by Tanya Huff
“I’m sure. But there will be questions.”
“Not our problem, now they’ll call health services.”
“And they are—specifically?”
“Good question. You okay? I mean you did some power stuff there.”
“Very little. I’m fine.” She sounded tired, but he wasn’t going to argue. Tony didn’t know how it worked on the wizard’s world, but on this one I’m fine meant any injuries short of decapitation weren’t to be discussed. “You?”
“I got bit,” he said as the light changed.
“No surprise. It wasn’t a fun experience for poor Shania. Or the shadow. It must have thought the dog was a perfect host; four legs against two, we’d never catch it. But the dog didn’t have quite enough sense of self to sustain it.”
“I was going to ask.”
“I know.”
“And,” he added, his leg throbbing as he remembered, “I got kicked.”
“Why?”
“They were aiming at the dog. Where are we going again?”
“Tsawassen. Near the border.”
“Right.” He headed up the ramp off Westminster and onto 99 South. “So the people are going to be okay? I mean, the shadow wasn’t in any of them for very long.”
“The one boy may not recover.”
“What?” Tony fought the car back onto pavement as his jerk toward the wizard put the right wheels on the shoulder.
“The second boy, the older boy, was twisted—his pattern wasn’t compatible. I doubt the potion will be enough.”
“Can’t you do something?”
“Like what?”
His fingers tightened around the steering wheel. “I don’t know; untwist him.”
“No.”
“Fuck.”
“This isn’t all bright lights and vodka, Tony.” He would have protested he knew that, but the memories weighing down her voice kept him silent. “Stopping the Shadowlord is about stopping death and destruction. Only two dead and one injured; we’ve been very lucky so far.”
He supposed that was hard to argue with. They were twelve kilometers down the highway before he tried. “If we’d waited for Ben to come to the gate, this never would have happened.”
“But if he’d gotten through the gate, if he’d given the Shadowlord the information he needs to invade, it would start happening with a soul-destroying frequency.” After a long moment she sighed and said, “All the easy answers get lost in the shadows.”
They reached the South Delta Baptist Church at 8:10. Tony parked in the nearly empty lot, twisted around, and dragged his backpack out from between Ben’s legs. “It’s past sunset,” he told the wizard, nodding west to where the sky had turned a thousand shades of orange and yellow and pink. “I need to call Henry.”
“The Nightwalker cannot help us now.”
Oh, great. Serious lackage of contractions. What’s up her nose? The larger part of the drive south had been accomplished while listening to The Best of Queen, Vol. 1 because it was the only tape in the car. Arra’s eyes had been closed, so Tony’d assumed she’d been napping. Maybe she had. Given her history, the odds were good she hadn’t been dreaming about Mel Gibson.
“Henry’s helped in the past,” Tony pointed out, punching in the number one-handed. “And he’ll be helping later, so if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll keep him in . . . Henry!” Henry could do both Prince of Darkness and Prince of Man over the phone, but tonight he sounded like neither. Talk about locking the garage after the car’s been stolen . . . After making arrangements to meet at Arra’s at 9:30, Tony hung up to find the wizard staring out the window at the collection of red brick buildings.
“That’s a large facility,” she said before he could speak. “It won’t be easy finding the shadow.”
“We’ll split up . . .”
“Oh, yes, that always works so well.” Her hands closed around her seat belt strap though she made no move to release it. “It won’t always be so easy.”
“Easy?” He waved the dog bite, now purple and swollen, in front of her. “And I’ve been grabbed, pummeled, kicked, shadowed . . .” Words seemed less than capable of describing what had happened with Henry, so he skipped it. “Two people are dead, one’s twisted, Mouse has a broken jaw, Lee thinks he’s going bugfuck, we have an enchanted electrician in the backseat, I’ve been living most of the last few days in a state of high terror, and you say it’s been easy?”
“Yes. So far, it’s been easy.” She turned to face him. “Even on you. Realize that it’s going to get a lot worse. The longer the shadow remains in a body, the more of the host’s characteristics it absorbs—it stops acting and starts becoming. Humanity didn’t become the dominant species on this world by playing nice. The shadow in Alan Wu chose to attack. His shadow . . .” She jerked her head toward the backseat. “. . . chose to run.” Her voice roughened. “There are other more terrible options.”
Tony stared at her for a long moment then pulled out the thermos holding the lesser amount of potion. “Drink?”
“Why the hell not.” There was just enough remaining to fill the cup. She drained it in one long swallow. Tony’s eyes watered in sympathy.
“Feeling better?”
“No. Now I’ve got to piss.”
Too early for air-conditioning, too warm for heat, the air inside the church still had a filtered feel in the back of Tony’s throat. It smelled of cleansers—although not as overwhelmingly as Arra’s co-op—and faintly of aftershave and perfume. “I don’t like leaving Ben in the car.”
“He won’t wake up until I tell him to.”
“So remember to save enough power to play alarm clock.”
“I know what I’m doing, Tony.”
“I’m just saying . . .”
“I know what you’re saying. Stop it.”
He shrugged and stepped away from the women’s washroom. Right inside the west doors, it hadn’t been hard to find. “I’ll wait here.”
