Gremlin Night Page 13

  “Thanks,” I said.

  He didn’t answer. “Okay, well, good luck,” I said.

  He turned and headed through the door.

  “Be careful,” I called after him. The door closed with a heavy thump.

  He was definitely not happy to we were going in different directions. A few hours ago, I would have chalked that up as a win, but now I felt like a jerk. But he was a rookie. We had to do this, and he had to roll with my judgement.

  I just hoped I’d made the right decision.

  11

  The teleportal in Therese’s house was in the basement, in a side room. It was a one way. The easiest sort of teleportal. It went to the R.U.N.E. garage in Northwest. If it came from the garage, Farlance or another R.U.N.E. manager could have checked on Therese, only it wouldn’t have mattered. Protocol regarding sentinels was clear. They contacted you, not the other way around. They were tuned into the mana flux and the magical connections. Which made them vulnerable, but they needed space and isolation to sit, like arcane spiders, in their webs, waiting for a disturbance.

  Not a life I’d have chosen.

  I didn’t know anything about Therese Sprig, other than she obviously cared about a manifestation, had been good at her job, and had been dying of some sort of nasty cancer. And that she’d been smart and determined enough, despite the terminal illness, to make her death count.

  The teleportal was a wooden blue door, set in a painted white frame, in the middle of a brick wall. It had been here for ages.

  The thing about teleportals was, once they were created, they were permanent. You couldn’t just switch them off. No, you were stuck with them.

  I grasped the glass door knob, and turned the handle. An ordinary person would not have been able to use the teleportal. An ordinary person would have seen only a bricked-up space, to match the brick wall.

  In other words, it would have led nowhere.

  Not so for me.

  A midnight black corridor stretched beyond the portal, and, at the far end, a garage filled with vehicles glimmered, lit by overhead lighting just out of my field of view.

  My stomach flip-flopped as I stepped through the doorway. An instant later I stood in the garage.

  Behind me was blank concrete wall. Steel girders spanned the ceiling above me, holding the roof up.

  My stomach settled down. I glanced around me, and rubbed my hands together. I knew exactly what vehicle I needed.

  I didn’t just wear the biker chick jacket because I liked how it looked. I loved bikes. I didn’t get to ride often, which was to say, almost never.

  My heart beat faster when I saw the Ducati Monster. All black, except where it wasn’t, and where it wasn’t, it was carbon-fiber. My heart pounded just looking at it. Down girl, I told myself. But, still this was the perfect motorcycle for tonight. Okay, pretty much every night for me, but especially tonight.

  A locker nearby held various sizes of helmets. You had any choice of color you wanted, as long as it was black, which suited me just fine.

  The button to open the garage door was emerald green, set in an ancient oaken base on the wall beside the motorcycles. Sigils shaped like scales were carved in the wood. This was troll magic, perfect for bridges.

  I straddled the Ducati. My right hand twisted the throttle, and I felt the engine’s rumble between my thighs. The open garage door showed a clear night, street lights illuminating a deserted street in the industrial district. I reached to flip down my visor and zoom off when a comet trailing golden sparks flew into the garage and over to me.

  The new messenger sprite was back. It looked the same, not surprising since it was brand-new.

  “What now?” I groused.

  “Update,” it replied, its high-pitched little voice cracking.

  I cut the engine so I could hear it better, and focus. “What is it?” I hoped the Gremlins hadn’t started manifesting in multiple locations simultaneously. That had happened once to me and Tomlinson with shadows. It had been a royal pain to clean up.

  “Another manifestation at the bank site.”

  Worry wormed its way into my stomach. “Not a gremlin?”

  “No—unknown exactly what, but it is complicating matters. Genie unable to provide more intelligence.”

  If Therese had been alive she likely could have I.D.’d the new player. If I hadn’t sent Tully off to find Sylvas, he’d have been able to spot the new player from a distance.

  I shrugged to myself. I’d just have to do it myself, in my own way.

