Turn Coat (26 page)

I stared at her for a minute. Then I said, in a very quiet voice, “I always know when I’m being tempted to do something very, very wrong. I start sentences with phrases like, ‘I would never, ever do this—
but
.’ Or ‘I know this is wrong
but
.’ It’s the
but
that tips you off.”

“Harry,” Molly began.

“You broke one of the Laws of Magic, Molly. Willfully. Even though you knew it could cost you your life. Even though you knew that it could also cost mine.” I shook my head and looked away from her. “Hell’s bells, kid. I choose to trust Anastasia Luccio because that’s what people
do
. You don’t
ever
get to know for sure what someone thinks of you. What they really feel inside.”

“But I could—”

“No,” I said gently. “Even psychomancy doesn’t give you everything. We aren’t meant to know what’s going on in there. That’s what talking is for. That’s what trust is for.”

“Harry, I’m sorr—”

I lifted a hand. “Don’t apologize. Maybe I’m the one who let you down. Maybe I should have taught you better.” I petted Mouse’s head gently, looking away from her. “It doesn’t matter at the moment. People have died because I’ve been trying to save Morgan’s life. Thomas might still die. And now, if we
do
manage to save Morgan’s crusty old ass, he’s going to report that you’ve violated your parole. The Council will kill you. And me.”

She stared at me helplessly. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Get caught,” I said quietly. “Jesus Christ, kid. I trusted you.”

She wept more heavily now. Her face was a mess. She bowed her head.

“If Morgan goes down for this,” I said, “there’s going to be trouble like you wouldn’t believe. And even more people are going to die.” I stood up slowly. “So. I’m going to do everything in my power to save him.”

She nodded without looking up.

“So you’ve got a choice to make, grasshopper. You can come with me, knowing the cost if we succeed. Or you can go.”

“Go?” she whispered.

“Go,” I said. “Leave now. Run, for as long as you can. Hell, it looks a lot like I’m going to get myself killed anyway. Probably Morgan, too. In that case, things will go to hell, but the Wardens will be way too busy to chase you. You’ll be able to ignore what’s right all you want, do whatever you like—as long as you don’t get caught.”

She pressed her arms against her stomach. She sounded like she was about to throw up, through the sobs.

I put a hand on her head and said, “Or you can come with me. You can do something right. Something that has meaning.”

She looked up at me, her lovely young face discolored in anguish.

“Everyone dies, honey,” I said, very quietly. “Everyone. There’s no ‘if.’ There’s only ‘when.’ ” I let that sink in for a moment. “
When
you die, do you want to feel ashamed of what you’ve done with your life? Feel ashamed of what your life meant?”

She stared at my eyes for a minute and a half of silence broken only by the sound of her muted weeping. Then her head twitched in a single tiny shake.

“I promise that I’ll be beside you,” I said. “I can’t promise anything else. Only that I’ll stand beside you for as long as I can.”

“Okay,” she whispered. She leaned against me.

I put my hand on her hair for a minute. Then I said gently, “We’re out of time. The Wardens will know Morgan is in Chicago within a few hours at most. They might be on their way already.”

“Okay,” she said. “Wh-what are we going to do?”

I took a deep breath. “Among other things, I’m going to attempt a sanctum invocation,” I said.

Her eyes widened. “But . . . you said that kind of thing was dangerous. That only a fool would take such a chance.”

“I agreed to help Donald freaking Morgan when he showed up at my door,” I sighed. “I qualify.”

She wiped at her eyes and nose. “What do I do?”

“Get my ritual box. Put it in the car Murphy’s cuddling up with outside.”

“Okay,” Molly said. She turned away but then paused and looked back over her shoulder at me. “Harry?”

“Yeah?”

“I know it was wrong, but . . .”

I looked at her sharply and frowned.

She shook her head and held up her hands. “Hear me out. I know it was wrong, and I didn’t get much of a look but . . . I swear to you. I think someone
has
tampered with Captain Luccio. I’d bet my life on it.”

I ignored the little chill that danced down my spine.

“Could be that you have,” I said quietly. “And mine, too. Go get the box.”

Molly hurried to comply.

I waited until she was outside to look at Mouse. The big dog sat up, his eyes gravely concerned. He wasn’t favoring his shoulder at all, and his movement was completely unimpaired.

