Sleepy Hollow: Children of the Revolution

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  Jenny looked around at the two of them. “Ready?”

  Abbie nodded. Irving said, “Not in the least, but go ahead, anyhow.”

  After nodding back, Jenny closed her eyes, took a breath, and then said, “Da nobis auxilium de magicis.”

  A flash of light blinded Abbie temporarily, and she had to blink the spots out of her eyes.

  When her vision cleared, the scroll was gone, and she could smell the residue of smoke in the air, like a match that had just been blown out.

  “I don’t suppose Corbin had any more of those?” Abbie asked as she continued to blink away spots that danced in her vision from the flash of light as the scroll burned.

  “If he did, he didn’t tell me,” Jenny said.

  Crane raised an eyebrow. “As I believe we all may attest, his lack of speech on the subject is not indicative of anything—and is also of little moment right now. I suggest we proceed with all due haste to Bronck’s land.”

  They filed quickly out of the armory, Abbie pausing to turn out the lights and lock the door. Crane was polite enough to wait for her to finish that, and as she turned the key, she asked, “So what was that phrase that Jenny used?”

  “Simply translated,” Crane replied, “it means ‘give us protection from magic.’ It is almost poetic in its concision.”

  “Concise is nice. So’s poetic.” She turned to stare up at Crane. “I just wish we had more of them. Or we could make it last longer than a day. Or we could use it on you and still let the spell be cast.” She let out a sigh. “But hey, if wishes were horses, we’d be hip-deep in crap.”

  Crane made one of his faces. “How quaint.” Then he cocked his head. “Though, admittedly, it is actually rather a logical progression, since horses are indeed known for producing prodigious amounts of dung.” He shook his head. “In any event, if wishes did come true, I doubt you and I would ever have met. I would have survived the war with Katrina and our son, and we would have lived peaceful lives in these United States, perhaps with more children.”

  Abbie almost made a comment about how she would be in D.C. right now with the FBI, but she couldn’t bring herself to voice it. Crane had spoken in a remarkably matter-of-fact tone, but it wasn’t quite enough to hide the anguish behind his wistful words of what could’ve been—what, in her opinion, should have been.

  But she couldn’t bring herself to say that out loud, either, as it would sound horribly patronizing.

  So she settled for putting a hand on his arm and giving it a friendly squeeze, while looking up at him and smiling warmly.

  Crane looked down and provided a similar smile back. “Alas,” he said very quietly.

  Within a minute, they were outside, where Irving was standing by one of the department’s SUVs. The sun was starting to set, painting the western sky over the Hudson River with a magnificent burst of oranges and purples, and casting the Tappan Zee Bridge in a warm glow.

  But she couldn’t really pause to enjoy the magnificent sunset. She promised herself that she would force herself to do so one of these days. After all, she and Crane were trying to save the world. It wouldn’t do to go to all that trouble and not remember what about the world was worth saving.

  Irving was holding a set of keys in his hand. “We’re getting into rush hour, and the moon’ll be up soon. I want a company car that has sirens and lights we can run in case we hit traffic.”

  Jenny gave the captain a teasing look. “What’s this? Abusing police privilege? Captain Irving, I’m impressed.”

  The look fell when Irving whirled on her and pointed a finger. “Don’t—not tonight.”

  Holding up both hands, Jenny said, “Sorry.”

  Irving got into the driver’s seat. Jenny immediately went into the back on the driver’s side, and Abbie decided to take shotgun. Crane climbed into the seat behind her.

  As Irving started the ignition, Abbie looked over at him. “Look, I’m sorry for what I said. I know this isn’t easy for you.”

  “None of this is easy for any of us. Doesn’t mean we don’t do it. Like your sister said, I need to get over it.”

  He put the car into drive and headed out onto Beekman Avenue toward Broadway.

  SIXTEEN

  NEW YORK, NEW YORK

  JANUARY 2014

  BETH NUGENT NEARLY stumbled when she entered Sophia’s room at the hospital and found Frieda sitting next to her.

