“Sixteen, counting the time it took you to wake up,” Malcolm said. He took a drink of coffee, which was all he’d helped himself to, and added, “I’m starting to feel the exhaustion of having fought at Palembang and then spent the night napping fitfully.”
I pushed my tray away. “Let’s go home, and you can sleep.”
Malcolm didn’t look as if he were exhausted, but I kept up a steady stream of conversation with him on the drive home anyway, to keep him awake. “Have there been any more attacks?” I asked.
“Not to my knowledge. But I’ve been preoccupied.”
“Lucia would have said something.” I stared out the window at the passing cars. I’d lost enough time that I was disoriented by the sun being high in the sky instead of on the horizon the way my body told me it should be. “Was it really that remarkable, the factions fighting as one?”
“It was. Ambrosite teams split up and took the roles the familiars used to play in the fight. It wasn’t a perfect integration, but I could see how it will become so. I hope it set an example for the rest of the world.”
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the factions disappeared in our lifetime?” I leaned my head against the glass and breathed in the scent of warm leather and cinnamon air freshener. “Weird, too, but wonderful.”
Malcolm rested his hand on my leg, squeezing gently. “I’ll believe it when I see it. That’s not the sort of animosity that gets set aside overnight. It took me years to overcome my kneejerk reaction of assuming the worst of Nicolliens.”
“But you overcame it. That means it’s possible.”
“I overcame it in large part because of you, love. Not everyone has that advantage.” He pulled into our garage, turned the engine off, but didn’t open the door. “Very few Wardens came to this world as adults, free of those prejudices.”
“I know. But don’t you think there have to be some who are tired of the fighting?”
“I hope so.” Malcolm came around to open my door for me, something he did rarely enough that it warmed my heart when he did.
I made him shower and get into bed, something he clearly needed, then cuddled up beside him until he fell asleep. As Ruby had implied, I didn’t feel tired myself—well, I’d slept for sixteen hours, so that made sense. I eased myself out of bed, though Malcolm was deeply enough asleep I wouldn’t have woken him anyway, and went downstairs to the living room. I settled on the couch and turned on the television, flicking through the channels until I found one showing a dumb game show. I turned the volume low and let my mind wander.
My phone ringing startled me out of a dull reverie. It was Judy. “I’m tired of being patient,” she said without preamble, “and I want to know you’re all right. A badly-spelled text isn’t enough.”
“I’m all right. Almost. There’s some healing still to finish in a few days.”
“And is Viv awake?”
“Not yet.” I felt this was an optimistic thing to say. “They still don’t know what’s wrong.”
Judy sighed. “This was a disaster. Is it true it almost killed all of us?”
“I think so. At least, they told me if Viv hadn’t done what she did, the field would have engulfed the store.”
“And Mr. Wallach is dead. I’m so glad he didn’t spread the news around about what he intended. Imagine the whole magical world demoralized today instead of just us.”
I hadn’t felt demoralized until just then, what with my personal tragedy and my worries about Viv, but now I felt sick and weary. “I hadn’t thought of it like that.”
“Really? I haven’t been able to think of anything else. That was our best chance at stopping the invaders, and now it’s back to fighting a defensive war.” Her voice was almost plaintive.
I rolled onto my side and hugged a pillow to my chest. “Now I feel tons better, thanks.”
“Sorry.” Judy sighed again. “Father’s been on the phone all morning, organizing training sessions. He and Parish have been working on new fighting strategies that incorporate Ambrosite and Nicollien tactics. He…Helena, it’s weird to say this about my own father, but he seems happy for the first time in years. Like he secretly wanted this to happen, except I know that’s not true.”
“It has to be a burden lifted, don’t you think? I mean, being angry all the time…that can’t be healthy for anyone.”
“That’s what I think. He and Mike had a long talk late last night after I got back from the node. They might actually end up friends. Is that bizarre, or what?”
