The Serpent Waits

by Bill Hiatt

  “If Viviane…keeps up whatever she’s doing, I can last…a few minutes.” Speaking aloud was giving my weakness away to this stranger, but concentrating enough to make myself heard through the psychic network was getting more and more difficult.

  Tal looked at Viviane, and she gave him a reluctant nod. Her face looked pale and drawn. Keeping me from being overwhelmed was taking a toll on her, too.

  “Carla, please assist Viviane. We’ll try this, but Amy, if your pain gets too bad or Amenirdis seems as if she might get control, we’re out of here.”

  The most I could manage was a nod.

  “It would help if we could see this guy,” thought Stan.

  Umbra raised her hands in the stranger’s direction and tried to rip his shadowy concealment away, but whatever magic he had was stronger than hers.

  “There is…an amulet of some kind around his neck,” thought Umbra. “That seems to be the source of the darkness he uses for concealment.”

  Magnus reached over, felt around the stranger’s neck, found the amulet, and pulled it off over his head in one smooth motion.

  He was a black-haired, dark-skinned Arab with black jeans and a black leather jacket—good outfit for disappearing into the night. Despite all his struggling, a cigarette was still clenched between his lips.

  I expected him to look surprised, but he looked detached instead, as if being scooped up by magic was something that happened to him every day. His features were so hardened by whatever tough breaks he’d gotten that for a second, I didn’t recognize him.

  “May Allah preserve us—it’s me,” whispered Khalid.

  Evil Twins

  “Let me go!” yelled this world’s Khalid. He squirmed futilely against Magnus’s grip. Unlike our Khalid, he didn’t seem particularly unsettled by coming face to face with himself.

  Viviane looked around nervously. “It might be best to take him back to the van. We might need to make a quick exit.”

  The other Khalid started yelling more loudly. With a wave of his hand, Tal silenced him. The boy’s face contorted, and his mouth stayed wide open, but he couldn’t produce even a whisper of sound.

  I blinked a couple of times. Was I still getting some kind of visual feedback from Tal or Umbra? Not as far as I could tell—but now I was seeing the magic as its white tendrils twisted over the other Khalid’s mouth, soaking up the sound.

  The magic I’d seen before, like the summoning of power to stabilize my condition at Awen, had been so strong that perhaps anyone could have seen it. With the smaller spells, I’d seen what the caster did and sometimes its effect, but not the actual magic power—until now.

  It was a reminder of how much my life was changing. Was my normal existence fading away, as Hafez had, right before my eyes?

  Lucas gently touched my arm, pulling me out of my grim speculation. The group was moving fast. I fell in step with them as they headed back to the van. Magnus towed our captive along behind us, thrashing and cursing silently. Our Khalid looked pale.

  “It’s like seeing a ghost—of myself,” he told Shar. “I don’t know how to deal with this.”

  “With any luck, we won’t be here long enough for you to have to,” said Tal.

  “I guess if I thought about parallel universes much, I’d have known there were many other versions of me out there,” said Khalid. “Seeing one is different.”

  “Trust me, I know,” said Tal, glancing back at Magnus. That look got me thinking.

  I knew from the conversation that this was the first time Tal and the others had experienced any contact with a parallel universe. That meant Magnus couldn’t be Tal from some other world. What was he, then? A distant cousin who coincidentally looked exactly like Tal except for hair color and eye color? That was the public version, but I didn’t buy it. That comment about him not existing if Carrie Winn had disappeared in 1997 made me wonder about cloning again.

  Michael remained another mystery—an exact duplicate of what Tal had looked like years ago. I wasn’t writing a story anymore—no reputable editor would believe a word of it—but my journalistic instincts were still squirming around in my head, demanding to know what was going on. I would ask Tal as soon as I had the chance.

  By the time we reached the van, the other Khalid wasn’t struggling as much, but he was glaring at us with undisguised hatred. He started shouting again the moment Tal got him inside the van and removed the muting spell.

  “You’ll be sorry! I’m under the protection of Amen Hafez. He won’t be pleased when he finds out you’ve kidnapped me.”

