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  The lights came on again.

  A voice, amazed, said, "Jessie?"

  She stood in her uncle's study, in the town house in Georgetown: oak-paneled walls and crowded bookshelves, including the rows set aside for his prized first editions; the inlaid, never-changing men's-club smell of leather and cologne and tobacco. She recognized the model cars on the shelves, the pen-and-ink sketches in their silver frames clustered on the wall beside the fireplace.

  The Judge was sitting in the leather chair behind his desk. "Oh my God," he said softly, and stood up.

  In her memories of him he was a strong, towering figure; but now she saw that he was not quite six feet, only a couple of inches taller than she was. He was thin, with a slight stoop to his shoulders, his dress pants and cashmere sweater hanging off his frame.

  He came round the desk, his arms held out to her.

  She backed away from him.

  His arms fell to his sides like broken wings. "I understand," he said. "Jessamy, sweet girl, I'm so sorry."

  "You're…"

  This is not real, she told herself, yet the dizziness was storming through her skull again, whipping all her thoughts to hell.

  "Sorry," the Judge said, "for all the pain I caused you. I was so wrong, Jessamy. And that… that knowledge has tortured me. Never a day goes by when I don't think of you. You are my family."

  Not real. Not…

  "So very deeply sorry," the Judge said. "Apologies are useless, I know, but this one is sincerely meant. Please believe me. Do me the honor of believing me."

  He dropped to his knees in front of her.

  Not real, she thought again, but those words were like a neon sign slowly flickering out of power. She stared at the old, familiar figure kneeling before her. In her encounters with men those first years in New York, part of her was always waiting for the insult, the blow, the taste of blood in her mouth. It took a long time before she could trust that her own compass was directing her to the gentle ones, the ones like Gabe.

  And now the Judge was at her feet. She could see his pale scalp through the tufts of white hair, see the faint trembling of his hands as he lifted them towards her. He was holding a whip. As Jess watched, he took off his sweater and cracked the whip across his chest, across his back, across his chest again, scoring deep red welts.

  "Please," he said.

  Blood streamed down his skin, matting the fine silver hairs on his chest.

  "Please," Claude Harker said, and Jess jerked away from him, taking deep, gasping breaths like a diver breaking the surface. "Now you," he said, and held the whip out to her. "Hurt me. Hurt me the way I hurt you."

  Not real not real not real—

  "No," she said, and again, "no," even as she was tempted to take it, take hold of the whip and find out what it was like, just once, to strike the Judge, she would only do it once, then drop the whip at his feet because she was better than that—so only one blow, deep and lasting, to make him bleed just a little bit more—

  "No."

  Her uncle was gone. She was alone in the study, the fire churning quietly within the fireplace. "Lucas," she said, "get me out of here. Lucas—"

  No answer.

  "Lucas!" she yelled again. She felt herself beginning to break, beginning to panic, but this time couldn't stop herself: "Lucas!"

  * * * *

  And then darkness.

  Surrounding her. Enfolding her. Lifting her up.

  She was floating.

  Am I dead, she thought, or only dreaming?

  And then a man said, "Wake up."

  * * * *

  Jess Shepard opened her eyes.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  "Good morning," Gabe said. He grinned at her. He was standing by the window of his studio apartment, in his boxers, smoking his first cigarette of the day. The rumble and blare of Chinatown traffic drifted up from the streets below. "How's the head?"

  "… What?"

  Jess pushed aside the sheets, pushed herself up against the headboard. She was naked, and there was a faint stickiness along her inner thighs. She looked at Gabe, looked down at her own pale body. Something felt off, not right, but she couldn't remember what it was. Her head felt stuffed with cotton. Had they made love? Why couldn't she remember? Had they been that drunk?

  "Your head," Gabe said again, patiently. "Last night. There was much tequila. Remember?"

  "Shit," Jess whispered. "No." She touched her hands to her temples. There was a foul taste at the back of her throat. But something wasn't right. "I'm not that much of a drinker," she muttered. She was talking to Gabe, but she also needed to clarify something to herself. "Not anymore."

