The Collected Christopher Connery (8 page)

Nia’s earliest memories were red.

There had been a lot of blood. Blood from the wound in
her mother’s chest, blood from Sophia’s mouth, blood that was all that was left
of other students. Nia had even tasted blood in the air, a thin vapor left over
from the students who had been closest to the spell, the ones who had been torn
into pieces too small to be seen.

There had been blood on Nia’s hands, blood on her dress
from when she tried to embrace her mother’s still body. She had gotten blood on
the shirt of the man who had finally pried her away. Sometimes she would still
wake with that sharp metal taste in her mouth.

The dreams had been worse last night after the dead
woman, after Detective Lin’s injuries. At the time, it had been all right. At
the time she had been
working,
but later… later…

Later they had brought her to Arthur and she had clung to
him until he was as streaked with blood as she was. He had cried with her even
though Mother hadn’t really been his mother. He had been the price her mother
had to pay to have a child of her own, another child with the same father but a
different mother riding along in her womb. That was Academy policy.

She guessed that had been the first time – that time they
had clung to each other and cried – that Arthur’s hands had been covered in
blood. It was hardly the last, though usually his hands were protected by
smooth rubber gloves.

She shook her head hard, trying to jar her thoughts back
in order. The memories of her mother weren’t strange, she thought about her
mother almost all the time, but what did Arthur’s gloves have to do with
anything?

Suddenly she became aware that she was lying on her back.
When she lifted her hand, she found smooth wood right above her face. Someone
had locked her in a box.

Or a coffin.

As panic threatened to overwhelm her, she closed her eyes
and thought of Arthur’s gloves again, strong capable fingers incased in white
rubber ready to gently open up sick and injured bodies in order to put them back
together again. Then she thought – though she couldn’t have said why – of
Detective Lin’s battered coat, the way it hung off of her shoulders like a
second shadow.

Then the detective in her mind snapped her fingers in
front of Nia’s face and said, “Hey, Nia, wake up,” and the last of Nia’s brief
madness slipped away, leaving her mind clear as freshly purified water.

Heart slowing to a more normal rhythm, Nia placed her
hands flat against the bottom of the encroaching ceiling – because that’s what
it was, a ceiling attempting to crush her into the floor – and pushed.

The hotel gave way with something like a disappointed
sigh.

Sitting up, Nia pulled a spell from her pocket and
crumpled it in her hand. When she uncurled her fingers, a small gleaming sphere
had taken the place of the paper. The darkness shrank back a little, though Nia
could still feel it hovering over her like a hungry animal. Hadn’t it been
morning just a few moments before? Of course, she had no way of knowing how
long she had been insensible. She got slowly to her feet, holding the light up
with one hand and tightening the sash of her dressing gown belt with the other.

There wasn’t much to see, but the small light served
another, more important, purpose beyond simple illumination. The magic Nia put
into the glow pushed against Connery’s illusion spell, further clearing her
head.

Of course, that also meant she now had space to feel the
stomach-twisting embarrassment that always accompanied a blunder. What was
wrong with her? She had
known
Connery would have spells set up to
protect his hiding place and yet the illusion had successfully overwhelmed her.
She had nearly gotten herself killed and worse, had let herself be put out of
commission for who knew how long. What had happened to Arthur and Gail while
she was lost in her memories?

Even now she could feel Connery’s magic trying to slither
back into her mind.
Turn around,
it whispered,
I have something to
show you. Please. Just turn around.

Nia held the light up higher, keeping her eyes pointed
resolutely ahead. She knew whatever she would see when she turned would be
another lie, another image the hotel had pulled from inside her head, but
clearly these illusions were more powerful than those she was used to and she
didn’t dare give them another chance to deceive her.

She did her best to recall everything she knew about
illusion spells. One, they could be designed to show specific things, but they
were much more effective when allowed to feed off of the thoughts and emotions
of the subjects. Two, despite their potency, they were fragile and became
useless once the target became aware of them. Three, unfortunately, a talented
and experienced magician could weave many illusion spells into one larger spell
that would constantly self-correct, creating new illusions as soon as one was
uncovered.

