Spell Games

by T. A. Pratt

  “Okay. So we're past it. What now? You do to me whatever you did to Danny?”

  “That depends entirely on the outcome of this conversation.”

  “Oh, so there's something I can say to make you spare me? Just tell me my line, sis, and I'll say it with gusto.”

  “I just want to know—”

  Jason went for something in his jacket. Marla was across the room in a flash, pulling his fingers back, tearing away the knife he'd had concealed inside. Marla bounced him off the wall and returned to her chair, holding the knife, which was wickedly serrated. Jason leaned against the door across the room, not even looking sulky, rubbing his hand.

  “How many goddamn knives do you carry?” she asked.

  “When I'm planning to kill my sister, the wicked witch of the East Coast? As many as I can. What's that line from the Bible? ‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’?”

  “Now you've got religion?”

  “My friend Danny, the one you just murdered? He figured you must be in league with the devil to do the things you do. Seems plausible to me.”

  “It's a theory. Since when do you have anything against deals with the devil?”

  “Why didn't you tell me?” His eyes were wide and beseeching, and Marla was stunned by the sudden openness of his expression, by the pain in his voice. “You found out something like this, you found magic, and you let me keep going along as I always had, grubbing and grifting, when there was…when there was wonder out there in the world?”

  Marla shook her head. “Won't play. You were planning to kill me before you knew magic was real. Try again.”

  He relaxed, all that naked pain vanishing in an instant. “Ah, well. Worth a try. You really want to know why, Marlita? Why I planned to kill you, my own sister, my by-God flesh and blood?”

  “I really do.”

  “Because you're nobody to me,” he said, with relish, as if he'd been waiting a long time to say it. “Once we were family, and we looked out for each other, but that was a lifetime ago. My sister was a little girl with steel in her spine and venom in her tongue, and she was loyal. But that night you left me to my own devices, stuck with a dead body and nobody to help me out, abandoned me after all I'd done for you, that was the night you stopped being my sister. You gave it up, you washed your hands of me, and I returned the favor. In the years since then—not too far off from twenty years, Marla, and that's a lot of years—you've only gone farther away. You aren't my family Danny, he was my brother, he proved himself again and again. But you? You're a stranger who happens to bear a passing resemblance to my little sister, but as far as I'm concerned, my sister is dead and gone. What's more, you're a rich stranger. And what I do to rich strangers is, I take their money. I pick a mark, and I use whatever I can against them—if they like gambling, I become a gambler. If they like art, I become an artist. If they like real estate, I become a developer. If they want their long-lost brother back… I become their long-lost brother. And if, when it comes down to the blow-off, I have to kill them, c'est la fucking vie.”

  “Guess that explains it, then.” She could remember times in her life when she'd felt hollow, and tired, and wretched, but never quite so completely as she did now.

  Jason wasn't done. “Fuck, Marlita, you're a sorceress.”

  “Sorcerer,” she said absently. “It's like actors, it's sexist to say ‘actress.’ Same with us.”

  “Rondeau mentioned that. Before I killed him. You might as well be an alien, as far as I'm concerned. Are you even human anymore?”

  “I think inhumanity runs in our family Why did you kill Rondeau?”

  “Because if I hadn't, he would have told you I killed Cam-Cam, and you would have stopped trusting me, and then I would have had a tougher time making you dead. That's all. Nothing personal. He was a nice kid.”

  “He was. He was my brother.” She was thinking of B, instead of Rondeau, but that was too much to explain, and she was in no mood for explaining.

  “Then we're each short a fucking sibling after tonight's events, aren't we?” His eyes were narrowed, and she saw hate looking out at her. She thought it was the first genuine expression she'd seen from Jason since he came to town. “Want to call it a draw?”

  “No, I don't.” She teleported out of the room, back to her office, and once more, was disappointed when she didn't die along the way. Nothing even scraped her with a claw this time.

