We Walk in Darkness

by Bill Hiatt

  “There won’t be any awkward new-guy adjustment period if you’re with us,” Gordy said. “I don’t want to sound too cocky, but among us, we pretty much know everyone, and we’re well liked. If you’re with us, everybody will treat you as if you’ve always been there. Some will do it for superficial reasons, but a lot will do it for real.”

  “And, consider this,” added Gordy. “There’s no lack of hot girls, and every so often, one realizes she doesn’t have a shot with Tal and becomes available.”

  Tal blushed noticeably at that.

  “How could I not be sold?” I laughed.

  “On the more serious side, you can train with us if you want, become more versatile,” said Shar, whom I recalled had a mixed martial-arts background. “If you want, you could also teach us some of those capoeira moves.”

  “Isn’t capoeira basically like dance?” asked Gordy. I didn’t know him well enough to be sure whether he was kidding or actually putting me down. He’d been very friendly, but I was pretty tired of people ridiculing my choice of a martial art.

  Then I did something profoundly stupid. With a sweeping kick, I knocked him off his feet and sent him tumbling to the sand. It wasn’t an astute move. I could have made an enemy of someone I’d need as a friend.

  Shar laughed heartily, and I breathed a sigh of relief when Gordy joined him. “Good one, man!” he said happily, still sitting on the sand. “Really good one!”

  I don’t know what, but something about these guys made me feel as if I’d known them for years, rather than hours. I would really miss Gavin…but I could get used to this group very, very quickly.

  Well, that is, if Bisavó didn’t find some way to blow the whole deal.

  “I see how it is,” she said, even more suspiciously than before. “You want to use Lucas for his skills. This isn’t about protecting him; it’s about giving yourselves another man in combat!”

  Tal did a masterful job of covering up the fact that she had really offended him, but the look in his eyes gave him away. “This is about protecting Lucas. If he were a ninety-eight pound weakling, he’d have gotten the same treatment. If he wants to join us when there’s a threat, he’s welcome, but our help doesn’t have strings attached.”

  I swallowed my annoyance with her as best I could. “Bisavó, coming here to warn me was risky for you, wasn’t it?”

  “I didn’t know what threatened you, Bisneto, so in that sense, yes it was,” she replied.

  “Yet you came, even though you didn’t really know me.”

  “I did know you!” she shot back, sounding almost angry. “My people thought it best I not visit, but I have watched you since the moment you were born. I was there the first time you tried capoeira. I was there for your first kiss—”

  “Wow, not creepy at all!” said Gordy.

  Bisavó looked intensely irritated by the interruption, and I knew I had to intervene to prevent another argument…no doubt, an embarrassing one.

  “So you came because I’m family, because you love me,” I said.

  “Yes, of course!” she replied.

  “Well, all these people came, more or less on the spur of the moment, to help a total stranger. They saved me…and all you’ve done is give them attitude the whole time. You have to stop it!”

  “But—” she began.

  “No, stop it!” I said, as if I were ordering a child…not the way I was taught to respect elders, but I had just met her tonight, and she had spent most of that time not acting grandmotherly. Oh, and there was that kidnap attempt. I wasn’t going to beat myself up for being too harsh.

  “You know what?” I continued. “They helped me…and I’m going to help them…whether you like it or not!” Turning to Tal and the guys, I added, “I would be honored to be one of you.”

  I had deterred Bisavó from ripping into Gordy, but she wasn’t quite done yet.

  “Meaning no disrespect,” she said in a tone that missed sincerity by a mile or so, “your plan leaves Lucas exposed for another day.”

  “I didn’t think we could sell a midnight phone call from Carrie Winn or a demand for Lucas’s father to drive all night to get to Santa Brígida,” said Tal evenly. “I’ll stay in Madisonville with him—invisibly, so as not to freak out his dad or anyone else. I’ll escort them on the drive down also.”

