Blue Magic (26 page)

A burst of tactical information wrapped up the bulletin: Sahara Knax remained in custody. Gilead Landon’s whereabouts were unknown. Alchemites had been sighted in Elko, Nevada. Roche was in Washington, D.C., meeting with the joint chiefs and the president.

The sooner he remade the past, the better, Will thought.

“… ideally, a combat medic.” Janet’s voice pulled him back to the here and now.

“I’ll get our People Peeps on it,” Pike said cheerily.

Will asked: “Hiring a replacement?”

“An assistant, anyway,” Janet said.

“Nobody would blame you if you wanted off the strike team.”

Her smile was a little worn; for the first time, she looked her age. “After Lucius grabbed me, you mean?”

“You got hurt in Atlanta too. And Sahara’s threat—”

“Implied that next time I won’t be so lucky. Boss ask you to trauma-counsel me?” She led him out into Bigtop, past a crew that had gathered up a few thousand plastic water bottles. They were filling them with liquid magic—part of some dispersal plan, presumably, that Will hadn’t heard about yet.

“Astrid didn’t send me, Janet. We’re friends, remember?”

She plopped down on a log bench. “I’m still in Limbo, Will. Yesterday’s excitement didn’t move my portrait to the Big Picture.”

“We still have time to save you.”

“Maybe.”

“You’re saying you don’t care?”

“Of course I care, Will. I’m not looking to die.”

“Sounds to me like there’s a
but
coming.”

She shrugged. “I had a son and daughter, you know, same as you.”

“Had?”

“Brad hanged himself in ’93. As for Sally … Last I heard, she had a conservative husband and an SUV and four lovely children. We’re not speaking.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t mean nothing,” she said.

“People get out of Limbo, Janet. Ev did. Olive—”

“This isn’t a counseling session, right? We’re just two friends hanging out?”

“Of course.”

“Your youngest thinks you’re Satan, Will Forest. You saw your wife burned to shit. You’re having an on-again off-again romance with the closest thing this earth has to a deity. You feel like talking about that?”

He felt his jaw dropping, tried to pass it off with a chuckle. “You’re telling me to back off.”

“I’m a tough old bird, and I’m committed to this fight. Getting grabbed by a lunatic patient—”

“Watching him commit suicide,” he interrupted.

“It hardly comes up on my radar.”

“Still,” he said. “If you could rewrite the past.”

“I wouldn’t change a thing,” Janet said. She reached into her satchel, pulling out a black cashmere sweater. Bunching it, she pressed it to her face, inhaling—then passed it over.

Cautious, Will sniffed. The sweater smelled of laundry fresh from the dryer, and he flashed on a summer backpacking trip across Greece. He was twenty, standing at the temple of Delphi in the pouring rain, kissing a Danish girl in a cotton dress. The rest of the tour group had fled the storm.

Every sensation was as vivid as it had been that day: the warm rain sluicing over their bodies, caramel-colored mud spurting everywhere—the way it felt to neck with a stranger in the navel of the world.

“Wow,” he said.

“No offense, but I’ll take magic over therapy,” Janet said. Having reclaimed the sweater, she strode away.

Will was about to follow, when Astrid joined him on the bench. She had gotten so good at the mouse magic that he had to lay a finger on her to check … but, yes, her skin was cold.

“If it looks like me, it ain’t,” she reminded him. “I’m only allowed out in disguise.”

“Right.” By disguise she meant a magic scarf that made her look like a nondescript middle-aged guy.

“You’ve been keeping to yourself,” she said.

Guilt intruded on his magically induced bubble of cheer: it was one thing to plan to wipe out this bizarre empire, another to lie to Astrid’s face. “I’ve been making chantments.”

“Powerful ones, some of them.”

“Maybe, but it’s still only toys that have sparkle.”

“You’re doing what my father did,” she said.

She meant that Albert Lethewood had kept his vitagua exposure to a minimum. The grumbles brought disorientation and knowledge of the future. It had scared Albert, and Will could certainly sympathize with that.

But Astrid was right: Albert had never been much of a chanter. It was getting drenched in vitagua that had accelerated her development as a well wizard.

“Grumbles can’t guide you if you don’t listen,” she said.

“It’s like chatting with a lion who’s planning to eat you,” Will said.

