The Collected Christopher Connery

by L. EE

  “But why Xavier? Of all fucking people, why him?”

  “How could I possibly know that?” Nia asked in a small pleading voice. “Convenience? Mr. Rivers’ being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Or perhaps Connery picked him because he somehow knew he was connected to you, Gail. I don’t know. I couldn’t possibly know.”

  Twisting her braid in her fist, Gail bit down hard on all the words she wanted to say. Most of them were profane and none of them were helpful, but fucking hell, this was Xavier. Her buddy Xavier who wouldn’t even kill a rat he found in his kitchen.

  Arthur stared at her in horrified silence and Nia continued reluctantly.

  “It’s impossible to know exactly how long it will take for Mr. Rivers’ mind to consumed by Connery, but the odds are not in our favor. Not only does he currently possess a greater – portion of Mr. Rivers’ body than Mr. Rivers does, but his magic will be strengthening Connery’s personality even as it erodes Mr. Rivers’.”

  Gail pressed her hands to her temples. “And the scars? Arthur said they got worse.”

  “Not worse, just more visible. They concealed themselves in order to prevent anyone, including Mr. Rivers, from realizing what had happened.” Nia laughed, a dry humorless sound. “And I revealed them. This afternoon, I tried to expose Connery’s magic and it seems I succeeded.” She laughed again, running her hands roughly through her hair.

  Arthur was holding himself tightly with both arms. “So Xavier will…”

  “Become Connery, or at least a man so similar as to be nearly indistinguishable. He certainly won’t be himself anymore. He could fight the influence for a while, but over time, his mind will be subjugated to the point of technical nonexistence.” Nia’s voice had turned cold and flat as if she were just a recording of herself.

  At that moment Gail hated Connery so much she thought she’d be sick from it. She wouldn’t wish the sort of fate Nia described on anyone, but Xavier? Of all the greedy, vicious, heartless people in New Crossbridge, Connery chose fucking Xavier? Xavier who’d been cooking meals for them every day despite them being less-than-welcome guests and who’d spent the last week or so smiling at Arthur like the doc’s simple presence had turned the dank rainy season into a bright fall morning? She didn’t think she’d seen that kind of smile on Xavier’s face since before Eric Wayne had gone and fucked up his life. And now Connery was going to fuck it up again.

  Nia was staring at the floor. She had taken up the pearl necklace laying on the bedside table and was twisting it so tightly in her hands that it was a wonder the pearls didn’t burst off the string. “I need to think. There must be something…” Her eyes shot up to Arthur again. “Where is Mr. Rivers just now?”

  “He’s sleeping,” Arthur answered. “I made sure he was before I – before I came to talk to you.”

  “Good. The first thing we have to do is get him somewhere safe. I think it would best if I explained the situation to him. It will be upsetting, but it may help him remain in control for longer. Arthur, will you go wake him, please? Bring him back here.”

  Arthur nodded mutely and left the room.

  The moment the door closed behind him, Nia’s shoulders began to shake. She gritted her jaw, but a weak sob ripped out of her anyway.

  “Hey.” Gail hurried over and took her by the shoulders. “Keep it together, princess.”

  “It’s just so terrible,” Nia breathed, wiping her tearstained face with the back of one hand.

  Gail couldn’t disagree.

  “And it may be hopeless too,” Nia admitted through her tears. “There’s a chance that I can banish Connery’s magic from Mr. Rivers, but doing so could just as easily obliterate Mr. Rivers’ consciousness right along with Connery’s. If Mr. Rivers can’t hold on, I fear that –”

  Gail gave Nia’s shoulders a light shake. “Do what you have to do. If there’s a chance to get Connery out, then do it.”

  “But Mr. Rivers –”

  “Will want you to try. Ask him yourself, but I already know Xavier would rather risk anything than let Connery take him over. Okay?”

  Nia gave a tight nod then wiped her eyes roughly. “Okay.”