“Fine.” One hand against the wall, Arra disappeared from view.
It was obvious she still hadn’t recovered from her reckless use of power. No, not reckless, Tony amended, leaning against the wall. Thoughtless. As in, she didn’t think about it. Her reaction to being touched by the shadow had been essentially hysterical. Run and react; no thought for the consequences. And physical exhaustion often led to emotional exhaustion—thus the doom and gloom announcement in the car.
It all made sense.
They were winning. They had to be winning.
He tensed as voices sounded in the distance, but they headed in another direction and he relaxed again. And then he frowned. Was Arra taking longer than she should? Definitely longer than a guy would. How long did women take? He couldn’t shake the feeling that she might have done a bunk and climbed out the window. Be halfway to Seattle and a new identity by now.
With a glance around the hall to make sure he wasn’t observed, he pushed the door open a crack and heard, “You!” followed by a familiar string of nonsense syllables, and a soft sputz.
“Arra?”
“Better get in here with that potion.”
He took two steps farther into the washroom and peered around a cinder-block corner. Women’s washrooms definitely smelled better than men’s. Arra was at a line of stainless steel sinks washing her hands. Lying stretched out on the floor was one of the girls from the catering company.
“Shadow-held?”
Arra snorted. “Not anymore.”
“We forgot about the caterers when we made the list.” Dropping to the floor, he lifted her head up against his leg. “They must’ve been setting up for lunch.”
“Lunch.” Red-rimmed eyes snapped open. “Do we always have to have lasagna? I am so tired of making lasagna!”
“Hey, it’s okay.” The potion sparkled as it dribbled between her lips.
She swallowed, looked up at him and said, “Three kinds of cookies are quite enough. There’s cake.” Another half a dozen small swallows
. “Fifteen hundred bottles of water a month.”
“That’s a lot of water.”
Her brows drew in as she finished the last of the potion in the cup. “Who the hell are you?”
Before Tony could tell her, Arra muttered, “Sleep.” And her eyes closed.
“Why did you do that?”
“Easier than explanations. Also . . .” Stepping away from the sink, she indicated that Tony should pick the snoring young woman up. “. . . easier transport.”
“So, easier?” He swung the girl up into his arms. Grunted, shifted her weight, and headed for the bathroom door. “I thought you said it was going to get terrible?”
Arra snorted, as she retrieved the backpack. “I’ve only been on this world for seven years, but even I know that if a young man gets caught carrying an unconscious young woman from the ladies’ room in a Baptist church, terrible will be an understatement.”
She had a point.
“What’s with the ‘you’?”
Arra twisted around from checking on their two passengers and frowned toward Tony. “The what?”
“Every time a shadow sees you, it says ‘you!’ in exactly the same way.”
She shrugged. “The shadows are all cast by a single source; this makes their reactions less than original.”
“Makes sense.”
“Thank you.”
Ouch. Sarcasm that cut. “In the dream I had, the shadow didn’t want to go back to the Shadowlord; it didn’t want to lose its sense of self.”
“So?”
His turn to shrug; his shadow, dark against the pale upholstery, shrugging with him. “So maybe we can reason with them.”
“Reason with them?” She sounded surprised.
No, he decided, pulling out to pass a line of Sunday drivers heading home to the city, surprise wasn’t quite enough. Astonished.
“They’re still evil, Tony, even if they’re only bits of evil. And you don’t reason with evil!”
“Granted. But you can, you know, reform it. During the war on your world, didn’t anyone ever try to . . . ?”
“No!”
“Why . . .”
“Because that’s not the way it works!”
Rolling his eyes, he tried again. Old people often had trouble with new ideas. “But . . .”
“If you want to meet your Nightwalker at 9:30, you’d best concentrate more on driving and less on suggesting perversions!”
She had a point although perversions seemed a little harsh. “It’s just . . .”
“When I said concentrate less, I meant not at all!”
Right.
“Arra, you don’t have to go with us tonight. We’ve got the potion; Henry and I can handle things at the studio. There’s only the one shadow left.”
Eyes locked on the spider solitaire game, Arra grunted something that might have been good. Or sure. Or get stuffed, were “get stuffed” only a single syllable long.
“You can move that black jack.”
From her tea cozy position on the dining room table, Zazu hissed at him.
“Or not.”
The wizard’s concentration on the game—games, since she was running one on each computer—was a little disturbing.
They’d dropped Ben and the caterer off two blocks from Ben’s condo since neither of them knew anything about the girl and she was carrying no ID. Arra had woken them and then they’d driven off before they were noticed.
“Oh, crap. Their cars. We left their cars behind; no way they got that far south walking.”
“It’s a minor point.”
“Not to them, it won’t be.”
“They have a forty-eight-hour hole in their memories. I think it will be.”
Put like that, Tony’d admitted she had a point.
She’d been pretty quiet the rest of the way to the co-op, and had said next to nothing while she made a new batch of potion. Too busy eating the burger and fries he’d picked up to worry about the silence, Tony hadn’t really noticed something was wrong until she’d capped the second thermos and headed straight for her computers.
