Blood from Stone (17 page)

“Nightmares?”

Sergei nodded, feeling the tension of those nights creeping up on him again, of waking at three in the morning to the sound of his lover crying in her sleep, begging for someone not to go. Or, worse, the morning when he woke to a bundle of current in his arms, her skin crackling with so much power even he could feel it, his own skin craving for the touch. When she was awake, control had the upper hand. But in her dreams,
the dark abyss could reach her, entice her. The siren call, Doherty called it. The desire to reach for just that much more current, and be damned the risk to system and sanity.

“You think the doc could help her with that?”

It was the first indication the demon had given that he knew Sergei was in counseling, and the human couldn’t even find it in himself to feel annoyed or invaded. He was getting therapy because Wren needed him to deal with the shit inside, if she was going to keep him, and anything that involved Wren involved the demon, as well. Sergei didn’t like it, but he didn’t try to deny it anymore. That had gotten him exactly nothing except a bad case of, he was told, useless and pointless jealousy.

“I doubt it.” He got up from the chair and headed into the kitchen, his voice easily carrying back to the living area. “I’m not sure it helps much with anything, except giving me a place where I can put my fist through the wall periodically.”

“Useful, that,” P.B. agreed. “So the heart-to-heart gutspill’s not doing anything?”

Sergei put the kettle on to boil, and got down a mug and the tea canister. He measured out the black leaves and set the infuser into the mug, then waited patiently for the water to be ready.

“That a no, a yes, or a mind your own damned business, fur ball?” P.B. asked from the kitchen’s arched doorway.

“It’s not hurting,” Sergei said, not looking at the other male. “I don’t know if it’s helping. But it shows I’m trying.”

“Yeah.” The demon shook his head, and showed sharp white teeth in a sudden grin. “Used to be, to win a girl, humans would go kill something. Now you go sit in a comfy room and talk about your feelings. That’s civilization for ya.”

The water started to boil, and Sergei was saved from having to make a comeback by the whistle that filled the chrome and tile kitchen.

Across town, the day’s judgment was that it had been long, irritating, and filled with penny-ante bullshit. In other words, your usual Tuesday for New York’s Finest. It was almost end of shift, and there was one last transport to make before it was time for booze and a snooze.

“You think you’re being a tough guy, huh?” The cop, a ten-year veteran who had spent all of those years working the streets, didn’t push his prisoner out the door, but the manhandling made it clear that, were he the type to rough up a prisoner, the prisoner would be in no position to prevent it. The cop walking in front of them laughed. “He’s not tough. He’s already working a deal. Smart guy, figures the longer he holds out, the better the terms.” They reached the squad car, and the speaker opened the back door, moving out of the way so that his partner could ease the prisoner into the seat without any unfortunate bruises.

This had not been part of the plan, but the prisoner remained quiet, as he had since they caught him, and throughout his incarceration, even when his lawyer didn’t show. He had been told that he would be taken care of, and he trusted his employers. And if they failed to come through…well, he had a plan of his own,
worst-case scenario. He felt no desire to share it with these two yahoos, however.

“Only problem is,” the second cop continued, “we’re not an airline, we don’t up the offers to empty out the seats. More of you scum off the streets, better our job gets. So hold your breath all you want, pal. Won’t break my heart.”

“Excuse me?”

The first cop turned at the voice, his face dropping into pleasant “dealing with the public” lines even as his hand rested close to his holster, just in case.

By the time he had finished turning, he was already falling, his knees giving way under the low-handed blow. His partner shoved the prisoner into the car, slamming the door shut to lock the thief in while he dealt with this new threat. He started to shout for help, the precinct door only a few yards away, but never got the chance. A hypo was jammed into his bicep, and he joined his partner on the pavement, down and out for the count. The assailant stepped over the prone bodies, kneeling briefly to inject the first victim with another hypo, tucking both empty vials into a plastic bag and dropping it into a black leather briefcase. The thief, who had been watching all this from within the locked squad car, turned his face up to the newcomer, hope mixed with anticipation and a hint of fear.

The hope turned to excitement as the newcomer reached for the car door, opening it and allowing the prisoner to escape. Finally.

“You told them nothing?”

