Magic Binds (21 page)

“Did you say yes?”

“I said no.”

“You said no to my father?”

“I did. I told him that a storm could power you or tear you apart and I didn't want to be ripped to pieces.”

That took some serious balls.

“He said he understood. I told him that d'Ambray would make a better candidate. We all worshipped your father, but he had Hugh the longest, since Hugh was a child. He would do anything Nimrod asked of him.”

And what a wonderful reward Hugh got for his devotion.

“He said the process wouldn't work on Hugh. His healing power was too strong and would reject the alien magic. We mused about it. We finished the dinner. I don't remember getting up but when I woke up, we were in Mishmar and he had already started. I remember pain. Excruciating pain. It didn't stop for an eternity. I decided then that if I lived, Nimrod would never benefit from what he had done to me, so when I absorbed Deimos, I turned all of my power inward. There is only so much terror a human psyche can handle.”

The willpower required to do that to yourself had to be staggering.

“I don't know what to say. ‘Sorry' doesn't seem adequate. My father really hates hearing ‘no.'”

“He doesn't hear it often.” Ruby light rolled over his irises.

“Did he try to put you back together?”

“Yes. But he failed. The damage was too massive and I wanted to stay broken. After months of treatment and torture he sent me with Hugh to the Caucasus as a last-ditch effort. He didn't want me in Greece—too many native powers and too risky—but the Black Sea coast was close enough for Deimos to feel the pull of the land. He hoped that proximity to Greece would draw me out, so he told Hugh to put me in a cage, so I could see the sky and feel the wind, and starve me. But I was too far gone. I would've died in that cage, and then you took me out, and you and Barabas took care of me ever since.”

The memory of him in the cage triggered an instant rage. No human being should've been treated like that, starved, dying of thirst, sitting in his own waste.

“What will you do now?” I asked.

He smiled, baring vampire fangs. “When you fight your father, I will soar above you. I want to be the last thing he sees before he dies.”

So far I had the god of evil and the god of terror on my side. My good-guy image was taking a serious beating. Maybe I should recruit some unicorns or kittens with rainbow powers to even us out.

Teddy Jo walked out onto the porch. “Here you . . . damn it.”

Christopher gave him a small wave.

“Can't feel him with the tech up?” I asked.

Teddy Jo ignored me. “What do you want?”

“I'd like to come,” Christopher said. “In case something goes wrong. I won't be any trouble.”

Teddy Jo opened his mouth.

“Don't be mean,” I said.

“Mean? Me? To him?”

“Yes.”

Teddy Jo's face turned dark. He sat in the chair next to me. “Answer me this, how do you exist?”

“Forced theosis,” Christopher said.

“How?” Teddy Jo asked.

“Ask her father. I remember only pain. It probably began as implantation, a forced possession, but how exactly he went about it is beyond my recollection.”

“Did you . . . ?” Teddy Jo let it trail off.

“Absorb the essence of Deimos? Yes.”

Teddy Jo shook his head. “It's not apotheosis. Apotheosis implies reaching the state of rapture and divinity through faith. It's not an appearance avatar.”

“No,” I said. “That would imply the deliberate voluntary descent of a deity to be reborn in a human body, and from what I understand there was nothing voluntary about the process. Deimos wasn't reincarnated.”

“There is no word for it,” Christopher said.

Teddy Jo rocked forward, his hands in a single fist against his mouth. “That's because it goes against the primary principle of all religion—the acknowledgment of forces beyond our control possessing superhuman agency.”

“With the exception of Buddhism,” Christopher said.

“Yes. The key here is ‘superhuman.' A deity may consume a human or another deity, but a human can never consume a deity, because that implies human power is greater than divine.”

Just another night in Atlanta. Sitting on my porch between a Greek god who was really a human and an angel of death who was having an existential crisis.

“This shouldn't be. You can't be Deimos.”

“But I am,” Christopher said.

“I know.”

“It's the Shift,” I said. “The power balance between a neglected deity such as Deimos and a very powerful human is skewed toward the human, especially if there are no worshippers.”

