A door banged. A dim shape thrust into the room. William struck at it, but his arm fell limp.
“It’s me, it’s me,” Gaston’s voice said. A hand restrained him.
William snarled.
“Come on now, friend,” Zeke’s voice said. “You’re safe, it’s all good. All good. Gaston, slide him back into bed, before he chokes himself. There we go.”
“Where is she?”
“Safe,” Gaston said. “She’s safe.”
Alive. Cerise was alive.
A cup bumped against his lips.
“Drink,” Zeke said. “You’ll feel all better after you drink.”
The liquid spilled into his mouth. It tasted vile, bitter, and metallic. William tried to spit it out but somehow it worked its way down his throat into his stomach. Warmth spread through him, dulling the pain.
Slowly his vision returned to normal, and he stared at Gaston kneeling by the bed, his face two inches away.
There was something on his neck. William reached over. His fingers grazed leather.
“Hang on.” Zeke reached over and unhooked something, lifting a large dog collar free. “Sorry about that. You went wolf on us a couple of times. Had to keep you put.”
William shook his head. His voice came out hoarse. “Where is Cerise?”
“She had to go home,” Gaston said.
“Where am I?” He tried to rise, but they clamped him down.
“Settle down,” Zeke told him. “I will explain everything to you, but you’ve got to lie still or we’ll tie your ass to the bed. You got me?”
Fine. William lay back down.
“They brought you to me four days ago. They had you in some sort of casket, and you were barely breathing. Apparently you were hurt bad, and whatever the casket did kept you alive, but you weren’t getting any better. Cerise said that we had to get you to the Weird because the Mire didn’t have enough magic, and if we left you where you were, you’d die.”
They put him in the Box. He’d died. He remembered dying and the mist and then nothing.
“We didn’t have a lot of time,” Zeke said. “You were hanging by a thread. The Hand’s freaks were still after the Mars, and we had to move fast. There is only one way out of the Mire into the Weird and that’s through Louisiana. We had to grease the Border Guard’s hand. It took everything I had and all the money the Mars had. Wiped us out clean, but we got you and the kid out, because she didn’t trust me alone. I better get reimbursed for this. We’re in Louisiana now, in the country, in one of the Mirror’s safe houses.”
Zeke reached to the table and lifted a square of lined paper. “Here. She wrote you a note.”
William clenched the paper in his hand, focusing on it with all of his will. The tiny scribbles solidified into words.
I love you so much. I’m so sorry, I can’t go with you. There are only fifteen adults left, and most of them are hurt. The Hand’s freaks ran after you killed Spider, but they keep coming back. We’ve been attacked twice, and we don’t have enough money to get everyone over the border. I have to stay behind to protect the kids and Lark.
Live, William. Get better, get strong again, and find me if you can. Even if I never see you again, I regret nothing. I only wish we had more time.
He read it again. And again. It didn’t say anything different.
He would find her again. But before he did that, he had to make her safe from everyone. Her and her whole damn family. Until he saved the lot of them, they would never let her go.
The kid raised a cup and held it up to his mouth. “You need more of this tea.”
“No.” Every word was an effort. “The Box?”
“He broke it,” Zeke said in disgust. “Shattered the thing to pieces. When I woke up, it was burning.”
“Cerise told me to.” Gaston bumped the cup against William’s lips. “She said for you to drink this. It’s good for you. It will make you better.”
“No.”
Gaston’s face radiated grim determination. “You don’t have to like it. You have to drink it. Don’t make me hold your nose closed.”
William cursed and drank. There was only one man who could help him now. He had to get stronger so he could travel, and if it meant he had to chug the vomit-inducing tea, he would do it.
By evening, he managed to keep down some broth. The next day he sat up, two days later he walked, and two days after that, he and Gaston crossed the border between Louisiana and Adrianglia, heading north.
“WOW.” Gaston gaped at the two-story mansion, situated on a perfectly manicured lawn. “Wow. Is that all one house?”
William grumbled. Gaston had never set foot out of the swamp. The entire way through the Weird, the kid would stare at things in amazement, get embarrassed, and then try to be a smart-ass about it. It was getting old.
“Who lives here?”
“Earl Declan Camarine, Marshal of the Southern Provinces.”
“Are we going to get arrested?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
William growled at him.
A window on the second floor burst in an explosion of glittering shards. A body hurled through it and a boy dropped into a half crouch onto the balcony rail, his crazy auburn hair blazing with red streaks like a shock of dark flame. Wild yellow eyes stared at William from a narrow face. The kid looked at least a foot taller than he remembered.
“Jack!” Rose’s voice called.
Jack’s eyes flared with feral fire. He hissed and leaped off the balcony, changing in mid-jump, shredding his clothes. A spotted adolescent lynx landed into the green grass and took off at a dead run, heading toward the trees.
Wouldn’t be able to pull it off in the Edge, William reflected. In the Edge, changing shapes took a few seconds, but in the Weird with magic full force, you could go furry with no pain on the fly. Jack spilled out of his clothes quickly. No pause, no awkwardness. The kid had practice going from dressed to furry. “Jack!” Rose ran out onto the balcony. She wore a peach-colored gown and her hair was up. “Jack, wait! Damn it.”
She saw them below. Her eyes widened.
“I’m here to see Declan,” William told her.
Two minutes later he sat in Declan’s study. He’d left Gaston with Rose, who took him to the kitchen. The kid ate like a horse.