  "You were last night," Gabe said. He stubbed out the cigarette, chuckling a little. "You were smoking, too. That opening really undid you, didn't it?"

  "The show," Jess said.

  The show was last night, and yet the memory felt as if it were coming from a long way away.

  "Did you see the expression on your dealer's face? She was fucking orgasmic. Especially when that collector—what's his name? David Salik?—walked in the room."

  She remembered drinking the red wine at the show, then the talk with Gabe in that piano bar and then… ? What had come after? Barhopping, slamming down tequila shots, stumbling in her heels. She didn't remember smoking—she hadn't smoked in twenty-three months. But her throat did taste like… ash, and she caught the scent of smoke in her long hair.

  "Jesus," she muttered. "Tell me I didn't—"

  She couldn't complete the sentence—Tell me I didn't do any C—but Gabe lifted a hand and said, smiling a little, "No coke."

  She blew out air, relieved. "Well," she muttered, "only two vices out of three."

  "Last night was great," Gabe said. "You were wild."

  Jess said, "I don't…" She looked at him again, said, "What's with the goofy smile on your face?"

  The smile widened. He raked both hands through his hair, came forward, and dropped to his knees beside the bed. "I didn't think you'd remember," he said. "You were pretty trashed. So I took it back and figured we'd do it again."

  "Took what back?"

  He slipped his hand into the back pocket of his jeans. "Jess Shepard," he said, and she stared at him in amazement. "Oh, you're kidding me," she said, and his smile broke into a grin, the slightly off-center grin that she loved and he said, "Marry me."

  "Marry you," she said.

  Something not right about this. Not right…

  "Jess," Gabe said. He lowered his head for a moment, as if reconsidering his approach, then muttered, "Last night you said yes. You were pretty goddamn thrilled about it, actually."

  "I…" This damn hangover. It was harder and harder to think. "Marriage isn't for everyone," Jess said. "It might not be for—"

  Gabe lifted his head and stared at her directly. "You want to marry me. Have a baby. My baby."

  "A baby," Jess murmured. Well, yes. Although motherhood didn't fit with the way she saw herself, neither could she deny that longing, the way it tugged inside her as if tiny hands had already grabbed hold.

  A tiny boy, she thought. A tiny girl. She'd take either.

  "You want a home," Gabe whispered, "a family, a place to belong. I can give that to you. I'll be warm strong arms to hold you. You'll never be lonely again."

  His eyes were ocean-colored, thickly lashed—Such a shame, Chelle had said more than once, to waste lashes like that on a guy. You could dive all the way inside eyes like that. Let yourself get swept away.

  "Let me be your home, Jess."

  "I thought I'd lost you," Jess murmured.

  "Belong to me."

  "For some reason, I thought—I thought it was over."

  "Silly girl," Gabe said, still smiling. "Say yes to me. Say yes."

  "There's something I need to remember. There's something I need—"

  "Everything you need is right here. Right here in this room. All you have to do is say yes." He held up the ring. The diamond was at least a coupl
e of carats, sharp-edged and filled with its own white light, glittering on the smooth platinum band.

  "Say yes."

  She was struggling to find her way through the hangover, the wave of emotion swelling inside her. Yes. The word pulsed beneath her skin. Yes was the word that made everything easy. Yes made the world feel so good.

  Gabe shifted his knees on the floor. He was beginning to look uncomfortable. Sweat slipped from beneath his hairline, curved a slow path down his cheek.

  "I'll give you everything you want," Gabe said. "Everything. I love you, Jess. Don't you get it? I would die for you."

  The last words caught at her. Her head was throbbing. Something not right. Not right. So very very wrong—

  His eyes widened slightly, as if he realized he'd made a mistake.

  Another drop of moisture slipped down his cheek, a small ruby glimmer.

  It snapped into place, then, blasting out the strange sticky webs that someone had spun in her head. "You were in a car accident," Jess said.

  Gabe fell back from her, eyes widening.

  "You're in a coma," Jess said.

  Blood was streaming out from his hairline now, pouring down his cheek; the right part of his skull assumed a sunken appearance. He stared at her for another moment, his breath whistling in his throat; then his eyes closed and he slumped to the floor.

