Rania gazed down at the person who now determined the fates of both her sons. The stars were bright, the evening cool. The world didn't quite feel real. She couldn't shake off the shock of all that happened the past hour or how she'd watched it all unfold without being able to stop it.
She wasn't used to the idea of stepping aside to let her sons wrestle with the demons that tormented her for so long. Overnight, everything had changed. She felt cold. So cold. The yeti drew near her, but his warmth did nothing to thaw the ice in her body.
"How could you agree to do this, Sam?" she whispered. Instinctively wanting to help Summer, she knelt and lifted the T-shirt Beck used to stop the bleeding in the girl's neck. Rania lifted it, and the blood began flowing again. She replaced it and applied pressure.
Sam left her mind and spoke out loud in the soft, guttural language of the forest people. "He gave me no choice."
"You could've refused him. You could've used your magick to reclaim the amulet." She glared up at him, tears blurring her vision. "You could've taken my soul instead of his!"
"I've taken no soul yet," Sam reminded her. "Beck is the Master of Light. His choice carries weight. I must respect it. You must, too."
On some level, she knew this. She was no longer the Mistress of Dark. She no longer had a say in the ways of the balance that Sam and his people were charged with maintaining. She was the reason Beck did what he did. If not for the Dark she'd created during the years when there was no Mistress of Light, her sons would not be here tonight.
"You don't know that, Rania," Sam said with kindness she didn't deserve. "But you always knew you would not be the one to fix the gathering Dark. You cannot. Only a Master of Light can bring forth more Light and only a Master of Dark can stop the Darkness from growing."
She wiped her tears, meeting his dark eyes. The yeti's amber fur was dusted by starlight, making him glow. Sam was normally difficult to read. This night, emotions kept her from even guessing what was on his mind. Rania swallowed hard.
"I know I have no right to ask you. I know you have no obligation to tell me. I'm begging you, Sam." She spoke with forced calm. "What is it you're hiding? What made you agree to this insane deal with Beck?"
The yeti reached out to her, squeezing her shoulder to comfort her. His features softened.
"Please tell me. Please."
His gaze went to the cliff. He appeared to be listening to something. Rania assessed that he was talking to his fellow yetis.
"Beck was here when you arrived," he said.
She waited. Sam looked at her again.
"The Master of Light was here. The elements brought him."
"I don't know anything about the Light, Sam."
"Rania," he started then stopped. She saw the indecision on his face before he continued. "I have lived over a thousand years. Magick and the elements are not things meant to be fully understood, even by my kind. We listen. We watch. We balance. But we do not command the elements."
She listened, struggling to absorb what meaning he would give her.
"They brought Beck here tonight."
"Are you saying...?" She frowned. "Are you saying you made a mistake throwing her off the cliff?"
"No. That I had to do," he said with both firmness and sorrow. "The girl who went over the cliff was not strong enough to balance Decker. But the elements brought the Master of Light to the side of a girl caught between Light and Dark."
"To save her," Rania finished, attention on Summer's broken body.
"Maybe. She and Beck were meant to help restore the balance," Sam said. "The girl who dies tonight was not able to keep Decker from being absorbed into Darkness. The girl she becomes, well that is an altogether different story."
"Something must come between the Dark and its Master," she said, recalling what Sam told her long ago about her husband, Michael. "Beck can't do it alone, can he?"
"Beck can't repair the damage to the balance and save Decker. He can buffer both for a short time, but he will one day be forced to decide between them," Sam said. "Neither can be lost, or the Darkness will come again."
"I can't lose my boys, Sam."
"Their fates are not yet determined. They will be, if you don't take her to a hospital." Sam held out the bright amulet. "Remember the rules."
Rania took it. It was warm, amber streaked with black. Neither Light nor Dark. She gazed at it, able to sense the soul within and yet not knowing where it stood in the balance.
"How will you hide her?" Sam asked curiously. "Your magick will not heal her or care for her, and you cannot interfere with her trial."
"What my magick can't do, my bank account can," Rania replied. "I'll do what I must. I always have."
"You have," he agreed, sympathy on his features. "No matter what the cost."
"Yeah," she said. She held his gaze. "Don't take them from me, Sam."
"It is out of our hands, Rania. From now on, you are like me, a watcher."
The air warned her suddenly, crying out as the girl's heart stopped. All her other thoughts fled. Rania pocketed the amulet and dropped to her knees beside Summer.
"No, no, sweetheart," she said, gathering the bloody body in her arms. "Stay with me." Twisting to look up at Sam, she nodded her head in farewell.
He stepped back and raised a hand in response.