  She'd made her decision, so she began the laborious process of unlocking the bottom drawer of her desk. It was essentially a magical bank vault in miniature. Viscarro had made it for her, and nothing short of a nuclear strike could have opened it without her say-so. She kept two things inside it. One was the jewel that contained Viscarro's life.

  The other, she thought, is the thing that contains my brother's death.

  Marla didn't teleport back into the room. After three times already, she was going to have a teleportation hangover tomorrow so bad she'd wish for death—just like now, but for new and different reasons. She didn't want to risk becoming lost in the in-between. She'd made a decision, and now she had to follow through.

  She opened the door. Jason was lounging on the chair Marla had been using.

  “Nice cloak,” Jason said. “Very… virginal.” “Thanks.” Marla drew the white cloak around her. It was only white on the outside. Inside, the lining was the purple of an ugly bruise, or of dyes made from poisonous flowers. Technically, it wasn't actually a cloak. It just looked like one. What it was, she couldn't have said, exactly, except that it was old, and malevolent, and sly, and had plans for her. Things like that—objects with minds of their own and powers untold—were usually called artifacts by sorcerers. Other sorcerers were jealous she owned such an artifact, and many coveted it. In that respect, Marla thought they were idiots. “I have to kill you, Jason.”

  “The feeling's mutual, dear.”

  She shook her head. “But I don't think I can do it. You're my brother. You're one of the big reasons I am… the way I am.”

  “To my everlasting shame.”

  “Don't be cruel,” she said softly.

  “Don't betray me. Oh, wait. That's almost twenty years too late. Oh, well. Life is full of disappointments.”

  Marla took a breath. With a mental command, she could reverse her cloak, and the purple lining would switch places with the white exterior. Clothed in the purple, she would lose her conscience, her morals, her regrets; she would become a murderous thing, and would not hesitate to rip Jason apart. She'd promised herself she would never use the cloak again, because the toll it took on her mind was too great, and because it was too dangerous, but there was no other way she could bring herself to murder her own brother. “I'm sorry, Jason.”

  “Oh, moment of truth? Can I have some last words?”

  “Of course.”

  “Just one last word, then: ‘bang.’ ”

  Jason suddenly had a little gun, and he shot her in the stomach. She went down, blinded by pain. Gut shots were the worst. She curled up on her side, drawing her knees to her chest, trying to protect the part of her that had already been pierced. Jason had pulled the knife from the lining of his coat, but she wasn't sure where the gun came from—maybe some apparatus up his sleeve?

  It'd popped into his hand like a magician's bouquet of silk flowers. He'd played her. Jason had never expected to stab her with the knife—he'd just wanted her to think she'd discovered his last secret weapon, thwarted his final trick. Got me again, bro.

  “Say hi to Danny when you get to hell,” Jason said. “He was a religious man, but let's be honest, guys like us don't get into heaven.” He looked at her with cold disinterest, and she knew there was nothing she could say to stir the stone of his heart. He raised the pistol again.

  She closed her eyes. She didn't want to watch her own brother shoot her in the head.

  Marla woke almost two hours later, weak, with blurred vision, and a headache that was probably equal parts teleportation and head-shot related. She br
eathed a sigh of relief anyway—she'd had some fear Jason would dump her body somewhere, and that she might lose the cloak in the process, which would have been the end of her.

  She sat up, trembling, and unhooked the silver stag beetle pin that held her cloak to her throat. The cloak had healed her—the white side could repair almost any injury, given time, apparently even skull-and-brain-shattering gunshots—but she didn't want the thing on her shoulders anymore. Two lumps of misshapen lead lay on the floor where she'd been left for dead. Keep sakes.

  Jason knew she was a sorcerer now, but he still didn't understand what that meant. Marla's kind were hard to kill. Apparently Jason's kind were hard to kill, too. She had to admire him. She was also beginning to think she might be able to hate him—which meant, next time they met, she might not need the cloak in order to finish him off.

