Dying Is My Business

Thirteen

As the clock ticked toward 2:30 a.m., Ingrid led us upstairs, to the top floor of the safe house. There, we found a long hallway lined with doors, two on each side and two in the far wall.

“I’ve got plenty of room for all of you,” she said. “There are more bedrooms up here than I know what to do with.”

“You live alone?” Bethany asked. She was walking better, no longer favoring her right leg now that her knee was bandaged and wrapped tight with gauze. Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said of Thornton, who was supporting himself against the roof access ladder in the corner of the landing. I’d assumed he would walk better now that he’d been stitched up and didn’t have to worry about his insides spilling out, but instead his movements had become even stiffer than before. The greenish discoloration of his skin had spread, and he’d started to give off a pungent, sickly sweet odor. I’d been around enough dead bodies to recognize the smell.

“I’ve got the whole place to myself, I have for years,” Ingrid was saying. “I suppose if I had one regret about my time with the Five-Pointed Star, it’s that I never had time for anything else. After Morbius died and the team broke up, I kept the house. I thought I’d just live a quiet, normal life like everyone else, but by then it was too late to start a family.”

She pointed to one of the doors at the end of the hall and told us it was the bathroom, but I wasn’t listening anymore. An old-fashioned black Bakelite telephone sat atop a small round table against the wall. As soon as I saw it, I thought of Underwood. Since I hadn’t come straight back with the box, he would be waiting for my call.

A thousand-pound weight pressed on my shoulders. The truth was, I liked Bethany, Thornton, and Ingrid. They were good people. They didn’t slap my cheek and call me a dog the way Underwood did. They hadn’t tried to kill me or lie to me. They welcomed me, took me in, fed me, and tended to my wounds. They treated me as an equal, as a friend.

But Underwood was waiting, and so were the answers he’d promised. I felt like I was standing on thin ice, only I didn’t know which side of it I wanted to be on.

Once you’ve taken the box from them, kill them. No survivors.

I could feel the heft of the gun in the pocket of my leather jacket. My blood felt like ice water.

I turned away from the phone and everything it was making me think about, and let my eyes wander over the framed photographs that hung in clusters on the wall. A lifetime’s worth of memories were on display, each photograph hanging so close to the next that there was hardly any bare space between them. I looked at the closest one, a snapshot of Morbius and Ingrid standing in front of the Statue of Liberty. His arm was around her shoulder. They were smiling so wide it was like they didn’t have a care in the world. I noticed dozens more photos of the two of them, and suddenly I understood the root of her anger, why she was so eager to see the Black Knight dead. The Black Knight hadn’t just killed her colleague; he’d killed the man she loved. It wasn’t that she hadn’t had time to start a family, it was that she’d never stopped mourning.

Ingrid opened one of the doors along the wall, revealing a small bedroom. “Thornton, I think you’ll be comfortable here. This bed is nice and soft.”

Thornton walked stiffly past me to the doorway, trailing his foul odor. He bumped clumsily into the door frame, then leaned casually against it like he’d meant to do that. He stuck his head into the room and gave it a quick, dismissive look. “I’m not tired,” he said. “There are other things I’d rather be doing right now than sleeping.”

“You need to rest, Thornton,” Bethany told him. “You’ve been though a lot today. Your body is still adjusting.”

“There’s no way I’m going to be able to sleep,” he said.

“You have to try, for your own sake,” she said. “The more active you are, the more energy the amulet expends. If you don’t rest, it’ll burn out even faster.”

Thornton sighed and crossed his arms. The green patches of skin around the protruding bones of his wrists looked darker now, fading toward an ugly purple. “Fine. Just promise me we’re out of here at the crack of dawn. I mean it, Bethany. I’m not hanging around. The minute, the second the sun is up and the gargoyles hightail it back home, I’m on my way back to Gabrielle, with or without you.”

“That’s the plan,” Bethany said. “Now get some rest. I just need to talk to Trent, and then I’m turning in, too.”

Thornton turned to enter his room, wobbling momentarily on his feet. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought he was drunk. “If you two are going to make out all night, try to keep it down.”

