Whatever checks I’d held on my emotions shatter.
“Moved on?!” Whirling around, I storm at Millie, waving my arms like a maniacal marionette. “I don’t care if it was so long ago we could only get there with a TARDIS! There is no moving on because it’s happening right now!”
Millie scampers from her chair, putting more distance between us. I continue to advance on her.
“Don’t you see!” Grabbing a book off the shelf, I shake a cloud of dust from its pages. “These aren’t helping. I can’t be a student in your school when Central Park has become a war zone. I won’t keep hiding here with you. We have to do something!”
I’ve badgered the little woman across the room to the point where she’s quailing against the far wall.
“Elizabeth.” Stephen’s voice is quiet, but right behind me. The bubble of my outburst pops.
I look at Millie’s hunched body, her wide, fearful eyes, and I’m ashamed.
Taking several steps back, I don’t look at her when I say, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have . . .”
“We’re all afraid.” Stephen’s words fill the void. The truth in them makes me feel very small.
The soft shuffle of Millie’s house slippers on the wood floor alerts me that she’s approaching. I’m frozen in place, not knowing whether to cry, pretend I’m okay, or ask for a hug.
Millie clasps my elbow, her palm powdery against my skin. She’s recovered her dignity, and offers a wistful smile.
“I’ve only seen that kind of spitfire a few times in my life.” She points to her mouth. “And it was spewing from these lips.”
With a bit of disbelief, I try to smile back at her.
“While I don’t appreciate being screamed at by a banshee,” Millie continues, “it’s time for me to admit that you’re right. We can’t wait while Arbus spreads his disease through this city. To do so would be to fail in our duty as spellseekers.”
“To eradicate the malicious?” My smile grows bolder.
She beams and I can see a young woman beneath the layers of age. A woman full of force and fight.
I’m ready to grasp the branch of hope she’s offered when we both jump, startled by the rumbling and screeching one floor up. The sound moves, heavy groans marked by sharp whines, like something unwieldy is being dragged across the comic book shop.
Millie starts for the stairs, but without explanation Stephen begins to run. I hurry after him. He’s taking the steps three at a time. I’m halfway up and Millie’s at the bottom of the staircase when Stephen tries to open the door to the shop. He turns the knob, pushing the door, which opens out, and it moves less than an inch. He shoves the door again. It doesn’t open.
“Saul!” Stephen shouts. “Open the door! Saul!”
No answer.
I stare at Stephen and the unopenable door. “He trapped us here?”
Stephen clenches his jaw and throws his shoulder into the door.
“What the hell is he doing?” The door rattles in its frame as Stephen wrestles with it in vain. To Millie it probably looks like a restless spirit is banging around in the stairwell, desperate for attention from the living.
Millie is winded when she reaches the landing. She looks at the door, then closes her eyes.
“No,” she whispers, folding her hands before her face as if in prayer.
Exasperated, Stephen gives up on the door and turns to her. Even though she can’t see how insistent his blue eyes are when they fix on her, I’m sure she can feel their intensity.
“Why did he leave us here?” Stephen demands.
Tight-lipped, Millie shakes her head. Her hands tremble and stones fill my belly when I see tears brim in her eyes.
Stephen continues to glare at her, but I hold up a hand, warding off any further interrogation.
In a voice so gentle I barely recognize it as my own, I say, “Millie, where did Saul go?”
“He’s going after Arbus,” Millie whispered.
The anger in Stephen’s voice is replace by shock. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” she answers. She tilts as if her legs are about to give out and I jump forward, catching her around the waist so she can lean on me.
“Why?” I ask her.
Millie begins to cry, but I can make out words through the tangle of grief. “Because Saul knows Maxwell Arbus won’t leave New York without trying to kill me. And this time he’ll succeed.”
Chapter 25
“I’ve been so foolish,” Millie says. “So very foolish.”
