Graveyard Child

by M. L. N. Hanover

  “You cannot defeat us!” he shouted, but it wasn’t true. His strength was fading. A feral grin pulled at my lips. He was already growing weaker. The Black Sun and I? We were just warming up.

  I surged across the debris-strewn kitchen, hammering at him with my fists and my will. I felt him shifting from assault to defense, and I leaned into it. The blue-eyed woman staggered to her feet, and I spared enough attention to kick the shotgun out of her hands and send her back into the living room. I felt a little explosion behind me, and the older man Chogyi Jake had been fighting ran past me, unarmed and limping, for the front door. The rider glanced back. Chogyi Jake was on one knee in the dining room, blood running from his nose and mouth. He had the shotgun in his hand. Behind him, Mom was curled against the far wall, her face pale. I didn’t know where Curtis had gone. I could only hope he wasn’t chasing after them.

  The unarmed wizard’s eyes had lost their bloody look and gone for a soft brown.

  “What do you want from me?” the Black Sun asked. The power in her words reached into the man, pulled at him. He choked a little, trying not to speak, then bit down on his tongue hard enough that blood pinked his teeth.

  “Jayné!” Ex shouted. “Behind you.”

  I turned.

  In the TV room, my father had found his feet. He stood at the end of the couch, holding the pistol with both hands. The barrel shifted from the wizard to me, then back again, as if he wasn’t sure who was the real threat. Fear boiled off him like steam. He was a middle-aged man with a paunchy belly and jowls that were starting to sag. Redness like a rash crawled up his sternum toward his neck. This was the man I’d feared so much. This was the man who’d dominated my life so deeply that I’d fled my home and my friends—a whole life—just so I could say I’d done something of my own.

  And now he was going to shoot me.

  “Gary!” my mother shouted, her voice low and rough. “You put that down!”

  I could count on one hand the number of times my mother had used Dad’s given name. He shifted the gun toward the boy again, then back toward me. I waited for the muzzle flash, horrified. He lowered the gun. As I turned back toward the wizard, he drove his forehead into the bridge of my nose. I heard the cartilage break more than felt it. He opened his mouth and shouted wordlessly.

  The Oath of the Abyss was the common name of a terrible spell. The rough guess I’d been given was that each time someone used it, it dropped their life span by about a year. I’d seen it done twice, both times by Aubrey. From a normal human, it was enough to rock back a rider. Now, from the wizard and whatever spirit was riding his body, it was like getting a hurricane full in my face. The Black Sun staggered, and I felt it lose control of my muscles for a moment. We were both standing there, trying to keep my feet. The overheated iron scent broke, and the kitchen only smelled like the cold breeze through the broken windows. The young wizard sagged, his gaze unfocused and lost.

  “Stop him,” I tried to say, but my face felt like a rubber mask, and it sounded more like Ob em. The wizard turned, hobbling for the front door, and I went after him as best I could. The ground seemed to be shifting more or less in time with my heartbeat. When I got to the front yard, the older man was gone and the sound of a motorcycle blatting away was already fading. The blue-eyed woman was on another motorcycle, and she started it as I staggered down the front steps. The young wizard threw himself across the back of the bike, his arms going around the woman, his head collapsing against her like a puppet with its strings cut. The motor screamed out, and they started moving.

  Ex’s hand on my elbow was the only thing that kept me from collapsing on the lawn. A red mark around his left eye was deepening toward blue. When it was done blooming, it would be a black eye as profound as any I’d seen. Chogyi Jake came out of the house, shotgun still resting comfortably in his arm. His chin and neck were a single slick of blood.

  “Have to go after them,” I said. “Where’s the keys?”

  “We can’t catch them,” Ex said.

  “They were here,” I said. “They attacked my family.”

  “They’re on motorcycles. We’re in an SUV. Even if there was a chance we could catch up with them, which there’s not, none of us are fit to drive. We’re more likely to run into a light post.”

