Page 52

Chapter 52

Real Heroes Settle for a Draw

You couldn’t call it a peace treaty, but what Shame and Alice managed to negotiate with Tenebris and his cabal ended up being. . . well, a tolerable armistice. It would probably last about a week.

Our lives are plagued by absolutes. The Lords Celestine– up until they got their arses roasted by a faction of their fellow Aurorals– had insisted there was both absolute good and absolute evil. The Lords Devilish,stupid pricks, had gone out of their way to prove them right. A philosopher once speculated that fire was the absolute of heat and ice the absolute of cold. I’ve never visited the sun, but I’m going to take a wild guess that it’s significantly hotter than a campfire.

Human beings are prone to thinking in absolutes, it’s true, but we’re sure not built for them. There’s never one absolutely right choice, or even an absolutely wrong one. We never win an absolute victory, nor can we ever truly lose everything, even though it does sometimes feel that way.

‘What the fuck’s your problem?’ Corrigan asked. He reached up to swat me across the head, then groaned and slumped back on the mossy knoll where Galass had told him to rest after stitching the still sizzling golden wound.

‘What’s my problem?’ I repeated. ‘Oh, nothing much.’ I pointed to the ruins of the fortress, where Tenebris and his cabal of disaffected Aurorals and Infernals were already using some of the power they’d taken from the Celestines and Devilish to erect a grand palace. The Pantheon, they were calling themselves, those six arseholes. ‘We risked everything, killed who knows how many angelics and diabolics and malefics and all the rest, to prevent a war from turning the Mortal realm into one giant game board, and humanity into an endless supply of pieces for the Celestines and Devilish to play with.’

‘And we did,’ Corrigan insisted. ‘Those pricks are mostly dead or captive or whatever Tenebris and his merry band of idiots are doing with them.’

‘Yeah, only now that merry band of idiots are setting up shop as the gods of the Mortal realm.’

‘So? We’ll fuck them up, too.’ He laughed, groaned from the pain of aggravating his wound, then chuckled more cautiously. ‘It’s kind of our motto now.’

I tugged at the tatters of my coat. ‘Sorry I wrecked the uniform.’

Corrigan shrugged. ‘Ah, we’ll buy new ones. Aradeus says he’s got some more colourful designs in mind. I’ve decided I’m open to the suggestion. . . With your approval, of course, oh great and wise coven leader.’

‘Seriously?’ I asked. ‘You expect me to lead anyone after this mess?’ I held up my hand, which served no purpose, I supposed, but was meant to illustrate my current incapacity. ‘There’s no longer a Pandoral realm, Corrigan, which means I have no attunement. I’m not a wonderist any more.’

‘You weren’t much of one before, but we still followed you.’

That admission caught me off guard. ‘But why? Corrigan, you second-guess me at every turn– and you’re right to do so! My entire peace plan fell apart, our enemies played us for fools right up until the end, we barely came out of this ali — ’

‘Don’t forget, you slept with a crazy doom-witch.’

‘That too,’ I acknowledged.

Undeterred by pain or the promise of worsening his injuries, Corrigan forced himself to his feet, grabbed me by the collar and hauled me up to standing. ‘You’re a fucking idiot, Cade Ombra. The worst tactical commander I’ve ever met– despite being the most brilliant tactical mind I’ve ever encountered. You’ve got no sense of proportion, no ability to recognise when the odds against us are too great. You’ll risk sending six of us to our deaths just on the off-chance you might save one of us. You’re a self-righteous, belligerent martyr. A closet idealist. You claim to be a cynic but you can’t stop yourself from rushing headlong into every mad quest to save the world even when you know– you know – you can’t possibly succeed.’

‘Then why do you keep helping me?’ I asked.

He grinned. ‘Because I fucking love watching you try.’

Then he pulled back his right fist and punched me in the face so hard I passed out.

I couldn’t have been out for long, because the pain in my jaw felt all too fresh when Eliva’ren came and sat beside me. Whatever claim she’d thought she had to being a potentially good mother was rendered untenable by the fact that not ten yards away, Hamun was hanging onto Temper’s back as the kangaroo repeatedly hopped twenty feet in the air before spinning around in circles and landing again. All the while, beast and boy chanted a word that should never come out of the mouths of children. Or kangaroos.

‘What do you suppose we should call his species?’ Eliva’ren asked. ‘Flying vampire kangaroo? It’s a bit long-winded.’

‘Kangadragon?’ I asked.

She nestled against my shoulder. ‘Misses out on the whole blood-drinking thing, doesn’t it?’

Hamun must’ve heard us because he called out, ‘He’s a vampidragaroo!’

‘Stupid kid,’ I said.

I felt the blush in Eliva’ren’s cheeks as she smiled against my chest. ‘Yeah. I’m thinking of putting him up for adoption.’

‘I heard that!’ the boy said, then came running to us, flopping against my other side. ‘You are the worst parents ever! ’

I sat there, frozen for a moment, not sure what the hell I was supposed to do now. So I followed my instincts and did the stupidest thing imaginable: I held Eliva’ren tighter and reached around with my other arm and laid it across the boy’s shoulder, knowing full well that such gestures are not only questions, but promises.

‘Eliva’ren of the House of Ren?’ I asked.

‘Yes, Cade Ombra of the Malevolent Seven.’

‘If I somehow, despite having no magic left in me, no army other than five very emotionally challenged wonderists and one — ’

‘ — vampidragaroo,’ Hamun put in, helpfully.

‘Yeah, that. If I can somehow stop the Mortal realm from falling to pieces in the next year or so, what are the odds you’ll be so impressed that you agree to marry me?’

She nestled deeper into my chest. ‘Pretty slim. I’ve never seen myself as destined for marriage.’

‘That’s what I figured.’

Hamun leaned in closer and whispered in my ear, ‘Don’t worry, Cade. I’ll work on her.’

I sat there, those two unexpected and wonderful weights pressed up against me, and watched as Tenebris and his pantheon erected a palace so grand one could only describe it as befitting the gods themselves.

I was definitely going to start by blowing that piece of shit up.