Undone Deeds

by Del Franco, Mark

  He released a spherical burst of essence that knocked away the Dananns above, and we soared into the night sky, followed by Maeve’s scream of rage.

  43

  From the roof of a brownstone building on D Street, I watched thick smoke roll into the night sky toward the east. True to her word, Maeve’s troops had rampaged through the Weird, destroying whatever fell in their path. From Fort Point Channel to Blackhawk Terminal, the air burned an angry orange. Fire-engine lights flickered in a few spots, but not many. The city was protecting vital service locations like the power and sewer plants. It had no choice. The destruction was too widespread. The wind shifted, bringing an acrid stench with it.

  The sword had shrunk back to its dagger shape. I held it flat against my palm, staring at it, wondering at the path it had taken to arrive in my possession. The faith stone encased the base of the blade, a cold light burning in the heart-shaped stone. It lit the runes inscribed on the blade, soft blue glimmers that resonated with power and memory.

  Despite its beauty, it made me feel shame. The sword and the stone belonged together. Together, they were something greater than their individual parts. Together, they formed the image of the document Meryl found in the Guildhouse archives. Meryl hadn’t been trying to kill me. On some unconscious level, she had understood that the two wards needed to be joined, and Nigel’s compulsion had tried to force her to do it.

  I focused my thoughts on a mote of essence in my mind. I visualized Meryl’s body signature, wrapped the sense of it around my thoughts, and pushed them out.

  I didn’t understand, I sent. I colored the sending with earnestness and apology.

  She answered immediately. We both screwed up. If you can forgive me for almost stabbing you in the head, I guess I can forgive you for your anger about it.

  A door opened and closed behind me, a brief flash of light sweeping across the roof. Eorla came up beside me, taking in the view. “I’m surprised to see you smile while looking at this.”

  “Not that. Just the way life happens,” I said.

  Eorla surveyed the burning skyline. “She shows no mercy.”

  “Like any true fanatic,” I said.

  “Her forces are massing. They’re going after the consulate soon,” she said.

  “He saved my life,” I said.

  She peered at me, curious and expectant.

  I held up my left hand so she could see the gold band. It was Vize’s ring—our ring. When he died in the Gap, his essence transferred into it and bound itself to my flesh. “Bergin saved my life.”

  Eorla hugged herself, looking away from me. “Where is he?”

  I took her elbow and made her face me. “Under the Guildhouse. He saved my life, Eorla. He said to tell you thank you for everything and that he died with hope.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “He once said to me that if he had to die for his cause, he would rather die in hope than despair.”

  For the second time, I took her in my arms to comfort her over the loss of someone she loved. Vize’s death was without grief for me, yet I didn’t have the satisfaction I thought I would. He went and screwed that up for me by saving my life. He was dead, but he was part of me. I was satisfied in a detached way but not glad.

  The blare of a siren startled us apart. The sky overhead had become a smear of black and gray rippling in the wind. A vague sensation draped over me, an essence of a profound nature, wild and untamed, yet constrained by a force of will. Shapes were moving in the shadows of smoky clouds, enormous beings striding across the sky. “What the hell is that?”

  Eorla pointed toward the Weird, her hand trembling. “There. Over there.”

  The siren blast was coming from the top of the warehouse that housed Yggy’s bar. The old civil-defense horns were going off. I didn’t think they worked anymore, but that wasn’t what made me shiver. Heydan stood beside the siren tower, his head reaching almost to the top, almost thirty feet tall. He glowed white with power, facing the city. He leaned on the tower with his right hand and held a sword in his left, pointing toward the center of the city. The figures in the sky above him gathered together and moved toward downtown.

  “What does it mean?” I asked.

  “He calls the Old Ones to battle,” she said.

  “That’s good. We can use the help,” I said.

  Eorla turned toward the door. “You mistake me, Connor. It’s the end of the world.”

