In the wake of the spell, I feel a light tingle in my chest, which I take to mean that what remains of Delos’ original magic, transferred to me during the farm raid, is fizzling out. The curse has been summarily destroyed. By a single High Witch.
What power, I think, stunned. I knew the leaders of the ICM were among the oldest and most powerful practitioners in the world, but my bar until this moment had been set at Erica, who can pummel the hell out of pretty much any practitioner in Aurora without breaking a sweat. But even Erica can’t encompass all of Aurora in a single spell—that was the whole reason we tried to sneak into the DSI building, to get help with deploying the counter-curse. And yet, this woman, Iyanda, stormed in here like a force of nature and did in seconds what Erica could not do at all.
I have woefully underestimated the ICM. And what’s worse, I have woefully underestimated the top leaders of Methuselah, back in Europe. The ICM has been fighting these rogues for years, and still they persist, which means that not even power as impressive as Iyanda’s is enough to stop them in their tracks. Who the hell must they have on their side, who the hell must be leading them, if even the High Court practitioners cannot dismantle their roots?
Iyanda tosses Delos’ grimoire aside like a piece of trash, then turns her attention back to the man himself. With another wave of her staff, Delos’ built-up aura rapidly dissipates, until all that’s left are harmless wisps of magenta floating through the air. Depowered, Delos can do nothing but flop to the ground when Iyanda releases him from the immobility spell. He lands on his knees, palms smacking the concrete, and hangs his head, sucking in deep, haggard breaths, until he finally summons enough strength to look the High Witch in the eye.
Delos doesn’t say anything—there’s nothing he can say to better his situation—so when owl man swoops over, turns back into his man form, and hoists Delos up, the wizard simply glares at Iyanda. Owl man drags Delos across the garage, to the waiting portal, and callously pushes him through. Then, with a subtle nod aimed at me, owl man vanishes through the opaque glittering face of the portal as well, to presumably haul Delos off to his ultimate fate. I assume there’s a virtual army of interrogators waiting for him on the other side. Or perhaps a tribunal.
The bastard deserves an immediate sentence, in my opinion. And an immediate execution.
Iyanda remains, surveying the damage to the garage, the dead practitioners, the dead Wolves, the dead commissioner, the confused DSI agents, and lastly, me, lying on the ground, slowly succumbing to my injuries. “Ah,” she says, staring intently at my shot-up body, “you must be Calvin Kinsey.”
This is usually the moment I spout out a cheeky reply, but today, when my mouth opens, a big spurt of blood pulses out instead of a sarcastic quip. My vision skips a few seconds, and when it comes back, everything is suddenly in motion. My teammates are huddled around me, giving me first aid. The other teams are racing into the office to evacuate everyone, seeing as the building is now unstable. Erica is pacing in front of Iyanda, pretending she’s not humbled by a stronger practitioner’s presence. And Iyanda is giving Erica a once-over, an expression of both respect and exasperation written on the High Witch’s regal face.
“Cal, hey.” Ella gently shakes my shoulder. Her worried face peers down at me among the concerned frowns of my other teammates. “Hang in there, all right? We’re going to get you to a hospital right away.”
I can’t reply with a mouth full of blood, so I give Ella a thumbs-up with the hand that isn’t ruined. Don’t know if she sees it though, because it’s at this exact moment that my consciousness shorts out, my eyes roll back into my head, and I have the lovely opportunity to get reacquainted with the darkness in my mind.
Chapter Twenty-Two
When I briefly wake up three days later at the crack of dawn, the doctors tell me I almost died twice. I spent a great deal of time hovering on the brink in the ICU, with my teammates stuck in the lobby, unable to sit at my side. After I was finally moved out of intensive care, so says a chatty nurse a few hours later, when I wrench myself out of sleep again, my coworkers started taking rotations in groups of five. By the time I finally wake up for good, around noon, having faded in and out all morning, minutes of coherence at a time, I feel like I’ve been on a very long journey only to end up back where I started.
