I returned home with pizza and breadsticks, helped Emma with her vocabulary, and then settled in for the night. I’d never made it to the station, but I planned on being there first thing in the morning.
My dreams that night were a rehashing of Ahkneri’s battle, Alessandra’s eerie head spouting off prophecies, and random bits of me and Hank, his torture, and the fight against the Circe.
By the time I woke, I felt like I’d relived a couple lifetimes in just a few hours. I took a cool shower to wake me up, ate breakfast with Emma and Rex, and then dropped Em off at the League of Mages school before continuing to the station.
“Well done, Madigan.” The chief clapped me on the shoulder as I entered our work space. He must’ve decided that wasn’t enough because he pulled me into a bear hug. “Well done.” He set me back, the look in his eyes warm and fatherly. Then he winked at me and went right back to work mode. “You’re going to have one hell of a report to file, so better hop to it. And don’t forget to file a report on the oracle as well. Sian will send a copy over to the folks in Ithonia. Glad to have you back.”
“Has Hank been in yet?”
“He’s over in legal giving a statement.” The chief grabbed a file off his desk. “I’ll be back after noon. Ashton’s in the process of following up a lead, but he’s got until the end of the week to get his reports and notes together on the Grove case, then it’s back over to you and Hank.”
“I’m sure he loved hearing that.”
The chief gave a merciless shrug. “He knew all along he was just filling in. Good to have you back, Madigan.”
“Thanks, Chief.”
The chief barreled out of the office. Sian finished making coffee in the small kitchenette, and offered me a cup. “You should’ve seen his face when he found out you and Hank had come through the gate. He had to sit down, on the floor. I swear I thought he was going to have a heart attack. Teary-eyed and everything.” She handed me a bag of bagels. “For you.”
“Thanks, Sian. And thanks for . . . before . . .” When she’d tried to comfort me as Hank’s supposed execution dropped me to my knees.
“No problem. I got you a copy of the latest report from Liz. That hair you found by the lake came back as sidhé fae. I’m still searching the histories for that ‘old school’ group that showed up in the oracle’s club. Might be the same guys . . . I mean, pretty coincidental, right?”
I sat down at my desk. “Could be.” Probably was. This wasn’t going to be a cut-and-dry case, and I had a feeling Killian’s murder was just the beginning. As soon as I took care of my literal shadow of death, I’d be able to put my full attention to solving Killian’s murder. For now I was content to let Ashton finish up with his lead. I didn’t like him or his tactics, but he was a good investigator. “We’ll see. Keep searching. Try searching the word Disciple and see if anything comes up, will you? And run the name Leander through the database. Let me know if you get a hit.”
“Sure. That all?”
“No,” I said, chewing my bottom lip. “Can you get a courier up here? I need to send a message to the mages’ headquarters in Ithonia.”
“I’ll call downstairs and see if one’s available now.”
“Thanks.” Edainnué Lightwater was an Elder in Ithonia’s League of Mages. And I had her marker. If there was anyone who might know how to defeat Sachâth, it was her. And Leander. Leander knew way more than he let on . . .
After working all morning, I broke for lunch and headed into Underground to eat with my sister Bryn. We chose Abracus since it was right across the street from her shop. Using the same details as I’d given Emma and Rex, I filled her in on the happenings in Fiallan, leaving out Panopé’s “gift” to Hank and me, which I knew she’d love to hear all about, but I just didn’t want to talk about it; it was too new and tenuous at this point, and honestly a little unreal.
Bryn made up for my surprising lack of appetite, eating her burger and fries, and then picking at mine. “I take it things are better,” I said.
“As in?” she asked, mouth full.
“As in your health and relationship with Aaron.”
She grunted and swallowed a drink of sweet tea. Emma and Bryn looked so much alike it was scary. Big brown eyes and wavy brown hair—though Bryn’s coloring on both was lighter than Em’s. They had the same full lips, slightly upturned noses, and that impish quality to their look. “Ash is still kicking my ass. But I’m managing. As for the warlock . . .” She rolled her eyes and snagged another fry. “Irritating. You’d think a guy like that with a couple hundred years of mage training and scholarly pursuits wouldn’t be so . . . pigheaded and alpha all the time, you know?”
I laughed. “Shouldn’t surprise you.” With all the scholarly pursuits, Aaron was still a warlock—a warrior class of mage.
“It doesn’t. It’s just annoying. After everything, now he wants to take things slow when before he wouldn’t leave me alone. And now, suddenly, I’m the one who wants everything right now and he doesn’t.”