The former prisoner held out his hands for his rescuer to unlock the cuffs. “I was hired because I am
a professional,” he said, indignant now that things were happening. “I don’t roll on my employers. You don’t last in this business if you’re scared of a little jail time.”

“True.” The cuffs came off, and were dropped onto the ground. “Come with me.”

The thief stepped over the cops the way his rescuer did, not being quite as careful not to tread on fingers as he did so. They walked down the street, casual and slow, to all intents and purposes a well-dressed lawyer and more raggedly dressed client out for a stroll before their turn in the courthouse.

“You failed.”

“I know.” He was, as he had said, a professional. Part of being a professional was owning when you had screwed up. “If you wish me to make a second attempt, there will be no additional charge.” Normally a client would merely have posted the bail money, if they did anything at all. He had expected better treatment from this employer, and being broken out in such a clean and bloodless manner boded well for a continuing relationship. He was smart enough not to want to screw that up, if so.

“No. Your services will not be needed on that project again. However, I would like to discuss another service you could provide to us.”

“Of course.”

They turned the corner, walking away from the busy streets around the precinct house, and headed into a quieter, less-inquisitive area of town, even as the injured officers were being discovered, and an alarm was raised for the missing prisoner.

“I don’t have time for a session.”
They don’t have set appointments; he stops by when there’s a moment. Joe’s not in active practice; he teaches, and sees very few patients beyond his students. The office, a shared space, is more for tax purposes than anything else.

“But you still stopped by. Have you thought more about what we discussed last time?”

“We didn’t discuss anything last time. You shoved me into saying that I blamed her. But I don’t.”

“No?”

“No.”
He doesn’t. Except he does. Not for the addiction—he hadn’t known about the pleasure-pain kink before, but it was in him, was part of him, and she wasn’t to blame for bringing it out. He didn’t even blame her for not being able to say no to him; how could he be upset about someone who cared enough about him to want him to be happy?

“Then why did you say that you did?”

“Because I do.”

He knows it doesn’t make any sense. None of this makes any sense.

“Is it blame? Or anger?”

Sergei stares at Doherty, and his tense features relax just a little.
“I thought mind reading didn’t actually exist, outside of stories.”

“You knew better than that. I’m not reading your mind, just your body. You’re angry at her. Why?”

“Because she’s what she is, and I am what I am, and there’s nothing to be done about it. There’s no point to
any of it, because nothing’s ever going to change.”
He hadn’t understood, before talking to P.B. He still didn’t understand. But at least now he knew.

“You could leave her.”

For the first time ever in that office, Sergei laughed.

“I have something for you,” the old man said.

They were seated at a white-clothed table in Eddy’s, a very exclusive restaurant midtown, where the waiters knew your first name but never used it, and the wine had its own level for storage. Sergei had eaten there three times in his entire life, and each time was with the old man across the table from him.

“I assumed you had,” he replied calmly, making careful but appreciative work of the pear and foie gras appetizer in front of him. His companion never called except when he had something, and never spoke of it until after the formalities of ordering their meals and wine had been observed.

The old man wasn’t a Talent, and he didn’t, like Sergei, have ties to the
Cosa
of either personal or business nature. What he did have was money, more than he could count, and contacts everywhere, in every conceivable organization. That, and a fascination with the
supernatural that bordered on the obsessive. Sergei had been the one to confirm the man’s suspicions that the Fatae were real, and that the girl he had loved and lost, years before, had indeed been one.

Sergei wasn’t sure if he had done the old man any favors, but it seemed to be working to their benefit, so far. The call from him this morning just after Wren had left his apartment, a summons to lunch, was proof of that.

“I have been hearing whispers of a group—small, but well-funded—that is looking for something of a physical and yet mystical nature. A philosopher’s stone, of sorts, but one that breathes and bleeds.”

Sergei calmly cut, lifted and chewed his appetizer, then took a sip of his wine. An Italian white, and surprisingly good. He made a mental note of the producer to buy for his own cellar, if it wasn’t wildly overpriced retail; Wren might like it.

“A philosopher’s stone? And one that lives?” His tone was politely dubious. Not everything the old man came up with was useful. Having massive amounts of money and knowing everyone worth knowing didn’t make you not a crackpot. It just ensured that nobody called you a crackpot, not even behind your back.

