The Good, the Bad, and the Undead
The early afternoon sun had almost worked its way from the kitchen, a last band making a thin sliver along the sink and counter. I was sitting at Ivy's antique table, leafing through her catalogs and finishing my breakfast of coffee. I'd been up for only an hour or so, nursing my cup and waiting for Ivy. I had made a full carafe, hoping to lure her into talking to me. She still wasn't ready, having evaded me on the excuse of having to research her latest run. I wished she'd talk to me. The Turn take it, I'd be happy if she'd just listen. It didn't seem possible she would put this much weight on the incident. She had slipped before, and we had gotten past it.
Sighing, I stretched my legs out under the table. I turned the page to a collection of closet organizers, my eyes drifting aimlessly. I didn't have much to do today until Glenn, Jenks, and I went to tail Dr. Anders that night. Nick had loaned me some money, and I had a party dress that wouldn't look too cheap and would hide my splat gun.
Edden had been thrilled when I told him I was going to follow the woman - until I stupidly admitted she was meeting with Trent. We had nearly come to blows over it, shocking the officers on the floor. At this point, I didn't care if Edden threw me in jail. He'd have to wait until I did something, and by then I'd have what I needed.
Glenn wasn't happy with me, either. I'd played the daddy's-boy card to get him to keep his mouth shut and come with me tonight. I didn't care. Trent was killing people.
My eyes, roving over the catalog, fastened on an oak desk, the kind detectives had in pre-Turn movies. A sigh escaped me in an exhalation of desire. It was beautiful, with a deep luster that pressboard lacked. There were all sorts of little cubbies and a hidden compartment behind the bottom left drawer according to the sell line. It would fit nicely in the sanctuary.
A grimace pulled my face down as I thought of my pathetic furniture, some still in storage. Ivy had beautiful furniture, with smooth lines and a heavy weight. The drawers never stuck and the metal latches clicked smartly when they closed. I wanted something like that. Something permanent. Something that arrived on my doorstep fully assembled. Something that could stand a dip in saltwater if I ever got another death threat put on me.
It would never happen, I thought, pushing the catalog away. Getting nice furniture, not the death threat. My eyes slid from the shiny paper to my ley line textbook. I stared at it, thinking. I could channel more power than most. My dad hadn't wanted me to know. Dr. Anders thought I was an idiot. There was only one thing I could do.
Taking a breath, I pulled the book closer. I thumbed to the back and the appendices, stopping at the incantation for binding a familiar. It was all ritualistic, with notations referring to techniques I hadn't a clue on. The incantation was in English, and there were no brews or plants involved at all. It was as alien to me as geometry, and I didn't like feeling stupid.
The pages made a pleasant sound as I rifled to the front of the book looking for something I could understand. I slowed, inserting my thumb as I found an incantation for diverting objects in motion. Cool, I thought. It was exactly why I had wanted a wand.
Sitting straighter, I crossed my knees and leaned over the book. You were supposed to draw on stored ley line energy to manipulate small things, and connect right to a line for things with a lot of mass or that were moving quickly. The only physical thing I needed was an object to serve as a focal point.
I looked up as Jenks flitted in the open kitchen window. "Hey, Rache," he said cheerily. "Whatcha doing?"
Reaching for the furniture catalog, I slid it smoothly over the textbook. "Not much," I said as I looked down. "You're in a good mood."
"I just got back from your mom's. She's cool, you know." He flew to the center island counter, landing on it to put himself at nearly my eye level. "Jax is doing well. If your mom is cotton to the idea, I'm going to let him have a go at making a garden big enough to support him."
"Cotton?" I questioned, turning a page to some beautiful phone tables. I blanched at the price. How could something that small cost so much?
"Yeah. You know... cool, A-okay, keen, kosher."
"I know what it means," I said, recognizing it as one of my mother's favorite phrases and thinking it odd Jenks would have picked it up.
"Have you talked to Ivy yet?" he asked.
"No."
My frustration was obvious in the short word. Jenks hesitated, then, with a clattering of wings, he flew a swooping path to land upon my shoulder. "Sorry."
I forced a pleasant expression as I pulled my head up and tucked a curl behind my ear. "Yeah, me too."
He made an irate noise with his wings. "So-o-o, whatcha hiding under the catalog? Looking through Ivy's leather outlets?"
My jaw tightened. "It's nothing," I said softly.
"You looking to buy furniture?" he scoffed. "Give me a break."
Peeved, I waved him away. "Yeah. I want furniture, something other than pressboard - excuse me - engineered wood. Ivy's stuff makes mine look like trailer-park plastic."
