I squeezed his hand. “I can imagine. Malcolm, I’m so sorry.”
“We were fumbling all over the place. If we tried to go on the hunt, one or more of us would be seriously injured. It was discouraging, and infuriating. Based on my performance today, I have no business leading a team in the field.”
“But—that’s just temporary! You’ll figure it out, and soon you’ll be as efficient as ever. Maybe even more so, if this forces you to develop new techniques.”
“The Wardens don’t have time for that. So many teams have been devastated by the loss of their steel magi, there’s been a push to put more candidates through the Damerel rites, create new magi to take their places. If I really cared about the Long War more than my own selfish desires, I’d retire and let someone else head my team.”
An astonished breath hissed out of me before I could contain myself. “Malcolm, you can’t do that!”
“I can, and I probably should. But…Helena, love, I don’t want to! This is who I am, magic or no, and it’s where I should serve.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Malcolm looked away from me. “I’m going to undertake the Damerel rites again.”
It was so unexpected it took me a moment to understand his words. “Malcolm, you can’t,” I finally said. “No one’s ever survived it a second time.”
“This afternoon, after training, I went to talk to Darius Wallach,” Malcolm said. “He’s the bone magus who supervises the Damerel rites. I told him what I’ve told you and I told him what I wanted. And he told me—he said he’s been waiting for someone like me to come along.”
“Someone with a death wish?”
“I have never had more to live for, Helena,” Malcolm said, finally looking at me again. “Wallach has invented a new kind of steel aegis, an alloy he says makes a steel magus ten times as capable of wielding magic as the current one. But it’s expensive, and the two times he’s tried it before, the magi died and the aegises were lost.”
“Were you trying to fill me with confidence? Because it’s not working.”
“The Damerel rites are dangerous even for a first-time magus. Wallach believes the reason no one has ever survived them twice is that the previous aegis sets up a resonance within the magus that a second aegis has to match. He can create an aegis using the new material that resonates with my lost aegis and won’t kill me outright. There’s even a possibility that the second implantation will go more smoothly than the first.”
“But he’s never done this before.”
Malcolm hesitated. “No.”
“And all this is theoretical. He doesn’t even know if the new steel aegis can implant properly.”
“Yes.”
I felt as if he’d slapped me. “Malcolm, are you out of your mind? This will almost certainly kill you!”
Malcolm clasped my hands in both of his. “Helena, what is certain is that without this, I will no longer be a fighter in the Long War. I will be reduced to working from the sidelines, and the thought fills me with abhorrence. Can’t you see that this is my only hope?”
Tears filled my eyes. “Can’t you see that you’d be throwing away your life for nothing? What’s so wrong with working from the sidelines?”
“It would be a waste of my training. And Wallach is convinced—”
“He’s not the one who’d be mourning you in secret for the rest of her life!”
Malcolm put his arms around me and drew me close. “I know,” he said. “This affects you as much as it does me. I wasn’t going to tell you tonight—I wanted to think it through a little more, work out what I intended to do—but you were right, I should be able to share my problems with you.”
“Damn straight,” I said, my voice muffled a little.
“I wish I could introduce you to Wallach. He can explain it better than I can. It might reassure you to know I’m not leaping into this blindly. Wallach has convinced me that with his new procedure and the alloy aegis, my chances of survival are as good as a first-time Damerel candidate. It’s still dangerous, but not foolhardy.”
“But…” I couldn’t think of a way to end that sentence that wasn’t whiny. I didn’t want Malcolm to risk his life at all, let alone on an untested procedure with an unproven aegis. But before this crisis, he’d gone into the field almost every night, putting his life on the line for the sake of everyone, including me. “If I asked you,” I said instead, “would you give this plan up?”
I felt him stiffen. “I would,” he said after a moment’s pause.
“Why?”
“Because you would never ask it of me.”
I nodded. “You’re right. And the truth is, this is exactly the kind of risk you were made to take. I couldn’t ask you to abandon it without making you someone other than you are.”
He relaxed, and I felt him kiss the top of my head. “I never want to hurt you.”
“I know. This isn’t about me.”
“It is, a little. You’re right. If this kills me, you’ll be unable to grieve openly.”
I sat up to look him in the eye. “That’s why I’m going with you.”
His eyes widened. “You can’t go with me.”
“I can. I know they let loved ones accompany the candidate as a sort of anchor, a reminder of what they’re fighting for.”
“Yes, but you can’t go without revealing our relationship!”
“Then maybe it’s time to reveal it. Or did you think we could just go on in secret for years?”
Malcolm gripped my wrist. “Helena, I can’t let you do this.”
“It’s my decision.”
“I won’t be the reason you lose your life.”
“They won’t kill me. I’ve done too much for Abernathy’s for them to feel justified in executing me.” I was mostly confident of that.
“But you’d certainly be stripped of your custodianship.”
“Maybe. If I could convince them otherwise—”
“With what? The evidence from the Accords you’ve so far failed to find?” Malcolm stood and paced to the window, where he gripped the sill and stood staring down at the street. “No, Helena. Please.”
