Undone Deeds

by Del Franco, Mark

  “That’s preparation,” he said.

  She leaned over Eagan’s sleeping body, placing a hand on his forehead. “I throw a mean party, too. Get moving.”

  I grabbed her. “Tibs.”

  I stared into eyes tinged with a feral red light. “Go. Now,” she rasped.

  I kissed her. Grabbing Shay by the arm, I hustled him out of the room. The brownie guard outside the door was gone. Sounds of a struggle echoed up the back stairs. We ran for the grand staircase on the opposite end of the house. The brownie that waited there had gone full boggie, but had not lost his senses. Tibs had some amazing staff. He growled as we approached and scampered down the stairs ahead of us.

  “Don’t leave my side for a second,” I said to Shay.

  We waited in the gloom. The boggart moved through the great hall at an astonishing speed. He returned to the base of the stairs and waved us down.

  “There are French doors at the back of the hall, Shay. The greenhouse is a straight shot across the lawn from there. Keep low and do not stop,” I said.

  He clutched the stone ward against his chest. “They can’t take the bowl, right? Why don’t we leave it somewhere and get out?”

  “Because they’ll find it and figure the geasa out eventually, and we’ll never see it again. I don’t want to think about something that powerful being in the hands of whoever is out there. Get going before we can’t get out,” I said.

  A muffled explosion shook the house as the attackers dropped any pretense of stealth. We ran around the stuffed elephant and into the back alcove. Through the windows in the doors, the greenhouse loomed in the darkness, its skeletal frame a dull white against the backdrop of tall cedars.

  I activated my body shield, enveloping Shay in its protection. Another explosion from the right shivered against the glass doors. Shredded essence floated across the back lawn, the remains of barrier shields that had been disabled. Without the wards anchoring them, their energy dissipated in the night air. Here and there at the far end of the property, pools of essence indicated the passage of Danann fairies and brownie security. From that distance, I couldn’t identify specific signatures.

  Something moved across the grass, a dark shadow pierced by glowing red eyes. The shadow resolved into the shape of Uno. He had grown enormous, his legs almost three feet long and his muzzle as wide. He trotted toward the greenhouse and stopped next to the door, settling on his haunches.

  Frightened, Shay leaned back against me. “Why is he here, Connor?”

  “Uno has never hurt us, Shay,” I said.

  “It’s not him I’m worried about,” he said.

  “He’s waiting for us. Fifty yards, tops. Are you ready?”

  He moved to my side. “You’ve got longer legs than I do. Don’t leave me behind.”

  “I won’t,” I said.

  I took his arm to reassure him. We moved out the door, crouching across the pavers and onto the grass. Essence-fire flashed and burned, more warning shots than directed blasts. We started to run, closing the distance to the greenhouse.

  Gunfire erupted from the back lawn. I wasn’t expecting guns, a rookie mistake. The fey came at each other with essence, not bullets. My body shield shifted and folded as bullets grazed it, the force of impact knocking us apart. I shoved Shay to the ground among low shrubbery.

  Shay’s messenger bag flew free as he tumbled, its contents spilling out. The stone bowl rolled onto the grass. Instinctively, I grabbed it, surprised that it moved at my touch, my fingers slipping across wet stone. I lifted my hand. Blood covered the palm. I was sore from my shield contracting, but I wasn’t bleeding. I cradled the bowl against my side and crawled toward Shay.

  More shots fired, turf spitting into the air around us. Shay kept his head down, not reacting. I shook his shoulder. “Are you hit, Shay?”

  He didn’t move. I pushed against his side, rolling him onto his back. His eyes fluttered open. “Connor,” he whispered. Blood oozed from his lips.

  My hands came away with more blood as I searched his chest and stomach. “Dammit. Where are you hit, Shay?”

  Uno howled, an unearthly wail that shot fear up my spine. He lumbered toward us, howling louder—and growing bigger.

  “He looks so beautiful.” Shay’s voice echoed with moisture.

  “Hang on, Shay. I’ll get you out of here,” I said.