  She got out of the bed. She realized she wasn't naked after all; she was in the outfit she'd taken off the girl in the trailer, knee-high boots caked with orange dust. She turned away from Gabe's slumped and bleeding body—Not real, she told herself, even as she took in the smell of his blood, the rasp of his breathing—not real not real not real—

  The bedroom door was closed and locked. She struggled with the knob, then stepped back and stared at it.

  She summoned.

  "You lose, Lucas," Jess muttered, and the door blasted open as if she'd detonated an explosive.

  Pale red light spilled into the bedroom. The wind howled in, stroked her hair back from her face. Jess crossed the threshold—And stepped into the center of the Maze.

  * * * *

  A large room, red light flowing from the sconces set along the slanted walls. Figures moved inside the shadows, their eyes crawling across Jess as she walked deeper into the room, her own gaze riveted on the couple just ahead of her. The woman and the boy.

  Bakal Ashika lounged on a raised dais, a naked teenage boy sprawled limply in her arms. The pale skin of his legs and arms were slashed with bright red lesions. As Jess watched a figure detached itself from the shadows, stepped up onto the dais and knelt before Ashika and the boy. He carried an oversized wine glass in both hands. Ashika nodded at him. The man placed the glass beneath the boy's wrist. Ashika's lips moved as she murmered words that Jess couldn't hear. Blood spilled from the wound, filled the glass, and then stopped as neatly as if a valve had closed. The man drank deeply and swiftly, then bowed again to Ashika and retreated down the steps.

  Ashika looked at Jess and smiled lazily.

  "You can't have him," Jess said.

  "Oh, Jessamy," and she was startled to hear her name coming from this woman's mouth, "I claimed this one a long, long time ago."

  "He wasn't yours to claim."

  "Oh?"

  Another figure emerged from the shadows, stepped up to the dais, knelt before the boy. This one held out a heavy silver goblet, like something from a medieval ritual. Blood splashed. In Asha's arms, the boy was motionless, his head turned against her body.

  Look at me, Jess thought. Look at me.

  "So he's yours?" Asha said. "Why? Because Shemayan used him first?" She paused, then said, "Come here, Jessamy. Have a taste. Lucas seems fond of you."

  Her smile widened a little. "As does my brother. I could find some real use for you."

  Where was Lucas? She scanned the shadows, but didn't see him anywhere.

  "So come, Jessamy, and drink. Is that so much to ask? I can give you so much."

  "Nothing real," Jess said.

  "Oh," Asha said, "it's real. It's all very real."

  Look at me.

  She saw—or thought she saw—the boy stir, ever so slightly, in Asha's arms.

  "Your life," Asha said. "Your future."

  Look at me.

  "Or…" Asha said, and her mouth curled at the corners, "mercy."

  The blow struck Jess from behind. It sent her to her knees. Red light bloomed around her, and she was trapped in the center. There was a high-pitched sound that vibrated through the light and then went into her, going all through her, until it felt as if her bones would splinter.

  "I can make it stop," Asha said, as the pain intensified and she fought back a scream, "or I can make it go on for centuries. Is that real enough for you?"

  But she was looking at the boy.

  Ramsey was lifting his head, looking toward her.

  Their eyes locked.

  Jess said, "I release you."

  His head lifted.

  "I release you," Jess said again. "As you were promised long ago. Go home."

  The boy fell from Asha's body to the stage. Something lifted out of him: a long, lean shape of white shimmering energy, hovering over the boy. The creature lifted its head. Black eyes bore directly into Jess.

  The entity shot towards her, the red sphere of light that imprisoned her shattering like water.

  It was like a thousand strokes of lightning slamming into her. It whipped her back—whipped her head back—and tore a scream from her throat that was so high and pure it was unlike anything she'd ever heard. Her mind filled with alien memories—pale flickering shapes gliding against a white sky—and the knowledge of her own power, unleashed fully for the first time.

  She felt herself dissolving, and she was no longer afraid of that, either.

  You. Asha's lip had curled. You want to fight me? You don't even know your own name.

