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It is, sweetheart. The debt can only be repaid by the statue, he answered, and grief so deep it seemed endless welled up inside him and spilled out onto me.
Caspar, in his twisted, horrific state, screamed in Chinese as he scrabbled at the remains of the statue. I grabbed one of the pieces, intending to brain him with it—not that I knew it would do anything to permanently harm him—when a thought struck.
"Here," I snarled, snatching up a piece of the statue and throwing it at him before reaching for another piece. "Here. And here, and here. You now have all the pieces of the Jilin God. The debt Paen's father incurred with you is now fulfilled! I demand acknowledgement of receipt of the statue before deep night!"
"You!" The twisted face of Caspar was a truly sickening sight to behold, but it was made almost unviewable by the hatred that filled it as his eyes raised to mine. Paen wrapped an arm around me and pulled me up so I was held tight to his body, his wonderful warmth soaking into me. "You think you have won, but you have not. For I have this!"
From the head of the monkey statue Caspar withdrew a small, rolled-up bit of parchment. "Behold, the Simia Gestor Coda! Into it Sun Wukong wrote all the knowledge of the ancients, all of my knowledge that he stole from me!"
Paen sucked in his breath, releasing me to lunge for Caspar, but the god of death leaped aside, holding the manuscript tightly. Behind him, Fi
"Now you will suffer as you have made me suffer," Caspar gloated, his body stretching into a thin, ribbony suggestion of a human. "You too will spend an eternity in torment, and when at last you decide to end your own agony, I will be waiting for you!"
"No!" Paen shouted, throwing himself onto Caspar.
Eerie, high-pitched, evil laughter was all that remained as Caspar succumbed to the inevitable and was pulled back into his domain in hell, taking the manuscript with him. The demons suddenly vanished, leaving the ghosts and extras fighting nothing more substantial than air. They all froze, and for a moment, there wasn't a sound.
"Dude!" a voice said in awestruck amazement.
"Did you get that?" a second voice asked.
"Er… get the big guy in the ugly costume and all those little brown guys disappearing?"
"Yeah."
"I got it, but no one is going to believe it."
Paen helped me to my feet, being careful to avoid jarring my arm. Sweetheart?
The howling wind inside me seemed a horrible parody of Caspar's mocking laughter. Pain twisted deep within, pain and despair and hopelessness.
Sam? Paen's fingers were warm on my chin as he tipped my head back so he could see into my eyes. Don't cry, love. We'll find another way.
"He's gone?" Fi
"Ew," she said, prodding Pilar's detached arm. "That's just gross. So, we won?"
Two fat tears rolled down my cheeks. Paen pulled me up to his chest, but not even the lovely glow of his soul could warm me now. "I'm cold," I told him.
"I know, sweetheart. We'll get it back. If I have to go to hell myself, we'll get it back."
"Get what back?" Clare asked, her brow furrowed. "I thought we won."
I wrapped my good arm around Paen and held him tight, allowing him to pour into me all his love and warmth and everything that he was, but it wasn't enough. Sharp fingers of despair kept me tight in their icy grip.
"The Coda was lost," Paen said to Clare, but he never took his eyes off mine.
"Oh, the manuscript that's supposed to tell Sam how to get her soul back? But I thought that wasn't a sure thing?"
"It isn't…" Paen said, stopping before he could complete the sentence, his arms tightening around me.
I did the job for him. "But it was the only chance we had."
"Non-deities have such linear thinking," Pilar said, leaping over a few rocks to land a few feet away, Beppo clinging to his shoulder.
I wondered for a moment why I wasn't surprised to see Pilar wasn't affected in the least by losing an arm—then I realized I didn't feel anything inside that wasn't an all-consuming hopelessness.
"He does not have the Coda. There is no Coda. There never was. The manuscript he has is nothing more than a few scribblings I made centuries ago. It was intended to draw Yan Luowang out of hiding. And it succeeded."
Paen lifted his head from mine to look at Pilar, his beautiful eyes stark with loathing. "I will destroy you. I don't know how, but this I swear—I will destroy you for what you've put us through… for what you've done to Sam."
Not even the fact that Paen would undertake such an impossible task warmed me. I shivered, wondering if I would ever be warm again, and leaned into Paen, too exhausted even to think.
"She's diminishing," I heard Clare's voice say. The words were familiar, but they didn't seem to have meaning to me anymore. My focus was on the tornado of misery that ripped through me. "My aunt said something once about elves who diminish. They just sort of fade away until they are no more."
Sam, my love, hold on to me. Don't leave me now, not when I need you. I can't live without you.
Paen's words seemed to come from a long way away. I examined them, holding them, wondering why such beautiful words should mean nothing to me anymore.
The pain washed over me.
Hold on to me, love. I'll help you with the pain.
There was no sense fighting it.
You must fight it, Sam. Don't give in to it, don't let it sap your strength.
My ending had been written. How ironic that it would happen now when I had found the one person I was ready to give up everything for.
Dammit, Samantha, I will not let you go! You are a strong, smart, sexy woman and I will not lose you. Now fight, damn you! Fight for me!
"Can't you do something to stop it?" Clare asked, her voice thick with tears.
Pilar sighed, his voice as distant as everyone else's. "I've always found elves to be so melodramatic, but since she did stop you from slaying my mortal form, I will return the favor."
"You've done enough already," Paen snarled.
"Not yet, but I'm about to. This will accord us without debt on either side," Pilar said.
"What—"
I was ripped from Paen's side, yanked without ceremony from my existence to another one, a world filled with drifting souls and beings which had been caught there.
"Behold the Akashic Plain," a familiar voice said behind me.
Epilogue
"You already talked to him—why do you need to talk to him again?" I held the phone away from my ear for a second. "No, he's not going to change his mind. He's not that kind of man, and besides, he can't. I'm his Beloved. He can't impregnate me and leave me for someone else. Well, OK, he could, but he wouldn't because he's nice. And he loves me. A lot. He was going to destroy a god for me! Only a man head over heels in love would decide to do something so ridiculous."
My mother, never one to keep feelings to herself, unburdened herself of several items, up to and including the likelihood that the elf side of my family would look down on Paen because of his dark origins. "Like I care what they think?" I flinched at the barrage that followed that statement. "Sorry. Yes. Yes, I hear you. Yes, yes, yes. Huh? Of course we're going to get married! I don't know about Clare—she and Fi
Outside, traffic hummed along merrily in another gloriously su