“Powerful ones, some of them.”
“Maybe, but it’s still only toys that have sparkle.”
“You’re doing what my father did,” she said.
She meant that Albert Lethewood had kept his vitagua exposure to a minimum. The grumbles brought disorientation and knowledge of the future. It had scared Albert, and Will could certainly sympathize with that.
But Astrid was right: Albert had never been much of a chanter. It was getting drenched in vitagua that had accelerated her development as a well wizard.
“Grumbles can’t guide you if you don’t listen,” she said.
“It’s like chatting with a lion who’s planning to eat you,” Will said.
“They’re not that hostile,” she said.
“Okay, I’ll take on a bit more.” None of this was going to happen, after all. He would be changing the past.
After removing his ring, Will drew fluid from the forest floor, letting vitagua seep into him. Cold magic filled his nose and throat. Choking, he yanked his hand back. “Alchemites are asking us for sanctuary.”
“When?” Astrid said.
“Ugh, this is awful.” He groped: “I think … now.”
Thrashing in the forest beyond the ravine, followed by a scream, interrupted them.
Clouds of wasps formed around the periphery of Bigtop. As Will watched, Astrid raised the level of vitagua in the mulch, transforming the forest floor to impassable swamp. Spotlights shone down from a dozen umbrellas hung in the forest canopy, swiveling to focus on a single point.
Mark and Jupiter appeared in the beam, marching a young woman between them. Vines bound her arms; she was barefoot and had a bad burn on one shoulder. Her clothes were tattered, her hair matted and dirty. She’d fallen in vitagua more than once: she was changing into a pigeon.
“Just a girl,” Astrid murmured. “Come on, Will—let’s follow them to the hospital. We’ll test this doppelgänger trick of mine on a stranger.”
“Okay.” He suppressed an interior shudder: he found her ringers creepy.
They trotted to Emergency, where Janet, clad in the magic cashmere sweater, was examining the girl. It was hard to be sure, because of the pigeon features altering her face, but she looked about fourteen.
“Is she carrying any chantments, Will?” Astrid asked.
Will closed his eyes, trying to sense magic, and felt nothing. Instead, he frisked her. “Just this hairbrush.”
“Can you tell what it is?”
“It let her wiggle through the growth—it’s how she got through the forest.”
An orderly glowered. “We’re treating Alchemites now?”
“Shut up, Bernie. She’s a kid,” Janet said.
The girl was staring at Astrid.
“You gonna call me the Filthwitch to my face?” Astrid asked, but her voice was gentle.
She struggled against her bonds. “They’re frying everyone, all of us.”
“You shouldn’t have tortured that fellow you captured,” Jupiter said. “Pissed ’em off.”
“That wasn’t me,” she said. “Please, there are Fyremen everywhere. Wherever we fly, they’re waiting.”
Mark laughed. “You’re asking us for protection?”
“Wait here with the medics, okay?” Astrid pulled the men aside. “What do you think? Can we help her?”
“Are you serious?” Mark said.
“One of these Alchemites must know where that padlock chantment is. They give it up, we can fix Will’s daughter.”
Will was surprised by the flare of hope. Had he given up on Astrid too soon?
“It’s risky,” Mark said. “If we give them access to town, to Bramblegate and the plaza—”
“No, we can’t just bring them here. But I want to stop the executions.”
“You don’t owe them anything, Astrid,” Mark said.
“Of course not,” Will said. “Why would she?”
“If they all come to the forest, it allows the Fyremen and Roche to focus on us.”
“If we don’t, Landon will fry them all.”
The words stirred up the memory of Caro, her fine blond hair afire, her mouth open in a scream. All for Sahara …
“Nobody’s touched our satellite bases in Europe,” Mark said.
“We’re talking thousands of Alchemites.” Astrid frowned. “They’ll have to be nearby if we’re going to protect them. We don’t want them having a lot of chantments. And they’ll be praying to Sahara.”
“I don’t want that in my face.”