“Bite me, werewolf,” Bethany said.

Thornton slammed the door in her face.

“Poor thing,” Ingrid said. “He may not feel pain, but he’s hurting inside.”

Bethany didn’t answer. Her face was long and weary, the face of someone whose decisions were weighing on her.

Ingrid continued the tour, opening the bedroom next to Thornton’s for Bethany. For me she opened the door across the hall. “This was Morbius’s room,” she told me.

I was surprised Ingrid and Morbius hadn’t shared a bedroom. I thought they’d been lovers. Maybe they never got the chance. I saw regret etch itself deeper into the lines of Ingrid’s face as she took in the room. I got the feeling she stood in this doorway a lot and reminisced.

She came back to herself, and looked at me. “You’re about Morbius’s size, give or take. There should be something in the closet that’ll fit you if you want to change out of those clothes.” She turned to Bethany and sized up her diminutive frame. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think I have anything that will fit you.”

Bethany shrugged. “You and every clothing store in New York. Trust me, I’m used to it. I’ll be okay with what I’ve got.”

Ingrid bid us good night and disappeared into her bedroom at the end of the hall. I went into my room. It was bigger than the other two, with a queen-sized bed against one wall, a small desk and chair, a love seat, and in front of the curtained window a tall dresser topped with more photos of the Five-Pointed Star. I wondered if Ingrid had kept this room exactly as it was when Morbius died.

Bethany followed me inside. I heard her quietly close the door behind her. I didn’t turn around.

“It’s not going to work,” I said.

“What’s not going to work?” she asked.

I draped my ruined leather coat over the desk chair and sat down on the love seat, facing her. She stayed standing in front of the door.

“Whatever spell Gabrielle comes up with,” I said. “It won’t work, will it? I saw it in your face as soon as Thornton mentioned she was trying to find a way to help him. He saw it, too, I think, but he doesn’t want to hear it. He wants to believe there’s a way to keep the amulet going indefinitely.”

She nodded, her face clouding. “There’s a good reason the Breath of Itzamna isn’t permanent. I’m sure you’ve noticed how bad Thornton’s muscle functions are now, the discoloration of his skin, the smell.”

“The smell is hard to miss,” I said.

“His body is decomposing at an accelerated rate. It’s a side effect of the amulet. His body will keep decomposing faster and faster as long as the amulet is functioning.” Her eyes wavered and broke contact with mine. “I had to do it. I had to bring him back. But there’s no magic in the world that can bring the dead back to life. Not fully, not the way you and I are alive.”

Her words struck me with an unexpected force. After everything I’d learned tonight about magic, I was convinced my ability to come back from the dead was magical in nature—a spell some magician had put on me, or a spell of my own that I no longer remembered. But if Bethany was right, then even now, even in a world where magic existed, I was no closer to the truth than I’d been yesterday, or the day before that, or any of the days since I’d woken up in front of that brick wall.

“There’s nothing?” I pressed.

She shook her head sadly. “There are some things even magic can’t do. But trust me, it’s better this way. Even if Gabrielle could find a way to keep the amulet functioning, Thornton’s body is still dead. It’ll keep decaying. He would be stuck in a rotting shell until there’s nothing left but dust. That’s not something I would wish on my worst enemy. No, for Thornton’s sake, the best thing we can do is just let it run its course.”

“So you lied to him,” I said. She stayed quiet. “You told him he could go back to Gabrielle in the morning, but that’s not your plan at all, is it? You still need him to get the box.”

She looked away, refusing to meet my eye. “I don’t like it any more than you do. He’s my friend. But when things go wrong, someone has to keep a clear head. Someone has to keep their eyes on the goal so things don’t get worse.”

“And that would be you,” I said. “Even if it means letting your friend die.”

She glared at me, her face setting hard as stone. “You need to wrap your head around this, Trent. Thornton is already dead. There’s nothing anyone can do for him now. Not me, not you, not Gabrielle. Dead is dead, and no one can change that.”

But someone had changed it. I’d come back from the dead more than once, and fully back, not trapped inside a rotting corpse like Thornton was. I just wished I knew how or why. If I did, I could help him.

