by A. L. Tyler
I tried to undo my seatbelt and get out, but she caught the belt in her hand to stop me.
“Annie,” she said in a low tone. “Annie! Calm down!”
Suddenly, she let go of my seatbelt, and fell back against the seat, choking. It took me a moment to register that Charlie was behind her, holding her back by the neck. He was holding a rough wooden stake to her side with his free hand as Martha kicked and squirmed to try and escape.
“He came to me…!” She gasped with her stolen breaths. “For help!”
Charlie moved his face in closer to hers and loosened the hand on her neck just enough for her to speak.
“Make it fast,” he said in a deadly whisper. “I don’t like you, and that didn’t look good.”
“I told you we would take care of Vince first,” she said in a hurry. “Annie, I did that, I got him help, and I told you the second thing was to focus on the thing with Walter and Stark, and that’s what I was doing, I was going to try to find Walter—”
“You said he came to you,” Charlie accused. I saw him jab her a little with the stake, and she jumped away with a high-pitched whine.
“He came to me before I could even look!” she said. “He heard that Adeline is looking for him, but he can’t go to them. He’s in too deep with Stark, and he can’t get out. He’s just a dumb kid, Charlie, he thought he could manage a demon but he can’t, and now he can’t sever the connection without Stark killing him, you know that’s how it works! Even if the demon and the bridge mutually agree, it can be life-threatening without the proper spells, and Stark will not consent! Walter is a hostage!”
Charlie looked at me, his eyes asking an opinion. I finally nodded and he let her go.
She swore at us, touching her neck and the place where Charlie had threatened to stab her. “I offered to help you! What is wrong with you?!”
I shrugged. “You’re a necromancer. Even the people you call friends don’t trust you. Figured you were used to it.”
“What’s with the attitude?” she asked, furrowing her brow.
Charlie gave me a long look before answering the question himself. “Because she knows you’re after something, and she doesn’t like being lied to. And you’d best give it up, because she doesn’t have the book. I do. It’s safe where no one can reach it, even in the event of my death. I know that’s why you were at the greenhouse. You were looking for the book.”
“Book?” Martha turned around, looking confused. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“That’s fine,” Charlie said calmly. “You can play it that way. Go on and tell me how you’re going to help me break Stark’s spell, now that there’s no pay off in it for you.”
Martha glared at him, and then at me. She sounded pained.
“I was going to offer myself as a bridge to Stark, because necromancers are always looking for werewolves to sacrifice,” she said. “I was going to convince him to have me as a bridge, and that would ease the burden off of Walter before we sever their bond. Then I was going to bind Stark, make him undo his curse, and banish him. And I’m still willing to do that for Kendra’s sake, if that’s okay with you!”
I took a breath in and opened my mouth to speak, but her words sank into me with the ring of truth. I looked at Charlie. “That’s actually a good idea. As long as Stark doesn’t know her he won’t know it’s a trick. And if you don’t know her, I’m betting he doesn’t. Why didn’t we think of that?”
“Because it takes one to know one, and she’s a liar,” Charlie said in a low voice. “She’s after something.”
“She’s offering to help us in the meanwhile,” I pointed out.
Charlie gave me a long look. “Related to a certain scar I have, I’m not fond of people who offer to help in the meanwhile. It ends badly.”
“The only thing I’m after is Kendra,” Martha said. “And even if I wasn’t, that’s a good plan, and you’ve got to move fast. Walter thinks he’s already being advertised for sale. That’s bad for Walter, and possibly worse for the rest of you if Stark finds someone more willing to indulge his vendettas.”
Charlie and I shared a long look. That wasn’t a lie, and we both knew it.
“He said he could come by the apartment next weekend.” Martha spoke more gently now, as though she really hoped we would accept her recommended course of action. “He goes out alone more as the moon is turning, and he thinks Stark is less likely to follow him or think the outing is unusual. That’s our chance, if we’re going to make a move with his help.”
Leaning back, I watched the cogs turn in Charlie’s head as he considered the offer. When his eyes finally focused on Martha again, he didn’t look happy. “Fine.”
~~~~~~~~~
That night I found myself sitting on Vince’s couch again with a bowl of popcorn in my lap as I explained the new developments in the plan. When I mentioned that Charlie thought Martha was after his book, but that I didn’t know what was so special about it, he stopped me.
“Gates read it?” he asked.
I shrugged and nodded.
“She practically has a photographic memory,” he said. “You should ask her.”
“She can’t remember which stuff came from which book a lot of the time, because they’re so mixed up,” I said. “And besides, I don’t think the stuff that’s written in the book is the important part. This is about something else.”
He gave me a long look. “I thought you said that you trusted him.”
“I do!” I said quickly, and a little more enthusiastically than I meant to. “It’s just…”
I didn’t know how to put it without letting my secret out, because Charlie had warned me that people would be biased against anyone who was ever a demon, no matter how short of a time. He had made me human again and kept the secret, and he had never asked anything in return. He had even fielded a few questions when I had developed what I thought was a super-human lack of a need for sleep in the days following my revival, reassuring me that insomnia didn’t mean any trace of the Other Side had stuck around to toy with me. I trusted him deeply, even when he was lying to me, because I knew he wasn’t going to hurt me.
