"Rather an alliance. The neo-Travelers, certain Powers, and quite possibly the White Ravens. Now Jack's eyebrows went up. The White Ravens very rarely ventured from their own world, usually content to interact with this one through their dark children. The Old Man said, "It would make sense, for the Ravens control the winds."
"And so the whirlwind cage."
"Precisely. First trap it, then imprison it in the wall. Only—it found an escape hatch. Somehow it managed to break off a piece of its own prison, the wall, and send that into the world. The wall contained onyx—another indication that the Ravens were involved—and so the black stone became the link."
"Was it always a ring?"
"No, no, that is a relatively modern configuration, an adaptation, we might say, to cultural adornments." Jack knew that by "modern" he meant the last five thousand years or so. The Old Man said, "In one form or another, the link attached itself to a possible host. This human would know nothing of this, only an intense experience of something missing. Almost all have simply died, and then the link found its way to someone else. Did your Carol Acker say where she got the ring?"
"A thrift shop."
"Yes, that would work. Anonymous, unassuming."
"So let me see if I get this, "Jack said. "The link—the ring, or whatever—goes from one host to another and each one dies with no harm done. Except every now and then some asshole decides to help one of them resolve that awful feeling of something missing Is that it?"
"Yes."
"So now it's up to me, the current asshole, to destroy it."
"That cannot be done. What you can accomplish is to re-imprison it. And soon, before it becomes so strong that we have another Haarlindam. Or worse. But you cannot do this yourself, it is already too strong."
"So you' re offering to help me?"
"Yes."
Jack leaned forward. "And then what—at some future time you show up and remind me that I owe you?"
The Old Man shook his head. "No, no, I am already in your debt. Besides, having this creature loose in the world doesn't suit me any more than it suits you."
"Okay then. Where do we start?"
"I can offer you two things. A tool, and firepower." He opened a small drawer in the end table next to the couch and took out a lump of black rock. As he handed it to Jack he said, "Like the ring, it comes from the cave wall. This will help you transport Ms. Acker to the cave, and then to separate her from the parasite and force it back into its prison."
"Just like that, huh?"
"No. You will have assistance. Frank? Benny?"
The door at the back of the room opened, and two men stepped into the room. Had they been waiting on the other side, or had the Old Man used their names as a summoning spell? Didn't matter, Jack decided. They were white, and both around six feet tall, but there the resemblance ended. One was thin and handsome, with curly black hair, and dressed in high end jeans and a navy blazer over a pale red polo shirt. The other was stocky and muscular, with wide shoulders, a face that was broad and hard, a nose that had been broken more than once, and brown hair thinning on top. He wore old jeans, heavy shoes, and a leather jacket over a dark T-shirt. The Old Man said, "These are the Pope brothers." He extended a bony finger, first toward the thin one, then the other. "Frank, Benny."
Frank Pope nodded and said, "It's an honor to meet you, Mr. Shade." His brother—if in fact, that was true—said nothing, only nodded. Frank added, "My brother doesn't talk much, but he's quite useful, especially in a fight."
Jack said, "Frank Pope, Benny Pope, are you guys named after—"
"Actually," said Frank, "I'm afraid it's kind of the other way around."
Jack glanced at the Old Man, who allowed himself a momentary smile. "Sure," Jack said, "I guess it figures. So they're, what, backup?"
"Don't underestimate them," the Old Man said.
"I won't. When do we start? How do we find her?"
"I'm afraid that won't be a problem." The Old Man reached for his iPad and opened it to show Jack the screen. The sound was off, but a streaming banner on the bottom read Breaking News: Brutal Attack On New Hampshire Town—No Claim of Responsibility—Mysterious Message—‘Warming Up, Jack.'
The shaking was back. Jack tried to control it, but it only got worse. Fuck it, he thought. He said, "The Queen told me three days."
"And she was right," the Old Man said. He set down the iPad. "This is just a practice session."
"So what, I go there—with your Pope boys—and we take her on? How do we know she'll still be there?"
