“Well?” he said.
“Well what?”
“What’s this all about?”
“I felt something up when we stopped at the light, so I went in and found a robbery in process.”
“And you kicked the demons out?”
“Stabbed him in the back.”
“Reese, why is he in our car? Why is he not in the back of a police car on his way back to juvie?”
She sighed and glanced back at the unconscious boy. “Because it worked this time. And that means he wants to be free.”
“Come again?”
She nodded in the direction of the ignition. “You can start the car. I can tell you while we drive.”
“Oh, yeah. I almost forgot we were on a mission.”
“This didn’t happen by accident, Chris. The timing. It’s part of the Spirit’s plan.”
Chris grumbled, but he didn’t argue. Compared to Reese, he had been One for the equivalent of five minutes. She was far and away the expert. He started the truck and pulled back into the road, but said, “So keep talking.”
“Last time I tried to drive the demonic out of this same kid, he was holding on so tightly it almost killed him. I almost killed him. Your mother had to stop me.” Reese took a second to gain control of her voice—it was clear the memory was a difficult one. “But this time the thing released immediately. It means he doesn’t want them anymore. He’s tired of their control. Wants to be free.”
“He is free, right?” Chris asked, looking in the rearview mirror at their unconscious passenger. “You got them out?”
“It’s not that simple. They’ll come back unless he fills that space with something else.”
“The Spirit.”
“Right. He has to become One, or he isn’t going to stay free. And he isn’t really free now—he’s just getting a reprieve.”
“Isn’t it normally messy? When you drive the demons out with your sword and everything? I mean, what I remember from those battles you fought is a lot of screaming and weird clouds and slime and . . .”
“This one was quiet. It’s not always the same.”
“Right.” Chris glanced down at the address Andrew had left him for Miranda’s school. They were almost there. But having a passenger changed the picture a little.
“So now what? How do we help Andrew and Julie when we’ve got Billy the Kid back there?”
“I wish the cell was still here,” Reese said.
The Lincoln cell had disbanded a week ago—Tony and Angelica had come by the village to tell them. In the aftermath of David’s betrayal and the hive’s destruction, they had decided to part ways, the members leaving for other cells and other safe houses. They would regroup eventually, perhaps in quite a different form. But the cell Reese had known as family and home were gone.
“What about Dr. Smith?” Chris said. “Can he help us? Babysit, at least?”
“Maybe,” Reese said, “but he’s not in town.”
“So I guess he’s coming with us.”
Reese was on her knees, almost turned around completely to face the boy. “Maybe he’ll wake up soon.”
“What’s typical recovery time?”
“Um. ‘Typical’ doesn’t work here.”
Chris spotted the school sign on the left and pulled into the parking lot. As he slowed to find a spot, Reese reached out and dug her nails into his arm.
He looked down and opened his mouth to comment before looking back up at her face—and biting back whatever smart-alecky thing had been on the tip of his tongue.
She was staring at the school building with a look that said something was very, very wrong.
“Turn around,” she said.
He didn’t question, just did what she said.
“That was Miranda’s school?” she asked.
“That’s the address Andrew gave me.”
“No wonder she ran,” Reese said.
Chris reflected, briefly, that he had hoped becoming One would mean he wasn’t always in the dark about what was really going on. So far, it wasn’t helping much.
Except that he could feel Reese’s heart as close as his own, and he trusted it completely.
“What did you feel?”
“There’s something in that school.”
She sat back down, facing forward, and bent her head into her hands, fingers spread across her face. Chris knew that in some way, she was reaching out to the Spirit—praying.
They drove another half-mile before Chris asked, quietly, “Are you all right?”
“I’m okay. Where are we going?”
“Well, the school was supposed to be our rendezvous point. But I’m going to guess that Julie didn’t like it there any more than you do, and that they aren’t there anymore. Plan B was go to their house, and if they weren’t back there, Andrew was going to try to leave us a message and tell us where to go. Besides, that will give us a quiet place to wait for our passenger to wake up.”
Reese looked behind her again and bit her lip. “I just hope he’s more than tired of the demons. I hope he’s desperate . . . desperate enough to switch sides.”
“What if he isn’t?”
“Then you get to see what it’s like to lose.”
Chris turned down a residential street. “Is that why Jacob’s theories were attractive?”
“Partly. It’s easier to hate your enemies, even destroy them, than to care about them. It’s cleaner.”
Chris pondered that as he found the address for Andrew’s house and pulled into the driveway. It was nondescript, a typical suburban house in a typical suburban neighbourhood. A family house, he realized. Not a home for a bachelor. And Andrew had lived here for years.
He smiled. “You know something? We could all learn a few things about hope from this Hunter character.”
“And about life from his wife,” Reese said. She jumped out of the truck and Chris followed suit, heading to the back to remove Alex while Reese rang the doorbell.
No one answered, and Reese tested the door to find that it was open. Chris followed, carrying the still-unconscious Alex over one shoulder like a sack. Reese led the way into the house and pointed to the couch. “You can put him down there.”
