by Paige Orwin
He swallowed, mouth gone dry. He would never have to patrol again. Never have to do what he’d done again. He’d be completely self-contained, completely self-sustaining – not a scavenger reliant on others. No more Niagaras, not ever. Not ever again.
But… he couldn’t. He didn’t know enough. He didn’t know how it worked.
Not yet.
His one and only encounter with Shokat Anoushak flitted through his mind, the Immortal wheeling over the remnants of Providence atop a beast with wings like razors, reinforcements rising wherever her arrows fell. She wore the regalia of a Scythian queen, archaic and colorful. She’d looked down at him as the city burned.
Run, she’d said, and her voice sounded as though she stood beside him, speaking words in a language two thousand years dead. Run, and keep running as the jaws of fate and madness close on your throat. That’s all that awaits you.
Run.
Edmund closed his ledger. He managed to put it back in its place, though his hands shook, and to get the cap back on his pen. Better not to know. Always better not to know, especially when you wanted to know more.
Don’t ask.
Don’t ask.
He wished Kyra hadn’t said a word. He should have stopped her. He couldn’t sleep.
He couldn’t sleep.
* * *
If Edmund was at Niagara, that meant north to Barrio Libertad and then west to…
Istvan paused, hovering above the main road that led from the Twelfth Hour to the coast. No. No, wait.
Edmund was here.
What was he doing here? He was supposed to be at Niagara! Where was Kyra? Had he left the boy there, alone – with not even a promise to return, because Edmund so rarely made promises – all so he could spend the night in his own bed?
Istvan dove for the house. Smoke spiraled from its chimney. He swung in through the kitchen window, folding his wings to avoid clipping them on the appliances. “Edmund!”
A chair scraped backwards across the tile, accompanied by a wash of sudden dread.
“Edmund, what on earth are you–”
The wizard held up his hands. He seemed to be wearing a bathrobe; difficult to tell exactly, in the poor light. “Shhh! Cut the fireworks!”
The sound of snoring drifted from the living room. Istvan peered around the corner. A roughly human-sized bundle lay curled up on the couch, swathed in thick blankets. A cat sprawled on top of it, purring.
Kyra.
Oh. Oh, no.
Istvan tried to damp down the distant racket of gunfire. If the boy woke suddenly, startled, in the middle of New Haven… well, Istvan had enough to be blamed for already. He wasn’t about to have a tornado devouring Edmund’s house be his fault, too.
“Edmund,” he hissed, “what are you doing here? Why is Kyra here?” He looked at the table. “Why are you reading in the dark?”
The wizard reached out to shut the book. “The mockeries came back.”
“So?”
“One of them fell out of the sky while I was watching. It exploded, Istvan. Maybe they were fighting Kasimir’s troops again, I don’t know. It wasn’t safe.”
“So you brought Kyra to your house?” Istvan asked.
“Yes,” said Edmund.
Istvan put his hands on the table. “You ran?”
“Yes.”
What was the point of Niagara, if Edmund was just going to take people to his house? What was the point in building anything if Edmund was always kept just going home? Why not run everything out of the house, while they were at it? Clearly anyone could be allowed inside, never mind their documented hazard to life and property and the close proximity of unwitting neighbors, and it was perfectly normal to chain a child to a pillar and then later invite him over for tea and games. It was all perfectly acceptable if Edmund did it!
“Before you yell,” Edmund said, “let’s go somewhere we won’t wake Kyra.”
Istvan snorted. “Oh, it would be awful if something happened to this place, is that it?”
Edmund didn’t answer. Instead, the wizard extricated himself from his chair and started down the hall, stewing in a well-seasoned medley of exhaustion, dread, and self-hatred. It was typical of him, and yet there was a strange… fluidity to it, walled back by the sort of tingling horror the man reserved for grappling with eternity, the kind that led to fits and panic if left unchecked.
Istvan didn’t feel bad for him. Not at all. Istvan was still angry at him, and deservedly so, for Kyra’s sake if no one else’s.
What had he done, after Istvan left?
