Revenant

by Phaedra Weldon

  “The detective?” Gunter said.

  “No,” I barked at him. “Daniel’s not involved.”

  “How can you be so sure?” Gunter said, his eyebrows flying up onto his forehead. “You know something?”

  I turned and looked at him. “Do I have to come over there and bitch-slap you?”

  There were chuckles all around, especially from Loki.

  “Daniel has nothing to do with this.” I hadn’t told them about him. Or about Inanna. That wasn’t for me to say. “Inanna changed the spell, she saved her father’s soul, and tricked her sister. But I’m willing to guess the original spell—”

  Great Scott!

  Is it possible?

  “What is it, Zoë?” Rhonda said.

  I looked at Rhonda. “The original spell.” I held up my left hand, exposing my wrist. “I know where it is!”

  32

  IT all made sense now as I ran through the maze to the center, where I’d hidden the book. The sun was just cresting the trees as dawn came, but the fifteen-foot-high hedges kept the sun away as I navigated, having memorized the path from when I’d stood out on the balcony. In the center of that maze was a fountain with benches. I’d stashed the book in a paper sack beneath one of those benches.

  And when I arrived there, I had to look under each one.

  It wasn’t there.

  Shit.

  Did I miss something?

  “Looking for this?”

  I whirled to see Gunter standing behind me, holding up the package in his left hand. I was a little confused. Was he a good guy with a perverted sense of revenge? Or was he a bad guy who had infiltrated the Society, and I was about to get my ass kicked?

  Shadows coalesced on all sides, moving through the sludge of dawn. I was thinking the latter was based more on what was happening. But how could Rhonda not know she had a possessed guy in her midst?”

  “That’s easy,” he said as if reading my mind. “Because I’m not a Fetch, or a Daemon, not even a Symbiont. I’m something she’s never come across before. Something not even you can see when it’s in front of you.”

  I pursed my lips and shrugged. “You gonna tell me or keep me in suspense?”

  And then I knew. I don’t know how I knew. I knew the second I shifted and saw him with Abysmal eyes.

  Chimera.

  Nope. Never came across that before. So . . .

  Mental note: new thing!

  I held up a taloned hand. “Now . . . I might be wrong, but isn’t the Wikipedia definition of a Chimera like . . . an impossible or foolish fantasy?”

  He growled. Well, that didn’t ingratiate me, did it?

  I held out my hand. “Okay, so you’re a Chimera. And the moment Rhonda finds out, you are so fired. Give me back that book.”

  “I’m afraid Rhonda won’t be finding out. And as for this book”—he tucked it in his shirt—“my master will be getting it hand-delivered, along with you.” I thought he was going to hit me with some big light show, since these kinds of things were mostly all flashy. Instead, he pulled out Randall’s gun and fired.

  If I’d been in a body—it might have worked. What it did do was hurt. A lot. But I wasn’t the former Wraith, who had to move out of her body. I was a corporeal thing now. And that trinket . . .

  Eh.

  There was a brief look of terror on Gunter’s face as he realized the gun wasn’t doing what he thought it would. “But—this gun hurt my master. It should hurt you!”

  “Uh, dude.” I gestured to myself. “Physical creature not riding a human?”

  I held out my hand and tried something. I thought about the gun, and, to my surprise, it came to me. I pointed it at him. “Now you, a noncorporeal entity definitely riding a human.” I grinned. “Night, night.”

  Boom.

  And out it went, flying.

  Boys and girls, whatever you’ve read about Chimeras, that whole body of a lion, snake for a tail, head of a goat? Well, it’s true. All of it. ’Cause that is what I saw stumble to its feet. I think I got too complacent as I watched it, because lo and behold it recovered, reached its ugly goat’s head in the pocket of Gunter’s jacket, and swallowed the book in two gulps.

  Well . . . they say a goat’ll eat anything.

  Damnit!

  And then it was gone. Just . . . poof.

  Christ on a crutch.

