7: The Misguided Mule of Justice Waltz/ The Tree and I

"Sidney! Lory! It's another good day, don’t you think? Beautiful Sunday. Good weather. Nice breeze from the south—they're saying it'll snow tonight again, though. But it's a good day. A lucky day. Want me to top off your coffee, there, Lory?"

"Jack," I growled, smacking his hand away from my coffee almost protectively. "Stop dancing around the point, and tell us what cockamamie plan of yours required getting us up at the ungodly hour of seven a.m."

"I concur," came Sidney's muffled voice from where his head rested on his folded arms.

Jack laughed.

"'Cockamamie?'" he asked. "I love it. Even when you're being surly and unpleasant, you manage to teach me new words. Where do you get them all?"

"There are these fascinating contraptions these days known as books, Jack. Perhaps someday you'll run across one."

"Okay, Lory, okay. Let's not be mean."

"I reserve the right to be mean when I've had less than four hours of sleep."

"I concur," said Sidney.

"Too bad," Jack replied, smiling. "I've got plans for you. Lory, you may not have been informed, but things did not go well yesterday at the mall for Sid and Arthur."

"No," Sidney said, sitting up. …He looked so skinny. So much worse.

"In fact, Sachever and his bloodhound girl chased them off before they did anything."

"So true, so true," Sidney sighed.

"So?" I wondered.

"So?" Jack repeated. "You're going to go back and do it today."

Sidney and I exchanged a look. Then I glanced up at Jack.

"Why did this require being up at seven?" I wondered.

"They open at 9:30. You'll be there at ten."

Sidney groaned, and dropped his head back onto his arms.

"What," I started, "makes you think that Sachever won't show up this time?"

"Oh, I'm hoping that he will," Jack said, and then smiled. "I have some poking around of my own to do—I'm going to go back to the Temple today. I need Sachever to be occupied elsewhere. Got it?"

I sighed, looked over at Sidney. He appeared to have fallen back to sleep.

"Why ten o'clock, Jack?" I asked.

"The early bird gets the worm," he said, grinning.

"Not if the early bird isn't awake enough to see straight."

"Seeing straight is over-rated. Don't argue. You're going."

"I know."

"I know you know." He flashed his teeth at me quickly. "And have I mentioned how very badly I want that sword of his? We're going to find out how to get it—even if we have to find him to do it. Kill him. Be dirty, if you have to. Gang up on him. Sneak up behind him. Take hostages. I don't care how you do it—I want him dead. Or in our possession. Either way, get him and his sword, if he shows up."

I closed my eyes, and wrapped my hands around the warmth of my coffee cup.

"Understood," I said.

"Sidney?" Jack asked.

"Wha-at?" came the reply.

"Did you hear me?"

He lifted his head again.

"You know, I really am not feeling very well, Jack," he said.

"Sounds like a personal problem," Jack returned.

"I don't think I'd be at peak performance, exactly."

Jack didn't care, and by 9:15—slightly behind schedule—we were in my car, hurtling toward the shopping mall. Which was the last place that either of us actually wanted to be.

"Why do I have to drive?" I grumbled. "You get to go back to sleep in the passenger's seat."

"I don't feel good," he complained.

"Oh?" I asked sharply. "And whose fault is that?"

He wiggled one shoulder, and moved closer to the car door, resting his head on the window.

"It's like nothing is moving right," he said. "My joints all hurt."

Silence, for a moment. I considered turning on the radio.

"Hey," Sidney continued, after a second. "Do you think maybe I'm dying?"

I glanced across the car at him. God, he looked bony. Like he was a sculpture, and the artist had, after some contemplation, decided to start chipping away at him again, instead of leaving him finished. But dying?—I couldn't say. Didn't want to. I did know, however, that if we walked up to someone on the street and asked which one of us would be dead before the year's end, they would not pick me.

"'It will be a glorious death!'" Sidney quoted. "That's what she said. …This doesn't feel glorious."

I started to say something, but it caught in my throat, like a moth against a window-screen.

"It hurts," he said, more softly. "There's no glory in not being able to taste your food. …Why, do you think, my parents never talked about this? Never mentioned it?"

"Because you were just a kid, Sidney."

