by LW Herndon
They had thrown a jacket over me, maybe to strangle me into silence or just to shield my disgusting body from their sight. Whichever goal, the result had covered me in a smell so foul I’d lost what little I held in my stomach.
The action precipitated interest in me.
I shook away the memories and turned onto Sierra Madre Boulevard, heading north. Still five minutes away and no new response from Chaz. I don’t possess precognition, but even without it, something felt terribly off. I turned down a side alley to avoid a collection of police cars up ahead. The two vehicles didn’t have their lights on, but I couldn’t afford the delay.
Traveling a darker set of backstreets, I wafted back to the incident that had afforded me clan status.
My response and desperation to get away from the jacket had drawn first Abraxas’s, then Shalim’s attention. Their scientific “tests” were rudimentary and brutal. The jacket followed me like a bad plague, the stench of burnt, rancid flesh overlaid with petroleum and a silica mix of asphalt. Each time they covered me, I recoiled at the smell. Only when I didn’t wake up from their latest attempt did the jacket leave. Small measures of water appeared, followed by some liquid gruel, the composition of which I still don’t want to know.
I recovered enough to be alert, to accept a frayed blanket, and to crawl away from the jacket when presented. Finally, when I was strong enough to pull myself up to kneel, the tests evolved. Fortunately, so did the food and water. My compensation for locating the jacket, hidden in a series of lab-rat exercises, was more food, clothing, and warmth.
What more could one want?
The jacket had belonged to a sorcerer who claimed one of Shalim’s younger emissaries. The victim hadn’t been a warrior-class demon but one whose youth and lack of skill had made him an easy and vulnerable pawn. His skills, ones of dreams and visions, were neither a threat nor an exploitable great power. His possession had been vicious and slow, draining him until he was a husk. His demon body had been left to die chained on a remote southern-facing cliff over the Pacific Ocean, half a mile from a major fault line exit in a show by the Consortium to instill fear into Shalim’s soldiers and other demon clans.
The result had been fierce hatred and a reinforced commitment to eradicate the Consortium from the face of the planet. I’d heard only bits and pieces of the episode long after it had taken place. The hate and heat hadn’t diminished over time. Demons never forget.
Once satisfied with my detection skills, Shalim had accepted my addition to the clan and relegated my status to something between slave and treasured pet. My rank earned me a guarded place by the courtyard fire, an upgraded blanket, and constant supervision. Two demons monitored my every move. My bowel movements even garnered enough scrutiny to unhinge a normal person.
I didn’t care. I was alive. Once they’d also determined I didn’t respond to mind control, they left off with the shock attacks. My life was fairly good. Granted they treated me like a slave, though a somewhat valued slave. Better treatment than I’d received from the human tribe that had signed my death warrant.
I had value. Shalim wanted me alive, so I received food and protection, along with personal watchdogs and training. I learned to fight and operate within a team through grueling months of harsh physical conditioning, rigorous example, and laborious repetition. As with any decent soldier.
Everything I achieved was hard-won. From such struggle came pride and loyalty and a miniscule amount of begrudged respect.
I pulled into a strip mall one block away from the Walmart and canvassed the empty parking lot and store entrance. Plywood, chains, and locks sealed the glass front and double doors.
No scent of Chaz lingered on the breeze.
While invisibility isn’t a trainable skill, I could control my environment. With a quick calculation, I let my knife fly. From the extra bit of force behind my throw, the bulb in the parking light closest to the side of the building shattered. It was a shame to waste a good blade, but given my next step was to scale the building to the roof, I needed the cover of darkness more than the weapon. That, and any use of my powers to reclaim it would resonate energy and attract attention.
I reached the gravel asphalt of the roof, pulled up the rope, and disengaged the grappling hook, fitting the palm-size piece of metal into my pocket. Demons had an incredible array of skills, but human beings made and sold tools for even the most power-challenged of the rest of us.
After a quick break of the lock holding the roof door closed, I proceeded, silent and alert, down the service stairs that paralleled the electrical conduits for the building. The stairway ran the full height of the wall, shielded behind man-size perforated steel panels. The conduit disguised the daily ugliness of the utility housing from the general buying public inside. I worked my way down several levels of stairs and squinted through the perforated holes to check the building’s interior when I passed each panel.
An abandoned building like this provided perfect cover for the Consortium. Their aggravated sense of ego preferred the vaulted ceiling—a personal cathedral. The lack of public attention ensured no accidental surveillance.
Then again, their failure to think vertically to secure the roof just reinforced my judgment that they weren’t the planners behind the demon-Irin episodes.
One floor from the ground level, I stopped again and searched for Chaz. It took me several tries, but I found his vibration hidden not far from me, behind the AC compressor and backup generator equipment outside the stairwell. Luckily the units hiding him from me also hid him from the three sorcerers in the center of the vacant store.
I took another big whiff and waited for an armed security thug to pass by, using the time to focus on the sorcerers.
Two were visibly old. Long white wisps of hair stood out on a stoop-shouldered one, who used an empty display case to prop himself up. Despite his disheveled appearance, he seemed to hold the highest rank, given the deference the other two offered him. They waited on his words, and nodded in concert with his discourse.
