by Butcher, Jim
I just stared at him for a second, the adrenaline coursing through me, and realized that the cameraman—all of the newsies, in fact—didn’t even know what had just happened.
It made a creepy kind of sense. I hadn’t heard anything. The assassin must have been using a suppressor. There hadn’t been any flashes, so he must have done it right, aiming at me through the car window while sitting far enough back to make sure the barrel of his gun didn’t poke out suspiciously—and that he never became a highly visible target. I had helped, too, by denying the onlookers the subtle clue of a dead body with little holes in the front of it and big ones in the back. No sound, no sight, and no victim. Why should they think that murder had just been attempted?
“Move!” I said, hauling myself up by the cameraman’s paw. I struggled to get higher, to look over the crowd and get a plate off of the dark sedan. It didn’t take much more than stepping around a couple of people and standing on tiptoe to get a view of the shooter’s vehicle, cruising calmly away, without roaring engines, without crashing up onto the sidewalk or running red lights. It just vanished into the traffic like a shark disappearing into the depths. I never got a clear look at the plates.
“Dammit,” I growled. Pain was starting to register on me now, especially in my arm. The protective spells I’d woven over my duster had held out against the bullets, but the leather had been pulled pretty tight over my skin and as a result it felt like someone had smashed a baseball bat into my forearm. The fingers of my left hand were tingling and refused to do more than twitch. I felt similar throbs from the other two hits, and ran my hands over the duster, just to be sure none of them had gone through without my noticing.
I found a bullet caught in the leather of my left sleeve. It hadn’t penetrated more than maybe a quarter of an inch, but it was trapped in the leather and deformed from the impact. I pulled a handkerchief out of my pocket, wrapped the bullet in it, and put it back again, managing to do the whole thing unnoticed while about a dozen people looked at me like I was a lunatic.
From the street came a wheezy little beep-beep! The Blue Beetle came slowly down the street and stopped in front of the building. Molly was behind the wheel, waving at me frantically.
I hurried down to the street and got in before the mismatched color scheme of my car sent the obsessive-compulsive federal personnel in the building behind me into a conniption. As Molly pulled away, I buckled up, then got a sloppy kiss on the face from Mouse, who sat in the backseat, his tail going thump-thump-thump against the back of the driver’s seat.
“Ick!” I told him. “My lips touched dog lips! Get me some mouthwash! Get me some iodine!”
His tail kept wagging and he smooched me again before settling down and looking content.
I sagged back into my seat and closed my eyes.
Maybe two minutes passed. “You’re welcome,” Molly said abruptly, her tone frustrated. “No problem, Harry. Whatever I can do to help.”
“Sorry, padawan,” I said. “This has been a long day already.”
“I came back from the church and saw a bunch of guys and cops were going in and out of your apartment. The door was broken down and the whole place looked like it had been ransacked.” She shuddered and clenched the wheel. “God. I was sure you were dead or in trouble.”
“You were about ninety percent right,” I said. “Someone told the feds I was the one who blew up the office building. They wanted to talk to me.”
Molly’s eyes grew wide. “What about the Swords? We’ve got to tell my dad, right away, or—”
“Relax,” I said. “I stashed them. They should be safe for now.”
Molly puffed out a breath and subsided in relief. “You look terrible,” she said, after a minute. “Did they beat you up or something?”
I swept my eyes left and right as we went on, searching. “Giant centipede.”
“Oh,” Molly said, drawing the word out, as though I had explained everything. “What are you looking for?”
I’d been scanning the traffic around us for a dark sedan. I’d found about thirty of them so far, being a master detective and all. “The car of the guy who just shot at me.” I produced the bullet, a little copper-jacketed round more slender than my pinkie and a little under an inch long.
“What is that?” Molly asked.
“Two-twenty-three Remington,” I said. “I think. Probably.”
“What’s that mean?”
“That it could have been almost anybody. It’s the round used in most NATO assault rifles. A lot of hunting rifles, too.” A thought struck me and I frowned at her. “Hey. How did you know where to find me?”
