The Curse Mandate (The Dark Choir Book 3)

by J. P. Sloan

  A car pulled up near the front of the tavern, and I returned my notice to the newspaper. I stole a glance out the window, finding a man in a heated conversation on his cell phone. Once he had finished, he put his car in drive and continued up the street.

  “Why are you here, Zeno?” I asked. “What’s your play?”

  “This isn’t going away on its own. Brown doesn’t trust the Presidium to take care of its own business, and he can’t involve himself. So it’s up to us.”

  “I owe that man neither jack nor shit.”

  Zeno smirked. “I understand the sentiment, but understand that the two of us are essentially all that’s left of the independent practitioners. Can I be frank with you?”

  I nodded without looking at him.

  “I just want my lodge back. I have long-term projects across the Veil which, if left untended, will create a considerable amount of trouble for some very unforgiving people. The sooner we put the Presidium back on its pedestal, the sooner life returns to normal.”

  I swiveled my head in his direction. “I’m way beyond normal at this point, Frater.”

  “I can try this on my own. I’m inclined to prefer it that way. But my chances of success are greater if I involve you.” He finished his water. “It was simple math, Lake. But I’ll go.”

  I folded the newspaper closed. “Next target is Marshall, Virginia.”

  He paused by the front door. “Are you certain?”

  “It’s the only one left. The Ipsissimus filled me in. The Presidium will be guarding it, as they can’t know who’s an insider and who isn’t. As soon as I grab a hold of some reliable transportation, I’m heading there to stake it out.”

  Zeno turned back to the bar. “Brandon isn’t going to let them see him. His glammers are too strong. If they wait… if you wait… you’ll miss him.”

  “Why do you think I’m bringing you on, Frater? Simple math.”

  He nodded. “I have to gather some materials. Shall I meet you there?”

  “It’s the Living History Museum. Old schoolhouse. I suggest we meet somewhere at a distance, or the Presidium might just throw a bullet through your head.”

  He pulled his phone and brought up one of those map apps which I was slowly becoming convinced was a necessity for this business. “There’s a gas station a half-mile up the county highway. Meet me there in three hours, if you can.”

  “I’ll find a way. Let’s just hope we beat Carruthers there.”

  Zeno gestured to his face, probably a tic to adjust glasses that weren’t there.

  “And if we don’t?” he asked. “What then?”

  “Then we watch the free world burn.”

  Zeno took his leave, and when he had passed the front windows, I pulled Carruthers’s envelope from my pocket.

  Along with the Gregori pendulum.

  I pulled out the charming little note Carruthers had left me, and settled the tip of the pendulum on the ink. It wasn’t his vitae, but it was his handwriting. Script holds its own kind of power, and I banked that the pendulum with its centuries of ill intent had experience ferreting out all manner of energies.

  I lifted the pendulum just a little, and calmed myself, watching for the tell-tale swing of the instrument, and the flashes of intuition it sent up my arm and into my limbic regions.

  It told me exactly what I had expected to hear.

  I pulled my phone and dialed the number on Wexler’s card.

  “Is this Lake?” she answered.

  “Carruthers is on the move.”

  “Is he moving for the Node?” she asked.

  “Yes. Looks like Adrastos’s plan worked.”

  “We’ll be ready.”

  “No,” I replied.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I want your people to back away. I’ll be en route shortly.”

  “Lake, you’ve done enough. There’s nothing you can do, now.”

  I snarled. “There’s plenty I can do. Plenty I must do. Besides, I’m bringing reinforcements. A specialist in this matter, as it turns out.”

  “I’m sorry, but we can’t leave this entirely in your hands. If Carruthers succeeds―”

  “I’m not asking your people to leave entirely. Just let Carruthers in. Then me. If I fail, then you can finish it. But I get the first shot at Carruthers. You people owe me that. You owe it to Julian.”

  After a considerable silence, Wexler answered, “We won’t wait long.”

  “Shouldn’t take long.”

  “Then you’ll have your first shot at Carruthers.”

