“I suppose misanthropy suits you,” Pulcheria said.
Pharsia gave her a look. “I thought you died of a bee sting.”
Pulcheria gestured to Aleo. “This one helped me. Though he doesn’t remember.”
Aleo frowned. “That wasn’t me.”
Pharsia was close enough to touch him. Her hand trembled, as if she might. For a second, they were the only people in the courtyard. “Sweet boy,” she said. “You’re nothing but possibilities. Don’t forget that.”
He felt a stab of memory. A hand rubbing circles on his back. Sweet boy, some things are riddles. You can’t solve them all. Just remember that you’re nothing but possibilities.
Before he could say anything, Latona and Pulcheria stepped forward. Their movements were oddly choreographed. They mirrored each other in the water of the fountain. They each sat on the marble rim.
“We’re close to the end of a story,” Latona said. “Few remember its beginning. Worlds emerged out of darkness and mist, joined by a great axis. A root system linked them together. Green grass, stone buildings, and the spirits that haunt the gaps. Many were lost in the voyage between. Some wanted to be lost. They dreamed of empires. They chained the elements. They too passed away, when night fell.”
A breath later, Pulcheria took up the thread. The story seemed to live in their collective memory. Perhaps they’d never spoken it aloud until now. Perhaps they’d always been telling it, a slow shiver beneath the skin of things. “Three queens rose to preserve the pattern. One in the north, one in the south, and one who ruled among the roots. Grand-dame to mother to fierce young domina, they kept the weave going. They kept watch over Fortuna’s seal, which divided the possibilities. They laid aside their loves for the loom, knowing that one day, every thread would meet its opposite. The seal would break.”
Pharsia laced her hands together. She spoke to the courtyard as if it were a packed theater, but her eyes remained on Aleo. “War is one of the endings,” she said. “One possibility in the ocean where fates glide like dark minnows. Every story has an end. But an end isn’t a blank page. A story is a wheel, after all. We must all endure the turn. What it brings, not even we can say. We three queens who dance on its rim.”
“I don’t understand,” Felix said. “What’s our part in this? Are we just pieces on your board? Insects crushed beneath your wheel?”
“This one likes metaphors,” Pulcheria said.
Latona favored him with a smile that was almost kind. “You’ll have to fight,” she said. “You’ll have to roll. You may even win.”
“What if we refuse to play?” Aleo demanded. “I have a company. A family. People who keep forgiving me. They’re what I care about—not your war.”
“You will care,” Pulcheria said, with a trace of sadness. “Or they will be lost.”
Then he realized. He stared at Felix’s white garment, stark against his own. The ritual waters, meant to prepare them. The cutting sorrow, and the debt unpaid. Felix was no longer a member of the night gens, or any gens. He’d been stripped of his die. He belonged to nobody, and for that reason, he was dangerous.
Though perhaps Aleo was the dangerous one, after all.
A look passed between then. It wasn’t what he expected.
“It shall be war, then,” Latona said. “And right on schedule.”
Pharsia inclined her head. Then she walked down the gravel path. As she passed Aleo, she brushed his cheek with her fingertips.
His mother’s touch chilled him.
3
Paul’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean dragons?”
They were still dressed in black. Sam picked at the cheese tray, while Andrew rubbed his hands against the dress pants. The wool was driving him slowly mad. He thought about taking his pants off, in the middle of Ingrid’s living room, and realized that Carl would have approved of this mightily. Pantsless grief. Neil arranged gemstones on the carpet. His hair was getting shaggy. Andrew, not usually one to notice such things, realized that he’d grown quite a bit in the last year. It had happened while he was distracted. Time was always getting away from him. Ingrid used to be able to throw the boy over her shoulder like an outraged potato sack. Now, even Paul struggled to lift him. Andrew had once watched them carry Neil to bed in tandem, like an unconscious reveler. Three bodies shuffling delicately down the hallway.
“Dragon singular,” Ingrid corrected. “And it’s made of smoke. Though I suppose there are a lot of eyes and mouths. You could think of it as a hungry collective.”
