Nightkeepers

by Jessica Andersen

  ‘‘And?’’ she pressed, knowing nothing in Skywatch was ever that simple.

  ‘‘And it’s the symbol of . . . of an important adviser.’’

  He’d almost said, ‘‘the king’s adviser,’’ she knew. A glance at the trainees showed they knew it, too. And for the first time, she saw consideration rather than outright rejection of the concept. Or maybe those considering looks were strictly for her.

  She touched the eccentric, feeling nothing more than warm stone and a prickle of disappointment that she didn’t feel more. It should’ve been a powerful charm, she knew. On her, it was nothing more than a pretty necklace. ‘‘I shouldn’t,’’ she said.

  ‘‘You’re our outside perspective,’’ Strike said. ‘‘Stay.’’ It wasn’t quite a request, wasn’t quite an order, but she felt the power behind the word, and the need.

  She nodded before she was really aware of having made the decision. ‘‘Okay. I’m in.’’

  And, boy, was Jox going to be pissed. Then again, she thought as light dawned, maybe he already knew. It was a good bet that his attitude earlier had something to do with the eccentric. He must’ve known what Strike was planning.

  ‘‘Good,’’ Strike said, and stepped away from her. Turning to the others, he said, ‘‘Thanks for being out here practicing. Obviously, we all figured out a few things last night. I’ll start by saying I’m sorry for checking out on you over the past bunch of weeks. I thought I was doing the right thing, but Leah convinced me otherwise.’’

  ‘‘You weren’t the only one half-assing it,’’ Nate admitted, stepping up and taking the spokesman’s role. ‘‘We talked about it last night. We’re ready to buckle down if you are.’’

  It wasn’t exactly a promise of undying fealty, Leah knew, but it was a start.

  ‘‘Deal.’’ Strike stuck out a hand and Nate stepped up to shake on it, and the others formed a rough line behind him.

  To Leah’s surprise, Nate moved to her next and held out a hand. ‘‘Thanks for the wake-up call.’’

  ‘‘You’re . . . you’re welcome.’’ She shook his hand, and he moved off so she could press palms with Alexis next, followed by each of the others in turn. As Leah shook each of their hands, the sense of unreality grew, not because of their acceptance but because the setup was suddenly seeming far too much like a receiving line.

  She started edging away from Strike. ‘‘I should—’’

  He caught her arm. ‘‘Stay.’’ He looked at the group and frowned. ‘‘Where’s Jade?’’

  ‘‘I’m here,’’ she called from the open doorway. ‘‘Sorry I’m late.’’

  Quiet and studious, with brilliant green eyes and long, dark hair caught up in a messy bun atop her head, carrying an armload of books and wearing jeans and a T-SHIRT rather than combat clothes, she looked far more like a harried librarian than a mage as she hurried across the cavernous space toward the others.

  She stopped in front of Strike, seeming oblivious to having just interrupted a moment. ‘‘I think I’ve got something useful.’’

  Leah tensed on a jolt of hope. Had she found a way to track the ajaw-makol?

  ‘‘Go ahead,’’ Strike said, his voice inflectionless, as if he were afraid to hope.

  Jade started to open the top book on her stack, but then the others slid. ‘‘Hold these.’’ She shoved the books unceremoniously into Strike’s arms and took back the volume she wanted, cracking it to a marked page so she could show him what looked like a woodcutting of a male figure with Nightkeepers’ marks on his arm, facing off opposite a naked, human-shaped figure with no nipples or genitalia, and eyes that held no whites or irises, just flat blackness.

  ‘‘It’s a nahwal,’’ Strike said as the others clustered around to get a look. ‘‘The in-barrier embodiment of each bloodline’s accumulated knowledge, without any of the individual personalities of the dead.’’

  ‘‘Not exactly,’’ Jade corrected. ‘‘It’s a special kind of nahwal, one that doesn’t connect to any specific bloodline, and isn’t fixed with past and present knowledge.’’

  Strike fixed her with a look. ‘‘It’s a precog?’’

  She lifted a shoulder. ‘‘I’m not totally clear on that. But there’s a spell called the three-question spell. Once per lifetime, a Nightkeeper can summon this nahwal and ask it three questions that it’s bound to answer truthfully. ’’ She glanced at Leah. ‘‘I don’t know if it’d work for a human, but it might be worth a try, given that you’ve shown Nightkeeper-level magic during prior cardinal days.’’