I caught myself. Help him? Wouldn’t it be easier to let him die? That way, his blood wouldn’t be on my hands when the time came.

Bethany sighed. “Let’s just drop it, okay? This isn’t what I came here to talk about.”

“So what did you come here to talk about?”

She looked at me like I ought to know. Suddenly I wasn’t happy to be alone with her. I felt like she could see right through me. At that moment I was very glad to be sitting on the love seat, because it was about as far from those probing eyes as I could get without actually leaving the room.

Finally, she crossed her arms over her bulky cargo vest. “I think I’ve been more than patient with you, Trent. I figured you would tell us the truth when you were ready, but I don’t think we can afford to wait anymore.”

I looked up at her sharply. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s obvious you haven’t been honest with us,” she said. “It’s time to come clean.”

My heart thumped like a tin drum in my chest. How much had she figured out? I glanced at the closed door directly behind her. Standing between it and me, her message was clear. There was no way out, not until she got an answer.

“The Anubis Hand, the Black Knight,” she continued. “The things you did shouldn’t have been possible.”

I very nearly sighed with relief. She didn’t know anything. “I told you before, Bethany, I don’t know how I did those things. I was as surprised as you were.”

“Huh,” she said. The word dripped with skepticism. “See, I keep going over it in my head, but your story doesn’t add up. You weren’t just passing by that warehouse tonight, were you? You said you heard me scream and came looking, only I didn’t scream. I don’t scream, Trent. Ever.”

“I don’t know, maybe it was a gargoyle I heard,” I said. “Whatever it was, it was enough that I thought I should investigate. Anyway, what’s with the third degree? If I’d decided to ignore it and keep moving, you’d be dead right now.”

“But you weren’t just investigating, you were expecting trouble. You walked into that warehouse with your gun already drawn.”

“I always carry a gun,” I said. “New York’s a dangerous city.”

She arched an eyebrow, not buying it. “Enough games. I want the truth. Who are you? For real?”

“Bethany, come on.” I shook my head.

“Because here’s the thing, Trent,” she said. “The reason your story doesn’t add up? I put a ward around that warehouse. It didn’t work on the gargoyles because they already knew we were there, but the ward was still active. That means even if it couldn’t stop the gargoyles, it still should have kept the warehouse hidden from everyone else. It should have been hidden from you, Trent. Unless you already knew it was there. Unless you meant to come to the warehouse. So do you still want to insist you were just passing by, or do you want to tell me the truth?”

I remembered the peculiar feeling of the little hands pushing me back as I drew closer to the warehouse. At the time, I thought it was just a manifestation of my own reluctance about the job, but now I understood it was more than that. Without knowing it, I’d walked right through Bethany’s ward. No wonder I’d felt the same thing on the front steps of the safe house.

Bethany’s sky-blue eyes bore into me. I looked away. She had me dead to rights, and like a cornered animal I felt the need to protect myself. My leather jacket was still draped over the desk chair. The grip of my Bersa semiautomatic peeked out from the pocket. It was so close I could draw it in a second. Less than a second.

But if I did, there would be no going back. I would cross the threshold to cold-blooded killer. Was that what I was? Or was that what Underwood wanted to turn me into?

I hated this tug-of-war inside me. How could I know what kind of a man I was when I didn’t even know who I was?

“Everyone has their secrets, Trent,” Bethany said. “I get that. But if I’m going to keep you around, I need to know if I can trust you. So I’ll ask you again, who are you really?”

I blew out my breath and whispered, “I don’t know.” I said it so softly I didn’t know if Bethany could even hear me.

“I don’t believe that for a second,” she said. I should have known nothing got past those pointed ears of hers. “I have charms in my vest that can make you tell the truth, but they’ll also cause you a lot of pain. I don’t want to have to use them, but I will if you keep lying to me.”

“I’m not lying,” I said. “I don’t know who I am.”

She furrowed her brow. “What do you mean? How can you not know?”