  “Thanks for the update. Get some rest,” I told the sprite. “You look terrible.”

  “Must do as the circumstances require,” the sprite said. It suddenly looked ancient, tiny face covered in wrinkles, hair gone white.

  “You need to rest and recharge. Or you’ll be gone long before morning.”

  “We do what we must,” the sprite said. “Our duty is to bring messages, no matter how little mana there is for us to absorb.”

  It departed, slower than it had arrived, trailing fewer sparks.

  Could whoever or whatever was siphoning mana be doing it on a city-wide scale? It seemed impossible, but something had apparently sucked up much of the mana in the vicinity. That said, arcane nature also abhors a vacuum, so more mana would move in. But, it wouldn’t be fast enough to save the new sprite. My chest ached.

  “Never get attached to manifestations,” they told me at the Academy. Especially new ones. I’d failed that test as well.

  I flipped my visor down and started the Ducati again, and roared out of the garage, the door rolling shut behind me.

  The police were already on scene when I arrived. I parked the Ducati on a side street a block away, and peered around the corner at the bank across the street, rubbing my arms. There was a small crowd of people clustered around the two ATMs on the outside of the building. People snatched at the clouds of twenties spewing from the ATMs. The paper money swirled around in little mini-dust devils, blowing out into the street.

  A passing car screeched to a halt. The driver jumped out, and started snatching at the twenties that rapidly covered his car.

  People stuffed money into their coats, purses, backpacks. The ATMs continued spewing torrents of paper money. More people ran up, grabbing at the flying bills.

  But that wasn’t even the weirdest part. The weirdest part was, even though the ATMs had to be malfunctioning, there was no sign of gremlins. The street lights shone like normal. The two police cruisers parked in front of the bank were empty, and there was no sign of the police.

  This was where I really missed Tully’s magical sight. He could have pinpointed the gremlin and whatever this other manifestation was. And, annoying though he seemed to be, at least at times, he was someone to bounce ideas off of.

  Something moved in the shadowy space between the bank and the next building, across from me. I squinted, trying to make out what it was. For an instant, I thought I glimpsed a silhouette of a tall, skeletal figure, but I blinked and it was gone. I really could have used Tully right then.

  I crossed the street at a half crouch, passing the man plucking twenties off his car and shoving them inside his coat. He ignored me. I reached the planters and crouched down just as the doors to the bank swung open.

  The lights inside flickered madly. Obviously, gremlin or gremlins cavorted inside the building, spreading malfunction and chaos. I narrowed my eyes, trying to focus on the faint, wispy tendrils of magic I thought I glimpsed streaming from the bank.

  Silver light flickered inside.

  Two police officers walked out, casually, like they were heading for coffee. My hackles rose. What gave? That made no sense at all. They went to either side of the bank steps, and stood, hands on hips. They were both women, trim and about my age. Both were blonde and white.

  “Deal with her,” I heard a male voice say nearby. I whirled around but there was no one there. My heart pounded in my ears.

  A gremlin darted past the bank’s open doors, skidding t
o a stop between the police officers, grinning its stupid grin. The police didn’t react.

  “Hee-hee!” Its laughter was an insane giggle.

  The money snatching mob also completely ignored the gremlin.

  Another hide-the-magic spell like back at the strip mall? I looked around again, trying to see if I could see any signs of a spell. Nothing.

  The gremlin was right here. I could deal with it then figure out what was cloaking it from the ordinaries.

  I drew Tully’s exquisite wand and gestured at the gremlin, ending with a snap of my wrist and the wand’s tip pointing straight at the center of the gremlin.

  “I banish you!” I commanded in Italian. The gremlin turned to black smoke.

  I braced myself for the cops’ reaction.

  They ignored the whole thing, continuing to standing there at the top of the steps.

  Another gremlin ran from the bank, then a third. A fourth.

  My hand shook as I clenched Tully’s wand. Spellfire, but this didn’t look good. The sprite had said one other manifestation was here, and strongly implying it wasn’t another gremlin, so what was the deal?

