“That’s the real reason,” said Karl, stabbing a finger at her. “You don’t want to give anything to the other witches.”
“They are both the real reason,” replied Amber. “Stop giving me a hard time about it. I’m telling you the truth. We will die if we try to use too much Elemental energy. We’ll take just a little, just enough to keep moving. Besides, I agree with you. We need to find out where this started. And if you feel it’s in Buffalo, then to Buffalo we will go. Together. After breakfast. Pancakes.”
Chapter Nine
“I do not understand why you drive that blasted thing,” Karl complained as he carried his overnight bag across the forecourt to the antique VW camper. Then he looked around, stunned.
“Where the hell is my car?” he demanded. “It was bad enough when the color changed, but this is theft.”
Smoke chuckled as Amber joined them and they watched Karl staring at a blank section of gravel.
“Where’s my car?” Karl repeated, refraining only through weakness from grabbing one or the other of the cousins and shaking them. “You can’t have started it. I had the distributor cap. If you don’t bring it back I’m calling the cops.”
“Planning on telling them that a house stole your car?” asked Smoke.
“No. They’d think I was crazy. I’m beginning to think that myself. Come on, the house has to do what you say; you’re the witches. God above, did I really say that?”
He leaned against the fender of the VW which creaked and shifted away. Karl stood up fast.
“I,” said Amber, dropping her case and the emergency magic bag onto the ground, “have a midnight black Aztec. New, midnight black Aztec. The house, for reasons no one can explain, has hidden my car and insists on giving me Uncle Robyn’s … thing.” She waved her hand vaguely in its direction, glaring at the peeling paint and bumper bar held on with wire. “It isn’t even a car. It’s a formation flying rust team held together by paint and the belief that it was once an automobile.”
“Make it give me back my car,” demanded Karl.
“I can’t even get it to give me mine. I’ve been in and out of the house for half an hour arguing with it and this is all I have to show for it and I can’t even drive the van. I’m too tall!”
Karl blinked.
“I know I’m going to regret asking this, but how, exactly, do you argue with a house?”
“Don’t ask. And if you ever accuse me of enjoying magic too much I will throw things at you. Starting with the house.”
“All of this is beside the point,” said Karl. “We need a decent car to get to Buffalo. This thing won’t even get us as far as a rental place. How old is it anyway?”
“Oh, over thirty easily,” said Amber. “Maybe more. Who knows. It doesn’t work. And the house hates me. I know it does. Why else would it punish me by giving me this heap of junk to drive?”
Karl studied her pouting lip and bright eyes and laughed for the first time in days. She sounded close to tears. He didn’t blame her; it just struck him as funny.
“Why doesn’t the house fix the car?” said Karl, then added to himself. “Did I really ask that question?”
“That’s easy enough to answer,” said Smoke, coming over to pat the side panels of the old van companionably. “Robyn won’t let the house repair this old lady. He says that cars are real and their repairs should be real, too. Only Robyn is a busy man; he never has time to take this old girl in for work.”
Amber stopped dead, staring up at the house.
“It couldn’t be that simple,” she whispered, “and it could be a sign that the house believes that Lucinda and Robyn are still alive.”
She cast a brilliant grin to Karl and Smoke.
Smoke shrugged although his dour expression lightened a little.
“And if I put this thing in for repairs it would have to give me my car,” Amber cried, almost danced with delight.
Karl laughed, watching her slender form disappearing into the hall. He surprised even himself with the emotion. He wasn’t certain why he felt a sense of accomplishment. He didn’t understand half of what was going on whenever Amber was about. The laugh choked off and he slung his overnight bag over his shoulder.
With her in the house, this was his chance to leave. There was no reason for her to accompany him to Buffalo. He would go, find out what there was to find out, and if he thought she needed the information, he’d tell her. He’d … how the hell would he get away from here? They were miles from the nearest town and his cell phone wasn’t picking up a signal.
There was a dull crunch behind them and Karl spun. His car rested a few feet away. There were no marks on the gravel to reveal where the hidden garage was. No engine sounds as it approached. Nothing.
It was amazing what you could get used to, he thought, moving his hand over the smooth skin of his car. Caring about the opinion of a house, for God’s sake. Cars changing colors. Appearing, disappearing.
Whatever the reason the house had returned his car and not Amber’s, he was not going to wait around to discuss it.
Karl glanced toward the house then flung his overnight case into the back seat. He was about to jump into the front seat when he turned and saw Smoke leaning casually against the front grill.
There was nothing threatening in his posture. Certainly the smaller man could not stop the car from moving if Karl started to drive away. But there was something heavy and permanent in Smoke’s amused eyes that made Karl pause.
Amber came charging out of the house, breathless but laughing, her computer bag bouncing against her hip. Smoke stood back, brushing his hands together and nodded in Karl’s direction.
“I called around,” said Amber. “There’s a classic car restoration company that will come down and pick up the van tomorrow or the next day. I told them to restore it to bright and shiny new.”
“That’s going to cost a fortune,” Karl warned.
“Money isn’t important,” Amber and Smoke chorused.
Amber ducked past Karl and scrambled over the door to land in the driver’s seat leaving a scrape and dust on the door from her shoes.
