Smoke and Ashes

by Tanya Huff

  Kevin was sitting on CB’s couch poking unhappily at his handheld. “I can’t get an uplink.”

  “I told you,” CB growled from behind his desk as the reporter set the PDA on top of his open backpack. “We’re in a dead zone.”

  “Your phone won’t work either.” Tony crossed the room and dropped onto the other end of the couch. His trousers squished, and he realized a little too late he should have stayed standing. But since there was already a damp imprint of his ass on the cushion, he remained where he was.

  “You seem confident, Mr. Foster.”

  “Phones haven’t worked since…Wait. Not confident about the phone thing?”

  “No.”

  Confident. As in filled with confidence. Hey, why not? He’d just sent a demon home by force of will alone. His will. His will alone. He had been the world. He had the power! Although it might be best to play that down a bit in front of the boss. He shrugged.

  “Ow!” The lines of blood on the shirt had dried, sticking the fabric to his skin. Specifically to his right nipple. Shrugging had ripped it free.

  “I’m pleased to see that this new confidence hasn’t changed you,” CB growled as Tony clutched at his chest.

  Weirdly, in spite of the sarcasm, CB actually did seem pleased. What had he expected? What had Leah told him? Tony repeated the latter question out loud as Leah perched on the far edge of CB’s desk.

  “Ms. Burnett told me what happened in the parking lot. That you returned a demon to its hell without using the proper runes. That wizards who feel they can ignore the rules are dangerous.”

  “I saved her ass.” It seemed so obvious and yet he kept having to bring it up.

  “She doesn’t dispute that, Mr. Foster, but she considers it a matter of luck that you’ve injured no one but yourself to this point.”

  Tony frowned at Leah who was looking…smug. Not overtly, but it was there. “She doesn’t like that she can’t control me.”

  To Tony’s surprise, CB smiled. “No, I don’t imagine that she does.”

  “That’s not—” Leah began, but CB raised a hand.

  “Mr. Foster,” he said, “has always been able to see what is in front of him. It’s a rare skill. Mr. Groves…”

  Kevin jumped.

  “…has identified the rune cut into the demon’s hand as this.” The sheet of paper he lifted held a new swoop and squiggle. “It is on the third circle of Ms. Burnett’s interesting tattoo…”

  Interesting? That was a bit of an understatement. Tony glanced at Kevin, who was blushing again. He’d have heard a lie even with his ears that interesting color of puce, so if Leah hadn’t told them what the tattoo actually was, what had she told them?

  “…and it seems to indicate,” CB continued, “that she was its primary target.”

  “Why?” Tony prodded.

  “Because it’s on my tattoo,” Leah told him, smiling. Ryne Cyratane flickered behind her.

  Rune-to-rune attraction was apparently true enough for Kevin’s gift and banal enough to give nothing away. Looked like Leah still hadn’t given up her backstory, using her demonically-fueled sex appeal to keep CB and Kevin Groves from asking inconvenient questions. It seemed only vampires and Demongates got to have secret identities while wizards were left flapping in the breeze. Tony frowned at the rune. “Did the demon in the soundstage have one?”

  “There was something,” CB acknowledged. “But it moved too fast for me to get a good look at it.”

  “I knew it wasn’t a fan,” Kevin muttered.

  “Actually, Mr. Groves, there is nothing that says the demon isn’t also a fan.”

  The reporter snorted. “You think they watch syndicated TV in hell? Never mind,” he continued before anyone could answer. “I withdraw the question.”

  “Mr. Groves was attempting to access the electronic copy of the page he found.” CB set the rune to one side and laced his fingers together. “His astrologer friend was only able to work out the time of the Demonic Convergence in a general way, so I suggest he retrieve the original and bring it here for our demonic consultant to study it. Perhaps, with her experience, she’ll have more luck.” The look he shot Leah said he figured she could do anything she put her pretty little head to.

  Eww. Tony felt slightly sick.

  The look Leah shot CB in turn sat just to one side of Are you nuts? “You’re going to let him walk out of here?”

