Ink & Sigil

by Kevin Hearne

  The undine objected.

  Instead of trying to get past my outstretched arms and cane, she simply switched targets, grabbed my left arm, and bit into it. Those knifelike teeth tore through the cashmere of my topcoat and sank into my flesh, and fire lanced through my nerves as my grip loosened on the cane. My defense fell away and my neck was exposed, which is what she wanted. She tore herself from my arm, her teeth coated in my blood, and snarled prior to lunging in for the kill.

  But a shucking sound and a jerk to her torso made her gasp and gurgle, and I was abruptly forgotten. Nadia had plunged her sword up under the undine’s ribs and pierced at least half a dozen vital organs. The undine may have been immune to iron poisoning, but she wasn’t immune to sharp pointy weapons. Nadia twisted the blade, which caused another tremor and moan, and then the undine’s head slumped down and her expression went slack.

  Nadia pulled the creature off and shone her torch on me. “Awright, Al? Sorry about that.”

  I confined myself to a tight nod, since I didn’t have my phone, and searched in my pockets for a Sigil of Knit Flesh to use on my wound. The blood was flowing pretty well, and I imagined I’d have a hell of a dry-cleaning bill.

  “Ach, she got ye a good one, I see. Well, she got me too.” She swung the torch around to point at her heid. “Took off the top of ma mohawk. Wild stuff. That was a blade made of water, just shaped out of magic and whipped through the air before she came at us like an alligator after all.”

  It had taken the top off my hat as well. My sigil was probably ruined, but that was no matter. Had Nadia not warned me, or had I not ducked low enough, I wouldn’t have made it.

  “Now I know why the pixie thought the undine was scary,” she said.

  Once I’d given my arm some time to heal and Nadia found my phone, I explained that we needed to haul the body up to the surface. That was an awkward drag, especially over the body of Dr. Larned on the first landing, where I paused to pick up that extra torch, but we managed it and reunited with Buck and Cowslip in the control room. Their prisoners looked a little tousled and the worse for wear, what with an eye missing and blood streaming down their faces, but Buck proudly handed over their IDs. One was the middle-aged man with the loosened tie we’d spoken to briefly over the chat, and the other was a younger white woman with short dark hair and a square jaw.

  [Excellent. Peek outside, won’t you? See if the bean sídhe are still there.]

  “Right.” The hobgoblin and pixie exited together, chatting amiably like old friends.

  I gave Nadia a Sigil of Muscular Brawn.

  “What’s this for?”

  [I need these two agents dragged outside and dropped by the door. Then I need the undine and the three other Fae bodies piled up some distance away but nowhere near the trees.] Like the troll at the bottom of Hatcher’s pool, they hadn’t disintegrated to ash like most Fae did upon their death. The experimental treatments had fundamentally altered them, so we’d have to turn them to ash the old-fashioned way.

  “Cleanup time, eh?”

  I nodded.

  “Do ye think that drone the doctor was talking about will get here?”

  [If it was coming, it would have struck by now. I think he was talking out his arse.] I took her torch, because I needed to search the other rooms of this place before we left it.

  There was a galley and several bunk rooms along with some lavatories and what looked like a medical lab, judging by the equipment inside, but there were no other occupants. The entire facility—especially its data and medical marvels—had to be destroyed. There was nothing I could do about data stored on a remote server somewhere, and Clíodhna knew precisely how to get the whole thing going again in the future, but wiping out this node, together with Hatcher’s neutralization, should solve my problems for now. Happily, Brighid was a goddess of fire and had created the perfect sigil when one absolutely, positively had to burn it all down: the Sigil of Cleansing Fire. I had brought plenty of them for just that purpose, even though it exhausted my supply of ink for it and I’d have to get fire-salamander hearts to make more. There was a delay built into the activation so one could open the sigil in a room and have about ten seconds to get to a safe distance. I opened the first one on top of Dr. Larned’s body in the stairwell, then climbed up and left a sigil in every room. I noted that the clurichaun’s bunk room had a refrigerator stocked with bags of human fingers and labeled jars of aioli. That definitely needed to burn. The sigils ignited and filled the spaces with flames, and my back was uncomfortably toasty by the time I walked out of there. I wished I could say I exited in slow motion with sunglasses on as the entire facility exploded behind me, but it was just a building on fire with oxygen provided by the blasted door and whatever ventilation they had built into the mountain; no doubt there were camouflaged vents on top of the plateau.

