by Nancy Holder
Neema knew that Rupert Giles had spoken on Micaela’s behalf, documenting her many acts of selflessness in the battle against her one-time adoptive father, Fulcanelli. She had risked her life to help the Slayer and her friends protect the heir of the Gatekeeper, young Jacques Regnier.
Neema wondered what they would have done to her if Giles had not made his report.
She had no official business with the Council prisoner; she had only wanted to speak to the woman because she provided a connection, however tenuous, with Roger. Neema couldn’t let him go, not yet; she had no one to grieve with, and she assumed another woman would understand the depth of her grief.
Now Roger’s former lover stood in the passageway, facing the doorway, listening in horror to Tony, her confidante, attempting to force Micaela into helping him with some secret plot.
She withdrew into the shadows, holding her breath.
“I find your sense of morality most puzzling,” he said. “But I can adapt. Here is further inducement for you. If you don’t help me find that axe, I shall kill Rupert Giles the moment I set foot in Sunnydale.”
“No,” Micaela breathed. “Not if it’s used against the Slayers.”
“It will be. Slayers die; it’s what they do. Watchers often live to a ripe old age.”
Neema’s skin felt tight; she was prickling with anxiety. Don’t do it, she begged Micaela. Whatever it is, don’t betray the Slayers.
“I need to prepare,” Micaela said, and Neema pitied her for her weak attempt to buy time.
“No, you don’t. Do it now, Micaela, or Giles will die.”
Soon green light shone from the cell, and Neema knew Micaela was performing the spell. After a time, Lord Yorke said, “Hello, that’s most intriguing. So all four of the axes are in Sunnydale. I wonder why Cecile told me that Tervokian had the other one in Boston . . . .” He broke off. “Right. Hold on, then.” There was a moment, then: “Cecile, ma vie, yes, it’s Tony. Hang on, here’s a shock: they’re in Sunnydale. All of them. Yes, I know that’s what Tervokian said, but he must be lying. I just had a finder’s spell done and I’ve no reason to disbelieve the result. Yes, well, you’d better discuss that with him, eh?”
Neema heard the sound of something snapping closed; the cell phone he’d been using must have been state of the art, to work at this depth.
“Well, she found that rather shocking, I must say,” Lord Yorke drawled. “I wonder how shocking she would find it if she realized I know who and what she is, and what she intends to do.”
“What are you talking about?” Micaela asked carefully.
“Have you ever heard of Cecile Lafitte? No? How remiss of Fulcanelli. She is a sorceress of awesome ability. I believe she is over eight hundred years old. She’s enticed me into working with her in her attempt to empower her god, the Gatherer, so that it can rule this dimension.”
Neema listened hard. Micaela said derisively, “Oh, Tony, there have been so many attempts to rule this dimension. Even my foster father failed.”
“Cecile will fail, too,” he replied, chortling. “You see, she’s playing a number of us against ourselves. She’s promised each one of us that we will be the Fourth Servant. The Fourth will be the acolyte of the risen Gatherer. Let’s see, there’s Simon Lafitte, who is her descendant; and the demon Tervokian, who keeps insisting that all he wants is control of South Boston. Then there’s Cameron Duvalier, the Third and current Servant, who has no idea she wants to replace him. And then, there’s me.”
“Ah,” Micaela said. “Of course. You.”
“I’m the only one who realizes what she’s up to. I’m going to beat her at her own game. That’s why we’re going to Sunnydale. When I rendezvous with her there, I’ll kill her.”
There was a pause. Keep going, Neema mentally prodded.
“Have you ever heard of the Book of Fours? No? Well, Roger Zabuto had some fragments of it in his diary. I have no idea how he got them. But they actually tell how to kill ‘Ceceli,’ as she called herself.”
“How?” Micaela asked him.
He chuckled. “You’ll see. A promise is a promise, luv, and it’s time to leave.”
“What?” Micaela asked faintly.