  44

  I waited in a room with no windows but two doors, both closed. I wasn’t in the mood to see outside anyway. When Eagan had ferried me across the city, I had seen the extent of the destruction. We had flown along the edge of it, dipping and diving among downtown city streets to elude our pursuers. More than once, we had flown through smoke and fire. The room stank of it because we all stank of it.

  Eorla entered with a glamoured Dylan. They placed documents on the table and sorted through several vials of glow bees as reports flowed in from across the city. Dylan looked a little the worse for wear, his uniform torn and covered with dirt and soot.

  Keeva arrived next. I hadn’t seen her since she let me escape the safe house. I had doubted her, but she stood with me in the end. I resisted the urge to smile as our eyes met because there was nothing to smile about after her sacrifice. She placed a brown binder envelope on the table. Stone-faced, she unwound the string holding the binder closed and removed a sheaf of documents. She pushed them toward me. “Callin won’t be coming.”

  I pulled the papers toward me. “Is he all right?”

  “He’s still in AvMem, but he’s weak. We didn’t want to risk his coming here.”

  “Risk? What risk?” I asked.

  “Look at the documents, Connor,” she said.

  The top sheets were index forms, categorizing the rest of the paperwork. Reports were organized like Guild case files, but without any official markings. They referred to people whose names I didn’t recognize. My name jumped off the page on the first case. It was a record almost a decade old, an elf arrested for attempted kidnapping—my attempted kidnapping. I remembered some of the outlined events, but I had no recollection of someone’s trying to kidnap me. The next case was similar, this time an Inverni fairy charged with attempted murder—my attempted murder. Case after case showed more of the same: attempted murder or kidnapping; stalking; conspiracy to commit murder. All of them listed me as the target. The problem was, I had no idea about the history described, as if a parallel series of events occurred that I knew nothing about. They were all filed by the same Guild agent over the ten-year period.

  “Who is Shadow?” I asked.

  “Callin,” Keeva said.

  “He’s Shadow? But he was….” Cold realization swept over me. Callin had been kicked out of the Guild for insubordination and failure to perform over a decade ago. His firing had coincided with my return to Boston and the break in our relationship. I cleared my throat. “What was his assignment?”

  Joe popped into the air. He hovered over the table, holding the stone ward bowl like a host trying to decide where to put food on a crowded table. He winked, placed the bowl in front of me, and sat next to it. Essence shimmered in it, a soft swirl of blue and white that swelled in reaction to the people in the room.

  Keeva frowned. “You. I was his handler. He was personally responsible for stopping seventeen assassination attempts.”

  “Well, I helped on three of those,” Joe said.

  “I don’t understand,” I said.

  Keeva glanced at the other closed door with annoyed hesitation. “You needed protection. We provided it.”

  “Protection from whom?”

  Eorla and Rand had stopped talking to listen to us.

  “Maeve. Donor. Anyone you ever pissed off, which is pretty much everyone,” she said.

  I shook my head. “I am so lost.”

  The other door opened, and Eagan entered, the Eagan of my youth, strong, healthy, and fully in command. He took a seat at the table and gestured at the binder. “
You are the linchpin in a long-term strategy, Grey. The dwarf Brokke had a vision. He foresaw another war for dominance among the fey. He predicted that certain people might be able to avert the war. You are one of those people. We took it as our duty to keep you alive.”

  “We?”

  Eagan glanced at Keeva. “Your partners were informed. We’ve had someone guarding you at all times.”

  “Why wasn’t I told?”

  “Because Brokke said your knowledge would turn events for the worse. It’s what ruined Bergin Vize. He became obsessed with the vision,” Eorla said.

  “Vize tried to start the war,” I said.

  Eorla nodded. “He thought if he challenged Maeve to act before she was ready, he would undermine her ability to succeed.”

  I looked at Eagan. “You stopped me from killing him at the nuke plant. You could have prevented all this bloodshed.”