  As I leaned over him, placing the bowl against his chest, I gathered him in my arms. Uno barreled into me, pinning me on my back, his muzzle looming over me, huge and foul. Snarling, he backed away, then shifted his bulk over Shay. He opened his mouth—and opened it and opened it—a huge maw of shadow spreading over Shay. Lowering his head, Uno wrapped his jaws around him, knocking the stone ward bowl to the ground.

  I scrambled to my feet. “No!”

  I leaped, slamming into Uno’s flank. I flopped away like I had hit a brick wall. Uno lifted his head, Shay dangling from either side of his jaws. The massive animal arched his back and stretched his neck out. Shay rolled inward, curling into a fetal ball, then vanished into the shadowed gullet.

  Uno threw his head back and yowled with a song of sorrow. Tears burst from my eyes at the sound, a keening that reached deep into my soul. I fell to my knees as grief shocked through me. Uno lowered his head, staring at me with his eyes ablaze. With a soft bark, he turned and lumbered off, vanishing into the night.

  I jumped to my feet, roaring with rage at the darkness, when someone tackled me.

  24

  Tibbet’s body signature registered, and I stopped struggling. She eased off me, crouching in the grass and facing the back lawn. Light glinted off metal there as faint human body signatures moved against the dark.

  Tibbet’s face contorted, with an extended jaw bristling with teeth. She clutched the grass with sharp claws on her hands and feet, a feral gleam in her eye. Unlike her brethren, Tibbet was able to retain her sanity when she was boggie. The skill came from years of practice and a strong will. Get to the greenhouse now, she sent.

  “I can’t leave you, Tibs,” I said. Not then. Not after what happened with Shay.

  No time. We are defenseless, she sent.

  “Tibs….” I said.

  She bared jagged teeth, gripping my arm with sharp claws. “Please,” she rasped. Her eyes showed a determination I couldn’t argue with. She spun in place, then leaped into the darkness, the shape of her lost in a blur of preternatural speed. Someone screamed out there, a man’s harsh cry. Gunfire sprayed the grass, then more screaming rent the air. Tibbet was not going to let the mansion go down without a fight.

  I scooped up the stone bowl from where it had fallen and ran the remaining yards to the greenhouse. The door let me into an air lock. After closing the outer door behind me, I opened the inner door and left it open. The outer door wouldn’t open if the inner was open. It would slow down pursuit until someone decided to smash through the glass walls.

  Inside, the humid air stank of rot. Eagan had spent a lot of time in the greenhouse, the heavy moisture easing the brittleness in his wings. The vegetation had been lush and thick once. The plants had been allowed to wither. The room seemed bigger as result, and the windowpanes along the walls were more visible. The muzzle flash from gunfire lit the air like lightning, and glass shattered overhead.

  I knocked aside two armchairs on the oriental carpet in the center of the room. Yanking back the carpet, I exposed the trapdoor. Tucking the stone bowl in my jacket, I heaved the door open with both hands and clambered down a short flight of stairs. The door slammed shut behind me, and I slid a large dead bolt across it.

  Motion detectors brought the lights up. The bunker was a narrow room with a simple table and chairs and shelves filled with boxes. An open door led to a bedroom/office that could have been photographed for a design magazine. I skipped it and made for the door on the far end. More lights flickered on to reveal a long, narrow corridor. I locked the door behind me. The lights flashed on and off as I followed the long line of bare bulbs down the
corridor and off the estate.

  After I had run about a mile, another door appeared ahead. Beyond it, a staircase led up to a garage, empty except for a small black sedan. I jumped in and fished keys from under the seat. The glove compartment and the console held nothing but a few rolls of quarters and the insurance and registration papers. People who could do sendings didn’t think of storing a throwaway cell phone. I hit a remote on the dashboard. As the garage door opened, I put the car in gear, then shifted back into park.

  I reached in my jacket and withdrew the stone bowl, cradling it in my hands, hands stained with Shay’s blood. The bowl was stained, too, Shay’s blood seeping into the grain of the stone. Shay might have been worldly beyond his years, more a man than most, a quirk of fate that made him a virgin in the eyes of old Faerie. His blood broke the geasa; a young man, barely past boyhood, was dead because he had been pulled into the craziness of my life.

