Sleight of Fantasy

by Dima Zales

  It figures the Council would take such a stupid position. How could anyone blame Vlad for seeking revenge? If I could will my muscles to move, I’d probably be out there myself, doing my best to test how immortal Koschei really is.

  My promise to Rose swims up through the turbulent swamp of my thoughts.

  I’m supposed to take care of Vlad, yet I’ve been doing a horrible job thus far. I wasn’t there for him when he discovered his lover’s dead body. Now I’m letting him become persona non grata with the Council.

  But then what can I do?

  Headspace is the answer again.

  If I can reach it, I can both prove to myself that this isn’t a vision and check on Vlad’s future.

  So, I repeat my earlier breathing efforts for a while, until eventually, the prerequisite mental focus arrives.

  I float in Headspace for some time without forming thoughts or noticing the surrounding shapes.

  Lacking a body, I enjoy the lack of nausea, as well as the absence of the weight on my chest and the painful knot in my throat.

  But I didn’t get here to spare myself pain.

  I wanted to be sure I wasn’t having a vision, and it seems like I wasn’t. That hope, thin as it was, was my version of denial.

  That, or it is possible to have a vision inside a vision and so on.

  No.

  That’s denial talking again.

  Rose is gone, and whether my reality is a vision or not, the only logical way to behave is to pretend like it isn’t and keep living my life.

  Somehow.

  My thoughts turn to Vlad since the least I can do for Rose is try to keep my promise.

  I bring to mind the imposing brow on his extremely symmetrical, carved-out-of-ivory face.

  Nothing changes.

  I guess I need to dig deeper. Vlad was violent and volatile on the best of days, but given how protective he was of Rose, the rage he must now be feeling is—

  The shapes around me change.

  Without much ado, I shorten the vision duration and reach for the one in the middle of the swarm.

  The grisly room looks like a slaughterhouse.

  “Gdye on?” Vlad barks at the remnants of the mobster-looking dude on the metal table.

  The guy squeals out something incoherent in Russian.

  Vlad indiscriminately rips a tattooed chunk of flesh from the man’s body, tosses it into a large, mostly filled-up bucket, and yells in rapid-fire Russian—

  I’m back on the bed, my neck corded like a climbing rope.

  If I’m to help Vlad, I need to know where he will be, and my gruesome vision held no hint of his location.

  That means I have to try this again.

  Suppressing a pained moan, I resume my earlier Headspace-friendly breathwork.

  Inhale. Exhale.

  Inhale.

  Exhale.

  Something in my head shifts, and I find myself in Headspace once more. As I float among the unfamiliar shapes, I consider my options.

  I can get another vision of Vlad—and probably see him torturing more of Baba Yaga’s people to get to Koschei.

  For many reasons, I’m not a fan of that idea.

  What if I seek out Koschei instead?

  Could I get lucky and catch Vlad as he’s getting his revenge? Given his last encounter with Koschei, he might need looking after at that moment in the future above all others.

  Though everything in me revolts at the idea, I try to think of the essence of Koschei.

  I start with his physical attributes, and soon I have his distinct voice and skinny good looks firmly in my mind’s eye.

  Nope.

  Not enough.

  I do my best to guess Koschei’s vile personality next.

  I must be good at this distasteful exercise because the shapes around me change once again.

  Keeping the length of the vision unchanged, I reach out with my wisp and reluctantly spiral into the vision.

  Koschei is standing on the corner of West 57th Street and 12th Avenue, staring at his smartphone.

  It’s 6:57 p.m. and the address in his GPS matches the number etched into the modern-artsy building looming above.

  Koschei heads for the door, and I ghost-float after him.

  The elevator stops on the fourteenth floor.

  He makes his way to apartment 14N and knocks.

  “Who is it?” a familiar female voice asks from behind the door.

  “This is Keanu, your superintendent,” Koschei says, his gravelly voice barely disguised.