  The two half-blind agents started yapping at me when I emerged. Nadia had deposited them somewhat near the no-longer-secret entrance and informed them that I was the one in charge, and they had things to say to me. I ignored them and walked out to the neatly stacked pile of corrupted Fae, noting with pleasure that the bean sídhe were all gone and they hadn’t been wailing a dirge for Buck Foi after all. They’d been singing the unknown name of the undine. I opened a Sigil of Cleansing Fire on top of the Fae and walked back to the agents.

  I really wished I had those sunglasses, but the effect was no less cool in the dark. Or perhaps it was chilling. Seeing the bodies suddenly consumed by a pillar of fire as I strode toward them, the agents quickly ran out of threats and promises of vengeance.

  Fire is our friend.

  [Straight razor, please?] I asked Nadia.

  “Sure.” She dug it out of her pocket and handed it to me.

  [Thanks. I need everyone out of sight in the van. I’ll be there in a moment.]

  Buck shouldered up his bag of miniature terrors and told Cowslip she was in for a treat. I waited until they and Nadia were in the van before I put away my phone.

  “Now we can talk,” I said. “I’m sorry about yer eyes. That’s not what I was expecting to happen, and I really was hoping ye would all just walk away. But that mad scientist of yours wouldnae let it go. I just needed ye out of there because I had a monster to kill. But ye’re the ones that made the monsters, are ye no?”

  The woman spoke up.

  “That wasn’t us. That was Dr. Larned. We’re just ops.”

  “I see. So ye’re the ones who sent the monsters he made out to kill other people and eat them. Maybe I should do ye like those over there, eh?” I nodded my head at the burning bodies.

  “No, no,” the man said. “There’s no need for that. Who are you, anyway?”

  “A certain rare brand of law and order. An entirely different agency from yours. When it comes to the Fae on this planet, I have broad authority to right wrongs, and you have been very, very wrong. Hatcher in America is done for, just so ye know, and so is his pet troll.”

  The agents exchanged a quick glance before remembering that they’d probably given something away by doing so.

  “Now, I can set the two of ye on fire right now and sleep well at night, knowing what ye did. I’m no interested in any rationale ye might have. But I am interested in what ye have in Area 51. I’ll be merciful and let ye live if ye tell me what’s down there.”

  “We don’t know,” the woman said.

  “Aliens,” the man said immediately afterward. “It was always aliens.” The woman glared at him with her one remaining eye, and I chuckled. I hadn’t really cared to know; I just wanted to see how they’d answer.

  “I thought so. Thank ye. Awright.” I pulled out my official ID and said, “I’m gonnay show ye who I work for.” That got their attention, and so they were easily exposed to the sigils on my ID, which allowed me to command them to look at the next two very carefully. I proceeded to show them Lethe Ri
ver and Restful Sleep, and they slumped back on the grass, unconscious. When they woke up, they’d see that their op was burnt down and they might even be in custody, but they’d have absolutely no recollection of how it all went wrong, how they’d lost an eye, or, most important, who’d done it. I used Nadia’s razor to cut their bonds and made sure their IDs were spread out next to them. The CIA would have some explaining to do to Scotland, and Hatcher would take the blame.

  I looked around at my handiwork and was satisfied. It wasn’t the tidiest of resolutions, but it was a bandage on the wound, and it would heal so long as Clíodhna allowed it.

