Page 109

FIFTEEN

Omen

It said something about how eager the Highest were for any news of the mission they’d sent me on that the slathering goblin who stopped me at the edge of their vast hollow came barreling back mere minutes later with an urgent rasp that rippled through the clotted darkness around us. “They’ll see you now. Come on!”

That welcome was a far cry from my last visit, when they’d left me waiting for what had turned out to be more than a day. And that time they’d summoned me. I’d just have to hope they’d be too distracted by the news I’d brought to sulk over the news I hadn’t.

As far as I was concerned, I had no idea where a hybrid being named Ruby might live. The only human-shadowkind mishmash of a being I knew was named Sorsha, and the Highest hadn’t asked me about anything to do with her .

Besides, Tempest had ruined about a realm’s worth of lives already. You couldn’t find a threat much clearer than that.

The goblin followed me all the way into the yawning cavern, where the potent if ponderous energies of the Highest beings washed over me with an itch through my shadow-side body and a twinge around my neck. They never quite let me forget the hold they had over me. I’d have preferred not to have their slathering lackey witness it, but it wasn’t my place to send him off. Or to take a good chomp out of his throat, which would have accomplished nearly the same thing with much more satisfaction.

Shadowkind couldn’t die in our shadow forms, but we could certainly be maimed to the point that we might as well be dead.

The Highest’s penetrating attention weighed down on me even more heavily than before. The goblin dipped into a sort of groveling bow as if looking for praise for managing the incredible task of walking me the short distance from the entrance. Self-respect was not a quality the behemoths looked for in their minions.

The Highest ignored him. “What word have you brought, hellhound?” one of them demanded, her hollow bellow of a voice echoing through every particle of my being.

Oh, I had a whole lot of words for them, but I’d better choose which ones I actually said carefully. I gathered myself. “I have not encountered a being that goes by the name Ruby, but my search has turned up an even graver danger to both realms. The shadowkind you believed you dispatched ages ago, the one whose vicious tricks I admit I sometimes assisted with, has survived after all. Tempest the sphinx lives, and she has a plot more immense than ever before underway.”

I couldn’t make much of the muttering that passed between the pompous leviathans. “It cannot be so,” another said. “Our warriors tore her to shreds. They reported as much—they would not have lied.”

“I doubt they knew they were lying,” I said. “I’d imagine she performed one of her tricks on them too, to make them think she’d died or that they had her at all. But whatever they tore up, it either survived despite their ravaging or it wasn’t her. I’ve spoken to her face to face. And if anyone should recognize that menace, it’s me.”

One of the massive beings loomed closer with a thicker, harsher surge of energy. “How can we know this isn’t you playing tricks on us?”

For all my own power, it took the tensing of every muscle in my body for me to resist the urge to cringe. As easily as I could have ripped the goblin—who was still watching all this, gaping dopily, the dimwit—into a pulp so mangled it would have taken centuries for it to reassemble into his proper being, the Highest could flay me to shreds even faster. The only reason they hadn’t in the first place, all those years ago when we’d made our deal, was that they’d believed I was of more use to them in one piece. I had to make sure they continued to believe that.

“What possible reason could I have for making this up?” I asked, holding my ground. “I’m on the verge of completing my deal with you. No good could come from reminding you of my old association with the sphinx if she didn’t pose a real threat now.”

The rumbling that followed sounded at least slightly agreeable. My hackles came down, but I stayed braced where I was.

“What is this plot the sphinx is carrying out?” the first speaker demanded. “How much danger could she pose when no word of her has reached us all this time until now?”

“That’s probably what she wants you to think. She wanted to lull you into complacency.” A prod to their dignity couldn’t hurt. “And this scheme is so dangerous precisely because she’s spent so much time putting the pieces in place. She intends to see as many mortals dead as she can—and knowing her and her methods, it could be more than remain alive in the entire mortal realm after she’s through—and to sicken and kill nearly every shadowkind who’s ventured mortal-side as well.”

Another of the Highest spoke up. “You’ve mentioned this sickness before. You said there were mortals creating such a thing.”

“Apparently Tempest has been directing those mortals—and ensuring it’ll come around to bite them in the ass,” I said. “But she made it clear to me that shadowkind will die too, and she doesn’t care how many. I’d imagine if she can find a way to have the sickness spread all the way to your doorstep, she’ll do her best to make that happen. She’s carrying a bit of a grudge after the whole nearly-slaughtered-by-wingéd incident.”

