He stirred. “Harley?”
“I’m here.”
“What happened?” he murmured. “I felt like… I don’t know. It was weird. It was like I was fading away, like the portal was dragging me into a place I wouldn’t be able to get out of.”
“You overworked yourself, that’s all. We shouldn’t have tried to do so much in one evening. That last portal was one too many. You’re not injured or anything, are you? Is anything broken? I pulled you away pretty hard.”
He smiled weakly. “Doesn’t feel like anything’s broken, except my pride, maybe. Did anything bad happen?”
I shot a look at Wade, who walked up at that moment. “There was a bit of an explosion when the portal closed, but everything’s okay. Harley had to pull you out, which meant the connection got snapped instead of it being magically disconnected. That must have caused an imbalance in the portal, which led to the blast. Anyway, there’s no harm done, as far as we know. You did good—you just need some rest,” he said, to my surprise. I’d expected the usual tough-love attitude.
“I messed up, didn’t I?” Jacob dropped his gaze.
“No, Jake; you’re just exhausted. You want to help, so you pushed yourself too hard. We’ve all been there.” I squeezed his hand gently, wanting to encourage him. If he lost his confidence, we’d never get him to try this again.
“I’ll do better next time,” he said, a yawn stretching open his mouth.
“I know you will. You’ve got the talent; you just need a bit more training.”
Regardless, it was becoming clearer and clearer that Jacob’s powers were massively temperamental. They relied on a lot of precise factors and focus, which Jacob didn’t always have handy. He couldn’t help his mind wandering, or his stamina slipping, especially considering he was still a novice at all of this stuff. Isadora had done what she could, but their time had been cut short.
We’d need to call in some outside help, but I had no idea where to start. Who the heck could I ask when the only two people with these portal powers, whom we knew of, were Jacob and Isadora? I resolved to think about it and speak with Alton. He’d put me in charge of Jacob’s training, so it was my duty to tell him when things weren’t working. If Alton didn’t want any more accidents like this happening, he’d have to come up with a solution himself. Although he’d likely just tell me to carry on doing what I was doing. He had a lot on his mind with this traitor still amongst us and the continued threat of Katherine.
“Come on, we should probably get you to bed,” I said, reaching out for Jacob’s hand. With Wade’s help, we pulled him to his feet and held him between us as we made our way toward the exit.
“I can walk, honestly,” he insisted, pulling away.
I was about to argue when a figure in the doorway made me freeze. A shadow stood across the threshold, lurking in the darkness. I stared at them in abject fear, worried we were about to be found out. The preceptors knew the situation, and knew we were using this facility, but this person didn’t look like a preceptor. If they were, they would have walked in by now.
“Show yourself!” I shouted, stepping in front of Jacob to protect him. Meanwhile, Wade kept his arm around the boy’s shoulders.
The figure stepped forward, the dim light of the training room casting its glow on the face of Dr. Krieger. “I apologize for the intrusion,” he said calmly. “I was with Tobe in the Bestiary when something strange happened. I came to investigate on his behalf, as he was busy recalibrating the energy source. He told me the glitch had occurred here. I trust everything is well in here?”
I nodded. “A training accident with Jacob, but everyone’s fine. I know it looks bad, but it’s okay now. I’ll give a full report to Alton about it.” Krieger already knew that Jacob was Tarver. The only reason that Alton had let the good doctor in on the secret, after the whole curse debacle, was because it was up to Krieger to do the Reading. Alton’s eagerness to discover the strength of Jacob’s powers couldn’t wait.
“Glad to hear it. Are you sure it was just an accident? The glitch was fairly sizeable.” He looked much better than he had a week ago, the dark circles less prominent around his eyes, and a bit of color having come back into his pale complexion. Clearly, the guy had finally got a bit of rest after the trials of the removal hex.
“Yep, absolutely positive. Sorry for dragging you down here. Actually, I was wondering if I could have a word with you, doctor?”
“About the Dempsey Suppressor?”
“Got it in one.”