Carl’s mother had read Borges aloud. “Street with the Pink Corner Store.” The sky swallowed her voice, low, incantatory:
Su inquietud me deja
en esta calle que es cualquiera
The joy of being surprised by light from a pink crossroads. She’d moved through so many cities. Carl had once told him that she took pictures of her hotel rooms, sending them first as Polaroids, then as attachments. He had a collection at home. Now it belonged to Andrew. The apartment was silent and smelled of lemon cleaner. He could remember the sweat, the aching muscles, the task of moving everything in plastic totes that would barely fit in the truck. Where had it all come from? Where was it going? He touched his left pocket, where Carl’s phone was wedged like a small brick. The only account that he hadn’t closed. An archive of sorts that he carried around, since he didn’t know what else to do.
“And the dragon’s controlled by . . . the ballerina?”
“Basilissa. Actually, they’re plural.”
Neil had arranged the gemstones into a fortress. He was humming something to himself as he built up the walls. Andrew didn’t know if he was listening or not. His eyes narrowed in concentration as he surveyed the mosaic. Light fired the stones, and he smiled.
Andrew stood up and grabbed his bag. As he walked down the hallway, he heard part of a question: “. . . the nice one?”
As soon as the bathroom door was closed, he tore off the pants, nearly ripping them apart. His fingers trembled as he unbuttoned the dress shirt. The starched collar left a ring around his neck. He stood before the mirror in his underwear. As a child, he used to practice facial expressions in the mirror. He would laugh, as if he’d just heard the funniest joke, and then study the shape of his mouth, the crinkling around his eyes. He stared at the face in the mirror. It made less sense than the array of reversed objects in the bathroom: the rubber duckies, the shampoo bottles shaped like cars, the Waterpik that seemed to be collecting dust. The urge to wreck things had passed, but there was still a dark energy that made him twitch. He touched his forehead to the mirror. If he pushed hard enough, he might slip through. He’d probably need clothes for that.
He emerged from the bathroom in jeans and one of Carl’s shirts. Shelby noticed this but said nothing. The shirt didn’t smell good. That was why he chose to wear it.
“When were you going to tell me?”
Ingrid smoothed her skirt. “Every time I imagined this moment, it was different. There was yelling, and explosions, and possibly running. But now we have no choice. What happened—” She swallowed. “I couldn’t lie about that. I couldn’t spin it. There’s no going back now, Paul. If we’re going to get through this, we need your help.”
Paul breathed in. Then out. He didn’t say anything for a while. His eyes were a little wild, and there wasn’t much color left in his cheeks. Andrew wondered if he might throw up and thought about going to fetch something. Ginger ale? A receptacle? There didn’t seem to be enough time. Surely, Ingrid had planned for this. She had sharp reflexes.
“How do I know you aren’t all crazy?” Paul asked finally.
“Mummy has a sword,” Neil observed from his circle of gemstones.
Paul looked at him. All he could manage was: “A sword?”
Neil didn’t bother to look up. “I have seen it in mine dreams. Mummy’s sword. It has a very beautiful crac
k in it, like . . . a mineral.” He seemed pleased by his own simile. “We are all inside of her force field, which has quite a lot of range.”
Ingrid knelt beside Neil. “Did you really see me in your dreams?”
He looked up finally. He touched her cheek. “It was so lovely to see mine mummy there, in her armor. Protecting us all.”
Andrew could remember when he used to say betect rather than protect.
Shelby emerged from the kitchen with a tray of coffee. “There you have it. Dream evidence is admissible in court, right?”
Paul took one of the cups. He turned it around in his hands, like a polished stone. His eyes were unfocused for a bit. Then he said: “Let me get this straight. You’re telling me that Wascana Park leads to another world, a place where you’re all heroes.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Shelby replied. “More like advanced meddlers.”
Paul blinked. “You go to this world every night. While Neil and I are asleep, you traipse around this fantasy world, solving quests.”
