by R. L. King
“Not just weed—trying all sorts of mind-altering stuff.”
“Really?” Verity, who had spent the most of her teenage years in various inpatient programs due to the adverse effects her odd connection to the energy seeping in from the Evil’s open portals had on her mind, had seen just about enough mind-altering drugs to last her for the foreseeable future. Unlike most teenagers, she had no desire to experiment, since she’d already had more than her share of involuntary experiments as the doctors had struggled to find a treatment that would work for her. That, and her brother would kill her. Still, the whole concept intrigued her. “Why is that?”
She shrugged. “Variety, I guess. I mean, when you switch on your magical sight, the world looks pretty amazing. All the auras, and the magical energy that’s out there flying around—I guess a lot of mages want to see if it looks even more interesting if they amp up their consciousness a little with some artificial help.”
“But not you.”
Sharra shook her head. “I had a cousin who was an addict. Not a mage, just your garden-variety junkie. He ODed when I was thirteen. So yeah, not really my thing.”
Verity nodded. They meandered down a street lined with small shops, on their way back to the car. The sun was still high overhead; it was a beautiful day, not too hot, the sky bright and cloudless. The kind of day made for walking slowly and window-shopping.
So why did she feel like somebody was watching her?
She slowed her pace a little, glancing sideways into the display window of a small clothing shop and trying to spot any watchers. They weren’t alone: pedestrians moved in both directions, and cars crawled by on the narrow street. None of them appeared to be focusing on the two women ambling past the shops.
“Something wrong?” Sharra asked.
“Not sure,” she said under her breath. “Keep walking. It’s probably nothing, but I just got a weird impression that somebody’s paying attention to us.”
Sharra’s eyes narrowed. “Where?”
“I don’t know. Like I said, it was just a quick impression. I’m not even sure I saw anything.”
“Okay. Let’s just keep going, and keep your eyes open. If it’s creeps, we can handle ’em easily.”
Verity nodded. It was true: she herself was sufficiently advanced in her magical abilities by now that if she kept her head, she was confident she could deal with at least three mundanes as long as she saw them coming. With Sharra, she had no concerns about their ability to handle a whole collection of garden-variety lowlifes.
But why would garden-variety lowlifes be surreptitiously watching them on a populated, midday street? That didn’t make sense. It wasn’t like they could attack them in front of all these other people.
She mentally went over their route to the subway station, where they’d catch a train to get back to where they’d left Sharra’s little car. They had around three large blocks yet to go, and then the subway itself. If anything was going to bother them, she imagined, it’d probably be there.
She and Sharra kept walking, maintaining an unhurried pace and occasionally glancing into windows, but neither of them spotted anybody. The feeling didn’t go away, though: twice more during the three-block walk, the hairs stood up on the back of Verity’s neck. Somebody was out there.
“You think they could be invisible?” she asked Sharra.
“Maybe. It’s possible. But there aren’t that many mages around, and why would they want to follow us?”
She nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. I guess I’m just jumpy, and I don’t even know why.” Part of her did know why, though: because of what Jason had told her when she’d called him, about how he and Stone suspected that the Evil might be on the move again.
Would the Evil follow her all the way back East, or activate some Eastern branch and set them on her tail? Were they even that organized? Without really thinking about it, she darted her gaze around to see if she spotted any Forgotten symbols scrawled on the streets or nearby buildings. She didn’t see any, but continued to look.
The subway entrance was just ahead. “See anybody?” Sharra asked.
“No.”
“Okay. Well, let’s get on the train and maybe if they’re there, we can lose ’em. If not, then they’ll find out that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to hassle us, you know?” Her smile was hard this time.
Verity nodded. It was one of the things she loved most about being a mage, and she thought Sharra probably did too: not having to be afraid. With her abilities, she was more than the equal of any mundane man—or even group of them—who might seek to bother her, or worse. Sure, she had to be smart—but everybody had to be smart. What she didn’t have to be was scared, if she kept her wits about her. It gave a confidence to her stride that usually meant people didn’t mess with her anyway, which was a nice side effect.