Jenks laughed, the wind from his wings shifting the hair about my face. "So get yourself something nice the next time you have some money."
"Like that will ever happen," I muttered.
Jenks zipped under the table. Not trusting him, I bent to see what he was doing. "Hey! Stop it!" I cried, moving my foot as I felt a tug on my shoe. He darted away, and when I came up from retying my lace, I found he had pulled the catalog off the textbook. His hands were on his hips as he stood on it, reading. "Jenks!" I complained.
"I thought you didn't like ley lines," he said, flitting up and then right back down where he had been. "Especially now that you can't use them without endangering Nick."
"I don't," I said, wishing I hadn't told him about having accidentally made Nick my familiar. "But look. This stuff is easy."
Jenks was silent, his wings drooping as he looked at the charm. "You gonna try it?"
"No," I said quickly.
"Nick will be okay if you pull your energy right off the line. He'll never know." Jenks turned sideways so he could see me and the print both. "It says right here you don't have to use stored energy but can pull it off the line. See? Right here in black and white."
"Yeah," I said slowly, not convinced.
Jenks grinned. "You learn how to do this, and you could get back at the Howlers. You still have those tickets for next Sunday's game, don't you?"
"Yeah," I said cautiously.
Jenks strutted down the page, his wings a red blur in excitement. "You could make them pay you, and since you have Edden's paycheck coming for your rent, you could get a nice oak shoe rack or something."
"Ye-e-e-eah," I hedged.
Jenks eyed me slyly from under his blond bangs. "Unless you're afraid."
My eyes narrowed. "Anyone ever tell you you're a real prick?"
He laughed, rising up with a glittering sunbeam of pixy dust. "If I had a quarter..." he mused. Flitting close, he landed on my shoulder. "Is it hard?"
Leaning over the book, I swung my hair to one side so he could see, too. "No, and that's what worries me. There's an incantation, and I need a focusing object. I'll have to connect to a ley line. And there's a gesture..." My brow furrowed and I tapped the book. It couldn't be this easy.
"You gonna try it?"
The thought that Algaliarept might know I was pulling on the line flitted through me. But seeing that it was daylight and we had an agreement, I thought it was safe enough. "Yeah."
Sitting straighter, I settled myself. Reaching out with my second sight, I fumbled for the line. The sun completely overwhelmed any vision of the ever-after, but the ley line was clear enough in my mind's eye, looking like a streak of dried blood hanging above the tombstones. Thinking it was really ugly, I cautiously reached out a thought and touched it.
My breath hissed in through my nose and I stiffened.
"You okay, Rache?" Jenks questioned, launching himself off my shoulder.
Head bowed over the book, I nodded. The energy flowed through me faster than before, equalizing the strengths very quickly. It was almost as if the previous times had cleared the channels. Worried about using too much, I tried to push some of it down through me and out of my feet. It didn't do any good. The incoming force simply filled me back up again.
Resigned to the uncomfortable feeling, I mentally shook my second sight from me and looked up. Jenks was watching me in concern. I gave him an encouraging smile, and he nodded, apparently satisfied. "How about this?" Jenks said, flying to my stash of water paint balls. The red sphere was as big as his head, and clearly heavy, but he managed it all right.
"It's as good as anything," I agreed. "Toss one up, and I'll try to shift it."
Thinking this was easier than grinding plants and boiling water, I said the incantation and made a swooping loop of a figure in the air with my hand, imagining it was like writing your name with a sparkler on the Fourth of July. I said the last word as Jenks tossed the ball up.
"Ow!" I shouted as a surge of ley line force burned my left hand. I looked at Jenks in bewilderment as he laughed. "What did I do wrong?"
"Ah." Embarrassed, I took the red ball as he dropped it into my hand. "Let's try it again," I said, and cradled it in my recessive hand as the book had instructed. Feeling the cool smoothness of it, I said the incantation and etched the figure in the air with my right hand.
Jenks tossed a second ball with a sharp whistle of his wings. Startled, I let loose a surge of power. This time it worked. I stifled a yelp as I felt the ley line energy dart through my hand, following my attention right to the ball. It hit it, knocking it into the wall to make a dripping smear. "Yes!" I exclaimed, meeting Jenks's grin with my own. "Look at that! It worked!"
Jenks flew to the counter to get another ball. "Try it again," he prompted, tossing it eagerly to the ceiling.
It came faster this time. I found I could do the incantation and gesture simultaneously, holding the ley line energy with my will until I wanted to release it. With that came a great deal of control, and soon I was no longer hitting them with so much force that they broke when they hit the wall. My aim was getting better, too, and the sink was littered with the balls I'd been bouncing off the screen. Mr. Fish on the sill wasn't happy.