  From the day I laid eyes on him, I wanted to see him safe. He had fire and spirit that deserved more than the lot he had been given in life. I wanted him to have the chance to become all he wanted to be, but he’d had the misfortune of meeting me. He never expected me to protect him, but I tried anyway. And I failed. Of everything that had happened to me, to the people around me, I didn’t know what I could ever do to atone for his loss, but I would try. That was all I ever wanted to do for him. Try.

  I settled the bowl in my lap and put the car in gear. I pulled out into a quiet neighborhood, modest by Brookline standards, which meant the multimillion-dollar homes were within spitting distance of each other. I saw no one as I followed the GPS map out of the area.

  Unless someone from the Guild responded to reports of the shooting, the Brookline police would be the first responders. They shared resources with Boston, but they weren’t likely to call them until they knew they needed help. I tuned the radio to local news stations. No one was reporting gunfire. I had some room to maneuver before a call went out looking for me, and the more distance I put between me and Eagan’s house, the more at ease I was.

  I drove Route 9 back into the city, considering my options. The Tangle was being watched. Briallen’s town house had to be under surveillance. Murdock’s house was out of the question. I considered hiding in the Guildhouse archives, but only one way in existed that I knew about. If I was discovered, I’d be trapped.

  Aimless, I circled Boston Common. Each time I made the loop, I stared at the great stone pillar on the hill. The night that I sealed the Way into TirNaNog, the trees surrounding the pillar had been destroyed in the blast. Over the last few months, the city had removed the debris, exposing the hill. The pillar radiated with powerful essence and attracted gargoyles from everywhere. The ’goyles faced the pillar, covering the hill in a field of tortured stone as they bathed in the radiant flow.

  The high levels of essence gave me an idea. I pulled the car into a semilegal space, the rear bumper edging into a bus stop. By the time a cop noticed and a tow truck was called, I’d be gone. I tucked the bowl inside my jacket and entered the Common through the Joy Street gate.

  The hill had been cordoned off. With the power emanating from the pillar, the city had declared the hill a disaster site and turned security over to the Guild. A few brownies guarded the fences, but they didn’t have much to contend with. The place gave everyone the creeps, so the guards only needed to chase away curiosity-seekers and the occasional drunk goth kid. I watched them as I strolled down the path, timing their patrols. Two of them ran an overlapping pattern that brought them back-to-back briefly as they meandered among the gargoyles. It was enough time for what I needed to do.

  I waited for my moment, then jogged between a twisted angel and a giant green-man head. As my feet touched the hill, a buzz built in my ears, the grating hum of gargoyles talking. Not everyone could hear them, but one had decided to speak to me long ago. I thought of it as a privilege, having access to some kind of secret knowledge. I had relied on the words of one of the gargoyles whom I had named Virgil, and it had saved my life. I discovered recently from Joe that all the gargoyles repeated the same things to whoever listened, that my survival had to have been luck. It was disappointing to learn that, but at least I was alive.

  I scrambled through a cluster of smaller ’goyles, misshapen animals worn with age—lolling-tongued dogs with human arms for legs, cat-headed birds, and human-headed snakes. The essence from the pillar beat against my senses, a powerful thrumming that reverberated in my chest.

  I spotted a small child with long sheep horns curling around its ears, its palms lifted in supplication. I slipped the bowl out of my jacket and placed it on the hands. I liked the way the red-splattered green bloodstone of the bowl blended with the red marbling of the ’goyle. To the casual eye, it belonged there, and its essence was lost in the intense background field the pillar generated. It was risky to leave it, but now that Shay’s blood had broken the geasa, anyone could move it. Until I understood what was going on, I didn’t want to have it on me if someone detained me. I didn’t have a choice but to hide it.

  A brownie guard shouted. Instead of running, I waved at him with a smile. He thrust his arm away from the hill and shouted again, coming nearer. I hurried down the slope, smiling and waving, doing my best to appear properly scolded. I reached a break in the storm fence and walked onto the empty concrete pond basin. The brownie kept his distance as I returned to the steps that led to the gate. As I settled in the car, I was astounded to see a parking ticket. I left it on the windshield.

