Mortal Danger

THIRTY-THREE

THE widest part of the pass was filled with rabble and body parts. Lily tried not to look. Immediately beyond that it narrowed again and they skidded down a steep slope for about twenty feet. The land leveled abruptly, then, as they rounded a low shoulder of mountain, it opened up.

She stepped out onto a giant-size ledge maybe twelve blocks long and half a block wide. There was grass here, the first she’d seen. Otherwise it was flat, featureless. Beyond it the ground simply ended. Beyond that was the sea.

The ocean didn’t look right, reflecting that ugly sky, but it smelled right. Lily paused, letting the breeze fill some of the empty places inside.

But she couldn’t pause long. Rule was close. Only where—?

Her small troop spread out behind her, looking around as she was. “Where do we go from here?” Cullen asked.

“Maybe one of us should watch the pass,” Cynna said. “Try to hold it.”

“Ha! You volunteering?” Max shook his head. “Better if we get rid of it. Boom!” He rubbed his hands together, grinning.

“No,” Lily said abruptly. “No, we can’t go throwing grenades at the mountain. Rule is…” She started moving, scanning the blocks of stone that cradled the oversize ledge. “He’s there. He’s inside it.”

The others followed. “Inside?” Cynna said dubiously.

“A cave or something.” She was moving faster now, her heart pounding. He was so close, so horribly close. They hadn’t brought earth-moving equipment, she thought, halfway to‘ hysterical. They’d never once contemplated what they’d need to remove a few feet of rock. “But he’s moving.”

“Toward us?”

“No.” That came out quick and frustrated. “That way.” She gestured at the far end of the ledge, where a tumble of rock blocked them. And started running, as if her feet alone could bridge that last distance, carry her to him in spite of the rock between.

“Max,” Cullen said, keeping pace beside her.

“What?” The gnome was huffing slightly as he ran.

“You’re supposed to have an instinctive feel for rock. How do we get in, or get him out?”

“I’m working on it.”

Lily barely heard them. Here, he’s here—

And at the far end of the ledge, a huge, dark wolf stepped out from a crevice in the jumble of stone.

Maybe she cried his name. Maybe she just screamed it in her head. Her feet moved without her telling them to. She was running, stumbling over the rough ground—and then someone stepped out behind Rule.

She stepped out. Wearing a dark blue sarong and her token. Rule’s necklace, the missing necklace.

Lily stopped dead. She reached out one hand—not to touch, but to push the impossible away. She looked into her own eyes from twenty feet away, saw her own face go pale, and heard herself say softly, “My lost parts. All my lost parts. You have them.”

Then her knees buckled.

She didn’t faint. Quite. But the next thing she knew was a rough, wet tongue on her face. “Rule.” She touched his muzzle, his shoulder, ran her hand over his ribs. “Rule.”

“This is beyond weird.”

That was Cynna. Lily turned her head slowly, hoping not to see… but she still stood there, her face blank. A face not exactly like the one Lily had seen in the mirror a million times, because it wasn’t reversed.

“Holy shit.” That was a high, squeaky voice, vaguely familiar. And yet another person—creature—stepped out from that crevice. “There’s two of you!”

A demon. The same small, orange-skinned demon who’d tried to possess her—the one who’d conspired with Harlowe, who’d grabbed her while Harlowe hit her with the staff.

Lily grabbed her weapon on her way back up.

Cynna and Cullen already had theirs aimed. But the other Lily moved fast, too. She stepped in front of the demon. “No! She’s—this is Gan. She won’i hurt you.” She looked at Lily, then at the others, and licked her lips—a nervous gesture Lily had been trying for years to break herself of. “You’d like an explanation.”

Cullen answered for all of them, without lowering his machine gun. “That would be good. Be sure to include what the hell you are.”

“You know her!” Gan piped up. “She’s Lily Yu!” Then, more subdued: “Of course, I guess the other one is, too.”

The second Lily sighed. “This may take a while.”

Lily glanced back at the pass. “Better make it the Reader’s Digest version. We don’t have much time. There’s a war headed this way.”