Mouse got hit by the driver of a minivan once. He got back up, ran it down, and returned the favor. The Foo dog was very, very tough. I doubted he’d really needed the medical attention to recover, though I was also sure it would help speed things along. But I hadn’t been completely certain the injury wasn’t as serious as it looked.

In other words, the freaking dog had fooled Molly and me both.

“You were
acting
?” I said. “To make it hit Molly harder?”

His tail wagged back and forth proudly.

“Damn,” I said, impressed. “Maybe I should have named you Denzel.”

His jaws opened in a doggy grin.

“Earlier tonight,” I said, “when I was trying to figure out how to find Thomas, you interrupted me. I didn’t think about it before now, but you helped him track me down when Madrigal Raith was auctioning me off on eBay.”

His tail wagged harder.

“Could you find Thomas?”

“Woof,” he said, and his front paws bounced a couple of inches off the floor.

I nodded slowly, thinking. Then I said, “I’ve got another mission for you. One that could be more important. You game?”

He shook his fur out and padded to the door. Then he stopped and looked back over his shoulder at me.

“Okay,” I told him, walking to the door myself. “Listen up. Things are about to get sort of risky.”

Chapter Thirty-five

I
looked at Luccio’s still-unconscious form. The stress of coordinating the search for Morgan for who knows how long before he showed up, coupled with the pains of her injuries and the sedative effect of the painkillers I’d given her, meant that she’d never stirred. Not when the gun went off, not when we’d been talking, and not when we’d all had to work together to get Morgan back up the stairs and out to the silver Rolls.

I made sure she was covered with a blanket. The moment I did, Mister descended from his perch atop one of my bookcases, and draped himself languidly over her lower legs, purring.

I scratched my cat’s ears and said, “Keep her company.”

He gave me an inscrutable look that said maybe he would and maybe he wouldn’t. Mister was a cat, and cats generally considered it the obligation of the universe to provide shelter, sustenance, and amusement as required. I think Mister considered it beneath his dignity to plan for the future.

I got a pen and paper and wrote.

Anastasia,

I’m running out of time, and visitors are on the way. I’m going someplace where I might be able to create new options. You’ll understand shortly.

I’m sorry I didn’t bring you, too. In your condition, you’d be of limited assistance. I know you don’t like it, but you also know that I’m right.

Help yourself to whatever you need. I hope that we’ll talk soon.

Harry

I folded the note and left it on the coffee table, where she’d see it upon waking. Then I bent over, kissed her hair, and left her sleeping safe in my home.

I parked the Rolls in the lot next to the marina. If we hurried, we could still get there before the witching hour, which would be the best time to try the invocation. Granted, trying it while injured and weary with absolutely no preritual work was probably going to detract more than enough from the ritual to offset the premium timing, but I was beggared for time and therefore not spoiling for choice.

“Allow me to reiterate,” Murphy said, “that I feel that this is a bad idea.”

“So noted,” I said. “But will you do it?”

She stared out the Rolls’s windshield at the vast expanse of Lake Michigan, a simple and enormous blackness against the lights of Chicago. “Yes,” she said.

“If there was anything else you could do,” I said, “I’d ask you to do it. I swear.”

“I know,” she said. “It just pisses me off that there’s nothing more I can add.”

“Well, if it makes you feel any better, you’re going to be in danger, too. Someone might decide to come by and try to use you against me. And if word gets back to the Council about how much you know, they’re going to blow a gasket.”

She smiled a bit. “Yes, thank you. I feel less left out now that I know someone might kill me anyway.” She shifted, settling her gun’s shoulder harness a little more comfortably. “I am aware of my limits. That isn’t the same thing as
liking
them.” She looked back at me. “How are you going to reach the others?”

“I’d . . . really rather not say. The less you know—”

“The safer I am?”

“No, actually,” I said. “The less you know, the safer
I
am. Don’t forget that we might be dealing with people who can take information out of your head, whether you want to give it or not.”

Murphy folded her arms and shivered. “I hate feeling helpless.”

“Yeah,” I said, “me, too. How’s he doing, Molly?”

“Still asleep,” Molly reported from the back of the limo. “I don’t think his fever is any higher, though.” She reached out and touched Morgan’s forehead with the back of one hand.

Morgan’s arm rose up and sharply slapped her arm away at the wrist, though he never changed the pace of his breathing or otherwise stirred. Christ. It was literally a reflex action. I shook my head and said, “Let’s move, people.”

