Nightkeepers

by Jessica Andersen

  ‘‘There’s more.’’

  She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘‘Of course there is.’’ ‘‘The powers you exhibited yesterday must mean you retained some sort of connection to the barrier, one that Red-Boar couldn’t trace. If you’re still linked to the god in any way, we’re going to need to put you into the barrier on the next ceremonial day and figure out how the connection works.’’

  She swallowed, her stomach going hollow at the thought of the limitless gray-green she’d glimpsed during the teleport. ‘‘Okay,’’ she whispered. ‘‘I’m game.’’ Actually, she was scared spitless, but the idea that she might have power was seriously tempting. With it, maybe she could find Zipacna.

  With it, maybe she could kill him.

  ‘‘There’s a risk,’’ Strike said, his eyes never leaving hers. ‘‘Rabbit nearly died during the binding ceremony, and he’s half Nightkeeper.’’

  ‘‘Oh.’’ Leah leaned back against the altar, needing the feel of something solid to hang on to as the world spun around her. ‘‘So it’s like this. If we become lovers, I could die. If I go into the barrier, I could die. If I go home, I’ll probably die. Is there an option that includes me not dying?’’

  ‘‘I don’t know,’’ he said. ‘‘But I promise you one thing: If we can figure out a way, then that’s what we’ll do.’’

  But there wasn’t much of a ring of conviction to his words. And when Leah crossed the small chamber to press her face into his chest, needing something even more solid than the altar to lean on, he didn’t push her away, didn’t tell her that the no-being-alone-together thing had already started.

  Instead, he closed his arms around her, dropped his cheek to the top of her head, and hung on tight, like he was already saying good-bye.

  Or Godspeed.

  When Anna’s husband, Dick, phoned her office just past lunchtime and then spent a good five minutes talking about the weather—hot and sunny wasn’t exactly news for Texas in July—she knew he was working up to something she wouldn’t like.

  That knowledge drummed alongside the headache that’d been a constant low-grade throb since the day before, when she’d been released from Brackenridge Hospital around lunchtime. The docs had diagnosed her crash as ‘‘catatonia pursuant to a transiently high fever of unknown origin’’—i.e., ‘‘Nobody knows what the hell it was, but you seem fine now.’’

  As far as she was concerned, an FUO sounded far saner than, ‘‘I read a spell off my grad student’s laptop and nearly put myself straight through the barrier.’’

  She’d been so surprised to see familiar words twined into the line of text on Lucius’s laptop screen that the words had slipped out before she’d been aware of it, as though something else had reached across and spoken through her. The next thing she knew, poof. Instant loss of six hours. And ever since then, she’d had headaches she suspected were the result of her mind fending off the power—and the visions—-she didn’t want.

  She’d known the barrier was reactivating, had felt it at the solstice. She’d just hoped to avoid dealing with it for as long as possible.

  Like forever.

  ‘‘Anna, did you hear me?’’ On the phone, Dick’s voice gained a faint edge.

  She shook her head to clear her vision when the walls of her office blurred around her, threatening to become a step-sided pyramid rising up from a sea of foliage. It took several furious blinks before she could focus on the cordless phone in her hand. ‘‘Sorry, hon, what was that again?’’

  ‘‘I said I’ll be home late tonight, and you shouldn’t wait dinner. I’ll grab a sandwich or something.’’ He paused, and his tone softened. ‘‘I know we were going to go over the bills tonight and figure out how we’re going to pay for another round of in vitro, but the dean asked me to meet him at the faculty club. I’ll owe you one, okay?’’

  By Anna’s count he owed her several hundred already, and she knew damn well that if she stopped in at the club later, he wouldn’t be there.

  ‘‘No problem.’’ Her lips felt numb, as though they belonged to someone else, another woman entirely, and she wondered fleetingly if that other woman would challenge Dick’s glib excuse, or if she, too, would be too much of a wuss to force the answer she didn’t want. ‘‘I’ll wrap a plate for you, in case you’re hungry when you get home.’’