“No,” Astrid agreed. “We can’t ask the volunteers to suck that up.”
The volunteers, Will thought. Not her? Something had shifted in Astrid’s feelings toward Sahara since the massacre at the courthouse.
Maybe seeing her childhood crush object use a sick old man as a human shield stripped away her last illusions.
“Astrid,” Mark said. “They’ll vamp us all and pick our bones.”
“This is a chance to stop them vamping altogether,” Astrid said. “We’ll make them forget the cantation.”
“Even if you do, they can’t stay in town,” Will said. “Mark’s right—we’d have riots.”
“I agree. We’ll set them up in the forest, close to here.”
Mark said. “Astrid, talk sense. The Alchemites hung their own asses out—”
If it doesn’t work, I can still rewrite the past, Will thought. “Didn’t you tell me there was a ghost town nearby? Cabins, running water, that kind of thing?”
“Tishvale,” Astrid said. “Good idea.”
Mark groaned. “You’ll bring the Fyremen down on us.”
“Time we should go after the Fyremen,” Will said.
Astrid shrugged. “Go after them how? Our seers can’t find ’em.…”
“Do it the old-fashioned way,” Will said. “Investigate.”
“Wow! We never thought of that,” Mark said.
“You don’t have to be sarcastic,” Astrid said.
“Will, we’ve got people going through Chief Lee’s house,” Mark said. “Scavengers are searching for the fire hall.”
“Sahara’s people might help there,” Astrid said. “They know things about the Fyremen. If we shelter them, they’ll have to tell us everything.”
“So who does what?” Will said.
“Alchemites won’t talk to me,” Astrid said.
“Will’s the negotiator,” Mark said. “Let him wheel and deal.”
“Sounds good,” Will said, ignoring his snarky tone.
“I’ll set up the ghost town,” Astrid said, and another full-grown ringer, blue in color, crawled out of the ravine. Clothes and skin grew over its nude body, and red curls spilled over its torn right ear.
Shuddering, Will focused on the Alchemite.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
WENDOVER HAD A PERPETUAL smell of spent jet fuel and scorched grass, a sere, acrid atmosphere that, along with the heat and the glare of the sun reflecting off the salt flats, made the whole place seem inhospitable, like the surface of the moon. At first, the base staff seemed to marvel at its novelty. Now that the judge had declared a mistrial—what else could he do, with seven defendants dead?—people had been going out as little as possible. They blamed the heat, but Juanita sensed something else: a feeling of impending defeat, perhaps, like the surrender of an injured animal that curls up in a patch of shade, waiting to die.
She had taken to running around the barracks and administration buildings, escaping from the desperation pervading the base while she contemplated her own diminishing options.
Gilead was on the loose, out running up his body count and playing to the press. But he hadn’t killed every Alchemite at Wendover, and once the survivors pulled themselves together, Juanita knew she would be back under their thumb.
She couldn’t handle that anymore.
Which left Astrid Lethewood and her offer of help.
Would Lethewood do any more good than Gilead? What if she was another murderous magic
ian, like Sahara? Even assuming she could protect Juanita’s family, what would she want in return?
Will Forest trusted Astrid. She had tried to release Lucius Landon.
But she too had killed someone.
She also confessed, took responsibility.
If that was true: Gilead called her a Lady of Lies.
Gilead is a homicidal maniac.
Does that make his facts wrong?
Facts? What facts? False prophets, remember?
“Corazón!” Judge Skagway’s voice broke her out of the mental tailspin. He was in his sports chair, volleying a tennis ball off the barracks wall.
She trotted to his side. “Your Honor.”
“I’ve been trying to get us out of here—you, me, the rest of the Federal Court staff. Roche is stonewalling.”
Out of here. Could it be that simple? No, Sahara would chase her in dreams no matter where she went.
“What about the trial?”
“I’d order selection of a second jury … if Roche could guarantee their security from beasts and mad wizards.”
“I’d have thought he’d want us out of here.”