“Already on my way,” Chris said.
A note on the kitchen table said, “No luck at the school—gone to the police station.”
“Drat,” Reese said. “Why do I think Lieutenant Jackson isn’t going to be happy to see us again?”
Chris was about to answer when the sound of someone pulling into the driveway alerted them both that they weren’t alone. Andrew walked into the house only seconds later with Julie right behind him. The sight of Reese and Chris startled them, but it was Alex both their eyes riveted on.
“Who is that?” Andrew asked as Julie said, “Is he all right?”
“Not sure yet,” Chris said. “Reese drove a demon out of him, and we’re waiting for him to wake up.”
“I recognize him,” Julie said. “He came to the community once. With Clint.”
“He was involved with the hive,” Reese said. “But I think things have changed . . . he wanted to be free of possession.”
Conflict chased across Andrew’s face. “Look, I’m grateful to you for coming out, but we need to stay focused on getting Miranda back.”
“In my experience,” Reese said, “the Spirit has a way of bringing threads together. We ran into Alex—this boy—on the way to find you. I don’t think that was coincidence.”
Andrew’s eyes lit up. “You think he has something to do with Miranda’s disappearance?”
“It’s possible. Did you learn anything?”
His expression was bleak. “The school couldn’t help. She disappeared after asking to go to the bathroom, and they didn’t bother to check on her for an hour. We think she probably tried to hitchhike home, but as you can see, she didn’t make it back here. We went to the police to file a missing persons report and get them looking for her.”
Chris laid a hand on his shoulder.
“She’s going to be all right,” he said.
“You don’t know that,” Andrew answered, his voice taut.
No one answered him.
“Why hitchhiking?” Reese asked.
“Because she’s done it before,” Chris said. “I found her last time . . . and I told her not to do it again. But I don’t think she cared much about what I had to say.”
“Why did she run?” Reese asked.
“She’s been through so much lately,” Julie said. “Too much to process. She’s been having nightmares, waking up screaming . . . and there’s something at the school. I think something triggered her.”
“I felt that too,” Reese said.
“I don’t know what to do now,” Andrew said. “Someone should stay here—man the phone in case she calls. Or the police call with some information. The rest of us—can we go looking for her?”
“That would work if we knew where to start looking,” Chris said. He gestured toward the living room. “Right now I wonder if we should just wait for our guest to wake up. Reese may be right. He could be connected to Miranda’s disappearance somehow.”
Andrew headed for the living room with a grim expression. “Well, let’s wake him up.”
Chris stopped him with a hand on his arm. “I don’t think it’s that simple. Just wait.”
As if on some invisible cue, the phone rang at the same moment that Alex suddenly convulsed and shouted something incoherent.
All four of them froze momentarily, staring at each other. And then Andrew leaped for the phone and Chris and Reese leaped for Alex.
Chris grabbed the boy’s shoulders, holding him steady, while Reese sat at his feet and looked intently at him. “Alex, it’s okay. It’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you. You’re free.”
In the kitchen, Andrew’s voice was rising on the phone. “What do you mean you can’t give me the address? That’s my daughter you’re talking about!”
Alex’s dark eyes stared back at Reese, wide and terrified. She found herself shushing him like an older sister with a child, and he leaned back, trembling, some of the tension easing out of his limbs.
“What’s going on? Where am I? Who are you?” he asked.
“My name is Reese,” she said. “Don’t you recognize me?”
Alex shook his head and then twisted his neck so he could see Chris behind him. He shrank even farther down into the couch. “Who are you?”
“Don’t know me either?” Chris asked. “You should.”
“I’ve never seen you before.”
Chris raised his eyebrows at Reese. “Is amnesia normal?”
“It is when the demons have been in serious control for a long time. The possessed lose a lot of themselves—lose a lot of their lives.”
“What are you talking about?” Alex asked, his voice shaking. It cracked, a remnant of puberty.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” Reese asked.
“I don’t know, I . . .” He shut his mouth suddenly. His expression went half-sullen, half-scared. “I don’t remember anything.”
“Except trying to rob the corner store,” Reese finished for him. “It’s okay. We got you out of there, and the owner isn’t going to report you. Do you know what else happened in that store?”
“I . . . no.”
“Do you know what’s different?” she asked. This time her voice was gentler—an invitation, an attempt to help him see.
He just stared at her for a long, long minute.
And then he said, “They’re gone.”
“Yes,” Reese said. “We are Oneness—Chris and I. We drove the demons out of you. You’re free, Alex. But I would be lying to you if I said you’re going to stay that way. They will come back, and they’ll come back stronger, unless you Join us.”
He shook his head slowly. “I don’t want to.”
“The Spirit is not like them,” Reese said. “The Oneness is not like the hive. Joining is life and freedom. I promise you that.”
He shook his head again and pulled himself away from Chris, who was still holding loosely to his shoulders. Swinging his feet to the floor, he stood. His shoulders were hunched, and stringy black hair hung into his face. He seemed to have shrunken since they first encountered him in the store.