  The four new gremlins flickered and my hand stopped shaking. Level zeroes. Brand new, still only-barely-here manifestations. These I could deal with.

  I cast a simple Dispel. My head throbbed, but not with the avalanche of pain it would have been if I’d been forced to do another banish so quickly after the first.

  The four gremlins vanished in a shower of sparks and I let myself grin.

  There, that was easy.

  But that left the crowd and the cops. The thing was, none of them paid any more attention to my spellcasting than they had the now-vanished gremlins. But they should have reacted. They probably wouldn’t have seen the full deal, but still some strangeness would have intruded. They certainly would have seen the sparks and heard my words. Their minds would have tried to make sense out of what they did see. A few who had greater intrinsic awareness of the arcane might have seen the blue and purple glow of magic.

  That’s when I spotted a familiar-looking figure cowering behind a lamp post. I frowned. It was the guy I’d last seen cowering outside the strip mall a couple of hours ago. What was he doing here?

  His face was ashen white and his eyes wide.

  He was the single ordinary who had reacted to what I’d just done. He stared at where the gremlins had been and then at me. The crowd continued to snatch at the swirling cloud of money still spewing from the ATM.

  “What’s going on?” he wailed. The crowd ignored him.

  Curses. “Sir! Remember me?” I asked him, giving him the fake name that I’d used before. I walked over, and crouched beside him, trying to look reassuring.

  He gestured at the police. “Why aren’t the cops reacting? They are just standing there.” He brushed his long hair from his eyes. “What were you doing? And what were those strange creatures?” He looked at me desperately.

  Strange creatures. Double curses. Not just monkeys, but creatures. I had to come up with a rationalization on the spot. This wasn’t my forte. Not one bit. Binders don’t have to persuade ordinaries that the bizarre thing they are seeing they really aren’t seeing. That’s what Persuaders do. Not my type of sorcery at all.

  But, what choice did I have? I had to come up with something, like it or not.

  The man’s eyes were wide. He held on to a walking stick. Silver rings flashed on his fingers.

  I’d seen rings like those tonight, but where?

  I tried to make my fuzzy brain remember, but just then a tall, slender figure appeared out of the shadows. It wore a tall, old-style black hat and matching black suit. The hat and suit were fashioned from a fabric that gleamed like a crow’s feathers, and what may have been a feathery fringe, it was hard to tell in the dark.

  The man shrank against me, eyes wide, filled with panic. “Wh-at i-s that?” He asked in a tiny voice.

  The clothes it wore were out of the nineteenth century, but the wrap-around sunglasses were modern.

  “I’m here to help with this play.” The figure brought two fingers to its mouth and whistled. It was a piercing sound.

  Strands of silver light played like lighting over the crowd, which began glowing silver in turn and then blinked out of existence. The two blonde police officers, the car in the road, the scattered fortune of twenty-dollar bills, all of it, vanished as well. The bank’s doors were closed, the ATMs sat silent.

  “There, that’s better,” the figure trilled.

  I shook myself, swallowed. “I request your identity,” I said, my voice a squeak. “I invoke the Compact.” I said the spell in English. An illusion. The whole thing had been an illusion. I’d been messed with. The question was, why?

  The manifestation smiled a wide smile. “Your compact doesn’t apply to me.”

  That wasn’t how it worked. My spell must have fizzled. Had I already used English three times this night? I couldn’t remember. There had been too much craziness along the way.

  I could try the spell again, but it would be harder.

  It stretched its arms wide, in an overblown gesture. “I am the Lord of Chaos.”

  I blinked. He didn’t seem like an arcane lord. But I couldn’t tell. If Tully were here, he’d be able to, but somebody had sent him off on a different mission.

  “Name, please,” I said.

  Crazy pants laughter erupted from the manifestation.

  “Sorry, but sounds are not a substitute for a bona fide name.” I felt like an idiot quoting from the Laws of the Compact, but I didn’t know what else to do. “Please declare yourself.”