SHE felt more lost than ever. She’d followed Rule through darkness to find herself—her other self, the one that possessed everything she’d lost. The self who knew Rule in his other form. Knew him as a man.

She tried to keep her story short and coherent, but she was distracted by the sight of her face, her body, sitting on Rule’s other side. That woman wasn’t her. Maybe they’d started out as one person, but they weren’t the same, not anymore.

They were sitting in a rough circle, all of them except the little one—Max—who’d taken a guard position in the rocks where he could watch the pass. At least the others had stopped pointing their guns at her… once Rule insisted. He’d gone up to the man—Cullen—and pawed at the muzzle of his machine gun, growling.

Gan had translated that time with no problem: Put it down, you ass.

They were all silent for a long moment when she finished. Finally, the other woman asked quietly, “How long do you think you’ve been here?”

“I don’t know. We don’t have regular days and nights here. After a while I didn’t think about it that way anymore.” She glanced at Rule. “He’s slept about twenty times, I think. I don’t know if that means it’s been twenty days.”

“Twenty.” The other woman didn’t sound happy. She kept stroking Rule, touching him. Lily wanted to push that intruding hand away, but… she swallowed. Rule wanted that touch. She could tell. He wanted both of them with him. To him, they were both Lily.

It was the other one who knew him from before, though. Who remembered whatever they’d shared on Earth. All he’d shared with her was… hell.

“We’ve got a problem,” the other Lily said.

Cullen barked out a laugh. “Never let it be said you don’t use understatement, luv.”

“I’m talking about the gate. We’ve got too many people to go back through it.”

“A gate.” Her heartbeat picked up. Of course. They had to get here, didn’t they? They hadn’t all been dragged here by some realm-hopping demon, the way she had been. “You have a way back. We can go back.”

“We have a small gate,” Cullen said. “And, as Lily— one of you Lily’s—pointed out, that’s a problem. We planned this pretty tightly. If…” He stopped abruptly, looking up.

She looked up, too. And stood. “It’s Sam!” That huge, winged shape could be no one else.

The others sprang to their feet, too. Cullen swung the long, hollow tube on his back around and onto his shoulder.

Do you shoot at everything you see ?

That rocked them. Cullen recovered first. “Around here it seems like a good idea.”

There are better targets. Sam began a slow, spiraling descent.

“Don’t shoot at him. Sam’s on our side… sort of.” He’d saved her life, anyway, and killed one of his own kind to do it. She suspected that was mostly because of the insult of another dragon daring to dispose of his property, but still…

This is most curious. You seem to have connected with the missing half of your soul, but it is embodied.

“I noticed that,” she said dryly.

The little demon didn’t do that. I wonder… He was close now, the wind from his wings stirring her hair. Yet you are the one with Ishtar’s token.

Cullen stared. “You know about the Lady’s token?”

I know a great deal that you short-lives will never dream of. As gracefully as dandelion fluff, that great body drifted to the ground near the cliff’s edge. The head swung around to look at them.

“Don’t look at his eyes,” Cullen said quickly.

An informed short-life. Sam was amused. And… how interesting. You’re a sorcerer of sorts.

“Of sorts?” Cullen said indignantly.

And one of you has a gate. No, I misspoke. One of you is a gate. That is unusual. He settled his wings about him more comfortably. And useful. I wish to make a deal.

“Deal quick,” the little one called down from his vantage point in the rocks. “They’re coming. First wave should be here in fifteen minutes—and that’s one fucking big demon coming along about thirty minutes behind it.”

Yes. Xitil comes.

LILY couldn’t stop glancing at her other self. Her, yet not her. The part with her Gift. The self who’d been with Rule all this time. You’d think she’d feel a tug, a sense of longing, something.

She wanted to knock the bitch’s hand away from him.

Lily swallowed. Not now. She couldn’t figure out how she could be bitterly jealous of herself—her other self— right now. Somehow she had to get them all out of here. “We’ll have to hold the gate open longer.”

Cullen shook his head. “Can’t, luv. We’re too far from a node for me to pull any energy, and there’s precious little loose sorcéri around.”

