Goth-Julian’s phone slowly ticked over to nine o’clock, and as it filled the appointed hour, my skin started to tingle, and I ground my teeth in an effort to keep from scratching my arms raw. I was so distracted that I almost missed the fox fire glow playing in a circle on the ground a few feet to my right. Brown craned his neck to look more closely, and I scurried to get in place. As soon as I was in the circle, the blue-white glow crawled over my skin, and the world around me started to fade into transparency.
“Julian,” Brown said. I turned my head, and he held up one hand and waggled his fingers at me. “See you soon.”
Chapter 22
2100–2245, Wednesday, June 22, 2016
I opened my eye. Just the one. Because the other was swollen shut. Every part of me hurt, and I groaned, rolling over onto my back. Dana waddled into view. “What happened to me?” I croaked.
“Other-you was an asshole,” she said, as though that was sufficient explanation.
Jack Redderton loomed over me, bending down to speak. A rose fell out of his lapel and landed on my face, thorn first. Ouch. “You—he threatened Dana. Called her a see-you-next-Tuesday. I don’t put up with people acting so disrespectfully to pregnant women.”
“It may have taken us a minute to remember that you’d have to put up with the damage, sweetheart,” Dana said.
“Some of us may have remembered right away but chose not to say anything,” Mia chipped in from somewhere behind me as Jack offered a hand up.
“Superb. Hundreds, maybe thousands of lives depend on my physical performance, not especially impressive in the first place, and you beat me like Rodney King at a police convention. Anyhow, I know what we have to do, and I have a plan.”
“Another one?” Mia said, deadpan.
“Bitch, he just came back from an alternate reality based on a plan that he cobbled together in less than a day. What have you got?” Dana snapped. Mia stared at her with icy eyes, but I intervened before the situation could escalate.
“What she’s got is access to a small private army of well-trained agents, so we’ll just let her mock me if that’s how Carmen Sandiego gets off,” I said, grinning and putting my arm around Dana. It was so good to have her back.
“That’s not going to matter if she spends the whole evening making smartass remarks,” Dana replied, still looking daggers at Mia. Yup, so good to have her back.
“She has a point. We need the rest of your plan, so quit wasting time like a bunch of fuckwits. And remember, Sloane is mine,” said another voice a few feet to my left, and Gerald Cooper stepped out of the shadows gathered around the foot of a large, gnarled oak tree. Badger’s rolling gait brought him near, and he nodded to me and twitched his mustache. I looked around; Jimmy, the vampire, my wife, the big private investigator, and Mia leaning sullenly against a headstone. That just left Henry.
“Your Majesty?” I called.
“Here…barely,” Henry’s voice whispered near my right ear. “Keeping hold of your…essence after I swapped you took everything I’d stolen from your little friend—and more. I may need to rest for a good long while after tonight…” The former king’s voice was barely louder than the leaves rustling in the gentle, late-evening breeze that ruffled my hair. I couldn’t expect much help from old Hank.
“Okay,” I said. “I know what we have to do.”
I then proceeded to relate the pertinent information from my trip to the alternate dimension to my allies. I may have left out the bit about using the Sigilum on our kid and the bit where Brown told me that he’d see me soon. “So, you see, we need to ambush Sloane, get the Sigilum, transport it to Kensington and Chelsea Cemetery, where we’ll need the ritual to be prepped, and carry out the complex thaumaturgic rite, which will require Cooper’s blood. According to my dreams, I estimate that we’ll have a window of maybe one and a half hours to pull that all off, so we’ll need to split up. Maybe we can stop this without violence—right now, we massively outnumber Sloane, but every vision I’ve had has been soaked in blood, so I’d guess that this is going to be dangerous. You helped me get the ritual—will you help me one more time?” I asked. I straightened and looked my allies in the eyes. Except the invisible one. And the one whose sockets glowed red—those were just creepy. One by one, I saw their decisions form, and one by one, they answered:
“For Christian,” Mia said.
“For you,” Dana fibbed.
“For Queen and country,” Badger chuffed.
“Aye,” was all that Henry could sigh.
“For a fat paycheck,” Jack said, earning glares from the others.
