The Saint (26 page)

Maxentius ground his teeth and snarled at the “angel” that had appeared and smashed the two giant wheels upon which he had been set to break the body of the troublesome human, Catherine. He wanted to shout to the crowd that the angel was no angel at all, but the fey called Niklas. But he could not risk that in turn Niklas would reveal to the humans that their emperor was actually a goblin.

“Thisss isssn't over,” Maxentius hissed at the fey as he gathered up Catherine's body.

“It's over for today,” Niklas said, and carried the woman away.

A storm closed in, battering the car and howling like a beast in pain. The wipers couldn't cope, but that didn't seem to bother Kris, who was preoccupied and failed to notice—or at least be concerned— that they were riding around in the world's biggest dishwasher.

“Don't worry,” he said. “It's just Thomas's jinn setting up a howl. The bad weather discourages people from messing around this back door, and will confuse anyone following us. It'll pass off soon, and we're not in a flood plain. Yet.”

“You aren't reassuring me. Can't we stop until it passes? Or tell the jinn to go away?” Adora stared at the fussing baby, wondering if she should take it out of its sleeper. It had to be cold and clammy. Probably it should have a bottle too—though a bottle of what, she did not know.

“Sorry about dragging you out in this weather and . . . well, everything,” Kris said, again pulling the car out of a slide and back onto what passed for a road. “This wasn't a part of the plan.” Then he muttered, “Not part of
my
plan.”

“Ha! Bet you aren't sorry enough to take a room at that motel,” Adora answered as a small, illuminated sign flashed past.

“It's miles out of the way—almost a hundred. Kids put the sign out here as a joke,” Kris explained. “And it isn't a proper motel anyway, just a couple of broken-down motor homes with rotting floors and colonies of biting insects.”

“Maybe so, but you're missing my point. I can tell that you're upset about something and you wouldn't halt now if there was a five-star hotel and the Angel Gabriel himself appeared carrying a sign that said: stop here.” That wasn't fair. She knew he was worried about the baby and what had happened in L.A. Still, a part of her was certain that he was keeping something else from her.

“If the Angel Gabriel appears—sign or no sign— we will stop,” Kris assured her with a smile. “I wouldn't leave a friend out on the road on a night like this.”

The words were hardly spoken when the storm ended abruptly. Kris smiled wider but didn't say
I told you so.
Instead, he swerved off what was left of the road and started toward a cliff face that towered in the distance.

“This entrance is almost never used—too close to the L.A. hive. But it's the closest, and I want to get the baby inside. It's safer for all of us.” But for the first time, Kris didn't sound completely certain.

“This is the back road into Cadalach?” Adora asked. She used the term
road
very loosely. There actually wasn't one that she could see.

“Well . . . it's
a
back road to Cadalach now.”

Adora nodded, her eyes widening with alarm. A wall of stone had appeared in the desert. The cliff rushed at them, and Kris only slowed when there was danger of actually striking it. The car skidded to a stop, dust floating around it.

“What now?” Adora asked. “It looks like your road is closed. Permanently.”

“Now we wait. We missed the moonrise, but there will be another chance at the lunar setting.”

“Okay.” Adora cradled the child to her chest, as much seeking comfort as offering it, but eased the little girl away again almost immediately for biting her collar bone. Deprived of her shoulder, the child gave a small grunt and began chewing on its own fist.

Adora looked around as the dust settled. This was an eerie place, a haunted one. Cracked rocks were scattered about—immense geological wreckage from when the earth was made. A dead cedar had wound its branches into the cliff face as though fearing it might be torn from the soil. For some reason, this idea put Adora on edge. She was already keyed up, and her nerves began to jitter as she looked about quickly, half-expecting an attack.

North, south, east, west—nothing there. Just rocks and manzanita beaten down by the heat. Yet, there was something—something hovering just beyond the realm of her limited five senses. And it was growing, coming closer.

“Kris, do you feel—,” she started to ask.

