by R. L. King
“Wow. So you think these places—Oregon, Wyoming, and Michigan—will have more of these weird rifts?”
“That’s the theory. I’ve got a meeting on Friday, but I plan to head out to check on them on Saturday. I figure I can get at least one of them done over three days. If they’re there, I can close them, and if they aren’t…well, then I suppose it’s back to the drawing board, isn’t it?”
“You want me to come with you? I could put off the last of the move for a few days.”
“No, I know you’ve been looking forward to getting settled in. I’ll be fine.”
“Oh! Even better. If this stuff is urgent, I don’t have anything going on this week. No jobs for Scuro until the middle of next week. I could check one of the places out for you, and tell you if I find anything, and that way I could be back by Sunday for the move.”
Stone hesitated. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Why not? I can hunt down magical weirdnesses as well as you can. I won’t get near it or try to do anything about it if I find one, but it’ll make things easier for you. I can do a little advance recon.”
He thought about it. Verity wasn’t his apprentice anymore—she was a competent mage in her own right, and even possessed a few skills at a higher level of expertise than he did. If the rifts were messing with people’s minds, her own was strong enough to block it out, and she might be able to detect things that would take him longer.
“I suppose,” he said, still with reluctance. “It would make things easier. I just don’t like the idea of you going alone. We still don’t know the extent of these things’ influence.”
“Don’t you start getting overprotective, Doc. I get enough of that from Jason already. He’s my brother so I can’t really do anything about him, but you don’t get away with it.”
“I’m not being overprotective. I’m being prudent. If you run into difficulty, I’d feel better if you had someone else along to help out. Is Jason available?”
“No. He’s away on another case for a few days, and I’m not gonna drag him off it to babysit me.” She paused. “Hey, wait, I know. I could take Kyla with me. We could make a little mini-vacation of it. If we find anything I’ll call you, but if we don’t…I could stand to get out of California for a few days.”
Stone didn’t say it, but her words relieved him. He didn’t know Kyla all that well—they didn’t have much in common beyond their mutual connection to Verity—but she was good in a fight and he suspected she had some kind of physical-based magical ability that made her stronger and more agile than the average person. “Yes, that sounds like a good idea. Which one do you want to check out?”
“Let me call her later today and ask if she’s up for it and if she has a preference. I’ll be seeing her tonight anyway. Can I let you know?”
“Yes, of course. Whichever one you choose, I’ll check at least one of the other two this weekend. Thank you, Verity.”
“No problem, Doc. Happy to help.”
He didn’t hear back from her until late that afternoon. He’d gone to the University and delivered his lectures by rote, and during a break he went to the library to find more detailed maps of the three states. By comparing them to the ley-line map he’d brought with him, he determined that both the Oregon and Wyoming locations were near tiny towns, and the one in Michigan appeared to be out in the middle of nowhere with the closest settlement more than twenty miles away. That was good for two reasons: first, it was unlikely to affect any mundanes—at least not on any kind of scale—and second, he could probably save it until last.
On a whim, he made a quick call to Madame Huan’s shop, but no one answered. He didn’t bother driving by Kolinsky’s place—it would have been pointless.
Verity’s call came as he was walking to his car.
“Okay,” she said. “I talked to Kyla. She’s a little skeptical about the whole rift thing, but she likes the idea of getting away for a couple of days. So we’re in.”
“Excellent. Do you have a preference? It looks like the Michigan one can wait until last, since it’s in a remote location. So, Oregon or Wyoming?”
“Wyoming,” she said instantly. “Kyla said she took a trip to that area with her parents when she was a little kid, and she’d like to see it again.”
“Brilliant. Put all the expenses on your credit card, and I’ll reimburse you.”
“I’ve got money now, Doc.”
“I know you do. But you’re doing this for me, so you shouldn’t have to pay for it. Neither of you should. I do appreciate your help, by the way. Tell Kyla for me.” He gave her the name of the small town near the ley line confluence. “Just—you know what to do. Talk to people, have a look around with magical sight, that sort of thing. And call me immediately if you find anything. I mean it, Verity—I know you’re quite capable of handling yourself, and I don’t doubt it for a moment. But if this is a situation Kolinsky and Madame Huan are trying to steer me away from, you’re not ready to take it on yourself. And if you see that figure I told you about, get the hell away.”
“Yeah.” Now she sounded serious, rather than indignant. “I get it. I promise, I won’t mess with anything on my own. If we find any weird stuff, you’ll be the first to know. I’ll even call if we don’t find anything, because I expect if that happens, Kyla and I will be out of communication for a couple days.”
“Fair enough. Good luck.”
“You too.” She paused. “And you be careful too. I know you think you can handle everything on your own, but like you said—this is big stuff. Don’t let that famous curiosity get you in over your head.”
“I don’t plan to.”
“You never plan to,” she said wryly. “That’s kind of the point.”
“Touché.”
