Revenant

by Phaedra Weldon

  “You understand what I mean when I say that Dags is carrying something very important. Right?”

  Ya.

  “And you understand that this something important is, in essence, keeping him alive.”

  Ya.

  “And you know that there are members of the Society who have concerns about a guy so young—infused with all the spells and powers—whose very soul is split between the Abysmal and the Ethereal. I.e. Alice and Maureen.”

  Uh . . . ya . . .

  “But did you know that over half of the council within the Society voted to destroy Dags—to retrieve the Grimoire in order to keep it safe?”

  Uh . . . ya . . . no. “I didn’t even know you had a council in the Society.”

  She glanced at me with that are you nuts look she’d been giving me a lot lately. “Yeah . . . you don’t think that I like own the Society of Ishmael, do you? That I’m the numero uno grand mucketymuck?”

  Funny . . . I think I actually mentally called her that once.

  Ah! Mental note: Rhonda is not the grand high mucketymuck.

  Uh . . . Addendum to mental note: find out who is.

  I waited for the rest of the story. “So . . . and?”

  She stopped at the light to the left of the Vortex and I got the craving for good hamburgers. But it was still too early. Only 8:30 A.M. Though the streets down here were already getting crowded with people. Working or not working, Little Five was always alive. “So and—I’m really only a figurehead. Having been the niece of one of the founding members of the Society. And because I have a personal relationship with the Wraith.”

  Awwww . . .

  “And I own the controlling financial interest in the Society.”

  “It has money?”

  “Loads of it. And my uncle made sure the older—” She clammed up quickly and looked around as if those very older people could pop out of the air. But then again, in my story, they could. “The more power-hungry members of the group couldn’t gain access to it. Oh, they’re not as bad as that, Zoë. Close your mouth.”

  “You make it sound like Congress versus the White House.”

  “Well, in a way it is. My uncle had to deal with this on a daily basis, but he also had to deal with people like Bonville and Rodriguez—and thankfully those assholes are dead.”

  Hear! Hear! I’d been present when Rodriguez exploded. Oh happy day! “But the monster grew another head?”

  She laughed at that. “Yeah, it did. The council is made up of seven individuals—each of them having had something to do with your great-uncle’s first experiments. Like working in the lab, or being there hands on. All of them live in different states. There are seven members to prevent deadlocking. No tie votes.”

  “Is that a good idea?” Tim said from the back.

  “Dunno.” Rhonda shrugged as the light turned green, and she waited for the slowpoke in front of us to move so she could turn right onto Euclid. I looked past the cars to the left, where Moreland continued on, and saw the Zesto’s sign. Mmm . . . a milk shake sounds good. And they have the best. “It’s kept them moving all these years. And my uncle was good at keeping them corralled. Though it has been the cause of Machiavellian machinations of biblical proportions at times.” She laughed.

  Tim laughed.

  I didn’t get it. What’s a Machiavellian? Was it like the Merovingian in the second Matrix movie?

  “So what exactly was the problem?” Tim asked.

  “Well, fear mostly.” Rhonda turned the Beetle into the back driveway of Mom’s shop/house. That’s when we noticed Mastiff’s car. Joe was already here as well. The boy must’ve done warp two to get here before us. Rhonda ain’t no slow driver. She parked it and released her belt. “It’s like this.” She half turned in her seat as I unfastened my own belt. “Dags ended up with the power they’d all wanted—especially once it was known that the Bonville Grimoire was indeed the original Cruorem’s bible. All those old spells, incantations, stories, histories—very important stuff. Hell, it was in that book I learned how to create a Veil.” And to demonstrate, she held up her right hand—and it disappeared in the air between us.

  Seconds later, she pulled it out but was clutching an umbrella. Demonstration over, she tucked it back into the invisible Veil.

  “Oh, so it’s like having a Clarke Belt surrounding you all the time?” Tim said.

  Oh, I know that! Clarke Belt was the name given to the area that surrounded the planet that allowed geostationary orbit.

  Named after some writer or scientist named Clarke.

  And something to do with Sri Lanka.

  Wow . . . I really needed to organize the junk folder in my head.