I’ve stopped pummeling the door and am now feeling through the small opening I’ve created, to figure out what’s preventing the door from opening farther. Meanwhile, Elizabeth has guided Millie to sit down next to her on the stairs.
“Why have you been foolish?” Elizabeth asks.
“Saul told me this would happen. The moment you left, that first day, he said to leave it alone. He knew you’d bring Arbus here, one way or the other.”
“But why would Arbus want to kill you?”
“Because I am a spellseeker. Because I am one of the last. Because many years ago, our paths crossed.”
“Why didn’t you tell us this up front?” Elizabeth is incensed. “You lied to us.”
Millie sits up straight. “I don’t think you should be the one teaching the lesson on lying, young lady.”
I stop what I’m doing and study their faces. Both stubborn. Both angry. Both guilty.
“What’s going on?” I ask. I can’t get more specific than that, because I’m not the one in the room with access to the specifics.
“Tell us what happened,” Elizabeth says to Millie, as if my question hadn’t applied to her.
Millie sighs. “It was twenty years ago. I had a modest spellseeking practice. Private clients. Nothing advertised—everything by referral. It wasn’t much, but it paid the bills. And I felt I was doing a service. Strictly diagnostic, but you’d be surprised how much that meant to people. To know it wasn’t their fault. To know they weren’t crazy.
“I’d had some encounters with cursecasters—in a city this big, that’s inevitable. If they don’t live here, they’re always passing through. But it was rare for me to encounter them face-to-face. Mostly, I knew them through their work.
“All of a sudden, these intricate curses began to appear. I didn’t know what to make of them. I had heard of Arbus’s curse patterns, but I’d never seen them myself.”
“Who’d told you about him?” I asked.
“Other spellseekers. Dead now.” Millie shakes her head. “There once was a network. Now there are only outposts. It used to be, if someone like Arbus showed up, there would be a dozen people to call. Now I don’t know what to do.”
“So what happened after you started to see people with his curses?” Elizabeth asks, trying to get Millie back on track.
“I did the best I could. I couldn’t make sense of some of them. And others scared me deeply. I started wandering the streets, looking for traces of him. I was so naive—not young anymore, but still naive. I didn’t realize that he was after us. He wanted to destroy all spellseekers, so cursecasters could reign unhindered.”
“But how did he know you were a spellseeker?”
“I imagine he used a lure. It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book. A caster curses someone, knowing he will run to the nearest spellseeker. Then once the cursed individual discovers that the spellseeker cannot in fact cure him of the curse, the cursecaster returns, offering to end the curse in return for information. Who could resist such an offer?”
“So someone ratted you out,” Elizabeth says.
“I have to imagine so. Or maybe Arbus sensed me—I have no way of knowing for sure. I often wondered what brought him to New York, but now I imagine he was looking for your mother, Stephen. I’d like to think that it wasn’t entirely random.”
“So what happened?” I ask. “Did he track you down?”
Tears start to form again in Millie’s eyes as she remembers.
“It was an ambush. I was just locking up for the night. It was late, and I wasn’t paying attention. So it was as if he just appeared there, out of the air. He didn’t say a word, but I knew who he was. I tried to shout for help, but his hand was too fast—he went right for my windpipe. I dropped my keys, kicked with all I had. And Saul—somehow Saul knew something was wrong. Just as I was about to black out, he came in and saved me, at a great cost to himself. It caused such a commotion that other people came running too. Arbus tried to curse them away, one by one, but he could only handle so many people at one time. So he fled. And I lived. But he’s not the kind of man to forget his unfinished business, is he? The only way to rid yourself of a spellseeker is to kill her. I’m sure Arbus knows that.”
* * *
I look at Elizabeth, to see if this registers. I look at Elizabeth, expecting her to crack, if only a hairline. I want her to feel the fear I am feeling.
But if Millie’s a wreck and I’m afraid, Elizabeth keeps a look of calm determination. She is taking everything in, but it is not disturbing her. It is only information. It is not a death threat, because she won’t let it be one.
