“Oh, who says you can’t flirt?” said Elisabeta. “It is just being friendly.”
We bantered like that as we rode the elevator down to the ground floor and crossed the lobby to the bar. Sure enough, the gorgeous bartender was there, shaking up a martini for an older gentleman who sat at the bar. He saw us come in, and a slow smile spread across his face. Wow.
We sat at the bar some distance from the other gentleman and waited for the bartender to come our way. “What can I get you folks?” he finally said.
“Manhattan,” Carlos said. “For both of us.”
“Right up. And for you, miss?” He leaned forward and smiled at me again. In the face of that smile, I couldn’t order a beer. I was tired of being boring. The trouble was I knew nothing about liquor.
“I don’t know,” I heard myself say. “What would you recommend?”
The smile broadened. “Dark rum,” he said, “with ginger beer, served over ice with a lime garnish. Sweet and dark…just the way I think you like it.” He winked, and I went red all over and very nearly blurted out that I had a boyfriend, thanks, and I didn’t want to be flirted with. Carlos and Elisabeta roared with laughter. I nodded, inarticulate in my embarrassment. There was nothing wrong with letting him flirt with me, since I had no intention of letting it go farther than flirtation. I needed to relax and, as my sister Cynthia frequently told me, stop being so serious all the time.
“He likes you,” Carlos said sotto voce as the bartender turned away to fix our drinks.
“I’m sure he flirts with all the young women,” I said. “And I have a boyfriend.”
“You make no promises,” Elisabeta said. “Be friendly. Have fun.”
I sat up straighter and smiled at the bartender when he returned with my drink. “Tell me what you think,” he said.
I took a sip. It was rich, and a little spicy, and I liked it. “It’s good.”
He leaned on the bar, inclining his head and shoulders toward me. “I’m Kevin.”
“Helena.”
“Pleased to meet you, Helena. Hope you’re not offended, but aren’t you a little young for this crowd?”
Carlos and Elisabeta laughed again. “We are old, you see,” Elisabeta said.
“I didn’t mean—”
“They understood,” I said. “I guess you’re never too young to get into the…heating and cooling business.”
“Glad to see you can party, too. Someone as beautiful as you, you shouldn’t just wear those drab suits.”
His expression was so admiring I blushed again and had to take another sip of my drink. “What’s it called?”
“A Dark ‘n’ Stormy. Dark for the rum, stormy for the ginger beer, get it?”
“It’s delicious. Thanks.”
Kevin nodded and moved away down the bar to where someone else was signaling for his attention. “You sure you have a boyfriend?” Carlos teased.
“Very sure.” The ache in my chest roused by seeing Ewan had mostly faded. Even so, as hot as Kevin was, my heart still belonged to Malcolm, and I missed him more every day.
Kevin returned to my side, polishing the counter with a white rag. “You know,” he said in a low voice, “I get off at ten. Do you—”
I was saved from answering by a buzz from my phone signaling an incoming text. “Hang on,” I said, and pulled it out. Judy.
KELLERS FAMILIAR ATTACKED THEM. HARRY CRITICALLY INJURED. COME NOW.
6
I sucked in a sharp, horrified breath. “I have to go,” I said. “A friend was attacked—I have to go now.”
“Wait, Helena!” Carlos said. “Let us come with you.”
“No, it’s okay, stay here.” I tossed those last words over my shoulder as I ran from the bar and through the lobby. The valet stand was busy, but I grabbed one of the uniformed men and said, “I need my car, please. It’s an emergency.”
He remembered me, and the urgency in my voice propelled him off into the darkness. I jigged in place, too late remembering I didn’t have my coat. The little jacket wasn’t enough to keep me warm, but I didn’t dare waste time running back to my suite. I pulled out my phone and texted Judy: COME WHERE?
Almost immediately came the reply: KELLERS HOME HURRY.
I choked back a sob. Did she mean Harry was dying? Was this to give me a chance to say goodbye? So many questions thronged my mind, driving my anxiety higher. Hot tears trickled down my cheeks and were chilled by the wintry breeze that blew through the awning. I wondered how long ago it had happened and hoped Harriet was all right. Surely Judy would have said if Harriet had been injured too.