  Leah’s breath backed up in her lungs at the thought, at the spear of hope it brought. If they could get some answers about what’d happened to her, and what was supposed to happen next, they’d be able to make a better plan. Hell, they might even be able to lock her into whatever powers she’d somehow acquired during the aphelion.

  She wouldn’t be a Nightkeeper, but she wouldn’t be powerless either. She’d have something to use when she went up against Zipacna, something to bring to war with the others.

  Almost afraid to ask for anything more, she glanced over at Strike. Their eyes locked and she felt the punch of heat, of connection. And though she was no mind reader, she sensed the same wish in him, the same seemingly impossible hope.

  Maybe, just maybe, they could use the spell to figure out how to circumvent the thirteenth prophecy . . . or use it to their advantage.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Lucius didn’t mean to eavesdrop on Anna’s conversation . . . it just sort of happened.

  The astrology babe on the campus talk-radio station was babbling something about Venus coming into conjunction that night, and he’d just finished up with his office hours for the week. He was packing up to hit the library and pick up an obscure translation of the Popol Vuh he’d requested through interlibrary loan, when he heard the raised voices coming from his boss’s office two doors down.

  ‘‘Jesus, Anna! I don’t know where you’re coming from sometimes. You’ve been nagging me to set aside time for you, and now that I have, you’re too busy to grab a bite? For Christ’s sake, I can’t seem to win for trying these days.’’ The Dick’s voice carried a harsh, dismissive impatience that set Lucius’s teeth on edge.

  ‘‘Based on what? One night out of the past four months? That’s fair.’’ Anna was trying to keep her tone reasonable, but he knew her well enough to hear the hurt.

  ‘‘This isn’t about what’s fair or not. I’m trying to—’’ The Dick broke off. ‘‘You know what? Forget about it. I’ll just eat at the club.’’

  A door slammed and footsteps rang in the hall. Once they’d passed, Lucius stuck his head out his office door and flipped the retreating form of Anna’s husband a double-barreled bird.

  ‘‘God, what a jerk.’’

  For a second, he thought he’d said that, because he was sure as hell thinking it. Then he turned to find the sentiment shared by Neenie Fisher, a second-year grad student who’d only recently joined Anna’s team full-time.

  She was petite and borderline mousy, with pale eyes and thin lips that didn’t exactly command attention. Rumor had it she was dating some sort of local grunge rock star, which suggested she could catch attention when she wanted it.

  Not so much in the glyph lab, though.

  ‘‘Hey, Neenie.’’ Lucius glanced back to the empty hallway where Anna’s husband had been moments ago. He wanted to agree with the jerk comment and add a few of his own, but he usually tried not to bad-mouth Dick Catori out loud.

  Neenie, however, had no such compunction. ‘‘I don’t get it. Anna is frickin’ gorgeous—why does she put up with that guy? Did you hear him? It’s like he doesn’t give a crap that she’s putting in overtime trying to translate a codex fragment that is, as far as I can tell, completely new to the literature. Doesn’t he get how huge that is? I mean, honestly. I’ll bet if he had some sort of economics emergency—is there even such a thing?— she’d let him bail on dinner. Heck, she probably has more than o
nce, and I bet I can tell you the name of the emergency. My friend Heather’s in his Intro to Econ class, and she said that Desiree—’’

  ‘‘Stop.’’ Lucius capped a hand across Neenie’s mouth, having learned that there wasn’t much else he could do to shut her up when she got on a roll. ‘‘Back up.’’ He took his hand away. ‘‘What codex fragment?’’

  The fact that she didn’t immediately launch into an explanation spoke volumes. Instead, her eyes went wide and she slapped her own hand across her mouth. ‘‘Oh!’’

  Aware that they were out in the hallway, two doors down from Anna’s office, and she was likely to be in a pretty prickly mood after the spat with her husband, Lucius dragged Neenie into his office and shut the door. ‘‘You weren’t supposed to mention it to me, were you?’’

  Eyes still wide, she shook her head, keeping her hand firmly over her mouth. ‘‘I promised,’’ she said, words muffled behind her hand.

