Morganna Faire.
From the instant I met the tiny, ancient hairdresser, I’d sensed there was something supernatural about her. Yet, whatever she was, she’d stayed off everyone’s radar. My aunt couldn’t connect her to any local witches or supernatural creatures or magic ingredient suppliers. The DWM didn’t have any files on her. But there she was, hiding in plain sight, with her wall full of historical photos that implied she was well over a hundred years old. The department should have had a file on her, if only to study her for anti-aging practices. The absence of information was, in itself, information.
The first time I saw her for a haircut, she’d mentioned to me in a confused fashion that one of her tattoos had disappeared. She’d chalked it up to fading, or a memory issue. I’d chalked it up to the strange side effects of the Erasure Machine, which had been pulling ink off all sorts of things.
But what if there’d never been a tattoo on her hand? I hadn’t seen one there in any of her photographs. That meant she’d lied to me, to make me pity the sweet, harmless, little old lady who couldn’t keep track of her body art. To make me ignore her as a suspect.
And she might have gotten away with it, too, except she slipped up the last time I saw her. When Chet Moore was in the hair salon, posing as Archer Caine, she’d asked him what he was up to, and she’d asked him in the manner of someone who was well acquainted with him. Except it hadn’t been Archer in the chair, despite the booking being under his name. She’d recovered quickly—so quickly, I hadn’t clued in at the time. But the subconscious is a powerful thing that keeps working on puzzles for hours, if not days. The subconscious is like a good research librarian who won’t give up.
Morganna Faire was involved with Project Erasure, which had led to Perry Pressman’s death, and now she was connected to the entity with Chet Moore’s face, and Jo Pressman’s death. The DWM had closed that case, but they shouldn’t have. I knew there was at least one other party involved. Chet denied it. He’d been adamant… almost as though he had been pulled into the conspiracy. Influenced.
Infiltrated.
No. Infected.
As I plummeted from the tower toward the rocks below, and I imagined the mess I would make, two images in my mind lined up. The first was Chet’s current grotesque state, halfway between wolf and human. The second was Chet’s body half-submerged in the fleshy, crawling monstrosity inside the Pressman attic. Both times, he’d been a mess, barely human.
What if something from Project Erasure had infected him that night? It seemed like kind of a far-fetched idea, but what if the entity calling itself Archer Caine was, in fact, the Erasure Machine, but in human form?
Think about that for a minute.
Spoiler alert: I would soon find out that my theory was only partly right.
But which part?
Chapter 39
So. The whole falling-from-a-bell-tower thing.
Remember the fancy, old-fashioned dress I was wearing, with the waist-cinching corset, the flattering gold brocade, and most importantly, the billowing layers of skirts? It turns out that, with a little magic to hold the hem down, such a thing can work as a parachute. As soon as I launched from the window, the skirts filled with air, inflating to a tulip shape. Kids, don’t try this at home unless you’re a witch! The captured air only stayed in place thanks to my telekinetic magic—which had thankfully been working when I’d grabbed Chet’s gun, and continued to work now, despite my spell-casting failure.
Down I floated.
I didn’t exactly hang in the air like a dandelion seed, but there was a gracefulness to my descent. Thank goodness the Mary Poppins trick worked, because my fallback plan had been less glamorous. Remember the wagon full of horse manure I’d been smelling earlier, when I’d talked to Griebel Gorman? You got it. My other option had been to wheel over the wagon full of horse manure by a couple of feet and break my fall with that.
My twilight parachute ride was over far too soon. I thudded to the ground right next to the wagon, sticking the landing like a gymnast—or at least in less of a disaster than my landing the night before, when I’d dropped from my mother’s room into the rose bushes with all the panache of a redheaded Sasquatch.
I listened, hearing nothing but crickets and the crashing of the ocean. Judging by the lack of screaming or applause, I could assume nobody had seen my amazing trick. The twilight had hidden me well, but it had also hidden Archer. Where could he be? Did he go straight into the castle to confront Morganna?
