Twenty Palaces: A Prequel

by Harry Connolly

  While I waited for an answer, I noticed a small pile of folded newspapers lying in the bushes beside the stairs. The top paper obscured one with the headline: "JAIL."

  With a sense of dread, I picked it up. The entire headline was "JAILBREAK!" Right beneath that word was a picture of me.

  I threw the paper deep into the bushes without reading any further. Rush hour traffic raced down the street behind me, and I pressed the call button again.

  I'd expected to hear a voice squawk at me through the little speaker, but instead the front door swung inward. Wally King stood there, wearing sweats and a bathrobe.

  "Ray!" Wally said. "This is a surprise. What's up? Did you get that jay oh bee at the copy shop?"

  I looked him straight in the eye. Wally looked different somehow, more haggard and a little wild. I'd seen that expression before, on one of Arne's crew who had been convicted of grand theft auto and was going into prison the next day. It was the look of a man who had lost interest in whatever living he had left.

  "Yeah," I said. "I did, but I'm pretty sure I'm fired already. Sorry if I made you look bad."

  "I don't give a fuck about that place. But I don't have any other job leads to give you--"

  "I'm not here about that."

  "Okay. What's up?"

  "Can I have a copy of the spell you used to cure Jon?"

  He shrugged. "Sure. Why not?" Then he turned around and walked into the building. I followed. "I guess I'm sorry I got you involved in this."

  "Mind explaining that one a little more?" We trudged up a flight of stairs. Wally stopped at the first door and fumbled with his keys.

  "When I heard you were getting out of the clink I thought you were the answer to my prayers. Stupid me. I was pretty screwed up."

  "Because Macy had dumped you."

  "Exactly." Wally opened the door and stepped inside, then held the door open for me. His place was a squalid mess. Hard tool calendars and NASCAR posters hung on the walls. The floor was littered with dirty dishes and discarded clothes. I stood in the middle of the floor and tried not to touch anything. Wally locked the door. "Who told you that?"

  Echo, when she had still been alive, had said Macy's previous boyfriend had been a charity case, and at the copy shop Oscar had made a crack about Wally stalking his ex. "I saw you standing outside the building where she worked." If Wally was the guy with the spell, Macy was the logical path for it to get to Jon.

  Wally was red-faced from the climb up the stairs. It was hard to imagine a loser like him with Macy, but stranger things had happened. Just this morning, in fact, stranger things had happened in Callin's hotel.

  "It doesn't matter, anyway," Wally said. "I hoped you were going to reverse-Yoko Jon and Macy apart so I could win her back."

  "How exactly was I supposed to break them up?"

  "By being Jon's beer buddy. Get drunk and shout at football games with him. She hates that guy stuff because of her dad or whatever." He shrugged. He seemed tired and distracted.

  This seemed to be the place where I should have said I was sorry, but there was no way I was going to say those words. "It didn't work."

  "So much for my big plan. Guess I'm no Lex Luthor."

  "What about the spell?"

  He lumbered to the stereo. "It's back here." He shifted a speaker and took out a stack of blue pages. The stack must have been at least 18 inches high.

  "Christ, that's a lot of reading."

  "It's just copies, dude. I used to work at a copy shop, remember?"

  Wally dropped the stack on the coffee table. I edged around him and began flipping through the pages.

  "Here," Wally said. He had found the place where the top copy ended and the second began, then offered it to me. "Help yourself."

  This stack of blue pages was hand-written like Callin's spell book, but it was thicker. "Thanks." I sat on the couch and pushed aside a plate holding old pizza crusts and a pair of cheese-encrusted scissors. I set the stack onto the cleared spot and began to go through it.

  Wally drummed his fingers on the remaining stack of pages and kept talking dreamily. I only half-listened.

  "It's hard to remember the guy I was a few days ago. That other me was obsessed with Macy. And stealing from the till. And making moves on customers, like the lady who brought in that book--"

  "These aren't spells." The pages I was looking at were cramped with a large, flowing handwriting, but there were no diagrams.

  Wally leaned over and glanced at the page. "That's the true, secret history of the Earth. Spells are in back."

