She heaved herself down and prowled over to Bee.
Standing as rigid as a statue, her gaze fixed on me to remind me that if she was eaten it would be my fault, Bee endured being sniffed. I wasn’t sure I would have had that much courage, but she did.
Last the big cat sniffed delicately at the cacica’s head. The two queens eyed each other as might rulers who are not sure whether they are destined to become rivals or allies.
Without warning, my sire sprang.
I spun and thrust.
My blade caught him along the right shoulder, a mere scrape. Pain flamed across my own shoulder, but I knew it was coming so I hardened myself. I heard Rory’s mewl, and most importantly the cry of every creature who attended him. Because hurting him hurt them, they were momentarily unable to attack.
I flung myself into him and together we crashed sideways onto the ground. The fur of his shoulder smeared into a new form. I was lying on top of Vai, who had his arms caressingly around me. He was naked, and aroused.
Pain was nothing compared to my disgust.
I shoved off him and scrambled back, keeping my gaze averted as I got to my feet.
“Blessed Tanit!” cried Bee.
“You’re a monster. You’ll never defeat me, not in this way, not in any way!”
Bee sucked in a harsh breath. The saber-toothed cats had arrayed themselves around her. They faced outward, ears flat, mouths open to show teeth. Every cat had her hair fluffed up to make herself look bigger.
My sire rose to his knees as his body sprouted the wings of an eru. His skin brightened to a sheen like brass. His long black hair stirred as if, like his limbs, it could grasp and strangle his enemies. His wings were feathered with silver. He now wore a kilt woven out of disks. The glittering amulets made me blink from the shine.
He stared at me with eyes the same amber color as mine. But he had also a third eye, a mass of cloudy veins in the center of his forehead. What sights that bloody eye could see I did not know, and I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to find out.
“This is your true form,” I said.
“Change is my true form. But the one who gave birth to me had an eru’s form when I was disgorged. So it is the form to which I return most naturally.”
“No wonder the eru called me Cousin,” I muttered.
When he opened his wings to their full span, they exhaled an icy mist. He was magnificent. “You must be what you are, little cat. That is why I sired you. Do you not wonder why you can kill without regret, escape certain death, and prowl like a tomcat among males who attract you?”
“I might be able to do those things even were you not my sire.” Waves of pain like hot knives still stabbed through my right shoulder. I wondered if I could bring myself to stab him again, even though my first attack had proven successful in forcing the Hunt to retreat.
His stance remained relaxed and confident. “Do you ever ask yourself how it is you can command the loyalty of others? Why they do your bidding at your word? It must be so, because my blood is your blood. Those I command are yours also to command.”
“There are better reasons for people to be loyal. People give back to you what you give to them. You may say it is blood or birth that binds servants to masters and plebeians to their patrician lords, but that is only another word for force. The Council in Expedition ruled because they had wealth enough to keep themselves in power. But I watched the people of Expedition speak out in protest. I watched them fight. They took the opportunity to govern themselves. They did not wait for it to be given them. They did not say that their demands for new laws and for justice must cede to the prerogatives of blood and birth.”
“Yet blood binds all.”
“Does it?” I demanded. “Do you command every creature in the spirit world?”
He said nothing, but he blinked.
I was breathing as hard as if I had been running, or maybe it was just my aching shoulder that made me dizzy. “I think you only command the Wild Hunt, not one creature more.”
A smile cut his face. Before I thought to retreat, he folded his wings forward to cage me in their web of ice. His clawed hands pulled me close, not in an amorous way but as if he had decided to dismember me and rip off my head. His voice had the shiver of a bell when a rod is drawn across it to make it vibrate.
“Hear my words, little cat. A prince among slaves is still a slave. The courts bind him with blood in the palace where those without blood cannot walk. You are bound because he is bound.”
“I don’t care what you say! I will free my husband!”
He let go, opened his wings, and launched himself into the sky. I staggered back. Bee, Rory, and the cats shook free as if chains had been loosened.
“Cat!” Bee grabbed my hand. Rory shoved his head up under my free hand.
My shoulder really hurt. I took in short breaths to get through the sting of pain.
Over the palace the eru caught an updraft and spiraled up until he became too small to see.
The pain ebbed enough for me to think straight. “Bee, how did you know it wasn’t Vai?”
“That was easy. First, he met us here. I was here all alone for about ten throbbing heartbeats before you came through after me. When he asked where you were, he referred to you as “Cat.” Andevai never calls you Cat. He calls you Catherine. I don’t understand why your sire didn’t kill me immediately, but I suppose he would want to save me for the next Hallows’ Night sacrifice. Did he say something to you when he imprisoned you in his wings?”
I waggled my hand to show I did not mean to answer where my sire might hear, and she nodded, then glanced past me. Her eyes flared as her mouth turned down. Rory’s mother coughed a warning. Shapes like fanged butterflies fluttered toward us in a zigzag way that made my skin prickle. The Master and his Hunt had departed, but other denizens of the spirit world had come calling, attracted by Bee’s scent.
“You have to leave, Bee.”
“Your jacket is wet. What is that?”
I rubbed at my shoulder but I could tell it was a shallow scrape. Rory also had a scratch along his right shoulder, oozing the golden liquid that was his blood.
“Nothing as important as getting you back to the mortal world. Bee, give me all the bottles. And leave the hammer. I’ll take Vai’s tools.”
Her high color suggested she had known this moment would come. “I sorted the packs in Adurnam already. I never thought I’d be able to come into the spirit world with you, Cat. I knew I would just get in your way here.”
“Rory will go back with you.”
He protested with a coughing grunt.
“Rory, you know perfectly well it’s not safe for Bee to travel Europa alone. Don’t argue. Queen Anacaona will stay with me. Find a troll maze to hide in if Hallows’ Night comes before I return. We’ll meet in Havery, at the law offices of Godwik and Clutch.”
“Yes,” she said. “Havery.”
Rory’s mother snarled. A swirl of bright leaves swept up as on a blast of icy wind, congealing into a monstrous beast with a lizard’s length, a silky coat of pale hair, and a snake’s jaws. Two of the cats charged at it, but its claws drove them back. I leaped forward and cut its open mouth with my sword. The beast disintegrated into a thousand shards that clattered to the ground with a noise like chimes.
“Go, Bee! Through water.”
“I love you, Cat.” Chin lifted, Bee smiled bravely at me.
My look had to speak for me, because I could not produce words. The big cats prowled the perimeter of the warded ground to give Bee time to get away. Shards littering the ground stirred to take on the monstrous shape of a fluttering harpy with teeth like obsidian knives. Four wolves loped up, tongues lolling and breath steaming. More winged creatures appeared in the distance, arrowing our way.