“I let Mouse drive.”
Thump, thump, thump.
Chapter Fifteen
“Aren’t you pleased with me?” the Leanansidhe said. She gestured with one manicured hand to the two cocoons, then went back to caressing Mister. “I came upon these brigands ransacking your little cave and . . . What is the word?” Her smile widened. “I apprehended them.”
“I see,” I said.
“As I understand mortal business,” she said, “next there is a trial, followed by . . . What is the word mortal law uses for murder? Ah, an execution.” Her red-gold brows furrowed briefly. “Or is it execution and then trial?” She shrugged. “La. It seems largely a matter of semantics in any case. Harry, would you prefer to be the judge, the jury, or the executioner?”
I . . . just stared.
The last time I’d seen my faerie godmother, she had been ranting and raving in a couple of distinct personalities and voices while half-entombed in a sheet of ice at the heart of the Winter Court. Since I was sixteen, she’d pursued me relentlessly whenever I crossed into the Nevernever, apparently determined to transform me into one of her hounds.
For crying out loud. Now she was all smiles and bubbles? Protecting my apartment? Offering to play courtroom with me, as if I were a child and Martin and Susan were a pair of dolls?
“It isn’t that I don’t like to see you, Lea,” I said. “But I can’t help but wonder what it is you want.”
“Merely to ensure the well-being of your spiritual self,” she replied. “That is what a godmother is supposed to do, is it not?”
“I was sort of hoping your answer would be a bit more specific.”
She let out a musical laugh that rang like distant church bells over snow. “Sweet child. Have you learned nothing of the fae?”
“Does anyone, ever?”
Her slender fingers stroked Mister’s fur. “Do you think it so impossible?”
“Don’t you think it is?”
“In what way is my opinion relevant to the truth?”
“Are we going to stand around here all day answering each other’s questions with questions?”
Her smile widened. “Would you like that?”
I lifted a hand, capitulating.
She inclined her head to me, a gracious victor. Lea was better at that sort of wordplay than me, having had several centuries to practice.
Besides, losing to the guest with grace was a traditional courtesy, as well.
“What I would like,” I said, nodding toward the cocoons, “is for you to please release these two. They aren’t robbers. They’re guests. And this is, after all, my home.”
“Of course, child,” she said agreeably. “No harm done.” She snapped her fingers and the cocoons seemed to sublimate into a fine green mist that quickly dispersed. Susan fell limply from the wall, but I was waiting to catch her and lower her gently to the floor.
Martin plummeted from the ceiling and landed on a threadbare throw rug covering the concrete floor. Nobody was there to catch him, which was awful. Just awful.
I examined Susan quickly. She had no obvious wounds. She was breathing. She had a pulse. And that was pretty much the length and breadth of my medical knowledge. I checked Martin, too, but was disappointed. He was in the same condition as Susan.
I looked up at my godmother. Mister was sprawled in her lap on his ba
ck, luxuriating as she traced her long nails over his chest and tummy. His purr throbbed continuously through the room. “What did you do to them?”
“I lulled their predator spirit to sleep,” she said calmly. “Poor lambs. They didn’t realize how much strength they drew from it. Mayhap this will prove a useful lesson.”
I frowned at that. “You mean . . . the vampire part of them?”
“Of course.”
I sat there for a moment, stunned.
If the vampire infection within half vampires like Susan and Martin could be enchanted to sleep, then it was presumably possible to do other things to it as well. Suppress it, maybe permanently.
It might even be possible to destroy it.
I felt a door in my mind open upon a hope I had shut away a long time ago.
Maybe I could save them both.
“I . . .” I shook my head. “I searched for a way to . . . I spent more than a . . .” I shook my head harder. “I spent more than a year trying to find a way to . . .” I looked at my godmother. “How? How did you do it?”
She looked back at me, her lips curled into something that wasn’t precisely a smile. “Oh, sweet child. Information of that sort is treasure indeed. What have you to trade for such a precious gem of knowledge?”
