Sons of Entropy

by Christopher Golden

  “Number two, can you feel your feet?”

  Taken off guard by this seemingly inane question, Trenholm scowled, began to make some retort, and then his face froze. He glanced down. His face crumbled, and a tear appeared at the corner of his left eye and began to stream down his cheek.

  The waiter brought their meals, happily asked if there would be anything else. Ethan ordered another glass of scotch, and, out of pure kindness, asked for another wine for poor Trenholm.

  When he’d left, Trenholm could only stare at his food. “What have you done to me?” he asked, without even looking up.

  “Hmm?” Ethan mumbled, even as he contentedly chewed his first wonderful bite of steak. It was perfect here, every time.

  “Oh, right. Well, it’s just a little spell, really. Made slightly more difficult by the restrictions I placed on it. I’ve given you time, you see, it’s going to take effect quite slowly. And, of course, I know precisely how to counter it, assuming you give me reason to.”

  “Ethan,” Trenholm snarled through gritted teeth. “What have you done to me?”

  “It’s the Gorgon’s Eye, I’m afraid,” Ethan said, and a small thrill ran through him as he watched the tic in Trenholm’s right eye begin to flutter. “It’s probably moving up your legs right now, yes?

  “That’s right, old man. You’re turning to stone.”

  Trenholm didn’t have a response for that.

  Ethan took another bite of steak, chewed several times, and then paused. “I’m going to eat my dinner now. When I’m through, I’ll expect those answers. Otherwise, I’ll just leave you here.”

  He ate very slowly. Trenholm didn’t eat a single bite. He moved less and less, and by the time Ethan wiped his mouth with the heavy cloth napkin he’d had on his lap, he thought the man was likely stone from about the navel on down. When he finally met Trenholm’s gaze again, there was hatred in the man’s eyes such as even Ethan had never seen.

  But Trenholm told him what he wanted to know.

  Ethan smiled. “Thank you so much, Calvin. You may have just saved the world. And you’ve certainly saved your life.”

  “Until Il Maestro destroys me,” Trenholm said.

  “Well, then, if I were you I’d be off to a church as soon as I was able,” Ethan advised. “I wouldn’t want to die with what you’ve got on your soul. Not if you believe that sort of thing.”

  With a flick of his wrist, Ethan produced a small box of wooden matches. He reached for the white candle that burned on the table, blew it out, and then relit it with a match of his own. Black smoke burned up from the candle for a moment, and then it burned white.

  “Just a whiff or two should do it,” he explained.

  The man complied, inhaling the smoke, and his features seemed to relax as his lower half began to return to its fleshly state. While that process was taking place, Ethan waved the waiter over and procured the check, which he then paid in cash.

  “Shall we be off, then?” he asked when the waiter had gone. “You might be a bit shaky on those legs at first, but you’ll adjust.”

  They walked outside together, and Ethan was right. Trenholm had trouble putting one foot in front of the other. But by the time they reached the parking lot, he’d fully recovered.

  Trenholm rounded on Ethan, who had begun to stroll toward his rental car, whistling “Over the Rainbow.”

  “I should kill you, you know!” the man declared.

  Ethan nodded. “I wholly agree,” he said. “But you won’t. If you were going to kill me, you would have done it years ago, when I first seduced Kymberly. I’m not surprised you left her, you know. Insufferable witch.”

  Trenholm reddened, and for a moment Ethan wondered if the man would actually attempt to attack him. It would be a change for him, at least. But then his question was interrupted, and would forever remain unanswered, as a black Jeep roared suddenly out of a space behind Trenholm and shot across the pavement at him, its lights out. The man barely had time to scream before the vehicle shattered his body, throwing him to the ground a lifeless shell.

  Tires squealed as the Jeep turned, backed up, and started for Ethan. An elderly couple had come out of the restaurant in time to see Trenholm’s murder, and now were screaming at him to run for his life.

  Ethan rolled his eyes. He’d prepared for this. The Sons of Entropy acolytes behind the wheel knew that Trenholm was likely a traitor, but they couldn’t have known who it was he’d been meeting.

  Or they’d have sent sorcerers instead of assassins.