  ‘‘So unpromise,’’ he said, as if it were no big deal, which it probably wasn’t to someone like her, a conduit through whom gossip flowed at approximately the speed of sound. ‘‘Come on . . . you know you want to tell me.’’

  Looking undecided—which as far as he was concerned was a big step up from ‘‘Oh, shit, I’m gonna get canned if I tell’’—she dropped her hand from her mouth and looked around his office. ‘‘Well . . .’’

  He followed her gaze, saw it lock onto a small, graceful figurine of a jaguar, and winced. ‘‘That’s real jade. And it’s hand-carved.’’

  He’d gotten the effigy at a small open market at the foot of the Guatemalan highlands during one of his early trips out into the field with Anna. The statuette wasn’t old, but it hadn’t been cheap either.

  She looked back at him and raised an eyebrow. ‘‘Then I guess a promise is a promise.’’

  He scowled, grabbed the effigy, and held it out to her. ‘‘You suck.’’

  ‘‘I had brothers. Deal with it.’’ She accepted the jaguar and tucked it into her pocket, then gestured for him to lean closer so she could whisper her secret.

  ‘‘The door’s closed, for chrissakes. Just say it.’’

  ‘‘Fine. Go ahead, ruin my dramatic intro.’’ She straightened and made a face at him, but now that she’d given herself permission to give with the goods, she couldn’t hold it in a second longer. ‘‘The fragment is gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous. Some of the glyphs are degraded, but you can still see an incredible level of detail, and the colors . . .’’ Her eyes practically glazed over at the memory. ‘‘God, the colors are so awesome now, it’s hard to imagine what it must’ve looked like when it was new.’’

  ‘‘Hello, Neenie?’’ Lucius waved a hand in front of her face. ‘‘Someone else in the room here, remember? Let’s focus. Okay, so Anna showed you a piece of a codex. What did she say, ‘Hey, Neenie, come in here and see what I got my hands on’?’’

  ‘‘No.’’ She shook her head. ‘‘It was more like, ‘Come in and close the door. Now, promise me this is just between us. Okay . . . what does this look like to you?’ ’’

  And all of a sudden, he got it. Anna had called Neenie in because she didn’t know how to translate the glyphs yet, but she’d shown an almost uncanny knack for being able to identify the pictures themselves.

  The writing system of the ancient Maya was seriously complex, the symbols often difficult to interpret, meaning that field epigraphers got real good at pattern recognition real fast, or they moved on, and they often asked one another’s opinions and went with the consensus vote, at least until something else in the text proved the interpretation wrong. It also meant that an epigrapher who didn’t want anyone else to know what she was working on might use, say, an untrained pattern recognizer to help with the gnarly stuff. Anna must’ve gotten stumped on something and needed a second set of trained eyes, but hadn’t wanted to use someone—namely him—who could translate the glyphs themselves. So she’d taken a chance on Neenie, not realizing that her vault had some serious leaks when it came to keeping secrets.

  ‘‘What did you tell her you thought it was?’’ Lucius asked, feeling an itch of excitement. If Anna was working on something huge, it would explain so much of what had gone on lately—from the stress she’d been under, to the weird working hours, to the fact that she’d been kicking him out of the lab as often as possible over the past week.

  Yeah, he was cheesed that she hadn’t let him in on it, but he’d forgive her if it was the sort of thing that would land her—and, by extension, the senior member of her lab—on the cover of National Geographic or Smithsonian magazine or something.

  Already envisioning the two of them suited up in full kit, posing beside the chac-mool throne inside the step-sided Pyramid of Kulkulkan at Chichén Itzá—because that was the sort of thing the big magazines wanted, even if the codex page had come from someplace else entirely and most of their work was done in a lab in Austin—Lucius almost missed Neenie’s answer.

  Then he got it. And froze.

  ‘‘What did you just say?’’

  ‘‘I told her I thought it looked like a screaming skull.’’ Neenie gave him a weird look. ‘‘Are you okay?’’

  No, I’m not. I just took a big whack upside the head with the every-glyph-groupie-for-herself stick.

  He shook his head, hoping those last few words would rattle loose and turn into something else. But they didn’t, leaving him with only one question: Why hadn’t Anna shown it to him? She knew damn well he was looking for text with a screaming skull, so he could compare it to the images on his computer, the ones he thought were screaming and she insisted were nothing but more of good old King Jaguar-Paw Skull’s laughing skeletons.

