Incarnate (A Spellmason Chronicle)

by Anton Strout

  “Territory disputes,” she said. “Access to certain arcane supplies that can only be found naturally in certain parts of the city. Every borough rules itself, but our meetings help to keep the peace among them.” She gestured across the arena floor back toward the throne. “That paperwork I have my people working on? That’s what covers a lot of the more mundane conflicts going on . . . rituals, permits, fishing rights, reagent material harvesting, treaty agreements between the various factions that simply don’t play well with others. It’s for reasons like this that I decided to take you aside for the moment, so that you might better understand . . .”

  “I think I do,” I said. “The lives of witches and warlocks are complex.”

  “And I want you to understand your part in it,” she said. “I would give you a chance to hear it first away from the crowd. Tell me, why do the Spellmasons return to us now? And why this grand gesture of summoning all these gargoyles to life?”

  Laurien’s eyes examined my face as I tried to figure out how to respond. It was clear there was a perceived threat in what I had unleashed upon this city.

  “A year ago, I had no idea what a Spellmason even was,” I said. “All I knew was that I was named after my great-great-grandfather and that I had a passion for the art and architecture he had created.”

  Laurien raised one of her perfectly plucked eyebrows again. “You have only been at this arcane work a year?”

  I nodded.

  “My girl, I would not let that get around. The power you wield in such a short time will bring out the jealousy in some, and wrath in others.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up,” I said. “We didn’t come here to brag or anything. I’m still trying to figure out much of what Spellmasonry even is.”

  “Why unleash the gargoyles?” she asked. “What purpose does it serve, other than to put the rest of us on guard, not to mention you’ve outed the arcane world to others.”

  I took a deep breath. “My friends touched upon it,” I said, “but the truth is that the creation of so many creatures, so many grotesques, was . . . an accident.”

  “An accident?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.

  I had to tread carefully if I didn’t want to ruin Caleb’s reputation around her, since he had been party to the whole fiasco. “There was an enemy from long ago who had come to this country, seeking the secrets of the Spellmasons. We were trying to remedy the situation to keep him at bay, but . . . things got out of hand.”

  “I should say so,” Laurien said. “I have long thought the secrets of Alexander Belarus died with him.”

  “I stand before you as living proof they didn’t,” I said.

  Laurien looked me up and down once more, which made me feel like I was under some kind of microscope inspection. I felt naked in her gaze.

  “So you do,” she said, with a tight-lipped smile. “So you do. Come.”

  We walked in silence back through the crowd on the arena floor, the air above us filled with chaos, explosions, and shouts as conflicts raged on and resolved themselves. The closer we got to her throne, the more I noticed a shift in her. Her body became more poised and she walked with an air of authority that she had discarded when we were out among the stalls. Her carriage was almost royal, and when she rounded the table, she took her throne with all the grace of a queen once more, the noise of the crowd all around us dying down.

  Marshall, Rory, and Caleb were all staring at me with intensity as I moved to rejoin them, their eyes searching my face for some sort of indication of what had just gone down. The thing was, I wasn’t sure what had just gone down. The best I could muster for my friends was a halfhearted smile, which seemed to annoy them more than help.

  “So,” Laurien said, her voice quiet yet booming out as if being broadcast to the entirety of Madison Square Garden. “What is it you wish from us, Alexandra Belarus?”

  Walking among the people talking had been easy. Answering in front of them with all eyes falling on us had my heart in my throat. I controlled my breathing before answering. If I could just keep from hyperventilating, I wouldn’t have a panic attack. I collected my thoughts, and when the pulse in my throat lessened, I spoke.

  “I’d like your people to ease up on us,” I said. “I’m trying to deal with the gargoyle situation I’ve created, and it would go a little easier if I didn’t have to worry about witches and warlocks gunning for us at the same time. I’ve spent six months dodging them. It needs to stop.”

  Laurien looked out across the gathered crowd. “I am sure none of our community wish to interfere with your efforts,” she said, meeting the eyes of those hers landed on. “This council and I would not take kindly to hear of anyone barring their progress.”

  “And actually,” I added. “We could use a little help.”

  Laurien shook her head. “I am afraid not,” she said.

  “What?” Rory asked.

  “Laurien,” Caleb said. “Come on. Be serious.”

  “I am being serious, Mr. Kennedy. We cannot offer you help . . . yet.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “Try to understand my position,” she said. “The great-great-granddaughter of a known menace to our community unleashes an even worse problem and now wants our help in cleaning up the mess?”

  “We’re here because Warren asked us to help him clean up his mess,” I said. “The one where the Butcher has already torn apart his home in gargoyle form looking for the Cagliostro Medallion.”

  Laurien looked surprised. She turned to Warren, who had locked eyes with me the second I mentioned his name.

  “Is this true?” she asked.

  Warren ran his hands through his wild hair, the rings catching in it. He walked over to stand with us on our side of the table as he freed them.

  “It’s true that there has been an attack on my home, yes,” he said. “And it would appear that it is the work of a gargoyle if the claw marks and destruction are any indicator. That’s why I hired Miss Belarus here. Isn’t that right?”