I ran over to the path leading to the castle entrance. In doing so, I startled a pair of women who’d been walking by. One of the women was my mother and the other was Dr. Ankh.
“Zara!” My mother clutched her throat. “You nearly startled me to death.”
“I doubt that very much,” I said. It would take more than a good startle to kill my zombie mom. “Did either of you happen to see the guy who looks like Chet come through here?” I looked at the doctor. “The, uh, parasite?”
My mother made a tsk-tsk sound. “You’re not chasing him, I hope. Men don’t like to be chased.”
So helpful. “Thanks,” I said flatly.
“Zarabella, your face is a mess,” she said. “You’re all sweaty, and you look stressed.”
“Would you say I look like someone who just fell out of a tower window and narrowly avoided having to land in a wagon full of manure?”
She did a double take, inhaled sharply, and held her hand to her mouth. “Is this about the top secret thing you were allegedly doing tonight? I thought you were lying to get out of dinner with me.”
“Me? Skip a meal? Come on.”
“I should have known,” she said.
“Speaking of my top secret thing,” I said, turning to her companion. “Dr. Ankh, in case you don’t already know, Agents Rob, Moore, and Knox may need your assistance. They’ve been frozen, or slowed down, or something. They’re in the tower, in the clock room. But be careful, because the access points have been set with traps.”
Dr. Ankh took this all in with no signs of dismay or even surprise. “I will go there now,” she said. “Thank you.” She paused, giving me a look that bordered on admiration. “I didn’t see the parasitic twin come through here, but I did see a creature head that way.” She pointed toward the front of the castle, the main entrance.
I asked, “Four legs or two?” It might have been Ribbons, beating me to the punch.
She scrunched her full lips until they were in danger of looking regular sized. “All I saw was the blur of motion.”
“Close enough.” I gathered the front of my skirts and started running.
Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw when I arrived at the castle’s hair salon.
The scene looked like a freeze-frame from a music video, captured in the instant following an explosion. Hanging in midair were bottles of hairspray, tubes of styling mud, loose glitter, combs, brushes, scissors, mirrors, magazines, several bouquets’ worth of flowers, plus at least two pairs of rubber clogs, all red.
Nearest the entrance, at the first hair-cutting station, were two stiff yet familiar faces. Both had apparently been frozen in midscream. One was the hairdresser named Patty, and the other was Detective Theodore Bentley. By the look of his silver-streaked hair, which was shorter on one side, he’d been getting a trim when the action had started.
I stepped into the salon, ducking under a floating bowl of hair curlers and its comet-like streak of loose curlers.
The air felt thick, like fog but not as cool or moist on my face. If anything, the air was dry, and wicked away the sweat on the surface of my skin quickly.
I heard bells ringing—another one of the tower bells had fallen to join the others in the clock room. The sound of the clang was normal, meaning the rest of the world wasn’t frozen in time, just the interior of the hair salon.
On my way past Bentley, I paused to check him for weapons. I’d tested my hands on the way into the castle and found my blue lightning makers were on the
fritz. Some defense system. This was the second time my plasma didn’t work right when I needed it most. Did I have to start carrying weapons at all times? Perhaps hair barrettes that doubled as ninja throwing stars?
Bentley didn’t have any weapons on him—at least not in the areas I checked. As I straightened his plastic cape again, we made eye contact. I could have sworn he’d been blinking when I’d pulled the cape up. I patted him on the shoulder, apologized softly, and headed toward the eye of the storm.
The only sound was the clack of my heels on the polished concrete floor.
There were about a dozen people frozen in various tableaus along the hairdressing stations. They might have been wax figures demonstrating hair techniques ranging from the permanent wave to the gray-roots touch-up. I could tell by their frozen expressions—not to mention the fact they were fixed in place—that the hairdressers and clients bore me no threat. I was much more concerned with the two people at the end of the room, near the sinks.