  “Why not?”

  “With this story?”

  “Your story is safe with me,” Kevin told her.

  Tony snorted. The ringing tones and the hand over the heart detracted somewhat from the believability. Seemed that twenty minutes or so removed from the demon, being inside the story was no longer enough to suppress old habits. “Safe doesn’t mean out of the paper, does it?”

  Kevin’s betrayed expression was slightly less believable than his sincere expression. After a few moments of reorganizing his face, he ended up in the general vicinity of resigned. “Okay, fine. But we’re a weekly. I’ve got until next Tuesday at 3:00 to file, so you’ve got until then to change my mind, right?”

  “Yeah, that sounds fair except that you’ve been digitally recording on that handheld, so you’ve got blackmail material if nothing else.”

  “Kevin!”

  As Leah’s shocked exclamation—heavy on the second syllable—caught his attention, Tony grabbed the PDA from the backpack. When Kevin lunged for it, Tony held up his left hand. “We can’t trust you.”

  Back in the corner of the couch, as far as he could get from Tony’s hand and still be on the couch, Kevin glared over the barrier of his backpack. “I’m a journalist!”

  “Essentially.” Still working the rune, Tony stared down at the screen and double-tapped the record icon with his right thumb. “If he’d got the uplink, he’d probably have shot the sound file back to his office.”

  “No, I…” The weight of disbelief cut him off. “Yes. Fine. I would have. But you don’t understand.” He lowered the backpack onto his lap and fiddled with a strap. “This is a complete validation of my entire life. Demons and wizards and sex!”

  “Sex?” CB asked. One eyebrow rose.

  Tony suppressed a shudder. “Don’t ask.” Sounded like CB’s virtue was intact at least. Back to Kevin. “So you’ve been validated, big whoop; you’ve still got questions. You want to know why the demons are attacking Leah. You want to know where they come from.” Tony took a moment to study the rune on his palm, then he grinned at the reporter. “You want to know how I sent something capable of smashing its way into a car out of this world using only the finger of my right hand. Hell, that’s not even my good hand.” He waved his left, feeling power ripple with the movement. “Not even my wizard hand. You’ve got to be wondering exactly what I’m capable of.”

  Not exactly a threat.

  “Are you threatening me?”

  Okay, maybe it was.

  “I don’t even know you guys,” he continued. “Why should I do what you want?”

  “Because we’re trying to save the world here, Kevin.”

  “By suppressing the truth?”

  “If that’s what it takes.”

  “And what kind of a world will that give us?”

  “One not strewn with dismembered bodies, you shortsighted jackass.”

  “You want that page I found.” His chin lifted. “I think I’ve got bargaining power.”

  “Yeah? I think you’ve got…”

  “Mr. Foster.”

  Tony sighed. At this rate the Demonic Convergence would be over before the conversation. “Here’s a thought: you let us look at that page, you don’t talk about this to anyone, and I don’t erase your memory.”

  “No one is erasing anyone’s memory!” CB’s protest added a certain verisimilitude to the bluff.

  Tossing her hair back over her shoulders, Leah crossed to kneel gracefully by Kevin’s feet. Reaching out, she took both his hands—and his backpack straps—in hers. No sign of Ryne Cyratane and no
sign CB was reacting.

  She’s playing the long shot. Appealing to Kevin’s better nature. Given what he did for a living, wondering if he even had one seemed redundant.

  “Kevin, please. Work with us. Don’t just report the truth, become a part of it. Make a stand against the darkness you know exists. Be one of the heroes.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Heroes die young.”

  Yeah. Redundant.

  “Mr. Groves, if you don’t want to help, we cannot…will not force you.” CB sat back in his chair and laced his fingers together. “Mr. Foster, return his equipment and show him out.”

  “Just like that?” Ragged unison from everyone in the room who wasn’t Chester Bane.

  “Yes.”

  Kevin pulled free of Leah’s hands and stood. “You’re just going to let me go and tell the world what I’ve seen?”

