“She’s a bitch,” he said. “The others are better.”
“Thanks,” I said.
He slumped back in his chair and studied the ceiling.
Tor arrived in the doorway to the waiting area about fifteen minutes later. I got up and ran to his open arms. When I told him what had happened so far, his jaw tightened, and his eyes narrowed.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go straighten things out.”
Tor raised hell at the admission desk. I don’t know what else to call it. He snarled, barked, threatened legal action for the way I’d been treated, and bullied the woman behind the desk until she handed him all the forms I’d signed. He tore those up, tossed them into a nearby trash can, and told her he’d fill out a new set. She handed him a clipboard by shrinking back in her chair and stretching her arm out as far as it would go, as if she were offering meat to a tiger. Tor signed the forms and handed it back.
“Get that nurse out here,” he said. “The one with the pale hair.”
“I can’t do that,” she snapped. “She’s with a patient.”
Their eyes met. She snorted and turned away to her computer terminal. In a few minutes another nurse appeared, a woman of Indian descent, I figured from her reddish-brown skin and straight black hair. She told us immediately that her name was Devi.
“I’m so sorry you had to wait,” she said to me. “Caroline worked a double shift today. Stress, you know. She’s off duty now.”
“Not with a patient?” Tor snapped. “Whatever.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “My brother—”
“In surgery now. They’ll retrieve the bullet and assess the damage. Here, come with me, and you can wait near the recovery room.”
Tor turned to the admissions clerk, who was cowering behind her computer terminal. “If the police arrive, tell them where I am. My name is Tor Thorlaksson. Can you remember that?”
“Of course I can.” She cracked her gum in his direction. “No need to be so nasty!”
“Yeah?” Tor considered her for a long moment. “I’d say there was plenty of need. It’s funny how things turned around when a white guy walked in here.”
The woman winced and pretended to ignore him. Devi arranged a poker face and beckoned us to follow her. As we did, I realized that I’d never called Brittany. With Tor beside me I could calm down enough to think. We had the next waiting room, a quiet pale green space with comfortable brown padded chairs, to ourselves. A TV murmured in the corner, but Tor was tall enough to reach the thing and shut it off. I took out my phone, which I’d turned off. I turned it back on and tapped Brittany’s number on speed dial. When she answered, she sounded frantic.
“Maya, I’ve been trying to reach you! Is something wrong with Roman?”
“Yeah, he’s been shot, he’s still alive, and he’s in surgery. Are you home? We’re not far from you if you are.”
“Yeah, I am. Oh god, I knew it was something awful.” She took a deep breath. “I know what now. So okay. Give me directions, and I’ll be right there.”
I told her the name of the hospital and gave her a rough idea of where we were inside it. After I clicked off, I slid over close to Tor. He put his arm around me.
“He’ll pull through,” Tor said. “It’s a deep wound, but it missed the spine.”
I felt every muscle in my body ease, because it never occurred to me to doubt him.
When Brittany arrived, some fifteen minutes later, Tor spared me the job of telling her what had happened. I huddled against him and listened to the clear, calm way he organized the details. For the first time that day I understood them.
Roman had taken the bullet meant for me. At first I merely accepted the idea. It made sense, explained why I’d ended up lying on the sidewalk. He’d been covering me up, keeping me safe. Sure, okay. A couple of seconds later it hit me. He’d taken the bullet meant for me. He’d known it could happen. He must have known. He’d seen enough combat. He’d seen enough death. I began to tremble. I could not stop, could not control the shaking, my hands, head, my whole body, not even when I realized that Tor and Brittany were staring at me.
“He could have died,” I croaked out the words. “Protecting me.”
“Yeah,” Tor said. “Which is why neither of you have to worry about the bills for this. I’ll take care of it. I don’t give a shit how much it costs. What the VA won’t pick up, I will.”
Brittany sobbed—just once—in relief. “Thanks,” she whispered.
“Welcome,” Tor said. “Now we wait.”
And we did, endlessly, it seemed. Brittany and I talked a little, but words failed me. She brought out her phone and called Cynthia first, then the place that held the group therapy.
