City of Souls

11

It was all so obvious now. It was a bar, the heat was unbearable, and the bartender had offered the first one “on the house,” presumably to get me hooked. I realized from the way my fellow players watched me that they’d each come to these same conclusions, and that none of them were fighting it. I can do this, I thought, trying to shake my head of the drink. I succeeded only in making myself dizzy.

With Tripp gone, I starting winning easily. I had to be the most “sober” person at the table, though every time someone sipped from their eternally full glasses, every time they licked their lips or swallowed hard, I greedily followed the movement. Even the wasteful beads of sweat on their foreheads were suddenly as enticing as a cold spring in summer. I quickly grew a begrudging respect for Tripp. I was dying of thirst, and I’d only been fighting it for…how long?

But I was also cleaning up at power poker.

Shen finally had enough.

“Why don’t you go up where you belong,” he spat when I raked a pile of chips toward me that included his sense of smell. He bet that power instead of the one he’d taken from me, which told me how valuable mine was, and that I definitely wanted it back.

If possible, my movements slowed even further because what Shen meant was up with the whores. Too bad for him I hadn’t handed over the chip containing my temper, because I’d had far less to drink than he, and had the reflexes to prove it. Yet even before I could swing, Boyd was pushing me back into my chair. The effort it’d taken just to get up drained me.

“That’s the second fight you’ve been involved with at this table today!” He shook his finger in my face like he was scolding a child.

“He insinuated I was a whore!”

Boyd’s eyes did a full rotation. “He insinuated you were a woman, though it’s hard to believe given your color.”

“You can go upstairs at any time,” the albino said, finally revealing the source of his obvious resentment. “Not like us.”

“How about another drink to calm yourself, sweetie?” I turned at the voice that bloomed beside me, and Bill gifted me with that deadly hot smile. Yet it was the sweet-smelling liquor in his hand that had my heart racing. Light refracted off the gold liquid, and sweat poured down my face.

God, I wanted it. Even knowing what it was and did, I couldn’t help it; I was literally dying of thirst.

I reached for my bag, and the wallet inside. Xavier’s money was still in there. If I could go upstairs-get away from these men and heat and drink long enough to clear my head-surely this Solange woman would accept a pile of bills as payment for those chips. I’d make the trade and find my way out after that. Maybe I’d be strong enough to play Shen for my last chip, though more likely I’d have to leave it. I knew not to chase my losses.

But my wallet wasn’t there. I emptied the entire contents of my satchel onto the table, not caring that I was holding up the game, that Shen looked like he wanted to lunge at me again, or that Boyd was nervously eyeing his felt. I’d had the money when I entered…

My gaze rose slowly to the top of the staircase. Diana, who’d bumped against me at the bar, was there, smiling. And fanning herself with a small stack of bills.

Pushing from the table, I fumbled at my belongings as she disappeared from sight. I had to go up there, and not merely for money. Whether I learned Jaden Jacks’s secrets or not, I wasn’t leaving pieces of myself lying around this so-called Rest House.

Though my trek to the staircase was almost painfully slow, no one tried to stop me, and I was steadier when I hit the second floor landing. Aged floorboards creaked beneath my weight in the silent, empty hallway. Tired and on edge, I wiped the back of my neck, trying to recall a time when I’d been so exhausted. Not to mention this afraid of the heat. I looked down at the saloon, and the red door with its glowing frame. I’d grown up in the desert, and knew its dangers, but this was different. It was as if fire was being held back behind it, and chasing me up the stairway too.

The men below stared at me with hollow eyes, envy warring with their curiosity as they wondered which woman-Diana or Solange-I’d go after first. Mackie remained slumped over on his piano stool, and from this angle I could see the layer of dust coating the instrument, the keys, and even the wide lapels of his dark jacket. The whole room, I thought, looked like a living museum, a reenactment of the Wild West where visitors could pay to walk into the past. The difference? Those people paid with coin, not power…and they could walk back out into their proper reality whenever they chose.

Bill, ever solicitous, nodded up at me, and Boyd remained granite-faced while puffing on his pipe. I’d drawn the attention of the other half-dozen dealers, and returned their nods as if doing nothing more than taking in the scenery. In reality, as I regained my strength, I surveyed the room like a map.