No one from DSI is in the room with me at this precise moment, which I take as a sign I should call in a nurse and get the rundown on my injuries before any of my friends try to gloss over the extent of the damage. I instinctively try to reach the call button with my right hand, only to find it wrapped in a wad of bandages as thick as a tree trunk. In addition, my leg is in a cast I can’t move, my chest is tightly wrapped in gauze and dotted with itchy tape, and my shoulder has a wide rectangular bandage slapped over it that is starting to peel at the edges.
The sheer amount of white material, coupled with the number of sensors and IVs attached to my body, gives me pause. But I ultimately reach over and hit the call button with my intact left hand anyway. I have to confront my condition sooner or later. Best get it over with while the good meds are still running through my veins.
A nurse hurries into the room a minute later, sees I’m coherent, and smiles. “I’m glad to see you up, honey. Let me grab a doctor for you.” She shuffles out of the room, only to return shortly after with an older black man in a white coat, a seasoned doctor, in tow.
The man introduces himself as Dr. Preston as he plucks my chart from the end of the bed and sets a pair of reading glasses on the bridge of his nose. He flips through numerous pages, many of which are filled with hastily scribbled notes, and whistles. “Goodness, Mr. Kinsey, you have been through a lot. Shot in the chest, shoulder, leg, and hand. Lost a kidney and a lot of blood. We weren’t sure you were going to hang on for the first forty-eight. How are you feeling now?”
I think about it for a second. “Uh, I don’t feel anything. My whole body is numb.”
Preston nods. “That’s a good thing. Trust me. We’ll wean you off the IV morphine when your body has healed enough to move you to oral pain management.”
“How long do you think that’ll be?”
The doctor frowns. “To be quite frank, you’re looking at months of recovery. At least five or six before you’re healed enough to resume intensive activity. Maybe more, depending on how well the physical therapy takes.”
“Physical therapy?” My gaze drifts to my bandaged hand, recalling the moment Bollinger shot right through it. “That bad, huh?”
Preston says, “I’m afraid so. The damage to the tendons and nerves in your hand was significant. The surgeons did what they could on the fly, but you’re going to need several more surgeries, and a very good physical therapist. Even then, it’s highly unlikely that your hand will be a hundred percent again.”
A pit forms in my stomach. “Oh.”
If my dominant hand ends up too weak to properly fire a gun or punch bad guys in the face, then there’s no way I can resume my job as a DSI field agent. Riker gets a pass with his bum leg because he’s an elite captain, plans more missions than he executes, and can compensate well enough for the injury, especially with his enchanted cane sword. But as a rookie, even a well-beloved “team baby,” there’s no way Riker can justify keeping me on an elite detective team if I can’t contribute as much as the others. He’ll have to transfer me to some other division, a demotion in every respect.
Preston seems to sense my dismay. “Look, Mr. Kinsey, I want to emphasize that you will be able to live a normal life after your recovery, even if it’s not quite the same life as before. I understand you have a very dangerous job, one that involves a lot of physical violence, and I admit that, no, maintaining such a job may not be possible for you. But that doesn’t mean your life is over, okay? You’re a young, intelligent man. You have many, many opportunities. Please don’t be discouraged if a few doors close to you. There are hundreds more doors to open. I promise.”
The doctor rolls up his sleeve to re
veal a thick, nasty scar running down his arm. “Would you believe I used to be a football player? College level. Had a spot in the NFL waiting for me. Then I got nailed by a drunk driver when I was walking down a sidewalk late at night. Thrown twenty feet. Broke eighteen bones, including my skull in three places, and nearly had my arm torn off. Ended my athletic career.” He gestures to the hospital room around us. “Started a new one.”
I can’t help but smile at that. He means well. “Thanks, Doc.”
“All right.” He sticks my chart back in place. “Now you rest up, get yourself something light to eat—I suggest simple, soft foods for now—and watch some TV. Preferably not the news.”
