Fists of Iron: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Clans of Shadow Book 3)

by J. A. Cipriano

  Yeah, totally no pressure here.

  7

  Aglaia turned her faceless gaze between both of us. I couldn’t see her eyes, but I still felt like she was looking right through me. “Which of you wishes to begin?”

  This whole deal was making me uncomfortable, especially because I could put my foot in my mouth and screw this up. I fidgeted on my seat and glanced over at Gabriela. This was her show, and she knew it, already shifting forward to speak.

  “I will start, holy Aglaia.” The doc lowered her head in a show of respect. “I wish to seek the counsel of the Pythia to find my son, Maximillian. He was kidnapped by one that presented himself as a friend.”

  “While a mother’s love for her child is a powerful thing, there are many with needs just as great that seek consultation.” Aglaia’s fine fingers pulled files from the divider on the desk, laying them out neatly. She produced way more folders than should have fit in there, and when she finished, the divider looked as full as when she had started. “And the Pythia is only one being. Even in the shadow of Olympus, time cannot be stretched forever. What can elevate your cause above those of so many others?”

  I rubbed my temples, partly from the phantom lights I was still seeing from my glimpse at the hosioi in the magical realm but more so from the spark of an idea forming. See, our old buddy Joseph had taken Max for the stated reason as insurance against us, but there was a real possibility it was for more than that.

  You know how la Corazon shows me that whole vast tapestry of magic? As I said, that tapestry includes pretty much all living things. Most people are woven in by the threads of said tapestry, all important and interconnected and all that Jedi jazz. A few people were different though. Some were left almost entirely unthreaded, while others were tied in more intricately to the mystical weave.

  Max blew all of that out of the water. The kid was bound to that glorious tapestry tighter than anything I’d ever seen. He glowed almost as brightly as Aglaia. Those magical threads made him the vital piece to the shit both the White and the Enders plans in the past.

  Why wouldn’t Rabbi Joe do something with that himself?

  While my puzzler was puzzling, Gabby shifted to the edge of her seat, trying to keep her humble exterior. “I don’t know how to express my son’s importance to me with words. You’ve already shown us you can see our hearts and souls.” She put a hand over her heart, emotion eating through her tone. “Look at mine and look at the truth of my feelings.”

  Aglaia turned the full force of her glowing, empty visage on the doc. “There are no doubts as to the truth of your love, Doctor. I need not pierce your soul to see it, yet this truth does not correlate to worthiness in the eyes of the gods. Events flow with the pace of a surging river. The oracle’s insights are needed only for the most vital of quests.”

  “There’s nothing more important than my son.” I could practically feel the frustration rolling off of Gabriela as she spoke. Her green eyes flashed angrily, and I knew she was about to lose her cool. That would not help us at all.

  “To you, Gabriela,” the knock-off angel said in delicate, melodic tones. “Though I truly feel for your loss, there are, as you mortals would say, ‘bigger fish to fry.’ As a mother myself, I wish I could look the other way, to let you ascend those final steps, but my divine duties force me to bar the way.” For a moment, the misty halo shrouding her face faltered slightly and I could see the downcast eyes of a middle-aged woman, someone who had seen far too many things in her life, but the mask snapped back into place a second later.

  Gabriela’s hands curled into fists and her brow twisted. For a moment, I thought she was going to make a dash for the steps or maybe even take a swing at Aglaia, but Gabby was made of sterner stuff than me. “But we don’t have any other options, not with those Outer Things coming after us.”

  That was what cinched it in my mind. There hadn’t been time to talk about it earlier, not with gibbering ooze trying to slaughter us, but it made me really wonder about the monster mobiles. Considering it rattled everyone as equally as me, it couldn’t be a typical wizardly problem to have wandering death cars attacking people. No, those things had sought us out specifically. Maybe it had nothing to do with Joseph, but it might have had everything to do with Max.