The gawking goblin gave a shudder. Really he should have been more worried about himself. Somehow I suspected his constitution wasn’t up to resisting Tempest’s manufactured disease.

The grandiose goliaths muttered to each other some more. It’d been a thin line between offending them by suggesting they were vulnerable and driving home the threat Tempest posed as hard as I could. They sounded as if they were taking my report at least somewhat seriously.

“You have been in much communication with the sphinx,” one said finally. “We presume you convey this information to us with some concept of how she might be brought down.”

For once, they’d played right into my hands. I smiled as well as I could in my hazy state and bowed my head. “Of course. It would be an honor to not only present the problem but solve it for you as well. I do think, though, that combating a being of such experience and proven power goes well beyond a typical walk in the park. I thought perhaps you might want to adjust your orders to account for that.”

“In what way?”

They were going to make me spell it out, were they? Typical. “Your original instruction was for me to notify you of Ruby’s location—but this Ruby hasn’t caused any noticeable trouble that anyone’s been aware of in decades. Tempest, on the other hand, is days away from unleashing the worst catastrophe any shadowkind has wrought on the realms. If you would rather I pursue her, I would happily take responsibility for?—”

A booming laugh cut me off—and reverberated down to my bones, turning what shadowy gut I had into water. What in darkness’s name was funny about my proposition? The question rose up with a rankling irritation, but at the same time I hesitated to ask.

I didn’t need to. The same being who’d laughed turned a waft of attention onto me that fell even thicker and darker than before. “Of course you would be happy to do so. This has been your scheme all along, hasn’t it? You had to invent the sphinx’s resurrection so we would take your crusade more seriously. Did you really think we would fail to see through such a deception?”

Well, I probably wouldn’t have if it’d actually been a deception. Now that he put it that way, it was difficult to avoid seeing how it’d appear to be a trick of my own to someone who hadn’t stood face to face with Tempest in the recent days.

“No,” I said, working to keep as much irritation as possible out of my voice. “Which is why I wouldn’t have attempted it as a deception. She really is alive and pulling the strings behind the Company of Light. I’d be happy to take a few of your minions to meet her to confirm, although I can’t promise she won’t chew them up and spit them out much worse off than they were when they arrived.”

“I see no reason why that should be necessary,” another of the Highest intoned. “Your intentions are transparent enough. You will resume following your original directive, and you will return to the mortal realm to see about carrying it out now . We have waited long enough.”

They might have waited decades to find “Ruby”, but they’d only asked me to take up the search a couple of weeks ago. I guessed I didn’t get any benefit of their patience.

I wasn’t the type to back down without some sort of fight. “If something isn’t done to stop Tempest, then there might not be anything left in the realms that’s worth saving from whatever you think this Ruby is going to do. Do you really want to leave me in the position to be able to say I told you so?”

The murmur that passed between them sounded unsettled, but not concerned enough. “If the sphinx truly poses such a threat, then attend to her as you see fit. We have seen no evidence of it.”

They hadn’t seen any evidence that Sorsha was a threat either, other than what they’d made up in their own heads about human-shadowkind hybrids. I bit my tongue against flinging that point at them, though. It wouldn’t be good for her or me to appear too invested in her.

The damned puffed-up giants. What could I say that would get through their incredibly dense skulls?

The simpering goblin was already darting to my side. “I can see the hellhound away from you so he won’t bother you any further, your greatnesses,” he said.

“Back off,” I snapped, far less worried about what he thought of me, and advanced a little closer to the Highest. “Do you want to be known as the ones who prevented a catastrophe of immense proportions or the ones who stood by and let it happen? I’m giving you the chance to be the former. And believe me, if Tempest rains down all her rage on the rest of us, I’m not going to stay quiet about your complacency.”

That was a threat in itself, and a gamble I nearly regretted. A wallop of chilling fury hit me, tossing me backward like a tidal wave, head over feet. I shook myself, regaining my bearings and confirming I’d kept possession of all my limbs, and the blustering fools shoved me again. The impression of a choke collar around my throat yanked painfully tight.

Several of their echoing voices rang out together. “Begone, hellhound, and we will hear no more of this ridiculousness from you.”

There was a thing or three I could have said about who was being ridiculous here, but I wasn’t saving anyone if I ended up in tiny pieces scattered across the entire shadow realm. I spoke through gritted teeth. “As you command, oh Highest ones.”

I loped off with only one thing I hadn’t possessed before this visit: the certainty that in this war, no matter what else came of it, my companions and I were utterly alone.