The Darkest Gate (7 page)

Something huge snapped. What remained of the roof crashed into the counters with a groan, and for an instant, the world was impossibly hot. His hair burned. His neck blistered. Coals showered around him, stinging his arms and back.

And then the third wind extinguished it all.

With a whisper of a breeze, the house went silent.

James looked up. The counters had taken the brunt of the collapse, leaving them framed with smoking wood and sheltering him from the worst of the debris. He couldn’t get up without moving it, so he didn’t try.

Groaning, he rolled onto his side and brushed plaster dust off his shirt. Chunks of wood crumbled at his touch. He could see stars through what was left of the walls, and the summer breeze felt cold on the places his skin had burned. Betty was still unconscious. He pressed fingers to her throat and found a pulse.

“Thank the Goddess,” he whispered, and then he let himself go limp, too.

Every breath burned his lungs. The chill on his neck had to be bad. And he didn’t care at all.

The voices of men approached as firefighters moved in. James slipped his notebook into his pocket before they grew close.

Then he heard a woman’s voice.

“James!”

He swallowed, coughed, and took a deep breath. “Over here.”

The debris on the counter shifted. Elise threw everything aside, forgetting to pretend she wasn’t preternaturally strong. “Betty!” She dropped beside them. “Is she…?”

“She’s alive.”

Elise let out a sigh. “Good.” And then she turned on him. “What did you think you were doing? Are you
suicidal
?”

He held out a hand, and Elise helped him sit up. The debris at the back of the house was still burning where Alain’s spell had started it, and judging by the amount of smoke, Anthony’s side of the duplex was on fire, too. “Betty was inside. I had to do something.”

“Like dive into a burning building? Why didn’t you stop the fire from the outside?”

“Alain’s magic—”

“Forget it,” Elise interrupted. She threw her arms around him and almost knocked him into one of the smoldering beams. Her grip made his ribs creak and the burned skin on his back ache. “You are such an idiot, James.”

“Ouch,” he said helpfully.

“I’m thanking you for saving Betty. Shut up.”

“Right. Sorry.” He patted her on the back.

“Hey! Over here!”

A firefighter had found them, ending the conversation. Elise stood up. “We’ll talk about this later. Let’s get Betty to the hospital.”

VI

T
he checker behind
the counter swiped Elise’s debit card again. “I’m sorry. This one has been denied, too.”

She pulled a credit card out of her wallet. “Try this one.”

The hospital cafeteria was empty in the middle of the night. Several quiet hours had elapsed since loading Betty into an ambulance, and nothing had happened since the police finished asking questions. The sudden change of pace left her feeling restless, but with her office and home burned, there was nowhere else to go.

Now she was trying to buy a salad for a late dinner, and it was much harder than it should have been. Both her personal and business debit cards had already been denied twice. She could tell by the apologetic look that her credit card wasn’t coming up any different.

“Sorry,” he said, handing it back. “Maybe it’s a problem with our system.”

She gave him a ten dollar bill and took her salad back to the waiting room.

The lettuce tasted like tissue in her mouth, dry and flavorless. Maybe it was the dissatisfaction of having her cards denied, or the lingering taste of ash, but she dumped it in the trash after two bites.

She stretched out between two chairs, pillowed her head on her arms, and tried to focus on the television mounted in the corner. She had never been able to sleep in public before—in fact, she didn’t even sleep when Anthony spent the night with her—but fading adrenaline and stress mingled to overtake her.

She could barely find the energy to fill her lungs. Every breath was slower and deeper than the last.

The news was reporting on the fire. Pundits discussed rising crime rates.

Elise’s eyes drooped. The figures blurred.

She stretched with a yawn, trying to force her eyelids open. What if someone found her? What if she was attacked?

But she sank into her chair again as the news flickered in front of her, and her eyes fell closed. A dark and endlessly vast space settled around her. It sank into her skin and weighed upon her bones. Air ruffled the hair at the back of her neck.

Someone was calling her name.

Elise…

Fear thrilled through her stomach. She could still see the dim light of the news and hear them discuss investigations and arson. But the room wavered around her.