“I think he’s just worried about you. You’ve been through a lot. So has he.”
“I know. But”—she pointed a fry at me—“what better reason to grasp love by the horns while you can, before something comes along and snatches it away from you?”
She did have a point and as she went on about her complex relationship with Aaron, I smiled. I hadn’t seen Bryn this animated since before her exposure to ash. She still had shadows beneath her eyes, still had gray threaded through her aura, and I knew she suffered, but even with all that she seemed more like the little sister I knew and loved.
I’d held that stone tablet in my hands, the very thing that could’ve freed her from addiction, and then watched it shatter along with Ephyra. Gone.
But the cure still existed . . .
And if Leander had it, then I sure as hell was going to find a way to get it. Tablet or not.
After lunch, I walked back toward the plaza where Mercy Street joined with Helios Alley and Solomon Street. The scene—people shopping, goblins pushing their sale carts, patrons sipping coffee at the outdoor tables in front of the imp’s bakery, the sound of the fountain and the traffic echoing from the city above—it was comforting. It was what I knew, what I loved, and I hoped to God my inter-dimensional travel days were over.
I hadn’t told Bryn about Sachâth. Doing so would involve her in knowledge that was far too dangerous to have. And while I’d turned a corner when it came to including those I loved in details of my life, this wasn’t something I would or could share. Pen, Hank, and I had made a promise when we hid Ahkneri in the lake. No one would know. No one.
For Bryn or Rex or Emma, even the chief and the ITF, to know that a First One existed, that a divine weapon existed, was knowledge that’d get them killed, used, targeted . . . And I couldn’t reveal details about Sachâth without getting too close to the truth.
As I came to a stop in the middle of the plaza, I felt Hank before I saw him.
I turned slowly and watched the main stairs that led from Topside Atlanta down into Underground. First his combat boots stepped casually down the steps, then tan cargo pants, standard issue equipment belt with hip weapon, black tee . . .
His eyes were on me the second they came into view and it felt like the crowded plaza vanished. Wavy blond hair, sardonic tilt to his mouth, five o’clock shadow. I knew what those arms felt like, how the skin tasted, knew how it felt to suck on that slowly curving lower lip.
Partner. He was my partner. As in work. As in: how the hell was I supposed to separate the work from the relationship?
I let out a shaky breath as he strode toward me, all large and male and greedily taking up all the oxygen and space in the plaza. “Charlie,” he said, purposefully making his voice lower and deeper than it already was.
“Hank,” I countered, narrowing my eyes, but not being able to keep from smiling. Damn him.
“So, listen . . . I know it’ll be tough, but try to keep your dirty thoughts to a minimum. Once we clock out, we’ll go back to my place, and you can have your wicked, wanton way with me. Sound good?”
He was enjoying this way too much. But then, I guess, so was I. He waited a beat, and when no response came out of my idiot grinning mouth, he leaned in, kissed me, and walked around me, saying, “Awesome. It’s a date.”
Nice, Charlie. I rolled my eyes at myself, spun on my heel, and fell in step beside him. On one hand, I was glad he was trying to fall back into his old routine—the easygoing, likeable, flirtatious guy. On the other, I wondered how he really was and how he was dealing with the wounds on his mind and soul. I knew what it was like. To forge ahead, to pretend something didn’t happen or just deal with it in the quiet of your own space, in your own time.
We entered Helios Alley—or as I often called it Elysian Territory—and headed down the middle of the street, avoiding the busier sidewalks. “How did it go at legal?”
“The usual barrage of boring, repetitive questions. The Feds are sending a group to Fiallan to help with the fallout. The king has abdicated the throne . . .” He slid a glance my way. “I hear the delegates told you I was executed.”
“Yeah.” Not a pleasant memory.
He bumped me with his shoulder. “Thanks for not believing them.”
I bumped him back. “You’re welcome.”
Helios Alley dead-ended into the underground lobby of Helios Tower. After a quick walk through the tunnel, we emerged into the spacious lobby complete with restaurant and bar/lounge. We bypassed the receptionist’s desk and took the elevator.
“This is giving me flashbacks,” Hank muttered.
“Tell me about it. At least we’re only going to the fourth floor this time.” Instead of the rooftop, or the forty-sixth floor from whence we took our tumble . . . I shuddered with the memory.
The lower floors of the tower were devoted to businesses. The address that had been on Leander’s card had said 4th Floor, Suite 107. No name. Nothing else but a phone number. The plaque indicating Suite 107 was also otherwise blank.