He smiled. “Well, actually, I have some news regarding that,” he replied, glancing around as if he didn’t quite believe me about the room being fine. “And I was hoping to talk with you some more, at some point, about the magical-detection technology I’ve been working on. I believe I may have made a breakthrough, though I should very much like your opinion. Perhaps this meeting is more serendipitous than I initially suspected.”
“My opinion?”
He nodded. “Yes, you seemed rather interested the last time we discussed it. I thought we could kill two birds with one stone, as the saying goes. Do you have time now? I realize it’s rather late, but Alton told me you might be up and about.”
“Did you say magical-detection technology?” Jacob perked up behind me, his tone eager.
“I did.” Krieger tapped the side of his head. “Ah, yes, the Sensate. That’s right. I did your Reading, didn’t I? Wait… did I? I can’t quite remember what is real and what is not. To be honest, I was almost certain I’d dreamt we had a Sensate among us.” He sighed heavily. “You must forgive me for my mental sluggishness; this hasn’t been the most straightforward of weeks for me, and I’m still regaining some of my former faculties. A severe hex will do that to a person. Indeed, you may be extraordinarily useful in this, if you wouldn’t mind accompanying us.”
I frowned. “You should really get some sleep, Jacob.”
“You sound like Mrs. Smith again,” he said, with a smile. “Come on, let me stay for a while. An hour, max, and then I’ll go straight to bed.”
I rolled my eyes. He wasn’t my kid—what right did I have to stand in his way? “Fine, but just for an hour.”
“Thank you!” He grinned with glee, practically shoving Wade away in his eagerness to follow Dr. Krieger. He snatched up his mask on the way out and tugged it down over his face.
As Wade and I headed out of the training room behind Jacob and Dr. Krieger, I paused for a moment to lock up the double doors. Wade hovered beside me, almost like he was awaiting an invite to the infirmary too. Still, I couldn’t help noticing the weary expression on his face. Evidently, the night’s events had taken a lot out of him.
“You don’t have to hang around. Jake and I will be fine with the doc,” I said sheepishly. “I want to hear Dr. Krieger out, and then I’ll get myself to bed. No portals, no shortcuts—just plain old walking. You should head back. I’ll fill you in on everything I hear tomorrow.”
He arched an eyebrow. “No secrets?”
“No secrets.” Well, aside from the gigantic elephant in every room we step into together.
“You sure you don’t want me to come with you? I know Krieger didn’t technically invite me, but I don’t mind coming along.”
“Nah, we’ll be fine. Honestly, you get some shuteye. I feel bad enough about waking you up as it is, though I’m kind of glad you were there when things got out of hand. That could’ve all gone south so fast.” I couldn’t bring myself to look him in the eye, in case I gave myself away. “Anyway, you’d still be in dreamland if I hadn’t landed on you in the middle of the night. Go on, we’ll be okay. And I promise, no more secrets.”
“Okay… Well, goodnight.” He didn’t look like he wanted to leave. “You did a good job back there, Harley. Jacob wouldn’t be alive right now if you hadn’t stepped in the way you did. What you did back there was… well, like I said, you did a good job.”
“You sure you didn’t crack your head when you knocked me down?” I teased, wish
ing I could take the words back as soon as they slipped out. He looked a little disappointed.
“Goodnight, Harley,” was all he said, as he turned to go.
“Goodnight, Wade.”
With that, he left, taking the right-hand hallway while I took the left, hurrying after the fading figures of Jacob and Krieger. The thing was, there was more to my reluctance about having Wade there than met the eye: unless it was good news about the Dempsey Suppressor, I didn’t want him to know about it. In fact, if it wasn’t good news, I didn’t want to tell anyone about it.
Besides, after all my promises about not keeping secrets, there was one big one that I’d been hiding from most people: Isadora’s letter. I’d already had enough bad news from that to last me a lifetime. Right now, the only news I wanted to share was good news. Something that would tell me, without doubt, that I could get this stupid Suppressor out of my body, once and for all.
