by Lee Dignam
Isaac looked toward the window in the corner of the room. The first pattering of new rain was starting to pop against the glass. A siren faded off into the night. “It may have been my fault,” Isaac said.
“Your fault?” Alice asked, straightening up. “What do you mean?”
He turned to look at her again. “It’s been three months,” he said, “Three months of nothing. I may have gotten… complacent. Maybe I could have done a better job with our wards; the wards around my apartment, the wards around the vault. No one has my power. Crafting an adequate defense against Nyx’s attack was solely my responsibility, and I failed. Twice. The magistrate isn’t pleased.”
“The magistrate is never pleased,” Jim said.
“They’re a bunch of aristocratic assholes,” Cameron said, “I doubt if the praetors have ever really gotten their hands dirty before.”
An angry heat radiated into Alice’s chest. “Fuck the magistrate,” she said, “Like they’re doing anything to help the cause.”
“They can’t, Alice,” Isaac said, “And you know that.”
“Then make more amulets for them—like the ones you made for Cam and Jim. Then the praetors will be able to face Nyx head on.”
“Making the amulets is difficult and time consuming. It takes hours to just imbue the spells, not to mention that I have to find the materials to make the pendants and etch symbols into them. I would need to make one for each of the praetors, and no one would be able to help me—not even Silver. I don’t think that’s the best use of my time or my abilities.”
“Neither is blaming yourself for something that’s entirely out of your control, Isaac. Nyx isn’t just a mage or any other supernatural entity. She’s a force. No one blames the victim when a tornado destroys their house.”
Isaac nodded. “You’re right, of course,” he said. “In any case, I have re-doubled my wards around the apartment. One good thing did come from her breaking into the vault; we now know what kind of magic she’s using, and now that I can factor that in it should allow for a more solid defense against her power.”
“Okay,” Alice said, “So, how are we going to get her back?”
“We aren’t,” Cameron said, “Not right now.”
“We have to do something, don’t we?”
“She could be expecting retaliation, and if she is, then making a move on her wouldn’t be the best of ideas. Plus, you need to rest. You’ve just been hurt pretty bad. I’m going to see if I can come up with something that can help you with the pain better than these mundane painkillers can. Until then, bedrest and plenty of fluids.”
“You’re a doctor now?”
“No,” Cameron said, standing, “I’m a vet.”
“And I have a doctorate,” Isaac said, “So, between the two of us, we make one real doctor.”
Alice didn’t like the idea of sitting on her hands, but they had a point. Her arm was throbbing and still very much raw from the attack, and if Nyx had done all this just to play with her and Isaac, then it meant she was at least one step ahead of them. Now wasn’t the time for impulsivity or rash action, as much as she wanted it to be.
“Fine,” Alice said, “We’ll wait.”
“Very good,” Jim said, “I’m going to hit the books and see if I can find anything useful.”
Isaac nodded. “We’re going to hole up here for now. Cameron, let me know if you develop something that may help with Alice’s injuries.”
“No problem,” Cameron said as he headed for the front door. Jim followed, nodding at Isaac and Alice as he walked by. Silver was last, though he seemed to have deliberately planned on making a slow entrance so that he could speak to Isaac privately. Alice, sensing this, got up and headed into the kitchen to rummage around in Isaac’s drawers for take-out menus. It was late, but there would be plenty of places that would deliver even at this time of night, and her stomach was growling.
Elvira circled around her legs with her back arched. She looked up at Alice and mewed loudly. Hungry, Alice thought, and she watched the conversation between Isaac and Silver unfolding from where she was while filling Elvira’s bowl with dry cat food.
Both men were talking in front of the open door. Silver had his hand on it, and Isaac had his arms folded in front of his chest. She couldn’t precisely read their lips or figure out what they were saying, but Isaac’s body language read as defensive, and Silver’s as accusatory. The conversation ended quickly, Silver briskly walking away and Isaac shaking his head.
