Destruction: The December People, Book One

by Sharon Bayliss

  “Emmy!” David shouted again. His vocabulary had been reduced to a single word.

  “Emmy what?” Amanda asked. Amanda glanced at Evangeline. “What do you have there?”

  David’s heart lurched into his ribs. Evangeline held a pink Post-it note. He must not have noticed her take it out of his hands. Xavier leaned in and read it over her shoulder. They didn’t say anything. They didn’t even move.

  Amanda snatched the note. At first, she had the same frozen expression. Then she said, “I don’t understand what this means. David?”

  “I can only assume it means what it says,” David replied.

  “You told me he was dead.” She whispered it as if she didn’t want the kids to hear, even though they stood right next to her and had read the note themselves. Evangeline and Xavier animated enough to look at him, waiting for an explanation.

  Patrick and Samantha entered the upstairs family room too. Samantha didn’t look as if she had been crying, but she had a manic vibration about her, as if it all simmered under her skin.

  “What happened?” Patrick asked. The tiredness in his voice belonged to a much older man.

  David took the note from Amanda’s hands and gave it to Samantha. “Did she say anything to you?”

  Samantha stared at the note with a numb expression. She nodded.

  “What?” The girl had been raped and orphaned in the course of twenty-four hours, and he still wanted to shake the answer out of her.

  “She listened to your conversation with that woman. She had her ear against the door. She was worried the woman was your lover or something and wanted to find out for sure. She told me what the woman said, that their stepfather is still alive, and that you were supposed to kill him.”

  “What?” Amanda interjected.

  Samantha paused for a moment, then continued, “But she never said she was going to do it herself. She didn’t tell me that. I… I had no idea.”

  “Damn you, David,” Amanda said. “You’re still keeping secrets from me. Why didn’t you tell me the man was alive?”

  “I’m not going to waste time fighting with you. I have to find her. Now.”

  “You’re right,” Amanda said.

  She retreated into the bedroom without a word, but David knew what she had in mind. She would get the one thing that made her feel safe.

  She returned with an empty lock box. “She already took it.” Her hands trembled, and she dropped the box on the floor with a loud clang. “Where is he? Where is she going?”

  David opened his mouth as if he expected the answer to come out. Then the truth hit him. “I never even opened the envelope,” he said. “I can call the woman who gave it to me.”

  He ran down the stairs while he dialed. He moved so quickly he missed a step and had to catch himself from tumbling down the stairs. There would be no more discussion. He would go find her right now.

  Rachel’s cell went straight to a monotone male recording: “The person you are trying to reach is unavailable now. Please try again later.”

  He didn’t even have the option to leave a message.

  “Shit,” he said. He would keep calling every thirty seconds if he had to.

  He grabbed his jacket and his keys.

  “Wait,” Amanda said. “Take one of the hunting rifles. I’ll get one from the garage.”

  “I can’t walk around with a hunting rifle.”

  “How else are you supposed to kill him?”

  David had no response to this. She asked it so matter-of-factly, as if she wanted him to take an umbrella for the rain, not a gun to kill a man.

  When Amanda disappeared to her garage locker, an odd moment of silence passed. His three remaining children and Samantha had followed them down the stairs and stared at him. He had Emmy’s face in his tunnel vision and had forgotten this impacted all of them. They all heard him and Amanda talk about killing a man, and not just any man. He couldn’t think of a thing to say.

  “Please stay here,” David said. “Don’t do anything. I just want you to be safe.”

  “How will you find her?” Evangeline asked.

  “I… I’m going to keep calling the woman who gave me his address. She’ll answer eventually. She isn’t the type to be away from her phone for too long.” David’s stomach lurched when he said this. Rachel didn’t seem like the type to have her phone off at all, or ever roam far from a cell tower. She had said that betraying her brother hurt both of them. Who knew what could have happened to her?

  “You can find her with magic,” Evangeline said. “Wizards can find each other.”