“Yes, that was much my reaction, as well.” The old man finished his wine and a waiter was there to refill it soundlessly. He waited until the server had finished and left them alone before continuing. “However, it appears that this is a different sort of stone. Rather than transmuting base metal into precious, it turns inert into active. It gives life.”

All of Sergei’s warning signals were chiming quietly, not quite at full alert but completely aware and quiver-
ing. A magical item that could convey life? You could interpret that a lot of ways, none of them good for them, right now. Wren joked about it, but it was true: Once was an accident. Twice was not-a-coincidence. Three times meant fecal matter was in the air vents.

“A valuable thing, if it’s true. And they came to you, thinking that you might have some word of it?”

“And I come to you, knowing that you have a reputation as a man who can determine if something is truth or falsehood.” The old man never asked where Sergei got his information from, and vice versa: it was one of the reasons they were able to do business.

“There is, to the best of my knowledge, no such thing as the philosopher’s stone.” It might exist. It might not. Sergei knew too much to say he knew everything about the supernatural world, but neither Wren or P.B. had ever even implied that any such thing might exist, not even in the most wistful of wishings. And he had heard them wistful and wishing—mostly about money—many, many times. A stone that might give life…that he would have heard mention of. Sergei was certain of it. So, he could say without any falsehood that there was no such thing as a philosopher’s stone, flesh or otherwise.

He prayed that was enough for the old man.

“You’re being cagey. When you are cagey it means that there is something under the words that intrigues you, but you don’t want me to know.”

Damn.
He started to frame an explanation that said nothing, and was stopped by the old man’s laughter. He waved a fork at Sergei, still chuckling. “I have no need for any such stone. I have more money than my ad
visors know what to do with, and more grandchildren than I can spoil with that money. Wealth and flesh have already been kind to me, I desire no more.”

The two men looked at each other across the white linen and white china, and neither one of them blinked.

“I would like to know if such a thing exists, merely to have something to discuss with the good Lord when I go,” the old man said. “You will find out, and you will tell me. And I will carry that knowing to my grave. In return, I give you the names of the men making the inquiries, and the specifics of what they claim. Agreed?”

Sergei trusted the old man as far as he could throw him, but he could probably throw him a reasonable distance. And this…sounded as though it might be what they were looking for: the names of whoever had coerced the demon who had sent P.B. that letter.

“Agreed.”

They raised glasses at each other, and sipped in perfect accord.

He should have gone directly back to Wren with his information. Should have, and didn’t. Sergei left the restaurant, having turned down the offer of an excellent cognac, and found himself walking up Fifth Avenue, covering ground at a steady pace, moving past casual pedestrians without even seeing them.

He should be heading downtown, not up. There was nothing uptown that related to this situation.

Maybe that’s why he found himself heading there.

Somewhere in the sixties he realized what he was doing, and made a left turn, heading into the green space of Central Park.

Almost immediately, the change of atmosphere soothed him. He left the roadway and strolled much more slowly along the curving paths. Joggers and the occasional mounted rider went by and while he could still hear the traffic outside, it seemed miles away rather than yards. More than eight hundred acres, all for free, and the last time he had been here purely for pleasure was…

He couldn’t remember. It had been summer, but he didn’t remember if it was last summer, or the year before, or…

That had been the last time life was quiet enough to just take a walk for pleasure, no pressing needs or life-threatening crisis.

And you didn’t have anyone to walk with, then, he reminded himself. Would you change it?

No. He was not the sort of man meant to go through life alone, no matter what his earlier years had brought him. Much as he’d fought it, Wren, and P.B., and the rest of their insane extended community was his community now, too. Which meant that their problems were his problems.

The philosopher’s stone. Creating life, not wealth.
People would pay well for such a thing. Pay—or kill.

Sergei felt a sigh building in his chest. It was possible, entirely possible that the information he had in his wallet had nothing whatsoever to do with P.B., or the materials that Wren was set to Retrieve. Possible, but probably not probable. One, two, three things intersecting. There was no such thing as coincidence where the
Cosa Nostradamus
was concerned.

“Hey. Partner-man.”

Sergei felt the pinecone hit his shoulder the same
instant the guttural call caught his attention. He looked up and was greeted with the sight of a small, grayish-green figure sitting on a tree branch about a foot above his head. Wild orange hair—a color not found in nature or supernature—spiked madly around the ugly little face, and one thin arm was wrapped around a squirrel, who was watching him with equally bright black eyes.

