Pacific Fire

by Greg Van Eekhout

  That meant Sam wasn’t there at present, but had been. Otherwise, Fernando would have said that he hadn’t seen him.

  “Any word on when he might return?”

  “No word.”

  This didn’t sound good.

  “None?” Daniel said, to make sure he wasn’t misunderstanding him, or that they’d got their phone protocol mixed up.

  “No word,” Fernando repeated.

  This was bad. That meant that not only had his wife not returned from the flight, but that he’d gotten no word from her that she’d delivered her cargo and was on her way back. Daniel’s mind ran through all the implications of her silence, and none finished in happy conclusion.

  “I need to take off,” Daniel said. “Any tips?”

  He wanted to fly out and trace the route Sofía would have taken and search for wreckage. If he found none, he’d continue to Catalina in hopes of heading Sam off.

  “Goddamnit, Blackland, if I could get my hands on another plane you think I’d help you get a flight? Maybe everything’s fine but she can’t communicate for some reason. Maybe she made her destination and got into trouble. Maybe she’s lost somewhere out there. If I could get another plane, I’d be in the air right now looking for her.”

  Even on a reasonably secure line, it wasn’t like Fernando to completely disregard protocol. Bautista was a careful man, rational and measured. But Daniel knew how much he loved his family. In the background, he could make out children’s voices.

  “I’ll find them,” Daniel said.

  He set down the receiver, already feeling like he’d just made a broken promise.

  He picked up the phone again and dialed the downtown Los Angeles headquarters of the Department of Water and Power. It only rang once before someone picked up. If he’d called the Ministry of Osteomancy or Labor or Justice, he would have been shocked at the quick response. But Gabriel Argent was a monster of efficiency.

  “Department of Water and Power, how may I direct your call?”

  “What a spectacularly good question,” Daniel said.

  Hi, this is the regicidal maniac Daniel Blackland, and I’d like to speak to the realm’s chief water mage regarding the location of the Hierarch’s golem, whom I misplaced on my way to sabotage the weapons project of LA’s most dangerous powers. Can you connect me, please?

  He hung up.

  The cabin was equipped with a kitchenette. There were probably raccoons in the cupboards and possums in the stove, but the sink was clear of standing water. Daniel had an idea. He opened the faucet. At first there was nothing but a choked hiss, but after a few seconds, a stuttering trickle of brown water coughed out. It gradually gained strength, if not clarity. From the osteomancy kit the Emmas lent him to replace the one Sam absconded with, he took out the torch, bone crucible, and copper needle. He pierced the pad of his index finger deep enough to bring water to his eyes and let three fat ruby drops plunk into the crucible. Dialing the torch to burn indigo, he heated his blood until it darkened to match the flame. He tipped the crucible and let his blood slide down the sink, heavy as mercury. He packed away the kit and let the water run.

  The vermin sensed something happening before Daniel did. The floor skittered and squeaked with insects and rodents, and a jay he hadn’t noticed took flight from the rafters and shot out of a gap in the roof. Pipes in the walls rattled before dropping to a low, humming frequency that Daniel felt in his chest and belly.

  Gabriel Argent played the role of humble bureaucrat, but it was a mask behind which lurked a great, emergent power. Water magic was a different kingdom than osteomancy, and Daniel barely understood its workings, its mechanisms of flow and circulation and mandalas. Gabriel Argent, however, knew both water and bone. His mother was an osteomancer, and he’d gotten his start working in the Ministry of Osteomancy. Daniel had eaten half the Hierarch’s heart, and he’d given the other half to Argent in payment for a favor.

  On the Salton Sea, Daniel turned the fish into magic-detecting grakes. He’d always suspected Argent was seeding his water network with his own microscopic grakes. As the pipes breathed and moaned, he knew he was right. The water detected his magic.

  “Argent, can you hear me?”

  The water in the cabin hummed, as did the water in Daniel’s body, and in the saturated leaves and pine needles, and in the muddy ground, and in the air.

  Yes.

  “Sam took my place. I don’t know where he is.”

  A long delay before Argent’s answer. Uncertain.

