The Book of Peril

by Melissa McShane

  “Which might explain why this guy was trying to teach himself origami. But in that case, why murder his supplier?”

  “We were close to finding the supplier, who would almost certainly have told us who he sold those origamis to. Our man couldn’t afford that risk.” He picked up one of the exploded snowflakes and examined it, his fingers working the folds as if that would make it give up its secrets. “All this trouble to destroy the oracle. I blame myself for not watching him more closely. I would very much like to know what he had in mind.”

  “You can’t be expected to think of everything.” I wished I dared ask how the guy had gotten the drop on him, but decided it might embarrass him.

  Malcolm nodded, but he looked distracted. I had a feeling this was something he wouldn’t forgive himself for for a long time. If ever.

  Someone outside shouted Malcolm’s name. Malcolm and I went out onto the little landing at the top of the stairs. Olivia waited below. “Helena, what are you doing here?”

  “Getting captured. It’s a long story.”

  “Where are the others?” Malcolm said.

  “Tinsley and Canales are on their way. Tinsley thinks he found something. It’s about five blocks over.” Olivia continued to look at me in a funny way.

  Malcolm gestured to her. “We’ll wait for them to arrive. I have to notify Lucia’s people. We have a body for them. In the meantime, I have some origamis for you to investigate up here.”

  I waited on the landing for Derrick and Hector to arrive, half-listening to the conversation Malcolm and Olivia were having. The euphoria had worn off, leaving me feeling cold and adrift. I’d seen someone killed by an invader before, and it had looked agonizing. Malcolm had told me it wasn’t a pretty death, not that I imagined death being pretty, ever. So why hadn’t it hurt me? I was certain it would have killed me if Malcolm hadn’t been there, yes, but I felt it would have sent me into a peaceful unconsciousness rather than excruciating pain. If this was an alteration given me by my role as custodian, like the one that let me see through illusions, it made no sense. At least seeing through illusions was useful.

  “… send her home…” That was Olivia.

  “… prove helpful…” Malcolm. They were too far from the door for me to hear more than a few phrases.

  “… know what you’re…” Olivia sounded more concerned than I’d ever heard her.

  “… doesn’t matter what…”

  From my vantage point, I could see Hector and Derrick running toward us. I waved. “Helena?” Derrick said.

  “It’s a long story. I’m going to help find the primary illusion.”

  “There’s no way Campbell will go along with that,” Hector said. He held a gun longer than his arm over one shoulder. It looked like an unholy cross between a missile launcher and an old-fashioned musket with a bell-shaped mouth.

  “He was persuaded to see reason.”

  “Campbell, since when do we take civilians along?”

  “Helena’s ability to see through illusions will be helpful,” Malcolm said from behind me, startling me. The man could move like a cat. “Tinsley, show us what you’ve found.”

  The rundown warehouse neighborhood didn’t extend more than two streets west. Beyond it, past some empty lots and a line of oaks, a residential area sprang up, its homey ramblers a stark contrast to the industrial construction we’d left behind. As we ran through the streets, avoiding the puddles of light cast by the streetlamps, my sense of dissociation rose again. We’d played night games when I was a kid, two teams trying to capture each other’s base or individuals playing tag, and it had felt like this, this combination of silly fun and deadly seriousness. I kept glancing at Hector’s gun to keep myself anchored. We were trying to save the oracle, and while that man might be dead, he could have allies.

  In fact, what was I doing here? I didn’t know how to be a commando, and I might endanger the team by my stupid insistence on going along. They had their goggles; they didn’t need me. I started to say something, then closed my mouth. I’d committed, and if I backed out now, Malcolm would insist on sending a team member back with me, weakening them further. I just had to do my best to keep up.

  Deep in the residential area, Olivia beckoned to us to stop. She handed out tiny paper parasols, the kind you get in drinks with too many layers. “In your hat, or in your hair, and make sure it’s open,” she said, giving one to me. I pulled my messy hair into a ponytail and stuck the parasol into the band. Then I grabbed Olivia’s arm. A cyclist was coming straight for us. Olivia shook her head and stepped off the sidewalk, pulling me with her. The others did the same. The cyclist kept coming, then passed between us without even making eye contact, let alone exclaiming in wonder at four black-clad commandos and a woman wearing very dirty pants and a torn blouse.

