Twenty Palaces: A Prequel

by Harry Connolly

  We were playing with something we didn't understand. Casting these spells was like laying a trail of raw meat from the jungle through the front door of our house. We were calling monsters, and I had fucking helped.

  "What the hell have we been doing?" I said aloud.

  "Preparing," a voice behind me said.

  I jumped to my feet. A tall, slender figure stood in the doorway, lit by the dim hall light. Echo. Her sallow skin and sunken eyes looked healthy again. I'd never been one to go for the plain look in a woman, but she was beautiful.

  There was enough light to see that her hands were empty; maybe she hadn't come to kill me. She glided toward me, staring intently into my eyes. "You are alone." Her body was as fluid as a tiger's. She moved out of the hall light and became a silhouette. I didn't move.

  Of course I was alone. I'd just spent three years in prison and the only women I saw there were on TV or were taped to walls like a pinup. "Yeah, I--" She leaned toward me, as though she was about to kiss me. "Payton."

  She breathed in, taking in the smell of me, and her body language was so smooth that a small part of me was suggesting that maybe she wasn't a monster after all.

  "Payton does not matter," she said. "I don't like to share."

  That didn't really make sense. I had the sudden intuition that I was being incredibly stupid. It may have been a long time for me, but I wasn't a damn fool.

  She leaned close. The tip of her nose touched my cheek and it felt all wrong. I stepped back. "I need to talk to Jon," I said. I realized that I still didn't know where Annalise and Callin were. "We're all in danger."

  Echo stepped toward me into the light. Her eyes were wild and starving, and she had a killer's deranged smile.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I fumbled for my ghost knife. Echo grabbed my arms, lifted me into the air and slammed me onto the hardwood floor.

  It was a bruising impact and I cried out, partly because it hurt like six kinds of hell and partly because I immediately knew that she was too strong for me. The fight was already over, and I hadn't even had time to lift my hands.

  I tried to will my ghost knife out of my pocket the way I'd called it out of the concrete stair, but I was too panicked to concentrate.

  Echo smiled. "If you will not become one of us...." She leaned close to my throat, her teeth bared.

  She was suddenly torn away from me, leaving me alone on the floor. She flew backwards and slammed into the wall, cracking the plasterboard.

  She fell to the floor, an animal noise of rage and frustration coming from her. Jon picked her up and slammed her against the wall a second time. Plaster dust rained down on them.

  "I told you! He's my friend!" Jon pinned her against the broken wall. She struggled, but could not free herself.

  "Wake up in there, cousin!" Echo shouted at him. "Wake up!"

  Jon shook her. "I am awake!"

  Payton leaned in through the doorway and switched on the light.

  Except for Echo, they were all covered in blood. Their shirts, their pants, their hands and even their faces were smeared with dark blood.

  I snatched up my pages and hugged them to my chest. A chill ran down my back. Jon shoved Echo into Payton's arms; he embraced her and began to speak softly into her ear. She glared at Jon.

  "Out." Jon slammed the door.

  He stalked toward the window. I couldn't see a visible wound on him but, considering how casually he'd taken the loss of his finger, I wasn't sure if he'd even notice one. Had he been fighting? Had Annalise turned up while I was floating around in the Empty Spaces?

  "Are you hurt?" I asked.

  Jon threw open the window. "You're getting out of here." He climbed out onto the roof.

  "That's not your blood," I said. I picked up my backpack, feeling as though I was a step behind everyone else. "Whose blood is that? Is it--"

  He reached back through the window and grabbed my arm. His grip was frighteningly strong. He dragged me out the window and onto the roof.

  A misty rain had begun to fall. What I'd thought to be a shaft of moonlight was actually a single streetlight. I shoved the pages into my pack.

  Jon gasped and clutched his wrist, holding his hand up to the light. The stump of his missing pinkie finger began to visibly throb.

  Something pushed out of the stump of the old finger like a worm crawling free of the dirt and it only took a moment to realize it was a new finger. Jon gasped again. This was hurting him, but he couldn't repress a huge grin.