  “Did he make it to Catalina?”

  The water hummed, No.

  “What does that mean, Argent? He hasn’t made it yet? His plane crashed? Do you know where he is now? Is he alive?”

  No answer. Either Argent didn’t know, couldn’t better communicate through oracular manifestation, or wasn’t telling Daniel for reasons unfathomable.

  “Argent, if you don’t care about Sam as a person, care about the fact that the treasure is unaccounted for. Tell me something useful.”

  Hurry, the pipes sighed.

  After that, the water fell silent and Gabriel Argent said no more.

  * * *

  Moth didn’t give out his phone number. He didn’t share his postal address. To locate him, you needed to consult the Musicians Wanted section of the Los Angeles Times classifieds. The major flaw in this system was finding a copy of the Times. They published only now and then, when the presses were running, and it was rare for them to deliver out on the edges of the realm. Daniel burned fuel and nerves trying the gas stations and markets on the desert valley floor, but finally his search paid off at a bar and grill in an unincorporated settlement on the rim of the Inyo wilderness. They were using a week-old paper to wrap fried fish.

  It took some cash and an order of fish and chips to negotiate release of all the newspapers they had. Surrounded by the smell of fried haddock in his parked 4x4, he rifled through the grease-stained pages until he found the classifieds.

  Here it was: Band seeks guitarist with mastery of Norwegian-style metal.

  Last time, it had been Nashville-style country. The time before that, New Orleans–style jazz. The N signaled northern latitude. This part of the code always struck Daniel as unnecessary, as Moth had never been south of the equator. But there was just no reasoning with Moth about this kind of thing.

  We have 35 years of combined experience and a repertoire of 37 songs. Avg. 21 gigs per month. No waste cases.

  “Busy band you got there, buddy.”

  North, 35 degrees, 37 feet, 21 inches.

  In the past, Moth’s special-code band had excluded wimps, wusses, whiners, walruses, and wallabies. He had never excluded women, because he didn’t want to be that kind of musician, even in a pretend band. The W stood for western longitude.

  A nonexistent PO box and a nonexistent phone number completed the coordinates.

  Daniel retrieved the road map considerately tucked in the glove compartment by the Emmas and munched fried fish.

  * * *

  Downtown Crumville was a two-traffic-light stretch of highway with a sparse scattering of sun-faded stucco buildings: a used car lot, a video store with posters in the window for six-year-old movies, and a place called Desert Tom’s #17 Burgers.

  The smell of chili and orange grease assailed Daniel when he pushed through Desert Tom’s front door. Half the tables were occupied by parties of one or two, working on chili burgers and chili fries. A ceiling fan whirred frantically, either trying to dispel the odors or distribute them for the benefit of those who enjoyed that sort of thing. Towering behind the counter like a granite monument was Moth, all six and a half feet of him, his muscled torso barely contained in a black T-shirt. His gaze fell upon Daniel, and his grin was so radiant with genuine delight that Daniel choked up.

  Moth rushed out from behind the counter, spread his arms, and charged Daniel like a freight train. He wrapped Daniel in an embrace and lifted him four feet off the ground.

  “You came to visit,
” he said in his deep bass. Then he abruptly dropped Daniel and barked out, “We’re closed!”

  Customers looked up in confusion.

  “Closed?” one man said, a chili-slathered fry dangling between his fingers. “It’s not even two o’clock.”

  Moth fetched a stack of takeout boxes and frisbeed them at the customers. “I found a rat in the kitchen. You all gotta fuck off.”

  Meekly, his customers packed their in-progress meals and emptied out. When the last one shuffled away, Moth locked the door and flipped the CLOSED sign around. His smile returned, and he subjected Daniel to a somewhat gentler hug. “Everything okay?”

  Despite an overwhelming sense of relief at being in the presence of his best friend, everything felt heavy and dark. Daniel’s eyes itched.

  “Moth, I lost Sam.”

  Moth’s dark face paled. “What happened, D?”

  He gave Moth a brief of the last few days’ events, including Gabriel Argent, the Pacific firedrake, the tsuchigumo attack, and the Emmas, and the Bautistas.

