Malevolent (The Puzzle Box Series Book 1)

by K. M. Carroll

  She looked at my hands, then my face, but didn't say anything. She didn't say it so hard that I added, "We're just friends."

  I left her smirking, and hurried to the camper. Dread crawled up my throat. What if he told me to take a hike? Worse, what if he stood there and stared at me and never said anything? I had hurt his feelings pretty bad. I hadn't even listened when he tried to explain about how he'd saved my life. Guilt joined the dread.

  I tapped twice on the door with my fingernails.

  Footsteps thumped inside the camper and the door opened. Mal looked down at me. His eyes crinkled in his almost-smile. "Libby!"

  His clothes and hair were rumpled, as if he hadn't bothered changing in days, and he smelled like it, too. Stubble sprinkled his chin, but his eyes caught the light as spring green.

  Tense wariness and joy fizzed inside me like Diet Coke and Mentos. One wrong move and I'd explode. I'd missed him, dang it. I hadn't realized it until I saw him again--but fear tainted the gladness. I swayed forward to hug him, but checked myself and clasped my hands instead.

  He stepped down out of the trailer, and his cold hands closed over mine. "I'm glad you returned. I'd begun to consider leaving."

  "No! Don't do that!" I drew a breath to steady myself. His touch was like coming home, and I never wanted him to let go. I lowered my voice. "I can't handle this without you. This is my friend Tiffany, here. Robert bit her."

  He glanced at Tiffany in the cart, and his mouth tightened into a frown. He continued to hold my hands. "Libby, my bees are struggling to survive after I ... the incident. If I harvest their honey, I may lose them all."

  And another healing ritual would kill more of the ranch. But neither of us said it.

  He released my hands, and I immediately dragged my fingers through my long hair. "Tiffany's been testing herself to see what's wrong. She took pictures of the death motes."

  Mal groped for the doorframe and leaned against it, as if his knees threatened to give out. His white face turned gray. "Pictures. What have you told her?"

  "Only that you study them. She thinks that you're a scientist. Are you okay?"

  His chest heaved with a quick breath, almost a gasp. "I must speak to her."

  He closed the camper door and stepped past me, but stopped and laid a hand on my shoulder. "I need to apologize to you, first." His eyes turned sad and amber.

  I looked into his strange, pointed face, and at that moment, I lost my fear of him forever. Lich or not, he was also a lonely man with a lousy life. Had our places been swapped, would I have killed the orchard to save him?

  In a heartbeat.

  I patted his cold hand. "It's okay. I forgive you."

  We gazed at each other a long moment, and a new tension strained between us--things we felt but couldn't say. Then he turned away and approached Tiffany. I followed, unsteadily. Why did he churn up these feelings inside me? Why couldn't I make it stop? I didn't want another boyfriend. But these feelings were definitely not friendship.

  Tiffany watched us with a knowing expression. But as Mal approached, she stepped out of the cart and became a smooth, professional scientist. "Hello, sir. I'm Tiffany Taichi."

  "I'm Malachi Seren." They shook hands, then Tiffany displayed her photos. "These were taken under an electron microscope with numerous filters in place."

  Mal took the binder and examined the photos. His eyes flashed from amber to yellow-green, like a startled cat's. "These are samples of your own tissue?"

  "Yes, simple blood and mouth swabs."

  Mal glanced at me. "You've perused these, correct?" But the fear lingered in his eyes.

  I nodded. Why was he so freaked?

  He sighed. "These particles are known as motes. They exist throughout nature, but there are ways of ... altering their behavior."

  I winced. Inside my head I whispered, Don't tell her what you are!

  Fortunately Mal had more sense than that. "I've spent years learning to balance motes, and one way is through honey gathered by my specially-bred bees. I have a doctorate in agricultural biology."

  I stared at him. A doctorate? How old was he, anyway? Why hadn't I ever asked?

  Mal continued, "My colonies are working the orchards here, but the nectar flow will not produce harvestable honey for at least three more weeks. Will you last until then?"