  Frieda said, “Hey, Beth” as if she hadn’t disappeared for three months. She was looking at Sophia’s still-comatose form in the hospital bed. Sophia was a scion of the very wealthy Cabot family, and so her health coverage pretty much boiled down to money-is-no-object. So she got a private room in Mount Sinai Hospital, and had been looked at by many of the best specialists in the world.

  Not that any of them had been able to do anything about her condition.

  Sophia had also been Beth’s ace in the hole. She’d wanted to avoid going after the Whitcombe-Sears Library at first, as that was right under the Witnesses’ noses in Sleepy Hollow, but once Stacy got herself killed without getting the cross in Ticonderoga, she had no choice.

  The good news was that she wouldn’t need to use Sophia’s blood, as a descendant of someone awarded a cross, to enhance the spell. Since she had to kill Whitcombe-Sears anyhow, it was easy enough to get his blood.

  Now, though, she was more concerned about her prodigal coven-mate. Putting her hands on her hips, Beth said, “Who the hell let you in here?”

  “It’s a hospital, Beth.” Frieda chuckled, but it sounded odd. So did her voice; it was more whispery than usual. “People come in and out all the time.”

  Beth intended to have some serious words with hospital security after this, but didn’t pursue the matter further with Frieda, instead asking, “Fine, then where the hell’ve you been?”

  Finally, Frieda turned around and stood up. Beth gasped. The entire left side of her face was scarred and disfigured from what appeared to Beth’s ex-cop eyes as multiple stab wounds.

  In a much quieter tone, Beth asked, “What happened?”

  “Can answer both those questions in one shot. Two nights after Moloch showed up at your house, he showed up at mine. I was all packed and done, gettin’ away from all this. I was in this for empowerment, not the apocalypse. I wanted a better world, not a blown-up one.” She shook her head. “Guess he was in a bad mood ’cause he couldn’t resurrect Serilda. Decided to take it out on my face. Oh yeah, he told me all about how those Witnesses he was talkin’ about stopped the resurrection an’ burned her bones, an’ that it was my fault for bein’ disloyal.” She snorted. “I was never disloyal to Serilda, not once. Anyhow, I been in a hospital bed, too, past few months, recoverin’ from this.”

  Beth moved toward Frieda. “I’m sorry, I had no idea.”

  “Yeah, well, I wasn’t really much in the mood for company. And I didn’t want you to have no idea, y’know? I was done with all this nonsense. I only came here to see how Sophia’s doin’. But after this? I’m done. Serilda ain’t comin’ back. Not now.”

  “Yes, she is,” Beth said emphatically. “And it’s happening tonight.”

  “Say what?” Frieda gave her a look of disbelief that was the first sign of the old Frieda that Beth had seen today.

  And so Beth explained about the eight half-moons and the Congressional Crosses—one of which was Sophia’s and the other five of which she had gathered—and the ritual she was performing tonight.

  “I shoulda known.” Frieda was looking at Beth with an almost pitying expression. “I read about the museum downtown, and those two places up in Westchester. That much carnage, figured it had to be you or Stacy.”

  “Stacy’s dead.” Beth saw no reason to beat around the bush. “She tried to get one of the crosses up in Ticonderoga, but the two Witnesses stopped her and killed her. Same ones who stopped the mistress from being resurrected in October.”

  “Wait, Stacy’s dead?”

  Beth nodded.

  Frieda shuddered. �
��Dammit, this is crazy. And honestly, I thought it was Stacy who did those killings ’cause some cops were killed. Whatever happened to ‘we can’t kill cops’?”

  “That was before.” The words sounded lame even to Beth. “For regular stuff, yeah, you bet, we did not want to get on the radar, but this? This is to resurrect the mistress. It’s the damn brass ring! That’s worth paying any price. Look, Frieda, I’m doing this tonight.” She reached out and—not knowing how far down the injuries went under her clothes—was sure to grab Frieda’s right arm. “I could use your help.”