With a screech, my car pulled up to the curb, and the attendant hopped out. “Good luck, miss,” he said so compassionately the tears started up again. I drove away as rapidly as I dared, heading for the freeway.
The night was dark, overcast with clouds that threatened freezing rain or possibly snow. I shook uncontrollably as the Civic’s heating system struggled to fight back the cold. If Harry died…I hoped they’d destroyed Vitriol. It infuriated me that the monster had a name, like it was a pet or a friend. No pet could do something like this.
Everyone on the road tonight seemed intent on getting in my way, creeping along the freeway like they were afraid of excessive G-forces on their stupid cars and their stupid bodies. I swerved around a pickup truck and got honked at. Fine. Honk. Just stay out of my way. The roads were dry, the visibility was…well, it wasn’t good, but it wasn’t raining. There was no reason not to go a little faster than the speed limit, something I never did, but then I’d never had so much reason to before.
I took the curving streets and switchbacks of the Kellers’ neighborhood at speed, my tires squealing sometimes, and skidded into their long driveway. William Rasmussen’s BMW was parked there already, along with a few cars I didn’t recognize. The house blazed with light at every window, as if they were hosting a Christmas party, but there was no music, no sound except the wind soughing through the branches of the fir trees surrounding the house. I parked and nearly fell getting out of my car, sprinted to the front door and flung it open without bothering to knock.
The pale gray living room I was so familiar with had been destroyed. The couches and chairs were tipped on their backs or sides and huge chunks had been torn out of them, turning them into splintered wood and shredded upholstery. The andirons and fireplace screen were bent and lay some distance from the fireplace, where the fire burned low and menacing. Several men and women I didn’t know were picking up the furniture and holding its broken pieces together, and I smelled something sharp and bitter like burnt glue. They all looked up when I entered, then silently went back to what they were doing. I passed between them to enter the formal dining room, where the table’s gleaming surface was covered in deep scratches and burn marks. Someone had fought a battle in this house, and if not for Judy’s text, I would have believed the Kellers had lost.
Judy emerged from the hallway that led deeper into the house. “He’s still alive,” she said, her voice hoarse from crying. “Lucas is with him. Come talk to Harriet.”
I followed Judy down the hall, which was covered with photos of the Kellers’ children and grandchildren. I’d never been in this part of the house and it surprised me how normal it all looked. Harry and Harriet were glass magi and had fought in the Long War for years before going into semi-retirement, and part of me had trouble reconciling that with raising a family. “Did someone call their children?”
“Father arranged it all. He’s in Harry’s office making calls.” Judy opened a door to a frilly pink bedroom that might have belonged to a pre-teen girl. Harriet sat in an overstuffed pink armchair, staring at nothing, while a magus I didn’t know knelt at her feet, holding her hand. Harriet was covered in blood and the sleeve of her bright yellow sweater was torn and hung, blood-soaked, from her shoulder.
As we entered, she closed her eyes tight and hissed, her lips drawn back from her teeth in pain. I’d never seen a healing done before—at least, not on
someone other than myself—and watched in astonishment as the angry wound beneath the torn sleeve glowed with amber light. I knew Harriet would be in agony from the healing, which could feel worse than the injury, and I closed my eyes in sympathy with her.
Then I heard Harriet breathing heavily, like someone who’d just run a grueling race, and I opened my eyes to see her put her free hand on the magus’s head. “Thanks, Joanie,” she said. She raised her head to look at us, and her lips quivered. “Oh, girls,” she said, and Judy and I flung ourselves at her and held her tight. I cried again, not sure if it was for her pain, or for the danger Harry was still in, or for the terror so many others faced as well.
“I have to go to him,” Harriet whispered. “Thank you both for coming. Judy, has Will called the children?”
“He’s doing it now,” Judy said. “Pete’s on his way.”
“I’m glad.” Harriet disengaged from us and stood. “Come along, both of you. If…” She shook her head and was silent.