Softly, the Old Man said, "Because she's proud of her work, Jack. She wants you to see. You are her rescuer, after all."
Jack clenched his fists to keep from hitting him. Or trying to. "All right," he said. "I guess this is our shot. How do we get there?"
The Old Man smiled for a moment, then said "I'll take care of that."
"I should have realized," Jack said. Then, "I have to go outside for a moment."
"If you're going outside to ask Archie for increased strength that'd probably be a good idea."
"Christ," Jack said, "is there anything you don't know?"
"In my woods? Please. Do you think your Djinni is the only entity disguised as a tree? Perhaps I myself am a tree and you are talking to a puppet. Perhaps, unlike Archie, I have always been a tree. Perhaps that is the true meaning of the Old Man of the Woods."
Jack stepped out without answering.
Outside, it had gotten dark, and Jack swayed with a moment's vertigo. How much time had passed? He remembered the Sun in the sky as he'd approached the porch. Was it even the same day? It had to be. Why would the Old Man offer to help him, then speed up time so Carol Acker, or the thing inside her, would reach full power before Jack could get there?
In the dark, it was hard to tell the trees apart, so that Jack finally had to say, "Archie. Show yourself, please. And that's not a wish, it‘s a request."
The Djinni's voice came from the left. "And my pleasure to grant it, effendi."
Jack turned to face him. The Djinni stood motionless, with his hands clasped loosely in front of him. A quarter Moon had risen, which it was well into the evening, and there was just enough light to show Archie's hair stirred slightly by a breeze. Jack said, "The Old Man knows you're here. Knows you were a tree."
"Of course. These are his woods, after all."
"Yeah, kind of what he said. Look, is there a way you can block him hearing what we say?"
"I believe so, yes."
"And can we do that without it being an official wish?"
The Djinni smiled. "Perhaps I myself do not wish to be overheard."
Jack smiled back. "Thanks, Archie."
Archie's face became serious. "But please understand, effendi, there is a limit to how many favors I may grant. I remain under contract, after all, to Suleiman International, and the terms do not just govern the clients."
"Don't worry," Jack said. "I'll need my second wish soon enough. I'll even tell you what it is. Power. It's what the Old Man thinks I came out here for, but I'd rather wait until I really need it. So when I say ‘Now,' I want you to give me energy to resist whatever Carol acker throws at me. Agreed?"
"Of course. But if all you wanted was to adjust the timing, why close off our conversation?"
"Because that's not the reason. I need to ask you something. Can you tell if the Old Man is lying? Does he really want to stop Carol, or is he playing me? I don't know if you realize it, but he's done this thing with time. Speeded it up." The Djinni nodded. "So I need to know, is he actually going to help?"
The Djinni closed his eyes and bent his head forward. When he looked up again slight stress lines had formed around his mouth and eyes. With what seemed a conscious effort he smoothed them away. He said, "It is—difficult to venture too deeply into such a convoluted mind. There are�
�traps. If you will, effendi, tell me, please, how much time has passed since you asked me that question?"
"Only a few seconds," Jack said.
"Ah. Thank you. Let me say that as far as I can discern, the Old Man did not lie to you. He does indeed wish to help you. He does wish to see the creature returned to its confinement. Only—and I cannot be certain about this—he may wish to delay that confinement until the last possible moment. Exactly why I could not say."
"And that moment would be?"
"Shortly before it reaches full power. Sometime in the next several hours."
Jack made a noise. "Okay. Thanks. And the Pope brothers?"
"They are sincere. They wish to follow their Master's orders and do not seek to understand his motives."
"All right, then," Jack said. "I guess that's as good as I'm going to get." He started to head for the porch but turned and said, "Oh, and as long as you grant my second wish at the moment I need it, you're free to do what you like for now. Roam the world, see the sights."
The Djinni smiled. "That would be most pleasant."
Once again, Jack stopped himself before going inside. "Oh, and Archie?"
"Yes, effendi?"
"Thank you. And call me Jack. If that doesn't break your contract."
"You are most welcome, Jack."