  “Mr. Groves, I have spent my entire career ignoring what the tabloids print about me. I think I can manage to ignore this as well.”

  “You don’t think anyone will believe me.”

  “Have they ever?” As the reporter sputtered, Tony caught Leah’s eye and shook his head. Kevin could spot a lie and, so far, he hadn’t accused the boss of lying. She closed her mouth as CB sighed. “People have no interest in the truth, Mr. Groves. They’ll enjoy the story while it’s being told and forget it the instant the next story comes along. It’s why television is so successful.”

  “Reality TV…”

  “Isn’t. Now, if you don’t mind, in spite of delays…” Somehow he made the delays seem like they were Tony’s fault. “…I have a show to produce.”

  “No. You need the page I found!”

  “I expect we’ll continue to manage without it.”

  “It could have important information!”

  “Mr. Foster, tell Ms. Chou to arrange to have my couch cleaned. Ms. Burnett…” He frowned at her. “If you intend to continue hanging about my studio, find something to do.”

  Kevin didn’t quite stamp his foot. “You need the information I have!”

  “And you haven’t convinced me of that. Good afternoon, Mr. Groves.”

  “Then I will convince you!”

  “Fine.”

  “I’ll prove it to you!”

  “Very well.”

  “I’ll be back with that page. It has important information!”

  “I look forward to you proving it to me. You will, however, have some difficulty returning if you don’t actually leave.” The final word carried enough volume to lift Tony and Leah to their feet as well and move all three of them across the office and out the door.

  Kevin pointed a finger at the two of them. “Don’t go anywhere.” Then he turned and ran for the street.

  “Don’t let the door hit you on the way out, asshat!” One hand covering the phone, Amy flipped him off with the other. “Thank you for holding, Father Thomas; we really need to use that graveyard…”

  Leah smoothed down her clothes; not because they needed it, more because she needed something to do with her hands. “Your boss is an impressive man.”

  “Yeah.” Tony carefully detached the rest of the shirt from his chest. “All his ex-wives think so.”

  “I meant he’s a manipulative s.o.b.”

  “They’ll probably agree with that, too.”

  Amy hung up and grinned at them as they drew even with her desk. “I got you the g…u…n.”

  “I can spell,” Leah sighed.

  “I’m not spelling it out for you.” She jerked her head toward the bull pen. “I don’t want that lot to get excited. It’s never pretty. Anyway, the guy’s bringing it over later.”

  “Tonight?” Tony asked incredulously.

  “This very.”

  “That was fast.”

  “I’m the best.”

  “You’re kind of scary.”

  “Just part of my charm.” Head cocked, she examined him through narrowed eyes. “So what are you going to do now?”

  “I don’t know what she’s going to do,” he nodded at Leah as he pulled polyester away from his body. He might have the whole world in his hand, but he also had wet fabric in the crack of his ass. “But I’m going to talk to Rachel and then I’m going to get my laundry out of my car and change my pants.”

  Eight

  “ALL RIGHT, THAT ONE works for me.” Peter tossed his headphones onto his chair and walked out into Raymond Dark’s office, one fist pressed against the small of his back to knuckle out the stiffness of a fourteen-hour day. “Mason, you happy with it?”

  “I’m happy with anything that lets me get rid of these damned teeth,” Mason muttered around the fingers shoved into his mouth. “I bit my lip again.”

  “Bad?”

  “Nothing that’ll show on camera; thanks for the sympathy.”

  “You’re welcome. Lee?”

  Lee, sprawled on the red velvet sofa, waved a weary hand. “It was art. Emmys all around. Are we done?”

  “We’re done. That’s it, people…” Peter raised his voice as he turned to face the crew. “…good work, thanks for staying late, and make sure you have tomorrow’s sides before you leave.”