"Didn't stop them from telling me other stuff. Really, I think I knew more than the Seraphim thought I did. …Maybe they didn't want me to worry about them, though. Hey, Lory, what's prison like?"

"You mean for a long time? Not horrible, I'd guess."

"But then again, how would you know, right? Longest you've ever been in prison is over night. That's longer than me, though." He laughed lowly. "I've never been arrested for anything, except… well… that. With my parents. I don't think that even counts."

"Guess not."

"No… God. What am I going to do?" he asked. "I'm going to die, that's what," he immediately answered himself. "What do you think it'll be like?" he wondered. "Will I just stop breathing?"

"You did, the other night," I said softly.

He sat up, and looked over at me intensely.

"What?" he asked.

"You came home, and I saw you dancing around in the snow. I went to get you inside, and you passed out. I brought you back in, and realized you weren't breathing."

"What happened?" he asked tensely. "I mean, obviously I started to again."

"I slapped you. You don't remember? You started breathing again, then."

"You mean…" he trailed off. He looked straight ahead for a moment, then looked back at me. "I didn't start breathing again on my own?"

"No."

"I would have died."

"One can only assume."

"…Why didn't you let me die?" he asked, sounding almost… angry. "Why didn't you just let me die?" he repeated, definitely angry this time.

"What do you mean? How could I have let you die?" I asked defensively.

"I was meant to die, Lory!" he said. "Don't you see that? Didn't you hear Gemma? I was meant to die then. My body knew that, but no—you had to prolong this… this ache." He closed his eyes again, and slumped.

"You've gone mad!" I said. "You're upset, because I saved your life? You're crazy. I've said it before, and I'll say it again—you're killing yourself, Sidney. Maybe your body wanted to go, just then. But I wasn't about to facilitate that. How could I?"

"You can't cheat the reaper!" he cried. "He'll only come back later! …Angrier. Is that what you want for me? Is it?"

"I don't want you to die at all, Sidney! I wish you'd stop talking about it. Stop talking about it like it's already happened."

"It has, Lory. I'm dead. I'm dead."

"You're an idiot. That's bullshit, Sidney. Thistle is dead. Mink Longfellow is dead. If you're mad because I didn't want you to end up like them, then I don't care at all. Do what you want. Keep shooting that stuff into your veins. I don't know where you go, when it's in you, but it can't be that different from the underworld."

He didn't speak for a while, and when he did, he sounded far-off. Wistful.

"It's beautiful, you know. If I… If I thought death would be like that, then I wouldn't be afraid. It's peaceful, there, Lory. Everything has meaning, and everything has its own beauty. Everything is shining. It's like little flecks of silver are flowing in your blood. I mean, it is the real world—our world—and it isn't, at the same time. I can't describe it. But it's everything in the world that's good, and true. If that's what death's like, I'm not afraid."

"Shut up. I'm sick of hearing you talk like this. Like you're some suicidal drug-addict. I've known you for three years, and maybe that's not very long, but in that time, you've been neither. I don't know what's come over you. But stop it. Just stop."

He didn't speak—only stared out the window.

"I don't want to die," he said softly, after a long time.

"Shut up," I told him.

The shopping center was deserted. I didn't know what Jack had expected out of ten o'clock on a Sunday morning—maybe the holiday rush. Whatever it was—whatever he'd anticipated—it wasn't there. There were a few assorted Devas, but no one especially interesting. Not even Sachever appeared to be in the area, and so Sidney and I sat down on a bench and waited for the crowd to increase. And ignored each other.

"You know," I said, after probably half an hour, "this is pointless."

"I know."

"It's a waste of explosives, if anything."

"Yeah."

"People are starting to look at us."

"True."

We sat there for a few more minutes, thinking over our plight—waste ammo and accomplish nothing, or risk angering Jack?

"Look," Sidney said finally. "Let's go find something else to work our magic on, okay? Let's wait 'til lunch time, and do some fast-food joint.

I stood up.

"Sounds good," I said. "And until then, we can sleep in the car."

Sidney also stood, but slowly. Like it hurt. Like he was an old man.

"To the parking garage!" he said, smiling feebly.

"Yeah. That," I agreed, still a bit angry at him.