  Even through her scientist mask, I could tell Tiffany hung on his every word. "Do the motes do lasting harm? I'm not irradiated, for instance?"

  "Nothing like that." Mal handed her the binder. "It will grow neither better nor worse. Come back the first week in April and I'll tend to you then." He stepped back and folded his arms.

  Tiffany wasn't satisfied. "What are the motes called? Surely you're not the only authority on them."

  His eyes flicked to my face, and his fingers drummed on his arm. "There isn't much data on them at present. I'm sorry, but that's all I can tell you."

  "Hm." Tiffany stared at Mal, then me. "All right, let's go."

  Tiffany and I climbed into the cart, and I turned it around. Mal watched us go, unmoving.

  As we drove back to the house, Tiffany leaned toward me. "What was that all about?"

  "What?"

  "The private conversation ... holding hands ... you sure you're not dating?"

  Heat burned up my cheeks and into my hair. "No. We're just friends."

  "Ha." Tiffany sat back in her seat, grinning. "You could totally do better. He's awfully scruffy."

  "Hey, he usually doesn't look like that. Be nice." He probably had been miserable since I stormed off. My heart stung.

  Tiffany shrugged. "Well, they say love is blind. I'm going to check his facts, though. Seriously, motes undiscovered by modern science? And I just happened across them with student lab equipment?"

  I blinked at the road. She made a good point. Why hadn't anybody else discovered the motes, anyway?

  We reached home and went back up to my room. Tiffany set me up with study materials, then helped herself to my computer.

  I tried to study, but my mind kept wandering. Motes, Mal, the dead orchard. What would happen if Tiffany learned about the motes, and about liches and vampires? What if everyone learned about them? Would there be a war?

  Tiffany made a frustrated sound.

  I looked up. "Did the router go down?"

  "No. All these articles end the same way. Whenever anybody started to study these mote things, the person disappeared. That makes four different researchers now!"

  My stomach lurched as if I'd looked over the edge of a cliff. "What do you mean, disappeared?"

  She pointed at the screen, which displayed a news article. "That's what it says. Adam McGuinness, nearing a breakthrough on a new particle he believed would revolutionize the energy industry, disappeared one night after leaving his home on a bike. Marcy Fry, physicist, in the middle of experimental research on new energy source, vanished while walking home from work. Same thing for Lynnette Dolittle and Carson Mitchel. No bodies were ever recovered." She swiveled around to face me, eyes wide. "What, is this top secret or something? How has your friend kept from disappearing?"

  The voices of the bees echoed through my head. He whom we fear. "I think ... he's been trying to."

  Tiffany chewed a fingernail and stared out the window a moment. Then she looked at me. "Are you and I in danger?"

  Mal had been so afraid. Spooky chills crept down my back. Necromancers are scary, but so is the idea of being dragged off by the government. "I'm not sure. But Mal has said some odd things."

  "Does he know what's going on?"

  "Maybe."

  Tiffany opened her binder and studied the pictures. "I was going to show these to my science professors, and maybe write a paper. But now, I think I'll wait." She slid it aside with shaking hands and forced a smile. "Let's drill you on this test."

  Mal

  Libby's friend did not depart until two o'clock.

  I performed the noon half of the protection spell, but often lost focus. The b
ees surrounded me and sang their songs of comfort and well-being, but even that could not calm the cold waves that rolled inside me.

  I could not heal everyone. How many people had Robert bitten? Four? A dozen? The entire town?

  When my father raised his hand, who would answer?

  To complicate matters, the foolish girl had photographed the motes. Every time I thought of it, I dragged my hand down my face. If she breathed a word of her findings to anyone, the Marchers would converge upon her--and Libby--and myself.

  Wasn't my father a big enough problem already?

  Once Libby's friend's car left the driveway, I walked to the front door of Libby's house and knocked.

  Libby's mother answered the door and studied me suspiciously. "Yes?"

  "I need to speak to Libby, please," I said. "Just for a moment. Out here is fine."

