by E. A. Copen
I smiled to myself. “That sounds like Chanter. And what did you think about it?”
Reed laughed. “Oh, I told the old man it was about time something around here changed. There were too many of us set in our ways. I just never expected…” He trailed off, looking down at the rosary now wrapped around the hilt of his sword. “You have never asked about me. What I am. Where I came from.”
“That’s mostly because we were avoiding each other.”
The statement was a half-truth. Reed and I had seen each other several times in passing and while working. I could have pressed the issue if I wanted. He knew I had searched for records of him and found he wasn’t registered with BSI, but the clergy were kind of a gray area when it came to registration. The church had very good lawyers. I knew he was a pyromancer, gifted with the ability to summon and control fire. I knew he was deeply religious, even if he was a little unconventional in his dedication to his faith. I also had a nagging suspicion that he was more than human.
“If you asked me today, I would answer you,” Reed offered. “I’m sure you already have your suspicions.”
I sat in thought for a long moment. It was true I wanted to know what Reed was, but I wasn’t sure I wanted that knowledge weighing on my mind as I faced down my own death.
“None of that will matter if I stay dead today,” I said, standing. “Tell you what. Why don’t we revisit it after all of this is done? I didn’t come out here to chat. They’re ready for us at the hospital. Did you get everything on your list?”
Reed reached beneath the pew and pulled out a large, black duffel bag, unzipping it to show me several grocery bags full of supplies. He handed one full of white candles to me and then removed a brass censer and a small plastic bag full of incense cones. “He didn’t say what kind of incense so I raided the church supply and found rose and frankincense. As for candles, I assumed the votives would be too small and got the pillars.”
“I’m sure whatever you got will be fine.”
Reed stood, a Walmart bag in one hand and sword in the other. “So, your car or mine?”
“If I’m going to die today,” I said, gesturing toward the door, “I’m driving myself there.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
The section of the hospital under construction wasn’t difficult to find. All I had to do was follow the dust. An iron plaque outside the temporary drywall blocking off the area announced that the old Eden Memorial Hospital Outpatient Surgery Center would be rechristened as The Kelley Outpatient Surgery Center due to a large donation from Marcus. I stopped and huffed at the sign and then pushed open the door.
Construction looked like it was nearly finished. Checkered green and white linoleum tile covered the floor, and long, fluorescent lights hummed in the ceiling. To the left and right, plastic sheets hung from the ceiling at irregular intervals. Behind them stood glass walls, some with gold lettering. There wasn’t any furniture, but there were a few fixtures already attached to the walls. Fire extinguishers, emergency sprinkler systems, a few monitors, and drop down lights, the kind doctors pull down to examine patients more closely.
An air vent kicked on. Reed’s footsteps echoed next to mine. At the end of the hall, there was one room that was finished save for a door. A double layer of plastic covered the entrance. The plastic crinkled as Hunter pushed it aside and walked out into the hall. I paused when I saw him, and my confidence wavered.
My son had grown taller and looked more filled out than when I’d seen him yesterday, but maybe that was just because he was wearing a tight t-shirt and jeans and not a hospital gown. He stood with his fingers tucked in his back pockets, those long black-dyed bangs of his swept to one side. And dear God, was that an earring? When did he get that?
“Hey, Mom,” he said.
“Hunter, what the hell are you doing here?”
He rolled his eyes in true teenager fashion. “Come on, Mom. Did you think I was going to let you sneak off and kill yourself without talking to me about it first?”
I smiled weakly and went to put my arm around Hunter, pulling him into a hug. The plastic moved aside, and Sal poked his head out. “What’s he doing here?” I mouthed.
“He’s here to help.” Before I could voice my objections, of which there were many, Sal held up a hand and added, “As backup. I told you I didn’t think I could pull it off on my own. You need something to tether you here, something stronger than anything I can do. You and Hunter share a bond that supersedes all others.”
