Skykeepers

Myrinne’s dorm room on fire. Shit.

“You’re back,” Strike said.

Rabbit’s knee-jerk response was something along the lines of, Duh, but he managed to squelch it, saying instead, “Sorry it took so long.” He braced to get his ass chewed up and spit out. Gods knew he deserved it—he’d broken his “no Nightkeeper magic” vow, if not to the letter, then certainly by intent.

Worse, he didn’t have a damn thing to show for it except more property damage. He hadn’t gotten the answers he’d been looking for, and didn’t know what to make of the answers he had gotten.

There was an awkward pause, as though Strike couldn’t decide whether to hug him or strangle him.

In the end, the king didn’t do either; he just turned away, muttering, “Glad you’re okay,” under his breath.

“You scared us,” Anna said, but instead of censure, there was mostly relief on her face, and in Jox’s eyes. Which made Rabbit realize that they were pissed, yeah, but they were also damn glad to have him back. The knowledge warmed him. It humbled him, to the extent that he could be humbled. Why did he keep forgetting that they weren’t his old man? Why did he keep assuming the worst about their reactions, and then being surprised when they went the other way?

“He should rest,” Myrinne said pointedly. In case the others didn’t get the nonhint, she followed it up with, “Go away. I’ll let you know when he’s up for an interrogation.”

Strike ignored her to lean over the bed. “I’ll kick your ass later for pulling this stunt . . . but given that it’s a done deal, I’ve gotta ask: Did you get any answers?”

Yeah, Rabbit thought. I’m just not sure which question they belong to.

What is my destiny? he’d asked. How can I make Myrinne mine? And he’d gotten a response of sorts. He just wasn’t sure what the hell it meant. Choosing his words carefully, he said, “The images I got were all jumbled up. I have a feeling they weren’t anything, really, just pieces from inside my head . . . except for one of them. Just before I passed out for good, I blinked into a ceremonial chamber and felt a hell of a power surge. Like maybe it was an intersection.”

There was a collective indrawn breath. Strike said, “Can you describe it? Could you get back there?”

Rabbit grimaced. “I didn’t really see the room; it was mostly a blur. But there was a stone tomb in the middle of it, a big one with a scorpion carved in its side, along with some wavy lines.” He paused.

“The thing was . . . the symbols weren’t Mayan, I don’t think.”

“What were they?” Strike asked, his voice deadly intent.

“Egyptian.” He looked from Strike to the others, and raised an eyebrow. “Anybody up for a field trip?”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

The next morning, after catching up on sleep and calories, the residents of Skywatch assembled for an all- hands-on-deck meeting, at the picnic tables set beneath the big ceiba tree. Rabbit was there, with heavy circles beneath his eyes and a faintly mulish look on his face. But at least he was vertical.

Myrinne sat beside him, with Anna on his other side. Sasha had originally taken a seat between Jox and Sven, in a cowardly effort to avoid dealing with Michael. Her best efforts were foiled, though, when he arrived, big and grumpy-looking, and thumped Sven on the shoulder. “Move.”

Clearly hungover, Sven merely winced and slid down. Sasha divided her glare between the two men, annoyed with Sven for being oblivious, with herself for the kick of physical reaction that coursed through her when Michael’s shoulder touched hers, and with Michael for being . . . hell, for just being.

Before she could decide whether or not to change seats, Strike brought the meeting to order, standing up at the head of the table and saying, “Okay, gang. Suffice it to say that a whole lot of things have changed over the last forty-eight, some for the better, some not.” He paused and looked at Sasha.

“First and foremost, I want to officially welcome Sasha to the family, quite literally. I’d like to start by having Jox go over what we’ve pieced together so far.”

The winikin, clearly prepped, stood up from his seat. Once he had everyone’s attention, he began, dropping into what Sasha had learned to recognize as his sto ryteller mode, eyes half-closed, as though he were describing vivid pictures seen in his mind’s eye. “Nearly two years before the massacre, the queen gave birth to a baby girl. As far as anyone alive today knew, it was a stillbirth. The funerary bundle was made and burned, the child’s ashes added to those beneath the altar here at Skywatch.”

Sasha was aware that everyone might be looking at Jox, but their attention was on her. She hadn’t heard the story, but suddenly couldn’t sit still for it. She’d waited so long to learn about her mother; now that the time had come, all she wanted to do was get up and pace off a sudden case of restless nerves. Just when the jitters were nearing the breaking point, though, Michael touched his booted foot to her sneakered one beneath the table, a brief, supportive pressure that said, You can handle this . And she could, she realized, exhaling a long breath and drawing in the next. But she didn’t like that he’d been the one to remind her.

She shifted her foot away from his as the winikin continued, “Based on what the nahwal said about Sasha being his second daughter, and the way the timing fits, it seems that the baby was either stolen from the queen and replaced somehow with an appropriate substitute . . . or that the queen herself was involved in the deception. We don’t know which of those was the case; we may never know. Sasha’s mother made Ambrose memorize the triad prophecy, and insisted that it related to Sasha. In a way, this suggests the queen’s involvement. She was the most powerful itza’at of her generation, so it’s certainly possible that she foresaw Sasha’s importance to the end-time war, and knew she had to keep her alive at all costs . . . perhaps even by lying to her husband and her people.”

Sasha’s head buzzed as thoughts collided and separated within her, threatening to tip her brain toward overload. “But why send me away?”

It was Anna who answered: “An itza’at can foresee the future but not change it. If she envisioned the massacre, or a dark future at the very least, she might have thought to spare you.”

“Why not send all three of us away, then?” Sasha asked, then wished she hadn’t. Because if their mother had sent her to safety, it meant she’d knowingly left her two older children in harm’s way.

Strike didn’t look offended by the question, though, saying only, “Either she’d seen Jox raising us—

but not you—in relative safety . . . or she had no foreknowledge of our fate, but couldn’t risk sending us away, because it would look like she didn’t believe in the king’s plan to attack the intersection.”

“Treason is one of the few things considered a true and absolute sin,” Michael said out of the corner of his mouth. “It’s good for a one-way trip to Mictlan.”

“That’s—” Sasha broke off, not sure what she wanted to say, what she could say. She was only beginning to understand what it meant to be a Nightkeeper, how her decisions had suddenly become plural, impacting so much more than just herself.

“The king’s writ spells out the responsibilities of the leaders,” Strike said. “Personal desires are pretty far down the list.” He glanced at Leah. “Lucky for us, the jaguars are known for being not only stubborn as hell, but willing to rewrite the rules to suit themselves.” He returned his attention to Sasha. “Our mother made the choice she made—I have to believe it was her choice, in retrospect. She grieved deeply when the baby died, and again around the time of the funeral, which was a few months later. She and the king drifted apart for a bit too. In retrospect, what Anna and I remember of that period is pretty consistent with her having made some hellish personal choices.”

“If that’s true . . .” Sasha trailed off, trying to find the right question amidst the clamor of them in her brain. “If this was her plan to keep me safe and make sure I made it to the end-time, then why did she send me with someone like Ambrose? Why not a winikin?” But what she was really asking was, Why not someone stable, who had half a clue how to raise a child and introduce the Nightkeeper ways gently, rather than like magical boot camp for the criminally insane?

It was Jox who answered: “Even narrowing it down to the inner circle of the royal jaguars and their close