Darkness Undone: A Novel of the Marked Souls

by Jessa Slade

  “Sidney?” She nudged his knee, and he wondered how long he’d been thinking. “I can’t go back there. Not yet. All of them together make me feel …”

  Her pupils dilated, like a sudden spill of blackest ink, and in the depths, violet flared.

  His heart missed a beat in limbic panic, but he didn’t flinch. “I suspect, since you went through possession without a veteran talya to guide your way, your teshuva settled unbalanced in your soul. It chafes like an ill-fitting shoe.” He smiled at her reassuringly. “Maybe that’s why you don’t have the talisman. Maybe that’s why you don’t like shoes.”

  “I like shoes,” she said. “But they are hard to steal. Unless I kill someone on the street and take what I want.”

  Only half hearing her, musing to himself, he continued. “The unbalanced teshuva would also explain your memory loss and your rather disturbed …” He stifled the rest of the analysis. How inappropriate to share his conjecture with the subject herself—and about as flattering as that housedress.

  Then his mind caught up with his ears. “Talyan destroy the horde-tenebrae. You mustn’t kill people.” Belatedly, he considered she’d been living with teshuva violence and without talya or Bookkeeper guidance. He found it hard to believe she’d have gone so far astray. But then, most people didn’t believe in demons either.

  “I have heard many mustn’ts.” Her tone dropped an octave.

  He frowned. “Killing people is one of the really, really don’ts. Especially not for shoes.”

  “But for evil, yes?”

  “Well …” He might be a Bookkeeper, steeped in the lore and modus operandi, but this was out of his league. Maybe it was out of every league, which was why Liam Niall’s Irish skin had gotten even paler at the mention of a rogue.

  She nestled closer to him. “Which evils deserve destruction?”

  It was like cuddling a pipe bomb, all thin, hard lines and precarious menace.

  If he was going to contain the danger, he’d have to be as steady and dispassionate as any bomb tech. It would be hard to unravel the more-sensed-than-seen snarl of live wires with sweaty, shaking hands. Not just his studies were at stake but Alyce’s survival.

  The first time he’d been seduced by shadowy secrets, he’d been a heedless child and lost his mother. By the second time, with Maureen, he’d learned better, and he’d lost only his heart.

  This time, at least, he had nothing left to lose.

  Alyce angled her cheek against his shoulder to look up at him, her gaze fixed on his as if he’d spoken every word aloud. Too bad the Bookkeepers a hundred years ago who invented the energy sinks to dampen talyan etheric emanations hadn’t created a portable version as protective against emotions as a bomb tech’s Kevlar was against shrapnel.

  He tried to plaster over his grim thoughts with a quick answer to her question about evils. “Stick with ending the nasties that don’t look human. That’s the malice and salambes—the smoky incorporeal ones—and the ferales like the big corpse-husk ones you pulled off me. Sound good?”

  She nodded. “There are as many of those as there are mustn’ts and don’ts. I can never get to the bottom.”

  “But now you’ll have help from the other talyan.”

  “And you.” The fall of her dark lashes softened her gaze.

  He stifled a twinge of unease. Certainly Kevlar would hold up against eyelashes. “Of course. Me. While you need it.”

  “Need you.”

  “Right.” He cleared his throat. “Would you like to meet just one or two of them? They’ll keep their teshuva latent and not overwhelm you.”

  “If you like.”

  No other Bookkeeper would believe in a talya this submissive, a teshuva subdued to the point of somnolence—at least when she wasn’t sleepwalk-slaughtering. His unease welled higher. What if she really wasn’t talya? What if her demon wasn’t repentant?

  “Alyce, why did you save me last night?”

  She peaked her brows and gave him a disbelieving look, as if he were being unnecessarily stupid. “The devils … The ferales would have killed you. It is what they do. I destroyed them. That is what I do.”

  Did she have an instinct for good? Or merely for innate carnage? Could he unravel the two impulses and find what she was at her core without a slackening of the strict nonintervention policies of a good Bookkeeper? He’d have to; only a highly trained scholar could aspire to such heights of philosophical indulgence and metaphysical parsing.

