Master of None

by Sonya Bateman

  “Yeah, you fucked us. But we managed.” Lark stiffened and swiveled back to the screen, which displayed a topographical map. “Tory, I need your eyes.”

  Tory crossed the floor to stand beside him. “What’s up?”

  “I listened to the audio feed twice, but you know how garbled the scanner is. Check the police band for the county sheriff.”

  Nodding, Tory leaned in front of the wheelchair and punched some buttons. A ticker-tape banner scrolled across the bottom of the screen. I couldn’t read the text from where I stood, but I got the general gist of it when Tory said, “Shit. How could they know?”

  “I’ve been trying to figure that out myself. Funny, but I can only think of one possible answer. Why don’t you ask him?”

  Tory straightened and glared at me. “You sold us out.”

  “What? No, I didn’t.”

  I managed two steps toward him before Ian pulled me back. “Let us clarify things before anyone does something regrettable,” he said. “Taregan, I can assure you he’s done no such thing.”

  “Really. So it was you, then?”

  “Will you let me talk?” I shrugged Ian off and restrained myself from lecturing him. He might have been a few thousand years old, but he had no idea how to deal with criminal protocol. I did—and I had a feeling Tory knew a thing or two, if he’d hung around Lark for long. “All right. What, exactly, is the code?”

  “A ten one-oh-seven and a four eighty-seven. Two squads and a Frank dispatched. ETA thirty minutes.”

  “Jesus. What did you steal, the mayor?”

  Tory hesitated. “Sure you don’t know anything about this?”

  “I’m clueless. Like I said, came by to ask for help.” I stifled a laugh at Ian’s baffled expression. “Suspicious person, grand theft, four officers, and a detective en route,” I explained. “They expect Lark to resist arrest. But I swear to God, I didn’t tip them. I’m not looking for amnesty. Do you think . . . wait.” Certainty struck me like a pile driver. “It was Trevor.”

  Lark swiveled and faced my general direction. “How? He doesn’t know where I live, or he’d have tried to finish me off by now.”

  Ian uttered something garbled and explosive. It sounded like the same curse he’d spat in Trevor’s yard. “He used Shamil to pinpoint our location.”

  “What?” Tory looked at Ian like he’d just forecast a snowstorm in hell. “Shamil would never work for them. And only the tethers can be traced, remember?”

  “I know,” Ian said. “That disgusting son of a jackal has Shamil bound and sealed. Trevor uses his blood to whore himself to one of the Morai. And . . . I carry my tether.”

  Tory stood silent for a moment. “So that’s why you’re not dead. Well, Ian, this is a bit of a mixed blessing, isn’t it? They can’t break the barrier as long as you live, but you’re leading them straight to us.”

  “Shamil can only trace to a fixed point, and he won’t be able to repeat the spell for several hours. No matter what they do to him.” Ian shuddered. “We will have to move.”

  “Hey. Excuse me. The blind cripple objects.” Lark slapped a palm on the arm of his chair. “I can’t run. And besides, this is my fucking house. That bastard’ll destroy it if no one’s around when his rent-a-cops show up.”

  Ian glanced at me. I didn’t like his expression. Before I could throw in some objections of my own, he said something stupid.

  “We cannot protect your house. But we can remove your other objections.”

  Tory stepped in front of Lark. “He’s not expendable, Ian. Don’t even think about it.”

  “Come now. Do you really believe I intend to kill him?” Ian forced a grim smile. “The thief and I will heal him.”

  I had to assume Ian meant me. Which obviously wasn’t going to work. “You’re crazy. Seriously. I can’t do that mojo stuff.”

  “You’ve enough to contribute, and you will have to learn to control it quickly. I cannot do this alone.”

  I shook my head. “What about Tory? I mean, he’s gotta have more juice than me.”

  “Ian,” Tory said. “What is he babbling about?”

  Ian looked uncomfortable. “Donatti is my descendant. And there is one other who lives still.”

  “Holy shit. How did he dodge them?” Tory sent me an approving smile. “You must be the luckiest human alive. No others have managed to escape the Morai once they’ve been marked.”