"Look, Lory," he said on the way back to the car, apparently sensing this. "Maybe you're right. And maybe you were right not to let me die, that night. Maybe I'm being stupid about all of this. All of it. Everybody wants to escape the real world sometimes, right?" he asked, and with a pang I thought of Thistle, but pushed it away—she'd been only that. An escape.

"And what right do I have, to try to escape all the time? No one can afford that. Hell, I can't afford it anymore. In more ways than just money, right?"

"Well, just look at you," I muttered.

"Look at me?" he laughed. "You should try being in me. But it'll get better, right? I'm young, and—uh—exuberant. I'll heal quick, right?"

"Hope so."

Saying this, we left the mall and opened the door into the perpetual darkness of the parking garage.

"Thought you'd try it again, did you?" asked someone. I couldn't pinpoint the voice—the parking garage echoed. But I did know the speaker.

"Crap," Sidney hissed at me, grabbing my arm. "I'm not sure I can do this, today, Lory."

"I will," I said, stepping forward.

"Enough with the dramatic entrances!" I yelled into the parking garage, pulling from inside my coat the long blade that Jack had sent along for just such an occurrence. "You want to do something about it? So come here."

"I can't believe you would try the same thing twice," Sachever scolded. He stepped out from behind a pickup truck.

"We never give up," I replied.

"We're kind of like mules, actually," Sidney added from behind me.

"…Mules?" I repeated. Sachever looked equally perplexed.

"Sure," Sidney explained. "Stubborn. Don't give in. Mules, right?"

I sighed, and refocused on Sachever. He seemed to sense this, and struck a battle-pose.

"I'm like a mule, too," he said.

"A mule of justice!" Sidney called.

"A misguided one," I added.

"How can you call me misguided, when you came here this very day with murder on your minds?" he asked. "How can you call me misguided when every day you torment a people who want nothing but peace and love? When you look to destroy the energy through which they communicate?"

"It's pathetic," I replied, "How they've led you on. How they've made you into their puppet. No, Sachever, you are misguided. You have to see—if we Animals don't take the world back now, the consequences will be dire."

"I can't let you—"

"Look," I interrupted. "This is all becoming horribly formulaic. You track us down somehow, shout at us about your ridiculous Deva's ideals, and then use your unfairly superior weaponry to chase us off. I'm sick of it. I want answers. I want to know who the hell you are—or who you think you are. And I have orders to take you—alive or dead. 'Dead' would make me most happy, if you won't talk. So I'll tell you what." My bravado increased with each word, until I truly believed what I was saying—believed that he would drop the sword and sing like a nightingale. "If you start talking right now, I'll let you live. I can't guarantee that Jack will be so kind, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

"I'll never cooperate with scum like you!" he cried, and charged.

I met him halfway, blocking his sword with my own knife. I half expected Gaudium Gladius to sever the knife, like last time, but it did not. I noticed that it wasn't glowing, and wondered why—did he have to command it to, every time? We struggled briefly, until I realized that he was stronger than he looked and I may not be able to gain the upper hand. So I kicked him in the stomach.

Gasping, he fell back. I laughed, and continued forward after him.

"Want to give us some answers, yet?" I wondered. He groaned, and shook his head.

"All right, then," I said, and delivered an uppercut to his jaw.

"Splendid!" Sidney yelled at me.

Sachever staggered backward again, and ended up leaning against an expensive looking car. He stood again, and held his sword up once more, but without much conviction. I brought the knife down at him again, and he blocked it.

"How do you manage to get that sword into places like this?" I wondered. "Especially with all of these terrorists on the loose?"

"I have an honest face," he growled.

I laughed again, then stepped to the side, and swung at him again. He was unprepared for it, and I managed to nick his arm.

"Sachever!" I heard Airial scream, but didn't know where she was. Sachever looked up almost hopefully, and I took the opportunity to hit him upside the head with the butt of the knife. He stumbled to the side, came back swinging feebly at me. I sidestepped him easily—like a matador would a bull—turned quickly, and pushed him as he came past me. Momentum and gravity did their job—he stumbled and fell. I kicked him in the ribs.

"No! Sachever!" Airial shrieked, leaping out from behind another car, and looking like she was going to pounce at me.

"Get her!" I barked at Sidney.