The other man paused at the junction between bedroom and bathroom, paused, and then sighed and pushed the door to the bedroom open. “Here.”
“Now I’m permitted, I see.”
“Unless you’d prefer to talk in the bathroom, yes.”
Istvan brushed past him into the room and turned on the desk lamp. The sheets were still made up, as though Edmund had never slept in them. A bottle and a glass, inevitably, sat on the bedside table. No sign of the time ledger. Istvan had only ever seen it when it was open, never closed – or nothing that looked right, anyhow. There were plenty of other books stacked above the desk.
Edmund stepped in and shut the door behind himself.
“I won Niagara for you,” Istvan said.
The wizard sat on the bed. “I’m aware.”
“I gave you a way to get your time back. I took care of Kyra. I protected you from the Susurration, I was forced to unleash the War on it, and I’ve spent the last two months trying to make reparations – and what have you done? Nothing!”
Edmund glanced at the door. “Istvan–”
“You held endless meetings,” Istvan continued, “you went on patrol by yourself – for yourself – every night, and when the Magister asked you to go on a proper mission, you complained. You imprisoned a child, Edmund, and made me keep him in a coma. I’ve done everything for you. Everything!” Tears welled: foolish tears, impossible tears, relics of a past long gone. Weakness, when he least needed it. His vision swam. “And now that you’ve gotten your time back, you expect to be lauded for all your hard work even as you run away, again?”
“I didn’t–”
“You expect Kyra to forgive you? You expect me to forgive you?”
Edmund sat very still, both hands clutching the edge of the bed. He looked terrible: he hunched, his shoulders drooped, his face was drawn, and wan, and still not fully healed. He clearly hadn’t slept at all.
Istvan tore off his glasses. He didn’t care. He’d been used, taken for granted, ignored, taken for a monster – and none of it had mattered until he was free. He thought he’d been happy, chained. He deserved it, after all. The wizards were in the right. Edmund, at least, had spoken to him. Visited him. Never tried to free him.
Not until the War would be useful as a weapon. Not until they had no other choice.
Istvan would do anything for him. Istvan was his best friend. Istvan loved him, and loved him enough to never breathe a word of it.
And then he went and put Kyra in Istvan’s chains.
Istvan couldn’t face him any longer. He turned, and went to the window. Snow blew past, outlined by the lamp on the front of the house; a light not visible save as a diffuse glow in the storm.
“I’m sorry,” said Edmund.
Istvan folded his arms.
“What did Lucy tell you at Triskelion? After I left?”
As though that’s what started it. No problems at all until Lucy gave him ideas, hm? Istvan sighed. “She said that I’m an ‘ending spirit,’” he said, still staring out the window. “Her world – where all of the Triskelion armies are from – they have things like me. Sundered spirits. I don’t know how many, but they understand them, and they have a place for them, and they…”
“They treat them like god-kings,” said Edmund.
“Edmund, Lucy said that I’ve a wisdom no one else does. She said that clinging to who I am – who I was, the dead man named Istvan Cz
ernin – is halting a… a sort of transcendence. She said that I’m more than my parts, my memories. I’m an ending spirit of War, and if I go back there, I’m entitled to command every soldier they have. Even Kasimir’s forces are mine, by right.”
A long silence.
Istvan wiped at his eyes. He wished he could remember more details, but they slipped away; they always did. He was positive he’d ruined a great deal before coming back to himself. That Edmund didn’t despise him was a wonder.
“You don’t believe all that, do you?” the wizard finally asked.
He wanted to. Oh, he wanted to.
Istvan turned. “Are you going to do what Kyra asked of us? With Shokat Anoushak, and Tirunto, and whatever else?”
“Toronto.”
“Edmund, I don’t like that you brought him here. I don’t like that you’re trying to win him over. I know that I… I said some things to him, and that I could have been better, but Edmund, he remembers me! He remembers things that I…” Istvan drew a false breath. “Please, tomorrow, if you do nothing else, leave us alone for a time so that I can speak with him.”
Edmund rubbed his face. Then he leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Triskelion was a mistake.”
