The Fourth Channel (Kari Hunter Series Book 1)

by Jen Kirchner

  “Stay back!” I shouted. “Don’t go past the posts!”

  The tendrils turned black. They whipped around, searching for their severed ends, slamming against the barrier walls from both sides. The sound was deafening. The walls shook. The posts groaned.

  “Oh no,” Dad said. The bubble spell enveloped me again.

  The top panel of the barrier gave way first. It rolled back like a shade toward the voodoo doll and vanished. The floor was next and was sucked up the same way. When the walls wouldn’t collapse, the tendrils bulged and latched on, sucking like mouths.

  “Do something!” I said.

  “Such as?”

  “I have no idea.”

  All four barrier walls rolled back at once. The tendrils reconnected, but they weren’t finished. Each tendril looped around a post. The outline of each post wavered and their embossed runes flared a dark light. Color drained from them, leaving translucent husks behind. The tendrils constricted. All four husks melted to the floor and hardened into plastic-like pools.

  The tendrils relaxed and returned to their previous formation, as if they had never been disturbed. The script of the voodoo spell now filled the room.

  TWENTY-SIX

  I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even move. I was too shocked to react. Grandpa had called Dad immediately and put him on speakerphone. I was numb to the retelling of how Ruairí’s voodoo spell destroyed a set of Dad’s protective posts.

  “The spell is connected to unauthorized communities all over the world. It is an elaborate web. When the communities and the spell are cut off from each other, the spell reacts. It attacked the posts from both sides.”

  “What happens if we reverse the strategy?” Luucas asked. “Put Rick Kasen inside the posts instead of the voodoo spell?”

  “There is no way to know unless we try,” Dad replied.

  “The State would need to evacuate to safety zones before we set off the power like that,” Grandpa said.

  His statement snapped me out of my stupor. Were they suggesting setting off the magic killer raw and sending it out worldwide?

  “What!?” I didn’t mean to shout, but I was angry—and scared. “No. Absolutely not. Immortals are kept alive by some very powerful magics imbued in your blood. What about the unauthorized communities?” I crossed the room and grabbed Grandpa’s hand, sharing my necromancer sight. I pointed at the gray strands. “Look at all of those voodoo tethers, Grandpa! Do we even have an estimate of how many people are stuck in these unauthorized communities? We have no idea where those people are. It would be genocide.”

  “But it would also rid the world of Ruairí,” Luucas said. “As long as he didn’t know what we were planning, he’d get caught in the magic killer. He’d never hurt anyone again.”

  I released Grandpa’s hand and whirled on Luucas. “And that makes it right? Killing hundreds of people just to nail one guy?”

  “Eliana, I know this is very difficult. I would not ask you to do it, except that you would save many lives.”

  I wished it were that simple, but refusing to kill is what makes me who I am. “No!” I shouted. “There has to be another way.”

  A phone rang. Everyone instinctively checked their cell phone, but it wasn’t from any of them. Our heads turned in the direction of the sound.

  I walked back into the bedroom area. A Bakelite rotary phone sat on a nightstand. I glanced back over my shoulder one last time, like I was checking for backup.

  My backup was standing in the doorway with unsure expressions on their faces. Dad seemed tense.

  I answered the phone. “Hello?”

  The caller shouted into my ear. “What are you doing in my house?”

  “You know what we’re doing, Ruairí.”

  Luucas shook his head and motioned to hang up the phone.

  “Do not touch that spell.”

  “Why not? So you can keep killing people?” I pushed Death Radar out as far as I could, about a half mile. Ruairí’s signal didn’t show up, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t out there. “Where are you?”

  “Is that important?”

  “Yeah. I want to make a deal.” I ignored the incredulous looks I received, and said, “If you agree to come in here and destroy the spell, we’ll leave peacefully. No fighting, no questions asked. All you have to do is take it down. What do you say?”

  The line was silent. I crossed my fingers, hoping Ruairí would go for it.

  “No.”