  Her eyes narrowed, but she turned her head and called Libby's name.

  A moment later Libby arrived, head bowed, downcast. "Hi, Mal." She stepped onto the porch and closed the front door. Her dark hair formed a soft wave against her neck, and the pink of health touched her face. She moved with unconscious strength.

  "Hello, Libby." My voice was far warmer than I had intended.

  She gazed at me. The fear that had encompassed her earlier was gone. Before I could ask why, she said, "So, um, why is it so bad that Tiffany took pictures of the motes?"

  I glanced around the porch and surrounding yard. Empty. "Because of the Marchers."

  "Marchers?"

  I raised a finger. "Hush. Not too loudly. They are magic users who also wield life and death magic, but they are human beings, not monsters. If a human encounters the motes, the Marchers find and silence them. Sometimes by recruitment. Other times ..."

  She drew a finger across her throat.

  I nodded. "Tiffany has endangered everyone in her social circle, especially you. You must persuade her to keep this secret."

  Libby nodded, then made a face. "I will. Where are these people?"

  "They have cell organizations everywhere. But there is a more pressing danger."

  "What?"

  I cleared my throat. "I recommend that you leave Arvin for several days."

  She looked at me, blinking. "Why?"

  "My father intends to turn you into a thrall at the full moon."

  She froze, eyes wide. Only her lips stirred. "What?"

  "Yes. You must be far away when he calls you." I flung an arm westward, where the Lost Hills were a barely visible blue line. "He is strong enough to draw life motes from hundreds of miles away."

  She leaned against the house's wall and rubbed one cheek. "What about Tiffany?"

  Yes. That.

  "I cannot vouch for her safety, now that she is infected. Perhaps she should accompany you."

  She raised her eyes to my face. "And you?"

  I had no wish to talk about my fate. "I'll survive."

  "But you've been running from him. The bees called him 'the one you fear'."

  The longer we associated, the more she knew about me. But was this good or bad? It certainly eased my loneliness for a time. I sat on the porch steps.

  After a moment, Libby sat beside me. "You're not answering, so I know I hit a nerve. I'm sorry."

  My phylactery was nearby. That had to be why my emotions grew as complicated as the puzzle box that contained them. My arms ached to hold her.

  But you are a lich, I told myself. A foul, soulless creature with barely any heartbeat and the coldness of a corpse. Your very touch poisons her.

  I kept my arms at my sides. "Yes. I have run from my father for many years. But now more lives than my own are at stake, and I cannot flee." I gazed at the blue mountains in the distance. "But it is tempting."

  "So you want me to run instead."

  "Yes."

  "What if I don't? I mean, will your dad walk into our house and kidnap me?"

  "No. He will call and you will go to him, you and anyone else Robert has infected. Then my father will remove your soul and bind your will to his own. You will then do whatever he commands until your body dies."

  Libby gripped her knees as if in pain. "But--but I thought you healed me."

  I nodded. "I did, but the dark influence takes more time to wear off. The full moon amplifies all mote activity, and he will call you then."

  "What if I just resist? Chain myself up or something?"

  I had seen that happen once. A man who resisted the Necromancer had locked himself inside a block wall basement. I was sent to retrieve him. When I arrived, he had already beaten himself to death against the walls, trying to answer the call.

  "It would kill you."

  Libby squinted into the distance. She pulled out her pocket knife, and snapped the blade open and closed. "Tiffany has no chance at all, right? Because she's infected?"

  "She will not resist."

  "What do we do? Carry sharpened stakes?" She flicked her knife open and made a stabbing motion.

  Her fighting spirit warmed me. It had been years since I had met anyone so willing to resist my father. "The Necromancer is a lich, remember? He can only be destroyed if one destroys his phylactery."

  "Great! Where is it?"

  I lifted a hand, then let it fall. "Hidden somewhere in Europe, I believe."

  She drooped. "Fail. Where in Europe?"

  "That I don't know. He mailed it to a contact over there before I became a lich."

