by Jen Kirchner
“Is this what you do when you disappear into your lab for days at a time?” Dad asked.
“Absolutely. If I didn’t have to work, this is all I would do.”
The panels collapsed back together with a clang that echoed across the garage. I announced that it was ready, except for one thing.
“This is the awkward part,” I said, “because now I have to pseudo-sacrifice someone.”
The group fell silent. Dad seemed startled.
“I don’t blame you for being nervous,” I said. “Brad was nervous the first time too, but it’s a simple trick. Your soul waits on The Floor, on the other side of the Styx. When it’s done, I bring you right back.”
Luucas folded his arms over his chest. “You said there were problems with the Styx.”
“Not where you’re going. It’s safe as long as you don’t touch the water.”
“No stabbing?”
I held up empty hands. “No knife.”
Thaon’s eyes narrowed. “How do we know this is not a scheme to kill one of us?”
“Because if I’m not careful, this will kill both of us. I’d have to be immortal to sacrifice another immortal successfully.”
Luucas relaxed, dropping his arms to his sides. “Will I see the spell go off, too?”
“Sure. I’ll put a delay in it.”
For safety’s sake, I asked everyone to stand back a bit, then shot Luucas’s soul down to The Floor. His soul was hard to move around. This was probably going to hurt.
I grabbed the spell on the wall. Black mist swirled around me as I braced myself. Mentally, I reached for Luucas and pulled the slightest bit of his life…
A powerful wave of energy slammed into me, desperate to cram itself into every corner of my body. I staggered, using all my strength to fight back. Dad felt something was wrong and started shouting into my head. That didn’t help.
The spell clanged its signature sound, letting me know the sacrifice had been accepted. I pulled Luucas’s soul up and fell against the wall, panting, as a low rumble rippled across the garage.
A large, black disc spread over Thaon’s cars. It hung in the air for as long as the delay dictated, then slammed downward. The cars flattened against the pavement like beer cans. The impact was deafening. Glass shards, plastic fragments, and other bits of debris flew in every direction, embedding themselves in the concrete walls and surrounding cars.
I slid down the wall until I was sitting with my knees to my chest. My lungs burned and my eyes stung, but worse than that, my skin felt as if it were aflame. I lay down on the cool concrete and pressed my palms and one cheek against it. I was tempted to rip off my clothes for more contact.
Mikelis knelt down to inspect me.
“What’s the matter with her?” Henri asked.
“She pulled in too much of Luucas’s energy. Necromancers overheat when we have a close call.”
I lay still, listening to my pounding heart. In the back of my mind, I watched Dad dial his cell phone. Mine started to ring. I couldn’t move, so Luucas took it from my purse and answered.
“Yes, Sir?” He then described what it was like on The Floor.
Thaon was the only one who wasn’t impressed. He was pissed. “Not even The Fathers could cast that spell! This necromancer is not bound by any rules of magic. She could use her freakish abilities against us. We are not safe with her loose!”
Mikelis snarled, “It took her ten minutes just to put the damned spell together and she almost killed herself doing it. I think your pretty face is safe from danger, Thaon.”
Mikelis helped me up, and I stumbled into him. I felt everyone’s scrutiny, as if interaction with Mikelis made them nervous.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, and stepped back.
Luucas hung up the phone and handed it back to me. He turned to the conservators. “Okay, I want to start going through the apartments. I apologize for invading your privacy. I’m sure this will only take a few minutes.” He waited for them to leave, then looked at me. “Don’t go anywhere, especially after that performance.”
He gestured to Mikelis, who just gave me another thoughtful look before following Luucas down the hall.
“Eliana, I do not want you to do that ever again.”
“What’s wrong?”
“The spell you cast has never been successfully completed before. I do not want this display to encourage the wrong people into thinking you are an advantageous target.”
“It really wasn’t that big of a deal, Dad.”
