Malevolent (The Puzzle Box Series Book 1) (8 page)

On my way to the doctor's the next day, I saw a man who terrified me.

The rain's end had brought the Tule fog back. It was noon and visibility was twenty feet. I drove gently through town in Mom's Buick, headlights on, and waited a long time at traffic lights and stop signs. I'd been driving in the fog since I got my license, and it was both annoying, and tense--another car might come screaming out of nowhere at any time. I kept the windows cracked, and listened for the swish of wheels on asphalt.

I was sitting at a red light when I saw him.

At first, I thought it was only a random pedestrian in the crosswalk. He was a dark silhouette in the fog, and I tracked his progress to make sure I didn't hit him when the light changed.

But as my gaze wandered, his form smeared into shapeless blackness. When I focused on him, he snapped back into human shape.

It had to be a trick of the fog. I looked away and back four times, and he blurred each time. It reminded me of seeing Mal's death motes. Maybe it was because the guy's poncho was wet. Or the sickness was affecting my vision now--even though I had felt better this morning.

As the stranger drew opposite my car, he turned his head and looked at me.

His face was a long, leather-clad skull with gleaming wet eyes in the sockets. The eyes drilled into me, the black bread-mold on my hand shivered, and so did my insides. The smeary blackness around him bled through the air toward me in long strands--then I blinked and they vanished.

My heart tried to leap out of my chest. One hand automatically grabbed the door handle, as part of my brain screamed to jump out and run. The rest of me wailed not to leave the car.

He had barely moved out of the way of the car when the light changed. I floored the gas, and the tires squealed on the wet street. I blazed through the intersection and up the road, gripping the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white.

The rear view mirror showed only fog behind me. Had the man vanished? Or was the reduced visibility playing tricks on me?

"Oh, come on," I said aloud. "You see magic once, and now you see it everywhere. Get a grip, Lib."

I couldn't have seen a skeletal man who blurred into darkness. He was probably just an old man with cancer or something. Their faces got pretty skull-like. Still, those black eyes ... and the way his blackness oozed toward me through the air ...

When I reached the doctor, my brain was twisted like a pretzel. I fidgeted in the waiting room, and the cheerful pictures of flowers and landscapes annoyed me. I'd come to this same office since I was born--you'd think they'd change the decorations at least every decade.

Finally they called me back to the examining room. Doctor Sing checked my vitals, then regarded me over her laptop. "Elizabeth, your blood pressure is up. Are you upset?"

"No, no," I lied. "Just a little tense from driving through the fog."

"Well, calm yourself. Your air passages are clearer today than they have been in months. I think the drugs are finally working."

And Mal's honey. And that thing he did with chalk and powder that made me feel so warm and energized. But I couldn't say any of that to Dr. Sing.

She studied my hand, especially the red oval mark where Robert had bitten me. "What is this?"

"A memento from my jerk boyfriend after I dumped him."

She raised an eyebrow over her glasses, so I explained our weird little encounter. Maybe she would know about vampires ... or maybe not. She listened to the story, then gave a jerk of her head that was a cross between a nod and a shrug. "Well, it appears to be healing, so it was not deep. I recommend treating it with antiseptic until it is gone."

I sighed. "Thanks, Doctor." If only rubbing alcohol could remove the black motes that clung to me.

She adjusted my medication dosage, and dismissed me with fresh prescriptions. I escaped with one thought in my head--ask Mal about creepy old men with black auras.

I pushed open the office door and froze. Robert leaned against the Buick's hood, waiting for me. His grin showed white, perfect teeth, and his blond hair was brushed in an immaculate wave. "Hey, Lib! Mind giving me a lift to my apartment?"

The vampire. The jerk who used Raid on bees. The mote-infested creeper who bit me last time we'd parted. I ground my teeth and stalked to the car's driver's side. "I told you, we're through." Why couldn't breaking up with someone make them disappear off the face of the earth?

Still, his easy smile weakened my resolve. I'd always had trouble resisting it.

"Come on, Libby," he wheedled. "We don't have to be an item for you to drive me half a mile."

"I already said no." I opened the door and slammed myself behind the steering wheel.

He followed me around the car's hood. "My car's in the shop, Lib. I had to ride the bus to my first day of work, I just got off, and it's cold."

I glared at him, but he was pressing my Pity button. I'd always been too kind-hearted to tell him 'no' for long. Plus, he was pushing at me in a way I had never noticed before--as if he were leaning on my psyche to force me to do what he wanted. I struggled to resist it.

He sensed my weakness, and gave me his best puppy eyes. "It's half a mile--five minutes's drive. Please?"

I struggled against his pressure, but it built like a cresting wave. It must be his death motes, but I had no idea they could manipulate someone like this. I tried to fight back, but I didn't know how, and I was so tired. I could be rid of him and his power in five minutes. "Fine."

The pressure eased at once, and he climbed into the car. My body sank into the seat with too much relief--our little face-off had sapped my tiny energy reserves. I wanted to crawl into bed. Instead, I had succumbed to the leech's demands.

