The Harlequin   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

The visual in my head was of my leopard finding a metal wall in her path. She snarled at it and reacted like any self-respecting leopard would if a giant wall suddenly appeared in the forest path. She ran. The leopard ran back the way she had come, to hide in that empty, full, dark place where all the beasts seemed to wait inside me. It was like the blackness of space before the light found it, except it was inside me somewhere. I don't explain the show, sometimes I just watch it.

A woman's voice, half singing, beautiful and pure and strangely joyous, spoke from inside the open doors. «Let it begin at last, our contest, Jean-Claude. Your servant has struck the first blow.»

I yelled, «It was an accident.» But it was too late. I had done metaphysics. Either she didn't realize how little control I had over some of my powers, or she was using it as an excuse to start the fight. Either way, shit.

Graham offered me his hand, and I took it. He dragged me and Nathaniel up off the steps. His hand in mine was just a hand, just warmth. Maybe he wasn't armed, and maybe he didn't understand how to take cover, but in that moment no one else with us could have dragged me to my feet without complicating things. I looked up and found Edward with his hand on Olaf's stomach, or lower chest. Olaf would have helped me off the steps, and Edward had stopped it. He looked at me, and the look was enough. They weren't psychic enough to tell the difference between beasts rising and the ardeur rising, not in its early stages. Edward didn't want to have it spread to him, and he was going to make certain it didn't spread to Olaf. I pushed the thought away, into that crowded cage that all the other thoughts had gone into for the last few days and hours. Think about it later . We were running up the steps. Graham had my right hand, but we weren't supposed to be pulling guns tonight, right?



chapter forty-three

FACES TURNED TO us as we stumbled through the door. There was no vestibule, so the three of us were just suddenly in view of the crowd. Nathaniel and I were breathing as if we'd run a mile. Only Graham was calm at my side. Edward and Olaf fanned out to either side of us. Micah moved wide around us all. Was he still fighting off his beast? I trusted him to handle it. I had to trust him, because there were things happening that I didn't trust anyone else to handle.

The area behind the pulpit had become a stage. There were three people on stage in masks. What could only be Columbine and Giovanni were to the left.