“It is to everyone who views necromancers as the key to unlimited power. The Yeng Fuling spell is, as they say, the stuff of legend. What you did is outside of anything I am able to do. What Thaon said—that the rules of magic do not apply to you—appears to be true. I must ensure your identity is not revealed by anyone who has seen you today.”
I was afraid to ask, but I did anyway. “How are you going to ensure that?”
“You do not want to know.”
I didn’t want to think about Dad making death threats.
I returned to Veronica’s car. As I had guessed, it was a rental. All I found was a receipt and a scrap of paper with a phone number scribbled on it. I pocketed the scrap and decided to call the number as soon as I was finished here. With my check of the front seat concluded, I moved to the back.
Death Radar brought my attention to movement by the elevators. Thaon was heading my way.
“Dad?”
He was on the phone, telling Heraclitus what I had just done. He was so distracted I had to mentally shout to get his attention.
“Dad, that Thaon guy is coming over here.”
“I assume Luucas asked him to watch you.”
“I don’t like him.”
“He is a conservator and is deserving of our trust.”
“He could be Veronica’s buyer.”
“Eliana, this is a witch hunt. No conservator who works for Luucas would dare associate with voodoo.”
I opened the rear driver’s side door and stuck my head inside just as Thaon reached the car. He stood on the opposite side, watching me.
“I am staying with you to ensure your safety,” he announced.
“Gee, thanks. I feel better already.”
I bent down to look under the driver’s seat, but it was empty.
“Diaco Rendon has an effective means of watching you.”
“Yeah, so feel free to leave at any time.”
“May I see it?” he asked.
I held up my wrist. “See?”
Unsatisfied, he held out his hand.
“Dad, he wants to check out the bracelet.”
Dad’s conversation with Heraclitus stopped. He sounded tired and aggravated. “Eliana, it is all right.”
I knew I might have been overreacting because Thaon was a huge jerk. I slipped off the bracelet and handed it over. Thaon reached out and took it, taking special care not to insert his fingers through the band.
I crawled into the car and checked the passenger side. Nothing under that seat, either. I crawled back out and stood up. I grabbed the phone number from my pocket.
“You gave an impressive display earlier,” Thaon said.
I didn’t even bother looking up at him. “Not a big deal.”
“But it is.” His voice dropped to a low whisper, sending a shiver up my spine. “You are a powerful necromancer indeed.”
My head snapped up. Our eyes locked. I heard a light clinking as my bracelet hit the pavement and slid under the car.
My first reaction was to take control of Thaon’s body, but something blocked my mental probe. A painful and violent throbbing burst in my head and I was nearly brought to my knees. Thaon slid across the hood of the car. I stumbled toward the elevator, but he grabbed my jacket and jerked me backward, slamming me against his rock-solid frame. My hands were loose, so I cut out the supernatural plane we were standing on and flipped it. As the plane tilted away, Thaon fell to the ground, pulling me with him.
We tumble
d apart from each other. The metal gleam of my bracelet caught my eye from under the car. I scrambled for it, squeezing myself into the small space and scraping my head. My fingers brushed the bracelet, but I wasn’t close enough.
Thaon’s hand clamped down on my ankle and dragged me back out. I rolled the supernatural plane again, pitching Thaon forward. He slammed headfirst into the car door, cursed, and released me. I dove for my bracelet again. My fingers barely reached it and grabbed hold just as I was dragged back out.
“Dad!” I screamed into the telepathic link. “Dad! Help!”
Thaon flipped me onto my back and clamped his hand around my throat. His other hand ripped his shirt open. Buttons flew off in different directions, pelting me and the pavement. Hanging from his chest was a necklace of small, stained bones. My eyes were instantly drawn to them. A calming sensation came over me and my head tingled. The bones sang to me, asking for my blood.
Thaon removed a cloth bundle from his back pocket and unwrapped it. Light caught the object inside and a silver gleam hit my eyes.