Molly and I wrestled the wounded Warden into his wheelchair again. He roused enough to help a little, and sagged back into sleep as soon as he was seated. Molly slung the strap of my ritual box over her shoulder and started pushing Morgan across the parking lot to the marina docks. I grabbed a couple of heavy black nylon bags.

“And what do we have in there?” Murphy asked me.

“Party favors,” I said.

“You’re having a party out there?”

I turned my eyes to the east and stared out over the lake. You couldn’t see the island from Chicago, even on a clear day, but I knew it was there, a sullen and threatening presence. “Yeah,” I said quietly. A real party. Practically everyone who’d wanted to kill me lately would be there.

Murphy shook her head. “All of this over one man.”

“Over a hero of the Council,” I said quietly. “Over the most feared man on the Wardens. Morgan nearly took out the Red King himself—a vampire maybe four thousand years old, surrounded by some disgustingly powerful retainers. If he hadn’t bugged out, Morgan would have killed him.”

“You almost said something nice about him,” Murphy said.

“Not nice,” I said. “But I can acknowledge who he is. Morgan has probably saved more lives than you could count, over the years. And he’s killed innocents, too. I’m certain of it. He’s been the Council’s executioner for at least twenty or thirty years. He’s obsessive and tactless and ruthless and prejudiced. He hates with a holy passion. He’s a big, ugly, vicious attack dog.”

Murphy smiled faintly. “But he’s your attack dog.”

“He’s our attack dog,” I echoed. “He’d give his life without hesitation if he thought it was necessary.”

Murphy watched Molly pushing Morgan down the dock. “God. It’s got to be awful, to know that you’re capable of disregarding life so completely. Someone else’s, yours, doesn’t really matter which. To know that you’re so readily capable of taking everything away from a human being. That’s got to eat away at him.”

“For so long there’s not a lot left, maybe,” I said. “I think you’re right about the killer acting in desperation. This situation got way too confused and complicated for it to be a scheme. It’s just . . . a big confluence of all kinds of chickens coming home to roost.”

“Maybe that will make it simpler to resolve.”

“World War One was kind of the same deal,” I said. “But then, it was sort of hard to point a finger at any one person and say, ‘That guy did it.’ World War Two was simpler, that way.”

“You’ve been operating under the assumption that there is someone to blame,” Murphy said.

“Only if I can catch him.” I shook my head. “If I can’t . . . well.”

Murphy turned to me. She reached up with both hands, put them on the sides of my head, and pulled me down a little. Then she kissed my forehead and my mouth, neither quickly nor with passion. Then she let me go and looked up at me, her eyes worried and calm. “You know that I love you, Harry. You’re a good man. A good friend.”

I gave her a lopsided smile. “Don’t go all gushy on me, Murph.”

She shook her head. “I’m serious. Don’t get yourself killed. Kick whatsoever ass you need to in order to make that happen.” She looked down. “My world would be a scarier place without you in it.”

I chewed my lip for a second, feeling very awkward. Then I said, “I’d rather have you covering my back than anyone in the world, Karrin.” I cleared my throat. “You might be the best friend I’ve ever had.”

She blinked quickly several times and shook her head. “Okay. This is going somewhere awkward.”

“Maybe we should take it from ‘whatsoever ass,’ ” I suggested.

She nodded. “Find him. Kick his ass.”

“That is the plan,” I confirmed. Then I bent down and kissed her forehead and her mouth, gently, and leaned my forehead against hers. “Love you, too,” I whispered.

Her voice tightened. “You jerk. Good luck.”

“You, too,” I said. “Keys are in the ignition.”

Then I straightened, hitched up the heavy bags, and stalked toward the docks. I didn’t look at her as I walked away, and I didn’t look back.

That way, we could both pretend that I hadn’t seen her crying.

My brother owned an ancient battered commercial fishing boat. He told me it was a trawler. Or maybe he said troller. Or schooner. It was one of those—unless it wasn’t. Apparently, nautical types get real specific and fussy about the fine distinctions that categorize the various vessels—but since I’m not nautical, I don’t lose much sleep over the misuse of the proper term.

The boat is forty-two feet long and could have been a stunt double for Quint’s fishing boat in
Jaws
. It desperately needed a paint job, as the white of its hull had long since faded to grey and smoke-smudged black. The only fresh paint on it was a row of letters on the bow that read
Water Beetle
.

