Three Days to Dead

Chapter 24

16:05

The standoff lasted the space of a breath, then Nadia lowered the shotgun. Her coffee-colored eyes darted to the hall behind us, searching. She stepped back and cocked her head. “He is waiting for you,” she said.

“Who is?” I asked.

“Rufus, idiot.” Her disdain was palpable. She pointed the muzzle of her weapon toward the interior of the apartment. “Go on, then.”

Not quite the welcome of Kings, but she didn’t shoot us on the spot. I walked down a short entry hall that smelled like tomato soup and bleach—two cloying and somewhat nauseating odors. The hall opened into a surprisingly spacious living room/kitchen combo. Plain roman shades covered both windows in the living space, and the sofa had been pushed up against the shared wall. Light flared down from a single overhead fixture.

Rufus lounged in a wheelchair parked next to a small wooden side table. His left shoulder was in a sling. Bloodstained bandages poked out beneath his unbuttoned shirt. He was pale, with dark circles lining both eyes, and he was sweating like a junkie long overdue for his next score.

“Jesus, Rufus,” Wyatt said. He scooted past me and approached his old friend. “Why aren’t you in the hospital?”

“Not safe,” he replied, slurring his words. Nadia had him hopped up on something. “Halfies followed me to finish the job.”

Nadia swooped past me and knelt next to Rufus, shotgun across her lap, protecting her Handler. She continued to glare at me with open suspicion, so I glared right back. She had nothing to fear from me unless she got in my way.

“He insisted we come here,” Nadia said, her faint accent sharpening her S’s and R’s. “I told him it was not safe, but he is stubborn. He said you would know to find him here, so here he must stay.”

“And I was right,” Rufus said. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you, Truman. I should have helped you sooner.”

“I didn’t give you much reason to trust me, pal,” Wyatt said. “But at least I didn’t shit on my friends for nothing. We finally got the answers we wanted, and none of them are good.”

“About the alliance?”

“More like a conspiracy,” I said.

Wyatt and I took turns narrating the events of the last twenty-four hours, right up through Horzt leading us out of First Break, and Wyatt ended with our arrival at their doorstep.

Rufus had gone impossibly paler during our description of Tovin’s ultimate plan for Wyatt’s free will. His breathing seemed erratic, almost panicked. Nadia remained a sphinx, her internal thoughts impossible to guess by her body language. I might as well have told her the grocery store had a half-price special on laundry detergent, for all of the interest she displayed.

“That’s unbelievable,” Rufus said after a brief pause. “I mean, I knew it had to be something big, but from the elf? I never would have guessed.”

“He’s playing everyone,” Wyatt said. “Putting up a concerned front about a possible alliance that was all bullshit. He’s been using the Halfies, and the goblins, too. The Bloods are on to him, but the Families won’t act without proof. No one will.”

“Are we not overthinking this?” Nadia asked. Her chilly voice sparked goose bumps across my skin. “Save lying, Tovin has committed no real crime. All we need do is void your contract. Simple, no?”

Wyatt glared at her with unmasked fury. “No, not so simple, Nadia. And if you even contemplate putting buckshot into either one of us, I’ll summon your heart right out of your chest.”

Her eyes widened to comical proportions. The threat worked; she backed off. Lucky for us she didn’t know Wyatt couldn’t summon living tissue.

“We need to find Tovin,” I said, “but he could be anywhere in the city, and we don’t exactly have time for a door-to-door.”

“You can always have a go at the babbler,” Rufus said.

I blinked. “The what?”

“The babbler in the next room.” He waved his right hand at a door to the left of the kitchen. “The Halfie who tracked me to the hospital. Nadia brought him with us, but he’s pretty useless. Must be newly turned, because it didn’t take well. He’s losing it.”

“Lost it,” Nadia said.

