Page 23 of All Hallows Masque

“What happens if I don’t find him?” I asked, staring at the pooled velvet on the floor where a girl had sprawled, screaming. Cruelty said she’d returned to her cage, but what if Moth was dead? What if the next person she killed was my husband?

Cruelty turned me from the room and began leading me to the door, seeming pleased with herself. Pleased to keep me as hers and only hers for another week. “You know what happens. He dies, silly.”

14

Madness

Ipeered through the black netting of a veil at the statue that had been finished mere hours before Nightmare attacked and Cruelty stole my lioness. It was never revealed. Cat didn’t even know it existed.

I sniffled, more tears bubbling up. I dabbed them away with a handkerchief. Also in black. I was mourning, grieving the severed, violent loss of the secret bond we shared. The way I could follow Cat, hear her worries and dreams, speak into her mind in low, comforting whispers, and remind her how deadly and perfect she was. Gone.

“It’ll come back.”

Tor’s voice made me jump. I twisted to see him and Misery stalking down the cobbled, fog-wreathed road with a whole host of other gods at their back. I sniffled again. They’d made good on their promise to round up the others, and here we all were, every one of us present and accounted for. Unless you counted Crueltyand Violence, those fucked-up siblings, which I did not. Cruelty stole my wife, and there was no doubt Violence was involved. Where one went, the other followed.

And Fear didn’t count, either; she locked herself away. I wasn’t sure why, but she usually had a good reason. Maybe I should pay my friend a visit.

Tor and Miz had done what they promised, but what had I done? Not got Cat back, that was for sure. I couldn’t hear her, couldn’t evenfeelher. Not through a distant fog, not on the other side of a brick wall, not even a phantom of her fierce soul. She was gone.

“You heard her last time,” Tor reminded me, peering up at the huge statue I had erected in the village at the foot of my castle. It showed Cat in her beautiful human form, with her hair flowing around her shoulders, an elegant dress draped over her perfect body and a sword held aloft in her hand, the hilt decorated with realistic kittens and cactuses. The stone version of me was pressed as tight to her as he could get, his arm wrapped around his girl to hold her close, his head bowed to rest his forehead against hers, their eyes locked adoringly. It was perfect. Beautiful and loving and dangerous. Even in stone, Cat would vanquish my enemies. She would carve them into teeny, tiny bits and pieces, and I would do the same to any threat to her.

My bottom lip wobbled.

“Ah, shit, I’m not good with people crying,” Wrath muttered, the pink-haired goddess backing up a step. “Pash, do something.”

“Like what?” a flat, monotone voice replied. Passion.

I dabbed another rush of tears and jumped when a shoulder brushed mine. “Here.” Before I could react, a small bundle of fur and warmth was pressed into my hands, and I jumped when itmoved.“She helps.”

“Helps…” I asked Misery, giving him a confused glance, then transferring it to the warm creature in my hands. Not an otter… a prairie dog. Not that she looked like any dog I’d ever seen. Maybe a squished spaniel?

“When the world falls apart.”

Well, my world had certainly fallen apart. “This time feels different,” I admitted to him, to Tor, to the onlookers. The words were like gravel, like I’d been swallowed by a landslide and rocks had forced their way into my mouth, down my throat, into my stomach. Another tear fell, hidden by the black veil I wore over my face. My clothes were pitch black, too. I was debating dyeing my hair.

“Different how?” Tor demanded, casting a glance at the statue of me and my lioness before fixing his attention on me.

“I could feel her last time, far, far away. And the amplifier helped. This time, I might as well be holding a rock.”

“If there’s a bond, it should still be there, no matter how well hidden.” That was Neglect’s brusque, no-nonsense voice, getting louder as she came towards me.1 Without Cat beside me, I backed up a step, forgetting that I was a deadly killer in my own right. Without her, I was stripped of all strength and confidence. I was small.

The furry creature in my hands shifted, blinking dark eyes up at me like she could see right into my soul. My world was ending, but Peach could fix that. I didn’t know how, but Miz wasn’t a liar, so I allowed myself to fall into her endless eyes, ignoring Neglect as the stern goddess stopped in front of me.

Neglect cleared her throat, and when I continued to pretend she wasn’t there, a band of dark magic yanked my head up, forcing me to look at her. My veil was pushed onto the top of my head.

“That was impolite,” I remarked with a sniffle, brushing my cheek against Peach’s soft fur. She hadn’t bitten me yet; did that mean we were friends?

Neglect didn’t bother to reply. She tilted her head back and hooked me into eye contact, her face tight with concentration. “Hm,” she said after a tense minute, the domain utterly silent around us. No ghosts, no people, just us and the statue of me and my lioness. “I can see the pathways of a bond, but it leads nowhere. Like it’s been hacked off.”

“I was right,” I choked out, pulling the dark veil back down so I could hide behind it, a horrible, wrenching pain cutting my chest. “She’s gone forever.”

And Tor’s attempts to track Death with his signet ring had led nowhere. With this loss, and the silence in my head, the emptiness in my chest … how could I speak to Cat?

Would I ever hear her voice again?

I turned away from the others and began the long, slow, depressing walk back to my castle. I didn’t look at the statue again. The stone was the only thing I had left of my lioness now. And it hurt too much to look at it.

15

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