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  Reluctantly, I remove my own glove, squeeze my hand into a fist for a count of five, and then slide my palm across his, hoping the current will stay under control. Breathe, like Nutesh showed you.

  Though I know something horrific is coming, the initial flush of warmth sends a calming shiver through me and puts a slight smile on my face.

  The smile dies quickly.

  We’re in the room, Henry watching me as I watch Xavier and Thierry. This memory drips with tension. Henry is scared. And he’s worried, about me. My queries to Xavier go unanswered and then both men, startled, grab at their phones. Their faces change. The cigarette is abandoned. Hand signals, wide eyes. More fear.

  And then the moment when I see the spiders—no one else can see them. It’s bizarre to watch me freaking out when nothing is there. I scream; Henry clamps his hand over my mouth, his face close to my ear as he whispers assurances. He’s frightened, but he’s begging me to come back to him. He cannot see the Etemmu; he cannot see what I know was there at that very moment, its acidic touch burning my skin, the whispering in my head. He can’t see any of it.

  I scream louder. Xavier scrambles toward us and does something against the back of my neck, and I go limp onto Henry. “Get her out of here!” he hisses. Henry, his pack still on, grabs under my shoulders; Thierry runs over and picks up my legs to help drag me out of the room—as he stands, the first bullet blasts through the shutters and shatters the window and hits him in the back of the head, blood spraying as if from a misdirected garden hose. Its warmth on Henry’s face brings a swell of panic; he struggles to hang on to my weight.

  Thierry drops like a stone.

  A second shot—this one hits Henry. Just above the right knee.

  Jesus, that burns.

  He sucks in through his teeth and grabs at his leg, dropping me against the floor, though my landing is awkward because of my enormous backpack strapped to my body. Xavier pulls a firearm and shoots back; a shadow falls over the room and there are feet on the roof. Heavy, plodding. They’re coming for us. I can feel Henry’s heart pounding in my own chest as he hoists me under the arms again and drags me into the long hallway.

  Xavier shoots at the windows— bang bang bang bang—and then he rejoins Henry where he opens a hatch in the floor. We drop two floors’ distance onto a pile of mattresses; Henry’s leg is absolutely on fire. Xavier pulls a lever that seals the hatch above us; he then rushes to the end of a dank, dark basement and opens yet another door, this one camouflaged by cluttered shelves of various tools and garden implements. He races back to throw me over his shoulder, gestures for Henry to run ahead, and we’re moving.

  Xavier pauses only to slide closed the door behind us, struggling to balance the weight of me and both of our packs. Henry skip-hops down a long wooden corridor lit only by the occasional yellow-caged work lamps strung between draped cords, the kind we use in the big top when we’re setting up. A plump rat runs ahead of us. Henry’s leg is leaving a blood trail like Hansel and Gretel’s crumbs in the woods. Xavier sets me down on the floor against the plywood wall and inspects Henry’s leg through his pants. Henry winces and bites down so he doesn’t yell—I can feel the jolt of searing pain as Xavier’s finger finds the wound.

  “Lucky. It’s through and through. You wouldn’t be walking if the bone had been hit. Can you make it?” Henry nods. He’s never been so afraid in his whole life.

  Xavier extracts a length of cloth from his pack and ties it around Henry’s leg. He pats him hard on the face, and then scoops me off the floor, throwing me over his shoulder again. We race down the corridor until the wood becomes concrete. Every step is fire.

  Henry pulls his hand from mine, the flush gone, reality flooding back in. “And then you woke up,” he says. He sniffs against his own emotion.

  “Thierry . . . I’m so sorry,” I whisper. No one was supposed to die. This isn’t how it was supposed to go. I’m at once consumed by sadness and rage and guilt. If I’d just shut my mouth—if I could just figure out how to deal with this demon—Thierry would still be alive. If I hadn’t screamed; if Baby were here, the Etemmu couldn’t touch me; if Aveline were dead . . .

  If these fucking books had never been created.

  I stuff the heels of my hands against my eyes. I’m so angry—but Henry is still bleeding. He needs me.

  I sniff hard and wipe my face. I cannot melt down right now. “I need to see your leg.”