“You’re coming with me, of course,” he said simply. “How else did you think you’d be leaving here?”
“You bastard,” Micaela said. There was the sound of a slap.
Neema inhaled sharply, afraid for her. There was a pause. For one heart-stopping instant, she thought Lord Yorke had heard her. But nothing happened, and she exhaled as slowly and silently as possible. Her heart would surely give her away. It was pounding so hard she was afraid she was going to have a heart attack.
“You’re not going to free me,” Micaela said slowly. “Ever.”
“No. Of course not. But I will make you my queen, Micaela. You’ll be happy.”
Micaela made some kind of noise. There were rustling noises, and Micaela’s muffled groan of protest.
“You’re so beautiful,” the man breathed. “I can’t wait until we’re alone in a beautiful setting, where I can make love to you properly.”
“Are you positive we’re alone now?” she asked him.
“There’s no need for you to be afraid, Micaela,” he said, sounding bemused.
“Oh, but, Tony, there’s plenty of need.” Micaela’s voice was hard and cruel.
Without warning, the hall lit up with bright blue light. A harsh, hot force wrapped around Neema’s body. There was a muffled shout, and then nothing.
Neema looked around the corner, to find Micaela Tomassi bent over the body of Lord Yorke. She whirled around. In her hand, she held some fragments of ancient-looking paper.
The small blonde blinked at Neema. She said quickly, “I know who you are, Ms. Mfune-Hayes. I know you heard. These are the pieces of the Book of Fours. Help me. We have to stop this.”
“But—”
“We have to get out of here. We have to help. Get me out of here. I have no one else I can trust.”
“But the Council—”
Micaela looked hard at the other woman. “Roger Zabuto was tortured to death at the orders of Tony and his co-conspirators. These same people are trying to kill Faith and Buffy. And perhaps Giles as well.”
Micaela took a breath. “If not for them, then for Roger.”
Neema’s eyes glistened. “All right,” she said. “Come on. There’s another way out.”
Chapter Eight
Sunnydale
James Asakawa, president of the Sunnydale High School International Relations Club, loved France Tranh more than he would have thought one human being could love another. He couldn’t look at her enough, couldn’t listen to her voice enough, couldn’t be around her enough.
“Will you get away from me, you psycho?” she screamed at him, as she half walked, half ran to her car.
The Sunnydale Mall was being evacuated. Most of the kids James knew from the Game Players of Titan, the mall comic-book and game store, were extremely ticked about being told to leave. But James had lived half his life in Japan, and he knew a hurricane when he was in one. This was not some “hokey little storm,” as some of the guys were saying.
“France, I don’t have a ride home,” he said, loping alongside her. The rain and the wind were fierce; the storm blew them both so hard that they bumped into the cars lined up in the parking spaces. “My dad was supposed to pick me when the mall closed. That’s in two hours. I can’t stay here.”
“That’s not my problem,” she snapped. She whirled around to stare him down. “You scare me. You’re always following me.”
“I-I love you,” he insisted, as the rain smacked him hard enough to leave bruises.
She was holding her hair out of her eyes with both hands. Soaked to the bone, she was thinner than James had realized. So slender. So beautiful. She would blow away in all the wind and rain, just like a tender leaf . . . .
“Then leave me alone.”
“Give me a ride,” he pleaded
. “Look.”
The queues for the city buses were as long as the lines for the good rides at Disneyland. People were yelling and pushing as two buses pulled up. No one got out, and they were both full. The mall lights were still on but security guards were signalling everyone that the shopping center was closed.
France rolled her eyes. “All right. But if you act weird, I’m throwing you out of the car.”
“Thanks.” He caught up with her, crossing his arms over his chest and shivering as she unlocked the car with the remote. She gestured for him to go around to the passenger side and he did, realizing he was getting so freaked out he wasn’t thinking straight.
Man, my one chance to be alone with her in a car, and I’m too terrified to do anything about it, he thought.
