“I’m not the Kairos.”
“Oh, I know.” She smirked but stopped short of saying she had birthed the fabled child, now hidden somewhere in the folds of this alternate reality. “Though there’s something about you. Some power you possess which others don’t. You should have died the last time you were really here.”
“You mean when you threw me down the stairs.”
Solange nodded absently. “You were somehow protected then…and when I tried to sliver away your soul to augment my beautiful night sky. That stone’s deformed. It won’t ever fit.”
“Guess you should give up.”
“Why? I get at least one more try.”
“You’re not getting the last third of my fucking soul,” I said, widening my stance.
“Because you’re still protected.” She sighed, and the sound grated like sandpaper against my spine. “I can feel it.”
Well thank goddess for small miracles, though I remained close to the lantern. She smiled like she found my wariness endearing. “By the way, learn anything more about the constellations since we last met?”
“I’ve been kinda busy,” I replied flatly.
“Then let me tell you about my favorite, Canis Major. It contains a star called Sirius, the brightest in the sky. It’s part of a pattern we call the Winter Triangle.”
“Does this boring diatribe have a point?”
“In gemology,” she continued, shooting me a sly wink, “and you know I’m a fan…in gemology an asterism is an optical phenomenon reflecting the shape of a star on a precious stone’s surface. So you see, I’ve decided a star as remarkable as Sirius needs just such a gem to do it justice in my rendition of the night sky. Something with the right amount of power and heat to fuel that Big Dog. The soul bits you gave upon crossing here twice came close to what I was looking for, but another third and my masterpiece will be completed. And I will finish it, Joanna. Once I do, my sky will hum with enough power to fuel multiple worlds…and I’ll rule them all.”
“I told you-”
“I know what you said! But Mackie will either bring me your soul pierced on the tip of his blade, or I’ll flashcook ‘Hunter’ until the connection between you burns.”
And waving her hand over her head, the pressed tin ceiling disappeared, the heat fell away with it, and I was sud denly gazing directly into her sky of souls. No denying it, I thought, breath caught in my chest. It was stunning.
“Don’t look for the Big Dog…you’re not there yet. But can you find Ursa Major?”
The Big Dipper. I traced the luminous handle, gaze catching on the two stars comprising its scoop. They were bright but not completely luminous. The gems and the soul she’d stolen to form them contained some sort of impurities that made it appear like honey had hardened inside a crystal casing. Like her aforementioned asterism.
“Check out that dreamy nadir, those golden depths. They’re perfectly identical, which is rare. Aren’t they beautiful? Don’t they remind you of…someone?”
And she beckoned the night sky down so the twin stars of the Dipper’s bowl unhinged from the sky and lowered in a dizzying and unnatural 3-D display, the other stars fading until all that remained were…
“Hunter’s eyes.” My voice cracked.
“The windows to the soul,” she agreed, motioning again. The gems lowered some more…and blinked. The rest of his body began to form out of the dark matter comprising the faux universe, like he was his own constellation, though his golden eyes remained fixed on me.
Solange was suddenly whispering in my ear. “The planets and stars are constantly evolving, Joanna. The universe is not a fixed entity, and it’s not as gentle as it looks from afar. And the requirement of any phenomenal birth or death is a wild chaos. Do you know what my favorite kind is?” She smiled at me with a beautiful sweep of those lips. “Violence.”
And Hunter blinked. Reaching up, Solange levitated, but then paused midair to look back at me. My hot blood suddenly ran cold. Her intention was written all over her beautiful face. She couldn’t touch me…so she was going to touch him.
“Take a good look at your one true love, Jaden.” She spoke softly, but every word was honed. “Because now you see her. Now you don’t.”
I whirled, lunging for the lantern closest to me, but knew I’d never make it in time. Sure enough, Hunter screamed. One hand cupped around the flame, the other poised in front of it, I could only glance up. Solange’s laughter cut the air as she returned her attention to Hunter…and plucked out his left eye.
He screamed again, the lone remaining eye blinking furiously, and I sucked in a deep breath as Solange turned back to me, hand lifting.
“Don’t you dare put that in your fucking mouth.” My voice was strained. My breath was held.
“Or what?” she said, pretty mouth twisted like a snake. But then she glanced down, recognized what I held in my hand. I’d have smiled as shock blunted her pretty features, but there wasn’t time.
“Suck it, Sola.” And I blew out the air in my throat, aiming for her face, fixed on that mouth.
The quirley was as savage as Tripp said. The smoke took on a life of its own, forceful as a rapist, and Solange screamed as she put her hands to her face and throat, eyes bulging as tar-black death whipped around her. Hunter’s gem fell from her hands, and I yelled even as I dove for it. “Io!”
Solange fell atop me, screaming and tearing at the air with her hands, smoke still ripping at her pores, but I held my breath…and made damn sure to keep my eyes closed as her hands scraped over my body. When icy palms wrapped around my shoulders, I bucked to free myself, fighting like a mental patient strapped to a gurney.
“Come back!”
I lunged upright, Io suddenly beside me, the night sky just a memory and Hunter gone. I sucked in a breath of air so cold I coughed, the ache burrowing to spread like a fissure in my lungs. Buttersnap licked at my arm, and I pushed her away so abruptly the great dog whimpered.
“Ugh,” I managed, keeping my breath shallow so I didn’t puke.
“Shh,” Io said, an arm around my waist, holding me close.
I shook her off too, needing to be untouched, alone, so the rage I was feeling wouldn’t zap anyone else. My breath rattled harshly in the too-still room. “She needs my power, my soul, to finish her horrible sky.”
Yet Midheaven was the one place I needed to go. That’s where my army was. That’s where Hunter was.
Io inched closer again but was careful not to touch me. When my breathing had calmed somewhat, she said,
“How do you feel?”
“Truthfully, Io?” I asked, hand over my queasy stomach. “I’m pissed.”
She stared at me with her wide, lidless gaze before nodding once. “That could work.”
Sure it could, I thought, the fresh memory of Hunter’s scream sending a shiver through me again. It ran through my body, down my limbs, and zipped to my fingertips, where I shook it off…and sent Hunter’s soul gem clattering to the floor.
I cried out and dove as I had in Midheaven, this time to save the gem from Buttersnap’s inquisitive nose. Cradling it to my chest, I looked back up at Io. She gazed back, as dumbfounded as I’d ever seen her.
And looking at the gorgeous jewel in my hand, recalling how Hunter had warned me never to return to or for him, I swore an oath to every star in the heavens above: the blow I’d just dealt Solange wasn’t even the beginning of it. Fuck the universe; fate wasn’t a fixed entity. Mortality or not-Mackie and the Tulpa and my other numerous enemies aside-I was more than happy to show Solange a wild death.
“I’ll give you the phenomenal violence you seek,” I said, cupping the gem in my palm as gently as I would a baby bird. “I’ll deal it to you like a hand of soul poker.”