  She was dimly aware of a quiet knock at the door. Moments later, the panel swung inward and Lucius stuck his head around the corner. The shaggy-haired grad student winced when he saw she was on the phone. He mouthed, Sorry, and motioned that he’d wait outside.

  No, she mouthed back, come in. She waved him in, knowing her husband all too well.

  ‘‘Thanks for understanding, hon.’’ Dick’s voice gained that false cheer that she’d come to hate over the past few months. ‘‘Okay, then, I have to go. I’ll try not to wake you when I get home. Love you.’’

  He hung up before she said anything, which was probably just as well, because she didn’t know what she would have said in return. She loved him; she really did. And she knew he loved her. But she was tired and discouraged with their marriage, and had a feeling he felt the same way, which left them . . . nowhere, really, and sinking fast. The more months that went by without the pee stick showing positive, the more distant he became. Or maybe that was her drawing away, like he said. Maybe both. But she’d even gotten to the point of wondering why they were going to bother for another try at in vitro when they barely talked to each other anymore beyond vapid pleasantries and scheduling. She’d wanted a baby to add to her and Dick’s life together, not as an attempt to fix it.

  Feeling hollow and achy, she sat for a moment with the phone pressed against her ear before she sighed and snapped the receiver back in its charger.

  Lucius crossed to the side of her desk and folded his long limbs into an easy, graceful crouch, so they were eye-to-eye. ‘‘Everything okay?’’

  Carrying a battered canvas knapsack over his shoulder, wearing worn jeans, a T-shirt, and sandals, with his hazel eyes clear and guileless, his brown hair too long to be stylish, too short to be a fashion statement, he looked so damn young. Too damn young. The eight years separating them could’ve been twenty, the way she was feeling these days—at least, that was what she told herself, because it was best to think of him as a boy rather than a man, better to ignore the occasional urge to lean on him, especially now, when she was so close to falling apart.

  Instead, she forced herself to lean away. ‘‘I’m fine.’’

  He tilted his head. ‘‘You’ve been saying that a lot lately,’’ he said. ‘‘Why don’t I believe you?’’

  Anna exhaled. ‘‘Weren’t you headed to the library?’’

  ‘‘I’m on my way.’’

  But he didn’t move, just kept looking at her until she was tempted to wipe a palm across her face, thinking she had something on her cheek. A hint of something sparkled in the air between them, an attraction that had no business existing.

  ‘‘Lucius,’’ she finally whispered, feeling weak and small. ‘‘Please go.’’

  ‘‘I will. But first, I have something for you.’’ He shifted, dipped into his knapsack, and pulled out a flat, paper-wrapped package. He held it out to her. ‘‘A guy came by my office and asked me to get this to you. I’m not sure why he gave it to me and not you, but . . .’’

  She didn’t hear the rest of his sentence, as his voice faded to a buzz—or maybe the buzz was coming off the package, she couldn’t tell. She felt the power before she recognized the handwriting, the shock jolting through her like heat. Like temptation.

  ‘‘I’ll take it.’’ She snatched the thing away from Lucius and gritted her teeth when the magic sang up her arm, even through the wrapping.

  What the hell was in there?

  I don’t care, she told herself sternly. This means nothing to me now. I’m a wife. I’m trying to become a mother. I’m not that person anymore.

  Yet the power called to her, reaching deep down inside and curli
ng around her soul, warming the places that had grown so cold.

  ‘‘What man?’’ she asked, more for something to say than because she needed to know. It would’ve been Strike, her baby brother, coming to bring her back to the fold.

  ‘‘He didn’t give a name, just told me to take the package straight to you, nobody else.’’ Lucius frowned. ‘‘Huh . . . that’s weird. I can’t really picture him. I know there was something seriously cool about him, but . . .’’ He scrubbed a hand down the back of his neck, and as he did so, she saw that the coarse hairs on his forearm were raised, as if drawn upright by static electricity. His voice went serious. ‘‘What’s going on, Anna? Things have felt . . . weird around here since the night you conked out, and I’m not the only one who’s noticed it. Half the artifacts are suddenly under lock and key, you’ve got strangers dropping off mysterious packages, the interns are practically living at the library, and I get the feeling you’d be happy if I joined them.’’ He paused. ‘‘I’d like to think you know me better than that, so why don’t you spare us both the argument and tell me what’s up?’’

