I reeled back, shocked. Of all the people, I would’ve never guessed Tony.
The ad-hal reached out and touched Mrak’s shoulder. An unearthly voice emanated from inside his hood. It was the kind of voice that stopped your heart.
“Be still.”
Mrak stopped moving. His opponent stumbled back, his face horrified.
The corruption awoke and surged forward.
Magic drowned the clearing, ancient and cold. I felt it even through the darkness. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck rose. It flowed among the Draziri and held them in place.
Behind me the corruption dripped from the ceiling to pool on the kitchen floor.
Arland spun around toward the creature that used to be Tony, focusing on the new threat.
“No!” Maud threw her weight on Arland’s sword arm.
“You have been judged by the Assembly,” the ad-hal said. “You have been found guilty.”
Mrak just stood there, a lost expression on his face. Nobody moved.
The corruption spilled from the doorway, rising like a foul cloud, emanating its putrid magic. I tore at the darkness. It’s coming. Look! Look, damn you!
Someone screamed.
The foul cloud slithered toward the ad-hal across the grass. It wasn’t hiding anymore. He raised his hand. His magic rose to block it, but the corruption flowed through it and kept going. I felt him pour his power out and the corruption swallowed it and wanted more.
It would infect him. It had wanted him all along.
Sean stepped between the corruption and the ad-hal and raised his knife. His eyes were pure amber.
The corruption would kill him. I would lose him and that couldn’t happen. I’ve lost too much already. I lost my father, my mother, and my brother. Even my sister was lost for a time. I’d lost the seed of an inn.
Nobody would take Sean from me. I loved him, he loved me, and he was mine.
No. Not today. Not ever.
Not in my inn.
A towering wave of rage swept through me and burst through the darkness. The wall blocking me tore apart, its shreds melting into nothing. The power of Gertrude Hunt hit me all at once, the inn suddenly triumphant, giddy that it finally felt me and we connected. The broom landed in my hand. I was on my feet, and I didn’t know when I got up or how. I raised the broom and poured all the inn’s power and all my magic through it.
The broom glowed with bright blue. A wall of pure magic surged up in front of the corrupt cloud, a brilliant blue barrier separating it from Sean. The cloud smashed into it and recoiled.
Sean smiled at me.
A phantom wind stirred my hair and the hem of my robe—the inn’s magic surging into me. The corruption shrank, hugging the ground, but there was no place to go. This was my inn. The soil, the trees, the air, all of it was mine. I wrapped the barrier around it, locking it into a sphere of magic.
It jerked up, trying to flee, but I took it into the fist of my power and squeezed, harder and harder. I squeezed it because I loved Sean, because I loved my sister and my niece, because the Draziri made me live through the death of a tiny inn, because the Hiru had sacrificed everything, and because nobody and nothing would ever get away with threatening one of mine, guest or family, on the grounds of Gertrude Hunt.
The corruption thickened under the pressure of my power, collapsing in on itself.
It hurt, but I barely noticed. I squeezed. I wanted to feel it die.
The sphere pulsed with white, contracting.
The corruption within burst into blue flame. It howled as it burned, its shriek cutting across my ears, sharp and painful.
Nobody said a word.
It burned until it disappeared into nothing.
I looked at the Draziri. My robe turned black. My face must’ve been terrible, because even trapped within the ad-hal’s power, they tried to shrink back. He didn’t let them move.
“The inn is yours, innkeeper,” the ad-hal said.
“You may begin,” I told Sunset.
The Hiru walked off the porch, each step a slow torturous motion. The Draziri and werewolves moved apart, giving them a wide passage, some on their own, others pushed by the ad-hal. The Hiru’s mournful voice echoed through the backyard, fading into the encroaching twilight.
“You destroyed our home. You murdered our families. You almost killed our people. You sentenced us to eternal exile, because no other planet could sustain us. Today you will learn why.”
The nine tubes rose from the ground, each holding a member of the Archivarius within it. The plastic tubes sank back into the earth. The nine beings stepped toward each other, their arms raised in front of them, forming a ring. Their fingers touched and melted, blending together. Flesh flowed like water, turning into a whirlpool and uniting into a whole.
I bent physics to keep the backyard hidden from the street. The residents of the Avalon subdivision were not ready for this.
A giant knelt on one knee on the lawn. He was human in shape, but his head had no features, except for a dark slash of a mouth. Werewolf fur sheathed him, each strand long and translucent. Stars and galaxies slid over the fur and his feathered Draziri mane, as if the depth of the infinite Cosmos reflected in him. A Ku crest rose on its head. Quillonian spikes burst from his shoulders. He opened his mouth, and within the darkness, two white vampire fangs gleamed. A pair of wings opened behind him, glittering with stars. The Archivarius had mirrored us the way his body mirrored the night sky.
YOU ASKED A QUESTION, a soft voice said. I HAVE THE ANSWER.
Sunset raised his head. “The innkeeper must have her payment first.”
The cosmic being turned toward me. ASK YOUR QUESTION, INNKEEPER.
I would only get one question. Where, no, what, no… “How can I find my parents?”
The Archivarius paused. Silence reigned. My heart was beating too loud. Please let them be alive.
SEBASTIEN NORTH.
Who was Sebastien North? What did that mean?
The Archivarius pivoted back to the two Hiru. It was enormous and the Hiru seemed so small next to it, two ants talking to a colossus.
Around the perimeter of the backyard, ovoid portals opened, and behind each the other Hiru stood, waiting, dozens of them. We were looking at the entire species.
“Please,” Moonlight said. “Where is our new home?”
A cold rush of magic tore through me in a second. A vast portal opened behind the Archivarius, as tall as he was. Beyond the portal a beautiful landscape spread under a breathtaking sky. Glowing flowers, indigo and turquoise, bloomed in the shadow of majestic burgundy trees, their long weeping willow branches shimmering with pale green leaves. Strange blossoms grew in the meadow of silver-green grass that rolled gently to a sea, the water so transparent that every vibrant burst of color underneath was crystal clear. Long emerald-green seaweed rose among the cream-colored coral in the shallows studded with underwater plants. Bright fish darted beneath the waves, and above it all, a glorious sky reigned, awash with gentle pinks, blues, and greens.
Sunset took a step forward, walking to the portal as if he were asleep. Five feet away from it he stopped. Metal clanged. His body fell apart. Pieces of machinery tumbled down, gears fell into the grass, lubricant gushed, and a luminous creature flew up from the remnants of machinery and hovered above the grass. It took my breath away.
The Draziri screamed as their god spread the delicate veils of its wings, burning with all the colors of an aurora borealis. A tiny glowing strand stretched from its graceful neck. On it Helen’s Chrismas ornament dangled.