“What makes you think Damien will even be in the bathroom?”
“A hunch. See you later.”
Yeah, he was having an awful lot of hunches lately. Whenever someone in the movies consistently knows things he can’t possibly know, it turns out he’s either: a magician, a god, or the Devil. I didn’t know which theory disturbed me most.
Damien was indeed in the bathroom. We eyed each other like guys do, giving looks of don’t-screw-with-me-and-I-won’t-screw-with-you, and then I proceeded to scrub the blood from my shirt at the sink. I’d never spoken to the beef bus before, so trying to come up with a proper and cool ice-breaker took some time.
“Did Morgan tell you that Ash needs your help today after school?” Well, blunt hammers do make efficient ice-breakers.
Damien took a moment to finish his black cig. After flicking it into the closest urinal with impressive aim, he aimed his eyes on me. He nodded before heading for the door.
“Wait,” I couldn’t help my stupid self. “Why help them? What’s in it for you?”
The big black yahoo paused, hand on the door. When he turned, his full attention smacked into me: eyes, head, even his body and that whole black guy intimidation shtick. It did not make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. “One of them,” he explained, “one of those frigging I-cops dissed me in front of half my crew. An eye for an eye. Old Testament.” He straightened back up and calmed down with alarming speed. “Keep it righteous, zombie.”
The blood did not come off my shirt, but I did manage to get the material wet enough to make it look like I was pouring sweat. An indignity I might have suffered had I functioning sweat glands.
Seven hours later: time for stupid stuff.
Instead of waiting to pick their kids up after school, the moms and dads (or, to be PC: step moms and step dads, or dads and dads) parked their cars and came inside, to the auditorium. Since this whole Parent-Teacher spiel had been set up with about as much forethought as a crackhead has before taking his next hit, everyone was milling around. ‘A bunch of sheep without a shepherd,’ as Lamorak put it.
Principal Steck was not in attendance, but his Iconocops certainly were. All three of them.
The Morai showed up about ten minutes into this melee. Without so much as a preamble they stepped up and started directing traffic, introducing teachers to parents. I couldn’t help but notice that all these ‘chosen’ parents happened to have students Ash had favored with his gift.
“Liven up Sanson,” Lamorak whispered as he passed by behind me, Wes Dodds trailing him, looking menacing. “Lexi is looking a smidge lost over there.”
Oh right. I was supposed to babysit the Goth chick until her dad showed up and then guide them both to Ash, who was hanging by the Camelot stairway. Maybe if he’d Mesmerized me, I’d be able to remember all his rules.
I marched over to Lexi, taking my sweet old time. On my way past one of the columns supporting the second story tier, I noticed Ava. She was sitting alone in one of the pink seats, writing in a notepad. As if they had a mind of their own, my feet switched direction and wandered over to her.
Being cursed, my mind went blank and all words were lost on me as I stood over her.
“Yes, Charlie?”
“Um,” I said. “How come you’re not with the rest of . . . you know, your people, herding the old folks around?” Your people? Jeez-oh-man what a douche.
But she laughed. Ava laughed for real. And it wasn’t one of those pity-titters either. She stopped writing and sat up straight to look at me. “Between you and me?”
“Absolutely.”
“I don’t know what Ash is up to.” She sighed. I couldn’t believe she was taking me into her confidence. I looked across the way over at Lexi. She was still alone, doing homework in between glances around for dear old dad.
“I think he wants to get inside Mythcorp,” I confessed. It was mostly true: I didn’t ‘think’, I knew.
Ava waved a dainty hand through the air. “Oh, I know that. But all this?” A wider wave to take in the entirety of the Parent-Teacher conference: “Screwing with people’s minds, messing with schedules. It doesn’t make sense. And it’s not right. He’s acting like—”
“President,” I finished for her.
“Yes,” Ava agreed. I loved her smile. She was one of those rare girls who smiles with her entire face. “He’s trying to run everything as if he were the President of frigging Mythcorp.”
We traded abrupt glances when she said this. The words seemed to have hit the bulls-eye.
I plopped down in the seat beside her and looked ahead at nothing. “Holy crap.”
