He nodded and roared off, not even waiting for me to walk up to the front door. Not that I’d expected him to. Carlos might feel he owed me something for saving him, but I was taking on something big, something that had already almost consumed him. Staying would do no good for either of us. He’d help when I needed it, and I’d do the same, and we would be allies as need be, but this was as far as he could go tonight. I could live with that.
I knocked. I rang the doorbell. No one answered.
I walked around the outside of the house, stopping by the French doors to peer into the dining room. The inside of the house was mostly dark, lit only by stray electronic lights from clocks and appliances — microwave in the kitchen, DVD or Blu-Ray player in the living room, another couple standby lights that I couldn’t identify without getting closer. No motion, no sound, no people.
All the doors had deadbolts, but I wanted to get in and look around. He’d probably avoided electronic locks just to make my life more difficult.
No, that was giving him too much credit. Or was it? He knew I was a witch, knew I worked with revenge magic, knew how to target me to hurt me the most. Was it too much of a stretch to think that he knew I preferred to use technology for my magic?
On the other hand, if he did, then he almost certainly didn’t have an electronic security system. I held my hand an inch above the door handle and sent a pulse that went nowhere. The doors weren’t connected to anything. Nor was there the telltale red light to either side indicating a photodetector watching for me to interrupt its path.
Time for me to become a felon. I could’ve broken the windows and reached through to open the deadbolt from the inside, but neighbors might notice the sounds of breaking glass. I pulsed the deadbolt again, slowly this time, building up an image of the pins inside. Then I took a deep breath and started applying more directed current, urging magnetic flow to move tumblers up and down. I’d never win any contests for speed in lockpicking, but finally the last pin clicked into place. The door swung open.
I nudged the door further open with my foot. If this night went as badly as I thought it could, I didn’t want my fingerprints on Clay’s door. Even if this wasn’t where his body wound up.
The house echoed with the faint prickle of a place often used by a witch along with an empty feeling of abandonment. No one was home, and the air was stale enough to assume that Clay had not been home for a couple of days — probably at least since Friday. Just to be certain, though, I walked through all the rooms, upstairs and down. No one.
A nook off to one side of Clay’s bedroom had shelves filled with hand-written notebooks and old leather-bound volumes that looked like they would fall apart if I touched them. The top shelf was filled with books that made my flesh creep just to look at them, the same way the hex on the paper had. I couldn’t do anything about these right now, but after I dealt with Clay, I was going to have to come back and spirit these away — some to be destroyed, some to be studied — at least the ones that didn’t make me freak out with the thought of even touching them.
First, though, I had to find Clay and Beth.
I leaned against the wall in the hallway, out of sight of the bookshelves, and racked my brain to think of where else to find them. Where had Beth said they’d gone the other day? Right, she hadn’t. Thought it was fun to be a big tease about it, and I hadn’t wanted to play. Neither of us knew it might be important to keeping her alive.
My head drooped. Okay, what did I know? It was an incomplete building, probably one Clay was an architect for — and Beth had texted me the picture. I pulled my phone from my pocket, dropping it on the carpeted floor in my eagerness. Yes, there, the photo, and all of its metadata that Beth never worried about concealing, including the GPS coordinates. Copy and paste those into my mapping app, and I was in business again.
Now all I had to do was get there, which meant hiking to the nearest T stop. I didn’t want any bus drivers remembering picking me up anywhere near this place.
My phone rang when I was almost to the T stop. New phone, hadn't had the chance to double-check my ringtones, I had no idea who it was. So even though I was a day and a half behind Beth’s kidnapper, I stopped to see who was calling.
Matt’s name came up on the display, and my chest seized. Had something happened to the twins?
“What happened?”
“That's what I was going to ask you,” he snapped. “It's been hours, and I've heard nothing. Did you find her? And when are you coming home?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. I did not need this. “If I'd found her, I would have told you. Instead, I've been to the Cape and back, I'm going to have to pay for repairs to your parents’ car, another witch tried to kill me—”
He seized on the most trivial of these. “What did you do to their car?”
“A, I didn't do anything, and B, my use of that car is between me and them, not you.”
“Did you seriously just tell me my parents are none of my business?”
That wasn't what I'd said, but it was what he was going to hear. “Look, I have one final place to check before I give up tonight. Get some sleep. We can talk about this later.”
“It's always later with you, isn't it?” But he hung up.
I stared at the phone a moment longer before muting it and shoving it back in my pocket. I didn't want my phone warning Clay if anyone else had the bright idea to call me.
Inside the T, I stopped to stare at the map like a tourist, trying to figure out the best way to get where I wanted to go, comparing it with what the app on my phone showed.
“You seem lost.”
I flicked my eyes at the troll who was studying me, rather than the map. “I'm not lost. I know where I am.”
“Do you?” He seemed amused, with that low rocky rumble underlying his words.
Ignoring any other meaning to his words, I laid my finger on the map. “Right here. It says so.” I dropped my hand to my side. “I don't know how to get where I want or what I'm going to find when I get there.”
