It’s like we’re speaking a different language.
How much longer do we have until it’s too late?
“Bryce! Jax!”
I swing my huge head toward the sound of my name to see Quinn running toward us. Emmit and the Faoladh are with her, but they split up and begin herding the humans.
Quinn keeps going until she gets to us with Nyx, Selene, Orina, and Tate in tow.
“What is wrong with these people?” Nyx asks. “Massive beasts are yelling at them and they’re just standing around.”
“I’ll see what I can do with a little magical coercion,” Tate says.
“Not too much,” Quinn advises. “Remember, you can’t overdo it.”
“I won’t.” He drops a kiss on her temple, then hurries off.
Her gaze tracks toward the carnival, which is dark and closed. Typical for mid-week. “Ian and his people will be totally exposed when the Faelad come. I need to get them to the clifftop house.”
I growl low in agreement. “Do it. Warn them. Then you go home.”
“We’ll come with you,” Nyx says, indicating Orina and Selene.
Quinn kisses my cheek. “I’ll see you back at the house.”
The pier is clearing as the humans finally get the message. We might just be able to do this.
I growl menacingly at the nearest people, and they back up and run.
Whatever works.
Three hours.
All we need to do is hold the Faelad off for three hours.
We’ve totally got this.
QUINN
We jogged across the grass, past the dark, empty stalls, and toward the caravans parked on the edges of the field. I caught a glint of silver to my left and slowed as Paul wheeled into view from behind the big red tent.
His mouth was turned down, eyes blazing with what looked like anger and…fear? He signed something fast and urgent.
Selene grabbed my hand. “Shit, I forgot. After what happened in the hall of mirrors, I forgot.”
“What?” I looked from Selene to Paul.
He made a face that implored me to do something.
“What is he saying?”
“He says you have to leave. You must leave now. It’s not safe here.” She tugged me back. “The last time we were here he told you not to come back here. I forgot to tell you.”
Paul’s eyes flew wide, and he made a strange gurgling sound. A series of whooshes filled the air. Something bit my neck and then ice gripped my limbs. My knees gave way and I hit the ground.
The gurgling sound Paul had made was a warning.
A warning we’d been too late in heeding.
Consciousness came in increments, but memory hit me like a truck. My eyes snapped open to moonlight and shadows. Figures stood in a huge circle around me.
A circle…
The pattern on the field.
I was in the center of that pattern.
I made to sit up, but that was hard to do with my hands and feet bound. I managed it on the fourth attempt, despite the fuzzy sensation in my head.
My mouth was dry and ashy. I swallowed and worked it, trying to summon some saliva to moisten my throat. “What is this?” My voice was a raspy croak. “Hey! Talk to me?”
The figures remained silent and watchful, but as my eyes adjusted and my preternatural vision came online, I recognized the faces as the carnival workers.
My pulse quickened. “Where are my friends?”
“Your friends are safe.” Ian strode into the circle and crouched a little way from me. “It’s so like you to ask about them before inquiring about your own predicament.” His eyes were dark and sad. “I’m sorry that this has to happen to you. You’re a good person, Quinn. I didn’t expect to like you as much as I do.” He gave me a close-lipped smile. “Honestly I was a little worried about my plan, and whether you’d come running to our assistance when I called, but it turned out I didn’t have to ring you at all.”
“What is this, Ian? Why am I here?”
He sighed. “Everyone here is sick; you know that, right? Genetic illnesses, terminal diagnoses, some of them won’t live to see Christmas. But they can now. Because of you.”
He was making no sense. “I don’t understand.”
“My son passed away from leukemia when he was eight. I prayed every fucking night for a miracle. I prayed to God to save him, but God never answered. My son died, and then I was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Inoperable, of course, because that’s the kind of shit God does. I was ready to give up. I wanted to be with my son, but then your mother found me. She told me I’d been praying to the wrong god. She promised that together we could save many lives. All I needed to do was find the worthy and bring them together. She promised that if I helped free her, she would heal us all. Every last one of us.” He glanced over his shoulder at the curly-haired woman, Paul’s mother. “Unfortunately, some of us weren’t on board with the plan. Little Paul doesn’t seem to understand the meaning of sacrifice.”
The curly-haired woman bowed her head in shame.
“But we all make mistakes, and she will forgive, I’m sure,” Ian said.
It all clicked into place in my head. “You’re working with the taint.”
He shook his head sadly. “She’s not a taint. She’s a god, an old god, one that this world has misunderstood and shunned for much too long.”
“You’re wrong. She’s not a god. She’s an alien.”
He snorted. “Oh, she told me she came from the stars. A fitting place for a god to hail from, don’t you think?”
“You’re making a mistake. You can’t trust her. She’s wiped out worlds.”
“Unworthy worlds. Not this one. In this one she will heal the worthy and smite the wicked, and you…You are her most prized vessel.”
Vessel? “What are you talking about?”
“Your body, of course. She needs it to exist on this side of the veil and be free of her old connections to the entity you call the taint. Your body…A body she made, is the perfect vessel for her to be reborn.”
Ice flooded my veins. “What? No. She can’t…She can’t do that.”
He sighed. “She can. And she will.” He looked up at the full moon, which seemed to hover right over us. “Just a few moments and the doorway will be ajar for her to slip through and find a home inside you. She’ll have a powerful form, bound to three Faoladh who will have no choice but to protect her, not to mention the power of a sea god. It’s a shame you were unable to gain your immortality. That would have been a bonus for this body, but I’m sure she’ll make do.”
The panic simmering in my belly bloomed into an inferno. I kicked and twisted, trying to be free.
“Don’t. You’ll hurt yourself,” Ian said. “Those are enchanted bindings. They’ll only fall free for her.”
I stopped fighting, chest heaving with panic. “My mates will come for me.”
“Maybe, but right now the Faelad are keeping them distracted, and by the time they realize you’re missing, it will be too late.”
He stood and tipped his head back. “Just a few moments, everyone. Stay on your marks.”