by Alex Rivers
“Your clothing had vomit and dirt on it. You don’t want that in your bed.”
“Thanks.” I straightened a bit, my movements careful and slow. I reached for the glass Sinead had placed on my night table, and drank the rest of the water. I placed it back and looked at her. She was dressed in clothing she’d taken from my closet, a black T-shirt and a pair of blue leggings. Her hair was wet, as if she had just showered. She must’ve stayed here all night.
Licking my lips, I tried to smile at her. “We did it. Go team.”
“Yeah, go team. The big job is still ahead of us, you know.”
“I know. Did you talk to Harutaka? Will he work with us?”
“He’s actually excited about it. He’s really weird.”
“The guy was caught in the sacred library of the Shades. I’d say him being weird is an understatement.” I sniffed my hand. “My hand smells like dog drool. And so does my arm. In fact, my entire body smells like it has been licked thoroughly by a dog with poor dental hygiene.”
“Magnus insisted on administrating his own treatment for basilisk venom overdose. I tried to shoo him away, but your dog is relentless.”
“That’s him. What time is it?”
“It’s half past two.”
“At night?”
“Of course not. In the afternoon.”
“Oh.” I blinked as the timeline swam together in my mind. I was planning to tail Maximillian Fuchs, the dragon’s security chief, this evening. “Why the hell didn’t you wake me up sooner?”
Here’s what happens when you jump out of bed while recuperating from basilisk venom overdose: Your head explodes. Your feet buckle. Your body, half entangled in the bedsheets, falls sideways on the floor. You say, “Argh.” And you wish you were dead. At least, that was my experience.
“Because, honey, you almost killed yourself with your damn concoctions, and I wanted to give you time to recuperate,” Sinead said sweetly, looking down at me.
Magnus ran into the room and barked excitedly. Determining I was under attack from my bedsheet, he lunged at it heroically, tugging it with his teeth while growling ferociously. It ripped, and he stumbled backward, careening into the bed. He did three victory laps around me, his barks loud and sharp, painful to my tender brain. Then he quirked his head at me, confused by my lack of enthusiasm at his triumph, and licked my nose.
Sinead helped me get back in bed. “Honey, you’re staying in bed today. And probably tomorrow.”
“But Maximillian Fuchs—”
“I’ll tail Fuchs. We’re doing this together, Lou, you know that, right? You don’t need to do everything by yourself.”
“But you can’t. You need to get me that waitress job,” I said weakly.
“Already done.” She grinned at me proudly. “And I didn’t even have to leave the room.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. You remember Fred?”
“The guy you used to date? The one you dumped when you found out he has a mole on his—”
“Yes. So Fred has this cousin. It’s not a cousin, exactly… what do you call it if someone is married to your cousin?”
“I think it’s still a cousin.”
“Okay, so Fred has this cousin, who goes bowling every week in that place in Brookline. What’s it called? It’s on the tip of my tongue.”
“I honestly don’t care. Get to the point.”
“It’s going to drive me insane all day. It starts with a P. Anyway, one of the guys he bowls with—they’re really close, it’s like this tight-knit group of men. And one of them is… get this—in the Secret Service.”
“That’s… nice.”
“So Secret Service guy apparently knows a lot of important people, and he—Lucky Strike!”
“What?”
“The bowling place.”
“That doesn’t start with a P.”
“How is that relevant?”
“How is anything you just said relevant?”
“I’m getting to it, sheesh! So this guy—the Secret Service guy, knows the owner of the catering company that’s serving the dragon’s banquet. And Secret Service guy gave him your name after he got it from Fred’s cousin, who got it from Fred, who got it from me.”
“That’s amazing.”
“I already updated the rest of the crew. They were here earlier.”
“In here?” I asked, aghast. The thought of Kane and Harutaka seeing me unconscious in my bed was horrifying. I tried to imagine I was like Sleeping Beauty, lying pale in my bed, my hair and makeup looking perfect, just waiting for a prince to show up and kiss me awake. But I knew the truth. I snored slightly when I slept. My hair was always a mess. Sometimes I drooled.
