A Mystery of Light

by Brian Fuller

  “Right,” she said. “Why didn’t Avadan or Shedim or Dreads have any of these powers before? It’s the link between Avadan and King that has given him these new abilities. King is his link to a fount of darkness.”

  “So if we can Exorcise Avadan—”

  “No,” she interrupted, turning her brilliant green eyes on him. “I mean, yes, that needs to be done. What I’m saying is that it’s the merging of the two that gave him this power. Just like the merging of the two of us, the bonding, has given us this . . . whatever this is.”

  Helo took her hand. The bonding had given him her, and he really didn’t need anything else from it. But maybe it was Micah’s parity idea again. Avadan’s bond with King gave him power, and his and Melody’s bond did the same, like how connecting both ends of a battery activated something.

  “I agree,” he said, “but we still have the same problem. How do we use the power we have all around us here, out there?”

  “We’re bonded, right?” she said, turning to stand in front of him. She was glorious all the time, but here? She radiated a deep power.

  “A lot of Ash Angels have been,” he said.

  She kissed him. “Yes. But none of them are bonded and know about this, at least not that we know of. The point is, we’re bonded whether or not we’re in here. As an evil spirit attached to Avadan, King still has one foot in the darkness while Avadan walks the earth. We know we can come to this place alone, so . . .”

  He saw where she was going now. His eyebrows raised. It might work. As long as he was connected to her somehow.

  She smiled. “You’re so cute when you figure stuff out.”

  He concentrated and popped himself out of the meditation. The dark woods and loitering Ash Angels took a moment to become real to him again.

  “Fifteen minutes,” Faramir said, startling everyone. “It’ll be nice to get out of these creepy woods.”

  Helo ran his hand through his hair. What should he try? He ignited a hallow, and it poured out of him, running out into the forest in all directions, like a cup of white light had spilled out. It just kept going and going. His body felt warm, but the pool of power at his command seemed limitless.

  Everyone jumped to their feet. Sparks hefted his gun. “Something coming?”

  “No,” Helo said. “Relax. An experiment.”

  “To prove . . . what?” Faramir asked with knitted eyebrows.

  Helo killed the hallow—it might attract attention. He kept his hand on Melody’s and grinned. This was going to work. “Here it goes,” he said. With a thought, a katana of pure light, weightless yet thrumming with power, popped into his grip.

  “No way,” Faramir said.

  Helo let go of Melody. The blade stayed, but his connection to the infinite well of power was severed. Everyone gathered around.

  “New Bestowal?” Sparks said. “If it is, give it to me right now.”

  “No,” Helo said. “This is something different. I’ve got to talk to Melody. Give me a minute.”

  Faramir threw up his hands. “You can’t just—”

  Helo took Melody’s hand again and tuned him out. In moments he was back with Melody. It was now bright-blue daytime at their campsite, and she had made some improvements. She lounged in a hammock, hands behind her head. Instead of the golden dress, she now wore red flannel, denim shorts, and hiking boots with heavy tread. Their tent was now roughly the size of a bus, flaps pulled open to reveal rugs and brown leather recliners. A fancy bed with a thick mattress, a comforter as blue as the sky, and a dozen light-gray pillows artfully arranged on the top sat against one side.

  “Girl’s got to have some comforts,” she said. “And it appears there aren’t any real rules here. If you can think it, you can create it. I thought up a grizzly bear with the head of a unicorn, and it popped into existence. I mean, it looked totally wrong, so I got rid of it, but I could stay here forever. Wanna try out the bed?”

  Of course he did, but . . . “Hold that thought. Did you sense anything that I was doing out there?”

  She sighed. “Business again?”

  “I know,” he said. “Could you tell what I was doing?”

  “No,” she said, extricating herself from the hammock. “I was too busy having fun. What did you do?”

  He explained about the hallowing and the katana. “I think as long as we’re touching and one of us is in the meditation, the other has unlimited Virtus. I think I can undo Avadan’s desecration.”

  Her green eyes brightened. “Really?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Really.”

  “So we’re not leaving Saint Louis?”