  “You can run as fast as the car?” I asked. With this guy, it was hard to know whether he had any limits. Certainly, none were obvious.

  “I can use magic to accelerate to faerie speed—roughly comparable to what you can do, I think, except it’s natural for you. But no, I can’t keep up with a car on the highway. I can also use magic to fly, and that’s how I think I’ll follow. It’s going to be kind of a strain to fly that far; I’m really only used to short distances. I’m sure I can do it though.”

  Yet another explanation I would have thought insane only twenty-four hours ago. Now it seemed completely rational, almost run-of-the-mill.

  I half expected Bisavó to take issue with the last part, but she said nothing. Maybe she finally realized that I was in good hands. More likely, she had figured out she wasn’t getting anywhere and just bowed to the inevitable. At this point, I’d take that!

  It wasn’t too long before Viviane, Shar, Gordy, and Khalid said their good-byes and left. Viviane promised to make sure the house was ready for my family, and the guys said they’d organize some kind of party to welcome me to town so that I could meet people and get comfortable as soon as possible.

  By this point it was something like two o’clock in the morning back in Madisonville, and, again, I could hardly keep my eyes open. I wanted to go home, but Tal thought it was too dangerous and suggested we get a little sleep on the beach, protected by broad daylight and distant from any shadows cast by the castle. I would much rather have slept in bed at home, but then I realized I couldn’t sleep worrying about someone leaping out of the shadows and attacking me. I’d have to sleep with all the lights on and the closet open to avoid any possibility of attack, and, as Tal was quick to point out, if the girl we captured today wasn’t the only human the shadows had kidnapped and trained, light alone might not protect me. Somewhat grumpily I lay down on the sand, but I basically passed out within minutes.

  Chapter 9: Like a Dream (Lucas)

  Tal woke me a few hours later. We needed to get me back home so that I could go to school and my dad wouldn’t realize something weird had happened.

  Bisavó could have left with the others but insisted on staying. I’m not sure whether she watched over me while I slept, explored the island, or waded out to sea and became a dolphin for a while. The important thing was that she now seemed reconciled to my going to Santa Brígida, even happy about it. I knew she had taken some kind of oath not to interfere, but that agreement didn’t require her to pretend to like the arrangement. I wasn’t sure what had happened to change her mind, but, frankly, I didn’t care, as long as she didn’t embarrass me again…or try to kidnap me!

  It didn’t take Tal long to get us back to Madisonville by portal. Bisavó bustled off to lift the sleep spells on Mon and Dad while I grabbed a quick shower…with Tal standing guard right outside the bathroom door. I supposed that could have been creepy, but I already felt like I knew him, and I didn’t have to worry about shadows with him that close.

  There would have been no easy way to explain Tal’s presence to my dad, so he made himself invisible and watched (probably hungrily) while the rest of us ate breakfast. Mom looked relieved, so I figured Bisavó had briefed her on the plan, and Mom must have been OK with it. Of course, that also meant Bisavó must have made it sound like a good thing, and that was more evidence that she had accepted it herself. Everything was coming together nicely.

  The school day passed like a blur. I said good-bye to my friends, and that was hard, especially with Gavin. The dancers weren’t that happy either, particularly since we had a show coming up, but, all things considered, the day went about as well as could be expected.

&nbs
p; Almost at the end of the day, though, I realized I might have blown it big-time.

  “Tal,” I whispered. He was nearby, invisible, as he had been all day.

  “Yeah, buddy?” he whispered back.

  “I said good-bye to people and told them about my dad’s new job, but it’ll be awkward if he somehow hears about that. He didn’t know about the change himself when I left for school, and he hasn’t called me yet. There’s no way I could have known about it.”

  “I would have stopped you if I thought it was a problem,” he said reassuringly.

  “But I told Janice, and her mom works with him. She could very easily—”

  “You worry too much,” Tal said, sounding almost like Gordy. “Your dad would have found out as soon as he got to work, and neither Janice nor her mom will know he didn’t call you right away. They have no reason to worry about it or ask him about it. Chill!”