  I could have told Laurien that the source of Warren’s trouble wasn’t as “undetermined” as he was letting on, but given the grip he had on me, I decided that could wait until later if I had to bring it up at all.

  “He did,” I said.

  “And she charges a lot,” Caleb added, joining in on whatever web of lies we were suddenly spinning on our side of the table.

  “How do I get you to help us?” I asked.

  “Think of this like getting into Juilliard,” she said. “You have to audition.”

  “This is going to be harder than me getting into the Manhattan Dance Conservatory,” Rory whispered.

  “Why do I have to audition?” I asked, stepping forward. “It’s obvious what I can do. There are several hundred gargoyles out there right now that prove my abilities.”

  “Just because you can sing in your living room doesn’t make you American Idol material,” Laurien said. “You don’t get to be part of our community unless I say you are part of our community.”

  “And what if I’m not really a joiner?” I asked, recalling Nathaniel Crane’s words.

  “Then you fail to receive all the benefits of practicing magic in the New York area,” she said. “No protection and no aid.”

  Marshall held a hand up. “How exactly does she have to audition?”

  “That’s the beauty of it,” Laurien said. “She already is.”

  “I am?”

  “I think the aid you are providing Mr. O’Shea should prove sufficient,” she said. “I’ll consider the resolution of his problem a step in the right direction with the community. Then we can discuss how best we can aid you.”

  It wasn’t the ideal solution. I figured having Warren bring us before them might prove enough, but it seemed like the best offer I was going to get.

  “Fine,” I said, “but understand thi
s. Anything that befalls the people of Manhattan in that time is on you.” I turned and addressed the entire assembly. “All of you. As it already is with me.”

  I didn’t wait for a response and headed away from Laurien on her throne to one of the exits off the arena floor.

  Rory, Marshall, and Caleb caught up with me halfway around the circular corridor heading back to the entrance on Seventh Avenue, but it was the voice of Warren calling out from behind them that caused me to stop.

  “Alexandra, wait!”

  Warren ran around my friends and slowed when he finally caught up with me.

  “Get away from me, Warren.”

  “Easy, now,” he said. The rings on both his hands glowed, and he pressed them together, a vine of colorful flowers twisting up out of his hands.

  “Really?” I asked, pulling the flowers from his hands and tossing them on the floor. “That’s the best you’ve got? The cheap tricks of a stage magician?”

  Caleb grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around. Warren’s hands flew apart and the flowers fizzled out of existence.

  “What the hell was that?” he said.

  “You want to tell us why you clammed up in front of your people about the Butcher of the Bowery returning?” I asked.

  Warren looked down at the ground. “Right now was not the time to get into those particular details,” he said. “And this is a family matter for now.”

  “I could probably resolve your family matter a lot quicker if we had, say, those hundreds of people in there helping out!” I shouted at him.

  “You want to put us in jeopardy?” Caleb asked, grabbing Warren by the lapels of his coat. “Put us more at risk than we have to be? Don’t put us in front of Laurien like that and then dodge the questions.”

  Warren didn’t struggle even though Caleb’s anger was growing by the second. I would have felt bad for the warlock if it weren’t for the fact that my anger was also on the rise.

  Smoke fumed out of Warren’s jacket. Large, dark puffs rose and covered his head and hands as if his body were on fire from within it. Caleb began to cough, turning his head away from it, but his hands remained clutching the warlock.

  Or at least his jacket. As the smoke wafted up to the ceiling and cleared the hallway, Caleb had the warlock’s coat, but not the warlock. Warren was gone.

  Rory was already poised for combat with her pole arm stretched out in front of her. Marshall was already strategizing and had pressed himself back-to-back with her as he assessed the room, his eyes darting over to a strip of darkened food counters along the inner wall.

  Warren sat cross-legged on the countertop, his hands pressed down to either side of him. He shook his head at us.

  “Let me ask a question,” he said, looking the group of us over. “And I’m going to keep it real simple. Sherlock Holmes deduction simple. Which is more likely: that you, first-time visitor to our Convocation, have assessed our gathering perfectly, or that perhaps an esteemed member of said group—say, a warlock with decades of participation in these gatherings—might have been finessing this first contact situation?”

  The fight went out of me as I stood there. “I . . . I just thought—”

  “You didn’t think,” he said. “None of you. I’ve seen many a thing go wrong over the years at a Convocation. Most of those covens would gladly tear each other apart.”

  “Why would they do that?” Marshall said. “They have a common interest.”

  “Much of it is fear. Not all who wield such power do so with the same level of responsibility. There is little trust among most of them. It is an uneasy peace that we have fought to maintain for well over a century, but it is a peace.”

  “You didn’t think mentioning that the Butcher is back was important?” I asked.

  “It is,” he said, hopping down off the counter. He started walking back over to us. “However, tonight was not about that. Tonight was about granting you an audience and an introduction to the community. The Belarus name is not a beloved one among my kind, and you saw the chaos that these meetings are. Things like where and when to reveal things to the Convocation’s council take time, Alexandra. I need time to talk to the right people there . . . people I can trust.”

