It really did take a while, but not as long as she expected. She’d been checking on the police—the woman she’d spoken to had fallen back but still watched the house with rapt attention—when she heard a faint sound from the chimney. She hurried over.
“Did you say something?”
“I said it’s done.”
“Do you need more equipment, or—”
“I’m coming up.” A shuffling sound.
“Need any help?”
“Nah.”
She sat and waited, watching carefully as the dusty coat grew closer, his form becoming more discernible as he shimmied awkwardly up the flue. A few wisps of ashy blond hair snuck into Laura’s sight and she shoved them away with one hand. In the process she skimmed her face, and was irritated by the amount of sweat there.
Clae finally emerged, fumbling to keep from getting stuck. His amulets did a good job getting him up, but didn’t seem to have the capacity to push him out. Despite his earlier scorn, Laura grabbed on and helped heave him onto the roof. He looked as sweaty as the policeman before, a few looser waves of hair sticking to his cheeks and forehead. Laura fought the urge to tell him to take off the damn coat.
“We’ve got a hole,” he announced tiredly. “It’s not huge, but it’s enough.”
“Enough for what?”
“The Bijou.”
“Run that by me again?”
“Bijou.”
“I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Clae rolled his eyes and turned to the briefcase. He replaced the drill, grabbed the coiled wire, and unraveled it. He trailed it down the chimney, looking very focused as he did. Once satisfied with that, he reached into the briefcase and picked up what looked like a marble. There was a swirl of sparkling gold inside and a hole bored through the middle.
“Bijou.”
“Isn’t that a bead?” questioned Laura, and he tutted at her.
“No. Everyone has beads. Beads are common. Useless. These are special. They’re little grenades.”
“Oh.” She looked at it with newfound respect. “You didn’t bring those up before.”
“I have mentioned them,” he defended, but elaborated anyway. “They’re not exactly ‘aim and shoot,’ and a hell of a lot more difficult to practice with.”
“More difficult than Eggs?”
Clae nodded at her understanding and threaded the wire through it. “Hand me five others, one at a time.”
The Bijou were warm in her hands, but pleasantly so. She gave them to Clae one by one and he strung them on the wire, using one hand to keep them up. Once they were all on, he adjusted the wire so it stuck straight down.
“Now, there’s going to be a big bang,” he explained. “I wouldn’t be surprised if the house is damaged as a result. But the monster won’t die so easily. You’ve got an Egg?”
Laura patted the bag on her own belt, partly to reassure herself. “I’ve got two.”
“Good. Stay steady and be ready to jump.”
“… Really?”
“Really.”
With that, he let go of the Bijou. They slid down the wire without a sound, careening into the dark. Clae flicked the tip of the wire. It sparked like before, but now that spark traveled after the Bijou like flame down a fuse. Laura watched it descend almost halfway down before realizing what was going to happen, and clutched the chimney again.
There was a hiss below, and then the promised “bang.” The entire building shook, creaking and groaning as the walls twisted and warped. Shingles leapt off the roof at random points, others sticking straight up instead. Smashing sounds came from the front as windows blasted outward, and through it all golden light shone like a beacon from the chimney and there was a terrible, screeching, wailing noise.
Laura had trouble just keeping upright and steady, but Clae gave a whoop and leapt down the chimney. Laura didn’t want to be left behind. She clawed her way up, swatting at her amulet for a new command as she did, clambered over, and dropped into the light.
2
THE TWO-MONTHER
Laura couldn’t see a thing in the chimney for the light, so couldn’t figure out where the bottom was. Her descent was slowed enough that her feet hit the ground without much force. She lurched out onto the hearth, snapping her head up.
The Bijou were still working. They’d scattered across the ground in random directions and glowed white-hot. Fountains of sparks hissed out of them, raining down on the floor to swirl and leap as if they had minds of their own, bathing the whole room in stark white flashes.