He closed the door and returned to Alice, who was now inspecting take-out menus over the kitchen counter. Feeding her cat had reminded her of how hungry she was.
“This one looks good,” Alice said, pointing at a menu for an all-night burger place.
“We can get whatever you like,” he said, kissing her shoulder.
“Are you alright? That didn’t look like it went well.”
“I’m alright. So is he.”
“What’s the problem?”
“It’s nothing.”
Only it wasn’t nothing as Isaac said. There was something going on between those two, and there had been ever since they became tutor and apprentice. Silver was younger than Isaac and wilder, like a stray cat. Isaac was the kind of man who was used to being able to impress his will upon people and have them do what he liked. He liked to be in control, and Silver was the kind of guy who hated the leash.
She could understand and respect that. At the same time, she didn’t want to prod, so she dropped the subject for now.
“Why didn’t you tell them about Cora?” Alice asked.
Isaac kissed her shoulder again and stepped away. “For the same reason you didn’t,” he said.
CHAPTER 11
Blue Ribbon
The hour was late, and eating such a hearty meal had made the call for sleep hit Alice like a sack of bricks, but there was still one more thing left to do. Alice stood from the sofa, stretched, cracked her neck, and flexed her fingers. There was still pain in her joints, especially around her arm and back, but that was to be expected. The surgeon’s presence would linger like a ghost refusing to leave its haunt. She’d have to adapt.
While Isaac prepared things in the bedroom, Alice headed down the hall and into a storage closet that smelled like leather. She flicked the lightbulb on, dropped to her knees, pushed a number of shoes—mostly Italian loafers—aside, and then felt around the back of the closet until she could feel the dial between her fingers. Alice pulled herself closer to it, stuck her head between a couple of hanging coats, and stared at the door to a safe in the wall.
It was an old gray safe with a dial instead of a digital keypad, and Alice turned the dial this way and that, twisting it carefully, but with conviction. She knew the code and wouldn’t screw it up if she went slowly, so she was patient, and finally the locking mechanism clicked. She pulled the safe open and looked inside.
There was a brown envelope with some money inside the safe, probably a couple of thousand dollars. A British passport sat on top of the envelope next to a long necked Smith and Wesson revolver and a box full of metal jacket bullets. In here was also another brass bangle like the one Isaac wore on his wrist, only this one had gone dull from having not been used. What Alice wanted, though, was in the back.
She reached for it, and her hand closed on a small shoe box. She pulled the box out of the safe, stood up, and placed the box on a shelf, relieved. Nyx, thankfully, hadn’t found it. Alice hadn’t thought Nyx would ever get close enough to this box what with all the sigils of cloaking and obfuscation Isaac had put up around his safe, but there was always doubt. If Nyx had been in this apartment, then she had been only 10 or so feet away from Sonia’s soul, and she hadn’t even known it.
Alice opened the box and a soft blue glow emanated from inside, bathing Alice’s face in soothing, flickering light. The source of light was the underside of a transparent Tupperware container held within the shoebox. It had a green lid on it, into which a number of sigils had been car
ved with a Stanley knife. Alice pulled the cold Tupperware container out of the box and turned it up so that she could see inside. Tiny blue ribbons surrounded by floating motes of light danced softly, like fish in an aquarium. The light pulsed and blinked, and Alice smiled.
“Still safe,” Isaac said.
Alice turned her head to look at him and nodded. “Yes, she’s still safe.”
“That’s good news. It means we still have a chance of saving Sonia’s life.”
“We need all the good news we can get, right?” Alice put the Tupperware back in the shoe box, closed the box, and then shoved it back into the safe from where she had retrieved it. She only wanted to look at the soul, but looking at it for too long was apt to trigger her monstrous hunger. “Have you told the others what our plan is? With Sonia, I mean?”
“Cam knows, and Jim too. I haven’t told the magistrate… or Logan.”