  Eagan shook his head. “I had to stop you. Vize hadn’t made his full turn for the worse then. We didn’t know which one of you to pin our hopes on. One of you could have died. Neither of you was ready.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  Eagan nodded his head. “Brokke said success would come from humility. Neither of you had that then.”

  And Vize never learned it until too late, I thought. “Who else knows about this? Briallen? Nigel?”

  Eagan shook his head sharply. “We could not risk it. Brokke saw what the knowledge did to Vize. He said we had to be more careful than he was with Donor’s people. Briallen’s loyalties are too often obscure. Nigel will always blindly follow Maeve. In fact, I am deeply concerned about his hand in these current events.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about that. He’s out of the picture,” I said.

  “Dead?” asked Eagan.

  “No, but just as good,” I said.

  Eagan looked about to question me further, but he let it pass. “Trust in this has been paramount.”

  I glanced across the table at Dylan. “He shouldn’t be here.”

  “He has access to Maeve’s black ops network. We need him,” Eagan said.

  “He’s a loyal Guildsman who lied to Eorla, and now you want me to believe he can be trusted?” I asked.

  “He has been instrumental in these last few days. His intelligence gave us the location of your imprisonment,” Eagan said.

  “You have to trust me,” Dylan said.

  “Why? You didn’t trust me,” I said.

  “You know it wasn’t that simple,” he said.

  “It never is with you, Dylan,” I said. He had the decency to look away.

  “What happened to you? You’ve…. changed,” Eorla asked.

  I caressed the bowl. The essence glittered inside it as I trailed my fingers along the surface. “This, actually. Maeve wanted this bowl.”

  “Why?” Eagan asked.

  I glanced at him. “Why don’t you start with telling me about the faith stone.”

  Eagan arched an eyebrow. “What’s to tell? I used it to protect the Guildhouse.”

  “You didn’t tell Maeve about it” I said.

  “Brokke said not to. With good reason, it seems,” he said.

  “An underKing of the Seelie Court acted on the orders of an advisor to the Elven King?” I asked.

  Eagan grinned. “I’m not going to revisit a hundred years of decisions, Grey. Brokke made a convincing case. He knew things. He never steered me wrong.”

  I looked at Keeva. “What was in it for you?”

  She stared down at the table, her face cold and hard. “My choices are none of your business. I’ve sacrificed enough without answering to you.”

  “MacGoren had to die. Brokke predicted it,” Eagan said.

  She glared at him. “You could have told me sooner.”

  Eagan showed no sympathy. “You made the right decision, Keeva. MacGoren would have killed Connor or exposed you and our operation. He had to be removed, and you knew that when you walked into that room. If you had known he had to die, would you have followed through? Ask Eorla about knowledge of the future. Ask her how easy it is to stand aside and watch someone you love die.”

  Keeva met his gaze. “I did what needed doing. I would have liked a choice.”

  “You had one. You made the hard one, so that we can all live,” Eagan said.

  I looked at Eorla. “You knew your husband would be killed?”

  She nodded. “Brokke said a druid would kill him, and a druid did. I told Alvud the vision. It made him reckless. He didn’t suspect the druid would be glamoured as a troll. And, yes, Manus, as you imply, it was hard knowing what was to come.”

  “What does she want with the bowl?” Eagan asked.

  “It’s part of a package. She said she had the stone, the sword, and the spear, and only needed the bowl,” I said.

  “I no longer sense any of those things about you,” Eagan said.

  “I can call them to me. What do they mean in all this?” I said.

  “Brokke said to tell you: The Ways seal and unseal. A needle binds as it pierces.” Eorla said.

  “He told me to tell you: The bones of the earth are steadfast and eternal,” Eagan said.

  “He told me to tell you: Tell me what to do,” said Dylan.

  Joe laughed. “No one owns the cow.”

  Everyone looked down at him. Joe turned his head this way and that, annoyed and embarrassed at the same time. “What? Brokke said it, not me.”

