by Lee French
The power stopped swirling. Blue vibrated. Green writhed. Drew stumbled back and his snake retreated with him as the power twisted together to form a human figure rising from the ground. Though it lacked definition and detail, the flavor felt feminine, not like that of a Knight. He tripped over a squat headstone and fell into the wet grass and mud.
She swooped down on him and grabbed through his chest. “Abomination,” an alto voice growled, the sound echoing in his skull. Her hand clutched Kay, not him. When she squeezed, he thought his chest would explode.
Mutt shrieked and ran for the hedges.
“Wait.” Drew gasped and groped for something to say while the figure paused. The truth seemed like a good option. “I’m helping your descendant, Claire. Mark’s daughter. She needs this, I swear. Without it, she’s vulnerable. Test me if you have to. I’m not…whatever you think I am.”
Her swirling, crackling face filled his vision with raw, burning power. “Defiler.”
“No, I swear. This is necessary. To keep Claire safe. I’ll put the stone back into place if you want me to. I can bring whatever we don’t use back, or I can bring fresh dirt. The grass will regrow either way. Please just don’t kill me. Claire needs my help. She’s tired and hurting, more than she wants to admit, and I…want her to smile again.” The words tumbled out in a torrent and he watched the spirit-power-thing shimmer, hopefully considering his words.
When she neither growled again nor released him, he gulped and chose to take a leap. She might see through a blatant lie, so he kept it as close to the truth as he could. “I’m planning to ask her to marry me. I’ll be part of the family. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do this. It’s for her. It’s all for her.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You would be a family guardian?”
“Say yes,” Kay squeaked in a panic.
“Yes.”
“Swear it with blood.”
“Uh. Am I…what am I swearing, exactly?”
Her hand squeezed, stealing his breath. “Swear to guard the scion at all costs, for the rest of your days.”
Questions filled Drew’s head. He knew what a scion was, but had no idea what Claire might be a scion of. Did that explain Enion? Did the spirit actually mean Claire? Enion? Someone else? Or something else? By “at all costs,” was he pledging to kill people if needed?
She squeezed harder.
“Yes!” screamed Kay.
“Yes! Yes, I swear. I’ll be a guardian of the scion. With blood.”
The spirit-thing withdrew her hand from his chest. He relaxed. She gripped his wrist and shoved his coat sleeve aside, sending jolts of searing heat through his body. Her fingers lengthened into fang-like shapes and ripped open a vein. While he watched with his mouth open but no sound coming out, his blood flowed up her fingers and disappeared.
After far too long, she let go and sank into the graves. He lay back in the muddy grass and gasped at the sky, not wanting to move for a day or two. His arm burned. Kay gibbered in his head. The mist snakes had melted away at some point, leaving the clump of sod he came for lying on the ground near his head.
“Stop it,” Drew snapped at Kay with more bravado than he felt. “If you don’t calm down, I can’t either.”
Kay squeaked, whimpered, and quieted.
Drew waited until he could breathe normally before he sat up. His gaze fell to his lap and his trembling arm. Angry red marks on his flesh formed a heart-shaped whorl symbol he recognized. He poked the design and winced. That spirit thing had carved it into his skin, marking him more permanently than a tattoo. Claire would recognize it and ask about it. He rubbed his eyes, wondering if he’d just done something extremely stupid.
As he stood, he pulled his coat sleeve down to cover it. He’d show Claire when he was ready to, and not a second earlier.
Chapter 16
Claire
When she heard someone coming, Claire looked up to see Drew shambling toward her with his head down. Whatever happened in there seemed to have drained him, and that was her fault. No matter what he said, she should be the one risking everything for this, not him. She should have gone. She’d spent the past fifteen minutes pacing, thinking about how she shouldn’t let Drew fight her battles for her. Every time she reached the point of marching up there, she remembered the crux of his argument and agreed with it.
He carried the clump of grass tucked under one arm and glanced at her when he got close. His face seemed paler than before and his smile barely reached his eyes. “No problem,” he said, his voice cracking in the middle. He cleared his throat.