  After a few seconds, it stopped. Jon's finger had grown back. I grabbed his hand and pulled it close.

  The regenerated finger looked paler than the others, but otherwise it appeared normal. Jon curled and straightened his fingers. They functioned perfectly.

  "Holy God," I said. "How does it feel?"

  "Fine," Jon said. "But it didn't hurt when I lost it, either." He held up his hand and made a fist. "I can heal anything now, if I have the right food."

  "What food is that, Jon?"

  He stopped smiling. "You have to go." He lifted me off me feet and held me like a groom carrying a bride across the threshold. Before I could object, Jon stepped off the edge of the roof.

  He shifted his arm to support my head. We hit the ground so hard that I thought momentum would wrench me out of his grip and slam me against the pavement, but Jon held on.

  He released my legs, allowing me to stand. The roof was about ten feet off the ground. How strong were these guys?

  Through the kitchen window I could see all the way into the dining room. Macy sat hunched on the floor, facing away from me. Her shoulders trembled as though she was crying.

  "Get out," Jon said. "Now."

  I couldn't read his expression. "I'm here to help you, Jon. There are things you need to know. You're still in danger."

  I glanced back into the house. Macy had turned to face us. Blood covered her lips and chin. Her gaze met mine and her eyes widened with shame and horror. She ducked out of the doorway to hide.

  There, on the floor where she had been crouching, was a bloody human foot.

  "Oh, no." I felt sick at the sight of it, but I wasn't surprised. I should have been surprised, but I wasn't.

  Jon grabbed my shoulders and turned me around. "Ray. You're my oldest friend and I love you like a brother. I used to ask my parents to adopt you so you could be my brother. Go back to L.A. Go to Chicago or New York. Just get out and don't come back here. Ever."

  I backed down the alley. My whole body shuddered with a primal animal dread. Jon was sending me away. Jon was covered in someone else's blood. Jon was eating human flesh.

  No. No, no, no. I couldn't allow this to continue. Callin was going to have to take the spell off. I would make sure of it.

  Jon stood there, staring at me. I couldn't stay, but I couldn't abandon him, either. "I'm going to make this right, Jon," I called. "I'm going to make it right for you."

  He didn't respond. He just watched me jog down the alley and disappear into the street.

  At the sidewalk I slowed to a walk. It would take me at least an hour to walk from here to Aunt Theresa's house and while I still had a little money, I didn't want to throw it away on bus fare. Besides, I needed time to think. I stuffed the blue pages into my backpack and slung it over my shoulder.

  But there was one thing I didn't need to think about: I'd told Callin that I wouldn't take Jon's so-called cure away if it meant he'd lose the use of his legs again, but after what I'd just seen, I was ready to do it. Hell, I'd do it gladly. Jon didn't just need to be protected from Annalise and her people, he needed to be saved. I was ready to step in and do it if there were no other volunteers, and there weren't.

  Was this my life now? Had I somehow gone, in one pivot, from ex-con to... this? I laid my hands against the rough bark of a nearby tree, but there was no comfort in it. It didn't make me feel grounded or sane. My life had gone nuts, and I wasn't sure how I'd get back to the normal world.

  Or even if I wanted to. Desp
ite everything I'd seen, I wanted more of it. I wanted more of the world behind the world. It made me feel sick to admit it to myself, but the blue pages in my backpack were worth more to me than diamond. If I studied, went slowly, was careful, I could, maybe have the power of a "peer" whatever that was, and despite everything I'd seen, there was part of me that wanted it.

  It occurred to me that Echo could have slipped out of the front door and come after me. I took out my ghost knife and glanced up and down the street. There was nothing to see, and I realized I ought to be looking out for Annalise and Callin, too.

  I picked up the pace, holding the ghost knife so it would stay dry but still be handy, and I had my last steeled glass spell in my pocket.

  I was hungry again and my cash was dwindling. I headed home. Karl hadn't been wearing his cheerful face when he came to visit me at the library, but now I knew he wasn't after me because of Echo. With luck, he would be out and I could talk to my aunt alone. Maybe she'd have some food for me.

