Mad Maudlin

by Mercedes Lackey

  The only weak link in the system was him. He had no illusions about his ability to stand up under duress.

  Wheatley smiled benignly down at him.

  "You're a magician. I don't really care if you're black, white, or purple. You're a good one. The best. I checked. You can conjure up all sorts of things, I'm sure. So conjure me up an elf."

  Marley blinked; at first he was certain he must have misheard, then he wondered just what sort of insane thoughts were going on in this man's head. You've got to be kidding!

  But the man was deadly serious, Marley knew. To laugh would be fatal, though the tension in his soul screamed for release. Irrationally, he felt relief—he had not been brought here to inform on his colleagues. Fleetingly, he wondered who had given Wheatley his name, and dismissed the speculation. It wasn't important now.

  He took a deep breath, thinking hard. What the hell was it that this mundane actually wanted? And what were the penalties for guessing wrong?

  "Many grimoires concern themselves with the formulae for conjuration and evocation," he began, speaking slowly and watching the madman's face for any clue. "The entities which can be summoned are various, from the embodiments of the Elemental Powers of Earth, Air, Fire and Water, to lesser Elemental Beings—woodland spirits, genus locii, aspects of the anima mundi, to Greater Powers such as demonic or angelic forces—"

  "I'm not interested in any of that," Wheatley snapped, glowering. "You heard me, Bell: I want an elf."

  Helpful. But he's not going to like what he hears next.

  "—but if what you wish to summon is one of the Princes of Faerie, the Lords of the Hollow Hills, then the matter becomes more difficult." Talking actually made him feel better. This was what he knew best; his life's work. But if they'd just wanted information, why hadn't they come and asked? "There's only one book that deals with that sort of conjuration in any detail at all: De Rebus Nefandis—'Concerning Forbidden Things.' It was set down around the year 900 by an Icelandic monk who was deploring certain shamanistic practices among his new converts, who had apparently used to have a rather extensive magical system related to the conjuration of svartálfar and ljósálfar, or what we'd call Dark and Bright elves."

  "Well get it, and get to work," Wheatley said irritably.

  Marley allowed himself a small smile of triumph. "Unfortunately, there's only one copy, and the Vatican has it. I don't think they'll sell."

  Wheatley leaned over the table, bringing his face very close to Marley's. "I don't think you understand your situation here, Mr. Bell. I want results. I want them fast. You can bring one of your fairy princes here, or you can send him a message that I want to see him. I do not care which. But I do know that nobody is going to miss you. And I know that pain makes a man very eager to please."

  Marley tried to push his chair back, to get away from Wheatley, but the other man had moved around behind him while Wheatley had been speaking, and was pushing the chair forward, until the edge of the table pressed painfully against Marley's stomach.

  And that was the least of what they were going to do to him. He was, alas, entirely familiar with the psyches of the ruthless, ambitious, and mad. There were certain Nazi occultists who had fit that profile—and he had read their diaries. The look he saw in Wheatley's eyes matched the picture he had built up in his mind.

  "Please—don't—oh, God—please—"

  He couldn't do it. No one could. But he knew he'd try, because if he didn't, they were going to kill him slowly and horribly.

  "That's what I like to see," Wheatley said, patting him stingingly on the cheek. "Now, you just let Mr. Nichol here know everything you need. I'll be along to check on you in a day or so."

  Wheatley straightened up and left.

  "Well, now, Marley, what shall we do first?" Nichol said brightly from behind him. "How about some lunch?"

  * * *

  By the time it was dark—and much colder—Eric was frustrated and fed up. The trail was worse than cold; it was as if every time he got the ghost of a lead, there was a sudden psychic brick wall in his way.

  Could Magnus really be doing that all by himself? Or could he have found help already? If he had, Eric hoped it was the right kind of help, and not some modern-day Fagin, protecting kids only in order to exploit them himself. . . .

  Not that that would be anything new.

  But right now he was tired, and hungry, and cold. He'd covered a lot of miles today, and all on foot, and he had to get up early tomorrow to keep his appointment with Oriana. But after that, he'd have the whole day free to search. Reluctantly, he had to admit there was nothing more he could do right now.