The most direct path to the poster board was through the center of all those dealers. I counted the steps it would take me to get from the stairs to the wall of lanterns, then did it again from the poster board across the room. If I could risk the energy, which seemed unlikely since I’d barely made it up here, that would be my next stop in looking for Jacks. I shuddered, though, as my gaze fell on my poster. Its half-inished state made my features appear erased rather than the reverse.

That was a worry for later. First Tripp, my powers…and Solange.

I gave the other side of the hallway a cursory glance, needing to know what was at my back. All of the women had disappeared, though their muted voices sounded like cooing doves behind a trio of closed wooden doors. Unlike the red door downstairs, each of these sported only one symbol: a triangle like those on the gaming chips I’d been given downstairs. So they represented powers of some sort…but what?

I turned back to the solo door at the other end of the hall, expecting-and finding-the fourth triangle. I didn’t know why it was set apart from the rest, or why Solange was either, but it irked me that the very woman who’d told the others I’d come to them in such a husky, self-assured voice was the one I most needed to see. I rapped on the door hard, and, after a few silent moments, pushed it open.

“Hello?” I strained to see into a surprisingly complete darkness. “Solange? Tripp?”

I had to brace a hand against the wall to maintain equilibrium in the absolute dark. Everywhere I gazed-up, straight ahead, down-was inky depthlessness so complete I couldn’t tell if I was entering a space spanning the width of my arms or one the size of a state. No way was I letting that door shut behind me.

There has to be a light switch somewhere, I thought, just as my fingers fumbled across one. It was a flip switch, and when powered on, lit twelve small squares along the remaining three walls. The glow from those palm-sized windows was enough to allow me my bearings…and reveal that this was neither a small space nor vast. It was simply a modest-sized square room, containing only those tiny, eye-level windows.

And a woman centered in the middle.

At first I wasn’t sure this was Solange. From the way the men spoke of her, the way the women listened, I’d expected a lethal beauty, and hers was not. She bore little ornamentation, only fragile gold hoops with colored gem drops and intricate scrollwork at her ears. Beautiful, but not ostentatious.

Her hair was an unremarkable brown, parted simply down the middle to fall past her shoulders in uneven lengths, her attire simple; a fitted silk dress running from neck to ankles, shoulders to wrists, in a dual pattern of chocolate hues that played off the depth of her hair. A lace inset drew the eye to a slashing V-neck that ended snugly at her navel, but the silk was so sheer her every curve was revealed. The eye even strained toward it beneath the fluctuating pattern, and I realized that was its allure. It showed nothing and everything at once.

“Hello.” She stood before a wooden cart with iron-rimmed wheels. It was lined in unrelieved black silk, pillows and cushions and throws all dangerously soft and smooth. A rope that disappeared into the depthless ceiling hooked to a bar across the middle, and other than the silken interior, the entire contraption looked like it belonged in a mine shaft. “I’m Solange.”

That she greeted me so openly both eased and alarmed me.

“Where’s Tripp?” I asked as she perched a hip on the cart.

She stared at one of the small square windows, studying it with solemn focus. “Did you really come here to ask that question?”

“Well, it wasn’t for the pleasures of the flesh,” I shot back, jaw clenched.

Solange sighed, and gave me a quick once-over, pursing her lips in what was either disgust or distaste.

“I don’t know what to do about the color, okay?” And I chafed at the idea that someone could look at my body-mine, Joanna Archer’s, in its strength and truth and perfect imperfections-and find something lacking. Perhaps I’d once done the same, but that was before it’d been so abruptly taken from me.

“No, you don’t,” she agreed, and my mouth was already open for a rebuke when she added, “but that’s not what I was observing.”

She climbed into the cart in a slide of chocolate silk, holding up her shift as she settled. Crossing the room in a much clumsier fashion, I grabbed her arm, forcing her to look at me. There was, I noted, even a glamour to the narrowing of her eyes. I didn’t care. “I want my power back.”

“Of course you do.” Her voice was unstrained, and she didn’t pull away, just sunk back until she was leaning upon the pillows. Feeling too aggressive against that pretty passiveness, I let her go. “What do you have to barter for it?”

I started to answer, but Solange tilted her head. “And don’t say money either. The only use we have for that wad of paper is in the lavatory.”