  History bored me. I flipped through the pages until I found a large diagram, then began scanning the pages. "Is there a way to undo Jon's cure in here?"

  "That doesn't matter," Wally answered. "Listen, I'm telling you something: Woman comes in with her book, and she's not what you call hot but who am I to be choosy? I take a run at her and she shoots me down, big surprise. But she leaves a partial in the trash. It says, Cure the Lame."

  I snatched up a page. "Here it is! Cure the lame!"

  "Yeah, that's the one."

  I scanned the spell, then the spell before it and the spell after it, looking for a way to undo the curse.

  Wally droned on. "See, Macy had just broken up with me, and her whole life is helping gimps. If I could cure one of them, really and truly, that had to be worth a blow job, minimum, not just the pity sex I was getting before."

  "I can't find a way to undo the spell. Is this the whole book? Every page?"

  Wally glanced at the stack I was holding. "I think so. I stole it right from her house. She paid by check--like it's 1986 or something--so her address was right there. All I had to do was break in."

  Something in his voice broke the trance I was in. There was something wrong with him, and I'd been so focused on the pages that I'd missed it until now.

  "You shoulda seen her," Wally said, then he giggled in a high voice. "She had gone nuts."

  I put my hands on the stack of pages and looked up at him. His behavior made me feel as though he'd suddenly pulled a gun from his pocket. "What are you talking about, Wally?"

  "The not-that-hot chick," Wally said. He smiled to himself, as though enjoying a private joke. "She read the book, but she couldn't handle it. I think it broke her."

  "Can I have her name and address?" I stood so I could be on my feet if he started something I didn't like.

  The door banged open. The noise was so sudden and so loud that I jumped and yelped.

  Macy stood in the room with us. "Wally, I need--" She lifted her chin and sniffed, then turned her gaze on me. "YOU!"

  She was between me and the door, so I couldn't run from her, even if I'd wanted to try. I fumbled in my pocket for my ghost knife. I was too slow. Too slow.

  "I don't want to fight," she said. Her face was flushed and streaked with sweat as though she'd run a long way.

  "Full stomach?" I blurted out.

  "That's not funny!" Macy looked like she was about to cry. "I'm cursed!" She turned toward Wally. "You cursed me, Wally!"

  Wally shook his head. "It doesn't matter."

  "It does! Echo isn't Echo anymore."

  "She was already dead when you did the spell," I said. "There's nothing of her left. She's all creature."

  Macy wasn't interested in discussing the nuances of her condition. "Wally, you have to take it back. You have to undo it and turn me back into myself."

  Wally shrugged. He seemed bored. "It doesn't matter and I don't know how. And even if I did, I doubt I would bother, anyway. 'Don't tell anyone it came from me,' I said. Was that too much to ask for curing your new boyfriend? But now I have Ray coming around and your other friends, too--"

  "Other friends?" Macy said. "Who?"

  "You know who wants that cure."

  Macy blinked twice. She didn't seem to be thinking very clearly, but she knew what Wally was telling her.

  "And you gave it to them?" She sounded horrified.

  He shrugged again. "Why not?"<
br />
  In the blink of an eye, Macy was gone.

  Wally turned toward me, a little smile on his face. "Quick, ain't she?" he said, as though talking about a car he'd rebuilt.

  I reached into my pocket and touched the ghost knife. The page with the cure the lame spell still sat on top of the stack of pages. I knew Annalise was looking for this. Maybe if I could give her the stack--the whole stack of all the pages--it would be worth my life. She wouldn't trust me, no, but maybe she wouldn't kill me.

  "Wally, why do you keep saying it doesn't matter?"

  "Because I'm going to kill everyone," Wally said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  I blinked at him. "What did you just say?"

  Wally reached down and patted the tall stack of blue pages. "I read the book, too, Ray. I know why we're here, and it's not good. Bad shit is coming, buddy. Shit like you can't imagine. Better if we all die."

  "Wally, I think you've gone nuts, too."

  He shrugged again, still smiling like a man with a secret. "I think I've gone sane." His dead little eyes told me he was serious... and with the spell book, might even manage it. Kill everyone.