“They’re not that hostile,” she said.

“Okay, I’ll take on a bit more.” None of this was going to happen, after all. He would be changing the past.

After removing his ring, Will drew fluid from the forest floor, letting vitagua seep into him. Cold magic filled his nose and throat. Choking, he yanked his hand back. “Alchemites are asking us for sanctuary.”

“When?” Astrid said.

“Ugh, this is awful.” He groped: “I think … now.”

Thrashing in the forest beyond the ravine, followed by a scream, interrupted them.

Clouds of wasps formed around the periphery of Bigtop. As Will watched, Astrid raised the level of vitagua in the mulch, transforming the forest floor to impassable swamp. Spotlights shone down from a dozen umbrellas hung in the forest canopy, swiveling to focus on a single point.

Mark and Jupiter appeared in the beam, marching a young woman between them. Vines bound her arms; she was barefoot and had a bad burn on one shoulder. Her clothes were tattered, her hair matted and dirty. She’d fallen in vitagua more than once: she was changing into a pigeon.

“Just a girl,” Astrid murmured. “Come on, Will—let’s follow them to the hospital. We’ll test this doppelgänger trick of mine on a stranger.”

“Okay.” He suppressed an interior shudder: he found her ringers creepy.

They trotted to Emergency, where Janet, clad in the magic cashmere sweater, was examining the girl. It was hard to be sure, because of the pigeon features altering her face, but she looked about fourteen.

“Is she carrying any chantments, Will?” Astrid asked.

Will closed his eyes, trying to sense magic, and felt nothing. Instead, he frisked her. “Just this hairbrush.”

“Can you tell what it is?”

“It let her wiggle through the growth—it’s how she got through the forest.”

An orderly glowered. “We’re treating Alchemites now?”

“Shut up, Bernie. She’s a kid,” Janet said.

The girl was staring at Astrid.

“You gonna call me the Filthwitch to my face?” Astrid asked, but her voice was gentle.

She struggled against her bonds. “They’re frying everyone, all of us.”

“You shouldn’t have tortured that fellow you captured,” Jupiter said. “Pissed ’em off.”

“That wasn’t me,” she said. “Please, there are Fyremen everywhere. Wherever we fly, they’re waiting.”

Mark laughed. “You’re asking us for protection?”

“Wait here with the medics, okay?” Astrid pulled the men aside. “What do you think? Can we help her?”

“Are you serious?” Mark said.

“One of these Alchemites must know where that padlock chantment is. They give it up, we can fix Will’s daughter.”

Will was surprised by the flare of hope. Had he given up on Astrid too soon?

“It’s risky,” Mark said. “If we give them access to town, to Bramblegate and the plaza—”

“No, we can’t just bring them here. But I want to stop the executions.”

“You don’t owe them anything, Astrid,” Mark said.

“Of course not,” Will said. “Why would she?”

“If they all come to the forest, it allows the Fyremen and Roche to focus on us.”

“If we don’t, Landon will fry them all.”

The words stirred up the memory of Caro, her fine blond hair afire, her mouth open in a scream. All for Sahara …

“Nobody’s touched our satellite bases in Europe,” Mark said.

“We’re talking thousands of Alchemites.” Astrid frowned. “They’ll have to be nearby if we’re going to protect them. We don’t want them having a lot of chantments. And they’ll be praying to Sahara.”

“I don’t want that in my face.”

“No,” Astrid agreed. “We can’t ask the volunteers to suck that up.”

The volunteers,
Will thought.
Not her?
Something had shifted in Astrid’s feelings toward Sahara since the massacre at the courthouse.

Maybe seeing her childhood crush object use a sick old man as a human shield stripped away her last illusions
.

“Astrid,” Mark said. “They’ll vamp us all and pick our bones.”

“This is a chance to stop them vamping altogether,” Astrid said. “We’ll make them forget the cantation.”

“Even if you do, they can’t stay in town,” Will said. “Mark’s right—we’d have riots.”

“I agree. We’ll set them up in the forest, close to here.”

Mark said. “Astrid, talk sense. The Alchemites hung their own asses out—”

If it doesn’t work, I can still rewrite the past,
Will thought. “Didn’t you tell me there was a ghost town nearby? Cabins, running water, that kind of thing?”