“Keys, please,” she said, holding out her hand.
Karl leaned forward, gripping the door until he expected the metal to bend.
“This is my car. No one drives it but me.”
Amber raised her eyebrows and placed her elbow on the car door, opening her hand and flexing her fingers.
“Arm wrestle you for it,” she said. “Be reasonable. You’ve been captive of the web for years. I’ve been caught for a few days. Which one of us do you think should be driving?”
Karl looked down at his hands that were trembling again. Shoulders slumping, but with a vicious scowl on his face, he reached into his pocket and tossed her the keys.
“Smoke will help you put the roof back up before you get in,” said Amber, checking out the car controls and testing the movement of the stick shift through the gears.
Karl actually felt the blood rush into his face.
“Now listen, Miss Witch. This is my Mustang convertible.”
“That’s Ms. Witch, thank you ever so much. And I know it’s a convertible,” interrupted Amber. “I don’t want to have to shout at you when we’re driving, so convert this thing from a windy brain scrambler back into a car. If you would be so kind.”
Karl heard the pop as Smoke began loosening the folded roof. Smoke’s smile had not faded an inch.
“Thank you,” Amber said, smiling and Karl considered growling. He also considered witch-a-cide and dwarf-a-cide, but decided that murder was a momentary pleasure bound to get him talked about and subsided.
“Have a nice trip, kids,” said Smoke, grinning as he dropped Amber’s cases into the back.
* * * * *
Getting accustomed to the car’s gears and handling took Amber a few miles – a gear-grinding distance she covered with Karl bracing himself against the dashboard, his face set in a permanent wince. Amber refused to let him disturb
her concentration. Her parents insisted she and her brother learn to drive stick, just in case they ever went overseas and wanted to drive. The intricacies of shifting came back to her fairly quickly and once they were on the turnpike heading north, she relaxed.
“Where are we going in Buffalo?” she asked.
“Hell,” Karl mumbled, his hand scrubbing his face.
Amber took one hand off the wheel long enough to thump him on the shoulder. If he was going to act like her brother, damn him, she would treat him that way.
“Who are we going to see? Friends of yours, of Mike’s? Do you have an address? Do we need to pull up directions?”
Karl didn’t answer. Amber cursed and slapped the steering wheel with her palm.
“You don’t have a plan, do you? Haven’t a clue. This is what I meant when I said your energy is all over the place.”
She gripped the steering wheel, her knuckles going white and tried to control the churning in her own stomach. After a moment a grin teased the corners of her mouth.
“I shouldn’t shout at you,” she said with a sigh. “My own energy isn’t all that organized right now. What with all the time I spent on the Ethereal and channeling Elemental energy the last few days, it’s a wonder my hair isn’t standing on end.”
Karl grunted but didn’t grant her anything more of an answer. She pulled to the side of the road and twisted around in her seat.
“Okay. Let’s plan something for once,” she muttered as she hauled her bag out of the back seat. “Is there anything you remember from your time in college that might have something to do with what’s happened to you?”
Karl sank back into the leather seat. He’d tensed when she’d pulled off the road, ready to start shouting and demanding they keep driving, but even he had to admit a plan would be a good thing.
“Okay. I knew Mike since high school, but when we got to college we stayed friends despite my relationship with my girlfriend. She was the high priestess of the college coven and he thought she was funny.”
Amber slammed her hand onto the wheel again and had Karl biting his lip as she rained abuse on his poor defenseless baby. She stroked the leather in apology before raining abuse down on him.
“And you didn’t think to tell me this? Did it possibly occur to you that I should know how close you were to magic? Who is she? Did you have a nasty breakup?”
“Gloria Simmons, and no, it was fairly amicable all things considered. I was getting ill and had no energy for her anymore. So she went off with a guy who could …”
Who could what? thought Amber when the silence went on a beat too long. Bang her all night long now that Karl was too weak to do the job?
Despite Amber creeping into his bedroom for the last few mornings, Karl had yet to do much more than hold hands with her. Of course every time he got near, he drained energy from her so she didn’t want to think what might happen if they tried something as physical as … getting physical. Even so, it would be nice to have him acknowledge that he noticed she was female. She remembered the tangled energy of his body. One of the threads was firmly planted in his root chakra. A nude … or naked … young Sophia Loren could ride by on a Harley and Karl probably wouldn’t even turn his head. Well, maybe. It depended on how he felt about bikes. More than likely he’d think about reacting, but nothing more than that.
“Who else?” said Amber, breaking into the uncomfortable silence.
Karl shivered, blinked rapidly, coming out of who knew what memories.
“Who else what?”
“Who else was in the coven? Who did you and your girlfriend hang out with magically?”
“I didn’t have anything to do with the magic. I didn’t see the point,” Karl replied after a moment’s silence, his voice sharp, “but I met everyone in the coven at one time or another.”
“Do you remember their names?”
“The coven? What?”
“The college coven, do you remember anyone’s name?”
When Karl nodded Amber reached into her handbag and pulled her phone. While Karl wrote out his list Amber shuffled through her address book, tucked the Bluetooth into her ear, and dialed.