The quiet desperation in his voice stopped my quick response. I stood and went to join him at the window, putting my hand on his shoulder. “I want to be with you.”
“And I don’t want you to lose something so essential to who you are because of me.” Malcolm looked over his shoulder at me. “How will my regaining my aegis matter if it means you losing your custodianship?”
I closed my fingers tightly on his shoulder. “Malcolm—”
“You were meant to be the hands of the oracle. For whatever reason, Nathaniel Briggs chose you—a non-Warden outsider to the Long War, the least likely candidate anyone could imagine. But what happens if you reveal everything, and I die anyway? You’ll still lose Abernathy’s, and for nothing. Please, Helena. I won’t tell you I don’t wish you could be with me. But I can’t indulge that wish. Not at that cost.”
The anguish in his eyes startled me. I knew how much Abernathy’s meant to me, but I’d never realized how much my custodianship mattered to him as well. “All right,” I said. “But you’d damn well better come back.”
He smiled and caressed my cheek. “I will always come back to you,” he said, turning to take me in his arms.
“When will you do it?”
“I’ll give him my answer tomorrow. Then…it will happen Saturday afternoon. It takes them a day to make the new aegis, and then time for him to build up a resonance in it…Saturday is the soonest it will be ready, and I don’t want to wait around for no reason.”
I put my arms around his neck and ran my fingers through his hair. “I’m not in the mood for a movie anymore.”
“Neither am I.” He kissed me, his lips lingering on mine, making me shiver with delight. “But I will show you what I am in the mood for, if you’d care to adjourn to the bedroom?”
I kissed him back. “Lead the way.”
&n
bsp; Doug Schrote came bounding into the store at 2:15 the next afternoon, shouting, “Did you all hear? Malcolm Campbell’s going through the Damerel rites again!”
I clutched the augury slip in my hand harder as the murmurs went up all around. “How do you know that?” I asked, calmly. I hoped.
“Everyone’s talking about it. Darius Wallach finally found a test subject for his wacky theory.”
I forbore to comment on how wacky something must be for Doug to find it crazy. “I’m sure you’re wrong. That seems like something very private.”
“No, the Damerel folks are making the aegis right now. It’s a special kind of steel that’s never been used successfully before. I think Campbell’s nuts for trying it. No one’s ever survived Damerel twice.”
At least Malcolm hasn’t been spreading the news. I silently cursed Wallach and his team. Malcolm was a private man, and I was sure he didn’t want his business the subject of gossip throughout all of magery. “I’m sure if Malcolm’s doing it, he has a good reason.”
“Desperation, most likely.” Doug turned and went to the end of the line, where he started sharing his news with his neighbors. I smiled at my current customer and hoped I didn’t look insane.
As I searched the stacks for the woman’s augury, I found myself going over what Malcolm had told me. I wished I was in a position to grill Wallach on the details—what other metals went into the alloy? How was the resonance established? What did “resonance” even mean? What were the chances of death? My knowing those things wouldn’t make Malcolm more likely to survive, but I needed something, anything to hold onto when the rest of my thoughts whirled around and around the terrifying central fact that no one, in all the centuries of magery, had ever survived what Malcolm proposed to do.
Judy was at the counter when I returned with the augury. “Is Doug telling the truth?” she asked in a low voice. I nodded. Judy’s lips set in a taut, angry line, but she stayed silent. For now. I was sure she’d have plenty to say once the store wasn’t so full.
At five, when the store was finally empty of Ambrosites, Judy said, “Why didn’t you talk him out of it?”
“I tried. He gave me all the facts and his reasoning, and I couldn’t convince him otherwise.”
“Of course you could! Threaten never to sleep with him again! It’s practically your duty to keep him from doing something stupid like that.”
“I couldn’t do that without making him someone other than he is. I love him too much for that.”
Judy threw up her hands and turned away. “He’s out of his mind.”
I followed her. “I’m not sure. He’s done a lot of research—”
“All prompted by Darius Wallach, no doubt. The mad scientist of Gunther Node.”
“Is that really what they call him?” I asked, surprised.
“It’s what he calls himself. He’s always experimenting—not just with the Damerel rites and aegises, but all sorts of electromagical doodads. Sometimes he comes up with something great, but mostly he just has explosive failures.”
“But…the great things are great?”
Judy scowled. “Not the point. The point is—”
“I don’t know, I think it might be the point. If his successes are so wonderful, doesn’t that point to them being worth the explosive failures?”
“We’re talking about your boyfriend here. Do you want to use his name anywhere in conjunction with the words ‘explosive failure’?”
“No, but I choose to have hope. Malcolm’s made his decision and I support him.”
“You have weird ideas about what it means to be a girlfriend.” Judy hopped up on the stool and put her elbows on the glass countertop. “I hope he survives. From what I hear, the magi could use that kind of morale boost. Things aren’t going well, what with losing almost eighty steel magi.”
“Malcolm thinks the new technique could benefit first-time Damerel candidates as well.”
“That would be wonderful. They’re already pushing the steel magi candidates through too quickly—there haven’t been any fatalities yet, but it’s only a matter of time.”
