Grave Debt

by D. D. Miers

  I squeezed his hand, wishing I had more to reassure him.

  "We'll figure it out," I promised him. "You're not alone, either."

  He smiled at me, and the doorbell rang. Aunt Persephona frowned.

  "Expecting anyone?" she asked.

  Ethan and I hurried toward the door. We braced ourselves, ready for it to be Aethon (though he didn't seem the doorbell-ringing kind) and pulled the door open.

  Cole stood on the step, holding an iced coffee.

  "Morning," he said. "Can I come in?"

  "Of course," I said, stepping back. Cole hesitated for a minute, then looked past me to where Aunt Percy was standing in the hall.

  "Actually," he said, "she needs to say it."

  "Fat chance," Aunt Persephona said bluntly. "You'll just have to eat the threshold if you want in here."

  Cole sighed, impatient.

  "I'm here to train your daughter," he said. "I kind of need my powers in order to do that."

  Aunt Persephona gave him a suspicious look, then looked to me. "You vouch for him?" she asked.

  I nodded, not sure what was happening. My aunt shrugged, giving in. "Fine. You are invited in."

  "Thanks," Cole said, stepping through the door sipping his coffee.

  "What was that?" I asked. Ethan looked equally confused.

  "Threshold Law," Cole explained, poking at the ice in his coffee with his straw. "Dwellings are magically protected. If a magical creature or magic user enters a dwelling without permission, they can have their powers diminished or even suppressed completely. It's most famous for how it works on vampires, but it applies to pretty much the whole magical community, 'cept for a few domestic Fae."

  "The longer a person has lived somewhere," my aunt continued, while Cole noisily sucked the last of his coffee, "the stronger the threshold. This house has been inhabited by our family for several generations, so our threshold is quite significant."

  "It's probably why Aethon hasn't been able to find you yet," Cole said, sliding past us, poking his head through doorways until he found the kitchen, dropping his empty coffee in the trash. "The threshold is masking you. But it won't work for long. And considering he's recognized as family, it may not even keep him out."

  "She's not my daughter," Aunt Persephona said, and Cole looked confused. "Vexa. She's my grandniece. But thank you."

  "Oh, right." Cole looked a little thrown of, but shrugged.

  "So," he said, turning to me. "Ready to start training?"

  "We're planning to go and see Ethan's contacts at the museum this morning,” I said. “We need their help figuring out what to do about Aethon next. And I'm hoping they'll know something about what's happening with Ethan's curse."

  Cole shrugged. "Suit yourself." He flopped into a kitchen chair, pulled my tea toward him, took an experimental sip, then made a face, pushing it away. "I can find somewhere else to hang out for the day. I just thought you were in a hurry."

  "I'm sure checking in with the curators won't take all day," I told him. "Can you just wait here till we get back?"

  Cole looked ready to refuse when Aunt Percy put another cup of tea and a muffin down in front of him.

  "I would also prefer it if you stay here," she said. "I have a lot to ask you about your intentions with my niece."

  Cole eyed Aunt Percy warily, and pulled the muffin closer to him.

  "Right. Intentions."

  Ethan and I hurried to get ready, feeling rushed now that Cole waited for us. I dressed in one of my outfits for work, a tea-length black dress, practical and somber but elegant, with a high boat neck and a plunging translucent lace panel in the back. I felt oddly like I was going to a job interview. I wanted very badly to impress these people.

  I wasn't at all certain what to expect as Ethan drove us to the museum. I had a vague image in my mind like something out of a movie about wizards, impossible architecture, goblins and owls flying around, and magic flying everywhere.

  We pulled up to the local public library, a plain and slightly rundown building.

  "It doesn't look like much, I know," Ethan said, leading me up the concrete steps. "But keep an open mind."

  "Is the library a front for a magically concealed museum?" I asked, trying not to get too excited. "Is there a hidden entrance?"

  "Uhhh, kind of?" Ethan said with a sheepish smile.

