by Horn, J. D.
He watched over his daughter as if she were his entire world. I should have felt joy at the sight; instead I felt the darkest shade of envy gnawing at my gut. Gudrun’s voice sang in my ear. “Is it ‘right’ this ordinary child should live and your own special, magical infant should not? If there were a God, a divine will, what type of monster must he be to allow such a miscarriage”—her inflection made her sound as if she’d just realized an unintentional pun—“of justice? No, I think it much more likely there is no supreme will, no grand scheme, only the survival of those who will do what it takes to survive.” She watched as the small girl turned back on her trike to circle her father. “What if you could trade that child’s life to save Colin’s?”
The suggestion sickened me. “That is a monstrous—”
“Well, of course, she is an adorable little one, isn’t she? We wouldn’t want to harm her.” Her eyes scanned the area before us, and she pointed at another child. This one was older and had moved into the awkward phase where external beauty was both a memory and a hope for the future. He was picking on a smaller child, shoving him and making him cry. “How about that one?”
“It would be wrong. I don’t have the right.”
“Of course you have the right. If you have the strength, you have the right. With the kind of power you have at your access, there is no such thing as being wrong. There is only the choice to survive or leave the world to those who will.” She raised an eyebrow. “Or perhaps you love your antiquated moralistic ideals more than you love little Colin?”
“No, you are twisting things, trying to confuse me.” I knew the spell she had placed on me made me more compliant. More susceptible. It had something to do with the opal, perhaps even carried to me in the dust I had breathed in. The damnedest thing about her enchantment was it left me incapable of caring that she had enchanted me. I felt like I was bobbing up and down in the sea. On the brink of drowning, but still indifferent to that fact.
“Child, I am trying to open your eyes. I am trying to give you the strength you need to throw off the shackles that bind you. I am trying to save your son. I had hoped you would appreciate that.” She looked away from me and down the path leading to the swan-and-merman-encircled fountain. “What if saving Colin didn’t require the sacrifice of a child? That man there—” She pointed at a homeless man, weaving as he made his way to a bench. He had a bottle wrapped in brown paper, and alternated between singing out of key and swearing at anyone who looked his way. I sensed he was very lucky not to have noticed Gudrun noticing him. “That one, why should he have such a strong hold on this reality when our Colin is being erased? Look at him, what about him? If we could trade his miserable existence to buy even another single day for our Colin, why wouldn’t we?”
I looked at the sad fellow. He held his bottle tightly as if he feared one of the passersby would covet it as much as he prized its contents. He swung around to argue with someone who wasn’t there. Looking through my witch eyes, I discerned there was no spirit, no invisible assailant threatening him. He fought a projection of his own alcohol-soaked brain. Would he be missed? Would his death leave a void in the fabric of this world? Wouldn’t it be so easy to reach out and draw the life force from him and offer it . . . ?
The heinousness of the crime I’d begun to contemplate woke me from Gudrun’s spell. The story of Eve and the serpent flashed through my mind. With how many greater sins had she been tempted before giving in to that seemingly innocent bite? “Oh my God,” I said in a gasp. “No. It’s his life. I am not a killer.”
Gudrun breathed deeply, as if she were trying to keep her cool as I tested her patience. She didn’t try to interrupt me.
“No. God or no God, the way you think is wrong. It’s true, I’m desperate to save my child, but I will find another way.” I flung myself from the bench, nearly toppling over as I did. I backed away from her. “The world you describe. I wouldn’t want to bring Colin into that world.”
“You are dooming your child to nonexistence. It may be that the only honorable outcome of that bum’s life would be to stand as sacrifice to protect something greater.” She waved her hand in the man’s direction, and he arose and made his stumbling way out of the park. “I believe I comprehend your difficulty.” Gudrun looked at me, her head tilted to the side, her eyes lowered. She was the picture of sympathetic understanding. “When one person is killed, it is murder. When a group of people are killed, it is slaughter. You find these things unimaginable, but believe me, Mercy, when a hundred thousand die, it becomes a matter of statistics. Once the count grows high enough, one’s mind loses its ability to consider the individuals behind that count. The emotions dull, and the conscience stops wheedling.” She paused. “When you’ve reached that point, you yourself become a god.”
