Ninth House

²⁷ Winter

When Alex woke, she thought she was back in the hospital in Van Nuys. The white walls. The beeping machines. Hellie was dead. Everyone was dead. And she was going to jail.

The illusion was fleeting. The pain burning in the wound at her side brought her back to the present. The horror of what had happened at Il Bastone returned in a rapid blur: red lights flashing, Turner and the cops flooding up the stairs. The uniforms had sent a jolt of panic through her, but then… What’s your name, kiddo? Talk to me. Can you tell me what happened? You’re all right now. You’re all right. How gently they spoke to her. How gently they handled her. She heard Turner talking: She’s a student, a freshman. Magic words. Yale falling over her, shroud and shield. Take courage; no one is immortal. Such power in a few words, an incantation.

Alex pushed her blankets back and yanked at her hospital gown. Every movement hurt. Her side had been stitched up and was covered in bandages. Her mouth was dry and cottony.

A nurse bustled in with a big smile on her face as she rubbed hand sanitizer between her palms. “You’re up!” she said brightly.

Alex read the name on the tag attached to her scrubs and felt a chill creep over her. Jean. Was this Jean Gatdula? The woman Skull and Bones had paid to take care of Michael Reyes, to care for all of their victimae for the prognostications? It couldn’t be coincidence.

“How are you, sweetheart?” the nurse asked. “How’s your pain?”

“I’m good,” Alex lied. She didn’t want them doping her up. “Just a little groggy. Is Pamela Dawes here? Is she okay?”

“Down the hall. She’s being treated for shock. I know you’ve both been through it, but you have to rest now.”

“That sounds good,” Alex said, letting her eyelids flutter closed. “Could I have some juice?”

“You bet,” said Jean. “Back before you know it.”

As soon as the nurse was gone, Alex made herself sit up and slide out of bed. The pain forced her to breathe shallowly, and the sound of her own panting made her feel like an animal caught in a trap. She needed to see Dawes.

She was hooked to her IV so she took it with her, wheeling it along beside her, grateful for the support. Dawes’s room was at the end of the hall. She was propped up in her hospital bed on top of the covers, dressed in NHPD sweats. They were far too big for her and dark navy, but otherwise they would have fit perfectly into her grad student uniform.

Dawes turned her head on the pillow. She said nothing when she saw Alex, just wriggled over to the edge of the bed to make room.

Carefully, Alex hoisted herself into the bed and laid down beside her. There was barely space for the two of them, but she didn’t care. Dawes was okay. She was okay. They had somehow survived this.

“The dean?” she asked.

“He’s stable. They put him in a cast and pumped him full of blood.”

“How long have we been here?”

“I’m not sure. They sedated me. I think at least a day.”

For a long time, they lay in silence, the sounds of the hospital filtering down the hall to them, voices at the nurses’ station, the click and whir of machines.

Alex was drifting into sleep when Dawes said, “They’re going to cover it all up, aren’t they?”

“Yeah.” Jean Gatdula was a sure sign of that. Lethe and the other societies would use every bit of their influence to make sure that the true details of the night never came to light. “You saved my life. Again.”

“I killed someone.”

“You killed a predator.”

“His parents are going to know he was murdered.”

“Even alligators have parents, Dawes. That doesn’t stop them from biting.”

“Is it over now?” Dawes asked. “I want… normal.”

If you ever find it, let me know.

“I think so,” Alex said. Dawes deserved some kind of comfort, and it was all she could offer. At least now this whole gnarled mess would unravel. Blake would be the thread that pulled it all apart. The drugs. The lies. There would be some kind of reckoning among the Houses of the Veil.

Alex must have fallen asleep, because she woke with a start when Turner wheeled Dean Sandow into the room. She sat up too quickly and hissed in a breath at the pain, then nudged Dawes, who drowsily came awake.

Sandow looked exhausted, his skin sagging and almost powdery. His leg was extended before him in a cast. Alex remembered that white spike of bone jutting from his thigh and wondered if she should apologize for calling the jackals. But if she hadn’t, she would be dead, and Dean Sandow would be a murderer—and more than likely dead too. How had they even explained these wounds to the police? To the doctors who had sewn them up? Maybe they hadn’t had to explain. Maybe power like Lethe, power like the societies, like the dean of Yale University, made explanations unnecessary.

