The Lord of the Curtain

by Billy Phillips

  He appeared in the dense woods directly behind the tomb of Robert Louis Stevenson.

  The Enchanter stood before Janus, not in material form but as an ethereal impression, a spectral shadow cast from the invisible part of the color spectrum: the infrared. The Lord of the Curtain assumed the visible part of the Red Spectrum only when necessary. He existed in the invisible part of the spectrum—the colors that couldn’t be seen by the naked eye, in any kingdom or realm.

  “What have you learned?” he asked Janus. His words emitted no physical sound waves but reverberated directly in Janus’s medulla.

  Janus stepped forward. “The girl—the elder one. She grows stronger. Bolder.”

  The Enchanter shimmered a smile. “She is deftly competent, but I don’t have to tell you that.”

  No, you don’t have to tell me. Tell the one who calls himself Blackbeard. I would have had her by now. But I will show you how good I am. I will show you who should become the second deputy when this mission is accomplished.

  The Enchanter waved a long, bony finger. “You are not to engage anyone of this world,” he instructed. Janus nodded. “Focus only on the firstborn,” the Enchanter continued. “Discretion is vital. And though you will walk among humans, parts of your anatomy will appear repulsive to their primitive perceptions. Be discreet. Favor the shadows. Above all, hide your head!”

  CHAPTER Ten

  Caitlin and Natalie strolled out of customs and entered the arrival terminal, wheeling their luggage behind them. Cousins Cordelia and Harry Wannamaker were waiting there for them with flapping arms, broad smiles, and earsplitting squeals.

  “Oh my! Caitlin, Natalie, how much you have grown!” Cordelia cried out as she wrapped her pudgy, freckled arms around them.

  Cordelia seemed sweet enough, and she immediately reminded Caitlin of two fruits: a pear because of her wide hips and bountiful butt, and two bananas because of the yellow polyester slacks stretched tight around her thick legs.

  Cousin Harry grabbed the girls’ suitcases. “Welcome to California, young ladies! Now, stick close to your cousin Cordelia. Everyone follow me to the car. We’ll chat on the car ride home.”

  Natalie shot an uncertain look at Caitlin that seemed to say, Is this really happening to us?

  After navigating through the crowds in the terminal and finding their car in the parking lot, Harry piled the luggage, Cordelia, and the girls into his nautical-blue Prius. He promptly hit the freeway, meticulously obeying the speed limit posted along Interstate 110.

  “Well, girls,” Cordelia said from her position riding shotgun, “Harry and I are so delighted to have you as part of our family. The first thing we shall do tomorrow is to prepare a Halloween birthday party for Caitlin.”

  The thought of Halloween and missing Jack at the grave of Lewis Carroll renewed Caitlin’s nervousness and anxiety. She took out her phone and texted Barton Sullivan.

  So much to tell you, Barton. I’m in California now. Need you 2 go 2 the grave of Lewis Carroll. Guildford. Halloween night. 10:00 p.m. sharp. Jack will be there waiting for you. Yes, Jack! I’m going 2 try 2 get back by then as well. Hopefully a morning flight. I know you don’t believe the garbage being said about me online. But do read in full detail what happened to me. I swear, it’s all true. I’ll explain tomorrow night. Jack can also explain.

  Caitlin hit “Send” and—

  THUMP!

  The Prius swerved. Caitlin jolted left, jamming against Natalie. Cousin Harry kept his cool—thank God—and quickly regained control of the vehicle as honking cars and irate drivers mouthing awful words whizzed past them.

  An object had struck the front windshield.

  “Dear Lord!” Cordelia shouted. “Did you see that?”

  Caitlin surely hadn’t. But the splat of blood and black feathers sticking to the front windshield made it abundantly clear what they’d hit.

  A black crow had slammed into the car. The suicidal bird had been blown off the windshield instantly by the blasting wind.

  Caitlin was a bit freaked.

  Harry shook his head in dismay. “That bird seemed to deliberately strike our car.”