  And there were no repentant Bookkeepers.

  He shook his head. “Whatever the reason, I am ecstatic you found me, Alyce.”

  “My demon—my teshuva—found you last night,” she corrected. “It showed me the signs and told me something was different, something …”

  “That it was finally ready to be part of the league?” He gave her an indulgent chuckle and pushed carefully to his feet. He held his good hand down to her. “Better late than never.”

  “I think … I saw …” Her shoulders tensed with frustration over whatever she was trying to say, then sagged. “It wasn’t just my demon. It was more than that.”

  “There is much more,” he said. “But you don’t have to worry about it all at once. Let’s go meet your teshuva’s distant cousins, and they’ll show you where to start.”

  He thought she would try to argue again, but she only sighed and put her hand in his. “Where to start worrying?”

  “Leave that part up to me. That is what Bookkeepers do.”

  He should actually do more of that—worrying—especially about the easy, instinctive way she fit against him when she stood up, as if that part of him had been missing all along.

  That part was supposed to be missing. He’d excised it very carefully from his life, as any good revisionist historian cut apart the past and rearranged it, cleaner, simpler, and with fewer innocent victims.

  “You know,” he said. “I really am happy you can nip off heads when necessary.” She would never fall victim to impossibilities. She was an impossibility.

  She might be nestled under his arm at the moment, with her shy smile, ferocity leashed and surprisingly soft, but she was utterly out of his reach, just as she should be.

  Turning her over to the talyan was a necessary step so he could step away. To observe, analyze, and bear witness, a Bookkeeper needed distance. And if he feared the distance might tear something fragile—not in Alyce, but in him—well, as he’d told her, better now than later.

  She was immortal; she’d survive. Ultimately, she didn’t need him any more than Maureen had—or maybe a little more, for the moment, for what he could teach her. But that would fade, as he would. At least Alyce would still be there, fighting for the light. He’d take consolation in that, since he’d never have it for himself.

  CHAPTER 6

  Alyce followed her Sidney to another phone box at a busy little building. She tucked herself behind him to avoid the rush of cars in and out of the white-lined parking lot, but she couldn’t escape the stink of burned coffee and the sweet-tart perfume of the garish candy wrappers swirling in the lee of the brick wall.

  She winced at the strain in his voice while he spoke. “No, Dad, really, you don’t need to send money. Everything’s under control here. … Yes, I’ll be careful.” They waited while the call was patched through to the devil-men from whom she’d freed him.

  For him, she would step back into that hell.

  “Liam,” Sidney said. “You found Ecco?”

  Coming through the phone box, the brusque voice hit her ears clearly. “Hard to sleep through his swearing.”

  “Maybe you could send someone else to meet us then.”

  “Us?”

  Sidney smiled at her reassuringly. “Alyce is with me.”

  “And you’re still in one piece?”

  Sidney’s smile faltered. “As good as before.” He rattled off their location.

  The other man grunted. “I’ll come.”

  The flat tone raised Alyce’s hackles, and t
he remnants of Sidney’s smile vanished. “Send Sera.”

  “You think she won’t judge as impartially as I would?”

  Sidney ran his hand down the back of his neck, and Alyce wondered if his hackles were up too. “We don’t need a judge. And if we did, I’m impartial. Sera has been your Bookkeeper until now, and I value her insights. More important, she has tight control over her teshuva.”

  “Archer will insist on being with her.”

  “Not as jury and executioner.”

  There was no answer for a moment, just a muffled discussion even Alyce’s sharp ears couldn’t decipher. “They’re on their way.”

  Sidney slammed the phone onto its hanger, the hand on the back of his neck clenched tight until his fingers bleached his skin. “Damn him.”

  Alyce touched his arm. “Never say that.”

  After a moment, he turned to her. “You’re right. It’s not my place.”

  “But, if you say he is evil, I can kill him.”

  “Alyce!”

  “I was teasing,” she said solemnly.