“I don’t want anything to do with this, okay? Whatever you did to me—thanks, I guess. But I’m just gonna go now. Okay? I’m just gonna go.”
He looked up to find Andrew standing in his way, blocking the door out of the living room. “I don’t think so,” he said. “You’re not going anywhere until you answer some questions. What do you know about my daughter?”
Chris groaned. “Hunter . . .”
Alex squared his skinny shoulders and tried to keep his head up and look Andrew in the eye. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t even know who your daughter is.”
Andrew shot Reese a glare. “I thought you said he would be connected somehow.”
“He is,” Reese said, “but—”
“Andrew,” Julie interrupted. “They’re here.”
Another car pulled into the driveway, and Andrew bounded for the front door. Chris leaned over and looked out the window—a police car sat in the driveway, and Miranda was getting out of the back.
Alex, peering out the window, paled.
“Oh,” he said. “That’s your daughter?”
But Andrew was already outside, talking to the police and keeping an awkward distance from Miranda, who did not look happy to see him.
Chris turned around and pinned Alex with a look. “Well?” he said.
Alex shrugged. “Look, she’s just a friend, okay? She’s been in trouble; I was just trying to help her out.”
“Do you know where she was today?” Reese asked.
He shrugged again. “Probably the same place she always is.”
Andrew reentered the house, escorting a miserable-looking Miranda—who immediately spotted Alex and blurted out, “What are you doing here?”
“Ask them,” Alex said, pointing to Reese and Chris. Then he nodded toward Andrew. “That your dad?”
Miranda nodded sullenly. Alex cleared his throat. “Yeah, well, I didn’t know who your daughter was when you asked me about her. She’s just a friend, I swear.”
“A friend?” Andrew asked with a dangerous tone to his voice.
“Yes, I keep saying that.” He seemed about to say something else, but Miranda shot him a look that they could all read—it very clearly said, “Shut up.”
He did.
Chapter 10
As Teresa journeyed north, terraced hills and vineyards gave way to wooded foothills and deep valleys. The air turned colder and the inhabitants of the dark more menacing—wolf and bear, raven and demon haunted these forests. She was not afraid. She knew herself to be on the Spirit’s mission, and the breath that filled the universe would not lose her to tooth or claw in some forgotten region.
Villages were fewer here as well, and those towns that did exist were smaller and less friendly. She wondered if the hardships of living in the north, the defences required against cold and wild beast and rocky earth, simply hardened men and women against each other as well. Where she could not find pockets of Oneness, she slept alone in the woods, preferring that to the inns encountered along the way. It was late summer, and though the air was brisker here, it was not yet dangerous to sleep out of doors.
She caught her first glimpse of Franz Bertoller’s small fortress when she topped a hill and saw it on the crest of the next, across a valley filled with one of the larger towns she had come across since leaving her own country. The house was built of grey stone, walled and defended by parapets and gates—a castle, menacing in its way, and yet promising protection to those who lived encamped around it.
Smoke rose from the hearth fires in the town, and the distant clatter of voices, horses, and activity came with it. She wondered how bad the plague was here, and if she was about to descend into anything as bad as her memories of ten
years before. Back then she had thought it was a plague to end the world: that no matter how long she lived, nothing would ever equal it.
The longer she lived, though, the more she realized that life in this world was capable of ending in a thousand ways and yet going on again as something new and different, even as in essentials it stayed the same.
Her horse stamped its foot and snorted, and she patted its neck as it blew out a cloud of cold air. “We’re almost there,” she said. “Good stabling for you, I hope.”
What sort of accommodations awaited her, she could not begin to guess. Nor what sort of greeting the lord of the castle would offer.
She had never forgotten the way he looked at her. That memory had eventually eclipsed all others, though she dimly held those too—the memory of the evil she had seen in him; the memory of his eager fascination with death and dying. All overshadowed by what she had seen in his eyes when he looked at her.
Unexpectedly, she missed Mother Isabel and wished they could have spoken before she undertook this journey. She knew Mother was a part of the cloud and still connected to her in the Oneness, and she hoped that in some way, the dear old woman oversaw this undertaking and took some active role in it. But how to bridge the gap between them and assure herself of her hopes, she did not know.
Oneness was never ultimately undone by death, and yet death was a terrible thing and a terrible separation all the same.
Nudging her horse, she started down the sloping, rocky road toward the town. On the outskirts, she was greeted by the sight and smell of burning piles of refuse—and to her horror, she recognized bodies stacked in among the garbage.
Yes, death was here.
She averted her eyes and urged her horse forward, though it grew more skittish the further they progressed into the town. The stench was overwhelming—the smoke mingled itself with the unmistakable reek of disease, and that in a town where sewage already ran through the ditches, mingled with mud and rainwater. The activity she had heard from the hilltop slowed and then ceased as she passed, and townspeople turned hard, burned eyes on her as she rode by. She felt the force of those eyes: some regarding her with desperation, some with curiosity, some with hatred, some with lust.
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