Dark Alchemy

by Laura Bickle

  “Give it a minute.”

  Petra stared at it, resisting the urge to tap her foot. She flicked a glance up at Gabriel. “This is bullshit. It’s not doing anything.”

  “It’s over a hundred and fifty years old. Give it a minute.”

  “Jesus, ­people. We’re wasting time—­” Maria began, but her voice stilled.

  The blood began to creep along the track, like a slow-­motion comet. It seeped along the edge, gathering itself, just as Stroud’s mercury had. It rolled along the track like a perfect ruby marble, picking up speed, spiraling faster and faster.

  Then it stopped, wobbling near the northeast part of the compass. Petra carefully lifted it to eye level, marveling at the perfect roundness of the drop, wondering how it retained surface tension. She looked over the edge of the drop at Gabriel.

  “You gonna tell me why it likes you?”

  Gabriel’s mouth turned downward. “No.”

  “Interesting,” she said, lifting an eyebrow.

  The drop split in two. One drop remained fixed on Gabriel. The other split off and wobbled in the direction of the door, then stopped.

  “I don’t get—­”

  “It’s Stroud. Stroud’s in the trunk of the car,” Gabriel said.

  Petra’s eyebrow quirked. “Are you shitting me?”

  The drops broke tension, leaking into the groove, like a damp ring left on a coaster. Before her eyes, the gold seemed to absorb it, leaving only a rusty stain behind. Petra flipped the compass over. “Interesting parlor trick. But . . .”

  Maria put her hands on her hips. “Can we stop playing with toys, please, and get started rescuing Frankie?”

  “You’re taking this really well.” Petra said. Better than she was.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Men with mercury armor. Magic detectors. Bulletproof cowboys.”

  “I’ve seen weirder shit than this before. I’ll process the hell out of it later. Maybe over some of Frankie’s gin. But later.”

  “What about the the kids Gabriel tied up? And Stroud, roasting his ass off in his trunk?” Petra said, resisting the urge to ask Maria exactly what that “weirder shit” involved. “We gotta figure out what to do with those guys.”

  “We could call Mike,” Maria suggested. “Though . . . this isn’t his jurisdiction. He’d have to call the sheriff, after he got done wigging out.”

  Gabriel shrugged. “I’m in favor of driving them out of town and dropping them off. They can find their own way home. Or not.”

  Petra shuddered, thinking of Jeff. “No. We can’t just leave them.” Stroud might be dangerous, and Justin an asshole, but Cal didn’t deserve this.

  “Screwing around with them’s gonna take too much time. We gotta help Frankie.” Maria drummed her fingers on the refrigerator.

  “How about I call the sheriff when we leave, okay?” Sweat prickled on Petra’s brow. “If the cops are on Rutherford’s side, and they hate Stroud, they’ll be here ASAP. Right?”

  Gabriel gave a small frown, as if she was being hopelessly naïve. “Your decision.”

  “Then I’m calling the sheriff,” Petra said firmly, though she was sure she didn’t have a full grasp of the political nuances of the situation.

  “Up to you to explain to them, then,” Gabriel said.

  “Damn it.” Petra groaned, digging her cell phone out of her pocket and dialing. She had no idea how she was going to explain this shit to the cops, but at least there wouldn’t be blood on her hands.

  Maria grabbed the shotgun. “Then let’s pay Sal Rutherford a visit.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Hanged Man

  “Let me try this again.”

  Petra clutched the Bronco’s steering wheel, keeping her eyes on the road. Maria was cruising at a breakneck pace down back roads in Frankie’s Explorer, and Petra was determined not to fall behind and lose her. But Gabe could almost see that her brain was whirring just as quickly. She continued to assault him with questions, while he sat serenely on the passenger’s side. Sig lay on the bench seat between them, one paw wrapped over his muzzle, as if to ward off any more of Petra’s charcoal concoctions.

  Gabriel regarded the coyote with amusement and a bit of wariness. Having lived with ravens, he knew something about familiars. They arrived and never left. He wasn’t sure what to think about this one. The Locus hadn’t recognized him as magic, so maybe he was just an ordinary coyote. Or maybe whatever magic he represented was far beyond the reach of the Locus.