Both of them had just slipped inside when the ground began to shake. Then it undulated, just like someone flicking a sheet prior to making a bed. The asphalt rolled and then began to crack, as huge, jutting sections of earth shot through, then broke the asphalt apart.
France screamed and turned on the engine. She put the pedal to the metal and threw the car in reverse. There was a thud that James didn’t even want to think about, and then she slammed it into drive.
She got about two feet before she crashed into another car, the impact throwing her forward, over the steering wheel. James had buckled his seat belt; she had not.
Then the car burst into flames. James shouted, unfastened his seat belt, and got out. The top of France’s head had shattered the windshield, but lucky for her, it had not penetrated the thick glass. She was groaning, which was a good sign, because that meant she was still alive.
“I’ll get you,” he yelled to her, crossing to her side of the car.
He was just about to open her door when a familiar-looking, grubby man shoved him out of the way and yanked open the door. The man grabbed France around the waist and threw her to the ground.
“It’s the aliens!” the man shouted. “I seen ’em. I seen ’em all!”
Shortly thereafter, a chain of explosions tore through the mall, and the Robinson’s-May shot skyhigh into the air.
Perfume counter and all.
The man ran crazily off into the night. He pulled something from his pocket and waved it over his head.
“I’m armed!” he shouted. “I’m Carlos New Mexico and I got me an axe! Don’t abduct me!”
He ran on, grateful to his bones that that sweet little brown-haired girl from the Fish Tank had dropped her weapon when she’d dusted those two aliens.
Through the wind, and the rain, and past the fires, Carlos ran, until he drew near to Willy’s Alibi Room. Willy was okay with him; sometimes he let Carlos have a pickeled egg for free and he’d let him sleep in the basement if he didn’t have anywhere else to go.
He was just about to go inside and ask for that pickeled egg, when a really tall man grabbed him by the collar and said, “Where did you get that?”
Before Carlos could answer, the man snatched the axe away from him.
“Hey,” Carlos protested. But faster than you could say “New Mexico,” the really tall man turned into an alien and broke Carlos’s neck.
* * *
Good Lord, are we having another earthquake? Giles thought, as every single item in his home rattled and shook. Some of his feng shui crystals smacked into each other, clanging like wind chimes. An old Sumerian tablet jittered off the book shelf and crashed to the floor.
Well, that completes our set of the arcane elements, then: earth, air, fire, water.
Sighing, he picked up the phone and hit redial. It was apalling that no one at the Council of Watchers was answering the phone. I could understand it if we were headquartered in Paris, he thought. The French are always on strike—garbage men, railway workers, phone operators—but good Lord, we are British.
“Ah, yes,” someone finally said. “Hello?”
“Is this the Watchers Council?” Giles asked indignantly.
“Who is speaking, please?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake. I’m Rupert Giles. I—”
“Oh, Mr. Giles, I’m so frightfully sorry,” the speaker cut in. “We’re rather in the midst of a situation here, I’m afraid.”
“Situation? What sort of situation?” Giles demanded, frowning. “No one’s answered my calls for the past hour, at least; hold on, it’s been two, and—”
“Sir, Lord Yorke has been killed. He was coming to see you, sir. A prisoner escaped; we assume she meant to take him hostage.”
Giles was stunned. “What? Tony Yorke’s been murdered?”
“It was Miss Tomassi done it, sir,” the speaker said, reverting in his distress to what appeared to be his native accent, which was Cockney. “Disappeared, she ’as.”
“Micaela?” He sat down slowly. “What . . . ?” He scratched his forehead, trying to digest the information. Impossible.
“Thank you,” he said; then, “Wait. I need Christopher Bothwell’s phone number. It’s urgent.”
“Sir . . .”
“I need it now.”
“Very well. I’m not authorized, but I’ll find the correct person and ring you back, sir.”
“Oh, very well,” Giles said, sighing.