  Picking up the heavy Gunter, I flew up and landed on the deck outside the library. People came running when I landed. Rhonda called in more staff to take Gunter away and treat him. And that was when I saw Joe in the doorway. He looked . . . wonderful. I told them about the Chimera and what it’d done with the book.

  “A Chimera?” Dagda said. “It takes a lot to raise a Chimera. And a very powerful spell. It’s not something I believe Sophia knew.”

  Rhonda paled. “Oh my God.”

  “What?” I said, and held up my hand to ward off the dawn sun. “You know this spell?”

  “It was in the Grimoire. That spell. Riding the Chimera. Oh shit, Zoë, they’ve got access to the Grimoire. They can read the pages!”

  But I didn’t think that was possible. At least it shouldn’t be. And Dad had assured me Dags was protected.

  “We have to find them now,” Rhonda said. “Now.”

  Joe reached out and took her shoulder. “And where do we start? Hum? My guess is—and I’m coming at this cold—is that Phanty, this Sophia person, has taken Dags and that book to where she feels safest. A place she controls. A home.”

  I didn’t know what that was. I’d hoped it was in this plane, because having Dags and Jason in the Abysmal . . . “It’s not in the Abysmal.”

  Dagda tilted his head. “Why do you think not?”

  “Because neither Jason nor Dags could survive there. Their bodies would die within a matter of minutes.” I wasn’t about to tell them that Rhonda had survived in the Abysmal a much longer time—no time for that. “Where in this world would she feel safe?”

  No one spoke.

  Then, “Between.”

  We all turned to see TC in the shadows. He wore his coat again, and his shades. His gloves were on. He looked ready for a scrap.

  “Where?” I said.

  “I found him. Came all this way to tell you, and I hear you let a Chimera take the book?” He shook his head. “God, luv, you are not so bright sometimes.”

  “You!” Dagda shouted. “How dare you show your face to us. You who hunted us.”

  “Dagda,” Erishkegal held out her hand. “Enough. We know now that Azrael wasn’t in control of himself.”

  TC turned a very angry face at me. “You told them.”

  “I had to,” I said. “We know that your sister Inanna didn’t use the spell Samael gave her. She changed it. And she put the original spell in that book—the one the Chimera stole. Sophia wants it so she can kill all of you.”

  And then TC began to laugh.

  I did not like it. That laugh was not something you ever want to hear in a dark alley. Vin Diesel unhappy.

  We all looked at one another. “You know nothing. All of you. You might have ruined it all.”

  Ruined it all. Oh-kay. Ruined all of what? I was missing something important.

  I held out my hands and shrugged at him. “Okay, which part do we have wrong here? You haven’t exactly been forthcoming all this time with the secrets.”

  “Because they are secrets, and they needed to remain so. But if Sophia opens that book—if she gets the spell—”

  “No, no.” I held up my arm. “I still have that.”

  Rhonda looked at me. “You do?”

  “I told you that, keep up,” I snapped before redirecting my ire at TC. “Is there something else about that book?”

  TC frowned. “Do you want to rescue your friend? Then we have to leave quickly.”

  “Not by yourself you’re not.” Dagda stepped forward. “We want to help.”

  “You can’t.” TC looked at them and shook his head. “Not like you are. But there w
ill be a time soon when you will be called. Can you be ready?”

  I thought I caught a bit of solidarity there between brothers and sisters. Something I didn’t think he was capable of. But then, my relationship with him had changed so much in these past months. We weren’t the same people. Literally.

  “When you say in between, you mean the borders?”

  TC looked at me and frowned. “No. Between, Georgia. Small town out 78. She’s got a base out there where she can manifest. Built a connection to the physical plane so her minions could move easily through the borders and not get caught.” He gave me a withering look. “You think they named the town ‘Between’ just for kicks?”

  You have got to be kidding me.

  He pulled a card from his jacket and gave it to Rhonda. “That’s the address. Zoë and I have to go in first, do reconnaissance. I hear you’ve got some help from the Seraphim’s foot soldiers?”

  Rhonda nodded. “Yes. They’ll come when I call them.”

  “Then we’ll rock and roll.” TC turned and grabbed my arm. “Let’s motor.”