Three
Harley
Catching up with Jacob and Krieger, I walked with them the rest of the way to the infirmary. They were chattering away like hyperactive birds, barely acknowledging my presence. Jacob wasn’t usually so talkative, but he tended to get excitable about things that intrigued him. Krieger had clearly pushed the right buttons. I didn’t mind; it gave me a spare moment to think about what had just happened… and what might have happened if I hadn’t stopped Jacob. The thought of him literally disintegrating sent a shiver down my spine. It filled me with dread. Now that Isadora wasn’t here to protect him, that role fell to me. I’d pushed him too hard, insisting we carry on. I'm no better than Alton. But my heart was in the right place. I wanted him to progress for his sake; anything else was just a perk. A useful perk that could save our asses one of these days.
“Are you sure you’re okay to do this, Jake?” I asked, as we stepped through the empty ward, with its eerie strip lighting and clinical white walls, and into Krieger’s private office. “It’s pretty late and we’ve got an early start in the morning. Plus, you’ve had one hell of an evening. Maybe I could fill you in on everything tomorrow, instead?”
He shook his head. “I’ll be fine.”
“Really? That last portal must’ve taken a lot out of you.”
“Honestly, I’m all good. You don’t need to worry so much.” He offered a smile, but there was a warning in his tone. Stop henpecking me.
I shrugged. “Fair enough. Don’t blame me if you need tape to hold your eyes open tomorrow, that’s all I’m saying.”
“Noted,” he replied with a laugh. He didn’t seem too affected by the portal mishap. Either that, or he was good at hiding the fact that he was on the brink of exhaustion. Beneath the stoic façade, I could feel the weariness emanating off him in sluggish rolls, like a marsh at low tide.
“If the young man says he’s fit and well, then let him stay awhile,” Krieger agreed. “If he starts to feel unwell or overtired, he’s in the right place. I might have been somewhat compromised these past few weeks, but I am still a doctor. And a good one, at that.”
I chuckled despite myself. “Point taken.”
Jacob and I sat on the nearside of Krieger’s almost ostentatiously large mahogany desk, while he walked around and sat on the other side. He had several files stacked up beside him, one of which he took from the pile and opened wide. He drew his finger across the page in a flourish, before settling on a cluster of notes at the bottom.
“Ah, yes, here it is,” he said, his soft Germanic accent creeping through. “As you know, thanks to my former affliction, I’ve had a great deal of time to give to personal study. The removal of the Dempsey Suppressor has been at the top of my list for some time and, you will be pleased to know, I have made some headway with it.”
“And you’re feeling better now? The curse has definitely been lifted?” I pushed away the note of concern in my voice. If Alton had given him the all clear, there was no reason for me to doubt his state of mind. Still, Alton likely hadn’t seen what I’d seen.
“Indeed it has, Harley. You need not trouble yourself,” he assured. “Preceptor Bellmore and Director Waterhouse did a splendid job of removing it, with few side effects. I have become somewhat hard of hearing in my left ear, and there is a permanent exhaustion deep within my bones, but it’s nothing I can’t treat with a colorful array of medicinal potions.”
“Good to know.”
“Now, shall we proceed, or would you like to talk about my health for a while longer?”
Chastened, I gestured for him to carry on.
“Excellent,” he said, glancing down at the page. “So, the good news is, I have discovered a way to remove the Suppressor successfully, but the bad news is, it will involve some rather intensive surgery. The Suppressor is designed to attach to nerve endings, so it can send constant pulses to block the flow of Chaos through your body. Which, in simple terms, means it is really stuck in there. That’s the intention, as these things aren’t usually meant to be removed once they’ve been implanted.”
“And this is good news how?”
He smiled. “Well, I’m glad you asked. I’ve been thinking about utilizing Tatyana’s skill set in order to lessen the collateral damage to your nervous system. With her healing powers, it may simplify the procedure a fraction. It will still be an enormously difficult task, for both you and me, but if she can maintain a current of healing energy through you as I work, then we might be able to make the removal a success. Limited side effects, which is precisely what we want.”