Detective Abel Turner looked fresh as ever, dressed in a charcoal suit and a mauve tie. He perched at the end of the big recliner tucked into the corner for overnight guests.

Alex realized this was the first time they’d all been in a room together—Oculus, Dante, Centurion, and the dean. Only Virgil was missing. Maybe if they’d started the year this way, things would have gone differently.

“I suppose I should begin with an apology,” said Sandow. His voice sounded ragged. “It’s been a hard year. A hard couple of years. I wanted to keep that poor girl’s death away from Lethe. If I had known about the Merity, the experiments with Scroll and Key… but I didn’t want to ask, did I?”

Dawes shifted in the narrow bed. “What’s going to happen?”

“The murder charge against Lance Gressang will be vacated,” said Turner. “But he’ll still face charges on dealing and possession. He and Tara were dealing psychotropics to Scroll and Key, possibly to Manuscript, and we had a look at Blake Keely’s phone. Someone got in there to delete a bunch of big files recently.” Alex kept her face blank. “But the voicemails were enlightening. Tara found out what Merity could do and what Blake was using it for. She was threatening to tell the police. I don’t know if Blake was more afraid of blackmail or exposure, but there was no love lost between them.”

“So he killed her?”

“We’ve been interviewing a lot of Blake Keely’s friends and associates,” Turner went on. “He was not someone who liked women. He may have been escalating in some way or using drugs himself. His behavior lately has been truly bizarre.”

Bizarre. Like eating the contents of a clogged toilet. But the rest made a kind of sense. Blake had barely seen the girls he used as human. If Tara had challenged his control, maybe the leap to murder hadn’t been a big one. When Alex had relived Tara’s death, it had been Lance’s face she saw looming above her, and she’d assumed it was a glamour disguising the real murderer. But what if Blake had somehow dosed Tara with Merity and simply commanded her to see Lance’s face? Was the drug that powerful?

Something else was bothering her. “Blake told me he didn’t kill Tara.”

“He was clearly out of his right mind when he attacked you—” said Sandow.

“No,” said Alex. “When…” When she’d been seeking revenge for what he’d done to Mercy. “A few days ago. He was under compulsion.”

Turner’s eyes narrowed. “You were questioning him?”

“I had an opportunity and I took it.”

“Is this the time to critique Alex’s methods?” Dawes asked quietly.

Alex bumped Dawes’s shoulder with her own. “Excellent point. Neither of you would have looked past Lance if I hadn’t been a tack in your ass.”

Turner laughed. “Still coming out swinging, Stern.”

Sandow gave a pained sigh. “Indeed.”

“But she’s not wrong,” said Dawes.

“No,” said Sandow, chastened. “She’s not wrong. But Blake may have believed in his own innocence. He may not have remembered committing the crime if he was under the influence when it happened. Or he may have been trying to please whoever was compelling him. Compulsion is complicated.”

“What about the gluma that came after me?” Alex asked.

“I don’t know,” said Sandow. “But I suspect whoever sent that… monster for Darlington sent the gluma after you as well. They didn’t want Lethe investigating.”

“Who?” demanded Alex. “Colin? Kate? How did they get their hands on a gluma?” Had they deliberately used a monster that would cast suspicion on Book and Snake?

You asked me to tell you what you were getting into. Now you know. That was what Darlington had said after he’d unleashed the jackals on her. But had he known? Had he understood that his own intelligence, his love of Lethe and its mission, would paint a target on his back?

“We’ll find out,” Sandow said. “I promise you that, Alex. I won’t rest until it’s done. Colin Khatri has been questioned. It’s clear he and Tara were experimenting heavily together. With portal magic, money spells, very dangerous stuff. It’s not apparent who was the instigator, but Tara wanted to go deeper and she wouldn’t let Colin put on the brakes, not if he and the society wanted more of the… assistance she was providing.”

Because Tara had gotten a taste of something more. She’d glimpsed true power and she knew it was her one chance to take it.

