Maybe it was the invocation of a boi with anger in their eyes and gentle hands. Maybe it was the sound of her name, and the rightness of its shape in Kite’s mouth. Eli closed her eyes and opened her mouth.
The bee felt like velvet as it slipped down her throat. The ash was still hot and warmed her cold body. The feather fluttered in the back of her throat before slipping back inside. She closed her mouth again, her teeth grazing Kite’s fingers.
Kite leaned in, and Eli vanished.
She was still there — she was always there — but also somewhere else; the world looked faint and incomplete, and she felt that she could see through it, or move through it. What would happen if she vanished entirely? How would the City of Eyes hold her ghostly form?
As the Heart, Eli could only see Kite as an essence. The seafoam green that Eli had seen only once before, when Kite and Circinae had fought over a girl trapped in a box of black ice, suspended between worlds.
A tendril of Kite’s essence reached out, shyly, like a new bud. May I touch you?
Eli could feel the question; could feel the electricity dancing around their strange incorporeal bodies.
Yes.
Kite reached into Eli’s translucent body and grabbed the Heart. She squeezed. Hard.
Pain seared through Eli’s bodies — Heart, flesh, magic, human. She blacked out.
She was back in the Children’s Lair. The beach and the sea were gone. Eli looked up at the stars raging overhead, burning with greed and desire. And somewhere out there, the chosen point of orbit for the witches’ world — the City of Ghosts.
She could still feel the ticklish sensation of feathers at the back of her throat. Eli pushed Kite away and stumbled back, clutching at a wall adorned with thick vines and chokeberries.
“You didn’t used to dream,” Kite said. “When —” “Get out,” gasped Eli. “Leave me alone. And stay out of my dreams.”
Kite left, trailing pearls in her wake.
Only later, when Eli looked down at her healed feet, did she realize that by wrenching her out of a dream Kite had probably saved her life.
Forty-Seven
THE HEALER
“You’re awake!” Tav threw their arms around Eli without thinking, pulling her into their embrace. “You scared the shit out of me.”
They needed to feel her body against theirs, needed to hear the thud of her human heart, needed to run their hands over her body to check that she was alive and here with them. Eli stiffened in their arms, and then relaxed. Tav buried their face in Eli’s neck, smelling laundry detergent and ripe hawthorn berries.
“Sorry,” murmured Eli into their hair. “But it’s not my fault you’re a worrier.”
Tav pulled back, eyes searching Eli’s. “The risk. We can’t —”
“We have to. This doesn’t change anything. I’m back, aren’t I?” Eli’s eyes swirled black and yellow. The spiralling pupils made Tav dizzy, and they had to look away.
“You two are so boring,” complained Clytemnestra. “I liked it better when you were trying to knife each other.”
“We can always play target practice with you, if you’d like.” Eli pulled the frost blade from its sheath and tossed it in the air. She caught it with the blade down. When she opened her hand, Tav expected to see a deep cut, but she was unmarked. The blade had chosen not to harm her.
“We have to get to the Coven,” said Tav.
“Of course you do. Isn’t that why you’re here? You didn’t want to miss out on all the fun. I know you” — Clytemnestra pointed at Tav — “know how to have a good time.”
“What fun?” broke in Eli.
“Oh, it’s going to be the best game.” Clytemnestra wriggled with excitement. “We’re going to destroy the Coven. You came just in time for the war.”
“The Earth —”
“Can wait,” said Clytemnestra. “Tonight is for harm. You can heal tomorrow — if there’s enough of you left.” Her smile was cruel and taunting.
“There isn’t time —”
“When the Coven has fallen, it will be safer,” said Tav quietly. “We can wait until then, can’t we?”
Light flooded Eli’s body. “Hurry up and finish your war. We have work to do.”
Quick as a cobra striking its prey, Clytemnestra lunged for Eli. She snatched Eli’s hair and forced her head back, so their faces were pressed together.
“I don’t take orders from you,” she hissed. She laughed, and it echoed through the Labyrinth. Then she vanished, her laughter still dancing in the room.
Forty-Eight
THE HEIR
Kite could still feel Eli’s teeth on her fingertips. The thrill sent shivers of excitement up her spine. Strands of hair like twisted seaweed drifted in front of her face. The walls melted away before her, welcoming her into their secret chambers and passageways. The sacrificial tears were devoured by stone. Kite plucked a few hairs and added them to the offering. She didn’t want to owe the Labyrinth a debt — it had saved Eli twice now.
She’s back.
The Beast nipped at her ankles with love bites. He was still invisible. Kite’s excitement was contagious; she could see it in the aquamarine swirls of light that bloomed from each step, from each breath; she could see it in the walls that darkened with seawater as she passed, trailing a finger on the damp, cold surface.
She pressed a palm against rock, and mossy seaweed studded with black pearls crawled through the cracks. The Labyrinth was reshaping itself around her emotions, studded with shells and sand and the fossils of crustaceans.
Kite watched as her joy spread down the corridor.
It stopped.
A small hand, no bigger than a child’s, was pressed against the wall. Slowly, the seaweed began to dry, matting like unwashed hair. The shells crumbled into dust. The water evaporated, leaving only traces of salt like frost on the pure white alabaster.
Clytemnestra.
“Feelings,” the baby witch growled, fingers arching into claws.
Kite’s hand dropped to her side. “Must you?”
“Yes.” Clytemnestra picked up a piece
