Page 50 of Chained Knight

Hannixe was probably full of helpful advice about cramps. Assuming these alien folk ever had them.

“Fine,” Ari said, and maybe the invisible translator didn’t know quite how to process the word because it came out in quivering, brittle English. She had a choice, though it wasn’t much of one; if she was going to fail, maybe she could do it with a little dignity instead of being dragged like a reluctant puppy. “Just fine.”

She lifted her chin and set off reluctantly downhill, her skirts whispering, slippers crunching on dry powdery earth.

The Cup’s pulsing intensified, a cut artery synchronized with waves of despairing revulsion. The wooden goblet was warm as the damn necklace now, just on the edge of uncomfortable scorching. The big perfect moon’s reflection bubble-steamed, more than half its bulk above the treetops on the Mere’s far margin, and the smell was thicker and more sickening with every step.

It really did remind her of nosebleeds, especially the few times Mike had forgotten to be discreet and popped her right in the face. Behind the memory was a reassuring catechism—no matter what else happened, she would never have to deal with him again.

Or would she? Once you accepted alternate dimensions, different planets, or fairyland, time travel wasn’t so outlandish.

I’d rather die. Well, she might get her wish.

She’d already done far more than she ever thought possible—shooting her husband, dragging a sword out of clinging rock, coming up with a correct hypothesis or two, and not going completely insane with fear on a bridge made of extraterrestrial or eldritch vertebrae. This was small beer, this was nothing.

Hold that thought. Pretend it’s a beating. Just disconnect and get through.

Easier said than done. Her breath came in short rasping sips. The ground really was crunchy, like dry cinders. Her footsteps made tiny chewing noises; Hannixe’s borrowed shoes were going to be filthy at the end of this.

Oh well.

She didn’t realize the chained man was right behind her until his gauntlet closed over her shoulder, warningly. “Close enough, my lady.”

Ari nearly started out of her skin. Did he think she’d run away? “I can’t reach from here.”I’m a lot shorter than you, and I don’t have fancy tentacle chains.

“Take care.” The words were a deep, warning growl.

You want me to do this, let me goddamn welldoit.She swallowed an uncharacteristic but highly bracing flare of annoyance and decided not to bend over; she’d probably tip headfirst into the… the pool.

The Blood Mere.

So she was forced to step a little closer before sinking into an clumsy crouch, one hand attempting to keep the dress’s hem out of softly moving fluid. A different, dozy heat rose from the Mere’s surface; the smell was everywhere, dyeing the darkness a rusted vermilion. The moon’s reflection was a bloated, gory semicircle. Veils of steam twisted, tiny screaming faces peering out of the vapor.

Imagination or reality? Either way it was deeply creepifying. Her heart kept leaping into her throat, splashing back into her stomach, and repeating the acrobatics. Her arms prickled, gooseflesh attempting to break free.

She gripped the Cup’s stem, hoping to fill it without getting any on her fingers. Was he going to drink whatever she dredged up? Ari’s stomach tightened even harder, fighting both the evening’s last shot of clear pondwater and the Carcanet’s soothing, irregular pulses.

Lower, lower. She had her balance, and hopefully his knee wouldn’t nudge her. Mike might do that, tipping her right into a pile of something noxious.

It was just a joke, Ari. Lighten up. Funny how the ‘jokes’ never involved his embarrassment, only hers. And his goddamn mother, cawing with laughter while Earl gave one of his occasional, skeletal grins.

Ari sucked in a breath, leaned a little further. The Cup’s rim tilted, brightening as it caught stray moonlight. Swelling and thinning, the silver chasing sped its rotation. It really did look snakelike, and she hoped he didn’t expectherto drink anything from it.

Her left foot slipped. Ari teetered, and the thought—of course, I’m going to fall in—died amid a white glare.

The Cup’s rim met a heavy, cloying surface. A hiss of steam, a flash lasting much longer than lightning should, a soft painless jolt up her arm. Her eyelids fluttered, but the light did not wane or flicker; it poured through her, a vast sweet unsound like a train’s thundering passage married to a choir lingering upon the last swelling note of an Agnus Dei.

A sensation of falling swallowed her whole. Yet the drop was arrested, the jolt tightening every nerve and vein, and she was yanked breathlessly upward, collapsing against warm metal.

The Cup’s contents scattered, flashing silver. The Mere flamed with pale radiance; a great soughing, tossing wind poured over the poisoned forest. Branches thrashed, trunks groaning, needles and leaves and cactus-spines torn free.

Oh hell.Ari kept her eyes squeezed shut, but it was no use. The light wasinside, not bothering to go through her lids or even her optic nerves. Doors opened along internal halls, a dizzying sense of looking across every blessed year of her existence—that was what they meant, she realized, when they saidmy life flashed before me.

As soon as it arrived it was gone, and she sagged. The whirlwind passed through toxic trees and poisonous undergrowth, spreading in concentric rings. But she was prisoned in metal-sheathed arms, and his chin rested atop her tumbled curls—Hannixe’s work with braid and ribbon was sadly damaged now, Ari thought, and blinked.

What the hell was that?

“The Mere is renewed.” His voice sliced through the storm, quiet and sure. “Do you doubt now, Ariadne?”

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