Her shadows claimed them so quickly, she gasped. They asked her where she wanted to go, and she hesitated. The nearest hospitals in Washington and Northern Idaho were too close. She chose another city in southern Idaho. The fog obeyed and carried them to the quiet street outside the emergency room of a hospital in Boise.
An orderly on a smoke break nearby started as she materialized. Rania didn't care who saw her. She carried Summer through the automatic doors and stood in the center of the reception area. For a long moment, the patients and receptionist stared at her without moving. The receptionist lifted the phone.
"Dr. Philips to the ER immediately."
Her words seemed to reanimate the world. A door opened from the other side of the waiting room, and two men in scrubs hurried out with a gurney. Rania set Summer on it carefully, looking at her in the full light of the room.
The girl shouldn't be alive.
Rania's hands shook. The orderlies rolled Summer away. Rania trailed as if in a trance. She'd killed men and women for most of her life without noticing how warm blood was. The metallic scent used to intoxicate her, for killing and soul-taking was addicting to the Dark within her.
But this blood burned, and she was horrified rather than soothed to see it covering her clothes and hands. It wasn't just Summer's. It was the blood of Decker and Beck, too, because Summer's life was now interwoven with theirs.
The blood of all three innocent souls was on her hands. Rania created the imbalance. She barely stopped Decker from going over a cliff. She'd stood by while Beck traded his soul for the life of another. She'd agreed to do nothing while Decker went mad and suffered the pain she had also endured for so long ago.
Her self-control began to slip. Rania sank onto one of the benches lining the wall outside the doors leading to the emergency surgical wing where they took Summer. She leaned over. No amount of deep breathing stopped the pain growing in her chest. She struggled to gain control of herself.
Her cell phone rang. She knew who it was without looking. Michael, her only light in a world of Dark, always knew when she was in pain. She didn't want to talk to him, not now. How could she, when she'd put their sons' lives in danger?
But she answered.
"Hi," she managed.
"Hey, baby."
Rania's tears spilled at her husband's soft voice. Decker might never know what it was to talk to his mate as she did hers. He might never know how even two simple words spoken by the woman meant to anchor him would make him feel like he wasn't alone with his burden. He'd never know reprieve from his pain and Darkness.
"You okay?" Michael asked.
"I won't be home tonight. I can't tell you why."
"I understand. But are you okay, Rania?"
She closed her eyes, willing herself not to break down. "No. Michael, I..." need you.
She'd never uttered the words. She'd never had to. After Nora's death, she ran, first aimlessly and then to Sam. She'd avoided Michael for fear of dragging him into her madness, only to learn that her bond with Michael was all that stood between her and her fall into Darkness. He became her safe place, her peace, her good half. She'd never needed him as much as she did now. She was trapped, unable to help her sons fight for their souls and right the wrongs she'd committed.
Michael heard the words she didn't say.
"I've got the jet on standby. Tell me where you are." His order was like him: calm, warm and steady.
"Boise," she whispered.
"I'll ask Grandpa Louis to come to the hospital and stay with Decker. He's stable and sleeping," Michael told her. "I'll come to you."
She nodded, unable to speak at the reminder of her son in the hospital. A glance at her watch told her she'd been seated on the bench – lost in her mind – for almost forty-five minutes.
"I'll call you when I get there."
She hung up and slumped, unaware of the woman who approached until she spoke.
"Excuse me, ma'am."
Rania looked up at the nurse with dark eyes.
"I'm sorry to disturb you at such a time," the nurse said, sitting down beside her. "I need some basic information about your daughter. I highlighted what I need now. The rest can wait."
Rania took the clipboard with some form attached to it. Only three fields were highlighted. She wiped her eyes on one sleeve so she could see and took the pen offered. The blood on her hands made it slippery and dripped onto the form. She froze, staring at the maroon drops.
"Here, I'll take it," the nurse's voice was kind. She pulled both pen and clipboard from Rania's hands, gripping the bloodied pen with a gloved hand. She rose and threw the pen and latex glove away in a biohazard bin on the wall.
Rania forced herself to focus on the task at hand. She recalled Sam's words. Summer no longer existed. She had to ensure it stayed that way.
The nurse returned to the bench and pulled a new pen from the deep pockets of her white overcoat. "What's your daughter's name?"
"She's not my daughter," Rania replied.
"Sister? Niece?"
"No." She forced her mind to recall what little she knew about Summer. "She's an orphan. My son's...girlfriend."
The nurse hesitated then scribbled something on the form. "Can you tell me what happened?"
"Drunk driver," Rania lied. "She was crossing the street when she got hit."