  Tal raised an eyebrow. “Is that why you were following us? Because Amen Hafez told you to?”

  The other Khalid clenched his lips together and said nothing.

  “What are we trying to accomplish here?” asked Shar. “He isn’t going to tell us anything useful.”

  “He doesn’t have to tell us anything,” said Tal, closing his eyes.

  The other Khalid’s eyes widened in surprise. “Get out of my head!”

  Tal’s eyes jerked open. “I don’t usually get in people’s heads without their permission, but your protector has been spying on us for a long time. He’s also been manipulating us in ways that could end up disrupting the barriers between universes. You have any idea what that means?

  The other Khalid glared at him. His muscles twitched as if he were testing the strength of Magnus’s magic grip.

  “If those barriers tear, the natural order will be disrupted in ways we can’t even imagine,” said Tal. “People could die—a lot of people, probably.”

  “That’s all lies,” said the other Khalid. “Mr. Hafez isn’t trying to destroy the natural order.”

  “What is he trying to do, then?” asked Tal. “Because he brought us to this world against our will. That’s not exactly the best way to gain our trust. Then he made no effort to contact us—unless having you spy on us counts. If there’s something we’re not seeing, tell us what it is.”

  “What you’re not seeing—is this!” The other Khalid twisted against his telekinetic restraints. He didn’t break free, but he loosened his arm enough to make a grab for his amulet, which Magnus was holding. The moment the half djinn’s fingers touched the chain, pained crashed into me like a sledgehammer smashing my skull. My eyes went out of focus, and I slumped over on the seat.

  My vision remained blurry, but I could hear the sounds of a struggle. Other Khalid must have surprised Magnus enough to loosen his grip. Beyond that, I could be sure of nothing except that Amenirdis was coming dangerously close to the surface. A vision filled my pain-wracked mind. I was looking down into the dark waters of a deep, still lake. Something was moving far below the surface. It gradually floated upward, becoming more and more distinct until it—she—was an inch away from breaking the surface.

  I looked into her eyes. They were deep and dark, like the lake from which she rose. I saw no malice in them—but I saw determination harder than rock, ancient as the pyramids.

  “Let me free,” she whispered, her voice undistorted by the water. “The pain will end if you just let me free.”

  “Stop it!” At first, I thought the voice was my own, but it had not come from me. It was Viviane’s. Amenirdis recoiled from it as if she had been slapped in the face.

  “Your time is past. Be content with that, and trouble the present no more!” The pain eased a little as Viviane’s magic surrounded me, and the vision of the lake became less vivid. Amenirdis raised a hand toward the surface, but suddenly the water was frozen solid, and she could not reach through. Then mists surrounded the lake, and it was gone.

  I had a pounding headache, but it seemed almost gentle in comparison to the earlier sledgehammer, and it was fading rapidly.

  My eyes came back into focus. Other Khalid was held so tightly by Magnus’s power that he couldn’t even squirm. His ears were wrapped in magic I presumed kept him from hearing us. That didn’t prevent him from staring at us with the same rigid defiance.

  “Amy, are y
ou all right?” asked Tal.

  “Been…better.” I tried to smile, but my lips felt numb.

  “Carla, would you please seal up this amulet in protective magic,” said Viviane, handing her the trinket that made my eyes hurt when I looked at it. “It’s not safe for it to be around Amy—or within reach of our guest.”

  “A pain-inducing spell?” asked Stan.

  “No, I think it’s just that Egyptian magic close to Amy calls to Amenirdis,” said Viviane.

  “Prognosis, Doctor?” asked Tal.

  “Her situation isn’t stable. I pulled her back this time, partly because either she or Amenirdis created a vision that used a lake as a metaphor for Amy’s past life, and I achieved rapport with it—a little Lady of the Lake trick. I may not be so lucky next time. Frankly, Amy can’t take that much more of this tug-of-war.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “The struggle is mental and supernatural, but it’s taking a toll on your physical body. Not only that, but Amenirdis is getting better at subverting your control. It won’t be long before she takes over—and when that happens, we may not be able to break her hold…as easily.”