Hunter shrugged away from me. “Chillax, Mom. I survived two wendigos and the ghost isn’t aimed at me. Besides, who else is going to watch your back with a vampire in the room?”
“That’s why I brought Reed.” I placed a hand on Reed’s shoulder. For as little as I knew about Reed, one thing I did know was that he hated being touched. I could feel him wincing without even looking.
“I dunno. Priest looks kinda shady. I mean, don’t look now, but I think he’s armed.”
Reed rolled his shoulder to get my hand off. “Look who’s talking. I’m not the one with teeth and claws. I need something to make the rest of you heathens think twice about turning on me.”
The playful banter was nice for a change. It eased the tension in the air and told me that Hunter was feeling better. I gave Sal a wary look. “Tell me you didn’t know about the earring?”
“Temporary fix,” Sal answered with a shrug. “Today’s the full moon, remember?”
Crap. I’d almost forgotten. Werewolves didn’t have to shift under the full moon, but they did so anyway. Not shifting left them with all kinds of physical symptoms ranging from migraines to intense muscle spasms. If I made it through this, it would be Sal’s job to conduct a fitting funeral for Chanter, induct Hunter into the pack formally, and then lead a hunt in Chanter’s memory. He had to do all of that plus kill me and make sure I didn’t stay dead.
And I thought I was going to have a busy day.
On closer inspection, the tiny stud in Hunter’s ear was silver. It would make shifting more difficult for him, probably impossible to do involuntarily, which must have been Sal’s aim. Tempers could flare if this didn’t go as planned, and no one wanted a teenage werewolf to lose his cool under the full moon. That would leave bodies behind.
Sal lifted the plastic aside for me and gestured with his head. “Come on, babe. Time is getting away from us.”
The room on the other side was big, white and looked mostly free of dust. I wouldn’t have gone so far as to call it sterile, but it would do. Instead of an operating table, there was a large, cast iron tub in the center of the room. It was already full of ice water, and Han was dropping more ice into it as I came in. I wondered who had hauled it in there since it was so out of place. There wasn’t any plumbing attached, so they must have brought the water from elsewhere.
Marcus sat on a plastic orange chair, one leg crossed over the other. In his lap, he held a monogramed handkerchief with something bunched up inside. He regarded me with sagging, dark circled eyes. His fingers tightened around the handkerchief.
Between he and I, laid out on mobile hospital beds on either side of the tub, were Zoe and Mia. A host of tubes and wires flowed out of each of them attached to silent, flashing monitors. I wasn’t a doctor, but the stats I saw seemed dangerously low.
Han dipped a disposable thermometer strip into the water and held it there a minute. “I suspect that neither Zoe nor Mia will last the day should you fail.” He looked at the strip and shook the water off it. Something gleamed in his eyes that made me very uncomfortable under his gaze.
On a stainless-steel cart, rested against the wall where surgical tools might have normally been laid out, were an unusual assortment of tools. An old-fashioned mortar and pestle sat prominently among mason jars and small, fabric pouches with leather drawstrings. Right alongside that were bits of traditional medical equipment, sterile packaged syringes, vials of epinephrine, and rubber tourniquets. Modern medical science and traditional magick, side by si
de.
Sal crossed the room in three steps and squeezed between the tub and Mia’s bed, stopping briefly to touch her hand. Then, he went to the cart and took up the bags, drawing out pinches of different powders, green, brown, and black, and mixing them, unmeasured, into the mortar. Once he had what he wanted, he turned and held his hand out to Marcus, who hesitated before handing over the handkerchief. From the handkerchief, Sal drew out a very human-looking finger bone.
“Aisen tsaan,” Sal said and nodded in an exaggerated way that seemed to indicate thanks.
Marcus wore an expression of worry but gave a stiff nod back.
Sal dropped the bone into the mortar and pushed the pestle into it, beginning the arduous process of grinding bone to dust.