I pulled out onto the road, carefully, trying to ignore the uncomfortable quivers in my nerves at his nearness.

"So, Lib, how're you feeling?"

"Crappy, no thanks to you." Mal's information swirled through my head, demanding to spill out. My lingering attraction demanded that I hurt him, and I wanted revenge for that power-thing he had used on me.

Robert shook his head. "Oh, come on. I just nibbled you."

"You drew blood! What are you, a vampire?"

He bared his normal-looking teeth. "Do I have fangs?"

"Some vampires don't have them." My attraction-fueled hate strengthened, and I took the plunge. "Your brother says you're a vampire, and that you've made me sick."

Robert leaned back and laughed. I clenched my teeth and watched the foggy road. This wasn't the reaction I'd expected--it made my heart sink.

"Mal says a lot of crazy things. He thinks his bees are magical, and that the zombie apocalypse is coming. Oh, and he hates everybody. Not someone you should hang out with." He touched my cheek.

...so many death motes, he's like an open, festering wound...

I slapped his hand away. "Don't touch me. I'm dropping you off and that's it."

His smile vanished, and for a moment his mouth turned down in a cruel snarl, like in the blueberry field before he bit me. "Did Mal tell you what he is?"

"Sure, change the subject." Robert hadn't actually denied being a vampire. But Mal? I'd pretended he was a vampire since that first foggy morning when the bees arrived. He seemed so nice, though, because of his bees, the honey, and the motes ...

Robert watched my face, and his smile returned. A petty, mean smile, like he was about to stick someone's head down a toilet. "No, he didn't tell you! I'm not surprised. Nobody wants to admit to being a lich."

A lich? I stared at Robert. "What's that?"

He lifted one shoulder and smirked, as if he thought I was kidding. "You read fantasy books--you should know." When I shook my head, he went on, "Undead sorcerer? Stuck their soul into a phylactery so they can never be killed? Ringing any bells?"

"I'm sorry," I said acidly, "I haven't played Dungeons and Dragons since I got sick. There's no such thing as a lich."

He gloated at my temper. "There's no such thing as vampires, either."

I pulled up outside Robert's apartment complex. "Get out."

He did, slowly. "Try asking him and see what he says. He won't kill you. Probably."

I didn't answer, and he finally shut the door and walked off. I've never been so glad to see someone leave. I kicked the gas and drove off a little too quickly.

The drive home gave me a chance to think. I'd seen a creepy, smeary man with a skull face, Robert never denied being a vampire, and Mal was a lich. But could I believe anything Robert said? When he wasn't flat-out lying, he was throwing around half-truths.

But somehow, this was different than a lie. This was two brothers jabbing at each other. Mal had told me Robert's secret, so Robert reciprocated.

A lich. I stopped at a stop sign and sat there for a moment, reviewing all the fantasy lore I'd absorbed from books and games. A lich was exactly what Robert had said--a sort of self-created super-zombie. End of story, I knew no more lore.

Maybe the motes made it possible. I had no idea what life and death elements could do--maybe they could move souls around. A soul was made of life, right?

That left the question of why Mal had extracted his soul. Usually only seriously evil sorcerers did it as a precaution against being killed--at least, that was the story in the few games I'd seen with liches in them.

But why raise bees and fixate on life if he himself was walking death? He seemed so normal for a soulless guy. Maybe the beehives were a front. Or maybe he hid his phylactery inside a beehive. A phylactery could be any vessel at all--a bottle, or a can, or a ...

I stiffened until the seatbelt cut into my neck--the puzzle box. Mal had tracked it straight to my room--it had to be his phylactery. And I had been in the middle of opening it! If I had, would his soul have gone back into him? Or would it have killed me? Nervous sweat broke out on my back.

Either way, Robert's leaving it in my room took on new, horrible connotations. He might as well have gifted me a bomb. Had he wanted me to kill Mal--or had he planned for me to die?

I made it home and dragged myself inside, full of questions. I needed to talk to Mal--but now I was afraid to. I'd see if sleep bestowed fresh courage on me. Robert still could be lying, after all.

Besides, the Bible implied that souls were attached to people pretty firmly. They only left the body when somebody died. But then, a lich was undead, weren't they? I climbed into bed, picked up my study Bible, and started flipping through passages. The more I tried to argue against the existence of undead, the more I realized how many verses talked about living people being spiritually dead.

Zombies. Vampires. Liches.

Mal had been in prison--for what? A lich was capable of all sorts of crimes. Had he dabbled in necromancy? Was he caught robbing graves, and raising the dead? What if the bees helped him control zombies?

I should ask Mal instead of lying in bed, worrying. Would he get mad and kill me for discovering his secret? Would he turn me into a zombie?

If vampires were real, then so were liches, and the prospect turned the world murkier than the fog ever did.

I did not see Libby for nearly a week.

In that time the fog persisted, and my bees feasted upon almond blossoms. My honey bees had recovered from the poison, and I focused on coaxing the orchard bees out of hibernation.