  He needed to check in with Hosea, tell him about yesterday, and get some ideas about how—and where—to look for Magnus. From his work in the shelters, Hosea was a lot more plugged in to the city's runaway population than Eric was these days. He'd have a better idea of where the kids hung out. Maybe Eric would be able to strike a fresh trail that way. And most of all, if he happened to run into Hosea while he was out wandering around, he didn't want Hosea recognizing him and blowing his "cover."

  Besides, he knew that he couldn't spend more than another day, two at most, playing the Lone Ranger. After that, he'd have to call Ria and let her put her specialists on the case, much as his instincts cried out against it. At the very least, he should give her a call later and find out what she'd learned about that Dorland his parents had hired.

  As if to underscore the rightness of his decision to go home, when he got out of the subway at his stop, he saw it had started to rain. Only a little rain—more a heavy mist than a real rain, but it made the street slippery and the air even colder. Another few weeks, and this would be snow that stuck; even now, there were a few white flakes mixed with the silvery drizzle, though they melted before they reached the street. Last winter had been unseasonably mild; this one obviously planned to make up for it.

  By the time he'd walked the three long blocks to the apartment, Eric was thoroughly damp; whatever waterproofing his trench coat might once have possessed had long departed.

  "Nice threads, Banyon."

  The familiar voice came just as he reached the stairs. He turned at the sound. He'd been so focused on getting inside, warm, and dry, that he hadn't seen Kayla come up the steps from her basement apartment.

  Kayla was just finishing her first year at Columbia, majoring in web design. She was a Healer and an Empath, but neither skill paid the rent, and for someone whose Gift could make close proximity to other people actively painful, it was good to develop money-making skills that would let them spend a lot of time away from people. Especially now. She'd spent the months of September and October of 2001 practically in a cocoon.

  Kayla walked across the foyer and inspected him critically. "This a new look for you?"

  "Um, look, Kayla, I—"

  "No," Kayla said flatly. She stood regarding him pugnaciously, hands on hips.

  Eric blinked at her in surprise.

  "Do not come up with some fool dog-and-pony story about leaving your other clothes in a taxi while you were kidnapped by space aliens. Jesus, Eric, this is me. You've got two choices here, the way I see it: you can tell me the whole truth straight up or I resort to blackmail, and that takes longer."

  Eric smiled in spite of his tiredness. "What kind of blackmail could you possibly use?" he found himself asking, out of a detached professional interest.

  Kayla grinned impishly up at him. "Well, either everybody else already knows what you're up to, or they don't. If they do, I bet I could get the truth out of Too-Tall Songmaker in a New York minute . . . or I could just follow you the next time you go out. But why not cut to the chase and level with me? You look like you're trying to pass for street—so why not consult an expert? Which would be me, of course."

  Eric had to admit that she looked street—upscale street, but still street. Kayla's look tended to change with the seasons; at the moment it was less Goth than paramilitary, with laced jump boots, the same l
eather jacket she always wore (all the glitter of its previous incarnation had been sanded off), baggy parachute pants, and a skintight camo-print camisole.

  "C'mon," she said, sensing his hesitation. "Let's get you upstairs and out of those wet clothes before I catch cold."

  * * *

  Taking over his kitchen Kayla made cocoa—grumbling over the lack of coffee as usual, but Eric had given her his espresso machine as an apartment-warming present, so she had no real cause for complaints—as Eric changed into dry clothes. When he came out, she was waiting implacably.

  "Spill it," she said, handing him his mug. Eric was careful not to touch her fingers when he took it from her, or she might have gotten the whole story at once—and not in a terribly pleasant way, either. There were certain rules of etiquette in dealing with Empaths.

  He sighed. "There's no way to explain this that doesn't sound really stupid," he said, and launched, once more, into the explanation about how he'd come to find out about Magnus. He was starting to wish he'd gathered everyone together and told all of them the story all at once; he still had Hosea to tell, and it was starting to feel as if he'd told this tale a thousand times already. At least it seemed to hurt a little less each time he told it.