  “It’s only a visual distraction, so stay quiet,” Olivia said, though I was sure the warning was just for me. No doubt the others already knew. We walked on, Derrick in the lead. The air was cool and damp, promising more rain before morning. I hoped we’d be done before then. We continued to avoid the lamp light, either because it would ruin the illusion or just out of habit, I didn’t know. The houses were all quiet and well-lit, no doubt filled with happy families that had no idea of the urgency of our mission.

  After a few blocks, we came to a small park studded with oak trees. A play area with slides and towers built of molded plastic stood near the center. “It’s somewhere in here,” Derrick said in a low voice, and with a gesture from Malcolm they all fanned out to search the area. I was left to stand alone near the sidewalk, uncertain what to do. I wasn’t trained to search like they were. You’ve got eyes. I headed for the play area.

  The playground had one of those playsets built to look like a rocket ship, with two towers accessible by ropes and rungs and the smallest rock climbing wall I’d ever seen. One of the towers had a corkscrew slide, and the other was attached to swings that moved idly in the growing breeze. I walked between them, kicking up the wood chips that covered the ground. They were supposed to soften the blow when you fell, but I’d never liked the way they shifted underfoot when they got wet.

  He wouldn’t have hidden it here. The playground was too public, and kids were guaranteed to pick up and possibly eat anything unusual. But I ducked under the towers and searched, wishing I had a flashlight. The light here, blocked by the trees, was especially dim. I searched beneath the slide and found only rock-hard bits of gum. I checked all three swings, then sat in one and rocked back and forth. I needed a flashlight—

  “Here,” Malcolm said, handing me a heavy flashlight big enough to use as a weapon. “Have you found anything?”

  “Not yet, and thanks.” I flicked on the light. “Will this be covered by the illusion?”

  “No. We count on the concealment of the trees and the fact that almost everyone is indoors at this time to obscure the lights. Are you feeling well?”

  “You mean after being bitten? I feel fine. Why didn’t it hurt?”

  “I have no idea. You should discuss it with Tinsley when the oracle is safe. He may have some ideas, as a bone magus and a doctor.”

  “Derrick’s a pediatrician.”

  “A doctor is a doctor. But we don’t have time to worry about it now. My sense of urgency is building.”

  I shone my flashlight up where the chains of the swings were fastened to a thick frame. “Mine too.”

  Malcolm left me to my search, and I lay down on the uncomfortable wood chips—I couldn’t ruin my clothes further—to shine the light underneath the nearest tower. I repeated this for the second tower and was about to move on when my eye caught something red. Something out of place. I dug through the chips to clear my line of sight and saw it. “It’s over here!”

  Shuffling, like wet leaves, and then the team surrounded me. “Let me look,” said Olivia, dropping to her knees. I rolled out of the way and let her take my place. “I don’t remember them being that red before.”

  “Red is bad,�
� Hector said. “We need to get rid of it now.”

  “I can’t reach it,” Olivia said. “I’m too big.”

  “I’m not,” I said.

  “Absolutely not,” said Malcolm. “That thing could kill you.”

  “I’ll immobilize it so it can’t shift,” Olivia said. “But you’ll have to be quick. The immobilization only works so long.”

  “No,” Malcolm said. “We’ll have to move this—”

  “There’s no time,” Olivia said. She rolled out of the way. “It’s immobilized. You have less than two minutes.”

  I dropped to the ground and wormed my way as close to the base of the tower as I could get. The thing glowed red in the light from my flashlight and to my eye pulsed with malevolence. My fingertips waved about an inch from the exploded snowflake origami. “Not close enough,” I said, and rolled flat on my back and shoved my arm that much closer. “I can’t see it.”