  Chapter 41

  Hallowed Ground

  “So we’re not leaving Saint Louis?” Faramir said, frowning. “I was kind of looking forward to leaving Saint Louis. That many Ghostpackers in one place gives me the willies.”

  “We’re heading back in while most of them are asleep,” Helo said, his fingers threaded through Melody’s. “The good news is, the hallow will keep the evil spirits from influencing them.”

  “But will it be permanent?” Finny asked. “I don’t like the idea of going back in either. I don’t want to kill the Possessed. We go back in, we might have to.”

  “I don’t know,” Helo said. “This is all new to me too. But even if the hallow doesn’t stick around like his desecration, if this works, we’re going to take out a third of Avadan’s Vexus collectors. That’s a major win we can’t pass up. We do it here, pack up, and get to the next one.”

  “Won’t he just make more?” Andromeda asked.

  “Maybe,” Helo said, “but he needs energy to do it. It took him years of storing Vexus to get this far. We keep on his tail. If we keep these desecration fields down, he’ll run out.”

  “I’m in,” Andromeda said. “Better get your driving mojo on, Finny.”

  Finny executed a little bow. “You got it. Ready to—”

  “No,” Helo said. “Everyone with an aura, strip and put your hearts, clothes, and equipment in the back of the Durango. That should keep the Ghostpackers off our backs. Don’t forget to throw Shujaa’s heart in there.”

  Sparks glared at Helo. “Fine, but I really didn’t come all the way across the pond to see Faramir’s glorious butt.”

  Compared to getting out of Saint Louis, going back in was a piece of cake. Traffic was light, but Helo found himself tightly gripping the steering wheel every time they passed a car driven by Ghostpackers, and most of the cars were. Helo relaxed his jaw. An entire city full of Ghostpackers. The more he thought about Avadan’s plan, the more brilliant it was. Create zones of desecration that fed him Vexus. Use Possessed to create atrocities. Create more zones of desecration and on and on until he had access to a source of Vexus almost as endless as the source of light he and Melody had tapped into. Almost. Parity plus one. They were going to prove it.

  An unhappily naked Faramir had provided them with the rough center of the desecration before he surrendered his phone, something harder for him than giving up his weapon and only marginally easier than throwing his hat into the back of the Durango. How the poor guy would spend the last hours until darkness without his precious electronics was anyone’s guess. Maybe Finny and Sparks would let him in on their “Would You Rather” game. Before Helo got in the car, the two had started debating whether super speed or flying was the superior superpower. That was right up Faramir’s alley.

  From her place in the middle seat, Andromeda kept them up to date on all the Billy Wickett news. A massive outpouring of goodwill had propelled Billy Wickett aloft on a trending rocket to name recognition. The fiery blast had miraculously only singed the fortunate Billy and his band with minor burns. It was a little too miraculous, if anyone thought about it. Billy was anxious to put on another show, the proceeds to go to the victims of the blast. He was just waiting for morning to see if there was a venue that would help out. Helo could only imagine the offers that would roll in as soon as the sun came up.

  “Billy
Wickett is kinda hot,” Andromeda said. “If I didn’t know who he was, I’d be a fangirl even if it meant I had to listen to country. He’s going straight to superstardom if we don’t stop him soon.”

  “Yep,” Melody said, resolute face lit by the glow of her phone screen. “Take this off-ramp.”

  Helo pulled off, turned left at a stoplight, and headed downtown. A Possessed cop whizzed by in the opposite lane, jolting his heart. One of these days, their luck was going to run out, and they were going to have to explain to some bewildered civil servant why they had big weapons and a bunch of fresh hearts in the back of their car.

  Melody guided him through canyons of stone, steel, and glass until they arrived at the Saint Louis Public Library, a massive building of light-colored stone, arched windows, and a wide set of stairs leading up to three tall arches. He eyed the little park across the street. He needed to be in contact with the ground, and the modest rectangle of grass and trees would do.

  Helo parked, noting the meter. He turned off the engine and handed the keys to Andromeda. “Unless you have any quarters, keep a watch out for parking cops . . . and the usual bad guys. Ready, Melody?”