We followed her next door, which I would have called the master suite if it hadn’t been so cozy. The rest of the Kellers’ house looked like a spread from a home decorating magazine. Here, the furniture was mismatched and worn the way something well-loved would be, with a four-poster bed carved with fanciful images taking up most of the space.
Harry lay in the bed under the covers, looking unexpectedly small for a man over six feet tall. I couldn’t see any injuries, none of the awful blood Harriet looked like she’d been drenched in, but he was barely breathing and he looked so pale I wondered if some of that blood hadn’t been his. Lucas Yarnell, a Nicollien bone magus I knew from Abernathy’s, stood beside the bed, looking down at Harry. Lucas looked as ashy-faced as Harry, and when he reached out to take Harry’s hand I saw both of them tremble.
Harriet moved forward to sit next to Harry on the bed. “Well?” she said.
“He’s over seventy years old,” Lucas said.
“I know how old he is, damn you,” Harriet said, startling me because I’d never heard Harriet use any stronger language than “darn.” “Will he recover?”
“It will take time. He lost a lot of his magic and a lot of blood. I can’t guarantee he’ll ever work magic again.”
“I don’t care about that. I just want him to survive. Did you hear that, Harold Archibald Keller? You are not allowed to die.” Tears were streaming down Harriet’s face that she made no move to wipe away.
Harry’s lips moved. Harriet leaned far over to lay her ear against his mouth. Then she laughed, a slightly hysterical sound. “He says my roast would bring a man back from the dead.”
Judy and I laughed, and I felt some of the burden lift from my heart. “Is that a good sign? That he can talk?” I asked.
Lucas caught my eye and shook his head, the tiniest movement, and my heart chilled again. “Let’s leave Harriet alone for a bit, okay?” he said, shooing us out of the room.
“What aren’t you saying, Lucas?” Judy said.
Lucas carefully closed the door behind us and motioned us away from it. “His magic isn’t regenerating the way it should,” he said. “It happens as you age—the mechanism that causes your magic to replenish itself becomes less efficient, and recovering from the loss of magic is harder and sometimes impossible. He’s going to need…not transfusions exactly, but some assistance for his natural processes to start working again. And it might not help.”
“So…he could still…”
“I’m not giving up yet.” He didn’t look as certain as he sounded. “There are still things I can do. If Joan’s finished, we can try to combine magic, see if that works. Right now I want Harriet to have as much time with him as possible, just in case…”
He went into the room we’d found Harriet in, and the muffled sound of conversation drifted from it. I focused on one of the pictures on the wall, of the Kellers’ four sons. They were one of those families with a strong family resemblance, though in their case all the boys looked like Harriet. They were lined up in a football starting position, bent over and smiling at the camera, and I wondered which one was Pete. Whether they were all magi. Where they lived, and was it close enough for them to travel to be with their parents.
“It was so unexpected,” Judy said quietly. “Harriet said they were just sitting in the living room after dinner, with Vitriol lying on the floor by the fireplace like it always does, and Harry stood up to get the paper and the monster launched itself at his chest. Harriet killed it with her cast iron skillet, but not before…” She took a shuddering breath. “They’re analyzing its body and the harness, but it looks like the same as the others—the alteration magic is failing.”
“What are the Nicolliens going to do? The problem’s not going away!”
“I don’t know. Father might order a mass extermination, if they can’t figure out why some are failing and others aren’t. It’s terrifying.” She looked me up and down. “Were you clubbing?”
She made it sound so horrifying I blushed and stammered, “Um, there are parties at the conference…I was going to one, and Carlos and Elisabeta said I should dress—”
“Never mind. Just so it wasn’t anything important.”
“No.”
We fell silent. The conversation stopped, and Lucas and Joan emerged from the pink bedroom. “There’s nothing else you can do here tonight,” Lucas said. “No. Help Harriet move some of her clothes into this room. She can’t stay in there with Harry, and she has to sleep sometime.”
“All right.”
