Seanan McGuire - An Artificial Night

The Garden of Glass Roses was filled with light that slanted down from the windows and passed through the translucent roses to scatter into countless tiny rainbows that glittered on the cobblestone paths and gray stone walls. Luna walked ahead of me, trailing her fingers over the unyielding glass edges of the flowers as she passed and leaving traceries of blood behind. I followed slowly, resolutely refusing to listen to the things her blood was trying to tell me. It was too changed and too confused; it knew nothing of value anymore.

Luna stopped in the far corner of the garden, standing in front of a bush with flowers that were crimson shading into black. Their stems were heavy with thorns, so sharply barbed that they looked like weapons. “Roses are always cruel,” she said, almost wistfully. “That’s what makes them roses.” She reached into the bush, not wincing as the thorns gouged her skin.

“What are you talking about?”

Her expression was serene. “Beauty and cruelty, of course. It’s simple.” There was a thin snapping sound from inside the bush. She withdrew her hand, now holding a perfect black rosebud. “The Rose Roads are no kinder than the others, but people assume they must be, because they’re beautiful. Beauty lies.” She kissed the flower, almost casually, despite the way the petals sliced her lips. Blood began to flow freely.

And the rose began to open.

The petals unfurled slowly, slicing her lips and fingers until the air was fragrant with the scent of her blood. Luna smiled, offering me the rose. “Prick your finger on the thorns, and you’ll be on your way. Take the rose, bleed for it, and it will take you where you want to go.”

Still frowning, I held out my hand. She placed the rose on my palm, where it rested lightly, thorns not even scratching me. “What do I need to do?”

“Just bleed.”

“All right.” I curled my fingers around the rose, stopping when the pain told me that the thorns had found their mark. “Now what do I … do … Luna? What’s happening?” The world was suddenly hazy, like I was staring through a fog. The woman with the rose-colored hair stood in the middle of it all, bloody hands clasped to her breast.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry, but it’s the only way. Go quickly …”

“Is drugging me a new hobby for you people?” I asked, and fell. Part of me was screaming; the Garden of Glass roses is mostly made of glass and stone and has very few soft places to land. That was only a small part—the rest of me was sinking in rose-scented darkness, falling farther and farther from escape. Luna was crying somewhere behind me in the dark. I wanted to shout at her, but there were no words. There was nothing but darkness and the smell of roses.

And then even that was gone.

KAREN SAT BENEATH THE WILLOWS, combing the hair of a Kitsune child. “Hello, Aunt Birdie,” she said, looking up. “You’re coming back for me.”

“I know where you are now,” I said, hearing the faint echo of my voice against the wind. I was dreaming. “Who’s your friend?”

“This is Hoshibara,” Karen said. “She died here.”

“Why?” I looked at the girl, who offered me a small, shy smile.

“Blind Michael stole her, but she got away; she wouldn’t let him change her. She ran to the woods.” Karen pulled her hands away from Hoshibara’s hair, hiding them in her lap. “She died, but the night-haunts never got her body. Someone else did.” She pointed past me. “See?”

I turned. Hoshibara was there, lying under a willow tree. There was someone—a girl, barely more than a child herself, with yellow eyes and hair that fell to her waist in a riot of pink and red curls. She crept out of the trees with one hand over her mouth, staring at the Kitsune.

Hoshibara lifted her head, looking at the girl; looking at Luna. The movement was weak. There wasn’t much movement left in her. “I won’t go back,” she whispered.

Luna knelt beside her. “You don’t have to.”

“I don’t feel good.”

“You’re dying.”

Hoshibara nodded, expression unsurprised. “Will it hurt?”

“It doesn’t have to.” Luna held out her hand, showing Hoshibara the thorn she held. “I can make it stop hurting right now. But you have to do something for me.”

The Kitsune looked at her distrustfully. I couldn’t blame her. “What happens then?”

“You die.”

“Is there a way for me to not die?”

Luna shook her head. “Not unless you go back to him.”

“What do I do for you?”

For the first time, Luna looked nervous. “You let me take your skin. I found … I know how the Selkies did it. Let me be Kitsune. Let me go free.”

“All right.” Hoshibara raised her hand and clasped it over Luna’s. She whimpered once as the thorn cut into her skin. Then she closed her eyes, movement stilling. Luna looked at her for a moment, then leaned down, pressing a kiss against her forehead.

“I wish there’d been another way,” she whispered, and slammed her hand down over Hoshibara’s, binding them together with the thorn. Then she threw back her head and screamed. There was a blast of light so bright that if I’d been watching it with anything other than dream-eyes I wouldn’t have been able to face it. When it faded, both Hoshibara and the rose-girl were gone. A dainty teenager stood in their place, slender hands covered in blood. She had chestnut hair and silver-furred tails, and looked like neither one of them. She stood unsteadily, clutching the hem of her suddenly too large dress, and staggered into the woods, vanishing.

“She got out,” Karen said behind me. “Can we?”

“Karen—” I turned. Karen and Hoshibara were gone. The landscape was dissolving in a pastel smear, and I could smell roses on the wind. I closed my eyes—

—and opened them to find myself at the edge of Acacia’s wood, hidden by a tangle of branches. The sky was black, and my candle was at least four inches shorter. Whatever Luna dosed me with knocked me out for more than a little while, and time was running out.

I stood slowly, leaning against one of the nearby trees. I was back in Blind Michael’s lands, and I knew how Luna managed her escape, and why she’d been willing to give me up to keep its secret. “The end justifies the means,” I whispered. “Oh, Luna.”

The cuts on my fingers were swollen and red and burned if I put too much pressure on them. Cute. “It’s poison Toby week, isn’t it?” I muttered, looking out over the plains. A thick mist had risen, bleaching the landscape; the lights of Blind Michael’s halls flickered dimly in the distance.

There was no time like the present and no time to waste. Shivering, I stepped out of the shelter of the trees and started walking. The steady whiteness of the land around me added an eerie quality to the trip that I could’ve done without. Boulders looked like looming monsters until I got close enough to see them clearly, while brambles and clumps of grass turned the ground into an obstacle course. I held my candle up to light the way, and it burned the mists back just enough to let me see that I was walking in a straight line. The flame was my compass and the light from Blind Michael’s halls was my lighthouse, leading me through the night.

Nothing stopped me as I walked through the mist; the land around me was silent. My candle kept burning slowly down; by the time it was another inch shorter, I was standing in front of the halls, aware of just how exposed I really was. The guards wouldn’t miss me for long. I hunched down behind a crumbling wall, eyeing the mist for signs of movement.