  What Tal was saying made sense, but the way he said it made me uneasy. Last night he hadn’t exactly come across as a total stress case, but he was clearly not as laid back as Gordy. I’d seen Tal’s type before. I figured him for the kind of guy who didn’t exactly obsess, but who was meticulous about details. He didn’t seem quite that way now.

  I was probably being silly. I hadn’t even known him for a whole day, so how could I really judge if he was being himself or not?

  I got Dad’s call right after my last class, asking me to come home right away so we could talk. I pretended to be resistant to missing dance rehearsal, so he wouldn’t get suspicious, but I agreed quickly when he told me he really needed to see me.

  When I got home, he told me about the sudden change in his job, and, despite my earlier misgivings, he didn’t seem to suspect that there was more to this new development than he had been told.

  I wasn’t surprised when Bisavó announced she wanted to come with us and see our new home; she probably still wanted to keep an eye on me. I was pleasantly surprised that Dad’s head didn’t explode. In fact, he and she seemed to be getting along like…well, like family. Last night’s tension was completely forgotten.

  Just as Carrie Winn had asked, we each packed a few things we’d need for tomorrow. By the time we finished, a Winn Industries employee popped by to assure my parents that he’d make sure everything else was properly packed and shipped to us. Then we loaded the car and hit the road. Since we had a five-hour drive ahead, Dad wanted to start as early as we could and have dinner on the way.

  The trip, like the school day, seemed a little fuzzy. I was both tired and excited, so it didn’t surprise me that I was a little out of it.

  About midway through the trip, though, I began to worry about Tal. During one of our conversations, Shar or Gordy mentioned that magic burned energy at a pretty constant rate. Tal had exerted heavily last night, gotten little sleep, and stayed invisible the whole school day. He still had to be invisible now…and fly. He’d told me that since he was human and not faerie or djinn, flying required energy too. I didn’t think he’d eaten anything today either. What would happen if he ran out of juice?

  I must have been in a weird mood, because I started imagining Tal plunging out of the sky and smashing his skull open right in front of us. It wasn’t one of my visions, but once I started thinking about it, it was hard to get out of my mind. The worst part was that I had no way to check with him to make sure he was still all right. I found myself watching the road in front of us, half-expecting that Icarus-style plunge I kept imagining.

  Fortunately, we reached Santa Brígida without incident. Once there, we were greeted with everything but a marching band and a twenty-one gun salute. Carrie Winn was waiting for us at our new address, as was the mayor, several other dignitaries, and a big crowd of high school students. I hadn’t thought Gordy and Shar meant to have a party tonight, but there it was, so I went with it. My parents threw themselves into the adult meet and greet.

  It took me a few minutes to realize something was wrong.

  I’d been to Santa Barbara, but never to Santa Brígida. The guys hadn’t really described it to me, either, except in very general terms. Tal made some comment about Spanish colonial-revival architecture, for example. There sure was plenty of that, but the streets we had traveled to reach our new house seemed somehow familiar. It wasn’t until after we’d arrived and I was in the midst of the party that I realized why.

  They were all streets I’d seen in Santa Barbara.

  What were the odds that part of the layout of Santa Brígida was the same as Santa Barbara’s? Similar, maybe, but exactly the same, down to the street names? And I knew Santa Brígida was a lot smaller. The trip to the house took longer than it should have. We had spent twenty minutes driving from the town border to our house, which wasn’t clear on the other side of town.

  Then there was the house itself. It had looked oversized for the neighborhood, but I figured Carrie Winn had pulled out all the stops and gotten us the biggest place available. My dad had taught me enough about architecture to question the way the house fit into the neighborhood though. I knew that Santa Brígida, like many new developments, had a lot of houses, but just a few basic floor plans, and all the houses would be pretty close to the same size, at least in the same neighborhood. No sane developer would drop a mansion into the middle of a block with more modest homes. Sometimes neighborhoods evolved that way through remodeling, but they would never be planned that way.