Declan looked at him from behind the desk. He hadn’t changed a bit: same hard eyes, same blond hair. Except he was growing it out again. He grew it long every few years to use as a power resource in case he had to sacrifice a part of himself to magic. Where William was leaner and taller, Declan looked like he could punch through walls. Judging by the look in his eyes, he wouldn’t mind bashing his fist against a few bricks.
Declan surveyed him. “Doing well?”
“Yeah.”
“Looking kind of thin there. My mother’s always looking for a new diet. Maybe you can share some tips?”
William bared his teeth. “Yeah. Shouldn’t you be all fat by now? Is that some flab on your sides?”
“Fuck you.”
They looked at each other.
“Two fucking years.” Declan spread his hands. “Two fucking years you’re gone without a word. So. What can the Office of Marshal do for you?”
William unclenched his teeth. It killed him to say it. “I need help.”
Declan nodded. “Tell me about it.”
Half an hour later William finished. It would’ve taken less time, but two minutes into the story he’d mentioned Nancy Virai, and Declan had turned pale and taken a big square bottle of Southern bourbon out of the cabinet. The bottle was half-empty now.
“So let me get it straight.” Declan leaned forward. “You’ve got the journal.”
“Not on me.”
Declan rolled his eyes. “Give me some credit. You do have it, though?”
“Yes.”
“Chances are, the girl’s father is still in Kasis. Once what’s left of Spider’s flunkies report back to their home office, the Hand will come after her, and they will want to use him as leverage. You want to save her, but she left you. And if you don’t give the journal to the Mirror, they will skin you alive. You want to get the girl and what’s left of her family out of the Mire, but you can’t do it through the border with the Broken, because they have too much magic. Have I got it right?
“Yeah, pretty much.”
Declan nodded his blond head and gulped more bourbon. “I’ll need a favor in return.”
Figured. “What is it?”
“Jack. He’s a good kid, but . . . he needs guidance. He needs understanding and I can’t give it to him because I have no idea what goes on in his head.”
William nodded. “Fine. I’ll help with Jack. I would’ve anyway.”
“I know, but you hate to owe anyone. This way we’re even.”
Declan pulled a copper sphere from the corner of his desk and tapped it. The sphere cracked in the middle. The two halves slid apart, revealing a pale crystal. A spark of light flared within the crystalline depths and streamed in a ray of light to form a map six inches above the sphere.
“Louisiana. Border. Mire.”
Declan pronounced the words with crisp exactness. The map centered on the green blob of the Mire where it touched the border of the Louisiana.
“Kasis,”
Declan said.
The map remained where it was.
“Blasted thing.
Kasis Castle.
”
The map slid to the Adrianglian border. A small dot of white glow flared on the boundary and grew into a gray castle. Declan scowled at it. “I’ve had a run-in with Antoine de Kasis before. The de Kasis family has treaties in place with both the Gauls and us that keep them out of our border squabbles. They were put in place a century ago due to some classified service the family provided to both Louisiana and Adrianglia. I never could find out what exactly they did. The treaties forbid any sort of military action on their land. The price of this sweet deal is complete neutrality from the Kasis family: they can’t aid either Louisiana or Adrianglia.”
William nodded. “I wondered why the Mirror didn’t just walk me into the Mire through Kasis. Now I know.”
“There is another reason. Antoine de Kasis is dirty. He’s a Louisiana sympathizer, and he’s very useful to them. His lands are the only way into the Mire without the bother of dealing with the Louisiana border guard. The Mirror has to suspect he’s dirty, because if I know, they definitely know. However, they lack proof of his involvement. If they’re holding the girl’s father there, it’s likely he’s guarded by the Hand’s agents, which would implicate Antoine. The Mirror won’t like invading Kasis for two reasons. First, they know Antoine is dirty and they observe him in order to gather intelligence on the Hand’s movements. If they take him out, there goes their chance to spy on the Hand. Second, if the Hand isn’t there for some reason and if the Mirror’s agents don’t find any clear-cut proof of Antoine’s involvement with the Gauls, invading Kasis would cause an international incident of huge proportions.”
William nodded again. “I have it figured out. I will use the journal as leverage.”
“That’s a really dangerous game to play,” Declan said. “If you get burned, William, there is nothing any of us can do.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
“My job is to warn. Here is the interesting thing. According to the treaties, if de Kasis is found to have violated his agreements, the realm that proves his wrongdoing gets to confiscate his lands. There isn’t much land there, but whatever there is will become the property of Adrianglia. You need to buy that land from the government. They wouldn’t sell it to you normally, so you have to make that part of your deal with the Mirror. It will give you access to the Mire, and you can smuggle your girl and her family out.”
William exhaled. “So all I need is to get the money to buy the place. Borrow it, steal it ...”
Declan stared at him.
“What?”
Declan braided the fingers of his hands. “
Borrow
it?”
William shrugged.
“When Casshorn died, his possessions passed to you. You’re his adopted son and his only heir. You own two castles, half of the Darkwood, a forty-mile stretch of Darron River, for the use of which you charge the shipping companies a sizable toll, and the land on which the city of Blueshire sits. They pay you rent. Why the devil would you need to borrow the money, you dumb bastard? You’re richer than I am.”
William’s brain screeched to a halt.
Declan got up. “While you had your two-year-long pity party and hid out in a shitty trailer, playing with your toys and drinking beer, I had to take care of your financials. And if you think I don’t have my own shit to deal with, you’re sadly mistaken.” He pulled several large ledgers from the shelf and dropped them in a stack on the table. “There you go. All yours now, Lord William Sandine. Have a go at it. Don’t spend it all in one place and hire somebody good with money to manage it for you.”