  “No, they can’t,” he shouted with unexpected force. “I couldn’t find you. We couldn’t find her parents.” He pointed at Samantha.

  “I found you,” Xavier said.

  The words floated around David’s ears for a while before he grasped his meaning.

  “No,” David said. “Don’t do any spells. There is too much at stake.”

  Amanda arrived with the hunting rifle her father had given him so many years ago. She had better, newer guns, but he had actually used this one before and he might remember how to use it again.

  “I should be the one to go,” she said. “I’m a much better shot.”

  “Absolutely not. Besides, you would only have the upper hand if you sniped him from 200 feet. He’s not a deer. He won’t run from you. If he got close, if he somehow disarmed you, you wouldn’t have a chance.”

  “I can’t do nothing.”

  “You won’t be. You’ll be protecting them.” He gestured toward the other children.

  He wanted to remind her again to lock the doors and bring her own rifle up from the basement on the off chance Colter decided to come back here for Xavier. But David didn’t want to frighten them. He hoped she would read between the lines. He realized he had never stopped lying to her. Or at least, he had never got in the habit of telling her everything. He thought about all the things she should know about Colter, about Xavier’s spell, about talismans, that he hadn’t told her, simply because he had grown so used to keeping secrets. And now, he didn’t have time.

  “You can protect me,” David said. “And you don’t have to do anything. You just have to want it.”

  She nodded vaguely but didn’t ask for clarification. She wrapped him in her arms and kissed him once on the neck. The gesture made her seem more like his wife again than she had since he had brought his newest kids home. Even having sex with her hadn’t seemed so intimate.

  “Bring our baby home,” she said.

  “I will,” David said.

  Emmy had taken the Expedition and Jude had taken his truck, so David had only one car to choose from. Emmy didn’t know how to drive, but at least she took the tank.

  A cold, damp wind hit him that seemed appropriate for Christmas Eve. He flipped up the collar of his jacket and could feel Crystal’s box, cold against his ribs. He wanted to tell her he would kill her killer. Not the magic-addled woman who had allowed her husband to abuse their children, but the twenty-something filled with fire and hope. He pushed her out of his head. Even thinking about her might cause a spell to misfire.

  “Wait.” The small voice seemed to blow away in the wind. He didn’t want to stop. “Wait,” it came again.

  He didn’t fully stop his mad trek to his Mercedes until she grabbed his arm and said, “Dad.”

  Evangeline had followed in his heels with sock feet and no jacket.

  “Wait,” she said again, this time forcefully.

  “What is it?”

  “You have to bring her talisman.” Her eyes blazed even greener than usual, and they reminded him of the puddle of magic she had pooled in her palm. Perhaps the redness around the rims made them greener. He had never seen her cry.

  “Okay,” he said. “Hurry. Go get it.”

  She didn’t move from her spot.

  “What does she use?” he prodded. “Do you know where it is?”

  “Jude,” she said.

  Just the sound of h
is name made David’s head swim.

  “I can’t. No,” he spluttered.

  “Please.” She sounded close to tears. “You have to. It’s so important.”

  “I don’t even know where he is, and I don’t have time to look.”

  “He’ll come to you. I know he will. Just leave a message on his voicemail and tell him what happened. If he knows Emmy is in danger, he’ll come. He wouldn’t be able to resist even if he wanted to. But he wouldn’t resist. He loves her.”

  David got on 1-10 and headed west. Eighty miles per hour to nowhere in particular. He felt as if he should head west, but he didn’t get any more magical insight than that. And “West” covered a rather large area. He called Rachel for the twenty-seventh time. No answer. He had also called Liza at home to see if she could find any other numbers for her, an unreasonable request considering she had left town for the holidays and didn’t officially work for him anymore, but perhaps the desperation in his voice led her to act. She called him back quickly with the number for Rachel’s office, the main line, and the direct line to her desk. When no one answered the main line, David wanted to chuck his phone out the window in frustration. Why the hell wouldn’t they pick up the damn main line on a Thursday afternoon? Didn’t they have a receptionist? As soon as he thought it, he realized he had forgotten something important, the date. Late afternoon on Christmas Eve, and getting later every minute. He would count himself lucky to find an open gas station, let alone contact a business office.