“Relax! Do you really think I’d let them in your bedroom? We sat in your store. I told them they couldn’t come back here, because you were naked in bed.”
“Wonderful,” I said, somewhat sardonically.
“I used the word naked several times when talking about you. Kane seemed interested. You can thank me later.”
“Okay.” I pressed at the bridge of my nose with my fingertips. “So… what did you discuss?”
“Harutaka said he can definitely hack into the security server in the complex. Once inside he’ll be able to see everything that’s going on, and he’ll have access to the banquet’s guest list.”
“Oh, good.”
“But he needs someone to hook him up from the inside.”
I groaned.
“Which is totally fine, because you’ll be able to do it in a few days, right? The catering staff all need to show up the evening before the banquet, to help set things up. I figure that’s your opportunity.”
“And what do we do until then?”
“You rest and get better from your basilisk venom overdose. And I’ll tail Maximillian Fuchs, and figure out what’s his deal.”
“Just be careful.”
“Yes, mom, who overdosed on basilisk venom and nearly got eaten by creepy Shades. I’ll be careful.”
Chapter Sixteen
Recovering from the basilisk poison took me three days, which translates to seventy-two hours, and those seventy-two hours were actually four thousand, three hundred, and twenty minutes. Time crawls when all you can do is shuffle slowly to and from the bathroom.
Sinead and Isabel brought me food, and Isabel also took it upon herself to walk Magnus, who was confused by my dormant state. Kane called once to check how I felt, which gave me a warm fuzzy feeling that I found worrying. The fact that I was attracted to him was no big deal. The fact that I seemed to feel something for him could mean trouble. I knew from painful experience that falling for someone during a job could end very badly.
The leftover venom in my system gave me some strange dreams. One night I dreamed I was breaking into Ddraig Goch’s mansion, except it looked like school, and the dragon was my math teacher. He caught me sneaking in and incinerated my clothes with one fiery breath, leaving me nude in front of the entire class. In another dream I was in prison again, but Kane was my cellmate. I tried to dig us a tunnel so we could escape, but I only had a spoon, and Kane kept taking it away, insisting that he needed it to eat his pudding.
I used most of my endless hours awake in bed to practice on what Sinead called my “flamey hands problem.” I would shut my eyes and start breathing deeply, focusing on each body part in turn, relaxing it, directing my complete attention to those muscles. When Isabel dropped by, she’d coach me, her deep voice instructing me to concentrate on my feet, my ankles, my thighs, going all the way up to my head.
The problem was, I invariably lost concentration, my mind chasing any random detail it snagged upon.
“I can’t even concentrate in my bed,” I grumbled. “What will happen during the job? There’s no way I’ll be able to relax when the shit hits the fan. And you know it will. No plan survives contact with reality. And I can’t have my hands randomly going fwoosh.”
Isabel bit her flamingo-pink lip. “Maybe we’ve
been going about this the wrong way,” she said. “We were trying to get you to relax.”
“Because fear or anger is a big no-no.”
“That’s my point. Maybe we just need you to focus on another feeling. Switch gears in your mind. Happiness, sadness, nostalgia, love… those emotions are fine, right? I think that’s what happened that night with the Shades. You were focused on Kane instead of your fear.”
“I was not! I just, uh… I got it together, that’s all.”
“Uh-huh. Well, anyway, doesn’t it sound like it could work?”
I thought about it. “Maybe, yeah. I can make some condensed emotion pills. That way, whenever I feel scared or angry, I could just swallow a happiness pill or a sadness pill and—”
She took my hand. “Or, for once, you can avoid abusing your body with your concoctions, and just use regular human emotions, Lou.”
“Well, sure, if you want to ruin my fun,” I muttered.
“Let’s try it now. Close your eyes and focus on a memory. Something that evokes happiness. Something vivid.”
