I crossed my eyes, completely distracted and trying to see inside my own head. “‘Ick is the technical term’? Are you sure you’re three thousand years old?” My heart was pounding too hard, pushing up lumps of nausea and worry from my stomach. I was sweating and cold and too hot all at once, my hands clenched in fists. Virissong was right, I knew he was right: there had to be an exchange, a price of sacrifice. My vision was tunneling down, getting narrower, and breathing was getting harder. It wasn’t the pain of a sword through my lungs. It was a little more like the desert heat pressing down on my chest. I swallowed and shook my head. “Colin?” My voice went up a register and broke. “Are you really okay with this?”
He didn’t look away from the serpent swaying overhead. “It’s fine, Amazon. It’s cool. I’m fine. Go ahead and finish this up so we can all get out of here.” He flashed me a smile without really looking my way. “I’m supposed to be back at the hospital by nine,” he reminded me.
Beneath the conversation with Colin, Virissong smiled, the expression warming the voice inside my mind.I am, yes, thousands of years old. But I’ve always had—how would you say it. Avatars? In the Middle World. Men and women who do my will and who have helped keep me up on the changes in language. And Colin, he promised, soothingly, will not go back to the hospital tonight, or ever again. My strength will be his for eternity.
“Who?” I asked, bewildered. “Who’s your avatar? Colin?” Underneath that, the sarcastic voice in my head said, eternity’s a very long time, but Virissong didn’t respond. Instead I found my head turning to the left, my tunneled vision blocking out everyone except Faye, with her bright puppy eyes and smile.
Colin is the host, Virissong caroled in my head. I sent her the dream of you, and she brought you here so we can rebuild the world, Joanne Walker. There is so much that we can do!
The slice across my left palm itched and tingled so badly I slapped my hands together, rubbing gingerly at the stitches to try to relieve some of the pain as I stared at Faye. There was a little hurt in her eyes: she knew, I realized. She knew Virissong had passed her over and was talking to me. “Last night,” I said numbly. “The blood ritual. You knew because he actually told you how to do it.”
More injury darkened her eyes. Brightened them, in my inversed vision, making them hard white agates that perversely reminded me of Judy’s bright black eyes. “That’s what we said happened, Joanne. Didn’t you believe us?”
“I didn’t quite understand.”
“But you understand now.” Faye’s mouth was set somewhere between angry and hopeful. “We only have to finish the ritual, Joanne, and he’ll help us right the heat wave you started. Not just in Seattle, but all over. Global warming. And so much more, too.” She clasped her hands together over her stomach, leaning toward me in her intensity. “We’re on the verge of changing the world. Can’t you feel it?”
I looked from Faye to the enormous serpent that dominated the pentagram. It waited, patient, never taking its eyes from Colin. It knew him. It knew the strength he was gaining from Virissong. Colin watched it serenely. The snake settling into his shoulders coiled around him snugly, becoming more and more a part of him.
The few coven members I could see looked absurdly distant, the confines of my vision pushing them away. I felt like I’d lost all my depth perception; like my mind knew I was looking at people who stood hundreds of feet away, rather than half a dozen steps from me. They held themselves terribly still, as if they were caught in amber, waiting while the world around them prepared to change.
“There’s only one more step to take to bring him back,” Faye whispered to me. “One more sacrifice to make, and the world will be ours. Are you ready, Joanne?”
“What sacrifice…?” My own voice sounded like it came from as far away as the coven members appeared to be. I felt thick and uncertain. Faye pressed something into my hands, a handle. I looked down to discover a bone knife, the ivory blade glowing black and deadly in my reversed vision. “It’s beautiful,” I said remotely. It throbbed with power, matching the itch and tingle in my left hand. It took the strength out of my legs. I knelt, feeling awkward and jerky, though my knees touched the ground so lightly it seemed like I’d borrowed a swan’s grace. I felt like I had the night before, before I walked into the fire. I knew what had to be done. It was just a matter of preparing myself mentally. I could do it.
“It was Virissong’s,” Faye whispered reverently. “The sacrifice must be made, Joanne. Are you ready?”
I put the knife across both my hands and lifted it, then twisted my right hand beneath the hilt so I could grab it. I thought the blade would slide between my ribs tidily, maybe without much pain. The idea made me want to laugh, but I couldn’t quite reach the laughter. The sacrifice had to be made. It seemed a pity to not be able to go out laughing, but at least I could change the world. I lifted the knife, taking a deep breath.
“I’m ready.”
Faye twisted the knife in my hands, reversing the blade so it pressed outward, no longer angled to be buried in my heart. Melinda, wheelchair-bound and frightened, came into my narrow line of vision. Her eyes were huge, frightened, all pupil that glowed silver and beautiful in my inverted vision. Faye’s voice rang out over our heads:
“Then take her!”
My vision went black.
CHAPTER 30
“Are you out of your fucking mind?!” I didn’t know if I’d screamed the words out loud, but they ricocheted through my skull like the bells of Cork. My arms were uplifted but frozen, waiting for the fall that would end Melinda’s life and bring Virissong back into the world.
“Me!” I screamed. “I’ll be your sacrifice! Mel, the baby, they’re not part of this deal!”
I fled backward, into myself, terrified and angry. Earth encompassed me, drowning me before it erupted and spat me out. I lurched into the sky and collapsed on my back in my garden. I could smell the old dying grass, the heat that stung the air and made my little pond rancid and flat, but I still couldn’t see, not even inside myself. “Judy?” I was high-voiced and desperate, sounding like a frightened child. “Judy, everything’s going wrong. Please, I need your help.”
“Joanne.” Judy spoke from somewhere behind me. I rolled to my hands and knees and whipped around blindly.
“Judy? Judy, I can’t see. Please, I need help, everything’s going wrong.” That was me, the broken record. I was shaking too hard to even get a ghost of humor out of myself. I knelt, putting my hands out. My heartbeat slammed in my chest and in my ears, drowning me in panic. “They want me to kill Melinda, Judy, they’re insane. You have to help me stop them.”
“Joanne,” Judy repeated, calm and reassuring. I felt her hand on my shoulder and clutched at it.
“It’s all right.” She knelt before me. I was astounded how much I could sense through hearing alone, how easy it was to place her. Even the sound of my heartbeat didn’t stop me from knowing where she was. Maybe I’d turned into Matt Murdoch. Judy’s weight shifted as she put her other hand on my shoulder, pulling me closer to her. “I told you,” she murmured. “I told you much would be asked of you tonight.”
“But they’re nuts! This is Mel, they’re nuts! Nobody could—I can’t—not this! This is—no! No!” I shook my head violently, knocking her hands from my shoulders. “This is wrong!”
“This is the path you’ve chosen.” Her voice was soft and soothing, making the horror in my stomach bubble even more, until it lodged in my throat and gagged me. “There must be sacrifice to make change.” Her hands came to my shoulders again. I fumbled for her wrists, blindly knotting my fingers around them. My left palm ached, throbbing with every heartbeat, as if the cut traveled all the way up my arm and into my heart itself.