  We both sailed up into the sky straight as arrows, and his grip on my wrist fell to my hand. Hand in hand.

  Flying over Atlanta as the sun came up was a bit disconcerting. We usually flew at night. Under darkness. Like this, I felt exposed and expected helicopters to come in and shoot us down. TC seemed to know where he was going, so I let him lead me there. We passed over so many trees, and I realized then exactly how green my town is. Atlanta.

  We passed over Snellville, then followed Highway 78. TC turned right at a certain point, and we dipped low over the trees, so low in fact it felt as if the tips were tickling my middle. Ahead, I could see a hazy area, where the trees seemed a little . . . unnatural.

  He pointed, and the two of us touched down near a seven-foot wall. There was a little space between the tree line and where we were. The wall seemed to vibrate and made the soft hairs on my face stand at attention. “Is the wall electrified?”

  “No, not in the way you’re thinking. It’s warded against humans. They can’t see the building from this angle or above.”

  Well, that explained the hazy look. I figured my human half saw the haze, but my Abysmal self was what let me see the building. “Can we get in?”

  “I have before, but that was before all this shit happened. Technically, we’re Abysmal, so any lockdown protocols wouldn’t be triggered. Then again, your Ethereal parts might make the alarms dance. But then, we’ll just have to find out.” And before I could say “Wait,” he had his hand through the wall.

  I ducked. Waited. Nothing happened. He nodded at me as he pulled his hand out. “Your turn.”

  I made myself incorporeal and shoved my hand through as well. Concrete . . . ick. Not as good. Made my skin crawl, as did the little electrical or magical impulses firing through. When nothing seemed to happen, TC walked on through, and I joined him.

  On the other side, there wasn’t much. Just a round brick building with a door. The grass was little more than weeds around us. No landscaping at all. “I guess this is supposed to look like this?”

  “I guess,” he said. “Makes it look like you don’t want to go in. Nothing special. And the door doesn’t have a handle or any other means for a physical body to open it.” He moved closer to it, studied it, then raised his shades as he stared again. “Ah, I see. Come on.”

  And he moved through the door as well.

  I sighed, shrugged, and moved in too.

  Now for something completely different. Inside was much bigger than the outside. I looked up at the stars above me, my mouth opening. “Whoa . . .” I said, and my voice echoed. I looked down and saw the same thing. It was as if we were standing in the middle of space with no ending and no beginning. “Where the fuck are we?”

  “Between.” He moved a few feet in and looked around. “You’ll need to see through the façade. You should be able to do it with your eyes. Pretend it’s a”—he snapped his gloved fingers—“magic eye thing.”

  I looked at him. “Dude, you spend way too much time at the mall.”

  “Just do it.”

  I dismissed my wings, not needing them in there, and moved forward. I stared at the floor first, readjusting my vision as I would when looking at those old nineties picture-in-a-picture thing. And then—

  The universe vanished, and we were inside a round room, just like the round building we’d entered. In the center was a spiral staircase, and both of us looked at it. “I wonder where that goes.”

  TC suddenly brandished two pistols. Desert Eagles by the size of them. “It goes down.” And he started his descent.

  “It goes down,” I mouthed, feeling anything but cooperative. Sheesh. Dude is gonna start shooting and wake the whole damn building. Idiot.

  With a sigh, I followed him down—and we went down a long way. There wasn’t anything to see around us or below us. Just black. And if I looked at it and not him in front of and below me, then I got dizzy and wanted to fall.

  “Don’t get sick back there and puke on me.”

  Now I wish I would. Jerk. Finally, I could see a floor . . . or something. It was concrete, like the one above. We came to the end, and I stood beside him. It was another round room, with hallways branching off in five directions. I looked at each, narrowing my eyes. TC stood near the stairs and nodded. “Pick one.”

  I moved out, going to each entrance. At one of them—the mark on my arm glowed.

  “That’s it,” he said, and moved in front of me. “Keep close.”