  She dragged the cloak back to her office and stuffed it into the bottom drawer of her desk. After falling heavily into the chair, she reached for the phone—but there was no one she wanted to call. Clawing open the top drawer of the desk, she opened a bottle of powerful painkillers, dry-swallowed three pills, and crawled back to Rondeau's spare room, into the bed.

  The mussed covers still smelled like B. They still smelled like Jason. They were smeared with bits of Danny Two Saints’ blood. It seemed a fitting bower.

  “Will you go after Jason?” Hamil said. “I daresay we could divine his location. You're related by blood, so I could create a sympathetic link—”

  “He'll turn up.” She sipped a cup of the strong Turkish coffee Hamil favored. After two days, her headache was mostly gone. They were in the front room of the Wolf Bay Café, sitting at a window, watching summer fade outside. “Or he won't.”

  “If you'd like, I can have someone… take care of him. So you won't have to deal with it.”

  “Jason's my problem. He was never a threat to Felport itself, so it's not right to bring the city's resources into it. It's a personal matter.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Without looking up from her coffee, she said, “Is Rondeau okay?”

  “He's… as well as can be expected. I heard from him yesterday. I check in. Would you like me to give him a message from—”

  “No. I don't have anything to say to him.” Yet.

  “I know it doesn't seem like it now, Marla, but things will get better.”

  “I know they will. I'll make them get better.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I'm going to bring B back to life.”

  Hamil set his cup down gently. “Marla. Necromancy doesn't bring people back—not really. Even if you can conjure his spirit, it won't be the same. Death changes you. You of all people know that.”

  “I'm not talking about necromancy.”

  “Then what?”

  “I know people, Hamil. And things that aren't really people. And they owe me favors. I'm going to call them in.”

  “Do you think that's wise?”

  “Wise? No. But necessary.”

  “Home again.” Bulliard sat down in a clearing that looked much like every other clearing they'd passed, plucked what appeared to be a poisonous toadstool, and munched it with relish.

  “What the fuck am I still doing here?” the courier demanded.

  “I have no idea.” Bulliard talked with his mouth full. It was disgusting. “The Mycelium desires your presence.”

  “That's just great.” The courier, filthy and exhausted after the long drive—across the fucking country twice in less than a week, that was no way to live, even for a slave—sat down in the underbrush.

  I am vast, whispered a voice in the courier's head, and the fungal magician sat up—he could hear it, too. If one part of me is destroyed, I live on. But I have no such redundancy among my followers. I begin to think this is a mistake. Bulliard has … limitations … I had not expected, and needs assistance.

  “No, master.” Bulliard rose to his feet. “I need no help, especially not from this—”

  “Thpt,” the courier interrupted. “You couldn't even drive. You couldn't even, like, order a sandwich. You're hopeless.” He paused. “Not that I'm making a case for my indispensability, here.”

  You failed. Both of you failed. The spores are not here.

  “I was deceived, master.” Bulliard put his hand over his heart. “I could not bring you the spores, because they do not exist.”

  Nevertheless, I am displeased. You will be reprimanded.

  “Master, please, don't—” Bulliard didn't get any further before he started to gag and claw at his throat. He fell to the ground and convulsed.

  “What the fuck?” The courier scrambled back.

  He will not die. I have only allowed the poison in the mushrooms to touch him lightly. But as for you…

  “Strike me down,” the courier said, closing his eyes.

  So the Mycelium was real. It wasn't just old Bully talking to himself. The discovery was not comforting.

  You failed, the Mycelium said. Why then should I reward you? No, you will remain here, and serve me in those matters where Bulliard cannot. I may occasionally need an ambassador into human lands. You will serve that purpose, and others. In the meantime, your presence will be an ongoing punishment for Bulliard… and for yourself….

  “You've got to be shitting—”

  Silence, the Mycelium said, and the courier didn't hesitate to obey—not because of any magical compulsion, but because he'd found a whole new field of despair beyond what he'd assumed were his own absolute limits.