  Cordelia turned to the back seat. “Are you girls all right?”

  “Totally fine,” Natalie said. “They estimate between fifty and a hundred million birds crash into cars each year in the United States alone.”

  Cordelia did not seem comforted by the statistics. “Well, in all our years of driving, this has never happened. And we’ve crossed this country by car on numerous occasions; haven’t we, Harry?”

  Harry was too busy watching the road to respond, obviously still frazzled.

  “How far is Los Angeles from London?” Caitlin whispered to Natalie.

  “About 5,400 miles. Why?”

  “How long would it take for a bird to fly that distance?”

  Natalie made eyes at Caitlin as though she were out of her mind. Then she said, “Assuming the average bird flies at twenty-five miles per hour, I’d estimate a hundred and eighty hours—or approximately seven days. Why? You think that drunken fowl flew here from the United Kingdom just to collide with our car on the freeway?”

  Caitlin let out an awkward laugh. “Don’t be ridiculous. Ha ha.”

  Natalie rubbed her chin. “They’re highly intelligent, you know.”

  “Who?” Caitlin asked.

  “Crows. As clever as the great apes.”

  Caitlin shifted in her seat.

  “And their brains are unusually large,” Natalie continued. “About the same size as a chimpanzee’s—relatively speaking, of course.”

  “Thank you, Natalie Geographic.”

  “And they have facial-recognition abilities.”

  “We’ve heard enough, thank you.”

  “They can remember and distinguish between individual humans.”

  “Oh. My. God! Why weren’t you born with a mute button?”

  “They’re also into anting.”

  Caitlin’s brows scrunched. “Anting?”

  Natalie smirked. “Oh, so you do want me to continue?”

  Caitlin ignored the snarky undertone. “Please answer the question. What’s anting?”

  Natalie was in her element as she babbled on. “Crows crush ants with their beaks. Then they rub the ant fluids and excretions on their bodies.”

  Caitlin’s mouth shriveled like a prune. “Disgusting!”

  “Not to crows. They love it. It’s a stimulant. Like a narcotic. It arouses ecstasy. They find it irresistible. The buzz seems to be triggered by formic acids the ants emit.”

  Caitlin plugged her ears with her hands and turned away from her sister.

  Hopefully that will shut her up.

  The rest of the car ride was uneventful—except for the part where Caitlin saw the Hollywood sign. Harry Wannamaker’s Prius soon arrived in Glendale, then wound through a hilly subdivision and pulled onto their street.

  The Wannamakers lived in a charming neighborhood and on a tree-lined street that featured single-family, Tudor-style homes and Spanish bungalows.

  When the car pulled into the driveway, cousin Cordelia hesitated before opening her door. “Don’t get out of the car just yet,” she instructed. She took out a mini, high-powered flashlight from her purse and pointed the beam through the window. Her eyes warily scanned the driveway and lawn. She was clearly searching for something.

  Natalie elbowed Caitlin, mouthing silently, Are they a bit weird?

  Caitlin shrugged to say, Possibly.

  “Cordelia, please,” Harry said, shaking his head. He turned to the girls in the back seat. “She’s paranoid. Some wolves were spotted in Northern California yesterday. First time in decades. And then someone reported seeing wolves in this area this morning. I think it’s just a coyote coming down from the Verdugo Mountains. Nothing to be worried about.”
>
  The expression on Cousin Harry’s face suddenly shifted from unruffled to skittish as the blood on the car windshield began to dribble down.

  “Everyone sit tight,” Harry said, “until Cordelia gives us the all-clear signal.”

  Black crows crashing into cars in California?

  Wolves on the prowl in Glendale?

  What could possibly be next?

  CHAPTER Eleven

  Caitlin thumbed the keys on her iPhone at speeds that seemed to defy the laws of physics. She was calculating.

  Three days left to get back to London.

  Seventy-two hours before Halloween.

  Four thousand, three hundred, and twenty minutes before her ten o’clock rendezvous with Jack at Mount Cemetery in Guildford.