One in five humans infected by a Blood doesn’t take to the change. Most adapt to their new cravings and lifestyle and limitations and powers, but some don’t. They can’t quite grasp that life will never be the same, and often lose their tenuous grip on reality in a mighty scary fashion. I’d cleaned up after many feral Halfies who turned their insanity against helpless innocents.

Rufus wiped his hand across his chin. “Keeps on muttering about his lost goblet, or some such nonsense. Can’t get anything else out of him.”

“Lost goblet?” Wyatt asked. “You sure know how to pick useless hostages. But I’m surprised that just one Halfie came after you. They tend to travel in packs.”

“Not if one of them’s gone feral,” I said. “Usually they kill them outright, to prevent them from weakening the group.”

“You want a go at him?” Rufus asked. “See if you can get something else out of him besides ‘goblet’?”

“Chalice,” Nadia said. “He said chalice, not goblet.”

My lips parted, and every muscle in my face went slack. Blood rushed down and set my heart pumping hard and fast. “Chalice.” The word slipped from my lips without thought.

“What is wrong with her?” Nadia asked.

Wyatt’s hand looped around my wrist. I forced my head to turn. Concern lined his face. I stood up and tore my hand away from his. He matched my steps to the bedroom door. I spun around and put a hand out that nearly clipped him in the jaw.

“Stay,” I snapped. “I’m not going to freak out. I’m going to talk to him. See if I can help him find his missing chalice, and maybe get a few answers.”

I opened the door, slipped inside, and closed it before Wyatt could drum up a good retort. I didn’t need him talking me out of it or following me inside. Help appreciated, but not necessary.

The light was off. I palmed the wall until my fingers found a switch. Harsh yellow light filled the room, courtesy of a garish floor lamp, all bulb and no shade. The bed was pushed to the far wall against a mirrored closet door. A wooden dining chair lay on its side, a naked body strapped to it with a queer tangle of shoelaces and ripped sheets.

Covered in bruises and dried blood, his skin red and rashed wherever it touched the chair, Alex Forrester was easy to recognize. I had never expected to see him again, much less tied up, sporting a pair of gleaming fangs, and babbling to himself. Spittle ran down his chin and had pooled on the scuffed wood floor. Everywhere, he was surrounded by unfinished wood—one of the greatest irritants to vampires and their kin.

I crouched in front of him, but he didn’t seem to notice. His eyes remained wide, staring straight through me.

“Alex? Can you hear me?” Not even a twitch. “I’m going to get you sitting upright, okay? Don’t, you know, bite me or anything.”

He didn’t react to the change in elevation. I expected something during the fiasco, but amid my groaning and straining, he made no noise. Nothing. His lips continued to move, but no sound came out. Old wounds on his arms and legs were swollen and infected from contact with the chair, some weeping and others necrotic. All looked extremely painful.

I touched his shoulder, and he blinked. Nothing else. “Alex, it’s Chalice,” I said.

He stopped muttering. He looked up at me, really saw me. Wonder and awe softened his features and widened his eyes.

“You’re dead,” he said. “Am I in Hell? Am I finally dead, too?”

“Almost, Alex.” I inhaled, held it, let the oxygen strengthen me. It wasn’t really Alex. He had died yesterday. This was a shell that had information I needed; I just had to manipulate it out of him. “You’re in a place where you can still do some good before you pass on. I can help you.”

His face crumpled. “I should have known you were depressed. I should have seen the signs. It’s my fault you died.”

“I killed myself, Alex. It’s no one’s fault but mine.”

“Friends don’t let friends commit suicide.”

Heartbreaking though it was, the conversation wasn’t helping us. “Do you remember my friend Evy? You gave her a ride once, did her a favor?”

He pursed chapped lips. Shook his head.

“She looks kind of like me. She was looking for someone she loved. You helped her find him, but you got hurt. That’s why you’re here.”

“You do look like her, Chal. It’s creepy. Is she dead, too?”

“No, but she could die if we don’t help her.”

He chewed on his lower lip. His fangs punctured the skin and drew blood. Glittering eyes flitted to the bedroom door, to the ceiling, the covered window. “They’re in the walls,” he said.