Now he–
Only after he had time did he–
Istvan slapped a skeletal hand on the desk, soundlessly. “Of course it was a mistake! You listened to me! You should never listen to me!”
The wizard shook his head. “No,” he said. “No, I should listen.”
“I’m the last person you ought to–”
“Istvan, I should listen a lot more than I have been. Grace had a point, you had a point, everyone at the meetings had ideas, and I was…” Edmund looked down at the palms of his hands. “I was scared. I still am. Mercedes wants to turn Niagara into a prison. I don’t know what to do with Kyra. I keep panicking over all this talk about Shokat Anoushak, and I was afraid that we were over, that you’d take off back to Triskelion and I’d never see you again, or that I’d have to fight you again.”
He clenched his hands into fists. “Istvan, I’ve never been so close to running out of time. I’ve never made anything this big. I’m a librarian. I don’t know how to do this.”
The man meant it.
Istvan tugged the desk chair sideways and sat in it.
“I’m not asking you to forgive me,” Edmund said. “But I’d sure like some help figuring out what to do next.”
Something changed in the tenor of the house. A subtle change, fuzzy and uncertain, a shift from one state to another. Brief confusion and then a dawning shock.
Istvan looked from the door to Edmund’s wretched expression. “Well,” he said, “I think that starts with Kyra.”
Chapter Eighteen
Breakfast went well, Istvan thought.
“I’m sorry about your table,” Kyra repeated.
“It’s fine,” said Edmund.
“It looks like it’s only three pieces. I can help fix it.”
Edmund finished hanging up the last of the cookware. “Don’t worry about it,” he said, voice flat.
Istvan bent to pick up a fallen fork. The house was still intact. That was progress. Besides, Kyra had seemed surprised and frustrated more than angry. Perhaps he didn’t know how fast Istvan was. In fact, past his lack of revulsion for Istvan’s appearance, the boy didn’t seem to know much about his abilities or modern history at all.
“I’m still sorry,” Kyra muttered, tracing the burns on his wrists.
“I was trying to be civil, I truly was,” said Istvan. “What did I say?”
Kyra huffed a long sigh and went back into the living room, where he threw himself on the couch.
“Stop harping on the dress,” said Edmund.
Istvan set the fork on the counter. “Why? He can’t wear that. Don’t you have anything his size?”
“No.”
“Doesn’t anyone?”
“No. And Kyra’s a she, all right? We talked last night.”
Istvan watched him straighten the cooking knives. “Edmund, that’s ridiculous.”
The wizard snatched up the fork and put it in the sink. “That’s how it is. I don’t know what’s going on, but it isn’t worth fighting over. Besides, Istvan, you’re already stranger than a body and consciousness that don’t match up.”
“Can we just go?” called Kyra.
Edmund strode robotically past Istvan, picking his way over the wreckage of the table. It was almost as though the damage were Istvan’s fault, which was ridiculous because Istvan wasn’t the one who had brought Kyra to the house in the first place. The man had known what he was risking, it could have been much worse, and they were both lucky that Kyra hadn’t seemed inclined to create another storm like the first time.
“She,” indeed. The boy was a crossdresser, was what he was. Istvan was not stranger than that.
At least they’d settled some things about Niagara. It might not have been an ideal base of operations, but it did lie just across Lake Ontario from where Kyra wanted to go. Toronto. The place Diego had extracted a promise to visit from the man who rarely made promises. Istvan hadn’t realized that the city – or the Greater Great Lakes fracture – was that close.
“Come on,” called Edmund. “If we’re going to go scout out Kyra’s cult, we need to leave now. Otherwise, we’ll be flying back to Niagara in the dark.”
Istvan followed them both into the living room. Edmund already wore coat, hat, mask, and cape, because he had a terrible habit of spending his ill-gotten time on frivolities. Kyra carried a rolled-up blanket with a pillow inside, a rubber band holding back his hair. One of Edmund’s old cold-weather jackets stretched over his shoulders. Beldam wound around his feet.