  “Don’t cut his pants. We’ll have to wash those and mend the hole,” Xavier says.

  “Thierry’s dead, Henry’s been shot, and you’re worried about some stupid pants?” I say as I help Henry out of his pack.

  “Thierry is dead because you screamed. That should give you something to think about. Your actions have repercussions,” he says.

  “You have no idea what I’m dealing with.”

  “Do you have more to say?” Xavier asks.

  I turn toward him. “You have no idea what I’m fighting against because you can’t see it. The demon that killed my mother? It’s after me now. It’s Aveline and Lucian running the demon show. Baby is my only defense against it. And he’s not here because they are torturing him to death.”

  Henry rests his hand on my shoulder, but it does little to calm the shudders and tears. So much for not melting down.

  “This whole situation is not our fault. And I don’t care that you’re my long-lost daddy. Any illusions that you give a shit about me were destroyed within the first minute of meeting you,” I say, wiping my snotty nose against the arm of my coat, “but you will honor my mother by keeping me, and Henry, safe. You will tell us what is going on. And you will know that I am fighting as hard as I can against a demon whose master wants to kill us. You said it yourself—we have a singular mission—so maybe start acting like it.”

  There is flame in Xavier’s eyes as I holler at him, but also the hint of understanding, especially when I mention my mother and the Etemmu.

  “Nutesh told me the Etemmu had found you,” he says as he looks right through me. And then he snaps back to focus and nods at Henry. “Do what you need to do to fix his leg. And settle in. It’s going to be a long night.”

  14

  THE WOUND ON HENRY’S LEG IS MEATY, BUT XAVIER WAS RIGHT—THE bullet went right through, impacting just above the kneecap, narrowly missing his femur. I’m able to keep my current under control long enough to access the nuclear reactor in the back of my head, the star I pull from that allows me to heal. I feel Xavier’s eyes on me while I put my hands on Henry’s wounds.

  When I’m done, Henry exhales what sounds like relief, leans forward, and with his hand on the back of my neck, he pulls me in for a kiss.

  “Thank you. Again. You are truly magical.”

  “Feels better?” I’m shaky and light-headed, and no juice to be had.

  “Like new. That is the most incredible trick.” He digs into the front of his pack and finds an energy bar, and then kisses me again lightly.

  I take a bite of the foul bar. “You need pants,” I say, looking at his now-healed leg. “You’re hairier than I expected.”

  Henry’s quick laugh is a pleasant diversion from the tension in the van. “Well, according to one of my new passports, I am French.” He pulls his other pair of pants from his pack and shimmies into them.

  “But are you? What are we, really? And are Frenchmen hairy?” I ask.

  “I’ve not seen a lot of naked Frenchmen, thankfully.”

  “And technically, you’re not French.”

  “Not even on my mother’s side?”

  “Where was Alicia born? We don’t even know how old she is,” I say. “Even if she was born in France, she’s Mesopotamian, from both of her parents. So are we.”

  Henry looks over my shoulder at Xavier resting awkwardly against the plexiglass wall, his eyes shut. “Where is he from?”

  I lower my voice. “Somewhere mean.” Henry smirks.

  I rearrange the packs so we can use them as pillows against the van w
all, and then stretch out facing Henry, my back to Xavier. Healing makes me so tired, even more so because I don’t have a fast-acting sugar source to replenish the energy lost and this bar is almost too gross to choke down. I’ll need to find some juice boxes or soda.

  Henry slides off his wool cap, and then reaches over and pulls mine off too, the back of his fingers lingering against my face, his thumb stroking my cheekbone.

  My eyes burn with tears. “Thierry . . .”

  Henry scoots closer and pulls me into his chest. He’s not wearing the coat that holds the last moments of Thierry’s life in its fibers, yet the smell of blood lingers.

  I don’t want to get used to the smell of blood. Something tells me I will.

  Henry rubs my back, his lips pressed softly against my forehead as he whispers quiet words of condolence and strength and promises that we will be okay and Baby will be okay and we will finish this together . . .

  I need to find a way to keep the Etemmu from destroying me before our mission is ended.