I knew. Diana had been fucking with me, drawing me upstairs. But why?

“I can tell you’re not stupid, honey, so don’t make me treat you as if you are. You now know what we trade in here.”

I finally nodded.

Solange crossed her legs at her knees. “Tripp doesn’t like you. He told me you’re not to be trusted.”

“Tripp and I are natural enemies.”

“So you’re of the Light.”

“Not exactly.”

She tilted her head. “Come,” she said after a bit, and motioned for me to join her. “I have something to show you.”

“Is it a poker chip embossed with my powers?”

“You are persistent,” she said, shifting to make room. “I’ll give you that.”

And that was it. No asking, begging, threats, or yelling. She just watched me expectantly with those great dark eyes. Seeing no other choice, I climbed in. Whatever she wanted to show me couldn’t be more shocking than everything I’d already experienced.

I hoped.

I’d expected to be nestled snugly beside Solange, but the interior of the cart expanded as I settled in, and I found myself sinking backward on a sea of smooth, limitless silk. Every muscle in my body relaxed, fatigue dogging me after the heat from downstairs. If I could just close my eyes…

Solange struck a match, the small sound an exaggerated zip that had my eyes flipping back open, but she was only lighting a small tea light in a cutout obviously designed for the purpose. She then pushed a button, leaning back as machinery above us kicked into gear. We rose in a slow wave, the light from the twelve tiny windows dropping away until they sparked out altogether. The pitch-dark coupled with my fatigue to make me feel stationary, so the sound of those grinding gears drawing closer was all that let me know I was still rising.

Our halt was jarring, and my melting limbs flew outward involuntarily. Solange murmured an apology. The light from her tea candle continued to burn stick-straight, as it had on our entire ascent, as if the flame too was being pulled upward, but other than that, and her delicate outline, there was nothing more to see.

Of course, maybe that was the purpose. Because the more I stared at Solange, the prettier she appeared. Some women were like that. I knew from living in Olivia’s skin that her effect on others was also instantaneous. However, Solange’s growing appeal was different. It was like the removal of blinders, or scales falling from the eyes. Even in the continual dimness her beauty grew more defined. She had delicate fingers and wrists, poised now over a tiny wheel, and her hair glowed softer than the silk surrounding me. Her half-lit silhouette was honeyed, her long neck as smooth as fragile ceramic. I suddenly found myself wondering how I ever could have believed her plain, and the thought that she’d need any ornamentation was so laughable I actually snorted.

Gripping that small steel wheel, she began twisting it. I felt like I was levitating. I’d once seen a man thrown into a black hole-a created one, sure, but a black hole nonetheless-and I felt as he’d looked then; rotating, softly spinning in space, my body pulled in unnatural and strange directions. I leaned my head back and couldn’t tell if my eyes were open or closed, and just as I decided I didn’t care, hundreds of stars burst to life around me.

I sat up on an awed exhalation. My rational mind told me I was at the center of a hollowed-out sphere, that the heaven engulfing me, embracing me as if I’d long been lost, was actually a metallic ceiling, and a bevy of mechanisms worked behind the scenes. But the sensation of being cradled in the pinpricked firmament was like a clap of thunder in my breast.

My God. Did I really identify this closely with the constellations? Because it felt like bloodline and lineage were rearing their heads, letting me know that for all my careful control, I was still very much at the mercy of the planets. I let my gaze wander, mentally crisscrossing lines to link the stunning little orbs into patterns of familiar constellations. It was a perfect diorama of the night sky. And yet, the stars…

“Are those…?” I leaned forward, squinting as I focused on the constellations winging overhead.

“Yes.” She sighed, like she was window shopping at Tiffany’s. “Minerals and some organics. No synthetics.”

“Gems?” There had to be millions of dollars worth splayed out above me.

“Jewelry befitting the sky,” Solange confirmed. “I’ve been collecting them for years.”

Unlike the others in my troop, I hadn’t been raised observing and adoring the natural night sky. Sure, I’d thought it cool and all, but pretty much the only thing I could pick out with any certainty was the Big Dipper, which I did now. “There are some missing,” I said, noting that the Little Dipper was shot through with pinpoints of light, but had no gems.