  It was new to Kayla, though. She stared out the window for a long moment after he'd finished, her face very still.

  "You know, Banyon, even having no parents—or parents that dump you because you get weird, like mine did me—is better than having parents like yours. Some people shouldn't even be let to raise houseplants!" she said at last.

  "I know," Eric said gently. Somehow, having someone else upset about it made it easier for him to deal with. "But this isn't about them. Or me. It's about Magnus."

  Kayla sighed, and seemed to shake herself all over.

  "Right. We've got to get him off the street and under cover before they find him. And that means the next time you go looking, I'm going with you."

  "But—" Ria would kill him and hang his scalp in the LlewellCo boardroom, no arguments, if he put Kayla in a dangerous situation. When she'd come East to go to school, Elizabet had made Ria Kayla's unofficial guardian.

  Kayla had been supposed to live with Ria, actually. It was Kayla who'd decided that her talents were better utilized at Guardian House, and she'd been proved right a couple of times already. Since the House itself had no objections to her staying—and there was a studio apartment available in the basement—Kayla had moved in, decorating it to suit her own Gothgrrl tastes. And, Eric had to admit, she was a lot more thoroughly watched over by Greystone and the House than she would have been staying with Ria.

  "See here, Banyon. Bringing me into this only makes sense. One—" Kayla held up a finger. "I'm a lot closer to Magnus' age than you are. So I can get closer to him. Two—" Another finger. "I've lived on the street a lot more recently than you have—in fact, you never lived on the street the way I did. Three— If you go approaching a bunch'a street kids alone and try to get in with them, you'll read as a predator. You may not be as old as you ought to be, but you're too old. Trust me. So we go around together. You find him and point him out. I can get next to him alone and get you in, or he'll accept you 'cause you're with me. And hey, how much trouble can I possibly get into with you right there to keep an eye on me?" she added, with a wicked grin.

  Plenty, Eric thought, with the wisdom of long experience. But he had to admit that all of Kayla's points were good ones. He looked like he was in his twenties. That was too old to get in with the crowd he was trying to infiltrate, and if Magnus was using magic—or was being protected by someone who was—using a glamourie to lower his apparent age enough to pass would be like posting a red warning flag above his head.

  But Kayla was still in her teens, and looked younger than her age. She'd fit right in. And she was right about being more streetwise than he was.

  Besides, trying to keep Kayla out of something once she'd made up her mind to "help" was a losing proposition, as he knew from long experience. . . .

  "Okay. Fine. You've got a deal," he said with a sigh.

  "Yo! Homes!" Kayla whooped exultantly. "Where do you want to start?"

  "I'm going to go see Oriana tomorrow morning—early—and take my lumps. I should be done about nine. Why don't you meet me there? Then we can head downtown. I'll buy you breakfast, and we can figure out where to go from there."

  "Sounds like a plan," Kayla said. "Well, better run. There's a Rutger Hauer retrospective over at the Gaiety, and I promised some friends I'd check it out. See you tomorrow, Morning Man."

  "Be good," Eric said, winning himself another smirk.

  * * *

  After Kayla left, Eric made himself an unsatisfactory dinner—he'd been eating out far too much, and getting behind on his grocery shopping, and there really wasn't much in the refrigerator but leftover takeout that was way past its "sell-by" date and the usual assortment of designer water. He finally opened a can of soup, and settled down for some channel-surfing. With expanded cable, he had his pick of almost 500 channels, including several international ones, so he could shop for things he didn't need, watch soap operas or game shows in languages he didn't know, catch up on the latest in sports from sumo matches to Australian football, or learn how to renovate and rewire his nonexistent house.

  None of it held his attention for very long.

  He realized that he was putting off something he needed to do, and it wouldn't be fair to make this a late night for Hosea. Hosea's days tended to start early—and Eric's day tomorrow was going to start early as well. He stretched out his arm, and snagged the phone.

  * * *

  A few moments later he presented himself at the door to Hosea's apartment. Hosea opened the door. The rich vanilla smell of baking wafted out into the hall.