  Through the doors, there was a small check-in desk where a woman a few years older than me with frizzy brown hair was sorting returns. She looked up as we came in, her brown eyes widening as she saw Ethan.

  "Hey, you're alive!" she said. "It's been days, dude. We thought you were dead."

  "Only almost," Ethan said with a small laugh. "I needed a couple of days to recover. But I've got news and a new friend."

  He turned to me and I waved a little awkwardly at the other woman.

  "Vexa, this is Daphne," he said. "She does most of the backend work here. Most of the research and cataloging and figuring out how to store the artifacts. We'd be basically out of luck without her. Daphne, this is Vexa."

  Daphne stood up and circled the desk to shake my hand. She was short and soft around the middle, like someone who ate well but who's desk job didn’t let her get a ton of exercise. The air conditioners whirred loudly, struggling to keep the building cool. Daphne combatted the heat in jean shorts and an old T-shirt with the blueprint of a robot on it. Her frizzy hair was up in a messy ponytail and she wore no makeup. She was a person who clearly didn't prioritize her appearance, which left me feeling slightly at a loss from the start, since I always put an absurd amount of work into looking good

  "You're a magic user, I assume?" Daphne said with a smile, shaking my hand. "Unless Ethan's just inducting normies, now?"

  "No, I'm a magic user," I assured her.

  "One of the strongest I've ever met," Ethan said, proudly.

  "Are you on any of the message boards?" Daphne asked. At my perplexed look she continued. "A lot of us met over private message boards. It's how most of the community stays connected these days."

  "I didn't even know the community existed until I met Ethan," I said. "Magic runs in my family, but I thought it was just us."

  "Ooh, a hereditary magician," Daphne said, sounding excited. "We don't have any of those yet. Most of the traditional family practices were gone before Gardner and Crowley. How far back does your tradition go? Do you know?"

  "Uh, Byzantine Empire, we think. Before the fall of Constantinople," I said with a shrug. Daphne's jaw dropped.

  "Jesus!" she said. "That's more than 500 years at least! Depending on when precisely, it could be more than 1,000! No wonder you're strong! There are only a handful of families left that can trace their tradition back that far. Most of us are lucky to have foundations in pre-Revolutionary American traditions. You must have so much history to share!"

  "Not really," I said, a bit reluctantly. I hated to disappoint her, suddenly. She seemed so delighted. "Practically no one in my family even has magic anymore. It's mostly just me and my great-aunt. Even her brother didn't have any powers."

  "You knew her great-uncle actually," Ethan said, before Daphne's expression could change. "Ptolemy, remember? That's how I ran into her. She was trying to save the family artifacts he left behind, including the candle."

  Daphne went stiff.

  "You're a Tzarnavaras?" she asked me.

  "Yeah," I confirmed, worry coiling in my stomach at the harsh edge to her voice.

  "A necromancer?"

  "Is that all right?" It came out in a ridiculous, anxious little voice, though I wanted it to sound confident. I couldn't hold on to my usual sense of self-assurance in front of this dumpy little librarian. I just wanted to belong here so badly.

  "Of course," Daphne said quickly, smiling. But her excitable friendliness was gone. "I mean, magic is magic, right? And it's not like you picked it, so, yeah, of course it's fine. Uh, Ethan, can I talk to you for a minute?"

  Ethan gave me an apologetic look and followed Daphne as
she pulled him away behind the shelves of the reference section. I stood where I'd been left, marveling at how remarkably similar this was to being uninvited to Mindy Phillip's birthday party in the fifth grade.

  The library was quiet except for the furious humming of the straining air conditioner. The building was mostly empty, though there were a few people here earlier, one browsing self-help and the other on the computers filling out applications. In the quiet, I didn't have to try hard to overhear most of Daphne and Ethan's conversation.

  " . . . isn't going to like it," Daphne said. "You know the fit he threw about even working with Ptolemy."

  "Why? She hasn't done anything wrong!" Ethan insisted. "She doesn't deserve to be alone just because her kind of magic offends his delicate sensibilities."