“I don’t think Logan will be impressed.”
“Or the magistrate.”
“But it’s the right thing to do. If we can do it, if we get a chance, we should.” Alice flicked the light off and closed the closet door. She noticed he was looking at her oddly. His head was cocked to the side, his lips were pressed together, and his eyes weren’t entirely on hers.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
“This isn’t the right time,” Isaac said. “But if I don’t mention it now, it will eat at my subconscious.”
“What will?”
“Cameron told me about the boxes in your office.”
Alice’s stomach sank. “What about them?”
“He didn’t mean to pry, but he’d noticed you still hadn’t moved in and was wondering…”
“Isaac,” she said, “We’ve talked about this, haven’t we?”
“But we haven’t. You made it clear this was a temporary solution to your lack of a living arrangement, but it’s been three months.”
Had it only been three months? Somehow, to Alice, it seemed like the time she had spent at Isaac’s had been much shorter. She had moved in here in a hurry after what happened at her loft with Raegan and Doug, the garbage man. There was no way she was going to ever sleep in that bed again after having found a corpse laying on it. She had moved in here with Isaac, who was only happy to host her, but in her mind living here had always been a temporary solution.
“I know,” she said, “Trust me, I know.”
“Do you think you’ll ever move in?” Isaac asked.
“That I don’t know.”
“Why not?”
“Because… okay? I don’t know. I know it doesn’t make any sense for me to keep putting it off, and I’m not doing it on purpose. I promise.”
Isaac approached, but his eyes were soft and warm. He didn’t mean her any harm and clearly didn’t want to start a fight, but Alice’s defenses were up. “I can’t keep asking you to move in. You have to make the decision of your own accord.”
“And I’ll make it, I just haven’t yet.”
“What’s stopping you, Alice? We’re over many of the hurdles our relationship has thrown at us. Why is the decision to move in with me such a difficult one for you to make? Your cat has clearly made my apartment its home, why do you have an aversion to this?”
Alice wanted this to stop. She didn’t want to get questioned like this, didn’t want to be interrogated. Not after everything that had happened tonight. All she wanted to do was get into bed with him, not fight about the reason why she hadn’t yet committed to moving into his apartment. But she already had, hadn’t she? Most of her stuff was here, wasn’t it?
Wasn’t that enough?
“Look,” Alice said, “Can we please stop talking about this right now? The last thing we want to do is fight right now. That won’t help either of us.”
“Is that what you think? That fighting has never helped any couple get over their issues?”
“We don’t have issues.”
“But we do. I can’t see them, and I don’t think you can either, but we have them If we don’t deal with them, then we’ll never move forward.”
“Why now, Isaac? Why tonight?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because things are happening again and we haven’t yet talked about this.”
“So, what, you want to double down on our relationship in case you don’t get another chance?”
“Would it be so bad for you to move the rest of your boxes in here? They’re a nuisance in your office, which is already too small as it is.”
He had caught her there. The boxes were a giant pain in the ass, and having the Chest of Haunts in her office was starting to attract that same creepiness that had plagued her home ever since the chest entered the apartment. Locked drawers would later be found open, the faucets in the kitchen would turn on and off, and she had gone through more exploded lightbulbs in the last two weeks than she had in the last two years.
The closet door in her old apartment had offered a surface onto which the Void Weaver’s wards could be carved to further insulate the Chest, but her office had no such barriers. There were no closed doors, save for the bathroom, and there was no way she was putting the Chest in there. Bringing it to Isaac’s apartment was the smart thing to do, but if she brought the Chest up she would have had to bring everything else up too, and she wasn’t ready for that.
Hadn’t she wanted to look for a new apartment?
“Please, Isaac,” she said, approaching. She took his hands in hers. “We’ll talk about it again in the morning, okay? I’m tired, we’re both tired. Let’s just put a pin in this for now.”