‘The dragons soak it up,“ the other Lily said. ”That’s what Gan says, anyway.“

Lily looked at the little demon, huddled unhappily against one of the larger rocks. It didn’t say anything. It hardly seemed aware of them at all, tuned in to some private fear. “Plan B, then. Cullen, you’ll carry, ah, the other Lily piggyback, and Max can ride Rule through.”

There are two problems with that. First, you’ll fall a great distance. The land is much higher here than in the earth realm.

She jumped. It was entirely too weird, having the dragon’s thoughts just show up in her head. And how did he know what this area was like on Earth? “There will be ocean below us,” she said tersely.

A long way below you. The main problem, however, is that your gate won’t open.

“It will open.” She just had to bleed again and say the word Cullen had taught her.

The dragon’s gaze swung toward Cullen. What happens, sorcerer, when you tie a spell to an object, and another object identical to the first is nearby?

Cullen scowled. “They aren’t identical. Well…” He looked from her to the other Lily. “Not entirely. They’ve had different experiences. They’ve… diverged.”

They are one soul. I believe your gate won’t open. The dragon’s long tail twitched at the end. But do try it and see for yourself . Unless, perhaps, you know how to check it without opening it?

Lily pushed impatiently to her feet. Where was Max? “Max! Come down. We’re going to get out of here.”

The other Lily spoke suddenly. “What do you want, Sam? What deal are you offering?”

/ can make the gate bigger. Much bigger. I can hold it open as long as is needed and fly you out. And I know how to solve the problem with the gate.

There was a second’s silence, then the other one—the Lily wearing blue—cried, “No! No, there has to be another way!”

Cullen glanced at her and then back at the dragon. “Dragons are magic, but can’t work it.”

Most do not. I, however, am a Great Singer. I know more about gates than you’ve yet dreamed, sorcerer.

“Except how to open one, it seems. Or you wouldn’t be talking about a deal. What do you want in return?”

The great tail lashed in obvious irritation. Is it not obvious ? I wish to leave. I wish to take those of my kind who still live and leave Dis. Something like a mental sigh whispered along the edges of Lily’s mind. We are losing.

“This is what you’ve wanted all along, isn’t it?” the other Lily demanded suddenly. ‘This is why you captured us. You wanted to leave hell. Only I don’t see how you knew they’d come for us.“

I didn’t. I had… another way in mind.

Cullen shook his head. “I’m sorry for your people. But a gate large enough for you to fly through can’t be tied to a person. It would destroy her.”

For the first time the little demon spoke, its voice wobbly. “But you’re a Great Singer. You said they couldn’t win without you. How come you aren’t winning?”

In her madness, Xitil has been quite clever. She—or the One she ate—made an alliance with the one you know as Tegelgor, lord of the realm to the south. In return for a large number of his lower demons, she has abandoned her region to him. She enters our land with every demon, every imp, every creature from her realm. We cannot fight such numbers.

“Tegelgor!” the demon squeaked. “Abandoned it? No, even crazy she wouldn’t… all her demons? I didn’t… I wasn’t called to her. I felt a tug, but not a summons. She’s got all my names. If she wanted me—”

You, too, have diverged, little demon.

What did that mean? Never mind. They were running out of time. “Where’s Max, dammit?”

“Wait a minute, Lily.” Cullen walked up to her. “I hate to admit it, but the dragon is right about one thing. I should check.”

“How?”

He made a graceful gesture with one hand, murmuring something in that liquid language he’d used before, and frowned. Then he turned to the other one, the other her, and repeated it. He lost all of the color in his face. “Hell. The gate’s jumping between the two of you. Oscillating.”

“Then if we both do it—if we stand together and cut our palms—”

He was shaking his head. “When it’s in her, it’s stuck in the closed position. She’s got your… she’s a sensitive.

You’re the only one who can open the gate, but when it’s in her, you can’t open it. Your—her—Gift won’t let you.“

“But if she’s close enough to being me for the gate to jump between us, why wouldn’t my Gift know me?” she cried. “It is me.”