Inside, the Old Man stared at Jack for a few seconds before he said, "Very well, then. Are you ready?"
"That thing you did with time," Jack said. "Speed it up. Why did you do that?"
When the Old Man didn't answer, Frank said to his boss, "What's he talking about?"
Jack told him "We had a whole day left to stop Carol—that thing—before it reached full power. But your Chief accelerated time while we were chatting, so now it's down to the wire." He stared at the Old Man. "Right?"
The Old Man sighed. "There would have been no point in sending you too soon. The creature simply would have gone dormant, hidden away inside Ms. Acker. You would have thought yourselves victorious while merely teaching it to be cautious."
Frank and Benny looked at each other, then Frank said, "We could have just killed her. The Acker woman."
"You do not understand," the Old Man said. "Once it's out it's out. If you'd killed Ms. Acker it would have jumped into someone else. Perhaps Mr. Shade. They have a bond, after all." Before Jack could say anything, the Old Man went on, "It needs to fully expose itself, to be almost ready. Only then can you return it to its prison." He looked at Jack. "That is what Margarita Mariq meant by three days. Not a time frame, but the moment at which to act. That was the reason for Haarlindam. The Dutch Travelers and their allies knew they had to allow it to reveal itself before they could send it back to the cave."
Frank said, "What the fuck is Haarlindam?"
The Old Man shook his head. "Of no importance. You had best be going. I pushed time to bring you to the correct moment, but if you delay . . . "
Jack said, "Where is she?"
"I just showed you. Willowtown, New Hampshire is the name, I believe."
"She hasn't left."
"Oh no, Jack. She wants you there. To witness. You're her rescuer."
"Can you send us there?"
"Of course." He pointed to a plain wooden door to the right of the bar. Jack could not swear it had been there before. "You'll find that opens to where you want to be."
Jack looked at Frank and Benny. "Ready?"
Benny grunted, and Frank said, "Let's go."
4.
The noise and the lights hit Jack the hardest. Helicopters, vans, bullhorns, armies of police and FBI, and all the media, all of them struggling for control, for something they could understand. And then the smell—blood, organs, slaughter. There were bodies, and pieces of bodies, everywhere, on the streets, the lawns. They were in some well-trimmed neighborhood, neat rows of two-story houses, lawns raked free of leaves, glassed-in porches, all set for an early New Hampshire winter.
And oddly, the first thought that came to Jack was not about the dead, or the cops, or even Carol Acker, but rather COLE's not here. He knew what they would do, of course. Mind slam everyone—cops, media, survivors—so it all became a terrorist attack, and the pols could make speeches, and the people could light candles and vow revenge. There were Travelers who believed that COLE had created and maintained a Jihadist group and a couple of right-wing militias just so they could have people to take credit for things no one would understand. So where were they? Maybe they'd already been and gone. Maybe they wouldn't even have to do anything, the Linear world would just believe what they needed to believe about something so terrifying. Or maybe—maybe COLE was keeping away because they were scared.
Frank Pope said, "Jack! Where is she? Can you see her?"
But before Jack could even look around some guys in suits—FBI? NSA?—spotted them, and came running, guns out, yelling, "Who the fuck are you?" and "On the ground! Now!" and "Where did you come from?"
"Shit," Frank Pope said, and turned to his brother. "Benny, shut them up, will you?"
Jack saw Benny reach under his jacket, and from some holster Jack was pretty sure hadn't existed a moment ago, take out a gun. It looked a little like Dirty Harry's .44 Magnum, but the cylinders were different colors, and the barrel was shorter and thicker. Jack knew what it was, though he'd never seen one up close before—a Gun of the Morning, the weapon of choice for La Societé de la Matin. "No!" Jack said, "They're innocent. COLE will—"
"Fuck COLE," Benny said, in a voice softer and higher than Jack would have expected. He fired once, a silent blast of blue light that filled the air, bright as the Sun if only for an instant. Everyone froze—the cops, the agents, the media people, even the helicopters in the sky. They might have been a frame from some big budget zombie apocalypse movie.