I wish I knew why.
* * *
“Any luck with the door?” she asks.
I’ve forgotten completely about the door.
“Here,” she says, standing up. “My arms are thinner. Let me try.”
She presses against the door and reaches around.
“It looks like he put all the furniture in the room against it,” she reports. Then she takes out her phone. “I’m calling for backup.”
* * *
It takes Laurie about twenty minutes to get there, and another ten minutes for him to push away enough of the furniture to clear us out.
While we wait for this to be done, I try to get more out of Millie.
“Is there any way he can be stopped?” I ask her. “I mean, what is Saul trying to do right now?”
“I don’t know what Saul thinks he can do. He’s not a murderer. None of us are murderers. But that’s what it would take. Cursecasters are humans just like the rest of us. Stab them and they will bleed. You just have to get to them first. Catch them unaware. Which is an extremely hard thing to do.”
“But it can be done,” Elizabeth says. I hadn’t even realized she was listening to our conversation.
“Yes,” Millie says. “It can be done.”
This fact doesn’t seem very encouraging to her. She says the words, but her tone is laced with doubt.
* * *
“Almost there!” Laurie calls out.
I move close to Elizabeth, so Millie won’t hear.
“Let’s go home after this,” I say. “Or let’s go with Laurie to a movie. Something normal.”
Elizabeth pulls away from me. Not dramatically, but enough that I notice.
“Arbus is out there,” she says. “Saul is out there. I need to help Millie find them. I know you can’t, but I can. It’s what I have to do.”
There’s no discussion in her voice, no desire for my opinion.
This is bigger than the two of you, I remind myself.
But I don’t want it to be. I want to narrow the world back down to the two of us, just for a little while. I want her to be able to retreat into me, and I want to be able to retreat into her.
When Laurie breaks through, Elizabeth gives him a big hug, even though he’s a sweaty mess. I want to hug him as well, but I suspect that will only freak him out. People like to see the people they’re hugging.
“Why is it that old furniture always weighs more?” Laurie asks.
“Time makes everything heavier and slower,” Millie replies. “Believe me.”
Still, there isn’t much heaviness in her movements once we’re free.
“I have to go find him,” she says. Meaning Saul.
“I’ll help you track him down,” Elizabeth says. Meaning Arbus.
Millie knows this. “You are to leave Arbus alone,” she warns. “No good can come of another run-in.”
“I won’t do anything,” Elizabeth promises. “He has to have a home base. I want to find it, so we can watch where he goes, see what he’s doing.”
“No,” Millie says. “I don’t trust you.”
Laurie looks as surprised as I feel. “Whoa,” he says. “That’s a little strong, isn’t it? We’re all on the same side.”
Millie isn’t backing down. “We are. But I think we have different interpretations of what this means. Don’t we, Elizabeth?”
“If I say I won’t do something, I won’t do it.”
“Can someone please tell me what’s going on?” Laurie asks.
I tell him about Saul and about Arbus, including my own run-in.
“All right,” he says, “this is what we’re going to do. Let’s focus on getting Saul back before he does something stupid and ends up being cursed into oblivion, okay? And we’ll also keep on the lookout for Arbus, but we will not search him out. Understood?”
He looks at Elizabeth when he says this. Instead of nodding, she glares at him. The meaning is clear: Who put my brother in charge?
Laurie is undeterred.
“Millie, you know Saul better than the rest of us. So Elizabeth, Stephen, and I will follow your lead.”
Millie mulls it over. I can tell she wants to go searching on her own. But she also realizes she can’t do it alone, not with Arbus on the loose.
“You and Elizabeth, yes,” she says. “Stephen, no.”
“Why not?” I ask.
“It’s too dangerous. It’s clear that Arbus can feed off your power. So if we happen to encounter him, you will only hurt us, not help. And you can’t see him. So if he attacks, you won’t be able to warn us.”