  She hung up.

  I just had one more call to make, and then it would be time to drop Adrastos’s ax directly on Carruthers’s neck.

  took advantage of the mile-long walk to the gas station to clear my mind. Repetitive motions were excellent tools of meditation. Left foot. Right foot. Left arm. Right arm. Breathe in. Breathe out. My entire mainline was tight as a funeral drum, and burning with intent. The mile disappeared in what felt like a minute, and as I stepped into its parking lot I spotted, Zeno lurking by the front doors.

  He approached with a lifted brow. “Where’s your car?”

  “Totaled. Long story.”

  “How…”

  “Have you ever actually hitch-hiked? It’s a bit of a gamble. You take what you can get.”

  Zeno took in my words, then nodded once. “Are you prepared?”

  “Are you?”

  He hoisted a backpack onto his shoulder. “I have the means to summon a third-choir arch-devil inside this bag. That would take time, however. The good news being, I won’t have to. Brandon should be attempting the circle prep now. All we have to do is interrupt the containment, and the enslaved should seize on him like a bear on a salmon.” He added, leaning in slightly, “He should die the same way Bright died.”

  I gave Zeno a meaningful glance. “That’s exactly the plan.” I cleared my throat and started toward the schoolhouse. “Live by the demon, die by the demon. I’ve always said that.”

  The short half-mile of county road was mostly devoid of traffic. I counted more roadkill than moving vehicles. We reached a narrow clearing in the trees and spotted a yellow-painted building with a sign easily twice as expensive as what the property was worth.

  Fauqier County Living History Museum.

  “Some museum,” Zeno grumbled.

  “I think the Presidium sets up these puppet societies to act as caretakers of the node sites. In Harper’s Ferry it was a Preservation Society. Enoch Pratt, well, that’s pretty much always under their guard.”

  “Not well enough,” Zeno said.

  “Apparently.”

  “Did you bring any weapons?”

  I unsheathed my darquelle and held it a little in front of me.

  He nodded. “It’s blooded?”

  “By a very bad man.”

  “We might need it. I know Brandon. I trained him myself, at least partially. He’s careful. Deliberate. There’s a reason, I suspect, these splitter Presidium members picked him for this task.”

  I sighed. “Well, it sure as shit wasn’t the health plan. Speaking of plans, are we just going to stroll right in, or what?”

  “I’d recommend some care. He may be absorbed in his work, but there’s a limit to one’s focus.”

  “Fine. I’ll take the back, assuming it’s unlocked. You take the front door, same assumption.”

  Zeno nodded and dropped across the driveway, cutting across a patch of tall grass stretching in front of the old schoolhouse. I hugged the tree line, stepping behind trunks as I got within sight of the windows. Entering this building at precisely the right moment would be key. I held my position to give Zeno time to take his. I spotted him crouching across the front of the porch, lingering behind the large cape cod-style posts holding up the massive overhang.

  I upped my pace, slipping through brush, the odd blackberry bramble stabbing me through my jeans. I pulled out my sachet of salt, opened a corner and spilled enough into my palm to rub into
the tiny droplet of blood soaking into my jeans. I wasn’t going to give any son of a bitch my vitae if I could afford it!

  My blood neutralized, I pocketed the salt and continued on up onto the gravel path, easing on gentle feet as I approached the building.

  I took a second to check the street. Wexler’s people must have been around, but they had done a fine job of staying out of sight. I wondered if I wouldn’t regret that in a moment.

  The back of the building appeared to be the original, as the front was a bit more modern… in a relative sense. The rear of the building was a tiny, twenty-foot-by-twenty-foot cube of stone walls, mortared together without care or concern. It seemed a miracle the building was still standing, but here it was. A relic from another time, housing the last gathered node of Andrew Ellicott’s geomantic sephiroth. The source of all power for the Presidium.

  And I’d allowed a renegade Goetic to infiltrate it. Indeed, that was the plan.

  I took a moment to ground and center, as my mainline had gone all sloppy on my walk up the drive.