The creature they were after was along the side of the room: a hulking black shape taking up the entirety of the wall, a slimy-looking viscous mass. It slipped, slid, and bulged at varying points in a form otherwise shapeless, no bone or structure but an impossibly agile and elastic thing that glinted iridescent red as the Bijou’s light glanced off it. The creature drew back from the sparks as it would from natural light. When one flare hit, it shrieked and burned like acid, glinting angry and voracious. The monster roiled away, affected patch drying out and leaving a thin black cloud in its wake.
Clae stood nearby, gun in hand. He aimed and shot, and the bullets exploded on impact with flashes of gold. The creature writhed out of the way, sliding up the walls again. Portions spun out from the main mass, forming ropelike appendages. It swiped wildly and Laura had to leap aside. These limbs collided with the wall; instead of breaking through they spattered on impact, staining the wallpaper. In unison they swung sharply right. Laura dropped to the floor entirely this time. She flinched as one of the Bijou rolled close, spitting enough for her to feel the heat on her face. The closest limb bent back on itself to avoid the sting, but the others continued to lash. Chairs and end tables overturned, a lamp smashed to the floor, and objects toppled from the mantelpiece. A smell like burning tar settled over them.
Clae ducked under a limb, straightened, and shot. This time he hit somewhere in the middle of the target, causing it to shudder violently. He got two more bullets in before the monster squalled and collected itself. It sucked in its limbs and hastened to retreat. Soon all of it seeped and squirmed through the door it had been blocking. Clae gave chase, kicking two of the Bijou after it. They squealed and flared brighter, rolling through the doorway as Laura scrambled to her feet.
“Wait up!” she gasped, running after him.
“You hurry up,” he shot back, not bothering to look at her as he ran into the hall.
There was another gunshot before Laura reached the door, and she looked around, trying to figure out where everything was. This was the front hall. A few doors were on the opposite wall, and a stairway rose on this side of the hall, the bottom just touching the top of the doorframe. Laura couldn’t see the stairs themselves from her position owing to the gloom and the railing, but Clae stood by the bottom, gun raised.
“It’s upstairs!” he shouted.
His hand went to the bag on his belt, and he took out an Egg. True to its name it was shaped like a large egg, glinting a darker yellow than the Bijou through its glass casing. He nicked the metal lid against the amulet on his belt and tossed it up the stairs. The Egg flashed as it sailed through the air, and Clae scuttled back. He grabbed Laura by the arm with a bruising grip and dragged her into the last room. She nearly tripped over her own feet, but didn’t complain. Clae slammed the door right before the Egg went off.
The Egg let out a roar, the building shuddered, and the monster gave another wail. A tinkling sound followed, seeping across the ceiling, spreading and getting louder.
Clae whipped the door open and raced out. Some remnants of the Egg’s glass had fallen through the railing. They spat fitfully, like tiny embers. Laura hopped around them as Clae charged up the stairs.
Laura stopped short before the stairs. What Bijou hadn’t been kicked had shrieked their way right after them but bumped uselessly against the bottom step. She made to jump through once, twice, but thought better of it and started kicking at t
hem. They veered away, some rolling to follow the presumed upstairs hallway, the others slinging themselves right back toward her. She jumped before they converged again, hoping that little delay hadn’t left her too far behind. Clae wasn’t far, only a few feet into the hallway. The creature writhed, shifting its slimy shapelessness to cover the space in front of him from floor to ceiling. One goopy tendril lashed out. Clae jumped out of the way just in time, and it hit where his feet were with a loud crack. It kept swiping, reluctant to pull its whole bulk closer, and Clae kept dancing out of the way. Laura watched in mixed fear and amusement.
“Uh … what now?”
Clae fired a shot near the ceiling. The creature flinched away before it could hit, emitting a guttural grumbling noise. Once the flare went off, it went right back.
“It wants to take a stand. Probably means we’re close. I’ll guess the amulet is in one of the rooms up here.”
“How do we get past it?”
He stepped back. “I’m going to shoot. You roll an Egg where I aim.”
