by C. E. Murphy
After a very swift mental debate, I took my boots off and got into the shower fully clothed. At least that way the jeans and sweater would be rinsed and not lying around stinking up my apartment. Skimming out of soaked denim was not my favorite thing to do, but I struggled free, rinsed everything again once I was out of it, and threw it in the end of the tub, where I hoped I would remember it before it grew mold. Then I stood there, eyes closed, short hair plastering to my head, as I breathed steam.
For more than a year I’d been lurching from one crisis to another, rarely stopping to think in the midst of them. In North Carolina I’d started to realize I was never going to have time to unwind—to eat, to shower, to tell somebody I loved him—unless I made time for it. A year ago I’d have run around Seattle smelling of dog poop, too, in my frantic attempts to keep all the balls in the air before something even worse went wrong. In retrospect, I probably could have stopped to eat a few more times than I had, without anything going significantly more awry than it already had. I might have even avoided a few conks on the head, in fact.
Which didn’t mean I could stay in the shower all day long. I sighed and opened my eyes, glancing at the pile of wet clothes at the end of the tub. I kind of wished I might see Coyote there, cock-eared and grinning around a lolling tongue, the way I’d seen him the first times we’d met after my shamanic gifts had reawakened. Odds were I would never see him like that again, which, given that I was naked and in a relationship with somebody else, was as it should be. It still gave me a sad twinge, a heart flutter for something that I’d left behind. Regret was probably part of growing up, but if so, it sucked. I dragged myself out of the hot water and into a fuzzy towel, and attacked my hair with a blow-dryer. It needed trimming. My hair, not the blow-dryer. The short-cropped bangs were inclined to brush my eyelids now, and the pixie cut was hiding the tops of my ears. A shower and food were within reason, but probably stopping to get a haircut was a little more blasé about crises than I should be. Some gel lifted the spiky bangs far enough out of my eyes for government work, and I went to find clothes.
I didn’t own anything besides the new leather trench that seemed really appropriate for endgame battles, so I put on clean jeans and a warm sweater over a tank top, found another pair of stompy boots and returned to my guests as laughter erupted in the living room. It silenced abruptly with my arrival, which went a long way toward making me feel awkward and self-conscious. I stopped in the bedroom doorway, hands twisting together like a nervous ingénue.
Morrison got up and came to give me a kiss. “I was telling Mrs. Muldoon how we met.”
“Oh.” My ears hurt from turning so red. “I didn’t think it was that funny a story.”
“Maybe ’cause you ain’t heard Mike tell it.” Gary got up as the doorbell rang, letting a scraggly-bearded kid bearing about forty bags of Chinese food into the apartment. I edged past Morrison in search of my wallet, and was obliged to accept the cash everybody handed over, because I had about enough money to cover my share of what appeared to be one of everything on Mrs. Liu’s menu. Judging from how we tore into it, it looked like one of everything might be almost enough for eight hungry people. Annie, who was by far the smallest of us, put enough away for three men Morrison’s size, and slender teenage Suzy ate as steadily as a metronome. I actually looked like a piker in comparison to everyone but Corvallis, who said, “Evidently unlike the rest of you, I ate lunch today,” after a modest snack of spring rolls and barbecue pork.
Her cameraman, obviously offended, said, “So did I,” then looked faintly guilty at four or five empty boxes spread around him.
Corvallis laughed. “I’ve never seen you turn food down, Paul.”
“If you were the one lugging that camera up and down mountains in your wake...” he said with the cadence of a familiar and unmeant complaint.
I said, “Paul,” under that, just audibly enough to be heard. He raised his eyebrows and I made a face. “I didn’t know your name. Sorry.”
“Nobody does. She’s the talent. I just make her look good.”
“It’s true,” Laurie said with a degree of fondness I’d never have attributed to her. It disappeared instantly into a piercing look at me. “So what’s the plan, Joanne?”
“I filled her in while you were showering,” Coyote said. “It didn’t seem like there was any reason not to.”