  I resisted the urge to kick the wall.

  “Be reasonable, Ruairí.”

  “I am being reasonable. Now leave!”

  “If you refuse to take this spell down, we’ll do it for you. Your house and all your belongings will be seized by the Immortal State. You’ll have to start your little voodoo colony all over again, somewhere far away from Mikelis. Is that what you want?” I was begging now. “Please make this easy on everyone and take that damned spell down!”

  What tenuous calm he had left dissolved. He screamed into my ear, straining his voice so much it cracked. I was so startled I almost dropped the phone.

  “I have connections everywhere! There is nowhere you or your family can go to escape me. I have devout followers in every government and society in the world. If you think what happened to your uncle was terrible... I swear his death will be a mercy compared to what I will do to you if you touch that spell.”

  I didn’t expect his words to touch me so deeply. He sounded so convinced, so sure, and so unapologetic about taking lives.

  Continuing this conversation would be pointless. He would never comply and destroy the spell. Worst of all, I knew the world would never be free until Ruairí was gone. So far, I had managed to uphold my own moral code, but I couldn’t continue if Ruairí insisted on dragging me down to his psychopathic level.

  Tonight, I needed to sacrifice the part of me that refused to kill. There was no other way to keep my family, much less anyone else, safe.

  My words choked as I fought to hold back tears. “Then it’s over, Ruairí. That spell’s coming down.”

  “I will make you regret this.”

  “No,” I assured him. “You won’t.”

  The line went dead.

  I set the receiver back in the cradle and sat down on the edge of the bed. I stared at my hands in my lap. “There’s no other way to kill that voodoo spell but to use the magic killer whole and uncontained...” I couldn’t bring myself to finish the sentence.

  “No,” Moons said. “If it helps, every Immortal State settlement has designated evacuation areas equipped with apokamara.”

  So that’s what the posts were called. Good to know.

  I looked over at him. He was standing at the end of the bed. Grandpa and Luucas were behind him, near the doorway to the room with the voodoo doll.

  “That’s oddly convenient,” I said.

  “Creating emergency areas was a suggestion from Isadora Rendon around the turn of the nineteenth century,” he replied.

  Luucas’s eyebrows lifted.

  How long had my mother been manipulating this event? No wonder she was in a deep Seer’s Coma.

  I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans and stood. “Okay, we’ll use the magic killer raw.”

  “Diaco,” Grandpa said, addressing my dad on the speakerphone. “I am issuing an executive command to evacuate the Immortal State to safe zones. The Council will ask about the situation, and you may explain it to them—but they are to tell no one else. The evacuation must be complete within the next two hours.”

  I heard Dad’s answer in stereo, on the phone and in my head. “Yes, Sir.”

  The bunker was a flurry of activity. Dad called everyone on the Council and repeated the evacuation order, then went through painstaking efforts to explain why the order was given. Luucas was trying to coordinate his territories over the phone. He excused himself to the kitchenette where he could pace and bark orders without disturbing the rest of us. Grandpa and Moons were also on their phones. Every time one o
f them would hang up, their phone would ring again.

  As soon as Dad had relocated to the evacuation zone in Marcus’s garage, he helped prepare a set of necromancer posts for the bunker. I placed them around the front living area, far away from the voodoo spell.

  Thanks to the amount of power we had added to the voodoo spell, I couldn’t even walk into that room anymore without getting sick. I was confined to the living area with nothing to do. For fifteen minutes, I sat on the couch and flipped through television channels. I ended up on a French-Canadian crime show. Everything was in French—including the theme song. I bet Rambo would love to learn a new song in French. Rambo loved to sing, even though the knife was only capable of a single note.

  Moons stepped between a set of fabric panels and saw me sitting there, remote in hand, trying to figure out the name of the show.

  “This will probably take a while longer,” he said. “You should take a nap.”

  I gave him a pained look. “I don’t think I could if I tried.”

  He came over and sat down next to me. “I could help you. Actually, it would help both of us.”