  I sank down to the dead brown grass and let the chill of the air sink into my skin. My body was trembling uncontrollably with shock and the aftermath of the fight. Carefully, I probed my ribs and was pleasantly surprised not to feel the sharp pain that would have meant I’d broken them. Again. I let my head sag down onto my knees while Ex rubbed his hand against my back. The contact comforted.

  “How bad?” I asked.

  “I don’t think anyone’s hurt.”

  I looked over at Chogyi Jake. He was wiping the blood off his face with the back of one hand. My nose felt wide and hot and solid with blood.

  “Not badly hurt,” Ex said. “And anyway, it’s just us.”

  Just us. Just me and him and Chogyi Jake. Not my family. Not civilians.

  “Should put the guns away before the police get here.”

  “Good point. I’ll get them into the trunk. We might be able to find something useful from them.”

  I nodded. Exhaustion pulled me toward the ground. My breath was bright white plumes. I listened to Chogyi Jake and Ex talking. The sound of the SUV’s door opening and closing. There still weren’t any sirens. Not yet. I tried to stand up and staggered. The hand that steadied me was Jay’s. His expression was closed. I wouldn’t have been surprised by anything—shock, anger, even excitement—but he only put his arm around me and helped me back into the house. The front door was hanging from its top hinge, the lower two having been ripped out of the frame. I didn’t know when that had happened. In the living room, the Christmas tree seemed out of place and vaguely obscene, like a jaunty hat on a corpse. Mom was in the kitchen, sweeping up glass like it was just another mess, and her job was to clear it all away before anyone saw. The furnace was roaring, trying to cope with the icy air flowing in through the shattered windows. Jay angled me toward the good sofa and sat down with me.

  “That was dramatic,” he said.

  “Yeah. Sorry about that.”

  “You know what it was about?”

  “No. Yes,” I said. “I’m not sure.”

  He nodded. When I’d left, he’d already been living in an apartment with three other young men from church. He’d put on about twenty pounds and added the beginnings of wrinkles around his eyes and mouth. I’d missed a lot of the changes in his life, and he’d missed out on mine. Chogyi Jake came out of the kitchen with a dish towel full of ice and handed it to me. I pressed it against my injured nose and almost yelped from the pain.

  “I think it’s broken,” Jay said.

  “It is,” I said.

  “So is this what you’ve been doing all the time you were gone?”

  “More of it than you’d expect, actually,” I said, smiling weakly.

  “Who were those freaks?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said, “and I don’t actually know most of it. They’re . . . part of what I came home to find out about.”

  He smiled, and for just a second I could see the boy he’d been.

  “So you didn’t just come for the wedding,” he said.

  I grinned. It made my nose hurt.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  Carla and Curtis came into the room. Two of the knuckles on his left hand were skinned raw, but other than that they looked okay. Physically, anyway. Carla’s eyes were wide, and her right hand was on her belly. She stepped toward us, hesitated, and almost collapsed beside Jay, her head on his lap. I thought there was more than confusion in her eyes. Fear. Sorrow. Love. She wouldn’t look at me. I couldn’t blame her. She’d been getting ready for her wedding, not an armed assault. I didn’t know enough about shock and miscarriage, but even if she’d only watched her fiancé’s family get gunned down in front of her, I had to figure it wouldn’t be g
ood for the baby.

  My blood reddened the ice pack, and the throbbing pain slowed and widened until it felt like my whole face was beating in time with my heart. My mother came and collected Jay and Carla, shepherding them back into the kitchen. She didn’t meet my eyes either, and I didn’t rise to follow them. Curtis popped his head around the corner for a second, but he didn’t stay either. I coughed, and a blood clot that felt about the size of a dime came down from my sinuses. I spat it into the dish towel and then sat there, miserable, listening to the low sound of voices and the scratching of broomstraw against glass. I heard sirens in the distance, getting closer. We needed to get together and make sure our stories all matched. We needed to make sure the police had a version of events that would let them write the whole thing off and not get involved.

