Unknown os-2

by Rachel Caine

  This was, I realized, not a serious attack at all. Candelario was a crude instrument, powerful and poorly trained. A failure, she would classify him. Expendable. She sent him to me expecting him to be destroyed.

  I exchanged a look with Luis, and then cupped a hand behind the boy’s head. Bravado or not, he was sweating; I felt the clammy moisture against my fingers.

  “Sleep,” I said, and took a small measure of Luis’s power to course through Candelario’s nerves. The boy went limp, head gone heavy against my hand, and Luis softened the ground around his feet while I pulled him free. The grass was tenacious where it had twisted around his legs, but I finally convinced it to withdraw. I eased the boy to his back on the grass and looked up at Luis. “What now?”

  He would be a bad enemy to leave at our backs; he might not be clever, but I sensed that he would be implacable. If he couldn’t hurt us, he could threaten those around us, innocents caught in the crossfire of powers that they couldn’t understand.

  Luis was quiet for a moment; then he said, “I’ll call Marion.” Marion Bearheart, I understood this to mean; she was a powerful Warden in her own right, and she had been left here to oversee the skeleton crew of adepts remaining in the country while the majority of the Wardens were off chasing some other threat—what, I did not know and did not care. It was none of my concern.

  Marion Bearheart was also the head of a division of the Wardens which concerned itself with policing those with powers. They were police, judge, jury, and executioner when required.

  We had little choice but to involve her. Only her resources could deal with this boy in anything other than a fatal manner.

  Luis turned away to make the call on his cell phone, and I considered the boy on the ground. He looked thin, but not unhealthy. No scars or bruises that I could see. He had not been abused, or at least not in a way that left marks. Still, there clung to him an aura of desperation, of darkness, and I wondered if, on some level, his subconscious mind understood how little he meant to the one he followed so ardently.

  I dug into his coat pockets, turning up the detritus of a young life—sticks of gum, a small cellular phone, a bus pass which showed he had arrived in town recently, coming to Albuquerque from Los Angeles, which I remembered was in the state of California. Many hours away. In another pocket I found a thin wallet, quite new, which contained only a library card for a place called San Diego, and some thin green sheets of money—not many. None of the other things that men like Luis normally carried in their wallets—no plastic cards, no slips of paper, no receipts for purchases. Only the cash, and the one simple card.

  I held the card up to Luis as he finished up his phone call. He frowned as he read it. “San Diego?”

  “What’s in San Diego?” I asked.

  “Awesome shoreline, big naval base, great weather. Apart from that, I have no idea.” He handed it back. “Marion’s dispatching a team to take the kid into custody while they see what’s been done to him. Twelve is too young for anyone to be using the kind of power he did today. It could hurt him.”

  Regardless of whether or not it hurt him, it would certainly, inevitably bring tragedy to those around him. Candelario was too powerful, and had none of the training and balance of an adult Warden. (Though I wondered, from time to time, how much difference that made with many of the Wardens, who had a tendency to act like spoiled children in their own right.)

  “How long before they arrive?”

  “You’re kidding, right? We’re short-staffed everywhere. She’s got to send a team out from Los Angeles. They’ll fly in, but it’ll still be tomorrow before they get here. We need to keep him on ice until then.”

  I didn’t understand on ice until I framed it in the context of his words. Keep him controlled and unconscious, I interpreted. “Is that not kidnapping?”

  “Sure,” Luis agreed. “If anybody is missing the kid. Which they might be, but we can’t give him back like this. He’s been brainwashed, like the rest of Pearl’s kids. Maybe Marion’s people can deprogram him and deactivate his powers until he’s old enough to grow into them.”

  That was a positive interpretation. The other side—the likely side—was that the Wardens would be forced to remove Candelario’s powers completely, to ensure he didn’t harm himself or others.

  But neither of us could afford to take a personal interest in the child’s rehabilitation. Isabel, I reminded myself. Isabel must be saved. Manny and Angela’s child, Luis’s niece. And something—though I hated to admit it—something to me as well. I dared not define it more than a simple admission that I had a connection to the child.