“For the past year, I’ve been living without any memories. Who I am, where I’m from, everything about myself, it’s all just a big blank.” I fidgeted in my seat, wondering if I was doing the right thing. Aside from Underwood, I’d never told my story to anyone. There hadn’t been anyone else to tell, frankly, and keeping it to myself for so long had buried it deep enough that after a while it felt like something that needed to be protected. Trusting Bethany with the truth made me uncomfortably vulnerable, but it also felt oddly freeing, like shrugging off heavy chains.

She narrowed her eyes, wondering whether to believe me or not. “You’re talking about amnesia?”

I nodded. “I can’t remember anything before a year ago. Not my friends, my family, my job. It’s like I didn’t exist at all before then. As far as I can tell, no one’s even looking for me. Amnesia is supposed to be temporary. I hoped I would remember eventually—hell, I try to make myself remember all the time—but it’s been a year and the memories haven’t come back.” I looked up into her eyes. “Bethany, I know I shouldn’t be able to do the things I did. I don’t know how I did them. I didn’t have any control over it, I swear. They just happened.”

She shook her head. “People can’t cast spells without knowing how, Trent. There’s no such thing as involuntary magic.”

I shrugged. “There is now.”

She crossed the room so quickly that I froze in surprise when she pulled open my collar and put her hand down the back of my shirt.

“What the hell are you doing?” I demanded.

I tried to get up from the sofa, but she pushed me back down. “Sit!” I felt something sticky peel off my back and thought she’d removed one of the bandages. But when she pulled away from me, I caught a glimpse of what was in her hand. My skin crawled. It wasn’t a bandage. It was moving. Alive.

I leapt off the sofa for a closer look. At first I mistook it for a spider, but then I saw there were no legs attached to its fat, ridged thorax, only round, slimy, saucerlike suction cups. Whatever it was, it was small, roughly the size of a nickel. It fit snugly in the center of her palm and glowed a bright neon green.

I shivered. How long had that thing been stuck on my skin? “What is that?”

She studied the creature. “It’s green.”

“I can see it’s green, Bethany, but what the hell is it?”

“A Collodi tick,” she explained. “It’s a rare interdimensional insect that feeds by absorbing a harmless amount of its host’s psychic energy. But they’re also remarkably sensitive to their host’s psychological state. They actually change colors when exposed to different psychic stimuli. It makes them the perfect lie detector. They turn yellow if the subject is lying, and green if the subject is telling the truth. Yours is green. That’s good.”

My jaw dropped. “Wait a minute. You put it on me? Downstairs, when you were bandaging me up, you put that thing on me?”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I had to be sure.”

I stared at her, taken aback not just by what she’d done, but also by what a close call it’d been. More than anything else, it drove home the fact that I was walking a very thin line. “You had no right, Bethany!”

She pulled a small, clear plastic box from a pocket in her cargo vest, dropped the Collodi tick into it, and replaced it in the pocket. “Try to see it from my perspective, Trent. You come out of nowhere, a complete stranger who claims to have no knowledge of magic whatsoever, and then you start killing gargoyles like a pro and fending off the Black Knight with powers no one else possesses. You can see how that might make me suspicious. I had to be sure I could trust you.”

“And what if that thing was yellow instead? What would you have done?”

“This.” She extended her arm. A wooden wand shot out of her sleeve and into her hand.

I blinked. “A magic wand? Seriously?”

“Scoff all you want, but the Endymion wand is stronger than you think,” she said. “It would put you into a deep sleep before you knew what hit you.”

I doubted that. I don’t sleep, and I was pretty sure no wand would change that. “You had that thing all along but you didn’t think to use it on the gargoyles, or the Black Knight?”

“It only works on humans. Against anything else it’s just a pointy stick.” She tucked the wand back into her sleeve. “Look, I don’t expect you to understand, but this mission Thornton and I are on is too important. If the box falls into the wrong hands, a lot of people will die. I can’t let anything get in our way, or anyone.”

I sighed and sat down on the love seat again. “The box. Everything comes back to that damn box. What’s in it that’s so important?”