While he worked, Hunter helped me out of the button up I’d worn. He folded it neatly and placed it on an empty chair. The skin on my arms prickled at the cold of the room, a pale ghost of the cold I’d feel once I got into the tub. I took off my boots and socks at Sal’s request and grimaced at the strange feeling of salt under my feet.
Doctor Han wheeled over a portable cart and did a quick check of my vital signs, recording them all in a tablet he wore strapped to his hip. He affixed an oxygen sensor to the middle finger of my right hand and then told me to open my mouth. With a gloved hand, he attached something tiny and metallic on the backside of one of my front teeth.
“A wireless thermometer of sorts,” he informed me. “I’m obligated to inform you that it’s not yet cleared by the FDA for human trials, but it did perform admirably in the chimpanzee trial.”
“That makes me feel better,” I said, which came out as barely intelligible because there was an uncomfortable strip of hard plastic jutting under my tongue now.
“Please remove your shirt.”
I looked at Sal, who was still busy. There was no protest from him, so I did as Han told me. Han came over with a tiny box and a bag full of suction cups with wires attached. After applying some lubricant, he affixed the suction cups to my chest and back, plugging the wires into the box. “Electrocardiogram,” he said nonchalantly. “The delay is less than a fifteenth of a second, so we’ll know as soon as you’re gone, and I’ll start the timer.”
“The cut-off is four minutes,” I reminded him once I found a way to speak without making the wireless thermometer thingamajig smack into my tongue.
Han smirked. “Four minutes without the ice. The induced hypothermia will give you almost double the time.”
“Eight minutes still isn’t very long,” Reed said, frowning beside me. “Are you sure you can find the ghost and take care of her in eight minutes?”
“We’re using the exact same magick that Cynthia delivered to Mia,” I explained. “Well, mostly. We’ve made a small modification that should keep the sickness from spreading beyond me. Even if I don’t come back, the only casualties will be me and the people who are already sick. I’m not going down without taking her with me.”
“I’m still unclear on how you plan to do that,” Reed said. “I understand that interaction should be easier once you’re on the same plane as her, but there’s no guarantee that will be any more effective than the spell Saloso says you used last night.”
“That…was an accident.”
I didn’t want to outright say I didn’t have control over the big, scary spell that I’d done when I went on automatic the night before. If I did, everyone would freak out and realize how wrong the situation was. A practitioner was never supposed to lose control of their magick. That was dangerous. Slinging spells in that state was irresponsible. Someone could get hurt. They might ask me to call off the whole thing until we figured out what was going on. I couldn’t let them do that to me, not with Sal’s whole family on the line.
“The spell would have knocked me out for a week if Sal hadn’t been there to help,” I explained quickly while Han affixed more electrodes to my scalp. So much for my clean hair. “Besides, it didn’t kill her. It just pissed her off, and she came back with a vengeance. Look at Zoe. As for what I can do as a disembodied spirit that I can’t do here, I’ll be able to interact directly, affect the reality that Emiko’s spirit lives in. In theory, if I destroy her where she lives, I knock out the source of the spell and it goes away. Everybody wakes up and we have a happy ending.”
Reed didn’t look convinced. “Talk about spiritual warfare,” he mumbled.
“While I’m out, Sal will be just as incapacitated,” I said. “He has to keep the magick going, monitor everything. If he stops, the line tethering my spirit to my body snaps.” I looked at Reed. “Your job is to protect our bodies and protect Marcus. There’s still a fae assassin out there who’s failed her job twice. By now, she knows, and she’s not going to go back to her master empty-handed.” I nodded to Hunter. “You, young man, are to get the hell out if anything like that happens. You get help, whoever you can find, and bring them back.”
By the time he got back with any useful help, Cynthia would have already made short work of the rest of us. At least Hunter would be safe, and giving him that task made him feel useful. I knew how hard it was to feel helpless. Even if the job was a sham, it would give him something other than his dead mom to think about.
Hunter nodded. Reed gave Marcus a wary look.
“Oh, don’t worry about me, priest,” Marcus said, crossing his arms. “The fae will not get the drop on me twice. I am far from the helpless billionaire Judah thinks I am.”
