All That Lives Must Die - Eric Nylund [193]
Eliot did know, however, he wanted nothing more than to pick it up, and play it.
But he halted as he recognized the wood grain pattern . . . so mirror-smooth that he saw his face reflected in its flaming colors. He’d seen it countless times before.
Lady Dawn.
“No way,” he whispered.
But why not? What if, in dreaming, he had done this? Played some song of transformation. The Covington conjurers could change one thing into another . . . so it was, in theory, possible.
Eliot didn’t think his magic had ever worked like that. And it’d never worked with such precision.
If he hadn’t done this, though . . . that left only one logical conclusion.
Her.
The dream girl had said: “For thou would I do anything, be anything.”
Could she be real? Alive?
Was that dream even a dream? The thought of an instrument who was also a young girl—who’d been in his father’s hands for so many years—it sent a shiver of revulsion down Eliot’s spine.
Still . . . he reached out and held his fingers a hairsbreadth over the guitar, feeling a subsonic thrum of her power, of anticipation for his touch.
Eliot took her and slung the guitar over his shoulder.
She was a perfect fit.
His fingers slid along the six steel strings. Different from his violin. Familiar, though, too. Definitely weird.
“We shall together make music the likes of which even God has not yet dreamed. Music to end the world if thou desire.”
Not yet.
Eliot was going to track down his father first. Louis had questions to answer.
55
UNDERESTIMATION OF HIS CUNNING
Louis puffed on a cigar he had borrowed from the Night Train’s humidor. He opened a window. These cars were stuffy with the sweat and fear of its usual passengers.
The engine’s screams echoed through the tunnel.
Amberflaxus licked its black fur in the seat next to him. It flicked its ears forward, thinking that noise was prey.
Louis felt better away from San Francisco, no longer obsessing over Eliot and Fiona, and his beloved lost Audrey. How wonderful to be away from the world of light and love!
He was annoyed that he was even thinking of the memory of their memories . . . and yet, he found it nearly impossible to stop.
Louis exhaled smoke and watched it mingle with the steaming screams outside.
But stop he must and concentrate on his deceptions, namely how to play with Sealiah and Mephistopheles.
Manipulating mortals was one thing, even Immortals, but his Infernal family? That was ten times the danger. He had to proceed with great care.
Should he betray Sealiah? Or side with her against Mephistopheles?
He chuckled. As if the Queen of Poppies would want him on her side, as if he would stick his neck out and actually stoop to physically fighting anyone in her war.
No, the best option was to play both sides against the middle, and then pick over what was left. To accomplish this, however, Louis would need leverage, some fact about the tactics and plans of one to ingratiate himself with the other—just long enough to get into the proper position to backstab and double-cross.
Sometimes the most clichéd schemes were best . . . because they worked.
He marveled at his willingness to embrace the simple truth of it.
The huge Ticket Master entered the car and bowed. He then adjusted the slightly out-of-place tassels of his uniform’s brocade and brushed a bit of ash from the black fabric.
“May I approach, O most noble of deceivers?”
“No,” Louis muttered. “I need nothing.”
“Yes, Lord,” he said, smoothed a hand over his bald head, and then added, “your stop is next, the Poppy Lands.”
Louis cocked one brow. “Oh? I don’t recall saying that was my destination.”
“No, my lord. It’s just your most illustrious offspring was here. . . .”
“Yes, yes,” Louis said with careless wave.
Eliot had been to the Poppy Lands?
“Had been” being the operative verb tense, because Amberflaxus spotted the boy just last night entering that Pacific Heights hovel of his—no doubt to dutifully practice his violin or do his Paxington