  Judging by the first day at the home of her cousins, Caitlin could see that the Wannamakers were kind and decent people. They would understand. And, therefore, they would help Caitlin get back to London—pronto. She’d have a heart-to-heart talk with them right after they returned home from their Wednesday-night bowling league.

  “You sure you’re all right staying home alone?” Cordelia asked.

  Caitlin rolled her eyes. “I’ve been babysitting Natalie

  since I was twelve. Not to worry, cousin Cordelia. We’ll be fine.”

  Cordelia set her bowling-ball bag on the floor and gave Caitlin a hug. “You have my cell number if you need anything. We’re only ten minutes away. And Harry left a twenty-dollar bill on the dining-room table. In case of an emergency. And don’t go outside. There’s a wind advisory in effect. The Santa Anas are blowing in this evening.”

  As soon as Cordelia and Harry left, Natalie grabbed the TV remote and put on some PBS science and nature show featuring a gabbing scientist who promised to make the complexities of photosynthesis simple to understand. Caitlin smiled; she knew Natalie could have done a far better job of explaining.

  She then sat on a La-Z-Boy chair and opened her iPad. She spent the next few minutes checking flights back to London. She searched for the best airfares and wound up shaking her head and huffing a lot.

  How will I possibly afford the plane ticket?

  The TV volume was too loud for her to be able to concentrate, so Caitlin powered down her tablet and wandered into the kitchen. She peeked through the screen of the open window above the sink. The backyard was dark except for a few moonlit trees casting irregular shadows that seemed to be moving. The winds were picking up. Tree branches swayed boisterously. Caitlin could hear whistling through the screen. The night air was crisp and she could smell roasted firewood billowing out of some nearby chimney. She closed the window and locked it.

  The hallways were dimly lit, all the bedrooms as dark as the night. The Wannamakers were obviously frugal folks. Why waste electricity when no one was in a room? Caitlin stepped into the hallway. She was about to flip on the light when she heard a man talking to Natalie.

  What he said chilled her blood. Something about the red light wavelength and the color spectrum and her life depending upon the red-band portion of the spectrum!

  Oh my gosh—

  Caitlin grabbed a knife from the kitchen and raced into the den. Natalie was absorbed in her TV show and still flopped on the sofa. The man’s voice was coming from the TV.

  “Will you lower that volume this instant!” Caitlin shouted.

  “Chill, girl. Come watch—you’ll learn something.”

  “What was he talking about?”

  Natalie perked up and lowered the volume on the remote, apparently delighted that Caitlin was taking a shared interest in the show she was watching.

  “Actually, it’s pretty incredible,” Natalie said. “Photosynthesis and quantum biology.”

  Wasn’t that in my dream?

  “What about it?” Caitlin asked.

  “Did you know the red wavelength of light is the most efficient and powerful color for stimulating photosynthesis in plants? Life on earth depends on photosynthesis, which means the red side of the spectrum is critical for our existence.”

  How odd.

  “But that’s not the incredible part,” Natalie said.

  “What is?”

  Natalie’s eyes rolled to one side as she thought about how to answer. “How can I make this simple?” she muttered.

  Her brows furrowed in concentration. “I know—I’ll give you a riddle. Suppose you’re driving a car. You have to reach a certain destination. But the destination is at the end of this crazy, tangled maze of roads with lots of dead ends and wrong-way signs all along the way. You’ll only have enough gas to make it to your destination if you find the shortest route. If you drive into the maze blindly, the odds are totally

  against you making it to your destination because you’ll run out of gas.”

  Caitlin interjected. “What are the odds of you getting to the end of this boring riddle before you run out of gas and I run out of patience?”

  “Very funny. Now, here’s the riddle: You can make one move before driving into the maze that will guarantee you arrive at your destination. What is it?”

  “I have no idea, and I could care less.”

  “I’ll give you two hints.”

  “How ‘bout I give you two hints: one, I’m bored to tears; two, I’m bored to tears.”

