Betwixt (36 page)

Moth sighed and wrapped his arms around himself. “Anyway, you can imagine it had quite an effect on my ring. The time for
our exidis came and went. Our guide — he fell apart — and Bleek was designated a cutter. Now I figure it was all a setup on
Bleek’s part — the whole thing. He chose his path. And since
then” — he cleared his throat and looked up at the mountains — “he’s been using it for the hunt.”

Nix looked over at Morgan. Her eyes were as blank as his probably were.

“The hunt,” Moth repeated, then shook his head. “It’s not something the scia like to advertise. The hunt is what we call —”
He looked embarrassed. “It’s what we call mating.” He cleared his throat and restarted. “For reproductive purposes. Totally
unsanctioned.”

Morgan and Nix must have continued to look confused because Moth stopped and stared. “Bleek’s been trying to capture a pet.
So that she can have his offspring … or something like that. I’m trying to figure it out. It has to do with the change, the
initial habitation.”

“Oh,” they said, almost in unison. There was a knowing tone to Morgan’s “oh,” but Nix’s was uncomprehending. He had no idea
what Moth was talking about.

“He’ll need a ringer for that.”

“A ringer?” Something about the word sounded familiar.

Moth held up his hand. “He doesn’t want to leave the human world, obviously. He doesn’t want to give up his mortal body. The
practice is
forbidden,
” he emphasized. “There’s no reason for it. In the old days, when the technology was worse and the exidis relied on natural
events, random lightning, that kind of
thing, the scia kept humans in bondage, used them to reproduce and then effected the inhabitation. That’s what a pet was:
just genetic material for a new changeling.” His eyes darted to Morgan’s, and Nix thought he could detect the faintest blush.
“We’re not strong enough to reproduce on our own … together.” His eyes fell. “Nor do we have time. The period between finding
out and the exidis is short — a year or two at most. Anyway, now, with dust and with the Ring of Fire it’s different. A few
pets are still kept, I know, and some are used by cutters to do their bidding —” He frowned. “But the practice makes me sick.

“They’re kept in horrible conditions.” He spoke earnestly. “Underground, in caves. In places … outside of the normal world.
It doesn’t happen so much anymore — there are plenty of corpa around and inhabitation techniques have improved — but Bleek
grew up like that, in the limina — the edge places between this world and the next.” Moth shook his head and looked at the
ground. “Usually they just spend their lives in a kind of dark haze, but Bleek was special, intelligent and good at identifying
potential changelings.”

He moved from Morgan to Nix. “That’s one of our tasks while we’re here, along with preparing for the exidis. We must … to
increase our kind. We must give consciousness its chance. Humanity, it’s not strong enough. Look how we’ve messed everything
up.”

Moth took a breath. “In any case, they let him out into
the human world. He became part of my ring. Usually cutters cause trouble for a while and then die, which you do fairly quickly
if you don’t go through the exidis…. Nix. You heard that part, right?”

Nix shook his head and Moth blanched.

“You can’t let your body die, Nix.” Moth spoke very slowly. “It’s absolutely forbidden. The worst thing that could happen
to a changeling. What becomes of us — it’s more horrible than any human can imagine.”

“A particle of pain,
” Morgan whispered sarcastically,
“passed from one living being to the next, for eternity.”

Moth stared at her. “It isn’t funny. It isn’t even something we should talk about.” He turned back to Nix. “You will never,
ever die. You will just keep hurting. Over and over and over again. And you will always be conscious of it. That is the burden
of the fay. We need a living creature to inhabit while we’re in this transitional state. Only in Novala can we take our true
form.”

Both were silent. Nix tried to look at Morgan but she was turned away.

“So the cutters. Their bodies die or they’re eliminated, by changelings who are trained to do that kind of thing. They’re
usually easy to spot. They have the sign” — he showed his wrist again — “but they’re old. Much older than they should be.
And they smell.” Morgan stifled a laugh and Moth again shot her a look. “If they’ve been given a pass by the scia —” The guide
faltered a little here and Nix wondered what he was omitting. “They have a cross through their X. Wicklings. Weak, not evil.
Bound for death. Fast. But Bleek is different. He’s a cutter through and through. He’s smart and powerful and wants to stick
around. He knows the limina, and he’ll do anything to survive. Clearly he’s planning something. I just don’t know what it
is. So Bleek tried with your friend Evelyn first.” Moth nodded to Nix curtly. “But she didn’t work out, so now he’s on to
Neve Clowes. The pet needs to be out of it, pliable. Addicted, basically. To dust. He’ll take her somewhere —”

Moth turned and faced Nix. “The ring you’re seeing is some indication of her demise. Bleek won’t keep her alive long after
he’s used her for what he needs.”