Tor eventually went out to find the men’s room. He also found a cart selling coffee and brought three cups back with him. I sipped mine slowly to make it last out of the sheer old habit of being poor. I’d just finished it when Devi re-appeared.
“He’s out of surgery. He did fine. He’s in the recovery room, but he’s not awake yet. I’ll tell you when he is, and one of you can go in then.”
“Good,” Tor said. “Did they save the bullet for the police?”
“I’ll make sure they do.” She glanced at Brittany and quirked an eyebrow.
“His girlfriend,” Tor said. “The person he’ll want to see first.”
Devi nodded, smiled, and left again. I heard men’s voices out in the hall and went tense, expecting the police. Instead, two men in civilian clothes walked in, a Hispanic guy in jeans and a Forty-Niners jacket, a brown-haired white guy in jeans and a Giants hoodie. The red and orange of those sports team pieces struck me all wrong, weirdly festive to my addled mind.
“Thorlaksson?” the Hispanic guy said.
“Yeah.” Tor stood up.
“We’re a couple of Cantescu’s buddies. From his group. Y’know?”
“Cool.” Tor stuck out his hand.
They shook hands all round, and Tor introduced Brittany and me. Valdez and Williams were their names. Williams never spoke nor smiled. Now and then he’d nod or frown at something Valdez said.
“Group leader told us about your call,” Valdez said to Brittany, then turned to Tor. “I thought we’d stop by and see if we could figure out who did this.”
“Good,” Tor said. “Let me tell you what I know.”
This time Tor edited his recital of the facts. Although he left out any reference to sorcery, Valdez struck me as the kind of man who might have accepted the fact that Uncle Nils could teleport or leap or whatever you want to call it. His dark eyes had seen plenty of horror, I figured, and plenty of strange things, too, when he mentioned that he and Williams had spent a lot of time in Afghanistan.
“Marines like Roman?” Brittany asked.
“Nah. Army Rangers.” Valdez grinned at her. “But for a Marine, Cantescu’s a pretty good guy.” He glanced my way. “I wouldn’t worry about the guy who shot your brother. We’ll find him, unless he’s lucky and the police get him first.”
“Cops just walked down the hall.” Tor kept his voice just above a whisper. “Careful.”
“Oh good,” Valdez said. “I like to know our police force is on the job.”
The statement probably didn’t fool the two officers who walked in, but they stayed perfectly civil. What they needed to know, they told Tor, was if they had a homicide on their hands.
“No,” Tor said. “He’s out of surgery. Doing pretty well.”
“Good,” the cop said. “Glad to hear it.”
The two of them looked Valdez and Williams over, then exchanged a glance. They returned to the hallway—to wait for the recovered bullet, I assumed.
“Tell Cantescu we’ll be back tonight,” Valdez said, “when he can see visitors. If he gives us the money, we’ll get it to The Man.”
“Thank you,” I said, “but I don’t know where his clothes are. He put it in his jeans pocket.”
“I’ll get it from the nurse,” Brittany said.
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“Okay.” Valdez turned her way. “They’re going to give him morphine, y’know.”
“Yeah,” Brittany said. “It’s back to Square One, isn’t it?”
Williams frowned, and Valdez nodded. “So it goes,” he said. “But they have to give him something.”
Valdez said good-byes all round, and the two of them left. Tor and I stayed until Devi returned to take Brittany into the recovery room.
“I won’t leave him,” Brit announced. “I’ll stay here all night if I can.”
“I can arrange that,” Devi said. “If his sister approves?”
I nodded yes.
“Maya, you look exhausted,” Brittany said. “That’s not good. I’ll call you with updates, and if anything changes. Go home and rest.”
“She’s right,” Tor said. “We’ll come back tomorrow.”
I followed Tor blindly as we walked through the maze of dull yellow corridors that stank of cleaning products. He found the way to a door that led out to the hospital parking lot. Watery streaks of sunlight broke through the fog above.
“Is it safe to drive home?” I said.