  I didn’t understand what he meant. My confusion must have shown on my face because he smiled apologetically. “I did not eat today and am feeling a little weary.”

  I felt my eyes widen in surprise. “Oh! You want to… You need… Right. I understand.”

  He held up a hand as if to apologize. “Only if you agree. I would never do this to you unwillingly; you are family, not an energy source.”

  Dad must have sensed something was off, because he paused his phone conversation long enough to check in. “Eliana, is something wrong? What is happening?”

  “We’re talking about dinner. Everything’s fine.”

  “From that freezer by the operating table? You might get tetanus. Ask Luucas to go outside and find something.”

  Luckily, I didn’t have to answer, because Dad returned to his phone call. Still, I lowered my voice just in case. “Don’t be silly, Moons. It’s not like anyone gets hurt in the process.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Right?”

  “Of course. Well, it has happened before, but not by me! I promise you will be unharmed and able to sleep.”

  I wasn’t sure how I felt about being fed upon, but I was curious about their process. I had never seen it done before. Eating is not a social activity in the immortal community because loud sounds wake up the food. All I know is that humans are an energy source for immortals. Whereas human arteries keep our blood moving, and thus keep our bodies alive, immortal blood moves on its own. But the energy the blood burns must be replenished. If it isn’t, and the blood stops moving, they die.

  “Okay,” I said. “What do I do?”

  “Just sit where you are and do not look away. The transfer process normally begins by putting the person in a trance, but it will not affect you.”

  “Why not?”

  “For some reason it does not affect your kind.”

  Was that a slight against me? I scooted away from him. “You mean necromancers?”

  “No, I mean necromancers like you. I have only known one other who could visit The Floor and make spells.”

  I threw up my hands. “So it’s true! You knew I was different and never said anything.”

  “We felt it was best for you to discover it on your own.” He shrugged. “Less pressure to perform.”

  “What happened to the other necromancer who was like me?”

  “He made us immortal, then accidentally blew himself up!”

  “How?”

  “By doing the same thing you did; he fell into a power on The Floor, but it was too much for him. Poor bastard.” He pulled me back so I was sitting next to him again. “Now sit still.”

  His expression relaxed and his eyes met mine. A string of red runes appeared to my left. I assumed it was the trance Moons spoke of, but he was right—it wasn’t working on me. A few seconds passed before I noticed Moons’s pupils morphing, stretching like putty, bending and twisting and spreading, enlarging to cover his brown irises.

  Moons’s pupils continued to spread until his eyes were orbs of black ink. The spell next to us winked out and another flashed in its place. This one worked on me. My toes and fingers tingled with numbness and pinpricks ran over my skin. My face felt aflame and my eyes dried until they hurt and I was unable to blink. Physical exhaustion swept through me. I wavered but didn’t look away. Moons reached out and caught me under my arms and steadied me, but did not break his gaze. I felt my energy draining. My vision grew dim. My heart was so slow...

  Dad started screaming something through the telepathic link, but I was so foggy I couldn’t understand what he was saying. It didn’t sound like fear, just anger. I dimly noticed he was casting a spell through me.

  Moons yelped and closed his eyes. My head fell against his chest. I was so tired I couldn’t even move my limbs. I heard him grumble something. I think it was directed at my dad. He set me down against the cushions, then stood and swung my legs up so I was lying down. I felt a soft blanket covering me. I heard Grandpa’s comforting voice nearby, and I gave in to an exhausted sleep.

  The phrase “mandatory evacuation” caught my attention, but I didn’t recognize the speaker’s voice. I opened my eyes.

  I was snuggled beneath a soft, fleece blanket on psychopathic killer Ruairí O’Bryne’s couch in his bizarre living room, next to his deranged trophy wall. The television was still on, though someone had turned it to the Immortal Cable News station.

