The Saint (17 page)

Kris broke their gaze. He looked back at Mugshottz and said something in a language Adora didn't know but wished passionately that she did. Whatever the words meant, they were filled with warmth and joy, and she wanted him to whisper them in her ear—preferably right before kissing her.

Eat my heart. Drink my soul. Love me to death
.

The words were not loud enough to be a whisper, just a shadow that slipped through her mind.

That wasn't me!
Joy said. She sounded a little scared.
Adora? That wasn't me.

If it wasn't Joy, where had that come from—and what did it mean? And what the hell was she going to do about this growing attraction?

 

 

Then it came to pass that the Rich Worshippers grew wroth with the Saint, who was more beloved by the others than their human king. Thus hunters were sent out to find the shaman, and to put him to death for the glory of the new god made in that king's image.

—
Niklas 4:8

“Mommy?” Cyra's daughter Meriel asked in a grumpy voice as she rubbed her eyes.

“Yes, sweetie?” Cyra put her parchment aside and reached for the child.

“When is Uncle Kris coming home?” The girl snuggled into her mother's lap. There was less of it than there used to be, because Cyra and Thomas were expecting their second child. They were fairly certain that it was a boy, because Thomas's jinn had taken to making spontaneous appearances whenever Cyra slept. Jinn were drawn to male children.

“I'm not sure. Why do you ask?” Cyra smoothed back her daughter's silken hair.

“I dreamed of the lady again. She's supposed to come here with Uncle Kris.”

“Is she?” Cyra asked, but knew it was true. It just surprised her that Meriel knew. She shouldn't be shocked— not really. Thomas had warned her that the ability to communicate with the faerie mound was an inherited trait.

“Uh-huh. And guess what, Mommy?” Meriel looked up. She sounded more cheerful.

“What?”

“She's sort of like . . .” Meriel paused, clamping down on what she was about to say.

“She's like the dragon?” Cyra guessed. She and Thomas were certain that their reptilian friend had shared his secret name with their daughter on her birthday, and that the child was doing her best not to betray his confidence.

“Yeah. She got mad at a bad man once and lit his shoes on fire.” Meriel giggled. Cyra and Thomas had tried explaining to their daughter that lighting things—and especially people—on fire was not amusing, but they hadn't yet convinced her of it. All the dragon's pyrotechnic tricks were harmless and amusing—and allowed— because the canny beast was still being very careful not to expose the children to his true nature.

“Hm. Well, I am looking forward to meeting her,” Cyra said diplomatically. “But in the meantime, I think we would both do well to get some rest. I don't think we'll be getting much sleep after Uncle Kris comes home.”

You're like a fish in a pond. You're so busy staring at the juicy worm, you don't see the hook underneath.

You know, Joy, I've looked it up. Talking back to the voice in my head is one of the symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia,
Adora snapped.

And your point is?

My point is, I'm not sure the whole split-personality thing is healthy. I mean, this usually indicates that something dreadful happened to a child before the age of five. But nothing happened to me, so I shouldn't need you to cope with everyday life
.

There came sudden silence from Joy that was unexpected and a bit unnerving.

Joy—nothing did happen, did it?
Adora asked.

Joy still didn't answer. One of the most annoying things about her: she would often up and disappear just at the point when Adora wanted to talk. It seemed that was the case now.

The sunlight and the crowd began to weigh on Adora as she and Kris walked, and she sought the shade provided by the pepper trees at the edge of the paved lot. There were fewer people there, and Adora felt like she could breathe again.

They weren't alone, though. Adora glanced warningly at the cooing birds above. They were halfhidden in the pink pepper berries, but she was aware of their mood and of their guerilla-bombing techniques used to chase everyone away from their feasts.

“You don't like pigeons?” Kris asked, seeing her scowl.

“Sure I do—roasted with a side of risotto and asparagus,” she muttered.

Mugshottz made a strangled barking sound that Adora realized was a chuckle. When the troll laughed, his cheeks creased into deep folds like fissures. She half-expected to see bits of stone crumbling from his face.

Kris smiled too. “Mugshottz has been known to eat pigeons Tartare. It's revenge for all his cathedraldwelling relatives, condemned to live under mounds of their poop.”

Adora blinked, then recalled that Mugshottz was supposedly part gargoyle. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled at him. It was getting easier to read the man, even if he wore less expression than the standard English butler.

“Please help yourself to squab,” she said. “I mean, don't hold back on my account.”

Mugshottz smiled but shook his head. He was now walking almost abreast of Kris, more of a peer and less a servant or bodyguard.

“Have you ever heard the song ‘Poisoning Pigeons in the Park'?” she asked. Mugshottz shook his head but looked intrigued—at least, Adora
thought so. “Look for it the next time you're in a music store. I think you'll enjoy it.”

“Title like that, I'd have to.” His voice was like gravel, and Adora winced in sympathy. Maybe Mugshottz didn't say much because it hurt to talk.

Kris found an alley of deeper shade between the cement-bound trees and guided her under it, switching sides so that he walked in the partial sun and shielded Adora from the odd passers-by.

“I've just recalled something about Saint Nicholas's church,” he said, smiling with sudden pleasure. Adora felt the familiar empathic swerve in his direction. His stories, however odd and improbable, resonated with her, stirring in her brain chords of some half-forgotten song. He went on: “The temple overlooked an older home—one they built for me when I was Poseidon. We had some real wild festivals there,” he said.