  Before I kill anyone else.

  We’ve stopped—it’s dark, and we’re on the side of the road. The van jostles as other cars fly past.

  “We are nearing the Barcelona border. Need to gas up. Sit tight.” Another truck has pulled close to us. We’re gassing up with a mobile tank? Makes sense—keeps us off surveillance cameras at gas stations.

  Once the gas truck has finished, the side door opens and Xavier scoots a cooler toward us. A new face climbs in behind the wheel, a dark-haired woman. Her long brown braid drapes over her shoulder, her eyes big and round and the color of soil, skin smooth except for the few crinkles around her eyes. Her black ensemble makes her teeth look very white in the dim round overhead cabin light.

  “This is Charlene. She is with Circ de l’Anell d’Or. She will take us into the city. Charlene, these are my latest orphans.”

  I flinch at being called an orphan again.

  “Bonjour, orphans. Do you have names?” She smiles. She can’t be older than thirty.

  I stare at Xavier—we didn’t discuss this. And I didn’t think to memorize whatever name my fake passport has on it. Are we supposed to give our real names? How much does she know?

  Without missing a beat, Henry speaks. “I’m Jack, and this is Diana.” His British accent has melted away. He sounds more American than I do.

  Henry saves the day.

  “Well, orphans Diana and Jack, I hope you know what kind of trouble this one causes.” Charlene hikes her thumb toward Xavier.

  “I am innocent of all charges,” Xavier says, his hand over his heart. It’s weird to hear him be nice.

  He then points to the cooler, his gruff tone back in place. “Food in there. When we arrive, it’s straight to work.”

  Charlene starts the van.

  With one last look at us, Xavier turns in his seat to face front.

  This is all so confusing.

  Henry and I dig into the cooler, glad to find sandwiches and more canteens. I consider offering food to Xavier, but he doesn’t ever look back toward us, so whatever. He can figure out his own meal.

  “I wish this van had windows so we could at least see Spain,” I say quietly. Henry nods as we dig in.

  His last bite finished, Henry leans over to whisper in my ear. “Alicia wants me to show you something.”

  “She’s here? Right now?” Man, I really miss being able to see her.

  “I woke up with a new memory. It might provide . . . context.”

  I pointedly bounce my head toward Xavier and Charlene to ask what about them?

  “Pretend you’re asleep. I can show you. It might help you understand your fa—, I mean Xavier, a little better.”

  “Do I really want to?”

  Henry hikes his sliced eyebrow. “We’re going to be spending a lot of time with him for the foreseeable future. It would be . . . less tense, if you guys didn’t hate each other.”

  “Fine.” I crumple my food wrapper and stuff it back in the cooler. “Also—Diana? Where is that from?”

  Henry is so close to my ear, it tickles when he speaks. “Princess Diana of Themyscira, aka, Diana Prince, aka, Wonder Woman. I, Jack Kirby, one of the fathers of the modern comic arts.”

  I smile. “I should’ve known.”

  “Sit back. Close your eyes. This won’t hurt a bit,” he says. I kiss his cheek, trusting that whatever he’s going to show me isn’t going to send me screaming and clawing to escape the confines of this lightless, four-wheeled box.

  Delia dismounts and ties up a huge brown horse she’s eased along a waist-height stone wall. Heavy tree branches hang low overhead, their leaves dripping and the heady smell of recent rain underfoot. Her long red braid ropes down her back. The horse whinnies behind her; she offers a green apple from her pocket and rubs the white patch on his forehead, her hands soiled, nails dirty and broken. Torn foliage has snagged on the lengths of the weighty cloak over her shoulders. Underneath, she’s again in pants and boots, like at the marketplace where Udish died, only this time, there’s no elaborate half dress. These are clothes for movement.

  A leather messenger-style bag hangs crosswise over her front. It’s the same bag from Udish—the saddlebag that was empty that terrible day in the field.

  “It is yours now, my Delia. You . . . must find it. I will . . . come back to you,” he’d said.

  She rushes the wooden front door of a small stone cabin, trees and overgrowth dense around the outside, only a scant light from a square window along the cabin’s front. She enters.