  My face went hot with red, his words humbling me. I didn’t know what we were getting into. I hadn’t really known that for over a year, making it all up as I went along.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I get it now. I don’t know what I expected going in there. Given the hatred that there seems to be for my family name, I’m glad we had you to vouch for us.”

  Rory lowered her pole arm and came up to me. “What exactly did that woman tell you when you were out in the crowd, Alexandra?”

  “Yeah,” Caleb said. “You probably had more time with her tonight than I’ve had in counsel with her during the last decade!”

  “She said much,” I said. “I’m still trying to process it all.”

  “Why do they hate Alexander so much?” Marshall asked. “What did your great-great-grandfather do to piss off their entire community?”

  “He may not be the man I’ve always thought him to be,” I said, hating that I even had new and nagging questions forming in my mind. “If I’m to give due diligence to what she told me, my great-great-grandfather might have been a bit more murderous than we thought.”

  “What?” Rory asked, practically laughing. “That’s insane.”

  “Is it?” Warren asked.

  I stared at him, wanting to deck him as my knee-jerk reaction, but upon examining his face I realized there was no malice or snide to what he was asking, only genuine concern. Having nowhere to channel my anger only angered me further, and I turned from him and started walking off toward the doors leading out onto Seventh Avenue.

  “You do what you need to, Warren, and leave the hunt for the Butcher to me,” I said. “But the sooner you get those people on our side, the better protected you’re going to be.”

  Once again Caleb, Rory, and Marshall struggled to catch up with me, only doing so once I was out the doors and back on the streets in the cool autumn air.

  “Lexi!” Caleb called out, taking my hand. “You okay?”

  I nodded. “As okay as I ever am with this business,” I said. “By the way, nice crowd you hang with.”

  “Easy,” he said as if I had slapped him, letting my hand go. “I never said I hung with them. They’re just business. It’s all professional and customer service with them. Freelancers learn not to start making friends in those circles. That way you’re not playing favorites. A job is a job.”

  “How ethical,” Rory said.

  “I kind of get it,” Marshall said.

  “Of course you do,” Rory fired back. “You were there sizing up the crowd and practically handing out flyers to your store.”

  Marshall said nothing as I turned down Seventh Avenue.

  “So what now?” Rory asked, catching up to me.

  “Go home,” I said. “It’s late.”

  “Given the irate pace you’re walking at, why do I think you’re not just going to jump into bed and catch some zzz’s?”

  Sometimes I hated that she knew me so well, but I had things I needed answered right now and I didn’t necessarily feel like getting into it with everyone just yet. Things had taken a personal turn in there.

  “You guys get some sleep,” I said, already plotting my course through the city back to my home on Saint Mark’s Place. “I’ve got questions I need to find answers to, for myself.”

  Twenty

  Alexandra

  Much like the road to Hell, my walk home alone was paved with good intentions. I’d hit the guildhall and start searching through the books of Alexander Belarus, hoping to unwind truth from fiction in what Laurien had told me. My kin was not a murderer, not that the witches and warlocks were going to take my word on it unless I had
proof to the contrary. I needed to know the truth about my great-great-grandfather’s activities, if only to help get the Convocation on my side, and that would hopefully be found hidden in his secret notes throughout the books I’d accumulated back at my place. I made it all the way down to the basement of my building and into the hidden guildhall, but after only thirty minutes of preliminary research my body shut down.

  I awoke later to Rory nudging me. When I lifted my head heavy with sleep from the stone table at the center of the subterranean chamber, my notebook came with it, plastered to the side of my face.

  “What time is it?” I said, snapping up to a sitting position.

  “It’s like nine,” she said.

  “Okay, good,” I said, stretching. “We can get breakfast, then hit the books.”

  “Breakfast?” Rory asked. “It’s nine, Alexandra. At night.”

  “Shit,” I said, panicking. “You’re kidding, right?”

  Rory rubbed my back. “You needed the rest after last night,” she said. “All of us did.”

  I set about rearranging the table I had messed up in my sleep, moving my spread-out notepapers to one section and organizing them into the order they had started in. “What time did you get up?”

  “Me?” she said, laying down her dancer’s bag on the stone floor. “I was up and at ’em about seven thirty this morning, but I only had dance rehearsals, not all this obsessive compulsive bullshit to contend with.”

  “Don’t start,” I said, going over a sheet of book reference numbers I had jotted down before falling into my coma last night. “But if I beg you to run upstairs and get me something to eat, I’ll be your best friend forever.”

  “You’re already my best friend forever,” she said, turning and walking toward the exit of the guildhall. “Since elementary school.”

  “Well, you wouldn’t want to jeopardize it all starting now . . .”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Rory said, heading out the secret door.

  Since she seemed like she was actually going to do it, I decided not to press my luck and went back to sorting out all the reference book numbers I had notated. I was so deep into the detective work that I didn’t snap out of it until Rory dropped one of my breakfast-in-bed trays in front of me, a pizza box from Lanza’s sitting on top of it.