Skykeepers

He was dangerous. He was powerful. And he was one of the last of the Nightkeepers. For the first time, Michael understood his uncle’s choice, truly understood it.

“No,” he grated, forcing the Other aside. “I won’t do it. I fucking won’t do it.”

No matter what Rabbit had done in the past or what his bloodlines suggested he might do in the future, he was trying to figure his shit out. He’d started growing up at school, started taking responsibility for himself, for his magic. He and Myrinne were trying to make it work. Why, when the kid seemed to be pulling his shit together, would the gods decide he needed to die? Or was the vision even from the gods at all? The skyroad was demolished, their lines of communication cut. Where the hell was this coming from? Was it the gods or the Banol Kax? How the hell could he be sure?

The decision ached within him, alongside the hollowness that came from knowing that Sasha was gone, that in the end they hadn’t been able to make it work after all. His head spun; his stomach hurt.

He couldn’t stop thinking of Rabbit’s power, and his talent for inadvertently destroying almost everything he touched. Scarred-Jaguar hadn’t meant to destroy the Nightkeepers; he’d meant to save them. If he’d been assassinated, there would be hundreds of magi now, an army of them. It was his uncle’s sin, his bloodline’s burden.

Shit, what was right and what was wrong?

At the thought, silver muk flared within him, buzzing death in his veins, whispering secrets and threats in the Other’s voice. And, as his alter ego flowed back into him from nowhere and everywhere at once, Michael knew what he had to do. Lurching to his feet, he pulled on his combat clothes, locked and loaded his pistols, scrawled a quick note that he left propped in his bachelor-bare kitchen. Then he left his suite. And went in search of his final target.

PART V WINTER SOLSTICE

The longest night of the year.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE December 21 Winter solstice Three years until the zero date Skywatch

Michael knocked hard on Rabbit’s door, then jiggled the handle, cursing to find the damned thing locked. He was about five seconds from kicking it in when he heard the lock click. A slow second later, the door swung open a few inches. Rabbit scowled at him through the gap. He looked like he hadn’t slept in a few days; his eyes were red rimmed. “It’s not time for the meeting yet.”

“Come on. I need your help.” Michael turned and strode off, figuring sheer bloody curiosity would get Rabbit moving. Any rational person would’ve asked for an explanation before taking off with the compound’s resident hit man, but this was Rabbit they were talking about.

Sure enough, by the time Michael had gotten halfway around to the garage, the teen was slouching along at his heels, eventually asking, “Where are we going?”

“You still keep a stash of pulque up at the pueblo?”

Rabbit nodded. “It’s been up there since I started school, but I don’t think the shit goes bad. Doesn’t go really good, either, but doesn’t go bad.”

“Then that’s where we’re going.”

They snagged one of the Jeeps and they bounced their way along the track that led out past the firing range to the back of the box canyon, where a nearly vertical, cliff-clinging path led up to an intricate, multilevel group of native ruins that the ancient Puebloans had built into and out of the cliff itself. Many of the small spaces had collapsed over time, but some were still sturdy enough, and Rabbit had staked out a couple of them for his own. In the months between when Rabbit’s father died and when he met Myrinne, it had been more or less common knowledge that he’d spent most of his free time alone up there, getting stoned on peyote and pulque, and zoning out on his iPod.

Now his stash was covered with dust and looked like it’d been worried at by a creature or two. But it didn’t take him long to unearth a couple of tightly stoppered clay jugs. He held them out to Michael.

“Not sure of the vintage, and it tastes like shit. But it’ll get you hammered almost instantly. No doubt about that.” He paused. “You and Sasha have a fight?”

Michael narrowed his eyes. “How did you know?” Mind-benders weren’t supposed to be able to pick up on thoughts without physical contact, but the rules of magic didn’t always apply to half-

bloods.

“Saw her stomping past the cottage. Made a leap. Not sure what Strike’ll think of your getting hammered right before the solstice.” Rabbit lifted a shoulder, not looking particularly upset. “Might be fun to watch, though, so have at it. I’ll even let you drive home.”

“Fuck you. We’re not here to get drunk. Or not entirely.” Michael palmed his knife from his belt and held it for a moment, testing its weight as the Mictlan roared and the silver muk flared through him. Then he flipped the knife and offered it to Rabbit, blade-first. “Cut me.”

The young man’s eyes flashed with understanding, followed by reluctant respect. “Son of a bitch.

You crazy bastard—you’re trying the scorpion spell on the sly.” He paused. “You must really love her.”

“Why’s that?”

“You’re going against a direct order from the king just so you can wear the jun tan before the solstice. If you’re aiming for the big gesture, that’s a good one.”

Michael hesitated, realizing that on one level, Rabbit was right. If he broke his connection to the muk, he would be able to take Sasha as his mate. She’d like that, he thought, knowing the symbol would matter to her. Except that she’d dumped him, hadn’t she?

At the thought, the Other—or should he call it the Mictlan?—stirred, too close to the surface of his mind. Oddly, though, it wasn’t trying to stop him from casting the scorpion spell, and it wasn’t trying to take over and force him to kill Rabbit.

The Mictlan is just a talent, he realized. It’s up to me whether I use it . Unlike the Other, which had been created to be partially autonomous, using his body to do the job it had been programmed to do, the Mictlan talent came with the gods’ gift to mankind: that of free will.

Although the Nightkeepers’ lives were largely guided by their writs and responsibilities, and the prophecies handed down by the First Father and others like him, in the end, each of their actions came down to a personal decision. Ambrose had chosen to give up his life as a Nightkeeper to carry out the wishes of his sister, the queen. Michael’s parents had chosen to follow their king into battle. His uncle had chosen damnation rather than murder his king.

Now, Michael chose to try another path, one that might—just might—allow him to come out the other side whole. Because although he’d barely acknowledged the possibility, even inwardly, he couldn’t stop remembering how Jade had talked about Scorpion River having the ability to purify, to take away sin.

What if it could take from him, not just the muk, but the Other as well?

“You going to do this?” Rabbit said, breaking into Michael’s thoughts. He was trying to look cool, but jittered from one foot to the other, constantly in motion.

“Yeah,” Michael said. “I’m doing it.”

He sat, propping himself up against the wall and stretching his legs out in front of him. He was so mentally clamped-down that his only real thought about what he was about to do was a passing consideration that it was