Beneath that collar, her pulse point fluttered faster.
"What are you saying to her?" Vincent blinked rapidly.
"Um, your carnate needs you." I pointed at the pool beside Selena. Both of the clone's arms had risen, the top of a head crowning. Like a toddler, the creature repeatedly grasped at air, as if wanting to be picked up.
"Follow my voice," he crooned to the thing as he knelt at the edge of the pool--
WHAM.
In a spray of blood, Selena had snatched her nailed hand free then whipped her straightened arm out at Vincent. The line of her tensed limb connected with his throat.
His head snapped back. Lolled at an odd angle. His body collapsed backward.
Selena had awakened to break Vincent's neck--with one strike.
"The sensor!" I dove for it, but he'd dropped it into the blood beside the now sinking carnate. "Selena!" I twisted around to claw her collar off.
"It's okay," she murmured.
"NOT okay!" I wrenched the piece off her neck, throwing it away.
She turned toward me. "I saw . . . his thumb slip . . . nothing happened. The sensor for the collar is broken, has been broken." Without warning, she lunged at me.
"Selena, wait!"
"Evie!" she cried, hugging me tight. "You came for me."
"Oh! Um, you're going to be all right," I assured her as I stroked her tangled hair. "But we have to take Violet out too."
Selena pointed at Vincent. "Look at him."
He sprawled on his back, his pale glazed eyes fixed on the ceiling. His shirt had shifted to reveal a weird tattoo on his chest.
"He has his own brand," she added.
"I don't understand. Let me go look." I pried myself free from her, then took a step closer to him--
"AH!" I scrambled back, slipping in the blood, arms pinwheeling as I busted my ass. Below Vincent's collarbone, right over his heart, a wide-open eye stared at me.
Pale blue. Like a dead fish's.
"Oh, my God! What is that?" Never taking my gaze off it, I managed to turn over on my knees. When the eye blinked, I stifled a shriek. Real? Unreal?
"That is Violet," Selena bit out. "He told me he loved her so much, he took her into him before they were ever born. So the Empress could never separate them again."
Vincent had absorbed his twin in the womb. His sister had never been a . . . person.
Matthew's words: The twins--inseparable. Never parted. "B-but Vincent talked like she existed. The general did."
"Because they were crazy!"
No wonder Matthew had been confused. No wonder the twins had never used their most potent powers. They couldn't whisper together or clasp hands and swing arms.
The eye darted. Right. Left. Then it stilled, wide open, as glazed as her brother's.
Violet was dead.
I couldn't breathe, was ready to lose it, but as Matthew had told me, we weren't out of the woods yet. "Selena, I'll be right back. Getting your clothes. Okay?" I stumbled to the outer door. Combination-locked. Could Death break it down?
Aric? What's happening?
--The remaining carnates collapsed.--
Vincent's dead. The Lovers are gone. Are you and Jack all right?
--We will be if we can find you. Are you safe?--
We're okay. Just stuck in here.
--Help me find you.-- I heard him yell, "Empress!"
You sound far away!
--And now?-- He yelled, Jack joining him.
Closer.
While I waited for them to call out again, I went to the sink, hastily washing off the worst of the blood. Then I grabbed Selena's clothes and a roll of paper towels, returning to her. "Let's do a temporary bandage for your hand." I couldn't tell for sure, but I thought the nail had missed the bones. I folded paper towels, fashioning a wraparound covering. "Okay, time to get you dressed."
"Wh-where's J.D.?"
"He's coming. He's good. All the carnates dropped dead."
She nodded, kept nodding. Still nodding as her face crumpled. "Evie, he branded me." I didn't know what rattled me the most in this room: Violet's location or Selena's reaction.
She needed to cry. But the tears had been trained out of her.
I grabbed her good hand. "We're here. We're going to get through this."
I heard Aric's yell. You're getting closer.
"That's not J.D."
"Uh, let's get your shirt on." I helped her pull it on. "Boots, next." Once I'd gotten her dressed, I said, "Hey, you should know, Aric is here with us. He's the reason we were able to get to you."