He advanced on her in what appeared to be a menacingly slow manner, but I worried that it was more because of his condition.

"No," Sachever protested weakly.

"You're in no position to argue," I chuckled, and kicked him again, for good measure. "So much for you peaceful Deva friends. Your priests and priestesses," I gloated. And I couldn't help but gloat. I walked around him, and stood in front of the hand that still tightly gripped the sword. I knelt, and tried to take it from him gently, but he would not give it up. And so I stood again, and smashed his hand beneath my heel.

He cried out, and so did Airial. I bent once more, and picked up the sword. It was lighter than I had expected. The weight felt good, in my hand. It felt right—and I was sure that it would feel that way regardless of who held it. It was like an old friend. Jack would be pleased.

I turned, and saw that Sidney held Airial at knife-point. I smirked, and he smiled back reassuringly. I turned back to where Sachever was trying to pick himself up. I pushed his head back down with my foot.

"Now tell me," I said, "how you got this sword. Tell me how you're connected to the Temple. What's the secret?"

"I'll never tell you anything," he spat.

"Oh, wrong answer," I replied, applying a bit more pressure to his head. He groaned.

"Sachever!" Airial screamed, and then, "Don't hurt him!"

"Airial…" he breathed.

And I laughed. I couldn't help it, just as I hadn't been able to help it after killing Airial's father—it was all so very melodramatic. And this boy was the embodiment of the spirit that I hated. That type that worship Devas.

"Won't talk, eh?" I asked. "Maybe you need a bit more incentive." I turned, and looked at Sidney—looked at Airial. God, she was beautiful. I didn't want to hurt her, but… Jack would be so happy, if we got both the sword and some answers. I swallowed.

"Sidney," I said. "Apply a bit more pressure, would you?"

"Certainly," he said, although he looked a bit nervous, too.

"Answer me," I told Sachever, "Or Sidney's going to scar her lovely neck all up."

"I…"

"No, Sachever!" she yelled. "Don't tell them anything! Let them kill me!"

"Airial," he said.

"Five seconds," I warned, "Or he'll slit her throat."

"I—" started Sachever.

"No, Sachever, don't!" Airial cried.

"One," I began to count.

"Don't hurt her!" Sachever pleaded.

"Two," I said. "Answer us, and we won't. Three."

"Well… You see…"

"Sachever, no!"

"Four."

"Believe in yourself, Sachever!" Airial shouted.

"Five. Too late," I said. I turned to face them. "Sidney," I said, but never finished, because suddenly, the sword was burning hot—burning my hand. In shock, I dropped it, at precisely the second that Sachever managed to get himself out from under my foot.

"No!" he bellowed. "Airial!" And in one movement, he was up, sword in hand, and hurtling across the floor. At Sidney and Airial. No, only at Sidney, because in that brief second his grip on her had loosened, and she'd fled, but he wasn't quick enough. He stood there, stunned, knife in hand, starting at Sachever like a deer in headlights.

Suddenly, the parking garage was filled with light as the sword began to glow, and I felt an odd heat in my other coat pocket at the same time, but there was no time to think about that, because Sachever had raised the sword, and Sidney wasn't moving, and…

And the sword cut into him as easily as it had cut Jack's knife. As easily as a spoon dips into pudding.

For a second, I wasn't sure if it had happened—despite the fact that Gaudium Gladius was halfway through Sidney's abdomen. Sachever had stopped moving, stunned. Sidney looked shocked. His mouth was an 'o,' and his eyes slightly widened. They widened more as Sachever pulled the sword out. The boy backed away, and then ran to Airial, unsure.

Sidney swayed slightly, then dropped to his knees, and then to one hand, pressing the other against the gaping wound in the left side of his body. Black blood spilled out across the floor, but not nearly as much as I would have expected, given that the sword had cut through underneath his ribs, and nearly to his spine.

I ran to him as he fell forward again, onto his stomach. I rolled him over as gently as possible, and pulled him back into a near-sitting position, braced against my leg. Almost as I had done with Thistle.

The wound was now bleeding an absurdly small amount. It appeared almost as though the heat from the sword had cauterized it. Sidney's breath came in small, short gasps. His mouth hung slightly open. I was in shock—could think of nothing to say, or do.

"Sidney," I finally started.