  “I’ll guide you,” Malcolm said, his voice muffled. “Move your hand to the left—no, your left.”

  I did as he instructed and felt the feather-light touch of paper against my fingers. “Keep your hand touching it and slide your fingers down, not too fast, very—stop there.”

  I could still feel its smooth surface, though I had no idea what Malcolm saw. “Now, move deeper—toward it—half an inch, and that will put it where you can grasp it,” he said.

  I strained toward it. “I can’t get any closer,” I gasped.

  “You can do this,” Malcolm said. “Think of the store. Push.”

  I remembered the oracle, of the timeless silence that enveloped me whenever I stepped inside. Heat radiated from the origami, and in a sudden fury I pushed, screamed at the pain tearing through my shoulder, and my fingers closed on the smooth papery folds.

  “She’s got it. Pull her out,” Malcolm said, and hands gripped my leg and other arm and slid me along the wood chips until all of me was free. Olivia took the origami from my hand with two fingers and turned away, muttering over it. I lay on my back and gasped in the cool, damp air until my head cleared. Malcolm helped me sit. “Are you all right?”

  I nodded. “Is it done? Is the oracle safe?”

  We all looked at Olivia, waiting for a response. She had her head bent over the origami and her back to us. I took in another cool breath and realized Malcolm had clasped my hand in his, though his full attention was on Olivia. Then a flash of red light illuminated our surroundings. Olivia staggered backward, swearing and shaking her hands as if they’d been burned. I felt dizzy again, as terrified as I’d been facing those invaders.

  “Quincy. Report,” Malcolm said, his hand tightening on mine.

  “It’s done,” she said, turning around. She was smiling. “The illusion is broken.”

  Malcolm released me and stood. “Well done,” he said. “Let’s head back. Lucia’s people will have a lot of questions for us.”

  Lucia’s people still weren’t there when we returned to the warehouse and the body. Derrick made me sit at the student’s desk in the office while he examined my shoulder, which was scraped and beginning to bruise, and the place on my calf where the invader had bitten me. My pants leg was torn, but the skin beneath was unmarked and didn’t even hurt. “They have physical weapons, claws and teeth and so forth, but mostly they kill by sucking the magic out of you,” he said. “That doesn’t leave signs of physical attack. That’s why it looks like their victims die of heart attack or stroke, or something similar. If you hadn’t been there, though, they’d have torn Campbell to pieces.”

  “But it didn’t hurt at all. It felt relaxing. When I saw someone killed by an invader, he looked as if he’d been terrified to death.”

  “I don’t know, Helena. It might be a custodian thing. Ask Lucia—” He stopped, his mouth tightening in a grimace. I didn’t need him to say I might not get a chance to ask Lucia anything.

  “They’re here,” Malcolm said from the doorway, and we left the office and hurried down the metal steps, rattling and clanking without caring who heard. It was full dark, and no one seemed interested in what was happening among these old, abandoned warehouses.

  Two little white vans had pulled up to the curb behind my car, and men and women in dark jeans and T-shirts in various colors emerged, followed by Lucia herself. She looked much older than her real age, mid-forties, and as weary as if she hadn’t slept for three days, which might be true. “Where is he?” she said.

  “In that warehouse. I apologize for allowing him to kill himself,” Malcolm said.

  Lucia waved that away. “You can’t be everywhere, Campbell. You, you, and you check the body. Standard procedure. The rest of you—Campbell, where are the origamis?”

  “Up there, in the office.”

  “You two, bag and seal the office contents. The oracle is safe?”

  “Quincy destroyed the primary illusion. The oracle is safe.”

  “Good work. I—what in the hell are you doing here?”

  I’d been standing most of the way behind Malcolm and Derrick, not on purpose. “I was, um, sort of kidnapped.”

  Lucia eyed Malcolm. “Why would he capture both of you?”

  “I believe my capture was accidental,” Malcolm said, looking more impassive than usual, to conceal his embarrassment, I thought. “It was Helena he wanted, judging by how much effort he went to to lure her here alone. He did not anticipate my team finding his hideout and I was careless in allowing us to split up. I take responsibility for my failure.”

