Page 15

Make Her Mortal

There’s no reason I should have woken up, except for maybe Vos’s snoring behind me. The man sounds like a desert sandstorm when he sleeps. A glance around the camp shows him out cold, Tziah snuggled up against his back. The others don’t stir, either.

It wasn’t the Shadows that woke me. Not with Scoria here.

A small part of me—a very small part—almost wishes it was. Just for a second. So I could hear Reven’s voice.

Stop. I think it to myself. Goddess, I can’t believe I even considered it. It was probably Vos.

I’m lying on my side. The icy grasses crackle around us as the breeze rustles through them and a shiver racks through me. Vos makes a windbreak out of ice at night, but it only helps a little.

At least this is the last night like this. Tomorrow, we start gathering with our allies.

I pull my legs up to my chest and burrow into the animal pelt covering me. Closing my eyes on a sigh, I reach for sleep. At the low growl that rumbles directly above my head, my eyes snap back open.

Actually, just for a second, I debate keeping them shut and pretending I didn’t hear it. But I’ve come across too many monsters lately to believe that method still works. Not like it did when I was little and afraid of all the things Omma warned would come for me, and I would hide under my bed at night.

I force my head to turn very slowly to look up…directly into the gaping open maw of the grass monster Mimick had become.

Except she’s not the same.

This cursed woman is no longer made of grass, but of darkness, and her new form has finally awakened.

Just like in the Shadowood, this darkness is something else, slick and oily like tar. Similar to my attempt at making two bunnies, strings of drool-like shadow drip out of her mouth, connecting the teeth inside.

My heart decides it wants nothing to do with this situation, lodging itself halfway up my throat. The Shadows are locked down, thanks to Scoria. How am I supposed to stop Mimick again? I barely survived the first encounter.

I try to call out. But the only sound that comes out of me is a hoarse squeak.

Where is Scoria? Why doesn’t she feel this thing’s presence if she feels souls? Oily shadow drips onto my face and runs down my cheek.

“Help!” I’m yelling inside my head, but the cry won’t come out.

“We can help you, love.” The voices of Eidolon’s Shadows knock around inside my skull, all of them speaking as one, in unison.

I should be shocked at hearing them again after days of silence. I should be asking myself where Scoria is. Instead, their offer slides through me, tempting. Maybe I can use them…

“But you have to ask us nicely.”

Forget that. I’d rather be eaten by the monster above me.

“I die, you die, assholes.”

One of the Shadows tsks . “Someone got her fire back. The mouth on Reven’s princess,” he says, almost like he’s speaking to the others, and I can picture them all there, hazy versions of Reven and Eidolon, nodding to themselves and agreeing they should do something about that. About me.

“Maybe we can make Mimick a deal. Trade being trapped inside you for being inside her now that she’s made of shadow. She might help us. After all… you did this to her.”

A drop of the drool lands on my neck, rolling under my top, between my breasts, and then down one side of my ribs. Gross. I can’t even squirm.

“Go ahead.” I’m calling their bluff. “Show me what you can do.”

Except, instead of the words sounding in my head, they come tumbling out, over loud and gibing.

Oh shit.

Mimick doesn’t even hesitate. She lunges at me, jaws snapping. I roll, but don’t make it far, tensing as I wait for the violent pain coming my way. Except nothing happens beyond an arrow flying overhead with a telltale whistle. It doesn’t strike anything, that’s for sure.

I roll back to find her still above me, still trying to bite me, but it’s like something has a hold of her body and only those snapping jaws can move. The rest of her is arrested above me.

“I’ve got her,” Scoria calls out in the dark, her voice coming from somewhere above the monster trying to eat me. “Move.”

She doesn’t have to tell me twice. Using my elbows and my feet, I scramble backward, out from under Mimick until I’m far enough away to be able to safely get to my feet.

The others are all close, Horus with his bow dangling at his side. I’m guessing he’s the one who shot at her.

“Kill it,” Eidolon’s Shadows snarl in unison. And that rage, the same as the last time I faced Mimick, bubbles up from within me, spewing hatred through me with the force of an avalanche. “You know you want to. Save yourself.”

“Quiet,” Scoria snaps. Not at me, not at Mimick, but at the Shadows.

Inside me the Shadows cringe away from her, the sensation like bugs moving through my gut as they crawl deeper inside me where they hope she can’t get to them.

She lost control of them? How? When?

“Meren, we must try to help her.”

What? “How?”

“Prepare to follow my instructions.” Scoria’s voice is as calm as I’ve heard it in three days.

Me, on the other hand? I would really love the luxury of losing it. She wants me to use Eidolon’s powers on Mimick? I’m not ready for this. Then again, when have I had a chance to be ready for anything I’ve done since Reven kidnapped me from our palace?

I know I’m risking Eidolon getting to me again, but I have no choice. I tap into his power, yanking on the cold inside me. A gentle purple light illuminates the darkness and reflects off the oil-slicked monstrosity in front of me in hideous ways.

“What do I do?” I ask Scoria.

“Draw on the darkness around you.” Scoria’s voice gentles even more, like she’s afraid I’m going to run away screaming or something. “You know the difference now.”

I do. She’s shown me how to feel the darkness, to recognize a simple shadow that merely fills the holes the light forgets to touch. Those kinds of shadows are my safe haven, a source of camouflage, protection, and even comfort, and always have been.

