Blackhearted Betrayal (27 page)

Panic threatened, but I fought it down. “Jeserit?”

She nodded and raised the scrying stone’s chain once more. To my surprise, the stone didn’t stay quiet as I’d feared. It lit up with sapphire energy and made like a compass arrow, pointing straight at the far wall, which was all but hidden beneath a lichen infestation. Jeserit let out an annoyed breath and shook her head. “I’m sorry
but …the divination tells me that our path lies ahead, no matter what our eyes— Wait. Another illusion spell?”

My eyes widened at that suggestion since it was a valid one. I started forward, but Scott laid a hand on my shoulder and turned toward our resident earth expert. “Charlie?”

The Giant trotted forward, stopping a few feet in front of the glowing wall to begin working his mojo. The ground rumbled beneath his feet, but nothing else happened. Charlie clenched his hands, gestured, and chanted loudly, only to wind up with the same result. Nothing. He finally accepted defeat and shrugged in my direction. “Sorry, darlin’, not seeing anything there but the radioactive lichen.”

Elliana’s Hound eyes flashed, and she cursed. “Don’t
tell
me we came all this way for nothing!” Mac touched her shoulder and murmured something in her ear that kept her from leaping at the wall as if it were an enemy although, in that moment, it kinda was …

My gaze zeroed in on the center of the wall and a patch of lichen that looked a hell of a lot like a deliberate pattern. I frowned and stepped forward. Scott grumbled in protest, but I waved it off. Imseti and Mijai had possessed complete confidence in Jeserit’s divination skills, and thus far, I’d seen nothing to indicate that faith was misplaced. Quite the contrary, really, considering Sean’s showing up to try to convince me to abandon my Mandate. He’d claimed to be going against Anubis’s wishes to warn me that the Jackal-Faced god waited for me outside the Hall to stop me, but what if Anubis had actually put him up to it? What if this was just another trick to throw me off track and get me to give up before I even reached the Hall?

Fat chance of
that!

I peered more closely at the patch of lichen, and sure enough, it more closely resembled some sort of intentional symbol than a haphazard mishmash of a living organism. Maybe if I stepped back a little …No, that didn’t put it into any clearer focus, but my hunch grew stronger that something important was missing. If I could just find that vital link, everything would fall into place, like when Jeserit had activated the scrying stone and—

That’s it!
My pulse accelerated. I drew the borrowed blade, made a few quick slashes, then tossed a hair-and-blood-covered piece of skin onto the lichen patch’s center. Silver-and-blue light exploded, and a portion of the lichen similarly flashed with purple opalescence, clearly forming the Egyptian hieroglyph most people—even mundanes—at least recognized, if not understood: the ankh, a stylized loop at the top that twisted into the bottom three-fourths of a cross below, which traditionally translated to mean
eternal life
. Murmurs broke out behind me, but I ignored them. The ankh faded as quickly as it appeared, then writhed before my eyes to form a new symbol: the ankh reversed, which in the arcane world symbolized death, or at least the time a shade spent in the underworld before facing Reckoning and either rebirth, reward, or damnation. One final flare of energy and one more symbol took shape: a simple set of scales, bearing on one end a modified ankh—this one having a heart on the top instead of a loop, symbolizing an individual’s soul—and upon the other an elaborate ostrich feather.

Ma’at’s Feather and Scales! I let out a hiss matched by Nike, nestled atop my shoulder. I braced myself, but even then wasn’t prepared for what happened. The wall
before me disappeared—but so did the world around me, including my lover and allies. A shimmering silver-and-blue portal beckoned from just ahead of me. I peered into the inky blackness that lay behind but could see nothing, not even the slightest hint of light or color. Nike wound down to my lower arm, as unsettled as I. I sent a questing tendril of magic, but it faded almost immediately, making me blink in surprise. Panic flared, but I fought it back and did the only thing I could, turned and stepped forward …