That was an unassailable argument, even if I had the vague, uncomfortable feeling that one shouldn’t go around confessing all the complications of the magical life to a reporter. I said, “The plan,” like saying the words would make one leap fully formed into my mind, then blew out a breath that verged on being a raspberry. “We’re going to Woodland Park. Suzy tracked the leanansidhe’s retreat to there, and it makes sense. We—” My cell phone rang, startling me into silence. Practically everybody I knew who might call me was in this room. “Um. I have the horrible feeling that might be important. ’Scuze me.” I left a half-finished plate of Mongolian beef balanced on the arm of the couch and went to dig the phone out of my trench pocket.
An unfamiliar male voice said, “Joanne Walker?”
I frowned and retreated to the kitchen, not that a doorway and pass-through wall provided much in the way of silence or privacy. The gathering in the living room quieted down, which was polite, but also meant they could hear every word of my conversation. “Yes?”
An explosive sigh came down the line. “This is Lieutenant Dennis Gilmore. We met in North Carolina, if you remember?”
“Yes. Yes.” I put one hand on the counter, clutching it for balance. “Yes, of course I remember you.” Lieutenant Gilmore had been his unit’s only survivor of Raven Mocker’s attack. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Nothing, exactly. I just wanted to let you know we’ve found Daniel Little Turtle’s body in Arizona.”
My stomach twisted so hard it cut the strength from my knees as I ran through every worst-case scenario I could. I knew people in Arizona. Coyote was from Arizona. I looked at him, reassuring myself he was really here. “Arizona? Where in Arizona? What was he doing there?”
Coyote straightened, flicking black hair down his spine in an action strangely reminiscent of his coyote-form’s ears twitching with concern. He got up and came to the other side of the counter, leaning on it like he, too, needed bracing.
“Phoenix, ma’am.”
I crouched, fingers of one hand wrapped around the counter’s edge and my forehead pressed against it beside them. My question came out as a thready whisper. “Mark Bragg?”
The beat of silence was worse than any confirmation could have been. Gilmore said, “Missing, ma’am,” in cautious tones.
“It’s not fair.” I was hardly aware of having spoken aloud. I was aware that I had begun gently hitting my forehead against the counter’s edge, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. Mark Bragg had been a researcher at the University of Phoenix. He’d gotten tangled up in one of my messes, and his twin sister had died of it. He was supposed to be safe in Arizona. Far away from me and the trouble that walked with me.
“I’m sorry, ma’am. We’re looking for him. His image has been forwarded to the airports and he’ll be detained if he tries to fly.”
My forehead was starting to hurt, but it didn’t stop me from calculating the hours it took to drive from Arizona to Seattle. Lieutenant Gilmore continued speaking as white sparks began showing in my vision, the maybe not-so-gentle impacts starting to have effect. “It appears Daniel Little Turtle did fly, although we’d flagged him, too, ma’am. We just weren’t fast enough.”
“Why’d he go to Arizona?” I whispered. “Why not come straight here?”
Gilmore cleared his throat. “It may have occurred to him that we’d be looking for him coming off a flight to Seattle, ma’am. You did warn me.”
A broken laugh caught in the roof of my mouth. “Lieutenant, what are you
telling your superiors about this?”
“The official story remains that there was a disease outbreak in Qualla Boundary, ma’am. My superiors are concerned with finding Patient Zero, that’s all. We’re still working with the CDC to make certain the incident remains contained. We will continue to do so until Mark Bragg is located and it’s determined whether he’s infected and contagious.” Gilmore hesitated. “Ma’am, why didn’t the infection spread among the air travelers on the plane with Little Turtle?”
“You want the official line or the answer?” I stopped hitting my head because it interfered with thinking, and Gilmore deserved me to be firing on all cylinders for this.
“I’ll take both.”
“Officially, it’s spread through touch, and if no one else is infected, we’re lucky. The real answer is that first off, you can’t make wraiths from people who are still alive. But more importantly, Raven Mocker is trying to find a host strong enough to contain him, and I think spreading himself out right now would do him more harm than good.”