“Typical of someone with your coloring. Missing what is there and finding fault with what’s not.”

Surprised, I drew back at the venom in Solange’s voice. “No, I was just-”

“It doesn’t matter!” she snapped, eyes suddenly as fiery and fierce as the jewels above. “I’ll fill the entire sky soon enough, and then I’ll be the First.” She tilted her head sharply. “You don’t have a problem with that, do you?”

“What?” I didn’t know what she was talking about, and I was taken aback by her sudden anger. “No.”

Leaning back, she resettled silk over her knees. “Good.”

I tried to relax or at least look like I was relaxed. I didn’t trust her, especially after that little outburst, but I had a hard time pushing back the peace I felt amidst all this beauty. The cloud of pillows was soft at my back, and still spinning, the air a mere whisper against my skin. I wished I could undress just to feel more of it. My eyes began fluttering shut again.

“In the past, the constellations were what brought people the nightly news.” Solange’s voice arose beside me, closer than I thought she’d be, but I didn’t open my eyes. “A person ignored the heavens at their own risk.”

“Couldn’t be any less accurate than modern-day meteorologists,” I murmured before catching myself, but when I looked at Solange, she only nodded. I sighed. She might not know where I was from, but surely she knew when I was from. My dress, my speech, even my hair and deportment, all modern. Her, however? She could have been from just about anywhere, any place. Any time.

“Because meteorologists study maps and currents and calculations. They neglect to look up. They forget that the word cosmos means ‘harmonious order.’” Her dark eyes glittered. “The heavens are as ordered as the western calendar. Vikings sailed by it. Pilots used it to train in night navigation. If you read the skies correctly, you can even anticipate what will happen next. Nothing drawn upon the sky is by mistake.”

I tilted my head back to the ceiling, quietly sharing her awe if not her knowledge. “Are you like Bill or Boyd?”

What else could she be, I thought, but some sort of supernatural being? A phenomenon, I thought, looking at her. One as breathtaking as a shooting star. “No. I am my own.”

Her pursed lips and flat response made me feel like I’d failed a test.

She sat back, nearly disappearing into the shadows. “You’re looking for Jaden.”

That brought me to full alert. “You know him?”

“You could say.” The shrug was in her voice. “Is he still a romantic at heart? Belief in the individual, in choice, etcetera and so on?”

“I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know him at all.”

Solange shifted her attention away from the sky. “Then why are you looking for him?”

“I broke something. That Shadow knows how to fix it.” Except that he hadn’t fixed the changeling, I now knew. Jacks had killed him.

“He is good with his hands,” she said wistfully, and it was clear she wasn’t talking about tools. “But I haven’t seen JJ in years. Your lantern’s been locked.”

I shook my head. “I didn’t have any problems getting in.”

She shrugged. “Then someone unlocked it.”

“So…” Jacks wasn’t in Midheaven? I’d lost power, and he’d been in Vegas all along? “Well, do you know where he might be?”

“Is Warren Clarke still the leader of Light?”

That surprised me into momentary silence. “Yes.”

“Then I suggest you ask him.”

“How would…” I never finished the thought. My mind raced, searching for a time when a manual or even Warren had mentioned Jacks and Shadow agent in the same sentence. Coming up blank, I realized I had just assumed, and Warren had let me. “You mean…”

“Jaden is Light, dear.”

My dizzy-headedness wasn’t due to heat or drink or spinning stars. Everything I’d believed had just realigned into a different, unrecognizable pattern. I could understand Zane not telling me-he was the record keeper and had a cosmic obligation to remain a neutral force between Shadow and Light-but Warren…

All this time he’d let me act on the assumption that Jacks was a Shadow. “This is making me sick to my stomach.”

Solange immediately sat up, pushing the button so our slow spinning came to a stop. The heavens above ceased their movement.

“It’s that god-awful drink,” she muttered, and bent over, returning quickly with a simple gold flask. “Here. Wash it away.”

I sniffed. Water. I took one sip, then found myself guzzling it. The cloying finish of the drink downstairs disappeared, and my head cleared. Sheepish, I pulled the flask away before I emptied it. Solange smiled and waved at me to hold onto it. “It’s okay. I have more.”

By the time I finished the water, the nausea had faded.