"There," Frank said, "Now we can goddamn think."
And then she was there, weaving her way slowly through the bodies on the ground, the frozen mob of outsiders. She wore a black dress with no coat, and high red boots (absurdly, Jack thought how that was smart, she wouldn't have to worry about staining them with blood), and she'd cut her hair shorter, the sides angled longer from back to front, and she, or some salon person, had made her up in a way that was both subdued and sharp as a knife.
As she approached them she raised her hands and clapped, three times. "Oh Jack," she said, "you came. My hero, my rescuer, and now my witness. Sweet loyal Jack. I can't tell you how good it is to see you."
Benny fired again, black light this time. It surrounded Carol, and for a second she swayed, and looked about to fall. But then she shook herself, and the light cracked like a thin shell and fell in actual shards that vanished as soon as they touched the ground. "Seriously?" she said. "Against me?" Benny didn't answer. She turned to Jack. "Your new homies?"
"We're here to take you back, "Jack said.
"Oh, but sweetie, you just set me free."
"We all make mistakes," Jack said.
"Not you, Jack. You did it exactly right. And you know what? Because of you, and your steadfast loyalty, I'm almost ready. You should be proud."
Frank Pope said, "Shade! She's mind-fucking you. Do it!"
Jack looked at him, then back at Carol, who tilted her head slightly, still smiling at him. "Do what, Jack?" she said. She spun her head around on her shoulders, Linda Blair style, and when it was facing him again, she said, "Would you like me to devour you?" She opened her mouth, and it seemed to get larger and larger, the teeth like sharp mountains and beyond them black smoke that swirled endlessly into darkness.
Jack didn't realize he was moving towards her until Benny yanked him backwards. "Archie!" Jack called out. "Now!"
Fire surged through him, a holy flame that burned out any confusion or fear. He laughed suddenly as he remembered that the Djinn, for all their ability to take on human form, were made of "smokeless fire," offshoots o
f the Original Flame. He reached inside his jacket and took out the black stone. "You've used Carol Acker long enough," he said. "It's time to go home."
For a moment, Carol's face twitched and changed shape, becoming larger and more ferocious at first, then almost formless, made of nothing more than teeth and wind. Then it was Carol again, and she screamed at him, "Where did you get that?"
"An old man gave it to me," Jack said. He stepped towards her, holding the stone in front of him. She began to spin, faster and faster, and Jack became scared she would escape them. But then Frank and Benny each fired their guns, blasts of light the color of a bruise, and the air itself screamed, and Jack wanted to drop the stone and cover his ears, but the Fire inside him held on. Carol stopped spinning and fell to the ground, on all fours on the blood-soaked grass.
And then they were falling, all of them, plummeting through worlds, one after another, some familiar, like the leather bar and the minuet, some new and strange, and so quick Jack couldn't make out what they were. In a few the little girl was there, begging Jack not to send her back, please, she said, she trusted him, he'd saved her, how could he give her back to the torturers, didn't he know the terrible things they would do to her? The Fire in Jack's arms held on to the black stone, and his ears of flame refused to listen.
They landed heavily, off balance, in a dark cave lit only by Jack's Fire until Frank found the switch for the lights the French archaeologists had set up along the walls. It was smaller than Jack had expected, only about twelve feet long, and three feet wide at its center, narrowing at each end to low tunnels. Carol Acker was on all fours, crumpled and scared. She looked up, her face frightened and wet as she stared at Jack who was still holding the black stone before him. His whole body was shaking but he refused to let go.
"Why are you doing this?" Carol said. "I don't understand." She looked at Frank and Benny, who stood on either side of her and fired dark purple light at her from their Guns of the Morning. The light became spiraling strands, winding tighter and tighter. Carol Acker's pleading voice said, "They're hurting me, Jack! They want to kill me. They're evil, can't you see it? You're not like them. You're not like them. You're better, Jack. I know you are. Make them stop. Please!" She sounded like a child who'd been viciously abused and just tasted freedom, only to have her rescuer inexplicably return her to her tormentors.
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