Ever After

Chapter Seven



The scent of burnt amber pulled through my awareness first, dragging the rest of the ever-after behind it. I left the ley line gratefully, the harsh taste/sound of it making me shudder. Ku'Sox hadn't summoned me, or I'd be fighting for my life by now, and I sighed in relief as I decided that I was in the ever-after, blue sky, white sun, and salty-tasting wind notwithstanding. Nowhere in reality stank so bad. My nose had adjusted to the smell even before I finished coalescing to find myself standing on a round dais of white rock, two toga-clad demons before me like judges, a crowd of them behind me muttering like the mob they were.



I shivered, trying to throw off the wrong feeling of the line. I seemed to be in a Greek auditorium with rising benches of stone and stately pillars with white cloth strung between them to shade the demons from the fake sun. The horizon was lost in a stark white line, and I looked for the jukebox when I realized I was in Dalliance. It might look as if we were outside, but we were deep underground in the ever-after. The restaurant was a convenient meeting place, and I wondered why the demons were adhering to the dress rules since it was clearly not being used as an eatery, but rather . . . a courtroom? Irate demons filtered in, their varied clothing shifting to togas as they passed the threshold.



Al was beside me on the dais, and finding the collected, slightly bitter demon there was a relief. He was in a toga as well instead of his usual crushed green velvet frock coat, the fine cloth tied with a crimson sash so bright that it made me squint. His hair was in oiled ringlets, making his somewhat blocky face look even more so. Sandals peeped from under his hem, and I stared at his black toenails. That was new.



His manner was off as well, his red, goat-slitted eyes holding a sheen of nervousness as he gave me a quick once-over and frowned. This didn't bode well. He was always confident, even when he shouldn't be, and I followed his gaze to the long bench before us just on the other side of the shallow moat, making a pained smile at Newt and Dali. Not my favorite denizens of the ever-after.



"So you always talk to Dali in front of an audience?" I quipped, and Al grimaced.



"Stand up. Fix your hair," Al said as he smacked me into a stiffer position, keeping to his usual British nobleman accent though he now looked like a Greek councilman. "My God, what is that you're wearing? Jeans? You smell like horse."



"That's because I was on one," I said, becoming angry. "Someone from the ever-after stole Ceri and Trent's daughter. Three guesses as to who. And why."



My tone was sarcastic, but Al made a noise as if he didn't care, and I shivered as a cascade of ever-after fell over me, tainted with his aura. For a moment, the rising noise of the demons behind me muted, and then it returned as his aura fell away and I found myself in sandals and a homespun robe with purple silk lining. The moist wind tugged unfamiliarly at my hair, and I reached up to find a ring of wilting flowers. The entire outfit smacked of something that Ceri, Al's ex-familiar, might have looked good in. Me, not so much.



"There. Now you fit in." Al stiffened as he returned his attention to the two demons reclining on a long bench before us. There was an ominous wide ring of sunken ground between us like a barrier.



"You promised you'd never summon me," I said, nervous as Newt gave me a bright, evil-looking smile and toasted me with something red in a wineglass that didn't fit the time period. "We had a deal. I don't yank you across the lines, and you don't yank me." I tried not to complain, but I was still shaking off the adrenaline, and it was my God-given right to be bitchy. "I was trying to get to my scrying mirror, but I was across Cincy at Trent's." I hesitated. "Sorry," I added. "I really was trying."



Al didn't meet my eyes, instead gazing forward into nothing as he squared his shoulders. "They asked me to summon you, and since you failed to contact me, I complied."



They? He meant Newt and Dali, and I shifted uneasily, my sandals scraping. Better and better. Al took pride in refusing to work in the system-compliance meant we were up shit creek. Again. Nervous, I followed his gaze to the dais and tried to smile at the big bad demons smiling back at me.