“Warren hasn’t told you anything, has he?” she said softly as I closed my eyes. “He just sent you into a whole new world without even mentioning what this place is and does.”

I whimpered. She leaned me back again, like I was a child.

“You’ve spent many years at war with yourself. That’s why you’re gray.” She pressed a finger to my skin, looking at it like she expected to come away with soot on the shiny tips. “Toxins ooze from your pores. You doubt who you are and your place in that world. But here, you can embrace all your contradictions.”

“Like you do?”

She nodded as she leaned back, shutting her eyes, beautiful in repose. “I choose to be. Myself. In the moment. With the person I’m with. It’s simple, really. Anyone can do it.”

And there was something about Solange that was authentic. Maybe that’s why she was so beautiful. Maybe I was looking at the best her, the most her. That sort of comfort with oneself was rare.

I certainly wasn’t there yet.

Which reminded me…“I need my power back.”

“Why?” To her credit, Solange only cracked an eyelid. “No, really. Why?”

“Because it’s a part of me. I entered the world wholly and I want to leave the same way.”

“Nobody can walk through the world unchanged.” She nestled farther into the inky darkness. “Besides, the moment is all that matters. Control that and you control all. That’s true power.”

I found her lack of sentiment unnerving, and her dismissal of the people and events that marked and made a person was ruthless. Yet her eyes were soft when she turned her face back to mine.

“You look tired,” she said, voice honey-rich. “Maybe you’re coming down with something?”

That’s certainly what it felt like. My head pounded and my limbs were heavy. My skin ached and the nausea from before threatened again. Even Solange’s soft hand stroking my forearm was an irritant. Only the enveloping silk was welcome. A thought visited me: But superheroes don’t get sick.

“The water…”

The water…drugged…too late…

My eyelids were heavy, my limbs numb. “Oh, no…”

“Oh, yes.” Her words were sharp, her fingertips silken as she stroked my cheek. My eyes fluttered shut.

“I drank…”

“What you were given. Silly girl.”

And I nose-dived into sleep, the universe pulsing around me.

Fire greeted me on the other side of wakefulness; innocuous flames dancing atop a tiered cake, twenty-six candles burning in celebration. There were symbols on the cake, ones I should recognize, but my knowledge of them lay like words on the tip of my tongue; both there and not until their meaning dissolved. I panned backward, as you do in dreams, to find myself standing in Saturn’s Orchard, the training room and dojo in my troop’s sanctuary. Pink and white paper streamers hung fifty feet from the pyramid’s hollowed apex, and the mirrored walls that normally flashed star signs across their surfaces picked up the girly color, lightly hued at the tip, depth graduating in degree until reaching a toothaching fuchsia at the base. It was clear I’d walked in on a birthday celebration, and from the plastic crown nestled atop her head, and the wide, clownlike grin stretching Chandra’s face, I knew it was hers.

This, I realized with a start, was her twenty-sixth birthday. More than a quarter century spent in our troop, but with no star sign to inherit, and still no metamorphosis to make her “super.” I looked for any sign of bitterness or resentment, because as long as I was in the troop, Chandra would always be relegated to sidekick status, no matter how old she grew. Her dark eyes landed on me, and though they remained blank and unseeing, the too-red lips of that clown smile widened. She gave me a “howdy-do” wave, then turned to mill with her guests.

My entire troop was there, and though no one else wore a painted-on smile, they were all grinning and silly, and had been celebrating for a while. Shot glasses littered the glasstop table holding Chandra’s cake, and a full Scotch bottle was being passed from hand to hand, though it never seemed to empty. As with most drunken social gatherings, it wasn’t long before the universal, and unanswerable, questions began to fly.

Is there a God? Who’s right, the Creationists or Darwin? What is the human position in the Universe?

“What is it,” shouted Micah, staggering dangerously from his seven-foot height, “that makes the world go round?”

People began blurting their answers like they were blowing on party horns.

“Money!” Kimber said, and threw a wad into the air.

“Not true!” said Tekla, pointing a stern finger at her before toppling into a chair and passing out.

“Spoken like someone who has it,” Warren put in, slurring every syllable. He was dressed in his undercover bum attire, which he rarely wore in the sanctuary. He raised his arm in a silent toast when he saw me looking. He wasn’t holding a glass, though, because he didn’t have a hand.