  “Janus, oh golden idol,” he said quickly, gesticulating with his fingers. “Transform, begone, from human’s eyes; fur and ears, now smaller size.”

  The men behind the wheel turned into rabbits and the Jeep crashed into several parked cars. Ethan was glad his rental had been spared. While the people on the restaurant stairs called out to him, he climbed in, started the engine, and drove off, laughing softly to himself.

  He just loved coming to Sunnydale.

  * * *

  Angel wasn’t at the library when Buffy returned. They’d planned to meet there at seven, and from there to continue the search for her mother. But when she pushed through the swinging doors, the room appeared empty at first.

  “Hello?” she called out, as she moved farther into the room.

  In the cage, Oz snarled and threw himself against the metal mesh. He stalked back and forth across the small space, glaring at her, saliva sliding from his fangs.

  “Down, boy,” she said in a low voice. “You got up on the wrong side of the moon this morning.”

  The werewolf snarled.

  Behind Buffy, the door opened. She turned to see Giles coming in with a cup of coffee in one hand, holding a book open in the other.

  “You could get hurt doing that,” she said.

  Giles looked up, startled, and his coffee spilled on his hand. He hissed and held the cup away from him.

  “See,” Buffy said reasonably. “It’s bad enough, the whole walking and reading thing. But carrying hot coffee? Major potential for household injuries.”

  “Yes, well, perhaps if you weren’t sneaking around . . .” Giles began, even as he put the cup and book down and went in search of a paper towel.

  Then he looked up, as if startled by his own words. “I’m sorry, Buffy,” he said. “I’ve just been growing more and more frustrated, trying to figure out where your mother might be held. Sunnydale is actually a larger town than it would appear, though—unsurprisingly—not very thickly settled in most areas.”

  Oz growled again.

  Giles looked over at him, rolled his eyes. “Oh, do shut up!” he snapped.

  The werewolf paused, looked at him a moment, then went about his business of being caged up.

  “Oh, great, Giles, lash out at the defenseless werewolf,” Buffy said, raising her eyebrows. “Look, Angel was supposed to meet me here. Has he shown?”

  “Not yet,” Giles replied. “No. But there are some things we have to discuss, Buffy.”

  There was a tone in his voice that was all too familiar. Giles picked his coffee up again and turned to regard her. The silence inside the school was too much for her.

  “What is it, Giles?” she asked weakly. “Something with my mom? Is she . . .”

  The Slayer could not finish that sentence.

  Giles’s eyes widened. “Oh, Lord, no, Buffy. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply anything of the sort. But there is a connection, I’m afraid. You see, earlier today when I was at Angel’s speaking with Micaela, young Jacques told us that he could sense his father, well, dying.”

  “That’s nothing new,” Buffy replied. “It seems like he’s been on the verge of checking out for, okay, ever.”

  “Indeed,” Giles agreed. “But this is different. It’s the first time Jacques has felt anything of the sort. It likely means that whatever has been sustaining Jean-Marc Regnier, the Cauldron, the house, what have you . . . that those things can no longer help him.”

  Buffy
took that in, and then let its meaning sink in for several seconds. If it was true, it meant that Giles’s flying to Boston with the kid, with Jacques, just wasn’t going to work.

  “I’m not going,” she said bluntly.

  Giles blinked. Ran a hand through his hair. Began to speak, then thought better of what he’d been about to say.

  “You know I can’t go,” she said. “Angel can go. Oz can . . .” she glanced at the werewolf in the cage. “All right, maybe Oz can’t go. But Angel can. I’m not leaving this town until I find my mother, Giles. I can’t just take off and leave her a prisoner of some psycho who really wants me instead.”

  “We’ll find her,” Giles insisted.

  Buffy swallowed. “Sorry. You had your shot.”

  “This is too important, Buffy,” he told her, growing angry now. “I’m sorry, but to simply pawn this off on Angel, who has several handicaps of his own, if you hadn’t noticed . . . The world hangs in the balance.”

  “My mother’s life hangs in the balance!” she snapped, and then all the energy left her, and when she spoke again, it was nearly a whisper. “Right now, she’s all the world I have.”