Newt was the only other female demon in existence, possibly driven nuts because the elves killed her "sisters," but more likely because Ku'Sox had tricked her into killing the ones they'd missed. Slim and gender neutral, she was sporting a bald head again. Heavy black eyeliner edging her eyes was the only feminine touch beyond the spare curves showing past her toga. Her entirely black eyes traveled over me, and a turbanlike hat misted into existence atop her head, sliding her from androgynous to feminine. The demon had trouble remembering what she was doing, but she was powerful, sort of the crazy Wendy of the lost lord-of-the-flies boys. She seemed to do better when I was around, which made everyone nervous.



A good six feet away from her on the same bench, Dali reclined in apparent idleness. He was squinting at me in irritation, his decidedly round form half a civil servant, half a hanging judge. His toga didn't do a thing for him.



I glanced at the demons behind us, assembled either to watch or take part. I didn't know which, and the distinction seemed important. Some of the faces were familiar, demons who'd asked me to make everything from backyard pools to cars to chandeliers for them. I stiffened as I spotted Ku'Sox weaving his way to the front, earning disdainful looks from those he passed.



He has Ceri and Lucy, I thought, my hands becoming fists as I fought the urge to launch myself at him. I'd saved the tall, psychotic demon's life in the effort to save my own, and I trusted him about as far as I could throw a mountain. The admittedly attractive demon was the engineered child of the demons around me, created with both science and magic in an attempt to circumvent the elf curse that kept them tied to the ever-after and basically sterile. Except now he was chained here even more than they were-since I'd cursed him to be fixed to the ever-after day or night.



The more I got to know him and his kin, the more I wondered if most of the ugliness attributed to demonkind over the centuries could be lain at his feet. The wacko habitually ate people alive, believing that by doing so, he would absorb their souls; apparently he harbored doubts he had one. Even better, the demons had designed him with the ability to manipulate as much ley line energy as a female demon. That hadn't turned out very well, seeing as that was probably why Ku'Sox had tricked Newt into killing everyone who might have a hope of controlling him.



And now he was using Nick to drop into reality whenever he felt like it. It had to have been Ku'Sox who took Ceri and Lucy. He had enough reason. It was obvious, and I snarled at the demon working his way to the bottom of the arena.



Al was trying to turn me back around, and I tugged out of his grasp. "I know what you're doing, Ku'Sox!" I shouted as my face warmed, and several nearby demons elbowed each other to get their neighbors to shut up, hoping for some gossip.



The slightly gaunt, youngish demon in gray smiled at me, his charisma falling flat. "I doubt that," he said, his smooth, melodious voice not at all like Trent's. "You're not nearly scared enough," he added, shoving several demons out of his way with his foot so he could take a front seat.



"If you hurt one hair on Lucy's head, I'll throw you back into the ley lines from where I pulled your sorry ass!" I shouted, and Al tugged at me to be quiet. "You think I cursed you now, wait until I put your ugly face in a jar!"



Al smacked my gut, and gagging, I turned back around. "Al," I hissed as the arena began to quiet. "Ku'Sox is up to something."



"Ku'Sox is always up to something," Al muttered.



"He stole Ceri and Lucy!" Oh God. That murdering bastard had Lucy. Ceri could probably take care of herself, but if he hurt one chubby finger on the girl, I would tear both realities apart to make him pay.



Al sniffed as if he didn't care. "How? As you say, you cursed him to the ever-after, and even if he found a way past that, why would he?"



"Because he can't snag Trent, and if he has Ceri and Lucy, Ku'Sox has Trent's nuts in a vise."



"So-o-o-o?" he drawled, gazing up to the sky that had never seen a contrail.



"My God, Al, are you being intentionally blind? I told you Nick was stealing surviving Rosewood babies. Trent can make the cure permanent. If he gives it to Ku'Sox, he won't need you anymore. Any of you!"



Al's expression suddenly became worried. "You have more important things to think about than what Ku'Sox is going to do over the next hundred years," he said, a thick, heavy hand falling on my shoulder and turning me around. "We're on trial."



"Again?" I asked, shaking as I leaned past Al to eye Ku'Sox. "What, are we broke?"



"No." Al's voice was sour. "It's your damned ley line. It went wonky. Leaking like the bloody Titanic."



Remembering the increasingly caustic sound of the lines, I turned to face him fully. My line? Had it really gone that badly unbalanced?