“I trust him.” There was nothing else I could say. “I’m more worried about Martha. Charlie called Lyssa and asked her to come back, and I wish he hadn’t done that. I feel so stupid that I can’t handle this myself.”
“Don’t think about it,” Vince said light-heartedly. “Everything will be fine.”
“Yeah?” I asked. “Are you ever going to tell me what you did with your new friends in the mountains?”
He gave me a sly look, and then said that they had showed him around the camp, and talked about how they let the newcomers roam free during the moon, but had a buddy system with older and more experienced werewolves to prevent human encounters. They had tried to convince him to drop out of school for a year and devote himself completely to adjusting to his new life.
“I kind of think that may be for the best,” he said quietly.
I was shocked, and I nearly dropped the popcorn I had lifted to my mouth. “Really?”
Vince nodded. “Yeah. But this semester is already paid, and I figure I could give it a shot, because nothing’s lost if I go ahead and try to do both now. I’ll probably be spending most of my free time with them, though, and Adeline said she’d try to find someone down in this area for me to stay with.”
I wasn’t hurt, exactly. I was stunned, because I thought he was doing so well. The thought that his resilience was waning crossed my mind, and the disappointment must have shown on my face.
“It’s not you,” Vince said quickly. “Annie, I appreciate what you tried to do for me, but this is hell. It’s hell being locked up and going through… that. I can’t do it again, and I think we can both admit it’s been a little weird, with the way we’re living and everything.”
I looked away. I wasn’t sure if I understood his insinuations, so I only nodded.
Vince moved closer on the couch an
d took away the popcorn. He grabbed both of my hands in his, and a memory of my dad doing the same thing when he told me my mom had passed flashed into my mind.
Adeline was right. He was breaking up with me.
“This isn’t going to work out for us,” he said. “Not like this. That’s why I have to make some changes. I really want this to work.”
I was looking away into a corner when I saw him move in close. When I felt his lips touch mine, I was confused, and I froze. I didn’t kiss him back, and when he moved away, looking a little embarrassed, I grasped at straws trying to undo the awkwardness.
“I really want this to work, too,” I muttered. My smile came a little delayed. I shook my head, unable to hide it any longer. “Adeline said this probably wouldn’t work between us. She said you might want someone else, who’s…”
“Like me,” Vince offered. “They told me the same.”
“So if you want an out, I’m giving it to you. We’ve always been good friends. We can still be good friends.”
Vince smirked a little nodding. “Do you want an out? Because I told them to go screw themselves. What happens between us is between us and no one else. But I’ll understand if you want an out.”
I looked at him, shocked that he had even used the word “screw,” because he never swore in casual conversation. I had only heard him say “damn it” twice: once when he had slid his car into a phone pole after school during a snow storm, and again when he had rolled his ankle getting out of the car to check the damage.
I shook my head. “I don’t want an out.”
He gave me a little nod, and this time approached slower before he kissed me. I kissed him back.
Once again, we didn’t watch much of the movie that night.
~~~~~~~~~
Lyssa wasn’t happy with me.
When I opened the door the next day, she glared at me from behind the sunglasses that she liked to wear when she drove, and then carefully removed them and tucked them in the pocket of her pea coat.
“Charlie says you’re having sleepovers with the werewolf and you let a necromancer move in.” She took a deep breath, and forced a smile. “Please tell me he’s joking.”
I nodded, realizing how bad it sounded in its simplest form. “That’s about right.”
“Annie.” She hauled her suitcase through the door, and hefted it up onto the table. It was bigger than the last bag she’d brought. “I haven’t even been gone two weeks. How do these people keep finding you?”
A light clinking made both of us glance up. Martha had poured herself a cup of coffee in the kitchen. She held it gently in her hands, just above her exposed navel; she was wearing a shirt that was a little too small and tight even though the temperatures were dropping outside.
“Martha, resident necromancer.” She set the coffee on the table and offered her hand to Lyssa. Lyssa didn’t take it. “I knew Kendra.”
Lyssa glanced down at her hand again, and then whipped something out of her bag and tossed it at Martha. A shower of dead, crushed flower petals sprinkled over her and onto the kitchen floor.
“Prove it,” Lyssa said.
Martha glanced around, confused, and absent-mindedly tried to sweep the petals from her clothes and hair, but they were so fine that it proved futile. I wasn’t sure if she or Lyssa looked crazier in that moment.
“I knew Kendra,” Martha repeated. “We were friends.”
I looked at Lyssa, wondering what her next interrogation tactic would be. She zipped the pocket on her bag shut again, and a little smile graced her lips.
“Okay, then,” she said.
Martha’s smile lit up the room.
“Okay then! So much easier than the demon. You must be Lyssa.” Martha walked over and took Lyssa’s face in her hands. “You look so much like your mother. Pictures I saw from the wedding, I mean.”
“Thank you!” Lyssa smiled. “So, Charlie said something about you trying to become Stark’s bridge?”