I shut my eyes, and it came almost instantly. Pink boots, purple skirt, red coat, and pigtails. Clutching her adoptive mother’s hand, half-walking, half-skipping, and talking nonstop. That bright excitement in her eyes as she thought of something new, the way she happily jumped with both feet into a puddle, splashing water, shrieking in laughter. And me, watching her from the corner of my eye, holding Magnus’ leash, yearning for her attention.
I wasn’t sure what I felt right then, but it was definitely powerful, and it wasn’t fear, or anger.
So I trained on focusing very hard on vivid thoughts. A memory of my mother’s smile. The feeling of my first kiss. More memories of my daughter—fragmented and much shorter than I wanted.
And, occasionally, thoughts of Kane. The way he grasped my wrist and pulled me to him. The sensation of him picking me up, carrying me in his arms out of that warehouse. His green eyes, staring into mine.
Sinead kept giving me the details of her nights tailing Maximillian Fuchs. He seemed to leave around nine every evening, choosing a different bar each time. All the bars were high-class joints, which Sinead enjoyed describing in her half-mocking, half-jealous manner. Maximillian spent his time there buying women drinks, talking to them. Every night he ended up leaving with a different woman, going to her place. He’d stay there for about an hour, then leave.
“So… he likes women,” I finally said after she told me about her third night of tailing him.
“He likes a lot of women. And he isn’t exactly the snuggle-until-morning type. He fucks and leaves, Lou. Every time. And he doesn’t seem to get out of the mansion during the day. But I have some good news. He has a type.”
“What’s his type?”
“Tall, pale, elegant. Two of the women were red-headed, the third blonde. All three were ravishing, but in an old-fashioned way. Long dresses, huge cleavage. One of them had a French accent; the second was definitely British; the third I think was German. So I think he’s into aristocratic European women.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Know anyone who matches this description?”
I looked at her innocently. “Ravishing and elegant? Doesn’t ring a bell. All the people I know are kinda crass and ill-mannered.”
“That’s…” She thought about it for a moment. “That’s actually probably true. But if I wanted, I could be an aristocratic European lady. May I introduce—” she changed her accent and tone— “Baroness Fleurette van Dijk.”
“What’s that ghastly accent?”
“It’s Dutch.”
“It sounds like you’re trying to poop.”
“Well, who’s crass now? I’m still working on the accent. Anyway, once Harutaka hacks the servers, he can add Baroness Fleurette van Dijk to the guest list. I’ll enter the banquet, use my feminine wiles to woo Maximillian, and have a drink with him.”
“Then, while you two are drinking, you can drip some truth serum into his wine.” I warmed up to the idea. “You get the combination from him, pick his pocket for the keycard, and voila! We’re in.”
“It’s a fantastic plan! Or, as the Baroness van Dijk would say, fantastisch.”
I flinched. “Awesome, just please work on that abysmal accent.”
I inched slowly across my bedroom, my body not yet entirely healed. The floor was icy cold, and each barefoot step ran chills up my spine. Twice I had to stop because Magnus blocked my way, mouth open wide, tongue lolling. His face indicated that he was ready for a walk, and that he assumed I was ready as well. My dog was cute, but intelligence wasn’t one of his stronger traits. I opened the door to my lab, and slammed it behind me before Magnus could slither inside. He whined and scratched at the door, but I ignored him. The lab was the one room that was off-limits.
Across the room, the counter where I did most of my work lined the wall. All my tools were there—some classic ancient alchemy tools, others more modern, because I tried to move with the times. There was a copper mortar and pestle standing next to a high-powered blender. My retort—a glass container with a long mouth pointed at a downward angle, like an overweight giraffe drinking—lay on a three-legged iron stand above a small gas grill. I had rows of empty tubes, pots, vials, bottles, pans… all waiting to be used. The rest of the lab consisted of shelves, trunks, and cupboards containing my ingredients. Those used to be full, but lately I’d been running out, and many of the jars that lined the shelves were empty.