Al's eye twitched. A spot of ice slid down my spine, making me stiffen. We'd been trying for weeks to get the line I'd scraped between reality and the ever-after to close or at least balance, but until I knew how to jump the lines by myself, it wasn't happening. The imbalance was slowly siphoning off the ever-after into reality, and the only reason that no one had said anything before was because it was only a trickle-plenty of time to fix it. That, and because I was the only female demon they might get some baby demons out of after they tired of the trinkets I could solidify into reality for them. They'd been losing maybe a cubic foot of their dimension a year, not much at all. "How bad is it?" I whispered, trying to smile as I looked at Dali, Al's parole officer.



"Bad." Al's voice was faint but resolute. "Stand up. Try to look sexy."



"In a bedsheet?" I complained, running my hands down it. "How can I look sexy in a bedsheet?" He cleared his throat, and I grimaced. "Never mind."



Frowning, I leaned past Al to glare at Ku'Sox again, certain that he was the reason my line had gone wonky. The demon's smile confirmed it, and suddenly I realized just how deep in the crapper we were. Ku'Sox had thriving Rosewood babies. He had the leverage to make Trent give him the permanent cure. He had a line-my line-leaking ever-after enough to be a real problem. He was going to kill the ever-after and blame me for it.



"Oh shit," I whispered, and Ku'Sox inclined his head as he realized I'd figured it out. I took a breath to shout out the truth, hesitating only because Ku'Sox seemed to want me to. There was more to this; I could see it in his face, feel it in the air, moist and heavy.



Frantic, I turned back to Al. "Al," I hissed. "Tell them he broke my line!"



"Right . . ." Al muttered. "We don't know that, and saying so will only get us in jail where you can't do anything."



"But he did it!" Crap on toast, this had gone from bad to worse, and Al didn't care.



"Don't say anything to get me in jail, love," Al breathed, hardly audible over the noise. "You don't have enough to get both of us out. We'll find out how bad the damage is and fix it."



I wasn't sure if Al meant damage to my line or damage to my credibility. Frustrated, I cocked my hip and fumed.



Dali, who'd been counting heads by the look of it, stood up, his hands raised to quiet the rabble behind us. "Quiet! Quiet!" he shouted, his resonant voice booming. The demon was used to being listened to, and the last of the demons hustled to find their places. Every demon was equal in the ever-after, but some had more power than others, and some had more money. Dali had both.



Beside me, Al jammed a finger into my ribs to make me jerk straight. "I'll do the talking," he said.



"If you can't shut your mouths and your minds in that order, I'm going to clear the room!" Dali bellowed. "None of you will have a chance to vent!"



Newt sniffed, curving her legs up beside her on the bench to look oddly sexy. "And by the Turn, you need to vent," she said, her soft voice carrying to the back of the stands. "It smells like goats in a locker room."



There was a smattering of masculine guffaws, and finally they all shut up. It was like living with perpetual sixth graders. Dali lowered his hands, moving his middle-aged spread gracefully as he walked to the center of the narrow stage. Demons could appear as whatever they wanted. I still didn't know what Dali found appealing in being a fortysomething, slightly overweight, graying civil servant.



"As Al's parole officer, I am responsible for keeping Algaliarept's behavior within acceptable parameters," he said, and Al cleared his throat and made an elegant bow. "And you," Dali added, pointing at Al, "are responsible for your student's."



That would be me, and I turned a smidge to show off my curves. So I wanted to appear attractive. So sue me. I was surrounded by perfection.



Al visibly swallowed back his ire. With a small breath, he seemed to gain two inches, again bowing with an overdone flourish and sending a foot to smack me to try to get me to do the same. "Assembled countrymen," he said as he gracefully straightened. "May I say-"



"No, Gally," Newt interrupted as she took up her wineglass again. "You've talked enough. Your student's ley line has degraded to the point where we're losing enough ever-after to give me a splitting headache."



It might be the wine she was drinking, but I, too, had a soft throbbing at the base of my skull where there'd been none this morning. I had blamed it on whatever had been in Trent's fridge, but maybe it was more. Behind us, the demons muttered agreement.