  "You knew I was coming so you baked a cake?" Eric asked, startled.

  "Ah'm baking cookies for the shelter," Hosea said, in his slow mountain drawl. "You can have a few, if you're good. C'mon in."

  Eric walked down the long hall, following Hosea. The bookshelves were filling up nicely, he saw, and he noticed a few new additions to the art gallery since the last time he'd visited, as well—a large framed poster of Daybreak by Maxfield Parrish, and a couple of small drawings of banjo-playing mice that managed to bear an odd resemblance to Hosea—he remembered that Hosea was dating the children's book artist who lived down on Four. What was her name? Kathy? No, Caity.

  "Jest set for a spell, I've got to get this last batch out of the oven, and I'll be right out," Hosea said. He disappeared into the kitchen, while Eric wandered around the living room.

  Jeanette was there, lying in her open case. Eric gazed at her, wondering, as he often did, just how present she was when Hosea wasn't actually playing the instrument she inhabited. He knew that at those times she could see what Hosea saw and hear what he heard, and that she spoke to Hosea through the music, and that only Hosea could hear her. Those were the terms of the original spell that had bound her to "haunt" the banjo until she had expiated the evil she had done in her life. But he did wonder what it was like for her—was she "there" the rest of the time, or just asleep? He'd never asked, though—it seemed sort of intrusive, somehow—and Hosea hadn't said.

  Hosea came in a few moments later with a colorful tin tray that bore an old Rockingham teapot and a plate of golden sugar cookies, still warm from the oven. The tray was one of Hosea's many "urban scavenger" finds: New Yorkers threw out the most amazing things, and many city dwellers had furnished entire apartments from curbside scavenging. Most of the items—from furniture to dishes—only needed minor repairs, or a little elbow grease, to make them perfectly usable. You had to know the right neighborhoods, and get up early, to find the best items, but Hosea was a morning person anyway. Hosea kept some of his finds, and donated the rest, after repairing them, to others who could use them. Somehow, he always seemed to know someone who needed just that thing.

  Hosea set the tray down on the coffee table and gestured for
Eric to sit. "I was hopin' you'd drop by and tell me how yesterday went for you," he said mildly.

  "Well, I made a real dog's breakfast of it—to borrow one of Greystone's favorite phrases—but nobody's dead, and my parents don't even know I was there. But wait. There's more," Eric said. He knew he sounded flip, trying to distance himself from the pain with sarcasm, but what else could he do?

  "Have a cookie," Hosea suggested, pouring tea.

  Between bites of cookie and sips of peppermint tea flavored with wild honey, Eric told the story: that his parents, having lost one trophy child, had decided to make another one. That this second son—far more rebellious, by all accounts, than Eric had ever been—had run away from home. And was now in New York. Somewhere.

  "And I can't find him. Ria can't find him. It's like he's wrapped in some kind of magical cloak of invisibility. I spent all day trying to trace him, and I just kept getting more and more muddled. The harder I looked, the less there was to find. And . . . well, you see a lot of runaways," Eric added hopefully.

  "That I do," Hosea agreed. "Do you have a picture?"

  Eric pulled the bus pass out of his pocket. Hosea studied the picture for a moment, then shook his head. "He hasn't come around when Ah've been there, but most of those kids are wild as jackrabbits, specially if they think somebody might be out to drag them back home. And even the older ones are spooked by La Llorona. Some of 'em'll come around for a meal, sometimes, but only if they can be durned sure we won't turn 'em in. If you want to copy this, Ah could show it to Serafina and the others, so they could look out for him."

  "Thanks," Eric said. "I'll do that."

  * * *

  "Have you talked to Oriana about this?" Hosea asked, keeping his voice carefully neutral. The last thing Eric needed right now was pity; he'd rarely seen his friend and teacher so brittle, not even just after they'd returned from Chinthliss' domain, when he'd been trying to cope with Jimmie's death, and the battle with Aerune, and—in its own strange way, though she'd died thousands of years before—the death of Aerete the Golden. Not even after the Towers fell, when everyone was in what his Grannie would have called "a State."