by D. J. Bodden
Jonas sat on his bed and contemplated next steps. Phillip was still searching for Bert… or Alice, whoever turned up first. He recalled what the specter, Madoc, had said about not trusting the wolf. If only he’d been a little more specific, Jonas thought. For a moment, he considered going to Edwards for help, but he had a feeling the hunter would be less than discriminate about how he handled supernaturals, if he agreed to help at all. I’d better have a good, clearly defined target before I open that Pandora’s Box, Jonas thought.
He took out the journal and thumbed through it again. This time, as he flicked through the pages, he noticed one was a little thicker and heavier than the others. He picked at it, and it finally came apart. Apparently, his father had dabbed a small amount of glue along the edge to keep them together. It was toward the end of the journal. The left page was blank, and the right page contained a small note, addressed to him in his father’s neat handwriting:
Jonas,
If you’re reading this, something’s happened to me. They probably haven’t killed me, because they need what’s in this journal. Make sure they don’t get it; my life depends on it.
You remembered the coin I “gave” you when you were younger. I was hoping you would. By now, you’re probably going through some changes that might seem scary, and that’s okay. Believe me, I’ve been scared many times over the past 350 years. I wish I was there to help you, to teach you how to handle yourself, but it looks like you’re the one who’s going to be helping me. I’m very proud of you, son.
Tell your mother I was investigating the Order of Shadows. She’ll laugh, but tell her I found proof. Tell her that Marcus did what we always cautioned him against, and she’ll know what to do.
If for some reason your mother has disappeared too, find Madoc. You can trust him to do what’s in the Agency’s best interests. He stays on the move, but you can reach him in the center of the Whispering Gallery, at 4 p.m. every Friday, until I come home or they find me dead.
Have faith, but make sure others earn your trust. If I’m dead, don’t blame yourself. I didn’t train you soon enough. Your mother and I wanted you to have as normal a childhood as we could provide, short of leaving you on someone else’s doorstep. It was sentimental and, perhaps, in retrospect, a little foolish, but we did it because we love you.
If you’re owed any favors, or if you’ve made friends you can depend on, now would be the time to call them in.
-Dad
Jonas read the letter three times, to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. As tears streamed down his face, he smiled and thought… It’s going to be okay, Dad. I’m coming.
♚
At 3:59 p.m., Jonas stood nervously in the center of the Whispering Gallery, with the Oyster Bar Restaurant at his back and one of the Grand Central information booths in front of him. Tourists stood in the corners of the space, seemingly talking to the wall, but Jonas knew that by a trick of the room’s acoustics, you could hear a word whispered in one corner from the opposite one. He’d even seen someone propose that way.
The booth in front of him had a clock over it, and he watched as the minute hand clicked over to vertical. There was a gentle push on his barrier, and he allowed it in.
♚
“Jonas Black?”
“Yes. My father instructed me to meet you here.”
They were in the gatehouse of Jonas’ barrier. Guardians looked down from the guardrooms on either side, and Sam stood slightly behind Jonas, a crossbow not-so-casually cocked and ready to fire. The specter floated a few inches off the ground.
Jonas had imagined he would look cool and a little scary, like a translucent grim reaper with glowing eyes and a few chains that clinked when the wind blew. Instead, Madoc looked like a skinny accountant with gray skin and thinning hair. He wore wireframe glasses and a long, striped scarf that wrapped around his neck, and draped down over a battered sweater. He was clearly agitated, wringing his hands.
“Does anyone know you’re meeting me here?” Madoc asked.
“No,” Jonas answered. He watched as Madoc licked his lips and glanced anxiously at the closed door behind him. Then he looked over his shoulder at Sam and said, “Open it.”
“You sure about that, sir? There was that time in the street, with Ms. Amelia, and—”
“It’s okay, Sam. I don’t think he can do much harm.”
Sam scowled and made a hand gesture to one of the guards, causing Madoc to whimper and shrink back a little.
