"Holy shit." I stood up. "You're right. Dredge is forging an army in a world that can't protect itself from him. I have to accept Jareth's offer. I can go up against Dredge if I'm prepared. Otherwise… I don't have a chance."
Camille slid off the bed and crossed to my side, draping one arm around my shoulders. "Menolly, you can do this. You survived Dredge, you came out of the abyss… you can survive anything Jareth throws at you."
"But that's just it," I said, feeling faint. "I'll have to go back to that night, to the darkness when he tried to destroy my soul." My voice ripped out of my chest like a baen-sidhe, and I dropped to my knees. "I don't want to relive it! I remember too much in my dreams."
My sister knelt by my side. She took my hand. "It's not fair, and it never will be. But, Menolly, you have to do this. You know it, and I know it. And when it's over, you can find Dredge and obliterate his soul. The gods will smile on you."
"The gods can go to hell," I said, roughly grasping her hand. "I'm so grateful you're here. Will you help me and stand watch? Will you come with me if Jareth says it's okay? I need you."
She nodded. "You can count on me. You can forever and always count on me."
And then it was okay. Camille would be there. My big sister, who had taken over when Mother died, who had become our rock, who had kept her head when I tore into the house in a manic bloodlust to kill, who had led us against Bad Ass Luke and the first Degath Squad… She would be there, watching over me as always. All of a sudden I realized that, torture or not, I still needed my family. I still needed their love. I needed to belong.
CHAPTER 14
We waited until Camille and Morio ate before heading out to the Hall of Temples again. I perched on one of the beds, watching as they sat at the table. As I tuned out my thoughts, which were raging with fear, I noticed an odd light emanating from their auras. It was a silverish-green cord, linking the two of them. What the hell had they been up to? Camille was linked to Morio in much the same way she was to Trillian, but it seemed more than sexual.
"Menolly," Morio said, tearing a piece of bread in two and handing half of it to Camille, "I've been meaning to ask you something. You don't eat food anymore, right?"
I nodded. "I can't. I can't drink anything but blood, either. I get violently nauseated when I ingest anything else. Food won't kill me, but the aftereffects sure aren't pretty. Why?"
"I've been thinking. My skills with illusions are extremely good. I thought maybe we could play around a bit. I can try to cast an illusion on the blood you drink while you're at home. Maybe I can make it smell and taste like something different… something you miss eating, perhaps?"
I stared at him, mouth agape. Nobody had ever thought to suggest anything of the sort before. "That has to be the sweetest thing I've heard in a long time. But wouldn't that be a waste of your energy?"
"What waste? I don't go around casting major spells every day, and that sort of thing wouldn't require much effort, I think. It's worth a try, if you're interested." He shrugged. Camille wrinkled her nose and smiled.
Not sure exactly what to say, I stammered out a "thank you" and then thought, Why not? What could it hurt?
"I'd like to give it a try," I said. "Maybe after we get this mess with the Elwing Clan cleared up. I miss… there are so many things I miss."
"Like Mother's buttercream biscuits?" Camille said.
I laughed then. Of all the things to discuss on the night before I handed myself over to a shaman prepared to tear my soul apart. "I haven't thought about those in a long time, but yes, her buttercream biscuits. Do you have the recipe?"
She nodded. "I kept all of her recipes. I can't make them nearly as good as she did, but maybe Iris can. I never thought of asking her to try."
And then we were off, talking about the wonderful meals Mother had fixed when we were young, and how she'd done her best to recreate Earthside food enough times to give us a taste for things like hamburgers and fries when we were still very young. I avoided watching the clock that sat on the shelf, but finally, by the time Camille and Morio finished their dinner, I knew we couldn't delay any longer. At least the small talk had kept me distracted from what I was about to do.
"I guess we'd better go. You two going to be shielded enough to come over to Temple Row?"
Morio nodded. "I think we'll be okay. We cast a pretty strong protection barrier to guard against excess magical energy, so we should be fine. You're ready?"