  Jess felt another, alien voice, speaking through her:

  My name is Zakrial.

  Jess gave herself over, folded herself down so that she was taking up as little space inside herself as possible. She reached her mind toward the Labyrinth walls and they dissolved, the high rounded edges softening, crumbling, the walls falling away in chunks of mud, collapsing in on themselves; she felt the cold ancient power that was Zakrial radiate through and out from her body. The walls and roof exploded. Suddenly there was sky and wind and blood-rain; the air was thick and churning. Asha shrieked. A shadow erupted from her skin, moved across her body, and transformed human skin into glinting silver scales. Asha's eyes glowed, the sockets widening and deepening, filling with an acid green; her blonde hair stiffened into chunks of yellow bone, giving her scalp a rough and studded appearance. She turned, and Zakrial saw the tail, long and thin with a studded tip, and even as Zakrial recognized both it and its purpose Bakal Ashika lashed it toward him. He heard the hiss as it cut through wet air and he moved a half-second too late; he felt the bite of it across his back, and then the searing pain.

  Bakal said, Must we do this again?

  He felt, then, a different pain move across his back. He felt a shifting pressure inside his bones, pressing up against the skin of this borrowed body. His wings, searching for form the way they had so many times during his time in this world—searching, never finding it.

  Until now.

  They erupted up through his skin with a sound like tumbling water; he felt the liquid flexing motion of them unfurling above him, sending long pulses of wind into the blowing mud and rain. He lost the earth beneath his feet; he was airborne again, and for the one sweet moment he was so distracted by the joy of it he forgot about Bakal, almost ignored the whipping tail. In the last half-moment he twisted his body away from it, felt the tip catch and whistle across his cheek. He climbed the air, then looked below: the swarming fires, the air filled with screams and gunshots and cries of pain, motorcycle wheels spraying mud.

  He found Bakal's acid eyes, staring up at him, Bakal's mouth wrinkled back from rows
on rows of jagged teeth.

  Zakrial said: Come to me. It is time.

  She moved into a crouch and then sprang, her arms reaching for him. She slammed into him, the force of impact tumbling them both through the air, her teeth snapping at his throat. This was what she wanted: close, intimate contact, skin on skin, blood on teeth, not the distant sparring of spellcasters. He flexed his wings, pulled them higher into the air, the desert dropping away below. Blood-rain slashed at them, hot and wet, salty tang on his lips and in his mouth. He head-butted her and felt her grip on him slacken; he gauged the distance to the ground—good enough—then pulled his wings against his body and went spinning into free fall, disorienting her, before abruptly jerking out of it, wings flexing long and smooth and easy, the ground disappearing beneath him once again as they rose, and rose.

  Zakrial.

  A different voice, not Bakal's. A new voice. He turned, and found himself staring at that strange, red moon, pulsing right above him. Except, this close, he could see it was not a moon after all; it was not even solid. He was beating the air with his wings, something pulling at his memory. There was something he was supposed to remember. When a burning pain slashed across his wings and then slashed him again: Bakal was whipping him with her tail, squirming against his body, raking her claws across his torso. He caught her arms in his own, felt that odd silvery skin against his palms, and folded his wings and plunged again into free fall.

  And suddenly, Bakal twisted in his grip and came loose of him, dropping long and easy to the ground as he unfurled his wings and skimmed across the desert, across the crowd, people crying out and scattering away from him, yelling at him, pointing, his nostrils filling with the smells of burning and carnage. He curved upward through the air, went higher, looking down for Bakal. She was on all fours now, loping through the crowd and then away from it, moving across the vast pale stretch of dead lake, keeping pace with him. A man was in her path, didn't get out of her way quick enough, and she raked her claws across him, tearing away part of his arm as she tossed him aside. Zakrial saw her gather her legs beneath her, saw her spring towards him, and as she rose up he twisted back and to the side, her hands closing on nothing but blood-rain. She fell back to the earth, landed smoothly, legs bending deep, tail lashing the ground in frustration. Zakrial rolled over on his back and hovered, grabbing a moment to look again at the red moon.