  That wasn’t it, of course, but with the last shot in the can the mood lifted as everyone found enough energy to get them through wrap-up and out the door. With no demons currently ripping either place or people apart, Tony did what he always did. He made sure the radios were back where they belonged, put the batteries in the charger, ran an errand for Peter, helped Tina close the trunk she locked her computer gear into, had a short meeting with Adam about an error in the advance schedule—where meeting would be defined as Adam pointing it out and telling him to see that it got fixed—and then he was done and the rest of the crew were heading for cars and home and the soundstage was empty.

  Nearly empty.

  Leah was somewhere around.

  And Lee was standing just inside the door, watching him, his face expressionless enough that it was kind of creepy.

  “What?” Tony demanded. He’d stopped just a little too close, almost inside the other man’s personal space, but if he backed up now, he’d look like a dork.

  “You’re staying in case another demon shows up.”

  “That was the plan.”

  “It’s not a great plan.”

  “Yeah? So far it’s wizard three, demons big fat zero—nada, zilch, and three asses kicked. I think it’s a workable plan.”

  “Workable,” Lee snorted, rolling his eyes. Expressions were catching up to him—concern, disdain, and exasperation chased themselves across his face. “You’re just going to live in the soundstage until this Demonic Convergence is over?”

  “It won’t last forever.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  Shrugging, Tony tried to look like a wizard on top of things. “When it happened before, it ended. Precedent suggests it’ll end this time.”

  “Precedent suggests? Precedent?” A twisted smile appeared to punctuate the silent but obvious give me a fucking break. “What? You’ve been watching Court TV?”

  Tony chose to answer the actual question. “Nah, CITY’s had Ironside running Mondays at midnight. Raymond Burr,” he added at Lee’s blank stare. “Wheelchair lawyer? Black-and-white lawyer show ran from ‘61 to ‘68? Dude, it’s classic television.”

  “I’m not big on the classics.” Lee sketched air quotes around the word classics, body language relaxing as they moved away from demons and wizards. “I don’t watch anything older than I am.”

  “Your loss. You’re missing your own history.”

  “My history?”

  “As an actor.”

  “Ah. Well, maybe someday you can expose me.” Challenging eyes. Flirty smile. Tony took an involuntary step back, not caring how it made him look. Never a demon around when you need one…

  Hang on. Flirty smile?

  Was Lee possessed again?

  Tony cleared his throat. “Expose you?”

  “To my history.”r />
  “Ah.”

  The pause stretched toward uncomfortably long, and Tony frowned as the expression left Lee’s face. And how am I supposed to respond? We don’t do that joking around with sexuality thing anymore, remember? Not since you took that one step too far—and may I point out that it was you and not me. But, hey, you responded to Leah this afternoon, so now you’re comfortable in your sexuality again and I’m fair game. His brain just wouldn’t shut up about it. “Look, some guys like black and white, some guys don’t. Some guys try it but end up holding on to the whole Technicolor thing.” Great. Now his mouth was in on it.

  Any chance the anvil missed?

  “Tony…”

  No chance in hell. In any of the hells.

  The coyote wouldn’t have missed with that anvil.

  And now it’s his turn to pause—except his pauses seem to be meaningful instead of empty. I wonder if I hurt his feelings by reminding him of how he gets indiscriminating under stress? Now that’s an idea; he should hang around, and if the next demon’s big enough, I could do him up against the wall after the fight.

  Shut up, brain!

  “…I just want you to be careful. Okay? Since there’s seems to be nothing I can do to help—even if I thought you meant it…”

  Martyr much?

  “…I just, well, be careful.”

  Without waiting for an answer, he was gone.

  Tony stared at the door for a moment, wondered what he’d been reaching out for, and let his hand drop to his side.

  “He wants you.”

  “Bite me.”

  “And you have some unresolved aggression toward him.” Leah fell into step beside him as he turned and headed for the area under the gate. “You want to talk about it?”

  “No.”

  “There’s not a lot I don’t know about the psychology of sex.”

  “There is no sex.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because he’s straight.”

  “Please.”

  “Why are you even still here?” he demanded, moving into her path and stopping suddenly, forcing her to stop as well. “I thought you were off to live your life, to take a chance, refusing to be held hostage by your Demonlord’s expectations.”