  Anna almost told him, but didn’t, because he wasn’t part of what was going on behind the scenes of everyday life. Hell, she wasn’t even part of it, not anymore. She was a consultant. A convenience. I’ll give it to Anna, she could picture Strike saying. She’ll translate it.

  No, she decided, she bloody well wouldn’t.

  ‘‘Trust me, you’re better off not knowing,’’ she said, pinching the bridge of her nose. ‘‘I’m trying to spare you a headache you can’t even begin to understand.’’

  ‘‘I’m tougher than I look.’’

  ‘‘It’s not about being tough; it’s about—’’ She broke off, shaking her head. ‘‘Never mind. Everything is fine. I’m fine; I promise.’’ She forced a smile. ‘‘And if it feels like I keep shuffling you off to the library, it’s because I do. Or have you forgotten that you’re defending your dissertation in a few weeks?’’

  Refusing to be distracted, he tapped the package, which she still clutched in both hands. ‘‘Are you going to let me see what’s in there?’’

  Not on your life, she thought, but said aloud, ‘‘Maybe later.’’

  ‘‘Which means no.’’ His voice held faint reproach, but his grin was pure and sweet and held just enough of the devil to have her taking a second look when he said, ‘‘You know I’ll get a look eventually. I have my ways.’’

  ‘‘Keep on believing that.’’ She waved him out. ‘‘We all need our little delusions.’’

  But her smile died the moment he was out the door. She stared down at the flat packet. It seemed like such a small, innocuous thing—an oblong rectangle wrapped in brown paper and secured with packing tape. Inside, though, was something beautiful. Something terrible. She could feel it hum up her arms, begging to be unwrapped. To be seen. To be used.

  It was one of the lost spells. It had to be. But where had Strike found it? Where had it been all these years?

  Jox had told her the stories, of course. He’d told both her and Strike as part of their training, and then repeated them over again when Red-Boar’s young son, Rabbit, had been old enough to understand. The winikin had told them how the Maya had welcomed Cortés’s ships, ignoring the Nightkeepers who said they should be wary, pointing to the third prophecy: When the solstice sun rises, a fair-skinned man arrives from the east, bringing destruction.

  The Mayan hosts, believing the lies of the demon-worshiping Order of Xibalba, had welcomed the conquistador’s ships as heralding the return of the winged serpent god, Kulkulkan. Instead, the galleons had brought utter destruction. What happened before will happen again, said the writs, referring back to the massacre that had driven the Nightkeepers out of Egypt when Akhenaten decreed there was only one true God. And history had indeed repeated itself, with the conquistadors slaughtering all but a handful of the magic users and burning their books, forcing the Maya to convert to Christianity. The accumulated wisdom of thousands of lifetimes had perished in the second massacre, with only scraps surfacing from time to time. What were the chances of one surfacing now, as the portal was wakening, as power was building and the end-time approached?

  There are no coincidences, Jox had always said, his voice suddenly fresh in Anna’s mind even after all these years. There is only destiny. It was that destiny that had driven her away. Now it was looking to suck her back in, looking to make her into something she didn’t want to be, to take her away from the things she did want to be. A wife. A teacher. Hell, a soccer mom.

  She ripped the package open more violently than necessary, because it was hard to be a soccer mom without kids.

  Beneath the outer layer of packing, there was a layer of acid-free paper, a layer of cardboard, and another of acid-free paper. Inside that was a flat packet of oilcloth, tied shut with a boot lace. Within that was a scrap of power.

  The codex fragment bore lines of glyphwork so ornate that it was difficult to make out the symbols themselves. Soon, though, the lines and shapes began to resolve into flattened faces with heavy, hooked noses and elaborate headdresses, stylized caricatures of animals and plants interspersed with the dots and slashes. And the skulls. So many skulls, all tipped back, mouths opened as they screamed agony into the darkness.

