Yarrow (32 page)

"Come to me," Lysistratus said.

His power pierced her. His will slipped inside her, meeting no resistance. Dazed, she forced herself up. She got as far as her hands and knees, but couldn't rise any farther. A small part of her remembered the vision in Mynfel's pool. Her terror then was a joke compared to what paralyzed her now. She would welcome those branched antlers weighting down her brow, if having them endowed her with enough power to break the hold her mocking captor held her with.

But that vision had been a sham. What did it matter if her secret name twinned Mynfel's? It proved nothing. Meant nothing.

Bound to the parasite's will, she had to obey him. She began to crawl in his direction. Her hand landed on Toby's knife. She gripped it reflexively, closed her fingers around the sharp blade and opened a deep slash in her palm. The knife fell free, and she stared numbly at the blood welling from her hand. She watched it drop and soak into the earth. She didn't even feel the pain.

Lysistratus drew her in like a hooked fish. He had her so completely overpowered that eye contact was no longer necessary. She moved forward again, setting her bloodied palm down on the earth to pull herself along. As the open wound ground into the dirt, a sudden shock went through her, stealing the last of her ebbing strengths.

She sprawled forward on the ground, her mind ablaze with a kaleidoscope of sound and images that twisted and churned in a maddening blur. Incongruously, tattered remnants of the real world made themselves be known. Words leapt through the maelstrom— words torn from the pages of the books that she'd spent the better part of her life immersed in.

A rotund figure, narrow-framed glasses in the midst of a frizz of charcoal-gray hair… a high-pitched voice crying over the droning sound of a harmonium… Alien Ginsberg's primal
Howl…
speaking of a generation destroyed by madness….

Cold fire ran up her hand. Her head was too heavy to lift. She sensed Lysistratus standing directly over her.

Blake's 'Mad Song': "Like a fiend in a cloud, with howling glee…."

The ground heaved under her.

Toby, forgotten, his sanity spilling from him in a rush, watched golden-green sparks leap from the craggy tips of the standing stones. When his gaze alit on Cat, his jaw went slack.

"No future!" Sid Vicious fronting the Pistols… the crash of discordant music warring with his angry voice. "No future…."

The horned head lifted from the ground. The pulse of her lifeblood mingled with the energy stored in the longstones— ancient batteries awaiting a key to unlock their mysteries. She saw herself reflected in Lysistratus's eyes. She shook her head. She didn't understand what she saw— not the weight on her brow, nor the cold fire that filled her palm with more than pain and sent it speeding through her abused body.

She was aware of it all on a subliminal level. Far clearer was the knowledge of the parasite's hands reaching for her, the Otherworld as a wasteland and herself lost in—

Milton's 'Paradise Lost': "The seat of desolation, void of light…."

An emptiness from which there would be no return. A banishment that was ultimate. Final.

Lysistratus gripped her by the throat and lifted her, his face inches from her own. Her lungs begged for air. His gaze drove into hers. He ignored the sprouting horns, the potential for power that was dying stillborn with each passing moment. He had her. She was his. That was all that mattered. And not all the transformations in this world or any other were going to save her now.

Tattershank, the wizard from her own
Cloak and Hood,
forcing Meg to her feet to face the demon: "I am dying. Save at least yourself. Your world…."

She lifted her arms to strike at Lysistratus. Her blows were ineffectual, but blood sprayed from her wound, momentarily blinding him. The blood burned where it struck his eyes and skin.

His grip faltered, and she tore herself free to stumble across the withering grass. She forced air through her bruised windpipe with deep rattling gasps. When she fell, it was against one of the three standing stones. She pressed her cheek against its bruising surface. Strength surged through her from the stone. She turned, her back to it, her head still heavy with the unfamiliar weight on her brow.

Half blind, Lysistratus moved toward her. His eyes no longer had the power to bind her, but there was the undeniable pull of his radiance that made her want him almost as much as she needed to destroy him. And there was still strength in him— enough to suck her empty, enough to bleed the Otherworld barren….Her world…

She braced herself against the stone and met his outstretched hands with her own. Beyond fear, she joined her gaze to his. The buffeting power of his will pounded against her own. She fought him as best she could, awkwardly, the raw power filling her, but spilling uselessly from her untrained mind. He battered aside her clumsy defenses as soon as she erected them, drove into her with the skill of centuries at his command.

His feral eyes blazed. His hands were locked around hers, crushing bone, drawing her out of herself….

But she heard only—
Tattershank: "Save at least your world…."

The Otherworld a wasteland, bowing under Lysistratus's fierce hunger….

"Save at least yourself…."

He was too strong. She couldn't keep him out of her. One traitorous part of her commanded her to let him have his will. The effort of holding him back was a monstrous, gibbering pain. He loomed over her— in height, in skill, in strength. She was a frail leaf ravaged by the force of his gale, an ugly smudge compared to his radiance. She was falling into a—

"…void of light…."

The longstone rasped against her back as she was forced to her knees. With success so near, Lysistratus laughed. The sound bled into her—

"…with howling glee…."

Mynfel, help me! she pleaded to the night skies. There was no reply except for the endless jabbering inside her own head.

"No future!"

"…destroyed by madness…."

"Save at least your world…."

There was no deeper Otherworld to draw Lysistratus into, as she had with her first assailant. No Toby waiting there with knife in hand to help her. There was nothing. Only—

"…desolation, void of light…."

A darkness inside her like a prison rose steadily upward through her mind, drawing into it all that made her who she was. It stilled the cacophony, swallowing the voices one by one. It was a black cage steadily consuming her.

No! she cried as it threatened the very core of her being. That's all I have left— that's all that's me!

Mine,
the blackness demanded with Lysistratus's voice. Sibilant. Triumphant.
Come to me and be mine.