“You are very powerful,” he whispered, raising the Ker’Mortan Dagger. “Ruairí told us not to touch you, but this will make me more powerful than he.”
I barely heard him. I was too entranced by the song of the bones. Thaon started to chant, his foreign words entwining with the melody. He raised the dagger over his head in a maddening crescendo. Just before he plunged it into me, his body spasmed. His eyes widened and he stiffened in a contorted pose. A dark shadow swept over him. The shadow did not hurt the necklace or the dagger, and the bone song continued.
I looked up at the dagger, still poised in Thaon’s blackened hand. I extended my wrist toward the blade. Before I could give my blood offering, a hand wrapped around my wrist and pulled. I slid away and the entrancement shattered. My ears popped, the room spun, and voices shouted. I looked up at Mikelis, who sat on the ground, cradling me in his arms. I followed his gaze and shuddered.
Thaon had been transformed into a blackened cinder. The form and expression were entirely Thaon, but the person was no more. Luucas removed Ker’Mortan from his fist and the arm crumbled into black dust.
Through the telepathic link of the bracelet I was tightly grasping, I heard Dad shouting for Mom while rushing from room to room.
“Dad, I’m okay.”
Was I okay? My head bobbed, unable to stay upright. Mikelis pressed a gentle hand against my cheek until I was resting against his shoulder. I closed my eyes and watched Dad run toward a closed door. As he reached out for the handle, the door flew open. A lovely woman with long, chocolate-brown hair and dark eyes stood at the end of the bed, dressed in a smart, yet stylish, pantsuit. Her hair was neatly combed, her face fresh with color, and she looked as if she were in her right mind—at least, more than she had been in the last two days. She smiled.
“Hello, Darling.” She pointed to two suitcases on the floor, standing side by side, their handles extended. “I have packed a bag for you. We should hurry to our plane. Before you ask, I reserved our tickets many years ago.”
She grabbed one of the suitcases and pulled it from the room with a flourish. From down the hall and through Dad’s ears, I heard her call back to us, speaking as if nothing had happened, “Eliana, it is time for breakfast!”
The world was going crazy and taking me with it.
NINETEEN
After everything that had happened to me this morning, attending the photo shoot was a bad idea. Of course, I went anyway. Driving to the location in Buffalo took an hour, makeup took another hour, and I spent the following three hours in a full-leather getup under hot flood lights and powerful fans, head-banging myself into a furious headache. By the time we were finished, I was nauseated and exhausted and all I wanted was to lie down. I thanked the photographer and his team and told Pasha to take the rest of the day off.
While I was changing back into my clothes, I heard a phone ring on the other side of the dressing screen, followed by Mikelis’s voice as he answered. Mikelis hadn’t been far from me since we left the garage, and had stayed even closer when I removed my bracelet for the photographs. The phone conversation was short and Mikelis’s portion was all one-word answers: “Hi. Soon. Yes. Bye.”
I put my bracelet back on, grabbed my purse, and stepped out as Mikelis was putting his phone away.
“Luucas?” I asked.
He nodded. “Word’s out about Thaon, so he’s calling a concilium.” I gave him a questioning look, and he explained, “It’s like a town hall. They’re old-fashioned, but Luucas still has them. A lot of our people will drive in for it.”
We drove back to Rochester in relative silence. I didn't think Mikelis was cranky; he just looked preoccupied. I tried making conversation, but he just gave me single-word responses, so I eventually gave up.
Halfway home, my phone rang. Mikelis politely turned the radio off. The display on my phone said it was our public relations company. Great. What had I done now? I answered the phone with trepidation.
“Hi Kari, it's Amy Trantham. I was listening in on your phone interviews this morning. You did a great job.”
I exhaled a huge sigh of relief. “Thank you.”
“Did you notice anything odd about the questions?”
“Not really. They asked about the new album and my relationship with Cody. Come to think of it, there were some odd questions about Brad. I don’t know why.”
“Yeah. We noticed the same thing about Brad, so we looked into it.”