Isaac stared at her for a good long moment before finally saying “We’re going to run out of pins.”
Alice nodded. It was a fair reply. She kissed him on the cheek, and then on the lips. A soft kiss, but one filled with care and tenderness. When the kiss was over, Alice took his hand and led him into the bedroom. She reached under the hem of her shirt, looked over her shoulder as she pulled it up, and said “Turn off the light.”
Isaac did as she asked, casting the bedroom into darkness. A square of orange light fell through the window creating enough ambient light for features, but not details, to be visible. Alice removed her shirt and tossed it to the floor, letting her bare chest breathe the cool night air flowing in through the slightly opened window. She felt her nipples stiffen, her heart started to flutter, and she turned around to look at Isaac fully.
She was only able to see his silhouette, but saw that he too was unbuttoning his shirt and about to remove it. Alice approached and helped him, slipping her hands into his shirt and gently urging it off his shoulders. His skin was warm beneath her fingers, and when his shirt was gone she pressed her breasts against his chest. He gasped at the sudden coldness, but then wrapped his arms around her naked waist and kissed her, drinking deeply from her lips.
“I’m sorry,” she said, when the kiss broke, “I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s quite alright,” Isaac said, interrupting. “When you’re ready.”
Alice nodded. Isaac’s warm hands travelled up her ribs, causing lustful ripples to spread upwards and into her chest. She shuddered and allowed herself to enjoy the sensation, melting into Isaac’s body as he continued to run his fingertips up to the sides of her breasts and back down to her waist. She kissed him and, with her body, gently urged him to the bed before pushing him down onto it..
He looked up at her while propped on his elbows, watching as she wriggled out of her underwear in front of him. Though her arm was in pain, her heart was fluttering and her body was wanting. He worked furiously at his belt as she approached, sliding his trousers off just as she began straddling him. She couldn’t sense any apprehension from him. He cared that she was hurt, but he wasn’t about to stop her from taking what she wanted, nor was he about to deny himself what he wanted.
Silently, she lowered herself onto him and let whatever exultant moans cared to leave her body do exactly that. Together they rocked, and with every motion, with every
kiss, every nibble and thrust, Alice felt the night’s tension rise to a powerful climax, and then release, sending her into the kind of deep, satisfied sleep that pulls you in and envelops you, promising to keep you safe.
After all that had happened tonight, this was exactly what she needed.
CHAPTER 12
Storm's Coming
Alice awoke with a start, fear wedged in her throat like a ball of hot iron. Her injured forearm pulsed with pain like white fire, and she gritted her teeth to stifle the moan. She had been dreaming of the surgeon. The remnants of the dream and the pain in her arm were the only clear things in her mind right now. The surgeon had been chasing her again, only this time it had caught her and…
Her arm pulsed again, but this time the pain raced to her back and the nauseating hit of agony she felt there caused her to cry out. Isaac awoke at the sound like a cat in the dark—alert and ready to bolt. His fingers found the light switch on the bedside lamp and he flicked it on. He was talking to her, but she couldn’t hear him. There was only the pain and the sound of the surgeon’s gargled, metallic scream.
Isaac was walking her out of the bedroom now, but she was aware of this only in the way one is aware that they’re having a bad dream. Her head was drooping, her legs felt like they weighed a ton, and her back refused to straighten. Cold water hit her face and her mind cleared, at least enough for her to realize where she was. To realize that she was awake.
“Alice,” Isaac said, and he splashed another handful of water on her face, “Alice, wake up.”
“I’m here,” she said, or at least she thought she did.
“Are you alright? What happened?”
“It hurts.”
Another dose of pain struck her, this time emanating from her back and radiating around her chest and arms. It was as if she had been struck with a heavy object—or cut by a clawed hand. It had cut her back again in the dream, and the pain felt real. Too real. Her heart was beating a mile a minute and speeding up, dark spots were blooming around her eyes like black roses, and her legs were getting weak again.