  “If your supplication is complete, I sadly must ask–”

  “Now hold on a second there, Mrs. Halo,” I said as I snapped my fingers. “Gabby might be done, but I’ve got something to add to our case.”

  Aglaia focused on me again, but the bolt of the blue lightning I expected to strike me down never came. In fact, her posture was more expectant than reproachful. “Speak, Bearer.”

  I did my best thinking on my feet so, decorum aside, I hopped up, pacing as I talked. “Okay, so you’re right, lady. There’s some serious shit going down. That crystal prison thing, the Cube of Whatever, is broken and those Lovecraftian monsters are on the loose. There’re whole strings of the tapestry going black.” I glanced over to make sure she was paying attention. She was, so I continued.

  “So I totally get where you’re coming from. There’s bigger shit than one lost kid going on.” I spun on my heel and pointed at the faceless lady in white before me. “Except you’re wrong, at least when it comes to this kid. You know about the things hunting us, and you also know the particular boy we’re trying to save. There’s only one reason a bunch of oozing chaos beasts would to try to kill us right after we decide to save the one person in the universe that’s more connected to the rest of the universe than anyone else.”

  Aglaia pulled a final file from her in/out box and flipped it open in her hands. “Though I believe I read your intentions, I cannot make a decision based on implication. Please continue.”

  Gabriela looked at me, the gears in her head spinning, and I thought she was starting to see where I was coming from.

  Either way, I kept going. “Oh yeah, I’m on a roll! Stand back and watch me go!” I turned on my heels and continued my pacing. “Maybe Joe doesn’t mean Max any harm or maybe he does, but the Great Old Ones do. We’re questing to find him not only for Gabriela’s sake, not for his father’s sake, but because we’re the only ones that can be trusted to keep him safe.” I grinned, knowing I had this in the bag.

  “To tie it up with a bow for you, we’ve got to save Max to save the world-slash-dimension-slash-universe!”

  Silence hung in the air save for the whipping winds. I took that as a cue to sit back down on my seat, and as I did, Gabriela gave me a grateful nod. She could’ve figured this all out faster than me if she hadn’t been so preoccupied by the loss of her son and the antics of her obsessed back from the dead husband. Let’s also not forget she was doing all this behind her husband’s back, which is what I would have done too, but she wasn’t me, so it wasn’t easy for her.

  Aglaia produced a rubber stamp from thin air, breaking the silence with a loud thump as she stamped the open file. “Your request to enter the presence of the Pythia has been approved. Your cause is just and the need is great.” She gestured grandly to the stairs plunging upwards into the heavens. “You may proceed.”

  A wave of relief washed over me. We’d done it. We were one step closer.

  “Thank you, Frank,” Gabby said, hitting me with a smile that made me feel like Superman himself. Then she rose and began walking toward the steps. As she reached them, she stopped and looked over at me once more. “I couldn’t have done any of this without you.”

  “Don’t mention it,” I said, wishing I could pull her into my arms. Instead, I pushed the pang of guilt that swam up inside me down deep and pushed forward onto the steps. “Let’s just save Max.”

  Gabriela nodded to me, and we began to climb. We had been going up the steps for at least a half-hour. Unlike the platform, the whipping winds had started to wear away at the marble, but they still seemed awfully sturdy. They had started off straight along the slope of the mountain, but soon began to spiral, like the builders wanted to make everything longer an
d harder than it had to be.

  Considering all the steps, we had saved most of our breath for the walking. Eventually Gabriela broke the silence. “Thank you again, Frank.”

  “You’re welcome.” Maybe I should have gone all false-humble, but why should I? “I promised I’d help you get Max back, and I’ve re-promised that a few more times since then. I certainly wasn’t going to let some celestial bureaucracy bull get in our way.” I snorted.

  “Still, with everything that’s happened, I wouldn’t hold you to that, not anymore.” She shook her head as she produced a couple of water bottles from her shoulder bag. She held one out to me as we started another round. Hopefully, we didn’t have to go much farther since the turns were getting shorter now. “Here.”