“I don’t want to be a ‘god.’ ”
“Not even if for every death, you could buy another day of life for your little boy?”
I responded before any further temptation could penetrate my weakened defenses. “No, not even then,” I said, knowing what I said was right even if it felt oddly like I was betraying Colin. “I’m leaving. Don’t try to stop—”
“What about those the line destroyed? You have heard firsthand the effect it had on the world of the Fae, and you only know of their fate because enough of them survived to tell the tale. What about the others whose worlds were ended by the creation of the line?”
“There were others?” Again I felt responsible. Guilt washed over me.
Gudrun looked back at the Confederate Monument and shrugged. “I don’t know about that, but I do know the witches who created the line demonstrated absolute indifference about anyone other than themselves.” A shirtless guy, about a thousand years too young for Gudrun, jogged past us for what I realized was the fifth time. His gaze met with hers many times at each pass. “Foolish child,” she said, but I wasn’t sure if she meant the runner or me. “Today’s anchors are no different. Ayako told me the other anchors have kept many things secret from you. Even now they have left you to believe that Ayako has been bound, but I assure you she has not been. Your fellow anchors have decided in your case, her actions were understandable, even if they did lead to a result Ayako herself had not intended.” She smiled and placed her palm over her heart. “They have agreed they need Ayako for the final battle they plan to wage against the two of us.” She nodded at the fact the other anchors had judged me as being as dangerous as the great Gudrun herself.
She folded her hands together like she intended to say grace. “I realize I am asking you to think in ways that go against your current convictions, perhaps even against your very nature, but I sought you out because you are special. I am convinced you are the witch we have waited for. The witch who can bring an end to the abomination you call the line. I promise you, though, if I cannot bring you around to my way of thinking, I will go. I will leave you and yours in peace. I have no desire to be at odds with you, Mercy. After all, we are of the same blood.”
Well, there you have it. Her words struck me as a despicable and incontrovertible truth. I hated it, but for the first time since Gudrun had begun flapping her gums at me, I believed her. Really believed her. “You are a Weber?” I was related to Jilo—sort of. Now I was related to Gudrun too. I evidently shared DNA with half of the flipping world.
“No, not a Weber, but your father, Erik, was a cousin to me.”
I couldn’t even begin to process this at the moment. It was like learning I was second cousin to the boogeyman. It seemed just as impossible and twice as frightening. Right now, though, our shared blood might be the only thing keeping me alive. Hoping she would be bound by a thief’s honor, I decided to pin her down to a promise. “So, we agree to disagree, you let me leave? You leave me and mine alone?”
“Your fellow anchors would consider your proposal the final proof of your treachery.” She seemed pleased by the thought. She nodded. “You have my word. I onl
y have one more issue to discuss with you, before we part.”
I felt a rising suspicion at the same moment I felt my stomach dropping. “What’s that?”
“All right. I acknowledge that you’re not a killer. At least not in this circumstance. What, though, if it constitutes a matter of administering justice?”
“I am not a judge, and I am certainly not an executioner.”
“No? Well, I think I should grant you the opportunity to be both.” She raised her hand and began drawing a small circle in the air next to me. “You blamed me for your losses, but I am, in truth, not to blame.” The empty space next to me began to solidify, darken. “He is,” she said as Josef appeared by my side. The moment he assumed full corporality, he spat in Gudrun’s direction. He strained against bonds of dark matter that fettered his feet and held his arms in place behind his back. “I hand him over to you for judgment.”
“Bitch.” The word no sooner escaped his lips than a band of the binding darkness formed around his mouth.