I had mounted their wooden block hives in several trees, away from the station. I had kept them under heat lamps in my camper to persuade them that spring had come, and I apologized when they awoke to cold, wet grayness. As the males emerged, I infused each with an extra burst of life motes, as I had done last year. The motes were passed on during mating, and each generation was more powerful than the previous one.

I was breeding magical orchard bees to complement my honey bees. Orchard bees do not gather honey, but they are fantastic pollinators. Back home in Pennsylvania, I had been raising hybrid flowers and fruit trees with high life mote concentrations that would in turn improve the honey's power. And my magic-charged orchard bees were instrumental in this endeavor. Eventually I would have the means to cure all instances of vampire infection.

The work distracted me from Libby's absence. Of course, she was ill and the fog was bitterly cold. But she had proclaimed us friends, and then vanished. Perhaps that is why there are so many jokes about the unpredictability of women.

The fog persisted at night and morning, but it thinned at noon. One day at noon, when the light was strong and it was nearly sixty degrees, Libby arrived.

I was inspecting the orchard bees, when the golf cart drove up with a crunch of wheels on packed dirt. She scanned the bee station. But the trees concealed me, and she drove away.

I confess to feeling a sense of loss.

But apparently she'd only driven off to check my camper, because, a few minutes later, she returned. This time, she spotted me among the trees, and drove down the avenue of white flowers to where I stood.

"Hello, Libby."

She didn't meet my eyes. "Hi, Mal." She wore a coat and gloves, and her long umber hair cascaded down her shoulders in shining curves.

When she said nothing else, I ventured, "I am afraid it may be some time before the sun emerges. I require full sunlight in order to attempt a healing ritual."

She straightened, and tucked her hair behind one ear. "I forgot about that! Yeah, the fog goes on for weeks, sometimes."

She had forgotten my promise to attempt to make her well? What had happened in the time since our last visit?

We made small talk. I showed her the orchard bee blocks, and explained my plans. There was a new wariness in her face that I disliked. Perhaps I had been too forward in showing her the motes. The idea of undiscovered forces at work in the everyday world is a frightening prospect, and Libby was not strong.

Since I despise rooms containing elephants, I addressed the problem. "Libby, what's the matter?"

She bit her lip and looked away. A strand of hair curled across her cheek.

I flexed my cold hands to keep from brushing it away, and kicked a small stone instead. "If it's about the motes, I apologize. I am an expert at giving too much information."

"No, it's not that." She had been sitting in the cart as we conversed. Now she grasped the steering wheel and set a foot on the pedals, as if preparing to flee. "I talked to Robert."

Cold dread settled over me. I should have expected this. The push-pull of our family relationship had continued, but now there was a third party involved--a girl.

She hesitated, then said quickly, "He said that you're a lich."

Ah, the little man had taken his tiny revenge. It hurt like a throwing dart to the chest. For a long moment, words deserted me, and I gazed at the nearest bee block. But Libby waited for my answer, so I licked my dry lips and said, "Was that all?"

"That's enough, don't you think?" Her voice was a little too even, as if masking her nervousness. "Are you?"

I couldn't meet her eyes. "Yes."

Her hands moved on the steering wheel, as if considering flight. She drew a deep, shuddering breath, and looked down, perhaps afraid that I could suck out her soul through eye contact.

The pain and shame inside me combined into furious hatred. My middle grew hot, then my face and hands. How dare Robert fill her with such fear! He was the one who had preyed upon her for months, and now he sought to drive her away from the one person capable of healing her? My fingers curled, and I wished for the weight of my clawed gloves.

I turned my back on Libby to conceal my struggle, and walked the worn paths in my mind to contain the rage that burned my life motes.
The anger is in me, but it does not define me.
The death motes swayed the vicious outburst of life motes back into balance, and in balance, there was peace.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me ...

As my madness subsided, Libby cleared her throat. "Can I ask you a question?"

Ah, curiosity. It kills cats and prompted Pandora.

"Ask away."

"If you're a necromancer, why do you raise bees?"

I raised an eyebrow. What lies had Robert told her now? "I am not a necromancer."

"But you're a lich."

"Yes."

"Aren't all liches necromancers?"

"Only if they planned to become a lich."

"You didn't?"

"No."

That stumped her. She gazed at the flowering trees around us, as if they might provide her with inspiration. "So somebody--" She made a ripping motion with both hands. "--did that to you without your consent? Like, an actual necromancer?"

"Yes." And there she touched the source of my pain. The newly-subdued hatred stirred beneath my self-control, like a tortured animal that had been prodded with a stick one last time. "I no more asked for my condition than you did for your sickness."

She frowned. "Then, who?"

I rubbed the exquisite softness of an almond petal between a thumb and forefinger. It soothed me enough to name He Whom I Fear. "The same man who twisted Robert into a vampire: Doctor Amos Seren."

Libby shook her head. "Never heard of him. Was he famous or something?"

"No," I said heavily. "He's my father."