  The manifestation loomed. “Call me Mister Trickster.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Please. You’ve got to be kidding me.” This was ridiculous. This thing was way too over the top to be an actual trickster.

  It bowed from the waist. “At your service.”

  I snapped my fingers. “Hah! If you were a trickster, that would be the last thing you’d be saying.”

  It laid a long finger hand against its brow. “How can you imply that a true trickster doesn’t serve mankind?”

  “For one thing, it’s humankind, not just mankind.” I drew Tully’s wand. “Second, the law is the law, which you’re apparently ignorant of, but that’s no excuse.”

  “You mistake me,” Mister Trickster said, and laughed again.

  It was super creepy.

  “Don’t worry,” I whispered in the direction of my cowering companion. “You’ll be okay.”

  No answer. I glanced around. There was no one there. He was gone, taking his knowledge of what he’d seen here with him. That was a problem.

  “This is no time for wands,” Mister Trickster said. He snapped his fingers and Tully’s wand flew from my fingers.

  I snatched at the wand but my fingers just missed it.

  The wand clattered on the sidewalk. I dove after it, but impossibly, it rolled away.

  “Get back here!” I darted after it.

  It rolled into the street. Headlights shone and a big panel van roared toward me. I threw up my hands to shield my eyes, staying out of the street. I’d lose that argument in a heartbeat. The van sped past. Wood snapped and my heart with it.

  There was a flash of purple. The van drove off. I ran out into the street. The wand had splintered into a hundred pieces. Tully would kill me.

  But that was impossible. Wands didn’t just snap. They were made by dryads working with artificers.

  I smelled an illusion. I whirled back around and looked at the Trickster. Sure enough, it held Tully’s wand in its bony fingers.

  “Give that back!” I said.

  “Make me,” it replied, sounding suddenly like a five-year old. It twiddled the wand, stroked it, then brought it up to its lips. “Perhaps I discover that I enjoy the taste of wand.”

  “You’ll break a tooth,” I said.

  “Are you so sure?” It laughed again. That laugh was like fingernails on the proverbial blackboard
. It opened its mouth, revealing rows of needle-like teeth.

  The problem with illusions that really worked is that they twisted reality to the point where you didn’t know which way was up.

  A chorus of hee-hees erupted from the bank. It sounded like a horde of gremlins. If it was, I was well and truly hosed. But again, that’s illusions for you. They tricked you. Just like gremlins and would-be tricksters.

  I needed to put a stop to this. Pronto.

  Which meant I had to use the verboten blood magic. Good thing Tully wasn’t around, or Dara Kind for that matter. She’d have a field day with this.

  I fumbled around for my special item.

  The trickster’s jaws snapped and the wand split in two. It laughed again. Showing me rows upon rows of knife-like teeth, all free of shards and splinters.

  “You see, your fear was for nothing.” Its left hand held Tully’s wand. It looked intact.

  Unless, of course, the wand still wasn’t there. I fought the urge to look around for it.

  My fingers brushed against the barbed amulet pricking my index finger. Sloppy, Liz, I told myself, real sloppy.

  “One last time,” I said. “Declare yourself!”

  The trickster gave a “you-have-to-be kidding” look, its eyebrows arching and lips smirking. “I’ve already told you my name.”

  “You’ve told me a made-up silly title,” I said. “Not your name.” There was a difference. Manifestations had true names, that sprung from their essence, which came from the collective subconscious.

  “That is all you’ll get.”

  “Pretty uppitty for a newbie manifestation,” I said. “What are you, level 1?”

  It snickered, twiddled its fingers. “You have not begun to see my anger,” it said, face a sudden thundercloud.

  “Touchy, too,” I said, and ran my left hand around the edges of my blood magic amulet. Agony convulsed my hand. I bit my lip to keep from crying out and continued my spell.

  “I take your essence and bind it to me,” I said. I gestured with my right hand, while my left felt like it was on fire. “I take the source and sever you from it.”