"Lory," he said, looking at me as if he'd only noticed I was there because I'd spoken. Already his eyes were glazing over. But, strangely, he laughed—and as he did, a trickle of blood spilled out of his mouth. "It doesn't hurt," he said. "Nothing hurts! …Gaudium Gladius. A joyous death, Lory! I see, now. I see."

"God, Sidney, try to hold on. Maybe they can sew you up. Maybe they… Maybe…"

"It's all right, Lory." He sounded peaceful—calm, as if there was no rush. "I see it clearly, now." He laughed again, and then coughed. "How wrong I've been! All of us, Lory." His eyes met mine briefly, and he looked very sincere about whatever thought he was trying to communicate.

"I don't understand," I said.

"I was so afraid of this," he continued, as if he hadn't heard me. His eyes went unfocused. "I don't remember why I was so afraid… After what she said to me, that night—I kept it in the drawer, by the way. The second one down on the left. You'll find it. …Joyous death. Oh, Lory, I'm so sorry. So sorry, for all of you. How wrong… we've… all been…" he breathed, and then his head rolled back.

"Sidney," I said nervously. I held his head back up. "Don't go. Don't do this," I told him. "Don't you dare be dead—not after Thistle. Oh, God." I knew he was dead. There was no way he could have survived being cut nearly in half, but still, I… "Oh my God," I repeated. He couldn't have survived, but he couldn't be dead. He couldn't. "Sidney," I said again, and shook him a little. His head lolled back again.

"I'm sorry," Sachever said. "I just wanted to save Airial. I… I didn't mean to…"

"Don't be stupid," I interrupted, lowering Sidney's body to the floor, and standing. I turned to face Sachever. "Of course you meant to. Don't try to be so… so noble," I snarled. "By saying you didn't mean to kill him. …Of course you did." I laughed a bit bitterly. "Because you're human. An Animal. And we get carried away, sometimes."

"I didn't mean to," he insisted. "It was an accident." Airial cowered behind him, staring at me. For a brief second our eyes met, but she looked away.

"An accident?" I asked. "You ran at him with a raised sword. You willfully—consciously—brought it down into his side. You nearly cut him into two pieces. That was absolutely no accident."

I stared at him, waiting for a response. He looked down, at his bloodied sword, at the parking garage floor. After a time, I spoke again.

"But that's what it means, to be human. We get angry. Not like Devas do. We want blood. Revenge. We want to do ill to those who hurt us. We create war. That's how it's been, all through history. And the world is unbalanced, now, because it's stopped. Yin and Yang, Sachever. Without the darkness, how can you know the light? We need to have darkness to move forward. This peace that Devas live in only causes stagnation. That's why people have destructive instincts. Even you."

"No," he said finally. "It's not true."

"It is true," I replied. "And you just proved it," I said, motioning behind myself, at Sidney's corpse.

"No," he said again. "Love," he continued desperately. "I'm fighting for love!"

I laughed again.

"Then you're much, much more dense than I had imagined," I said.

"I'm fighting for love!" he said again, and now he looked like he believed it. His brow was furrowed. He looked angry.

"Yes," I said, again laughing. I felt as if I was on the verge of breaking down. "Get mad. Hate me. Because you're fighting for love! Get mad, Sachever—because that's how Animals get things done."

He gritted his teeth in an angry grimace.

"That's only the way you think it is!" he said, in a sweet, heroically strong voice. "But you're wrong!" And once again, the sword began to glow. Brightly—so brightly. White-hot, like newly forged metal. Like a star. But it was so bright, this time, and so much more puissant. I had to squint against it, and it was like full noon in the summer, and then brighter, brighter. Again I felt that strange burning in my coat pocket—something round, hot against my leg. Curiously—stupidly—I slid my hand into the pocket to find out what this thing was, and then I remembered: the disk from the catacombs. The tips of my fingers touched it, and the fire, the heat, the light passed through me—up my arm, and through my body, and to my head, blotting out all my senses. Taking them over. All that I could see, feel, hear, taste, smell was the light—just like when my hand had touched Sachever's sword, and my blood sang with it. For some time, I knew nothing else, and then…