  I gratefully accepted the bottle and took a long drink. “Thanks.” I shrugged. “Circumstances change all the time. You can’t use those to cop out on something you promised.” I glanced sidelong at her. She really was beautiful, even with the sweat, scrapes, and torn clothes. It was time to put on my big boy pants for once. “You know I want you to be happy. The best way to do that is to get your entire family back together. Hell, I found your husband, didn’t I?”

  Gabriela gave me a long, searching look. “I … yeah. You could even say you brought John back from the dead.” She turned back toward the stairs and continued, her words measured and a little hesitant, “The funny thing is… I really don’t know how to feel about him. I was finally starting to let John go, to come to grips with his passing. I was ready to move on.”

  If you looked up “uncomfortable” in the dictionary, that moment would be pictured next to it. I’m not sure why I wanted to duck this moment, but I did. I didn’t want to have this conversation at all, let alone right now. It had only been, what, a day or two since the Cube had been cracked? That was too soon to deal with this. Besides, I had an excuse to ignore it. As the angel lady had put it, there was bigger fish to fry.

  At the same time, though, could I exactly blame Gabby for this? Time might be short, and this could be a moment of relative peace from the rampaging murder mobiles and ducking the magic police. We might never have another moment to sort this out.

  “I understand that, I think,” I said, eyes focused on the steps ahead. “I know what it’s like to lose someone important. Family, ya know? Can’t say what I’d do if Bobby were suddenly back again.” I took a deep breath. C’mon, Frank, man up! “Basically, where I’m going is that with all this craziness and sorting it all out, I’m not expecting anything. Don’t let anything we talked about, you know, complicate matters.”

  The doc put a hand on my shoulder and stopped our ascent. I turned toward her, our eyes drawn together. “You’re not wrong, Frank, but you’re not right either.” Her eyes were flashing and her brow was screwed in consternation. “When you practice magic, you learn to understand your emotions, to recognize and channel them constructively. If you don’t, there’s too many chances for unchecked magic to run wild.”

  I frowned a bit. “And what does that have to do with this?”

  “It means that simply ignoring our feelings and burying them will only cause hardship and heartbreak in the long run.” She sighed. “Of course, I can’t … I won’t do the same in regards to John either. I may have finally reached the point where I could let him go but–”

  “You certainly aren’t going to push him away now that he’s back.” I frowned harder. Yeah, see I definitely should have avoided this conversation. This wasn’t going to go anywhere good, and that realization was almost too much to bear. Hope meet crushing reality. “So why are we doing this again?”

  She ran her hands through her hair, flashing a wry half-smile. “Because at least we have it in the open. We know where we stand. Maybe it also lets you be free to do what’s best for you, instead of waiting for something that might never happen.”

  Gabriela wasn’t wrong. She was treating this like she treated almost everything else, like a pro. For now, the least I could do was to do the same.

  “Yeah, well, I guess you’re right.”

  I took a deep breath, about to turn away when Gabby put her arms around me. I wasn’t going to pull away, it felt too nice, and instead returned the embrace. We stood there silently and let the moment linger.

  But that moment couldn’t last forever. Just like John had been the wedge that drove our relationship to the distance it was now, the heavy weight of what was still waiting for us above pulled our hug apart then. Before I was tempted to say or do anything else, I started back up the stairs with Gabby following right behind me.

  8

  We made the last turn to the peak of the mountain, breaching a final cloud layer to unveil a scene straight out of Clash of the Titans.

  The peak had been shorn flat, either by magic or an act of some god, and a small Greek temple had been slapped on top of it. Unlike the platform below, all hints of modern technology were gone, making the place look truly ancient. It also wasn’t nearly as clean or polished as the lower level. The marble was worn, half the roof was gone, and quite a few of the granite columns were cracked clean in half, though most of the broken edges and shattered stones had been worn down by the wind and weather.