  When the door creaked open again, Nia clamped on a serious but cautiously optimistic expression. The only signs of her fear were her red-rimmed eyes. Unfortunately, Gail couldn’t bring herself to look anything but fucking horrified.

  The good news was that her lack of acting didn’t end up being a problem.

  The bad news was that Arthur had returned alone.

  Xavier had disappeared.

  61

  Gail Lin

  “I checked downstairs too,” Arthur explained, twisting the lapel of his jacket anxiously in his fist. “But he’s not anywhere in the house. I swear he was sound asleep when I came to talk to you, but –”

  Nia held up a hand to quiet him. “That doesn’t matter right now,” she said with remarkable calm for someone who had been sobbing just a few minutes earlier. “We just have to find him. If we can get him somewhere safe, we stand a chance of stopping the transformation, but if he gets away from us…” She let the sentence hang.

  Gail knew what would happen if they didn’t find Xavier, even if she didn’t want to believe it. Connery part two. Even if he didn’t have magic, because no matter what was going on with the rest of him, Xavier’s brain was still a layman’s brain, Gail knew magic wasn’t the only way to hurt people.

  “We should split up and look for him,” said Nia.

  “What?” Arthur and Gail said at the same time.

  Nia rolled her eyes. “I don’t mean split up and do something foolish. I mean, split up, so we find him faster, find him before he hurts himself or someone else.”

  Arthur’s jaw tightened noticeably. “So you think there’s a chance that he –?”

  “Yes, Arthur. Due to the magic I did earlier, I believe Mr. Rivers may have temporarily lost control of his senses. But only temporarily. If we can find him, it’s possible we can bring him back to himself, but we have to do it quickly. That’s why we need to split up.”

  Gail still didn’t like it. No matter the benefits of spreading out, it would still make all of them twice as vulnerable if something went wrong. But she was right. They had to find Xavier and they had to do it now. If he was still himself, they needed to get him back where Nia could help him, and if he wasn’t… Closing her heart down tight as an iron chest, Gail pushed the memories of her friend aside. She would do what had to be done.

  Arthur replied only with a tight nod, looking like he didn’t trust himself to speak.

  “Very well, this what I propose. Arthur, you stay here in the house in case he comes back. Gail, I want you to take a quick look around the nearby streets, a very quick look. If you see him, you can try speaking with him. He knows you best and you might be able to help him regain control of himself, but if anything feels off come back to the house immediately.”

  “All right,” Gail said reluctantly. “But what are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to glance around the yard, the toolshed, the garage. It won’t take long, I’ll likely be back before you are.”

  Gail looked at her closely. “And you won’t try tangling with him alone either, right?”

  “Of course not,” Nia replied. “At the first sign of danger, I’ll come back to the house. Once we locate him, we can proceed together.”

  Gail would have to be satisfied with that. She snapped her watch on to her wrist and checked the time. “All right, everyone be back here in fifteen minutes. If someone’s missing after then, the other two will go looking together. Deal?”

  “Deal,” said Nia.

  “Deal,” Arthur managed on a shaky breath.

  The next few minutes were a blur of activity. Nia and Gail grabbed their preferred weapons, Nia making sure her pockets were loaded with spells and chalk while Gail made sure her gun was loaded with bullets.

  “Do you know how to use one of these?” Gail asked Arthur, pulling
the smaller revolver she kept alongside her main piece in case of emergencies.

  He shook his head.

  “It’s not difficult. You just have to be careful. This is the safety. Don’t take it off unless you’re planning to put a hole in somebody.”

  Arthur didn’t take the gun. “I don’t know if I –”

  “It’s just for show, doc. Connery doesn’t know you don’t know how to use one and without magic, I don’t think he’ll risk a bullet.” Gail took Arthur’s arm and placed the little gun into his hand. “Understand?”

  Arthur’s fingers curled slowly around the butt of the revolver. “Yeah.”

  “Good. See you soon, doc.”

  Gail parted from Nia just outside the front door. She gripped her hand tightly for a moment, not caring about Nia’s large diamond ring digging into her skin or the rain dribbling down the hood of her poncho. “Be careful.” It was a weak parting statement if there ever was one, but what else was there to say?