She jolted back. "Death?"
"He and Jack took on the carnates together. Baggers and slavers before them. They've been fighting side by side for days."
Pounding footfalls sounded as they closed in. There's a combination lock on the door. Can you break it down?
--What can't I do to reach you, Empress?--
At the revelation that Death was here, Selena started looking spacey. "No, no, stay with me, girl! He's not going to hurt you. He's helped us every step of the way. They're busting us free, okay?"
Seconds later, Aric's armored boot pounded the metal door. And again.
Send in Jack first. Selena's not good. You might freak her out even more.
Suddenly she loosed a scream that echoed off the walls. She was staring in horror at her hand, the uninjured one.
An icon was appearing, one that matched her brand. The Archer had been marked by the Lovers . . .
Twice.
40
Selena's gaze remained fixed on that icon even when we heard the door give way.
"Evie?" Jack called. "Selena?"
"In here."
He rushed inside, his gaze sweeping the area, showing no emotion at all the blood, the torture contraptions, Selena's condition.
Not yet.
"Where's the sister?"
"Look on his chest," I said.
Jack frowned at Vincent, then squinted. "Is that . . ."
"Yep. Vincent absorbed his twin."
"Mere de Dieu." Collecting himself, he said, "It's over, then. You two all right?"
"I think so." Define "all right."
"Any of that blood yours, Evie?"
I shook my head. "And you?" He had a shallow slice down his neck, and a deeper slash over his arm.
"I'm fine. How you doing, Selena?" A muscle ticked in his jaw as he surveyed the Archer. "Come on, fille, answer me."
"J.D.?" Selena roused from her daze. "It's you!"
"You're goan to be okay. We're taking you home."
When Death entered, Selena scrambled back. "I-I can't do this!"
"He woan hurt you," Jack assured her, making both Aric and me do a double take. Going to one knee, Jack clasped her uninjured hand. "Trust me in this, cher." His position looked romantic.
I flushed with guilt that my thoughts had gone there.
"You gotta get me out of here," Selena pleaded. "I have to get out."
He reached for her, lifting her against his chest, her long hair spilling over his arm. "We're goan."
I told him, "Death and I will do a search for survivors."
With a nod, Jack carried Selena out of the room, murmuring soothing French words to her.
"And so the day is won, another card trumped." Aric's gaze roamed over me. "I'm surprised the Archer took their icon. Your witch didn't want it?"
I shook my head. "Let's search this place--then get out." I wanted to stand in the rain, taking another car wash/shower.
"Of course."
As Aric and I walked down that spray-painted hall, I said, "I remembered what I did to the Lovers in the past." To those kids.
I'd wondered if Arcana turned evil because of nature or nurture. I'd debated if evil was innate in us or manufactured by chroniclers. What if we made each other evil? Perhaps we traded torments from one game to the next, spreading a contagion.
Like the plague.
I wrapped my arms around myself. "I never want to be like
that again. It's selfish, but I didn't want that icon. Aric, I'm done killing. I am done."
He shouldn't look so troubled by that statement. "The game begins in earnest. You have to be prepared, sieva. There might come a time when your ruthlessness would be rewarded."
I gazed up at him. "You weren't ruthless tonight. You could've let Jack die twice."
He stopped in the middle of the hall. "I wanted to prove to you that I can be selfless." He slid off his gauntlet to press his bare hand against my face. "I can be what you need."
Those red lights illuminated his spellbinding face. When we were alone together, I felt like I was supposed to be with him. He would understand me better than Jack ever could. Aric knew my real history, what I'd really been like. And still, he wanted me.
But was I already too far gone for Jack?
"Release the mortal, Empress," seductive Death said. "Deveaux will help the Archer heal. She'll continue to be his perfect partner. Let them have each other with your blessing."
Jack had murmured to Selena in French. I'd thought that had been our thing. And, God, could I be any more petty?
"Your eyes are green," Aric observed. "Jealousy rules you."
