Rose’s ears pricked up. What was this about a succubus?
“I honestly did think Sienna Nealon would be here for this,” Weissman said, and now he was quieter. “That she’d try and stop us, at least.” He laughed bitterly, but it sounded hollow. “My spies still put her in London, hunkering down and waiting for us to come back. I guess she doesn’t give a damn about Scotland, but then…who in London does, really?” He cackled, but again it lacked any real feeling other than a malice that made Rose shiver in the night. “So…she ain’t here. It was probably just poison.”
“Do you see any cups?” Raymond’s soft question was laced with accusation.
“Shut the hell up, Raymond. You’re stepping all over my triumphal mood, you downer lowmarket jackass.” Weissman seethed in the dark. “Can’t you just let me have this moment? If I could stop time to savor this minute, this second, without pissing off Akiyama, I would do it just so I could breathe in this triumph. We have wiped out every cloister in Europe. Every one. They are all dead, all of them—with that, you know, glaring exception of the country of Revelen, but who cares about them? We’ll get to them. Sovereign will get to them,” Weissman amended. “But Europe—the old redoubt of metahumankind? It’s ours, Ray.” Weissman slapped him, genially, across the back of the neck. It didn’t seem very friendly, even to Rose, who had just been handled much more roughly. “Now let’s go deal with your not-so-great niece and put this whole continent away, okay?”
They started away, Weissman again in the lead, and Raymond giving one last subtle look around. He seemed to stare into the dark, and then, placidly, quietly, gave an indistinct wave at the darkness, but not at her. As though he could not see her, but somehow suspected—or knew—she was there. Then he, too, turned and started after Weissman.
“Something I’ve been meaning to ask you, Ray,” Weissman said, their voices receding into the dark. “Why can’t you use your souls like Sovereign does? Seems like a thing that you’d want to do. Power untold, right at your fingertips? Why not seize it, Ray ol’ boy?” Weissman adopted a British accent—a terrible one—for the last bit.
“Because it’s forbidden,” Raymond said, raising his voice slightly, as if trying to project the message backward, to Rose. “After Hades died, his offspring were warned, in no uncertain terms—do not seek this power, or you will be annihilated, swift and sure. And they did some annihilating, too. My brothers and sisters—”
“Yeah, I got the story from Sovereign,” Weissman said, already sounding like he was losing interest. “Still…haven’t you ever at least been tempted? I know you’ve got to have some serious souls rattling around in there, Ray. Why not just…keep it in reserve, you know?”
The answer came back, muffled, not given for her benefit: “Because my father never taught me.”
Weissman was quiet for a moment, then let out a peal of laughter. “Daddy issues? Join the club, Ray.” And they vanished into the night.
Rose huddled behind the bushes, listening. They were talking still, in the distance, and she could hear them all the way up until they reached a vehicle and she heard the engine start. She sat there listening, until it faded from sound, from audible range, and was gone in the night.
When it was gone, she stood. The village was silent, dead.
And her mind…
…her head…
…was not.
The question, unasked, on her lips, was asked instead, in a dozen voices, in her mind, all at once, a cacophony of confusion and fear and worry:
What now?
We have to get away, her granddad said. Have to survive.
What if they come back?
We need to be elsewhere, her mam said.
Where do we go? they all asked.
Edinburgh, Tamhas said. We vanish. Blend in there. Wait. We’ll be safe in numbers.
Rose just stood, listening, buried in her own thoughts, the thoughts of the entire village.
You carry the fate of us all now, her mam said, seeping disgust. Try not to cock it up, you little whore.
You should get going, Tamhas said, a bit more kindly. You can take Miriam’s car.
Aye, Miriam said with loathing that was apparent, even in Rose’s head. The keys are in the house on a hook. She’s topped off.
“I…don’t know how to drive,” Rose said, muttering into the dark, speaking to herself? It felt so strange.
Miriam knows, Tamhas said. So now you know. You know everything we know, and can do everything we can do. Hamilton’s acting…my martial arts…it’s all at your disposal now. For the good of us all.
Did you hear what those two were talking about? Granddad asked, sounding a bit shrewd. About—
Her using our powers, Tamhas said, with some calculation of his own. Aye, I heard it. Sounds like something we should look into as well. I knew it was possible for Old Hades to do it, but…this is an added wrinkle, isn’t it? Explains why her kind— he didn’t put any meanness into it, like others in the village might have when talking about Rose —were so hated after he died. It became quite a stigma.
Aye, it’s a wrinkle, all right, mam said. But what’s my useless daughter going to do with our knowledge, our powers? Other than likely burn herself to death with Augie’s?
Tamhas was quiet, was calm, but when he spoke, a ripple of excitement ran through them all. Why…she’s going to get revenge, of course. For all of us. Because… And she could almost see him smile in the dark of her mind. …that’s our way.
*
Zack just stared, stared at the dead bodies, and a cold unrelated to the winter’s chill ran through him, top to bottom. “Oh…my…my God…”
“This…changes things somewhat,” Eve Kappler said in quiet voice, staring at the dead, and the girl who stood frozen in the middle of them, talking to voices in her head that they all could hear. “Weissman and Raymond killed her family.”
“They tried,” Gavrikov said, the Russian seeming to shiver in the chilly Scottish night. “But did you not see? The entire village sacrificed their own lives to Rose in order to save themselves from Raymond.”
“It’d be hard to miss that mass suicide disguised as a midnight wilding,” Harmon said, looking around a little cagily.
“This little scene bringing back memories?” Bjorn asked Harmon with a nasty sneer.
Harmon snapped around to look at him. “Why, yes, yes it is. When it comes to throwing yourself on a succubus to avoid death, I’m very familiar with the process. Though even I have to admit, watching an entire village mob make that choice at one time to avoid being drained by a Hades? Well…I thought I was jaded, that I’d seen it all.” He looked over the dead. “This…this is new.”
“It’s not new,” Zack said quietly. “This must have happened…seven years ago now. Look at Rose here. She’s a teenager, probably about Sienna’s age. She’s got that thin, reedy look, malnourished. Reminds me of—well, Sienna, when we pulled her out of her house.” He looked away. “It’s starting to alarm me the similarities I’m seeing between them.”
“Her people were wiped out by Century during the war,” Eve said, nodding at the dead. “How many voices do you suppose this scared, angry girl has in her head right at this moment?”
“This moment we’re viewing?” Harmon asked, looking away. “Or this moment right now, that we’re not living because we’re among the dead trapped in her head, reliving the tragic high points of her life?”
“Explains why is she crazy, no?” Gavrikov asked.
“The sooner we get out of here,” Harmon said, “the better.”
“Now all we need is a body to jump ship to,” Eve said. “And a chance to do so.”
“You assholes,” Zack said under his breath. “Bastian…you cannot possibly think this is a good idea?”
Bastian’s ghostly form was standing silent in the moonlight, arms folded across his massive chest. He stirred in the dark. “Leaving this place behind? Why wouldn’t we want to? This girl’s made a hell in her own mind and we’re living it with her. You bet your sweet bippy I’m getting out of here if I get a chance.”
“Sienna has been our—” Zack started.