“It’s okay, we’re just… he’s telling them to open the door,” Jonas said. “Why are you so jumpy?”
Madoc’s voice was high-pitched and plaintive. “I’m fragile, in case you don’t know. Bad enough you almost shattered me that day in the street, gripping me like that.”
“What? But all I did was—”
“Shattered. Do you know how much time it took to piece myself back together after that? All because I trusted a vampire, and that cretin had a demon inside him! And now you tell me not to worry, while weapons are pointed at me, and wards are all over the city—”
It was an avalanche of words. Jonas was able to catch more from the ones Madoc emphasized than the rapid-fire chatter in between.
“—and you completely disregarded my warnings about Edwards, Fangston, and Macready. You practically gave the hunter a map of your head.”
“Wait, Phillip? He’s the wolf I’m not supposed to trust?”
“Not Phillip. The younger one, Bert. Waist deep in the Order of Shadows, that one. He stinks of betrayal, and you sit there bantering with him. Don’t you know he hates vampires? I blame his mother, really, but it’s all because of what happened to her father. And—”
“Stop!” Jonas yelled, causing Madoc to flinch and dart back toward the door, where he cowered like a frightened dog with his hands clasped in front of his throat. “Please,” Jonas said, trying to keep his voice calm. “You’re talking so fast about so many different things, I don’t understand half of what you’re saying. Are you always like this? I thought specters were master communicators.”
Madoc pressed his lips together, and raised a finger in what looked like the beginning of a scathing retort, but he must have heard something because he spun around and peered at the darkness outside. “Umm… could we… close those, actually?”
Jonas looked at Sam and nodded. Sam rolled his eyes, but gestured at the guard and the doors began to swing shut. Madoc floated down to the ground and sat with his back to the wall, hugging his knees to his chest. “Thank goodness. I haven’t felt this safe in over a year. Could we go somewhere else? Anywhere is fine. I’ll just sit here, where your figments can see me. It’s just nice to not be so afraid for a change.”
♚
Against Sam’s protests, Jonas agreed to carry the specter out of the terminal, inside his head. He was wary, though; Madoc seemed harmless enough, but Fangston had been on full alert and the demon had still taken control of him. At the slightest sign of trouble, he was prepared to jettison the specter from his mind. To tell the truth, considering how fragile Madoc seemed to be, and how jumpy Sam was about having a hitchhiker, the specter might have been safer outside anyway.
What did you mean when you said you’d been shattered? Jonas asked, as he left the Gatehouse of his barrier and made his way through the terminal with the specter in tow.
I meant shattered. Broken in pieces. Scattered to the winds, Madoc replied.
Why are you still here, then?
Specters are tied to the physical world by a phylactery — some blood, some hair, a magical focus. We’re fragile, but if something breaks us we just pop back up near our phylactery. As long as it’s intact, that is. We’re like a poor man’s Lich.
What’s a Lich?
Usually a dead wizard, sorcerer, or warlock. Big fans of robes, underground lairs… they’re very powerful. Doesn’t take long for that power to burn out their minds, though, and they turn nasty. Wasn’t for me.
Jonas wrapped a scarf around his neck,
as he walked up the marble slope and pushed his way through the crowd. It was always busy in front of Grand Central. Busses loaded and unloaded tourists, and people switched trains to go to Times Square or dallied in the bookstores and clothing shops, before continuing on their way. The floor below was a dining concourse, filled with every food imaginable, both prepared and unprepared. People were everywhere. It was a world unto itself, and behind the sound of conversations and heels on marble, Jonas picked up the hum of people’s thoughts, in every language imaginable. It was pleasant for a moment, like the babble of a stream, but it never stopped. He could see how public spaces would become unbearable to someone like Viviane.
Once outside, Jonas took two lefts and headed uptown, bodyguards in tow. Phillip had sent two of his other sons, Ryan and Sean, to keep an eye on Jonas while he and the rest of his family combed the city for Bert and Alice. The new bodyguards were twins and wore identical clothing down to the color and brand of their shoes. Like Kieran, they weren’t as wide as Bert or their father, but they were adults, easily in their late twenties. They didn’t say much. But Phillip had said they were trustworthy, and Jonas took his word for it, although he missed the constant banter he’d had with Bert and Phillip.
