Bayou Moon (The Edge #2)(98)
Author: Ilona Andrews

"I love you," she told him. "When I asked you to stay with me, I meant it."

"He’s a changeling," someone said from the back.

Cerise turned in the direction of the voice. Nobody owned up. "I’ve managed the family’s money for the last three years. I know all of your dirty secrets. Think very carefully before you start throwing rocks at the man I love, because I will throw them back and I won’t miss."

Silence answered her.

"Okay, then," she said. "Glad we got that settled. Why don’t you talk between yourselves." She turned and marched out on the balcony and walked away, around the corner, out of their sight.

Outside the heat of the swamp enveloped her and she exhaled. Tears wet her eyes and ran down her cheeks. She tried to wipe them off, but they just kept coming and coming, and she couldn’t stop.

William came around the corner and grabbed her.

She stuck her face into his chest and squeezed her eyes shut, trying to stop the tears.

He clenched her to him.

"I can’t believe you didn’t tell me," she whispered. "I asked you point-blank back in the swamp, and you didn’t tell me."

"You would never have let me come with you," he said.

"We’re trapped," she whispered. "I just want to be happy, William. I want to be with you and I don’t want anybody to die, and I can’t have that."

He gripped her shoulders, pushing her away so he could look in her face. His eyes were driven. "Burn the journal, Cerise. Listen to me, damn you!"

"Too late," she told him. "You know it’s too late. The Hand will come for us, if not now, then in a week or a month. You said it yourself: they can’t afford to let any of us live. And even if they did, if they use the Box, it won’t just mean war. It will mean the end of the world in the Weird, because they will make these creatures and then they won’t be able to control them."

"Let me handle it," he told her.

"Twenty agents against you alone? Are you out of your mind?" She wiped her tears with the back of her sleeve. "If I offered to go up against twenty agents, you would pitch a fit. We have no choice."

He hugged her, his hands stroking her hair. They stood together for a long time. Eventually, she stirred. "I have to go back. It won’t be okay, will it?"

William swallowed. "No."

"That’s what I thought," she said. She turned around and went back to the library.

Inside familiar faces waited for her. Aunt Pete, Aunt Murid, Ignata, Kaldar. Grandmother Az sitting in a corner, letting her run the family into the ground. Cerise sat at the table and braided the fingers of her hands together. Gods, she wished for guidance. But the person in the sky, the one she always asked for advice, was apparently running around in the woods, killing things at random.

Her grandfather had murdered her grandmother. If she thought about it too long, it made her want to rip her hair out.

Richard was off, too, gone to blow off steam.

Who am I kidding? she wondered. Richard would never be all right. None of them would ever be all right.

"It has to be the Drowned Dog Puddle," she said. They went to gather berries there every year to make the wine. It was a big family affair: children gathered the berries, women cleaned them, men talked . . . "What else could it be?"

Murid said, "Nothing else. Vernard didn’t know anything else."

The question had to be asked and so she asked it. "What do we do now?"

"What do you want us to do?" Murid’s clear eyes found her, propped her up like a crutch. "You are in charge. You lead and we follow."

Nobody disputed her words. Cerise had expected them to. "We must destroy the Box."

"Or die trying," Kaldar said.

Aunt Pete shook her head. "We all benefited from Vernard’s knowledge. We studied his books, we learned from him, we made wine together. He was family."

Cerise looked to Kaldar. "Kaldar?"

"They’re right," he said. "I hate it, but we must fight. It’s a Mar affair. Our land and our war, and it won’t be done until we’ve chased the freaks from our swamp." He hesitated and scowled, deep lines breaking at the corners of his mouth. "I’m glad we have the blueblood. I don’t care if he is a changeling. He fights like a demon."

They blocked her on every turn. Cerise turned to Grandmother and knelt by her. An old word slipped out, the one she used when she was a child.

"Meemaw …"

Grandmother Az heaved a small sigh and touched Cerise’s hair. "Sometimes there are things that are best to be done and things that are right to be done. We all know which is which."

Murid slid her chair back. "That settles it."

Cerise watched them go and a sick feeling of guilt sucked at her stomach. Nausea started low within her belly and crept its way up. She was tired of the last dinners before the big battle. Tired of counting the faces and trying to guess how many more she would lose.

A hard, heavy clump of pain settled in her chest. She rubbed at it.

Her grandmother’s fingers ran through her hair. "Poor child," Grandmother Az whispered. "Poor, poor child …"

WILLIAM strode down the hill, carrying the Mirror’s bag. Gaston chased him.

"So that’s it?"

"That’s it. We get our shit together and go fight the Hand."

Gaston mulled it over. "Will we win?"

"Nope."

"Where are we going now?"

"We’re going to make sure that this insane family doesn’t get wiped out, if we win."

Gaston frowned.

"Insurance," William told him.

"Wait!" Lark’s voice rang behind them.

William turned. Lark dashed down the slope, skinny legs flashing. She braked in front of them and thrust a teddy bear into William’s hands.

"For you. So you don’t die."

She whipped around and ran back up the hill.

William looked at the teddy. It was old. The fabric had thinned down to threads in spots, and he could see the stuffing through the weave. It was the same one she had up in her tree.

He pulled his bag open and very carefully put the teddy bear in. "Come on."

They walked down, away from the house, deeper into the swamp.

" ‘ Where the fisherman waits,’ " William quoted. "What does that mean to you?"

"It could be a lot of places. There is a whole bunch of Fisherman’s this and Fisherman’s that in the swamp."

"Vernard wouldn’t know many places. This place has to be close. Some place your family would go often."

Gaston frowned. "It might be the Drowned Dog Puddle. It’s a bad place. The thoas used to come there to die."