  Their words shifted in my mind. I recognized them, remembered them from somewhere else, somewhere stark and white and dangerous. And beautiful beyond words. I never saw Brokke there, but he heard the same things I did. Something beyond powerful had reached out and touched us both. More doors opened in my mind—memories of the past, decisions made and efforts failed. Convergence wasn’t an event. It was a process, one that had been leading to this moment for over a century.

  I bit back a laugh and a sob. “I know what I have to do.”

  45

  Meryl leaned off the side of the bed and rummaged around on the floor. We were in a room in the safe house. Several floors above us, the others worked out the final details of their battle plans, deciding who would do what and the risks involved. Eorla and Eagan had known for a long time that they would have to defend the city. They had plans and contingency plans, and contingency plans for their contingency plans. It was fascinating to watch them work together. They had been secret allies for years, yet protecting their own positions in case…. well, in case I died or Vize died or the world went to hell. After I saw the shape of their strategy, I didn’t need to hang around. In the final analysis, what they did was a distraction—for me and for Maeve. The endgame would be decided by two people, no matter the plans.

  Meryl propped herself on the pillows and lit a clove cigarette. As the sweet smell filled the air, I curled on my side next to her. While she smoked, I used one finger to trace small circles in the damp skin of her cleavage. “Thank you for coming,” I said.

  “Is that a pun?” she asked.

  I poked her in the side, and she chuckled. “My poor taste in humor is finally rubbing off on you,” I said.

  “I have to ask you something,” she said.

  I propped my head up on my hand. “What?”

  She flicked ashes on the floor. “We just had farewell sex, didn’t we?”

  I forced myself to grin. “I hope not.”

  She glanced at me through half-closed eyes. “Tell me something more wasn’t going on. Tell me you’re not planning on dying.”

  “I’m not planning on dying,” I said.

  She sighed, staring at the ceiling. “Gods, I know that tone.”

  “You’ve heard it before,” I said. I wasn’t asking.

  “You’re not planning on it, but it’s likely,” she said.

  I stretched out my arm and laid my head on her shoulder. “You remember everything, don’t you? About Faerie. You remember it.”

  “It sucks,” she said.

  “Did you know who I
was when we met here?” I asked.

  “No. You don’t look the same. I had planned on avoiding you like the plague this time,” she said.

  “Why?”

  She stared at the burning ember of her cigarette. “Because I was tired of serving the Wheel of the World. I thought Convergence was an opportunity to be left alone and do what I liked this time. Whenever I’ve gotten involved with you, one of us dies. I was hoping to avoid that this time.”

  I trailed my hand down her body. I remembered her from Faerie. She didn’t call herself Meryl then. We weren’t friends. Not enemies, exactly, but she had a knack for screwing up my life. This time had been different.

  “The Wheel of the World turns, and we turn with It,” I said.

  She snorted. “You don’t believe that anymore.”

  No, I didn’t. Maeve was right about one thing. The Wheel of the World turned as It willed, but sometimes we could nudge it in different directions. “I need you to do me a favor—two, actually.”

  She smirked. “Do I have a choice?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I need to you to get my parents out of the city and as far away as possible,” I said.

  She quirked an eyebrow at me. “Okay. And?”

  “I want to send you away, too. You’ll be a fail-safe in case I fail. When you get to where you’re going, you can decide whether to come back or not,” I said.

  “What if I decide not to?” she asked.

  “I’m sending someone else, too. He’s already agreed,” I said.

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Okay? That’s it? You’re not going to argue and ask details?” I asked.

  She put the cigarette out against the wall. “Nope. I’ve spent lifetimes letting the Wheel of the World dictate my choices, and each time, I’ve helped fuck it up. This time, I want to be in it for the ride. I’m going to trust you. I’ve never done that before.”

  I rolled on top of her and kissed her. “Don’t die on me, okay?”