Dreams of Shreds and Tatters Part 25

He frowned and rubbed his temples. "Tried, yes. Succeeded... I don't know. I'm sorry, sorry for the things I said before."

She reached out, slow and careful with her wounded hand, and brushed her fingertips against his. "I'm sorry too. But... Can you help me out of bed? I really need to use the bathroom."

THE BLACK CAR carried Blake away from the sirens and chaos, purring through the wet streets. Blake slumped against the soft leather seat and watched the city lights bleed through the haze. Seker studied him silently; the driver-a pale man in tinted gla.s.ses-didn't speak either. He wasn't sure where he expected the car to take them. Eventually he realized it wasn't going anywhere, only circling through the city. Waiting for him? He knew he should be alert, ready to run, but his head sagged against the cushions. Turning to look at his rescuer took all the strength he had.

Streetlights swept rhythmically across tinted windows, revealing his face in flashes. Strong cheekbones, deep-set eyes, a wide, amused mouth. A face Blake would have itched to paint a month ago; now the thought left him cold and unsettled. The white robes he'd glimpsed in the palace were gone, replaced by a tailored dark suit.

"Is your name really Seker?" It wasn't what he'd meant to say. The words sc.r.a.ped out of his aching throat, slurred as if he was drunk. The thought of drinking reminded him how painfully thirsty he was.

"It sounds silly here in the real world, doesn't it?" His voice was as deep and rich as Blake remembered. He said real as though it were a private joke. One hand slipped into his inside pocket, slowly enough that Blake didn't flinch. He took the offered card and tilted it toward the light. Shadows lined the embossed letters. Sebastian Sands, it read, beside a stylized scarab. On the back, in smaller type, was a phone number.

Sands reached down into the darkness and Blake tensed, but when the man straightened he held a bottle of water, its plastic seal still intact. Anything else he could have refused, but his tongue curled at the sight. Condensation slicked his hand as he accepted it; he didn't notice the chill. He shuddered as the first swallow soothed his throat and lined his hollow stomach with cold.

"Thank you." Plastic dented under his fingers as he lowered the half empty bottle. "For helping us."

Seker-Sands-dipped his head in acknowledgement. "Your friend did most of the work. My a.s.sistance was minimal."

"Liz. Is she-"

"She'll be fine. She has people to take care of her. You, however, look terrible."

Even in the dark car that much was obvious. His hands were pale and gaunt around the water bottle. Shadows pooled between bone and tendon. A crust of blood stained his left wrist where he'd ripped the IV out, and a fresh bruise purpled beneath it; his groin still ached as if he'd been racked. His palms and knees were dark with grime, jeans clinging damp to his legs. The water couldn't entirely rinse away the lingering taste of bile. Over the aroma of leather and citrus cologne that filled the car, he could smell himself-greasy hair and skin, p.i.s.s and sickness. Humiliating, but he was too tired and raw to feel the sting.

"Would you like something to eat?" Sands asked.

Blake swallowed. A drink of water. A cup of coffee. A hot meal. Then the snare of debt would close around him.

"Why?" he asked before Sands could go on. "Why did you help us? Why are you helping me now? What do you want?"

"I wanted you out of Carcosa. Now I want to keep you alive. Which would be easier to manage if you'd eat something, but we'll skip that for now."

Every mention of food reminded him how hollow he felt. How long had machines pumped paste and fluids into him to keep him alive? Plastic creaked as his hands tightened.

"That's all? Simple altruism? Just like Rainer?"

Sands sighed. "Morgenstern is a fool, little better than a dilettante. Though in fairness, he never meant to hurt you. He merely courted you with gifts he didn't understand." He tilted his head, one eye flashing as light slid across his face. "As for my altruism, I wouldn't call it simple. More a long-term investment. Some day I'll ask for your help. But for now I want you safe, and away from Carcosa and its king. Can you accept that?"

"Do I have a choice?"