Then I was running. Running through a field, but a field that had seen no rain through the whole summer. It was dead, and dry, and brown, and crackled as I passed. There was a path, but it was clear that no one had used it for a long time. In the far distance were mountains, and storm clouds, but I knew without looking that the sky above me was grey and cloudless. And I was running. But despite the fact that I'd been in a parking garage in the middle of the city in the middle of the winter only moments before, and was now in a place that appeared not to have known man's touch in a long time, where the only sound was the wind shrieking across the grass, it didn't feel wrong. I was running. And I was smaller than I had been, before. Younger. A boy. And suddenly—it sank in—wild with panic. Scared witless—literally, witless. Blind panic drove me forward through the long grass and screaming wind and way from civilization. They were chasing me. They would hunt me down, and if they found me they would kill me.

Because the whole village thought I was bad luck, and wanted me dead to bring back the rain. Because I'd stolen from the baker so that I wouldn't starve to death like my brother, and the man had caught me. Because I didn't want to work for my master any longer, but if he found me running, he would make me pay. Because the older boys didn't like me sleeping in that alley on their turf, and they wanted me gone. And—most personally terrifying—because daddy was mad at me because I'd ripped the knee of my pants, and he was getting his belt...

And so I ran, scared.

"But you've always been running, Starry-eyes," said a clap of thunder in the distance. And I kept running, because I could feel the ground reverberating with hoof beats, with the footfalls of the mob, with my father's steps.

I can't be so many things at once, some distant part of my mind screamed, but it was too logical. The fleeing, instinctual part of my mind—the one operating my body—pressed it down.

"But you are so many things," said the thunder, said the wind, said the grass, said Gemma. "And you've always been running. You've always been hunted."

Crickets flew up from all directions in front of me from the scarred grass as I ran. Some hit me—in the face, in the chest. They stung.

"That's how you are made," she said—for she was everywhere at once.

My lungs and throat burned, but she was pursuing me. She was chasing me, for pleasure alone.

"No, not for pleasure alone," said the old woman. "It is because that is what you were made for. You have always run. …You have always been caught."

In the distance, I caught sight of a tree, and I changed direction. Headed for it.

"For a time," said the girl, "I wasn't sure which of you it was. Your captain I discounted almost immediately. He's always renaming things, and that's not in your nature—this I knew. The Saint was running too, though, you see. I'm not quite all-knowing, Starry-eyes. I thought it might be him. But in the end, he was only running from himself. No. It is you."

I reached the tree, panting. I could feel, acutely, the pounding of blood in my neck. But the tree felt safe. A haven. As if they couldn't get me once I was in its branches. I began to reach up for the lowest limb, when suddenly I noticed the split in the tree trunk. Sap flowed from it sluggishly. Sap darker than any I'd ever seen before—near black. And across this crevice—indeed, all up and down the tree-trunk—were black ants. Thousands of them. More than I'd ever seen before in one place. They seemed to be gravitating around the sap. …No, they seemed to be coming out of the sap.

In horror, I began to back away from this place that I had thought safe. And as I backed away, a light filled the air in front of me, striking the tree in two, and charging the air. Flinging up an arm to cover my face, I shrieked, and it was a little boy's voice, but this didn't seem odd to me any longer.

"By the lighting," the thunder that followed said, "I should have known."

And from behind the split tree a woman stepped. She was round-figured, her hair was thick and dark and shining, and she smiled kindly.

"But now I know," she said, in a voice that was comfort and honey and sweet, but in this horrible and terrifying. I was torn between running to her, or turning back and risking the anger of my fellow man.

"They say good things come in threes," she said. "Bad things, too," she added, laughing lightly. "And I always wonder why they think they can tell them apart." She approached me, and I stood rooted to the ground, as the tree had been only moments before. Only moments before the lightning had hit. The tree and I, we were afraid together.

"I am three," she said, "and I am one. I am beginning, middle, end, and the whole story. I am waxing, full, and waning, but still only one moon. Perhaps soon you will see that it is all one, and all mine. I am the Queen of Everything, but I may be persuaded to share a little, with you. But only if you're a good boy. Even if I don't share, I won't forget you, Starry-eyes. I'll never forget what you've tried to do, and have done."

She reached out and touched my face. I could feel the ants crawling up my leg, and she smiled, and the world cracked.