  Gods, she thought, feeling awe shimmer over her, through her. It’s gorgeous. Hideous, but gorgeous, and giving off so much power just sitting there that her skin grew warm in the center of her collarbone, where her quartz crystal used to rest. She even reached up to touch her pendant before she remembered it was gone. Then she let her hand fall and shoved the damned packet in a drawer, locking it tight, as though that would make it all go away.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  In the weeks following Strike’s revelation of the thirteenth prophecy, Leah channeled her excess energy into finding the bastard who’d killed her brother and friends . . . and learning how to kill the creature Zipacna had become. Logic—and rationality—said she should go home and work the case from there. But home wasn’t safe, and besides, the things she’d seen and done recently had separated her from that life somehow. She didn’t feel like that world fit anymore.

  Which was unfortunate, because she sure didn’t fit into the Nightkeepers’ world, either.

  As agreed, she and Strike avoided the hell out of each other. It wasn’t easy, considering that they crossed paths just often enough to keep the sizzle at a maddening background hum. But because he’d been right, damn it, the sex hadn’t been just sex, and because she didn’t want to be anybody’s sacrifice, she ignored the hum as best she could and threw herself into her work.

  Unfortunately, she didn’t have much more in the success department there, either.

  She was a bust in Magic 101, showing zero power, which was both a relief and a disappointment—a relief because she wasn’t sure she wanted to play the magic game when it seemed like a good way of getting dead, but a disappointment because she really, really wanted to fry Zipacna’s ass. Then she found out the deal with the MAC-10s: The bullets were tipped with jade, which was apparently anathema to the denizens of the nine-layered hell called Xibalba. They were the Nightkeepers’ silver bullets.

  And they were a way for her to fight Zipacna.

  According to Jox—who had no use for her but proved to be a bit of a weapons junkie—the jade-tips wouldn’t kill a makol because its human aspect would protect it from the jade while its magic protected it from getting dead right away. But the jade-tips would sure as hell slow it down long enough for her to do the head-and-heart thing and recite a simple banishment spell. Jox said he wasn’t sure whether the banishment spell would work for a human—and of course he said the ‘‘human’’ part with a superior lip curl. That meant maybe the makol would vaporize . . . and maybe it’d sit its headless ass up and make a grab for her.

  She had a feeling the winikin was hoping for the latter. But who the hell cared? At least she had a weapon with some hope of success. All she had to do
was track down Zipacna, who might or might not be traveling with a hundred or so of his freak-show disciples.

  That turned out to be easier said than done.

  She leaned on the Nightkeeper’s private eye, Carter, and called in all her markers and then some. She tracked the 2012ers from Miami to the Keys and lost them when they hit the water, headed south. A week later, she picked them back up in south Texas, near the border. Once she had the location, she forced Strike and Red-Boar to take her along on the teleport recon by refusing to give up the location—and the relevant photographs— until they agreed.

  They got there half a day too late. Zipacna and his freaks were gone.

  Then the same thing happened in Fort Worth, and again in Philly, of all places. Then LA. Each time they were a fraction too late, sometimes a day, sometimes just a few hours, as if the bastard had known they were coming.

  ‘‘He’s got a seer,’’ Strike said at one point. ‘‘It’s the only explanation.’’

  The knowledge hurt him doubly, she knew—once because they couldn’t catch the ajaw-makol, and a second time because it drove home the continued separation between him and his sister, Anna—a rift Leah had learned of when she’d come across him one day, sitting at the kitchen table with the mail open in front of him and his head in his hands. Eventually he’d revealed that he’d given Anna a text for translation and she’d sent it back, refusing to get involved. Which left them with no seer, and no translator the Nightkeepers could trust.

  With so much of their magic lost over the years—to time, to persecution—they couldn’t afford to waste any of their assets. But instead of zapping to UT Austin and dragging his sister’s butt back to the compound, Strike had withdrawn completely, giving Jox and Red-Boar control of Magic 101 and spending most of his time locked in the archives. When he did come out in public, he was snarly at best, churlish at worst. Even Red-Boar started giving him a wide berth, which was saying something.