“But I can see Saul, can’t I?”
Millie is on her feet, moving to the door. “We’re wasting time, and that’s a luxury we can’t afford. Stephen, listen to me—you cannot help us. You can only make things worse. This is not at all your fault. It is entirely the fault of your curse. I can’t deny your harmfulness just to spare your feelings. Not right now. I hope you understand. But even if you don’t, you must go home. Immediately.”
I look to Elizabeth for help, for support. But she is equally unyielding.
“I will come by the minute we get back,” she says. “I promise.”
Only Laurie seems to understand how left behind I feel.
“We need you,” he tells me. “Just not for this.”
I don’t think it’s fair that he gets to go and I don’t. But I would feel childish saying so. This isn’t a trip to a baseball game.
Millie is writing Saul a note, just in case he comes back and we’re gone. I almost offer to stay here and wait for him. But if I’m going to be stuck alone, this is the last place I want to be. There is no welcome here, only the specters of risk and casualty.
“Fine,” I say.
“I’ll see you soon,” Elizabeth says, softening a little.
I can only hope this is true.
* * *
Coming back to my apartment, I feel worthless. While they go forward, I must retreat. I understand why, but it’s a comfortless knowledge.
If she’s in harm’s way, I should be in harm’s way too. I should not have the refuge of home.
My thoughts are loud as I go inside. I cannot stop berating myself, thinking if I’d said something different, done something different, I wouldn’t be on my own, forced to wonder what’s happening. It isn’t until I’m in my bedroom that I allow myself to stop for a moment. I can’t stop the concern, but the running commentary of concern stops. Just for a second. Two seconds. I look at my computer and think about turning it on. Then I pause again.
I have spent most of my life in this apartment. I know every inch of it, every corner. I know which books belong on which bookshelf, and in what order. But most of all, I know how the apartment sounds. The hiss of heat in winter. The thrum of air-conditioning in summer. The muffle of traffic as heard through glass. The r
efrigerator shifting in its seat. The breathing of the floorboards.
I can’t pinpoint why, but something is off. As faint as the ticking of the clock in my parents’ bedroom, there is a new presence.
“Dad?” I call out, thinking maybe he’s come back. Maybe he’s asleep in his old bed.
But when I look in that room, he’s not there. I call out again, but there’s no answer.
This, I think, is what happens when fear metastasizes. My concern for Elizabeth—my concern for all of us—is spreading through all of my perceptions, curling their edges.
This is what I should have told Elizabeth and Millie: I need to be doing something, because doing nothing is just as harmful as facing danger head-on.
I think about calling my father, because I have to admit, it might be better if he were here. I don’t think it would make me any less restless, but it would at least divide my attention a fraction.
I head into the living room, figuring that if I can’t have actual human interaction, I can at least drown myself in some television. I concentrate and pick up the remote control, watching it hover in the air for a second.
“You really shouldn’t leave your key outside,” a voice says. “You never know who might let himself in.”
The remote falls from my hand. I turn to look and see where the voice is coming from.
Nobody’s there.
“Stephen,” the voice continues. “I thought it was time for us to meet.”
The voice is old, but not weak. It is deep and rough and devoid of any trace of kindness.
I remain silent. To say anything would be to acknowledge him. I refuse to do that.
“The apartment is not as I pictured it,” my grandfather tells me. “For all these years, I don’t know what I was thinking.”
The voice is just as any voice would be. But the body is not there. This is what hits me, what hurts me. This, I now know, is how I appear to other people. This is what it must be like to be in a room with me.
How fitting that Maxwell Arbus should be my first person who isn’t there.
“I know you’re here,” he says. “I can feel you. That is part of it, you see. A person who paints a picture does not experience it in the same way as a stranger—there is an element of experience in every encounter, and that experience manifests itself not in sight but in feeling. So it is with what I do. I know you are there because I created you.”
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