  Natalie ignored the diss. “Here’s your first hint, sweet sis: it’s windy.”

  “Good, now blow away.”

  Girl Wonder persevered. “Hint two: there’s a man in a uniform standing by.”

  “I love a man in uniform,” Caitlin said. “But why not a woman in uniform?”

  “You’re stalling. You’re too scared to try to solve the riddle. In case you flunk it.”

  Caitlin made an epic Are you kidding me? face.

  “Then try it, Caity-Pie,” Natalie dared.

  “I’ll humor you. I have one move?”

  “Yep.”

  “And it’s windy. And there is a man in uniform, right?

  “Yep.”

  “Okay, twerp—the dude in the uniform is a pilot. He flies helicopters, and the spinning rotors from the copter are creating the wind. The pilot takes me up to give me one bird’s-eye view of all the routes at once. I map out the shortest one. Then he—or she—lands the helicopter. I drive into the maze and make it to my destination in record time.”

  “Impressive—I’m proud to call you my big sister.”

  “I’m, like, so flattered. Now what does photosynthesis have to do with the red side of the spectrum?”

  “I’m impressed by your curiosity as well. Okay, so photosynthesis works the same way as the riddle. It’s called quantum biology. First, the red light of the spectrum excites an electron in a leaf.”

  “The electron corresponds to the car in the riddle, right?” Caitlin interjected.

  “Affirmative. Now, there are many routes for the electron to travel to get to the part of the leaf called the reaction center; that’s where the light is converted into energy.”

  Caitlin rolled her eyes. “I graduated grade school.”

  Natalie didn’t miss a beat. “But there’s only one route that allows the electron to make it there without running out of gas—or energy—along the way. The miracle of photosynthesis is that the electron somehow chooses the shortest route every single time. And scientists could never figure

  how this was possible. Until recently. So, you wanna know how?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “Always. Ready?”

  “Like Freddy.”

  “Superposition.”

  Caitlin shrugged. “Is that word supposed to mean something to me?”

  “It means an electron is not just located in one position or one place. An electron can exist in all possible positions, in all places, all at the same time.”

  “That’s, like,
totally nuts.”

  “Indeed. It’s a freaky phenomenon, but it’s a proven fact of quantum physics.”

  Hmmm. I’d like to superposition myself right over to London.

  “Do you know what this means?” Natalie asked.

  “Enlighten me.”

  “It means an electron can travel along all the routes to the leaf’s reaction center simultaneously! So once it knows the fastest way, that becomes the de facto route that it travels. And—voila! Light is converted into energy. Plants can now produce the air that you hyperventilate on.”

  Cheap shot, twerp.

  “All thanks to the red band part of the spectrum.”

  Caitlin’s brows sharpened into points. “Superposition sort of reminds me of you. Everywhere I turn, wherever I go, you’re always there.”

  Natalie winced. That one hurt.

  Caitlin ran over to her and hugged her. “I’m sorry, Nat. I didn’t mean that.” She held her tighter. “I’m just frustrated and frightened and—”

  Ding!

  Doorbell.

  Who’d be ringing the bell at this hour of the night?

  “Pizza’s here!” Natalie shouted.

  Caitlin let her go and shouted, “Pizza? Who said you could order a pizza?”

  “I’m ravenous.”

  “Who’s paying for it?”

  “Chill, cheapskate. Our new foster parents left a twenty on the counter, remember?”

  Natalie skipped into the kitchen, grabbed the bill from the countertop, and scurried to the front door. Caitlin followed.

  Natalie opened the door. . . .

  Caitlin’s eyeballs ballooned in terror.

  It’s him!

  The intimidating man from their father’s funeral was now standing in the doorway. The man who looked like an undead pirate. Same wrung-out face, dark-rimmed eyes, and facial lines as deep as the Grand Canyon. His voluminous sway of gunmetal hair was in its own sort of superposition—scattered everywhere at once, defying even gravity. And he was wrapped in an oversize black houndstooth scarf. He stood there in the nippy night air.