Morganna Faire and Archer Caine were both standing, facing each other, holding their positions but not frozen. As I drew nearer, I could see their chests rising and falling, and I could hear their labored breaths. Both were surrounded by a shimmering bubble of heat, about ten feet wide in diameter. I stuck a finger forward, into the bubble. There was resistance, and more heat, but my finger passed through. I could puncture the bubble if I wanted to. But did I want to?
The tiny, old woman and the big, tall man were a strange pairing, yet their powers seemed equal. Both had their arms outstretched, and their stances wide legged, so they were star shaped. They resembled two mimes pretending to press on either side of a sheet of glass. Both had faces shining with sweat from exertion.
Morganna spoke to me through gritted teeth, “Zara, help me!”
“Don’t fall for her tricks,” Archer growled through his clenched jaw. “She might look like an old woman, but she’s not what she appears to be.”
No kidding. What was she? I leaned forward, getting my face as close to the bubble’s surface as I could without pushing through. The power was buzzing off them, sending a heady rush of power through me. It wasn’t my power, but I could feel it all the same. This power was what had drawn me here, drawn me into the heart of the conflict, despite the warnings of the more sensible part of me who felt I should wait for backup, or let the DWM finish what they started.
But I wasn’t feeling very sensible that night. I hadn’t nearly died in a wagon of manure just so I could turn around now and miss the good stuff.
“Well?” Archer asked. “What do you think is happening here?” The tendons on his neck stood out as though they might suddenly pop off like overtightened guitar strings.
“You seem to be locked in a standstill,” I said. “You must have equal powers. Whatever you are. That’s why you want me to take a side.”
“My stars, you certainly are smart,” Morganna said, breaking eye contact with her foe so she could look at me. “I could tell from the moment we met. You’re whip smart, just like your beautiful daughter. Zara, remember that lovely time we all shared together at my beach studio, the first time we met?”
“That was nice,” I agreed.
“Zara, you’re as beautiful as you are smart,” Archer said, not to be outdone.
“Enough with the flattery,” I said. “I’m immune to flattery. If I weren’t, the library would never collect any overdue fines at all.”
“You’re tough but fair,” Morganna said, her eyes watering now from the effort of her magic. “Now, help me with this big meathead so we can have a good discussion, woman to woman.”
I circled around them slowly, careful not to broach the bubble of fire. “How could I help? I mean, assuming I even wanted to pick a side.”
She slowly sneered. “Hit him on the head with something. Knock him out.”
Archer caught my eye as I walked behind Morganna. “Not me,” he snarled through his clenched jaw. “She’s the evil one. Hit her on the head, not me.”
I asked, “How do I know she’s the evil one?”
He held my gaze as his whole body began to tremble from the effort of holding off the tiny woman. Calmly, he asked, “Did you notice how she was the first to suggest violence? Plus, let’s not forget, she’s the one who gave the poison to the gnome to give the girl to kill me. She’s the one—”
Morganna cut him off. “He’s dangerous,” she spat out. “The potion was for his own good.”
I put my hands on my hips and continued circling them. We were getting somewhere, but not fast enough.
“Morganna, I believe you that he’s dangerous. He can freeze people in time. He can set guns on fire. What is he? A sorcerer? A warlock? Come on, Morganna. I like you. Girl power and all that. But you’ve got to give me something to work with.”
“I’ll give you a hint,” she said. “What is the end of a flame?”
“That sounds like more of a riddle than a hint,” I said.
Archer chuckled.
Morganna flashed her eyes at him then said, “It’s time for you to go back into your bottle.”
I sucked in air so quickly it burned my lungs. What kind of supernatural creature goes back into a bottle? The same kind who comes out of one.
“He’s a genie,” I said. “You’re both genies.”
Archer’s upper lip curled up in apparent distaste. “We prefer the term djinn, with a d.”
“No, we don’t,” Morganna said. “What we prefer is for nobody to know what we are.”
I casually nodded toward the salon full of frozen people who were watching and listening in their semi-petrified states. “Bit late for that now,” I said. “Even Bentley knows about you two now, and Bentley has been missing a lot.”