And suddenly, I was in the parking garage once more, with a most decidedly aching head. The first thing I did was vomit, because the transition from that hideous nightmarescape back to the parking garage was sickening. Too much to comprehend, for body and mind—it was like getting sick from being on a swiftly-moving ride at the fair, or from severe jet-lag. What the hell had it all been? I felt stiff, and tired, as if I really had been running. I found that I was somehow against the cement wall, propped between two parked cars. How long, I wondered, had I been unconscious?

Sachever, I suddenly remembered. Sidney. What had happened?

I got carefully to my feet, and peeked over one of the cars. To my shock, Sidney was gone, and all traces of blood—in fact, all traces that anything had happened. And also missing were Sachever and Airial.

I stepped out from behind the car, and a thought occurred to me—if they'd gone, already, why hadn't they killed me while I'd been unconscious? Why had they left me alive? I had to know how long I'd been unconscious. I peered in car windows until I found a clock I could see. 11:41. How was that possible? That couldn't be right, because it meant that I'd been out for—at most—five minutes. So what had happened to Sidney? To Sachever and Airial? …And just what the hell was that disk that I had found in the catacombs?

A brief look around the immediate vicinity yielded several things. Firstly, it became apparent that little time had passed. Not a single car had moved, and surely that wasn't likely if the time span had been very long. Secondly, Sidney and his blood were thoroughly gone. What could have happened in such a short time was beyond me—but I felt a tightening in my throat, thinking of him. Thinking that we wouldn't even be able to bury him, because he was gone. Had someone come by and found him, but missed me, laying against the wall? Were the Seraphim hurtling in this direction, even now? I started to head away from the area, back to where I'd parked my own car, when I saw something else of interest: Airial.

She was in much the same position that I'd been in—against the parking garage wall, slumped between two cars. And she was as unconscious as I had been. I approached her warily, patted her face lightly. Yes, definitely out like a light. …I wondered if where she was was anything like where I'd been. For her sake, I hoped not.

But this was a fated find, surely—someone had dropped her into my hands. I gathered her up carefully in my arms, and discovered, underneath her back, Gaudium Gladius.

It was too much to be believed. Too much good luck! And it shocked me so much that I nearly dropped Airial again.

As it was, I had a hard time picking the sword up with her in my arms, but I managed through sheer force of will.

Sachever, on the other hand, I could not find no matter how I looked. After a few minutes I gave up, afraid that the Seraphim would be coming, or that Airial would wake up, or something. What could he do, now, anyway? He had no magical weapon, and no way of finding us to get it back! He was just a pathetic Deva-lover again. Jack would be so happy! …But I tried not to think of Sidney. Tried not to see his jacket still in the car as I loaded Airial into the backseat, and tired her hands and feet with a few spare cables I found in the trunk, and blindfolded her with my own jacket. And mostly, I tried not to think of Gemma. About what she'd said to us that night, or about what she'd said to me, just then. King of Nothing? Always running? What on Earth was she?—Did I want to know? But even still, I was afraid to think of her, for the same reason I'd been afraid to talk of her with Jack. It seemed to me that merely doing this would allow her access to my head. I didn't want that.

In this haze of not thinking, I barely noticed the long drive, and before I knew it, I was home.

I put Airial down on my bed. Sneaking her into the house had been almost absurdly easy. Jack wasn't home, yet. A few of the Newly Dead had been in the kitchen, but they'd been occupied with something else to the point that they didn't even bother to look up as I passed. Airial was still unconscious—as if Gemma was doing me a favor, for some reason. The thought made me shudder.

I left her hands and feet tied, but undid the sleeves of my jacket from around her eyes. Not much risk of her escaping, and she hadn't seen the way here, anyhow. Now, what to do with Gaudium Gladius was a much bigger issue. Frankly, it felt like it needed to be in a case. Or at the very least, a scabbard. And it had to be far away enough that Airial could not get it through any feat of strength, flexibility, or talent. The closet did not quite seem appropriate, but it had to do for the moment. I myself slumped down against the wall opposite the bed, and slid to the ground, where I put my head between my knees. Yes, I'd done well, all things considered. But it was all too much. How could we operate now, with Sidney dead? He'd made most of the explosives out of those kegs of stolen gunpowder from so long ago. I knew that I couldn't do it. Maybe Jack could learn, or Arthur, or someone, but it could never be the same. Nothing could. I couldn't begin to imagine the house without Sidney in it. Didn't want to. Didn't want to think at all, in fact. It was all too much.

