by Devon Monk
“That’s not my problem.” I wanted it to come out strong, but only a whisper escaped my lips.
“Yes,” he said. “It is. There are things you don’t know, dark things, dark magics that dwell on the other side. If they are allowed into this world, you, the people you care for, will die.”
I thought about Pike, already dead. Then I thought about Violet, who was pregnant with my father’s child, my brother or sister. I thought about Davy, and then my mind turned to Zayvion.
Shit.
“I’m going to call the police,” I said a little louder than before. “MERC can handle this. Fix this.”
“Allison, listen to me. This is far more than the police or any of the uninitiated can handle. You must do as I say. Let me touch you. Let me use the magic you hold in your body, your blood to seal the gates. It is what you were born for, what you and I were meant to do. With your magic, I can break these spells. Close the gates that are just beginning to open. You and I together can keep those we love safe. Alive.”
Okay, I liked it better when he couldn’t talk. Maybe being so close to his dead body made him strong enough his words carried a little of the old Influence he used to use on me to make me do what he wanted.
Frankly, everything he was saying just made me want to run like hell.
“You want to use me?” I said. And yes, that came out indignant. I get prickly under extreme duress. We had a long history, my father and I. And most of it was him trying to use me for his own benefit. “For all I know you set this up. Maybe you’re the one who wants to open the gates. Maybe you’re the one who is hurting those girls and hurting Anthony.” Maybe you’re the one responsible for Pike’s death, I thought silently.
“If that were true, I would not rely on chance to bring you here. I certainly would not rely on your cooperation for my plan to work. I am not that irresponsible.”
He had me there. My father was a thorough bastard when it came to planning and executing his desires. It didn’t seem likely he would implement anything, much less something that may involve a lot of magic, a lot of death, and me going along with it all, in such a haphazard way.
Still, he was dead. Maybe dying had dulled his edge.
“Fine,” I said. “Prove to me I can trust you. Free Anthony from the Offload.”
“Who?”
“The boy being used as a Proxy on the other side of this room.”
He scowled into the distance as if trying to focus through a fog. “He is nothing.”
“He’s someone I care about. Someone I have promised to look after.”
“Allie.” He was getting angry. I knew that tone. “You underestimate the severity of the problem. One boy’s life is nothing to give.”
“You’re wrong,” I said. “One boy’s life is too much to give. I am going to get the hell out of here, find a phone, and call the police.”
I took maybe five painful strides away from my father’s dead body.
“Oh, let’s not ruin a good thing,” a man’s voice echoed from behind me.
I turned and spotted a movement by the darkest area across the room, which, now that I looked closely, was a doorway.
That movement stepped forward into the faint light.
Balding, thin, Dr. Frank Gordon ambled across the wooden floor, his dress shoes making solid clucks that echoed against the rotted rafters. As he walked, he rolled the sleeves of his dress shirt up to his elbows. He didn’t look up at me, didn’t look at my father. His glasses caught the liquid play of light and shadow from the windows, reflecting mercury and ebony. In his hand, he held a vial. A vial of blood. My blood.
“Do you understand now, Allison?” Dad asked. “This man is a very powerful magic user. He has done this to me. Used me, my death to open our world to magics that will destroy it. And you are going to help me put an end to him.”
Fuck. How did I get in the middle of a dead-undead magic showdown?
“To bring the police here?” Frank continued like he had not heard my father, and I realized he hadn’t heard him. So only I could see my dad; only I could hear him.
Frank pursed his lips and shook his head. “This is too sacred an event to expose to the uninitiated.”
There was that term again.
“His name is Frank Gordon,” my father said. “He is part of the Authority. An ancient order of men and women who are the caretakers of magic. Life magic in life. Death magic in death.”
“I know who the Authority is,” I said to my dad.