Martha had looped her arm through Lyssa’s and they started walking back to the hidden door in the kitchen.
“That’s it?” I asked after them. “You blew some crap at her, and all over the kitchen, and that’s it?”
“Violets, Annie.” Lyssa waved at me as they went through the door together. “Just sweep them up!”
I turned back around and looked at my dirtied kitchen. Charlie was standing there. His fur was a little puffed out against the cold draft that the open door had let in, and he looked dumpy and unhappy.
“That didn’t go as I planned, either,” he said. “Something’s up with her.”
“Are you going to tell me what’s in that book?” I asked him, reaching for the broom. “Why you think she wants it?”
“No,” he said. He flicked his tail, and the mess disappeared. “She’s not getting it, so it’s irrelevant.”
“You didn’t tell me about your history with werewolves because you thought that was irrelevant,” I pointed out. “Is it suddenly going to become relevant when it screws us all over?”
“It will never be relevant enough for me to tell you.” And he walked away.
I shook my head and went back to my library to read and study.
Vince had cleared out that morning, but Charlie left his safe room furnished and in place. Adeline had found another werewolf, some guy named Blake, who was willing to let Vince room with him. Vince had gone to meet him, give it a few days, and see if it would work out.
The memory of the previous night still made me smile. We had been too shy to do much more than kiss, but to me, it still felt like we had moved too quickly.
He kissed me again before leaving that morning. The sudden change in our relationship fascinated me to no end, and I loved it. We were going to meet for lunch on Tuesday.
Lyssa took the time to work a spell to block my thoughts from demons so that Stark wouldn’t know what we were up to, but she warned me that he probably wouldn’t like it when he found himself unable to read my mind.
He found me on Monday, and she had been right. He taunted me with more stories of Charlie, and things that he had done. They made me wince, but I held my tongue and refused to be provoked.
Vince came by the apartment for lunch on Tuesday because I didn’t want Stark to interrupt us, and Lyssa and Martha cleared out to run some errands and see to the greenhouse. He said that things were going well with Blake, but he glossed over the details, so I took it that he didn’t want to focus on his malady or its effects on his life. We talked about that week’s astronomy assignment instead.
On Wednesday, Stark followed me around to my classes, invisible to everyone else, and told me a long history of how he and Charlie had been the most feared pair in Europe a few hundred years back. He was getting bolder, and I spent that night worrying that Saturday wouldn’t be soon enough, because he had said something about medieval torture and how he would have the book from me by Monday.
I stayed in the apartment on Thursday and Friday, telling Vince to stay away and emailing my professors that I was sick. It was still early in the semester, so it wasn’t a big deal, but all of their well wishes only made it worse. I didn’t know if I would be better by Monday or not. I might be dead.
Martha had managed to get in touch with Walter, and they bumped the plan up to Friday night.
When the knock came at my door, I was more than ready for everything to be over.
Chapter 12
When I opened the door, I was shocked by how much weight Walter had lost since I had last seen him. He looked ill as he stood there, taking me in and nodding in defeat.
“Vince’s girlfriend,” he said quietly. I think he meant it as a joke; we hadn’t actually been dating when I met Walter. “I didn’t know who you were when all this started. You’ve got friends in high places.”
I moved to the side so that he could come in, and his eyes fell on Charlie. He froze.
“Low ones, too,” I said.
Charlie had arranged things with Gates that
morning, and she told her mom she’d be staying with me that weekend. As long as she answered any phone calls, no one would be the wiser that she was actually hiding in Vince’s former basement apartment as a cat. She had refused to be on site at first, saying that her mother wouldn’t be able to cope if she lost her now. Charlie assured her that the room would do just as well keeping werewolves out as it did keeping werewolves in.
The look in Walter’s eyes made me think he was going to change his mind and bolt, but he didn’t. Martha came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his neck before kissing him on the cheek.
“It’s all going to be fine!” she said, her voice quiet. “Charlie’s a friend. You don’t have to be afraid of him. Are you ready?”
Walter looked at her as she walked around in front of him. She was wearing short shorts and a tank top that showed off several tattoos I hadn’t known about. Even with circles under his eyes, Walter still tried to stand a little straighter in her presence.
“I’m ready,” he said.
Martha smiled, taking one of his hands again. “Good.”
“Good,” Charlie echoed. “I would rather Lyssa does this part.”
Martha’s smile turned to a frown. “What?”
“I’m not giving you any demon, let alone Stark,” he said. “If we’re going to do this, Lyssa will be the bridge. I don’t see any reason the plan can’t proceed the same outside of those details.”
“I’m a necromancer,” Martha said. “He doesn’t know me. He’s more likely to accept me as a bridge, because he won’t suspect anything.”
Charlie crossed his arms and grinned. “We’ve got the cooperation of the current bridge, so I don’t see the problem with forcing his hand. I think Walter has known for a while that he’s a dowry. Stark is going to butcher and sell him to the first warlock he finds who knows the value of a werewolf. It’ll be a hard hit to Stark, losing a bridge to death, but that’s never fatal if he already has a new bridge in place. If he doesn’t, well…”
My eyebrows shot up. “Excuse me?”