"Oh, how awful. She has no family at all?"
Rania's chin quivered at the innocent question. "No. She has no one."
The nurse asked another question, but Rania didn't hear it. Decker wasn't the only one who was alone. Her eyes went to the double doors leading to the surgical wing. She wasn't sure what she felt towards Summer.
She has no one.
It was more than sympathy that filled her. It was the familiar cold fear she'd never felt before this night. Summer had no one to guide her through the second trial. She'd failed the first, and the second was going to be worse. The fate of Rania's sons both rested with a girl who was more lost than any of them ever had been.
The elements knew something, or they wouldn't have tried to help her, she reminded herself. It was the only thing that kept her from weeping.
"Ma'am, are you okay?" the nurse asked.
"Yeah. Sorry," Rania replied. "Do you know how she is?"
"We won't know until morning, probably. It doesn't look good."
Rania felt sick. "I need to use the restroom."
"Down this next hall to your right. I'll wait here."
Rania was on her feet, hurrying down the hallway, before the nurse finished. She pushed open the door to the ladies room and crossed to the sinks to wash her trembling hands. She looked at herself in the mirror, distraught by the amount of blood covering her.
Crossing to the door, she turned the deadbolt and stepped away again, the amulet in one palm and her cell in the other. She pulled up an internet browser on the phone and searched for the address of an orphanage in Boise then lowered the phone to focus on the amulet.
Summer needed a new name. A convincing story for the orphanage in L.A. about why there was no body. A death certificate. A new face. A new history. A benefactor to pay the hospital however much it took to help her recover.
Assuming she survived.
Rania closed her eyes and steadied her breathing. She broke down the tasks before her. First things first: making sure no one connected the girl in the hospital with Summer.
Her mind worked quickly to create a plan to hide Summer in an orphanage until she was well enough to return to the boarding school for her second trial. She'd spoken the truth to Sam: there were things her magick couldn't influence. There were things money couldn't buy. But when combined, there wasn't much magick and a bottomless bank account couldn't make happen.
She'd ask Michael to trust her, no matter what the cost. He would without hesitation. She ached to be with him, to sink into his arms and let him protect her from the world, if only for a few minutes. Thinking of him helped calm her.
Breathing out hard, Rania opened her eyes. She lifted the amulet and called forth her magick. Black fog surrounded her, filled her. She envisioned the Dark spell that would contain Summer's memories and hide her in plain sight, then bound the Dark magick to the amulet. So long as Summer wore it, she'd be shielded from her past and from others.
The amulet flared then faded with the magick and shadows. Rania replaced it in her pocket and took out her phone again, memorizing the address of the orphanage. At this time of night, no one would call. By morning, Rania would have everything arranged.
Composed once more, Rania left the bathroom for the hallway. Her step faltered as she saw the double doors. This was a nightmare. After years of being the Mistress of Dark - the final judge, the woman with power beyond power - she was helpless.
Now was not a time to let emotion derail her plans.
"You look better," the nurse said from the bench a few feet away. "Can I get you some water?"
Rania approached her. "No, I'm okay. I just needed a minute." She held out her hand for the form. "May I?"
The nurse handed it to her. Rania's gaze skipped over the first few fields. She started with the billing and wrote in her personal information. When she finished, her eyes flickered to the first field. It should've been the easiest to complete.
Patient Name.
After a long moment, she completed the field.
Autumn Nathanial.
Autumn to mark the death of Summer.
Nathaniel after Nataniel, the Darkbringer, the first Master of Dark from her bloodline who helped restore the balance long ago. The hope of humanity had been in Nataniel's hands, just as Rania's hope was in the girl dying behind the double doors a few feet away.
Steeling herself, Rania handed the form back. "I have to go. I'll be back to check on her in the morning," she said. "My cell number is there in case...in case the worst happens."
"Of course," the nurse said. "We'll call you if...," she glanced at the form, "if Autumn's condition changes."
"Thank you."
Rania looked at her watch as she started away. It was almost three in the morning. She was drained from the night's events and her own emotions. Her night, though, was just beginning.
Striding out of the hospital, Rania unleashed her shadows. After years of exposure, she knew enough of the Dark arts to know how far she could push without tipping off Decker, who would sense if she crossed any Dark Laws. She had the power, the knowledge and the resolve to recreate the world of one girl long enough to give all of them a second chance.
Nothing – especially something as human as fear – was going to stop her from doing whatever she could to save her sons.
Survive, Autumn, she willed the girl silently. Tonight is nothing compared to what comes.
With one last look over her shoulder, Rania closed her eyes. Black fog swept her away.