  They stood together in silence. The only sound in the room was the grunting and heavy breathing of the werewolf in the cage. Oz, Buffy reminded herself. It’s Oz, not just some monster. And Oz needed Willow.

  Buffy needed Willow. Things just seemed to make more sense, decisions seemed to be easier to make, when Willow was around. She always seemed to know the right thing, hard as it might be to say it. And Xander . . . If he’d been here, he’d have volunteered to lead the charge into the ghost roads. Crazy and stupid and unbelievably brave. But now he’s . . .

  “We should have heard from them by now, Giles,” she said, hanging her head in despair.

  They had no idea what had happened to Willow and Cordelia, and even if they made it to the Gatehouse, Cordelia’s cell phone didn’t work there. There had been no answer on the regular ground line, and Buffy feared the worst.

  Xander might be dead.

  Her mother was a prisoner, and might as well be dead, if Buffy couldn’t find her.

  The world was falling apart around her, Hell trying desperately to spill into Earth. The Gatekeeper was on his deathbed. It all seemed so hopeless.

  Buffy lifted her head. No, she told herself. Never hopeless.

  “I’ll take him,” she said. “Get him here.”

  Giles nodded, but there was no sense of victory in his manner. He went to reach for the phone—

  “And, Giles?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Find her.”

  Before he could answer, the swinging doors of the library opened again, and Angel stepped in. But he wasn’t alone. Micaela and Jacques were with him. The looks on each of their faces made Buffy freeze.

  “Oh, Rupert,” Micaela said fretfully.

  “What is it?” Giles asked. “What now?”

  It was Angel who answered. “It’s the Gatekeeper,” he said, turning to crouch and put an arm across the shoulders of the heir to the Gatehouse.

  “He’s dead.”

  “Dear God,” Giles whispered.

  Buffy closed her eyes. “We’re too late.”

  * * *

  “Oh, God, Willow, what’s wrong with him?” Cordelia shrieked, grabbing Willow’s shoulder.

  “I don’t know, I don’t know!”

  The girls looked down at Xander, who lay in the Cauldron of Bran the Blessed. He had been there throughout most of the day. At first, they’d thought him dead. But then he’d moved, just a little. And a little more. But now . . . this.

  His body was shaking violently in the Cauldron, spasming, his arms and legs pivoting, his head slamming back against the iron walls of the Cauldron. He should have shattered his entire body by now. But he hadn’t.

  Xander’s eyes were wide open and he stared at them. Plaintively, he spoke. “Will. Cor. Help me.”

  Tears coursed down Willow’s cheeks. Cordelia’s makeup was running down her face in black streaks. Both girls tried to reach into the Cauldron, tried to hold Xander down, but it was no use.

  The door to the chamber, the Gatekeeper’s bedroom, slammed open and a punishing wind whipped against them, blowing them both back slightly from the Cauldron. Willow leaned forward and gripped the edge of its rim. She grabbed Cordelia, and then they were both hanging on.

  “Oh God, oh God, oh God, Xander!” Willow said, terrified for him. Then she looked at Cordelia again. “We’ve got to get him out of there!”

  “Get his arms!” Cordelia shouted over the galeforce wind.

  Lamps shattered. A large bust of some Egyptian god crashed through the window and flew out into the courtyard.

  “Where did Antoinette go? The ghost? We need to know what’s happening!” Willow yelled.

  “Just get him!” Cordy replied.

  The two girls reached into the Cauldron and grasped Xander by the wrists. Both were instantly jerked upright by an electrical shock that ran through their bodies. The surge threw them back, away from the Cauldron.

  With a sudden hush, the wind died.

  The house began to shake.

  Inside the Cauldron, Xander let out a long, chilling scream.

  “Willow, look!” Cordelia cried.

  The ghost of Antoinette Regnier floated through the open door and into the room. There were gossamer tears on her face, and yet, despite the tears and the rumbling of the house beneath them, the ghost seemed strangely content.

  “Is this the end?” Willow asked her. “Have we . . . did we lose?”

  Cordelia stared at her. “You don’t think . . .”