  Libby toyed with her knife for a moment. "Even if he is immortal, your dad probably wouldn't like having a stake through his heart."

  Amusement bubbled through me, and my face tried to smile. "It would certainly distract him." I relaxed control and at last allowed the smile through. My muscles hardly remembered how to arrange my face into such a benevolent expression.

  Libby studied me in approval. "You have a nice smile! You should do it more often."

  I reverted to my usual blank expression. "I seldom have anything to smile about."

  "You did when you found out I was still alive."

  The memory rose before me like a ghastly specter. Robert twisting her head with a sickening snap, and letting her fall to the ground. I had never experienced a true black rage before--the sort where I sank into a trance of violence, summoning every ounce of magic, using it to annihilate my brother. But then I returned to reality, went to Libby, and found her with eyelids fluttering and limbs twitching, life swiftly ebbing.

  Her life was more important than a few trees and animals.

  I faced the same scenario again. But this time, I would not be able to save her. Anguish rose inside me until my chest was a single knot of pain.

  "You cannot die again," I whispered.

  She laid a warm hand on my arm. "It's okay, Mal. Don't cry." Her own eyes had filled with tears.

  I dared touch her face with my palm, and it felt as soft as peach skin, and warm as life itself. "Libby. I'm afraid I have feelings for you, and I cannot face seeing you enthralled. You must flee."

  As she blinked at me through her tears, I wondered if she cared for me, too--but it didn't matter. What mattered was that she walked the earth, alive and untainted by black magic. Giving up her companionship was a painful price, but I would pay it.

  She stroked my hand against her face. "Will the beach be far enough? Like Pismo or somewhere?"

  "No. Farther, like Monterey or Santa Barbara."

  She nodded and pulled away. "Let me check my calendar and talk to Mom and Dad. Then I'll see if I can talk Tiffany into an overnight trip. It's just the one night, right?"

  "Correct." Relief eased my agony. "The full moon is next Tuesday."

  She stood and I did the same. She turned toward the house and hesitated. "Will you still be here when we get back?"

  I shrugged. "One can hope."

  Her eyebrows drew together and her lips tightened. "What if he finds your phylactery?"

  My own death had long ago ceased to terrify me. "Then I will most likely die." I shrugged. "But it is be
tter that I die than you lose your soul."

  She bit her lip and nodded. "Okay. I'll make some plans."

  She went in the house. I thrust my hands in my pockets and walked toward the almond orchards. Several bees left the flower bed and circled me.

  "Hello, Mal," they sang.

  "Hello friends," I replied. "How do you fare?"

  "We are protected by your spells, and we thank you. In return we seek to guard your phylactery. But it is gone."

  "Gone?" I sprinted around Libby's house and checked behind the air conditioning unit. Gone. It had been a poor hiding place.

  I shut my eyes and concentrated on finding it. First, I located all my limbs and digits--and found a part of me elsewhere. Nearby. I opened my eyes. It was inside the house above me--the same window I had climbed to in the dead of night. Libby's room. She must have discovered it.

  I had not told her what the box contained. She probably suspected, for she had not asked. But at our next meeting, I would beg her to hide it well and never open it.

  Once my father and brother discovered Libby's absence, they would seek my phylactery in revenge.

  Chapter 13

  Libby

  When a monster tells you to run for your life, you run for your dang life.

  Mom and Dad approved of my trip idea, possibly because it took me away from Mal. They approved even more when they found out that Tiffany had agreed to come with me.

  The plan was to leave early Tuesday morning. We'd head down to Santa Barbara, walk on the beach, go shopping, and act like ordinary, uninfected teen girls.

  I hadn't been out of the house in six months, so I was starting to feel butterflies of excitement in my stomach whenever I thought about it. Even though it was only Sunday, I'd already packed my overnight bag three times.

  I actually went to church that morning. I hadn't gone in months, and all our friends welcomed me with open arms. But all through the sermon, I missed Mal with a formless longing deep beneath my other feelings. He'd healed me, and my life was back. But what had I done for him, besides endanger him?