Page 40 of All Hallows Fate

“Virgil,” I breathed, and leapt from Fuzzball’s back, the impact of my feet driving into the ground not even registering.

Shadows gathered around me with eagerness, helping me float past sharp, jagged rocks and fluffy moss the rich colour of jewels. It barely hit my radar that I was flying1 because all my attention was fixed on the bulky form of my brother.

I had a brother. Two brothers. I had family. And one of them was right here, lifting his head as I landed six feet away from him.

My heart lurched, nerves twisting up my belly as I waited for him to recognise me.

Instead, a rolling growl came from his chest. I didn’t have enough time to twist away before he leapt, powerful paws slamming into my shoulders, driving me to the ground. Teeth the size of daggers closed in on my throat.

26

Cat

Hope died in my chest, its decay spreading a lethargy to my limbs so I barely managed to close my fingers around the scales hidden in a deep pocket of magic in time. My fingers brushed cool metal—cold even after hours of resting against my body heat—and I tore the scales free, thrusting them between us before Virgil could rip my face off.

I didn’t want to kill Virgil. I didn’t even want him hurt, but there was no way to know what the scales would do when faced with a threat to my life. They’d tried to crush the life from the last threat to me, and their failure to kill Violence still rankled, but I needed Virgil alive. He was my family, my brother. He knew who I was, like my husbands knew who I was. I craved that connection to my former life with a hunger that made my chest hurt.

“Virgil,” I panted, looking into his eyes as a blast of light from the scales and nudged him back three feet. His heart still beat, furry chest moved with the bellows of great lungs, but he shook his head over and over. Panic sank its claws into my heart as I scrambled to my feet, holding the glowing scales between us. “Do you know me? It’s Cat. Your sister…”

My voice fell flat, no confidence in it, and the scales seemed to respond to my doubt. But instead of dimming, the pink-tinged illumination grew, casting itself across the gorge until light beamed into the sky and I had to squint to even make out the shadow of my brother.

The thread that had tugged me towards the scales sang now with a deep vibration, and goosebumps swept down my arms. There’d been a severe injustice here, enforced on every one of the gorge’s inhabitants, and it wasn’t just the scales that reacted. My rage flickered, a match sputtering to life, and then the fire caught, latched on, and blazed.

A crime had been committed, with each of these creatures a victim. A coal burned red hot in my chest. The scientist was dead—my husbands had told me as much. The woman whose orders she followed was dead, along with Cruelty who pulled her strings. But Violence. The coal flared hotter as the magic within me judged him and found him guilty.

Not only of my death and torture, but the suffering of these innocent people, too. A low growl built in my chest and Virgil took a step back, lowering his head in deference to a predator far higher on the food chain.

“Cat,” Misery called, but Death interrupted him.

“No, don’t interrupt. She’s judging them.”

It sent a thrill through me that he understood my magic, sensed its importance, and showed me the respect both that ancient title—Judgement—and the scales demanded. It made a more human, feminine part of me purr, too. My husband knew I was dangerous, knew this was my job, and trusted me to handle it.

The scales’ light slowly, gradually swept back from the grey sky above, past the ragged stone of the chasm, and into the rose gold metal, winking from the faceted morganite before it went dull. Dormant once more.

When I lifted my head, it was to see every wild animal in the gorge focused on me, no doubt why Miz had tried to warn me, but the creatures didn’t attack. They didn’t move at all. A frown tugged at my brow until I realised this was instinct—fight, flight, or fawn, and every animal, every predator in the gorge, had chosen fawn. They stood so perfectly still and prayed the apex predator in their midst didn’t notice them.

But I did. I scanned every animal, searching their eyes for intelligence, watching it sharpen in so many stares, until a smile pulled at my lips.

“I think,” I said, walking slowly through the gorge toward my husbands, “you should be able to shift now.”

The scales had judged their innocence, had sifted through the injustice wreaked upon them, and had undone it.

The power made me a little dizzy. Not the magic itself, but the ability to affect things on this scale. The power to blast a bestial curse into threads and cobwebs.

The second I was close enough, Tor dragged me into his arms and held me so tightly my bones ached.

“You’re gonna give me a fucking heart attack, beautiful,” he groaned into my hair, tucking my head under his chin, a kiss feathering over my crown. “Please stop running headfirst into danger. For the sake of my health.”

I wrapped the scales in their shadow and sent them back into the pocket where they sat, calm, against my skin. My arms found their way around Tor’s waist, my desire to have him closer overriding any awkwardness I might have felt. His scent drowned out everything else, the feel of his heart beating profound for reasons I couldn’t articulate. It was as if I’d been scared to lose him, scared something bad would tear him away from me, and the relief of having him back was overpowering.

“Tor, were you…” I began, unsure. “Were you in danger? Recently?”

His chest brushed mine when he loosed a great sigh. “You could say that. Those prick siblings had me trapped in a mirror, separated from all of you.”

My body knew that, my soul knew and remembered the panic. It was just taking my mind a little longer to catch up.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” I said, forcing myself to unwind my arms and step back or I’d never let him go.