  No. I couldn't let Wally keep on the way he was, copying spells and sharing them. It wasn't just what he'd done to Jon--I could overlook that, mainly because I assumed he didn't know what he was doing any more than Jon or Macy or I did. It was that he had learned the truth and was going to be sharing spells and taking lives. I couldn't turn my back on this. I looked at Wally's shiny, smug face and I knew he had to die.

  I drew my ghost knife from my pocket.

  But he was ready for me, almost as though he expected it. He held up a compact disc with a sigil drawn on the blank side and despite myself, I glanced at it.

  My body became impossibly heavy, much too heavy for me to stand. I fell forward, hitting my head on the coffee table and slumping on the carpet. All my strength had left me and my vision was getting blurry.

  Wally took hold of my arm and rolled me onto my back. I was helpless; he could do anything at all to me, and I tried to use that fear to hold onto consciousness. I wanted to be awake and aware when I died.

  "Buddy," Wally said, "I don't blame you for trying to kill me, not at all. I would've done the same thing. Anyway, I'm leaving town in the Accord, but you can have my motorcycle. Key's in the dish."

  I couldn't hold on anymore. Consciousness left me in a sudden rush, and I did not dream.

  #

  Someone was calling my name. I opened my eyes and blinked away the blinding light. Hands helped me up, but I suddenly had the idea that Wally had changed his mind and come back to kill me.

  But that didn't make any sense. Wally wouldn't help me up if he wanted to kill me. I knelt on the carpet and rubbed my eyes. Jon knelt beside me.

  "Hey man," he said, "you all right?"

  I blinked, trying to adjust to the light. Jon's face was pale and his skin hung loose on his bones, but his eyes were bright. He looked like he'd gone crazy, too, and that that it was eating him alive.

  I had to undo that cure as soon as possible.

  "Okay," I said. "I'm okay."

  Jon helped me to my feet. I touched the sore spot where my forehead had struck the table. It didn't seem too bad.

  Payton and Echo were standing in the doorway, where Macy had stood who knows how long ago. One look at Echo's expression cleared my mind. She had already tried to kill me once today.

  "Where's Wally?" Jon said. I didn't answer right away. Had I been on the floor for a few seconds? If so, Wally was just down in the garage. If it had been longer...

  Jon stepped in front of me and looked me in the eyes. "Ray, where's Wally?"

  I realized I was still holding my ghost knife. Where they going to attack? I really needed more steeled glass. I looked through the window and saw that it was dark outside. Hadn't he talked to Macy? Wally didn't want to take off their curse. "Gone. A while ago."

  "We know that," Payton said, impatience rising in his voice.

  Jon didn't acknowledge Payton at all. "We need your help to find him."

  "My help? You tried to kill me!"

  "We didn't mean it," Jon said.

  I glanced at Echo. She was smirking slightly, and her eyes were narrow and unblinking. She meant it, all right.

  At that moment, Echo noticed the sheets of blue paper on the coffee table. The cure the lame spell sat on top of the stack. She rushed forward, snatched it up, and slipped it into her pocket.

  Shit. She was going to cast the spell again. Annalise was right; she was planning to summon more cousins. Time was running out, not just because of Echo, but because Callin's friend was on the way. I wasn't ready to see what a full-scale war of magic would look like.

  Jon was still talking. "You smelled like them. You still do. Our sense of smell is very powerful for us now. It's getting stronger all the time, and our noses confuse our eyes. Do you understand what I'm saying? Eyes take longer now."

  "And you were with them," Echo said. Her voice was steady and cold.

  I glared at her. "They were killing each other because of me."

  "Talk," Echo said. She tilted her head and looked away dismissively. "This is just talk. You have done nothing to convince me that you are on our side."

  "That's because I'm not on your side!" My temper was getting ahead of me, but I couldn't rein it in. I'd been bouncing from one dangerous situation to another for days, and the fear and stress were wearing me thin. I turned to Jon. "I'm on your side. I've always been on your side. Do you think I'd be sticking my neck out like this if you weren't all mixed up in it?"

  "I know, buddy," Jon said. "You and me."