“Is Mark Bragg strong enough?”
“No. But if Danny got Raven Mocker halfway across the country, Mark can probably get it up to Seattle.”
“And what happens there, ma’am?”
“I take care of it.”
Another silence followed my response. Then Gilmore said, carefully, “Ma’am, would it be...better...if we were unable to apprehend Mark Bragg?”
“Yeah.”
I could just about hear his next promotion going down the drain in the crispness of his voice: “Thank you, ma’am. I’ll keep that in mind. And if I may say so...”
“Say away. God knows you’ve earned the right.”
“Thank you, ma’am. Good luck, ma’am.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant.” I thumbed the phone off and pressed my forehead against the counter again, then hit it a few more times for good measure.
Coyote eventually said, “Jo?” which made me look up.
The whole gang was gathered on the far side of the counter and in the kitchen doorway, peering at me with nervous concern. “You should all go away from me,” I said flatly. “Go away and stay away, because I’m a bad luck magnet like nothing I’ve ever dreamed.”
“And who will protect us from your enemy if we go?” Annie asked with a hint of humor.
I wished I had any to share. Instead I said, “Danny Little Turtle was found dead in Mark Bragg’s house,” to Morrison, the only one I was sure knew all the players right now.
His face fell, though he recovered quickly. “Where’s Bragg?”
“Missing. Presumably on his way here.”
“Who is Mark Bragg?” Corvallis cut to the heart of the matter, and I let Morrison make the brief explanation about Mark and his sister’s involvement in the previous summer’s Blue Flu. Laurie glanced between us, her mouth pursed. “Sounds like being a thousand miles away isn’t any protection anyway, Joanne.”
“Thank you. Thank you, Laurie, that makes me feel a lot better.”
“It makes me feel better,” Suzy mumbled. “I’d rather be here where I can maybe do something to help instead of hiding out a jillion miles away knowing the bad guy could come for me anyway.”
“Kid’s got a point,” Gary said. “C’mon, Jo. This don’t change anything, except maybe giving this Raven Mocker a face. An’ that’s good, ain’t it? ’Cause at least we know who we’re lookin’ out for.”
“Yeah,” I said, knowing exactly how petty and nasty I sounded, “but I liked Mark. I didn’t like Danny.”
Morrison was the only one who looked disapproving. “You’re better than that, Walker. Now get up and let’s get down to business.”
I got up, although I wasn’t the least bit sure I was better than that. I didn’t want anybody to be dead because of me, but Danny’s own anger and hurt had made him a great temporary host for Raven Mocker. It was bad enough that had killed him. Mark Bragg hadn’t invited any of this onto himself. He’d just gotten caught up in my world. If I had to pick and choose, at least I could see some kind of cruel cosmic justice in Danny’s fate. Mark flat-out didn’t deserve any of it. “I hate this.”
“None of us love it. Maybe you can save him,” Coyote said quietly. “It’s what you do, Jo. Don’t give up faith yet.”
“Okay.” I nodded once, then rubbed my fingers over the tender spot on my forehead. “Woodland Park. The leanansidhe’s probably going to be sucking as much residual power as she can out of the half-finished power diamond the banshees left there. She needs a host. I’m sure she needs a host. So if she finishes that circle she might be able to draw one there. Someone vulnerable.” My stomach curdled again. “Morrison, have you heard from Billy?”
Morrison shook his head and walked away, cell phone already in his hand. Gary snorted. “Holliday ain’t the vulnerable type, sweetheart.”
“Gary, everybody who’s close to me is the vulnerable type right now. I wish to hell I had—”
My mother. For the first and only time in my life, I wanted my mother. My father would have been handy, too, but Mom had brought the fight to the Master in a way Dad clearly never had. She was a mage, a fighter, and I wanted somebody I knew could fill those shoes. Somebody who could protect my friends while I took myself into battle.
