I raised my arms a millimeter to shove it away, but a voice growled, “Stay still.”
Someone fumbled in the gloom. A glass shattered, a few small trinkets clattering.
Finally, flint was found, the blade never wavering from my throat.
My raging pulse vibrated down it, the swoosh of my carotid forcing itself around the solid obstruction.
One slip and I would be dead. At least it would be to a human and not to the spirits slinking through the walls.