  "Jon is one of us," Echo said. "We are family."

  I ignored her and focused on Jon. It was time I got his help. "Jon, I'm sure I can find a way to cure you."

  He blinked at me, confused. "I'm already cured."

  "I mean cure the cure."

  "What?"

  Why the hell was he giving me that look? Hadn't he come here, like Macy, because he was cursed and wanted it taken off? "Jon, that spell turned you into a killer. We have to undo it."

  He stared at me in disbelief. "You want to take away my legs? Again?"

  We stood there, looking at each other. I waited for him to take it back, call it a joke, something. He didn't.

  I waited.

  Waited.

  Neither of us spoke.

  Echo turned to Payton. "Kill him."

  In a flash, Payton crossed the room and slammed me against the wall like a tackling dummy. I already had my ghost knife in my hand, but I still wasn't fast enough. Before I could do anything, Payton took a carving knife from the pocket of his jacket and slammed it into my stomach.

  I didn't feel any pain, just a strange pressure. I could smell Payton's sweat, could see dried brown blood flecked on the collar of his jersey. There was still no pain and I realized he'd struck the tattooed part of my skin.

  He pressed harder and the knife blade snapped. He stepped back and stared at it in confusion.

  I glanced at Jon. He was alpha, he'd said, and he could call off the attack.

  But Jon just averted his eyes and looked at the floor.

  So be it. I grabbed Payton's arm with Irena's glove and the ghostly branches appeared around his head. He screamed, then twisted away from me as though he was about to collapse. With my other hand, I plunged the ghost knife into the back of his head, slicing off several crooked branches. They fell away and dissolved into smoke.

  Payton's scream stopped suddenly. He gasped and then black blood blasted onto the coffee table. His knees turned rubbery and he fell backwards to the floor. The ghost knife, still inside him, slid along the side of his skull, cutting through his hair, ear and face as he dropped.

  I jumped back, shocked and horrified. The severed top of Payton's ear bounced on the carpet and wisps of hair fluttered around it. His eyes were wide and blank, and he wasn't moving at all. He looked dead.

  Echo rushed fo
rward, kneeling beside him. She cradled his head in her lap. "Cousin!"

  Jon stood over her, then looked up at me. "What did you do to him?"

  "It--It never did that before," I said. Jon moved between me and Payton to protect the body. "I swear to God, Jon, I never thought it could do that."

  Payton's legs spasmed and his broken skull bulged and twisted. Echo whined like a grieving dog. Payton's face became more and more distorted and his bones made a sound like cracking walnut shells. I had to look away.

  The ghost knife hadn't changed; it was the same spell I'd always had. No one had switched it on me and once again there was no way to blame someone else.

  But if this was my fault, again, I had no right to close my eyes. I looked down at Payton as his skull split wide open. Spiny legs scraped free and scratched against the coffee table, knocking a black-spattered pizza box onto the carpet. A phlegm-colored worm squeezed into the air, unfurled its wings, then fell onto the floor in two pieces.

  Echo tried to scoop up the dead creature, but it dissolved into smoke and disappeared. "You killed him," she said. She raised her hands to show me they were empty. I knew she wasn't talking about Payton. "You killed him!"

  I turned to Jon. "I've used this spell before. On you, even. See?" I held up the ghost knife, hoping Jon would recognize it. He only flinched. "Jon, that never happened before--it's not supposed to happen."

  Jon backed toward the door, motioning for Echo to do the same. "You keep having these nasty accidents, don't you, Ray?" His voice was low and dangerous.

  I stepped toward them. Jon fell into a crouch, shielding Echo with his body. He stared at the ghost knife--he couldn't look away--as he herded Echo toward the door.

  "Jon... Jon, just listen to me for a moment. You saw what came out of him. That's the thing I told you about. That's what your so-called cure put inside you."

  "No," Jon said, still watching the ghost knife as if it might jump out of my hand and run at him. "Your spell did that. You put that thing in Payton and it tore him apart."

  Echo backed through the doorway. "We will be coming for you, meat."

  I had lost and she had won. Jon was hers. "You forgot," I said to her, "that you're pretending to be Echo."