They took the stairs down into the cool, dank-smelling dimness of the subway station. Verity glanced around again but still didn’t see anyone paying attention to them, aside from a couple of young guys who gave them an appreciative eye from up ahead. They did nothing more than grin hopefully, and then move on when it became obvious that Verity and Sharra weren’t interested in their kind of attention.
“This is frustrating,” Verity said. “I can’t tell if I’m just being paranoid, or if somebody really is watching us.”
Sharra frowned as they got swept into the crowd, went through the turnstile, and headed toward their platform. “Is there some reason why you think they might be?”
Verity considered that. For a moment, she thought about telling Sharra about the Evil, at least enough to explain why she might be concerned about that very thing. Finally, though, she just shook her head. It wasn’t the time, especially since she wasn’t sure. “Not really, no. I just sometimes get these feelings, and I’ve learned to listen to them. I figure it’s gotta be related to my magic some way.”
“Maybe so,” Sharra agreed. They continued forward, joining a small group of people waiting at the platform for their train. “Five minutes,” she said, glancing at the overhead sign that displayed the upcoming arrivals and departures. “Once it gets here, we can find a defensible spot and watch for anybody who looks suspicious.” She grinned. “If they try to mess with us, they’ll be sorry.”
Verity grinned back.
More people drifted in and spread out along the platform, until there were twenty or thirty of them waiting. They clustered in small groups of two or three, with a few singletons. Everyone appeared to be minding his or her own business. Verity and Sharra took up a position near one end of the crowd where they could keep a subtle eye on as many people as possible, but so far nobody looked suspicious.
Far off in the distance the train’s blaring horn sounded, and the crowd began to shuffle forward, closer to the edge of the platform in anticipation of boarding. Verity relaxed a little: maybe she was just imagining things. Maybe Jason’s words had affected her more than she thought they had, and now she was seeing Evil around every corner, even when they were nowhere near. She took a step forward as the oncoming train’s light appeared in the dark tunnel.
Neither she nor Sharra spotted the figure that darted sideways out of the crowd. It ran silently up behind Verity and, with no sound or change of expression, slammed into her and shoved her over the edge of the platform. The train’s light drew inexorably closer, and its horn blared again as it broke free of the tunnel and rushed into the station.
A lot of things happened at once at that point. Verity screamed as she overbalanced and began to pitch forward, flailing her arms and trying to regain her balance. Several other people in the crowd screamed too, including Sharra, who lunged forward in a vain attempt to grab Verity’s arm before she went over.
The train sounded its horn again with more urgency.
Verity reacted purely on instinct. As soon as she felt herself tipping sideways and falling, she cast a levitation spell and lifted herself up and back toward the platform. Sharra lunged again and this time succ
eeded in grabbing her hand and yanking her back. The two of them fell in a heap, and the rest of the crowd surged around them.
The train pulled forward, horn still blaring, crossing over the place where Verity would have been only a second before.
Time sped up to normal again as the crowd pressed in. “Let me up!” Verity cried, struggling to extricate herself from Sharra. She activated her shield spell for just a second, using it to shove everyone around her far enough back that she could scramble up.
She took off after the figure, which had made it to the other side and was approaching the stairs. Two subway cops ran toward him with their guns out as well, but there were too many people for them to get a clear shot and they were too far away to catch him before he disappeared up the stairs.
Verity had no such issue. As the rest of the crowd looked on in horror and shock, she made a subtle gesture, aiming a small concussion beam at the man. As he stumbled, she quickly caught up and launched herself at him, catching him around the waist and bringing him down in a heap of pumping limbs. “Get out!” she screamed, still running on instinct. She reached out to the guy and shoved with her mind, with no idea if it would even have an effect.