Claire rushed to him and threw her arms around him. “You look like crap.”
“Drained,” Enion chirped.
“I’m fine.” Drew hugged her. “I admit I could use a ley line.”
“What happened? Where are your glasses?” She let go and touched his cheek. Her fingers smeared mud on his face and she frowned. Twisting to check his back, she found mud and grass stains. “Did you—”
“I slipped on the wet grass and fell. There was mud. Because it’s raining. Mission accomplished, though.” He held up the clump of grass and mud while fishing he glasses out of his coat pocket.
Annoyed at him for both cutting her off and not explaining, Claire crossed her arms and frowned. She always told him everything. He’d been the one person she could trust for so long that she hid nothing. He paid her back for that by being cagey. “What happened?”
Lowering the clump, he sighed. “This was all no big deal.” When he saw her narrowed eyes, he shrugged and put his glasses back on without looking at her “Someone knocked over a headstone. Made the whole place a little heavy on the magic and power and stuff. Nothing I couldn’t handle. Good practice, actually.”
Enion puffed tiny sparks out of his mouth. “Liar.”
Claire nodded and wondered what it would take to pry the story out of him. She got the feeling he wanted to protect her from it, like he’d met some echo of her parents. In fairness, she didn’t want to hear about that. Deciding to let it slide for now, she nodded down the road and he walked with her. “Where’s Mutt?”
Drew laughed, the sound bordering on hysterical. She looked him over and watched while he took a deep breath and seemed to regain control. Maybe Kay helped him more than he wanted to admit.
“He ran off. He’ll wind up back at home eventually. I’ve been thinking about where we might find a strong ley line. There’s places in Portland that’re supposed to be haunted. The biggest one is the Shanghai Tunnels. It’s a network of tunnels they used to kidnap people and take them to the docks to work on boats. Lots of people claim the places with access to it are haunted.”
If he wanted to change the subject, she supposed she could let him. “Never heard of it. How do you know about that?”
“Eighth grade research report.”
“Sounds like a decent place to try, I guess. Can you get us there or should we take a bus?”
“It’s in the middle of Chinatown. We could maybe mist to Skidmore Fountain without being noticed, but I doubt it at this time of day. Besides, I’m kinda wiped out.”
“We could go home for a while.” Claire stopped before they reached the end of the street. If he needed a break, she wanted to take one. “Sit. Change into dry clothes. Grab raincoats.”
“I thought this crystal-locket thing was urgent and important.”
“It is.” She laced her fingers through his and smiled at him. “You’re important too.”
One corner of his mouth quirked up and he finally met her eyes. “I just need a little time to recharge. I promise that’s all.” His gaze fell to her mouth.
“Okay.” She forgot to breathe. They’d kissed before, but never in the open. Stolen moments in secret paled in comparison to standing outside in plain sight of anyone who happened to walk or drive by.
Enion stuck his head between them, wings flared. “Time to go?”
The moment destroyed, Claire shoved the dragon aside with a huff.
Dr
ew’s cheeks flared pink and he coughed as he stepped back. “I don’t think I need a translation for that.”
“We’re going to talk later,” Claire grumbled at Enion.
The dragon draped himself around her neck again with a smug little grin.
Claire restrained the urge to flick his head. She turned to Drew, who shifted uncomfortably. “If you only need a rest, let’s ride the bus. I bet there’s a stop by the outlet mall.” She looped her arm through Drew’s and guided them back the way they’d come. As they passed a familiar side street, she paused at the corner and looked back.
This was Alicia’s street. The third house down, a brown two-story with a three-car garage, was Alicia’s house. On their way down, she hadn’t noticed it, maybe because she didn’t want to. The trees stood taller, the rhododendrons had more branches, and the driveway no longer had the freestanding basketball hoop.
She remembered playing in this yard. Alicia fell over there, in the raised flower bed, and broke her doll. At the corner, Alicia’s older brother told off a bunch of boys for shoving both girls around. She’d had sleepovers here. They used to climb that Japanese maple and hide in that hydrangea.