“Probably, as long as it’s light. And I’ve got something planned for Uncle Nils. It should keep him busy for a while.” He smiled, the cold twitch of his mouth that always frightened me. “Once it’s good and dark. As the moon wanes, he’ll wane.” He glanced at his watch. “Shit, it’s three o’clock already. Let’s get over the bridge before the traffic peaks.”
As soon as we returned home, Tor fed me élan. I flopped onto the couch while he cooked us both dinner. I considered taking a nap, but once we’d eaten, I felt my strength return. Tor insisted that I rest while he cleaned up the kitchen. I sat down in an armchair and let the last of the sunlight pour over me from the west window. When I looked out I could see the fog returning to distant San Francisco. I took out my phone and called Brittany.
“We’re in a private room,” she told me. “He’s sort of awake. They hooked him up to a morphine drip. The nurse told me they’ll switch him over to pills in a couple of days. But it looks like he’s going to be okay.”
Except for his addiction, of course. They’d renewed it for the best of reasons without even knowing what they’d done.
“He can move his legs,” Brittany continued. “That’s the best news ever.”
For a moment I felt sick. My brother could have been paralyzed.
“Have you talked to a doctor yet?” I said.
“No. They want you to be here for that.”
“Okay. We’ll come over in the morning. Once we’re there, you can go home and check on your grandmother.”
“Right. I’ll need to. I called her, but I’m not sure how much she understood.”
We clicked off so she could eat the dinner Devi had ordered for her. Tor started the dishwasher running and joined me in the living room. He stood arrow-straight at the window, his arms crossed over his chest, and watched the sunset fading in the west. The last of the scarlet light made his face glow like fire.
“When are we going to do the ritual?” I said.
“Soon.” He turned around to look at me. “Now remember! I don’t want you participating.”
“Even if you’re in danger? Even if you’re losing?”
“I’m not going to lose.”
“You told me that you and Nils were pretty evenly matched.”
“That was before he lost the last couple of rounds. Involving you is too risky.”
I wanted to agree, to be all meek and obedient. The thought of taking part in a sexual ritual again terrified me. I knew now that it meant giving up complete control of my self, mind and body both. I’d be nothing but a battery, a source of power to supplement his. I gathered my courage and stood up to join him at the window.
“If you need help, I’ll do it,” I said. “It’s worth the risk to me.”
He tilted his head a little to one side and studied my face. “You really mean that,” he said.
“Yes, I do. I love you.”
“And I love you, which is why I don’t want you running any risks.”
“I’d be in worse trouble if something happened to you. Nils would come after me for sure, then.”
Tor turned half-away, then back again. “You’re right,” he said. “Shit! I never should have brought you into this. But I did, and I’m stuck with it now. Look, I’ll do my best to leave you out. But okay, if I really need another weapon, I’ll ask you join me in the center.”
“I’ll be ready.”
“Something I meant to ask you. How did you know what I wanted, that other time? When I asked you to come to me.”
The fear took hold of my lungs with icy hands. “I don’t know,” I stammered. “I really don’t. My dad never would have told me about sex magic, and he’s the only person I can think of who might have known about it.”
“In this life.”
The words hung like a challenge between us. I took a step back. He waited, hands on hips, head thrown a little back. I felt as if I were trapped in a staring contest with a tiger. Eventually his mouth twitched in a smile.
“What’s behind those shutters you dream about?” Tor said. “One of these days you’ll have to open them.”
I broke. I took a few steps away and stared out at nothing. Let the tiger pounce and kill me—I refused to see the view that those shutters hid. I heard him move. He put gentle hands on my shoulders and pulled me back to rest against him.
“I’m sorry,” Tor said. “I know better. I shouldn’t push on you.” He kissed the top of my head. “Still love me?”
“Of course.” My surprise that he’d ask that question returned my courage to me. “Do you really need me to love you?”
“That’s what I tried to tell you. Without you I’d shrivel up inside. You run that risk when you’re a sorcerer. You can turn as dry and brittle as dead leaves.”