“Joanne,” Laurie said into my silence, “everybody in this room has decided being at your side is the safer, smarter or more interesting place to be right now. I understand that you feel like you need to protect all of us, but with the exception of Suzy Q there, we’re all competent, capable adults. You need to stop thinking about how to protect us and start thinking about how to use us.”
I stared at Laurie, vaguely offended. Suzy Q was my nickname for Suzanne, although I imagined anybody who’d ever heard of the song or the snack cake probably used it, too. It was no doubt completely in character for Laurie to use it.
I was offended anyway, and took it out on her in snappy tones. “And how am I supposed to use you, Laurie? You’re almost completely on the outside of this. You don’t have any skills I can use here. You’ve seen a few things most people would dismiss. Why won’t you be smart, and get out of here?”
“You’re wrong. I don’t have any magic, but I have something you can use.”
“What?”
A faint cold smile curved Laurie’s mouth. “Nerves of steel.”
I started to protest, then thought about her lying in the snow, my spear so close to piercing her heart that I’d drawn blood. She hadn’t flinched. I said, “Shit,” under my breath, and triumph flared through her smile.
“Tell you what.” She turned and whirled a finger at the cameraman like she was gathering him up and pointing him toward the door. “You get out of here, Paul. I know your nerves are as good as mine, but we can’t use the footage, anyway, and it’ll make our urban shaman here feel better.”
I said, “Your what?” in quiet dismay, barely able to hear myself under Paul’s protests and threats that he would bill the station for a full day’s work anyway. He stole three more spring rolls on the way out the door, though, so I thought most of the protesting was pro forma. At least it meant being rid of one of them. Nerves of steel or not, I was considering whacking Laurie over the head and leaving her tied up in the bedroom to keep her safe when Morrison returned with his mouth set in a thin straight line.
“Holliday’s not answering his phone. I called down to the crime scene and nobody’s seen him. I think we’d better get down to that park.”
Chapter Thirteen
Suddenly the forty-five minutes for a shower and food seemed like an unnecessary luxury. I tried stuffing that thought back into my brain and ran for the door. Five adults and a mostly grown teen followed, and for a minute we were a latter-day Keystone Cops struggling into the hall. I popped free and the rest of the knot loosened, though Morrison, from the
middle of it, muttered, “We’re not all going to fit in the rental. Where’s your cab, Muldoon?”
“Back at Seattle General. I didn’t think of driving it, what with pullin’ off the great escape.”
Laurie perked up. “Escape?”
I gave her a quelling glare that did nothing to quell her as we thumped down five flights of stairs. I was used to going on adventures with one or two compadres. Having half a dozen of us was starting to feel silly, but I needed Coyote’s expertise, had to keep Annie and Suzy close, and could hardly ditch Morrison or Gary at this late stage of the game. I sent another glare Laurie’s way, just in case she might take the hint and depart for greener pastures, but I was wasting my time.
“Call Keith,” I suggested to Gary. “Have him drop a spare cab off at Woodland Park. We’re going to need it eventually.”
“You call him, doll. Pretty young things get told yes a lot more than old dogs do.”
“Yeah, but I’ll have to buy him flowers.” I pulled my phone out and made the call, anyway, while Suzy volunteered, “I can sit on somebody’s lap,” with the casual air of someone young enough to still do that sort of thing frequently.
Laurie sized herself up compared to everybody else and sighed. “So can I.”
“I can’t drive a rented vehicle rated for five with seven people in it!”
I lifted my eyebrows at Morrison. “You’re the captain of this precinct’s police department. Who’s going to ticket you?”
His upper lip worked in a way I recognized of old as preceding a top-blowing explosion. It made his mouth look very kissable, which came as something of a relief. I hadn’t been losing my mind all those times I’d thought that, back in the day. But he pulled the rant back under control and, with the expression of a man who knew when to give up a fight, gestured for us to all pile into the car. I finished asking Keith at Tripoli Cabs to send a spare car and joined the muddle.