  “Can’t wait,” she said. And she sounded like she meant it.

  Touching his feet to the desecrated ground reminded Helo of why they were here, its ghostly black fog of filth a blight that had seeped into every alley and street. The worming evil pinched his face as they jogged across the street in their ridiculous country getups from the concert. If the cops showed up, they’d have to act drunk or hilariously lost. The little park was open and exposed, but Dreads and Shedim would avoid a hallow at all costs, and the Possessed would regain control of themselves when they entered. If he could do this fast, they’d be out before any bad guy could get within throwing distance.

  Helo lay down flat on his back, Melody next to him, to present a small profile. He took her hand and smiled at her, then closed his eyes and got down to business. It was like clockwork now. Spinning spheres. Focus on the sun. Fall into the sun. The campsite she had conjured up appeared around them exactly as they had left it.

  “You know, that bed is begging to be used,” Melody said, throwing him a sultry look. “I’ll just be in here hanging out while you’re at work . . .”

  He ran a finger down her cheek. “We’ll get there. Yeah, and I know. Six months. No one regrets it more than I do. Be back soon.”

  He kissed her and then fell out of the meditation and back into the warm spring night in Saint Louis. The city had a particular hum in the background, punctuated by the occasional car horn or roaring motorcycle. He held Melody’s hand tight and let the hallow flow across the ground. It expanded smoothly away from him, the desecration powerless before it, like weeds devoured by a wildfire blown on a gale.

  But the power was there, flowing into him from his bond with Melody. Never ending. No exhaustion. No need to ration it. He pulled it in and redirected it out. He had no idea how long he needed to do it or how far it had gone. His body warmed with each passing minute. A glow settled on his skin, and before too long, the warmth flared into a genuine heat. He was surprised the grass around him wasn’t burning. It was like he was walking toward some enormous bonfire, the heat more uncomfortable with every step.

  But he couldn’t stop. He glanced over at Melody, her face peaceful and content in the divine light. Then the flesh of his body started to peel like a piece of paper curling at a flame. He lifted the hand not holding Melody’s and watched it disintegrate, his muscles, his bones, his entire arm disappearing into nothingness. He had to stop before it consumed him completely. Had he done enough? Was the desecration gone? His legs were. The burning raced toward his heart and then consumed the hand that grasped Melody’s.

  The hallow faded away. Only his head and torso from the belly button up remained. He took a moment to extend his senses. The city had changed. The weight had lifted like a fog, a place coming out of a depressed funk. Saint Louis was . . . normal . . . again. But his hallow didn’t stick like the desecration had. Even so, Avadan had to know by now that one feeder city had been cleansed.

  The flushed sky looked ready to announce the arrival of dawn, but without hands, he couldn’t get to his phone to see the exact time. He needed to get his body and his team back and get out of Dodge in their stolen Durango.

  He wasn’t touching Melody, and still she meditated. They always touched when they meditated, but what would happen now? He closed his eyes and went through the meditation sequence. And there she was, regarding the sky with the same expression an artist would use to evaluate a sketch she had just drawn. It was night again in their shared world, and three moons, all crescents, glowed softly in the sky.

  “Too much?” she asked, pointing to the moons. “Two was weird and four too crowded. I guess I could vary the sizes and do, like, ten of them.”

  Helo put his arm around her waist. “I think you’re getting lost in here.”

  “It’s a great place to get lost,” she said, snuggling into him. “Did it work?”

  “Saint Louis is free of the desecration,” he said. “We’ve got to leave. But some good news. I’m not touching you right now, and here we are.”

  “That is awesome!” She leaned into him. “We really need to find some time to play around in here, Helo.” She turned her gaze back to the sky. “Stay there,” she said to the moons. “I’ll be back.”

  Then they were out. Andromeda was running toward them, and she didn’t have to explain why. Red eyes everywhere. The Possessed had come. Just a few. A couple of security guards walked down the steps from the library. Others exited nearby buildings. They didn’t come running—probably because they couldn’t tell if the three people lounging around were Ash Angels or not.