I tensed, listened hard, but heard nothing save the occasional creaking floorboard from the living room. I imagined Wyatt standing there with his ear pressed to the door, straining to hear every word.

“Who’s in the walls?” I asked.

“Them. You know.”

“I don’t know, Alex. Who are they?”

“Millions of them, crawling through me, Chal. Making me want to hurt people. Making me want blood, but I don’t want blood. Can I please just go? I want it to stop.”

The vampire infection; that’s what he saw in the walls. The parasite that turns them into monsters. He was trying to fight those instincts, to reclaim his body again by disassociating. I hadn’t the heart to tell him it was a losing battle.

“You can go soon, I promise, but I need you to help me first. Just answer a few questions, okay?”

His chin trembled. Tears filled his eyes and spilled down both cheeks in twin streams. He pursed his lips and shook his head. “They’re everywhere, Chal. Make them go away. Make it stop.”

My heart went out to him. I wanted to end his suffering. I just couldn’t. He knew something, and big or little, I had to know what it was. When I didn’t reply, he started to cry in earnest. I’d never seen that sort of utter terror in the face of a grown man. Strike that—I’d seen it once before, as I lay dying the first time.

A sharp knock on the door stole my attention. I opened it a crack, revealing half of Wyatt’s face.

“You want to put a pause on that for a minute?” he asked, “The package is here.”

“What package?”

“The one I asked the gremlins to assemble before they wiped out all hard traces of Chalice Frost.”

I perked up. That was certainly worth a short recess. I slipped through the door, back into the living room, and pulled it shut behind me. In his hands, Wyatt clutched a bulging legal folder, held together by two large rubber bands. “Why did they bring it here?” I asked.

“It’s where I told them to bring it,” he said, as though it was the most obvious question in the world.

“Duh, genius, but why here?”

Wyatt had the good sense to adopt a hint of chagrin. “I thought I’d still have Rufus in custody when we swung by to collect it.”

Across the room Rufus grunted. Nadia had disappeared somewhere—a blessing I wasn’t about to ponder. She gave me the willies. I snatched the bundled folder from Wyatt and ripped off the rubber bands. Dozens of newspaper clippings tumbled to the floor and scattered, along with photographs and a few slips of printed paper.

I dropped the remaining contents of the folder on the dining table, freeing my hands to collect the information.

“A little eager?” Wyatt asked.

My mature response was to stick my tongue out at him. I snagged a column dated twenty-seven years ago. The headline stopped me short: “Woman Gives Birth in Mall.” I scanned the article and sucked in a breath.

“What is it, Evy?”

“ ‘Six people trapped in the women’s restroom at Capital City Mall soon became seven,’ ” I read, “ ‘when one woman unexpectedly went into labor. Part of the ceiling outside the restroom collapsed, authorities say, making it impossible for the women to exit for several hours. During that time, Lori Frost, eight months pregnant, went into preterm labor. Charlene Williams, an off-duty trauma nurse, helped Frost deliver the baby without complications. Upon rescue, both mother and daughter were rushed to St. Eustachius Hospital, where they are listed in good condition.

“ ‘The Frosts were not available for comment, but Ms. Williams described the experience as “the easiest birth of my life. Though that’s not saying much, since I work in the Emergency Room.” ’ ”

I looked up, mouth agape. “That’s the same place Isleen took me to for that memory ritual. I was born … Chalice, I mean, she was born on a magical hot spot. Holy shit, Wyatt.”

He plucked the article and read it for himself. His eyes grew wider with each sentence, letting the full meaning settle into his brain. Hot spots existed all over the city. Many were so faint they couldn’t be detected. A few, like the vampire Sanctuary, were unmistakable and made their presence felt. It wasn’t the coincidence of the location that scared me—it was the implication that Chalice had been born above a hot spot, just like Wyatt and the handful of other human beings considered Gifted. It meant she (and in turn, I) was Gifted.

