Touched (The Marnie Baranuik Files) (25 page)

I peered at the clear liquid bobbing with eyes, pretty much the last thing in the world I wanted to be touching. The punctured one lay on the bottom, a deflated and inverted blob, a piece of onion-thin tissue floating like mermaid hair in the alcohol. I remembered I had
the other one in my jeans pocket still, probably dried-stuck to the fabric by now. I'd have to send for a credit to my account.

“Harry? I can't find any of my gloves. Did you move them someplace?”

Apprehension flashed across his face. “No, my love. You have pairs in your bedroom, in the office, in the hall stand…”

“Gone. All of them.”

“Mais c'est impossible. You have near thirty pair at last count.”

“I just had some on, before I fainted. They were with me when I was at the mailbox, on my hands. The lambskin ones with the extra-fuzzy lining.” I double-checked the pocket of my parka and found only an old menthol cough drop in a crinkly wrapper. “They were just in the living room, on the coffee table, I'm sure I took them off while I was on the phone with Carrie.”

“The only people to be in this house since then were your agents,” Harry said. “Perhaps we should check the bedrooms upstairs, where they have stored their overnight bags.”

“Why would Jerkface take my gloves?” I frowned, outright discounting the possibility of Chapel taking them. “If he thought they needed them for evidence or something, he would have just said, ‘Yo, give me those’ or something equally pushy and moronic.”

“One would certainly expect so.” His troubled face scanned the kitchen with concern.

“Besides, I just had some. Two pair. Lambskin and the pink ones.”

“It would be a mistake to ignore this. I fear it indicates a larger problem.”

Great. Just what I needed: more problems. “I don't have time for this. The sun is practically gone. I need to do this warding spell before full dark.”

I collected some items from the office (nail polish, dried legumes, tiny mirrored discs, Liquid Paper corrector fluid) and swept the jar up, cradling it between my elbow and belly, careful not to let it touch my bare hands. I could open the lid, and block what I didn't need or want to see, but not for more than a moment. The Blue Sense was much too strong to be ignored for long.

Kicking the front door shut with the sole of my navy Ked, I stopped short to stare at the front gate and its fluttering yellow tape.

TWENTY-TWO

It had taken a therapist from Gold-Drake & Cross to point out that I had gone from one extreme to the other, where my attitude towards death was concerned, following the shooting in Buffalo. One minute, death was the sheltering care of my Cold Company, the strength that lay beside me on nights that I needed not to be alone, loyal and protective, radiating strength. It was the elegant creature with enormous intuition who fed from my veins and spoke in soft, posh cadence in my ear. Death wasn't a scary thing. Death was just Harry, resting in proper morning dress, or charming in a shadbelly coat, astute and quirky. My Harry, intelligent and witty, using his big words like abstemious and frigorific. My Harry, splendidly-groomed and smelling fantastic.

An unrealistic view, I know, but that's what death was to me before Buffalo. Sure, I'd seen bodies, I'd been to funerals, including Vi's, but death couldn't touch me. Not really. I couldn't die. I believed, right down to my very core, that Harry would simply not allow it. If he couldn't protect me from it, he'd at least turn me (I refused to accept that he couldn't, or wouldn't). I'd be at his side for eternity, that was the only thing that made sense. With Harry, I was invincible.

The next thing I knew, death's face had changed radically. It had only taken a heartbeat for death to storm down an alleyway—a rogue revenant, a bullet, a stinking pile of sludge—to plummet into my flesh in excess of seven hundred feet per second. A shocking violation, the slap of an unwanted wake-up call.

I had withdrawn after that, the only defense I could muster, coiled up to lick my wounds. We'd retreated to the only place I could think of, Carrie's quiet remote cabin. But nothing could fix that I'd
seen the other face of death. Death wasn't my graceful companion, and death wasn't on my side. Death was everywhere, and I could no longer pretend it wasn't going to get me, one way or another.

And now, as the sun sank into the dark acres of wild forest west of the cabin, death might be waiting in the yard for me. I stood on the porch, feeling the reassuring weight of Harry's hunger behind me in the warm cabin. It was dim enough that he could join me outside without exhausting himself with shadow manipulation, but I thought I'd better face this alone.