Finally, Cooper growled, “For vengeance.”
“Awww…group hug!” I said, on the verge of drowning in a sea of pathos. I’m not good with the touchy-feely. Not much of that in the nightmare-slaying business.
After that was done, we spent the next ten minutes hammering out the details of how we were going to ruin Sloane’s day: Badger was driving to Kensington and Chelsea Cemetery with Dana, an armed response team, and a hastily arranged set of works permits to deal with any pesky park rangers. Mia was going to King’s Cross to meet the agents that she’d convinced HQ to send. The rest of us were staying in Highgate to ambush Sloane when he entered. We’d attempt to hit him with overwhelming force by eleven thirty, snag back the Sigilum, and then bust ass to Hanwell before midnight for the counter ritual, where Cooper’s blood could be used to put the vampires back to sleep. Easy—as long as the bad guy showed up on cue as per my dreams. I tried to ignore the rest of the details from my visions, hopeful that I could change them.
“Is that clear?” I asked after we’d gone through everyone’s responsibilities twice. Half a dozen heads nodded their assent. We had a plan. Yeah, that lasted for all of about ten seconds.
The rapidly cooling evening air was suddenly split by a piercing whistle coming from Mia’s purse—her ringtone was the theme song from Kill Bill. If we lived through tonight, I was absolutely going to give her shit about that. Mia dug in her clutch, pulled out a smartphone, and put it to her ear. After listening to the person on the other end speaking for fifteen seconds, the color drained from her face, although her hands and voice were steady. “I have to go,” she said, spun on her heel, and click-clacked toward her waiting Aston-Martin as fast as she could without actually running. That would be gauche.
“Where are you going? I have a message for you!” I yelled at her retreating back.
“Back to HQ. Emergency—the Chapter Master is calling off the support teams for tonight. Something about the remaining Escapees running riot. I’ll call you when I know more,” she shouted, tossing her head so that her brown curls bounced in the cooling evening air. There was a roar of engine, a squeal of tires, and Mia’s silver Aston-Martin powered into the evening and she was gone.
Without the Sons’ backup, the situation was even more dangerous, and I thought of the little boy from my visions, bleeding out on the ground, because I’d decided to value my baby’s life over his. Nevertheless, even with that abrupt departure, most of the team could still carry out their part of the plan. I jogged over to Dana, and she pulled me close, whispering into my ear. “Get me that damned Sigilum like you promised, and save our baby.” I nodded in response; she planted a kiss full on my lips, and I returned it, reaching up to cup her face in one hand and placing the other on the swell of her belly. Her lips were pillow soft, and she smelled of roses and talcum powder. I felt a kick under my hand, and we broke away. Her eyes glimmered with unshed tears as we smiled uncertainly at each other. Badger cleared his throat, and when I looked around, I noticed that everyone else had found something else to pay attention to. Dana squeezed my arm and then hopped in a car with Badger, but before he could speed away, I flagged him down.
“Are you sure I can’t have a gun?” I asked, clasping my hands in supplication.
“Have you received training and a firearms license since the last time you asked?” Badger enquired sweetly.
“I’m a hil
lbilly. I had a cousin Cletus. That’s all the license I need!” I yelled, putting my hands in the air.
“You grew up in the suburbs. Your dad sold insurance, and your mom was a realtor—sort of. The answer is still no. Now get to work, young man,” Badger said, threw on his lights and siren, and sped off. Badger was right that I didn’t have a huge amount of experience in the real world, but I’d fired tens of thousands of rounds in the Dreamscape, and I’d have felt a lot better with an AK-47 on my back. I’d just have to make do with my friendly neighborhood vampire for protection.
I turned to said vampire. “You’ve got this, right?”
“Ha!” Cooper barked, melted into the shadows, and was gone between one blink of my eyes and the next. Great. Henry whispered a farewell in my ear and went to take up sentry duty at the front of the cemetery—something he could do even in his diminished state.
“Just you and me again, Jack,” I said, turning to the last member of our group.
“I’m not even supposed to be here today,” the big man said, absentmindedly twirling the flower in his lapel.