  This is what I propose, the voice of the Mycelium, the largest organism on Earth, whispered. Serve me willingly, and gain my strength, and exalt me, and be exalted.

  The courier considered. “Do I have a choice?”

  Serve unwillingly, and in misery.

  The courier sighed, and looked at Bulliard's still-twitching form. “If I say yes, can I give this fucker a kick?”

  The Mycelium's answer was, perhaps, coolly amused, or maybe the courier was just projecting. You may.

  The courier stood, drew back his boot, and planted a kick in the fungal sorcerer's ribs, grunting at the impact. “Fuck.” He limped away. “Stubbed my toe.” He sat on a log and considered his options. “Same shit, different day.” He plucked a poisonous mushroom. “So how do these taste anyway?”

  Marla opened one of her unsecured desk drawers and picked up a little silver bell. It was precious, and deep magic, in its way, but it wouldn't work in anyone else's hand, so there was no reason to keep it locked up. She rang the bell.

  A pale, beautiful man with long hair and rings on all his fingers came in from a door that ceased to exist as soon as he passed through it. He smiled, a bit distractedly—he'd probably been busy. He usually was. “Marla, dearest, what can I do for you?”

  “I have a friend. I had a friend. He died a few days ago.”

  Death's expression became more focused, and concerned. “I'm so sorry Would you like me to arrange a meeting?”

  “No. I want you to restore him to life.”

  Death whistled. “Marla… There are precedents, of course, one can go into the underworld and retrieve a loved one, but the costs are more than you can afford to pay”

  “Even for me? Don't I get… special privileges? Given our history?”

  “You're asking this from me as a—a favor? In light of our personal relationship?”

  Marla didn't want to make presumptions on this man, who wasn't a man, but who was very important to her, and especially important to her future. But this was for B, and she knew that if she was the one who'd died instead of him, B never would have stopped trying to bring her back. “That's right.”

  “What's his name?”

  “Bradley Bowman.”

  Death's eyes widened. “Ah, yes, him. He went to the underworld, once, when he was alive—years ago.” He frowned. “But…he's not there, Marla. Nowhere in my realms. You're certain he died?”

  Marla closed her eyes. “There were… speci
al circumstances. His body is still walking around, but there's a different mind inside it.”

  “I don't know where his spirit went, Marla, but I'm afraid I didn't claim it. If his body still lives, but his mind is lost…” He shook his head. “He is beyond my reach.”

  “He might just be gone,” Marla said. She began to cry She couldn't help it. Rondeau had shoved Bradley out of the circle of life and death entirely, consigned him to darkness and oblivion. B didn't even get to go to hell—he'd just ceased to be.

  “I should go,” Death murmured. “Call me, anytime, and I'll come.”

  “I'm sure I'll be seeing you soon enough.” She waved him away

  She went to Genevieve next, peeling two dozen oranges and piling the peels in a heap and breathing deep the scent of citrus, her eyes closed. When she opened her eyes, she was in the courtyard of Genevieve's palace in the sky—though it wasn't the sky of any world Marla or anyone else on Earth could look up and see.

  “Marla.” Genevieve stepped into the courtyard, her caramel-colored hair wild, her violet eyes concerned. She was a psychic, and more—a reweaver, capable of altering existence itself to suit her wishes, capable of dreaming new realities into being. Genevieve's powers were so vast and dangerous that she'd voluntarily absented herself from Earth, to a pocket universe of her own creation…but she and Marla kept in touch.

  “I need your help, Gen.” Marla extended her hand, and Genevieve touched it briefly She wasn't much for physical affection, which suited Marla. She didn't have to explain herself, either, because Genevieve could read her mind, and that suited Marla, too. “You've brought people back from the dead before—Mr. Zealand, and St. John Austen.”

  Genevieve widened her remarkable eyes. “Not really, Marla. People I know very well—people whose minds I know well—I can create constructs of them. But it's not really them, you know. Not exactly.”

  “They can think, they believe themselves to be real, and that's good enough for me,” Marla said stubbornly.