Ever After (The Hollows 11)

"Is it?" I said loudly to Al but talking to all of them. "Distraction seems to be working for him! Have any of you given any thought to why he might have kidnapped my former familiar's child and wife? My elfin familiar?"

The mention of their age-old enemies got the expected snarls, but Newt and Dali were listening. Their war had nearly killed all of them.

"I say we kill her and be done with it!" Ku'Sox said loudly.

Taken aback, I spun, the ring of flowers falling from me to land in the dry moat between us. "Kill me?" I said, unheard over the rising complaints. "Are you nuts?"

"I can't think straight, my head is ringing so badly from the lines!" one demon shouted as he stood, getting a round of agreements before he sat down in vindication.

"I was in the middle of some work, and I lost it all!" a second exclaimed. "You owe me restitution for a week's work down the crapper!"

Al's brow was furrowed. "My student is not responsible for your failure to record your curses in the collective," he said, and Dali nodded his agreement.

"We have a problem," a third said, a band of blue fabric draped over his shoulders. His voice was firm, and I wondered who he was. "The imbalance is impacting everything. It took two of you to summon her through the lines. Two! That's not normal. And it's getting worse!"

I took a step forward. "Well, that was because of Trent," I said, and Al jabbed me with his elbow to shut up.

Newt and Dali pulled their attention from the rising noise behind me. "Trent tried to block our summons?" Newt asked, her long legs showing from under her toga before she tugged it to cover them.

"It's never taken a collective to summon anyone!" the demon with the blue sash said loudly, enjoying the attention his claim had brought him. "The ever-after is falling apart!"

The sky is falling, the sky is falling, I thought derisively, and Newt shifted her feet to the floor, her expression seeming to mirror my thoughts.

"This is pointless," Newt said as she poised almost coyly. "Stay on track, gentlemen. Rachel, love, can you fix the line?"

I didn't like being called "love," especially not by her, but I let it pass. "No," I said sullenly.

"Of course she can!" Al shouted to drown out the immediate complaints, his hands raised pleadingly as he shot me a glare. "We need more time, is all."

"We have no time!" Ku'Sox asserted, aggressively riling them up. "She broke the balance. Killing her will fix it."

"It will not!" I exclaimed, but Al's wince and Dali's sudden deflation as he sat down made me wonder. "It won't, will it?" I asked Al softly, and the demon made a long, drawn-out, regretful noise of possibility.

Dali leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, ignoring the rising noise behind us for a moment. "Unfortunately it might," he said to me, giving the demons time to argue. "Lines created from a jump between reality and the ever-after are permanent, for the most part, but lines made from a reality-to-reality jump are not, and killing you might erase it."

"Might?" Panicking, I looked at Ku'Sox, hating his smug smile. "This is a setup," I said, wanting to retreat but there was nowhere to go. "The line was stable. Well, not stable, but it wasn't unzipping like this! Someone's tampered with it!" It was as close as I dared go without actually blaming him, and even so, Al lightly smacked me on the shoulder to shut up.

"We have nowhere to go if the ever-after collapses," Ku'Sox said, voice loud over the rising noise. "Kill her before it's too late!"

"Wrong!" I shouted, and Al sighed heavily. "They have nowhere to go. You do."

Ku'Sox beamed at me as if I'd played right into his hands. "Not anymore, but you do, Rachel. Perhaps you are trying to kill us."

"Me?" I stammered, mentally backpedaling as I realized why he was so smug. He was going to kill the ever-after and everyone in it-blaming it on me. He had a way around the curse. Had to. Or he knew a way to force me to remove it. Maybe Lucy and Ceri had been kidnapped to force my hand, not Trent's. Damn it all to the Turn and back.

"I didn't do this!" I spun to face the crowd behind me, then back to Dali. "I was on a horse in reality when the line started leaking this bad!"

Ku'Sox stood. "Then you admit it was leaking? And you never told anyone?"

Al was holding his head in his hand, and I wished I'd kept my mouth shut. "Just a little," I said, then had to raise my voice when they all began talking. "I was trying to fix it before anyone noticed!"

Al stood stiffly beside me as he fidgeted in subtle ways that only I could possibly see. "Will you shut up now?" he breathed, roughly turning me to face Newt and Dali.

"But he did it!"

"But you can't prove it!" Al mocked my whiny tone.

"There are thriving Rosewood babies being stolen, and he kidnapped hostages to force my freed familiar to make the cure permanent!" I shouted. "Doesn't that sound a bit odd to you?" But no one cared.

"Are you done?" Al muttered, his back stiff as he faced Newt and Dali.

Looking uneasy, Dali rose to his feet, hands raised to quiet them. "Rachel, as it is your line and you're the only demon who can survive free of the ever-after, we are understandably concerned that your intent is to destroy us and the ever-after."

My hasty breath to protest whooshed out as Al poked me in the ribs to be quiet.

"Much as I regret my decision," Dali said, moving to the front of the drop-off between us, "it's my recommendation that if Rachel admits that she can't balance her line, then perhaps her death is the best way to ensure our continued existence."

I couldn't speak. They weren't serious, were they? Ku'Sox had done something. I knew it by his smug expression as he listened to the demons call for my blood. Standing there, my heart hammered, and I backed up into Al. They couldn't. I hadn't done anything!

Dali looked at me, and I quailed. "If it's a choice between your life and all of ours, then you will die." He hesitated, then added quietly, "Even if you're not actually the one who should be blamed for it."