I opened the door to find a typical waiting room and a desk behind which sat a thin middle-aged woman whose fingers tapped efficiently on a keyboard. She stopped typing, looked up, but didn’t say a word in greeting. How lovely.
“We’re here to see Leander,” I said.
She peered at me, then Hank over the rim of her glasses. “Who may I ask is inquiring?”
“Detectives Madigan and Williams,” I answered.
“One moment, please.”
As she left the room, I glanced around the small front office, noting that it looked like my accountant’s office, and not what I expected from the mysterious Leander.
“Right this way,” the receptionist said, returning to lead us down a long hallway to an end door, which she held open and then closed behind us.
The room was the size of my entire downstairs cottage in Candler Park. Two gigantic windows offered views of the city. The chair behind the massive desk was empty and it looked as though neither one had ever been used much. To the left were two couches with a coffee table between them and beyond that an entire wall of books from floor to ceiling.
Leander, however, was to the far right with his back to us, playing a pinball machine.
Hank gave me a look that said, You’re shittin’ me. This is the guy?
Oh yeah, this was the guy. There was no mistaking the power in the room. We walked over. The words Bally’s Wizard! were painted across the back glass along with some curvy, barely clad women, and if I wasn’t mistaken a guy that looked like the Who’s Roger Daltrey in the middle wearing a Pinball Wizard T-shirt.
From the less than impressive score, either Leander had just started playing or he sucked at pinball. I was guessing sucked, since he lost the ball seconds later.
Leander barely acknowledged me. His gaze went straight to Hank. They stood several feet apart, about the same height and weight, both broad shouldered, both powerful, and easy on the eyes. “So you brought back the last son of Elekti-Kairos,” he said to me while studying Hank.
“Actually, he kind of brought me back,” I said, giving props where they were due.
Hank stared so intently at Leander that my hand moved to rest on the grip of my firearm. The energy in the room shot up and the hairs on the back of my neck rose.
Leander folded his arms over his chest. “Ignoring it won’t make it go away, siren.”
“So what does, then?”
“Nothing, really. Time. Distraction. Women. Killing things . . . they just make you forget for a little while.”
“What are you?” Hank asked.
Leander cocked a smug eyebrow and then finally turned his attention to me. “Where’s the tablet?”
“Destroyed.”
He leaned back against the pinball machine, his casual stance deceptive because I could feel the surge of anger that ballooned around him. “Then you waste my time.”
“I’m going to face Sachâth,” I said, surprising both Leander and Hank.
Leander recovered first and snorted. “Didn’t figure you for a total head case.”
Hank was watching me, his eyes narrowed, his mind working. “What makes you think you can defeat it?” He knew I’d never face Sachâth unless I felt I had a chance.
“Yes, do tell,” Leander added, amused.
“Since you know about Ahkneri’s existence . . .” I said to Leander. “She gave me a vision. She showed me the last battle she fought with Sachâth.” Leander straightened and the quiet intensity that stole over him made me stutter.
I forged on, though, and told them about the vision, what Ahkneri had told me about the nature of Sachâth, and of my talk with Pendaran. Leander looked a little pale, and strode over to a cabinet and poured himself a drink. He tossed it back in one gulp and then turned to us, cradling the empty glass in his large hand. “So you think all you have to do is pull together three primal energy sources and that will be the end of the Creator’s assassin.”
“Do you have a better idea?” I shot back.
But Hank was watching Leander. “Has that ever been tried?”
“Not to my knowledge,” Leander admitted. “Sachâth was always engaged by First Ones and their Disciples. Every weapon conceivable was tried, to my knowledge,” he felt the need to add again.
“The indigenous people of Elysia and Charbydon developed outside of the Creator’s influence,” I said. “They sprung from the primal deities and energies that emerged in those worlds’ infancy. Like the sirens, fae, and nymphs,” I said. “And the jinn and the ghouls . . .”
“So you want to hit Sachâth with powers that aren’t connected with the Creator,” Hank said.
“Right. I just need to figure out how to bring them together. Pen can direct the Earth’s arcane energy . . .” I looked at Leander. “I just need a means to use Elysia’s and Charbydon’s. I don’t know what you are, Leander, but you must have some idea of how I can do this.”
He eyed me for a long time. “Did you read the tablet?”
I blinked at his change of direction. “Um . . . yeah. I read it.”
“Out loud?”
“Yes,” I said slowly.
“In the ancient tongue?”
“I believe so. Why?”
He walked to another wall of cabinet and bookshelf combinations, and pulled out a drawer. Inside he retrieved a metal cylinder and then walked back to me. “Here.”
I took it. It was cold. “What is it?”