Harriet was still sitting on the bed next to Harry, holding his hand. “Lucas wants you to move some things into Amelia’s old room,” Judy said. “We’ll help you carry.”
“I don’t want to be away from him.”
“You have to sleep eventually. And it will disturb him if you sleep in here.”
Harriet raised her head. “If I’m gone when he—”
“Don’t,” said Judy. “Don’t think like that. He’ll be fine.”
“And Lucas won’t leave him alone,” I said.
Harriet nodded and patted her husband’s hand, then rose. “I should get out of these clothes and burn them. I just can’t stop seeing Vitriol’s smashed skull and wishing I’d been able to cut its damn head off.”
We helped Harriet take some clothes and her toothbrush into the other room. The Kellers’ one daughter, Amelia, had a frilly soul, and I wondered if Harriet would even be able to sleep in that pink nightmare. But eventually we got everything put away and left Harriet to change her clothes.
As we loitered in the hall, Judy’s father emerged from a room at the far end of the hall and stumped toward us. William Rasmussen normally looked like a professor of some obscure science, but tonight he just looked weary, his eyes dark-circled and pouched, the corners of his mouth drawn down in a permanent frown. He glanced once at me and dismissed me—well, we weren’t friends and probably never would be.
“I’ve reached all five of their children,” he said to Judy. “Peter will be here in a few hours. The rest will come as they’re able, and let’s hope it’s soon enough.”
“What made the magic fail?” I asked.
It was a mistake. Rasmussen’s lips compressed tight with anger. “This has nothing to do with you,” he spat. “Stay out of it.”
“One of my friends might be dying. It matters to me.”
“So you can turn it into a weapon? Don’t tell me you’re not thrilled to see our weakness. You’ve always hated familiars, you—”
“Stop it!” Judy exclaimed. “Do you really think Helena’s happy about this?”
Rasmussen and I glared at each other. I said, “I don’t want anyone to get hurt. Yes, familiars scare me, but I’ve seen them in action and I think you’re right that they help in the Long War. But if you don’t know what’s causing this to happen, I think I have a right, as a potential victim, to know what you plan to do about it.”
Rasmussen was breathing heavily. “We won’t let it go on,” he said. “I�
��m waiting for word from the Archmagus. If we can’t find a way to identify the familiars who are likely to break containment, we’ll have to start destroying them.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I. Now get out. There’s nothing more you can do here.”
“Father—”
“It’s all right, Judy. He’s right. Call me if—if anything changes.” I turned and walked away. The living room looked more like itself, though the fireplace screen was still bent; the couches were mostly whole, with the upholstery restored and the ash wood glossy and unblemished. The Nicolliens avoided my eyes the way someone who’d heard Rasmussen yell at me would. I let myself out the front door and trudged to my car, no longer feeling the cold.
I drove back to the hotel, barely seeing the road. It probably wasn’t safe to drive like that, but I didn’t care. I kept glancing at my phone where it lay on the passenger seat, willing it to stay silent. Harry would be all right. He had to be.
I left my car with the valet and slumped through the lobby, only just then realizing I’d left my purse in my room and had been driving without my license. Reckless driving, driving without a license…I was normally the most law-abiding person you could imagine, but none of that mattered now. I avoided the bar. It was after ten by now, so Kevin would be gone, but I didn’t want to take any chances on meeting someone who’d want to talk. Talking felt like way too much work.
Inside my suite, I slung my jacket over one of the chairs and went into the bedroom to fall face-first onto the bed. I let it swallow me up, draining all the fear and sorrow and tension out of my body and sending it somewhere far away. I kicked off my boots and curled in on myself, listening to my breathing. I needed Malcolm so badly, and at that moment I didn’t care if the entire Board of Neutralities and every custodian there was knew I’d violated the Accords. I just wanted him there.
Eventually I found myself drifting off and rolled off the bed, stretching. I stripped out of my party dress, leaving it puddled on the floor, and put on my pajamas. I plugged my phone in and set it on the nightstand, then stared at it for a few minutes, willing Malcolm to call. Nothing.
The Book of Lies Page 7