by E. A. Copen
But it’s more than something physical. The Ancient Roman orator Cicero once wrote that the eyes were a window into the soul and people have been quoting it ever since because it’s true. When you look someone in the eyes, everything else melts away, leaving behind the person they truly are underneath. Underneath everything, Sal was just a man fighting to leave his mark on the world and protect those he loved.
I smiled. “None of us are strong enough alone. That’s why there’s family.”
“You just make sure you come back to yours.”
“Of course I will, Sal.”
“Then you won’t be needing these.” He lifted the envelopes and ripped them in half before stacking the halves and ripping them into fourths. When he was done, he scattered the ripped paper in the air like confetti before gripping me by the chin and pulling my lips to his, holding me until I couldn’t breathe.
Had my arm not been broken, my head aching, and the floor littered with bags and boxes, it might have been more than a kiss, but there are times when a kiss is all you need.
For a long time after that, I sat in his arms in silence, listening to him breathe and his heart beat. I thought a lot about what I should say, if anything, before I left. My mind was still broken from Warren’s assault, my heart still aching over Mara and Reed’s loss. I could cry, but that felt like wasted energy. I had already shed too many tears.
Maybe I owed him an apology. I’d made bad decisions and I had to own that. He’d warned me about getting Ed involved, and I’d ignored those warnings. Because of that, he was hurt more than he might have been. If I hadn’t been so hard on Mara all those months ago, she might still be alive, too.
All those could haves and might haves pounded away at the inside of my head for hours before I remembered something Chanter had once said to me.
“You can’t help everyone,” his voice rang in my head.
If I closed my eyes, I could almost see him standing in his kitchen, scolding me when I came to him with some mundane problem. He wore a brown apron, a white tank top and blue jeans. While he spoke, his hands worked to chop the celery and carrots on his glass cutting board. The room smelled like roasting meat and old smoke.
Chanter lifted the knife and pointed it at me to emphasize his words. “There are people in this world who don’t want to be saved, girl. Some of us are doomed from the day when we first draw breath to end in tragedy. You are not one of those people.”
I crossed my arms and leaned forward on the bar. “What makes you so sure, old man?”
“I could say it’s because I’m an Indian and we know these things.” Chanter smirked. “But you wouldn’t believe me.” He turned back to chopping his vegetables, a somber look now on his face. “But one day, something bad is going to happen to you. Bad things happen to all of us. We can’t always choose to avoid tragedy. What we can do is decide how to respond. Do we play the victim and wallow in our own self-pity, asking again and again, ‘what if I had done things differently?’” Chanter lifted the cutting board and dumped the vegetables into the stock pot, taking his time to continue, as he always did.
“Or?” I pressed, impatient as always.
He waited until he had put the cutting board back down and cleaned his hands on his apron to turn and lean on the counter himself. “Or you pick yourself up, you acknowledge what happened, and you learn from it. That is the difference between someone who cannot be saved and someone who saves themselves.” He leaned back and sighed. “You should wake up or you’re going to be late.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Wake up!”
~
I woke from the dream with a start. The room was dark with long shadows. My right foot was asleep and my arm itched like crazy. It had been late evening when he came in. What time was it now?
Sal drew in a deep breath and cleared his throat. “What time are you supposed to be wherever it is you’re going?”
“Four thirty.” I grunted and hauled myself up, which was more of a task than normal given the pins and needles in my foot. The alarm clock on the other side of the bed announced it was four fifteen. “Shit, I need to go.”
“Need a ride?”
I shook my head. “It’s not far. Listen, Sal, you weren’t supposed to know. If you let on that you did—”
He interrupted me with a dismissive snort. “I used to work for the government, too, Judah. You don’t have to tell me what happens when people don’t play by their rules. Go. I’ll be waiting for you when you get back. Just do me one favor.”
I stopped limping around, trying to get the blood going to my foot again. “What?”
“You make sure that bastard can’t hurt anyone else again the way he hurt you.”