  The dull white sun hung low in the sky. He had several hours until sunset, but the dead winter angle of the sun made it look as if it would sink behind the hills any minute. Amanda had called the police, but had said they didn’t seem to understand the seriousness of the situation. Emmy had not been abducted; she had run away, and only a few hours ago. Apparently, the situation didn’t call for an AMBER Alert. They took note of Amanda’s claim that the dangerous Whitman Colter was still alive but didn’t sound convinced.

  David’s options ran thin, but he had to try everything, even the ideas that made him want to throw up. When Jude’s phone started ringing, David wanted to hang up. His temples pulsed with rage, and his throat tightened with grief. He had no word to describe the feeling. He needed something that meant “disappointment”, only exponentially worse.

  Not too surprisingly, Jude didn’t pick up. He heard his son’s voice on the answering machine. His real son. He had recorded those words before he changed into something else. After the beep, David forgot to talk right away. The first part of the message Jude would hear would be nothing but highway noise and his father breathing.

  “Emmy’s missing. She could be in serious danger. I need you to help me find her.” His tone sounded as dull as the day.

  Jude called back.

  David wanted to let it go to voicemail. Possibly, he could manage to communicate with him by voicemail tag and not have to speak to him directly. But he didn’t have time for games.

  “Yes,” David said.

  “Dad?” Jude’s voice sounded far away. “Something happened to Emmy?”

  He described the situation as quickly and plainly as he could.

  “Why would she do that?” Jude asked. Fear increased the pitch of his voice.

  “Because of you,” David said.

  The vague statement didn’t make sense by itself, but Jude didn’t ask for more clarification.

  “I’m sorry,” Jude said.

  “Just tell me where you are.”

  Jude was in Austin. A friend of his had gone to UT last year and said he could crash on his couch, without asking too many questions. Fortunately, this meant David could keep driving in the general “West” direction. He didn’t think he could get his car to go any other way. When he pulled into the dilapidated apartment complex, the sun skirted the horizon. Jude met him in the parking lot. He wore the same blood-spotted clothes he had left in and had no bag with him. He didn’t wear shoes. He had a glassy, vacant look in his eyes.

  Jude got in the car without comment and avoided David’s eyes. From his smell, David guessed that Jude hadn’t brought deodorant with him either and had been drinking. David had expected to want to bash his head into the dashboard, but a different emotion rose to the surface—the deep ache of seeing someone he loved suffering. It made his bones hurt. He wanted to take him home and get him cleaned up, give him a good meal, and put him back in his own bed.

  When David didn’t start the car, Jude finally looked at him.

  “Well, where is she?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I need you to find her.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Find her,” David shouted. “That’s why you’re here.”

  Jude stared at him with his mouth slightly agape. He looked as if he might pass out.

  “You’re her talisman. And she’s yours. You’re connected by magic. I know you’re a powerful wizard. You could pull her out of the air when she jumped off the roof. Find her.”

  Jude stared at the glove compartment. Even though the request sounded insane to David, Jude seemed to take it seriously. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. After a minute or two, he opened them again.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve never done any spell like that.”

  “You know where things are. You know where the other players are on the football field. You can sense them. Can’t you?”

  “Yes. But they’re close. If you put me in a dark room with Emmy, I could find her. But… there’s too much noise, or interference, in the world. I can’t find her across miles.”

  “If you don’t, she’ll face Whitman Colter alone.”

  Jude lowered his head and closed his eyes again. David could sense his magic vibrating from his skin. He had turned himself on high.

  “Leave the city,” Jude said. “Go west.”