He let me go, and I turned around to find him serious and oddly sad. I saw in his eyes the deep melancholy you sometimes see in a wild animal’s eyes, when they come up to the bars of their cage in the zoo. They stare at you as if they were begging you to let them go, but they know you can’t open the cage door.
“It’s not easy, being who you are,” I said.
“No. I can see why you don’t want to open those shutters.”
Tor turned away and strode out of the room. I followed more slowly. He paused with his hand on the door that led to the stairs down.
“I’m going to get things ready,” he said. “It’s growing dark.”
When the waning moon finally rose, Tor led me downstairs. We changed clothes, as we’d done the first time I’d watched him work. The clothes he put on surprised me, a pair of red sweatpants and an old Cal hooded sweatshirt in dark blue. I knew from my reading that red was the color of sorcerers, but the blue hoodie?
“It substitutes for the sorcerer’s cloak,” Tor said. “It doesn’t matter what you wear, really. It’s just a way of setting yourself apart from the mundane world.”
He gave me the same white T-shirt to wear for a tunic, but this time he’d drawn big runes in a bindrune pattern all over it. “Yew,” Tor told me, “and Elk for protection.” The resulting design looked like a bristling hedge or a wrought-iron fence, the kind with spikes. For good measure he drew a Yew rune on my forehead with a piece of chalk.
From one of the drawers he took out a knife with a wooden handle carved with runes, then led the way into the ritual room. It smelled of different herbs, no fruit and flowers this time around, but bitter things, sharp and vinegary. I noticed that he’d used duct tape to cut the circle into eight sections instead of four.
“Sit in the west again,” he said.
I sat down cross-legged against the west wall. Tor carried the rune-knife into the center of the circle and faced north. For about two minutes he spoke not in Icelandic but Old Norse, a tribute to the ancestors. In the corners of the room the candle flames jumped and flickered.
Tor stretched out
his left arm and with the knife in his right hand slit the skin from just below the elbow to a few inches above his wrist. I clasped a hand over my mouth to keep from whimpering aloud. The blood welled from the shallow cut along the back of his arm. He turned slowly through the circle, scattering the blood onto the floor as he did. He chanted as well, a long string of syllables and vowels—not loudly, but in the deep vibrated sounds of raw magic. When he returned to facing north, he rested for a moment. He began to turn again, and at each place where a line met the circle he called out the name of a rune.
I saw them. As he brought them forth I could see them hovering in the air where he’d placed them. The runes glowed red, a hot flickering red like fire seen through a crack in a burning building: Ice at the north, then Thorn, Thorn, Torch, Torch, Hail, Hail, and back to Ice again at the north-west. He raised his bloody arm above his head and called forth Tiwaz, Tyr’s Mark. All of them hung reversed except for Ice, a straight line that has no reverse. On his arm the blood had stopped oozing, but the scarlet line glowed like the runes and marked his hand between his fingers. When he lowered his arm, the blood dripped. A shadowy form built up beside him. A wolf, I thought at first. Tor snapped his blood-soaked fingers, and the ghostly form sat on command—the malamute bitch come to assist at the revenge on the man who had killed her so shamefully.
“Nils!” Tor vibrated the name like a chant. “Come here! I summon you!”
I heard a scream, a distant throbbing wail. At first I thought—no, I hoped—I was only hearing a siren from outside, a fire engine maybe or a police car, but the scream came again in a mixture of rage and terror, louder this time. Tor called out words in Norse. The scream echoed through the room. Between Tor and the Ice rune at the north a mist formed. I could see a mask-like face and the furious blue eyes that glared out of it. The dog-ghost got to her feet. I heard, very faintly, her growl.
Tor raised the blood-smeared knife and continued speaking. The blue eyes looked this way and that in desperate evasion. The mask of bluish mist tried to turn away. Tor spoke again, and the mask held steady. Slowly Tor raised his left hand and grasped the spear-point of Tyr’s justice that hung over his head. He clasped the tang as if it were as tangible as metal and brought it down, pointed it at the mask, and held it out in front of him. He spoke. I understood not one word, but it sounded like a list of charges or perhaps the tolling of a bell, a death-bell in slow grim strokes.
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