  In all, Gabriel was amused by Petra and her companion. It felt good; he hadn’t been amused in a very long time. He was also a bit befuddled, if he truly admitted it to himself. She showed no fear of him, had marched right up to Rutherford’s doorstep. He was accustomed to ­people scattering in his wake like dandelion fluff. Not chasing after him like a stubborn nettle.

  “You’re bulletproof, but Frankie can beat the shit out of you with a fence post. How the hell does that work?”

  Gabe stared stoically out the window. “We’re not having this conversation.”

  “But Sal Rutherford can hurt you. That’s why I had to scrape you off the floor of the barn.”

  Gabriel didn’t answer her. She might be entertaining, but he wasn’t sure how far to trust her. He hadn’t wanted to trust her this far with the knowledge of what he was. And it needed to stop. There was nothing to be gained by telling her that his situation was actually under control. His healing had been slowed by lying on the wood floor of the barn, but he’d sent parts of his body out to the tree to heal and return. The ravens’d had a devil of a time locating him when he wasn’t sprawled under the hayloft.

  Petra tried a different avenue. “How do you know so much about this Veneficus Locus?”

  “Let’s just say that I’ve been around here awhile.”

  Petra gave up, focused on stomping the gas to pursue Maria’s receding taillights. “We can’t just surrender you to Sal.”

  “You don’t really have a choice. Besides, Sal won’t kill me.”

  “Why not? Looks like he tried.”

  “I’m useful to him.” He said it simply, without attachment.

  “Why tolerate that? You can deflect bullets like fucking Superman,” Petra said.

  “It’s not what it seems,” he said laconically.

  “You a masochist?” Petra bit her lip. It was a charming gesture. He noticed that she did it when she was nervous.

  “No. But I get what I want out of the arrangement.”

  “You aren’t really good with this conversation thing.”

  “Nobody really talks to me.” He said it with the same matter-­of-­factness, no self-­pity.

  “They’re afraid of you.”

  “Yes.” The corner of his mouth turned upward. He was unused to such directness, and he couldn’t help but admire that her thoughts slipped past her lips unfettered.

  “I’m not afraid of you.” She said it with defiance.

  “So I’ve noticed.” He looked at her, hard, lifting an eyebrow. He could make her afraid of him. Of that, he had no doubt. If she continued to chase, she would come up against a nightmare that she’d never forget. Better that he stop playing games and get her to abandon the line of inquiry.

  Petra squirmed, frowned. “Look, I can circle back and pick you up as soon as we take Frankie . . .”

  “You’re delaying the inevitable through misguided intentions. Some things haven’t changed here since men arrived. And you will never know the reasons why. You’ll be forced to accept them.” He said it coldly, with as much frost as he could muster. After so many years, that was formidable.

  Petra fumed silently. Acceptance clearly wasn’t one of her strong points. And Gabriel bet she’d be damned if she’d be improving that aspect of her character anytime soon.

  The Rutherford ranch spr
ead around them. Gabe hoped that Maria would pull off the side of the road, allow them to formulate a strategy before they stormed in with guns blazing. But Maria was evidently a fan of charging forward without stopping. She pulled up right before the barn, shut off the engine, and hopped out of the truck with her shotgun in hand, long skirts swirling around her.

  “This is gonna go over real well.” Petra sighed, climbing out of the Bronco.

  Ravens cawed overhead, perching on the edge of the barn. The rest of the ranch hands shambled out of the structure. They said nothing. A few nodded in Gabe’s direction.

  “Where’s the boss?” Gabe asked.

  “Here.”

  Sal Rutherford strode out of the barn at a leisurely pace. He had the irritating attitude of a man in complete command of his surroundings, one hand tucked into the belt loop of his jeans and the other resting on the holster at his side. The whites of his eyes had a jaundiced yellow tint, but the sunburned skin around them crinkled in wicked mirth.

  Maria stood her ground, shotgun balanced on her hip. “We’ve come for Frankie.”

  Sal grinned. “I’m not sure I’m willing to give him up. He says some very interesting things when he’s drunk.”

  “He’s crazy. Crazier when he’s drunk. Nothing he says is the truth,” Maria said, but the desperation in her voice glittered too brightly.

  Gabe stepped forward. “Let him go. I’m back.”