  The anchorwoman struck the perfect balance between immortal frugality and conservative chic, wearing a black blazer with a red cami peeking out. The only jewelry she wore was a pair of small pearl earrings. No lipstick, just the sheen of gloss on her lips. Behind her was a faded brick wall. My necromancer sight was deadened by the cameras, so I couldn’t tell her name, age, or cause of death, but a blue band at the bottom of the screen read “Alejandra Calderón.” Below that, it read in bold letters, “STATE EVACUATION IN PROGRESS—first evacuation command from The Fathers since World War II.”

  “As you can see,” she said, gesturing at the brick behind her, “we are broadcasting from our own safe zone, number eighty-seven. There is still no word as to the reason behind the evacuation. The Council has been holding special emergency meetings and has refused to comment on the matter.” She shuffled a stack of white papers before her and flashed a smile. “In a moment, we will go live to safe zone thirty-four in Rochester, New York, where Immortal News One correspondent Gabrielle Jacob has flown in and will get to the bottom of this.”

  She shuffled the papers again. “In other news, the State Education Program, which is the brainchild of founding Father Montuhirkopshef Bacon Newton Celcius Réard Brando, will be adding courses to its curriculum to ensure Immortals are not left behind in the computer age. Classes are mandatory for the entire State and will include basic typing proficiency, using various office suites, and surfing the Internet.”

  I pushed off the blanket and sat up. Immortals are flying around the continent? How long had I been out? I looked around the room. I was alone in the living area. The black posts were fully formed, blocking Death Radar from going beyond. I shouted for Luucas.

  “How long was I asleep? Did you know that Immortal News One is flying around the continent instead of staying in their safe zone?”

  Luucas appeared in the opening between panels. He had dark circles under his eyes and his hair was sticking straight out in every direction, as if he had been trying to rip it out. I pointed at the television.

  The picture was gritty and pixelated, but I could see Marcus’s garage. It was packed with bodies. The camera followed a tall woman with long, blonde hair, clad in a blue jacket with a yellow Immortal News One logo. The camera captured Dad standing away from the crowd against a wall. He was on his phone. Mom was dead asleep on a cot next to him. The reporter stopped when she saw them, but decided not to approach. She turned left and darted through the crowd. The camera foll
owed, hot on her heels.

  “We’re at the safe zone in Rochester, New York, trying to find out what is happening. As we reported earlier, The Fathers flew here two days ago, and Councilman Rendon and his wife followed shortly thereafter. Since then, we’ve learned that a new fourth-channeler has been discovered. Could this evacuation be the result of one bloodthirsty necromancer?” She ducked around a group of people. I saw Mikelis off in a corner by one of the black posts, talking to Heraclitus. The reporter went straight over and stepped between them.

  “Mikelis Priedis!” She turned and gave the camera a nervous smile. “How do you feel about the evacuation?” She jammed the microphone in his face. His blue eyes narrowed at her, then at the camera. Her smile wavered. She pulled the microphone back. “How do you feel about this report of a new necromancer? Do you think you’ll make the first move or wait for her to come to you?” She stuck the microphone back in his face.

  “I think my knives are a little rusty and could use some practice.”

  The reporters eyes widened. The picture immediately cut to a commercial for Tilene toothpaste.

  I looked up at Luucas. “I don’t mean to complain, but the longer we wait, the more we risk Ruairí catching on to our plan.”

  “I know,” he barked. He grabbed his phone from his pocket and stormed out of the room.

  Ten minutes later, Luucas, Grandpa, and Moons returned and announced that we were finally ready. I stood and walked out of the room, stepping through the barrier of the posts.

  Dad was waiting for me on the ramp, just outside the barrier for the Rochester community. The tall, gray wall obscured the group on the other side, though I heard their voices in a dull roar.

  “Are you ready, Dad?”

  “Yes,” he grumbled.

  “I’m sorry about the Council—they sounded furious when you told them about... well, everything.”

  I thought the Council would be happy to hear that the end of Ruairí O’Bryne and the unauthorized communities was nigh, but they weren’t. They were too distracted by the news of the necromancer my parents had raised in secrecy.