  Patrick watched his mother bounce around the house like a pinball. A pinball with a gun. Patrick felt more like an anthill, filled with nasty biting things, but unable to move himself. He should do something for Samantha. Comfort her. Help her. Go back in time and kill his brother. But he didn’t know how to help her any more than he knew how to travel through time.

  He sat at the kitchen table with Xavier, who created an elaborate house of cards. It had three floors, plus a chimney, and an attached garage. Patrick wondered if anything went on behind Xavier’s cloudy no-color eyes. Did he care about any of it?

  The pinball bounced into the table, but only a few cards came down.

  “Perhaps you could see her future,” Mom suggested. “And tell us where she is in your vision.”

  “Yeah, I’ll be happy to tell you one second before something terrible happens.”

  “Xavier, there has to be some kind of spell to find a person,” Mom said. “Please.”

  “You asked us not to do spells,” Xavier said. He had already said it twice before.

  “I know I’ve forbidden magic over and over again,” she said. “But even wizards who don’t practice sometimes do magic in an emergency. There comes a time when what’s at stake is worth more than the risks of doing magic.” She put her hands up as if she wanted to throttle him. “Why are you picking now of all times to start listening to me about magic?”

  “I haven’t done any serious spells since I’ve lived here. Not since my mom died.”

  Mom huffed and ran up the stairs.

  “Why did you stop doing magic when your mom died?” Patrick asked.

  Xavier looked at him for the flash of a nanosecond, then shrugged. “Didn’t feel like it, I guess.”

  The house of cards tumbled as if a blast of wind Patrick didn’t feel came through the kitchen.

  “Why’d it fall?” Patrick asked.

  “It happens sometimes,” Xavier said.

  Mom thundered back down the stairs with Evangeline and Samantha at her heels. She should leave Samantha alone. Of course, Samantha would agree to whatever Mom wanted her to do, but that didn’t mean Mom should
ask. Mom and the girls sat down at the table with them, making Patrick and Xavier unwilling parts of a circle of wizards. Patrick could feel the subtle increase of magic, but the magic didn’t feel as clear and cold as it had on the Solstice. The magic still felt cold, but had unexplained warm spots, like in a lake. Their magic felt as they did. Distressed. Erratic. Desperate.

  Samantha had sat on Patrick’s left. Whatever he said would be wrong, so he didn’t say anything at all. She placed her hand on his.

  “It’s going to be okay,” she said.

  He should comfort her.

  “How are you?” he asked tentatively.

  “I want to do magic,” she said.

  “She should,” Evangeline said. “She’ll feel better.”

  Patrick didn’t know much about magic, but he knew enough to know magic didn’t make people feel better.

  “We’re casting a spell,” Mom said. She said it with the no-nonsense Mom tone she might use to say, We will be cleaning out the garage.

  “Whatever,” Patrick said.

  “No whatevers,” Mom said. “This is very serious. And dangerous. You need to give it your full attention.”

  “Why do I have to do it?” Patrick asked.

  “Because you love your sister.”

  “I used to.”

  “Is that really the choice you’re making?” Mom asked. “That’s not the kind of person you are.”

  Was.

  Patrick didn’t respond. He didn’t fully understand his choices or why they mattered at this point anyway. He glanced at Samantha. She had the stringy hair, red eyes, and sunburned skin of someone who had spent the day at the beach. It would have been lovely if they had just come from a romp on the beach, but on someone who had stayed inside all day in winter, it just looked wrong.

  “You want to help her?” he asked Samantha. “After what she did… or what she didn’t do.”

  “I think you’re more angry than I am. Bad things happen. It’s done.”

  “I don’t know if you’re really tough, really crazy, or just in denial.”

  “Maybe she’s all three,” Evangeline said. “What are you picking on her for?”

  “I’m not,” Patrick argued, but the accusation shut him up. Not only had he failed to comfort her, but now, apparently, he had picked on her.