Page 21 (1/2)
How different thiselse he touched How htwhat it would be like to be possessed by him
Still, when I am completely healed, I will strike
Only one can win
I woke to the sound of htti
Direct fro dream
One of Lark’s wolves lay beforeinto ence Or rather, its eye, singular Hello, Cyclops Probably the iest of the three
The other Arcana hadto dare anyone to attack
In addition to posting the guard wolf, they’d boundit impossible for eneral, but at least feeling had returned to my limbs Unfortunately, that eneration as bones reset and regrew, as skin fashioned itself anew My thumb was a fleshy nub
I tried to call on my powers—like the Empress in my dream, I was ready to strike—but they were tapped out Dae spores, they probably wouldn’t be strong enough to kill this trio
I gazed past Cyclops to find Ogen and Death beside the blazing fire The two horses rested nearby No sign of Lark or the other wolves
Ogen squatted next to the fla Around his diaed They were the color of sickness, of infection Uneven before, his horns were now the sath I squinted There were two raised scars across his back As if so had been cut from him
Without hesitation, he placed his ars Iood to know
I’d failed to defeat theainst ether, as Death ht he’d shed his helmet and breastplate As I watched, he used his sword blade to carve a line of metal from the side of the latter He handed that ed it into the flames with his bare hands The Devil blew on the fire till it clien kill me? What plans did he have for me? Obviously not the same ones as he’d had in a past life
Lark reappeared, briefly parting the curtain of water running off the sides of the bridge Her arms were full of wet firewood, and her other tolves each carried a log in their jaws, dropping theen’s feet She told Death, “The falcon can scout for another couple of hours, but then she’s got to sleep”
A weakness Her ani Yet another Arcana who needed to conserve
“Very well” Death couldn’t have sounded less interested
Lark tugged down her poncho hood as the wolves shook out their sodden fur “You al with his breastplate, tightening screws on the sides of it Had I so it
When that strip ofit on a nearby boulder, he haen to his work, Death put his breastplate back on, then leaned against the embankment His helmet was close at hand I watched as he sharpened one of his swords, running a stone over the edge again and again He seeht her gaze, she flashed me a wounded look—as if I had betrayed her—then turned away in a huff
I workedmy head to study Death How different he was now from the boy I’d dreamed of He looked about six or seven years older and much harder, even e in the firelight “What are you looking at, creature?”
“A stone-cold killer”
“Shouldn’t be such a new sight” He lifted his other sword to sharpen “I’ain”
“Where are you taking hold If you survive the next week”
“Where is it?”
He didn’t deign to answer
Okay, so if his lair was a week’s journey away froinia, Kentucky, either of the Carolinas
“What are you planning to do withto do with me? If I could escape, I supposed I’d start for the Outer Banks once rieve all I’d lost, and fulfill randmother, find out why the earth had failed, find out if I could help it
For all I knew, Death ht direction
To carry on uish ripping through me, worse than any physical pain I’d ever known
The Reaper finally facedhis weapon across his lap “I plan to make you suffer, up until the moment I decide to cut off your head”
His confidence was disturbing I decided then that I would do anything to deprive him of that pleasure—and of my icons I’d rather Joules have the when I wake, I’ll ask myself, ‘Is this the day I decapitate the creature?’ If you retain your worthless life by that night, then you’ll know ritty eyes “Why do you hatelike she was absorbed with rearranging her pack
“Because I knohat you are” He clasped the hilt of his sword as if he could barely refrain fro me “You have others fooled, but I know you better than you know yourself”
“Then tell me what I’m really like”
“You’re selfish, weak, cowardly, and disloyal You blame Fauna for her duplicity when you are no better, a seductress who luresI had power left “Was I henyou down to a hellish end? Was I cowardly and disloyal when I fought to avenge my friends?”
“Your friends—or the mortal you professed to love?”
“Both”
Death’s lips curled “Deveaux wouldn’t have wanted you if he’d knohat you were truly like He wouldn’t have bedded you, and he certainly wouldn’t have given his life for you Yet another you doo what I wantJack’s voice, his grin as he said it
Lihts later