  Rhonda was smiling. “You could say that. But—when it came down to it—it wasn’t that they really saw Dags as a threat. I mean, they kept him locked up at the mansion for a week examining him after it happened—and they determined he wasn’t possessed. It’s just that he had the power, and they didn’t.”

  As we got out of the car, the Georgia June thick air hit me in the face. Instantly, I was coated in a thin layer of sweat. God, if there was one thing I hated, it was the Southern heat. Like moving through soup. Even at eight in the morning. And it was just gonna get hotter by the time August got here.

  Meh.

  Tim vanished—and who could blame him. It was cooler on the other side. Not this thick. I grabbed up the rock and shut the door before scooting up to Rhonda as we neared the back porch. “Wait . . .”

  She stopped at the lower step and looked up at me. “Huh?”

  “You said—” I licked my lips. The hair under my ponytail was already sticking to my neck. At this rate I was gonna need another shower. I was already walking in that dream state of no sleep. “You said they kept Dags at the mansion? Like . . . as a prisoner?”

  She looked sad. “Almost. Honestly, Zoë, I didn’t know what the asswipes were doing in the beginning. They snatched him out of the hospital after we got him away from Rodriguez—and he wasn’t used to the changes his body went through.”

  I narrowed my eyes at her. Cicadas buzzed from the brush nearby between Mom’s home and Jemmy’s. “What do you mean?”

  “Well”—she shook her head—“when they took him from the hospital—he defended himself.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “He made one of the members disappear.”

  !!!

  Oh. My. God. There was so much I didn’t know then about what that boy had gone through. From being branded by the Cruorem as a Guardian, to having the Familiars sealed in his palms, to Rhonda fusing the Grimoire to his very soul. And yet—when I’d seen him again that night, I’d nearly barbecued the house doing magic—

  The softness he’d shown me. The care and the kind words. It was like none of what he’d gone through mattered. If any of his experiences left scars, he kept them on the inside, never bringing attention to them. “What—what did he do with that member? What happened?”

  “They’re vague about it—” Rhonda looked irritated. “I had to scry to see for myself. And what I saw was unforgivable.”

  I waited. Then leaned forward. “Care to share it with me?”

  She balled her hands into fists, her backpack on her left shoulder. Her skin looked even paler in the June morning light, and I couldn’t see her eyes through the shades. “They came into his hospital room—six of them. One of them had a syringe ready. But Dags woke up—” She gritted her teeth. “He opened his mouth to say something, and one of them slapped a pillow over his face as the others held him down. They were going to shoot him full of something—but then the syringe and the one holding it vanished.”

  I blinked. “Just . . . poof?”

  “Yeah. Poof. It freaked them out. They ran out of there, and Dags managed to catch his breath and call Joe. We came and got him, then the council called and demanded he be brought in for examination. Bastards. Joe stayed with him, you know. Didn’t leave them alone with him.”

  “Joe did?”

>   She nodded and looked at me. “There was one thing—”

  And I never discovered what that one thing was as the back door opened, and Joe and Mastiff walked out.

  Mastiff was a tall man—Joe’s height. With a medium build and close-cropped hair, his dark skin was smooth in the sunlight. I always thought of him as a young Denzel Washington. Same bright beautiful smile. Only this Denzel knew about the bad things.

  Hell—he’d been shot by one. Daniel Frasier.

  We looked up at them as Nona came out to stand to their left. “You two need to get in here for this. We have a problem.”

  Rhonda and I looked at each other. “We do?” I asked.

  Mastiff nodded and looked at me. His suit was impeccable— down to the starched white collar. An opposite to Joe’s more mountain-man casual. “Especially you, Zoë.” He sighed. “Daniel Frasier disappeared from the Mt. Sounder mental facility in Maryland three days ago. He was spotted in town last night, asking about you.”

  I blinked. Daniel . . . escaped from a mental hospital?

  Joe smiled. Meet your new bodyguards. He pointed to himself and Mastiff. The new Crocket and Tubbs.

  6

  I never watched Miami Vice. But I knew the characters. And these two were more like Starsky and Hutch. The remake version.