  “Uh, right. Lucky. That’s me.” Except that when it came to my fellow humans, I was a disaster waiting to happen. Everything that kept me alive ended up hurting someone else. How fortunate. “Like I said, why can’t you and Tory do this? You’re both full of djinn.”

  “Because Taregan and I combined are merely two. You and I are bound, thief, like it or not. And together we are exponential. Now, concentrate.”

  “On what? Damn it, Ian, I have no idea what I’m doing. This is stupid. I don’t have magic powers.”

  “Hold on. Donatti has a point.” Lark wheeled forward with a frown. “Are you sure you have the right guy? I don’t think he’s really your descendant. I mean, he doesn’t have a competent bone in his body.”

  “Jesus Christ. I’m not that bad—”

  “Besides,” Lark interrupted, “Tory already tried to heal me. Obviously, it didn’t work.”

  “Taregan is young and . . . alone.” Ian averted his gaze. “And I am certain Donatti is descended from me. I would not have found him otherwise.”

  “Have you actually seen this clown do anything magical?”

  “All right. Enough bullshit,” I said. “Lark, if you don’t want us to try, that’s fine with me. I don’t want to make a fool of myself, because I don’t think it’ll work, either. But you’d better come up with another idea fast. The cops aren’t going to wait for us to formulate an escape plan.”

  Tory crouched next to Lark’s chair. “Ian is right, adjo,” he said. “This guy really is descended from the djinn. I can sense it, too.”

  Lark turned his head in Tory’s direction. “Do you think they can do it?”

  “They’ve got a better shot than I did.”

  “I don’t know. He’s still an idiot.”

  “Okay, that’s it. I’m not doing this.” I backed away and looked around the room, trying to think of another option. No way I’d be able to work any magic, and Lark would hate me even more when I failed to help. “Cops aren’t here yet. Maybe one of us could carry you or something. You do have a vehicle stashed around here somewhere, right?”

  “Donatti.” Lark’s ash-coated voice shook. “I’m sorry. If there’s any chance at all that this crazy scheme might work . . . for God’s sake, please try. Trevor can have the fucking house, if it means I get my eyes and legs back.”

  “Way to lay a guilt trip on a guy,” I mumbled. At least he’d apologized. “What if I screw this up? I mean, I’ve managed to fuck everything else over so far.”

  “You couldn’t possibly make me any worse.”

  “Right. Let’s see you say that when I turn you into a frog.” I sighed and looked at Ian. “What am I supposed to do here, chief?”

  “Well, you . . .” He blinked. “I do not know. Concentrate. Focus.”

  “You’re not helping. D’you think you’d have been able to get us here if I plopped you behind the wheel and said, ‘Just drive’?”

  Ian gave an exasperated snort. “You have already experienced invisibility. Do what you did to achieve it, but direct it at Lark.”

  “I don’t know what I did to achieve it! It was an accident, remember?”

  Tory held up a hand. “Maybe I can help. I’m going to guess you’ve only been accidentally invisible when you really needed to not be found, right?”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “The key here is need. In order to affect something, you have to need it to happen.”

  So that was why Ian would only give me what he thought I needed. At least something made sense. “Okay. I’ll try.” I stared at Lark and tried willing him better. N
othing happened—at least, not that I could tell. “Should I wave or something?”

  “You can, but it might not help you,” Ian said. “I use gestures to focus. Perhaps you should try closing your eyes. You may have more success if you rid yourself of distraction.”

  I did, and attempted to tune out the small sounds in the room: the muted hum of computer fans, faint breathing from the others, a distant steady ticking from the synchronized clocks. I really, really wanted to heal Lark. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the same as need. Easing the burden of guilt over getting him busted in the first place would have been great, but I’d still feel responsible, and I had plenty of other shit to feel guilty about.

  Like Jazz and Cyrus. I hadn’t let myself think about them. I needed to stay alive. I’d promised Jazz. And if we didn’t get the hell out of here, I couldn’t keep that promise.

  Something raw and hot balled in the center of my chest. I focused on the sensation, felt it sprout tendrils and spread through me, seeking a target. The stuff felt alive, electric.