“There it goes,” Kris said softly. “Watch now.”

Suddenly, the air stilled. The remaining clouds parted in the sky. The cliff shifted in the silver light of the emerging moon, appearing suddenly as a chiaroscuro in gray and black, a picture of something, but she couldn't say just what. And then it began to move, to fold in on itself.

“That's impossible,” she whispered, watching the stone turn smooth and glossy and then fold like curtains.

“No. Just improbable,” Kris answered. Then he said formally: “Open to us, brothers and sisters of the rainbow wherein the magic dwells. Let us enter into the realm of the Goddess who watches the world with eternal unshut eyes, and find shelter there.”

And with that, Kris put the car in gear and drove into the mountain.

There were no lights inside, but this didn't seem to bother Kris. He didn't squint against the darkness and his hands barely rested on the wheel.

Almost immediately Adora began to feel pleasantly stoned, and wondered what was causing the buzz. The baby too had quieted, drooling contentedly on its fingers.

“Do you feel it?” Kris asked. His voice was melodious. “There are certain psychic locales where magic congregates—mystery spots, they're sometimes called. Few pureblood humans can sense them,but to the fey, even of mixed blood, they are as obvious as a landing strip lit up at night—only a lot more exciting.”

“We're getting closer,” Adora said, smiling a little. A part of her knew that this was something she would normally be concerned about, but the rest of her didn't care.

Kris nodded. “We're in the vein, and about to enter the heart of the country.” He stopped the car. “I'm afraid we ride shank's mare from here. The car will age too much otherwise.”

“We walk?” she asked.

“Yes—well, sort of. Give me the baby.”

Adora happily handed the child over and let herself out of the Jag. Her body was relaxed, anesthetized, as Kris joined her.

“It's best not to watch this part,” he said, taking her in his free arm and urging her head against his chest as they stepped forward. It meant she had to walk backward, but she didn't mind. It was sort of like dancing. “It has something to do with spatiotemporal divergence—or so Thomas says.”

“You know, you say the funniest things.”

Kris looked thoughtful. “Do I? Hm—I suppose I do. It's rather like having double vision, but a hundred times more confusing. You see things that aren't there now, but were there and will be there, layer upon layer of unreality. It can drive people mad.”

“Let me guess, this is all part of the laws-of-eternity thing,” she mumbled, not really caring. She was
soooo
mellow.

“Yes. Stay close now and walk slowly. Don't worry about the wind. It won't hurt us.”

Kris held Adora and the baby close, enjoying the physical comfort of having bodies pressed against him. It had been a long, long time. The impulse to keep Adora closer than plaster on a wall almost made him smile. Almost. They were in the Goddess's realm of power now and she hadn't waited to administer her first gentle nudge. Kris knew that if the hint didn't do the trick, She would soon bring out bigger guns.

That would be interesting. He had never refused her anything, so they'd never had a battle of wills. But this time he would refuse—would
have
to refuse—unless Adora was completely willing and informed about what such a union would mean. Maybe the Goddess couldn't or wouldn't understand or accept his judgment, but it was his belief that there was already too much hurt in this woman from past emotional betrayals. He would not add himself to the list of people who had done her wrong. If she didn't understand and agree that there would probably be no rose-covered cottage and rocking chairs for their golden years, then this relationship was a nonstarter. He had no illusions. The fey were going to war with the lutins and mankind both. That the battle would not be waged with conventional weapons did not mean that there would not be fatalities. And he was the chosen general, the one who would be targeted by the enemies. Anyone standing near him would also be in the line of fire.

But he didn't want to think about that right now. The moment was so wonderful. He was in the tomhnafurach again, closer to Gaia than he had been in nearly two centuries, and holding both Adora and a child he had saved.

Adora felt and smelled especially wonderful. He turned his face into her hair and inhaled deeply. Beautiful, perfect. What a gift, if she would truly be his.