“I hope the rest of the world figures out how much better it is without the factionalism. We need that kind of boost.”
“Right. Even if nobody knows how close we came to ending the Long War.”
I examined my bandaged hand and wondered how I was going to get a shower. “Lucia sounded like everything hadn’t gone well at Palembang. Do you know anything about that?”
Judy sighed. “It was what Mike and Father were talking about—how the invaders kept popping up and then disappearing. It’s something the Nicolliens used to train familiars to do. So our teams were successful because every group had someone who could predict where the invaders would appear. But the Nicolliens from other parts of the world were useless without their familiars. And the Ambrosites, not ours, the other ones, mocked the Nicolliens like it was all a game, even though they were inefficient too. Mike and Father were both furious about it.”
“I wonder if Lucia is going to rip into them. The others, I mean. Now that she has proof that Nicolliens and Ambrosites can work together and are more effective when they do.”
“I hope she does. Are you coming in tomorrow?”
“Yeah. I feel fine, except for only having one hand for a few days.”
“Good. I was going to visit Viv later today, see if I could talk Jeremiah into going home for some real sleep.”
I felt slightly guilty that that hadn’t occurred to me. “Good idea. Maybe I—”
“Stay home and rest, Helena. I’ll call if anything changes.” Judy hung up before I could argue with her.
I turned off the television and lay back on the couch. My mind still felt scrambled, as if everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours was disconnected from everything else. It seemed impossible that this time yesterday I’d been worried about the fighters going to Palembang and been completely unaware of what waited in my future. But I didn’t want to rest. I wanted to do something. Sure, Wallach’s plan had failed, but that didn’t mean it was time to give up. The problem was I didn’t have any idea what I could do short of talking to the oracle, and I’d have to go to the store for that. I wasn’t sure driving was a great idea.
On the other hand…I’d communicated with the oracle when I wasn’t in its space, and there was no reason I couldn’t try that. And even if I didn’t succeed, I might manage to calm my fevered brain.
I sat up and rearranged the pillows, then lay back with my hands crossed over my stomach and closed my eyes. It had been an unusually hot day, and the air conditioning was running, a distant purring sound that became louder when I focused on it. I breathed in through my nose, out through my mouth, and listened to the purr. Aside from that, the house was quiet.
I became aware of the thrumming of blood in my ears, a lower sound than the air conditioning. My bare feet rubbed against the couch’s suede upholstery, soft and relaxing. I breathed in again and smelled the woody scent of the diffuser on the mantel, faint because it needed to be changed—but thinking about it was a distraction. I focused instead on the feel of the air brushing my face, how my skin tingled with awareness.
Again I felt as if I were sinking into thick, welcoming foam that enveloped me in its warmth and softness. I let my mind wander, not thinking of anything in particular, just waiting for the oracle to speak through me if it wanted to.
My memory touched on a recent augury, nothing special, one of hundreds of auguries I’d performed over the past almost three years. The book had been missing its dust jacket, and its co
ver was bright cranberry red, the color of my favorite dress. I recalled thinking that at the time, commenting on it to the oracle, who had been paying attention for no reason I could remember.
Helena. Danger. Ending.
I know, I thought, not wanting to disrupt my meditation with speech. Mr. Wallach is dead. Did you know it would happen?
Warning. The anchor vanishes. It happens. He is not. He chooses.
But we could have saved him. We could have made him listen.
HE CHOOSES.
The thought reverberated through me, wiping away all other thoughts and making me temporarily numb. I understand, I thought. I wish he’d chosen otherwise.
The oracle was silent, but the pressure of its awareness bore down on me like a heavy blanket. I embraced the feeling, letting it press me down into the imaginary foam further. After an endless moment, the oracle said, They fall. The guardians remain. Seal the cracks.
I don’t understand. I thought that was what Mr. Wallach had in mind, and that failed.
Many, few, one. Power strikes. I will end.