He put down the phone and tried to do some research. Meteorological Magick came to hand, and it was tedious going for the next half-hour or so. He had just plowed through a discussion of N. Richard Nash’s play, The Rainmaker, when the phone rang.
“Sir, it’s Thomas Andrews,” said a voice new to him. “George Salisbury forwarded your request on to me. I’m authorized to give you Christopher Bothwell’s home phone number.”
“Thank you ever so much,” Giles said, exhaling.
He wrote down the number, rang off from London, and stared at it for a moment, suddenly reluctant to dial it. What does one say? How does one commiserate, sympathize?
Sorry your girl died?
Frightfully glad mine hasn’t?
Summoning his backbone, he punched in the number. It rang a number of times, during which Giles tried to remember what he could of the history of India Cohen. One would have assumed I’d have memorized it, he thought, ashamed of himself.
“Bothwell,” slurred a British voice.
“Rupert Giles here,” Giles said.
There was a moment of silence. “Yes. How may I help you?” Christopher Bothwell asked politely.
He’s drunk, Giles thought. Well, it is rather late at night . . .
“We’ve got a bit of trouble up here,” Giles said. “And it appears that your Miss Cohen figures into it in some way.” That didn’t sound quite right, but he let it go.
There was another pause. “India? How?”
“A friend of the Slayer’s dreamed about her, for one thing.”
“A friend? She has friends? How extraordinary.”
Giles reddened slightly. “She’s rather an unorthodox girl, for a Slayer. Has friends.”
“I see.” Another pause. “Well, what did she dream, this friend?”
Giles adjusted his glasses. “I’m not sure, exactly,” he admitted. “The friend is in hospital at the moment. We’re also concerned about some axes. Now, I understand that Miss Cohen . . . that she . . .”
“She was killed with an axe,” Christopher Bothwell said.
“I am so sorry,” Giles murmured. “I know this must be difficult.”
When next the other Watcher spoke, his voice was muffled, as if the man was struggling for composure. “You say that this friend dreamed of India, or got her name, or something.”
There was another long pause before he spoke again. “I suppose I ought to tell you that I’ve been using magicks to attempt contact with her. And I believe I have succeeded. I think I was in contact with her just a short while ago, in fact.”
“I beg your pardon?” Giles was taken aback.
“To a small degree. Look here. I’m in San Diego. You’re, what? Bit up the coast? It might be a good thing if I came up.”
Giles nodded, then realized that of course the man couldn’t see him.
“Yes. That would be good indeed. But we’ve got rotten weather here. Quite, ah, apocalyptic.”
“I’m a sorcerer of some small skill,” Bothwell announced. “I should be able to maneuver, don’t you think?”
“If you say so,” Giles ventured.
“But first I, uh, need to . . .” Bothwell sighed. “I’m pissed. Drunk as a skunk, as the Americans say. I suppose you can tell.”
“I am British,” Giles teased gently. “We do like our ale.”
“Far too well. I’ll sober up and get on the road. Expect me by morning, won’t you? I’ll need some directions. And your address and number, of course.”
“Good.” Giles glanced at his watch. “I’ll try to have both the Slayers here.”
“I beg your pardon? Did you say Slayers?”
“Oh. Yes. There are two of them at present.”
“How extraordinary,” Bothwell said again. “I had no idea.”
“It was rather a surprise all around.” Giles smiled ruefully. “Caught the Council off guard, I can tell you.”
“Would have liked to have seen their faces.”
The two Watchers chuckled together. Then Giles gave him his address, phone number, and basic directions to Sunnydale.
“Right, then. I’ll come ’round directly,” Bothwell said.
They clicked off.
Giles looked at the phone for a moment, then went back to his book.
* * *
The hospital corridor rattled again and Oz calmly walked under the transom of the nearest door. The quakes had almost become commonplace now, and everyone was remarking about how glad they were that the hospital, so far, had not sustained any major structural damage. News of what had happened at the Sunnydale Mall traveled fast.