And Connery had been both talented and experienced. Nia
would have to remain vigilant as she searched for the others. She was reaching
for the door handle when she heard a sound behind her. An actual sound, not
just the murmuring of Connery’s magic.

“Nia?”

Arthur! He must have been sleeping when the magic took
hold. Nia turned back and saw him standing the doorway between their rooms,
half-dressed and wearing dazed, frightened expression.

“I was just getting ready when the lights went out,” he
said, buttoning one of his open cuffs. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing serious,” Nia lied, not wanting to alarm him and
give Connery’s magic an advantage. “I simply –” Her eyes caught on the piece of
slate still lying on the floor. The spell was still there, though much of it
had been smudged to incomprehensibility.

But Connery’s head was gone.

“Oh no,” she breathed, dropping to her knees beside the
slate. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before placing her hands
carefully where the head should have been.

Her fingers met nothing but cool slate and smeared chalk.
Damn it, it wasn’t just hidden; it was truly gone. How had Connery managed
that?

“Nia, what the hell is going on?” Arthur said, this time
with a touch of hysteria in his normally calm voice.

“One second, Arthur, I need to think.” There was no way
Connery’s head simply gotten up and walked away, illusion spell or no illusion
spell. That meant someone must have taken it, but who? Holding the light close to
the slate, she studied the ruined spell.

“Why did the lights go out? Where’s Detective Lin? Damn
it, Nia, what did you
do?”

“Shh, Arthur!” There, just at the edge of the slate. It
was hard to make out between the lines of the spell and her own handprints, but
she was certain she wasn’t mistaken. There, in the spoiled half of the spell,
was a shoeprint. Someone had walked on the edge of the slate and whoever it was
had probably taken Connery with them. She bent closer to the slate. Yes, it was
definitely a shoeprint, from a man’s shoe if she didn’t miss her guess, of good
quality and average to small size. The sort of shoe Arthur would –

“Nia, will you please tell me what is going on?”

Carefully keeping her eyes down, so Arthur couldn’t see
her face, Nia slowly slid her free hand into the pocket of her dressing gown,
her fingers closing tight around the slender silver case that held her
emergency supply of chalk. She didn’t dare shake it to ascertain if there was
any inside.

There must be. There was before I fainted. I’m almost
certain.

“I’m just going to do a quick locating spell,” she said
lightly, flipping open the case and sighing silently when a fresh piece of
chalk fell into her hand. As she pressed it to the slate, she thought as hard
as she could about Connery’s head: the cool skin, the empty eyes, the drooping
mouth. Meanwhile, her hand sketched a very different kind of spell. The
darkness around her began to flicker and bend.

“What are you doing?”

“I told you, it’s just a locating spell.”

“It doesn’t feel like a locating spell.”

Nia drew faster. “Well, it is. Unfortunately, I’m not
sure the hotel is safe at the moment, so why don’t you go back to your room and
keep the door closed? Once I’m done with this spell, I’ll go find the detective
and bring her here. When we’re together, we can come up with a plan. It
shouldn’t take…” The stream of words tripping from her lips ran dry as Arthur
knelt beside her.

For a few seconds, they simply stayed like that, not
moving, not speaking.

Then, in a soft voice, “That’s not a locating spell.”

Nia jerked to the side as she felt Arthur’s hand move to
his pocket. The first slash of the knife missed her by less than an inch. She
scrambled clumsily back until her shoulders hit the wall.

“Arthur,” she said.

For a moment, he just stared at the knife – no, the
scalpel. It glinted silver in the glow of the magic light lying on the floor by
the slate. Then he lifted his head slowly to look her in the face. In the dim
light, his eyes look like empty holes.

He lunged.

The spell wasn’t finished, but even half-done, it was
enough to throw him backwards and send the scalpel flying from his hand. Nia
scurried behind the heavy oaken desk near the window, crouching with her cheek
pressed against the wood as she fought to catch her breath. She knew he likely
had more than one blade with him. He rarely carried fewer than three, just in
case of emergency.