Impatience fractured my calm, and I concentrated on my breathing for a while, hoping I hadn’t lost my connection with the oracle. Do you mean you will end when only one is left? One of what?
The guardians fall. The guardians remain. I will end. Helena will end.
Do you mean death, or some other ending?
The oracle said nothing, but its attention increased. I had a feeling I’d confused it. Do you know death? What happened to Mr. Wallach?
I know ending. He ends. I end. Helena ends.
I drew in a sharp breath, and my connection to the oracle shattered. Breathing heavily, I lay on the couch with my eyes squeezed shut and wiped tears away before they could leak into my ears. That had been about as definitive as I could expect. The oracle had seen our death. Maybe it didn’t understand time, maybe it couldn’t tell me when it would happen, but I was convinced that waited in my near future.
I wiped away more tears and sat up. Crying wouldn’t solve anything. Since the oracle couldn’t tell me when it would happen, I could only keep on doing my job and hope that would help the Wardens find another solution to the invaders’ attacks. What I was not going to do was give up.
21
I’d never realized how much I depended on having two hands in my job. Some of the auguries were large and heavy, too big for me to easily lift one-handed. I ended up balancing those on my hip like an angular, motionless baby. I took the latest one to the counter and awkwardly heaved it up to lie flat on the countertop. “This one is $1700,” I said, flipping the cover open. “Did you have any more requests?”
“That’s the last,” Dave Henry said. He opened his familiar aluminum briefcase and extracted bundles of cash to hand to Judy. “Thanks. I hope we can get these interpreted before the next attack. It would be nice to go on the offensive for once.”
“Is that even possible?”
Dave shrugged. “Maybe. Lucia has some ideas, but I’m not allowed to discuss them. You know how she is.”
“I understand.”
Dave put the books away in the briefcase and nodded to me and Judy. “Be seeing you.”
I accepted the next person’s augury slip. The Nicollien woman was short and slim, built like Judy, but she had the hard look of a front line fighter, and I knew better than to make assumptions. Her question read Can I trust my new teammates? I wondered if by “new teammates” she meant Ambrosites, and was tempted to tell her she didn’t need an augury for that. Instead, I smiled and walked into the silence of the oracle.
It hadn’t paid attention to me all morning, but now I could feel its presence like someone hovering at my shoulder. “I don’t know whether to be heartened by this question, or annoyed,” I said as I paced the narrow aisles. “I mean, at least she’s asking, but on the other hand, she shouldn’t have to ask.” I pulled the augury off the shelf—a skinny little paperback, fortunately—and headed back for the store front.
The woman was the last of the Nicolliens that morning, and accepted the augury (Brian’s Hunt) with no change of expression. “Are you forming a new team?” I asked as Judy wrote up her receipt.
She nodded curtly. “I don’t like working with new people,” she said, “and Ambrosites…don’t worry, I won’t bad-mouth them, I’m just saying it takes some getting used to. On both sides.”
“I understand. Good luck.”
When she was gone, Judy said, “How many is that?”
“Fifteen people asked for auguries related to combining forces with Ambrosites. Most of them were positive ones, too. Not passive-aggressive or anything.”
“I’m glad. The invaders could attack again at any moment, and we need to be at our strongest.” Judy put the receipt book away. “I’ll fix lunch.”
I leaned against the counter and picked at the bandage on my hand, which still didn’t hurt, though my skin itched constantly. Whatever regenerating field the doctors had created, it didn’t feel like it was doing anything. It did make me wonder, though, if I would need rehabilitation to get my new tendons working properly. The thought didn’t disturb me the way it had a day ago. I’d stopped being freaked out on my own behalf and had moved on to mourning Wallach and being afraid for Viv.
Viv still hadn’t woken up. Rick Jeong had come in early this morning to remove what was left of the anchors and had told me there was no change in her condition. Whenever I had a free moment, like now, my thoughts went to her and to Jeremiah. There had to be something I could do—though even I knew that was a ridiculous thought. I hated being helpless.