“I was going to say millionaire,” I said, and Hunter snickered.
“If this construction takes much longer, that may be the case.”
Sal put the pestle down and turned around. “Judah, Hunter, come here.”
Hunter went. I hesitated, drawing in a deep breath. Would this be the point of no return? My heart was doing jumping jacks inside my chest. I should have asked more questions. I didn’t even know if it was going to hurt or what to expect. I mean, I knew the basics. Tunnel. White light. Life flashing before my eyes and out of body experiences. Even knowing all that, I didn’t feel prepared.
The coarse salt crunched under my bare feet as I went anyway.
Sal asked us to each hold out a hand, palm facing down. My fingers trembled, and it wasn’t from the cold. Something slick and cold swept under my hand before I could think about it. Hunter tried to jerk his hand away, hissing through his teeth in pain, but Sal held his fingers tight and passed the ceramic bowl holding the powder under his hand. Two tiny droplets of blood fell into the pea-green mixture from Hunter’s hand. I gave a little more, but then, I wasn’t a werewolf and the knife hadn’t been silver. Hunter was already healing.
“Go and stand in the water,” Sal instructed, his voice all business.
Reduced to just my underclothes and jeans and covered in waterproof electrodes, I stepped into the tub.
The coldest I’d ever been up to that moment had been when Hunter, Chanter, and I were stuck in the Way in his shed. Hunter fell through the ice, and I went in after him. That ice must have been twenty-five degrees, but I had been fueled by adrenaline and fear. By the time I felt cold, we were tumbling through a door, back into the desert heat. It didn’t last more than a minute.
That chill was nothing compared to the ice water in that cast-iron tub. I put one foot in up to the ankle and quickly jerked it back out on impulse. Everything in my brain screamed at me to stay out of the water. Extreme cold hurts for a very good reason. I fought that impulse for self-preservation with everything I had. Teeth grinding and muscles tense, I forced one foot to the bottom of the tub. The icy water chewed into my bare feet, the chill traveling up the tendons in the back of my legs and into my spine. It felt like walking on glass—only colder. When I put my second foot in, I had to let all the air out of my lungs and couldn’t help but whimper in pain.
“W-what now?” I asked, hugging myself to try to contain the shivering.
Sal dipped his fingers into the bowl and mixed the blood into the powder, forming a paste. This, he used to draw so
mething on my forehead, upper arms, and over my heart. The mixture was like coarse mud. Everywhere the paste touched on my skin, it left behind a trail of numbness and the buzz of magick. It wasn’t Sal’s magick, at least not the healing magick I was used to. This was dark, angry magick. Hungry magick.
He spoke words as he worked, but I found I was unable to concentrate on anything he was saying. The words had an odd cadence and his voice an unusual, deep pitch. To my ears, it sounded as if two voices spoke at once, though I couldn’t separate one from the other. They were two, and yet one.
Wooziness hit as people on either side of me—I couldn’t turn my head to see who—took my arms and lowered me into the tub. The pain I’d felt when I first climbed into the water didn’t strike again. When the water rose over my chest, I couldn’t draw breath. For a moment, every part of me that was submerged was paralyzed, and I panicked. Control came back in fits and starts, but my movements were uncoordinated. Oddly, the cold didn’t bother me as much once I was in it.
Flame hovered in my vision and I blinked, taking longer than normal to realize it was just Sal lighting candles around me. He walked a circle, placing and lighting candles at whatever intervals he needed to close the circle he was working with. I was only vaguely aware of the magick building inside the circle. My heart thumped in my chest to the beat of invisible drums at an irregular rhythm. I leaned back, the movement meant to make it easier to draw breath. The effort of air in my lungs hurt.
After a moment, Sal knelt beside the tub, holding the back of my head. He lifted a plastic cup of foul, green liquid to my mouth, but I couldn’t make myself drink it. My head recoiled at the notion until he commanded, “Drink.”