  "He doesn't even want you working with us," Daphne hissed. "And a few of the others agree with him. You shouldn't have brought her here. They might ban you for this!"

  "I . . . that isn't true." He didn't sound that sure. "I mean, the old man maybe, but Donald and Tracy—"

  "Tracy still thinks you're contagious," Daphne said. "I've explained you're not that kind of werewolf a thousand times but—"

  "Even so, after everything we've done together—"

  "I put my neck on the line to get them to tolerate you. I could get in trouble for this, too!"

  "Listen, I'm not asking you to be friends with her or make her part of the group. Just . . . listen to her. She has information that could really help us. And she could really use the help from us as well."

  There was a long moment of silence.

  "Fine," Daphne said. "Only because that candle is too dangerous to pass up any opportunity to get it off the streets."

  They emerged from behind the bookshelves, and I did my best to school my features and not look like I'd heard everything.

  "The others are in the back," she said, giving me a customer service smile. "It's just Donald and Fiona right now. Tracey and Deshawn are out on a field mission."

  "And the old man?" Ethan asked. Daphne shrugged.

  "Who even knows, dude? He comes and goes as he pleases."

  She shuffled away and Ethan smiled at me, giving me a thumbs-up like everything was fine as we followed Daphne deeper into the library. But I was beginning to realize this place wasn't at all what I had hoped it would be.

  Chapter 7

  Daphne led us through the library, which was just a single large room divided by a series of shelves, most waist high, a few ceiling height. The computer area housed four ancient Dells. There was one sitting area with squashy, mismatched couches. I waited for us to pass through whatever illusion or secret door and reveal the bustling ministry of magic I'd been expecting. Instead, she led us to one of several study rooms at the back of the building. The window had been papered over and a hastily scrawled “Do not disturb” sign was taped to it. Daphne knocked brusquely before letting herself in. The sound of an in-progress argument greeted us.

  "—don't understand why it's not working!"

  "You've got your electron count wrong."

  "You're not even looking at it!"

  "It's always the electron count."

  "It's not, I checked it!"

  "You never check it. You always try to do it by memory and screw it up."

  "Well, this time I checked it!"

  The small room contained a single long table, a low shelf, a rickety folding desk holding a computer that was much nicer than the ones outside, and no windows. One wall was devoted to a huge whiteboard dense with chemical equations.

  A young woman, maybe twenty, sat at the computer, her back to us. An older man, in his forties maybe, sat at the long table, squinting at several sheets of paper crammed with handwritten notes, which I vaguely recognized as the same kind of general wizardry my aunt dabbled in. The girl at the computer sighed impatiently and snatched one of the pages from the older man, skimming over it quickly.

  "You checked it, huh?" she scoffed. "What source told you helium has four electrons?"

  The man snatched it back, quickly spotted the mistake she'd pointed out, and fell back into his chair groaning.

  "You've got to stop trying to do it by memory," the girl said. "Just use Google like everyone else!"

  "A wizard shouldn't have to rely on Google."

  Daphne cleared her throat and both people looked up in surprise, finally noticing us.

  "Holy shit, Ethan's back," the girl said, more deadpan than I would have expected.

  "Did you get the candle?" the man asked.

  "No," Ethan replied, pulling out a chair and sitting down at the end of the table. "Other parties intervened and I almost died. It was a good time."

  "Is she one of the other parties?" the girl asked, eying me.

  "In a manner of speaking," Ethan said evasively. "Fiona, Donald, this is Vexa."

  "She's Ptolemy's niece," Daphne added.

  "Oh," said Donald. Then, as he put together what that meant, "Ohhh. Uther isn't going to like that.”

  "Uther doesn't like anything," Daphne said. "Ethan's vouching for her. He thinks she can help us."

  "We're listening," Fiona said, swiveling her chair to face us.

  "Um, can I ask how you knew my uncle, first?" I asked. "No one's explained that yet."

  "Your Uncle Ptolemy was working with us," Ethan explained, inviting me to sit down beside him. "He found the curators through the message boards and wanted to help."