  More than that implied threads which bound me into this half-life of human existence, and I was not yet ready to truly explore the depth of these connections.

  None of which solved the problem of the boy lying at my feet. “What do we do with him?”

  Luis shrugged. “Take him back to the house, I guess,” he said. “Can you shield us?” He meant, from prying eyes—a thing which, in fact, I had already done when I realized how this might look to the random humans in the area. It was not invisibility, but it was similar; they would see us, but their brains would attach no significance to it. No memories would capture us.

  Luis, on my nod, picked up the limp body of the boy in his arms, and we walked calmly across the street, down the alley (where I, at least, held my breath), and into the backyard of Luis’s house. I refastened the lock on the gate, repairing the damage, and followed Luis inside.

  He took the boy to Isabel’s room, still furnished with all her little treasures and brightly colored toys, and stretched him out on a bedspread covered with cartoon characters. In a curiously kind gesture, he removed the boy’s shoes and put them beside the bed, then touched his fingertips to the child’s forehead. I sensed the sleep I’d given grow deeper.

  He wouldn’t wake for hours. “Unless you are planning to be here when he comes out of it, we should restrain him,” I said.

  “Great. Kidnapping and restraining. I guess we have to tack assault on to that, since we knocked him down.”

  “He was trying to kill us.” I glanced toward the living room. “Also, he burned your couch.”

  “Well, that makes it all okay.” Luis sighed and sat down on a delicate white stool decorated with tiny pink flowers, which did not seem at all suitable. “Seriously, Cass, we’re in weird territory here. This kid could make a case that we abducted him, drugged him, tied him up. We could look at major prison time for this if we’re not careful.”

  “He attacked us.”

  “And you seriously think anybody’s going to believe that? Anybody who wasn’t there, I mean?” He shook his head. “We need him out of here before he wakes up.”

  “And how do we do that if the Wardens can’t send someone until tomorrow?”

  “Meet them halfway,” he said. “We stick him in the backseat of a car, put a blanket over him, and drive. I’ve got a real bad feeling that if we don’t, we’re going to be sweating in a cell by nightfall.”

  I didn’t really see the danger; with the power we had at our disposal, a jail could hardly hold us—at least, not a jail the way normal, nongifted humans constructed them. Holding any kind of Warden was extremely difficult, but Earth Wardens were by far the worst. Jails were made of metal, of stone, of wood—materials worked from the Earth and connected to her by chains of history.

  If he was not unconscious, or drugged, Luis could make short work of most locks and stone walls. So could

  I, through him.

  “You’re not worried about escaping,” I realized. He grunted.

  “Thing is, I’m not exactly tops on the Good Citizen list. They’re going to come for me guns blazing, and there are a lot more of them than there are of us.” Interesting that he was now automatically classifying the two of us as facing adversity together. “Trust me, it’s better if we don’t get into a fight. Not that we can’t win it, but we shouldn’t have to try. People will get hurt.”

  I
t wasn’t the nature of the Djinn to be so prudent, but I saw his point, and I nodded. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Manny’s van is in the garage,” Luis said. “Get it started, I’ll get the kid. If you could tint the windows a little darker . . .”

  Child’s play. I went to the garage and did as he asked, and before long, Luis appeared in the door of the garage with the slight burden of the child in his arms. I opened the back sliding door, and we settled the boy across the bench seat in the back, sleeping quietly and wrapped in a colorful blanket from Isabel’s closet. He looked even younger now than before, and much more helpless. I saw Luis touch his fingers gently to the boy’s forehead, both in gentle affirmation and to ensure the deep sleep continued uninterrupted. I took the passenger seat up front, and Luis closed the back and entered the driver’s side.

  “You ready?” he asked. I shrugged. “Yeah, me neither. Here, take my phone. You make arrangements with the Wardens. Shoot for someplace halfway.”