A pillar grew in front of her like a stone tree sprouting. It was wrapped with thick lines and glowing symbols at the base. It was soapy-white, unnaturally smooth. The pillar arced over her head, and she watched as the other end touched the earth and formed a gateway.

Not here. Not again
.

She struggled to focus on the TV, but her eyelashes were glued shut.

“A home in downtown Reno burned last night in an incident the police suspect to be arson…” The newscaster’s smile stretched and blurred. Her eyes sank into her skull, leaving black pits in their place. “You deserved it, didn’t you? You’re going to lose everything.”

Her hand reached through the gateway, grin huge and looming. Pale fingers filled her vision.

“I see you, Elise.”

Her voice echoed through the air.

I see you
…

Elise’s eyes flew open as her hand closed on a wrist. She wrenched her attacker off his feet. Her other hand went to the back of her shorts, where she kept a knife.

“It’s me, Elise, it’s me!”

The haze lifted, and she realized the blurry face in front of her belonged to James.

Suddenly, she wasn’t in that dark place anymore. She was in a quiet hospital with tan carpeting, bare walls, and murmuring nurses. She released him, sat up, and cradled her head in both palms. “Sorry,” she said, blinking hard to clear her vision. Her heart thudded as though she had been running.

James sank to his knees next to the chair. He had ashy smudges on his chin and a bandage across the back of his neck. “Are you okay?”

“Fine.” She wiped sweat off her upper lip with the back of her glove. “I’m fine. What do the doctors say?”

“I’m all right, so I’ve been discharged, but Betty needs to stay the night. She inhaled a lot of smoke and has second-degree burns on ten percent of her body. Anthony will be here soon to stay with her.” He offered Elise his hand. She ignored it and got up on her own.

“Will she be okay?”

“Yes, but she’s in a lot of pain. They’ve sedated her so she can sleep.” The careful way he spoke told Elise there was more to the story that he didn’t want to say. They took the elevator to the first floor and went outside, and he continued once they were alone in the parking lot. “I think she was poisoned. Drugged.”

Elise got into the car. “The wine.”

“Most likely. That fire was meant to kill her.”

“No, it was meant to kill
me
.”

“He was surely tracking the cross and knew you weren’t there. If Mr. Black wanted us dead, he would be more overt. I think he’s trying to—well, punish us.”

Her jaw clenched. “Fantastic. Where are we going?”

“The studio. You can’t stay at the duplex anymore, and it’s one of the only places with strong enough warding to stand up to Mr. Black.”

That was optimistic of him. Elise wasn’t sure an entire fortress would be strong enough. “Thanks. I’ll find a hotel or something tomorrow. There isn’t enough room for Betty and Anthony at the studio, and we’re all homeless now.”

“Actually…” He hesitated. Cleared his throat. “There are two bedrooms in my apartment, and I’m staying with Stephanie. That leaves plenty of room for all of you.”

“You should stay with us. Stephanie’s house isn’t warded, either.”

“Her old house wasn’t,” James agreed.

She shot a sideways look at him. He had always taken their lifestyle with grace. Even covered in soot, he didn’t seem as beaten as she did. His black hair looked artfully tousled, while hers was a tangled mess of curls.

“But?”

“She’s moved.”

The terse response made her uneasy. But it wasn’t until they got to the studio again that she realized exactly what it meant.

The last couple of times she had been there, she assumed the disarray meant he was cleaning. But now she saw that his most important belongings were gone. The photography prints, his kitchen utensils, his altar. She followed him into his bedroom and realized half of his bookshelves were empty. She didn’t have to check the closet to know his clothes would be gone, too.

It didn’t look like a place where someone lived. It looked more like long-term storage.

Why hadn’t she noticed earlier?

James gathered fresh blankets from the linen closet and tried to get a fitted sheet over the mattress. Elise took the other end and helped him pull it over the corner.

He changed pillowcases and folded the comforter at the foot of the bed. “There you go. Should be comfortable.” When she didn’t respond, James studied her face with deep furrows carved into his forehead. He misinterpreted her angry silence. “We’ll figure this out. We defeated Mr. Black once, and we can do it again.”