  Sal rubbed his chin with an exaggerated gesture, pretending to consider. “You can see him,” he conceded.

  Maria bristled, but Petra put her hand on her arm.

  Sal shouted back to the barn, and two of his men dragged Frankie out. Frankie was limp as a dishrag. There was no blood, no sign of a beating. Maria rushed to him, patted his face. Gabe could smell the vodka staining the front of his shirt from where he stood. His head was soaked in it.

  Maria turned on Sal. “How much did you give him?”

  Sal shrugged. “We gave him all he wanted. And then some.”

  Gabe’s gaze flickered to the interior of the barn. He could see a funnel, some garden hose, and empty bottles in a vomit-­filled puddle by the door. They’d force-­fed him.

  Beside him, Petra’s hands balled into fists. “Bastard.”

  “Let him go,” Gabe repeated. “You have what you wanted.”

  Sal made a show of considering, wallowing in his power. “I think that perhaps you overestimate yourself, Gabe. Your uniqueness.”

  Gabe cocked his head. “What do you mean?”

  “Let’s just say, I think that I’ve figured out how to replace you.” A smile played on Sal’s lips. He stank of magic, like sulfur and mercury and salt.

  Gabe’s gaze flickered past the barn, to the tree and the Lunaria beyond.

  Something shimmered, and it wasn’t just the heat.

  He strode past Sal, past the barn and the Hanged Men, into the tall grass. Sweat prickled his brow.

  “Gabe!” Petra shouted after him.

  He waded into the field, feeling the awful energy of spilled magic swirling around him. It clung to his skin, roaring in his ears like ocean and blood. Overhead, the sky had darkened to a bruised grey, and the wind rattled over the land. Ravens descended upon the Lunaria, cawing, agitated.

  He began to run, his breath charring his throat. He could feel the Lunaria’s roots reaching into the earth underneath his feet, sense its magic shaken awake. The tree had been asleep for a century, and now . . .

  He skidded to a stop, heart in his mouth.

  “Sal, what have you done?” he whispered.

  The tree reached to the sky with glossy dark branches, wind hissing through the leaves. Ravens fluttered amid them in a deafening cacophony, screaming at this thing that had disturbed their nests.

  A body dangled from the lowest scarred branch. It spun lazily in the wind, like a tire swing, hands slack at its sides and feet skimming space.

  Gabe rushed to the body, took its weight on his shoulder. There was no telling how long it had been there.

  “Oh, my God,” he heard Petra breathe behind him.

  Being tied up in the hot sun was bad enough.

  Being tied to the motionless sack of meat that was Justin, listening to the Alchemist cook in the trunk was worse.

  Cal strained to scoot forward in the dust, away from the car, but Justin was dead weight His awkward heft caused Cal to fall to his side on the ground. Frustrated, he kicked at Justin’s legs. Justin didn’t react. Cal hoped to hell he didn’t piss himself in his unconscious state.

  Cal looked up at the trunk. It sounded like an overheated radiator, ticking like something was boiling in there. Stroud had stopped screaming and swearing about fifteen minutes ago. He wondered if the Alchemist was dead—­or worse.

  A finger of mercury dribbled out of the gas tank cover near Cal’s head, and he wormed away from it, grunting, trying to haul Justin’s limp body. But the mercury slipped and spiraled over the back of his neck with hot, wet fingers. Cal whimpered, pressing his face into the dirt and scrunching his eyes shut.

  Gravel crunched in the distance, tires on the road. He felt the mercury hesitate, then retract.

  He started yelling. “Hey! Over here! Help!”

  He wasn’t sure what he was hoping for. In the best-­possible reality, Petra had developed a crisis of conscience and had returned to let him go. In the worst, it was the cops she’d called. Whichever, it was better than being killed by Rutherford’s man. He was pretty sure that dude had been ready to toss Justin and Cal into the trunk with Stroud like a cozy tweaker family.

  The crackle of a radio sounded through an open window. A car door opened, and boots shuffled on the ground.

  “Unit six is en route to your location,” the radio hissed.

  “Roger that, Dispatch,” an unfamiliar male voice said.

  Cal pressed his forehead to the ground. Shit. The cops. But he reasoned that spending the night in jail would be better than getting fondled by Stroud’s mercury. Gotta look on the bright side.