His eyes slid behind me to Ku'Sox, and my hope leaped. He believed me. I glanced at Al to see he realized it, too. And Newt, now toasting me with her wine. Proof. We needed proof. I could do that. I could get the damned proof. I just needed a few days.

"Gentle associates, gentle associates!" Al said, his voice rumbling through me from where I was pressed against him. "Of course she can balance her line." His breath was like brimstone against me, sharp and jolting. "Tell them, Rachel," he prompted, his voice low with threat.

"S-sure," I stammered, scared to death.

Al's eyes closed in relief. "We can fix it," he said as they opened.

"Then why haven't you?" Ku'Sox said softly, mocking us.

"My rooms are shrinking!" another called.

"We have nowhere to go. Kill her now before it's too late!" a third shouted, and it all started up again. I began to panic. Only Al's firm hold on my arms kept me from moving. He was not my jailer, he was my rock. Whatever happened to me would happen to him. I didn't altogether trust Al, but I trusted that.

"No." It was a soft utterance, and my eyes went to Newt, still sitting calmly on her bench, legs curled back up under her again. "I said no!" she said louder, and the noise behind Al and me abated. "I told you months ago that Rachel's line was unbalanced, and you all said I was crazy."

"You are crazy!" someone shouted from the back, and she smiled as if in benediction.

"Tru-u-u-ue," she drawled when they quieted again. "But no one listened. You will listen to me now. Call it your collective penance."

My heart gave a pound, and I tensed against Al. Was it a chance or a sentence?

Knowing all eyes were on her, Newt stood gracefully. "I will give you space from my own rooms to compensate your loss, Cyclarenadamackitn. I will compensate all your one-inch, two-inch losses because I know how important every inch is to you aged, decrepit men. But in return, I want to see if she can do it. It would be a skill worth having-don't you think? Being able to balance lines scraped from a reality-to-reality jump? In case we someday can return to reality and abandon the ever-after completely?" I swallowed hard as Newt turned her black, featureless eyes on me. "If she can't, then you may kill her."

There was a breath of silence, in which I could almost hear the demons thinking that over. Behind me, Al sighed, his hands gripping my upper arms easing. It was a chance.

I looked at Ku'Sox and his evident anger, but he stayed silent as the demons came to a consensus. I couldn't tell if Dali was pleased or irritated as he stood, frowning once at Newt's pleased smile as she beamed over all of them.

"So!" Dali said, bringing everyone's attention back to the stage. "Are we agreed? Rachel and Al have time to balance the line if Newt compensates everyone?"

Al held his breath as no one spoke, each waiting for the other to say something first.

"Ku'Sox?" Dali prompted. It was clear that the bastard child wasn't pleased, but if he continued to push for my death, it would be obvious that he wanted it.

His face empty of emotion, Ku'Sox turned on a heel. Pushing past the surrounding demons, he distanced himself, and then, with a soft breath of air replacing his mass, he vanished.

"I'll take that as a yes," Dali said as the rest of the demons began popping out in turn, a soft muttering of conversations rising and falling like surf.

I finally began to relax, turning to look up at Al as he let go of my shoulders. "Now what?" There was no way in hell I could balance that line.

Al wouldn't look at me, and I again wondered how I could have gone from fear to mistrust to understanding to reliance in so short of time. "We find a way to fix this," he said. "Or a way to blame it on someone else," he added, stiffening as Newt rose and made her way to us. Dali was busy with a few lingering demons, and I watched as Al seemed to shift and change, the mask he always wore sliding over him again as she came forward.

"That's it then!" he said cheerfully as he clapped his thick hands again. "I guess we'll be off to look at the line. See what we can do."

"Yes," Newt said, her smile chilling me as she took my hand and looked at it, noticing perhaps that I now had a metal pinkie ring instead of a wooden one. "You go balance that line. And in the meantime, Rachel's debt to me grows with each passing second."

I winced as I pulled my hand from hers, but what could I say? I did have some income here from the use of the tulpa I'd made for Dalliance.

Al was huffing and puffing, but I knew there was no deal we could get that was better than our continued survival.

"Al," Newt said sharply before he could protest. "If your student dies, that debt reverts to you."

Al glanced at Dali, and then back to her. "Looking forward to it," he grumbled, his hand on my shoulder tightening.

Newt's black gaze was on the wisp of my tattoo that showed, and I managed a nervous smile. "Thank you," I said as she turned to leave, and she spun slowly back to us.

"Don't thank me now, love. Save it till the morning after."

In a hush of inrushing air, Newt vanished like a Cheshire cat. Feeling ill and scared, I turned to Al. "Can we go home?"

"No," he said, simultaneously leading me down off the dais and waving to Dali as if everything was A-Okay, not Oh Shit. "But I agree we need to leave."

I hopped from the raised stage, and Al's hands left my wrist. I felt small as I looked at the stone bench Ku'Sox had been sitting on. "It's him," I said, and Al growled. "Ku'Sox has done something to the line. You know it, too. He's got those kids, and this is all an elaborate con to destroy the ever-after and blame me for it."

"If you can't prove it, it doesn't mean shit," Al said, but as I balked, he sighed and rubbed his head. "Fine," he grumbled as he took my arm as if to escort me. "The sun is still up, but let's go look at your line."

"How?" I said, knowing he couldn't be in reality when the sun was above the horizon, but it was too late and the soft ache of the ley line had taken me.