A Tree of Bones (Hexslinger 3)

“Nor would you, in turn, be constrained to tell her that she could,” the Enemy added, softly. “Yet there is more.”

Rook thought again, frowning hard. “That title of hers,” he said, eventually. “Something . . . about that, isn’t there?”

“Only one of many,” the Enemy agreed. “And therein lies her trouble.”

Hank Fennig up on the ramparts, staring down into the storm, gaze fixed on Ixchel’s back: She’s got a hole, a plug stuck in it, like a cork. Or telling him, back after that first uprising, the Mex shaman and his tied-together band: But there’s a crack in everything, y’see, Reverend. You just have to keep handy to find it, keep quiet . . . and pay attention.

“Theophagy,” Rook said. “She ate those other goddesses, way down in the Sunken Ball-Court: Ixtab-Yxtabay-Coyotlaxquhui-etcetera, and all that. But that’s why she ain’t really one thing nor the other now, isn’t it? What with Ixtab the Rope being true Suicide Lady, and Ixchel herself just the Moon part. . . .”

“And Coyotlaxquhui, who Huitzilopochtli tore apart, being another kind of Moon entirely.”

“Yeah, right. Not to mention that Filth-eater, or the Long Black Hair, or Mother Earth with her snake skirt, and her head like two other snakes kissing. ”

Now it was the Enemy who nodded, approvingly. “You recall them well for a steel hat, though your tongue stumbles over their true names.”

“Listen up, Smoking Mirror: one of these days, one or the other of you needs to understand that Americans are not Spaniards. Hell, even Mexes ain’t Spaniards, not completely.”

Rook sighed. “Hank Fennig once told me the Oath was a true Patriot’s creed — all hexes created equal. And that was something Ixchel never could grasp, being how she’s unused to a world where people expect a two-way street — to get what you pay for, to keep what you earn. To her, she’s the only one gets to give or take, so she don’t have any call to account for any of it; we live and die at her sufferance, and she thinks we should be grateful to do so.”

“A view so many of us share, yes. It became habit, which in turn became a weakness, by our end. And yet — it is so very hard to think clearly, little king, when drunk to the dregs on flowery wine.”

“‘The blood of men is sweet,’ huh?”

“Exactly so.”

Things sunk a level further, then, to where Rook no longer had to speak aloud at all; the truth of it came at him all at once, a kindled shoal of bottom-feeding trench fish coming on like lamps out of endless black, lit one after the other from their predecessor’s flame. Slice by slice it presented itself, an unfurled pomander-orange stinking of secret wisdom, and the Enemy’s Chess-eyes crinkled to see him cobble it back together — those cold fingers stroked at his forearm, raising gooseflesh.

Yes, priest-king; yes. Now say it, so I know you know.

“Them that took the Oath don’t see things like she does, though, not in their hearts, where true hexation comes from. Which means . . .

what they swore to never was her, per se, or me either. They swore to each other, to this place — Hex City. Only real power she has in this arrangement is as the City’s protector, its occupying spirit. But she don’t care about that, and she’s shown it a hundred times over — by killing Hank over what she wreaked on Clo and her baby, most recently. Which means . . . they’re freed from serving her at all, though they still gotta do what I say. Because — ”

“ — you care for them, for this place, and have proven it. Absolutely, mi conquistador. Much as you may wish otherwise, you have bound yourself to these people, their future. It has become a — religion of sorts, to you. Is that not the best of jokes?”

“They finally get wise and throw her out, though, then I go, too. Can’t be High Priest for a goddess no one worships.”

“Ah, true. But . . . would that not be best, really? For with both of you gone, alive or otherwise, the City could live still, every one of its citizens protected in their own mutual embrace; untroubled by hunger, no longer set to roam and rage across this world. You would have helped birth a paradise for your people, something unseen in all worlds, ever. A race of hexes neither outcasts nor victims nor gods, but men, women, children of great power, all bound willingly together for the common good.”

America, Rook thought, way it’s s’posed to be, but ain’t. Like what the War was fought for, but real. And all I have to do, to make it come true — is die for it.

Or, at the very least . . . be willing to.

The Enemy clapped Chess’s palms together. “Yes. Now say the rest, before you persuade yourself you have misunderstood.”

Oh, for the Devil really is a lawyer, just like they say . . . and you really ain’t Chess, no matter the resemblance, since Chess never would’ve had the perspicacity to notice the Oath’s discrepancy —

But no, Chess would’ve seized fast on any escape clause he could, on his own behalf and Rook’s too, without even consulting Rook first. Because he always had been the truly practical one, in their arrangement.

Pretty little red-headed Satan of a man. My sin and my salvation, just like I always wanted to be, for you. Just like I never could’ve managed to, even if I hadn’t lied to myself at every step of the

way, and you too, darlin’. You, too.

“Nothin’ in the Oath that says that ‘other world’ the Engine brings on has to be the same one Ixchel dreams on, either,” Rook said, at last, staring down at his empty hands like he thought he could read their creases.

“Not at all, no.”

“It could be anything.”