Magic enveloped me as it had when I stepped through the earlier illusion spell, but this was neither gentle nor dispassionate. Despair and a sense of insignificance flooded into me, threatening to send me to my knees in a crying mess, but I gritted my teeth and reminded myself of everything and everyone I was fighting for. A dispassionate voice echoed inside my head much the way my Amphisbaena finally could:
Turn back now or your life is forfeit!
I realized this was some sort of test and made myself take a second step forward …

Despair became an aching desire to flee responsibility, to cast off my duties as Nemesis and return to my normal existence as Boston cop and Chief of the MCU, except that wasn’t particularly accurate.
Nothing
about my life was normal, not even my relationship with Scott …That disembodied voice whispered inside my head again.
Your lover would never sacrifice so much for you. Just turn around before you lose your soul.
But Scott
had
sacrificed a tremendous amount for me: his relationship with his personal god. That thought made me cry out and push myself another painful inch ahead …

Hatred boiled, but it wasn’t my own; this came from all directions and burned its way inside, liquid fire
making me scream in frustrated Rage. They would
pay
for what they had done, pay with every mortal breath until Duat flooded in a sea of souls. Starting with Scott and Mac and ending with Mom and Nan, images of them each being tortured and killed flashed into my brain, making it impossible to resist the urge to turn and run to their aid. My body started to pivot, but then Nike’s fangs nipped my hand, bringing me back to myself. I took a grateful breath and found the strength to take another shaking step …

An avalanche of pain forced me to my knees, the inexorable agony sweeping along my every nerve ending much like my initial portal journey into Duat. Tears flooded my eyes, and I screamed for what felt like hours, again and again until my voice went hoarse, cried and screamed but forced myself to endure the pain.
Why do you insist on hurting yourself so? You have but to turn around, and the pain will stop! Wouldn’t that be so much easier?
Whoever this mental
voice belonged to obviously didn’t know me very well. I’d never taken the
easy
route in my life. Eventually I found the sheer determination to stumble to my feet and press another step forward …

And found myself standing in the shadow of an honest-to-gods pyramid, one that had been carved from black granite and towered a dizzying height upward that should have been impossible underground, but then I blinked and realized that a million glittering pinpoints in the ceiling were actually stars, and what I’d taken for a ceiling was actually a midnight skyscape blazing with celestial light. My breath caught in my chest, and I could only stare skyward, transfixed.

Then the vocalized version of that unemotional mental voice claimed my attention. “Long has it been since a Nemesis dared venture into my Hall. Born a mortal, reborn an arcane, then supping the essence of immortals to become one for a fleeting moment. The only time someone who has not yet tasted death but someday
will
may enter my domain—and then only because she feels herself equal to me. Equal to Ma’at, Regulator of the Stars and Seasons, She Who Brings Balance and Sees into the Hearts of All. How dare
you
, Nemesis who shall someday face her own Reckoning, step into my Hall as if you belong here now?”

Did I just call that voice unemotional? Perhaps it began that way, but by the end of that tirade the voice trembled with disdain and loathing and Rage, the same supernatural Rage that fueled a Fury’s abilities and gave her the nerve to carry on even in the face of overwhelming odds—and sudden insight told me a world-shaking truth: That similarity was not just figurative, it was literal. I somehow knew the answer she sought.

“Because I
do
belong here by virtue of being one of your daughters, She Who Brings Balance—or as you are called in your Grecian guise, Nyx.”

AN EAR-PIERCING CHIME RANG OUT, AND MY
surroundings vanished once more, only to be replaced by what was obviously the interior of the subterranean pyramid. I stumbled slightly as my mind struggled to catch up. Black granite walls towered overhead, but rich tapestries broke up their stark grandeur, each showing Reckoning scenes from myriad mythologies, all having just one thing in common: immortal beings passing judgment upon mortals or arcanes whose faces looked eerily similar no matter whether African, European, Asian, or Egyptian. Mother Reckoner in all her aspects.