The bubble made a whooshing sound, and the air grew hotter, like a bonfire. I felt the burn in my cheeks and stepped back instinctively.
Both of the genies were now trembling with effort, and locked in their battle.
“Darling brother,” Morganna said, her voice sweet and gravelly like that of a weary yet loving great-grandmother. “Since Zara won’t decide, we could always make a truce.” Don’t trust her, I thought, probably because her voice reminded me of an evil witch in a classic cartoon movie.
“No truce,” Archer said. “One of us is going back in the bottle, and it’s your turn, dear sister. It’s been your turn for a long time.”
“But I’ve accomplished so much in my time,” Morganna said. “Just think. As soon as we have the new Erasure Machine up and running, we’ll have an unlimited supply of bodies at our disposal. We can be anything. We won’t even have to get old and wrinkly every hundred years.”
I held up my hand like a student in a classroom. “I’m sorry, did you say Erasure Machine? Are you admitting that you two were the ones behind that whole thing with Perry Pressman and the monstrosity in his attic?”
Their grim silence told me everything.
I cursed under my breath. If only I’d thought to retrieve the DWM microphone from beneath the tower. If only I had the genies’ full admission on tape. The DWM was never going to believe me. They wanted their closed cases to stay closed.
“Just hit her already,” Archer said to me impatiently. “Whack her on the head with whatever’s handy. You heard what she said. She was the one who used Dorothy Tibbits to try and drive you out of your house so she could use your basement.”
“Joke’s on you, because I don’t have a basement.” Unless, of course, it’s what’s behind my new mystery door. Oh, floopy doops. She knows about my door.
Archer continued. “She’s responsible for the death of Perry Pressman and his daughter, and countless others. She trapped all of your friends in that hellish machine of hers, and I would know, because I was trapped in there, too.”
Morganna lifted her chin defiantly and caught my gaze. “Except for he took over your body, Zara,” Morganna said. “Remember that? Remember how violated you felt?”
I did remember, and knowing Archer was
the one who’d taunted me with my own lips was not currently endearing me to his cause. I circled around the two genies—no way was I calling them djinn with a d in my own head—to get a clear look at Archer’s face. “That was you?”
“You got your body back, good as new,” Archer said. Rivers of sweat streamed down the side of his face. Guilt sweat? “In fact, you might have ended up more powerful, thanks to me.”
I had felt more powerful after the incident in the attic. I’d chalked it up to experience and time, but what if he was right?
“He doesn’t respect women,” Morganna said. “My brother uses women and tosses them aside.”
“I love women,” Archer said. “I love all of them.”
Their heat bubble was getting hotter, and my circling path was getting wider. I caught my shoulder on a floating mirror. I grabbed it in my hand before it could fall to the floor and break. Who needs another seven years of bad luck? The mirror had an ornate metal casing and weighed as much as a small skillet.
“Hit him,” Morganna urged, flashing her eyes at the weapon in my hand. “Hit him now!”
I swung back my arm. I wasn’t actually going to hit him on the back of the head, but the genies didn’t know that. They were looking at my face, and not at my feet, or the thick snail trail of glitter gel I’d just momentarily slipped on, causing me to momentarily lose my balance and swing my arm up wildly to steady myself.
Archer blurted out, “I’m Zoey’s father! You wouldn’t kill the father of your only child, would you?”
“You’re not Zoey’s father,” I said, almost laughing at the genie’s desperation. “Nice try. He was just a regular boy. He was nothing like you. He was sweet.”
Archer craned his neck so his face was near the shimmering edge of the bubble. “Lean in close and I’ll prove it to you.”
I snorted in disbelief. There was no way.
And yet, I leaned in to listen.
He whispered something to me.
And…
I jerked my head away and stepped back, slipping again on the glitter gel and actually wiping out this time. The mirror fell from my hands, and I heard it smash.
Wisteria Wyverns Page 29