“I know, right?” Ava said. “You don’t think that’s his real design here, do you?” She said it like it was a question, but there seemed little doubt to the answer. “I mean, he’s wanted to get inside Mythcorp for like ever. You know, to find out about our parents. But to reopen it? Is that even possible?”
I snorted without thinking. “Have you looked around? This is all his doing. And he’s about to meet a congressman. You know how that’s going to go.”
Ava sat up so quickly it startled me. “We have to stop him.”
“Wait, what?”
“We can’t let him open that place.” She was already marching off through the crowd in search of Ash. “Last time Mythcorp was up and running, it divided the city. And Ash as President? He’d make hunting the Iconocops who slaughtered our parents his first order of business. How could I not see this coming? What a flipping dum-dum.”
“Whoa, hold up,” I raced after her, bumping past someone. In the hallway I grabbed Ava’s shoulders. If I’d had some kind of sensation, it would no doubt have been . . . righteous.
“It’s too late.” Though I wasn’t sure that it was; I just didn’t want her to walk in on Ash and Damien and his boys dealing with the Iconocops. I wasn’t sure what was in the cylinder Nimrod had given to me and which I had given to Ash, but I doubted it was heroin or any other kind of pleasure. Besides, if she stopped the little Napoleon, I’d never get my curse lifted.
“Let go,” Ava shrugged out of my grasp.
Time for damage control.
I lunged forward, gripped both her wrists and tugged her towards me. Despite her squirming, I managed to hold her snug to my body. And then I planted a long, hard kiss on her pale lips.
“What the hell?” she pulled away and wriggled. “Let go.”
I released her and, after receiving a loud painless slap, watched her twirl around. Her long white braid batted my face as she twirled, and then she huffed down the hall—opposite the way she’d been going. I watched until she disappeared into the girls’ bathroom, safely away from Ash.
How did I feel? Vacant—and also sad. Ava was going to hate me.
I checked the auditorium. Lexi was standing between Mr. Pribeck and a man wearing a light blue suit and a severe expression. Either she was dating far out of her age range, or her father had showed and was growing impatient. I shuffled over to them. Lexi’s face brightened when she saw me, and who could blame her.
“Daddy, this is Charlie.” She wrapped a bracelet-covered arm around him.
The man in the blue suit offered me a beefy hand. “Call me Virgil.” He looked away and nodded as I took his hand. After a tense moment, his eyes landed on me with the kind of scrutiny that makes you feel like those pathetic cats in pet stores. “You’re the one with the disorder, right?”
Oh super, my favorite subject. I nodded and sighed in a vain attempt to dissuade him.
“Yeah,” Virgil Montaigne said, showing teeth. “I remember reading about you . . . what, four years ago? What was the name of that doctor on that documentary?”
He clicked his fingers as if doing so would summon the memory. “Dr. Wilmut,” I provided.
“Yeah. I remember that clip got over forty million hits. That was some impressive genetic stuff. Almost like something Mythcorp would’ve done. Is it true you don’t have a pulse?”
Lexi had been watc
hing me and squirming a bit while papa Virgil spoke. She put a finger up before me and said, “Daddy, he doesn’t want to talk about that stuff. Jeez.” She leaned over to me, favoring me with her perfume, some pungent fumy gak. “He always pries like this. ‘Information is key, Lexi’ he says.”
Virgil was back to looking impatient. “Ah,” I said, “would you like to meet Ash, Virgil?”
“Not really,” he mumbled. Lexi cast a wicked glance at him and he sighed. “Fine. Let’s go meet the boy who wants to take my daughters chastity.”
“Daddy!”
Well, this was going to be fun.
I led them through the crowd and out into the hall. It was quieter out here, and cooler, as my thermal indicated. Last thing I wanted was to have it start wailing with Mr. Wow-You-Were-Somebody-Once-Upon-A-Time hovering nearby.
About twenty feet from the corner around which Ash should be, we started hearing grunts and curses. I stepped in front of the Montaigne’s. “Um, can you two just wait here a moment? I think I need to check on something with . . . someone. Yeah. Just please, wait here.” I backed up, holding my hands in front to make sure they didn’t follow.