Nix felt his mouth go dry. The businesslike tone Moth slipped into when he mentioned Evelyn and Neve struck him. As did the
easy way he spoke about the rings Nix saw; as if it were the most normal thing in the world to see light around people when
they were about to die.

“The ring?”

“You’re a ringer. You monitor the mortality of the body at the beginning and at the end. During the change and during the
exidis. Every ring needs you; without you it would be too dangerous. We’ve been waiting for you, Nix. Your ring has been waiting
for you. You’re a seer. You’ve got the power of life and death. Your gift is … it’s a necessity.”

“And yours is important, too, Morgan.” Moth hurried to include the girl. “Have you had a sense of it?”

She shook her head — too quickly, Nix noted — but Moth didn’t seem to notice.

“You will. Soon. I’ll help you.” His eyes turned back to Nix. “The whole thing about being a cutter is that you’re addicted
to this life. The human world. Even though it’s doomed.” A shadow passed in front of Moth’s eyes. “But I guess that’s why
Bleek wants you. That’s why he’s been giving you dust. That’s why he lured you to him at the Ring of Fire. That’s why he didn’t
kill you. If Ondine had been with you he would have eliminated her, surely. Both of you.” Moth nodded at Morgan and she took
the news without blinking. “He needs a ringer for whatever he’s planning to do.”

Moth delivered the news as if he’d been reading the weather report. Nix let his mind unravel the tangled thread of what he
was hearing. Pets he understood. Dust — yes. It was needed to effect a measure of control over the human body as it was inhabited
and during the exidis to Novala. And the ringers — those made the most sense, since he’d been living with his visions his
entire life. He even understood the importance of keeping his body alive. But the body he lived in, had spent almost eighteen
years in … If Nix and Morgan and Ondine were inhabiting human bodies, if the bodies had been “inhabited” sometime during their
childhood, then there was something — no,
someone,
a human being, an actual person, stuck in his body — or he was stuck in someone’s body, or —

Here is where he stopped. Where? Where did the real humans go?

“But, the human, me … where do I go? Where am I?”

Morgan spoke over him. “How long has this been happening?”

Though Nix couldn’t see her face — the orange hood obscured it — he felt she must be as confused as he felt. Moth chose to
answer her.

“Since …” He looked up at the sky and shrugged. “Since I don’t know. Since whenever. Since forever. We’ve been here since
humans developed consciousness. Since they learned to tell stories about things they didn’t understand. That’s what the legends
said. Fairies, fay, pixies. All the same thing. Just not how they pictured it. No wings. No Tinker Bell. ‘Fay’ means spirit
— energy — intelligence unbound from matter. A power, but fractured, manifold. But we need the human body, the human brain,
to take shape, to organize ourselves for the higher spheres. Otherwise we would simply be diffuse energy, no more powerful,
singular, or lasting than a puff of wind, a crackle of static. That mountain over there.” He pointed to Mt. Hood in the distance.
“But changelings — us.” He locked his eyes to Nix’s, then Morgan’s. “We are a median step to the next dimension. Our brains
act as gatherers and conduits for the current that electrifies
everything. That defines life itself. That’s why we’re called changelings. We change energy. We create focused spirit. We
are the only hope universal consciousness has. Humans used to kill us, okay? Roast us, beat us. They knew we were different.
Not like what we should be. They’d throw us in fires, boil us, keep us tied up. We died by the thousands, millions, who knows.
Look.” Moth stared. “Nix. Morgan. You have a year or two, max, to learn what you need to. Then you get pulled in. The shortness
of the changeling phase is so that the experience isn’t too hard on your body. This is a long-evolved process. The fay don’t
want to hurt the humans. They
need
them. They need them to gather consciousness together. There isn’t enough heavy matter in Novala —”

He paused and waved his hand. “This is all in the lemma — the knowledge. You’ll learn it soon. But in answer to your question,
Nix: Your body — the human you’re inhabiting — won’t remember any of this. That’s what the dust was for. Ondine — her parents
will come back and she’ll resume her life. Morgan will go to Princeton or whatever. You’ll go back to Alaska if you want to.
We’ve made this all so it isn’t hard on your body. That’s why it’s so important that we deal with this thing with Bleek immediately.
After he uses you, he’ll eliminate you. Kill your corpus. Do you understand?” Nix nodded and Moth mumbled, “Fortunately, I
don’t think he knows about Ondine yet —”

Morgan spoke. “He knows about Ondine.”