I went back into the stacks and the oracle’s space. “Do you know what happened to Viv?” I asked.
The oracle’s attention was focused elsewhere. It gave me no answer. “Please,” I said. “You were here when it happened. You must know something.”
Still the oracle said nothing. I leaned against the nearest bookcase and breathed in air scented delicately with lilacs. It was so peaceful I wanted to cry at how little it reflected our world’s current situation. Any time now, I expected to hear of a new attack, or of some disaster arising from the fear generated by the attacks.
I walked through the stacks to the break room, which smelled deliciously of pungent dressing and parmesan cheese. Judy was already eating her chicken Caesar salad and only glanced at me when I sat down to mine. “You’re worrying again,” she said between bites. “You need to stop. It doesn’t do anyone any good.”
“I know.” I took a bite of salad. It tasted as good as it smelled, but I wasn’t very hungry. “I can’t stop trying to understand the oracle’s warnings. It’s still telling me we need to seal the cracks. When it bothers to speak to me.”
“Lucia will figure it out. Keep her informed about the oracle, and let her deal with it.”
I grimaced and laid my fork down. “The oracle is my responsibility. That feels like passing it off to someone else.”
“It’s more like using your resources. Lucia can do more with that information than we can.” Judy swigged some Diet Dr. Pepper and set the bottle down with great deliberation.
“I think—” I stopped speaking as the room swayed around me. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
Another wave of dizziness struck me. The guardians fall, the oracle said. Danger. He flees.
I gripped the table with my good hand and squeezed my eyes shut in the hope that would control the dizziness. “Something’s wrong with one of the other named Neutralities. It’s under attack.”
“Which one?” Judy demanded.
“I don’t know. It could even be both.” I fumbled my phone out of my pocket and dropped it when the dizziness struck again, making me feel like the room was spinning like a top. “I think we’re under attack, too!”
Judy put a hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes and had to squeeze them shut immediately because Judy looked like she was tilted almost horizontally. “What’s wrong?” she said.
�
�Can’t you feel it?” I thought I might throw up if the movement didn’t stop.
“Feel what?”
He flees. The guardians fall. We stand. The oracle’s voice reverberated through me. I risked a peek and saw the room had stopped spinning.
“What was that?” I said.
“Helena, I told you, I didn’t feel anything.”
“I was talking to the oracle.” I crouched to retrieve my phone. The room stayed still. Quickly, I called Lucia and got her voicemail. “One of the other named Neutralities is under attack,” I said. “I don’t know which.” I shoved my phone into my pocket and ran, ignoring Judy’s questions, through the stacks and into the oracle. I hurried through the narrow aisles, sidling past the bookcases, until I reached the oracle’s heart, a spot where four tall bookcases stood facing each other in a square. The oracle pressed down on me like a giant thumb, and for once I didn’t mind.
“What’s going on?” I asked. “Something’s happening.”
They strike. The guardians fall. Stand strong.
“Are we under attack, too?”
We stand. He flees. Listen.
Dizziness hit me again, but faintly, like a memory. I rested my bandaged hand on one of the shelves and closed my eyes again, breathing slowly and letting my sense of the oracle wrap around me like a warm wool blanket, not quite soft enough to be truly comfortable. As I did so, the oracle bore down on me more heavily, making me feel like I was going to burst with its presence. But it stopped short of the point at which I would have to assume its body as I’d done twice before. I hugged it to me and waited.
Every inch of my exposed flesh tingled with goose pimples, and I felt as if I could see through my skin. I gradually became aware of the store surrounding me and remembered how it had felt to be the oracle, how all the books and shelves and walls had been a part of me, and in my imagination I felt that way again. I felt rooted to the floor, strong and immovable, and breathed in the scent of leather and old paper that I realized was the oracle’s true scent.
The Book of Destiny Page 23