When the number went through she was greeted with dead silence. No recorded greeting, no voice. She chuckled, turned the key in the ignition, and put the car into motion again.
“Davie, you’re the most paranoid man I know,” she said into the phone as she maneuvered around a semi-trailer.
“Who’s Davie?” whispered Karl.
“And this would be Amber Kemp,” came a strangely vibrant voice in Amber’s ear. “Voice print identified. What can I do for you?”
Amber swallowed a laugh. “Davie. Open an account, you have a new customer. Me. I need you to do some hunting for me. Track down a few people who were in college together about …” she glanced across at Karl. “When did you graduate? Where from?”
“Five years ago. Buffalo. State U.”
“Okay, Davie, start looking into them starting about, oh, eight years back. I want to know what scandals they were involved in, where they went to high school, religious affiliations, everything, oh, and where they are now.” She nodded to Karl. “Read me the list.”
Karl read out twelve names. To Amber’s slight surprise he did not say Gloria’s name. But he’d already told her that one, so she added her to the list ignoring Karl’s grunt. Maybe he didn’t want to investigate her. Too bad. She was in high probability, part of the problem.
“Do you want my credit card number?” said Amber, after Davie had finished reading back her list.
“I have already accessed that information,” came the mechanical voice. “Do you want fax or email information?”
“Send it to my email account,” said Amber. “I’m on my way to Buffalo right now. Call me when you’ve found out if anyone is still there, and if not, where the nearest person is.”
“You got it.”
“Who the hell was that?” Annoyance cracked in Karl’s voice.
“Davie is a computer dweeb I met two jobs ago. He telecommutes because of spinal cancer. He’s too weak now to go in. I kept in contact with him because in his spare time he is an e-detective.”
Karl groaned, closed his eyes, and lay back in his seat his hands trembling.
“Just when I think I understand what you’re saying, you go off again to la-la land,” he said after a pause.
Amber sniffed and consciously relaxed her grip on the wheel.
“He works with private investigators doing people and information searches from home over the web.”
“Hacking. Why didn’t you say so?”
“Most of what he finds is legal,” Amber replied serenely. “If it’s possible to track down your girlfriend’s old coven, he will. By the time we get to Buffalo he’ll have something for us.”
She glanced away from the road. Karl was still pale. He seemed almost fragile. Involuntary tremors passed through his body every few minutes. As she watched his head fell back against the rest and his eyelids fluttered closed. She could feel his muscle spasms even over the vibration of the car; then his whole body relaxed, slumped in his seat. Asleep.
Good. He needed the rest.
She wasn’t sure, but there was a possibility that her infusions were actually wearing him down faster. The strong Elemental power was flooding down nerve pathways that were already eroded by years of abuse. She couldn’t keep this up. She’d give them both just enough to get up in the morning and no more. He’d be mad, but she’d live with that; with luck, so would he.
Amber’s phone buzzed just as she was negotiating the outskirts of Buffalo. Karl woke with a snort and grabbed the phone.
“Hello? Hello? Where’s the damn talk button?” He shook the phone and blinked blearily at the small screen.
“I have it rigged for voice recognition. Anyway, that particular ring means that an email has arrived. Open file,” she commanded.
Karl tapped the screen and held it a little closer.
“It says it’s from Halabert’s Dairy?”
“That’s Davie’s secret identity. Consider yourself lucky. He used to send answers in code. Now that was fun because he wouldn’t give you the key. You had to work it out yourself. What does he say?”
“Ah, lessee. Ah … that of the names given only one still lives in Buffalo, now that Mike Clark … is dead. He wants to know if you need the autopsy report.”
He dropped the phone onto the car seat beside him and stared out of the window.
“I’m sorry for what happened to your friend,” said Amber in a soft voice.
“It’s nothing,” Karl snarled. “If he’s involved in this then he wasn’t my friend.”
Amber changed lanes and drifted down the exit ramp.
“He was your friend for years and we haven’t proven anything against him yet one way or another. Try to keep your memories a little longer. Don’t give up on him.”
When Karl didn’t answer Amber dropped the subject. She’d seen a sign for a coffee shop. Suspecting how much coffee Karl put away in any given day she was certain that he was skating the edges of a caffeine withdrawal headache by now. Anyway, it was well after lunchtime and she wanted to eat, refuel, before going to speak to the last local member of the old coven.
While Karl gave their order at the counter Amber took over one of the small tables and plugged her phone into her laptop. The email was available on her little palm unit, but she preferred reading from the bigger screen. By the time Karl was back with his triple espresso, her latte, and the sandwiches she was halfway down the tight text.
“Everyone has pretty much scattered to the winds,” said Amber, her chin resting on her palm as she clicked down the text. “The only one still in Buffalo is Albert Poole, now known as Albert Running Wolf, of all things. Legal name change. He runs a small, exclusive gym in center city. My, my. Look at that. Very high fees, private line of clothing, and diet drinks.” She clicked on the thumbnail photo and examined the enlarged picture carefully. “Blond, blue eyes,” she continued, “and if he has any native anything blood it’s in his left big toenail.”
First Destroy All Giant Monsters (The World Wide Witches Research Association) Page 22