by King, R. L.
Stone’s answering expression held frank respect. He found himself suddenly reminded of a friend he hadn’t thought of in a long time—a mundane professor who had died helping him deal with another magical threat shortly after he’d arrived in America. Like Lopez, Tommy Langley had been scared to death, his whole world turned upside-down by the knowledge that the magical world existed, but both men had put aside that fear, squared their shoulders, and stepped up to fight for the people they loved. Stone didn’t know if he himself would have been able to do that.
“Thank you, Stan,” he said softly. “You don’t know how much it means to me to have someone willing to help. I was beginning to feel very alone down here.”
Lopez’s face took on the resolute aspect of the career cop. “Jason’s family, Dr. Stone. And you’re his friend. That’s good enough for me. Now what do you want me to do? I’ve got a bunch of vacation time banked—I can take a couple weeks off so I can focus on this completely. Just tell me what you need.”
For the first time in what felt like days, Stone smiled. It was a small, brittle thing, but it was genuine. “The first thing I need is for you to stop calling me ‘Dr. Stone.’ If we’re going to be working together, formality seems a bit—counterproductive.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Okay,” Lopez said. “So, where do we start?”
“Damn good question.” Stone eyed the last slice of pizza and tried to decide whether he was still hungry. “I suppose I should start by asking you if you can do anything to help run a bit of interference with Casner and his lot. I assume I’ve managed to convince you that I didn’t have anything to do with any of those murders, including Lindsey’s?”
Lopez shrugged. “I already believed you when you said you didn’t do it. But if you were anybody else, the whole magic thing would make me less inclined to believe you. I’m guessing some of the stuff you can do includes things like turning invisible and—what do they call it—teleporting?”
“Invisible, yes. Teleporting, no. Except by using carefully prepared gateways, and there aren’t any around here.”
“But you could have gotten out of custody if you’d wanted to?”
“Easily. Even more easily if I didn’t care who I hurt.”
“So why didn’t you? Get out, I mean—not hurt anybody.”
“Because I don’t do things like that,” Stone said. “They had perfectly legitimate reasons for assuming I might be involved, especially in Lindsey’s case.” He sighed. “Would I have let them put me in prison? No. Escaping would have caused me a significant amount of inconvenience, but being incarcerated for life for something I didn’t do would have been worse. But as long as they were playing straight with me, I was willing to go along.” He paused, remembering how close his last encounter with the police had been. “So, can you keep Casner off our backs without telling him anything he doesn’t need to know?”
“I’m not sure,” Lopez said. “But if you’re with me, I can vouch for you. Might be a good idea to stick together. From what you’re telling me, this thing wants to fuck you over hard. It’s not a good idea for you to be alone with anybody else.”
Stone bowed his head. If only he’d thought of that two days ago, Lindsey would still be alive.
Lopez frowned. “You’re saying these things—what did you call them?”
“I didn’t. I don’t have a name for them yet.”
“Whatever the hell they are—you said they can possess people? Take them over, like Invasion of the Body Snatchers or something?”
Stone had to give Lopez credit: like Jason, once he decided to accept the initial premise of magic, he seemed willing to at least make an attempt to work with the details. “Yes, and apparently with ease.”
“Then how do you know they aren’t possessing me right now?”
“Excellent question. I know because they have a telltale aura that, now that I know what I’m looking for, I can spot. I’ve been periodically scanning you for it.”
Lopez frowned, obviously trying to decide how he felt about being “scanned” without his knowledge. “How do I know they aren’t possessing you?”
“You don’t. Though I can make a couple of educated guesses as to why they aren’t: first, mages, especially ones of my power level, are extremely difficult to possess, mentally influence, or otherwise muck about with their minds. We learn mental defenses early in our training, and I’ve always been particularly strong in that regard. Second, I don’t think if I were being possessed, I’d be able to do magic as easily as I can...” He trailed off, his gaze suddenly focusing on something far off in the distance.
“Something wrong?” Lopez asked.
Stone didn’t answer for several seconds; when he finally did, he sounded distracted. “You may have just given me an idea.” He switched back on. “So far, I’ve only interacted—at least that I know about—with two of these things when they were possessing a human being: Lindsey, and the boy at Bart’s Books who tried to strangle me. I need to talk to him, by the way, if you can manage that. At any rate, they both had two things in common.”
“What are those?” Lopez looked perplexed as he tried to keep up with Stone’s careening train of thought.
“First, they either didn’t speak at all, or else they sounded—odd. When Lindsey spoke to me while she was possessed, her voice didn’t sound like her own.” Stone made a deliberate effort to wall off both his feelings for and his guilt about Lindsey, focusing only on the facts. He could grieve later—and he would, no doubt to the accompaniment of copious amounts of alcohol, morose music, and days of solitary brooding. But now, he had to think clearly. “Second, neither of the victims remembered anything about what happened when they were possessed. Both of them, as soon as the entity vacated their bodies, acted as if they had no idea what they had been doing when they weren’t driving.”
“So—what’s that mean?”