“Tishvale,” Astrid said. “Good idea.”

Mark groaned. “You’ll bring the Fyremen down on us.”

“Time we should go after the Fyremen,” Will said.

Astrid shrugged. “Go after them how? Our seers can’t find ’em.…”

“Do it the old-fashioned way,” Will said. “Investigate.”

“Wow! We never thought of that,” Mark said.

“You don’t have to be sarcastic,” Astrid said.

“Will, we’ve got people going through Chief Lee’s house,” Mark said. “Scavengers are searching for the fire hall.”

“Sahara’s people might help there,” Astrid said. “They know things about the Fyremen. If we shelter them, they’ll have to tell us everything.”

“So who does what?” Will said.

“Alchemites won’t talk to me,” Astrid said.

“Will’s the negotiator,” Mark said. “Let him wheel and deal.”

“Sounds good,” Will said, ignoring his snarky tone.

“I’ll set up the ghost town,” Astrid said, and another full-grown ringer, blue in color, crawled out of the ravine. Clothes and skin grew over its nude body, and red curls spilled over its torn right ear.

Shuddering, Will focused on the Alchemite.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

WENDOVER HAD A PERPETUAL
smell of spent jet fuel and scorched grass, a sere, acrid atmosphere that, along with the heat and the glare of the sun reflecting off the salt flats, made the whole place seem inhospitable, like the surface of the moon. At first, the base staff seemed to marvel at its novelty. Now that the judge had declared a mistrial—what else could he do, with seven defendants dead?—people had been going out as little as possible. They blamed the heat, but Juanita sensed something else: a feeling of impending defeat, perhaps, like the surrender of an injured animal that curls up in a patch of shade, waiting to die.

She had taken to running around the barracks and administration buildings, escaping from the desperation pervading the base while she contemplated her own diminishing options.

Gilead was on the loose, out running up his body count and playing to the press. But he hadn’t killed every Alchemite at Wendover, and once the survivors pulled themselves together, Juanita knew she would be back under their thumb.

She couldn’t handle that anymore.

Which left Astrid Lethewood and her offer of help.

Would Lethewood do any more good than Gilead? What if she was another murderous magician, like Sahara? Even assuming she could protect Juanita’s family, what would she want in return?

Will Forest trusted Astrid. She had tried to release Lucius Landon.

But she too had killed someone.

She also confessed, took responsibility.

If that was true: Gilead called her a Lady of Lies.

Gilead is a homicidal maniac.

Does that make his facts wrong?

Facts? What facts? False prophets, remember?

“Corazón!” Judge Skagway’s voice broke her out of the mental tailspin. He was in his sports chair, volleying a tennis ball off the barracks wall.

She trotted to his side. “Your Honor.”

“I’ve been trying to get us out of here—you, me, the rest of the Federal Court staff. Roche is stonewalling.”

Out of here. Could it be that simple? No, Sahara would chase her in dreams no matter where she went.

“What about the trial?”

“I’d order selection of a second jury … if Roche could guarantee their security from beasts and mad wizards.”

“I’d have thought he’d want us out of here.”

“Us, maybe. Since we’d be taking Knax with us…”

Of course. On paper, Sahara wasn’t in military custody; that was why Juanita and the other marshals were here. “He doesn’t want to give her up?”

“He wants her dead.” He smashed the ball, racing to catch it on the rebound. “I told the Attorney General this could work. Told him we could try her openly—that American law could handle this magical outburst.”

“It was a good try, Your Honor, we just…”

The judge caught the whizzing tennis ball, wheeling to face her as he braked his chair, as graceful as a mountain lion. “What if we did take her out of here?”

“Pardon?”

“You’re a resourceful woman. If we transfer Sahara out, can you hang on to her without military backing?”

She was ice cold. “No.”

“If she was drugged … unconscious? Come on, Corazón, take a chance for me. I refuse to believe a bunch of cultists, however well armed, is invincible.”

“I…” the words caught. “I’ll have to think about it.”

He beamed, bathing her in that affectionate, fatherly glow she found so irresistible. “That’s all I ask.”

She bit her lips against an urge to tell him everything. Then, as temptation receded, she found she felt less burdened. Now she
had
to see if Lethewood could help. It wasn’t selfishness at all.