“Something ancient, and powerful, and extremely dangerous under the right conditions. You’re safer not knowing any more than that. Anyway, right now I’m a lot more interested in talking about you. A man with no memory of who he is. It takes a lot to surprise me, but I honestly didn’t see that one coming. It could explain a few things, though.”

“Like what?”

“Why the ward around the warehouse didn’t affect you, for one,” she said. “There are a small handful of immensely powerful magicians in the world called mages. They’re the only ones who can carry magic inside themselves without becoming infected. They’re powerful enough that certain spells don’t work on them—illusion spells mostly, like wards. They can see right through them. Given the things I’ve seen you do, it makes me wonder. What if you were a mage before you lost your memories? If you were that powerful, there might be some kind of subconscious connection with the magic inside you, almost like muscle memory or a survival instinct that kicks in when it’s needed.” She sighed then and shook her head. “But no, mages are much older. You can’t be a mage without decades of advanced study. Frankly, you don’t look old enough to be one.”

“Maybe I’m older than I look,” I said. “I could have lived a healthy lifestyle. Lots of vegetables and jogging.”

Bethany smirked. “Somehow I doubt that’s the answer. But when this is all done and we’ve got the box back safe and sound, I can ask Isaac to look into any reports of magicians or mages who went missing a year ago. Who knows, maybe he’ll find something.”

I stared at her dumbly for a moment, not sure what to say. I hadn’t expected her to want to help, especially without asking for something in return. I wasn’t used to anyone giving a damn. When I finally found my tongue, I said, “You’d do that for me?”

“We’re not so different,” she said. “I don’t know much about myself, either. I never knew my parents, or where I came from. I spent my whole childhood being passed from one foster home to another, waiting to be adopted, but it never happened…” She paused, absently touching the thick hair over her pointed ear. I could only imagine what it must have been like for her, passed over time and again for adoption because she was different. She must have felt like as much of a freak as I did. When she spoke again, she wouldn’t meet my eye. I could tell she wasn’t used to opening up like this. “I learned pretty fast not to get attached to anyone. Either they’d get adopted away or I’d get shipped off to another home. I spent a lot of time alone, looking for ways to pass the time. That’s how I discovered I had a natural aptitude for engineering charms. It’s funny how boredom and self-preservation can bring out your hidden talents, isn’t it?”

“It’s not everyone who would help out someone they don’t know,” I said. “Thank you.”

She opened the door and smiled at me. “You saved my life twice now, Trent. The least I can do is help you get yours back.”

I watched her walk out of the room and close the door behind her. Bethany kept surprising me. One minute she was an icy battle-axe, interrogating me like a cop and hiding gross, lie-detecting bugs on my body, and the next she acted like a friend, like she actually cared and wanted to help. The former I could handle, I was used to adversity, but the latter left me feeling conflicted and unsure of myself. I didn’t know how to deal with the sudden surge of warmth I felt toward her.

I looked at the photos on the dresser again. Morbius stared back at me through unknown years, strong, sure of himself, a natural-born leader. Ingrid had referred to him as mage. Could I be a mage, too, I wondered? Was it possible I was a mage so powerful I’d found a way to cheat death? But then, what had happened to me? How had I lost my memories? Bethany didn’t think being a mage was the answer, but I held onto it like a drowning man. Because if I was a mage it meant I wasn’t a freak of nature. It meant I wasn’t alone.

I felt like I was soaring inside. There was so much more to tell Bethany. So much more I hoped she could help me discover. For the first time I could remember, I felt like I’d found a place where I belonged, where I could be happy. For the first time, I felt truly alive, which was an odd thought for a man who can’t die. I felt like I was a part of the world around me. A world that suddenly felt wide open.

The grip of my gun peeked out at me from the pocket of my leather jacket. Damn. How was I going to tell her about Underwood? If I told her the truth about why I came to the warehouse, there was no way she’d still want to help me. Worse, I would be drawing her deeper into my own mess, putting her in more danger than she already was. There were consequences to knowing about men like Underwood.

He was still waiting for me to come back with the box. Probably, he was already wondering what was taking so long. It was only a matter of time before he sent Tomo and Big Joe to come looking.

What the hell was I going to do?