  As they waited, the October clouds thickened until the sky, the concrete, and the steel buildings were all one shade. A few errant raindrops spattered the sidewalk and the pigeons pecking nearby.

  “Their wings are brighter than the sky,” Alyce said. “Maybe that is how they can fly.”

  “That and lift, thrust, angle of attack, aerodynamics—”

  She moved her forefinger from his sleeve to his lower lip, and he stopped talking. “Do not be nervous.”

  “You think I’m nervous?”

  “Your heart races. You avoid my eyes. You talk too fast.” Yet she rather liked the velvety rub of his lip against her fingertip.

  “You already said I talk too much.”

  “To hide. I hide in silence.”

  He took her hand and squeezed it. “Sometimes you make sense.”

  “Is that good?”

  “It’s good if Liam thinks you’re lucid instead of a loose cannon.”

  “We’re not on a ship.”

  He sighed. “So much for making sense.”

  She gave him an admonishing look. “Loose cannons are bad on a ship in battle. They roll over sailors and knock holes in bulkheads. But I think on land, a loose cannon would be more useful than a cannon that couldn’t move.”

  He pursed his lips, and she wished her finger were still there—or her lips, against his. “Maybe you’re right. But do you mind if I do the explaining to Sera and Archer?”

  “You have the words,” she agreed.

  He eyed her, a furrow between his brows, as if she were one of those old books in his room where the ink had faded and run into strange new shapes.

  She waited. This was how his books must feel, glad for his hands upon their pages, willingly giving themselves up to his serious brown regard with a soft, rustling sigh. No one else had cared to open them. They could only trust his focus would yield some satisfaction.

  The thought of satisfaction—his and hers—finally made her shift, and he blinked. “I don’t think anyone has shut me up as often as you do.”

  They stood in silence until a white car with large rust spots pulled up to the curb. A blond woman in a cherry red coat rolled down the passenger side window. “Hey, guys. Liam said you might want to get some lunch.”

  Her voice was pitched to friendly, and her slender arm hung out the window with relaxed carelessness. Nothing about her said devil.

  When Sidney opened the back door and gestured Alyce inside, she found the devil—black-haired and stern-faced, his dark brown eyes hard as frozen earth—waiting in the driver seat.

  She started to back out, but Sidney bumped her hip from behind. “Who’s nervous now?”

  The woman in the passenger seat punched the devil-man’s shoulder, hard enough for the thud to reverberate through the worn fabric under Alyce’s fist. “Quit it, Ferris. You’re scaring her.”

  He flinched. “I’m just sitting here.”

  “You’re glowering all over the place. It gets in the upholstery.”

  “Sera, she almost ripped Ecco’s leg off.”

  “And you haven’t been tempted more than once?”

  The man—Alyce thought the surname Archer fit his sharp eyes better than the purr of Ferris—pinned her with a purple-tinged glare for a moment. Then he grinned. The humor warmed his whole face like spring. “Good point. C’mon in.”

  Alyce stayed with her haunches pressed back against Sidney. She could still kick him out of the way. But she had told him she trusted him. She couldn’t run forever.

  Even though running, kicking, and not trusting had kept her alive this long.

  Sidney flattened his hand over her spine in a soothing caress and ducked in beside her. His big body crowded her across the seat. “Let’s go. I’m starving.”

  He pulled the door shut behind him, and Alyce’s ears rang from the compression. The space was so small, she had nowhere to go. Sidney reached for a strap on the other wall, and now he was pulling it toward her, reminding her of the men in the hospital who had bound her to the bed and wheeled her down the halls. Now the carriage was moving, moving, toward what …

  “Alyce? Alyce, what’s wrong?”

  She half crawled into his lap to avoid the gray snake of the strap. Her breath hitched and caught, then raced away without her. “Don’t. Do not tie me.”

  “It’s just a seat belt,” Sidney said.

  “Westerbrook,” Sera said with unruffled calm, “she’s immortal. I think we can skip the seat belt, hmm?”

  He opened his mouth as if he might object; then he let go of the strap. It recoiled with a hiss. “Right.”