  When I got back into the van, Buck and Cowslip were marveling at all the miniature goth Nadias depicted in the altar triptych. The bags of chocolate and marshmallows were sitting empty on the love seat and Buck was still chewing, recovering his strength. I returned the straight razor to Nadia and she drove us back down the hill to the village. It was marvelously quiet, and I was surprised. I thought surely some sort of law enforcement or fire department would have roused itself by now to investigate the thunderous explosion and subsequent fires up on the hill—especially since said fires were clearly visible when we turned off the road and looked back. But the village was dead silent.

  I asked Nadia to pull over next to the Gargunnock Inn and soon realized why no one had paid attention to our raid: Everyone was inside watching football on the telly, with the sound turned up. Anyone still at home probably had the game on too. How much of the world could burn down, I wondered, while football was on the telly? How much magic and wonder was missed while people were distracted by something flickering on their screens?

  [Buck, pop in there and steal somebody’s phone really quick. The challenge is that ye must steal it and return it without them noticing.]

  “On it!”

  He popped away, and Cowslip laughed nervously in the back. “So, Mr. Sigil Agent sir, what’s going to happen to me now?”

  [I’m not exactly sure. What would you like to happen?]

  “I’d like to go back to Tír na nÓg, but I can’t.”

  [No, you can’t.]

  “Will you let me stay here?”

  [Not with me, but maybe I can find you some legitimate service elsewhere.]

  “I can’t get my injections anymore, can I?”

  [Sorry, no.]

  “So I’m going to start hurting soon and I might die.”

  [You might,] I admitted. [But I have a plan.]

  Buck returned triumphant, holding up an old flip phone. “Got one!”

  [Nadia, please let emergency services know about the fire on the hill so the agents can be found.]

  “A concerned citizen?”

  [Can you do frightened and angry? Bonus points for both.]

  Nadia called up emergency and gave them an earful. “There’s a fucking fire on the hill and you lot are watching football! Just go outside and look, ye can’t miss it! Pull yer thumbs out yer holes and do yer job!”

  She hung up and tossed the phone back to Buck, who popped out to return it. “That should do the trick, eh?”

  [Aye. Bottle of whisky on me. You choose.]

  “And a raise?”

  I grinned fondly at her. [A generous onetime bonus, I think.]

  A call to my colleagues solved the Cowslip problem—or at least I hoped it would. Mei-ling agreed to take Cowslip in and attempt to treat her withdrawal symptoms and pain with sigils when they began; if Cowslip survived, Mei-ling would offer the pixie a legally binding service contract with her apprentice. That way, Cowslip wouldn’t have to travel to Tír na nÓg much, if at all, and she could avoid being seen by the bean sídhe and thereby reminding Clíodhna that she was still around. It wouldn’t be the life Cowslip imagined for herself, but it would be a safe one, and that was what trafficking victims needed and deserved.

  It was a relief to tell the other sigil agents that I’d cleaned up my own mess. Clíodhna could try something again at any time, and we should remain vigilant, but more likely she would try something when we’d all passed on and hope the younger generation wouldn’t think of her. I told myself that my colleagues were pleased that the matter had ended and that I had clearly suffered in the process of resolving it, since the black eye the leprechaun had given me hadn’t cleared up yet.

  Eli reported a couple of days later that, as far as he could tell, Hatcher had been demoted rather than fired for the immense cock-up at Gargunnock. The aftermath had caused something of an international incident, since Scotland wasn’t fond of having one of its picturesque hills blown up, only to find out that it had been home to a secret CIA facility. Hatcher still had his shadowy offshore accounts to live on—we couldn’t touch those—but at least he didn’t have a squad of Fae—or anything else, really—to command. He wouldn’t be running operations again soon, and Clíodhna wouldn’t work with him anymore. We didn’t know how he’d got rid of the troll corpse at the bottom of his swimming pool, but since nothing of the sort hit the news feeds, we assumed he’d taken care of it somehow.

