Page 68 of Corvus and the Broken God

She stepped closer. My heart raced. “Well, as of now, Chaac has agreed to take him to the underground caves. Your lover can’t swim, did you know that?”

“Yes, he did actually admit as much to me.”

“Did he?” Her eyes narrowed further.

“So, then what? You’ll leave him in a cave with the only exit being underwater?”

“See, I was right about you. You aren’t that stupid. My husband will never willingly submerge his head underwater. He almost drowned centuries back, and the memory has, shall we say, stuck with him.”

I thought about the pools under the house and the hidden pool in the center of the house. They were all shallow. I imagined his head under the water, the weight of his horns sucking him down. Abandoning him to a cave surrounded by stone and water would truly be a hellish punishment.

“And then what? You leave him there to starve?”

“Well, not anymore. After I handle you, I’ll cut his head off personally.”

“Did you drug him?”

“Enough.” She stepped closer, but I didn’t flinch when she pulled a rope from seemingly out of nowhere. The goddess of suicide preferred death by hanging, after all. All those nights spent reading hadn’t proved completely useless. I grabbed her wrists and struggled as she grew her muscles to overpower me. My muscles expanded as well as we struggled, doing my best while she still underestimated my abilities.

But she was ancient, more experienced, and much better at killing people. Soon, she had the upper hand, the rope tightening around my neck. Had we come this far only to let this savage kill me? Black spots danced in front of my eyes. I had barely any time left to find a way out of this. I would have to be ruthless. What would Cassandra do? I gave up on my physical struggle, pouring all my attention into my last defense. Filling my lungs one last time, I dove inside her mind as I had done once before. Pushing past the almost overwhelming anger and need to see me obliterated, I focused on her makeup, the cells and DNA that make her tick. If I could use my power to heal someone like Darryl, could I use it to harm another? Out of options, I had to try.

Holding the thought of my Monster as I first saw him on that fateful night, I pushed my energy inside her and willed her brain to turn into stone. The pressure immediately eased on my neck, but I couldn’t afford to lose my advantage. Working my way out, I hardened each layer, bone, muscle, organs, skin, all into granite.

Only when she stood immobile in front of me, a perfect sculpture, did I yank the rope off my neck and gasp for air. When I could breathe normally again, I walked across the room and opened the door. Peeking my head out, I waited for someone to appear and expose me, but the corridor remained empty. I grabbed the key stuck outside of the lock, shut the door, and locked myself in with the statue.

Now what? Would she turn back? I half expected her to, but I had thought about this beforehand, when waiting for my Monster to return to me the night before. I had pondered how he had been able to turn into a boulder while waiting for his enemy. He had never turned back to stone since, as far as I had seen.

I circled her frozen body. Nothing moved. Would she stay this way long enough to give me time to save Camazotz? Would they even move him if she suddenly went missing? Then, the full extent of my mistake occurred to me. Instead of going straight to him, if I could even get to him, I’d have to assume her shape and pretend to be her. As my entire being rebelled at the thought, I couldn’t think of another way around it—not one that would guarantee his continued existence. And I wanted him to live. I wanted our life up in the mountains. Even though he was a lying, cheating, hypocrite—perfect mate, bah!

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed when I finally accepted her transformation was sticking. The statue showed no signs of movement. I sat down on the bed and finished my meal, feeling coldhearted and guilty. Good thing I still had the rope as evidence of her own intentions. Otherwise, I might have been tempted to change her back. That would’ve been true suicide. I had surprised her, only able to gain the upper hand since she had underestimated me.

Nobody bothered me. She must have asked for privacy back when she thought she’d be having a heart-to-heart with her husband. So, I had that going for me. Too bad I turned her clothes to stone with the rest of her. That hadn’t been deliberate; I was just being thorough. A little too thorough, maybe. And terrified. I didn’t trust my abilities enough to try turning her clothing back from stone, unsure I could repeat what I had done in the first place, since I had been acting from intuition more than anything.