  It fucking hurt. A lot.

  Lark. Heal Lark.

  A sound pierced my concentration. A gasp. My eyes flew open just in time to see Lark jolt to his feet. He stood in place for a few seconds, mouth agape under the mask, still and silent as an after-hours bank vault.

  Then he pitched forward and fell flat on his face.

  “Lark!”

  Tory’s shout competed with the sickening crunch of face meeting floor. I would’ve worried whether I’d killed him if I wasn’t busy being in pain. Dropping to hands and knees, I watched Tory help Lark up and discovered what had made the awful breaking sound. The mask lay shattered on the gray linoleum. My smudged vision wouldn’t reveal whether his face looked much better.

  “Well done, thief.” Ian sounded as bad as I felt. He slung an arm around my waist and hefted me to my feet, then supported my weight while my body attempted to let gravity take over. “You will feel better in a few moments.”

  “Don’t think so.” My words slurred together, and my brain insisted that I’d been Tasered again. “He okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’m not.” The room spun a few times. I felt like the ball on a roulette wheel. “Shit. Does it hurt like that for you?”

  It took him a few seconds to answer. “Only in your realm.”

  “Oh.” No wonder he wanted to go home. I shook my head and squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened them again, the world had more definition. I made out Lark, standing unassisted, staring at me. Only a few faded patches of scar tissue remained on his face. His cheeks glistened in the low light, but it wasn’t blood.

  I squinted. “Lark. You crying?”

  “Can’t help it. First thing I see in six months is your ugly mug. It’s depressing.” He turned away and walked unsteadily toward the terminal he’d used to access the police scanner. Tory followed, trying too hard not to look as if he was hovering. His overt attentions had me wondering again just what kind of relationship existed between them. Obviously, they weren’t blood-related, or the healing bit would’ve worked when Tory tried it.

  “You’re welcome,” I mumbled in the general direction of Lark’s back while I eased away from Ian and found I could stand, at least. I’d been physically exhausted plenty of times, but this felt different. If I was the poetic sort, I’d be tempted to believe my soul had been drained. Ian was right—this magic was no trifle, no parlor trick. I hoped I’d never have to use it again.

  A coughing fit seized Ian and doubled him over. I moved to help him, but he held a hand out and eventually straightened on his own. Then he stared at me as if I’d just sprouted horns and cloven feet.

  “What? Is there something stuck in my teeth?”

  “I do not enjoy being wrong.” He shook his head and smiled. “Your abilities are far stronger than I suspected, thief.”

  “Yeah, well, if you’re planning to see what else I can do, don’t hold your breath. No way I’m going through that again.” I could feel my legs now. They protested supporting the rest of me. I had to overrule them, since my arms weren’t up to the challenge. “That’s some powerful mojo. He’s already walking around, after being in that chair for years?”

  “Yes. Because your own magic is strong, he has been almost completely healed. The atrophied muscles have regenerated.”

  “Oh.” I wondered if Lark heard that—and kind of hoped he didn’t. Something might still go wrong, and he’d blame me for it. “So why are we all standing around? Shouldn’t we haul ass out of here? I hear Hong Kong’s nice this time of year.”

  Lark hit a button. A crackling burst of static filled the room. Even with Lark’s advanced technology, police scanners still had crappy reception. Maybe it was against the law for them to communicate effectively.

  “Code one, unit four-alpha-six. We are in sight of target, repeat, we are in sight. ETA two minutes. Ten-oh, all units copy.”

  “Oh, Christ. We’re dead.”

  Ian looked at me. “You understood that gibberish?”

  “Unfortunately.” I glanced at Lark, whose grim features reflected the dread sinking hooks in my gut. “They can see the house. They’re already here.”

  CHAPTER 23

  Shit,” Lark said. “I wanted to pack a few things first. We’d better get moving.”

  He didn’t sound nearly as terrified as he should, considering that by the time we made it upstairs, we’d be facing down at least six armed cops. I wondered if Ian and I had done something to his brain when we healed him—like deleted his common sense and self-preservation instincts. “I vote for staying right here,” I said. “Maybe they won’t find us.”