But it was Frank who answered. “Do you? And here I had thought your father kept you ignorant of such things. Protecting you.” He shook his head. “Such an idealist. You belong to us, Allison. To our world. Both worlds. You always have. Even he knew it.” He squinted to look up at me through his glasses. “Even he knew how useful you would someday be.”
My father swore. Called Frank a dozen names in a dozen languages. I had forgotten how extensive his vocabulary was.
“My father didn’t know me as well as you might think,” I said.
Move over, shock. Fight, flight, and adrenaline had just kicked the doors down. My senses heightened; my heart picked up a runner’s pace. Not because I was using magic, but because I was damned determined to get out of here alive. And I was going to take Anthony and the girls with me. I shifted my grip on the dagger, keeping it low, using the table that was still between me and Frank to block his view of it.
What I needed was a chance to throw a spell at him, something like Containment or Hold. Something to buy me enough time to run. Because unless I could knock him out-and I didn’t think my physical reserves were up to bearing the price of that without passing out myself-my best option was to do just what I’d told my father. Run and get the police, the SWAT team, Stotts, and the MERC down here. Fast.
“And yet,” Frank said, “blood calls to its own, Ms. Beckstrom, just as magic calls to magic. I have brought you here”-he gestured toward my father’s body with the vial of my blood as if that explained everything-“and you have come. Welcome to the beginning, the birth, of true magic. Life and death as one. As magic, and the world, should always have been.”
My father’s ghost traced a very powerful glyph that had pain written all over it. His lips moved in words I could not hear. He threw the spell at Frank.
And absolutely nothing happened.
Okay, time to do the math. Frank had my dad’s corpse. That made him a grave robber. And if he had my blood, it meant he was in league with Trager. He also had Anthony and the six girls whom I assumed were the kidnapped girls Stotts was looking for. I’d Hounded those hits, so I knew someone had used Pike’s blood and cast the Glamour spells with Pike’s signature. Even as I had Hounded them, I knew something was wrong with the glyphs, something that made me doubt it was Pike’s hand that cast those spells.
Pike said he thought Trager used Anthony to cast those spells, but I didn’t think Anthony was that good. He’d have to be a Hand-an artist who could forge magical signatures-and I didn’t think Anthony knew magic well enough to do that.
Frank, however, looked like he might be very good at forging someone else’s magical signature. Looked like he might be very good at all things magical. Hells, even my dead father said he was a very powerful man. Powerful enough to use my father. Powerful enough to be screwing around with the gates of life and death.
So I had it wrong. Trager was working for Frank, not the other way around. Working to help Frank with this horror-house magical ritual bullshit.
“He is working dark magic, Allison,” my dad said. “It is forbidden. Magic that has been mutated by death belongs in death. He is using my body,” he growled, “and the magic in it, not the magic beneath the city. He is using my body to open the gates to the dead. To free those who hunger.”
Holy crap. Zayvion was right. Why hadn’t my dad taught me this stuff years ago? Dark magic. Those who hunger. I didn’t even know what they were, much less what they could do.
I was so screwed.
“So now,” Frank said, “I will ask you once, politely, to come here and lie down on this table.” He smiled and pointed to the empty table next to my father’s corpse. “Please.”
“No,” I said.
“No,” my father said at the same time. Well, at least we were in agreement on one thing.
The doctor shook his head. “I am so sorry to hear you say that.”
He flicked his fingers fast and subtly enough he’d give Kevin a run for his money.
His spell radiated so much magic-dark, strange, twisting magic that moved on its own like snakes slithering through the air. I could see it, even without the Reveal spell. It was a huge spell. Strong enough it could knock a hole through a brick wall. And Frank had thrown it with no more trouble than flicking a speck of dust from his shirtsleeve.
From the corner of my eye I saw Anthony shudder in pain.
What kind of price did dark magic carry? How much more could Anthony take?
I held up the knife in one hand and wove Shield in the other, drawing magic from deep within my bones and pouring it into the Shield. I braced for the impact.