  “Stop looking for ways to make me punish you, Campbell, I’ve had my fill of unnecessary discipline this week.” Lucia glanced toward the warehouse door, which was open and revealed three figures bending over a fourth lying on the ground. “Why did he want Davies?”

  “I can only guess, but based on his first attack, he believed her to be a threat to his plan to destroy Abernathy’s. She slowed the progress of the illusion’s debilitating effect by continuing to provide accurate auguries. I believe he intended to have the invaders kill her and allow the resulting confusion over the succession to accelerate the oracle’s destruction. My stupidity in falling into his hands gave him one more potential victim.” Malcolm touched his bloody head. “It almost worked.”

  “Well, let’s thank God it didn’t.” Lucia walked over to the three gathered in the warehouse and began a low-voiced conversation.

  “I should take a look at that,” Derrick said, “now we have time.” He made Malcolm sit on the bottommost step and took his head between his hands, tilting it to catch the light better.

  “You did well,” Olivia told me. “Now, never do anything like that again.”

  “I can’t promise anything, given that I was tricked into coming here. I certainly wouldn’t have come on my own.” I remembered seeing those invaders come chittering over the windowsill and shuddered.

  “Are you cold? You’re not dressed for this.”

  “I was coming to help Viv—” I swore and dug out my phone. Viv picked up right away. “I’m fine,” I said.

  “What happened?” Viv exclaimed. “Why am I at IKEA instead of in Gresham?”

  “It’s a long story, and I don’t think I have time for it,” I said, seeing Lucia beckon to me. “The short version is someone used that illusion in your van to kidnap me, I escaped after a fight with some invaders, and Malcolm’s team found the origami affecting Abernathy’s and destroyed it.”

  “Wow,” said Viv. “I can’t imagine what the long version sounds like.”

  “I have to go. Did you get a tow truck for your actual location?”

  “The van is fine. It seems breaking down was part of the illusion. Can we meet at your place to talk? I’m still shaken by this whole ordeal. Not as shaken as you should be.”

  “I’ll text you when I’m back. It’s going to take a hell of a lot of ice cream to make this go away.”

  Lucia stood with her hands on her hips, glaring at me. “Later,” I said, and put my phone away and trotted toward her.

  L
ucia looked like she wanted to kill someone, and I slowed my steps as I approached in case it was me. But she said, “His name is Matt McKanley. He used to live in Eugene until his wife died, about three months ago, then he up and left without a word. Nobody’s seen him since then until tonight.”

  “The name sounds familiar. You know—knew him? Why would he do this?”

  “No idea. He’d started acting strange, but hell, Davies, his wife was dying of cancer. I’d act strange if that happened to me. But that’s not the bad news.”

  “What more could there be?”

  “McKanley was a glass magus. That means he didn’t suicide. He had a partner who killed him to keep him from talking.”

  That made me feel sick. “You mean this isn’t over?”

  “Oh, it’s over. The creator of the origami illusion is dead, and my people assure me they can defend Abernathy’s against it now they’ve got material to work with. If the second man has any common sense, he’ll have fled. But I wish I had McKanley alive to interrogate. He was a good man, I thought, and something must have made him snap.”

  “You don’t have any idea why he’d want the oracle destroyed?”

  Lucia gave me an ironic look. “If I knew what evil lurked in the hearts of man, I’d have a better-paying job than this one. Maybe I’ll ask the oracle. If McKanley and his friend had a longer plan than this, I want to know about it.”

  “I could look up his record, if he has one. It won’t tell me what questions he asked the oracle, but sometimes you can see patterns in the number and frequency of requests.” My idea was a long shot, but despite Lucia’s reassurance, I didn’t feel it would be over until I saw the oracle return a string of accurate auguries.

  “You do that, and tell me if you find anything.” Lucia’s face in the low light was grim. “About the only good news is it’s unlikely Judy Rasmussen ever saw this guy, let alone conspired with him.”