Of the remaining two, one had equally white hair shorn to a tight buzz cut. Only a blond streak on his white hair and the wrinkled texture of his face marked his features as unnatural.
The final man was younger still but possessed the long facial structure, high cheekbones, and aquiline nose as the others. Relatives?
Possible, though I hated to think what a family unit of domination, greed, and cruelty produced.
They appeared to be in a heated discussion. It might seem a normal business chat if not for the armed guards at the front and rear of the building, the makeshift four-foot altar graced with black candles, and a series of self-contained magic circles painted on the floor by their feet.
I had intimate familiarity with those circles, their use in the summons, and entrapment of demons, among other things. I had followed Shalim into an identical one and pulled him free at the last moment when the Consortium had tried an attempt on him. Evidently, I’m not affected by inducement or summoning circles, but the heat and ripple of Shalim’s power and rage as I wrestled him free is something I can still feel as a strange ache in my bones.
The emptiness of the building gave me a great view. Unfortunately, it would also enhance any sound I made.
The men’s voices escalated. The two younger ones moved closer to the oldest, arguing some fine point. The discussion was just out of my range to comprehend clearly. Only snippets drifted through the open space.
“Perry, if…”
The oldest sorcerer’s voice rose. “Persistence will prove out, Bartholomew. We need very little to succeed.”
The youngest cringed at the censure.
“Don’t even try to smooth everything over, Langston,” said Perry.
The middle sorcerer closed his mouth. A tight thin line showed his displeasure, but he kept his own counsel better than the youngest.
I took the opportunity to open the utility door and sidle closer to Chaz. He caught my movement from the corner of his eye
, the snarl of his lips an instinctive reaction to his fright. Whatever adrenaline had propelled him into this building had dissipated while he’d hidden and watched for an opportunity to escape.
I made my way over, still four feet from his side. I couldn’t get any closer without stepping out in the open. In response to my motion for him to shift, his eyes flared with flame. His expression momentarily disoriented, then he shook his head once and glanced at me as if just seeing me. I gestured again, more emphatically, until he nodded once.
A quick shift and his body elongated and folded; his rice-paper star tattoo wavered in the air. Squatting low, I stretched out my hand. The tip of the star snagged my index finger. The design floated over my hand and along my arm. The sensation sizzled against my skin, but the risk of capture kept me focused enough to ignore my nerves. I felt him move along my shoulder, warmth trailing in the wake of his path as he burrowed along the side of my neck beneath my ear.
The oldest sorcerer looked toward the generator where Chaz had hidden. With a wave of his hand, he stopped the others in their discussion.
I’d made my way farther from the site by the time the sorcerer had motioned the guards to check. Unfortunately, that left me with only the front and rear doors for exit, since Chaz’s location had been in front of my stairway to the roof. I had no path to reach either door unnoticed because the clearance event at Walmart had been very successful. Nothing remained to hide me except shelving racks bolted to the concrete floor. Even those were nestled in isolated groupings, the closest one not close enough.
I didn’t have a choice. Chaz was a veritable baby in demon skin and I had to get his ass out of there.
From a crouched position behind one shelf, I eyed the next set of taller units. The distance to the back door was reachable but still a good eight feet from my location. I flexed on the balls of my feet, prepared. Halfway through the vault, I felt a quicksilver sensation across my skin. I hadn’t made it to the next shelving when his royal pompousness, Sorcerer Perry, looked my way, his eyes bearing down on my location. I fell to the floor two feet from my target, expecting to hear his command.
None came.
I rolled to my feet and pushed up to discard the cover of subversion, only to realize that I couldn’t see my hands. Or my feet. Or any of the rest of me. A surge in power pulsed again from Chaz at my neck. Whatever he’d shared with me probably wouldn’t last very long. Not waiting to delve into the mystery of invisibility, I rushed through the shelving, almost sideswiped a guard, and ducked through the back door before it closed behind an entering guard.
I didn’t stop until I reached my bike and paused only long enough to turn the key, push-start the ignition, and hightail it out of there.
Relaying the Consortium site to Shalim would do no good. These sorcerers would be gone in an hour. Perry hadn’t seen me, but I was certain he’d detected my presence. And while I hadn’t seen a hint of who operated with them in the shadows, I now at least had faces to go with the latest deaths.
One bite at a time. That’s how you eat an elephant.
***
I drove my SUV along the dirt lane. Rocks and small branches crackled and crunched beneath the tires as the vehicle made its way around the small lake and higher toward the end of the tree line.
While leaving Chaz at the fault line and directing him to Abraxas, I’d received another message from Decibel. Jez had come up with the bright idea to check out Markowski’s home. He was one of the few Irin to be killed without his family, or so Jez conjectured.
I wasn’t willing to stir the pot on the errors in that judgment, but the idea of Jez going back into a potentially bad situation didn’t strike me as smart either. I’d been vocal with Decibel and insisted she be the same with Sol. Neither had been able to convince the up-and-coming Irin to change her mind. I felt a tug to go with them, but given my most recent exposure to the Consortium’s members, I ranked Anne’s risk higher.