So what should I do now, Madoc?
What do you mean, ‘do?’ You run. You put as many miles between you and the demon as you can, and you take me with you.
Jonas frowned. That’s not what I meant. My mom is missing—
They have her, Madoc said. She’s somewhere in the warded area, which means she’s probably in the catacombs, same place your father went before he disappeared.
The traffic light was blinking red, so Jonas jogged across the street. What’s the warded area?
Madoc sighed.
Once on the sidewalk, Jonas took about three steps before smacking into an invisible wall. “Ouch!” he said, as he staggered back and fell. Ryan and Sean were immediately by his side, helping him up. One of the twins walked cautiously past the point where Jonas had struck the wall. He didn’t see or feel a thing, and looked around curiously. But when Jonas eased forward with an outstretched arm, to keep from hitting his head again, it was still there. Even when he put his entire weight against the wall, it wouldn’t budge an inch.
That’s the warded area, Madoc said.
Jonas almost dumped the specter from his mind, right then and there. But he remembered how frightened Madoc had been. How about warning me next time.
Sorry. You’d have run into it halfway through the explanation, anyway.
No, you could have just said stop, Jonas told him, reproachfully.
Ah, yes. Tell you what to do. Because that’s been working so well for me. I believe I told you to leave town.
Jonas stepped aside and rested against a building, realizing that if he kept leaning against the invisible wall, people were going to take him for a street performer. “I’ll be here for a few minutes,” he told Ryan, or Sean — whichever of the twins it was. He nodded, and then both of the werewolves walked nonchalantly to opposite street corners.
Okay, Madoc, Jonas said, let’s get a few things straight. First of all, leaving is not an option. My mother’s missing, and I’m not going—
Your mother’s in there, Madoc said, his tone getting louder with every word. She let herself be carried in like luggage, and now she’s there – along with the wolf, the demon, that half-lich zombie receptionist, and lots of other things I want nothing to do with. So just let me out. The only thing I wanted from there was my phylactery. Your father was supposed to get it, and—
In where? Jonas interrupted, not wanting to go through another one of the specter’s long-winded tirades.
The Agency. Everything’s inside the Agency.
CHAPTER 16
Jonas brought his focus back to the gatehouse, where he watched Madoc float back and forth, mumbling to himself. “What do you mean, the Agency?”
“It’s not important. Just let me out. Then you can go back to whatever you were doing, while I bury myself beneath the city and wait for judgment,” Madoc said, wringing his hands as he glanced back at the closed outer doors.
Jonas squinted and rubbed his forehead. He knew the specter had the information he needed, but drawing it out of him was turning into a huge headache. He started to reply but, suddenly, Sam stomped forward and grabbed the specter by the arm. “Now listen, you. You’re going to answer—”
“Aaaah!” Madoc shrieked and pulled his arm away, shrinking back against the wall. He sobbed, clutching the spot where Sam had seized him, which was now cracked and covered in tiny fissures, like parched lips in the desert sun. The guardian immediately reached out… “No, please don’t! I’ll answer anything. Please! Just let me go!” Madoc screamed, pulling back into the farthest corner and curling into a ball.
Sam looked at Jonas in horror. “I didn’t mean to—”
“I know. I didn’t either. Maybe it’s best if I talk to him alone,” Jonas said.
Sam started to protest, then glanced at the whimpering shape in the corner and said, “Yes, sir. You’re probably right.” He rapped twice on the inner door and one of the guardians opened it. Then Sam walked out, leaving Jonas and Madoc locked in the gatehouse alone.
Jonas walked over to the specter and crouched, speaking softly, like he would with a frightened child. “Madoc? What just happened?”
