License to Ensorcell (6 page)

The kitchen itself, a wedge-shaped room crammed at the very back of the house, had never struck any of us as creepy, probably because my aunt loved to cook fancy desserts. That night, a big platter of chocolate chip cookies sat on the beige Formica counter near the sink. Eileen had planned ahead to let Michael and me spend a few minutes alone.

“What did you think of the news?” I said.

“It scared the shit out of me.”

“It should. I’m wondering if the murderer is the same guy who killed Patrick.”

Michael winced, then walked over to the round maple table and slumped down into a captain’s chair. I followed and perched near him.

“Mike, tell me, tell your poor aged sister why you want to be a werewolf. Please?”

He squirmed in his chair, looked up at the ceiling, groaned a couple of times, squirmed some more, then came out with it. “Well, there’s this girl at school,” he said. “She’s always reading these emo sticky books about vampires and werewolves. And she’s always saying she wants to meet someone like that, and she’s really hot, and well y’know.”

“You want to impress her.”

He nodded at the kitchen table. “Mom says there’s no such thing as vampires.”

“There certainly aren’t any like the ones in those books. For a change Mom is right about something.”

“So that leaves werewolves. I know that’s possible.”

“Yeah, sure, but what makes you think you can turn yourself into one? It takes more than just wanting to.”

“Yeah, I know.” He looked up. “I’ve got Pat’s journals. He like writes about it a lot.”

I nearly choked on my own breath. The Collective Data Stream had scored a hit.

“I thought Mom burned those,” I said.

“She thought she did.” He looked up with a grin. “I gave her a pile of my old school papers from Latin class. She never even looked at them. Just threw them in the fire.”

It never occurs to our mother that anyone would disobey her, an annoying trait but at times useful.

“Good for you,” I said. “Mike, you’ve got to give those journals to me.”

“I don’t want to.”

“There are better ways to impress pretty girls than turning yourself into a werewolf.”

“But she—”

“Do you want to end up like that poor girl on the news?”

He shook his head no and returned to staring at the kitchen table.

“I’ll bet they’re in your room,” I said. “I’ll bet I can find them.”

“You wouldn’t dare!” He shoved his chair back. “I won’t let you.”

“Oh, yeah?” Being his older sister was the only psychic ability I needed at that point. “What else do you have stashed up there? Something you don’t want Aunt Eileen to know about, I bet. Something green and flakey—”

“Oh, shut up! You can have the damn journals!”

“Thank you,” I said. “Go get them.”

Michael got up and started for the door on the opposite side of the kitchen, which led to the rear stairway up to the second floor.

“All of them,” I called after him. “I know how Pat numbered them, and I’ll be able to tell if some are missing. Unlike our dear mother, I’ll look at them.”

“Oh, shut up!” He slammed out of the room.

I heard his footsteps pounding up the stairs. I figured I was in for more charming conversation, but when Michael came back, he looked reasonably unsullen. He handed me a dirty green book bag bulging with sharp corners. I opened it and looked inside: twelve spiral-bound school notebooks, all well-used. I pulled out one at random and flipped it open: Pat’s tiny scrawl, sure enough.

“Thanks.” I put the notebook back in the bag. “You’ve done the right thing.”

He spent a minute staring at the floor.

“You know what?” He looked up. “I’m kind of glad to get rid of them.”

“I kind of thought you would be. Mike, consider your place on the family tree. You don’t need to force a talent on yourself. Yours is bound to come along any day now, and it’s going to be really strong when it does.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You’re the seventh child of a seventh child, aren’t you? Well, there you are. In the meantime, do you want to know how to impress that girl? Read one of those books she likes and then talk to her about it.”

He gave me a Christmas present of a grin. “Jeez,” he said. “I never thought of that! I bet it would work.”

“Yeah, so do I.”

“And you won’t tell Aunt Eileen about—well, like, y’know?

“Of course not. But if you don’t wash your hair every day, she’ll figure it out on her own.”

“You mean—” He gaped at me. “Shit! I thought you sensed it.”

“I did. With my nose.”

He blushed a full scarlet.

“And your language these days is awful,” I said.

“All the guys talk like that.”

“Yeah? But I’m not a guy.” I pointed at the plate. “Grab those cookies. I need to go rescue Morrison from our aunt.”

“Yeah, we better.” The blush receded. “So you’ve got a boyfriend now, huh?”

“No. He’s my boss, and he kindly gave me a lift over here.”

“Oh, yeah, sure.” He smirked at me. “I saw the way he looks at you.”

“That’s his problem, not mine. Now go get the cookies.”

We carried the platter in procession back to the living room. Brian had returned to his game, but mercifully he’d shut off the sound. Nathan was sitting on the edge of the brown armchair with a thick family photo album in his lap, while Aunt Eileen hovered behind, leaning over now and then to point something out as he turned the pages. I expected Nathan to be bored one degree away from rigor mortis, but damned if he didn’t seem interested.

“Now, who’s that?” he was saying. “The man in the gray suit.”

“That’s Nola’s dad,” Eileen said. “Right after he married my sister, poor fellow.”

“There’s quite a story in that,” I said, as firmly as I could. “But it’s not one for right now.”

“Well, of course not!” Eileen reached over and retrieved the album. “Brian, please, turn that awful thing off!”

Brian had just finished splattering three zombies against a wall with a ray gun. He started to protest the order, then saw the cookies. The game went off. Nathan glanced at the book bag and raised an eyebrow.

“Some things that belonged to my brother Patrick,” I said and nodded a slight yes. “Michael saved them for me.”

