“They missed the carnival,” Gil said, staring at his thumbs. “They were aiming for the carnival, and they missed.”
“Who is ‘they,’ exactly?” Sterling said. “How are we so sure we even know what’s going on here?”
“I think we all know,” I groaned.
I was splayed out on the couch – the long red one that Sterling liked so much, and to my surprise, had surrendered for my use. My head was in Asher’s lap, and he was holding an ice pack to my brow, the chill of it penetrating the towel in his hand. I shifted, then groaned some more.
The attack at the carnival had utterly destroyed everything in the parking lot. The normals were arguing over what might have caused it before we left. Sinkhole, someone said, before being cussed out by someone else who pointed out that a sinkhole doesn’t just flatten four-wheel drives into metal pancakes.
Gil had, understandably, grumbled something about not getting his deposit back for the rental car, and that left us with no recourse for transportation. The alternatives were to call for a rideshare and pay possibly a hefty hundred bucks because of the distance, or to buzz Carver and beg him to teleport to our location, then cast another sending spell to bring us all back home to the Boneyard.
But no. Oh no. Dusty had to be the big damn hero of the operation, so I ushered everyone to the very edges of the parking lot, instructing them to stand under the shadow of a particularly tall lamppost. Then I shadowstepped all five of us, herding our group through the chambers of the Dark Room so we could get home safe and sound.
And we did, appearing in one of the Boneyard’s hallways – where I promptly doubled over and puked my guts out. I’d never shadowstepped such huge distances, never mind taking four whole other people with me.
> “I’m gonna die,” I murmured, quivering.
“Quit fidgeting,” Asher muttered, lightly tapping his fingers against my cheek. Tiny tendrils of healing magic reached into my skin, down into my cells, curling deliciously as they worked the leftover chill and ache of the Dark Room out of my bones. “You’re gonna be fine.”
I groaned and clutched my stomach, then felt at myself again when I found a weird bulge under my jacket. The tiger. I held it even closer to my body, squeezing it, somehow feeling warmer. Don’t ask me how, but it helped.
“I don’t mean to make things worse just now,” Prudence said, “but I’m pretty sure we know what happened out there.”
Carver watched us over steepled fingers, a steaming cup of tea sitting untouched on the coffee table before him. His amber eyes followed each of us as we spoke, but I kept my gaze stuck on him. Everyone had their theories, well and good, but as the expert on everything to do with the Eldest, he would know for sure.
“They’ve returned,” Carver said quietly. “It appears that the measures we’ve taken to nullify the Eldest have had little to no lasting effect. Sealing their rifts was not enough to diminish their power. Even defeating the White Mother wasn’t a crushing enough blow to their forces.”
He rubbed the center of his forehead with one long, slender finger. I watched, moisture from the ice pack dripping down my temple, an equally chilling sense of dread building in the pit of my stomach.
“And now they’ve decided to dispense with ceremony. No more rifts. The Eldest are content to reach out to our plane purely with the emanations of their corrupt power. The incident at the carnival will not be isolated, I can assure you of that.”
“It was a blast from straight out of the sky,” Sterling said, his boot tapping incessantly against the stone floor. “Does that mean that they’re like the Heart? They can attack wherever they want?”
“Like an orbital strike,” I mumbled. The dread in my body was quickly transforming into despair.
“Worse,” Carver said gravely. “It appears that they’ve gathered enough of their terrible power to penetrate the barriers between our worlds as they please, and I am certain that they will be able to send these waves of destruction anywhere they desire.”
“Anywhere on the planet,” Gil said, his face lined with both awe and horror.
Asher asked what we were all thinking, the one question I didn’t dare voice myself. “And why did they strike Madam Babbage’s? Why the carnival?”
For some uncomfortable moments, no one said a word. We all knew what that answer was. Even Asher. He only wanted to be told otherwise. The reality of it hung thick in the air, choking like smoke, yet thoroughly unspoken.
Even after all that trouble with the Crown of Stars, nothing had truly changed. My soul still burned like a signal flare for the Eldest, shining as bright as a beacon to guide them to our reality, to act as a magnet for their destruction.
“But we were having such a good time tonight,” I murmured. The words kept tumbling from my mouth, hardly making sense to anyone but myself. “We got to just mess around. We weren’t supposed to worry about anything. This was supposed to be fun. I stole a tiger.” I looked down at my hands. “I don’t want to think about dying again. Not this soon.”
Ah. There it was.
“Patronage,” Gil offered. “Maybe another entity will take you. Is it too soon to check with the Midnight Convocation?”
I grunted noncommittally, hoping it was enough of a response, which it clearly wasn’t. “I still haven’t heard from Nyx. I think they’re happy to keep the homunculus’s soul. Why go through the trouble of trying again? They don’t need me.”
From out of the corner of my eye I saw Carver leaning forward in his seat. “We won’t have to resort to that, Dustin.” He gathered up his teacup, taking a cursory sip, then setting it back down in its dainty little saucer. “Over my dead body, as they say.”
I forced myself to give a little smile, but it didn’t stick. Asher’s fingers trailed against my skin as they moved a lock of hair out of my face. I knew he was doing his best to give me an encouraging smile of his own, but I just couldn’t manage it then. I kept staring at my thumbs.
The couch dipped as Prudence took a seat at the end of it, just by my feet. She placed a reassuring hand on my shin – sure, why not – and pressed her lips together.