  “No.” Frieda backed away from Beth’s touch. “I told you, I’m done with this. After that crap in October—”

  “Don’t you understand, what I’m doing tonight is because of what happened in October!” Beth blew out a sigh. “Look, you were right that night. We shouldn’t have let Moloch get involved. Well, he isn’t involved in what I’m—what we’re—doing tonight. Think about it, Frieda—we’ll finally have Serilda back. Our mistress can lead us—”

  “ ‘Us’?” Now Frieda was laughing at her. “There ain’t no ‘us’ left, Beth! Half our coven walked out on us over the last year, Sophia’s in a coma, and Stacy’s dead.”

  Beth couldn’t believe that Frieda wasn’t understanding the enormity of what she was about to accomplish. “The mistress’ll be able to wake Sophia up. And with her here, Miriam and the others will come back!”

  “You hope.”

  Shrugging, Beth said, “If not, we’ll get new members. Be a lot easier to recruit with Serilda of Abaddon leading the meetings instead of me.” She stared Frieda right in the eyes—though the left eye was half covered with scarred flesh. “I’m doing this with or without you, Frieda, but I’d rather do it with you.”

  She put out a hand.

  “You with me, or not?”

  For several seconds, Frieda stared at Beth’s hand, as if she’d never even seen such a thing before. The low beeps of the monitors connected to Sophia’s comatose form echoed in the suddenly quiet room.

  “One condition,” Frieda said, still not accepting Beth’s hand. “First thing we ask Serilda for is to take care’a Moloch.”

  That got a laugh out of Beth, as that was the second thing she intended to ask the mistress for, after helping Sophia.

  She was, however, concerned that Frieda had not once referred to Serilda as “the mistress,” as had been common in the coven for all of Beth’s life.

  However, she’d worry about that after the mistress was resurrected. “Deal.”

  Then Frieda put her hand in Beth’s. “All right, I’m in. But I’m warning you, I’m hella rusty. Ain’t cast a spell in months.”

  “You’ll be fine. It’s like riding a bicycle.”

  Beth briefly paid her respects to Sophia, then took Frieda with her to catch the express bus back up to Riverdale. They got off at her stop and walked the rest of the way to the house she’d grown up in, the house that had been in her family for several generations.

  As soon as they went inside, Frieda let out a whistle. She was looking down at the living room floor, which was now all hardwood. “Damn, girl. You tore up the carpet?”

  In the center of the living room, she had drawn a sigil on the floor, after moving the couch, recliner, rocking chair, and television against the wall and putting the coffee table in the basement. “Had to, you can’t draw with chalk on a wall-to-wall.”

  “I ain’t complainin’. If I’d known you had such a nice floor under the rug, I’d’a told you to rip it up years ago.”

  Beth went through the living room to the dining room, where she had a safe hidden behind a large photograph that had been taken of her when she was five years old. She sat on her mother’s lap, while her grandmother stood behind her mother. On the wall behind them in the photograph was a picture of Beth’s great-grandmother, who had died the year Beth was born.

  After taking the photo down off the wall, she opened the safe and removed the six Congressional Crosses, as well as the blade she’d stabbed Al Whitcombe-Sears with.

  All her planning, all her hard work, it was finally paying off. Now that Frieda was back with her, she knew that victory would be hers—and the mistress’s.

  SEVENTEEN

  BRONX, NEW YORK

  JANUARY 2014

  ACCORDING TO WHAT Irving told them on the drive down here, Nugent’s house had a front door, which she almost never used; a side door off the driveway, which led to a tiny foyer that led to both the kitchen and the living room, which she used fairly often; and a basement door that was down a narrow stone staircase behind the house. Abbie took the seldom-used front door for herself, with Jenny taking the basement and Irving the side door. Abbie chose that configuration on the theory that the side door was likely to be unlocked. Better for Abbie and her sister to use the doors with locks they could pick.

  To Abbie’s lack of surprise, Irving’s only response to her rationale had been “I’ll just pretend I didn’t hear that part.”

  Crane remained behind at the SUV, which was parked one house down the road on Delafield Avenue.