“It means I have a hypothesis that when they’re possessing a human, they’re fully in control, to the point where they can’t access the human’s mind or memories beyond some minimal comprehension of things like movement, speech, and spoken language.”
“I still don’t get it,” Lopez said. “Sorry, I’m still pretty new at this.”
“Quite all right,” Stone said. He was already feeling his mind engaging with much greater clarity than when he’d been stuck with only his own thoughts for company. “You’re helping me work it out as I go. What I’m trying to say is, I don’t think these things are capable of using their hosts’ higher mental processes. I’ve dealt with other similar entities that are—they can take over a human and create sort of a symbiotic relationship where they can pass flawlessly at whatever that human did in society. But these are different. They’re more versatile in that they can hop from one body to another, but they have to be careful about who they interact with to avoid giving themselves away.”
“And that helps us how?”
“I’m just wondering about something,” Stone said. He rounded on Lopez, his eyes alight with purpose. “Tell me: when someone calls into the police department to report something, is the call recorded? Does it work like when someone calls 911?”
“It’s recorded,” Lopez said. “Why?”
“Is there any chance you could convince Casner to let you listen to the recording of whoever called in to report Lindsey’s death?”
Finally the light dawned. “Ah, I get it. You want to hear if the voice sounded weird.”
“Exactly. If it did, then that will fill in another piece in our puzzle.”
“I’ll give him a call tomorrow,” he said. “I think he’s off shift now, and I don’t think we want to start dealing with somebody new at this point.” He began gathering the pizza box and other dinner items to take them to the kitchen. “Anything else we can do tonight?”
Stone considered. “Yes, but you’ll have to trust me a bit
more if I’m to do it.”
Lopez stopped. “Why’s that?”
“I’d like to put up a—sort of block on your mind, to make you less attractive to anything that might fancy taking your body for a joyride.”
“A block?” Lopez’s eyes flashed fear and a little suspicion. “You mean like, mess with my mind?”
“Sort of,” Stone said. His tone was understanding: he knew fully how much of a frightening thing it was to have anyone else—even someone you trusted with your life, and he didn’t think he and Lopez had quite reached that point yet—poking around in your mind. “Not so much mess with it as put a wall around it to protect you from outside influence.”
Lopez frowned. “Can you guys read minds?”
“No. That’s one thing we can’t do. Best we can do is get impressions, and any mundane who’s skilled at reading facial expressions and body language can probably do it just as well.”
“Mundane? Is that what you call us?”
“Sorry,” Stone said, a little embarrassed. He normally didn’t use that word around the uninitiated, since it tended to offend people. He realized just how tired he must be, despite his newfound surge of energy. “Non-magical people, then.”
Lopez took a deep breath. “What would I have to do?”
“Nothing. Just let me concentrate for a few seconds, and don’t resist. You won’t feel anything.”
“I can resist?”
Stone nodded, and didn’t miss the trace of hope in Lopez’s tone. “Probably not successfully, but mages can’t just go around making changes to people’s minds without expecting some resistance. I’d wager that as a veteran policeman, your mind is probably already at least somewhat resistant to influence.”
Lopez didn’t answer for several moments. “Okay,” he finally said. “If it’ll help, I’ll do it.”
The process didn’t take long. Stone stood in front of Lopez, fixed an intense gaze on him, and brought one hand up to hover an inch or so away from Lopez’s forehead. A few seconds later, he backed off. “There. That’s done. And a relief: it means I don’t have to re-scan you every time you leave the room. Though I probably still will, just to be completely sure.”
Lopez touched his forehead. He blinked a couple of times, then shook his head. “Nope, don’t feel a thing. You sure you did it?”
“Quite sure.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it, I guess.” He went over and sat back down in his recliner. “Do you have a plan for what you want to do next, aside from me getting Pete to let me listen to that message?”
“Yes, but it’s not something we can do tonight, since it’s too close to dark.” At Lopez’s questioning look, he said, “I keep hearing things about Creek Road being the center of a lot of local urban legends of the supernatural variety. That’s also where that first body was found. I want to take a look around there and see if I can find anything interesting.”
“Creek Road?” He frowned. “You mean like Char Man and shit? Those are just stories that kids and stoners tell each other. I’m not even from Ojai and I’ve heard ’em for years.”
Stone raised an eyebrow. “Magic is just a story that kids tell each other, remember? When you play in my world, you have to look at urban legends in a whole new light.”
“Wait.” Lopez leaned forward. “You mean Char Man might be…real?”
“No idea. I doubt it, honestly. But the fact that all those legends and stories center around there tells me there’s quite likely something magically interesting in the area. And I want to see if I can find it.”
He stood. “I don’t think there’s much else we can do tonight—I’ll be honest with you, the last couple of days have taken quite a lot out of me. I’m trying to keep going, but I think I need a good night’s sleep if I’m to be worth anything tomorrow. In the meantime, think of anything you might be aware of about odd stories in the area, unexplained crimes—anything you think could possibly be supernaturally related. You never know what might spark an idea.”