Sands' mouth quirked, a hint of a smile in the shadows. "You always have a choice. You can refuse to help me, when I ask. Though I hope that you'll at least consider it. Tonight, however, all I want is to be sure you don't end up dead in a gutter."

Blake turned back to the window, leaning his forehead against the gla.s.s. The chill soothed the band of pain that circled his skull. He squeezed his eyes shut as they turned onto Lions Gate Bridge; water was the last thing he wanted to see.

Blake dragged a hand across his eyes, pretending it was fatigue instead of tears he fought. "What happened to us at the cabin?" he croaked, swallowing the taste of salt. "Where did the monsters come from?"

"From the dark places between dreams," Sands said after a moment. "They're hunters."

"Hunting who?"

"They came to stop Morgenstern's invocation. But now-" He reached out and took Blake's hand, turning it over to expose the veins in his wrist. Blue now, but Blake felt the shadow inside him, waiting. "You're marked now. You escaped Carcosa, but you carry a piece of it within you. The King will be drawn to it. His enemies will be drawn to exterminate it."

"To exterminate me."

"Only if they find you." Sands smiled. He let go of Blake's wrist, but the warmth of his touch lingered. "I can keep you safe. We can leave the city. Tonight, if you like. Anywhere you want to go."

Blake fought a shudder. It would be so nice to say yes. To let someone else take care of him. To trust. But he should have learned that lesson eighteen years ago; he wasn't about to forget it again now.

"I appreciate everything you've done, but I can't do that. Not now. There are things I need to do, people I need to talk to. Alone," he added, before Sands could offer.

He waited for anger, refusal, violence. But after a frowning silence, the man nodded. "If that's what you wish. You have my card. If you ever need my a.s.sistance-"

Blake nodded. "I'll call. You can let me out here. Please."

The car slowed, sliding neatly up to the curb.

"You'll need these," Sands said. He reached inside his coat again, this time retrieving a lumpy envelope. Metal clinked as Blake took it, spilled cold into his palm. Leather slid after. His keys and pa.s.sport and wallet-warped now and water stained.

"And while we're at it, you might as well take this too." Sands shrugged out of his coat and held it out.

Blake hesitated, his hand on the door handle. He could feel the cold waiting for him. "I'll be fine."

Sands raised an eyebrow. "You've survived terrible things. That doesn't mean you can't get hypothermia. It's a coat, not an obligation."

"I-" His fingers closed on heavy wool. The smell of incense and oranges clung to the fabric. "Thank you."

"Be careful."

The door closed on his warning and the car pulled away, leaving Blake shivering on the sidewalk.

LIZ'S SENSE OF accomplishment lasted almost an hour, long enough to wash her hair awkwardly with one hand and for the bath water to cool. Alex sat with her, explaining as best he could what had happened since she took the mania. He wouldn't admit it, but she suspected he was also making sure she didn't pa.s.s out in the bathtub.

But when they came out of the bathroom, tension floated through the front of the house like strands of a spiderweb. Lailah sat at the tiny kitchen table, her gun stripped to metal bones. Rae-who Liz had met briefly only a few days ago, though it felt much longer now-perched on the arm of the couch, her arms wrapped tight around her.

Rae looked up as they walked in. Her hair trailed like a black veil across her face and beneath it her eyes were dark and sunken. A chill settled in the empty pit of Liz's stomach as she met the other girl's gaze.

"It isn't over," she whispered. Rae shook her head, sending her hair flying. "You thought it would be? If you and Blake woke up, it would be a miracle cure? Nothing's changed. No," she corrected herself with another shake of her head. "It's still changed. It's still changing. The monsters are still out there, waiting."

Before anyone could speak, Lailah's phone buzzed. Liz flinched at the sharp rattle, and Lailah's frown stretched into a snarl. She turned away to hold a short conversation punctuated by curses.

"Lions Gate lost power an hour ago," she said when she ended the call. "Even the backup generators. No one knows what happened, but people are dead. That was just about the time you woke up."