“She was essentially extorting him,” said Sandow. “All of it a disgrace—and all of it happening right beneath my nose.” He slumped in his wheelchair. He looked old and gray. “You were in danger and I didn’t protect you. You were keeping the spirit of Lethe alive, and I was so focused on Darlington’s disappearance, on trying to make it seem as if all was well, on maintaining an illusion for the alumni. It was… It is shameful. Your tenacity is a credit to Lethe, and both Turner and I will say so in our reports to the board.”

“And what does she get for her trouble?” asked Dawes, arms crossed. “You were so eager to wash your hands of Tara’s murder, Alex almost died twice.”

“Three times,” noted Alex.

“Three times. She should get something for it.”

Alex’s brows rose. Since when was Dawes part hustler?

But Sandow just nodded. This was the world of quid pro quo.

See, Darlington? Alex thought. Even I know a little Latin.

Turner rose. “Whatever bullshit you all come up with, I don’t want to hear it. You can dress this up in talk, but Blake Keely, Colin Khatri, Kate Masters—they’re rich kids getting wasted and wrapping a sports car they have no business driving around a tree.” He gave Alex’s shoulder a gentle squeeze on his way out. “I’m glad no one ran you over. Try not to get your ass kicked for a week or two.”

“Try not to buy any new suits.”

“I make no promises.”

Alex watched him saunter away. She wanted to say something to call him back, to make him stay. Good-guy Turner with his shiny badge. Sandow was looking at his clasped hands as if he were concentrating on a particularly difficult magic trick. Maybe he’d unfold his palms and release a dove.

“I know this semester has been a struggle,” he said at last. “It’s possible I could help you with that.”

Alex forgot Turner and the pain smoldering in her side. “How?”

He cleared his throat. “I could, possibly, make sure you pass your classes. I don’t think it would be wise to go too far, but—”

“A 3.5 GPA should do it,” said Dawes.

Alex knew she should say no, that she wanted to earn her way. It was what Darlington would do, what Dawes would do, probably what Mercy and Lauren would do. But Tara would say yes. Opportunity was opportunity. Alex could be honest next year. Still… Sandow had agreed too fast. What exactly were the terms of this bargain?

“What’s going to happen to Scroll and Key?” Alex asked. “To Manuscript? To all of these assholes?”

“There will be disciplinary action. Heavy fines.”

“Fines? They tried to kill me. They as good as killed Darlington.”

“The trust of each House of the Veil has been contacted, and a meeting will be held in Manhattan.”

A meeting. With a seating chart. Maybe some minted slush punch. Alex felt a wild anger building inside her. “Tell me someone is going to pay for what they did.”

“We’ll see,” said Sandow.

“We’ll see?”

Sandow raised his head. His eyes were fierce, lit by the same fire she’d seen when he’d faced down a hellbeast on new-moon night. “You think I don’t know what they’re getting away with? You think I don’t care? Merity being passed around like candy. Portal magic revealed to outsiders and used by one of them to attack a delegate of Lethe. Manuscript and Scroll and Key should both be stripped of their tombs.”

“But Lethe won’t act?” asked Dawes.

“And destroy two more of the Ancient Eight?” His voice was bitter. “We are kept alive by their funding, and this isn’t Aurelian or St. Elmo we’re talking about. These are two of the strongest Houses. Their alumni are incredibly powerful and they’re already lobbying for clemency.”

“I don’t get it,” said Alex. She should just let it all go, take her boosted GPA and be glad she was alive. But she couldn’t. “You had to know something like this would happen eventually. Turner’s right. You soup up the car. You hand them the keys. Why leave magic, all this power, to a bunch of kids?”

Sandow sagged further in his chair, the fire leaving him. “Youth is a wasting resource, Alex. The alumni need the societies; an entire network of contacts and cohorts depends on the magic they can access. This is why the alumni return here, why the trusts maintain the tombs.”

“So no one pays,” said Alex. Except Tara. Except Darlington. Except her and Dawes. Maybe they were knights—valuable enough, but easy to sacrifice in the long game.

Dawes turned cold eyes on the dean. “You should go.”

Sandow looked defeated as he wheeled himself into the hall. “You were right,” Dawes said when they were alone. “They’re all going to get away with it.”

A brisk knock sounded at the open door.