  After Mastiff’s initial blow, Mom hustled us inside. Jemmy was there, puttering in the kitchen. The shop wasn’t officially open till after ten since it was a Wednesday. I could smell the aroma of buttered eggs, biscuits, bacon, sausage, orange juice, and spicy gravy before I even came through the door.

  Okay. Before, when we left, I wasn’t hungry. But by then I was starving.

  And with the news of Daniel’s disappearance and reappearance—food was the best form of comfort. Right?

  About that—

  “The word is no one saw him leave,” Mastiff was saying as he buttered a biscuit. If there was one thing Joe’s new partner enjoyed, it was Nona’s breakfasts. Good old Southern boy at heart. “Since his internment, Frasier’s been the model patient. They took him off the tranqs about a week after he arrived, and he’s been very docile. Almost agreeable.”

  I frowned, remembering that day in front of the Foxx—leaving the Bridgetown Grill and Daniel wielding that gun—rounding it on me . . .

  Cooper jumping in front of it. Daniel firing—and then screaming at me.

  Blaming me because he’d shot his boss.

  And then the death masks came . . .

  “. . . till midnight. All the beds are checked every two hours. So”—Mastiff shrugged—“they’re not sure how he escaped. No sign of forced exit. All doors locked. And no one saw anything.”

  I blinked. Looked at him. “Nothing? Not even a scratch or a sign that he’d cracked that lock?”

  Mastiff shook his head as he bit into the fluffy biscuit, butter squishing out on the sides.

  Joe was across from us, his plate barely touched, his arms crossed over his chest. He was staring at his food but not seeing it.

  I decided to intrude on his thoughts. And why not? He did it to me all the time.

  What are you thinking?

  Eh? He kept his head tilted down but looked at me across the table. Trying to figure out if maybe Daniel was possessed by a Horror again. I mean—is it possible?

  I pursed my lips. I—I don’t know. If he was—it wasn’t from me. Not this time. No. I was whole. Literally so. Maybe it’s something else?

  Or maybe he really did figure out a way to get out undetected. He could have sweet-talked a staff member.

  True. I didn’t like the way that sounded—making Daniel out to be a whore-dog of some kind. But . . . You think maybe he did, and they let him out, then relocked the door?

  Joe nodded.

  I voiced this to Mastiff, who nodded.

  “Yeah, they thought about that. And the room’s been fingerprinted. But—that’s not really going to prove anything. They have an accounting of staff who regularly go in and out of that room—not to mention patients who wander in during the day. And as for the security cameras—they conveniently went on the fritz for that period of time.” He used his right hand to gesture while holding the biscuit in his left. “One minute he was in the bed. The next—he was gone.”

  Nona set her fork down and picked up her coffee. Tim sat beside me, listening and watching. Mastiff couldn’t see him unless Tim wanted to be seen. Steve was apparently absent. Lately, he hadn’t joined in any of the reindeer games. I wondered why. “Now—how was he spotted here in Atlanta? And how did he get here?”

  Mastiff shook his head. “He was spotted on a closed-circuit video screen. Here.” He wiped his hand on his napkin and reached inside his suit jacket. He pulled out a five-by-seven picture and handed it to Mom. “That was taken at a convenience store on LaVista yesterday. So he’s in the area.”

  After looking at it with her eyebrows arched high, Mom handed it to me. Rhonda started for it, but I snatched it back. Mine! When I looked at it—my heart leapt into my throat.

  The image was grainy—like any photo taken as a capture from video. But it was him, standing on the other side of the register purchasing something. He looked good, his hair longer than it had been, cupping around his face. He wore a gray hoodie of some sort, with a blazer.

  He looked good. Not crazy. “So when you catch him,” I said, handing it to Rhonda, “what are you going to do?”

  “Bring him in for questioning.”

  Joe sat forward quickly and waved at Mastiff. He made the sign, “What for?”

  “Oh, come on, Joe. You know we can’t talk about that in front of the ladies. Or at breakfast.”

  “You mean question him about the bodies with the drained blood and the wacky carvings?” Rhonda spoke up, her attention still on the photo.