“What’s the latest?” I ask, hitting the button on my bed to bring the mattress to an angle that allows me to pretend I’m sitting up. “Is there a final count on the…epidemic?”
“One twenty-six,” Preston says sadly. “Too many, if you ask me. But it could’ve been much worse. That trick the CDC pulled with the aerosol release of the antibiotic was unprecedented, and could’ve gone extremely wrong. But it seems to have done the trick. Everyone who was still alive when the cure was deployed is getting better. There hasn’t been a single death from the infection in three days.”
Aerosol release. That must be the cover for the counter-curse.
“I’m glad to hear it.” I reach for the remote on the side table. “Actually, I think I will watch the news. I know it’ll probably be stressful, but I care about the city. Want to see how everyone’s doing.”
Preston shrugs. “It’s your choice. But make sure to turn to something more lighthearted every once in a while. Doom and gloom hangs over hospitals enough, you know?”
“Yeah,” I reply softly, thinking of the butchered CDC employees and Navarro in the task room, “I know.”
“I’ll see you later then. Take care, Mr. Kinsey.”
I turn on the news once he and the nurse leave and catch up on the details of the largest-scale cover-up in Aurora’s history. Officially, the curse has been labeled an infection similar to the extremely contagious bacterial meningitis. While the origin of the “infection” is unknown—and will remain that way, I’m sure—the cure was created using a cocktail of previously existing antibiotics combined in a new formulation, which was released via helicopters all over the city, pumped through the air systems of all major hospitals, and dispersed in injection form after the aerosol wave, just to make sure no one was missed. There have been no reports of new cases since the cure was deployed, according to the relieved-looking news anchor, and everyone who was ill, besides the deceased, is recovering swiftly.
There is no mention at all of a major disturbance at the DSI building, and I figure that’s because the majority of the city’s population was holed up in their homes during the showdown with Delos and crew. The National Guard and any Aurora police who were on the prowl at the time were likely encouraged to look the other way and pretend they saw nothing, and DSI, as usual, is keeping a tight lid on everything that happened on our side of the fence.
What pains me about the secrecy is that no one will ever know what really happened to Bollinger’s victims, or to any of the innocent practitioners Delos swept off the street and brainwashed, or simply chained up in his dungeon to rot. No one will ever know what happened to Mac either, and to all the other Methuselah informants who were pressed into Delos’ service three years ago. All the normal citizens of Aurora will be fed this sanitized normal story, and the truth of the matter will remain buried. It’s not fair that the public will never have to acknowledge their sacrifice.
Alas, there’s nothing I can do about it. Exposure is a death knell for DSI, and the supernatural community at large. Sometimes, you have to suppress your principles to serve the whole. That’s just the way—
Someone knocks softly on my door, and I turn down the volume on the TV.
“Yes?” I call out.
The door opens a crack, and a vaguely familiar face peeks in. It’s Zhane Carpenter, Delarosa’s new teammate, who I met just before all hell broke loose. If I remember correctly, we didn’t get off on the best foot.
“Um, hi,” she says nervously. “I was wondering if I could come in real quick. The rest of my team is out in the hall, asking the nurses about your condition. But I wanted to get a word in before…”
I wave her forward with my good hand. “Sure thing.”
Smiling shyly, she slips into the room, and I spy a brown paper bag under her arm. “This is stupid, what with all the shit that’s going on,” she murmurs, “but I really wanted to apologize to you in private.”
“Apologize?” I rap my nails on the railing of my bed. “Didn’t I offend you?”
“Well, yeah.” She winces. “And then I realized when I was in the elevator why you reacted the way you did to my assignment, and I felt like a huge ass.” She holds out the paper bag like a peace offering. “It was because of Calvary, right? The agent who came before me? You were there when he died, and it affected you, and then I just came out of nowhere and said I was his replacement, and gosh, that was really insensitive of me. I should’ve realized you weren’t over that. And one of my last courses at the academy was Understanding Trauma too, and, oh man, please take this.”