After all, Jez had both Decibel and Sol with her. They should be able to cover one girl for a few hours.
I pulled over before I reached the clearing and parked. I walked the rest of the way and listened for sounds behind and ahead. If my clan or some other was tracking me, I needed to know before I reached the clearing.
Only silence surrounded me.
I ran the events of the last few hours through my mind, painfully aware of the overwhelming number of unanswered questions and growing problems. Foremost in my mind was the order from Shalim for me to intercept the Consortium’s local participants and blow open their plan. He’d expected me to do that full-time, not augment my twenty-four-hour days to help a newly emerging Irin, run interference between teenage drifters and drug dealers, safeguard Consortium victims, and ally myself with a demon of unknown clan ties. The coup de grâce—I was now prepared to instruct a fledgling wizard. Every step I took moved me from bad to worse.
I stepped into the clearing and headed for the small patrol cabin, which had seen better days. Some years back, the park administration targeted this area for recycling. The cabin, no longer useful for the maintained trails, had been earmarked for disassembly to discourage squatters.
I’d run across the location before the final execution of orders and set up a glamour of sorts. To humans, the cabin and clearing no longer existed. Others saw deep overgrown thickets with thick vines and sharp needles, not tantalizing to even the most industrious trailblazer. I came back periodically to make sure my wards and glamour still functioned. I didn’t have many skills, but the ones I did have, I’d perfected. Chaz, in a moment of weakness, had taught me how to create wards and focus my energy on them. With the exception of Decibel, I’d been fairly successful with them. Sol and Jez might have considered themselves skilled, but I’d allowed and expected their entry.
For that reason, I’d given Anne the choice to meet me here.
To say that she’d been reluctant was putting it nicely. She’d flat-out refused. Three times.
My ultimatum was clear. Either she came here, or the next time the Consortium came for her, I would not be there to help. The choice was ultimately hers.
I questioned why I kept trying, but deep down, I knew if I didn’t help her, the Consortium would come for her. Anne Kidd would end up dead or another pawn in their game. Or worse, they’d see her for what she was and turn her into one of them, growing their organization by one. I couldn’t allow that to happen. Even though what I had planned was equally harebrained, I didn’t see another option.
Giving her general directions, I’d left a crystal on her kitchen counter for her to bring with her, and told her look for the signs that I would leave along the way. The crystal was half of a whole, the second piece I kept in the cabin. It was a test of Anne’s ability, to see if she could make it here.
The crystal functioned like a divining rod to seek its other half, driven to reunite and be whole. At junctions closer to the cabin, the crystal would radiate a frequency and glow. She needed only to follow the crystal, for I’d left no other signs.
The cabin remained as I had left it and in far better shape than the park service had last observed it.
I had replaced the rotted support beam in the ceiling, patched the roof, and bolstered the framing for the loft sleeping area. The walls had received more insulation and replacement windows. Two solar panels on the roof powered a generator large enough to handle the small refrigerator in the kitchenette along one wall, lighting, and several outlets. I’d also added two large cylinders along the back of the cabin, which collected rainwater from downspouts off the roof. The generator powered a flow system for the tanks, enough to keep it mosquito-free, and a motor to siphon and filter the water for use in the tub and sink.
It wasn’t seamless, but the cabin was functional for small stints of time.
The toilet—well, I left the outhouse for the time being. Sewage was a little beyond my desire to dabble in. I have my limits.
I pulled the other half of the crystal from the built-in she
lving flanking the fireplace on one wall and watched it for a few seconds. It lay warm in my hand, not cold or cool like normal rock. This rock was active, its origins a cavern deep within the earth’s blanket. A dark and dangerous place that I’d survived. The rock remained one of the only things to survive my life before Shalim had added me to his clan.
The crystal vibrated in my hand as light surged from within. The mate was close. I tucked the crystal in my pants pocket, put the few things I’d brought with me in the fridge, and went to wait on the steps outside.
She didn’t appear for several more minutes, and she paused outside the line of wards, hesitant and perplexed. The wards still held, but the crystal would diminish the effect. In essence, she would be able to see the cabin and clearing through the thickets and vines.
It was a test of faith.
Just cross through the veil of thickets and reach the cabin.
Or refuse to see what was in front of you and go home and wait to die.
I watched her reach out a hand to the thicket and flinch, expecting the thorns to rip her skin. Confusion crossed her features. She pulled her hand away and turned it over to check for wounds. With firmer conviction, she dropped her hand to her side and turned sideways. Squinting, she proceeded slowly through the veil.
I waited on the steps. Waited for her to realize she’d made it through and notice that normal life existed in the clearing. Frankly, the wildlife paid no attention to either my wards or the veil, coming and going as they pleased.
As she drew closer, I pulled the crystal’s mate from my pocket and held it out to her.
Again she hesitated, but curiosity overcame her reluctance, and she reached out for the crystal. It snapped, a magnet to its mate, in a seamless seal. With a glow, an iridescent rainbow of colors, it flickered and then extinguished.
“Well. That was a little over the top. So now you’ll explain why people want to kill me?”
I stood up, motioned her into the cabin, and then followed her as she looked around. “Not people. The Consortium, among others.”