  Maybe, in the quiet of my apartment, I could cast more steeled glass cards. I was going to need them, I was sure, and I needed to find time to study Callin's book again.

  And how the hell was I supposed to persuade Callin to remove the spell from Jon and the others? At gunpoint? I wasn't sure a gun would give me the leverage I needed to control him. Maybe I should try it at bombpoint instead.

  During the long walk back to my apartment, I turned the problem over in my head but nothing truly workable presented itself. The only thing that came to mind was that Callin and Annalise had been pretty desperate to get that book back. Maybe I could get the leverage I needed if I threatened to staple the spells to telephone poles around town, or upload them to the internet.

  It was a bluff, of course. The spells were too dangerous to be shared, but Callin didn't know I felt that way. And the virtue of blackmail was that I wouldn't have to build a goddamn bomb. The real question was whether it would work or not, and whether there was any way at all for me to come through it alive.

  Once back in my aunt's neighborhood, I walked an extra block to circle around to the alley. With luck, Uncle Karl's car would still be gone. I'd be able to sneak some food into my apartment. I needed food and sleep as much as I needed a better way to blackmail Callin. I also needed a watch; I had no idea what time it was.

  The misty rain had stopped 15 or 20 minutes before, but the driveway was soft with deep mud. It couldn't have been caused by this misting rain; had someone washed a Mack truck out here?

  Then I walked around the high hedges of the neighbor's yard and saw that Karl and Theresa's house was gone. For a moment, I thought I was on the wrong block. All I could see were the houses across the street. But no, this was the right place.

  The house had been burned down to its stone foundations. The garage was gone, too. It, and my tiny new home above it, were ashes. The fire fighters were long gone, and there weren't even any neighbors standing around gawking. All this had happened hours ago.

  I struck something metal with my foot. It was the tiny bell I had strung beside my door, now charred, dented and missing its clapper.

  "Freeze!" a man shouted. "Police."

  I froze. I heard several pairs of footsteps approaching, and as they came close, Karl stepped into my line of vision. His expression was grim. This was why my uncle had been hunting for me.

  "Uncle Karl, is Aunt Th--"

  Karl jammed his nightstick into my stomach. I doubled over and fell to my knees. It wasn't the first time a cop had done that to me, but Karl was damn good at it. More people behind me pushed me down into the muddy gravel and slapped handcuffs on me.

  #

  I was handcuffed and processed, and they were pretty professional about it, considering. My blue pages, ghost knife and steeled glass cards were confiscated and I was dumped into a holding cell.

  I sat among the other detainees, feeling my hopes sinking lower and lower. No one would tell me if my aunt was alive or dead, I hadn't done any real good for Jon, and I was back in custody, likely to be charged with arson or worse.

  And why shouldn't they? I had led Callin and Annalise to Karl and Theresa's home. I might not have started the fire myself, but it had been my fault.

  They let me stew in the cell for a few hours, then handcuffed me and brought me to an interrogation room. There was a long, scarred wooden table and chairs, yellow paint on the walls and even a "mirror," just like in the movies. The two detectives with me sat across the table from me, sloppily shuffling papers and looking bored. They had arms a gorilla would envy, but their bellies strained against their shirt buttons. They introduced themselves but I didn't pay attention. To me they were Big and Bigger.

  They started by asking basic identifying information like my name and address.

  "What happened to Aunt Theresa?" I asked, breaking in on their routine. "Was she hurt in the fire?"

  "We'll be asking the questions here, not you," Big said. "Where were you yesterday afternoon between noon and five p.m.?"

  I was irritated. Karl had warned me that my debt wasn't repaid yet, but if I was going to be here, opposite these two cops, with handcuffs on, there was no reason to play at being a nice, cooperative citizen anymore. "I was walking around, wondering how my Aunt Theresa is."

  "Son, this isn't a time to be a wiseass," Bigger said. "Now answer the question."

  "I told you, I was trying to get an answer about my aunt."

  "You want to know?" Bigger said, his eyes moving shiftily to his partner and back to me. "She's in the hospital and she's not doing well. If she dies, you could be charged with accessory--"

  "Christ! You guys even lie sloppy. Where's my Uncle?"