Meanwhile, any Shadows that have a soul attached—like the ones inside me, like the monster trying to kill me now, and like I imagine even the ghosts of Eidolon’s past—have a different feel. Colder, emptier, and angrier.

Scarier.

I feel for the darkness that is warm, safe, gentle.

“Now,” Scoria continues. “Gather that darkness and feed it into her. Think of the way you tried to do with the bunnies. What you’re giving Mimick is something of this world to latch on to, to fill her up. The darkness she’s made of right now, that’s not from this realm. That comes from the hells.”

I ignore the shiver of fear that slithers down my spine, allowing it to pass through me and out through my extremities. I let myself feel it and then let it fade.

Then I focus.

Closing my eyes, shutting out the monster that Scoria can at least hold still, I picture the way I put holes in the top and bottom of my bunny to drain it and make a mold. Only this time, instead of draining it, while the oily shadows drain out the bottom, through the top I fill her with the kindness of the shadows of my mortal world.

She lets out a whine that turns into squealing, a terrible, piteous sound of inflicted agony. My hands shake, but I don’t stop.

Please let this work.

Given the results with the bunnies, I’m pretty sure it won’t.

“There you are,” Scoria says. Not to me, I don’t think. She sounds…pleased.

Pleased is good. Right?

“Seven hells, Meren.” I hear Cain’s whispered words close by.

“Should I stop?” I ask without opening my eyes.

“Stop.” Only that voice is not the giantess, or any of my friends.

I allow my eyes to flicker open and gasp.

What I’ve made is not a monster filled with a new kind of darkness. She’s still all things darkness, but smaller, with a womanly body and the delicate features of a beautiful face, including lips tipped into a small smile. I can’t tell if it’s tinged with gratefulness, or sorrow.

My chest swells with a confidence I haven’t had for so long that I started to forget what it felt like. I did that. I fixed her, helped her. I controlled Eidolon’s power the way I wanted, and it felt…good.

“Mimick?” I ask.

“Mimick,” she repeats her name, the lilt giving it a different meaning. Not a question like mine, but a statement. I glance behind her at the faces of my friends who stare at her, awe in their eyes.

“I’m sorry,” I say to her. I hope she knows that it’s more than those two words.

I’m sorry that she was cursed the way she was. I’m sorry that she was controlled by her own bones, carved by her lover into a horrendous instrument. I’m sorry Mimick and Aesthetus were willing to cause others’ deaths just to keep each other, just to survive. I’m sorry I brought the Shadows down on her.

She tips her head to the side. “I’m sorry.” Again, her tone gives the words a different meaning, and I know what she’s saying in return. She’s sorry she attacked me. She’s sorry she attacked all the other people who happened upon them. She’s sorry she forced me and the Shadows to defend ourselves the way we did.

I nod my own forgiveness.

Mimick holds out her hand and a rustling across the camp draws my gaze. One of our packs shifts and moves until it tips over, the flap opening, and the flute bursts out of it. Too fast for us to stop, it flies into her hand.

I jerk toward her. “Wait! We need that—”

The bones change before my eyes, becoming shadow like her, almost like a fine dust, to be absorbed into her own body. She’s taking back herself.

When it’s gone, something shiny drops to the ground.

Savanah’s amulet.

Holy hells, she did it. She got it out for us.

“Need that,” she says.

It’s more than I would have expected from her, honestly. She could just as easily have taken it to one of Eidolon’s souls, given where she’s probably headed now that she’s sort of whole again.

I look at Scoria. “What happens now?”

Scoria is difficult to make out in the dark, her rocky black body blending into the sky. But I think her lips form into a kind smile, and I can imagine how it must feel as a recently deceased soul to come across a creature that is so strong and confident to lead you to the next phase. I’d think it would be comforting. Especially after the disorienting task of dying.

“Now I can take you to your bondmate, who has already moved on to the afterlife,” Scoria tells Mimick. “Do you want that?”

It’s a question I never would have imagined asking bondmates. That bond was formed for a reason—to find each other in their afterlives. Of course she would want that. Except, after what they became, what they did together that left them worse monsters in their souls than on the outside…maybe she wouldn’t.

“Want that,” Mimick says.

Scoria shifts to standing, towering above us. “Then I shall take you.”

Take her to the burning lands, the land of souls…

Souls.

I frown.

Souls. I turn the word over in my mind. There’s something there.

Then what just happened hits me from a different angle.

“Don’t leave!” I call out.

I think Scoria raises her eyebrows.

I swallow, but I need to ask this. “Can you come find me after you take her?”

She considers me for a moment. “More souls?”

I nod. It will take a day or two to get in touch with our allies before we can even gather. In that time, I could do what I’m thinking. I could leave this world knowing I’d done one thing good. “Many more souls.”

“We don’t have time,” Cain reminds me.

Only if what I’m thinking works, it’s worth taking a little extra.

Another pause. “Don’t leave here until I return,” she says. “This will take me a few hours at most.”

Then in a mirage-like haze, she and Mimick fade away together.

The second she’s gone, I face Cain and the others all lined up behind him. “If we’re going to take Aryd back and hold it, we need as many allies as we can get. And I know how to add to our numbers.”

And right a wrong.