And essentially disappeared.
Scratch a little disturbing. It was definitely freaking him out.
He swung his backpack up onto one shoulder, taking what comfort he could from the familiar feel of the thermoses smacking him in the kidneys just above one of the bruises Mouse had left him. “I’ll just meet Henry out front.”
This time, not even a grunt. One game ended. She started a new game immediately.
“I’ll see you tomorrow morning at work.”
“Tony.”
He paused and turned to face her again.
“Remember that the gate works both ways. You have to stop the shadows returning to him, but you also have to make sure nothing worse comes through.”
All of a sudden the lines of electronic playing cards took on a new menace. “Is that what you’re looking for? Something worse?”
“I don’t know.”
“Something worse,” Tony muttered moving the lamp into place. “Way to be specific.”
“Let it go.”
“How?”
Henry wisely decided not to answer. “The gate’s about to open.”
They were alone in the soundstage. The gate opened and closed and they were still alone. Wherever—whoever—the last shadow was, it wasn’t going home. Not yet. Tony had no idea what the hell he was going to do tomorrow morning. Not going to be as simple as turning on a light, he acknowledged, his hands shaking as he rolled up the cable.
“Are you all right?”
“Sure. Fine.” He’d never felt the pull of the gate so strongly. Had actually found himself stepping toward it, his body practically vibrating with need. New call, familiar feeling. Only a white-knuckled grip on the sound board had held him in place. Not moving—not answering—hurt.
“This shadow-taint of yours; did the wizard mention how we can remove it?”
“No, because that would require a lack of ambiguity.” Cables stowed, he straightened. “Just takes time, I guess.”
In the dim glow of the emergency light, he saw Henry frown. “It seems stronger than it was.”
“Seems stronger or is stronger.”
The vampire shrugged.
“Okay, then, let’s not worry about it.” Plastering on a fake smile, Tony added shadow-taint getting stronger to his list of things to worry about. Right under something worse and more terrible options.
He briefly considered adding finds dark comforting to the list but comforting wasn’t quite the right word. Walking back to the rear doors, he felt hidden, safe, and hyperconscious of the man walking at his side—but then Henry’d been on his list for a few days now.
The circle of light on the back wall announced trouble of a different sort.
Crap. Security.
They hadn’t been seen yet, but they were seconds away from discovery.
Grabbing Henry’s arm, Tony threw him against the wall, hooked a leg between his, and locked their bodies together at mouth, chest, and groin—realizing too late that Henry might not understand the game.
Fortunately, Henry seemed willing to play regardless.
“Hey! You there! Break it up!”
Pulling away, Tony turned, faked surprise at the sight of the rent-a-cop, and murmured, “Wait here, babe.” As red-gold brows flicked up, he turned and stepped forward, launching into a low-voiced and urgent, “this is who I am and I’m trying to impress this guy with the whole working in television thing.”
The security guard rolled his eyes but allowed that he understood a guy doing what a guy had to do to get laid. “Just don’t fucking do it here!”
“We’re on our way out.”
“Good.” He’d clearly already dismissed them and was anxious to move on. He had a script waiting, after all. “Lock up behind you.”
Henry said nothing until the door was closed and locked, then he smiled, his teeth too white in the darkness. “Very clever.”
> “Thanks.” Tony just barely managed to resist the urge to wipe his mouth. He’d kissed Henry a thousand times, but this was the first time he’d tasted blood. Kate’s blood, Tina’s blood, his blood . . . older blood.
He knew it was all in his head.
It was nothing but . . . shadow-stuff.
The shadows had surrounded her, a ring of darkness she couldn’t break. Trapped. No escape. If she banished one, the others would attack. She drew herself up to her full height and began to gather power, determined to make them pay as high a cost as possible for their victory.
As they moved closer, she could hear their voices in her head.
Help us.
Don’t let him destroy us.
Help us.
We want to live.
Help us.
We need you.
“So I’m to be responsible for your lives as well?”
In answer, faces began to flicker around the circle. Lee. Mouse. Kate. Ben. Tony . . .
. . . Kiril, Sarn—eyes bulging, tongues protruding as they were nailed to the boards—Haryain, heavy white brows raised above his glasses.
“What’s your damage?” he asked in another’s voice. “You knew the job was dangerous when you took it.”
“This . . .” She waved a hand around the circle, the shadows bending toward the gesture. “. . . isn’t my job. I won’t let it be my job.”
Haryain snorted. “Who says you get a choice?”
Arra jerked awake. Squinting up at the pair of monitors, she reached for her mouse with one hand while wiping away drool with the other. There was always a choice.
There was always another gate.
Fourteen
“ SO HOW’D the date go?”
“Date?”
“With Zev? Friday night? I was going to call you, but I had a busy weekend.” Amy laid a salacious emphasis on busy and waggled her eyebrows in Tony’s general direction.
“Barry?”
She punched his shoulder. “Brian! Dipwad. Now tell.” Setting her extra-grande mochaccino on the corner of her desk, she dropped into the chair and grinned up at him. “Mama wants all the gory details. Make this Monday morning worth her while.”