"No!" Cat screamed.

Despair towered in her. She lifted her face. Her horns struck the longstone behind her. Sparks of witchfire flew about at the contact. Blind rage stabbed through her. Power swelled.

"You go into it!" she cried. "It can't have me!"

She was unskilled. Her use of the power was awkward. But her desperate fury, her final need, overcame her lack of knowledge. The Otherworld itself came to her aid, feeding her the strength she needed through the standing stone that supported her. The dark prison meant for her enveloped Lysistratus in a cloying, unbreakable web. Down it plunged inside her, dropping as though all the fiends of hell pursued it, drawing the parasite with it, locking him deep inside her with no escape, no reprieve, no mercy….

Lysistratus's hands loosened their grip on hers. She saw the fading light in his eyes. The blue fires in the depths of their pupils dimmed. He gave a wailing cry that echoed deep inside her.

You were mine….

His body fell across her. She shrunk from the contact, pushing at him, rolling the body away. With stunned eyes she watched it dissolve until no trace of him remained. Only a distant moan— but that came from inside her… from the shadow prison… the blackness….

"Oh, God. No."

She couldn't live with that inside her. What if it broke loose, spread cancerously through her, made her into what he had been….

Would that be so wrong? the treasonous part of her that had been attracted to the parasite asked.

She couldn't live with it— live with it and know how close she came to giving herself to him.

There was no other way, her reason told her flatly. This is the price she would have to pay if she wanted the Otherworld to be preserved, if she didn't want him loose, feeding on the dreaming minds of her own world, if she didn't want to take his place.

"But I'm not strong enough," she whispered.

Her fear of dying was nothing compared to what she felt now. She would always have to be on guard against him— against a part of herself as well. She would always feel that pinprick of evil inside her, knowing that it would be loosed again if she ever dropped her guard, knowing how close she came to welcoming it….

"M-mistress… Cat…?"

She turned a dull gaze in Toby's direction.

"Did… did we win?" he asked.

Submerged, faintly, she felt Lysistratus stir inside her. "I don't know," she said tonelessly. "It… it doesn't feel like we won…."

She lifted a hand to touch the heavy weight on her brow. The antlers grew insubstantial, just as Lysistratus's body had, fading under the touch of her fingers. But though they were gone, she could still feel their weight. She looked at her hand. The cut on her palm was a white scar. The blood that had woken the bond between her and the Otherworld was gone. The wound was healed, but the bond remained.

A sense of vertigo came over her. The hilltop spun in her sight. She was tired… so tired… drained….

Toby touched her shoulder and she toppled over.

"Mistress Cat?" she heard him say, then she was—

—looking into Ben's face.

"Cat? Jesus, Cat— are you all right?"

"Ben…?"

She was back. In her own world. The rest was all a dream. The Otherworld and— She felt the faint stir deep inside her, and shuddered. No. It had been real. God. How could she live with that… that thing inside her? And when she thought of how she'd almost just given herself up to—

"Everything's going to be okay," Ben said. He glanced at where the two bodies lay sprawled— one on the floor of the car, the other outside on the concrete. "It's over now, Cat. They're both… dead."

But it's not over, she wanted to tell him. Not when the creature was still inside her. Not when she'd almost let him seduce her to his side. Not when she could still hear that traitorous part of her, whispering and sibilant— its voice a combination of the parasite's and her own.

But she didn't have the strength to speak. She heard the sound of approaching sirens. Ben helped her to her feet and kept an arm around her shoulders for support. The physical contact was comforting. She saw Peter leaning weakly against the side of the car. Both Ben and Peter looked like they were just barely holding themselves together. She knew just how they felt.

"Somebody must've called the police," Ben said.

Peter nodded. "When we talk to them," he warned, "let's just keep it straight. No dreams. No vampires. No little magic—" He glanced over to where Tiddy Mun had been flung, but there was no sign of the little man. "No little magic people. Okay?"

"Whatever," Cat said dully.

"We
believe you, Cat," Peter said, "but we've got to leave it at that, or they're going to lock us
all
up."

"Okay," Cat whispered. "No… no dreams. No ghosts." Just a monster imprisoned inside her.

Ben wrapped his arms around her and drew her close. Peter lowered himself down to the pavement and leaned against the wheel of Rick's car, staring at his shaking hands. That was the way the policemen in the first patrol car found them.

The ringing of the phone jarred Potter out of a sound sleep. He reached blearily across his wife and hooked the receiver with a hand, bringing it to his ear. The side of his face was pressed against his pillow. His voice was muffled when he spoke.

"Whazzat?"

"Potter."

The authoritative tone of the voice dissolved the muddiness in his head. "Yeah."

"Got us a hot one. Tag-sheet says you want to be buzzed if we pick up another slasher victim."

Potter was fully awake now. He sat up. "What've you got?"

"You better get down here— underground garage at the corner of Main and Lees. The Marquis— you know the place?"

"Yeah. Who's the victim?"

"The body's not here, at least not that one. Listen, Potter. It gets real complicated. It'd be a lot easier if you'd just get down here."

"I'm already there," Potter said.

He hung up and started to get dressed.

May I be an island in the sea,

The four of them sat in a special waiting room at the Riverside Hospital, waiting for the plainclothes detective who had questioned them earlier to return. Peter and Ben's minor wounds had been treated, and like Debbie, they had both refused sedatives.

Cat had come through her ordeal physically unscathed, except for some bruising around her throat. Her real wounds lay inside, still open and raw. But while she had refused to be treated for shock as well, her reasons were radically different from those of the others. She was afraid of the balm that the sedatives promised, afraid of finding herself back in the Otherworld and having to go through it all again.

Becki and Stella were both in another room under police guard, after having been treated for shock.