  Then there were the guests. Aside from the people I had already met, they looked…well, too good to be true is the best way I can put it. The girls, especially, looked like Central Casting’s answer to the female population of a high school. I remembered Gordy telling me there were hot girls, and certainly Viviane, though somewhat older, was as hot as any guy could want, but no population was composed exclusively of good-looking people…except sometimes on TV or in the movies.

  Looking more closely, I realized that, except for the people I’d met last night and my own family, almost everyone reminded me of some actor or actress I’d seen. One or two people would have been understandable, but everyone?

  There was only one possible explanation: I was dreaming. The only problem with that explanation was that everything around me was so realistic, so detailed. It had been totally believable when I had been at home. Only now, when I was in unfamiliar territory, and I assumed my subconscious was fleshing out the detail from random memories, could I see clearly that what I was seeing couldn’t be real. My mind—or maybe someone else, come to think of it—was feeding me some fantasy version of Santa Brígida: I lived in a mansion; every single kid at my school had flocked to greet me; and the girls, if I was only going by appearances, looked like every teenage guy’s fantasies. Oh, and my dad and Bisavó were getting along as if they had known and liked each other for years.

  After all the stress of yesterday, there was a part of me that just wanted to go with it—and there was a lot of “it” to go with. A number of girls were eying me. How easy it would be to take one of them upstairs to my new bedroom, which, judging by the rest of the house, probably had satin sheets, and have wild sex with her. Actually, given the size of the house, the bed was probably big enough for more than two of us. The possibilities were endless.

  Well, at least they would have been if I were all hormones and no brain. The balance was a little off for a minutes, but there was still some brain in the mix. I supposed a dream this vivid could be caused by magic, and that suggested someone had me under a spell—Bisavó, most likely—though how she got around her oath I couldn’t guess. If I were right, I couldn’t see any purpose for it…unless I was being kidnapped again, and I couldn’t let that happen. The Encante might be beautiful. It might even be safe. But every instinct told me it would never be home.

  Impulsively, I sought out Tal, who appeared to be sucking face with some Selena Gomez clone. That was another thing that didn’t make sense. If this really had been our house in Santa Brígida, it would probably have some magic protection, but Tal didn’t seem li
ke the kind of guy who would just take for granted that I was safe and slip away to stick his tongue down some girl’s throat.

  I coughed and said, “Tal, can I talk to you for a minute?”

  “Sure,” he replied. “Excuse us for a minute, will you, honey?”

  The girl nodded, smiled, and walked away.

  That scene was yet another flaw in the scenario. If Tal had been the kind of guy to slip away for some quick fun, he would have been annoyed by the interruption. I knew I would have been under similar circumstances. His…girlfriend, I guessed, probably would have been too. Instead, they both acted like my needs should always come first…just the way I would want it in some fantasy.

  “So what’s up?” he asked. “You look worried.”

  “It’s not really a big deal. I just remembered you guys were going to tell me something about Carrie Winn, something important, and never got the chance to. What was it?”

  Tal looked blank for a second. “I don’t really remember having anything important to say about her, but that was a pretty hectic night. I’m sure it’ll come back to me after I get rested up. Anything else?”

  “No, thanks. That was all,” I said.

  “Well, then, back to business,” he said with a wink, heading off to find the Selena Gomez clone, still without any worry about the shadows, or whether or not whatever protection was on the house would hold.

  Now I knew for sure that what was happening around me wasn’t real. There was something about Carrie Winn, something secret enough for Shar to ask permission to tell me, something important enough he’d figured I’d need to know. Yet now Tal had no idea what I was talking about. He couldn’t, of course, because he wasn’t Tal but just an image thrown together by my subconscious. If I didn’t know something, he couldn’t either. That’s why my surroundings were so unrealistic. My mind was building them out of conjecture and creepy wish fulfillment.