It did: a cloudy puff of grayish energy popped free of the guy, hovering around him for a moment before it shot upward a few feet and flew to pieces. The guy collapsed to the ground and didn’t move.
After that, things slowed down even more. Sharra came pounding up, as did the subway cops and the subset of the crowd didn’t need to get on the train immediately. The cops grabbed the fallen assailant, slapped handcuffs on him, and jerked him to his feet as Sharra pulled Verity up, staring at her like the world had just suddenly turned upside down.
Verity herself stared at the guy. He was utterly unremarkable: a mid-twenties Asian man in a polo shirt, light jacket, and jeans. He looked like a student. He also looked terrified. Tears streamed from his eyes, and blood from his nose where he’d hit the concrete. “I didn’t mean to!” he wailed. “I don’t know why I—”
The cop shook him. “Come on, buddy,” he growled, trying to hustle the guy away. His partner turned to Verity. “We’ll need to talk to you, miss.”
Verity shook her head. “No. I’m not talking. I just want to get home.” She purposely made her voice sound more agitated than she really was, which was a good trick: she was pretty agitated to start with.
“You gotta come down to the station to press charges,” the cop insisted. The crowd crushed in now. Verity was sure that if they waited too long the media would show up, and that would be really bad. The last thing she wanted to do if the Evil were in town was show up on the six o’clock news with her name emblazoned across the bottom of every TV screen in the greater New York City area.
“No,” she said. “Just let me go. I want to go home.” She grabbed Sharra’s hand and pushed back through the crowd toward the platform.
Sharra, for her part, caught on and glared at the cop. “Let her alone. That scared the crap out of her. All of you just get the hell away from her.” She directed her glare around to the crowd at large, and apparently it was potent enough to push back all but the most persistent of them.
“Don’tcha wanna press charges?” the cop asked, confused. The other one was already shoving the Asian guy toward the exit, while the guy still loudly and tearfully protested his innocence.
“No!” Verity yelled. “Didn’t you hear me? The guy’s obviously crazy. Just get him some help and leave me alone, okay?” She turned her back on him and stalked off, still clutching Sharra’s hand.
Verity changed direction when it became clear that the crowd wasn’t going to let her alone if she stayed at the platform. Heart pounding, still not thinking straight, she tugged on Sharra’s arm. “Come on,” she said. “Ladies’ room.”
They made good time, and it didn’t take long to leave the nosey crowd behind: one good thing about New York City was that people, for the most part, tended to mind their own business unless whatever was going on was so compelling that they couldn’t ignore it. Once Verity and Sharra got away from the immediate scene of the attack, everyone else went back to their own activities.
Verity shoved open the women’s room door and flung herself inside. There was a small, graffiti-strewn lounge area off to one side, probably intended for breastfeeding babies (though Verity couldn’t imagine why anybody would want to feed a baby in this nest of filth) and she threw herself down onto the small bench. Her breath still came hard and fast, and beads of sweat stood out on her forehead.
Sharra sat down next to her and rubbed her back. “Hey,” she soothed, “You’re okay. You’re okay now…” Her own voice shook. “Nice trick with the levitation spell. Fast thinking.”
Verity nodded a couple of times and swallowed. “Thanks for grabbing me. I don’t think anybody would have noticed I was flying, but you made it look more believable that you just made a really good catch.”
“De nada,” she said. She paused a moment, then took a deep breath. “V…”
“Yeah?” Verity didn’t look up.
“Is there anything you want to—tell me?”
Verity swallowed again, still staring down at her hands. Finally, she said: “Yeah. I guess I’d better.”
They sprang for a taxi to take them to Sharra’s car, neither one wanting to trust the subway at this point. Sharra got Verity a bottle of water from a street vendor and she sipped it in the taxi, saying nothing until they were in the car and driving toward home. She’d mostly calmed down by that point. As they drove, she stared unseeingly out the front window and, slowly and quietly, told Sharra about the Evil.
