I don’t want you, she told it. I will not interfere with your captive. Let me pass.
There was a timeless hesitation, suspended, and then she slipped through the barrier, careful not to touch it and risk rousing the spirit. Safely inside, Isobel set the lure of her own spark, inviting the restless dead to come to her.
They swarmed.
push shove grab hold tug push. the sharpness of insubstantial fingers digging into her clawing at her, nails scraping claiming pressing. A flash of heat warned them off, the devil’s sigil flaring in the nowhere-place they were, a waft of tobacco and sulphur, soap and spice, the flickerthwack of cards turned on felt, the clink of fine glassware and the soft murmur of voices speaking needs wants secrets, the feel of blood welling on her fingertip, pressed against fine parchment, the touch of the Devil’s hand on her own, and the grabbing, grasping sensation retreats, not to disappear but to wait, impatient, overeager, for another chance.
Five, she counted. Five sets of hands-that-weren’t, five greedy, hungry mouths wanting to suck the marrow and the power from her bones.
Five magicians, dead and trapped under the grass, trapped under the soil.
Do you know who you are? she asked them. Do you know who you were?
Anger responded, anger and frustration wrapped around a pulsing core of need, without conscious thought or function, and it lunged at her, no longer five but a single entity, only aware that they needed and she had.
These things had been human once; she knew how to deal with them. The sense-of-Isobel skimmed just out of reach, resting within the dry bones of the cage, and then raised the ante.
She waited, waited waited an infinity of waiting, tracing the loops of the devil’s sigil in her mind, dark green flame flaring along the curves and lines, the loops and lines tarnishing and silvering in its path, turning and turning until they were all dizzy with the turning, dizzy with greed. They took the bait, then she turned and slipped into them—
Sensations filled her, overwhelmed her, and she forced them into some kind of sense, some frame of comprehension. Hunger, the ever-driving hunger for more, for more knowledge, more strength, more understanding. The sensation of being driven by the winds, hither and yon, chasing the scent of power, the lure of understanding. The crooked finger of invitation, suggestion. An Other, speaking of secrets unknown, power unclaimed. A sensation more than a knowing, an awareness rather than a vision; not trusted, never trusted, warily they gathered, driven/lured/prodded to this place, this valley, gathered to circle, bearing ritual and power, to reach up and pull, beyond their capabilities but together, together, with ritual and power. . . .
It stirred, and they pulled; it flew, and they chased; it dove, and they pounced.
Power. Immense, impossible, overwhelming. A chorus of voices singing alleluia, screaming alleluia, binding and rending, binding and rending, over and again, clawing at their own flesh, tearing out their own thoughts to find space to gorge themselves. . . .
—slipped past them, coming out the other side, shaking as though she’d run the full distance of the Territory, sick and wheezing.
Too much. Too much for her, too much for still-mortal blood and bone; she could contain power, but she was not power, not yet, only the sigil keeping her intact, only the sigil keeping her whole. She touched her skin and felt it crackle and slip off, black scale flakes shedding off her bone.
The world shook underneath her, around her. Rage. Fear. Sorrow. Betrayal.
Gabriel had never minded waiting. As a boy, he’d learned to wait his turn; as an advocate, he’d earned to wait for witnesses to say the important thing, the accused to say the wrong thing, the judge to make a decision. As a rider, he’d learned to let the miles wash over him, settling in each moment without demanding the next.
Waiting on Isobel tested that, the need to do something, to act, gnawing at him. Instead, he reached for the water, bypassing the smaller rivulets, the tiny pools, to touch the river he’d sensed before. Running water, not the panacea that silver was, but anyone born to the Territory knew that there were things that did not, could not cross running water intact.
If he could have diverted a stream, as he had suggested, he would have. It wouldn’t have been enough. The river itself, summer-low, wouldn’t have been enough.
“I knew you were trouble the minute I saw you. But such interesting trouble.” He pulled his water-sense back, shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, the just-polished quarter-and half-coins tucked there, smooth and cool to the touch. He suspected that they were now black with tarnish but felt no need to check.