Zhane sets the bag on the nightstand beside my bed. “I know you can’t eat much yet, but my grandma’s chocolate chip cookies are the best in the world, and you totally deserve them after all the crap you’ve been through, so please accept them as my apology and eat them when you feel better, and can we start over again?”
As she finally runs out of breath and stops talking, my lips arc up into a smile of amusement that I hope reaches my eyes. “Hey, look, that stupid conversation outside the gym,” I reply, “it was nothing. We can totally start over. In fact, let me lead.” I hold out my left hand, since the right one is out of commission. “Hi, I’m Cal Kinsey.”
Zhane’s expression brightens, and she awkwardly shakes my hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m Zhane. And you do like chocolate chip cookies, right?”
“I definitely do. I’ll eat some as soon as they let me change over from the soft food diet.” Which reminds me, the doctor ordered me to eat, but I haven’t asked for anything yet. I’ll have to get some food in my stomach sooner or later, to get my strength back. I have a long road ahead of me. “They’ll keep in the bag for a few days, won’t they?”
“Absolutely!” She claps her hands together. “And, of course, you can share them, if you want. With your team. There are like forty cookies in there.”
I glance at the bag. It’s a big bag.
“I’ll be sure to share them then.”
“Oh, sweet!” She pats her cheeks like she can’t believe her cookies could ever reach the mouths of anyone as important as Team Riker. There’s that star-struck thing again, I think. Not that I mind the celebrity treatment. Certainly beats the falsely declared a traitor and hunted on the streets treatment.
The door swings open all the way, revealing Delarosa himself and the rest of his crew. He raises an eyebrow at Zhane. “You aren’t badgering him now, are you, Carpenter?”
“No, sir,” Zhane says quickly. “Definitely not.”
Delarosa looks to me for confirmation.
I nod. “She’s fine. Just brought me a gift.” I gesture to his empty hands. “I’m hurt you weren’t as thoughtful.”
He rolls his eyes. “There is literally nothing in this world that can knock your snark down a peg, is there, Kinsey?”
“Nope.”
“Well, then maybe this will sober you up for the time being.” He rounds my bed and raises the blinds over the window, revealing the view from the fourth floor of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital. In the distance, peeking around an older brick building, I can just make out the DSI office. “Inspection wrapped on the building about thirty minutes ago,” Delarosa continues. “They assessed all the damage dealt to the structure during the fight with Delos and his co-conspirators.”
“And?” I ask.
“You’re joking.”
Delarosa shoves his hands into his pockets and sighs. “I’m afraid not. The whole building’s unstable. They’re going to have to knock it down and rebuild it from scratch.”
“We don’t have that kind of money in the coffers, do we?” I clench the sheets. DSI has never had the biggest operating budget, and a new building is a massive pull on taxpayer dollars.
“Funny you ask,” Delarosa says in an odd tone. “Your boss is discussing that issue with the mayor right now.”
“Wait, Riker is?”
Delarosa looks at me expectantly, like I’m supposed to figure something out.
“Is Riker filling in for the commissioner?” Since the commissioner is dead and spent at least a year as Iron Delos’ plant, I don’t add.
“More than that,” Delarosa affirms. “He’s been named acting commissioner by Burbank.”
“Whoa.” I drop my head against the pillow. “He’s going to hate that.”
“He already does.”
“Wait, so…” I roll the question around on my tongue. “Who’s acting team captain in Riker’s place?”
Delarosa gives me another look. “Who do you think?”
“Ella?”
“Oh, yes.”
Makes sense. She’s younger than Desmond and Amy, but a more tenured agent, and one of the most respected combat specialists in the entire organization. “So has she been officially promoted to elite captain status?”
Delarosa snorts. “She should’ve been promoted to captain years ago, as you well know. She held herself back, choosing to stay on with Riker. The official promotion paperwork ticked into process the second Riker moved up to the commissioner’s chair.”
Doom Sayer (City of Crows Book 4) Page 22