“So,” said Istvan, drawing closer. “If this doesn’t work, ought I go find–”
The cat hissed and shot past him.
“–a boat, somewhere?”
“It’s gonna work,” said Kyra. “I promise.”
Edmund pulled out his pocket watch. “Ready?”
Istvan shrugged. Kyra squeezed his eyes shut, turning his head away as though facing a firing squad, and then nodded.
Brass clicked on brass. A moment later they were at Niagara, again standing in front of the museum in a cold drizzle. Scorch marks marred the building’s face. The nearest dead mockery lay where it fell, sparking as water ran through its innards. A new plume of smoke rose from the trees. Kyra took off immediately for the museum and its gift shop.
“OK,” said Edmund, “I’ll be back in less than a half-hour, if we’re lucky.”
Istvan fanned his wings. He was to make a quick circuit of the area, just to be certain. “You have told William where we’re going?”
“Of course.”
“And how we’re going there?”
Edmund sighed. “I’ll be back.”
He vanished.
Istvan tried to shake away some of the rain – in vain – and then leapt skyward. The museum and the dam it sat on receded below him, merely one part of a larger complex that included the entire artificial lake and its central, bridge-connected island. Kasimir’s camp sprawled into the forest along the outer edge. A second dam lay on the other side of the river, of roughly equal size and equally below capacity. Marks along its edge indicated where the river had been higher, once.
Now, mockeries. There was the one that slid down the dam, the one on the island, the one in the woods, the one that had fallen into the lake, the ones that had fled… and the newcomer, also in the woods.
Istvan took off in that direction. It wasn’t far – only a few miles over thickly forested terrain, divided by trails bearing signs and scenic overlooks as well as the highway – and he made it there in only a few moments, landing where the trees had split and shattered.
There were two of them.
He slid down the wave of earth thrown up by the impact, stepping over rivulets of oil. The mockeries lay half-buried, entangled in a bizarre embrace. The first was th
e usual helicopter-type, with a single rotor, toppled on its side as the smoke billowed from where its windows had smashed in. A faint sound almost like screaming emanated from the interior. Two broken blades jutted upwards, the others snapped off.
The second creature was jet-black, sleek, with strange angles and broad wings – an airplane, but shaped more like a boomerang than any airplane Istvan had ever fought. It was much, much bigger than the first one… and it still moved, metal popping with heat, flipped onto its back with one wing curled over, bat-like, in a way that shouldn’t have been possible. One of the first mockery’s claws dug into where its cockpit probably was.
Istvan frowned. Fighting? The two of them had been fighting?
He prodded the bigger one. It generated a harsh metallic grumble, muffled in the dirt. Its surface trembled beneath his fingers, consumed in a strange, distant agony.
He had never seen two mockeries fight each other before. Had one of them gone mad?
“Wait here,” he said.
The big one grumbled again. It didn’t look as though it could right itself on its own, much less disentangle itself from the grip of the other mockery. Its shape was strangely familiar.
Istvan nodded and took off. The flight back to the museum was short, and he landed on the grass beside the front entrance.
“Kyra?” he called.
No answer.
Istvan pushed his way inside. A rattling came from the back; he passed a bathroom and then found an open closet door. He peered inside. “Kyra?”
The boy froze. He was knee-deep in boxes, in the process of pulling down a roll of packing tape from cluttered shelves. The blankets were nowhere to be found.
“What are you doing?” asked Istvan.
Kyra hugged the tape to his chest. “Fixing the window.”
Istvan blinked. “The window?”
Kyra gave him a betrayed look. He stepped over the boxes and tried to edge past him, smoldering with what was probably frustration. It was still so difficult to read him with Istvan’s usual level of precision. “Excuse me.”
Istvan stepped out of his way, not sure what else to do. He knew that he’d caused an uproar. He knew that he’d been awful to everyone, that he’d said things he oughtn’t have, that he’d hurt both Kyra and Edmund without thinking about what he was doing. Edmund had always shrugged it off: you were drunk, it’s fine, I know how it goes. Let’s both pretend it never happened.
