Skykeepers

little. Do you blame me?”

“You want to sit for a while? I’m no trained chef, but I know my way around a kitchen. I could make us something.”

His offer reminded her of where they were, and why. And although the memories had knocked her off- kilter, they had also reminded her in lurid detail why she had to get the hell out of there. “I’m fine,” she said, forcing herself to focus on the present—and the possibility of escape. Taking a look around, she saw that the large kitchen he’d brought her to flowed out from an upper ledge running around the sunken great room, and was separated from the big space by a breakfast bar that had leather-topped stools pushed into place beneath. The countertops were all marble, the cabinets good wood. The appliances were commercial steel, the pans Copper Clad, as promised, the knives surgical-

sharp. Even better, there were fresh herbs everywhere—hung from the rafters in drying bunches, growing in pots, and spilling out of a window greenhouse. A quick check showed that the cabinets, pantry, and commercial fridge and freezer were overstocked with just about anything she could want, especially if her taste leaned toward Mayan cuisine, which it did. Always had.

For a moment, she let herself wallow in the sense of being, finally, someplace that was familiar because of who and what she was, in a way that had nothing to do with her father. But really, her being there had everything to do with Ambrose. And she had to get her ass out of there.

Starting to pull ingredients with more thought to their spiciness than the flavor combinations, she set a trio of hot sauces on a nearby counter and stalled by asking, “Who’s the foodie?”

Michael hesitated, and for a second she thought he was going to remind her that the deal had involved her giving him info, not the other way around. But then he answered, “That’d be the royal winikin, Jox. He does the lion’s share of the cooking, with the rest of us pitching in or being dragooned, depending. Leah’s been on a kick to get the Nightkeepers doing more of the house stuff, as part of her whole ‘the winikin are not your servants’ thing. Jox doesn’t let too many people in his kitchen voluntarily, though. What you see here is mostly his doing, including the herbs. He and my winikin, Tomas, put in a big garden out next to the ball court, with a greenhouse beside it. They’ve got maize going, along with squash, beans, and about a dozen varieties of peppers. There’s even a small orchard. Sour oranges, thin-skinned limes—you name it. If our ancestors cooked with it, Jox and Tomas are probably growing it, or have at least tried to.”

Sasha’s brain had pretty much shut off after the first part of his answer, though. “You’ve got winikin?” she asked despite herself. She felt like the paleontologist guy in Jurassic Park, who’d gotten that oh, holy shit look on his face and said, “You’ve got raptors?” Because that was about how it felt: cloned dinosaurs. Winikin. Both unbelievable, but somehow believable within the context.

They’re not real winikin, she reminded herself as her head spun and her stomach lurched once again on the sense that she was in way over her head, and sinking fast. They’re just another group of people who’ve bought into an elaborate and extremely well-funded fantasy.

Right?

“Or they’ve got us. Either way.” Michael moved to the breakfast bar, dragged out a leather-topped stool, and propped himself up on it, leaning back against the reddish marble bar with his long legs stretched out in front of him as he continued, “Until about eighteen months ago, most of us thought the winikin were our godpar ents and the Nightkeepers were just bedtime stories. Instead, it turned out that we were the bedtime stories, that we’re the last dozen survivors of the Solstice Massacre of

’eighty four. The winikin had hoped—prayed, really—that the war was over before it began, but then the barrier reactivated, the magic came back online, and Strike—he’s our king—called us together to become the smallest damn fighting force that ever set out to save the world.” Michael’s lips twitched, but there was little humor in his expression. “We came here and learned how to connect to the barrier, how to pull the magic. Ever since then we’ve been playing catch-up, trying to reassemble all the old spells and prophecies, without much luck. Now, we’re just over a month away from the three-year threshold, and we’re floundering.” He focused on her, his gaze direct and silently demanding. “That’s why we need your help, both as the daughter of a mage and as the person who knew Ambrose best. He might not have told you where he hid the library, but you know how he thought, where he might’ve left clues.”

The kitchen took a long, slow spin around Sasha. Denial rose up within her, choking her with thick, viscous fear. The story didn’t make any sense. Yet at the same time, it did.

The magi had suffered population bottlenecks twice before in their history, once in Egypt around

1300 B.C., when the pharaoh Akhenaton declared Egypt a monotheistic empire and slaughtered the polytheistic priests, and again in the fifteen hundreds, when the conquistadors had converted Mesoamerica to Christianity, starting once again by killing the priests. The Nightkeepers. Each of those slaughters had wiped out all but a handful of the magi. From that angle, Michael’s implication of a recent massacre fit with the Nightkeepers’ view on the cyclical nature of time and events. It was also consistent with what she saw around her. The mansion was set up for an army, yet Michael had said there were only twenty or so people in residence. That said population bottleneck to her. Or rather, it does if I buy that the stories are more than an expensive and potentially deadly delusion , she thought, trying not to lose herself.

Throughout her life, she’d fallen prey to her own imagination time and again, talking herself into realities that didn’t exist. Like Ambrose being a good father. Saul being on the verge of proposing.

Hell, she’d even believed in the Nightkeepers long ago, had imagined herself fighting demons in the end- time battle, serving beneath the valiant King Scarred-Jaguar, who Ambrose had spoken of as if he were real, like they all were.

Apparently he wasn’t the only one who thought along those lines. But that brought up another question: Why had Ambrose left what seemed like the perfect location for him to hang out and indulge his obsessions? Should she take that as a warning in its own right, or a hint that there was far more going on here than she’d even begun to grasp? Her mind spun as she had to ask herself: At what point did delusion become a reality?

It doesn’t , she told herself. So get your ass out of here already . It was the best chance for escape she’d had in over a year. She couldn’t not take advantage of the opportunity, just because her mobile mind had cast Michael into the role of hero and lover, despite all evidence to the contrary.

When she pressed her hands to the counter, she noticed her fingers were trembling. Knowing she was close to losing it, she focused on the scene outside the wide kitchen window, which overlooked a football field-size patch of windblown hardpan, where a darker sand shadow outlined where a building must have stood in years past. To the left of that was a scattering of small cottage-type houses, to the right a huge, spreading tree in front of a big, industrial-looking steel building. In front of the tree sat a high-wheeled vehicle—a Jeep-like chassis riding on fat tires mounted on external shocks. Sasha’s pulse picked up at the sight.

“Well,” Michael said from right behind her. “You said you wanted a kitchen. What’s the next step?”

She hadn’t realized he’d moved from the breakfast bar, or that he was so close to her. Sensual awareness skimmed through her, lighting her up. This time, though, it came with the wish that they could have met under different circumstances, as slightly different people. If he’d been a normal guy and she’d been a chef with a little less baggage, she thought they could’ve made it work. For a while, anyway. But as the people they were, in the situation they were in, there was zero hope. The only sane thing she could do would be to get the hell away from him—from all of it—and build a new life.

“I guess this is the next step,” she said, hoping her voice didn’t give away her intentions. As nonchalantly as she could manage, she picked up one of the hot sauces, uncapped it . . . and splashed it straight into Michael’s face, aiming for his eyes.

“Aah!” He howled and reeled back, grabbing for his eyes with one hand, for her with the other.

Sasha went in low, got in an elbow to his solar plexus, hooked his back foot with hers, and yanked. He fell hard, his head banging off the marble counter on the way down. He went limp when he landed, but she couldn’t turn back now.

“I’m sorry,” she cried, eyes blurring with foolish tears. Then she ran for her life.

She raced across the main room, hit the sliding glass doors at a dead run, and burst out into the open,