I glanced away. "I can't control it."
"If you could, I'd demand to know how. I've experienced jealousy all my life. Of men whose skin doesn't kill. Of men who can cherish a wife and start a family with her. I have never known it like I do when I think of you and Deveaux together."
"If it's any consolation, I pictured you kissing someone else and felt just as jealous."
Though my words seemed to please him, he said, "But there will be no one else."
"By some quirk of fate it's me you can touch. It could just as easily have been Selena or even Tess."
"You think that's all I see in you? I told you I was raised to be a warrior scholar; my match must be one as well. Quintessence might read alongside me, but she's no warrior. Selena is all warrior, but no scholar." His thumb stroked my cheekbone. "I didn't want to fall in love with you, equating it to my own doom. I resisted with everything in me but was no match for your fierce courage and keen mind."
"Fierce? I'm the one who doesn't want to fight anymore."
"But when forced to, you fight to win. When I captured you, you devised a brilliant impromptu plan to destroy me and my allies."
"I lost."
"Three Arcana narrowly won. I admired you then. Perhaps more than admired. Still I resisted, until one night in our study."
I found myself leaning my face into his palm. So warm. Comforting. "What happened then?"
His amber irises lightened. "You were entranced with knowledge. You've a greedy intellect that must be fed. It called to my own, and I conceded defeat." He gave a humorless laugh. "Can you truly imagine Selena reading with me? Or Quintessence taking off her thumb so she could take my head?"
Sweet, good-natured Tess would've bawled in that conflict. The Archer would've chafed in Death's study, tossing her book away, demanding to go do shit.
Maybe Aric and I were perfect together.
Wait . . . "What's this about my intellect?" I stepped back, narrowing my eyes up at him. "I thought you found my musings 'banal and tedious.' "
He continued on, muttering, "Only when they were about Deveaux."
"Do it now," Selena bit out.
Jack glanced from her to the bowie knife he heated in a fire. Earlier, as they'd ridden together, he'd told her what he'd done to his own brand, and she would not be put off.
So we'd made camp in the same church, building a fire out of another pew.
Death and I sat on the other side of the flames. Selena had refused to look at him, acting as if he didn't exist. With a shrug, he'd taken out those chronicles again.
All night, he'd remained close to me. In our search of the Shrine, we'd found medical supplies, more food stores, fuel, weapons and ammo. A Prepper's wet dream. But no survivors.
Afterward he'd helped me wash in the rain, rinsing the blood from my hair and checking my healing injuries.
My body had mended, but my mind raced. And my emotions were going haywire.
Jealousy and guilt warred inside me. . . .
"The pain's even worse than the first time," Jack warned Selena, but I knew she'd still go through with it.
She'd been like a blank-eyed zombie--until she'd learned of a way to get rid of that brand. "I don't give a shit. I might have to wear their icon"--she'd used her injured hand to claw at it--"but I don't ever have to see this brand again." She tugged down her shirt for Jack, baring her ravaged skin with her typical stoicism.
"All right, then." He withdrew the blade from the flames, then knelt before her. Again, his position looked romantic. Again, I flushed with guilt that my thoughts had gone there.
Death paused his reading. --They've been through tortures that we will never know and can never understand.--
Jack and Selena had already been ideal for each other. Now they'd bonded in this. Both had survived the Lovers; both would wear matching scars.
With one hand, Jack brought the red-hot blade closer. He clamped his other hand over her shoulder. She never took her dark gaze from his as he scalded her, marking her forever. Binding the two of them for life.
Under his voice, Aric said, "Look at them, Empress."
As if I could look at anything else.
In the three months I'd been away, Jack had changed so much. His heart could change. He wasn't twenty yet! With me out of the picture, he could love the Archer.
By choosing Jack, I would doom not only Aric, but Selena as well.
41
DAY 381 A.F.
"This is blowing my ever-loving mind," Selena muttered as we watched Death and Jack riding point together.
The four of us were heading south on horseback, along the slavers' alternate route, a shortcut recently discovered and mapped by the Azey.