  Lark gently pushed Tory out of the way, jerked out a keyboard, and ran his fingers rapid-fire over the keys without looking. “Are you nuts? Of course they will. And even if they don’t, they’ll wreck the place, maybe set it on fire. Trevor loves a good torching.”

  “Right.” The skeletal, smoldering remains of Molly’s place shimmered in my head. “So what’s the plan? We gonna talk them out of shooting us?”

  Lark gave a long sigh, as if he couldn’t fathom the depths of my stupidity. “You’re not playing with a full deck, are you? We aren’t going up there.”

  “Did I miss a memo or something?” Lark had to be the crazy one here. Our choices were stay down or go up, weren’t they? Ian seemed more confused than I did, but Tory looked amused. “Okay, spill it,” I said. “What’s going on?”

  Lark ignored me. He moved to his abandoned chair, reached under the seat, and pulled. The distinct sound of snaps unfastening preceded the appearance of a battered leather portfolio. He slung the bag onto a shoulder, then yanked the Beretta he’d almost shot me with from the side pocket of the chair and handed it to Tory. With no further explanation, Lark made a follow-me gesture and headed out of the room.

  “You know why I bought this place?” he asked when we’d stopped at the elevator.

  “Because you’re a paranoid son of a bitch.”

  He grinned. “Exactly. But I’m paranoid about all the right things—just like you. Think I’d stay anywhere I couldn’t get out of in a pinch?”

  “Holy shit. You’ve got a way out from down here.”

  Lark nodded. “Remember your history lessons?”

  “Uh, kinda.” Most of my memories of school consisted of flint-eyed Catholic matrons at the orphanage with sharp tongues and sharper rulers who found me a more pleasing target than anyone else. They’d probably had a party when I didn’t come back after ninth grade.

  “We’re in Underground Railroad territory here. There’s a tunnel. Leads to one of my properties outside town. We’ll take that.”

  For a moment, I wanted to hug the paranoid son of a bitch. Thankfully, the feeling passed.

  Lark opened the grate, reached inside, and hit a button. The elevator started up empty, groaning and complaining all the way. He fished in his bag and came out with some kind of remote. After he fiddled with it, a smooth grinding noise reson
ated from the elevator shaft and ended in a metallic bang. “Firewall,” he explained. “Even if they figure out there’s another floor, they won’t be able to get down here without a big-ass blowtorch and a couple of days to spare.”

  I had to laugh. Even running for his life, Lark looked out for his gear first and his ass second.

  The computer equipment wasn’t the only thing down here worth saving. Lark led the way through a corridor and into a cavernous room stuffed with old things. Ancient things. Brittle rolls of parchment, statues and figurines, vases, jewelry—a few museums’ worth of artifacts, no doubt worth a fortune or three. Most of it was legally his. The rest he’d had stolen, but the former owners had been dead for a thousand years, so they wouldn’t file any complaints.

  When we reached the opposite end of the room, Lark opened a rough wooden plank door and flipped a light switch inside, revealing a spacious closet with floor-to-ceiling shelves lining the left and right sides. He located two flashlights and handed one to Tory. “Sorry. I hadn’t planned on more than two using this route. Tory, you want to go first? I’ll cover the back.”

  “Oh, could I?” Smirking, Tory slid a panel of the back wall aside. “This is gonna be fun.”

  I saw immediately why Lark had insisted he couldn’t run. The packed earth tunnel wasn’t more than four feet high and maybe two and a half wide. We’d have to crawl through. No way his chair would’ve fit in there. Cool air and the distinct smell of damp dirt wafted from the blackness. But it didn’t seem so bad—I could deal with a chill and a couple of cramps in exchange for my life.

  When Tory switched his light on and played the beam into the space, I almost changed my mind. Squeaks and squeals, skittering paws, and the flash of tiny eyes in the distance announced the presence of mice. And all those cobwebs meant we’d have to tangle with spiders, too. I hated them almost as much as mice.

  Good thing I wasn’t claustrophobic.

  “Wait.” Ian stepped up to the mouth of the tunnel and peered through. “Where did you say this ends?”