Jenks was a willing partner, zipping about the kitchen, throwing the red balls at the ceiling. My eyes widened as he threw one at me instead. "Hey!" I cried, sending the ball through the pixy hole in the screen. "Not at me!"
"What a good idea," he said, then grinned wickedly as he made a sharp whistle. Three of his kids zipped in from the garden, all talking at once. They brought the smell of dandelions and asters with them. "Toss them at Ms. Morgan," he said, handing his sphere to the girl in pink.
"Hold it," I protested, ducking as the girl pixy threw it with as much skill and power as her father. I looked behind me to the dark splat against the yellow wall, then back to them. My mouth opened. In the instant I had looked away, they all had gotten splat balls.
"Get her!" Jenks cried.
"Jenks!" I said, laughing as I managed to divert one of the four balls. The three I missed rolled harmlessly to the floor. The smallest pixy skimmed over the linoleum, tossing them upward to where his sisters caught them. "Four against one isn't fair!" I shouted as they took aim again.
My eyes darted to the hallway as the phone rang. "Time!" I called out, lurching to escape into the living room. "Time out!" Still smiling, I reached for the phone. Jenks hovered in the archway, waiting. "Hello. Vampiric Charms. Rachel speaking," I said, ducking the ball he threw at me. I could hear pixy giggles from the kitchen and wondered what they were up to.
"Rachel?" came Nick's voice. "What the blue blazes are you doing?"
"Hi, Nick." I paused to mouth the incantation. I held the energy until Jenks lobbed a ball at me. I was getting better, almost hitting him with the diverted splat ball. "Jenks. Stop it," I protested. "I'm on the phone."
He grinned, then darted out. I flopped into one of Ivy's cushy, matching suede chairs, knowing he wouldn't risk getting water on it and have Ivy come after him.
"Hey, you're up already? You want to do something?" I asked, draping my legs over one arm and lolling my neck on the other. I shifted the red ball I was using as a focusing object between two fingers, daring it to break with the pressure I had it under.
"Um, maybe," he said. "Are you by chance pulling on a ley line?"
I waved Jenks to stop as he swooped in. "Yes!" I said, sitting up and putting my feet on the floor. "I'm sorry. I didn't think you would feel it. I'm not drawing it through you, am I?"
Jenks landed on top of a picture frame. I was sure he could hear Nick, though the pixy was on the other side of the room.
"No," Nick said, a hint of laughter in his voice, tiny through the receiver. "I'm sure I'd be able to tell. But it's odd. I'm sitting here reading, and all of a sudden it feels like you're here with me. The best way to describe it is when you're over here and I'm making dinner, watching you watch TV. You're doing your own thing, not looking for my attention, but being really noisy. It's kind of distracting."
"You watch me watch TV?" I asked, uncomfortable, and he chuckled.
"Yeah. It's a lot of fun. You jump up and down a lot."
My brow furrowed as Jenks snickered. "Sorry," I muttered, but then a faint tickle of warning pulled me straighter. Nick was up reading. He usually spent his Saturday in bed catching up on sleep. "Nick, what book are you reading?"
"Ah, yours," he admitted.
I only had one book that he'd be interested in. "Nick!" I protested as I scooted to the edge of my chair and gripped the phone tighter, "you said you'd take it to Dr. Anders." After blowing off my trip to the FIB because I was frazzled worse than my hair, Nick had taken me home. I'd thought he offered to deliver the book because of my new and healthy phobia of the literally damned tome. Obviously Nick had other plans, and it hadn't made it that far.
"She wasn't going to look at it last night," he said defensively. "And it's safer in my apartment than sitting in a guardhouse getting coffee rings. If you don't mind, I'd like to keep it one more night. There is something in it I want to ask the demon." He paused, clearly waiting for me to protest.
My face warmed. "Idiot," I said, obliging him. "You are an idiot. Dr. Anders told you what that demon is trying to do. It nearly kills both of us, and you're still pumping it for information?"
I heard Nick sigh. "I'm being careful," he said, and I made a frightened bark of laughter. "Rachel, I promise I'll take it over first thing tomorrow. She isn't going to look at it until then anyway." He hesitated, and I could almost hear him gather his resolve. "I'm going to call him. Please don't make me do this behind your back. I'd feel better if someone knew."