I rounded the corner alone. Oh man. What incredibly atrocious timing. Twenty feet away, at the foot of the Camelot stairs, Damien’s boys were grappling with George the Iconocop. Old George was giving the three muscle-heads a run for their roids. The floor was all tracked up with about a hundred black boot scuffs, and the once proud George was no longer wearing his blue and yellow Iconocop vest.
Keenan tore the sick-stick out of George’s grip and prodded him with it. The Iconocop trembled before going still.
That’s when Ash strolled down from the stairs. Agravaine and Lamorak followed him. “Ah, Charlie,” Ash said, noticing me before turning to the conscious but decidedly helpless Iconocop. “Did you find Mr. Montaigne?”
“He’s,” but I stumbled over my words, too shocked by the scene. Ash wore an expression of supreme confidence. “He’s . . . back there, waiting.”
“Ah,” he said, “excellent. Distract him for ninety seconds, please.”
Ash turned his back on me without waiting for a response. He then marched up to George, hands folded before him like always. I lingered to see what would happen. A voyeur, sure, but I also wanted to make sure the little Napoleon didn’t kill poor Georgie boy.
“Take his shades,” Ash ordered. Lamorak whipped the chem-shades from George’s face.
I cringed at the expression of abject fear the man wore. It was the look a man wears on his way to the gallows. While George tried and failed to scream, Ash thanked Damien and his boys.
I left George to suffer, heartless jerk that I am, and, swallowing my pride, I went to distract the Montaigne’s with the excuse that Ash was in the bathroom. Ninety seconds later, Ash called my name and I led the Montaigne’s around the corner.
At least the Iconocop had been dragged away and the scuff marks somehow cleaned up.
Ash gripped Virgil Montaigne’s hand with both of his and gazed up into his eyes. During the quiet that followed, I began to realize just how easy this was for Ash. It begins (for the victim) with a seemingly harmless look into the Morai eyes, an understandable action, considering the mesmerizing appearance of those blasted things. Like trying not to stare at Medusa.
I listened to Ash’s spiel about his need to meet the Mayor, and it made sense, in an out-there kind of way. Gareth had taken Lexi to the side and I could tell from his stance and gaze that he was Mesmerizing her. I swallowed an urge to grab her hand and run the other way.
But I was in too deep to quit now.
“So, Mr. Montaigne,” Ash said three minutes later “will you help us?”
Virgil nodded slowly. He swayed and I steadied him, giving Ash a dirty look. “Of course,” Mr. Montaigne said. “Mayor Hayes leaves his office at six. I’ll set something up tomorrow.”
“I was thinking we might meet him tonight. Now, in fact,” Ash said with a faint smile.
Mr. Montaigne nodded once more and took a moment. “Of course. If we leave now, we should catch him having supper. How’s that sound?”
“Dynamite. Thank you so much, Mister Montaigne.”
Ash shook his hand one last time while Gareth led Lexi over. Like one big happy family, they turned and headed down the hall. For lack of a better option, I followed.
Two police officers were heading our way. First thought: here we go, Ash’s little revolution is over before it begins.
But then everything slowed down as I realized the officers were not looking at Ash. They were looking at me.
Chapter 27
Since Izzy was still in school and I didn’t want to bring her into Vera City, I headed for the phantasmagoric world first, alone. I’d draft her at her house after recruiting Kana and Faustus.
Assuming everything went according to plan.
HUGE assumption.
The path through the baseball diamond was a muddy one, but it afforded me solitude. Well, solitude from humans; Marie and Castor were hovering around me like very bad news, and the demon Malthus was trudging along in the shadows of the trees, out of sight but most definitely not out of mind.
From the Mythcorp Trilogy I knew he was old pals with the two Mythicons I meant to recruit. I was banking on his presence persuading them to leave their duties as Wards of Vera City.
At the edge of school property, a forest line concealing a darkness I did not want to enter, I paused and glanced around, trying to pick Malthus out of the shadows.
“Will you come in with me when I enter Vera City?” I asked in a loud and shaky voice.
Rustling. A few ticks later a paper airplane zoomed out of the brush to my right and landed at my feet. I unfolded it, read: I can, but won’t. Tell them if they don’t come, Knox is dead.