  If she had one and hadn’t showed it to him, it meant . . .

  Fuck, he didn’t know what it meant.

  ‘‘What else did you see?’’ he demanded.

  Neenie went a little wild-eyed. ‘‘Do you need to sit down or something? You’re freaking me out.’’

  ‘‘You had brothers. Deal with it.’’

  ‘‘Yeah, okay.’’ Still, she edged a little closer to the door before she said, ‘‘She kept most of it under that protective paper, so I didn’t see all of it. There were a few of those jellyfish blobs with the dots in them.’’

  Which represented numbers, or sometimes dates. ‘‘How many dots? Do you remember?’’

  She shook her head. ‘‘That’s not how my brain works. I can see the patterns, kind of out-of-focus, but if I concentrate too hard the lines get all jumbled up.’’

  ‘‘Great. Well, how about—’’ Lucius broke off. ‘‘Wait. Could you draw it from memory?’’

  She looked offended. ‘‘Of course. I remember this one time my brother Max—’’

  ‘‘Not now. Don’t care.’’ He rummaged through his horizontal filing system—aka the pile beside his desk— and came up with a piece of sketch paper and a pencil with some lead left. ‘‘Draw.’’

  She hesitated and looked at him as though considering another negotiation, but whatever she saw in his face must’ve convinced her otherwise, because she took the pencil and began to sketch.

  Lucius watched, his heart actually racing as the images emerged: the curve of a skull with its mouth gaping wide; three blobs stacked one atop the next with dots beside them, spelling out a date; a highly stylized jaguar with its jaws clamped around the neck of a human figure, with spurting blood that formed a waterfall leading to a round circle wreathed in flames.

  No, Lucius realized. Not a circle. A planet. Earth. Or, more specifically, the end of planet Earth.

  And the transition of a god to the plane of mankind.

  ‘‘Fuck me,’’ he said, loud enough to make Neenie jump and drop her pencil. ‘‘Don’t stop now,’’ he said, excitement riding his tone. ‘‘Keep going!’’

  ‘‘I can’t. That’s all I saw.’’ She looked up at him. ‘‘What does it say?’’

  He shook his head. ‘‘I don’t know.’’

&nb
sp; ‘‘You’re lying.’’

  ‘‘Prove it.’’ He snagged the paper before she could and stuck it in his top desk drawer. ‘‘And before you make a stink about it, don’t forget you’re the one who broke your promise.’’

  She lifted her chin. ‘‘I sold out. There’s a difference.’’ Unable to argue that point—and not sure why he’d want to—Lucius crossed the room and opened the door. ‘‘Whatever. Go away.’’

  She paused in the doorway and turned back to stare him in the eye, and the semiteasing look fell away from her expression. ‘‘You’re defending soon. Now is not the time to do something stupid.’’

  He dipped his chin. ‘‘I know.’’

  But once she was gone, heading down the hall in the same direction the Dick had taken maybe ten minutes earlier, Lucius sucked in a deep breath, told himself there was nothing gained from venturing nothing, and headed for Anna’s office.

  He knocked and waited for her to call, ‘‘Come on in.’’

  Her eyes widened slightly when he entered—not something he would’ve picked up on if he hadn’t been looking, but did because he was. ‘‘Expecting someone else?’’

  ‘‘Only because you knocked,’’ she teased, but the humor didn’t reach her eyes. She started neatening up her desk, pushing the papers to one side and reshelving a couple of books in the cases to the left of the desk. ‘‘What’s up? And make it quick, because I was just headed home.’’

  Which meant either she’d decided to give in to her jerk husband, or she was lying. Lucius wasn’t sure which option pissed him off more, but he throttled it down. ‘‘Never mind, then. I thought you were staying late, so I was checking to see if you wanted anything from Dirty Martin’s,’’ he said, knowing she could occasionally be bribed with a Sissy Burger and a chocolate shake.

  Her expression eased. ‘‘No, thanks. I’m good.’’ She shoved a couple of folders into her soft-sided leather briefcase and stood, slinging the strap over her shoulder. ‘‘See you tomorrow, Lucius. And . . . thanks.’’