“Us, maybe. Since we’d be taking Knax with us…”
Of course. On paper, Sahara wasn’t in military custody; that was why Juanita and the other marshals were here. “He doesn’t want to give her up?”
“He wants her dead.” He smashed the ball, racing to catch it on the rebound. “I told the Attorney General this could work. Told him we could try her openly—that American law could handle this magical outburst.”
“It was a good try, Your Honor, we just…”
The judge caught the whizzing tennis ball, wheeling to face her as he braked his chair, as graceful as a mountain lion. “What if we did take her out of here?”
“Pardon?”
“You’re a resourceful woman. If we transfer Sahara out, can you hang on to her without military backing?”
She was ice cold. “No.”
“If she was drugged … unconscious? Come on, Corazón, take a chance for me. I refuse to believe a bunch of cultists, however well armed, is invincible.”
“I…” the words caught. “I’ll have to think about it.”
He beamed, bathing her in that affectionate, fatherly glow she found so irresistible. “That’s all I ask.”
She bit her lips against an urge to tell him everything. Then, as temptation receded, she found she felt less burdened. Now she had to see if Lethewood could help. It wasn’t selfishness at all.
Skagway went back to his workout. With a farewell wave, Juanita jogged to the darkened, soot-walled tomb that had been the courtroom. The arch of thorns was waiting.
She put a hand past its chilly boundary, holding her breath. No wussing out now.
“Beam me up,” she murmured, and stepped through.
She found herself in the ruin of a bus or train station, amid a throng of commuters, many visibly contaminated. Hundreds of people were crossing the terminal, vanishing into a blue glow emanating from the stone columns at its edge.
Step into the light, she thought. This is crazy.
The people were cheerful and chatty, walking in pairs and clusters, calling greetings across the station, occasionally pausing for handshakes or hugs. Many carried egg-shaped rocks, and others bore stranger objects. She saw an old lady with a garish motorcycle helmet, a long-limbed, bearded fellow with a plaster gargoyle strapped to his back, a teen with a faintly glimmering paella pan.
A glassed-in TV on one side of the terminal was tuned to one of the news channels, updating a handful of viewers on the stalled trial and Gilead’s reign of terror. Her own face flashed onscreen, raising goosebumps on her arms.
Alchemized trees rose above her, cathedral tall, a branched roof of blue-tinged light.
“Welcome to Indigo Springs.” She jumped. Astrid Lethewood, the Devil herself, was at her side.
Juanita backed toward the archway, bumping against the flow of the crowd.
“That gate’s the ‘in’ door,” Astrid said. “But I can tell you how to get back to Wendover.”
Embarrassment at having shown fear sharpened her temper. “What the hell do all you people want from me?”
“You came to us.”
Juanita studied her closely. Lethewood wasn’t a tall woman, or a charismatic one, but there was something solid about her, and she seemed …
You’re going to trust her because she seems nice? That can be faked, the inner voice sneered.
Could it? All these people here, they trusted Lethewood. Could she fool them all?
I’m here for the judge, Juanita reminded herself, forcing her fists open, but what she said was: “The Alchemites are threatening my family.”
Astrid’s hand came up, and a startled titter broke from her lips. “I’m sorry, I … Wow. I should’ve picked up on that. I’m sorry, I’m not laughing. It’s like shock.”
Sorry. An apology was the last thing she was expecting.
Astrid regrouped. “We can … yes, we can protect them. Since Wendover, I’ve been making chantments for hostage situations.”
Juanita felt a rush of tears. “Too little, too late.”
“I know. But maybe not for you.” Astrid pivoted, moving in the same direction as everyone else, drawing Juanita after her. The crowd parted for them as they crossed the plaza.
“Hold on. What’s your help going to cost me?”
“We’ll call it even for you saving Sahara the other day.”
“She wouldn’t give me a dollar to save you.”
“Well, I don’t want her burnt,” Astrid said.
“That’s very forgiving.”
“Oh, I’m no saint.” Astrid’s words came weighted heavy, like stones from the heart.