I forced myself to stand up again, after a few minutes, although I would have liked nothing better than to fall asleep there, against the wall. Hopefully as peacefully as Airial appeared to be sleeping. …She was so lovely. All of that dark hair, and skin like cream. She was Thistle's very opposite, I realized vaguely, and then very firmly told myself not to be thinking of Thistle. Ever, in fact. I realized this, while contemplating Airial—that I had to forget Thistle completely, if I wanted to be of any use to Jack. How could I reminisce about someone who had been a traitor? Why should I still miss her? …And why had I put Airial down on her part of the bed, anyway?

Fed up with myself, I left the room, and nearly ran into Magdalena, who was lurking in the hallway.

"What are you doing?" I asked sharply.

"Who, me?" she asked, sounding surprised. "I'm not doing a thing, Lory."

"Oh, cut the crap," I said, suddenly very angry at her. "You're always lurking around doing something. And last time, someone got shot in the head because of it, Magdalena. I'd like to know that it isn't me who's going to be bearing the brunt of it for you, this time. So—right now—tell me what you're doing."

She looked genuinely scared—good, she should have, I thought.

"I-I'm really not doing anything, Lory. I just heard you come in, and I wanted to know what you were doing."

"Oh," I said, "So you're spying on me. That's delightful, isn't it, Magdalena?"

"No, no!" she cried. "Nothing like that! I just wanted to know how things went, is all."

I sighed, and tried to decide if I should tell her. It would probably be better, I decided, to wait until Jack was there.

"I'll tell you later," I said.

She looked disappointed, and started to move past me, down the hallway.

"Wait," I called, thinking of something suddenly. "Magdalena, do you… Do you have any magazines?"

She stopped, turned to look back at me.

"Magazines?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Well, sure," she said, bemused. "But you don't want 'em. They're women's magazines."

"Just give me a couple," I said. "You'll get them back."

"What on earth, Lory?" she asked. "You think I'm being sneaky? What do you want them for?"

"I'll tell you later. When Jack's home."

"No, tell me now," she said. "You're up to no-good, too, aren't you?"

"What kind of no-good would I be up to with women's magazines? Just a couple, Magdalena. Nothing's going to happen to them, and anyway, it's just paper. You're being completely ridiculous."

"No. First you tell me why."

"Fine!" I said, losing my temper. I threw my door open for her to see. She poked her head in, and then gasped, and back out again, closing the door. Then she opened it a crack, peered through, and shut it again. She looked at me.

"Alister Siderius!" she said. She hit my arm. Hard. "What the hell is wrong with you? What did you do to that poor kid? What were you going to do to her?"

"What? Don't be stupid. I didn't do anything to her!"

"Who is she? What's she doing here?" She hit me again, and I backed a few steps away.

"That's Airial," I hissed at her. "Airial Achard. Sachever's bloodhound. I'll explain later about how, but I got her, and the sword, too—Gaudium Gladius! Magdalena, do you know how happy Jack's going to be?"

"She's a human being!" Magdalena screeched. "She's just a little girl!"

"Shut up, Magdalena," I said lowly. "Just go get her some magazines, would you? So that at least she's not bored out of her mind."

She took a step backwards, bit her lip, and looked at me.

"So that's what you wanted them for," she said.

I nodded.

She cocked her head at me, and then shook it slowly. She brushed past me, and went into her and Jack's shared room. After a moment, she came out with a stack of glossy-covered magazines covered with pictures of smiling, fashionable women. She watched me like a hawk as I went back into my bedroom, and put the stack of magazines down in front of Airial.

She was standing in the doorway when I turned around.

"First you kill this poor girl's father," she said. "Then you kidnap her. Then you want to make sure that she doesn't get bored while she's waiting for Jack to decide what to do with her. Lory, I don't know what to think of you. Not at all."

I smiled at her, and guided her away from my door, and down the hall.

"You're not even going to say anything to that, are you?" she asked sharply.

"No," I told her. "I'm not."