“Ah,” Nathan said. “Nice of him.” He stood up. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Houlihan, but we’ve really got to leave. There are things I need to do after I drop Nola off at her place.”

Aunt Eileen fixed him with the gimlet eye. “Drop her off?” she said. “I should hope so!”

The weapons expert looked briefly terrified. I said good night all around and got us out of there before the lecture began.

The sky was darkening to twilight as we hurried across the street. He unlocked the passenger side of the car and opened the door for me. I stood my ground and held out a hand.

“The keys, Nathan,” I said. “If I do the driving, you won’t need to use that insurance policy from the rental agency. If you drive, we will.”

“I’ve noticed,” he said stiffly, “that California drivers do seem to be timid souls.”

“We happen to love life, that’s why. Give me the keys.”

“You know, you remind me of your aunt at the moment.”

“Good. If you don’t give them to me, I’ll take the bus home, and you can damn well find your own way to either my apartment or a premature death. I put the odds at fifty-fifty.”

He sighed and handed over the keys. As soon as we’d gotten back into the car, he retrieved his gun in its shoulder holster and strapped it on.

“By the way,” I said, “I’m sorry about the family photos.”

“What? Why?”

“You weren’t bored?”

“Only a little confused. You certainly come from a large enough clan.”

“You could say that, yeah. My grandfather—Eileen and Mother’s dad—was the seventh child of a seventh child. Then Grandpa had seven kids, too. Those are the O’Briens. Father Keith is the third O’Brien, Eileen’s the sixth, and my mother hit the jackpot—she’s the seventh of them. She married Flann O’Grady, and they had seven kids. Michael’s the seventh in our batch.”

“Isn’t there a superstition about that? All those sevenths, I mean.”

“If you want to call it that, yeah. There sure is.”

Nathan turned and looked out the windshield. In the cold glare of the streetlight, he looked exhausted. “The vast majority of my grandparents’ families died in the Holocaust—their parents, brothers, sisters—anyone still in Europe when the war started. Well, except for one brother who was an infant at the time—my great-uncle. A Dutch family took him and risked everything by pretending he was theirs.” He shrugged as if tossing the grief away. “But I don’t have much of a family.”

“Uh, God! I’m so sorry.”

“So am I.” He began fiddling with the safety harness on his side of the car. “Let’s go, shall we? I want to get back to your place in time for the news.”

So did I, but when we watched it, him on the couch, me on my computer chair, the news had nothing to add to the murder story. Apparently the police had yet to notify the next of kin.

“Next broadcast?” Nathan said.

“Eleven.” I paused to yawn. “Can’t you just hack into something and find out who she was?”

“I can contact the police, and I suppose I’d better. I’m working for Interpol again.”

“What? You mean you can just go ask? Why are you sitting around my apartment waiting for the news, then?”

He gave me a look full of sorrow, as if he couldn’t believe my lack of brain.

“No,” I said, “and you know what I mean by no. It’s time for you to leave, by the way.”

“What about those journals? Do you think there’s something in there for our job?”

“I don’t know yet. I do know I need to read them.”

“Spying on your brother’s love life?” He grinned at me.

I realized I’d never told him about Patrick. “No,” I said. “I’m afraid he’s dead.”

The grin disappeared, and he winced. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize—”

“I know. It’s okay.” I hesitated, then decided the truth about his murder could wait. “He had a lot of psychic talent. There may be something for our job in these notebooks, something he noticed or wondered about.”

“I see. I’d like a look at them.”

“Sure.”

I’d piled the journals up next to my computer. I scooted the chair around, took the top one from the stack, and handed it to Nathan. He flipped it open and swore.

“What’s wrong?” I said. “Can’t you read Latin?”

“No. I take it you can.”

“I endured twelve years of Catholic school. Damn right I can.”

“Why did your brother choose to write these in Latin?”

“That’s kind of the family code. He went to Catholic school, too. Hey, it could be worse. He also knew classical Greek, and I don’t.”

Nathan snarled like an angry dog.

“But don’t worry,” I said. “I’m planning on reading every word. I’ll give you a full report if I find anything of interest.”

And with that I shooed him out.

CHAPTER 3

EVERYONE IN THE FAMILY KNEW that Patrick wanted to become a priest, but until I read his journals, I never realized just how desperately he longed for a refuge within the church. When our dad went missing, Patrick was five years old. He turned to his uncle, Father Keith, who took over the role with his usual understanding. Unlike me and most of my siblings, Patrick kept up his belief in God and the specifically Catholic doctrines at least partly because Keith believed them. Fortunately for Keith, his share of the family talents fit into his priestly vocation: a heightened empathy, psychic insights, warnings of danger, spiritual revelations, all the phenomena that supposedly derive from the God of the Christians. Unfortunately for Patrick, hiding lycanthropy in a seminary would have taken godly powers.

He started keeping journals when he was living at home and attending classes at the local Catholic university. I found the first volume hard reading. Pat’s grief, loneliness, rage at the talent the family genes had devolved upon him, thoughts of suicide restrained only by his knowledge that Keith would be shattered—I kept thinking, why didn’t he tell me all this? Why didn’t he let it out? I reached the conclusion that he didn’t know why. Through the entire notebook ran the festivals of the church. He recorded each saint’s day, each feast, in different colors of ink to match the appropriate liturgical garments. And every month, around the full moon, for three days he wrote nothing at all.

When I finished the first journal, I realized it was two in the morning. Going to bed struck me as a great idea. I laid the journal down on the couch beside me, yawned, stretched, and opened my eyes to find the angel standing in the middle of the living room, between me and the TV. He seemed to be studying the pattern on the faded Persian carpet I keep under the coffee table.