“Claire? What’s wrong?”
“She was my best friend.”
Drew tugged on her arm. “This isn’t a good time to catch up on stuff like that. We can come back later, after this locket stuff is taken care of.”
Claire nodded and turned away from the house. Maybe she needed to leave the past behind. She and Alicia probably had nothing in common anymore. In fact, she remembered Alicia as the kind of pretty girl everybody liked. She was probably popular. Having Claire for a friend had never helped anyone. It had almost killed Drew.
They reached the bus stop and sat inside the glass shelter. Claire stared at her boots, determined not to think about anything other than a wish that she could let Enion run loose. Ten long, quiet minutes slogged with rain pattering all around them. When the bus showed up, Drew took an aisle seat in the back. Claire sat beside the window and put Enion on her lap. The dragon stretched and examined everything, including the used gum on the wall. They switched to the MAX halfway through the ride.
At Skidmore, they stepped off and Claire shivered. Only two nights ago, they’d fought Justin here. A sign proclaimed the fountain out of order, which made sense. Enion had stabbed it with her dagger to free all the dragons from lesser seals of binding.
“Go someplace else,” Enion chirped.
“There’s a ley line here.” Drew shuffled deeper into the shadows of the overpass housing the small station. He crouched by the wall and held a hand over the cobblestones as if warming himself by a fire. Relieved groans escaped him.
“You’re all kinds of wrong.” While she waited for him, Claire scowled at passersby. She considered switching her sight so she could detect the ley lines like Rondy had taught her in the Ordeal, but didn’t know how distracting that might be. Justin made it seem challenging enough she decided to let Drew handle it.
“I can’t help it if recharging feels good.” Drew stood and rolled his shoulders.
“You can do that without sounding like a perv.”
He blushed. “Sorry.”
Mollified by his embarrassment, Claire tugged on his coat to get him moving. They headed north, passing quaint shops, bars, and restaurants. At the corner of Third and Davis, Drew stopped at a yellow, brick building housing a bar called Nine Cans. The sign showed a dog with big, pointy ears sitting with a drink can, a garbage can, a soup can, a recycle bin, a pair of legs in high heeled shoes, a long-beaked bird, a tuna can, aerosol hairspray, and a watering can. The image seemed busy and confusing to Claire, but she supposed it was a joke of some sort.
“The name of this place is familiar,” Drew said.
Claire frowned. “If this is where we have to go, we have a problem. It’s a bar and we’re minors.”
“Won’t hurt to ask. They can always shoo us out.”
Claire noticed a police car waiting for the light a few cars back from the line. Entering a bar in plain sight of a cop sounded stupid. “Can’t you just see the ley lines? If you can’t, doesn’t that mean we should keep going?”
“I don’t know how deep they are around here. I can’t see through a street any more than you can. We need to get into those tunnels.”
“You just saw one back at Skidmore. Why is this different?”
“I don’t know!” Drew held up a hand and she bit back more questions. “I’m really new at this, okay? Maybe in a few weeks, I’ll be able to walk around and point to all the ley lines, but for now, it’s really hit or miss, and I just can’t do any better than this yet.” At least he seemed more frustrated than angry.
“Sorry.” Claire scuffed her boot on the sidewalk and realized she’d switched to treating Drew like Justin. Drew didn’t have any more answers than she did. She watched the light change. The police car drove past and the driver didn’t seem to care about them loitering in front of a bar. “Come on.”
They slipped inside the well-lit pub. Tables of dark, polished wood filled the space with only narrow aisles between them. At this hour, no one sat inside, yet the place was open. A middle-aged man stood behind the bar, moving glass tumblers from a drying rack to stacks on the back wall. He had the light brown skin and black hair of a Native American.
“Welcome.” His brown eyes flashed gold as he smiled at them. Claire figured it must have been a trick of the light. “You’re a little young to be in here.”