I jumped, mouth falling open, but he shrugged and found a shot glass with his other hand. Draining whiskey, he then offered his own answer to the question. “Power runs this world, of course. People will spend their last dime to acquire it. Just look at me,” he said, spinning to show off his tattered trench.

“Power won’t satisfy you when you’re lying alone at night,” Felix said, one arm draped over Kimber’s shoulder, the other over Vanessa’s. “Sex rules the world, my friends. That’s why people want power. People want different sex, better sex, more sex. It’s the only valid reason to acquire money in the first place.”

“You’re all wrong.”

The place fell silent. A spotlight landed on Hunter. He was completely naked and totally aroused. Nobody commented, or even seemed to notice. They were as attentive as a roomful of reporters at a press conference, heads cocked in concentration as they tried to decipher his meaning. Vanessa had even taken out her pocket notebook, pen poised at the ready. But Hunter was staring straight at me, and he walked my way in a warrior’s beat, stopping so close I felt the heat of his breath on my lips.

“Love,” he said, putting a hand to my cheek, “is what makes this crazy world go round.”

Again, awareness that this was a dream washed over me-Hunter would never say that-but the kiss that followed certainly made my head spin. I reached out-wanting deeper, longer, more-but Hunter pulled back, palm on his lips, blinking rapidly as he looked back at me. Shocked, he whirled on his heel without another word, and the spotlight faded.

“What do you think, Jo-livia?”

I was still gazing after Hunter, who walked right through the pyramid wall and disappeared, and I had to work to turn my attention to Felix, and his unanswerable question. After a minute I shook my head. “I can’t remember.”

“That’s okay, babe,” he said, and he was suddenly standing before me, as near as Hunter had been when kissing me. I backed away. Felix and I weren’t close like that. We were only friends, and he knew it. One side of his mouth tilted in understanding. “Memories are just silent promises you once made to yourself. The moment is all that matters. Here.”

Chandra’s birthday cake suddenly appeared between us, Felix struggling to steady it on a silver platter more appropriate for medieval feasts and giant banquets. We balanced it between us, and approached Chandra, now seated on a throne and dais, the plastic silver crown lopsided on her head. When we came to a stop in front of her, she tilted her head to the other side, the soullessly blank eyes remaining fixed on me, that obscene smile never wavering.

“Make a wish,” she said, screwing up her lines…and doing it in the Tulpa’s voice. Then, just as I realized they were really sticks of dynamite, she extinguished those twenty-six candles. Blood coated my face and body, and with the heat of my father’s scorched laughter raining down on my shoulders, my dream blew up. I woke.

Screaming.

Sweating, I sat straight up in the rickety mine cart. My mouth was sandpaper dry, probably from breathing hard, though at least it was still dark and cool. I was back on the second floor, no longer lost in the stars.

“That’s odd.” Solange’s voice was tight. I swiveled to find her seated at a rough wood table, tweezers in one hand, a loupe in the other. She was frozen over a microscope, a bright lamp hanging from a ceiling rope and casting her honeyed skin lighter. The windows along the wall were muted, notable only against the inky blackness of the wall.

She still stared at me with dark, liquid eyes, though she’d changed into a pale strapless dress a shade lighter than her skin tone. Her feet were bare, toes peeking from beneath the silk folds, and her only adornment was still the gold earrings hanging like petite chandeliers, winking from her ears. She was also wearing a deep frown. “Diana was supposed to check for protective charms.”

And she rose like she was going to battle.

I scrambled to my feet, suddenly not wanting to be anywhere near her.

“I have to go.” I also had to pause to be sure my knees were steady before stepping over the cart’s side. Then I had to pause to be sure they were my knees. My unreasonable, if instinctive, fear was suddenly eclipsed. “What the…why the hell am I wearing chaps?”

“Shit-hot leather chaps,” Solange corrected, a smile broad in her voice. They were shit-hot. That and skintight, with studs securing them to my sides, and a woven belt with thick silver meshing that caught even the meager light. The mesh overlaid a batik-stamped pattern like a tiny chain-linked fence, and the result-though two-toned-was a complicated pattern that was both fierce and feminine.