"Why," Newt said as she fixed her eerie black orbs on Al, "haven't you taught her how to line jump so she can fix it?"



"You think I don't want to?" Al took a step to distance himself from me, and I felt alone. "Her gargoyle is a baby of fifty years, but he's bound to her already so we simply have to wait. And before you mention it, the scar tissue my student received from that cretin in the front row trapping her in a ley line prevents any other gargoyle from breaking through her aura to teach her instead."



It was true, and I winced when Ku'Sox rose up, looking lean and elegant. "Blaming this on me? How gauche." His expression turned mocking. "And typical, I'm afraid."



"Why not?" I barked out, unable to help myself. "You're behind this."



The demons around him eased back to give him more room, and an uneasy murmur rose. "Careful, Rachel," Al said as he leaned forward, blocking my view of them.



Jittery, I pushed his hand off me. "Ku'Sox kidnapped Kalamack's daughter and his, ah, common-law wife," I said, exaggerating. "And then the lines go sour? All of them? Doesn't that seem a little odd to any of you?"



Again, the demons whispered among themselves, very aware of, and not liking, Ku'Sox's genocidal tendencies. Al was a lot more direct, and I pulled away when he pinched my elbow. "Stop trying to distract them. It's transparent and obvious."



"Is it?" I said loudly to Al but talking to all of them. "Distraction seems to be working for him! Have any of you given any thought to why he might have kidnapped my former familiar's child and wife? My elfin familiar?"



The mention of their age-old enemies got the expected snarls, but Newt and Dali were listening. Their war had nearly killed all of them.



"I say we kill her and be done with it!" Ku'Sox said loudly.



Taken aback, I spun, the ring of flowers falling from me to land in the dry moat between us. "Kill me?" I said, unheard over the rising complaints. "Are you nuts?"



"I can't think straight, my head is ringing so badly from the lines!" one demon shouted as he stood, getting a round of agreements before he sat down in vindication.



"I was in the middle of some work, and I lost it all!" a second exclaimed. "You owe me restitution for a week's work down the crapper!"



Al's brow was furrowed. "My student is not responsible for your failure to record your curses in the collective," he said, and Dali nodded his agreement.



"We have a problem," a third said, a band of blue fabric draped over his shoulders. His voice was firm, and I wondered who he was. "The imbalance is impacting everything. It took two of you to summon her through the lines. Two! That's not normal. And it's getting worse!"



I took a step forward. "Well, that was because of Trent," I said, and Al jabbed me with his elbow to shut up.



Newt and Dali pulled their attention from the rising noise behind me. "Trent tried to block our summons?" Newt asked, her long legs showing from under her toga before she tugged it to cover them.



"It's never taken a collective to summon anyone!" the demon with the blue sash said loudly, enjoying the attention his claim had brought him. "The ever-after is falling apart!"



The sky is falling, the sky is falling, I thought derisively, and Newt shifted her feet to the floor, her expression seeming to mirror my thoughts.



"This is pointless," Newt said as she poised almost coyly. "Stay on track, gentlemen. Rachel, love, can you fix the line?"



I didn't like being called "love," especially not by her, but I let it pass. "No," I said sullenly.



"Of course she can!" Al shouted to drown out the immediate complaints, his hands raised pleadingly as he shot me a glare. "We need more time, is all."



"We have no time!" Ku'Sox asserted, aggressively riling them up. "She broke the balance. Killing her will fix it."



"It will not!" I exclaimed, but Al's wince and Dali's sudden deflation as he sat down made me wonder. "It won't, will it?" I asked Al softly, and the demon made a long, drawn-out, regretful noise of possibility.



Dali leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, ignoring the rising noise behind us for a moment. "Unfortunately it might," he said to me, giving the demons time to argue. "Lines created from a jump between reality and the ever-after are permanent, for the most part, but lines made from a reality-to-reality jump are not, and killing you might erase it."