  “Please come back in a few hours,” the woman says. “I’m not dressed.”

  Koschei frowns, then steps back from the door and gives it a powerful kick.

  The door creaks but remains in place.

  He kicks it again.

  The door flies in, and Koschei enters.

  A very dressed Lucretia is standing next to a throne-like chair in the middle of a living room furnished almost identically to her office at Nero’s fund.

  “Baba Yaga sent me.” Koschei pulls out a knife. “She wanted me to tell you this isn’t personal, just business.”

  “Don’t make this about someone else.” Lucretia puts the huge chair between them. “I can sense that you don’t want to be doing this.”

  “This isn’t personal for me either.” He takes a step forward and raises the knife. “When you came to the banya, I always admired you… from afar.”

  “Then don’t do this,” she says, her usually in-control tone sounding more desperate by the second. “I know she’s not using her mind control power on you, so you have a choice.”

  “I do,” Koschei says, almost apologetically. “But I’m also a few kills away from being rid of my obligations to her. As much as I wish someone else could take your place, you’re a part of her plan.”

  Instead of a reply, Lucretia grabs something from the intricate design of the throne.

  Metal shines in the air.

  Koschei blinks and stares at the rapier in Lucretia’s hands with a mixture of awe and regret.

  She kicks the large chair toward him and assumes the en garde position.

  He dodges the chair and closes the distance between them.

  Lucretia’s rapier strikes with the speed of a scorpion stinger.

  Though skewered like a kebab by her blade, Koschei keeps moving forward until the rapier sticks out of his back.

  Lucretia strains to pull her weapon out—

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The vision is over, and I’m back in the fetal position.

  As I process what I just foresaw, a surge of stress hormones drowns my still-budding grief, lessening the constant pressure on my tear ducts.

  Lucretia is in danger.

  My breathing speeds up, and I can feel my sympathetic nervous system shifting into the fight-or-flight response.

  Good.

  It should help me fly to Lucretia’s place and fight Koschei with her.

  I leap to my feet.

  The room spins for a few seconds, but then the adrenaline clears my vision and reinvigorates my muscles.

  I grab the phone.

  It’s 6:21 p.m.

  Koschei was outside Lucretia’s home at 6:57, which doesn’t leave me much time. If there’s traffic (and there’s always traffic in Manhattan), it can take longer than a half hour to get to Midtown from here.

  I use an app to check if public transportation would be faster, but it tells me the shortest trip would be forty minutes and change.

  Grabbing my gun, I rush out of the room—but then recall that I’ve unloaded the thing at Koschei.

  Ariel might have bullets stashed somewhere in her room, but I don’t have time to search for them.

  Hopefully, Kevin, Nero’s bodyguard/driver, has some spare bullets in the limo.

  “How are you?” Fluffster asks me when I whoosh by him in the hallway. “Are you going to the bathroom?”

  “Koschei is about to kill Lucretia,” I say over my shoulder. “She�
�s my shrink. I have to save her.”

  “What? No, don’t go.” Fluffster’s tiny feet struggle to keep up with my crazy pace. “Koschei will then kill two people instead of one.”

  “He didn’t kill me when he had the chance.” I spin around to face him as I pull on my shoes by the door. “I think Baba Yaga is now pretending to honor her agreement with Nero when it comes to me. That or she wants me to suffer the loss of some people before she finally puts me out of my misery.”

  “But I can’t protect you out there.” Fluffster’s mental message sounds miserable.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t have time to discuss this.” I unlock the door. “Just keep Felix and Maya safe until—”

  “They already left,” he interrupts. “You people are insane.”

  “You let them leave?”

  “Maya had to get home,” he replies as something furry scurries across my peripheral vision. “Kit volunteered to take her—and she commanded a couple of Enforcers to go with them. Felix tagged along.”

  “And no one deigned to run any of this by me?” I look behind the shoe rack and realize the ball of fur that just streaked across the room is Lucifur.