The room had an old armoire that held clean linens, none large enough to drape around me. A yawn ripped from my mouth. Pushing aside a thick curtain, I peered out at the dark sky. I needed to move forward with my plan before the household woke up. At least I needed to find her bedroom. Then a terrible thought struck: Would Chaac be there waiting for me?

I shuddered, imagining sex with my Monster’s enemy. No, I decided, he would have his own room, for propriety’s sake. Or would she run from condemning her husband straight to her lover’s bed? No, she had her own room back when they were together in Tennessee; she would have her own space here as well. I couldn’t let my fears bog me down, not now.

I also had no good ideas for moving Ixtab, her arms still outstretched in her death act, her granite body too heavy for me to hide. And if someone found her, then what? Would they waste time trying to figure out who did this? No, they wouldn’t have to—they’d come looking for me.

I tried melting the lock from outside the room, but found I had no control over the old iron. I needed this room walled off, in case she figured out a way to transform back. So, I picked up a ball of rice, thinking I had been able to turn her clothing to stone, so organic material was fair game. Pushing aside my doubt, I mashed the soft rice into the lock and turned it into stone, locking the door to the room until someone kicked it down.

Naked and pumped up on adrenaline, I faced the rest of the house. Thinking through where I’d been earlier, I tried to reason out where her room would be. It was her manor house, so she would have the best room. The wing where she had taken me had an abandoned feel, still clean and attended to but not often used. The meeting hall was down a different wing on the ground floor. Where would a goddess put her suite? I decided to explore the rest of the top floor, even though my gut told me she’d be closer to the action.

The search went slowly as I tiptoed down the halls. It was late enough that I didn’t run into anyone, but the noises I did hear stopped me in my tracks. The doors were close together—several people slept as I checked the rooms with doors that opened—and I gave up quickly and headed down to the second story.

These rooms were larger, the ceiling higher, the doors farther apart, and most certainly occupied by the creatures who recently tried to kill my lover. The few doors I tried were locked, and I forced myself to keep going even as my nerves frayed. One or two bedrooms were empty but had the faint mustiness that told me they had been vacant for a while. At the end of the hallway was one final door. The doorknob turned, and the door opened without a sound. I held my breath and stepped inside, deciding to take Ixtab’s form at the last minute. What would she be doing roaming the halls of her house naked and lost? I couldn’t imagine what I’d say if I got caught, but I channeled Cassandra again, her haughty disapproval of everyone, and figured my best bet would be to fake my way from here on out.

The front room was set up like a sitting room, the furniture grand and reminiscent of my room back at Camazotz’s house. Her old room. His wife. Feral hatred took over my body, quickly replaced by shame. I had turned her into a statue—who even was I? Shaking my head, I pushed forward. The second room held a fancy canopied bed, and most importantly, it was empty. I glanced quickly into the bathroom and closet, confirmed they, too, were empty, then ran back to the door of the suite and locked it.

I leaned against it, finally feeling some relief. Tomorrow held plenty of uncertainty, but for now, I was safe.

CHAPTER TWENTY

The Caravan

I yawned and blinked, staring at the intricate fabric heavily embroidered with mythical creatures. Fitting. Spending most of the night agonizing over the great deception I would need to pull off, exhaustion had caught up with me at some point. While I had gotten some sleep, I didn’t want to move from the bed. I felt a combination of fatigue but mostly fear for what the day held.

A light tapping at my door got me moving. I grabbed a robe from a chair and forced my body into Ixtab’s form, unsure when I had turned back into my now familiar body. Standing straight, I thought about Cassandra and how she had treated me from my first day at work, already looking down my nose when I opened the door. The poor serving girl kept her eyes on the floor as she entered the room with a breakfast tray. She mumbled something in a language I didn’t understand, but I only yawned and rubbed my face. She didn’t seem to mind being ignored, setting the tray on the sitting-room table and making her escape. I wanted to lock the door behind her but decided against it. The charade had begun. I itched to check on Ixtab’s new room upstairs to confirm she was still locked in there, knowing that was the last thing I should do, leading someone to the last place I wanted them to look.