"Why? So I can tell your mother what killed you?" I said sharply, then caught myself. Eyes closing, I squeezed the red ball between my fingers. He was silent, waiting. I hated that I had no right to tell him to stop. Not even as his girlfriend. Summoning demons wasn't illegal. It was just really, really stupid. "Promise you'll call me when you're done?" I asked, feeling my stomach quiver. "I'm up until about five."
"Sure," he breathed. "Thanks. I want to hear how your dinner with Trent goes."
"You bet," I echoed. "Talk to you later." If you survive.
I hung up, meeting Jenks's eyes. He was hovering in the middle of the room, a splat ball tucked under his arm. "You two are going to end up as dark smears on ley line circles," he said, and I flicked the splat ball I held at him. He caught it one-handed, moving several feet before stopping its momentum. He flung it back, and I dodged. It hit Ivy's chair without breaking. Thankful for small favors, I picked it up and headed for the kitchen.
"Now!" Jenks shrilled as I entered the bright room.
"Get her!" shrieked a dozen pixies.
Jerked out of my depression, I cowered as a hailstorm of splat balls hit me, breaking against my covered head. Darting to the fridge, I opened the door and hid behind it. Adrenaline made my blood seem to sing. I grinned at the sound of six or more splats against the metallic door. "You little beggars!" I shouted, peeking up to see them flitting over the far end of the kitchen like insane fireflies. My eyes widened; there must have been twenty of them!
Splat balls littered the floor, rolling slowly away from me. Thrilling in it, I said my incantation three times fast and bounced the next three missiles right back at them.
Jenks's kids shrieked in delight, their silk dresses and pants a blur of color. Pixy dust made trails of slowly falling sunshine. Jenks was standing on the ladle hanging from the rack over the center island counter. The sword he used to fight off fairies was in his grip, and he brandished it high as he shouted encouragement.
Under his noisy direction they banded together. Giggled whispers punctuated by excited shouts filled the air as they organized. Grinning, I hid behind the door with my ankles cooling in the draft from the fridge. I said the incantation over and over, feeling the ley line force swell behind my eyes. They were going to attack en masse, knowing I couldn't deflect them all.
"Now!" Jenks shouted. His tiny saber swinging, he launched himself from the ladle.
I cried out at the cheerful ferocity of his kids swarming at me. Laughing in protest, I sent the red balls flying. Little thumps beat at me from the ones I missed. Gasping for air, I rolled under the table. They followed me, bombarding me.
I was out of incantations. "I give up!" I cried, careful not to hit any of Jenks's kids as I put my hands on the underside of the table. I was covered in spots of water, and I pushed back the damp strands of hair stuck to my face. "I give up! You win!"
They cheered, and the phone started ringing again. Proud and exuberant, Jenks bellowed out a stirring song about beating invaders from their land and coming home to seedlings. Sword held high, he made a circuit around the room, gathering his kids up in tow. All singing in glorious harmony, they flowed out the window and into the garden.
I sat in the sudden silence on the kitchen floor under the table. My entire body shifted as I took a deep breath, smiling as I exhaled. "Whew!" I puffed, still chuckling as I wiped a hand under my eye. No wonder the fairy assassins sent to kill me last year hadn't had a chance. Jenks's kids were clever, quick - and aggressive.
Still smiling, I rolled to my feet and padded into the living room to get the phone before the machine picked it up. Poor Nick. I was sure he felt that last one.
"Nick," I blurted before he could say anything. "I'm sorry. Jenks's kids had me under the kitchen table and were throwing splat balls at me. God help me, but it was funny. They're in the garden right now, making rings around the ash tree and singing about cold steel."
"Rachel?"
It was Glenn, and my mirth died at his worried tone. "What?" I said, looking at the trees through the shoulder-high windows. The spots of water covering me were suddenly cold, and I clasped an arm around myself.
"I'll be there in ten minutes," he said. "Can you be ready?"
I pushed my damp hair back. "Why? What's happened?" I asked.
I heard him cover the receiver and shout something at someone. "You got your warrant to search Kalamack's property," he said when he returned.
"How?" I questioned, not believing Edden had caved. "Not that I'm complaining!"
Glenn hesitated. He took a slow breath, and I heard excited voices in the background. "Dr. Anders called me last night," he said. "She knew you were going to follow her, so she moved her presentation to last night and asked me to go with her instead."
"The witch," I exclaimed softly, wishing I could have seen what Glenn had worn. I bet it had been sharp. But when he remained silent, the cold feeling in my stomach solidified into a sour lump.
"I'm sorry, Rachel," Glenn said softly. "Her car went off Roebling Bridge this morning, pushed over the rail by what appeared to be a huge bubble of ley line force. They just pulled her car from the river. We're still looking for the body."