Part 21 (1/2)

clutched in the fingers of her right hand, and the single feather, white as snow at the top of the highest mountain peak, caught in the stewardess' hair, and she lets the pain have her.

”Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her, and to wonder what was going to happen next.”

”Open your eyes, Niki,” Spyder Baxter says, and she does, even though she thought they were open all along.

”You gotta watch that first step,” and Spyder smiles. ”It's a b.i.t.c.h.”

And she's so beautiful that Niki doesn't know if she's breathless from the plunge or the sight of her. Not the Spyder she knew so many years ago, that sullen girl wrapped up in all her leather and bull-d.y.k.e defenses, and not the uncertain, unreal Spyder from her dreams and the fiery place before the Dog's Bridge. Maybe the most beautiful woman that she's ever seen, Spyder as some Pre-Raphaelite painter might have imagined her, Spyder reborn as something the G.o.ds would envy. She's still holding Niki's backpack.

”Are you okay?” she asks Niki Ky. ”Say something.”

”Daria's sick,” Niki says, because she'd almost forgotten, seeing Spyder like this, and the roar of falling water is so loud in her ears. She wonders how they can hear themselves over the sound of it.

”Yes, Daria's sick. But that can't concern you now,” Spyder says. ”Maybe later on, but not now.”

Niki starts to take a step towards Spyder and realizes that she's kneeling, on her knees on cold, mist-slicked stone. She blinks, then rubs her eyes, but it's all still there, radiant Spyder with her white hair-not Spyder's dark hair bleached white, but hair that grows as white as doves and milk and snowfall all on its own-Spyder in her gown that looks like something sewn from starlight, and the scar on her forehead has become a teardrop gem, the deepest ruby 188 red, set into her skin. The water roars all around her, and overhead the sky is dusk and tempera sunset clouds in brilliant shades of tangerine and goldenrod and violet.

”Am I dead?” Niki asks, and Spyder smiles again and helps her to her feet. Niki's legs are weak, and her stomach rolls like she's just had three or four rides on a roller coaster, one right after the other.

”It's not exactly that simple.”

”That's not an answer,” Niki says. ”I just jumped off a bridge for you, and now I want an answer.”

”You didn't jump for me. You jumped for you.”

”Whichever,” Niki replies. ”Am I dead or not?”

Spyder's smile fades, and she brushes Niki's long bangs from her eyes. ”Yes, in the world where you were born, you died. They'll find your body. You'll have a funeral. You'll be buried.”

”Cremated,” Niki corrects her.

”Same difference.”

”And I can't go back. Not ever.”

”Not the way you mean,” Spyder says, then turns and be - gins walking through the gathering mist, across the slippery gray-green rocks.

”So, is this Heaven?” Niki calls after her, trying to keep up and trying not to fall on her a.s.s at the same time.

”Not even close,” Spyder shouts back. ”Anyway, I didn't think you believed in Heaven.”

”Is it h.e.l.l, then?”

”Everywhere's h.e.l.l, Niki, if that's all you can manage to make of it.”

”G.o.dd.a.m.n it,” Niki says and stops, almost slides on a patch of mossy-looking slime, and sits down. ”No more f.u.c.king riddles, Spyder. Tell me the truth or-”

”Or what?” Spyder asks her, looking over her shoulder.

”You'll go back?” And she points an index finger towards the Technicolor sky. ”I'm afraid you're just going to have to be a little bit more patient. I've been here a long time, and I still don't understand the half of it.”

”Can you at least tell me where the f.u.c.k I am? I don't 189.

think that's asking too much. If I'm dead, and this isn't Heaven and it's not h.e.l.l, but I'm not on Earth anymore-”

”No, it's certainly not Earth,” Spyder agrees and then turns to face Niki again. The mist swirls eagerly, nervously, around them both, like it wants answers, too, like it's hanging on every word they say. ”This is another place.”

”Another place? You mean another planet?”

”No, Niki. I mean another place.”

”Like another universe?”

”Another place, Niki. I think we should just leave it at that for now.”

”And right here?” Niki asks, and pats the rock with her left hand.

”We're at the Palisades,” Spyder replies. ”And we really shouldn't stay here much longer. There are safer places to be. You'll need dry clothes, and I need to look at your hand.”

My hand, Niki thinks and holds it up. The bandage is still there, dirty and coming unwound, but she didn't lose it in the fall. It still hurts, now that Spyder's reminded her, still burns and aches and itches, and she glances up at Spyder.

”If I'm dead, then how come my hand still hurts?”

”I said that you died, Niki. That doesn't necessarily mean you're dead now.”

”Christ.” Niki sighs and laughs, laughing because she's scared and worried about Daria and so glad to see Spyder, everything pressing in at her in the same instant, and she doesn't know what else to do.

”What's funny?” Spyder asks and gives Niki the backpack. She unzips it and is surprised that everything's still inside, and that it's all still dry.

”Nothing,” she replies. ”Or lots and lots of things. I'm not sure yet. Ask me again later. So, what are the Palisades, anyway?”

Spyder peers through the mist and chews thoughtfully at her lower lip a moment before answering. And once again, Niki's struck by the perfect, simple beauty of her. Have I changed, too? she thinks. Have I become that beautiful?

190.

”The Palisades,” Spyder says. ”You know back when most people still thought the world was flat, and that if you sailed too far in any direction you'd fall right off the edge?

Well, if those people had been right about the world where we were born, then the Palisades is sort of like the place they were afraid of sailing over the edge.”

”That figures,” Niki mutters half to herself, zipping her backpack shut again, and she slips it on over her left shoulder. ”The ends of the earth.”

”More or less,” Spyder says. ”Now come on, Niki. I wasn't kidding when I said we shouldn't hang around here too long.”

”The jackals?” Niki asks, but Spyder shakes her head, scattering light through the mist and across the rocks, her dreads like the phosph.o.r.escent tendrils of a deep-sea creature.

”Here,” she says. ”you're going to have a lot more things to worry about than the jackals. They might be the worst of it, but there are other things that can kill you just as fast.”