“We don’t traipse,” Ingrid said. “You can’t really traipse in armor—” He gave her a long look. “Sorry. Continue.”
“Now the evil ballerina”—Paul grimaced—“sorry, basilissa—has raised some army of lizard demons and smoke monsters, and she’s going to attack the capital of Saskatchewan. Because of its global importance. So you need my help to protect Regina from the insane Muppet Queen who’s going to unleash an army of reptiles and Fraggles and other things that I can’t see—because what you need in a situation like that is someone who can make chocolate ganache. Or maybe you just need me to babysit Neil while you ride into battle.”
“We don’t have horses,” Ingrid murmured.
Paul’s color had returned. “And you chose not to tell me about any of this, so that you could secure free day care. You put yourself in danger every other night, you got hurt and scarred and nearly killed, and you didn’t tell me about any of it. Because your little brother can be a parent, but he’s too stupid to be part of this. And you’re only telling me now because Carl—” He hesitated. “Because something went wrong. You’re telling me as a last resort. Have I got this all straight? Because I’m not a graduate student who knows how to take perfect notes. I may have missed something.”
“That’s about it,” Ingrid said. Her voice sounded slightly hollow. They were all exhausted. Andrew couldn’t even tell what was keeping him conscious, except for a burning along the edges of everything.
“Ingrid—” Paul couldn’t quite look at her anymore. “This all sounds like some kind of nervous breakdown.”
Andrew stood. “Show me where the furnace is.”
Paul frowned. “Seriously?”
“Please.”
“I—” He shrugged. “Sure. Why not? It’s downstairs.”
They went down to the basement. Neil followed them with mild interest, still counting gemstones in his palm. The furnace was in the corner of the laundry room, surrounded by plastic bins full of toys that Neil had outgrown. He began digging through them.
“Don’t turn the light on,” Andrew said. “Just give me a second.”
He knew that lares could cross over. He’d seen the salamander at the university library, and once—out of the corner of his eye—he’d also seen a dripping undina in the bathtub. It must have had something to do with the paper-thin barrier between worlds. Or maybe the lares had always existed on both sides. He scanned the room. After a moment, he was able to make out a flickering ember, beneath the pilot light. He crouched on the cement floor. The salamander was very faint. Only part of it seemed to be here, or perhaps they were simply harder to see on this side of the park. But the amused golden eyes looked up at him.
“What’s he doing?” Paul whispered.
Ingrid didn’t reply. They’d moved past explanations.
“Oh!” Neil joined Andrew on the floor. “How sweet!”
Andrew looked at him in surprise. Then he remembered the children in Anfractus, who’d watched the salamanders feeding at the shrine. “You see him.”
“Her,” Neil corrected.
Paul sucked in his breath. It must have felt like he was in the middle of a horror movie. Something with prophetic children and nightmares living in the basement.
Andrew opened his clenched fist, revealing a piece of apple that he’d liberated from the kitchen. The salamander approached. He held out the treat. He could feel the lizard’s heat. It opened its mouth, revealing a row of needle-sharp teeth, and snatched the apple. The sound of its chewing reminded him of a cat eating dry kibble.
“What the—” Paul stepped forward. “How did you do that?”
“Put your hand right here,” Andrew said. “Slowly.”
Paul knelt beside him, looking confused.
“Don’t be afraid,” Neil soothed. “She’s not that hungry.”
Slowly, Paul reached out his hand, until it hovered near the salamander’s unseen head. She sniffed it cautiously. Paul’s eyes widened.
“It’s warm.”
The lizard sneezed. A tongue of flame burst out of the darkness, and Paul cried out. He sat down heavily on the concrete, staring at the tips of his fingers.
“Sorry,” Andrew said. “They do that sometimes.”
Paul looked at the empty space in front of him. “What is it?”
“One of the Fraggles.”
“And”—he’d gone white again—“it lives in our furnace?”
“Salamanders like warm places. She’s harmless. Mostly.”