I froze.
‘What are you waiting for, an armed guide?’ Castor asked. ‘Go on, Nancy pants.’
One last glance at Philicity High and then I stepped into the forest, darkness be damned. The presence of my spooks was a relief, but though they shone with their own otherworldly light, they did not guide me or provide an illuminated path.
‘Why are we going this way?’ Marie asked, dancing straight through a skinny maple.
“From the maps Izzy gave me, I’m pretty sure this forest leads into Lincoln Park, and from there it’s only a couple blocks to Vera City. I think.”
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, you little crud-muncher,’ Castor snorted. ‘It’s more like six blocks to Vera City from the other side of Lincoln Park. Plus, you go this way you’ll have to cross the old 87th Street Bridge over the Tonawanda.’ He turned to Marie. ‘What kind of a moron did we get stuck with here? Oh, that’s right—the bastard son of a moron.’
I stopped beside a birch and leaned close to Marie. After making sure that Castor wasn’t listening, I asked her, “Is he right?”
But the spook was not paying attention, which was really insulting, considering she was supposed to be haunting me. I asked her again. ‘Shh,’ she answered. ‘Do you see that? Malthus is following us. I remember him. The devil cut off his right hand and so he forged a new one.’
Ugh. No help at all.
Her Royal Highness suddenly bamfed into existence behind Castor. Like always she laid her creepy silver peepers on me, just watching. Being on the receiving end of the Evil Eye from a spook is no picnic. It makes you wish you were intangible so her look might go right through you and strike the dude standing behind you.
Thunder boomed overhead as I brooded over my spook-predicament. I hadn’t taken anything in almost ten hours, a lifetime for an addict—and for me too. I fingered a B-drop.
‘That’s right,’ Castor said, ‘turn to your drugs. That’ll make everything all peachy. Hey, here’s an idea, why don’t you take them all now and save yourself the trouble. You’re just going to end up dead on some cruddy floor somewhere anyway, yet another reeking corpse fouling the world with its stink.’
&
nbsp; “Go feed some piranhas,” I snapped. It probably sounded less snappy than I meant, since my words were not punctuated by booming thunder as I’d hoped they might be.
‘Oh, pardon me, precious, for speaking the truth,’ Castor said. ‘I should’ve known a delicate little flower like you wouldn’t be able to handle it.’ Castor glowered at me, ignoring the young pine he was gliding through. ‘I just can’t help but wonder, what’s going to happen to me when you finally do get snuffed? Will I get stuck following another retard around, or will I simply cease to exist, an ignoble end to a bitter, soul-draining afterlife?’
“God, you are so negative.”
Thunder bellowed as I sighed and trudged on. The forest canopy was thick enough to protect me from the brunt of the downpour, but I could hear the rain attacking the tree tops, like machine gun fire, trying to squeeze through and drench me. A smidge bit did make it through and the drizzle chilled me to the bones.
Twenty minutes later I crossed the wooden bridge and found myself in Lincoln Park. A kooky monument stood in the center, looking dead now in its green skin of corroded copper. I hobbled past this sad effigy. Made my way to the gates through which, only a few weeks earlier, Nimrod had deposited Ash. I paused at the very spot where the two kooks had conversed. What knowledge had the Hunter shared with Ash, what could he have said to convince the shrimp to try and reopen Mythcorp?
After waiting at the light off Beta Circle and Lincoln Park, I splashed across the street. My white shoes were now the shade of crap-stains and my socks held enough slop to water the Botanical Gardens. While waiting for a taxi to show up, I yelled at Marie over the rain.
“Where’s Vera City?”
She hesitated and for once not because she was distracted by a cute squirrel or some zipperdick she recognized from her pre-buggered days. “Come on, Marie,” I said. “You know we have to do this—
“Thanks a lot!” I screamed at the driver who’d just splashed me.
At the sound of another car approaching, I cringed. “All right, Marie, one last chance. If you don’t tell me where Vera City is right now, I’m going to pop this B-drop, and then it’s off to Limbo for you until I dry out.” I brandished the candy/drug. “Well?”
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