  "What about this?" Big said. He slid a manila folder across the table and opened it.

  The blue pages were inside and so was the ghost knife and the steeled glass. I felt a sudden, startling hunger for them. I wanted that power again. I could feel the ghost knife as though it was part of me. All I had to do was will it into my hand....

  No. I didn't want these cops to see magic. I didn't want anyone to know about it.

  I realized they were staring at me. They'd noticed my reaction to the contents of the folder. I closed my eyes and sat back in my chair. It was too late for a poker face now; the cops knew the papers were important to me.

  "Well?" Big asked. "Where did you get those?"

  I kept my eyes shut. The allure of those pages was strong, sure, but even stronger was the memory of my aunt embracing me on the steps of her house, or the memory of her lifting that pot of stew with her arthritic hands.

  "Where's my uncle?" I asked.

  The cops sighed and settled back into their seats. Big closed the manila folder, and I thought he looked a little nervous as he did it. Could he sense the power there?

  The door opened and Karl strode inside. He did not look as tall as I remembered, and his weathered face was sunken and shadowy. He looked exhausted.

  "Do you know what I lost yesterday, Raymond?" Karl began without any preamble. "Do you know what I lost because I brought you into my home? I lost every picture I ever took of my kids. All of my wife's medications. Every love letter my father wrote to my mother. The rare jazz collection my brother left me in his will. I don't even like jazz, but it was all I had left of him."

  Christ, I almost would rather take another night stick to the gut. I laid my face in my hands. "Please," I said. "How is she?"

  "She was at the supermarket," Karl said. "She's fine. Did you firebomb my house?"

  "No! Never."

  "Somebody did. Was it an old buddy from jail, then? Or one of your L.A. crew?"

  The urge to blurt out the truth was as strong as my urge to grab up the spells. Didn't Karl deserve to know? I hadn't been able to tell Jon, but maybe the cops would roust Callin out of his hotel, maybe put enough heat on him that he would leave town.

  Or maybe they'd arrive at his hotel while he was out, search his room and turn up his spell book. What if one of them had c
ancer or a dying mother? That would mean more spells, more cousins, more... Who knows what?

  I shut my eyes again. My uncle deserved some sort of answer, but there was nothing I could tell him.

  The door opened again.

  Callin entered. He wore a broad-brimmed hat and a long coat buttoned up to his neck and he was smiling.

  "There you are, lively one!" Callin said.

  Karl turned and placed a hand on Callin's chest. Karl was six inches taller and fifty pounds heavier but as Karl opened his mouth to order Callin out of the room, I shouted: "Uncle Karl, get back!"

  It was already too late. Callin held a handkerchief in front of Karl's face. There was a sigil stitched onto it, but I couldn't see the whole thing.

  Karl glanced at it, then his eyes rolled back and he collapsed. Big lunged out of his chair and slammed his body into Callin's back. Unfortunately for him, Callin had braced for the attack and the detective bounced off him the same way I'd bounced off Annalise.

  I stood, turned my back and shut my eyes, mentally calling my ghost knife. It landed in my hand, and I cut through the handcuff chain with a quick twist of my wrist. I heard the unmistakable sound of a taser being fired.

  I spun and grabbed the whole manila folder with the blue pages in it, then ducked low beside the cinderblock wall. With the ghost knife, I cut three quick slashes into the wall.

  Bigger rolled across the table and struck the wall just behind me, his taser gun clattering on the floor.

  I threw my shoulder against the cut cinderblocks and pushed. Karl lay in a heap beneath the table and I had no way of telling if he was alive or dead. Then the cut blocks slid out of the wall and I followed them into open air.

  Instead of coming out into a hallway or office, I found myself six floors above the asphalt parking lot. The weight of my upper body dragged my legs through the hole into free fall. Sky and traffic and the whole world spun around me as I plummeted.

  I squeezed the folder, holding the steeled glass against my chest. "Please please please please," I said. The parking lot seemed to rush up at me.