Ingrid touched Neil’s shoulder. “Bubs, have you always been able to see her?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes I can hear her scratching. Sweet little Chordata.” His eyes suddenly widened as he stared at the furnace. He gripped Ingrid’s hand. “But I don’t like this room. It is a bit too much like Hatshepsut’s funeral bier.”
• • •
Just past sunset, they gathered outside Darke Hall. The downtown campus of Plains University was a crumbling beauty, full of old brick buildings that had been commissioned after the cyclone that nearly destroyed Regina. Oddly enough, the venerable hall with its stained-glass windows had become the administrative center for online programs. It made no sense that something called “digital delivery” would house its offices in a haunted auditorium. Or perhaps it made perfect sense. The campus was quiet, almost derelict. Surrounded by Wascana Park, it seemed to be sinking into the woodland without complaint. Fat insects buzzed around the landscaped green. The parking lot was empty, save for Shelby’s truck.
It was an unlikely spot for a battle.
“You’re sure about this?” Ingrid asked. “The main campus seems a more likely target. Why would they come here?”
Andrew squinted at a spiderweb. “Because it’s old. And ghosts live here. That’s like catnip for lares. The basilissa wants to overrun our world with the spirits of Anfractus. But Regina has its own lares—they’ve been crossing the border for centuries. Maybe they’ve always been here. They won’t take kindly to a breach of their territory. Darke Hall is as good a fortress as any. We can defend it.”
“With all of the weapons that we don’t have,” Shelby clarified.
Paul unzipped his hockey bag. “I’ve got sticks and bats. And a lacrosse stick.” He frowned. “Not sure what good that’ll be.”
“This wouldn’t be a problem if we lived in Utah,” Shelby said.
Andrew frowned. “This is the hunting epicenter of Canada. If we wanted guns, we could find them. But they won’t do much good. We need something else.”
“Is he coming?” Ingrid asked.
She meant Oliver. He’d left a cache of weapons at the library. They’d thought of stopping there first, but nobody knew the code to the safe. Andrew shifted nervously from one foot to the other. “I’m not sure.”
“I thought you’d come to so
me kind of arrangement.”
“That’s not precisely how I remember it.”
You know him better than I do. Care to guess what his next move will be? Andrew didn’t voice the thought aloud. Ingrid’s speech to Paul hadn’t included any mention of Oliver. It didn’t seem like the right time to open up that particular box. He hadn’t objected to leaving Neil with a last-minute babysitter. Like the rest of them, he was pale, but present.
A car pulled up. Oliver stepped out, carrying what looked like a cooler.
“Sandwiches?” Ingrid asked.
He laid it on the ground. “Swords.”
“Even better.”
Something passed between them. A question asked and answered. Oliver looked at Andrew. He didn’t quite smile, but the corner of his mouth twitched. Like he was remembering something funny. Andrew thought about everything he didn’t know about Oliver and the few things that he did. They were both unpredictable pieces. His hand curled around the piano key in his pocket. It wasn’t a horn, but it might still work. All of their plans seemed like beautiful hypotheticals. Mere outlines that would burn beneath the shock of color. He reached into his other pocket. Carl’s phone was heavy and certain. A suitable grave gift. Death hovered nearby, fog on a windowpane. He couldn’t stop it. Best to invite it in.
Sam emerged from Darke Hall. “All clear,” she said. “Everyone’s gone home for the day. It’s a Scooby Doo ghost town in there.”
“It really is,” Andrew replied.
Sam gave him an odd look. “Can you see them?”
“No. But the lares can. It’s creeping me out, to be honest.”
“My grandma says that we don’t have to be afraid of ghosts,” Shelby said. “They’re citizens, just like us.”
“Let’s hope she’s right.” Ingrid held open the door. “We could use the reinforcements.”
Latin scrolled across the stained-glass windows. It was warm inside, and the air smelled like an old closet. The auditorium made him dizzy. Plush velvet chairs rose like a wave. The pipe organ loomed above the stage, a sleeping automaton with serrated teeth. He could almost hear spectral music clinging to the rafters.
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