CHAPTER 41
The ceiling loomed over Bristol in all its painted glory, sweeping scenes telling stories of the ages.
Paintings of goddesses and gods arriving on a shore shrouded in mist were surrounded by scenes of them planting, harvesting, swimming in lakes, dancing in forests, making love beneath the stars, and fighting great battles.
The scenes were vast and vivid, and reminded her of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, except these were painted in a more sensual style, with lush landscapes and innuendo in the shadows.
Something Fragonard might have painted—and maybe he actually had, since other artists had visited Danu.
She was absorbed by the scenes, and perhaps that was the point, a distraction for those about to receive treatment.
This room was nothing like Madame Chastain’s plain stone-walled treatment rooms. The Sisters had already given her a potion to put her out, but her chest still thumped out of time, like drunken sprites had taken up residence.
Please don’t let me die, she thought. Harper and Cat needed her.
She blew out a steadying breath and turned her head to study another painting.
Art had always been something that could transport her from her immediate circumstances.
She imagined the artist creating it, mixing paints, pondering his or her own circumstances and the world that inspired the art.
She imagined the whole story behind the painting—just as she wondered about her father’s paintings and his expressions as he worked on them.
Some things he would share, but some things he kept locked inside.
She knew what some of those hidden things were now.
The painting above her now was of a beautiful goddess with shimmering copper hair and a windswept gown that blended in with the sea and sky.
Her beautifully rendered hand reached out to help a bedraggled woman cross a great expanse of water.
At first Bristol thought it was a rescue scene, but then it hit her.
Paradise. This is a death scene. The goddess was helping the woman cross the threshold to the otherworld.
Bristol gasped and sat up. She didn’t want to view someone dying as she went under. “Shouldn’t I be on my stomach?” she asked. “To make it easier to get the tick out?”
Camille and Izzy eased her back down. “Don’t worry, dear. We’ll roll you over once you’re asleep. You’ll be more comfortable this way for now.” Camille brushed a wisp of hair from Bristol’s brow. “All will be well. Now let the potion do its work.”
Adela had only put three drops of an icy substance on her tongue, but Bristol finally felt her limbs getting heavier, the sleeping potion taking effect.
They had already explained the procedure to her—an untried one, but they thought it would work.
Since they could only safely stop her heart for three minutes, they prepared her by having her breathe in various potions deeply, and then they used another to slow her body down to simulate the process of dying to give them more time.
The tick would notice her body slowing down and start preparing for its exit.
Once the tick showed signs of loosening its grip, they would stop her heart to force its departure.
That’s right, let the potion do its work.
The ceiling grew blurry. The Sisters’ voices became a distant warble. And then . . .
Footsteps echo. Her father’s steps. She walks down a long hallway, trying to catch up with him, passing paintings of the masters.
She calls to him, “Daddy, stop, you’re missing it all, come and see.
Fragonard, O’Keeffe . . .” But he just keeps walking until she can’t see him anymore, the footsteps dwindling until the echo is gone.
“He’s lost,” she tells the docent. “Help me find him. Please. He’s lost.”
“My father is lost!”
“Deeper,” Jasmine said sharply. “She’s not deep enough yet. Another drop.”
Adela slipped a hand beneath Bristol’s head. “Open your mouth.” Bristol felt an icy drop on her tongue, and then another, and another.
“Enough,” Camille ordered. “No more!”
“It’s the only way,” Jasmine said.
Bristol shivered, her tongue, her body, everything cold. Dark. Wind. The rush of water. Brigid. Her hand outstretched to Bristol. “Are you coming or staying?” the goddess asks. “I don’t know,” Bristol answers.
The Sisters rolled Bristol’s limp body over and exposed her back. The tick’s shadow wriggled uncertainly beneath Bristol’s skin, edging in one direction and then another.
Jasmine shook her head. “He’s thinking about it. As far as he’s concerned, she’s dying.” The tip of a single leg emerged near Bristol’s spine, a bristled dark splotch against her perfect skin. Even for the Sisters, who had seen centuries of horrors, it was a sickening sight.
“How could Kierus do this to his own child?” Camille lamented.
“He didn’t know it would come to this,” Izzy said. And silently they all accepted that answer because it was what they wanted to believe.
Another leg tip emerged out of her side just below her ribs, but then the tick stopped, still clinging to its host, twenty-two years of feeding off her too much to give up.
“Come on, you bastard,” Adela whispered.
It stalled, refusing to move.
“It’s time,” Jasmine said and stepped closer. The Sisters moved in with their hands hovering over Bristol to amplify the spell that would stop her heart, but only Jasmine said it aloud: “Daeskah callonai.”
Bristol’s chest stilled. No more beats, no more breaths. They set the timepiece. Three minutes.
And they waited, time suddenly racing by too fast.
Yet the tick didn’t move.
“Come on,” Camille whispered desperately.
Still nothing, with only seconds left before Bristol would die.
There was only one last thing Jasmine could do. Something she hadn’t even shared with the Sisters. “Step back,” Jasmine ordered. “Now!”