  Chogyi Jake came back out of the kitchen with a fresh towel of ice, and we traded. He was mostly cleaned up, but his upper lip was a little swollen. At least it wasn’t bleeding anymore.

  “This could have gone better,” I said, and he smiled, because it was funny and it also wasn’t.

  “It wasn’t the conflict I’d anticipated,” he agreed.

  My father stepped and put a hand on Chogyi Jake’s shoulder.

  “I’m going to ask you to wait outside, sir,” he said.

  Chogyi Jake smiled but didn’t move. He’d offered to hurt people for me before, and I knew he was entirely willing to stand his ground in my father’s house if I wanted him to. I caught his gaze and nodded. It was all right. I mean, what the hell? It wasn’t like he was going to shoot me. I chuckled a little at the thought, and Dad scowled at me.

  “Of course,” Chogyi Jake said, as if it hadn’t been my decision. His step was careful as he walked out the shattered front door, and I wondered how extensive his injuries really were.

  “Police are going to want to talk with you,” my father said.

  “Yup.”

  “It’s all right with me if they want to talk with you here. But once you’re done, I want you and your boyfriends out of my home. Forever, you understand? You don’t have a place here. This is my house, and my family. Any business you have, you can take up with me. And you haven’t got any business with me.”

  I looked up at him, a sneer plucking at my lips. In the story, the prodigal son is the one who gets the fatted calf. I didn’t know what I’d hoped or expected from him or any of them, but the truth was the trip had failed before the enemy wizards attacked. It had failed the second my father and I had started breathing the same air. You haven’t got any business with me.

  “Fine,” I said.

  chapter four

  The police came in the form of two very nice men who looked over the house with calm, practiced eyes. The way they held themselves and the tone of their voices as they interviewed us implied that they’d seen worse. My guess was they were just relieved it wasn’t a domestic violence case. There wasn’t much blood, and no one was demanding that anybody be arrested. I thought it was funny how little it took to make it count as a good day for them. They spent most of the time talking to my dad and Chogyi Jake. Dad because it was his house, and he was the head of the family. Chogyi Jake—I guessed—because he was a man, he was older. If they seemed a little suspicious of him; it was probably more the epicanthic folds than anything else.

  All the time they were there, I was prepared to lawyer up. Too many questions or just a few of the wrong ones and we could stop talking, call my lawyer, and get a legal defense team in place that could drown the locals in paperwork until they left us alone. It never came to that, and I was more than a little relieved. Flying under the radar was the way I liked it. Just less hassle.

  The story was straightforward: Three tattooed people broke in, held the family at gunpoint, broke things, and ran off when my father started shooting at them. Technically, it was all true. By the time they got to me, I had to give them my name and address. I have about seventy houses, condominiums, and apartments scattered around the world, so I gave them the place in Santa Fe we’d just come from because I remembered the address. When they left, I did too.

  It should have been more dramatic. This was it. My failed homecoming in its depths. I left like I’d be back for dinner. No hugs, no farewells. Just me and Ex and Chogyi Jake heading out to the car and turning out into midafternoon traffic. The sun was already sinking toward the horizon. They were quiet. Ex’s black eye was getting lovely. I still couldn’t really breathe through my nose. Chogyi Jake’s swollen lip was starting to go down a little.

  I drove with my mind scattered. Part of me was scanning the streets for the Invisible College, and I kept drawing my will up through my spine and into my eyes, ready to peer through the magical disguises that they could use. Part of me was being buffeted by memories that came from driving down streets I hadn’t been on in years. And below them both, there I was, shifting in the solitary part of my mind. I had gone home, where I’d dreaded going. I’d gone there for answers, and I’d gotten nothing. I didn’t know one new thing about Eric or about my mother or how my family fit in with riders and vampires and body thieves. My own father had come inches from shooting me.