Although, when I looked closer, none of the tapestries near me contained Ma’at in all Her glory. Then footsteps sounded behind me, and I turned, only to find out why that was so. Here in Duat, Mother Reckoner
personified
Ma’at in all Her glory.

She walked in beauty like the night, as a famous poet once claimed, with skin as dark as the granite around us. Her eyes were golden orbs edged in silver that shone more intensely than any star ever could; and she wore a simply cut toga in the fashion of immortals, though hers was an iridescent charcoal that shimmered in the light rather than boring white. The filigree belt wrapped around her waist formed a traditional mythological symbol: a serpent devouring its own tail. The closer she drew, the more awe burned inside me until finally I could stand it no more and threw myself onto the ground.
How
had I dared what I just had, to claim this dazzling being as mother in even a figurative sense? Logic reared its ugly head, too, and doubt only multiplied. Furies did not swear themselves to any one deity, only taking oaths to the
Gens
Immortalis
as a whole, then their specific Fury class. Each class might claim its original founder as
nominal
mother, but it wasn’t like any of them were literally our ancestors …

Nike shot me very amused sensations through our bond, and I blinked.
Or were they?
Had those three original Furies been literal sisters, born from one immortal mother and eventually going on to birth subsequent generations of Furies? Mortal genetic science would have disputed that possibility, but magic and arcane life spans made it an all-too-real possibility.

Apparently my sense of unworthiness showed upon my face. “Rise, daughter, and stop being foolish.” That voice had many elements in common with the earlier except it very much trembled with emotion and had a distinctly feminine quality. It also brooked absolutely no argument, and so, I found myself rising without conscious intent. Looking into Ma’at’s eyes up close was even more
intimidating, but I did my best to obey her command to act like the demigoddess I was. She looked me over from head to toe, her movements drawing attention to the oversized ostrich feather adorning her midnight-dark hair—hair that shimmered identically to my own.

I let out another deep breath. “You really
are
mother to Furykind.”

She smiled a distinctly pleased smile. “Surely you know the alternate story for how the Erinyes came to be, that tells of the goddess Nyx giving birth to them without aid of a father.”

“Yes, but—many of mankind’s myths are merely that: stories so convoluted by the passing of time, they bear little resemblance to reality.”

Her pleasure only increased. “Indeed, but in this particular instance they got it right, at least partially. My three Fury daughters
did
have fathers, each an amazing specimen of his mortal race: Egyptian, Grecian, and what most now refer to as Native American. Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone made me extremely proud, as do their many-times-great-grandchildren today, not least of all you, Marissa Eurydice Holloway.”

My body shivered involuntarily when she spoke my full name. In her voice it seemed almost magical. “I—I—thank you, Mother.”

No matter how impudent it felt to call her that, I could tell how much it pleased her. Then again, it shouldn’t have been such a huge surprise; she’d said how rarely Nemeses made the journey to see her in the Underworld, and her duties there meant she probably didn’t see much of her birth children, who dwelt in the immortal realms not directly tied to the Underworld. She seemed almost …lonely.

And why shouldn’t she be?
Nike chided.
Haven’t you learned how very much we
are
our Creators’ children?

Meaning they felt emotions every bit as much as we did.

Ma’at narrowed her eyes in annoyance when a man wearing a white toga and wielding a golden spear stepped forward but allowed him to murmur into her ear. The look that crossed her face then was way more than annoyed, more like positively pissed off. He finished delivering his message and bowed himself backward, sweat evident upon his brow even though his deity didn’t say a single cross word to him. Still, it was
never
fun being the messenger bearing bad news, even less so when delivering that news to an immortal.

Her eyes momentarily flashed emerald green when she turned her gaze in my direction, something that had me gulping nervously.
Like mother, like daughter indeed.

“My guardians send word that Anubis is at my gates claiming that traitorous followers of his traveled here with you and demanding they be immediately turned over to him.”