“You feeling bad about working against Sloane?” I asked, not sure if he was bothered by working against a former client.
“Nah. My day off. Had a date,” he said.
“Now you have a date with destiny.”
“I hate you. I’d flip you off, but…” he trailed off, holding up his hook. “Seriously, though, Mia’s the one paying me. Sloane has no contract out against her. Plus, he’s an asshole—and not in a good way,” he added with a grin.
Jack and I walked to the glamorous hiding spot that Badger’s immense pull in the Met had been able to secure for us—the public toilet block. Ahh…it’s good to have friends in high places. We traded small talk as the light faded. Just before ten, Jack’s phone rang.
Jack put the phone to his ear and listened for a moment. “It’s Mia. She wants to know what Brown told you.” He pressed a button, putting the phone on speaker mode.
“Master Brown told me, ‘Olani hoath ol.’”
“I love you,” Mia said.
“Umm…I think you’re pretty swell yourself, Mia, but—Dana.” I replied, blushing.
“I’d say ‘In your dreams,’ but with you, that might just be leading you on,” she replied, and I briefly considered a universe of voyeuristic possibility—before she interrupted that train of thought by continuing, “‘I love you’ was the message. In Enochian. Jack, was he telling the truth?”
“Yes, luv,” he replied.
“Good. I think I can get the problem at HQ sorted. I just have to deliver the message, and then I’ll return with reinforcements. I’ll be there within the hour.” Mia hung up without any superfluous words, and quiet descended again upon our little slice of heaven.
◆◆◆
The clock ticked around to ten thirty, and somehow Jack managed to stand stock still, staring out the window, which was good since his massive frame filled approximately three-quarters of the toilet block. On the other hand, I couldn’t stop pacing as I watched a hearse pull into the West Cemetery. I thought about my dreams of the tourists being torn apart, and I shivered.
“Stop your damned prancing around, Jules. It’s not professional on a stakeout,” Jack said.
I was just about to make some unimaginably clever retort, but Henry chose that moment to whisper in my ear: “I believe our enemy is here. He was inside a coffin in the back of that hearse. I could feel the power of the Sigilum as the car drove through me. Not only that, but he had a number of armed men in the car with him.”
Aww…crap. My stomach felt like it was filling with ice water. Sloane had killed one of my friends, had displayed a ruthless ability to defeat attuned, and had no morals. I shivered in the night air and turned to Jack. “He’s here. Just crossed into the west cemetery, and he’s not alone.”
It was time to move, so I drew my gladius. Jack turned and put one hand on the door handle, but before he could twist it open, his phone rang. “It’s Mia again” he said before putting it on speaker.
“I’m on my way, and I won’t be alone,” Mia said, her voice strangely breathless, “because—” She paused, and I heard a squeal of tires and the pop-pop-pop of a light-caliber semiautomatic weapon. “Because I have the majority of the Sons of Perseus following me. I believe that my father may have found a way to screw us over, even after death.”
“Yeah, that sounds like him,” I said. I could almost see Mia’s disapproving frown.
“Yes. His phrase certainly did affect the geas. Unfortunately, using it obliterated the remnants of the controlling effects. The Chapter Master is free of my father’s influence, is fully aware of what was done to him, and has declared a pogrom against any extradimensionally attuned individuals. I’m the only one from the HQ that got out, though there were a few in the field. I’ll try to lose the agents following me and join you ASAP. Good luck,” she added and ended the call.
Jack’s face twisted up, and his chin worked several times. “She wasn’t telling the whole truth, but I don’t think that I can go with you, Julian. She hired me, and I’m on the clock until midnight. I need to get out and try to help Mia,” he said.
“You don’t even know where she is!” I hissed, not liking the idea of being left in the graveyard with a monster hunter who wanted to kill me and a vampire who was looking for revenge at any cost.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” he replied.
I raised my eyebrows. “What, do you have some magic ability to track people that you’ve been keeping under your hat?”
“I don’t wear a hat; would mess up my hair. What I do have is an ownership stake in a private investigation firm that just happens to have a crapload of tracking devices in stock. I stuck one to Mia’s car when she picked me up, and I put one in her handbag when I was helping her out of the car. It pays to have good manners,” he replied.