"Might?" Panicking, I looked at Ku'Sox, hating his smug smile. "This is a setup," I said, wanting to retreat but there was nowhere to go. "The line was stable. Well, not stable, but it wasn't unzipping like this! Someone's tampered with it!" It was as close as I dared go without actually blaming him, and even so, Al lightly smacked me on the shoulder to shut up.



"We have nowhere to go if the ever-after collapses," Ku'Sox said, voice loud over the rising noise. "Kill her before it's too late!"



"Wrong!" I shouted, and Al sighed heavily. "They have nowhere to go. You do."



Ku'Sox beamed at me as if I'd played right into his hands. "Not anymore, but you do, Rachel. Perhaps you are trying to kill us."



"Me?" I stammered, mentally backpedaling as I realized why he was so smug. He was going to kill the ever-after and everyone in it-blaming it on me. He had a way around the curse. Had to. Or he knew a way to force me to remove it. Maybe Lucy and Ceri had been kidnapped to force my hand, not Trent's. Damn it all to the Turn and back.



"I didn't do this!" I spun to face the crowd behind me, then back to Dali. "I was on a horse in reality when the line started leaking this bad!"



Ku'Sox stood. "Then you admit it was leaking? And you never told anyone?"



Al was holding his head in his hand, and I wished I'd kept my mouth shut. "Just a little," I said, then had to raise my voice when they all began talking. "I was trying to fix it before anyone noticed!"



Al stood stiffly beside me as he fidgeted in subtle ways that only I could possibly see. "Will you shut up now?" he breathed, roughly turning me to face Newt and Dali.



"But he did it!"



"But you can't prove it!" Al mocked my whiny tone.



"There are thriving Rosewood babies being stolen, and he kidnapped hostages to force my freed familiar to make the cure permanent!" I shouted. "Doesn't that sound a bit odd to you?" But no one cared.



"Are you done?" Al muttered, his back stiff as he faced Newt and Dali.



Looking uneasy, Dali rose to his feet, hands raised to quiet them. "Rachel, as it is your line and you're the only demon who can survive free of the ever-after, we are understandably concerned that your intent is to destroy us and the ever-after."



My hasty breath to protest whooshed out as Al poked me in the ribs to be quiet.



"Much as I regret my decision," Dali said, moving to the front of the drop-off between us, "it's my recommendation that if Rachel admits that she can't balance her line, then perhaps her death is the best way to ensure our continued existence."



I couldn't speak. They weren't serious, were they? Ku'Sox had done something. I knew it by his smug expression as he listened to the demons call for my blood. Standing there, my heart hammered, and I backed up into Al. They couldn't. I hadn't done anything!



Dali looked at me, and I quailed. "If it's a choice between your life and all of ours, then you will die." He hesitated, then added quietly, "Even if you're not actually the one who should be blamed for it."



His eyes slid behind me to Ku'Sox, and my hope leaped. He believed me. I glanced at Al to see he realized it, too. And Newt, now toasting me with her wine. Proof. We needed proof. I could do that. I could get the damned proof. I just needed a few days.



"Gentle associates, gentle associates!" Al said, his voice rumbling through me from where I was pressed against him. "Of course she can balance her line." His breath was like brimstone against me, sharp and jolting. "Tell them, Rachel," he prompted, his voice low with threat.



"S-sure," I stammered, scared to death.



Al's eyes closed in relief. "We can fix it," he said as they opened.



"Then why haven't you?" Ku'Sox said softly, mocking us.



"My rooms are shrinking!" another called.



"We have nowhere to go. Kill her now before it's too late!" a third shouted, and it all started up again. I began to panic. Only Al's firm hold on my arms kept me from moving. He was not my jailer, he was my rock. Whatever happened to me would happen to him. I didn't altogether trust Al, but I trusted that.



"No." It was a soft utterance, and my eyes went to Newt, still sitting calmly on her bench, legs curled back up under her again. "I said no!" she said louder, and the noise behind Al and me abated. "I told you months ago that Rachel's line was unbalanced, and you all said I was crazy."



"You are crazy!" someone shouted from the back, and she smiled as if in benediction.