“After all the trouble she caused, you don’t—”
“She dies, I die,” Astrid said.
Juanita stopped short. “Do me a favor and can the prophecies. I’m not a believer and I don’t want to hear it.”
If Astrid was offended, it didn’t show. “Okay.”
“I don’t want to be in debt to you.”
“You won’t. I’ve tried to keep Sahara from … I should have realized what she was up to.”
“You’re just saying that.”
“Okay, try this.” Astrid’s cheeks dimpled. “I’m prone to crushes on tough athletic girls.”
A champagne bubble of amusement threatened to crack Juanita’s mask. “Are you flirting with me?”
“Would you mind?”
This time she did smile. “I don’t date magicians.”
“That’s really quite wise.”
They shared a self-conscious smile, and suddenly being here didn’t feel so weird. Then a familiar face behind Astrid on the plaza broke the spell.
“Everything okay?”
“I just saw my Sunday school teacher.”
Astrid scanned the crowd. “Stella? She’s one of our science types—” She paused, wearing that trying-to-remember expression Juanita had seen before. “She’s studying the reproductive cycle of alchemized foxes.”
“How does that help whatever you’re doing here?” And what are you doing?
Astrid shrugged. “Do alchemized animals breed? What happens to their young? Sooner or later, we’ll need to know.”
“What if it’s later?”
“It’s what Stella wants to do,” Astrid said.
“Yeah? Everyone here’s doing what they want? You included?”
“I’m granting wishes,” Astrid said. “Today, that means protecting hostages.”
Juanita bit the inside of her cheek. “I should probably mention that I have a lot of relatives.”
“No problem.” They dodged around a gaggle of Japanese women dressed as stewardesses. Then Astrid led her between the cold blue columns … and out into a golden haze.
Juanita blinked against a curl of sun setting over a sea, trying to figure out which one it was. The Mediterranean? They were behind a farmhous
e that looked like it had been plucked straight out of a chick flick. As her eyes adjusted, she did a slow circle, taking in a grape arbor that ran the length of one stone wall. Ripening oranges and lemons hung from trees planted up the hillside.
Interspersed between the trees were steel sculptures, figures of welded-together metal. Juanita recognized their constituent parts—clockworks, a lawn mower blade, spark plugs. They were the sort of abstract sculpture you saw in public parks in bad neighborhoods. Largely incomprehensible, they were both inoffensive and hard to vandalize.
One piece was vaguely representational—a two-meter-high figure, male, made of steel staves. Its fists were raised in a fighting pose, and it wore silk shorts and mismatched boxing gloves. In the salad bowl that stood in for its head, a jumble of dried beans somehow evoked green eyes, blood, and brains.
A woman sat next to the statue in a rocking chair, flicking thin jolts of electricity into the statue’s navel from a crystal in her lap.
“Juanita, this is Tonia. Her son makes the sculptures.”
“Buonasera,” the woman said.
“Hi,” Juanita said. “What is this?”
“He’s a bodyguard chantment.” Astrid patted the boxer. “We tell him about people who need protection, Tonia feeds him magical power—” She pointed at the luminous chunk of stone. “If anyone attacks them, they get bopped on the nose.”
“That’s insane.”
“It works.” Astrid was gazing at the orchard with a professional eye. “Whisper a name in his ear—whoever you’re most worried about.”
Juanita stepped close to the thing. “Mamá,” she breathed.
It came out a sigh, a chorus of names, all in her own voice: Ramón, her sisters and nieces, Judge Skagway, her school friends, her last two girlfriends. Everyone she loved, caught in a single exhalation, a tremble of air that seemed to hang suspended in the boxer’s rib cage of steak knives, making this cobbled-together collection of parts the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
The statue suddenly meant as much to her as anyone she’d ever known. She wanted to enfold it in her arms, like a baby.
“Abracadabra,” Astrid said. “Your loved ones are off the Alchemite menu.”
Juanita stared at the sculpture, mesmerized. “They’re safe? You’re serious? Just like that?”
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