“I think it’s called ‘stalking’ when you bug someone’s car, not ‘good manners.’ But she said she was coming to join us,” I said.
“That was the lie. I don’t know where she’s going, but she doesn’t intend to meet up with us.”
“Shit. We need those agents here if this goes down the way I think it will,” I said, adding in a few words that aren’t fit to be repeated outside of a truck stop after midnight.
“I’ll bring her back safe,” Jack said, and then slipped out of the toilet block without waiting for my reply.
“Shit,” I said again. I’d expected to have backup from the police, or the Sons, or at least Jack. Instead, I was alone with my thoughts.
We’d missed Sloane. He was in the cemetery, and I needed to get moving, but I was frozen, locked in my head. I should have known that it would come to this. Every vision had shown only me, Sloane, and Cooper in the mausoleum, but I’d tried so hard to change what was happening. What did my failure mean? Were the events of this evening predestined? If they were, then did our intentions, our choices count for nothing? If I chose to be a man or a monster, was it always my fate to do so? Or was the universe even bleaker? Could I choose but not affect anything? Dark thoughts for a dark moment. I shook my head. I had to believe that my choices had an impact: some good, some bad. If our choices didn’t matter, then why were there alternate realities? Too many questions for one ex-procurement officer. I’d need some more learning to properly consider the possibilities.
I was procrastinating. Because I was scared. I’d faced a lot of monsters in the Dreamscape, and I didn’t scare easy, but it was dark, I was alone in a graveyard, and there were bloodthirsty monsters who wanted me dead. If I just waited, maybe Cooper would take care of Sloane for me. Sweat trickled down my back, and I forced one hand onto the doorknob, paused again. Fate or choice. Destiny or free will. Honor or survival.
My train of thought was interrupted when I heard Henry’s voice again: “Boy, if you intend to defend this nation, then the time is now. The murderer is making sorcerous preparations. Go stop him.” The late king’s voic
e regained a bit of its strength as he issued orders to me, and that was just what I had needed. He was right. I couldn’t stay in here any longer. I couldn’t wait for backup any longer. My friends had put their trust in me. It was time to do what I knew had to be done. I reached for the doorknob—and that’s when the tour bus showed up.
Chapter 23
2245–2315, Wednesday, June 22, 2016
My hands shook so hard that I had to grasp the wrought iron fence to stop them as I watched the tan, thirty-foot-long tour bus pull up in front of the main entrance to the cemetery. The worst part of my vision was coming true. My breath rasped in and out as I watched the tourists filing out of the vehicle. My vision blurred, but I couldn’t look away—then he came down the steps. A little boy with brown hair, no more than five years old.
“No!” I yelled, bursting out of my concealment, waving my arms. Four dozen pairs of eyes focused on me, and the familiar little boy shrank back against his mother’s skirts. A big man in a Hawaiian shirt stepped in front of me.
“Is there a problem…sir?” he asked with an American accent, taking in my disheveled, beaten appearance.
I knew that I must look like a madman, but all I could think of was stopping that little boy from going into the cemetery where I’d seen him die, horribly, in my dreams. “You can’t go into the cemetery!”
“We have a permit, sir. We’ve arranged a special summer solstice after-dark tour. These good people have paid handsomely to see the cemetery after dark, so unless you have a ticket, then I’ll have to ask you to be on your way. Otherwise I’ll call the police,” he replied.
“Yes—the police! Call the police!” I yelled, thinking that I might be able to at least slow them down that way.
“We have a tour to start, sir,” he said and turned away. The rest of the tourists walked inside the little faux-Gothic gatehouse, and I could see someone in a Friends of Highgate shirt peering out. I looked around, spotted a rock on the ground, picked it up, and hurled it at the bus. It’s important to remember here that I’m American. We spend our whole childhood playing games that involve throwing balls. I chucked that rock straight and true, striking the tour bus dead-bang in the middle of the windshield—and it bounced off. Damn. I didn’t see that coming. Why would a bus have armored glass? What was it, the dopemobile? My throw did, at least, have the desired effect, as the tour guide whipped out his phone.
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