  What I felt, there in that private corner of my mind, was a deep relief. I didn’t know what it was or what it meant, but I’d gone home, everything had gone pear-shaped, and the sick pressure that had been on me since I’d made that first phone call home was gone. Maybe it was because things couldn’t get much worse. Maybe it was because I felt like magical attacks and gun-toting wizards put the conflict back on my home turf. Or maybe it was just that I’d gone to that house, been with those people, and it hadn’t turned me back into the girl I’d been before I left.

  I pulled into the parking space beside the hotel, turned off the engine, and sat for a moment with my hands on the faux leather steering wheel.

  “You know,” Ex said, “we should really put together some kind of contingency plan where someone feeds the dog if we all get killed.”

  “Would be kind of rude to just leave her locked in the hotel room,” I said. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Ozzie met us at the door to my room, jumping a little on her front legs. Her tail wagged so hard it pulled her a little off balance. I scratched her ears while Chogyi Jake got a towel from my bathroom and a bucket of ice. Ex grabbed the leash, and Ozzie danced in anticipation as he fixed it to her collar.

  “Be careful out there,” I said.

  “I’ll keep my eyes open,” Ex said, and then, before I could go on, “I’m not only doing this for the dog. If I see anything off, I’ll let you know.”

  The door closed behind them and I let myself fall back on the bed. It wasn’t the best place we’d been. Not even the best place recently. The truth was that with the money Eric had left me, I could have bought a house and had it furnished and not particularly noticed the expense.

  “I think those two hit it off pretty well,” Chogyi Jake said.

  “Yeah, it’s funny,” I said. “I would have picked Ex more as a cat guy.”

  “He has a soft spot for loyalty,” Chogyi Jake said. “Do you want to reset your nose here or go to a hospital?”

  I looked up at him with an expression that was supposed to say Really? You have to ask? My history with hospitals hadn’t been good. His either. He smiled and handed me a towel.

  “Blow out as much as you can.”

  Sighing, I sat up and did my best. He’d been right to go with the towel. Kleenex wouldn’t have been up to the task. I plopped back down on the bed and he sat next to me, his thumbs on either side of my nose. It sounded like some ripping cardboard, and the pain was intense but brief. He handed me a washcloth filled with ice and three Advil. I sat back. It was easier to breathe, so I took that as a good sign. I took my cell phone out of my backpack. Twenty seconds and three rings later, my lawyer was on the other end.

  “Jayné, dear,” she said. “What can I do for you?”

  “Well, I need a couple things,” I said. “Do you remember that rep
ort I had you put together on Randolph Coin?”

  “Of course, dear.”

  “I think a few of his friends and associates are in Wichita, and I need to find out what we can about them.”

  “I’ll have something put together. Anything else?”

  “Is there a way to set up a trust so that if something happens to me, my dog still gets taken care of?”

  “Nothing easier. Would you want to put my phone number on her tags?”

  There were times I loved my lawyer. There were a lot of times, in fact. As far as I could tell, nothing fazed her. If I’d asked her to ship me quicklime and a shovel, she’d have asked if I wanted a defense lawyer along with them. On one hand, it meant never having to explain anything. On the other, I had to wonder whether she’d have been the same for Eric.

  My guess was yes.

  “That would be great. I’ll do that. And also I need to send some money to my family. Just a couple thousand to cover some repairs.”

  “What address should I send it to?” she asked.

  I told her, and we spent about a minute exchanging pleasantries: The new car and phone were great, the research grant had gone through, they’d had word from the property manager in New Orleans that the house there needed a new roof. It struck me as we were speaking just how innocuous the conversation sounded and how much it left out. The new car and phone were there because I’d been on the run from a band of compromised exorcists. The research grant was going to my old boyfriend’s girlfriend to help clear my conscience for the years her career had suffered because of Eric’s professional and personal destruction of her. The property manager in New Orleans was an ex–FBI agent who’d been possessed by a rider and killed at least a dozen people including her own parents, and the man taking care of her was a wanted serial killer who had been victimized by the same rider. If anyone had been listening to the conversation, it would have sounded like nothing. It was nothing, until you scratched it, and then all the deep weirdness shone through.