“What?” Moth faced the girl. “How do you know that?”

Her eyes were flat, but Nix saw the slightest tensing in her neck muscles. Right then he ceased to trust her.

“He told me.”

Moth tightened. “You saw Bleek.”

The girl blinked her assent. “He tried to corner me. In the forest. I fought him off.” She stared at Moth, and Nix could feel
the barely concealed contempt in her eyes. Did every ring start off this badly? “No thanks to you. This little mountaintop
picnic. It’s a little late, isn’t it, Moth? Considering what you think Bleek has planned?”

Moth’s silence made Nix feel that there were worse things than Tim Bleeker in this new world.

“Fortunately, I happen to know he’s wrapped up in another matter.” She gazed at the older boy calmly. “Yes, he’s after Neve.
My brother’s girlfriend. The girl Nix so valiantly tried to save at the Ring of Fire. So I imagine he’s not going to have
too
much time to chase after Ondine.” She sighed and faced Nix for the first time since they’d started talking. “So let me get
this straight. You see some kind of ring or something around Neve Clowes, which means that she’s going to …” She let the sentence
hang there. Moth looked at the ground, speechless. Nix knew he’d have to fill in the pertinent information.

His voice was flat. “Die. Once I see the ring, people die.”

“Oh.” Morgan bit her lip but didn’t move her eyes.

How strange it was to finally talk about it. After so many years of keeping the biggest secret of his life, here Nix was,
revealing it on a Portland hillside to two kids barely less screwed up than himself.

“So what are you going to do?” Morgan asked, her voice merely curious.

“What am I going to
do
? Well, I guess that’s why I came here this evening, to ask this asshole” — Nix flicked a finger at Moth, standing with his
hands in his jacket pockets, still looking at the ground — “what the hell I’m supposed to be doing here.
How I’m supposed to help.
But if you haven’t noticed in our little conversation, gothic ambience aside, our quote unquote
guide
doesn’t have a clue about what to do next and how the hell we’re supposed to settle into this new
identity
of being
changelings.
Fairies, Morgan. In case the word ‘fay’ threw you. Flying fucking fairies —”

“I said we didn’t fly —” Moth started. Nix ignored him.

“Now” — he shook his finger again at Moth, who was squinting at the younger boy, leaning back but his feet still planted in
quiet defiance — “there is a girl who all of us know, your supposed
best friend
, Morgan, who is in serious trouble. Not to mention Ondine. If you can’t help, Moth, then we need to talk to that lady — Viv
or whatever her name is.”

Moth shook his head. “Scia can’t see what’s going on. They are not omnipotent. They’re changelings, like we are. Just more
trained. Only the fay can hear all, see all —”

Nix started. “Then how the hell do you know —” But Morgan cut him off.

“Anyway, Neve can’t be my friend,” she said flatly, “because she’s a human. And,” she added, sneering at Nix, “you’re an asshole.”

Behind the defiant, unambiguous stare, he could feel Morgan’s real confusion, even a trace of fear. Out loud she was claiming
this new identity because her other life — her human life — had little to offer. He could relate. Besides, he knew even less
than she did. But still. Matterless creatures from another dimension who you couldn’t speak to, couldn’t communicate with,
just had to believe in … ?

He peered at Moth. “I don’t believe you. I don’t believe anything you’re saying.”

Moth didn’t look surprised. “No. You wouldn’t.”

He grabbed Morgan by the shoulders just then, drawing her to him till she stood under his jutting chin. At the same time,
he drew a knife out of his jacket pocket, which he immediately brought to the girl’s throat, just inside her parka. The tip
of the blade, Nix could see, edged into her pale skin, drawing a wisp of bright blood. Instantly she started to burn, a thick
yellow ring around her that was different from the ones he’d seen on other
people. She looked to the side once, then straight ahead at Nix. Her eyes bore the raw fear of an animal that knows it’s about
to be put down.