Sharra listened with growing amazement, occasionally glancing sideways at Verity with wide, frightened eyes but she couldn’t take her attention off the road for long. Finally, unable to contain her amazement, she took an exit and pulled into the parking lot of a small coffee shop. “Come on,” she said in a stunned tone. “We’re gonna take a break for a while.”
Verity followed her without protest inside, and soon they were seated in a window booth with a couple of Cokes.
“You’re—serious about all this,” Sharra said. She still had the stunned tone, and still looked like she’d taken a hard shot to the jaw.
“Oh, yeah,” Verity said, looking down into her Coke. “Dead serious.”
“And these—Evil—killed Eleanor?”
“Yeah.” Eleanor Pearsall had been a kindly, eccentric, middle-aged white mage who lived in rural Vermont. She had been brutally murdered last year by two Evil-possessed security guards when she had refused to allow the Evil to possess her. Her funeral, in fact, had been where Verity had met Sharra the first time. “They were looking for mages to bring over to their side. Dr. Stone thinks they can’t possess us without permission, so they have to do something to get us to agree.”
Sharra took a deep breath. “And…the guy today—is that what that weird gray thing I saw was?”
“Yeah. I didn’t know he was. I took a chance, and it worked. There’s no way to tell from the outside. But if I get scared or agitated enough, I can kick the Evil out of the body it’s possessing. Otherwise you have to kill the body.”
She frowned. “Is that a magic thing?”
Verity shook her head. “No, it’s—kind of a Forgotten thing.” She gave Sharra a brief description of the Forgotten and their abilities. “Honestly, I wasn’t sure I could still do it, now that the portals are closed. I thought maybe, since the energy’s probably dissipated by now, I wouldn’t be able to. I’ll have to tell Dr. Stone—he’ll want to know.”
Sharra looked down at her drink and digested all this information. “So—when you said you thought somebody was following us—you thought it might be one of these Evil.”
Verity nodded. “We haven’t seen much activity from them for a long time—not since shortly after the portals were closed. We were starting to think maybe they just decided to go native and keep their heads down. But when I talked to Jason, he said he and
Dr. Stone thought maybe they might be moving again. I thought I was just being paranoid, thinking they were watching us.”
“Do you think they—sent that guy after you?” Sharra sounded like she couldn’t quite get her mind around all of this information yet.
“That’s the weird part,” Verity said. “As far as we know, they don’t even really like each other very much. They’ve never shown much in the way of organization or cooperation. Especially the powerful ones. The Forgotten we’ve talked to think they don’t communicate much, except for when the little ones first get here and get their orders about who to possess. Plus, they don’t have any special powers, unless they get mages on their side. And that guy was no mage, right?”
“Sure didn’t look like it,” Sharra agreed. She let her breath out slowly. “Wow,” she said after a long pause. “This whole thing is—pretty heavy.”
“Yeah,” Verity agreed. “I was really hoping it was over after we closed the portals.”
“So… What are you gonna do now?” Sharra glanced around like she expected someone to be closing in on their table.
“I guess I’d better call Dr. Stone. And…” she started, her voice sounding small and reluctant.
“And—?”
She didn’t meet Sharra’s eyes. “If the Evil are back…I don’t want to, but I’m thinking maybe I should go back home. Jason and Dr. Stone are gonna need me—and I’m gonna need them.”
Sharra nodded. “Yeah…you probably should,” she said softly. Then: “Want some company?”
Verity looked up, eyes wide. “You serious?”
“Sure. I don’t have that much I really need to do back here, and now that I know what’s up, I can maybe help, too. You think Alastair will mind?”
She grinned. “No. But even if he did, I don’t care.” She leaned across the table and kissed Sharra, taking her hand. “Thanks, Shar. Really.”
Sharra squeezed. “Finish your Coke. If we hurry, we might be able to get a flight out first thing tomorrow morning.”