  Though there had been no sign of them before, it was obvious from our new vantage point that this was one of many mountains that pierced the clouds. It was also the smallest. Towering over all of them was a massive peak that stretched into the heavens, the peak only defined by a piercing corona of light, stark against the night sky.

  Which didn’t make a ton of sense. It had been mid-morning when we started our ascent and, though cloudy, it was still obviously full-on daylight when we broke through the cloud bank and stepped onto the platform. Now though, it was obviously a full, clear night, but not quite like an Earthly one. There were stars, yes, even familiar constellations, but that was all that I could see. Classical constellations with each star shining brighter than they should, stood out so vividly I could clearly make out what each one was supposed to be. I could see every one of them, even though that was physically impossible … at least if we had still been on Earth.

  “I guess staying on my home planet isn’t going to happen a lot anymore, is it?” I asked to no one in particular as we stood in front of the crumbling archway at the top of the stairs.

  Gabriela shook her head and took the crux of my elbow, pulling me along into the temple proper.

  Past the archway, most of the front hall was gone, the epicenter of whatever had damaged the place originally. Still, the place well maintained. After all, the wind couldn’t keep the place this well swept, and it certainly couldn’t have filled the amphora with fresh flowers. The celestial glow from the peak above mixed with the shining stars to light our way to the central chamber, though the polished wooden doors were marked on both sides by lit bronze braziers. The fires put off a palpable heat as we approached, counteracting the growing chill I was feeling, either from the altitude or sheer nerves.

  “So do we knock or just go in?” I asked, somewhat unsure of what to do.

  Gabriela cracked a faint smile as she pulled her lab coat tighter around herself. Guess I wasn’t the only one getting cold. “The Pythia’s waiting for us. We can just go in.”

  I was moving slowly, cautiously, not out of fear but out of, well, respect. This was a holy place and Momma Butcher always told her boys to be respectful of other people’s faiths, no matter what we believed. As I reached to push the door open, I said, “So have you ever actually come here before?”

  “No,” she whispered barely loud enough for me to hear. “John has a few times for Peacekeeper business. That’s how I knew the process.” The door, painted with fading murals that were probably copied into Bullfinch’s Mythology, opened without a creak. “At least up to this point. He never spoke of the Pythia herself.”

  “The truth of prophecy is ruined when the mystery is shattered.” The sing-song voice wafted through the open door, along with the strong, heady smells of inc
ense and volcanic ash. Smoke roiled out into the hallway. The entire chamber beyond was hazy, making it difficult to make out any details at all. “Please, enter before the smoke thins.”

  Gabriela glanced at me and held out an open hand. “Ready?”

  I replied with a nod and grabbed her hand tightly. She smiled at me, and we plunged into the haze and smoke.

  Needless to say, the door closed swiftly and silently behind us causing the fumes to rapidly refill the darkened chamber. There were more of those braziers, or at least that’s what I assumed they were, shedding faint light from all around. Frankly, the light only made things more disorienting. The fumes or smoke or haze or whatever you wanted to call it were surprisingly clean in my lungs, despite the constant cloying smell of sulfur mixed with cloves. It was more like walking into a seedy head shop than the den of a divine oracle.

  “Pythia, speaker for Apollo, sacred prophet,” the doc called out into the mists. She was barely visible to me even though she was less than an arm’s length away, “we have been judged by your hosioi and found worthy to seek your consultation.”

  I led us a bit deeper into the mist. “Yeah, that. Do we need to tell you all this or did you get a fax or mind message or whatever while we were hiking up here?”

  The Pythia sounded like she was everywhere around us all at once and it added more to the surreal atmosphere. “The sun fills me with its heat and Apollo’s light shines in my eyes.” As she spoke, the indistinct flames brightened and turned the color of a sunset. “Through that divine light, breathing through that sacred smoke, I know the answers you seek, and I know the answers that you need.