“Perhaps,” Gudrun replied, “but it is you who has need of a muzzle. He is yours,” she said, turning her focus back to me. “At least for the next twenty-four hours. I have put a kink in his magic, and until this time tomorrow, he will be without power. After that, he will again be free, to go on harming all those you love, and who knows how many more.” Her eyes scanned him. “He’s killed over fifty humans and”—she tilted her head inquisitively—“three witches.” Her face took on a bemused look. “Really, Josef, if your sister is weak enough to let you live to see another day, I would love to hear about those three witches.” She focused on me. “Of course, if she is weak enough to let you escape, I suspect that number will have risen to four by the time we meet again.” She waited for the meaning of her words to enjoy their full effect. “I trust you can find your own way home.” With that, Gudrun was gone.
TWENTY-FIVE
We stowed the still-gagged, bound, and powerless Josef in my old room. Stained as it already was by the memory of Teague’s death, I didn’t mind. My emotions had begun to let go of the space, and I had decided to take over the room on the other side of the nursery. It was smaller and didn’t have the same view my old room did, but it also didn’t have the old room’s memories.
For Maisie’s own good, Iris insisted she be locked in her room until we figured out how best to deal with Josef, a fate to which Maisie acquiesced with stoicism. “You understand?” I asked her before the family used our combined magic to seal the door.
“Yes,” she replied with a mischievous grin. “Oriental rugs are expensive and hard to clean.” Darn, I loved that girl.
On the other end of the spectrum stood Josef, my younger brother, well, half brother. I wondered how things might have been, if it weren’t for my mother and her friends having twisted him. Would we have eventually met each other and bonded? Or was he damaged from inception? My own word choice struck me. Inception, rather than conception. Somehow it seemed to be the right term when thinking of Erik Weber’s four children. We, his offspring, seemed to have been plotted rather than the products of ordinary physical intercourse. Rather than fathering children to preserve his memory or to pass on his traits, it seemed like he had been breeding pawns to be moved around in a game. I wondered if his children really numbered four, or if he’d managed to breed an army of damaged progeny.
“I don’t like having him here.” Oliver slapped his hand down on the table and pulled me back to the present. “He seems so damned cocksure someone is going to come riding to his rescue. I’m telling you the little prick is a Trojan horse. Gudrun wanted him here for a reason.”
“Well, I couldn’t leave him standing outside Sentient Bean, could I?”
“Gingersnap.” He shook his head. “I’m not saying you did anything wrong, I’m just saying it’s too neat of a package simply to have Josef handed over to us by a card-carrying member of the ‘Spear of Destiny’ club.”
Adam turned to Oliver. “Do you find this boy attractive?”
Oliver startled and his eyebrows rose high. He seemed genuinely shocked. “How could you even ask that? He’s a total psychopath.”
Adam looked at me rather than at my uncle. “All right, my bad.” He smiled at me. He was trying to lighten the mood, and I loved him for trying, but my heart was having none of it. The glint faded from Adam’s eye. He ran his finger around the rim of his glass. “I agree, we would be foolhardy to take this Gudrun at her word for anything.” His eyes grew unfocused, and his face hardened. “I must admit, after what the little bastard did to me, it is taking every ounce of self-control I can muster not to beat that smug face of his until there’s nothing left of it ’cept broken bone and table scraps.”
“You aren’t going to do that, Adam,” Iris said and shook her head. “You are not going to sink to his level. You are a better man than that.”
“I think you see me as better than I truly am, ma’am.” Adam’s voice sounded calm, measured, but the look in his eyes told me Josef was pretty lucky Iris was there to serve as Adam’s conscience.
“Your desire for revenge is understandable, but no, I see you plainly as you are. Otherwise, you would not be allowed to date my baby brother.”
Adam’s entire body rocked, then he laughed. He turned to Oliver. “Did she just say ‘allowed’?”
Oliver nodded once and chuckled. “She sure did.”