“More than you want, less than you need.” This time, the rumbling was lower pitched, felt in my bones, not something I was meant to hear. If anyone else noticed it, they likely passed it off as vibration from the trains. “Some of the holes are smaller now. Thank you.” Another bone-deep tone, an echo from farther away, coming closer. “We will help you.”
As if in response to his words, the section of the wall next to the map slid away. I say slid, but I have no idea how it moved — one moment, the wall was there and solid next to me, and the next, a door gaped open to reveal two more trolls, shaggy and brown, but clearly individuals, one with a hint of russet to the hair, the other shorter and thinner than both the others.
“Your guides,” he said. “I will tell your friends where to seek you.”
“How do you know where?”
His finger tapped the phone in my left hand.
“Oh.” I flushed. “I thought maybe there was some other hole that you were going to take me to.”
“There are many holes,” the one with the russet hair said. This one’s voice sounded more like the echoes in a watery cave. “The place Iárn points us to has no holes yet, but is in the pattern of where the holes have formed.”
The other spoke one word in a voice of sliding scree. “Yet.”
I understood that. Patterns are important — I’d used that against Dorothy not two hours past. The trolls were telling me that this place I was looking for fit into some pattern they could see within the earth, though I might not perceive it looking at a Boston map. Hopefully, that meant I was going to the right place.
And they were willing to take me directly there, which beat taking the T to the nearest stop and walking.
As for Iárn — the first troll? — telling them where to take me, I assumed that was done when he called the other trolls, with that subsonic reverberation. Pretty sure that no matter how changed I was, I wasn’t going to learn to speak troll. As tonal languages went, Mandar
in seemed simple in comparison. Or at least manageable by human vocal cords.
“Let’s go.” I stepped forward.
Iárn stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. “You may find this unsettling. We apologize.”
The wall closed behind me, sealing me into the dark. Not an unnatural blackness like the patron had struck out at me with, but more claustrophobic, as I knew that I was surrounded by rock, unable to even go back to the T stop where I had been without the help of these creatures I couldn’t even see. I breathed slowly, forcing myself not to panic and hyperventilate.
The area around me couldn’t be large — sound was deadened, with even the whisper of my breathing and the rustle of my clothing muffled. No echoes, no sharp reflections. That fit with the opening I had seen, but I presumed the tunnel stretched out in the direction I was facing — had been facing before I stepped in, anyway.
“Calm,” said the gravelly scree, and a hand gently closed around my right forearm, grounding me.
I breathed in the scent of minerals and warmth, trying to do as directed. Their magic, the sense of stability and belonging, helped. “I think I’m okay.” My voice was shakier than I liked, but I kept talking. “I’m ready.”
A hand gripped my other arm, and I had the unsettling feeling of being moved with no reference points to tell where or how fast or far, just air brushing my skin, hair being pulled back by our passage, and a spike of excitement as if I were at the top of a roller coaster plunging down into the dark. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been on a roller coaster, but it gave me something to focus on now — a fun sensation, something I’d done before and would do again, rather than fear of rushing blindly in the dark, unseen and lost.
We stopped, and the wall in front of me opened, displaying a street. We were under a bridge, and it looked as if we were in one of the support pillars rather than the support wall that I would have expected.
The russet-haired one pointed to a building under construction to the left. A crane sat next to it, and two sides of the building were still wrapped in fabric to prevent falling debris, but the building appeared almost complete. Floodlights lit the whole site, from the roof to the sidewalk. He was definitely going to see me coming.
“Thank you.”
They rumbled an acknowledgment, and the pillar closed behind me, leaving no evidence that there had ever been an opening.
Now all I had to do was get to the roof.
Chapter 35
First, of course, I had to get into the site — past the chained gate — and into the building. I was getting quite the education in breaking and entering tonight. The gate was easy; there was enough give to allow me to slip between the two halves of the gate. That was sloppy — if I could get in, kids or homeless or drug addicts could, too. Guards or dogs would help prevent that, but there was no one around.
Why would there be? Clay didn’t want witnesses.
The building wasn’t locked. “Come into my parlor,” I murmured.
I pressed the button for the elevator and waited. The engine starting echoed up and down the empty building, though not as much as if the walls weren’t there. This was entirely too easy — Clay wanted me here.
My arms tingled, and heat flushed through me. I spun slowly, trying to pinpoint where Haris was. He walked through the front doors as casually as though the building were open for business.
I tried to keep my tone nonchalant. “Fancy meeting you here.”
He carried off nonchalance much better. “I heard you were off to do something foolhardy by yourself again.”
I couldn’t exactly deny it. I shrugged. “It’s got to be done.”
He shook his head and put out his hand. “Give me your phone. The least I can do is give you my number so you can reach me yourself next time.”
He could’ve done that before. Well, not when I fried my phone, obviously, but when we met up last Tuesday without a crisis and he walked me home, or on Thursday — although he had just walked off then, so maybe not.
His eyebrows lifted. I waited, but there was no hint of his dimple. Serious, then, just waiting.
He said, “I told you why I left.”
I handed over the phone. He had told me, and I needed to keep moving. I trusted him.
Behind me, the elevator doors opened. It was time to go.