Instead my dad appeared in front of me and threw himself in harm’s way. For me. It was the most selfless, noble thing I’d ever seen him do.
Unfortunately, it didn’t work.
Frank’s spell slammed past my father’s ghost, slammed past my Shield, slammed past the bloody dagger I carried, and hit me like a train falling off a mountain.
The force of Frank’s spell threw me across the warehouse. I tucked and rolled. Managed to land flat on my back hard enough to knock the wind out of me. Seriously, I should take self-defense classes one of these days. Maybe I’d find a way to stay out of these situations.
But, hey, at least I didn’t eviscerate myself with the knife. Trouble was, I’d lost my grip on the knife. It was no longer in my hand.
My dad stood above me. “I will not see you fail in this.”
Way to talk me up, Dad. That disapproving scowl told me I was in for a world of hurt.
He knelt. Shoved his hand in my head. My vision went white for a second. I blinked. The warehouse was back, but I couldn’t see my father. I saw myself-through my ghost father’s dead eyes-on the floor of the warehouse.
No wonder Davy had been scared of me. Blood covered my face, following the strange leopard pattern burn marks from dead magic user fingers. Not pretty. Not even close to pretty. My eyes were too wide, hard and pale as cheap emeralds. I had a bad cut under one cheek and my lips were swollen. My hair was a mess. I looked wild. Angry. I looked like I was going to kill someone.
No coincidence, that. My father was pushing into me, into my head, taking me over. Oh, hells, no. There was no way I was going to let him possess me.
Problem was, I didn’t know how to stop him.
I pushed with my heels, scrambling backward, scooting my ass across the floor but unable to get away from him, unable to get to my feet.
“Get away!” I screamed. “Get away!”
“You were meant for this, born for this,” Dad chanted. “Your blood and mine. Beckstrom blood. The power you carry, the knowledge I carry. I have always known we would do great things, you and I. I have waited for this day.”
And over my dad’s babbling that grew louder and louder inside my head, I heard Frank’s footsteps across the wooden floor.
Frank bent, reached through my father-right through him-and I moaned, because it stung me too, like Frank was reaching through me.
“Open your mind to me,” my father said.
“I can’t, I can’t, I can’t,” I said.
Frank smiled. “Oh, you can. You can be everything I need.”
He pulled me up through my dad and onto my feet. Stuck a needle in my arm.
Possessive ghost. Dark magic. Blood magic. Probably drugs on that needle.
Holy shit, could this get worse?
The pain in my body eased some, leaving my head a little foggy and slow. That would be the drugs. Sensual heat rose up my legs, and I tasted sweet cherries on the back of my throat. And that would be the blood magic.
Fabo.
Allison, my father said from inside my head. Accept me. Let me use your power. I can stop him. Stop him from doing this to you. To us.
“No,” I whispered as Frank pushed me forward in a grip I could not shake. The drugs weren’t helping my coordination any. Everything felt sluggish. Dreamlike. Slow.
“Out. Get out,” I said.
“It will all be over soon,” Frank said. He wrapped his arm around my ribs and held me up, because my legs weren’t working so good. He shoved me over to my father’s corpse. I threw myself to one side, but Frank was strong and didn’t lose his hold on me.
“Be still,” he said. The needle wound in my arm pulsed at that word. I could not move. No matter how much I wanted to.
Shit, shit, shit.
Frozen in place, I watched Frank let go of me and pull my left arm out over the plate on my dad’s chest. A slash of pain bit my left palm as Frank drew a knife-a pretty little thing a lot like Zayvion’s-across my hand. He tipped my hand over the plate, letting my blood fall freely into the licorice mist.
He then poured blood out of the vial over my hand and over the tip of the knife he had used to cut me.
I might be frozen, but I could still breathe, could still smell. And that was not my blood in the vial-it was my father’s.
Hatred rose like bitter bile and stung the back of my throat. The weird thing was it wasn’t my hatred-it was my father’s. He hated Frank. And hated that Frank was using him.