“I’m not worried about it,” she said.

“You don’t have to lie to me.”

That almost made her laugh. Funny, coming from the man who had moved out of his apartment and hadn’t bothered to tell her. “I should rest.”

He nodded. “I’ll sleep on the couch. I’m too tired to drive, and heaven knows where Mr. Black is right now.”

“I can take the couch.”

“You need the rest much more than I do.” James reached out to tug on one of the curls in her ponytail. “You look terrible, Elise.”

“Yeah. Thanks. We can talk more about Mr. Black when sunrise hits.”

“A whole two hours of sleep,” he said. “I can hardly wait.”

Elise watched his retreating back before shutting the door. His room felt strangely vacant without him in it.

She wasn’t sure if the tension in her shoulders was from James or Mr. Black. Either way, her urge to sleep had completely vanished. She changed into a spare t-shirt and sweat pants from her laundry pile and splashed water on her face in the bathroom, trying to cool her parched skin.

In the light from the vanity bulbs over the mirror, she really did look terrible. Hollow eyes stared back at her from a face that seemed gaunter than it had the day before. Her auburn hair was fraying from its ponytail. Her tan skin was gray. There was no color to her lips or cheeks. A droplet of water shivered from the hard point of her chin, and she brushed it off.

All those worries crept back in twofold. Insurance company. Landlord—both for her office building and her duplex. The police would have even more questions. Her dwindling client list. All those unpaid bills.

Her gaze traveled to her wallet where she had dropped it on the back of the toilet. Denied credit cards.

A sense of foreboding filled her as she went back to the bedroom and turned on his laptop. She could hear James moving around downstairs, just as restless and unwilling to sleep as she was.

She logged onto her bank’s website. Her heart skipped a beat at the account totals.

Two dollars and fifty-three cents.

Impossible
.

She should have had hundreds in checking and thousands more in savings. But it was all gone. There were errors where her credit card statements should have shown.

Somehow, she knew if she called the bank, they would have her on record as having made the withdrawals.

“Burning my home wasn’t enough?” she whispered.

Of course not. Mr. Black didn’t do things halfway.

She stared blankly at a pair of loafers James had left behind. Without money or her home, all she had left was her car—and she could imagine waking up the next morning to find that stolen, too. The only clothes she had were exercise gear, which were now covered in dirt and debris, and some tattered sweats. Besides that, her total assets amounted to two dollars and fifty-three cents and a pair of falchions locked in a gun safe.

No money. No house. No job.

She dialed a number on her cell phone before she realized she had made the decision.

“That didn’t take long,” purred the Night Hag. That hard, ancient voice gave Elise chills.

“I’ve changed my mind.”

“And why is that?”

“It doesn’t matter. But if I’m going to work for you, I need a salary. Money isn’t a problem for you. I know; I’ve seen your books. You own all the demon businesses in the city.”

A snort. “Greedy, hmm?”

“The bills don’t pay themselves.”

“And everybody has a price. Apparently I’ve found yours.” The demand didn’t seem to anger the Night Hag. If anything, she sounded appreciative. “Consider yourself salaried. But if I’m bleeding money for you, I’ll expect you to earn it. And I need a commitment.”

Elise braced herself. “I know.”

“Excellent.”

She heard a
snap
on the other side of the line.

Something whip-cracked through the air, something intangible that reeked of ozone, and Elise felt a hot sting on her shoulder. She pulled down the strap of her shirt and twisted around to peer at the shoulder blade. A brand the size of a penny had appeared, comprised of eight curling lines inside a circle. Blood trickled down her back.

She was marked—just like any demon in the service of a master.

“My witch will be visiting soon. Can’t wait to get started.”

The Night Hag chuckled as she hung up.

P
ART
T
HREE

Loyalty

MAY 1999

S
hortly after meeting
with Mr. Black at the Pledger Bistro, Elise told James she needed to see a doctor.

“Have you been injured?” he asked, propping his head up on an arm. James was stretched out on the floor, paralyzed by early summer heat in a hotel room that had no air conditioner.