Death's Excellent Vacation - By Charlaine Harris & Toni L. P. Kelner Page 0,114
“That’s the hardest part, isn’t it?” His voice was just as musical as the guide’s. “Don’t worry, brother. It will all be well.”
“Yeah,” I mumbled. “Sure. What am I supposed to do?”
“Now you come with me. You bathe.” He paused for the briefest of moments. “And you choose your knife.”
THEY left me alone in a pretty, open suite that glowed with Heartlight, falling with the sunlight through the open spaces that passed for windows here. There’s no need for glass when it’s always balmy. I don’t think I’ve scrubbed behind my ears that hard since the orphanage.
So all that afternoon I sat in the window, looked out on yet another garden, and turned the obsidian knife in my hands.
They’ve got all kinds—kukris and daggers and diver’s knives and even butcher knives. Hilts of every description. But the metal all reminded me of that thin thread of gold—the broken necklace that even now I had in my other fist. My hands were wide and blunt, and as soon as I saw the rock knives—flint, obsidian, bloodstone, you name it—my fingers tingled.
What are you thinking?
This was the Sanctum. It was green and perfect, and it smelled sweet, and the Inners didn’t move with that lurching awkwardness that shouts gargoyle. They’d all made their tithe and Tiend, and the Heart had taken their candidates, and they were here to serve. They got to bathe in Heartlight every day.
They had names. The thing every gargoyle wants, a name of his very own.
But dammit, Kate. Kate.
I tipped my head back, bonked it gently on the window frame behind me. The frame was pure stone.
There was an Inner at my door. A guard. I wondered how many gargoyles considered something stupid when they brought their Heart candidate here. All of them? Just me? There wouldn’t be a guard if none of them did. Or was he there because I might need something? Like a good pep talk?
Like a reminder of why we did this? The Heart must feed. It fights the Big Bad; it powers all of us, gives us pieces of itself that grant us the stoneskin trueform. It even gives us names. True names, ones that don’t fade. None of that comes cheap.
But . . . Kate.
I had my feet outside the window before I thought of it. Pulled them back in.
What was I thinking? I was still damp from my bath, tingling from the Heartlight, and in a gray robe and cloak with a big, deep hood. I would still shamble, though. I couldn’t move gracefully at all. And I would have to keep my hands hidden. They all wear gloves.
Kate. She had a name. She probably took it for granted, too.
Where would they have her? If I had to guess . . .
I didn’t have to guess. The entire Sanctum was ablaze with expectation, the Heart’s singing to one of its own. I could just follow it to find her. Or I could follow the ringing pull from the necklace in my fingers.
Or I could just sit here until they came to get me. I could do what I had to and get a name. I could be beautiful.
Kate.
I slipped the obsidian knife up my sleeve, pushed my feet out the window, and landed on garden loam.
THE door was wide, and old, oak bound with scarred iron pulsing with life. I put my hand on it and the iron zinged, singing in a high carbon whine. It creaked a little as it opened, and I peeked in.
The chapel was long and narrow. At the very end the stone rose like a wave, shaping itself into an altar draped with crimson velvet and pillows. I pushed my hood back. It fell away from my ears and I could breathe again.
Kate lay there, very still. The walls throbbed. It was deep down and close to the Heart. The beats were a melody the Heart inside me echoed. It was hard to keep everything human-sized and inside. The trueform just kept wanting to bust out.
The corridors had been sleepy and deserted. I’d done my best to glide and managed not to lurch too much. The necklace quivered in my aching fist. I’d wrapped it around the leather-wrapped hilt of the obsidian knife and pulled both up inside my sleeves.
They’d put her in a red dress. It was beautiful. She was beautiful, in a way I’d never be. Her arm was over her eyes and her hair spread out over the pillows.