I clenched my teeth. “It’s always about bargains with you, isn’t it.”
“Of course, child. But I always live up to my end. Hence, my protection of you.”
“Protection?” I demanded. “You spent most of a couple of decades trying to turn me into a dog!”
“Only when you strayed out of the mortal world,” she said, as if baffled at why I would be upset. “Child, we had a bargain. And you had not willingly provided your portion of it.” She smiled widely at Mouse. “And dogs are so charming.”
Mouse watched her with calm, wary eyes, his body motionless.
I frowned. “But . . . you sold my debt to Mab.”
“Precisely. At an excellent price, I might add. So now, all that remains twixt thou and I is your mother’s bargain. Unless you would prefer to enter another compact, of course . . .”
I shuddered. “No, thank you.” I finally lowered my shields. The Leanansidhe beamed at me. “I saw you in Mab’s tower,” I said.
Something dark flickered through her emerald eyes, and she turned her face slightly away from me. “Indeed,” she said quietly. “You saw what it means for my queen to heal an affliction.”
“What affliction?”
“A madness had beset me,” she whispered. “Robbed me of myself. Treacherous gifts . . .” She shook her head. “I can think on it no more, lest it make me vulnerable once again. Suffice to say that I am much better now.” She stroked a fingertip over an icy white streak in her hair. “The strength of my queen prevailed, and my mind is mine own.”
“Ensuring the well-being of my spiritual self,” I murmured. Then I blinked. “The garden, the one on the other side of this place . . . It’s yours.”
“Indeed, child,” she said. “Did you not think it strange that in your turmoil-strewn time here none of your foes—not one—ever sought to enter from the other side? Never sent a spirit given form directly into your bed, your shower, your refrigerator? Never poured a basket of asps into your closet so that they sought refuge in your shoes, your boots, the pockets of your clothing?” She shook her head. “Sweet, sweet child. Had you walked much farther, you would have seen the mound of bones of all the things that have attempted to reach you, and which I have destroyed.”
“Yeah, well. I nearly wound up there myself.”
“La,” she said, smiling. “My guardians were created to attack any intruder—including one that looked like you. We couldn’t have some clever shapeshifter slipping by, now, could we?” She sighed. “You took a terrible toll on my primroses. Honestly, child, there are elements other than fire, you know. You really ought to diversify. Now I have two gaping maws to feed instead of one.”
“I’ll . . . be more careful next time,” I said.
“I should appreciate such a thing.” She studied me quietly. “It has been true for your entire lifetime, child. I have followed you in the spirit world. Created guardians and defenses ’pon the other side to ward your sleep, to stand sentinel over your home. And you still have only the beginnings of an idea of how many have tried.” She smiled, showing her delicately pointed canine teeth again. “Tried, and failed.”
Which also explained how she was always near at hand whenever I had entered the Nevernever. How she would be upon my trail in seconds whenever I went in.
Because she had been there, protecting me.
From everything but herself.
“Now, then,” she said, her tone businesslike. “You left a considerable trove of equipment in my garden for safekeeping.”
“It was an emergency.”
“I had assumed that,” she said. “I will, of course, safeguard it or return it, as you wish. And, should you perish, I will deliver it to an heir of your designation.”
I let out a weary laugh. “You . . . Of course you will.” I eyed Mouse. “What do you think, boy?”
Mouse looked at me, and then at Lea. Then he sat down—but still kept watching her carefully.
“Yeah,” I said. “I think that, too.”
The Leanansidhe smiled widely. “It is good that you have taken my lessons to heart, child. It is a cold and uncaring universe we live in. Only with strength of body and mind can you hope to control your own fate. Be wary of everyone. Even your protector.”
I sat there for a moment, thinking.
My mother had prepared protection for me with considerable foresight. She had anticipated my eventually looking for and finding my half brother, Thomas. Had she prepared other things for me, as well? Things I hadn’t yet guessed at?