If Danika Sherlock had been in my cabin to steal my gloves, surely someone would have noticed. When I'm asleep, Harry's awake, and his eyesight and earshot are far better than mine. She's not the Invisible Woman. As far as I knew, she wasn't even a practicing witch. So if she didn't take my gloves, who did? And why?

Taking the gloves was an indication of a desire to make me suffer. I wore them to protect myself from the constant input of images, scenes, thoughts, feelings, link-ups and hook-ups with every single residual signature around me. Harry had centuries of practice filtering these things out. I had only ten years and was fairly inept at blocking. Without the gloves, I'd be walking around with my hands in the air like a fresh-scrubbed surgeon, unable to use them for fear of going bonkers. Taking my gloves stunk of something Danika Sherlock would do. Except, would she step down from stabbing me to an act of petty theft? Why not just shoot me?

But here I was, rooted to my porch, staring at the empty front yard while the sun disappeared, again assuming it was all Danika's doing. I had to stop that, because Batten was right, there could be someone else behind everything. If I focused on her, I might miss something.

I marched out to the front gate while I still had a bit of twilight remaining. Shade was dappling the corners of the property, where large black pines cloistered the yard, blocking any view of the neighbor on the east side. CSI had taken the entire mailbox, wood stand and all, and it had left a crater in the icy ground like gums after an extracted tooth, earth wounded and torn. I avoided the taped area, stalking the front line of the property, abandoning the jar's metal lid behind me. From my pocket I withdrew the sachet and
began sprinkling its contents as I went. Each time I reached a place where the English Ivy parted to expose a bare spot on the wood, I tucked an eye of newt.

I pulled out from my pocket a handful of abrus precatorius, a psychedelic legume. The raw seeds containing one of the deadliest toxins known to the plant world. When I cast them outward in a line they made bright red spots in the snow, some landing with their black dots staring up at me like lethal watchers. I'd never needed the black-watch spell, but I'd secretly memorized it long ago, hoping it would never be used. Keeping most of the ingredients hadn't been a chore, except for the eyes.

I intoned softly, “Abrus a chapelet, black-watch for me,” and went another foot. “Hedera helix, blessed bindwood/ bind my spell to this line,/ fall to earth and rise again,/ flow to me and all that's mine.” I rooted in the jar for another newt eyeball and placed it in a nest of ivy leaves.

“All-seeing eye of the crone and sage, blessed be the sacrifice of your creatures. All-seeing eye, black-watch for me,” I breathed, misting the cold night air. I felt something crawl along the nape of my neck. A warning. I whipped around to look at the empty yard.

The wind had picked up. Something oogy thrummed along my spine like slippery squid tentacles. The black-watch spell in its infancy was beginning to warn me of detrimental influences nearby but I could see nothing except the fair bulk of Ajax the debt vulture sleeping in a nearby tree. It was a subtle change, but the sound of the breeze lifting through the woods nearby was like an injured cow moaning in a barn. I clutched the jar a little tighter to my chest, swallowing the lump in my throat.

Apotropaism, the need to protect from evil, was more my speed than actual confrontation. I still believed that my actions in the Motor Inn had been the better of two choices. I could have killed Sherlock. Most people would say that killing her would have given me the only sure shot at surviving in the long run. But the fate of my soul was as important to me as it was to Harry, who guarded it with his constant reminders to “keep true” on the right hand path. Killing Danika would have screwed my karma. I might be impulsive but my intentions are usually good. I resisted out of fear, but did the capital-
R Right thing in the end. I could rely on that. Did it make me predictable? Highly likely. Too predictable? I hoped not. Again, I scanned the empty yard. There were no footprints that hadn't been obliterated by the rising wind, including my own. It was like I'd levitated to the spot by the mailbox.

I took a small mirrored disk out of my other pocket and turned my back on the yard to place the disc where the fence cornered. Again, my skin crawled; I hunched against it and continued. The wood of the fence had aged to the point of crumbling. Long nails browned with old rust hung ineffectually in wide gaps, dangled where they had relinquished their hold. The joints no longer connected properly. It didn't matter. The fence's physical strength wasn't going to thrust evil out.