I took in a deep breath, holding it for a long time before slowly letting it out. "No, but there's no time like the present. Let's go find out where Jareth wants to take me."
The trip back to Temple Row took us all of thirty minutes now that we knew where we were going. Morio and Camille looked decidedly uncomfortable once we hit the other side of the park, but their spell held and by the time we came to the doors of the Temple of Reckoning, they seemed to be doing fine.
Jareth was waiting in the great hall. "I knew you'd return," he said. He nodded at Camille and Morio. "You are welcome, of course, but this isn't going to be pleasant. Are you sure you want to watch? You may find out more than you ever wanted to know about what happened to your sister, Camille."
Camille looked at me. "I said I'll stand by you, and I will, if you want me there. You shouldn't have to carry this alone. We're family, and whatever happened to you, happened to all of us."
I rubbed the bridge of my nose. "I've worked so hard to hide what Dredge did to me, to protect you and Delilah and Father. I guess… it's time to let go of my secrets."
Jareth nodded. "Come with me then. All of you. We'll be working outside of time. You'll make it home shortly before first light." He led us through a different door than I'd taken when I first arrived at the temple. We scurried down hall after hall until we came to a darkened room so large I couldn't see the other side. The ceiling and walls were black, and the only furniture was in the center—a long narrow dais draped in an indigo cloth, with pillows on the floor surrounding the platform.
He motioned for me to stand in front of the dais. Camille and Morio stood off to one side. "We don't have time for the usual rituals and rites that happen before an awakening, but I must ask you this. Do you come here of your own free will, to learn to control your own power and sever the chains that bind you to your sire's bidding?"
I swallowed the fear that rose. "I do so affirm."
"Will you surrender yourself to my hands, knowing that I will lead you into the darkness?"
The words hung heavy on my tongue. I didn't want to say them, but found them slipping between my lips of their own accord. "I surrender to you."
"Then take your place on the dais, Menolly." Jareth indicated for me to lay down on my back. When I'd done so, he pulled out silver cuffs that were lined with velvet. "These won't touch your skin, so they won't hurt, but you won't be able to break them."
I stared at the cuffs in horror. Silver, a blessing to the Fae, was bane to a vampire. Wincing, I held out my arms and he fastened them around my wrists. Nothing. They were well cushioned, like he'd said. He produced a second pair and fastened them around my ankles, then helped me lay back so that my head was on a small pillow. After I was in place, Jareth held up a blindfold and slowly covered my eyes.
I could hear Camille and Morio talking to him in low tones.
"Are you sure she'll be okay?" Morio was saying.
"I make no guarantees, but I believe Menolly is strong enough to make it through the rite. If she's to have any hope of confronting her sire, she must master her fear. She must rid herself of the chains he forged between them. Do you understand?"
Camille's voice broke in. "It makes perfect sense, but listen to me, Monk. If you hurt her in any way that isn't part of the ritual, if you try to fuck her up, I'll rip out your heart and feed it to a Corpse Talker. Do you understand me?"
There was a brief pause, then, "You make yourself perfectly clear, Daughter of the Moon." Jareth busied himself at something. The sound of blood trickling into a goblet reached my ears. The fragrance filled the room, metallic and brilliant and beautiful. Then a bell chimed three times and I sensed him circling around the table, widdershins, going against the sun.
"Once I begin, we must finish. You understand this? There's no stopping, or the energy could backfire." Jareth was standing near my head.
I let out a shudder. "This whole trip isn't going quite the way I expected. Get on with it."
Angel of glory, angel of blood,
rise to meet your maker.
Angel of glory, angel of blood,
rise to confront your sire.
Angel of glory, angel of blood,
rise to reclaim what is yours.
Angel of glory, angel of blood,
return to the time you were newly born.
He was circling the table, his voice drifting on a stiff breeze that had suddenly sprung up to sweep through the room. The energy shifted and I felt myself drifting lower, my consciousness lulled by the cadence of his speech, by the rhythm of his heartbeat.