The song met a note of discord.

“Poseidon . . . ?” Adora stumbled over a small crack in the uneven pavement, and as Kris caught her she thought:
Here we go again.
She half-expected Joy to say something snotty, but apparently Joy had given her up as a lost cause. Left on her own, the best Adora could manage was a weak: “You were Wodin
and
Poseidon? So, you were the one responsible for making the Queen of Crete fall in love with that sacrificial bull.”

Kris didn't blush. He even grinned.

“That was all her idea. She was one of the dark fey, you know. I had nothing to do with the conception of the Minotaur. She did that to get even with her husband, who liked that poor bull more than her.”

“I see.”

At her flat tone, Kris became wary. “But it was all
a long, long time ago. I can barely remember those times. My brain is so scrambled that I can barely recall this life. Maybe I'm not remembering properly. That happens sometimes.”

Adora made a
tsk
ing sound. “Kris, you're not supposed to lie—even to comfort me.”

“My brain
is
scrambled,” Kris insisted. “I could have it wrong. I'll have to ask Thomas.”

“Maybe the details of architecture or the geography are hazy, but you do recall being Poseidon, don't you? I mean, it's not just everyone who is worshipped as a sea god. One would tend to remember that,” she groused.

He hesitated a second. “Yes. I recall it.”

“So, though it may have been a long time ago, the underlying message of what you're saying is that you've been worshipped as a god at least twice, and that this Santa gig—though the latest and greatest for us modern-day humans—is just not that big a deal. I mean, what are flying reindeer and a sainthood when you can command oceans?”

Kris shook his head, clearly dismayed by her reaction.

“I didn't ‘command oceans.' That isn't my main . . . gift. It was more mistaken identity. They were looking for a sea god when I arrived in town.”

Adora snorted.

“And Santa
is
a ‘big deal,' ” he insisted. “We are talking about faith, so of course that incarnation is important. In these days of mass communication, branding's more important than ever.” Kris exhaled in a rare show of frustration. “I would let it go, you know. I'm not an egomaniac. But Santa isn't being interpreted in the right way, and the concept has been corrupted. It's doing more harm than good. I don't know why this happens. I never wanted to be worshipped. I don't need adoration. All I ever wanted was for there to be peace among races, to unite in a common goal and to love all things in this world. But the message always gets lost. Goblins always get brainwashed, and humans . . .”

“Humans?” she prodded.

He looked at her, perhaps weighing what he should say. He looked unhappy as he answered. “Humanity needs gods, I guess. And most of them can't seem to embrace a formless deity. For some reason, God can't simply be love. God has to be something smaller—something tangible and flawed that allows loopholes for men to war and do hateful things in that name.”

For the first time ever, Kris looked sad and discouraged, and Adora found herself equally disturbed. She was used to empathizing with her subjects, but this was something else—something she didn't entirely like. She needed to keep her emotions separate. She couldn't afford to head into another emotional spiral.

“Even after all this time, there are some things I still don't understand. Man is so frail,” Kris said more softly. “Knowing he can be broken, I don't understand why he does what he does. Like aggressive hedgehogs, men do terrible things to one another. Then, when vengeance comes, they curl about their pain, almost treasuring it even as they put out their quills. Those quills keep everyone away, even those they love, so they never receive comfort. And the cycle goes on.” He sighed.

“Strangest and most illogical of all, the entire time they are posturing and threatening, they're also hoping no one will notice their vulnerability and hurt them more.” Kris shook his head. “The most frustrating part is that they never learn. Millennium after millennium, it's the same damn mistakes, the same damn denials that anything is wrong with the way they organize their lives, and the same refusal to admit that anything can change. They're fatalists.” Kris shot Adora a look that she could not decipher.

Adora swallowed and looked away. It actually hurt to see Kris's frustration. His pain was suddenly her own, a dark stain blossoming in her heart that made her want to pull away from him. Maybe it was because she understood this “curling about one's pain.” At her core, there was already a vast hurt. And fear. Fear that she might never be well and whole again. And fear that if she loved—true, deep, forgetful love—she might very well end up like her mother. And that terrified her, because she knew such love could be shattered—was almost always broken, in fact—and then what would become of her?

The question left her feeling bereft, and more alone than she had ever felt in her life. And that was saying something. A part of her had always been lonely. Her parents' intense—

Admit it, that was a
gloriously
selfish relationship,
Joy interjected at last.
In fact, you could say it was hermetically sealed with you on the outside.

Their love had left Adora feeling displaced, not a part of a family. She often wondered if she'd been an accident, or conceived on a whim then conveniently forgotten, an unwanted houseguest or a pest that lived in the attic. She was like a mouse, often sneaking into the kitchen for food when no one was there to see because she hadn't wanted to spend another moment at a dinner table where she was unwanted. Though it had never been expressed to her in so many words, she had always had the feeling that she was allowed to stay in her home only because she didn't make any trouble.

It was a harsh thought. But all too frequently, when her parents would awake from their dreamy enchantment with one another, they'd stare at her as though her presence in their home—or at the dinner table, or in the back seat of the car—came as a complete and not entirely welcome surprise.

Even when her mother decided that life without her husband was no life at all, she hadn't remembered her daughter long enough to think of leaving a note of good-bye and absolution. Adora had needed that desperately; to hear that it wasn't her own fault that they weren't close, that her mother's sorrow and loneliness hadn't been caused by her daughter's inadequacy.