We rode the elevator up in silence. My thoughts were running in circles, wondering what was happening to Beth, what had already happened, what shape she was going to be in. To keep me on my toes, thoughts of Clay would interrupt me, asking why he was doing this and what he was going to do when the doors opened. The hate and rage were personal, but I didn't know why.
Beside me, cloth rasped as Haris shifted position, and currents shot up my arms in response. We still didn't speak. What was there to say? We were walking into a trap, me hoping to save my best friend, him just being there for me. As we climbed, we could feel the trap building around us, the greasy black coils of hate boxing us in, not touching us but surely enclosing us.
The elevator slowed, the bell dinged, the door opened. We were on the top floor, so not at the rooftop yet. The malevolence here was as strong as in the last garage, and my stomach roiled. The hate — the patron — would be stronger still above us, and I had no idea how we were going to stand against it.
My hand shook a little as I reached for the door to the roof access. If Haris noticed, he didn't say anything.
The walls inside, rather than the usual industrial stucco, were covered in custom ceramic tiles — custom because there was no way anyone was mass manufacturing tiles printed with hexes of hatred. Purple and black lines coiled up the stairs, with scant space left for us to walk. I had no doubt they would close in behind us. Clay had been planning this for months, perhaps years, and I had no clue why.
I walked into that nest of hate. My energy flagged with each step, draining into a watery pit. By the time I reached the top of the flight, it was all I could do to lift my feet. I wanted to look to Haris for encouragement, but if I turned around, I would run, if I could move at all. I couldn't let myself do that.
Still, I hesitated with my hand on the handle at the top.
Squaring my shoulders, I squinted against the glare of lights and stepped onto the roof.
Coils snapped around me, immobilizing me and separating me from Haris. Had he come out onto the roof, too, or was he trapped on the stairs? I couldn't look, couldn't see. My field of view was a narrow patch of roof with a body slumped prone. Beth!
“Did you really think it would be so easy, Pepper?” I couldn't tell where Clay’s voice was coming from. “You thought you thwarted me at every step, but instead, I've been leading you here all along. You ignored me in college, but as I led you along, I saw that was for the best. Why should I settle for your love? I shouldn’t. Not when I can get the power from you I need to give Boston to the Shining One who formed all things and walk as her avatar on Earth.”
Chapter 36
At least I was spared the maniacal laughter, small comfort though that was.
For the first time, I allowed myself to think of the twins, of the possibility that I wasn't going to make it back to them. At least they would have Matt there when they woke up, and they would always be surrounded by family. Matt wouldn't be happy about Tina finding her magic, but the Lung dragon would watch over her. Her and Gavin both. Tears slid down my face.
Across the roof, Beth pushed herself up onto her knees. She was alive — and conscious. I didn't know what she'd been through in the past day and a half, but now I had more hope than before.
“Clay? I think I fell asleep.”
Then he was by her, helping her up, offering her a drink. “Take it easy. You were blindsided, but I got her.”
She swayed unsteadily, side to side and front to back. If it had been up to her, she would have spilled every drop from the cup, but Clay braced it and poured it into her mouth, ignoring her splutters. He didn’t say anything more, and I mulled over his word choices
— blindsided. He was trying to convince Beth that I’d attacked her, that he was rescuing her from me.
“Mmmm. Honey and sage. You always find the best drinks. How do you do it?”
Memory flashed of the reunion dinner and Clay handing a Beth his wineglass to sip from. Doctored, with drugs or a potion. Which one made little difference — he had been preying on her and setting her up for this all along. I wanted to call out and ask why, but my mouth was as immobile as the rest of me. I could only watch as he hugged her to him and murmured, “I just do good work.”
And Matt. He had drunk the wine, too. Was that behind the kiss he'd given me that night, his jealousy of Haris, all of his hot and cold behavior since? I couldn't tell him — his detestation of magic would grow, and I worried for Tina and Gavin if that happened. Assuming that I got the chance to tell him, which wasn’t looking too likely at the moment.
Magic lay thick about the roof, mostly the black, smoky coils I’d already become so familiar with, but also a watery haze, blues and purples, waves washing like the breath of an unimaginably large creature. That fit with everything I’d been able to glean about Clay’s patron. I cursed the lack of time to have read the notebooks I’d taken from his home — I might know enough to fight, at least have a name to conjure against.
Clay’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “Did you want to get that tattoo now, Beth?”
“What tattoo?” She was confused — if this was something they’d discussed before, she didn’t remember it. Small wonder, with all Clay must have done to her. What potions had he been feeding her? How much of her mind was her own?
“Don’t you remember?” His low voice was a caress, as he lifted her hand and placed a kiss on her wrist. “Right here? That design I showed you that links us forever? Then you won’t have to worry about her hurting you ever again.”
He shot me a look, and I realized he meant it literally — this tattoo would bind Beth to him magically. Hot clear anger shot through me, radiated from me, pushing against the coils that trapped me. The coils withdrew an infinitesimal fraction. I still couldn’t move, but I could breathe. I did, feeling white-hot anger fill my lungs, ready to blast Clay, to rip through Beth and drive the potions out of her, to scar all the coils of the patron that dared to push through into this space, so far from the patron’s own home.
Ghost Garages_A Boston Technowitch Novel Page 24