  The pause told my reporter’s ear that the last part was just an effort to comfort me. Viviane wasn’t sure they could drive Amenirdis back if she got control.

  “What can we do to stop Amenirdis?” asked Tal.

  “We’d have a better chance if we were back at home,” said Viviane. “In an environment we could more easily control, we might even make progress. But here, with our attention divided and attack possible at any time, we aren’t in a very good position to help Amy. I’ll do what I can—you know that—but we need to get out of here as soon as possible.”

  Tal turned to Other Khalid and dismissed with a hand wave the spell that had kept him from hearing our conversation. “You knew what effect using your amulet would have, didn’t you?”

  “What if I did? You’re holding me prisoner. I’m just trying to get away.”

  “By risking someone else’s existence?” Tal leaned forward. “You’re not giving us much reason to trust your buddy Hafez—or you.

  “So what? You think Hafez needs your trust? He’s more powerful than you could ever imagine.”

  “I’m going to be straight with you,” said Tal. “Smirk if you want now. You won’t be smirking for very much longer. You’ve made it clear you’re an ally of Amen Hafez. That means you have information we need. You can give it, or I can take it. And yeah, I know you’re a half djinn, so you can fight me. I’ll get what I want eventually, though. You can’t stop me. All you can do is decide whether the process is easy or hard.”

  I’d never heard Tal sound so cold. Evidently, neither had Khalid, who seemed uneasy.

  Other Khalid looked us over. “So you know I’m a half djinn. Big deal! You only know that because of my dub hiding back there. No one can really read minds that well.”

  Tal smiled, but it was the creepiest smile I’d ever seen. “On this Earth maybe no one can read minds, but since you can see your dub, you know we came from another Earth—where I’m very good at it.”

  Khalid laughed, though it sounded hollow. “You’re bluffing. Even if you have the ability, you aren’t going to rip my mind apart to find out what I know. You don’t have it in you. How’s that for mind reading?”

  Magnus pushed Tal out of the way. “He may not have what it takes—but I do. If you’re that good at reading people, you know I am not bluffing.”

  Magnus was so intense that he did make Tal seem reluctant by comparison. I had to wonder, though—was this a variation on good cop-bad cop, or was Magnus really prepared to rip the kid’s mind apart?

  “There must…there must be a way to get what we need without hurting him,” I said.

  “Nobody’s getting hurt here,” thought Tal. “If we’re going to have any shot at getting out of Hafez’s clutches, though, this kid needs to think we mean business.”

  The other Khalid looked back and forth between Tal and Magnus as if weighing the sincerity of their respective threats.

  “If…if I tell you anything, Mr. Hafez will kill me.” His tone of voice was totally different, so much like our Khalid’s that I felt sympathy welling up inside of me. Had he been abandoned by his parents the same way our Khalid was?

  “I’ve seen better acting,” said Magnus. He chuckled in a deep tone that sounded almost like a growl.

  “If Hafez would kill you so casually, why stay here?” asked Tal. “Our Khalid lived on the streets for a couple of years. Did you?”

  The boy looked down. His lips twitched.

  “Hafez is the one who took you off the street. Is that it? That’s why you’re loyal to him? If you’re really afraid he’s going to kill you, it doesn’t sound as if he’s repaying that loyalty very well. There are other—”

  “You’re not my friend, so don’t act like it.” The other Khalid’s tone hardened again. “Your dub—or whatever he is—just threatened to use my brain as a punching bag.”

  “There are other ways,” said Umbra. Neither her tone nor her expression betrayed any emotion. She held up her dagger. I hadn’t seen it so close before. The dome light was bright, but the dagger didn’t reflect the light at all. The blade was dark as obsidian.

  Did she really intend to use it? Tal said they wouldn’t hurt Other Khalid, but the determination on Umbra’s face shook my confidence in Tal’s words. After all, she’d been raised to be a killer.

  Other Khalid’s eyes got bigger, but otherwise, his tough guy façade remained in place.