  “I will,” Nia assured her, her face set in lines of fierce determination.

  Then Gail went one way and Nia the other. As Gail ran through the drizzling rain to the dark streets beyond Xavier’s well-loved fence, she had a strange but powerful feeling that come morning, all of this would be finished.

  One way or another.

  62

  Nia Graves

  Nia went to the garage first. She was trying – oh, she was trying – to keep on a strong face for Arthur, but as she strode toward the garage, she felt the horrible futility dragging on her like chains, slowing her steps to a frightened creep. Oh, there was a chance, yes, of course, there was always a chance. If Mr. Rivers could fight back against Connery, Nia could potentially help him drive the magically imprinted consciousness out for good. But minds were just such delicate things and, though he couldn’t have known it, Mr. Rivers’ mind had been undergoing steady erosion ever since Connery’s body had been grafted into his.

  If only I had noticed a week ago. If only I had noticed when we first arrived, when I first met him… But Connery’s magic had been too well cloaked and Nia’s mind had been too distracted.

  And now it might be too late.

  She clenched her jaw tight against the tears that threatened to blind her. She had already cried enough. She might not be able to save Mr. Rivers even if they did find him, but there was something she could do to upset Connery’s ugly plans.

  The Directors will be angry, a small voice whispered in the back of her head as she ducked into the garage and hurried toward their car, which sat parked beside Mr. Rivers’ now fully-functional truck.

  Fuck the Directors. She opened the back of the car and grabbed the large suitcase, hauling it out on to the cement floor. She tore it open, exposing the cool pale flesh of Connery’s arms and legs. Using a predrawn spell from her pocket, she created another magical light, this one floating just above her head. The light was pale and weak in the surrounding blackness of the garage, but it was enough.

  Pressing down firmly, Nia scrawled a circle on one of Connery’s legs just below the knee. Then with a sharp dash, she triggered the spell.

  A gout of flame flared up bright enough to blind, forcing Nia to step back with a hand over her eyes. When she finally blinked the red spots from her vision, she looked down, knowing all she would find was a small clump ash where Connery’s legs had been. It was finally –

  Her breath caught so hard and sudden in her chest that for a moment she thought she was drowning.

  Connery’s legs were entirely intact, the only evidence of the spell a small black burn where the circle had been.

  “What?” she whispered. “But that’s…” Impossible. The spell should have burned the limbs to nothing, so how – diving back into the car, she ripped the top off of the hat box and yanked out Connery’s head by the hair.

  Tilting the head back, she pressed the pen against his forehead hard enough to draw slow seeping blood from beneath the magically preserved skin. She triggered the spell and for a moment felt a rush of triumph. The stench of burning hair filled the garage as Nia set the head down on the cement floor, watching with satisfaction as Connery’s hair began to blacken and crisp.

  Then the fire went out with a dull pop.

  “How?” she breathed, clasping her shaking hands together. “This is –” Yes, it was impossible, but… but it made a horrid kind of send, didn’t it? As Connery’s body was brought back together, his magic grew stronger, protecting each individual part from destruction. Each part must have contained a segment of a greater spell that was slowly weaving itself into its full power by simple proximity.

  Brilliant. Simply brilliant.

  But just because something was resistant to magic didn’t mean that it couldn’t be destroyed. Moving carefully around the fallen head, Nia removed Arthur’s toolbox from the floor of the car. She picked up the heaviest thing she could find, which turned out to be a wrench so large that it took two hands for her to hold it. After taking a couple of practice swings, she walked back to the head.

  Getting down on her knees, so she would be sure not to miss, Nia drew the wrench back over her head and brought it down as hard as she could.

  The wrench struck the concrete with an echoing thud. The impact sent a burst of shuddering agony up her arms. The pain came as such a surprise that for several moments all she could do was sit there stunned, waiting for the feeling to return to her fingers.