A flutter of excitement made my heart rate quicken. “Limited side effects? Like what?”
“There’s a wide range of things that can go wrong in all surgeries. I couldn’t say for sure what might happen. Surgery is always unpredictable, and it will be difficult, as I’ve said.”
“I can handle difficult, believe me. If I can take on Katherine Shipton in a tiny, dark hellhole in the earth, I can deal with a bit of surgery.”
“Correction, a lot of surgery. We’re talking hours and hours under the knife, with a very real chance that you might end up with paralysis, loss of motor function, as well as the risks to your magical abilities.”
“I’m willing to do whatever it takes,” I insisted. “I’ll spend a week under the knife, if that’s what I need to do. Yeah, it won’t be pleasant, but if it’s worth it then I’ll do it. I just want to know if you can get this thing out of me for good?”
He nodded slowly. “I can, but I must be assured that you understand the gravity of the endeavor.”
“I understand. Just tell me what I have to do.”
His fluffy eyebrows pinched together in a frown. “Well, the surgery preparation itself will take a few months to organize, as work like this requires very specific tools that one cannot simply pick up at the nearest hospital. I have already taken the liberty of ordering these surgical instruments, but they have to be cleared for use by the magical authorities. That process is lengthy at best, interminable at worst. Once that’s out of the way, there will have to be a period of two weeks, before the surgery, in which you will be required to enter a state of Euphoria.”
I looked at him anxiously. “Surely you’ve got something in your pharmaceutical stash for that? Can’t I just take something to put me in this Euphoria thing?”
“You misunderstand me, Harley,” he said sternly. “Euphoria is not something you can ingest or imbibe, but a trancelike state, which cleanses the magical body of all power. You must train yourself to perform this act and maintain the restraint that comes with it so that a sudden surge of Chaos does not interrupt the surgery. It’s a time-consuming and exhausting process, whereby the magic within you is pooled into a localized region in your body, where it will remain in stasis until you release it again. Bearing that in mind, the energy will have to be released back into your system slowly, to prevent a catastrophe from occurring.” He paused, casting me a concerned look. “It is an extremely hard method to master and will require a great deal of effort on your part. Even then, there may be risk
s that we will all have to face: myself, you, and Tatyana, if she obliges.”
“I told you, I’m not scared of a challenge. I’ll jump through every hoop you’ve got if I can have the full force of my powers at the end of it. Tatyana isn’t one to back down from a tricky situation, either.”
He clicked his tongue in response. “Once again, I must ensure that you understand the gravity of this. Euphoria is a dangerous act that can leave a magical vulnerable for a prolonged period of time,” he said gravely. “Magicals of old used to plunge themselves into intense states of Euphoria, as a means of strengthening their powers and improving their clarity. The sensation is said to be overwhelming. However, I would not normally advise or suggest it. Your case is the exception, as I can see no other way of performing the surgery without it.”
My heart sank as realization dawned. I might have been willing to go through the entire rigmarole of this surgery and all its prep, but even then, it was going to take a long time to get done—longer than we likely had, before Katherine struck us again. I’d been so excited about the prospect of getting this thing out of me that I’d neglected to process the length of time it would take. Reality bites. I didn’t want to seem ungrateful for all the research he’d done, but I needed something to get this Suppressor out of me faster.
“Is there any other way? A quicker way, maybe? Like, if I were to break it myself, would there be a safer way of doing that?” My mind turned toward Isadora’s letter—I needed to reread it, if this was the only solution that Krieger could offer me.
He shot me a stern look. “Not if you want to survive the Suppressor’s destruction, no.”
“Then I guess we’re playing the waiting game,” I said with forced cheer. “You make all the preparations, and I’ll do whatever it is I need to do to see it through.” I was by no means ready to give up on a quicker solution; I just needed some time to do some digging of my own. There had to be something between the lines that I hadn’t picked up on, or a lead I could follow. This couldn’t be it—months of waiting, a lengthy surgery, and a bevy of risks to go with it.
Harley Merlin 4: Harley Merlin and the First Ritual Page 3