That didn’t sound good. Brad didn't often get bad publicity. His good looks usually gave him a buffer.
“Is something wrong?”
“Well, let me ask you a question first: when was the last time you spoke with your sister?”
That took me by surprise. “My sister?”
“Last night, she was quoted by a few lowbrow gossip magazines saying you and Brad are together.”
I shrugged to myself, not really seeing the cause for alarm. “Well, yeah, we're together. The band has no plans of breaking up.”
Mikelis, who was overhearing the call with his heightened sense, shot me a sideways glance.
“No,” Amy said, “I mean romantically.”
Nausea and alarm washed over me simultaneously. “What?” I shrieked.
“If what she's saying is true, it's okay. Who could blame you? Brad’s pretty hot, and he’s only your cousin.”
The idea was so disgusting words couldn’t properly convey how I felt. “But it's not true! She has no idea what she's talking about!”
“Everyone thinks she does because she’s your sister. According to your bio, you two are close.”
Of course everyone thought so, because that was my carefully crafted story. I closed my eyes and groaned very loudly.
“Um, can you elaborate on that reaction?”
“No, I can't.”
Desperation filled her voice. “Kari, I've kept worse secrets for people. You'd be surprised at the things I know. I can help you with this, but you have to tell me the truth.”
I didn't know how to talk about this. I never had close friends because they asked these kinds of questions that I couldn’t answer. All I ever had was my immortal family, Brad, and Uncle Rick. That was it.
I took a deep breath and tried to steady my voice. “I haven’t seen or talked to my sister since grade school. She gets paid to stay out of my life and not talk to anyone about me.”
Amy’s voice was slow and coaxing. “Did you stop making payments or something?”
“I don't know. Marcus has always handled it. You’ll have to talk to him.”
“I will.” She actually sounded relieved. “Don’t worry, we’ll get this taken care of.”
“Marcus is going to be furious when you tell him,” I warned. “Be prepared for that.”
“Sure. Now we need to talk about damage control.”
I opened my eyes and slumped back in the seat. “Let’s hear the options.”
“No options this time.
You have to date Cody Springer.”
And I was back to shouting. “No! Absolutely not! No way!”
She ignored my protests and talked over me, intent on getting her message through my thick skull. “I talked to Cody's people again, and they're still willing to deal—which is unbelievable after what you’ve done. And by the way, that little water-throwing episode at the Dana DaCosta Show is circulating the Internet. A few people in the live audience caught it on their cameras.”
“Cody’s hands were all over me!”
“And you know what I’m going to say to that,” she said. “Cody’s a star and his pervy little hands are going to make or break your next album. Plus, the public loves you together. You're the rebellious rock star and he's the gorgeous actor. Cody's people are willing to make a deal for three to six months of dating. We need to set an end date.”
A dating contract? Was she kidding?
I caught Mikelis’s angry expression out of the corner of my eye. “No. There has to be another way.”
“There isn't. This isn't just about you, Kari. This is about Brad, too. If you don’t go through with this, you’ll be ruining both of your careers. Is that what you want? You want to ruin Brad, too?”
Oh, this lady was good. She knew exactly which of my buttons to push. My head dropped and I stared into my lap. If this affected anyone else, I would have said no. I had to do this, if only for Brad.
I had to look away from Mikelis while I said it. “I’ll do it for three months, but no touching—and definitely no kissing.”
I heard clapping on the other end. I guess she thought she had scored a touchdown. “We have to act fast on this. You and Cody have to get in front of the media right away—within the next couple of days.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
I hung up and tossed the phone into my purse between my feet. For the next ten minutes, Mikelis and I drove in awkward silence. I didn't know what to say. He seemed irritated, and I couldn't blame him. Could I be any tackier?
“I have to do this for Brad. It has nothing to do with me.”
Mikelis blinked slowly, staring straight at the road. I wasn’t sure whether that could be considered a reaction.