  “It’s a knife. You gonna knife me? You won’t get what you want that way.” Other Khalid’s voice had a slight tremor, and his eyes darted back to Tal.

  “Look, I don’t know much, but I’ll tell you what little I can. My arms hurt, though. Can you make the magic a little looser?”

  Magnus’s eyes narrowed. “That was a pretty quick change of heart.”

  “What have you got to be afraid of?” the boy asked. “My amulet is all sealed up. You think I can overpower all you big, strong, guys?”

  “No—but I think you might be dumb enough to try,” said Magnus. “You just did, in fact. You might get…hurt if you try again.”

  “Loosen the bonds a little,” said Tal. Magnus sneered, but he gestured, and Other Khalid twisted a little to test his new-found freedom. It wasn’t much, but maybe it was enough to make him more comfortable.

  “We’ve done what you asked,” said Tal. “Now it’s your turn. Can you confirm it was Amen Hafez who brought us here?”

  Were my eyes getting tired? Other Khalid looked slightly out of focus to me. No, it wasn’t just me. I could feel Magnus tightening the magic bonds once more—but not before the boy got an arm loose again. This time he grabbed Umbra’s dagger. He couldn’t reach the hilt, so he had to grab it by the blade. He winced as the sharp edge cut into his fingers, but he was moving so fast his hand blurred, and he pulled hard enough to wrench the weapon out of Umbra’s hand before she could react to his unexpected move.

  He flipped the blade so that he now gripped it by the hilt, but he did not hold it long. Instead, he threw it in Khalid’s direction. Khalid, just as fast as his counterpart, ducked, and the blade struck the wall of the van. Its point dug into the surface with a clang.

  Magnus’s telekinetic grip on Other Khalid had tightened so hard the boy could barely breathe. Once his prisoner was secure again, Magnus glared at Tal. “See that, Boy Scout? That’s what happens when you give little bastards like this an inch. He could have killed our Khalid.”

  Tal looked pale. “I should have been more cautious. Clearly, he has some training our Khalid doesn’t. You didn’t loosen the spell that much. How did he work an arm free?”

  “As you suggested, training,” said Umbra as she pulled her dagger out of the van. “Based on the way he moved against the spell and deft handling of the knife, I’d say assassin training—of sorts. If he’d been trained by the Populus Umbrae, he’d have known
not to let himself get cut by a shadow assassin dagger.”

  Other Khalid looked at her defiantly, but there was uncertainty in his eyes as well.

  “If you were not going to die soon, I might have taught you how to avoid such folly. I suppose there is no point now.”

  “Another bluff!” The way the spell squeezed Other Khalid just barely enabled him to get the words out.

  “Shadow assassin daggers create their own poison,” said Umbra in her usual toneless way. “I can will it to be a specific kind, but I did not make it specific to you, or you would already be dead. It may take a few minutes to figure out your half djinn nature. Death will come as soon as it does.”

  “He’s a scumbag…but he doesn’t deserve to die,” said Khalid. “You’re not going to let him die, are you?”

  “When I said we aren’t going to hurt him, I meant it,” thought Tal. “Have a little faith.”

  “You can feel it, can’t you?” asked Umbra. “You can feel the poison working its way into your bloodstream.”

  Other Khalid said nothing, but I could tell from the way his lip twitched, and his eyes darted around, looking for a sympathetic face, that he did feel something.

  “We know how to counter the poison—if you answer a few questions for us.”

  “You wouldn’t—” began Other Khalid.

  “You don’t really know us, do you?” asked Magnus. “And even if we didn’t have the stomach for this kind of thing ordinarily, you inflicted pain on one of us and tried to kill another. If you were trying to drive us to violence, you’re doing a great job of it.

  “Despite all that, we’ll give you a break. It takes time to create the magic that will destroy the poison. We’ll start working on it immediately—but you have to start talking if you want us to keep going.”

  Magnus picked up the lyre and strummed it until it began to glow with sunlight. “Your turn. We have to transform the light into a liquid form that can be infused into your bloodstream. Make it worth our while.”