  I nodded. The corridors themselves were softly illuminated, but I couldn’t tell where exactly the light was coming from. The only door seemed to be the one at the end of the hall. The walls were gray like cement, but when I touched them, they felt more like—felt. Yeah, felt.

  Like I used to cut out and play with in kindergarten. Mom always made Christmas decorations with it, sometimes ornaments with pouches to put on the tree, stuffed with candy and—

  Gah . . . where are these memories flooding from?

  Weird.

  As we neared the door—

  Zoë! Run! It’s a trap!

  I stopped. I knew that voice. “Mephistopheles?” I said out loud.

  TC frowned at me. “You can hear him?”

  “I can—”

  She has the book! She knows the secret!

  “She knows the secret?” I shook my head. “What secret?”

  TC cursed under his breath. “I was afraid of that. Well, she can’t do anything without that spell.”

  “But he says it’s a trap.”

  “It’s always a trap. Don’t you watch movies or read?”

  Touché.

  He motioned me to the door. I didn’t hear his voice again, but there was an echo of something. A voice murmuring something. “Do you hear chanting?”

  He nodded to the door. Counting down with the fingers of his right hand. One. Two. Three!

  We busted in, him first since he had a gun. I moved in after him, baring my old bad Wraith self.

  The smell of blood was overwhelming, the coppery, sickening sweetness of it. The room was painted black with silver symbols scrawled over it, looking a lot like Lex’s room at the morgue. In the center was a stone slab, and strapped to that slab was Jason.

  He was nude, and every inch of his flesh was carved. I yelled out when I saw him, then noticed a movement near him. A figure in a robe. The same robe I’d seen Daniel in.

  No . . . not Daniel. This couldn’t be him. He was helping me, right? He was a Revenant now. The hood obscured the face, and I took a step forward, seeing Jason’s neck with two tubes shoved inside, connected directly into his jugular. “Jason!”

  The robed figure turned to us and produced a gun from beneath its robe. It was a normal gun, which can inflict some damage on me—not sure about TC there. And then the robed figure pointed it at Jason’s head. “He’s not dead yet,” came the voice. “But he will be faster if I pull the trigger.”

&nbs
p; That wasn’t Daniel’s voice.

  That was a woman’s voice. A familiar voice.

  As in . . .

  A Familiar.

  I took a step closer, swallowing. “Oh God . . . no . . .” I said. “Not you . . .”

  And then she pulled the hood back and smiled at me. “Hello, Zoë. Didn’t expect this, did ya?”

  It was Maureen.

  33

  OF all the faces I expected to see under that hood, Maureen’s wasn’t one of them. I mean, I could even have swallowed Daniel being there, having a Symbiont invading his body. But this?

  “Holy shit,” TC said. “What the fuck are you doing? Ain’t you a Guardian Familiar?”

  I looked from Jason to her. “How . . . why? Did you kill the others? All of them?”

  She nodded, and seemed really proud of herself, like a puppy wagging its tail. “Yes. But I didn’t have the whole picture at first, ya know? And then there was Dags, always interfering with being conscious and all. I needed that final piece—that last bit that really makes the spell work. I remember writing it—but you know spells don’t stay with you.”

  Narrowing my eyes at her, I leaned forward. “I’m sorry—did you say you wrote it?”

  She nodded to me like I was dumb, the gun pointed at Jason’s head swaying as well. “Well, yeah. I did it so I could take out these bastards. All of them. Ungrateful assholes, all of them. I’ll teach them to turn on me.”

  “Uhm . . . can you tell me your name? Just so we’re on a friends basis.”

  She bowed reverently, and a bit spookily. “I am your death.”

  I leaned in close to TC, who still had his gun pointed at Maureen. “I’ve never dealt with a crazy-ass Familiar before, so I’m kinda out of my league.”

  “And you think I know what to do?” He shrugged and nodded to Maureen. “Hey.”

  “What?”

  “You solid? I mean—you have to be to wave that gun around.”

  “Well, of course I am. I used to watch Alice do this. Did you know she used Dags for five days straight like this? Kept him alive so she could drain his spirit and interact on the physical plane. So I learned how—and locked Alice out.”