  “What happened to your body?” Melody said. She placed her hand on him and the healing energy flowed into him.

  “I’ll explain later.” He donned his shoes and pants, and they took off across the lawn. Mistake. As soon as they started running, so did the Possessed. “Melody, Hallow. We can at least keep them from getting close.” Working the partner hallow with Melody hadn’t replenished his flagging Virtus from their first escape from the Possessed. Dawn was almost here, and then he’d have all he needed. Andromeda jumped into the driver’s seat.

  Melody’s hallow extended out in a fifteen-foot radius. The Possessed closing in on them pulled back like it was lava. But the security guards pulled their pistols and let loose with a steady volley into the Durango. The windshield shattered, Andromeda ducking behind the steering wheel. One bullet clipped Melody’s shoulder, ripping her blouse as Helo pulled open the door for her. The guards stopped firing, reloading.

  They clambered in, but that ended the hallow on the ground. The Ghostpackers leapt forward, sprinting for the car. Helo slammed the door and locked it. “Go!”

  They couldn’t reverse without crushing the oncoming Possessed, so Andromeda pushed forward, taking out the parking meter, revving down the sidewalk, and arcing out into a clear section of the street. More bullets peppered the car. Helo took one to the leg, Melody one to the abdomen. It looked like Andromeda had a hole an inch behind her temple. She floored it, wind blasting into the cabin.

  Rapture.

  It wasn’t much of one.

  The Durango had drifted right, and Andromeda nearly flipped it overcorrecting. A light pole ground across the side.

  “What are you doing to my Durango?” Finny said. “And get your foot out of my face, Faramir.”

  The cargo area had become a tangle of three naked men, a bunch of clothes, and a pile of weapons. And one heart. Shujaa’s heart. Or was it? They had assumed it was. If it was, it could only mean one thing.

  “He’s a Dread,” Melody said quietly, eyes hard, like she had read his mind.

  A gray SUV swerved out of its lane and rocketed toward them. Andromeda yanked the wheel, and the SUV narrowly missed the mother of all T-bone accidents, clipping their back bumper. The Durango fishtailed, and everyone swa
yed back and forth while she worked the wheel to get it back on course.

  Sparks’s head popped over the seat. “So the hallowing worked. Brilliant.”

  “Yeah,” Helo said. “It worked.”

  “Can’t get my pants on if the car won’t hold still,” Faramir growled.

  “Driving is my job,” Finny said, climbing over the seat in his tighty-whities.

  A motorcycle angled at them, but the Durango won that battle, the bike and the driver tumbling off onto the sidewalk. The road looked clear ahead of them for a quarter mile, though the Possessed poured out of every building like ants out of a hole. Andromeda and Finny did a complicated driver switch while the car was still moving.

  “Watch the master at work,” Finny said, leaning hard on the pedal. Air blasted into the cabin, the engine roaring. Then smoking. Then sputtering. “No! No! No!” The Durango slowed, warning icons popping up on the dash like Christmas lights.

  “Behind us!” Sparks yelled.

  Helo had just turned his head when a delivery truck slammed into their bumper. The back glass shattered, and the Durango lurched forward and careened off the road, tires squealing as Finny yanked the steering wheel. Another parking meter paid the price, but Finny kept it in the right lane. The delivery truck ended up inside a coffee shop.

  “Yeah!” Finny yelled, pumping the gas. The suffering Durango shuddered, and with a final clunk and a clank, the engine died.

  Finny slammed the steering wheel.

  “Time for a jog,” Sparks said, handing out weapons. “Leave no guns behind!”

  “Get Shujaa’s heart,” Helo said.

  The Possessed swarmed the Durango, rocking it back and forth, pounding the windows. It was like a postapocalyptic movie except the zombies looked perfectly healthy and wore dull expressions, like they were reading a book on tax law. Two jumped on the hood. Helo knew they would torch, and he couldn’t let his team get crippled. He let loose a blast of Glorious Presence, and the Possessed staggered back.