  Fluffster follows my gaze. “Rose’s cat is going to stay with us. We tried to tell you all this, but you looked catatonic.”

  “Fine.” Staring at the cat, I realize she looks sadder than the time she swallowed a key and nearly died. “I really don’t have time for this. If there’s any way you can comfort the cat, please do so.”

  “I tried.” Fluffster hangs his head. “She must know what happened.”

  “I’ll make them pay for what they did,” I promise the cat and yank open the front door.

  The hallway looks like a tornado chased a herd of bison through it.

  “Vlad was very upset,” Fluffster explains before I can even ask. “He was quite inconsolable.”

  I run to the dented elevator doors and press the button.

  The doors screech open—it looks like Nero will have more building repairs to do.

  I see them as soon as the elevator doors open.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mutter.

  Clenching my hands, I step out to face Roxy and her two minions.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The limo that is my destination is just a sprint away, but the three literal bitches have expertly placed themselves between me and the entrance door. Their lupine grins look sinister on their Dior-painted faces.

  “I told you she’d come out eventually,” says Ashley—or Maddie—in a voice of a sixty-year-old smoker.

  “It was my idea to follow the limo,” says the other—the one who’d helped Roxy chase me through Battery Park the other day, when it took Rose and Vlad to save me from a mauling. “Why do you always take credit for everything I do?”

  “Kevin!” I shout as loudly as I can.

  Kevin—who was standing outside the car, fiddling with his phone—looks our way.

  “Maddie,” Roxy commands the smoker-sounding one. “Get the door.”

  Maddie sprints for the door at the same time as Kevin launches for the building.

  Maddie makes it there first, grabbing the door with both hands.

  Kevin—who’s a big guy—looks at Maddie without much concern as he pulls the door toward him.

  The door doesn’t budge.

  He puts some effort into it.

  Still no luck.

  Is Maddie super strong, or is this the physics of the door?

  The latter must be the case—the Mandate would prevent Maddie from displaying supernatural strength in front of someone without an aura, like Kevin.

  “I didn’t realize your driver doubles as a bodyguard,” Roxy says, ignoring the struggle. “But looks like he can’t save you anyway.”

  “She’s scared.” Ashley takes in an exaggerated breath. “I can smell it.”

  “I’m not scared of you,” I say. “Whatever this is, I don’t have time for it. Can we do this later?”

  “You’re not leaving.” Roxy puts her exquisitely manicured hands on her hips.

  “Think about it.” I nod toward Kevin. “You might have a bigger advantage if he isn’t around.”

  “We don’t need to shift to deal with you,” Ashley says, pitching her voice low. “There are three of us and one of you.”

  Actually, it’s just two of them, unless Maddie lets go of the door and lets Kevin in, but two against one are still not good odds—especially since I’m more worried about getting delayed than getting into a fight.

  “Enough of this,” I grit through my teeth and reach for my gun.

  It’s empty, but I can still bluff my way out.

  Roxy leaps at me, knocking the gun out of my hand before I can point it at her.

  The weapon clatters on the floor.

  “Grab that!” Roxy yells at Ashley. At me, she hisses, “You’re going to pay for what that senile witch did to me.”

  My nostrils flare, and I glare at Roxy’s grinning face. “What did you just say?” I plant my legs wide—instinctively falling into the stance I’ve practiced so much.

  “Your geriatric retard of a girlfriend took my powers for a week,” Roxy snarls, her perfect chin held high. “Now you’ll—”

  “You mean Rose?”

  “Who else?” she sneers. “How many other decrepit—”

  My vision reddens, and I execute the punch Nero and Thalia had me drill.

  My fist smashes into Roxy’s chin.

  She seems to fly up, then crashes onto the granite floor.

  I soccer-kick her in the ribs.

  She gasps, struggling to get up while her minions gape at me in stunned fascination.