The towel slipped off Liz's hair, snaking down her shoulder to pool on the floor. "Blake?"

"Missing." Lailah turned back to her gun, rea.s.sembling the pieces into their killing shape. "I don't give a d.a.m.n about your friend, but whatever's happening in the city, happening to Rae, he's in the middle of it. We have to find him." She punctuated the last word by slapping the clip into her pistol, and all the dread Liz thought she'd left behind in Carcosa surged fresh.

Rae stared down at her hands as if she didn't recognize them. "The door is opening."

"Oh." Liz's face drained cold with realization. "The door. The door to Carcosa. Blake painted it. It's on display in the gallery."

Lailah holstered the gun at the small of her back. Her smile was harsh and sharp. "Get dressed."

RAINER DRIFTED BELOW the pain, as he had drifted for days. It waited for him, red and ugly, and it was simpler to hold his breath and sink.

When he did surface, Antja was with him, changing his bandages, feeding him tea and broth, humming charms to speed mending flesh. Sometimes she wept. He reached for her then, though movement twisted a hot knife in his shoulder, but she always pulled away.

He never should have involved her in this-the Brotherhood, the gallery, the intrigues of the world beneath the world-should never have wooed her with tricks and magic lessons. Once, burning with fever, he tried to tell her all of that. Delirium rode him, and he wasn't sure if the words made any sense, or even what language he spoke. She only kissed him, and her lips tasted of magic. The spell settled over him, warm and soft, and he drifted into the dark once more.

THE FEVER EASED; flesh and muscle knit back into their proper shapes, itching and burning as tissues healed. Rainer still drifted, but the darkness changed. He had felt the presence of the King since he first swore his oath at sixteen, a faint spark in the back of his mind, so familiar that it went unnoticed unless he sought it out. Now that spark burned brighter, stronger than he'd ever known. It whispered to him like a siren.

He woke drenched in cold sweat, alert for the first time in days. His vision was too sharp, colors brittle and razor-edged, and his pulse sang in his ears. Flowers of dried blood and other fluids spotted his bandages, but he could move his left arm again.

Antja was in the kitchen. She started when he called to her, and something clattered into the sink. Her eyes were shadowed, her hair lank and tangled over her shoulders. She knelt beside the bed, pressing him down when he tried to sit and laying a cool hand against his forehead.

" Gott sei dank," she whispered, and her voice was low and rough.

"It's all right," he told her, folding his hands over hers. She winced; her palm was raw and pink, puffy with healing blisters. "The worst is over."

She laughed, short and harsh, but kissed his hands before she pulled away. "The worst is never over. You should know that by now."

Something was out of place in the room, but it took him a moment to recognize it: her bags were packed. Not just Antja's luggage but his, piled in the middle of the floor.

"You're leaving?" Not that he could blame her, but the words took the wind out of him all the same.

"We're leaving. As soon as you're well enough to travel. Vancouver isn't safe anymore."

"How long have I been unconscious?"

"Three days. It's been quiet, but something is wrong. Something is coming."

"I can't leave. I promised Blake-" He winced and she looked away. When she turned back her face was the cool mask he'd come to dread.

"I saw Liz three days ago. Just before I came here. She took a whole vial of mania. She's a vegetable now, just like Blake. So what else do you think you'll be able to do?"

Rainer closed his eyes, as if that could stop the news. His last hope. Blake's last. "I'm sorry," he whispered, and he wasn't sure who he meant the words for.

"Rest," Antja said. "You're still weak, and I need to clean up. We can talk about this later."

The bathroom door shut and water gurgled through the pipes. Rainer lay back, trying to take her advice. But as his eyes sagged close, a flash of red by the door caught his attention and jerked him awake again. The alarm panel. Someone was in the gallery.

Sometimes he envied Antja her prayers.

20.