It was echoed in the halter top.

I don’t do halter tops, I thought, though my cold dismay melded into horror as my eyes turned to my jewelry. I’d been wearing none upon entering the Rest House, but now I looked like some sort of Bedouin experiment gone bad. It wasn’t that the jewelry was ugly…there was just so much of it; armbands like thick silver snakes and wrists cuffed as if fettered with aged, thick silver and secured with a pin closure. I fingered heavy hoop earrings with a row of teardrops, and a choker that felt like a shackle. Rings studded every other finger in sharp points, more brass knuckles than ornamentation. I turned toward one of the windows to study my superimposed image…and found an entirely different person looking back at me.

My short black hair was slicked back and secured at the nape, with a single cornrow framing my face and threaded with silver. A rose the size of my palm was tucked behind my right ear, a bloodred punch against all the monochromatic costuming. It matched only my lips, currently drawn into a frown. The tar black shadow edging my eyes winged to my brow line.

Which also mirrored the black henna sunburst flaring from my now-pierced belly button. How long had I been out?

At least I still had my boots, I thought, sniffing. And the chaps were perfect for my knife harnesses. I caught myself halfway through this last thought and shook my head. A bell, apparently woven into my cornrow, jangled, further clearing my senses. “Where are my clothes?”

“By now? Probably incinerated. Don’t look at me,” Solange said when I spun back around. “Diana paid a visit while I was changing. There’s your wallet, by the way. Tell me, how do you feel?”

Like an odalisque escapee from a goth harem, I thought, gingerly touching my belly ring. But I had a feeling she wasn’t merely interested in my health. I was just happy she seemed to have calmed. Picking up my wallet, I returned it to my bag. Studying the rifled contents, I muttered, “They went through it.”

“Of course. They knew you wouldn’t just tell them who you are.”

I flipped the bag over my shoulder and fumbled for the door at the sole blank wall, hands searching for the knob.

“Who armored you?”

I turned back. “What?”

She went from sitting at that table to standing in front of me, and I swore I hadn’t blinked. “Who. Armored. You?”

“I don’t know what-”

Something slapped me. But Solange never moved. “Who armored you?”

“Please,” I said before I could help it…

“Who, who, who-”

She flanked my every side but I still hadn’t seen her move. Then she was gone and I knew she was behind me. The scent of whipped rose wafted over my shoulder, and I stood so still I stopped breathing.

“Who the fuck is protecting your soul?”

Only my lips moved. “Y-You’re like Boyd and Bill, aren’t you? You work for the house?”

Suddenly in front of me again, she smiled, and it was beautiful. “More like Mackie.”

Where, I thought, backing up, was the fucking door?

“Calm down. I’ll let you leave.” Solange took a small step toward me. “But when you find JJ, you’re going to tell him Sola says hello. You’re going to make sure that door remains unlocked.” She licked her lips before smiling, and while alluring, there was also something feral in it. “And when you return, you’ll bring him along so I can string both your souls in my sky.”

Souls. That was why her gems were so beautiful. I thought of the men downstairs, ashy and drawn. The women, bright and alive. I shook my head even as the horror of that-all those colorful stones!-sunk in. “You can’t force me to barter my soul.”

“Of course not.” She was suddenly back at her desk, loupe in hand, hair swinging over her face as she studied a bloodred gem. After what she’d just done, the distance didn’t make me feel any safer. “Besides, you’ve already given up a third of it up for free.”

I frowned, swallowing hard. She had no reason to lie, but I didn’t know what she meant.

To clarify, she held up the precious gem between her tweezers and smiled. “Yours is the second lantern on the right.”

Your full identity isn’t revealed until you enter three times.

Giving someone your name gave her control over your soul.

And kill the rushlight in two tries…

That was what had been stripped from my body upon my passage here. I hadn’t just given up air in blowing out that candle…I’d given up a third of my soul. But how on earth had Solange gotten hold of it?

I didn’t know, but suddenly she didn’t look so beautiful. She was a spider, weaving a web of stolen gems, and I was being spun into its design. But I didn’t fight her. I didn’t know how. And I’d need all the energy I had left to me once I hit the staircase outside this door.

Women fight differently…in any world.

Oh Tekla, I thought, backing from the room. If only you knew.