  As her mind slowly settled back in her body, she realized what was going on. “It’s just a spell,” she whispered to herself. “It made me misjudge the distance. All I have to do is break it and then I can crush him to a pulp.” She lay a hand on the head’s slightly blackened hair. She closed her eyes, letting the shape of the spell fill her mind and then narrowing in on the strand she needed to break.

  She tried and tried, but with mounting horror, she realized she couldn’t do it. This was no logically organized collection of layered spells. These spells were twisted around and woven into each other until it was impossible to tell where one ended and another began. Each individual spell touched the others at a hundred trigger points. She could not break one without breaking them all and she had no time…

  Opening her eyes, she turned sharply toward the far corner of the garage where Mr. Rivers’ kept an old clanking incinerator for burning garbage. Yes, that would serve. The protection spells were powerful and complex, but once Connery was in the incinerator, he would burn. It might take hours or days, but eventually he would burn. She reached for the head –

  “Miss Graves?”

  On pure instinct, Nia threw the head into the suitcase on top of the arms and legs and slammed the lid shut. Then she grabbed up the wrench before whirling around.

  Mr. Rivers, who had stepped into the circle of magic light from the other side of his truck, took a quick step back. “Sorry! Sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you. I heard noises out here and thought maybe one of the kids was messing around.”

  “Oh!” Nia looked at the wrench and, realizing how it must look, lowered it slowly to her side. “I’m sorry, you just – surprised me. I was trying to fix something.”

  “After midnight?”

  “Yes, I – it was quite urgent.” Nia’s hands were sweating and she had to adjust her grip on the wrench handle to keep from dropping it. He didn’t come from outside, she realized He couldn’t have and approached her from the angle he did. He must have been hiding in here. The question then was, why? Was he aware of what was happening to him or was Connery manipulating him already? “Are you feeling all right, Mr. Rivers? We were worried about you.”

  He blinked at her. “What do you mean?”

  “You weren’t in the house.”

  Mr. Rivers’ shoulders relaxed a bit and Nia felt a flash of hope. He understood! Then maybe he’s not as far gone as I feared. Maybe –

  “So your whole family is gifted with repairs, huh?”

  “What?” Nia looked down at the wrench again. “No, no, Mr. Rivers, we
were looking for you.”

  He shrugged. “I haven’t gone anywhere.”

  Oh, how I wish that were true. “Mr. Rivers, what did you say you were doing in here?”

  “I heard a noise and thought it was a kid fooling around, but there’s no one here but you.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “That’s so strange, I swore I – maybe…” He blinked once, twice, three times and swayed, banging his shoulder into the side of the car.

  Nia dropped the wrench and caught hold of his arm. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” He pulled away from her and stood up straight, one hand pressed to his chest.

  Not his, Nia reminded herself.

  “I just felt dizzy for a second,” he went on, blinking hard and rubbing his forehead. “I guess I haven’t been getting enough sleep. I’ve been having some weird dreams…” He smiled a little sheepishly. “That reminds me, did your friend like that hat you bought her?”

  “I – what? Mr. Rivers, are you sure you’re feeling all right?”

  “Yeah, like I said, it was just a dizzy spell. No need to worry, Miss Graves.” He smiled at her with such sincerity that Nia’s heart clenched like a cold fist. We should have come sooner.

  “Anyway, I guess I should go try to get some sleep and stop hassling you about being awake so late since I’m the one falling all over the place.” Smiling again, Mr. Rivers put his hands in his pockets and turned to go. “I’ll leave you to it then. Oh, and let me know if I can give you a hand with your other assignment too. Layered spells can be such pains in the ass, huh?”

  “Oh, thank you, I –” She stopped short. “Do – do you have an interest in magic, Mr. Rivers?” Before they had explained it to her, Gail hadn’t even known about the difference between bound and unbound magic – and she had more experience with magic than the average layman. But perhaps being a schoolteacher had prompted Xavier to take an interest in magical theory, but... “How did you know I was dealing with layered spells?”

  Mr. Rivers just smiled at her.