"Tru-u-u-ue," she drawled when they quieted again. "But no one listened. You will listen to me now. Call it your collective penance."



My heart gave a pound, and I tensed against Al. Was it a chance or a sentence?



Knowing all eyes were on her, Newt stood gracefully. "I will give you space from my own rooms to compensate your loss, Cyclarenadamackitn. I will compensate all your one-inch, two-inch losses because I know how important every inch is to you aged, decrepit men. But in return, I want to see if she can do it. It would be a skill worth having-don't you think? Being able to balance lines scraped from a reality-to-reality jump? In case we someday can return to reality and abandon the ever-after completely?" I swallowed hard as Newt turned her black, featureless eyes on me. "If she can't, then you may kill her."



There was a breath of silence, in which I could almost hear the demons thinking that over. Behind me, Al sighed, his hands gripping my upper arms easing. It was a chance.



I looked at Ku'Sox and his evident anger, but he stayed silent as the demons came to a consensus. I couldn't tell if Dali was pleased or irritated as he stood, frowning once at Newt's pleased smile as she beamed over all of them.



"So!" Dali said, bringing everyone's attention back to the stage. "Are we agreed? Rachel and Al have time to balance the line if Newt compensates everyone?"



Al held his breath as no one spoke, each waiting for the other to say something first.



"Ku'Sox?" Dali prompted. It was clear that the bastard child wasn't pleased, but if he continued to push for my death, it would be obvious that he wanted it.



His face empty of emotion, Ku'Sox turned on a heel. Pushing past the surrounding demons, he distanced himself, and then, with a soft breath of air replacing his mass, he vanished.



"I'll take that as a yes," Dali said as the rest of the demons began popping out in turn, a soft muttering of conversations rising and falling like surf.



I finally began to relax, turning to look up at Al as he let go of my shoulders. "Now what?" There was no way in hell I could balance that line.



Al wouldn't look at me, and I again wondered how I could have gone from fear to mistrust to understanding to reliance in so short of time. "We find a way to fix this," he said. "Or a way to blame it on someone else," he added, stiffening as Newt rose and made her way to us. Dali was busy with a few lingering demons, and I watched as Al seemed to shift and change, the mask he always wore sliding over him again as she came forward.



"That's it then!" he said cheerfully as he clapped his thick hands again. "I guess we'll be off to look at the line. See what we can do."



"Yes," Newt said, her smile chilling me as she took my hand and looked at it, noticing perhaps that I now had a metal pinkie ring instead of a wooden one. "You go balance that line. And in the meantime, Rachel's debt to me grows with each passing second."



I winced as I pulled my hand from hers, but what could I say? I did have some income here from the use of the tulpa I'd made for Dalliance.



Al was huffing and puffing, but I knew there was no deal we could get that was better than our continued survival.



"Al," Newt said sharply before he could protest. "If your student dies, that debt reverts to you."



Al glanced at Dali, and then back to her. "Looking forward to it," he grumbled, his hand on my shoulder tightening.



Newt's black gaze was on the wisp of my tattoo that showed, and I managed a nervous smile. "Thank you," I said as she turned to leave, and she spun slowly back to us.



"Don't thank me now, love. Save it till the morning after."



In a hush of inrushing air, Newt vanished like a Cheshire cat. Feeling ill and scared, I turned to Al. "Can we go home?"



"No," he said, simultaneously leading me down off the dais and waving to Dali as if everything was A-Okay, not Oh Shit. "But I agree we need to leave."



I hopped from the raised stage, and Al's hands left my wrist. I felt small as I looked at the stone bench Ku'Sox had been sitting on. "It's him," I said, and Al growled. "Ku'Sox has done something to the line. You know it, too. He's got those kids, and this is all an elaborate con to destroy the ever-after and blame me for it."



"If you can't prove it, it doesn't mean shit," Al said, but as I balked, he sighed and rubbed his head. "Fine," he grumbled as he took my arm as if to escort me. "The sun is still up, but let's go look at your line."



"How?" I said, knowing he couldn't be in reality when the sun was above the horizon, but it was too late and the soft ache of the ley line had taken me.