  The boots stopped before him. Cal looked up. “Hey.”

  A cop with a buzz cut, mirrored sunglasses, and arms the size of deli hams squatted down before him, one hand on his gun. “You all right?”

  “Um, yeah. But this guy’s not.” Cal wriggled to show him Justin, his head lolling backward against Cal’s shoulder.

  The cop took Justin’s pulse. “Out cold.” He keyed the radio at his shoulder. “Base, I need the squad here ASAP.”

  Cal shrugged his aching shoulders. “Uh, do you think you could untie me?”

  The cop looked at him, then the broken door, then back again. “I’ll trade you for some cuffs.”

  “Sure. Anything. I swear I’ll be good.”

  The cop reached for the jumper cables and began to work them loose. Cal’s gaze slipped to the trunk. Stroud was still in there. He watched another bead of mercury form on the seam of the trunk lid and slide off.

  For a moment, Cal felt powerful. He could zip his lip and say nothing, and maybe the Alchemist would roast in his own shiny juices or bleed out from the dusting of birdshot he’d taken. If Stroud was dead, Cal could get on his bike and get the hell out of Dodge.

  But reality set in with a sharp pang in his stomach. He had nowhere to go. And he wasn’t sure he could live with having a death on his conscience. Deep down in his gut, he knew he wasn’t a badass. Plus, if he left Stroud in the trunk and Stroud somehow survived . . .

  Cal shuddered violently. If that happened, he’d be dead. And not just dead in a quick-­and-­painless, bullet-­to-­the-­back-­of-­the-­head kind of way. He remembered the feel of the mercury on the base of his neck, and was pretty sure that the Alchemist would make him suffer.

  “Um,” he squeaked at the cop. “There’s a guy in the trunk.”

  The cop’s hands stilled. “What did
you say?”

  Cal rolled his eyes. He’d overheard Petra tell the dispatcher that there was a dude baking in the trunk. Evidently, something got lost in dispatchland. “There’s a guy in the trunk of that car,” he said again.

  The cop stood, his hand on the butt of his gun. Cal squirmed his hands free of the jumper cables but stayed where he was, on the ground, with his hands in his lap. Justin lay beside him, drooling onto the dirt.

  The cop went to the driver’s side of the car, reached in, and flipped the hood release with an audible click. He circled around to the trunk, drawing his weapon.

  Cal held his breath as the cop opened the trunk. The cop stood there for a moment, not speaking, his expression unreadable. Cal wondered if he was staring at the dead Alchemist, curled up in the fetal position and cooked like a turkey.

  The cop aimed the gun into the trunk. “Hands up.”

  Cal swallowed. He felt a bit of disappointment, mingled with relief.

  “Out of the trunk, nice and slow.”

  Stroud looked like shit. He climbed out of the trunk like a cramped-­up old man, all tangled up in his black coat, white and sweating. What looked like bits of aluminum foil stuck to his skin, and he wore what seemed to be a crazy-­ass silver glove glued to his hand.

  The cop lifted his gun. “Keep your hands up.”

  Stroud complied, though it seemed he could only bring them to shoulder height.

  “Where’s the woman who called 911?” the cop demanded.

  Stroud glared at him with eyes the unnatural color of a storm. “I don’t know.”

  “What were you doing here?”

  Stroud spat in the dirt. “Selling fucking Avon.”

  “Did she put you in there?”

  “No. It was one of Sal Rutherford’s men. But she sure didn’t do anything to stop him.”

  The cop reached for the radio pinned on his shoulder. “This is Unit Fourteen. Be advised that–”

  Something flickered in Cal’s vision, flashed in the sun. He realized in an instant that Stroud was lunging toward the cop with that shiny glove. Ribbons of liquid metal extended from the fingers, reaching around the cop’s neck. Instinctively, the cop clawed at the liquid metal, but the skin of mercury wrapped tight around his throat, tight as a steel cable. He squawked and turned red as a tomato, then fired his gun randomly, wildly. Cal scrambled to cower behind the fender of the car. The metal fingers around the cop’s neck snapped back, away, as if they’d touched something hot. The cop fell to his hands and knees, gasping.