“I will,” I promised and opened the door.
Hunter was standing on the other side with a very sleepy Mia holding his hand.
I sighed. “Not you, too?”
Hunter grinned. “If you think I’m going to let you run off without giving me the password to your Netflix account, you’ve got another thing coming.”
He didn’t hug me, but he did let me hug him.
“God, Mom,” he said and sounded like he rolled his eyes. “No need to make a scene. This isn’t the first time you’ve gone off to certain death and it won’t be the last.”
I kissed him on the cheek and he cringed.
Sudden pressure on my leg alerted me that Mia was clinging to me. I bent over and kissed her, too. She giggled. “Be good for your daddy, okay?”
“Love you, bye,” she said, as if I were just leaving for any old day at the office. I wondered how much of all this she understood. Would she even notice if I didn’t come back? One look at her smile and all thoughts that she wouldn’t vanished. Mia might not have been related to me by blood, but she was still as much my child as she was Sal’s.
I paused in the doorway to look back at Hunter, Mia, and Sal one last time. No, to look back at my family. I might have been a mess, but I wasn’t going to go through life being a victim, not when I had people I needed to protect. I knew what Warren could do now, and I knew how to fight him. When I got my hands around his neck, he was going to wish he’d finished me in that Way.
~
I’d recognize Marcus’ Range Rover a mile away. He had other cars, most of them flashier, but that was for his public persona. The vampire underneath, the one hardly anybody got to know was ruthlessly efficient with an ego the size of the whole Lonestar State.
Also, a few months ago, I’d slapped a bumper sticker on the back end that said, “I’d rather be in Transylvania.” The sticker was faded and peeling from where he’d tried to scrape and wash it off, but I’d special ordered one of those high-grade, permanent stickers. A girl’s got to get her revenge somehow.
The Rover pulled up at the meeting spot and the back door opened. I hesitated when I saw it was Doc who had had opened it. His afro bobbed in the light wind as he leaned out and gestured for me to get in. “Come on, Judah. I’ll explain on the way.”
What choice did I have?
I got in, sliding in next to Doc. Creven waved from the seat across from me. The back seats in Marcus’ Rover aren’t the standard back seats. They faced each other, which made the back of the SUV kind of surreal to sit in.
Marcus adjusted his mirror. “Good to see you.”
“Did you fire Han?” I asked.
Marcus turned his attention forward and gripped the steering wheel tighter. “No. He didn’t report for work today. I expect BSI has whisked him away to safety already. It would be pointless to eliminate his position now, especially when I can just as easily fill it.”
I turned to Doc and raised an eyebrow.
He waved his hands frantically. “Don’t look at me. I don’t work in R and D. I don’t even have a license to practice outside the reservation. The state took that away after they found out I kept zombies.”
“Rightfully so.” Abe twisted in the front seat to frown back at us. “They’re dangerous creat
ures.”
“They’re misunderstood!” Doc shot back as the car slid out onto the road.
I cleared my throat. “So why are you here, Doc?”
“To administer the…uh…treatment.” He pushed his glasses up his nose with a finger. “I haven’t had a lot of time to study it, but the research he gave me seems to suggest it’ll do what he claims. Not only will it heal you, but it will accelerate your healing for a short while. But, you know, full disclosure. This hasn’t been tested on humans yet.”
“Although it performed admirably in the chimpanzee trials,” Marcus said, turning his head. “Nine out of ten were able to recover from significant injuries.”
“And the tenth one?” I asked.
“Died in a lot of pain,” Marcus answered and waved a hand, dismissing my concerns. “But that won’t happen to you. You should see what the Viagra trials were like and the FDA approved that. You’ll be fine.”
“So, what is this treatment?” I turned to study Doc.
He fidgeted until Creven tapped him on the knee with his staff and nodded below the seat. “Oh, right.”
Doc threw himself forward and hauled out a metal briefcase that he placed on his lap and opened. The inside was lined with foam except for a cutaway area where a series of no less than five hypodermic needles and syringes sat. A few alcohol wipes and a pair of rubber gloves had been shoved into the lid.