How would I pass on a legacy to my child if I knew that I wasn’t going to be alive to see it happen? What kind of legacy did I have, other than a collection of magical gear that anyone could probably accumulate without help, in time?
My only real treasure was knowledge.
Ye gods and little fishes, but knowledge was a dangerous legacy. I imagined what might have happened if, at the age of fifteen, I had learned aspects of magic that had not come to me on their own until I was over thirty. It would have been like handing a child a cocked and loaded gun.
A safety mechanism was needed—something that would prevent the child from attaining said store of knowledge until she was mature enough to handle it wisely. Something simple, but telling, for a child. A wizard child.
I smiled. Something like being able to admit one’s own ignorance. Expressed in the simplest possible form: asking a question. And, as I now knew, my mother had not been called “LeFay” for nothing.
“Godmother,” I asked calmly. “Did my mother leave anything for you to give me when I was ready for it? A book? A map?”
Lea took a very slow, deep breath, her eyes luminous. “Well,” she murmured. “Well, well, well.”
“She did, didn’t she.”
“Yes, indeed. But I was told to give you fair warning. It is a deadly legacy. If you accept it, you accept what comes with it.”
“Which is?” I asked.
She shrugged a shoulder. “It varies from one individual to the next. Your mother lost the ability to sleep soundly. It might be worse for you. Or it might be nothing.”
I thought about that for a moment, and then nodded. “I want it.”
Lea never took her eyes off me. She lifted her empty palm, closed her fingers over it, and opened them again.
A small, gleaming ruby, bright as a drop of blood, carved in a pentagon, lay in her hand.
“It is the sum of her knowledge of the Ways,” Lea said quietly. “Every path, every shortcut, every connection. She developed enough skill at searching them out that she was eventually able to predict them. Ways may change from decade to decade, but your mother knew where they were and where they would be. Very few of mine own kind can say as much
.” She narrowed her eyes. “That knowledge is the burden I hold in my hand, child. Mine own belief is that it will destroy thee. The choice must needs be thine.”
I stared at the gem for a long moment, forcing myself to breathe slowly. All the Ways. The ability to travel around the world without concern for geography. Knowledge like that could have won the war with the Red Court almost before it began. Whoever possessed that knowledge could regard laws with utter impunity, avoid retribution from mortal authorities or supernatural nations alike. Go anywhere. Escape from damned near anything. Gather more information than anyone else possibly could.
Hell’s bells. That gleaming little gem was a subtle strength that had the potential to be as potent as any I had seen. Such power.
Such temptation.
I wondered if I’d be able to handle it. I am not a saint.
At the same time, I had never seen a tool so obviously intended to help a man Show Up for his little girl. No matter where she was, I could go to her. Go to her and get away clean.
Maggie.
Chapter Sixteen
“Harry,” Molly called from up in the living room. “I think they’re waking up.”
I grunted and lifted my pentacle necklace to examine it. The little pentagonal ruby had been quite obviously cut for this particular piece of jewelry. Or it had been before I’d been forced to use the necklace as a silver bullet. My little pentacle, the five-pointed star within a circle, had been warped by the extremes of stress I’d subjected it to. I’d been straightening it out with the set of jeweler’s tools I used to update Little Chicago.
The jewel abruptly snapped into the center of the pentacle as if into a socket. I shook the necklace several times, and the gem stayed put. But there was no point in taking chances. I turned it over and smeared the whole back with a big blob of adhesive. It might not look pretty from the front after it had dried, but I was pressed for time.
“That’ll do, pig,” I muttered to myself. I looked up to Bob’s shelf, where Mister was sprawling, using a couple of paperbacks for pillows while he amused himself dragging his claws through the mounded candle wax. I reached up to rub his ears with my fingertips, setting him to purring, and promised myself I would get Bob back soon: For the time being, he was, like the Swords, too valuable and too dangerous to leave unguarded. In Lea’s bloodthirsty garden, they were probably safer than they had been in my apartment in the first place.