  "Being nonmagical in your family," Daphne added, "he understood why it was important that these artifacts and traditions be preserved, away from the hands of those that might misuse them."

  "He'd recently succeeded in tracking down some of your family's old artifacts," Ethan said, glossing over Daphne's somewhat caustic statement. "He reconnected with some of your distant relatives back in Turkey who'd been sitting on a small cache of family heirlooms, which they let him bring back to the states, including the candle."

  "The Curators have been looking for that one for a while," Donald put in. "The source of all necromantic energy in the world isn't something you want floating around unaccounted for."

  "We were still figuring out what to do with it when he died before he could hand it off to us," Daphne finished. "And the items he'd brought back from Turkey, including the candle, became part of the dispute over his estate, making it very difficult for us to get our hands on it."

  "Then the tracking spell we had on it started moving," Fiona continued. "We realized someone was stealing it from the funeral home, so we sent out the mutt to go fetch it. Which apparently went wrong somehow."

  "I was at work when they called me," Ethan explained. "I took the ambulance in the direction they said the candle was going, hoping I'd spot something. Instead I found your car accident and the scent of the candle on you. I followed you home, hoping I could just snatch it from your house and, well you know what happened after that."

  "I don't," Daphne said. "Did she have it?"

  "No," I answered. "That car accident he mentioned? Someone hit me and took the candle while I was out."

  "Who?" Daphne asked. "Do we know?"

  I pursed my lips, unsure if I should tell them, considering how they'd reacted so far to any mention of my family. Ethan gave me an encouraging nod.

  "Aethon Tzarnavaras," I said. Fiona and Donald looked blank, but Daphne's eyes widened.

  "Aethon Tzarnavaras the creator of necromancy?" she said, stunned. "The Lich Aethon Tzarnavaras? Most-wanted dark wizard in history?!"

  "Um, yes to the first one," I said. "I didn't know about the other two. He's a lich?"

  "Wait, who are we talking about?" Donald asked, still looking confused.

  "Don't you guys ever read any of the magical history research I give you?" Daphne asked, exasperated. "Aethon Tzarnavaras is one of the most infamous figures in the known history of magic. We have no idea where he came from. He just appeared in Constantinople one day, already the world's first true necromancer. He married into royalty and u
sed his power and influence to further his skills. He extended his own life for decades, something we still don't know how to do, and committed untold horrors to keep his family rich and powerful, until finally he did something so horrible his own family turned its back on him and had him banished."

  "What did he do?" I asked, interrupting. "Almost none of my family's books talk about him, and the ones that do won't say what he did."

  "No one is sure about the exact details," Daphne said. "A lot of the records of it were deliberately erased to keep people from trying to replicate what he'd done. But the earliest records I can find say he sacrificed an entire city—men, women, children, animals—in order to give himself eternal life. They say he raised an undead army and attacked the city without warning, killing every living thing. Some say it was worse than that. That he rounded them up and killed them slowly, until the amount of death and suffering was so extreme that he caught the attention of Death himself."

  I shivered, and glanced over my shoulder, suddenly certain there was someone standing behind me. There was no one, and Daphne continued.

  "When Death finally appeared before him, Aethon made some kind of deal with them. Some say he promised to deliver a number of souls to Death every hundred years."

  "That doesn't make sense," I interrupted again. "Death doesn't work that way."

  "Well, you would know better than me," Daphne said with a shrug.

  "Seriously," I tried to explain. "Death doesn't . . . enjoy people dying. It doesn’t get a kick out of collecting souls or anything. Having souls 'sacrificed' to it wouldn't do anything for it. Everyone you killed would just be . . .. dying at the time they were supposed to. If you found some way to kill people who weren't supposed to have died yet, Death would probably be pissed. There's a balance and shit."

  I turned red, frustrated that I couldn't explain myself better.

  "Well, like I said, we don't know all the details," Daphne said. "All we know is a lot of people died, and he got eternal life. And that the Fae lost their shit about it when they found out. They do not like the idea of immortal humans. They've been hunting for his phylactery ever since."