  Antoinette floated now above the Cauldron, looking down at Xander with kind eyes. Tendrils of blue light shot suddenly from every corner of the room, from the ceiling above and the floor beneath, and together they struck the Cauldron. It lit up in an aura of crackling blue light, and then, as the girls looked on, Xander floated up out of the Cauldron, jerking as the magick swirled around him.

  He floated on the air.

  And he smiled.

  “My son Jean-Marc has joined me now,” whispered the ghost. “The Gatekeeper is dead. But when last he immersed himself in that Cauldron, he left a part of himself behind, a bit of his life force drained away. The Cauldron saved your friend, but it also washed him in my son’s life force.

  “The house did it, you see. The Gatehouse thought that he was one of us, that he was a Regnier.”

  “What do you mean?” Cordelia demanded. “The house can’t think! It isn’t alive!”

  “No. But the magick is alive. The spell that Richard Regnier wove so very long ago. All the power and knowledge of the Gatekeeper will pass to the heir. Without Jacques here, the house sought out the heir.”

  Willow stared at Xander, blue fire crackling around him.

  “Xander,” she whispered. “It thought Xander was the heir.”

  “What?” Cordelia cried. “Willow, that’s insane.”

  “No,” Willow replied. “It’s true. Otherwise, the world would have been destroyed.”

  “Xander?” Cordelia asked, plaintively, looking up at him where he hung above the Cauldron.

  He looked down on them and smiled beatifically. Tendrils of blue magickal fire snaked out to stroke their faces, to touch their hair, but they did not burn.

  The house stopped shaking when Xander spoke.

  “I am the Gatekeeper.”

  Chapter 6

  JOYCE SUMMERS’S WORLD HAD BEEN Reduced to the walls of the labyrinth. There were only two things she believed in now that this was her world: that Buffy and the others would figure out a way to save her, and that there was another exit somewhere. She had to believe those things, or she would go mad.

  Where the labyrinth had appeared, in what remained of the once glorious Sunnydale Twin Drive-In, there were no streetlights, nor even very much light from Route 17, not far off. In the darkness, her only savior was the glow of the full moon, which shone down
on her through a clear night sky. Examining it now, Joyce thought she saw, dimly outlined, the features of a skull on the face of the moon.

  There is a man in the moon after all, she thought. A dead man.

  The walls were smooth as marble, impossible to climb. She had long since lost track of the maze itself, but had kept her wits about her enough to find a way to anchor her sense of direction. Though it wasn’t heavily traveled, there was a certain amount of traffic on Route 17. The passing cars let her set in her mind where she was in relation to the highway, the projection booth, and the entrance that had been used to put her in here.

  In here with the monster. The Minotaur.

  She had heard it grunting not long after first entering the labyrinth, but there had been little sign of it since. Other than the smell, of course. The entire maze had a dank, musky odor, and the well-trodden earth beneath her shoes seemed to have that scent buried in every inch of dirt. Hard-packed earth. Joyce hoped that she would hear it coming. That would be her only chance of survival.

  Survival. A part of her thought that she should give up on the idea. For Buffy’s sake, she ought to sacrifice herself, just surrender. As long as she lived—as long as she was bait—she was a liability. But another part of her, the stronger part, wanted desperately to live, and knew that Buffy would want her to fight. The Slayer would never surrender. She wouldn’t want her mother to do so either.

  So Joyce went on.

  Time and again she explored blind alleys in the labyrinth. Time and again she wound about, believing she had found a path through to the other side of the maze, or at least into its center. But each time she got turned around and was forced to retrace her steps, keeping the sound of the cars behind her as much as possible.

  It only made sense to think there was another gate on the other side. But it was pure fantasy to think that gate might be open, or more accessible. Still, it was all she had to cling to, to keep her from drowning in hopelessness.

  The musk of the Minotaur grew even more powerful, so that Joyce began to breathe through her nose. With the sound of the cars at her back, she moved closer to the center. The walls were cold and slick around her, the moonlight making them look almost alive. At each corner, Joyce would pause, heart beating rapidly, and listen for the man-beast. After several seconds, she would peek around the edge. Then she would move on.