“It would have to be a really powerful human,” Teddy Jo said.

“I was,” Christopher said. “I suppose I should say I am.”

“Do you retain any of your prior navigator powers?” I asked.

“No.”

We sat together on the porch, watching the universe strip herself bare above us.

“Theophage,” I said.

“What?” Teddy Jo said.

“You wanted a word for Christopher. Theophage.”

“The eater of gods?” Christopher smiled.

“That word is for the sacramental eating of God, in the form of grains and meat,” Teddy Jo said.

“Well, now it's for literal eating.”

“We should get going,” Teddy Jo said.

“So, can I come?” Christopher asked.

“Where? Where do you want to go?” Teddy Jo asked.

“To Mishmar. I could carry her. She wouldn't need a winged horse.”

“No. Even if you could carry her that far, you couldn't get there fast enough.”

“He's right,” I added. “The plan is to escape Mishmar before my father arrives, but it's possible he will catch me there. For whatever reason, he is reluctant to kill me, but he won't hesitate to fight you. If you saw him, what would you do?”

“I would kill him,” Christopher stated in a matter-of-fact way.

Well, he would definitely try.

“So that's right out,” Teddy Jo said. “You understand why? You come with her to Mishmar, neither of you might get out alive. She's safer on her own.”

Christopher nodded. “Well, can I come with you to see the horses? I promise to be good and not scare them.”

“Sure, why not.” Teddy Jo waved his arms. “The entirety of Hades can come. We'll have a party.”

Christopher stepped off the porch in to the backyard, spread his wings, and shot upward. The wind nearly blew me off my feet.

“Thank you,” I told Teddy Jo.

“He gives me the creeps,” Teddy Jo growled.

“You're the nicest angel of death I know.”

“Yeah, yeah. Get in the damn swing.”

•   •   •

T
HE FOREST STRETCHED
in front of me, a gloomy motionless sea of branches sheathed in leaves. The waters of the Blue River streamed past, quiet and soothing, the light of the old moon setting the small flecks of
quartz at the bottom of the riverbed aglow. Thin, watery fog crept in from between the trees, sliding over the water and curling around the few large boulders thrusting from the river like monks kneeling in prayer.

I sat quietly, waiting, a saddle and a blanket to go under it next to me. Teddy Jo had dropped me off and retreated into the woods, adding, “Don't treat them as regular horses. Treat them as equals.” Whatever that meant.

Christopher glided above me, somewhere too high to see. Watching him in the sky had made me forget about being suspended hundreds of feet in the air with a whole lot of nothing between me and the very hard ground. Christopher had remembered how to fly. He would climb up, bank, and dive, speeding toward the ground in a hair-raising rush, only to somehow slide upward, out of the curve, and soar. Teddy Jo had rumbled, “You'd think he'd act like he had wings before,” then caught himself, and left Christopher to the wind and speed.

Now all was quiet.

Even if I did manage to bond with a pegasi, I'd have to ride on its back as it flew. My stomach tried to shrink to the size of a walnut at the thought. If it bucked me off, I would be a Kate pancake. Life had tried to kill me in all sorts of ways lately, but falling off of a flying horse was a new and unwelcome development.

I had to get a horse. Not only did my idiotic plan depend on it, but Curran's did, too. He would walk his mercs into my father's castle, and he was counting on me to provide a distraction to get them out. Sienna foresaw a flying horse. So far she hadn't been wrong.

A shape moved to the left, in the woods. I turned. Another. Then another. A single horse emerged from the gloom; first, a refined head, then a muscled chest, then thin elegant legs. A stallion, a light golden palomino, his coat shimmering with a metallic sheen as if every silky hair were coated in white gold. Two massive feathered wings lay draped on his back.

Not a Greek pony. Not any local breed either. He looked like an Akhal-Teke, the ancient Turkmenistan horses born in the desert.

I took the apple out and held it in my hand.

The stallion regarded me with blue eyes, shook his mane, and started toward me.

I held my breath.

He clopped his way past me to the river and began to drink, presenting me with a front and center view of his butt. More horses came: perlino, white, golden buckskin, bay . . . They all headed to the river, drank, flicked their ears, and pretended not to see me.