“She means it too,” Iris added with mock severity.
Another attempt at levity landed like lead. Ellen began shivering. Even from the far side of the table, I could see goose bumps forming on her arms. “Bound or no,” she said, pulling her arms around herself, “I feel really uncomfortable having him around.” Her eyes made a circle of us there at the table. “After Tillandsia . . .” Her voice failed her.
“Oh, honey.” Iris leaned over and wrapped her arm around Ellen’s shoulders. She pulled Ellen’s head to her bosom and rocked her gently. Iris took her big-sister duties to heart.
“It’s either laugh or murder him,” Oliver said. He reached over and took Ellen’s hand. “We know what he did to you, sis.”
Ellen’s eyes widened for a moment; then her lips quivered. “I vote we kill him.”
Oliver released her hand, then pushed back from the table. He stomped across the room and grabbed hold of the sink. His shoulders rose and fell a few times before he turned back to us with a stern look on his face. “I think I second that.”
Iris bounded from the table, her movement lost between a leap and actual flight. She landed before her younger brother and delivered him a slap that reverberated in the air. Oliver stumbled back from the force. “I will have no more talk of murder. Do you all hear me? No more talk of beating.”
“No.” Oliver recovered himself and stood seething before his sister. “Just actual beating and on me rather than on the bastard who’s earned it.”
Iris’s temper cooled. “I’m sorry.” She reached out for him, but he pulled away. “But you were raised better than that.” She stopped and looked at her own hand. “So was I. I am truly sorry I struck you, Oli.”
“Well, damn, did you have to hit so hard?” Oliver bobbed out of her reach as he made his way back to the table. My eyes traced a path past the red mark on his cheek to his temple. I blinked, convinced it was just a trick of the light, but no, there were gray hairs growing in there. Even though they were aging gracefully, my aunts looked like they should be my aunts. Uncle Oliver, on the other hand, could easily pass for my brother. My entire life Oliver seemed to have been suspended around the age of twenty-five. Had his long stretch of seemingly eternal youth drawn to a close?
“I am so sorry,” Iris said, pulling my focus back to her. Iris closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. She sighed it out then looked at us. “We are not vigilantes, and we are certainly not murderers. I am well aware of the harm this young man has done to this family. We live in a society of laws. We
will obey those laws. Right, Adam?”
He ran his hand over his face, then reached out to take Oliver’s hand. “Yes, Iris,” he agreed with much less conviction than I would have expected from one of Chatham County’s finest. “You are right about how we should handle this situation.”
“Should handle?” Iris too picked up on his reticence.
Adam held his free hand out. “We, and by we, I mean the police, cannot handle him. Sure, if he were a regular man, but as soon as Gudrun’s temporary binding gives way, Josef would kill every last officer in the county. You know it’s true.”
“He will kill again,” I said, not having meant to speak out loud. I felt all eyes on me. “I’m just thinking that Georgia is a death penalty state. If it were possible to turn him over to the police, the result would probably be the same.”
Ellen pounced on my words. “Yes.” She turned to Iris. “You see, even Mercy realizes we have to do something to end this sociopath.”
Iris looked at me. Disappointment was written all over her face. “Are you proposing we skip any kind of judicial review and simply execute the boy?”
“Well,” I began to stammer, “I didn’t say that, not really. I mean, we have to deprive him of his ability to harm people, but . . .” Honestly, I didn’t know how I felt about any of this. Until this moment, I’d never given capital punishment a second thought. He’d tortured both Ellen and Adam, and he killed Colin and Claire. By doing that he had set my own life to unraveling. He’d as good as killed Peter, for my husband was as gone from this world as if he had died. Did I want Josef punished? Absolutely. Did I want him dead? Probably. But did I have it in me to endorse his killing? Did I have it in me to kill him myself?
“We all know the best way to do that.” Ellen’s voice grew raspy. “Iris, even you know some people just need killing.”