  The sun was coming up, saturated pink-and-orange light coloring the downtown buildings. I drove down to the harbor and left the car, pumping quarters into a meter and tearing up the ticket. It would be a few hours before anyone noticed it.

  I walked back toward Faneuil Hall. When all else failed, I went home, or, in this case, my parents’ hotel. I hoped no one would think I would go there. At the back end of Quincy Market, Joe flashed into sight in front of me. “Oh, good, you’re not dead,” he said.

  I walked with my head down. “Shay is. He got shot.”

  Joe’s face fell, embarrassment at his poor choice of words showing. “I am truly sorry, Connor. He was rather sweet.”

  “And didn’t deserve my coming into his life,” I said.

  Joe didn’t argue with me like he usually did when I said stuff like that. He settled on my shoulder and wrapped his arm around my neck. I knew he didn’t agree with my sentiment, but he comforted me without words anyway.

  I slowed my step when I reached Cambridge Street. The Bostonian Hotel was across the street, but I spotted Kevin Murdock at the end of the block. What he was doing there at that hour couldn’t mean anything good, especially since he had his body shield up. It was an impressive demonstration of control on his part so soon after gaining essence abilities.

  “What do you make of that, Joe?” I asked.

  He leaned forward to see around my nose. “All the Murdocks like to wake up early?”

  If there was one thing I had learned from putting people under surveillance, it was what people looked like when they were doing surveillance. Kevin was watching the street, the approach from downtown, waiting for someone or something. “I don’t like it. Let’s get inside before he sees us.”

  The entrance to the hotel was a series of flat arches along the sidewalk. As I reached the curb, Gerry Murdock stepped from behind a pillar. He was dressed in black like Kevin, not his uniform, but he did have his gun belt on. He glanced at Joe, then back to me. “Funny running into you,” he said.

  “I’m not laughing, though,” I said.

  “Your mother’s staying here, isn’t she?” he said.

  I froze. “Meaning what?”

  He shrugged. “Nothing. It’s not very safe down here at night. I’d tell her to be careful.”

  With two long strides, I was in his face. “If anything happens to my mother, Gerry. I am coming after you.”

  He gave me a cocky grin. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, there, big fella. I believe yo
u are threatening a police officer. You’re under arrest.”

  “You stink of gunpowder, Gerry. Where were you tonight?”

  “Picking off scum. Think I got a tranny,” he said.

  That did it. I grabbed him by shirt and shoved him against the wall. “You killed a kid, Gerry.”

  He surprised me by activating a body shield, not a strong one, but enough to force my hands to slip off him. He grabbed his gun. “Surprised, Grey? Playing field’s level now.”

  With an abrupt thrust of my hand, I slammed my body shield against his without touching his body. His arm jerked up, hitting the wall, and the gun dropped out of his hand. “Call me when you think you can take me,” I said.

  I had passed under the arch into the driveway when I heard the gun. “Stop right there,” he said.

  I put my hands out and pivoted. Joe flashed into the air next to me. I hadn’t noticed him vanish. He hadn’t said a word during the entire exchange. “What, Gerry? You going to shoot me? Go ahead, I dare you. I’ll have that gun out of your hand and up your ass so fast, you’ll be choking on the bullets.”

  “Is there a problem?” Dread clenched my gut when I heard my mother’s voice.

  “Get back inside, Ma,” I said over my shoulder.

  In her dressing gown, she came up next to me, her hands folded in front of her. “I asked if there is a problem here?”

  Gerry kept his gun aimed at me. “Do what he said, ma’am. This is a police matter.”

  My mother moved forward. “My name is Regula Grey. I am a member of the Seelie Court. I have diplomatic immunity from local matters and, through me, so does my son. Now I ask you, sir, what is the problem here? Do I need to contact the Guild for advice?”

  Kevin joined Gerry as he relaxed his stance and lowered the gun. The two of them stared at us for a long moment of failed intimidation. “A misunderstanding, ma’am,” Gerry said.

  My mother nodded once sharply. “I see. Well, then, good day.”

  She turned and entered the hotel.