Disintegration

BLAKE WALKED SOUTH across Granville Bridge, hands clenched in the pockets of his borrowed coat. The street glittered with Christmas lights, but signs in the shop windows advertised Boxing Day sales. The newspapers said it was the twenty-seventh. He had lost three weeks.

Snow drifted in lazy spirals from the dusty rose sky. Well after midnight, he guessed, from the depth of the stillness. The streets were deserted. Coffee cups piled in drifts by overflowing trashcans, and stray receipts and bits of wrapping fluttered soggy on the sidewalks. Only the lull of the holidays, but it felt as though he'd woken to find the world emptied in his absence.

Behind the clouds, the stars brooded. The cold, inky thing inside him sensed their gaze too, and stirred. Was this what Rainer had meant when he'd spoken of his gift? It wasn't what Blake had imagined. But he never could have imagined any of this.

The gallery was dark and locked tight, but he saw a sliver of light in the upstairs window. The faceless angel above the door stared down at him. His hand closed on his keys, metal gouging his palm. What would he say to Rainer? He wanted the strength of anger, but all he felt was tired and lost.

As he stood on the sidewalk searching for words, a car door shut across the street, then a second and a third. Footsteps started toward him, and he turned at the incredulous sound of his name.

"Blake?" Stephen York's eyes widened as he approached. "Son of a b.i.t.c.h. You're alive." Jason followed behind him, huddled against the cold, and another man Blake didn't recognize.

"I admit, we didn't think you'd make it. Especially after Lions Gate blew up. Lucky you got out."

"Lucky," Blake repeated, trying not to think of the nurse's staring face. A warning sensation p.r.i.c.kled down his back, a sensation he'd long since learned to listen to. Stephen had always set his alarms shivering, and now he was outnumbered. "What are you doing here?"

"Just stopping in to talk to Rainer. Have you seen him yet?"

When Blake shook his head, Stephen grinned. "Good. It will be a happy surprise."

All Blake's instincts screamed at him to run. But he was too slow; Stephen's hand slipped out of his coat pocket and the streetlamp gleamed yellow against the barrel of a gun. "Let's go up together." Stephen's hand closed on Blake's arm, steering him toward the narrow alley that led behind the gallery. Blake didn't look at the gun, but he felt its pressure against his side. After Carcosa and the King, a gun felt like a toy, not anything that should frighten him.

Which wasn't enough to make him risk a hole in the gut, though. "I thought Canadians were politer than this," he said, rolling his eyes.

"We all have our breaking points. I would have thought you'd be on my side, after what Rainer did to you. Not to mention Gemma and Robert and Alain."

Blake almost asked about Robert and Gemma, but decided not to give Stephen the satisfaction. Besides, he remembered the smell of blood, the screams, before Alain had dragged him to the water.

He could use his imagination. Since Stephen hadn't mentioned Antja, she must be alive.

"If you thought I'd be on your side," he said instead, "why is there a gun pointed at me?"

"No point in taking chances."

Stephen's voice was smooth as ever, but Blake heard the darker undercurrents; he was dead as soon as Rainer was. If not first. The shadow moved inside him, flaring like a cobra's hood.

Hinges squealed as Blake opened the back door. The blinking red light of the alarm panel broke the darkness inside; it chirped and quieted when he punched in his code.

"Wait for me," Stephen told his companions. Me instead of us settled Blake's suspicions. The two men just nodded. Jason shivered, sallow in the sodium light; he didn't meet Blake's eyes. The other man looked through him as if he were already dead.

Blake went first up the stairs. He could think of a dozen action movie scenarios for getting the gun away from Stephen, but he doubted any of them would survive contact with reality. A tingling itch started in his hands-like a nicotine itch, but he hadn't had a cigarette in years and rarely missed them. It spread up his arms and throat, across his cheeks. He looked at his hand on the railing and saw a network of black veins beneath his skin. His stomach lurched, but in the next heartbeat the vision was gone, a trick of shadows and uncertain light.