Laura fumbled with the bag on her belt and pulled out one of the Eggs. She gripped it tight and tapped it against the amulet on her belt. The glass portion of the casing cracked and the liquid inside started to glow, bubbles appearing as it began to simmer. Clae shot near the ground now, and Laura rolled the Egg like a bowling ball. Much to her relief, the Egg’s path didn’t veer off much. It bounced into the open space that had been vacated, just before the creature descended again. The glow vanished from sight and the monster squirmed oddly, but Laura didn’t see any other reaction before running back around the corner. Clae ran to the stair below her, just in time before this Egg went off. The floor shook and Laura clung to the railing as the creature shrieked again, so loud it hurt. More Egg shards flew out, scattering along the ground.
As soon as Clae saw these, he hopped back onto the landing and charged down the hall. Laura was hot on his heels this time. The Egg pieces crunched and popped underfoot as they ran, caught up by their shoes to follow along like a wake in water.
The monster had vanished from the hallway, leaving a slight haze of darkness from its burns. While Laura had no idea which room it retreated to, Clae seemed to have a built-in radar. He kicked open the door to their left. Laura followed him in, a second Egg ready in her hand.
This room looked like it belonged to a little girl. The small bed was draped in pink with dolls arranged neatly on top. Girly knickknacks—fake rings, hair accessories, model animals, and the like—were scattered on the white dresser and floor, little things Laura hadn’t been able to afford when she was a kid. Their quarry was nowhere in sight, but the window was still covered by curtains.
“Keep an eye out,” Clae muttered, slinking over to the bed.
He knelt down, peering underneath. Getting the idea, Laura peeked under the dresser. She saw dust bunnies and a stray comb, but no sign of what they were pursuing. On the other side of the room Clae switched to inspecting the dolls. With the tip of the gun he gingerly tapped them aside, searching through the pile for an amulet. Laura yanked the curtains open and glanced around, checking whether the sudden influx of light had revealed its hiding spot, but found nothing. She moved to the next spot she could think of: the closet. She opened the door, pushed aside dresses on hangers, and squinted, but the door blocked the light from the window.
She shook the Egg, and the liquid inside started to glow weakly. Holding it up and out illuminated the dark corners. There was a moment when she thought she saw something on the floor, but then darkness swooped down from above.
Laura took a step back with a horrified squeak, because now the creature was hanging in front of her face. Its slimy body slid down the woodwork and hangers in stringy tendrils, spinning about the sides and expanding enough that the closet creaked under the strain. There was movement in the middle of the mass, some sort of flicker of a different texture. A split second later she realized it was a set of eyelashes—made obvious as an eye snapped open. This single eyeball was as big as her head, with a crimson iris, bloodshot, wide and ugly and terrible.
Laura found herself rooted to the spot. She knew she had to escape, but she couldn’t so much as move a finger, couldn’t look away. She was completely convinced she’d die horribly when something rested on her shoulder. It was Clae’s elbow. His arm was outstretched, gun in hand, and he shot the creature in the eye. It screamed again, tendrils flailing. The redness of its eye turned away, and with this distraction Laura could move again. Clae dropped the gun and pulled out a second one, lifting an arm to keep her behind him. Laura stumbled back as he unloaded the gun into the monster. It thrashed and shrieked, but this time he stood his ground, eyes narrowed near to slits against the flashing light. Even when it pounded at his side, he didn’t flinch.
With one final screech the monster contracted, then expanded further. A wave of darkness surged out from it, dissipating into the air. Laura shut her eyes, and her hand flew up to press her bandana closer to her face to block the smell. The first time she’d experienced this, she was nearly knocked out and ended up sick for days. This time the goggles and bandana did their job. A wave of heat washed over her, but her eyes didn’t sting and she could barely smell a thing.
She opened her eyes to see that the creature was gone. The only signs it had been there were the ugly cracks in the closet, hangers in disarray, and the faint haze of darkness even now fading from view. Clae lowered his gun and snorted to clear his nose.