Stone had trouble containing his impatience for the next couple days. He knew he could have taken more time off and gotten an earlier start on his own investigations, but he deliberately chose not to do that. As the years had gone on, his magical dealings took more of his time than they used to, resulting in a lot of days away from the University. He felt guilty about it: this was his profession, after all, and he owed it to his students and his colleagues to be as present and engaged with them as he was with hunting down magical anomalies.
Not for the first time, as he sat in his office on Friday morning preparing for his meeting, he wondered about his future with the University. Following Adelaide Bonham’s bequest and the endowment, he’d had much more freedom to set his own hours and determine his own coarse load—that was why he only taught three days out of the week now. He fit his research into his free time, and even used some of his magical investigations as seeds for his papers, but if he wanted to continue teaching students—the thing he loved to do—he’d have to prioritize his work here at least as much as he did his “other life.”
That, and until they found another professor to replace Edwina Mortenson, he couldn’t leave Mackenzie Hubbard with an increased workload. If he stepped back from teaching and they couldn’t find anyone else to take up the slack, it was entirely possible the higher-ups in the Cultural Anthropology department might axe the Occult Studies program. They were doing well now and had moved long past any financial concerns they’d had when Stone had first arrived, but the program couldn’t go on without instructors, and Hubbard couldn’t carry the load himself with nothing but TAs for assistance.
Stone sighed, gathering the papers on his desk and sorting them into neat piles. This situation would bear a lot more thought before he made a final decision. At least he had his green card now, so they couldn’t kick him out of the country if he decided to leave the University. He’d thought about applying for dual citizenship, and even begun the process a few years back, but ended up not pursuing it. Even though he considered California as much his home now as he did Surrey, he didn’t feel any compelling reason to make things official. Not yet, anyway.
He finished stacking the papers and glanced at the clock. His meeting wa
s in half an hour; if he left now he could grab something quick to eat before he had to show up. He hadn’t heard anything from Verity since she and Kyla had landed in Casper at midday yesterday, when she’d called him with a quick “We’re here, everything’s fine.” Their plan had been to head to Mason, the tiny town near the ley-line confluence, and begin their investigation, but it was a couple hours’ drive and she’d told him they weren’t in a hurry.
After grabbing an energy bar and a to-go cup of coffee, he headed immediately to the administration building. Even though this was generally a day off for him, he found himself wishing if he had to be here, it could be to teach a class instead of to attend some tedious bureaucratic exercise. Despite his constant, low-level focus on the rifts lately, he still found himself caught up in the material when teaching, energized as he always was by the students’ interest. He wasn’t vain about it, but he knew his engaging, theatrical lecturing style was one of the major reasons the Occult Studies department had gained so much popularity over the years since he’d joined. True, his world-class expertise in the subject drew in the relatively smaller group of serious students, but quite a number of others from different departments took his courses as electives as well. He usually had to turn some away at the beginning of each quarter.
The meeting droned on as it always did, and Stone struggled to project an interest he wasn’t feeling. As soon as the last agenda item was ticked off the list, he hurried outside and pulled out his phone to check for voicemail. He had three: one from Laura the admin and two from unfamiliar numbers. He listened to them as he walked.
Laura didn’t want anything important, and the first unknown number was some resort trying to convince him he’d won a contest he’d never entered. He deleted it and hit the next button.
The number wasn’t familiar, but the voice was. “Dr. Stone? It’s Kyla.” Even though the staticky connection, Stone couldn’t miss the stress in her voice. “Please call me back as soon as you get this. Something’s wrong. Verity’s disappeared, and I can’t find her!”
32
Stone wished there were some way to make a commercial plane fly faster. He sat back in his seat, forcing himself not to fidget or to spin out wild scenarios of what might have gone wrong in Wyoming.
Something had definitely gone wrong, though.
He’d called Kyla back immediately, and she’d answered on the first ring. “What’s going on?” he demanded without greeting. “Where’s Verity?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “We went off this morning to investigate something, and the next thing I know I’m back here and she’s gone and she’s not answering her phone.”
“Hold on, hold on,” Stone urged. He’d only met Kyla a couple of times, but she’d always struck him as an unflappable, straightforward kind of person. Now, she sounded like her world was falling apart. “Tell me the whole story. What were you investigating?”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I don’t remember. We drove out somewhere, but I don’t remember getting back here. When I checked my watch, half an hour had passed that I can’t account for. What the hell is going on, Dr. Stone? What did you send her out here to check on?”
Stone was still walking, lengthening his stride as he headed back toward his office building on the far side of campus. “Kyla—listen to me. If I’m going to help you, I need the whole story. Tell me everything you can remember, and don’t leave anything out.”
“Okay. Okay. Uh—we landed in Casper, rented a car, and drove to Mason, the town we were supposed to be investigating. That’s where I am now. Seriously, this place is tiny, and it’s out in the middle of nowhere. Took us a couple hours to get there. They only have one motel. We checked in and V wanted to go out and look around right away, so we did.”
“Did you find anything?” Stone swept through the door to the office building and slowed his pace as he headed down the hall.
“No. Not a damn thing. V looked around with magical sight, but she didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. We walked around town a little—it’s not much of a tourist place, but people were friendly enough, I guess. Talked to a few of them, asked if they’d noticed anything odd around the area.”