  He backed the van out of the garage and into the street. The day remained quiet and sunny, few people around to see us leave. Manny and Angela’s home—Luis’s home, now—looked small and abandoned, and it was quickly left behind us as we made the twists and turns to lead us to the freeway.

  The Wardens’ central hotline connected me directly to Marion Bearheart. I knew her by reputation, as I knew most of the prominent Wardens; she had been well thought of by many of the Djinn, although that had never extended to me. She knew of me—that was certain—because I sensed the guarded tension in her low voice.

  “We need a meeting place,” I told her, without introduction; there was no need, as she would have been brought up to date by her staff or by Luis in any case. “Halfway between Albuquerque and your team’s starting point. We can’t wait here.”

  “You’re sure? Crossing state lines with that boy is a federal offense.”

  “I’m fairly certain that we’ve already crossed that line,” I told her, “and in any case, if we stay we’re likely to be betrayed before they can reach us. We need to move.”

  She didn’t argue the point, which was a pleasant surprise. “I’ll send the team to Las Vegas,” she said. “It’ll be about a six-hour drive from where you are, and they can get a short-hop flight. Go to the casino with the pyramid, and ask for Charles Ashworth. I’ll alert him that you’re coming.”

  “He is a Warden?”

  “Wardens are thin on the ground right now. He’s Ma’at.”

  “And we can trust him?”

  “In this, I believe you can.” I approved that she limited her trust. Most humans didn’t, to their great tragedy. “Call me when you arrive, or if there’s any trouble. How powerful is this boy?”

  “Very,” I said. “Far too powerful for someone his age. He lacks control and focus, but in power I would rank him highly.” I paused for a moment, then said, “I believe you will have to remove his powers.”

  “That’s a last resort.”

  “I believe it will be necessary,” I repeated, and shut off the phone. Luis cast me a doubtful look.

  “Las Vegas,” I told him. “I shall sleep now.”

  I drifted into darkness, only a little bothered by the noise of the road and the memory of Luis’s hands moving on my skin.

  When I woke up, it was because the car was skidding violently sideways, heading for an oncoming truck.

  Chapter 3

  “HOLD ON!” Luis shouted, and wrenched the wheel hard, trying to control our skid. The van jittered, wheels spinning, and finally straightened out. I blinked and grabbed the handle for security as gravity whipped us violently, and cast my senses out to see what had happened.

  Ice. The road was covered with it, an impossibility in the current weather conditions. The air was warm, and there had been no freeze, no rain.

  And yet the ice was at least an inch thick, slick as glass, and the van was not made for such conditions; its tires spun and slid, trying vainly for traction as our momentum sent us hurtling onward.

  Likewise, the truck coming toward us was helpless, driven by its massive kinetic energy. The driver’s attempts to steer were creating torque, and the trailer connected to the truck was beginning to slide as well, out of line with the cab.

  “Weather Warden,” I said. Luis nodded without taking his eyes off the oncoming truck. He looked tense, but unafraid. Timing his actions. With a deep breath, he held out one hand to me, and I took it, feeling the snap of energy between us—complex, deep, and growing intimate.

  “Now,” he breathed, and sent power out in a tightly focused wave. It plowed through the metal of the tractor trailer, slicing it cleanly in two. The two halves spun away from each other, spiraling outward from the release of energy, and Luis arrowed the van directly into the gap.

  As we passed the wounded truck, I glanced over and saw the mangled remains of some large household appliance, which had been sliced in two by Luis’s strike.

  “Man, I am hell on insurance companies today,” he said, with a trembling manic edge to his voice that was not quite humor. “Hold on. Could get bumpy.”

  The ice was already thinning, and a hundred feet on, it ended altogether. The tires bit into asphalt with an almost physical hiss, throwing us to the side.

  Luis hit the gas and arrowed us onward. I looked back over my shoulder. The driver of the truck was out, duckwalking cautiously on the ice, shaking his head at the mess that had been made of his load. He probably did not understand in the least what had just happened, which was best for us all, I thought. We drove for a few tense moments.