  “Say something else about Rose now, bitch.” I kick her again. “I dare you.” I kick another time.

  “Stop!” Ashley screams through the pounding in my ears.

  I spare her a glance.

  She has my gun aimed at my head.

  I show her my teeth and kick Roxy in the head this time.

  Ashley’s weapon clicks futilely.

  Roxy covers her head just in time to take a kick into her forearms.

  My boot scrapes her arm, resulting in a very satisfying smear of blood.

  “Freeze!” Kevin orders.

  I look back.

  Kevin is now inside the lobby holding two guns—one pointed at Maddie, one at Ashley.

  Maddie and Ashley have their hands raised, and my/Ashley’s gun is on the floor.

  Through the haze of rage, I realize that Kevin must’ve resorted to this once he saw my gun come into play.

  I wish he’d done it sooner. I have somewhere to be.

  To my shock, Kevin doesn’t lower his weapons.

  If anything, he looks like he’s about to shoot.

  Roxy notices this new danger and rolls onto her back with a pained grunt.

  Worried she’s about to try something, I raise my boot, ready to stomp her face with my heel.

  “Don’t,” she says through a split lip. “I submit.” Her Mandate aura dims, then gets back to normal intensity.

  Maddie and Ashley look at her with eyes the size of gourmet pizzas.

  I feel strange—as though someone’s dripped some caffeine directly into my brain.

  The feeling dissipates quickly, though. Maybe it’s just the shock of seeing some of the damage I’ve done to Roxy?

  “I also submit,” Ashley says ceremonially, then plops on the floor and stretches out to match Roxy’s posture. This time, it’s her aura that flickers, and I again feel that same rush of strange energy.

  This must be some kind of werewolf ritual.

  In fact, didn’t Kit talk about “submission” in the context of Roxy?

  “I submit too.” Maddie gets on the floor, and her aura does the flickering deal as well. I receive another boost of energy—or whatever this is.

  Shaking my head, I decide to figure out all this werewolf weirdness later. “We have to get to Midtown,” I tell Kevin. “I need to
be there as soon as physically possible.”

  “You exit first,” he says, keeping his guns aimed at the teens on the floor.

  I pick up my gun and sprint for the limo, taking a seat in the front so I can be more aware of the road.

  Kevin gets in a few moments later, starts the car, and looks at me expectantly.

  “West 57th Street and 12th Avenue. The modern-artsy building there. 14N. Hurry.”

  The car’s tires screech as we launch into motion.

  “Do you have any bullets for this kind of gun?” I wave my weapon. I don’t want to distract him, given our speed, but I need to be armed.

  “Glovebox,” he says without looking at me. “Box with the golden lettering.”

  I locate the bullets and reload my gun.

  When I look up, I cringe at the density of the West Side Highway traffic.

  Taking out my phone, I call Nero again.

  I get his voicemail, so I blurt out everything that has happened today—only editing out the supernatural bits so that the Mandate doesn’t punish me for Kevin overhearing.

  Next, I try Vlad’s phone. He doesn’t pick up, so I leave a voicemail to call me—then text him the same message.

  No reply.

  Maybe he doesn’t want to get his phone bloody, or is in general too busy torturing Baba Yaga’s goons.

  A spot opens up in the left lane, and Kevin swerves there, just barely missing a yellow cab. That only buys us a few feet, though, and I get more and more worried that we won’t make it in time.

  The traffic picks up from a crawl, and Kevin resumes his kamikaze maneuvers as I bounce up and down in my seat. Lucretia is about to fight for her life, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

  Stupid traffic.

  Stupid Roxy.

  Thinking of the teen werewolf, I feel a slight pang of remorse. I kicked her so hard that my foot is now aching. Unless werewolves heal faster than normal, which is feasible, she must be in pain.

  Not that she deserves my pity. The stuff she said about Rose—

  I stop that line of thought, not wanting to fall apart. I need to focus on Lucretia now.