Getting Morgan on board was a pain—literally, in his case. We got him settled onto the bed in the little cabin and brought all the gear aboard. After that, I climbed up onto the bridge, started the engines with my copy of the
Water Beetle
’s key, and immediately realized I hadn’t cast off the lines. I had to go back down to the deck to untie us from the dock.

Look, I just told you—I’m not nautical.

Leaving the marina wasn’t hard. Thomas had a spot that was very near the open waters of the lake. I almost forgot to flick on the lights, but got them clicked on before we got out of the marina and onto the open water. Then I checked the compass next to the boat’s wheel, turned us a degree or two south of due east, and opened up the engine.

We started out over the blackness of the lake, the boat’s engines making a rather subdued, throaty
lub lub dub lub
sound. The boat had originally been built for charter use in the open sea, and it had some muscle. The water was calm tonight, and the ride remained smooth as we rapidly built up speed.

I felt a little nervous about the trip. Over the past year, Thomas and I had gone out to the island several times so that I could explore the place. He’d been teaching me how to handle the boat, but this was my first solo voyage.

After a few minutes, Molly came partway up the short ladder to the bridge and stopped. “Do I need to ask permission to come up there or something?”

“Why would you?” I asked.

She considered. “It’s what they do on
Star Trek
?”

“Good point,” I said. “Permission granted, Ensign.”

“Aye aye,” she said, and came up to stand next to me. She frowned at the darkness to the east, and cast a wary glance back at the rapidly fading lights of the city. “So. We’re going out to the weird island, the one with that big ley line running through it?”

“Yep,” I said.

“Where my dad got . . .”

I tried not to remember how badly Michael Carpenter had suffered when he had gone there with me. “Crippled,” I said. “Yeah.”

She frowned quietly. “I heard him talking to my mom about the island. But when I tried to go look it up, I couldn’t find it on any of the maps. Not even in the libraries.”

“Yeah,” I said. “From what I hear, bad things happened to everyone who went out there. There used to be some kind of port facility for fishing and merchant traffic, big as a small town, but it was abandoned. Sometime in the nineteenth century, the city completely expunged the place from its records.”

“Why?”

“Didn’t want anyone to go out there,” I said. “If they merely passed a law, they knew that sooner or later some moron would go there out of sheer contrariness. So they pretty much unmade the place, at least officially.”

“And in more than a century, no one’s ever seen it?”

“That dark ley line puts off a big field of energy,” I said. “It makes people nervous. Not insane or anything, but it’s enough to make them subconsciously avoid the place, if they aren’t making a specific effort to get there. Plus, there are stone reefs around a big portion of the island, and people tend to swing wide around it.”

She frowned. “Couldn’t that be a problem for us?”

“I’m pretty sure I know where to get through them.”

“Pretty sure?”

“Pretty sure.”

Maybe she looked a little paler. “Oh,” she said. “Good. And we’re going there why?”

“The sanctum invocation,” I said. “The island has a kind of spirit to it, an awareness.”

“A
genius loci
,” she said.

I nodded approval. “Exactly that. And fed by that ley line, it’s a big, strong one. It doesn’t much care for visitors, either. It’s arranged to kill a bunch of them.”

Molly blinked. “And you want to do a
sanctum invocation
?
There?
”

“Oh, hell no,” I said. “I don’t
want
to. But I’ve got to find some way to give myself an edge tomorrow, or it’s all over but the crying.”

She shook her head slowly. Then she fell silent until we actually reached the island a little while later. It was dark, but I had enough moonlight and starlight to find the buoy Thomas and I had placed at the entry through the reef. I swung the
Water Beetle
through it, and began following the coastline of the island until I passed a second buoy and guided the boat into the small floating dock we’d constructed. I managed to get the vessel next to the dock without breaking anything, and hopped off with lines in hand to tie it off.

I looked up to find Molly holding my ritual box. She passed it to me and I nodded to her. “If this works, it should take me an hour or so,” I told her. “Stay with Morgan. If I’m not back by dawn, untie the boat, start the engine, and drive it back to the marina. It’s not too different from a car, for what you’ll be doing.”

She bit her lip and nodded. “What then?” she asked.

“Get to your dad. Tell him I said that you need to disappear. He’ll know what to do.”

“What about you?” she asked. “What will you be doing?”

I slipped the strap to the ritual box over one shoulder, took up my staff, and started toward the interior of the island.

“Not much,” I said over my shoulder. “I’ll be dead.”