He pulled one of the needles out. “Ideally, we would be in a laboratory setting and I would use monitors to keep an eye on your oxygen saturation, heart rate, maybe an EKG every few hours—”
“There is no time for that,” Abe growled from the front seat. “We know where Warren is now and he is unlikely to remain there once the sun rises.”
“Well, you’ll at least have to pull over.” Doc sounded firm, but his chin quivered. He was, after all, just a doctor in a car with a bunch of supernatural creatures. “I’m not injecting anything into a patient’s spine in a moving vehicle!”
I cringed. “That goes where now?”
Marcus pulled the car over to the side of the road just short of the exit from the reservation.
Doc turned to me, one of the needles in hand. “Five injections into the dura. You’ve been through childbirth. They did an epidural, right? Same idea, except this isn’t going to make you numb. It stimulates the autonomic nervous system directly. It’s quite astounding. Breakthrough research.” He gestured for me to turn around.
I started to lift my shirt.
“Oh, there’s no need. These go in the cervical lumbar.”
“Huh?” I turned my head and made a confused face.
Doc rolled his eyes. “Base of your neck. Now please turn back around, Judah.”
I shivered as he wiped the base of my neck with an alcohol wipe. “Hold absolutely still, Judah. If you move, the needle could paralyze you or have other unintended consequences.”
I don’t like needles. I especially don’t like needles when I can’t see them. Having five of them jabbed into my neck between two vertebrae in short order was so horrible sounding, even my nightmares hadn’t thought it up.
It wasn’t as bad as I expected. A little cold pressure, a strange rush followed by a wave of nausea, and it was all over. The first one was, anyway. I sat through it four more times before Doc wiped the area one final time and applied a band aid. “You’ll probably be sore for a while.”
I looked down at my arm in the cast. It didn’t feel any different. “How long until it starts working?”
As if on cue, there was a sudden, burning pain in my arm. I could feel exactly where the break was, where the jagged edges of bone butted against one another. It felt like someone had taken a soldering gun to the bones, forcing them to fuse back together.
“It’s working!” Doc grinned ear to ear and then pulled out a scary-looking tool with a circular blade attached. “Let’s cut the cast off and you’ll be good to go!”
I was still in doubt. There had to be a drawback to this magic cure, even if I wasn’t seeing it. But hey, I was fit to fight. Now wasn’t the time to look a gift horse in the mouth.
I extended my hand to Doc and turned away, cringing at the sound of him cutting into the cast. “So,” I said, trying to raise my voice over the sound, “where’s Warren? Where are we going?”
Marcus smirked and pulled out onto the road. “We’re going to church.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Saint Phillip’s Mission was an old Spanish mission of adobe and faded, red tiles. Surrounded by sagebrush and dry, cracked earth, the church stood a forgotten relic down an overgrown path several miles off the highway. It was just shy of dawn when we arrived. Streaks of red and orange colored the sky. Clouds wove through the painted color like mountains in the sky.
An old Oldsmobile was parked conspicuously against the side of the church. My fingers curled against my leg at the sight of it. I raked my teeth against my bottom lip, biting hard until it hurt so bad I couldn’t think. That seemed to keep the images at bay. There, so close to him, I feared they’d come back. I couldn’t afford to be reduced to a quivering mess. That meant I had to keep Warren’s hands off of me at any cost.
Abe turned in his seat and held a Tupperware container out to me. “I took the liberty of securing this from your boyfriend’s truck,” he said. “Smear it on your head and it will lessen his ability to affect you. You may still feel his pull, but you should be able to resist.”
I took the Tupperware and opened it, recoiling at the smell. The mixture felt thick and grainy on my fingers. “This won’t keep me from healing like it did Reed?”
“No,” Marcus reported. “Unlike Gideon Reed, you aren’t relying on magick to heal your body, but science.”
