do something I would never have considered before that point.
“I crossed a line,” I said quietly. “Lines, plural. I did things I shouldn’t have done. It wasn’t right. And I knew it. But . . . I wanted to help the little girl. And I . . .”
“Sinned?” she suggested, her large eyes eerily serene. “Chose the left-hand path? Fell from grace? Cast the world into madness?”
“Whatever,” I said.
“And you think you aren’t a monster.” Calmly, she folded the parasol again and trailed its tip in the snow, humming a quiet little song.
That cold, sick feeling swelled and began to spread even more. I found myself shivering. Dear God, she was right. She was exactly right. I hadn’t meant any of it to hurt anyone, but did that really matter? I had made a decision to do something I knew was wrong. I bargained my life away to Queen Mab, promised her my service and loyalty, though I knew that the darkness of the mantle of the Winter Knight would swallow me, that my talents and strengths could be subsumed into wicked service for the Queen of Air and Darkness.
My little girl’s life had been on the line when I made that choice, when I had acquired power beyond the ken of most mortals.
I thought of the desperation in the eyes of Fitz and his gang. I thought of the petty malice of Baldy and those like him. Of the violence in the streets.
How many other men’s daughters had died because of my choice?
That thought, that truth, hit me like a landslide, a flash of clarity and insight that erased every other thought, the frantic and blurry activity of my recent efforts.
Like it or not, I had embraced the darkness. The fact that I had died before I could have found myself used for destructive purposes meant nothing. I had picked up a red lightsaber. I had joined the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
I had become what I always fought.
There was no denying it. No chance to correct my mistake. I suddenly wanted, desperately, to simply drop back into the grave and seek out the quiet and peace I had found there. Dammit, but I wanted to rest.
I folded my arms and stared at Inez. My voice came out ragged and harsh. “You aren’t the ghost of a little girl.”
Her little face lit up with another smile. “If I am no ghost, why do you look so haunted?”
And then she was gone. No sound, no flash, no nothing. Just gone.
If I were living, then the headache I felt coming on would be typical of this kind of situation. Cryptic supernatural entities go with the territory in my line of work.
But, man, I hate it when they get in the last word.
“An insufferable entity,” murmured a slow, deep, redolent basso voice behind me. “Her soul is made of crooked lines.”
I stiffened. I hadn’t sensed any kind of presence the way I had with Inez, and I knew exactly what could happen when you let someone sneak up behind you. Even though rule number one for dealing with supernatural beings—never show fear—is simple, it sure as hell isn’t easy. I know the kinds of things that are out there.
I turned, very calmly and slowly, reminding myself that I didn’t have a heart to pound wildly, and that there wasn’t really any sweat on my palms. I didn’t need to shiver from fear any more than I needed to shiver from cold.
My self apparently found its own assurances unreliable. Stupid self.
There was a tall and menacing figure floating in the air behind me, maybe three feet off the ground. It was swathed entirely in a rich cloak of patina, its hood lifted, creating an area of completely black shadow within. You could see the dim suggestion of a face in the blackness. It looked like the old images of the Shadow, who clouded the minds of men. The cloak wavered and billowed slowly in a breeze with the approximate viscosity of a lava lamp.
“Um,” I said. “Hi.”
The figure drifted downward until its feet were resting atop the snow. “Is this preferable?”
“Aren’t we literal?” I said. “Uh, yes. That’s fine.” I peered at it. “You’re . . . Eternal Silence. The statue on Dexter Graves’s monument.”
Eternal Silence just stood there in silence.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said. “I guess you aren’t really just a local statue. Are you?”
“Your assumption is correct,” Eternal Silence replied.
I nodded. “What do you want?”
It drifted slowly closer. The