“Wait a minute. I thought I collapsed the spell,” I said.
Eorla shook her head. “I thought so, too, at first, but after examining the runes, I realized you didn’t. You grounded all the essence by anchoring it with stone.”
“I created a short circuit,” I said.
She nodded. “And dissipated the excess essence that the spell had produced. Nigel and I provided a window of opportunity for you to do it. We would have failed if the drys had not collapsed the Celtic side of the spell. She used Meryl as a conduit to channel her counterspell. Even together, Nigel and I did not have the power to hold all that essence at bay and negate the Teutonic half of the spell. We took care of the immediate problem—we held back the essence and gave you time.”
She pointed into the vibrant green sky. “The Taint is the remnant of the Teutonic half of the spell. I reconstructed the rune sequence. We can get the rioters under control by removing the Taint from them. I can do that if I stop the Taint.”
“That’s a big if,” I said.
She stared at the approaching mayhem. “I do not think I can live with what might happen otherwise.”
“Then use me,” I said.
Eorla shook her head. “I do not know what effect your damaged abilities will have. We must use a pure vessel.”
My gut clenched. I’d heard the phrase “pure vessel” the night the Taint was created. It was what the drys called Meryl. Everyone else had been touched by the Taint. Meryl moved several feet away from us. “You don’t know what you’re asking,” she said.
“Nothing more than what I am asking of myself,” Eorla said to her back.
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. Time after time, Meryl reminded me that I gave her choices that were not choices. I didn’t know what I wanted her to do this time. What Eorla was suggesting was dangerous. I saw what had happened when the drys used Meryl as a conduit. It was terrifying. I had no idea what the Taint would do to her.
Meryl came to me, and we hugged. Promise me you will kick her ass if I die, she sent. I kissed the top of her head. “Hers won’t be the only one,” I said.
She inhaled deeply and pushed me away. “Let’s do this before I change my mind.”
Eorla placed her hands on Meryl’s shoulders from behind. She closed her eyes and chanted in Old Elvish, the sounds harsh to the modern ear, but in Eorla’s voice, it sounded both soft and mournful. Meryl’s skin bleached to white as essence welled up from within, her body becoming sheathed in a vibrant halo. Eorla’s cadence shifted, her voice growing stronger with the power of her song. Pinpoints of light appeared, dancing around Meryl like green fireflies. Faster and faster they spun, growing larger with each circuit of her body. They shifted and bent, forming shapes in response to Eorla’s voice. They flickered brighter and resolved into the angular shapes of Teutonic runes.
Joe popped back in. “Whoa! What the hell are they doing?”
“I’ll explain later. Who’s on the bridge?” I asked.
He swooped around me, keeping his eyes on Eorla and Meryl. “It’s a war party up there. That Frye guy from the Consortium, macGoren. Lots of security agents from both the Consortium and the Guild. And”—he eyed me significantly—“a bunch of chrome-domes just brought Vize in.”
The air vibrated as Eorla pulled more essence from her surroundings and funneled it into the rune spell. The dark mass in my head spiked into a ball of claws as her essence touched our surroundings. My eyes watered as I struggled to hold in the darkness. Moving away didn’t help. The desire to touch Eorla’s powerful essence burned in my gut. The dark mass moved, spreading inside me, hungering to cross the distance between Eorla and me.
I clenched my jaw, refusing to let the darkness free. It wanted the essence. It wanted Eorla and Meryl. It wanted too much. I pushed back against it with my mind. My left arm flared with cold as the tattoo burned on the surface of my skin. The dark mass didn’t retreat, but it paused. I stepped farther back. My stomach churned. I almost didn’t care if I did interfere, if I reached out and touched them, touched the luscious reams of essence coursing from them.
A wind sprang up, biting and cold. Essence circled Meryl and Eorla in vibrant streams of green and blue and white. Meryl trembled as the runes swept around her. Her head fell back, the cords in her neck straining against the power coursing through her. The light in her face pulsed and flared and obliterated her features.
Eorla shouted above the rising wind. Clenching the back of Meryl’s neck, she thrust her other hand up. A surge of blue-white light leaped from her palm, pure essence fanning across the sky, crackling with power and piercing the clouds of Taint. The rioters paused in confusion as the green haze rippled. The wind rose to a gale, spinning the Taint into a whirlpool of sickly green light. A funnel formed beneath it, dancing in the air like an appendage groping for contact. It lashed like the tail of an angry beast and plunged into Meryl.
The Taint poured down. The funnel sucked it out of the sky and more shreds of green haze gathered from all directions. Meryl convulsed with shock as the Taint coursed through her. Eorla sang higher, her song becoming a roar of power. The Taint surged out of Meryl, along Eorla’s arm and flooded her body. The dark mass in my head contracted abruptly. It had never liked the Taint, had avoided it as much as the Taint avoided the darkness. I stumbled toward the bridge but the pain refused to subside. With the amount of essence powering in, no place within walking distance would be far enough.
Everything stopped. An utter silence hung over the street. Eorla and Meryl swayed on their feet. I searched the sky and found nothing but ambient essence. I didn’t sense Taint anywhere. They had done it. Eorla and Meryl had done it. The Taint was gone.
Up the street, the fey folk broke into a babble of confusion. I jogged toward Meryl and Eorla. Rand rushed to Eorla’s side as she stumbled and fell, and Meryl crumpled to the ground at the same time. I threw myself onto my knees beside her and pulled her to my chest.
“Meryl?”
Her head lolled to the side, her eyes glazed and sight-less. I grabbed her chin and turned her face toward mine. I shook her gently. “Meryl? Answer me.”
Not a flicker of awareness. I hugged her to my chest and rocked her. “Come on, Meryl. Wake up.”
I stroked her face. Her skin was hard and cold. She lay in my arms, deadweight. I sensed nothing from her at all. Whatever made Meryl Meryl was gone. I lowered her to the ground. Eorla’s essence glowed like an emerald star as Rand held her, but her head fell back slack. She lay still and insensate in his arms. He stared at me, stricken.
The Weird was not their home. The solitaries were not their people. Vize was not their problem. Or Moira. They could have walked away. They had wanted to help. They wanted to help me. But I couldn’t help them. I couldn’t stop the madness. I was useless and now they were—I didn’t know what they were. Mindless. Brain-dead. I didn’t know.
I lifted my head at the sound of a tank moving at the end of the Avenue. It shifted into place, its gun turret rotating toward us. Another moved forward. More National Guardsmen arrived through the side alleys. They pointed their guns at us.
I rose to my feet. “Stay with her, Joe.”
Agitated, he whirled around me. “What are you doing?”
I thrust my hand at him, and he somersaulted out of reach. “Just stay with her and don’t argue,” I said.
I walked toward the waiting tanks and soldiers, the pain in my head tearing at my mind. Essence light flared on the bridge—powerful Danann and Teutonic body signatures. The power players. The elite. The ones who played games while innocent people died. Something broke inside me, and I shouted in rage.