Deaths Excellent Vacation

lounge came foggy Paris light. I swear I could feel the Heart— the Heart, the big one—throbbing behind each little droplet in the mist, singing to the sun even through the rain and mist. “We’ll go together.”
    She gave me the same tight smile she’d given me each time I walked up to her checkout line. Now I wondered how much of that smile was seeing under the mask of my human seeming. She hadn’t even asked about my claws or the ears or the way I’d fought us both free of the gnomes and harpies.
    “Okay,” she said quietly. “If you’re going, too, I guess it’s all right.”
    My heart tolled like a bell inside my ribs, and then it fell with a sick splash to somewhere around my toes. Or even deeper.
    I was doomed.
     
     
    WHAT can I say about the Sanctum? Well, it’s green and it’s quiet. Heartlight bathes everything, and during the day it’s easiest to get to if you stand where the glow of the north rose window of the most famous cathedral in the world should be . . . and step sideways . It’s not a step you can take physically. I offered my arm to Kate as the Inner stood watching us from the edge of the glow.
    Kate put her hand through it and her tight smile didn’t waver. I stepped, she came with me, and the light burst over us.
    “Oh.” She sounded shocked.
    I didn’t blame her.
    No matter where you step from , the Sanctum always starts you in the same place: a quiet garden full of golden light and the cloaked and hooded forms of the Inners gliding around. One of them approached us, and Kate clutched hard at my arm. “Oh,” she said again.
    “It’s a bit much the first time,” our guide said. He’d stepped through right after us and crowded us forward. “If you’ll come this way, miss. Brother, Jean-Michel will show you your quarters. We’ll meet at nightfall.”
    She didn’t want to let go. “Jesus—please, no—”
    Smart girl. I loosened her fingers from my arm, gently. Very gently, because her bones could break before I squeezed hard. “Kate. Please. Go with him. It’ll be fine.”
    “How come they get names and you don’t?” She looked up at me. “And they’re so bright .”
    “You’ll get used to it.” The lie was ashes in my mouth. “They get names because they’re Inners. They’ve brought Heart candidates in. Like you.” And they get the beauty and the name.
    “So—” She still didn’t want to let go. “You’re coming back, right?”
    “Yeah.” I tried to sound reassuring. “Just go with him, Kate. Please.”
    “Okay.” She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin, and stepped away. “Okay.”
    God, that hurt, too. I watched as the guide took her away. Her hair lit up in the Heartlight, pure spun gold. She wasn’t walking like it hurt anymore, and I hoped the first thing they’d do was give her new shoes. You don’t have to wear them in the Sanctum, it’s warm and springtime there always . . . but that flapping heel, my Heart.
    My chest was full of lava. It was a struggle to keep my ugly face impassive. Jean-Michel, cloaked in gray with his hood drawn up and shadowing his face, sighed. His gloved hands folded together. “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