“Is that possible?” Rufus asked.

“Not only possible, but it solves the last mystery,” I said. “It’s why I came back in Chalice’s body, instead of where I was supposed to. My resurrection was made possible by Tovin’s connection to the Break, so I was attracted to a body that also had that connection.”

“Do you have the birthmark?” Wyatt asked.

“How the hell should I know?”

“You’ve been in that body for two days.”

I stood up and tossed the rest of the gathered clippings onto the table, annoyed by his silly argument. “Sorry I haven’t penciled in time to stare at my own ass, Wyatt.”

“Drop your pants.”

“Now’s not really the time….”

“Evy.”

Okay, wrong time to joke. He was dead serious. Giving little thought to my audience across the room, I tugged the button and unzipped the fly, then pushed the dirty jeans down to my ankles. I bent at the waist and placed my palms flat on the table. The pose was both submissive and suggestive, but I felt no thrill—only slight apprehension of what he might find.

Wyatt hooked a finger into the waistband of my panties and pulled them down. Cool air caressed my exposed skin. I shivered. Halfway down, he stopped. Pulled back. I yanked my pants up, my suspicions con-firmed by his silence.

“I can’t believe we never guessed it before,” he said after a moment’s pause.

“We still don’t know what I can do,” I said, “or if I can even access Chalice’s Gift.”

“You said you felt the power of the Break when we were down with the Fair Ones, right?”

“Yeah, and I’ve felt it ever since my rebirth, but I just thought it was a side effect. It never occurred to me it was something more.”

“You’re already tapped into the Break, Evy. Now we just need to find out what you can do with the tap. Knowing the well is down there doesn’t help if you don’t have a shovel to dig to it.”

“But how are we supposed to do that?”

He held up a handful of Chalice’s file. “Keep looking. There has to be something here.”

We sifted for several minutes, through school records and doctors’ notes and copies of report cards. I found more newspaper clippings. “Toddler Missing; Found in Toy Store” caught my eye.

“Listen to this,” I said, skimming the article for salient details. “When she was three years old, Chalice disappeared from a sandbox where three other kids were playing. No one reported seeing her get up on her own, or anyone take her. She was discovered a few hours later by police, in the stuffed animal section of a local toy store ten blocks from the park. The owner didn’t see her come in with anyone, and security cameras showed no front door entry.” I scanned the rest. “It was a shop that the mother frequented. She said Chalice loved the big stuffed lions and tigers.”

“There are more like that,” Wyatt said. He held up something with a Child Welfare stamp on it. “She also disappeared from her preschool classroom six times over a four-month time period. Same as before, with no one seeing her get up and leave, and no one taking her. She was always found outside on the playground, away from the other kids.”

Our eyes met over our individual sheets of paper. He was thinking the same as me, but I hesitated to say it. It seemed impossible, given what we knew of the Gifted and their limitations. But not so impossible when you factor in a return from the dead.

“Is it even possible?” I asked.

“Teleportation?”

“Yeah.”

“Theoretically, yes. Practically, I have no idea.”

“How do we test something like this?”

“Concentration?”

I balled up the article and threw it at his head. It bounced harmlessly to the floor. He didn’t react, seeming lost in thought. I stared at the pile of records, hoping to make sense of everything now swirling dangerously through my head. I pulled out a slim folder sporting the seal of a public school district more than a hundred miles away. High school records.

“Alex told me she moved back to the city two years ago,” I said. “He said she was fine for the first few months, and then gradually she started getting depressed. It wasn’t an overnight thing, so being back here affected her negatively. She obviously grew up elsewhere. Maybe her parents moved away because of the disappearances and, without that localized connection to the Break—”

“She lost her Gift,” Wyatt finished. “Which starts coming back when she returns to the source, only if she doesn’t remember it from childhood, or have any idea how to tap into the Break—”

“She ends up wallowing in depression without knowing why. It gets so bad she kills herself.”