The "day" was cold and black, with spates of drizzle. Every now and then, I thought I spied a snowflake--like the sole one I'd seen at Aric's--but it always turned out to be a bit of ash.
"If someone had told me a week ago that I'd be riding with Death," Selena continued, "I would've shoved his head up his ass."
The four of us could've taken a truck, trailering the horses, but we all had reasons to ride instead.
Selena wanted to heal more before she faced everyone at Fort Arcana. Her accelerated regeneration was erasing her bruises, mending her new burn wound and her hand. She thought she'd be able to draw her cherished bow soon. She'd been stuffing herself, already gaining weight. But she scratched at that icon so much, she'd taken to wearing gloves at all times.
Jack had voted for horseback because he burned to roust out any other slavers that had set up in Azey territory. No takers so far.
I'd been desperate for time to come to a decision. We were due back at the outpost tonight, and I still hadn't made my choice.
Death had laughed at the idea of trailering his horse. Which was understandable, considering what that stallion had done to those chronicle-seeking clones.
Thanatos bench pressed three eighty and left us a pile of carnate chum. . . .
Selena steered her mount closer to mine. "You didn't hear--because your senses are like a rock's--but those two were talking earlier."
"About what?" Deepening my voice, I imitated a guy, "You fought well, worthy foe."
"I know, right? So J.D. goes, 'I'm Jackson Deveaux. We've been in battle together. You goan to give me your real name, or what?' The Reaper was all stumped, like he's not used to being asked that."
He wasn't. And he was even less used to answering that question. Aric would never tell Jack.
Selena continued, "But then the Reaper says, 'My name is Aric Dominija.' "
My eyes went wide. Just like everything else about Aric, his name had come out into the world. I found my lips curving. Until I thought of my looming decision. Pain awaited me either way.
Selena cocked her head. "If J.D. can tolerate Domini
ja, then I guess I can too. It's easier when the Reaper isn't raising a sword or wearing that creepy helmet."
Aric had kept it stowed on his saddle more often than not. To some degree, he must trust Selena and Jack not to strike. And maybe he felt our strength in numbers against an outside threat.
Perhaps he'd realized all these fascinating new interactions were easier with his face unconcealed.
Jack received a transceiver call from Rodrigo then, answering with important-sounding military lingo.
"Didn't I tell you he was a leader?" Selena all but sighed. "Isn't he amazing?"
I got the weirdest impression that she was selling me on him. Or was she just bragging?
"I'm glad you got to see J.D. with the army last night."
Jack had given an inspiring speech about being a force for good--providing protection for survivors. And he'd outlined a game plan.
Azey South was marching to Louisiana to start work on a new settlement. Azey North would descend upon the Shrine, eliminating the Bagger infestation to secure all the supplies.
Then the two armies would unify again to form New Acadiana.
Jack had been magnetic, giving folks a new story to tell. Hope had been palpable. Even as the temperature dropped--and night endured.
I gazed up at the murky sky. "Selena, you ever think the sun will come out?" The question reminded me of Jack's words: You ever think we deserve better than the Basin? If he'd had the courage to hope, shouldn't I as well?
Selena rolled her eyes. "If the sun can disappear, it can re appear. Really, Evie. Duh." She took out her canteen, trying to open it, about to take the top off with her teeth.
I leaned over and yanked it from her. What was I going to do with this girl? "Here." I handed it back, opened for her.
She chugged, swiping her coat sleeve over her chin. "Hey, drop back a little. Want to talk to you."
Was she finally going to confide in me about her ordeal? I'd asked her a few times, but she always refused. "Anything you want to discuss, Selena. I'm here."
"Not about . . . that. I've put that time out of my head." The circles under her eyes belied her nonchalance.
"You can't just ignore it."
Her signature the hell expression firmly in place, she said, "Do you think about the cannibals you laid out? Or the time you almost ate raw human? Or the plague victims you offed? Yeah, I heard about that. You don't dwell on painful stuff. Neither will I."