“Your antidote.”
My hand tightened around the metal, and my heart lurched inside of my chest. “What do you mean? This”—I shook it at him—“is the cure to ash?”
“Yes. But maybe you shouldn’t shake it like that.”
I froze. “But why?” And I didn’t mean the shaking.
“Because, Detective, the entire point of retrieving that tablet was to read it, out loud, and in the language of the First Ones. Since you have done that, I’m upholding the bargain.”
Wariness flooded down my back, setting off every warning bell I had. “What the hell did I read, Leander?” But based on what he told me before about the tablet, I had a good idea. “I woke a Disciple.”
He grinned. It wasn’t happy or smug or even satisfied. It was feral.
“Tell me something, Leander,” I said. “Where did the Disciples come from?”
“They were among the first generations born to the First Ones when they seeded the worlds. The first Adonai, the first humans . . . There were none more powerful than them save the First Ones. They offered their swords and their lives. Some guarded mothers and fathers, some guarded lovers, husbands, wives . . .”
And then I took a chance. “I saw you in the vision.”
There was no reaction at all in those golden eyes, almost like he’d been waiting for me to say it. “You saw what you wanted to see.”
“I know what I saw.”
His voice was soft, but lethal. “No, you saw your precious Ahkneri turn her back on her own Disciple to save another. That is what you saw.” He moved back to the pinball machine. “As for Sachâth . . . If your plan will work”—he shrugged—“who knows. But I will lend my aid at the time and place. Just call my secretary. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m extremely busy running my empire.”
He turned back to the pinball machine, pulled the lever, and set the ball free.
Hank wasn’t happy with me. I could tell. It might’ve been the heat radiating off his hand when he grabbed mine and pulled me to a private spot in the lobby. Or it might’ve been the pissed off gleam in his eyes, or the plowing of his fingers through his hair and then the exasperated way he parked two fingers on his hip, dropped them, and paced before me.
“When did you plan on telling me about this idea?”
“Today.”
“Christ, Charlie!” he hissed and dragged me over to some tall palm trees in pots. “You can’t seriously think . . .”
“You’re the one who said in the cab we had to get rid of it!”
That seemed to take some steam out of him. “I know what I said.” He stared up at the ceiling, blew out a deep sigh, and then faced me again. “We have one shot. One. And that’s it.”
“Well, no pressure or anything,” I said, knowing exactly the risk involved. “And what the hell were you and Leander talking about anyway?”
He gaped for a minute, his focus still on Sachâth. “The NecroNaMoria.” Completely deflated, he slumped into a nearby chair. I did the same in an adjoining one. “Whoever he is, it happened to him. Even if he hadn’t said anything I knew . . .”
“What do you mean, you knew?”
Hank shook his head as though he was confused by it all. “I don’t know if I can even put it into words. It’s a sense of him being . . . not whole . . .” He let out a heavy breath, and gave up. Obviously not really something he wanted to think about.
I let that simmer for a moment, honestly not knowing how to respond, and disconcerted by the notion that if Leander exhibited a sense of not being whole, then Hank most likely did, too. I stared at Hank, this big, capable guy, sprawled on the chair, his head back against the cushion, who was still cracking stupid jokes and trying to fall back into the person he was before the Circe got ahold of him, and knew he was struggling. On the inside. Where no one could see. Where he wouldn’t let anyone see.
“You get a feel for what he is?” I finally asked.
He lifted his head off the back of the chair and scrubbed a hand down his face, leaning forward in the chair, knees apart, hanging his forearms over them. “He’s not siren. I don’t know what he is, Charlie. You really think he’s a Disciple?”
“I don’t know. I was hoping to get more of a reaction out of him.”
“Was he in the vision or were you just bluffing?”
“I don’t know. I thought . . . if not a Disciple then what is he?”
“He didn’t deny it.”
“No . . .”
Hank opened his hand, staring down at his palm for a long moment. “Well, I know how to solve the Elysian part of your problem. Straight from the deity herself.” He lifted his head and held out his branded palm. “Primal Source Words.”
Since we were comparing weapons . . . I lifted my arm, the one with the symbols, and smiled weakly. I hadn’t told him everything. “Ancient divine weapon.”
His crooked smile threw me off-balance. “Some arm you got there, kiddo.” At my confusion, he said, “I saw you use it. In the cave. When Arethusa died.”
Oh. Right. “Yeah, well, I was a little distracted.”
“You and me both.”
“So now what?”
“Well, now we work on the third power problem.”
And what was likely to be the impossible one. “Charbydon.”