I was out of luck. I sat there and watched them drink, holding the stupid apple in my hand. Should I go up to them making cooing noises? Teddy Jo said not to move and to let them come to me. Well, they weren't coming.

What else could I get? What could I do to get there fast enough? A car wouldn't do it. I had saved an ifrit hound from ghoulism a few weeks ago. Maybe he could carry me away from Mishmar long enough for me to escape my father. No, that was a dumb idea. He wouldn't be fast enough. My dad would catch us and then we'd both be killed.

A single horse peeled away from the herd. Dark brown and so glossy she didn't look real, she stood about fifteen hands high. Her crest and croup darkened to near black, while her stomach was a rich chestnut. On the flanks, barely visible under the dark wings, the chestnut broke the dark brown in dapples. She looked at me. I looked at her. She walked three steps forward and swiped the apple from my palm.

“Hi,” I said.

The horse crunched the apple. That was probably as good a response as I was going to get.

I reached out and petted her neck. The mare nudged me with her nose.

“I don't have more magic apples. But I do have some carrots and sugar cubes.” I reached into my backpack and held out a sugar cube. “Let me put a saddle on you and I'll give you one.”

And I was talking to the magic winged horse as if she were a human being. That's it. I had officially gone crazy.

I reached for the blanket. Her wings snapped open. The left wing took me right below the neck. It was like being hit with a two-by-four. I fell and scrambled to my feet in case she decided to stomp me.

The horse neighed and showed me her teeth.

“Are you laughing?”

She neighed again. Behind me the herd neighed back. Great. Now the horses were making fun of me.

I held out a sugar cube. She reached over and grabbed it off my hand. Crunching ensued.

I extracted the second sugar cube and held up the blanket. “Alright, Twinkle Pie or whatever your name is. I put the blanket on, you get more sugar. Your choice.”

•   •   •

S
WOOPING DOWN TO
the Keep's main tower sounded like an awesome idea when I originally decided to do it. For one, it would let me avoid being seen, and Jim could meet me up there with my aunt's bones, avoiding most of the Keep's population. At least that's how I explained it to Teddy Jo when I asked him to go ahead of me and tell Jim to meet me there.

In theory it all sounded good. In practice, the top of the Keep's tower made for a very small and very difficult target. Especially from up here.

After the first fifteen minutes of flight I decided that I could stop clutching at Sugar every time she beat her wings, which signaled to her that it was time for aerial acrobatics. She threw herself into it with gusto, neighing with delight every time I screamed. I managed not to throw up, she managed not to kill me, and by the end of the thirty-minute test flight we had reached an understanding. I realized that she didn't plan to murder me and she realized that I meant every word when I promised to drop the bag with sugar to the ground if she didn't stop doing barrel rolls. Christopher watched it all from a safe distance. I heard him laughing a few times. I'd never live it down.

However, landing on the Keep's tower presented a whole new challenge. We passed over the mile-wide stretch of clear ground around the Keep and circled the tower. Below me, Jim, Dali, Doolittle, and Teddy Jo were talking. I couldn't see Jim's face from all the way up here, but I recognized his pose well enough. It was his “what the hell is this bullshit?” pose.

Dali looked up, saw me, and waved, jumping up and down.

“Take it easy,” I said. “Let's land right here . . . oh God!”

Sugar spread her wings and dropped into a swan dive. Wind whistled past my face.

“Sugar.” I put some steel into my voice. We were going to crash. We'd
smash against the stone and there would be nothing left of us but a wet spot. “Sugar!”

Teddy Jo threw himself flat. Jim leapt at Dali, knocking her down to the floor. I caught a flash of Doolittle's face as we whizzed by, Sugar's wings clearing his head by about four inches. He was laughing.

“You're a mean horse!”

Sugar neighed, beat her wings, and turned around.

“Control your horse!” Jim snarled.

“
You
control your horse.” Oh wow, now that was a clever comeback. He'd surely drop to his knees and bow before my intellectual brilliance.