  Nothing else came at us.

  “What do you think?” Luis asked. “You think she got ahead of us somehow? Set a trap? You sense anything else?”

  “I didn’t sense that one,” I pointed out. “But somehow—I don’t think so. It must have come from . . .”

  From the boy. I felt that conviction strike me hard, and quickly twisted over my shoulder.

  The boy’s eyes were open, wide, and focused darkly on me.

  I waited, but he didn’t blink. There was an emptiness in his gaze that chilled me.

  “Pull over,” I said to Luis, as I unbuckled my seat belt. I climbed over the seats to land lightly next to the boy, who still lay bundled in his red-and-yellow blanket. He didn’t move, not even to shift his gaze to follow me.

  There was a dry flatness to his eyes.

  I pressed my fingertips to his neck, feeling for a pulse. Nothing. No spark of life responding to my touch at all.

  The boy was empty.

  Candelario was dead.

  Luis bailed out of the driver’s side up front, slid the cargo door back and climbed inside the van. I sat back and watched as Luis performed the same search I had, but with more effort, more anxiety. He came to the same result, but he didn’t simply accept the fact; he pulled the boy down into the flat open space between the seats and began pressing rhythmically on the unresponsive chest, sharp downward pumps that mimicked the beating of a human heart.

  He glared at me. “Breathe for him.”

  I didn’t move. “It’s no use.”

  “Fuck you, Cassiel, just do it!”

  This time, I didn’t answer at all. His look should, by rights, have melted the life from me as well, but then he dismissed me and bent to breathe into the boy’s slack mouth himself.

  It took a long few moments for him, Earth Warden though he was, to admit what had been obvious to me from the beginning: The boy’s life force was not struggling to remain, it was long departed. Destroyed. No matter what efforts were put in, he would not be miraculously waking.

  Luis sat back against the metal wall of the van, breathing hard, eyes unfocused, and then pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. He was trembling. I wanted to reach out to him, but I knew he wouldn’t welcome the touch, not at this moment; instead, I reached down and gently closed the boy’s open eyes, then lifted his heavy, limp body and put him back on the seat of the van.

  When it finally
came, Luis’s voice was rough and uneven. “What the hell, Cass. What the hell is happening?”

  “He was expendable,” I said. “Pearl didn’t get ahead of us; she used him to attack us. When he became of no further use, she used him to power the ice on the roadway; she hoped that you would be unable to avoid a wreck, perhaps fatal. She ripped so much power from him that he couldn’t survive it. She killed him to try to get to us.”

  “I get that,” he said raggedly. “But why kill him? Why now?”

  I shrugged. “She doesn’t have the respect for young life that you do,” I said. “You are all insects to her, regardless of your circumstances. It means nothing to her to kill. Sometimes, she does it for her own amusement.” Or she did, once, in my distant memories.

  I had, in thousands of years past, watched Pearl stand at the leading edge of a storm of destruction, tall and wild, only vaguely holding to a shifting human shape that glittered and flowed on the wind. Before her a wide, pleasant valley stretched out, covered in thick yellow flowers. There was a settlement there of creatures who were not humans, as we would later recognize them, but shared most of the same ancestry.

  Pearl rode the wave of destruction down the hill, sweeping everything before her in a storm of ashes and death. She was terrible and beautiful, and insane.

  It was the last settlement of its kind, and Pearl destroyed every last life in it, erasing the existence of that race of prehumans, erasing any trace that they had ever been. She unmade them, leaving behind the clean, green meadow, the nodding flowers, and an Earth that remained, for a time, the sole province and plaything of the Djinn. Before the rise of humans.

  I had watched. Watched, and done nothing. Only later had I acted, when we all realized just what Pearl had become. When her selfish desires no longer ran in concert with our own.

  And I had made the fatal mistake of defeating her, but not fully destroying her.