  Moth shook his head, reproachful. “Argent is a fucking drip. You should have never gotten involved with him. See what happens when you don’t have ready access to my magnificent mind?”

  Daniel’s world started to tilt. He slumped into a booth seat.

  “Still working through the poison?”

  “Yeah,” Daniel said. He was sure that was it. Though he feared it might be something else. There wasn’t much ambient osteomancy in a place like this. Not many osteomantic fossils in the ground. And this wasn’t Los Angeles, with millions of people breathing and excreting the magic they consumed into the air. Daniel hadn’t eaten raw magic in a long time. And he hadn’t been in Los Angeles for even longer. But he’d been near one of the most remarkable products of Los Angeles: Sam.

  He wasn’t ready to face the ramifications of that.

  “Let’s get some food in you,” Moth said.

  “Already ate,” Daniel said, regretting the fish and chips. “But I wouldn’t say no to a soda.”

  “Orange Crush, heavy on the ice, coming up.”

  Daniel just needed a few minutes. He’d sit here with Moth, rehydrate, then get back on the road.

  Moth dropped a bucket-sized cup of cold soda in front of Daniel and squeezed himself into the seat across the table. “So, a search and rescue, then?”

  Daniel shook his head. “I’m not convinced his plane went down. And even if it did, that’s not the worst-case scenario. Him actually reaching Catalina is the worst-case scenario.”

  “Wow. When a plane crash is the happy option…”

  “Yeah. It’s pretty much like that.” Daniel sucked sweet soda through his straw. The bubbles felt good going down his throat.

  “Have you wondered why Argent tipped you off about what Otis is planning for Sam? This wouldn’t be the first time you got played like a dumb trombone. The Ossuary job—”

  “Thanks. I remember the Ossuary job. Of course Argent could be playing me. I blow up the dragon and Argent lands a knockout punch on his competition without bruising his knuckles. But Otis can’t have a dragon.” Daniel reached bottom of the soda and annoyed Moth with the noise of slurping ice. Moth snatched his cup and refilled it.

  “So there’s no chance, zero, none, that Sam could actually pull this off?”

  “No, zero, none,” Daniel said, jiggling fresh ice.

  Moth frowned, a terrifying expression. He didn’t like Daniel’s answer.

  “D, I don’t want to psychologize you, but—”

  “Please, don’t.”

  “But your mom and dad abandoned you and turned you into the sad, pitiful mess of a person you are now. You can’t protect the scared and lonely boy you were by suffocating Sam.”

  “Oh, god, I beg you, shut up.”

  “Why did you try to dump Sam on the Emmas? Why didn’t you set out for Catalina with him?”

  “Sam’s not like us when we were his age.”

  The backrest of Moth’s seat creaked as he leaned back. “Whose fault is that? Sam’s got the Hierarch’s magic, and you’ve just tried to keep it hidden away. All you did was seal it under higher pressure. You weren’t ever willing to release him, so he finally released himself.”

  Daniel took another long sip. “You know that thing about true friends, how they’re the ones who can tell you anything?”

  “Yeah,” said Moth, a little puffed up.

  “I hate that thing.”

  “I’m not wrong, D.”

  Daniel massaged his temples. “I know. I wouldn’t be so pissed at you if you were wrong.”

  “I’ll live with it. So, what’s next?”

  “Sam might’ve gone down over the desert. Or over the Pacific. Land or water, I can’t search thousands of square miles of wasteland. But if he’s able … if he’s still alive … he’ll try to make it to Catalina. He’ll stop in LA first to gear up, make connections, arrange some kind of transport to the island. That’ll take him a while. Which gives me time. I won’t find him in the middle of the desert or the Pacific, but I have a chance of finding him in Los Angeles.”

  Moth tried to make encouraging noises, but they both knew they were talking about grim prospects. Sam alive in Los Angeles was ridiculously optimistic. And even if he was, that only meant he was in the very place Daniel had spent the last decade keeping him away from.

  Moth took a breath, filling himself with whatever vapors of cheer he could muster. “So, let’s go get your boy, right?”

  “What about your burger joint?”