  I focused on Julian. The way his face gasped in terrified suffocation. That last breath he was allowed before his heart had the life squeezed out of it.

  His final words.

  Don’t trust.

  That did it. I was focused again. Ready to do battle.

  I crept up to the back door and gave the knob a shot. It twisted easily in my hand, and as I eased it in, the door moved without complaint.

  Inside, I found a quaint patch of multi-colored carpeting lying in the center of several book stacks. I wound my way to what appeared to be a doorway leading to the dead center of the entire structure. No windows. Roughly square. Perfect place for a circle.

  I spotted the flickering light before I even reached the door. Candles had been lit already. The corner of a summoning circle met my eye. What’s more, across the casing I spotted red-painted glyphs. The Nombre D’or language. Instructions to whatever hellish beast was intended to appear.

  Or so it would seem.

  But, I knew better.

  Carruthers wouldn’t be casting a circle for this node, not just yet. He knew I was coming, and that I was already here. I’d seen to that personally.

  I stepped into the room, admiring the chalk art on the floor. Like the last one, it was slip-shod and easily sabotaged.

  A noise sounded from behind me. I looked over my shoulder to find Zeno peering from the front rooms.

  I gestured for him to join me.

  “Is he here?” he whispered.

  “Oh yes,” I answered at full volume.

  Zeno blinked, then straightened up. “Where?”

  I gestured for the summoning circle. “It’s a nice touch, really. The chalk? Easy to sweep up after the ritual is completed. Just leaves these old glyphs,” I added pointing at the walls. “Which no one without a brilliant goddamn researching student would have ever latched onto.”

  “Where’s Brandon?” Zeno prodded.

  “You know, it’s an old notion in our circles. The working name?”

  “What?”

  “Pseudonyms, Frater. It’s said if someone knows your true name, they hold power over you. So many take working names, to keep that from happening. Like Frater Zeno, for example. Hell of a moniker you chose.”

  Zeno curled his brow and shook his head.

  I turned back to the ritual room. “So, Goetic theory. If I just sweep a foot across the chalk, either it’ll dismiss the circle, or it’ll sic whatever creepy-crawly it was meant to summon on me. Right? It kind of depends on what the circle was cast for. Either punching a hole through the Veil to render the Presidium’s node into a nihil. Or, another trap set just like the one that killed Julian.”

  A hand brushed along my side, and my darquelle slipped from its sheath.

  I exhaled. “Part of me really wanted to be wrong about this, Brandon.”

  I turned to face Frater Zeno, the working name for Brandon Carruthers.

  He brandished my darquelle with awkward menace.

  “I have a bad habit of underestimating you, Lake,” Zeno stated.

  “We all have our flaws,” I replied.

  “How did you put it all together?” he asked.

  “Honestly? It was when you said Brown was the one that sent you.”

  He smirked. “You’ve never trusted him.”

  “In point of fact, I actually did. And that’s when everything started going wrong. Brown’s one of them, the L’Enfantines, isn’t he? Hell, he might be the only one, for all I know. He knew the whole conspiracy. And I rattled his cage when I busted up into his house. Took him a moment to spin the situation, but he did. He managed to turn me around, get me to distrust Clement, and Malosi.” I winced. The memory was a bit fresh. “And it dawns on me that good ole Clarence de Haviland lives literally ten blocks away from your lodge. You must have been working as his asset for the better part of a decade.”

  Zeno shrugged, then nodded.

  “I also found it convenient that a Goetic devil trap killed Julian, and you show up almost immediately, trying to enlist my help. I had to double-check with my trusty pendulum, but sure enough. Your energy matched the handwriting on the note. Thank you, by the way, for leaving saliva on one of my water glasses.”

  He swore under his breath.

  “But it was you, wasn’t it? In the hoodie. You’re the one that shoved Julian into the jaws of Hell.”

  “It wasn’t personal.”

  “Funny,” I growled. “It feels pretty fucking personal to me.”