“Ms. Dawes, your sister is here to pick you up,” said Jean. She pointed at Alex. “And you should be resting in your own bed, little miss. I’m coming back with a wheelchair.”

“You’re leaving?” Alex hadn’t meant to sound so accusatory. Dawes had saved her life. She could go wherever she wanted. “I didn’t know you had a sister.”

“She lives in Westport,” Dawes said. “I just need…” She shook her head. “This was supposed to be a research job. It’s too much.”

“It really is,” said Alex. If her mom’s place had been a few train stops away instead of a few thousand miles, she wouldn’t have minded curling up on the couch there for a week or twelve.

Alex climbed out of the bed. “Be safe, Dawes. Watch lots of bad TV and just be normal for a while.”

“Stay,” Dawes protested. “I want you to meet her.”

Alex made herself smile. “Come see me before you go. I need to get some of that sweet, sweet Percocet before I collapse, and I don’t want to wait for good nurse Jean to wheel me away.”

She moved as fast as she could out the door, before Dawes could say more.

Alex returned to her room only long enough to retrieve her phone and yank out her IV. Her clothes and boots were nowhere to be found, taken to be entered into evidence. She’d probably never see them again.

She knew what she was doing was irrational, but she didn’t want to be here anymore. She didn’t want to pretend to talk reasonably about something that made no sense.

Sandow could make all of the apologies he wanted. Alex didn’t feel safe. And she had to wonder if she’d ever feel safe again. We are the shepherds. But who would protect them from the wolves? Blake Keely was dead and gone, his pretty skull smashed to bits. But what was going to happen to Kate Masters and Manuscript, who had unleashed Merity for the sake of saving a few dollars? What about Colin—eager, brilliant, scrubbed-face Colin—and the rest of Scroll and Key, who had sold their secrets to criminals and possibly sent a monster to devour Darlington? And what about the gluma? She’d nearly been murdered by a golem in glasses, and no one seemed to care. Dawes had been attacked. Dean Sandow had nearly bled out on the hall rug. Were they all really that expendable?

Nothing was going to be dismantled. Nothing would change. There were too many powerful people who needed the magic that lived in New Haven and that was tended by the Houses of the Veil. Now the investigation belonged to Sandow and to faceless groups of wealthy alumni who would dole out punishment or forgiveness as they saw fit.

Alex snagged a doctor’s lab coat off the back of a chair and headed for the elevators in her hospital socks. She thought someone might stop her, but she strolled by the nurses’ station without incident. The pain was bad enough that she wanted to bend double and cling to the wall, but she wasn’t going to risk drawing attention.

The elevator doors opened on a woman with auburn hair in a cream-colored sweater and snug jeans. She looked like Dawes but Dawes winnowed down and polished to a high shine. Alex let her pass and stepped inside the elevator. As soon as the doors closed, she slumped against the wall, trying to catch her breath. She didn’t really have a plan. She just couldn’t be here. She couldn’t make small talk with Dawes’s sister. She couldn’t act like what had happened was somehow fair or right or okay.

She shuffled out into the cold, limped a half block away from the hospital, and requested a ride on her phone. It was late and the streets were empty—except for the Bridegroom. North hovered in the glow of the hospital lights. He looked worried as he moved toward her, but Alex couldn’t bring herself to care. He hadn’t found Tara. He hadn’t done a damn thing to help her.

It’s over, she thought. Even if you don’t want it to be, buddy.

“Unwept, unhonored, and unsung,” she growled. North recoiled and vanished, his expression wounded.

“How are you tonight?” the driver asked as she slid into the back seat.

Half dead and disillusioned. How ’bout you? She wanted to be behind the wards, but she couldn’t bear the idea of returning to Il Bastone. “Can you take me to York and Elm?” she said. “There’s an alley. I’ll show you.”

The streets were quiet in the dark, the city faceless.

I’m done, Alex thought, as she dragged herself out of the car and up the staircase to the Hutch, the smell of clove and comfort surrounding her.

Dawes could run off to Westport. Sandow could go home to his housekeeper and his incontinent Labrador. Turner… well, she didn’t know who Turner went home to. His mother. A girlfriend. The job. Alex was going to do what any wounded animal would. She was going where the monsters couldn’t reach her. She was going to ground.