“I told you. I shatter. I’m a specter. I’ve been separated from my phylactery since your father was captured and it took me more than a week to recover from the last time you grabbed me, and now you’ve done it again, and it hurts, and I don’t want to do this anymore.” His shoulders shook.
Jonas recalled his previous encounter with Madoc. He’d been with Amelia and had fought back as hard as he could. He couldn’t imagine how much pain he’d inflicted on the skittish, broken man. I can fix this, he thought. My mind, my rules. Focusing on the fragments on the gatehouse floor, Jonas concentrated, and they began to float through the air, like dead leaves on a gentle breeze. Carefully, he fitted them back together on Madoc’s arm. At first, the specter looked up in horror, then with fascination, as the skin smoothed over. There were black tear-tracks on the gray skin of his face.
“Are you okay now?” Jonas asked, softly. “I’m sorry that happened, I was just having trouble understanding what you were saying, and Sam got a little over protective. Can we please start over, and maybe you could make an effort to answer my questions as simply and directly as possible?”
Madoc looked at him, wide-eyed, and nodded.
“Good. Let’s start at the beginning. Who are you? And, if this is so painful, why did you choose to be a specter?”
Madoc licked his lips and looked at his arm again, poking it gently. There was no sign that, moments before, his arm had been broken. “I… I was a sorcerer. A very powerful one, by the name of Martin Thaddeus Dockstäder… M-M-Madoc for short, see? And I… I did a lot of bad things. Then I started thinking about angels and demons and the very real possibility of an afterlife that I wouldn’t enjoy very much. So, I decided to become a specter.”
“Because liches turn evil?”
Madoc pressed his lips together and nodded.
“So what happens if you shatter too much? Do you die?”
Madoc shook his head. “Eventually. Mostly, it hurts, and I just reappear by my phylactery. Except I can’t now, because—”
“Because of the wards around the Agency.”
“In the Agency,” Madoc said, correcting him, then turned a paler shade of gray. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… don’t be angry again.”
Jonas felt another pang of guilt about what he’d done, but pressed on. This was as lucid as he’d gotten Madoc to be, and he needed the information. He hoped there would be time to make amends later.
“It’s okay, I’m not angry. So, the wards are inside the agency. How big are they?”
“I’m not sure. They wouldn’t have to be that big, the size of your living room maybe. Smalle
r if they used the walls. It depends on the sorcerer, really. Magic is a very personalized craft.”
“What would they look like if you’d built them?”
Madoc hesitantly touched Jonas on the forehead with the tip of his finger and closed his eyes. Jonas could see it… a small room with a white circle painted on the ground. There was writing carved or painted onto the floor and three of the walls, curving and entwining like the petals of a flower bud. He could see small pulses of light traveling along the lines, illuminating individual words in a pattern that seemed random at first but felt somehow familiar, as well as smaller circles that contained objects: bits of bone, feathers, and what looked like animal or human organs. There were also four lit candles, on four-foot-tall brass candlesticks, in the four corners of the room.
“Okay,” Jonas said. “So that’s what’s keeping you from getting inside the Agency?”
“Yes, it keeps me from doing anything within a half-mile of the place. I can’t even see into it; it’s just a big sphere of nothing. The only reason I knew about their lair in the first place is because your father was beaming information out, right up to the moment he was captured.”
Jonas nodded. “So I’m being blocked because you’re in my head. You know what that means, right? I’ll need to let you out as soon as we finish this conversation.”
“You could just stay away,” Madoc offered.
“I can’t do that, and you know it.”
The specter snorted. “Why? Because of some misplaced sense of duty? Who’s going to tell you you’re a good boy when you’re dead?”
“My mother’s in there,” Jonas said firmly, “my father might be too, and I need to warn Eve about what’s going on. Fangston is doing his best to protect me, but a lot of good people are going to be hurt if that thing inside him takes over.” Jonas felt like Fangston was nothing more than a ticking time bomb while that thing was in him. “If I continue to act like everything’s normal, he might be able to buy me enough time to fix this.”
“Your father couldn’t,” Madoc said.