Surrender your expectations. Surrender your doubts.
Surrender your fears. Surrender your strengths.
Surrender your anger. Surrender your control.
Three drops of blood splashed on my forehead, their scent enticing me. Even though I'd drank just a few hours earlier, the thirst rose and I found myself ravenous. I jerked against the cuffs, wanting to be free to go and hunt. I can't, I thought, I can't leave. I can't just go traipsing off in search of fresh blood on the city streets.
Creature of the night, demon of the blood,
Turn back the clock, turn back the minutes
and hours and years.
Return to the night you were born anew.
Return to the night of your siring.
Three more drops, but this time he placed them against my lips, pressing gently with his fingers. I forced myself to keep from biting the warm flesh as he withdrew his hand.
My tongue snaked out and before I could stop myself, I licked the blood off my lips.
"Holy crap!" A searing flame ran through me and I convulsed against the chains. For a moment, I thought I'd been staked, but as the pain subsided I realized it was magic, carried within the blood I'd just tasted. I had barely digested this thought when I began to tumble, spiraling away from my body, away from the room, away from the table and Jareth and my sister and Morio.
"What the—?"
I stopped as I landed on a hard surface. As I opened my eyes, I realized I was back in the cavern where Dredge had taken me after he caught me. And he was there, standing over me, a dreadful expression on his face as he latticed my body with his nails.
The pain rolled over me in waves. It seemed like hours since I'd lost my ability to scream. I was lying naked on a stone slab deep in the cavern complex.
If I could only faint, pass out until it was all over and I walked among my ancestors. I tried to will myself into unconsciousness, tried to coax the fog of forgetfulness out of hiding. But my mind was too strong, my grasp on the present too firm. If I closed my eyes, I could almost grasp the edge of oblivion, but each time I started to slide into that blessed abyss, Dredge dug in a little harder, twisted my flesh a little sharper to bring me back.
"Don't give up on me yet, love," he said. His voice was like a gentle balm, soothing me for a fraction of a second until I relaxed and then he ripped at me again. "Don't think of it as punishment," he whispered. "You really have nothing to do with this—I'm sending a message. And you just happen to be my canvas."
As I bled, drop by drop, I could hear tongues rasping against the floor, lapping up the tears shed by my body. My stomach lurched. Dredge noticed, stopped, and tipped me on my side as my breakfast came pouring out.
"Can't have you dying in your own vomit, can we?" he said.
"Fuck you, you bastard," I said, spitting out the vile phlegm that remained in my mouth. "If you're going to kill me, just do it. I'm not afraid to die." Until the moment he'd caught me, that would have been a lie, but the pain I'd gone through in the last few hours made dying seem like a slow cruise into the underworld, where it would all be over and I'd be free.
"I know you're not. That's why we're taking it nice and easy," he said, then stood back. "And now that you're decorated, it's time for the real fun to begin."
I blinked. What more could he do to me? And then he started to disrobe.
"No—no… You're not fit to wipe my boots, you motherfucker—" The pain and fear of what was to come spurred on my anger and I struggled against the heavy cuffs securing me to the stone slab.
He laughed. "Spirit yet. I like it." Leaning over me, his curly hair trailed down to tickle my face and shoulders, hurting as it stuck to the bloody lines crisscrossing my body in a latticed design. Dredge's eyes were steel and ice, diamonds in the rough, and his lips were so full and inviting that his face almost made me weep. How could someone so beautiful be so savage? I shuddered as he climbed on the slab, erect and throbbing in the night.
"You want me, don't you? You want this so bad that you're dripping wet. Well, baby, I'm all yours," he said, driving deep inside me, his shaft of ice-frozen flesh grinding against my hips. The slashes across my body sent stinging jolts of agony through my nervous system as he moved against my skin, tearing the cuts further. I felt like a piece of meat under a mallet.