  Moth loved chili cheeseburgers. He was a connoisseur and cared about them passionately, the way fly fishermen cared about hacklers and muddlers. Owning his own shop was his dream.

  “It can go a few days without me. Louis can run it while I’m gone.”

  “Louis?”

  Moth grinned, bashful. “He’s my guy.”

  “Shit, Moth, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you had someone.” He got up. “I should go.”

  “This is how you congratulate me?”

  “This is how I don’t take you away from your life and drag you through my shit.”

  “I decide where I go and what I do.”

  Moth was giving him exactly what he came to him for: not just his physical strength and durability, or his counsel and his loyalty, all the qualities that made him invaluable on the jobs they used to run for Otis. But he was also offering to once again be Daniel’s bedrock, to make sure whatever dark places Daniel walked into, he’d never be alone. That in a world where no rational person would ever trust anyone, there’d be one person he could trust.

  Moth was always willing to be that person for Daniel. And Daniel would always accept it. He could rationalize good reasons. Saving Sam. Stopping Otis. Saving millions of lives. But he suspected the real reason he wouldn’t turn Moth down was because Daniel was still a thief. Thieves took what they wanted.

  NINE

  Sam was empty. His veins and arteries were hollow tubes. His heart was a hollow box. He busied his hands and his mind on building a cairn. It was not the osteomancer’s way to worry about a corpse—if it had magical value, you ate it, and if not, it was worthless. But Sofía Bautista was not an osteomancer, nor was her husband, and nor were her children. He would give her as much of an honorable burial as he could.

  Em was looking over Sofía’s rifle. She’d found it beneath more rocks. The barrel was crimped.

  “We’ll have to figure out a way back to the Bautista farm,” Sam said. “We’ll have to tell Fernando what happened.”

  Em set the useless rifle down in the sand. “No, Sam.”

  “How else is he going to find out? Somebody might come along and take the plane for salvage, but no one will care what happened to her. So we’ll tell Fernando to his face. Then we’ll drive back to the safe house. If your sisters have already ditched it, they’ll have left a way for us to find them, right? We’ll go back to the Emmas and Daniel.”

  Em came over and crouched beside him.
She brushed her fingers over the cold stones of Sofía’s cairn. Some of the rocks came from the fault creature’s body. Sofía was dead because Sam blew it apart.

  “Sam, I’m going to try to say this as kindly as I can. I didn’t partner up with you because I have a crush on you. I didn’t partner up with you because I was swayed by your charismatic leadership qualities. I’m not interested in being your sidekick while you seek redemption, or closure, or trot ahead on a quest to fulfill your destiny. Not everything is about you, Sam. The Emmas debated whether we should make the firedrake our problem. My sisters decided to leave it to someone else. And not because they didn’t see the danger of a dragon in the hands of Otis and the LA osteomancers. They know it might lead to full-scale war with Northern California or an internal war that lays waste to half the Southern realm. None of my sisters saw a scenario in which the dragon gets built without a lot of people dying. But they won’t do anything about it. Too risky, they say. But I think they’re wrong. So I’m doing something. I’m going to Catalina, and I’m going to make sure the dragon never gets completed.”

  “With or without me?”

  “No, with you, because I can’t do it by myself. So get up, shake it off, and let’s go.”

  “Shake it off. Is that what I should say to Sofía’s kids?”

  Em stood and picked up her bag.

  “Tell me about Otis,” Sam said.

  “You know about Otis.”

  “Tell me what you know about him.”

  “Why?”

  “Would you just? Please?”

  Em took a breath. “Here’s the first thing I was ever told about Otis Roth: he wanted golems. Because reproducible, disposable people are too useful to someone like him to pass up. So, he acquired some. But they didn’t work out the way he’d hoped. They still had minds of their own. So Otis came up with a Plan B. He found the bones of some bird that could turn anyone into a programmable zombie, and he used them on street kids. Voilà, he had his wraiths, a collection of little operatives even better than golems. They’re his cannon fodder, his suicide vests, whatever he needs. That’s the kind of man Otis is. And that’s why we don’t want him to have a firedrake.”