Was Danika out here, watching me? I saw nothing over my shoulder when I stole a furtive glance. I saw only swelling, deepening shadows; any one of them could mask her presence. I would never inherit Harry's perfect night vision. Much of a revenant's Talent was not transferable to his human DaySitter: the ability to sense the undead or smell blood at a fair distance, night vision, immortality, audiomancy. If only, I thought with a lopsided smile, and then took it back. I bungled enough shit without adding to my repertoire of ridiculousness a major power like the ability to sway someone's mind.

I wriggled the mirrored disc in until it was wedged good and tight into the joint.

“Oh silvered glass confound my enemy/ magic mirror black-watch for me./ Return, return, return thrice fold/ Each reflection, for me to behold.”

This should prevent her or anyone from psychically spying on me by mystical methods, if that's what she was doing, if she was even capable of that. It would also report to me if a force was flitting around unseen, by reflecting it into my home mirrors. It was the Wiccan version of security cameras for unnatural forces.

I used the bolline to clip several evergreen vines from the English ivy and set the jar of newt eyes aside so I could braid the vines together. On one strand, I used Liquid Paper corrector to coat white for peace. Another, I used my Revlon “All Fired Up” nail
polish to coat red for vigor. It should have been blood, but I'd had enough of that lately, and it was the intention that mattered. The third vine, I left its natural woody brown for strength. I wound the braid into the ivy at the corner of the fence, effectively hiding one mirrored disk there. I flicked Harry's monogrammed lighter and held it aloft so I could better watch the way the wind was playing on the dense, dark green foliage clinging stubbornly to the fence.

“Hail fair moon in the wake of night/guard me and mine in dark and light/The laws of magic I abide/sacred elements by my side.” I ran a bare hand along the old wood of the fence, honored its aged crevices and cracks, its abiding strength returning with the sacred infusion. “Ye who guard the Watchtower, return/Your ancient lessons shall I learn/Welcome here, your splendor and might/Let your charm light up the night.”

Power flared brilliant orange in the dark like dragon's breath and raced in a blazing hot ripple along the entire length of the ivy-coated fence. A stray spark zinged out and bounced off the jar lid, attracted by the metal. The heat created by the union melted the snow and the lid sank out of sight.

“Just you and me tonight, Lady Mine,” I breathed. “I hope you remember I'm your most humble servant.” Then I smirked. “Ok, maybe humble isn't the right word. But devotion I got in spades.”

I reached down to pick up the jar of newt eyes and a sharp cramp doubled me over in the gut. I let out a pained squawk and went to my knees in the hard pack snow. Whistling air in and out through pursed lips, I had to wait until the pain settled before I could begin to straighten. The front door opened, spilling hospitable light onto the porch, Harry silhouetted in its bright warm aura. His concern carried over the space between us.

“Do you require assistance, beloved?”

“Coming,” I gasped. “I'm fine. Just a stitch.” I touched the newt jar with a bare finger, just a brush, and it cracked loudly. A large chunk of its glass body toppled forward, spilling the remaining imperfect eye remains into the snow along with the sharp stink of preservatives and alcohol.

Eeeeuuuuww. I scooped it up, shuddering at the slimy consistency of it, as the broken filament slipped between my fingers. I wiped it
into my jeans pocket with the other one, thinking again about a refund for shoddy merchandise.

As I turned to return to the house, my eyes fell on the Buick, which sagged to one side in a funny way. I cocked my head and studied it, giving it a wide berth, moving to the nose to see better. Both tires on the driver's side had been slashed deeply; thick rubber lay like a dead seal flayed in the snow.

“Curses and cuntfungus!” I hurried with dread to the black vinyl cover thrown over Harry's Kawasaki near the front porch, knowing before I lifted it what I'd see. Both wheels were torn to the rims. I scanned the yard; the feeling of being watched intensified, like cockroaches crawling under my collar, until scurrying inside to my Cold Company was the only thing that made sense.

TWENTY-THREE

I found Harry lingering at the kitchen sink, plunging his hands into the hot soapy water, using a dirty spoon as a pretext for warming his arms up to the elbow. “Agent Chapel rang round on the telephone, my fawn,” he started.

“Harry, our tires are slashed.”

His head came up. “The Buick?”

“Now, don't freak out…”

“My bike?” he roared, shaking the water from his hands. I put my hands on his chest; it quivered under my touch, and his fists vibrated at his sides.