“You’ve still got that Egg, right?”
“R-right,” she replied.
She clapped the Egg into his outstretched hand. He squatted, gesturing with his fingers for her to do the same. He brushed aside a fallen dress, picked up some shiny heeled shoes, and set them down out of the way.
There where the shoes had been were shards of a broken amulet. It looked like its outside was once painted bright colors, and the form of a still-intact wing made Laura think it was shaped like a bird.
Clae knocked the Egg against the wall before cracking it entirely over the amulet. Gold liquid seeped out onto it, prompting a hiss. Some black smoke escaped but vanished quickly, and the amulet absorbed the liquid with a sound like a sigh.
“There,” Clae murmured. “You can relax now.”
“That’s it?” said Laura. It hadn’t taken much more to finish off the last few, but the last few hadn’t had eyes. The very thought of them made her shudder again. “Are you sure you don’t need to shoot it again? Use another Egg or three?”
“This step is the same no matter how old the beast is. Once the cloud is gone, it’s dead. You just need to soak it so we can transport it without another one taking root.”
“And once it’s soaked, it won’t sprout eyes?”
“Not until the next one roots itself. You should learn to avoid the eyes. They immobilize you.”
“You say that as if all of them have eyes.”
“They do.”
Laura made a gagging sound. “I don’t remember it on any of the others!”
“They don’t always open them. All infestations have eyes. Some of the more creative ones think up other details. It’s not like they need the extra senses, but they know it gives their victim a fright and that’s what they like. Close your eyes and try to avoid them or you’re easy pickings. Eyes are good targets, though. Hit them there and they die twice as fast.”
“How am I supposed to hit it if I can’t look at it? Just guess and throw an Egg? Don’t we have some kind of equipment for that?”
“Other cities are doing research into it, but at this point we’ve got nothing. That’s why Sweepers move in groups. That way if one of you gets caught, the other one can retaliate. Case in point.” He gestured at the amulet.
“What happens if we both end up looking at it?”
“Then we’re probably dead.”
“Thanks. I needed that in my nightmares.”
Clae took a small wooden box from his pocket and picked up the pieces of the amulet, depo
siting them inside. After a while he asked, “So what do you think?”
“About evil eyes?”
“Whether it was a murder or not.”
“Oh.” Laura looked back at the closet. “Well, amulets don’t belong in a little girl’s closet. I think there’s a good chance it was planted there.” Clae hummed noncommittally and Laura felt a prickle of irritation. “I know this looks nothing like a mobster plot, but you said it yourself: mobsters are far from the only thing spreading infestations. Someone else could’ve done it.”
“There’s also a chance that a child finds an amulet, becomes entranced by its looks and hides it away, only for it to be forgotten in the back of a closet. And if one day she knocks it with some shoes, drops a jewelry box on it, it happens to break … well, who would know to call for help?”
Laura looked back at the closet and the shoes, feeling her stomach twist. She saw Clae watching from the corner of her eye.
“And what have we learned from this exercise?”
“Infinite possibilities?” she guessed weakly.
“Exactly,” he replied. “The Council and police don’t seem to care, so if someone’s going to make the connections, it’ll have to be us. But there’s something worse. What we should really be thinking about is that.” He pointed up at the closet walls. The discoloration there had set in to the point where it looked like sickness oozed from the wood, mottled and weeping black sap from the cracks. “Have you ever seen something like that?”
“Not caused by an infestation, no,” Laura murmured. “Actually, not at all. This looks poisonous. Should we be breathing this close to it?”
“Normal infestations don’t leave damage like this until they grow much bigger. This was inflicted, not just a side effect. They don’t usually think of such things until they’re grown and aiming to frighten their prey.”
“But two months—”
“You’d need at least ten weeks for damage like this.”
“So what does this mean?”
“Hopefully nothing but a maverick.” The little box snapped shut and he stood up. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
City of Broken Magic Page 3