Because, as the sorcerer said, you have diverged. A spell, even one wrought by ritual, is a crude working compared to your Gift, Lily Yu. Your Gift recognizes differences between you that the gate cannot.

Her Gift didn’t recognize her? She rubbed her forehead. “I’m out of ideas, here.”

Then accept some of mine. I will do my best to shield you from—

He broke off in mid-thought. With unbelievable speed for so large a creature, he sprang for the sky. The wind from his wings knocked her down, so in that first second she didn’t see what he was springing at.

Then she wished she hadn’t.

It was long and red, the color of blood that’s not quite dry. It had way too many short legs on the back two-thirds of its wormlike body, every one tipped in claws. And though its body was smaller than the dragon’s, its wings were every bit as large, veined like a bat’s.

The front third of its body was jaws. laws rimmed with teeth like the red-eyes‘, and when it opened those jaws and screamed, she saw all the way down its gullet.

It had the advantage on the dragon, swooping down at him from above, those jaws gaping. Sam flew straight at it. At the last second, he twisted. His jaws closed on one of those enormous wings and he twisted his neck, shredding the membrane. His wings beat hard, and he started to pull away.

Rule howled. Lily spun around even as he raced past her—raced to where the other Lily was even now turning, staring up at one of the red-eyes perched on a ledge above her, jaw gaping in evil imitation of the fanged worm battling the dragon overhead.

It leaped. And collided with Rule in mid-air.

They fell in a snarling, slashing tangle. Lily raised her weapon, but there was no chance to get a shot in without hitting Rule. She moved closer. Blood sprayed out, spattering her.

Rule’s blood. Oh, God, his side—

“Get back!” Cynna shouted.

“You can’t shoot! You’ll kill him!”

“I’m not using a gun! Move, dammit!”

She looked over her shoulder—and moved quickly away.

Cynna stood just behind her with one arm straight up, the other straight out, pointed at the rolling mass of wolf and demon. Her lips were moving, but Lily couldn’t hear her over the snarls and howls. And there was a bloody light streaming from her hand.

It didn’t travel like light. The ugly red glow crossed the space between her and the battling animals sluggishly— too slow, too slow! Rule was down—he wasn’t moving. Lily pulled her weapon to her shoulder again—

And the light hit. The demon stiffened and fell down dead.

“Sonofabitch,” came Cynna’s shocked voice. “It worked.”

Lily raced to Rule.

So did Lily.

Blood covered his side, so much blood she couldn’t see how bad it was. But it was bad. She knew it. His breathing was labored, his eyes closed. She looked up. A shock went through her as she met her own eyes.

“Leave now,” the one in blue said. “You have to go right away and take him where he can heal. To a—a hospital.” She said the word as if it was new to her. “He’ll die here.”

“The gate—”

“Sam told me how to fix it.”

All at once she knew. Without knowing how, she knew what the other woman meant. Her mouth went dry. “There has to be another way.”

“Funny.” Her lips quirked up, but her eyes shone with tears. “That’s what I said.” She reached up and ripped the chain with its dangling charm from her neck. “There isn’t, though. You’re the gate.”

Slowly—knowing what she was doing, what she was accepting—Lily held out her hand.

And Lily dropped the toltoi into it. “Tell him…” She looked down and caressed Rule’s head. “Tell him how glad I was about him. How very glad.”

Lily’s fingers closed around the necklace. She could only nod as her throat closed up.

And the other one—the other her—sprang to her feet. She tugged at the top of her sarong, and it came open. “Bind him with this. He’s bleeding badly.” She tossed it to Lily—and started running. Naked, barefoot, she ran full out.

For the cliff. Straight for the edge of the cliff.

It was the little demon who understood first. “No!” it howled, and started after her, short legs pumping. “No, Lily Yu! Lily Yu, I do like you! I do! Don’t—”

She leaped.

Lily felt the air rushing past, air heavy with the scent of ocean. No, she was standing, standing on her feet, tears streaming down—down and down she fell, too far, so far from Rule—

A hammer smashed her, smashed her everywhere at once. And she died.