“Are you the one who does the tours of the Shanghai Tunnels?” Drew asked. He took a moment to clean his glasses on the hem of his shirt.
“I am, indeed.” The man’s smile brightened. “I usually ask for prior reservations, but I’m not busy right now. It’s back this way.” He beckoned for them to follow him into the back room.
His enthusiasm made Claire grin and she took five steps before she realized Drew hadn’t moved. “What’s the matter?”
Drew pursed his lips and stared at the man. “What’s your name, sir?”
“Ki Teah.” He closed the distance to Claire and shook her hand. “Proprietor of Nine Cans, which has access to the tunnels.”
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Teah. I’m Claire. This is Drew. How long does it take to walk the tunnels?”
“Please, call me Ki. Most people just want to go from here to the docks and back, which is about an hour and a half, round trip. Exploring everything that’s been excavated is more like four or five hours.” He pushed the back door open, still smiling eagerly.
Claire followed him. As with Khalil, she found someone polite and obliging to be a refreshing change of pace. “How much do you charge for that?”
“Oh, pish.” Ki waved a hand. “No charge for you.”
“I’m not sure this is a good idea,” Drew said with a frown. “We should probably go.”
Claire had to admit something seemed off here. Nobody did something for nothing. “Is there another way down?”
“Nowhere you can access it legally,” Ki said. He smiled and gestured like a host with a bow of his head. “Really, it’s free. I insist. I’ll show you around myself. I’m not doing anything else, and I’m always happy to help the local Knights.”
Ki knowing about the Knights and identifying her as one explained everything for Claire. She took the dirt clod from Drew and said, “Stay here if you want. I need to get this done. As you reminded me.”
“Don’t get into any trouble,” Ki told Drew with a jaunty wink.
Chapter 17
Drew
Something about Ki bothered Drew, but he couldn’t put his finger on what. Like he told Claire, this stuff didn’t have a user manual, and Kay could only help so much. Tapping the ley line had made his head spin and now everything looked like magic, even the chairs and tables. Ki, though…something about him seemed off.
“Well? Follow her,” Kay said. “We just promised a blood oath to guard her. If anything happens down there, we’re both screwed.”
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Drew blinked, then he hurried to catch up. As he rounded a corner in the back room, he found Ki holding a wooden trap door open with dim yellow light coming from the hole.
“Ah, you’re coming after all! Good,” Ki said, still smiling too much. He handed Drew a small flashlight. “There’s a ladder. Watch your step and your head.”
Before descending, Drew peered through the hole and saw Claire ten feet below, turning in a slow circle with a flashlight of her own. He stuck the flashlight in a pocket and climbed down. When he reached the ground, Claire looked him over and nodded.
They stood in a small room with an earth floor, wooden support beams at the corners, and more at three foot intervals along the ceiling. To Drew’s left, a narrow tunnel led away from the room. Another came from the opposite direction. He looked up and oriented to determine the tunnels ran north and south here.
“Look out below,” Ki called down. He sped down the ladder with far too much energy and jumped to the ground from three steps up. His landing kicked dirt into the air and made Drew cough. Claire seemed fine.
“Excellent.” Ki clicked on his own flashlight and directed the beam to the north. “That way goes to the docks. The other way goes to a dead end beneath another building. These tunnels were originally dug out and used by unscrupulous ship captains to illegally acquire ship slaves. This trapdoor was used by the abductors inside the building above to access the tunnels. Along this path—”
“Excuse me,” Claire said. She almost sounded polite. Almost. “I don’t mean to be rude, but we’re not actually interested in the history so much.”
“Oh?” Ki raised his brow and grinned. “Did you come down here to find a new creepy place to make out?”
Heat flared on Drew’s cheeks. “Uh, no. That’s not what we’re looking for.” He glanced between the two brick-wall tunnels, not sure which way to go. Claire picked for them, taking the north passage.
“Really. Well, now I’m interested.” Ki followed as Drew trailed Claire. “What’s the power-infused dirt for?”