The door opened, jingling the bells. I was caught with my mouth open, surprised not only at the intrusion but at the man who came through the door. “Detective Green,” I said, “how are you?”
“Better than you,” he said in his gruff voice. He went to the nearest bookcase and began feeling around underneath its shelves.
I glanced at Judy. “Um…can we help you with something?”
Green grunted and straightened. He extended his hand toward us, displaying something small and matte-black. I heard Judy gasp. “What is that?” I said.
“A bug,” Judy said. “His damned partner bugged us, probably illegally.”
“Legally, illegally…it’s a gray area,” Green said. “He didn’t intend to use the information he gathered to send anyone here to jail, at least according to him. Could one of you please tell me what the hell is going on?”
Judy and I looked at each other again. “You’ll have to be more specific, detective,” I said, but my words felt like they were coming from far away. How long had that thing been there? No wonder Acosta had known about auguries—oh, no, we’d talked about Malcolm freely in front of it! Probably Acosta had no idea of the magnitude of the potential for blackmail he had, but if it was recorded somewhere—
“I haven’t seen him for more than a couple of hours at a time, this past week,” Green said. He tucked the little device into his pocket and patted it absently. “He’s put a lot of time into this Abernathy’s case, only I find out yesterday he was ordered off the Abernathy’s case. Worse, there no longer is such a case. And when I finally cornered him, he was cagey as hell and only admitted to having bugged you because I saw the equipment. Who are you, Ms. Davies? And what exactly do you do here?”
Judy and I exchanged glances. Green looked thoroughly perplexed, his brow shining with sweat though the store was as comfortable as ever. Don’t tell Green the truth, Lucia had said. Steer him toward asking Acosta. “I sell books,” I said. “I sold one to Detective Acosta yesterday. Why don’t you ask him about it? In fact, tell him I told you to ask why he bought it.”
“That’s not good enough.”
“It will have to be, because that’s all I can tell you.” I crossed my arms over my chest and stared him down, hoping I didn’t look as frazzled and nervous as I felt.
Green scowled. “If I don’t start getting some answers, I’m arresting both of you.”
“On what grounds?”
“I’ll figure something out.” He pulled the door open and stomped away.
As soon as the door shut, I slumped against the counter. “He can’t arrest us, can he?”
“I guess he could manufacture evidence,” Judy said. “I have no idea whether it would stick. I’m sure my father would intervene.”
“For you, maybe. Probably not for me.”
“You’re a Warden. He’ll support you over a non-Warden, even a police officer, however he feels about you personally.”
“That’s comforting.”
A few more Ambrosites came in during the last hour, but they seemed more interested in talking about how insane Malcolm was than in getting auguries. I smiled politely until my face hurt, told them all my support for Malcolm’s decision, and managed not to burst into tears. When I finally put up the CLOSED sign and locked the door, it was with a profound sense of relief. Only two more days—not even two full days—and it would all be over. One way or the other.
“You’re tougher than you look,” Judy said.
“How so?”
“I’d have punched Lucy Yearsley in the throat for twittering on about all the horrible deaths people have suffered during the Damerel rites. Death’s really very rare these days.”
“Except for a second-time candidate.” I leaned against the counter and scrubbed my eyes with the heels of my palms.
“Hey, no falling into despair. You said Crazy Wallach—I mean Dariu
s Wallach had good support for his theory, right? And Campbell’s not stupid. He wouldn’t do this if he wasn’t confident.”
“It’s the waiting—the not knowing. Worse, not having a right to know. I should be with him for this, Judy.”
“That really would be crazy.” Judy gathered up her purse and headed for the back door. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Just two more days, right?”
“One and a half, really. I can endure for thirty-six hours.” And then I will run mad in the streets. I locked the back door behind Judy and trudged upstairs, where I planned to eat ice cream for dinner and watch re-runs of The Donna Reed Show. Mindless entertainment, a window on a world that had never existed.
My phone rang ten minutes into the first episode. “Hey, Viv. Have—”
“Yes, I’ve heard from Jeremiah,” Viv said, her voice practically squeaking with excitement. “It’s going to be all right, Hel!”
“That’s great? Um—what does ‘all right’ look like?”
“Well, I guess it’s not totally all right. He’s been locked up in the Gunther Node—for his protection, he says, and he didn’t sound sarcastic so I think it really is for his protection. And I’m here too, for now, until they figure out how much of a threat the Mercy is to me. But he and Lucia met, and he said he was completely open with her, and she asked all sorts of questions, but not as many as she probably had, and in the end Lucia said she would give him a chance to prove his loyalties. Personally, I think he’s already done that, but you’ve always said what a hard-ass Lucia is—”
“I’ve never said that!”
“Not in those words, but I know what you meant. Anyway, we’re in a very nice little apartment that doesn’t look at all like a cell, except for being—yes, all right, there are no windows and I think the lock is on the outside, thank you, Jeremiah—he’s so pessimistic sometimes.”
“Can I talk to him?”
The Book of Betrayal Page 17