  The vibrations of the car racked her. No, she was shivering.

  Sidney settled his arm across her shoulders. “You don’t even notice the cold.”

  “I’m not cold.” And still she shivered.

  Sera exchanged glances with the devil-man beside her; then she smiled at Alyce. “It’s a little crazy, isn’t it?”

  “I was never crazy.” Her voice shattered across three octaves, and the lowest rocked the carriage until the metal around them squealed.

  Archer clamped both hands on the wheel in front of him. “Now who’s scaring her?”

  Sidney tucked her closer under his arm. “Everybody be quiet for a second.”

  The motion of the car still rattled her teeth, but the weight of Sidney’s arm seemed to press the fear out of her. Finally the car caught up with her runaway breath, and she let out a tired sigh.

  Sidney stroked her hair. “Okay now?”

  “Tell me again—what is ‘okay’?”

  “Less loose cannon.”

  She nodded against his shoulder. It was his bandaged arm, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  From that shelter, she was able to look up at Archer and Sera. “Sidney said you are possessed by devils.”

  Sera slanted a look at Sidney, then nodded. “We call them teshuva.”

  “Sidney has given them so many names: malice, ferales, salambes, djinn.”

  “Those are different,” Sera said. “You’re like us.”

  Could she ever be as poised as the woman in front of her? Alyce shook her head.

  “There’s so much we want to tell you, and even more we want to ask you,” Sera continued. “That’s why I said it’s … overwhelming.”

  “Crazy,” Alyce whispered.

  “Just because we don’t understand something right away does not mean it’s a danger,” Sidney said. His tone was instructive, as if he stood at a lectern, but his narrowed gaze on Archer held more meaning than his words.

  Archer stared back at her in the small mirror above his head. “Although what we don’t know can kill us before we figure it out.”

  Alyce met his eyes. “Sidney says I mustn’t kill anyone.”

  “Well, isn’t that thoughtful of him.”

  Sera elbowed Archer. “We promised them lunch. It’s not far to Therese’s.”

  Sidne
y stiffened. “The diner at the pier? I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Just because we don’t understand doesn’t mean danger.” The pitch of Archer’s voice was mocking.

  “I am hungry,” Alyce offered. “I haven’t been to the pier since the fair.”

  Sera gave her an encouraging look. “The art fair this summer? It was fun, wasn’t it? Lots of fried food and not too many tenebrae to fry in return.”

  Alyce shook her head. “They called it the World Fair.”

  Sidney’s arm over her shoulder twitched. “The World Fair? That was … a while ago.”

  “That was 1933,” Archer said. “Great Depression years. Lots of tenebrae.”

  Alyce straightened. “You were there?”

  His eyes crinkled at the corners when he looked back at her. “Sorry—I must’ve missed you in the million-people crowd.”

  “I am shorter than you.”

  “I guess that’s why we’re feeding you.”

  Sidney’s fingers twitched, tugging at her hair. “But … 1933?” His voice rose. “Alyce, how long have you been possessed?”

  Alyce hunched under his agitated intensity, and Sera tsked. “Westerbrook, it’s never gentlemanly to ask a lady her age.” Her tone was teasing, but her half-shuttered gaze wasn’t.

  Alyce closed her eyes. All the conflicting signals buffeted her. Why couldn’t they say and look and act just one way? Why did Sidney soothe her with his hands and chide her with his words? She already knew his mouth could be put to better use.

  Fortunately, they were quiet again except for the rumble of the metal cage on wheels. She didn’t open her eyes until the light dimmed as they pulled into a building full of neatly aligned cars. When Sidney opened his door, she scrambled over his lap to get out.

  Archer was already there, his hand braced on the door frame. His black trench coat fell around him like threatening wings, ready to flare.

  She followed the shimmer of violet that chased around the dark lines on his hand. Devil-man.

  “You wouldn’t leave before lunch, would you?” His voice dropped. “In the teshuva’s quest to atone for their sins, I think they become overzealous in their privation. But we are still human, if not only human. We deserve some pleasures.”