  The expression on Mastiff’s face was priceless. He blinked a few times and downed some OJ. “Uh . . . how did . . .”

  “Society,” I piped up.

  He nodded. That seemed to explain a lot in this group. Not that the rest of the Atlanta PD knew about them or their purpose in the South. Most of the members—including Rhonda—came from money, and with money, well, you gets respect.

  And with the way my account is looking lately—I’ll be missing that respect bus for quite some time.

  Joe was waving again and this time grabbed up the pen and notepad by his plate. He scribbled. I used to scribble too. WHY 4 THOSE? NO EVDENCE HE WS INVOLVE.

  I winced at his misspellings. I used to do that too.

  Mastiff shrugged. “Not my call. Talk to the captain.”

  I could tell by the look on Joe’s face that was exactly what he was going to do.

  “Anyway,” Mastiff said, “one of us will be with you at all times, Zoë. Or at least our presence will be known.”

  Ominous.

  Not.

  “Are you first on duty?” Jemmy asked from where she’d been eyeing the poor detective from her perch beside Nona. Yeah . . . he’s cute, Jemmy, but a half and more younger than you. Down girl. Woof.

  Mastiff nodded. “Yes. Halloran here was up early with the latest body.” He winced—but I wasn’t sure if it was from the taste of Mom’s coffee or the fact that we already knew about those. “I’ve put in to have the other two bodies moved to Dekalb. Made it a central hub of activity for the time being.”

  So all the bodies were going to be in one place.

  Rhonda asked, “You mean like that’ll be done today?”

  Mastiff nodded. Rhonda looked at me, and I thought, Uh-oh. What is she plotting? I was making nefarious plans to grab Archer tonight and show him the bodies to get his opinion. And to find out if he’d maybe gotten an idea on that hair-monster thing. Pick his Symbiont brain about the First Borns.

  But why is Rhonda curious?

  With a full stomach—I was ready for sleep. Whether I wanted it or not. I gathered up my dishes, dropped them in the sink, and turned to find Rhonda directly behind me. I backed up, blinking. “Hello?” />
  “Going to bed?”

  I looked past her to the tea shop, where everyone was gathered at the main table still eating and talking. Except for Joe, who was watching us. Refocusing on Rhonda, I nodded. “Yeah—like you said. Sneaking out. Tired.” And I even yawned on cue. Not made up.

  But she wasn’t moving out of my way.

  Instead, Rhonda narrowed her kohl-rimmed eyes at me. “You weren’t sneaking out to meet Dags—not like I thought. You didn’t even know he was in town.”

  I didn’t have time for this. If I didn’t get at least a few hours of sleep, I was never going to last tonight while zooming to the morgue. I sighed. Okay . . . a half-truth was better than a no truth. Right? “Okay. Fine. No, I wasn’t sneaking out to see Dags. But first you have to tell me how you know. You keeping spies on me too?”

  Rhonda’s reaction was perfect. She actually looked stunned. “Well, no . . . it’s just that you’re always sleeping. So I figured you were doing something at night and not sleeping.”

  “I’m practicing—okay? I went nearly a month with no OOB, then poof”—I held up my hands for emphasis—“I’m not only a Wraith but part of a Horror. And then I’m slammed back together. So, yeah, I’ve been out practicing. Learning what it is I can do.”

  She almost looked . . . happy. At least she didn’t look mad anymore. Instead, she reached out and hugged me. And I mean gave me the huge squish. I returned the hug, feeling a bit awkward. Then she pulled back and smiled. “I’m sorry. I just—I lost you for a while, and it was awful. And I thought because you felt you couldn’t trust me—you’d leave me out of what’s happening in your life. And I’m still interested. I still want to help.”

  I grinned. “That’s good. But the best way to help right now”—I reached out my arm and pushed her to the side—“is to let me get a few hours of deep sleep.” Moving past her, I waved at the table. “Mastiff, you’ll have a great shift. I plan on sleeping all afternoon.”

  “What about helping me?” Mom said, looking mockingly upset with a hand to her chest, her eyebrows raised.

  I went to the steps beside the kitchen and waved them off. “Get Steve to do it. He’s great with the customers.”