Installed in one wall was a small safe, containing my most prized possession in the entire world. The safe had a combination dial, and even a skilled burglar would find it almost impossible to crack. But knowing how devious a dedicated burglar could be, it was also etched with various runes that would hopefully keep anyone but me away from the safe’s contents.
I crossed the room to the safe and unlocked it, the mechanism’s ticking echoing in the silent room. I pulled the safe door open, and, ignoring the gun and the meager amount of cash inside, I removed the false bottom. Underneath was a book.
It was thick and leather-bound, the pages yellow and brown with age. Engraved on the cover with spidery letters were the words Tenebris Scientiam. It was a book assumed long gone by sorcerers and alchemists alike. People had been looking for it for centuries, claiming to have seen it, or to have acquired a page of it. And it was in my possession.
The memory echoed in my mind. The sad, serious voice. Your mother left something for you, Lou. Something important.
I took it out, placing it on the counter, and opened it carefully, treating the pages with the utmost care. Once when I’d been careless, a page crackled and broke between my clumsy fingers, and I had cried for hours at my stupidity. Since then, I had coated all the pages with a special oil to strengthen them, and I flipped the pages as if I were touching a delicate butterfly that might flap its wings at any moment.
The Tenebris Scientiam was, for all intents and purposes, a cookbook.
It wasn’t for delicious chocolate cakes or three hundred exciting recipes for paleo. No, this book was for alchemists, and it contained recipes and instructions for some very nifty potions discovered by hundreds of scholars over decades. Unfortunately, like paleo recipes, most tasted like crap.
But the things they could do! Enhance senses, change a person’s shape, heal, kill, distill emotions, manipulate reality. The possibilities were endless, provided you had the right ingredients. Which is where the problem really started. Because the local 7-Eleven did not have hydra venom, or the blood of a martyr, or mistletoe cut on a night when Mercury occults Uranus. Ingredients were expensive. Sometimes impossible to acquire. And I was running out.
I flipped the pages carefully until I reached a recipe I had already made several times: a truth serum. I read the instructions, though I knew them by heart. It required, among other things, a crystallized angel tear. Or, in accountant’s terms, it required nine hundred seventy-five dollars, which is what one of those tears cost, last time I purchased one. I had only one,
and the thought of wasting it made me sick. But you can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs, and you can’t get a combination key without spiking Maximillian’s drink, so waste it I would.
I walked over to one of the shelves and picked up a jar labeled in my own almost illegible handwriting: Cryst. Angel Tear. It had one small crystal in it, its color a sparkling silver. I put the tear in the glass retort and lit the flame underneath. The tear itself was highly poisonous to humans, but when distilled, I could extract its essence. I wasn’t sure exactly what it contained—perhaps God’s own DNA, or distilled holiness, or maybe just the condensed essence of a whiny angel. But regardless, the essence could compel truth, if used correctly. Which was what I needed here.
While the tear distilled, I went back to my cookbook and skimmed the instructions again.
Something thumped loudly behind me. Probably a client knocking on the shop’s door. I ignored it. The “closed” sign should have been clear enough on its own.
I took a bit of earth from the old country (a.k.a. England) and the shell of a bluebird’s egg, and crushed them together with my pestle. My sharp grinding movements aligned themselves with the rhythm of repeated knocks on the door. Finally, exasperated, I put the pestle down. I returned my cookbook to the safe, and locked it up. I verified that the gas flame wasn’t burning the angel tear, and that the essence was distilling nicely. Then I went to the shop door and unlocked it, preparing myself to shout at the persistent customer.
It was a short Japanese man, his hair the color of cinnamon, and a cheerful smile was plastered on his face. It took me a moment to recognize him. Last time I had seen him, it had been pitch-dark, and I had been vomiting.
“Harutaka!” I remembered I had told Sinead to ask him to come over.
“Yes!” he answered, his voice carrying a mild accent, and a tone of excitement. “You are Lou Vitalis, who saved my life four days ago.”
“You can just call me saved my life,” I said, and then, at his confused look, added, “Sorry. It was a joke. Not very funny. Not funny at all, really.”