“But they hadn’t?”
“Nope. Nothing out of the ordinary at all.”
“What did you do then?”
“That was yesterday. This morning, V got the idea to go driving around the area outside town—she said maybe your map wasn’t completely accurate, and whatever it is might be out in the boonies somewhere nearby.”
“Good thought,” Stone agreed.
“So we got up, had breakfast, and drove out of town, following where she said one of the ley lines was. According to the map, there weren’t any other towns within like a half-hour’s drive, so we just tooled around on some of the smaller roads. Every once in a while, we’d stop and she’d get out and check for—I don’t know—magical traces or whatever she does.”
“Did she find any?”
“Yeah. We were out this little road—it was paved, but barely two lanes wide. We were stopping like every five minutes, so this had to be like thirty minutes or so out of town, and she suddenly got all stiff like she’d spotted something.”
“This was near the road?”
“Yeah.” She sounded miserable. “Fuck, this is all my fault.”
“Why do you say that?”
“We were stopping so often, and she wasn’t ever finding anything. So that one time, I stayed in the Jeep to check my voicemail. She’d only be gone for less than five minutes, so I figured if I kept her in sight, she’d be fine.”
Stone tensed. “But she wasn’t?”
“That’s the part I don’t remember.” She growled, obviously frustrated with herself. “The last thing I remember clearly was sitting in that fucking Jeep, watching her wander around like she always did. But then, next thing I know, I’m waking up in our motel room and she’s not with me. I can’t find her anywhere, and she’s not answering her phone.”
“Bloody hell…”Stone muttered. Then, louder, “All right. I’m coming there, but it will take some time. Do you think you can retrace the route you took?”
“Yeah…I think so. Maybe not exactly, but I know what road we were heading out, so if you can do the magic thing, you should be able to find it. Should I—”
“Kyla, I know you won’t like what I’m about to say, but what I want you to do is stay where you are. Do not go out there and try to find her or rescue her. I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but whatever it is, she’s better equipped to deal with it than you are.”
“I can’t just sit here on my ass and—”
“You can, and you must. If she’s found another rift, all sorts of things could have happened. And unfortunately, blundering about without any idea of what you’re doing is more likely to get both of you killed than to help anything. So stay put, and I’ll catch a flight and get there as soon as I can.”
“Yeah. Fuck. Hurry, or I don’t know how long I can do that.”
She’d hung up then, and Stone, heart pounding, had immediately informed Laura an emergency had come up and he’d have to leave. He hadn’t given her time to ask any questions.
Cursing the fact that there weren’t any portals close enough to Wyoming to make it worthwhile to take one instead of flying directly from San Francisco, he’d quickly packed a bag, called Brandon Greene to look after Raider, and headed for the airport. He thought about calling Jason, but Verity had said he was off on a case somewhere. Stone wasn’t willing to wait for him; if something truly was wrong, he’d call from Wyoming.
The only spot left on a nonstop flight to Casper leaving soon was a middle seat in coach, all the way in the back of the plane. Stone sat wedged between a doughy man in a Denver Broncos jersey and a chatty old lady, barely noticing either, and tried not to speculate too much about what might have become of Verity. He’d tried to call her himself before the plane took off, but not only didn’t she answer, he didn�
�t even get voicemail. It rang four times and cut off.
By the time they landed in Casper, it was late afternoon. As soon as he stepped off the plane, Stone was already calling Kyla. “I’m in Casper. Did she turn up yet?”
“No. I’ve been trying to call her, but nothing. I did find out one weird thing, though.”
“What’s that?” Stone was nearly running now, dodging slow-moving knots of tourists on his way to the rental-car counter.
“I asked some people about what’s out that way—if they’d ever heard of anything strange. A couple of them mentioned there’s a town out there. I found it on the map—it’s even smaller than the one I’m in now—but I’m sure we didn’t see it.”
“Are you sure you were on the same road?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. I can’t be certain. Like I said, I lost like thirty minutes, and I don’t know how that happened. Listen, I’m not sitting here much longer. If you don’t get your ass out here soon, I’m going without you to try finding that town.”
“I’m moving as fast as I can. Getting a rental now. Please, Kyla, don’t do that. You’ll be more help if you wait for me and we’ll go out there together.”
“I’m sure as hell not waiting till tomorrow morning. Who knows what’s happening to her out there?”
“No—we won’t wait until morning. Just stay put. If you want to do something useful, ask around about the other town. See if anyone can tell you anything about it. The more information you can gather before I get there, the better off we’ll be.”
“Yeah…okay.” She sounded reluctant. “But hurry.”
“Fast as I can. Call me if anything comes up in the meantime.”
There weren’t many customers at the rental counter, so in less than half an hour he was on his way out of Casper in a Jeep SUV with four-wheel drive. He remembered what Kyla had said about their having one, so he didn’t want to take chances that he might need it. He barely had any idea what it was like in Wyoming, but had a mental image—which he was fairly sure wasn’t entirely accurate—of lots of trees, snow, and large herds of buffalo or something.