Lopez nodded. “I’ll do that. And yeah, you do look kinda like hell, if you don’t mind my saying so.” He started to say something else, then put a hand up. “Wait a sec. Where are you staying again?”
“I’ve got a small house I’ve rented for a week in Ojai. Why?”
“I’m just thinking, if we’re going to be working together, it might be easier—and safer—to stick together, like I said before. I’ve got a spare bedroom—why don’t you just stay here? Now that my ex is gone, I’ve got the place to myself.”
Stone considered. On the one hand, he valued his privacy—but on the other, he’d had quite enough of his own company lately to satisfy him for the foreseeable future. And Lopez was right: even aside from the security angle (nobody could accuse him of murdering anyone in their sleep if Lopez could vouch for his whereabouts, and the wards he’d placed on the man’s mind meant a repeat of the situation with Lindsey was unlikely), if they were going to be working together it made sense not to have to keep making the commute back and forth between Ojai and Oak View. It wasn’t far by Stone’s Bay Area standards, but it still took time that could be better spent. “I’ll take you up on that,” he said. “I’ll pack up in the morning, settle up the house, and come over here after, if that’s all right.”
“Great. That’ll give me some time to clean up a little.” He grinned, but almost immediately looked serious again. “Do you think we’re gonna find Jason alive? And find whatever it is that’s doing these killings? Do you think you can deal with it if you do find it?”
Stone gave his answer careful consideration. “I think Jason is alive,” he said at last. “And I think, given enough time, I’ll be able to track down the thing that’s responsible for the murders.”
“And deal with it?”
“That part, I don’t know. I don’t know how powerful it is, and I don’t know why it’s here.”
“Can you—call in more mages?”
“I wish I could,” Stone said softly. “But as I said, there aren’t that many around, and most of them aren’t suited to this kind of work. Those I know who might be helpful aren’t currently within my reach.” That was true: aside from Verity being out of communication somewhere in Vermont with fellow mage Sharra, his old friend Madame Huan was in China hunting down magical ingredients. He’d had no contact with the enigmatic gray mage Harrison for over a year. And Stefan Kolinsky, the black mage with whom he traded useful tidbits of information and occasional favors, while he might prove somewhat helpful for research, wouldn’t leave his spider’s web in the Bay Area for anything short of a potential magical catastrophe. A few murders in a small town and a missing friend wouldn’t even rate his notice.
“So we’re on our own, is what you’re saying.”
“It very much appears that way.” He sighed and stood. “But we will do this, and I will do everything in my power get Jason back and stop these killings. You have my word on that. I’ll see you tomorrow, and we’ll get started.”
Lopez got up too. “You got it, Al. Get some rest.”
Stone winced, but said nothing.
Chapter Nineteen
When Stone showed up at Lopez’s house around ten the following morning, the cop was waiting for him. “You look better today,” Lopez said. “You get some sleep and get moved out okay?”
Stone nodded. He had, in fact, gotten a reasonable night’s sleep—he must have been truly exhausted, because he didn’t even have any nightmares about Lindsey’s bloody body. It was the part after he left the house that hadn’t gone so well.
In retrospect, he should have simply surrendered the house over the telephone. Instead, he’d gone back to the real estate office to do it in person. The door had been locked, a hand-lettered sign tacked on it stating the office would be closed for the next couple days in observance of the tragic death of their friend and colleague.
&nbs
p; Glancing inside, Stone had seen Lindsey Cole’s older fellow agent, Florence, sitting at her desk looking miserable. She’d looked up, met Stone’s eyes, and paled, quickly getting up and hurrying to the back. He hadn’t waited to see if she’d return. He didn’t know whether he was imagining the stares from passersby as he walked back to his car or if they were real, but either way they disturbed him.
“I got some good news and some bad news,” Lopez was saying, his expression sober.
What now? “Oh?”
“The bad news is there’s been another murder.”
Stone stiffened. “When? Where?” He quickly scanned Lopez, but his blue aura (fewer angry red streaks now) was still free of any green interlopers.
“They found the body out on Rice Road, in the river bottom. Middle-aged lady named Linda Solis. She never came home from a trip to visit a friend, so her family got suspicious. Guy walking a dog found her body in some bushes. They think she was killed sometime yesterday afternoon.”
“How was she killed?” Stone asked, irrationally relieved that there was no possible way they could suspect him of this one, since he’d been in a jail cell at the time.
“Stabbed several times in the chest and abdomen. Messy.”
“And what’s the good news?”
“I went up to the station in Ojai this morning, and Pete let me listen to the call.”
“And?”
“You were right. It was the freakiest thing: it was a woman, but the voice was raspy as hell, like maybe she’d just smoked a whole pack of cigarettes and followed it with a Drano chaser. And the phrasing was weird too: slow and kind of—off. Like the inflections were all wrong.”
Stone nodded. “Good. Did Casner give you any trouble? Did you have to tell him you were working with me?”
“He didn’t ask. I kinda think he doesn’t want to know. He’s spooked, Al. Like I told you, I’ve known him a long time. He’s a good cop, but he’s not too comfortable with the weird shit. He wants things to make sense.”