  The front door in question was made of wood, with a half-oval etched-glass window just above Abbie’s own eye level. Standing on her tiptoes, she saw Nugent placing small pieces of metal—probably the six crosses she’d gathered—on different places on the floor. The etched glass warped the view enough that she couldn’t be sure, but it seemed reasonable.

  It also meant, as they’d feared, that she’d already had an Independence Cross of her own, and only needed to steal five. Either that, or she’d stolen another one that they managed to miss, but given the body counts at all but one of the sites, Abbie considered that unlikely. And that one exception was the Met, where Nugent had an in. None of the other museums or libraries across the country represented by IYS had an Independence Cross; Abbie had checked that back at the beginning of this process. At the time it was just due diligence, but she was really glad for her police training, which had her check into Nugent and her company as a matter of course.

  Something else she had Corbin to thank for.

  Which sometimes made up for his keeping all the demon stuff from her. At times, she wondered how much easier dealing with all this nonsense would’ve been if Corbin had just come out and told her.…

  To Abbie’s surprise, the door was unlocked when she tried it. Riverdale was a generally safe neighborhood, but still, leaving a door unlocked seemed imprudent.

  Then again, Nugent had the ability to slice people into five pieces. Not much to fear from a burglar there.

  Unholstering her Glock, Abbie very carefully did not cock it, but held it in a ready position as she opened the door.

  As she entered the living room, Nugent turned and gestured at her.

  Abbie flinched and held her breath, but then nothing happened.

  Nugent was actually smiling. On the cover of the News and in the file she’d read previously, the short, broad-shouldered woman looked completely professional and straight. Now, as she was smiling and gesturing at Abbie, she looked completely unprofessional—and damned scary.

  “Gotta say, I’m impressed, Lieutenant.” Then she whirled and turned toward the doorway to the foyer, where Irving was also standing with his Glock. Nothing happened there, either. “Nicely done, partner. I didn’t think you had it in you. Never thought that Frank ‘I turned my back on God after Macey’s accident’ Irving would go for something like an Agrippa talisman.”

  Abbie blew out a breath through her teeth. If Nugent could tell what they’d done just by how they resisted her magic, then they were dealing with some serious mojo. Not that they didn’t think that anyhow, given what she did to all those bodies, but still …

  “Oh, by the way? The talisman affects you, but not your weapons.”

  Suddenly, the stock of her pistol grew too hot to touch. Quickly, Abbie dropped it to the hardwood floor. Irving did the same with his a second later.

  “I’d watch out if I were you,” Nugent added w
ith a chuckle.

  “No need,” Abbie said. “We already went through that episode of Mythbusters up in Ticonderoga. Neither of us had one in the chamber, case you pulled that.”

  Abbie then heard a clicking sound, prompting Nugent to whirl around and throw out an arm toward the back of the room. The air shimmered like the sky in the desert for just a second, just as Abbie heard the report of a bullet being fired.

  Just like at the fort, though, the bullet that Jenny fired from the back door was liquefied.

  And then Jenny appeared in the doorway and had to drop her 9 mm as well.

  “You guys are good,” Nugent said. “I’m impressed. But the thing about old Agrippa? He was big on stopping black magic. His little talisman’ll keep me from slicing you all to ribbons. But there’s other magic that’ll still work just fine. Now, Frieda!”

  Abbie was wondering who the hell Frieda was, when suddenly the house started to melt away. “What is—”

  “—THE PROBLEM HERE, Brian?”

  Special Agent Abbie Mills stood and stared at the assistant special agent in charge of her division, Brian Wilhoite, while standing in the doorway to the latter’s cramped office in the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington.

  “No problem, Abbie, we just want Smith to take the lead.”

  Abbie put her head in her hands. “This is my case. I’m the one who figured out that the murders were linked, I should be the one—”

  Wilhoite shook his head. “Abbie, stop. Look, you’ve only been with the bureau for five minutes. This is a serial case, and thanks to the latest victim being the husband of a woman running for Congress, it’s a press case and a politically sensitive case.”