“Then you find her body, because even though she’s dead, it’s still a tap into the Break.”

“Do you think that’s how the Halfies tracked us to the mall? Someone gave them information on Chalice and they had the place watched?”

“Possible, but not likely. I had the gremlins start wiping her out a day before that happened.”

“Right, okay.” I turned, marched back to the bedroom door.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m not done talking to Alex. Keep sifting; see what else you can find that might help us.”

“We need to talk about this teleportation thing.”

“We will, when I’m done.”

I slipped back inside before he could argue, and locked the door. No more interruptions.

Alex hadn’t moved. Tears had left stains on his pale cheeks. His cut lip left a red smear on his chin. Clear snot dripped from his nose. He didn’t look like a dangerous, half-Blood traitor, just a scared young man without a friend in the world.

I imagined a similar look on Chalice’s face near the end. Completely at odds with herself, feeling alienated and uncertain as to why. So depressed that she saw no way out of the well of pain she’d fallen into. I found no common ground with that sort of emotional agony and no sympathy for the choice she’d made—only commiseration in feeling trapped inside a body that didn’t seem like her own.

“Alex?” I asked. “It’s Chalice.”

He blinked, didn’t look at me.

“I’m sorry I left, but I still need to talk to you.”

“Are you going to set me free now?”

“Soon, but first, do you know a man named Tovin?”

“Tovin’s not a man,” Alex said, his demeanor changing instantly. Like I’d flipped a switch with a single word. His face hardened, mouth drawn in a tight line. Every scrap of misery was gone. “Stay away from him, Chal.”

“Tovin wants to hurt someone I care about, and I need to stop him. I have to find him first, though. Do you know where he is?”

“I’ve only heard things. The others, they talked about him. He’s like the boogeyman. He’s powerful.”

“I need to find him, Alex.” I cupped his cheeks in my hands, amazed at how cold his skin was. Cold and clammy and rough. “Where is he?”

He held my steady gaze, his tinged with disgust. “Do you promise to let me go?”

Across the room, on top of an antique dresser, I spotted a discarded gun belt. Several boxes of ammunition were laid out on top of it. Nadia had certainly brought along an arsenal. Good news for us, since I had no weapon on me, save Horzt’s crystal shard. I eyed the gun and hoped one of those boxes held what I needed.

“I promise, Alex.”

“The old mill.”

“What old mill?”

“They kept talking about an old mill, said that’s where he was. The old mill. That’s what they said, Chal. Does that help?”

I searched my memory, thinking about the city’s waterfront properties. No mills came to mind.

“I told you where he is,” Alex wailed. Tears pooled in his eyes. Bright spots of color flamed in his cheeks, standing out from his pallor. Blood dripped from his cut lip to his chin and dappled his shirt.

“The old mill,” I said.

“Let me go.”

I stood up and walked to the dresser. Each step echoed like thunder. I found the box of bullets labeled “A.C.” and fed two of them into the gun’s chamber. Anti coagulant rounds were hard to come by outside of the Triads. I walked to the back of Alex’s chair and held up the gun. His shoulders shook. My finger twitched.

“I’m sorry, Alex,” I said.

“Does dying hurt?”

My eyes tingled. I bit the insides of my cheeks, tried to ignore the heartache in his voice and keep focused. Alex was already dead; this wasn’t Alex. I was stopping a monster, putting down a rabid dog. Nothing more, nothing less. Lie to him, shoot him, and get it over with.

“Dying didn’t hurt the first time,” I said. “It’s all the shit leading up to it that’s painful.”

He bowed his head. I pressed the muzzle to the back of his neck. Clean shot, perfect kill, even for a Blood. My finger twitched. I couldn’t pull it. I couldn’t rationalize the kill.

“Do it, Chal.”

I closed my eyes.

“Let me go.”

I couldn’t breathe.

“Save me.”

My finger squeezed. The gun roared. I screamed.