  I approved those short-term stays for the various deities who wished to go skiing in the Alps but let the other sigil agents know that something significant might happen there. I toyed with the idea of attending, just to make sure everyone behaved, but dismissed it since no one had invited me and I disliked the snow anyway.

  With the assorted crises settled, there was finally time to sort through Gordie’s inks and ingredients and either store them or dispose of them properly. A detective constable from Human Trafficking reached out to thank me for my information on those two pimps and said if I came across any more information like that, he’d be delighted to make use of it. And how did I come across that information, he wondered? Ignoring his question, I replied that I would pass on anything new that I learned.

  Though I had no guarantee of any new information coming soon. Saxon Codpiece hadn’t yet returned, and there was no way of knowing when or even if he’d be back. I imagined he’d wait until everyone thought he was dead and then return with dyed hair, a new wardrobe, and a new ridiculous alias, like Angus Crotchpot or Wallace Hungwell.

  But I made a note to follow up with the detective constable in a few days to make sure the victims were being cared for. If it turned out agreeably, perhaps I could figure out a way to generate some new leads without Saxon’s help.

  D.I. Munro hadn’t come around again and I hoped she wouldn’t, though I simultaneously hoped I’d find a way to do her a good turn someday, since I’d been nothing but a source of memory loss to her so far. If she ever saw me in the company of Buck, the wee pink man she was certain had once punched her in the nose, I doubted I’d be able to shake her loose again.

  On Thursday, I made my customary trip to the Mitchell Library and returned my borrowed book. I visited Mrs. MacRae on the fourth floor—her scarf was a riot of autumn colors this time—and asked her for help finding books in the occult or mythology section that dealt with humans being cursed specifically by deities, as opposed to witches or warlocks.

  Her eyes widened a bit as her fingers began flying across the keyboard. “Are we feeling a bit cursed by God today, Mr. MacBharrais?”

  [Asking for a friend.]

  “Of course, of course. But even if your friend is cursed, they’re still blessed in a way, if ye think about it.”

  [How so?]

  “Well, gods so rarely do anything tae us. Or for us—I certainly got no help keeping my husband alive, for all my prayers. So it’s kind of an achievement, in a way, tae be someone a god wants tae curse. Who were the good ones, eh? Tantalus. He deserved what he got, though now that I think of it, maybe that was a punishment after death rather than a living curse. Cassandra had a powerful curse on her, for sure. But ye know I’ve never been positive about that Ancient Mariner fellow. Did he really deserve to walk around forever undead and all his crew be killed because he shot a
n albatross? Not sure the scales of justice were functioning well on that day. But I defy ye to pick a day when the scales worked well for everyone.”

  I simply grinned at her.

  “Oh, I’m babblin’ on, in’t I? Forgive me.”

  [Nothing to forgive. I find the case of the Ancient Mariner to be problematic as well.]

  “I just feel so sorry for the crew, ye know? It wasnae their fault they happened tae be workin’ with a pure bastard, yet they had tae pay for it with their lives.”

  [It certainly illustrates the dangers of living in the opium-addled imagination of a poet. And the principle of collateral damage.]

  “Aye, collateral damage. It’s a shame. So let me write a few things down for ye here…”

  While she wrote down titles and catalog numbers, I thought about that angle a bit more. What if I’d never been the primary target of the curse but collateral damage? A deity may have been actually angry at someone else—another deity, most likely—and since they couldn’t take it out on the god that vexed them, they took it out on…me?

  That only made sense if someone was angry with Brighid. Attacking, compromising, weakening a sigil agent to get at Brighid—I could see that as a possibility. Some of the pantheons chafed at the necessity for contracts. It was an avenue of investigation worth exploring, at least, to discover who might have been motivated enough to do this.

  I had to get to the bottom of my curses if I didn’t want Buck to become collateral damage too and go the way of my apprentices. The clock was ticking, and I dreaded telling him about it, though I knew it was the right thing to do. He had the right to decide his own future, and I couldn’t make that decision for him.