I smeared the strange mixture on my forehead. If Abe had taken it from Sal, that meant it worked. I trusted Sal enough to believe that. I offered the Tupperware to Creven who mimicked my movements. Abe refused, saying he had protections of his own in place. I decided it was best to just leave it at that.
“Alright,” I said once everyone who was going was protected, “I’m ready to go.”
“There is one more thing,” Abe said. “A gesture of good will from Deputy Director Richardson that he feels will be useful in your fight.”
He pointed under my seat.
“This is beginning to feel like I’m on an Oprah episode.” I reached down and my hand fell on something cool and metallic. When I closed my fingers around it, there was no doubt in my mind what it was.
I pulled the Sword of Light from under my seat and held it in front of me. There was no mistaking the faint buzz of magick as I held it, but there was something more. Most magick has a feel to it. Magick can be dark and greasy like the ghost I’d fought, or light and crisp like Creven’s magick felt. This magick felt like standing on a tall building to watch the sun rise. Hope. I held hope and light in my hands. There was no way handing that over to Seamus would be a good thing.
Doubt settled in where the hope had been a moment ago. “I don’t know how to use a sword, Abe.”
“We have had this conversation before and you did fine then.”
“The Sword of Light is no ordinary blade,” Creven said, regarding it with sparkling eyes. “The legends my people tell of it would have you believe a child could pick it up and slay a dragon. It is the sword of heroes.” He smiled at me. “Something tells me you’ll do fine.”
“Once you three are out, I’ll take the doctor to safety.” Marcus unlocked the doors. “Agent Helsinki, you know how to contact me. If I haven’t heard from you in a few hours, I’ll assume you failed and that you’re dead. I, of course, will deny any involvement.”
“Encouraging.”
“And if Warren gets away like last time?” Creven asked.
My grip tightened around the sword and I felt the rush of magick flow out of me and down into it. “Warren is mine. I’m not letting him get away. I’ll drag him to Hell with me if I have to. He doesn’t get to walk away, not this time.�
�
I pulled the door handle and climbed out of the SUV, walking around to stand in front of the church. There wasn’t much of a path leading up to it, but there was a place where no plants grew. The dust was heavier going in a narrow line up to the door. There was a loud thump as Creven and Abe closed their respective doors, coming to stand beside me.
Abe checked the shotgun he carried to make sure it was loaded.
Creven paused, dusted himself off and shifted his grip on his staff. “Lass, I feel there’s something you should know before we walk in there together.”
“Save it,” I said and took my first step forward. “There’ll be time after.”
We walked up to the door. It was an old, rotten slab of wood, broken down by time and the elements. Heavy, iron chains that once served to secure the building now hung in pieces, fine red desert dust half burying them. The door creaked loudly as I pushed it open.
The sanctuary had no ceiling. Dust danced in the pillars of late afternoon light that filtered through the holes in the walls. Broken half round shapes cast strange shadows over ancient pews that no longer sat in a line. They’d been moved against the walls or placed about haphazardly. The way they were arranged reminded me of barricades. Some of them were broken, some burned. Others held the carved initials of lovers forgotten by time. The adobe walls had been the victim of spray paint and decay, the artwork ranging from swastikas to poetry.
The raised platform at the front of the church stood empty but for several dozen lit candles. Their tiny flames danced at the feet of Christ on the cross. His face was missing, chipped away by vandals. The cross was huge, taking up almost the whole wall. With the marred life-sized iron sculpture of Christ on it, it must’ve weighed several hundred pounds.
Creven, Abe, and I stepped into the empty church, letting the doors swing closed behind us. “Warren!” I called, stepping further in and avoiding a hole in the floor. “Show yourself! We know you’re here!”
Another door on the far side of the front stage, to the right of the cross, opened and Warren strode out. He’d had a change of clothes since I’d last seen him, changing out his cassock for a black suit and polished shoes. His collar was pristine white. A silver cross hung from around his neck on a thick chain. His green eyes danced back and forth at a rapid pace. Just our luck. Warren was on rem.