Using him to break open the gateway between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Using him to finally connect the magic of the living with the magic of the dead.
Horrors of what breaking the barrier between life and death and letting magic flow freely between the two swam through my mind-my dad’s mind. Somewhere beyond that horror, I heard the cold, angry thoughts of my father wishing he were the one doing this exact ritual but with Frank’s corpse on the table instead.
And it was then that I realized Frank was right about one thing. My dad did know how very useful I would be. And even now, in death, he was thinking about his missed chance of using me for his own ends. Thinking that he who opened the gates would be the one who controlled them.
I wanted off this crazy train. If I were going to get out of this room, get away from my father, from Frank, now would be a great time to do it. Except I couldn’t feel my feet. It’s hard to run when you have no idea where your legs are.
Anthony moaned.
Crap. I couldn’t leave him. Couldn’t leave him and the girls. I wondered if my father could feel my emotions, my thoughts like I could feel his.
Yes, he said. I can.
If I let you… use me… use my magic, you’ll stop Frank? I asked.
Yes. And I knew without a doubt that he was not lying. Okay, that was one good thing about this. He was so close to me I would know exactly when and how he would try to screw me over. I might even have a chance to stop him.
And you’ll help me free the girls? I asked. And Anthony?
Allison, there isn’t much time. I don’t know what I’ll be able to do after breaking Frank’s Wards and the Binding he has on my body. It is complicated. Untried. Half true. He might not know what the magic would do, but he had ideas, plans, of exactly what he’d be able to do: control me and all the magic at my disposal.
“Lie down,” Frank commanded. He put some Influence behind it. Anthony, the poor kid, whimpered. Of course, I wasn’t in that great of shape myself. Frank’s command filled me with the desire to do exactly as he said.
Damn it.
I crawled up on the empty table, fighting it, sweating, hating him, hating myself, hating my father. Magic filled me, but if I pulled on it, my dad would be able to reach it-push me aside and use it, use me, and then he could make me do anything he wanted to.
But maybe it would be worth letting him use me if he stopped F
rank.
I looked around wildly. Shadows, slanting light, webs of magic, moaning girls. I twisted so I could see the door. Maybe I could get out. Maybe I could still get away and call the police.
The door I had walked through was open. That was weird. I thought it had shut behind me.
A man moved into the light of the doorway, silent as a cat’s dream. Dark and shadowed, his skin flickered with silver glyphs, his body crackled with dark fire.
Zayvion Jones.
Maybe I was imagining him. I really wanted someone to show up and make some sense out of all this. Make Frank stop, make my dad stop. Make this all go away so I could get away, and life and death and the world would be normal again.
But Zayvion said he wasn’t following me. Kevin said Zayvion wasn’t following me. So why would he be here?
He made his way silently to Anthony’s side, and I looked away from him just in case he was real. Just in case Frank caught me looking at him. Frank was busy weaving a spell between my father’s corpse and me with the tip of the bloody knife and his empty left hand.
This was not how I wanted things to work out. But if Zayvion could get Anthony out of here, maybe I could find a way to rescue the girls.
I moved my feet, felt the bite of a rope around my ankle. Not a physical binding-a magical one. Frank was a busy little bastard.
“You are much like your father, Ms. Beckstrom,” Frank said in his nice-doctor voice while another rope of black snaked out to tighten around my legs. “Intelligent. Willful. And incredibly powerful. If you had simply returned my phone call, we could have gone about this in a much more civilized manner. It could have been very… pleasurable.”
Holy crap.
Allison, my father growled in my head. Now. Give me your power.
Help me free the girls.
Allison, he warned. If you will not give it to me, I will take it. And that will cause us both damage.
Anthony grunted.
Frank noticed. Glanced up away from me. Saw, as I saw, Zayvion carrying Anthony on his shoulder, moving toward the door.