As a rule, Kris was indifferent to human packaging. He hadn't had his ideal woman created for him by any particular culture, and therefore did not mind that Adora wasn't from America's heartland, corn-fed, wholesome and sweet—or dark and exotic and decorated in tattoos and lip plates. Some people—many, in fact—would find her appearance startling, her body and face strong and unconventional by human standards. That made her interesting to watch.

Her mind and nature were equally unconventional, and this was her real attraction for him. If she was
the one
promised by the Goddess, then she needed to be strong mentally, a survivor instead of a sleek and pampered darling, or an obedient drone. He needed a consort—someone with greatness in her. Like Cleopatra. The Queen of Egypt hadn't been conventional. Helen of Troy, Ninon de Lenclos— these were not merely physically beautiful women. What they had were charm, wit and guts. Adora had those too, and something more besides—she was fey. A very strong fey, if she could ever access her magic without hurting herself. Or him.

He hadn't been indulging in idle flattery when he told Adora that he loved her work. Her books were truly wonderful—subtle, compassionate masterpieces that showed the most intimate sides of her subjects. She had a knack for finding out who they were, right down to their deepest fears and fondest desires, and she treated both with the greatest care while she distilled the essence of their lives into something that anyone could understand.

And she had now turned her mind to him. She finally believed the truth about him being fey, but a difficult time was probably ahead for both of them now that the first battle was won. Adora had taken the first step, and she was going to find out who he really was—no matter how it challenged her longheld beliefs and perceptions. This discovery wasn't something he could do anymore with his damaged mind. The door to understanding was stuck fast. No matter how he pushed, it would open no farther. But Adora would be able to open the door and look deeper into his heart than he had ever seen. Then she would tell him about the view from inside. What would she say? Probably not to come on in 'cause the water's fine.

Kris snorted. He at once knew too little and too much about his past. In many ways, in spite of his lifetimes of fragmented memories, he was a stranger to himself, and his past lives—which he should not be able to remember—were made up of a lot of dark, unexplored territory. And to make it all the more challenging, his mind was littered with funhouse mirrors that distorted what memories and understanding he had. Flawed mirror images refracted off other flawed glasses almost endlessly. The longer he looked, the more warped the picture became. Meaning had disconnected from purpose, and actions that had had meaning at one time no longer made any sense.

He truly wanted to know himself again so that he could understand why he had done and continued to do everything he did—why he was still filled with conviction that his course of action was correct when it flew in the face of all history and logic. He just had to hope that he and Adora were both ready for the portrait she would paint once all her deliberations were done. She had thought him a madman. Was he one? That he was fey did not prove anything one way or the other.

Kris exhaled slowly. Frankly, he would not have sought out this analysis at this moment had the situation been less urgent. He was not filled with hubris that needed to share his glorious past with the human world, and he did not revel in nostalgia for its own sake—that was for the young and sentimental. His cumulative losses through the millennia rendered the past too painful a place to visit casually.

But needs must when the Goddess drives and all that. He had also begun to question small things, to feel things, and he needed some answers. He needed to know why he had done all the things he had, whether they were worth the lifetimes of sacrifice and loss that now horrified him. Because from where he stood, his life—his many lives—seemed as crazy as Adora thought. Perhaps, given that nothing fundamental had changed in the human world, they were even futile.

He'd always been a good foot soldier and done what was asked of him, however impossible the odds. But he had neglected to leave space for a life of his own—for personal reward or joy while he fulfilled his duty. He had loved everyone generally and no one in particular. Why? Why had he done this? It made no sense to him now. Why had he never found a wife, a great love with whom he could share his dreams—or even a bed—for any length of time? Why were there no children? He who loved all children as he loved his own life—in fact, far more than he loved his own life—had none of his own. Why? It couldn't be because Gaia was jealous and had kept him from it.

Could it be because he was somehow flawed, incapable of feeling this kind of love? Could it be because he had needed to wait for Adora? Kris inhaled again, drawing in her scent, wondering if what he was feeling in that instant was love.