“I must strongly advise against this course of action.”
“You think I’ll let this freak go. Is your prison really that shabbily constructed? I mean, it must be if Grant was able to waltz in.”
We made it impossible to leave, Sarai said, voice cool and dry. We were not worried about the fools who would fall in.
“You’re not a normal woman,” Jack said. “So no, I don’t know how you might break his shackles, just that I’ve seen the possibility.”
I’d seen the fire. Witnessed myself torn apart within it. And he was right, maybe being brave meant I should walk away and let my husband rot in that place. But I couldn’t even contemplate that. I couldn’t even face that option.
I stared him dead in the eye. “Tell me the truth, old Wolf. Can a Lightbringer of Grant’s strength control that Aetar?”
Jack hesitated. “I don’t know. Grant is not like any one of his kind who ever existed. But neither is the Devourer.”
“You still managed to imprison him.”
“Barely. Because we used the crystal skulls. It was our last act with them, after we broke the power of the Reaper Kings.” Jack glanced at Zee and the boys. “You destroyed the other skulls. If he goes free, we will have nothing to use. Nothing that is strong enough.”
Sarai had also positioned herself in front of the gate, her head lowered ever so slightly—just enough to make that horn seem like a weapon instead of a decorative piece of fantasy. Raw and Aaz gathered close to my sides, watching her with glittering crimson eyes. Claws flexed.
Tracker studied her, then my grandfather, his gaze inscrutable.
“The Wolf is right,” he said. “This is too incredibly dangerous.”
“Of course it is,” I said. “It may be suicidal. But what would you have given, Tracker, to have someone risk herself to keep you safe? What sacrifice would have been too much to keep that iron collar off your neck?”
“This one,” he said.
“Liar. Even the attempt . . . someone trying for you . . . would have changed everything.”
I stepped away from the men—and the unicorn—clenching my right hand into a fist. Zee and the boys gathered close. “Get out of my way.”
Jack shook his head. Zee rasped, “Nothing lasts, Meddling Man.”
“Except foolishness,” he whispered. “You’re a mother now, Maxine. What do you owe your child?”
“Stay here,” I told Tracker, ignoring that dirty play. “Watch them.”
I didn’t wait for a response. I ran to that shimmering haze, demons at my side. Raw and Aaz slammed Sarai out of the way when she tried to charge me. I heard Jack’s choked, startled shout—but that was all. I hit that shimmering haze, passed through.
And got a surprise.
I found myself inside a white marble foyer. Wide and curved as two cupped hands—and gleaming, shining, with an unnatural brightness that permitted no blemishes. In fact, it was as though the stone and walls had been airbrushed to absolute perfection. No color, anywhere. Just a pure, alabaster white.
It was the visual equivalent of hearing a prim old woman speak in a man’s booming lumberjack voice. Unexpected, given certain expectations. I was anticipating hell, after all.
“Tell me,” I said to Zee, who prowled across the floor, looking like some obscene blemish against that pure, luminous marble. “This is kind of fucked up, right?”
Dek and Mal began humming the melody to “Strangeness,” while Raw and Aaz pressed against the walls, scratching them—leaving claw marks that oozed black tar, like blood.
“Excuse me,” said a quiet male voice.
I flinched, surprised. Zee also twitched—all the boys, jumping a little—their surprise even more visceral than mine. No one ever sneaked up on them.
I turned and found that an elderly man stood just behind me: stout, with spectacles hanging down his nose. He was dressed like a butler, all in black, his skin very pale and his eyes a watery blue. He held slippers in his left hand.
“Please announce yourself,” he said.
I stared, heart still pounding so hard I wanted to vomit. “Who are you?”
One stubby brow arched up. “I am the butler. And you are?”
He was polite, proper, the very epitome of nonthreatening—but the skin-crawling menace I felt at those simple, quiet words made me want to run screaming.
“My name is Maxine Kiss,” I said.
“Ah, very good.” He extended some slippers. “Please put these on. The master abhors noise.”
Zee sniffed at them. The slippers seemed to be slippers. Still, I felt very strange about it. I stared from them to the butler, who straightened and fixed me with a cold look.