“There’s no point in hiding,” Arthur said in that
sardonic tone he always used when he thought she was being silly. “This room
isn’t that big.”

Nia put her hand in her pocket, but found it empty. She
risked a glance around the desk and saw her chalk lying on the carpet beside
her silver case. It was only a few feet away, but too far, much too far. She
would never get to it before –

Arthur’s footsteps rasped against the carpet. He paused
for a moment to crush the piece of chalk into powder with the heel of his shoe.

Damn it.

“You know this is why they let me come with you, Ni.”

The sound of his voice made Nia’s heart twist in her
chest, but she forced her hands to remain steady as they felt across the floor.
There had to be something she could draw with. She hardly left her bedroom in
the Academy without carrying a day’s worth of chalk, pens, and pencils. Surely,
something
must have fallen behind the desk during their stay here. There
had to be
something.
She slapped the carpet in frustration then froze
when her fingers brushed something cold and metallic. Arthur’s razor. He had
complained about not being able to find it the night before.

“They knew it would come to this. I can’t go back, Nia. I
won’t.” Arthur’s voice grew softer on every word, but Nia knew he was coming
closer.

Just a few seconds,
she begged, dragging the razor
sharply across her palm, hardly feeling the sting.
I just need a few
seconds.

“Do you know what it’s like, Nia?” The soft sound of a
hand sliding across wood. “To watch you rise higher and higher while I have to
sit down in the dirt and watch?”

Nia smeared her blood into a circle on her uninjured
palm.
Shut up, you filthy liar. Arthur never thought these things. Never.

“This is what the Academy wants, you know? No one likes
having to listen to you.”

Shut. Up.

“I’m sorry, Nia.” Arthur whipped around the desk. Less
than a heartbeat later, the scalpel drove down into her chest.

Or it would have if Nia hadn’t thrown herself forward,
pressing her bloodstained hand against the bottom of Arthur’s breastbone. The
scalpel scraped across her shoulder instead, drawing a stinging line down her
arm. Then it fell silently to the thickly carpeted floor.

Arthur hit the ground with a thump, his hand clawing at
his chest where his heart was stuttering to a stop. “I – I got you too,” he
choked out.

Nia shook her head, putting her hand to the scrape on her
arm, knowing it didn’t matter if the spell on her palm was spoiled now. “Not
well enough, Arthur.” She knelt beside him, gently pushing his hair away from
his wide terrified eyes. “I’m sorry, but this is the kindest way I know how.”

Arthur’s eyes clenched shut, fingers knotted in his
shirt. “Why –”

“Because you’re not real.” Nia put her hand over Arthur’s
eyes. “But I know you don’t know it, so I’m still sorry.”

Arthur-who-wasn’t-Arthur gave one last convulsive shudder
and Nia pulled her hand away from his face. Even as she watched, he grew less
lifelike, his features softening until he looked like a wax doll only
indifferently modeled into Arthur’s likeness. The hotel room was still dark,
but there was enough of glow coming from the dropped magic light for Nia to see
that the walls were now smeared with blood. As she studied them, the smears
curved themselves into profanities, threats, and condemnations from Arthur, her
mother, anyone she had ever wronged.

Honestly, now this was just cliché. Connery must have
been a devotee of the most uninspired ghost stories.

But the overarching illusion was still holding and the
head was still gone, which meant there was more to be done. Nia had to find the
others. Arthur had obviously taken the head, but she had no way of knowing if he
had been hoping to protect it or if he was being deluded by Connery’s magic.
Finding him was her first order of business. Then they both would find Gail and
together, they would work toward breaking the illusion for good.

She flexed her injured hand, wincing at the pull of torn
skin. Normally, she would heal her injuries before proceeding but she might
need more blood later. She compromised by tearing a strip of cloth from her
dressing gown and knotting it around her hand. She left the arm as it was. The
sleeve of her nightgown would absorb the worst of the blood.