  A fire crackles in a modest stone hearth as Delia moves to pull a carpetbag from a rustic wooden wardrobe. As she kneels, the messenger bag thumps onto her thighs. It looks heavy—it’s not empty anymore.

  “What have you done?” A man’s voice behind her. She stands and faces him, the firelight highlighting the fierceness of ice-blue eyes.

  Xavier.

  “What have you done? He will find us, and he will kill us.”

  “Not us. I’m going. I will go and you will no longer be in danger.”

  “I told you we were safe. He knows nothing of us, of you and me. Of the child. I made a promise, Delia, an oath of fealty—I cannot so easily go back on it.”

  “You made an oath to the devil.” Delia’s hand moves to her belt, to a pearl-handled knife—the one Aveline used to stab Henry back in Washington.

  Delia pulls it from its sheath. “I’m leaving. I’ve taken what is mine, nothing else.”

  Xavier’s black curls, coiled loosely against his head, bounce as he slides to the left and pulls a curtain aside, seemingly unfettered by the knife gleaming in Delia’s hand. “You have signed her death warrant,” he says, his voice low. On a bed, behind the curtain, lies a very young girl, her long black hair mussed with sleep, her tiny body wrapped in rough blankets. She stirs and when her face emerges from the covers, she’s the spitting image of her father.

  Despite her youth, I’d know Aveline’s face anywhere.

  “Keep her safe. He won’t come for you,” Delia says. “It’s me he wants, and I cannot wait any longer.”

  Xavier drops the curtain and makes a move toward Delia, his own hand on the hilt of a blade at his waist.

  “Forgive me,” she says before he can draw his knife, and then she’s out of the cabin, astride the horse, racing through the darkness of an endless forest.

  Henry releases my hand, and even though I know I’m safe, it always takes a moment to reorient.

  I’ve seen the end of this scene—Delia on horseback—painted on one of the murals in Lucian’s study where his AVRAKEDAVRA slept in its glass case.

  “From Delia to Alicia to me to you,” Henry says, patting the beads of sweat off my forehead with his paper napkin. “She thought you should know what happened before . . .” He hands me a canteen; I finish it off, looking through the plexiglass at Xavier. Delia broke his heart—she left them, both of them—and then somewhere along the line, they were all captured and Xavier tortured, most def
initely worried about the fate of his young daughter who would be lost to him forever.

  Aveline Darrow, my sister, has her own ax to grind, but now it’s clear that Xavier’s is even bigger.

  “That vision just complicates everything,” I say. “How could Xavier ever forgive Delia enough to conceive another child, and hundreds of years later?”

  As if he heard my whisper, Xavier looks at me. Our eyes lock for a beat, and I swear to god he’s heard my question. My recent meal turns over in my stomach.

  Henry slides his gloves on again and nudges me against his side. “Get some rest. We’ll figure it out.”

  “How?” I ask.

  He doesn’t respond.

  15

  WHEN XAVIER ANNOUNCES WE’RE ENTERING BARCELONA, I SCOOT ACROSS the floor toward the open square in the plex wall, stretching to see what I can through the windshield and front-door windows. Even though it’s still dark, the freeway and area bordering looks very much like California—low-rise hills covered in brush and deciduous trees. Traffic has picked up, and though there’s still a lot of greenery, the area is dense with office and apartment buildings and semitrucks and power lines and homes and graffiti and life.

  And then the city explodes before us. We enter a labyrinth of streets, block after block of balconied apartment buildings and huge glass storefronts and cars and a dedicated bike lane and more mopeds and motorcycles than I have ever seen parked in narrow spots along the wide sidewalks. So many palm trees and what might be eucalyptus and date trees line the streets in front of the buildings.

  The sun is coming up over the incredible architecture—places I’ve only ever seen in pictures on the internet—painting the partly clouded sky in shades of blue and pink and orange. Streetlights flicker off, but apartment buildings still sparkle with their interior lights.

  Xavier turns to look at me through the square. “We will be going to the apartments across from the venue at the Port Vell Marina where the circus is. When we stop, we will proceed directly into the building where we can prepare for the day.”