Soul Fire (Darkling Mage 8)

Because that was what it was. I didn’t want to give Herald reason to stress out since nothing – nothing at all – had happened. I reached for his hand, flinching when I found it damp from sweat, then squeezed it anyway.

“Long day,” I said.

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t get me started.”

I leaned into him, sniffed, then backed away, wrinkling my nose. “Oh. Oh wow. You smell like a trash can, Igarashi.”

“Damn it Graves, I said don’t get me started.”

“You smell like the thing that trash lives inside of.”

He shoved me in the shoulder, laughing as he hugged me. I pretended to complain when his bare arms got sweat on me, pretended to cringe when he planted a wet kiss on my cheek, then shooed him down the corridor, pointing him to my bedroom, and therefore, the shower.

Alone. Silence. I admit, I wanted a little time to myself. We, all of us at the Boneyard, lived bizarre lives. I was sure as shit that everyone was happy as I was to just savor those precious few moments of normalcy, of sanity. I stretched my arms, sighing pleasurably at the empty space around me, at the sight of our break room mostly restored to its former function.

They had to throw the sofa out, though, the one that had Loki’s blood on it. Sterling was livid, at first. It was his favorite one, Sterling’s Sofa, the nice red couch that he loved to stretched out on like a cat. I noted that he specifically asked to have a private moment before Mason and Gil hauled it into Valero to toss into a dumpster – or, more likely, to leave it on some sidewalk. I didn’t know if Sterling wanted to say goodbye to the couch, or find some way to suck up the dregs of trickster god’s blood left on the upholstery. I didn’t really want to find out.

All that we had left to sit on were the assorted models of armchairs and stools Carver had picked out of a catalog, those convenient modular Swedish bits of furniture that you had to put together yourself. Most had been damaged in some way during the fight and were just barely usable. Mason sounded excited over the prospect of helping to build the new ones Carver was planning to order.

I didn’t really want to park my butt in a slightly burnt chair, though. So I sauntered off towards the rim of the platform, sitting down on the floor and letting my legs dangle over the edge. One of the world’s most powerful witches had held me hundreds of feet in the air that day. Kicking my feet at the abyss like it was a swimming pool wasn’t so scary anymore.

I groaned as I stretched out my legs, lifting my head to look at the breach. You could hardly see where the hole had been blown into the Boneyard – twice, no less, by our explosive little canine friend. I chuckled at the very idea that we had a magical corgi as a pet to begin with.

“My life is weird as fuck,” I said softly, to no one in particular, maybe to the abyss.

A woman’s voice answered. “There is a town in Alaska, fleshling, where the mayor was a cat.”

I sighed. Not even ten minutes. I counted. “Hello, Hecate,” I grumbled. She was sitting next to me, similarly posed, her legs and her dress draping down into the abyss. “I’m so tired. Please. What are we talking about?”

Hecate smiled, her features shifting as she did. “You did say that your life was strange. This is factual. The oddest things can happen, with or without the influence of the supernatural. A cat as a mayor, indeed.”

“I still don’t understand,” I said, sounding more and more tired with every word that left my lips.

“Your life,” she cut in abruptly, “will in no way become less complicated from this point on. You must know that. Truly, you must have known it from the start. It is best for you to accept that your existence is meant to be lived in extremes. Constant danger, fleshling. Constant sorrow. Is it not better to be prepared for the worst?”

My fingers dug into the floor. She was bringing it up again, all this talk of permanent change, of acquiring power. “Tell me what you have in mind, then. As plainly as you can. It’s been a long day, Hecate.”

Her hand was warm against mine, a gesture meant to be sympathetic, but coming from an entity – a triune goddess of magic – that could simply be calculated, meant to simulate a human response.

“You tasted a different form of magic when you bonded shadow to fire, did you not? You rose to another notch in the arcane hierarchy when you understood that the darkness and the flames could work in concert.” Hecate waved her hand, a wireframe diagram of a staircase appearing in a hazy green light in midair. She tapped one claw at the bottom of the staircase, then tapped at the top. “What if you could go from here, to there, in the blink of an eye?”

I watched the diagram intently, a little thrill tumbling in my stomach. “To ascend. Wasn’t th

at what you called it?”

Hecate clenched her fist, and the staircase dissolved into fading motes. “Yes. To rise above the bounds of what humanity can accomplish, to join the very highest echelons of earthly power. Hercules. Perseus. Maui. Gilgamesh. Do you know these names, fleshling?”

My heart thumped so quickly that I could hear my blood pulse in my ears. They were demigods, every last one of them. I nodded.

“Then you understand.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but my chest was tight, my mouth parched. “What do I have to give?”

“Everything.”

It was so hard to breathe, but I tried harder, wanting to ask more, wanting an answer.

“And if I did this, Hecate – would I have what I need to end the Eldest and their dominion forever?” My eyes were huge when I looked at her, as open as my heart. “What could stop me then?”