  “It was supposed to be you, to be honest. Brown was getting worried about you. So, he left this fictional art studio for his wife to hand over. It was just a matter of time until you found it.”

  “How were you so ready for us yesterday?”

  “Oh, I’ve enjoyed the dubious honor of tailing you ever since I had to wipe out my own lodge. You’ve been an utter pain in the ass, you know that?”

  I sneered. “I knew you were a bit of a heavy hand with your students, but slaughtering them on behalf of Brown? Can I ask you why? Why are you helping him accomplish this?”

  “I told you. I have several interests on the other side. I require peace and quiet. Adrastos and his high-minded polished-badge arbitrators are doing little more than wasting the time of those who are getting on with real workings. Change was inevitable. But, your suspicions may be confirmed in that I truly don’t care about L’Enfantines or Presidium, or even Dorian Lake. I just want it all to go away.”

  He stepped forward, the point of my own darquelle aimed at my solar plexus.

  “So, what?” I asked. “You’re just going to shiv me?”

  “I have too many enslaved on the other side whom I owe consideration. Why waste blood when it can serve two purposes?”

  “Is that what Julian did? Paid a debt to one of your demons?”

  Zeno rolled his eyes. “You keep muddling the issue with sentiment. I don’t care whose blood I have to use. We’re all going to die, eventually. Might as well make use of the resource while I have the opportunity.”

  I glared at Zeno as he tightened his jaw. It was an odd gesture. Almost boyish. Poor child, trying to look brave.

  I held out my hands. “So, here we are. You’re going to just toss me to your wolves, then you’ll sweep the floor, recast a new circle, and deep-six the Presidium’s power supply. I suppose that’ll bring Brown into his end game?”

  “I’m not a part of that.”

  “No. You aren’t.”

  He lunged forward, and I took a careful step backward into the doorway.

  Zeno said, “You could make this easier, you know. I understand they feed quicker on willing participants.”

  “That’s very Neolithic of you.”

  “It’s an old art.”

  “But not the oldest.”

  He cocked his head.

  I looked over his shoulder, and smiled. “No, there are older crafts. Older, and angrier.”

  Zeno shook his head,
before he realized that my gaze was held on someone just behind him.

  He spun around, blade held at arm’s length, to find Annarose Rodolfi consuming the space behind him. She wore a dark-laced blouse tucked into a pair of western-style blue jeans. Her hair was pulled back into a tight bun, her face hard, eyes burning with the dark flames of hatred-fueled power.

  Zeno made a confused noise in his throat, then asked, “Who is this?”

  I answered, “For the longest time, I’ve considered your peculiar practice to be one of the most frightening. It’s like playing chicken with a freight train. You’re just really good at ducking out of the way and letting others take the hit. And now that I have a wider perspective on things, I realize that you are basically just a giant coward.”

  He shook my darquelle at Annarose, whose energy washed forward onto his face. She was charming him, in that classically non-targeted manner that Nature magic followed. Were I not filled with absolute focus, I might have felt the tugs of her glammer, as well. But as it was, hatred kept me immune from her working.

  Sentiment, it seemed, was my strength.

  “A witch?” Zeno sputtered, shaking off a good portion of Annarose’s glammer. “You can’t be serious.”

  “Not just a witch,” I answered. “A Stregha.”

  His eyes darted to the side for a second, and his grip tightened on my blade.

  “I brought reinforcements, as it turns out,” I said.

  He squared his shoulders toward Annarose.

  She pulled her hands up onto her hips and raised an eyebrow. “You poor, pathetic boy.”

  Zeno pulled in a breath to respond with what I was sure would have been a condescending and fruitless rejoinder.

  Instead, I jumped him from behind, bowling him down onto the floor. My cracked ribs sent electric waves of pain through my midsection. I hissed and willed away the distraction.

  He thrashed with his free hand, his other crowded by the nearby bookcase.

  I reached to grip the back of his hair, and jerked it up.

  He grunted as his head pulled back.

  I hammered the front of his face down against the carpet.

  And I did it again.