It wasn’t the first time he had been addressed directly by a piskie, but it never felt comfortable. Piskies actually liked humans as a species, being one of the few Fatae-breeds who did, but they liked them as subjects for their practical jokes as much as anything else. As a Null, Sergei was well aware of the fact that he had few defenses against those pranks, or anything worse.

But then, he really only needed one: he was The Wren’s partner-man. The Wren was friends with the demon P.B. And the piskies, for whatever reason, adored P.B. Wren had asked the demon about that once, and gotten a very vague hand-waving shoulder-shrugging response. If Sergei didn’t know the demon better, he would have said that it was embarrassed.

“Partner-man,” the piskie said again, more urgently. He knew they had individual names, but personally couldn’t tell one from the other. They all looked like Kewpie dolls to him.

“Yes?” He was cautious, but polite in responding. He really didn’t want any more pinecones—or worse—thrown at him.

“You be careful, partner-man.”

“Any particular reason why, or just a general warning?” It could be anything, knowing piskies, up to and including a prank they themselves had planned.

“Whispers. Whispers in the ground, rising on the wind.” The piskie made a face, as if it couldn’t believe it was saying what it was saying. “Old history, blood and stone. It should have been left in the old world, but it’s coming here. Bad cess.”

“Could you be a little less obscure?” Sergei couldn’t resist asking, and the piskie grinned, showing small sharp teeth.

“No,” it said. With an impossible leap, it disappeared into the higher branches.

Abandoned, the squirrel stared at Sergei for another moment and then, with a scolding chrrruup chrrrruup, disappeared, as well, if not quite so gracefully.

“Great.” Sergei kept walking, not even bothering to keep an eye out for further interruptions from above. The piskie had said what it wanted to say.

“Whispers in the ground, rising on the wind.” It sounded like something one of Jimmy’s fortune cookies would say. “Blood and stone.” That had him more concerned. Stones again. Was that the same as the philosopher’s stone the old man had mentioned?

“It has to be. Coincidence and
Cosa
don’t go together, never have.”

He took the sheet of paper out of his pocket, and fumbled for his glasses, putting them on so that he could read the handwritten notes without holding the paper at arm’s length.

Two names: Rogier Kees and Jef van Deuren. Dutch passports: Dutch nationals, although the first, Kees, had arrived a week ago from Canada. He had taken a room at the Midtown Hilton. Despite the high-ticket room, he wasn’t splashing money around: the room
had been booked using points. Interesting. Van Deuren showed up only the day before, and his room was paid for with a credit card. The two of them met for breakfast each day since then, and then went their own ways. Kees would return to his room and work the phones and computer systems all day, while van Deuren appeared to be making a more direct approach. According to the information Sergei had been given, he was making personal calls to every veterinarian in the city, working a sweep pattern from the Upper East Side across and down to the financial district, asking about any unusual animals treated lately. Specifically, white-furred animals.

Sergei felt his lips twitch, despite himself. If they were looking for P.B., they really had no clue. A veterinarian? The demon had a massage therapist he saw every few months; Sergei had heard Wren teasing him about that once, but otherwise the entire concept of medical attention was nonexistent. In fact, Sergei wasn’t even sure if it was possible to damage the demon with sheer brute force; his bones were so solid you could drop him out of a third-story window and he’d probably bounce up and land on his feet without a bruise, and any flesh wounds could be healed by a halfway decent Talent. They were crap at healing internal injuries, although he’d never quite understood the explanation why, but mending cuts and breaks was nothing. Even Wren could manage that, and she had trouble applying a bandage properly.

But they were clearly looking for P.B., and with bad intent. What the demon had to do with the legend of the philosopher’s stone, Sergei didn’t know; it was
enough that these Dutchmen made a connection to make him worry. Creating life—or possibly
saving
life, against the ravages of current? Did they think that
P.B.
was that stone, that his ability to bond with a Talent…? Possible. Very possible. Damn.

The demon might be physically tough, but anyone could be killed, if you brought the right tools to the party and he would not go quietly if someone tried to shove him into the back of a van.

Outsiders, and Fed, and
Cosa,
oh, my. Bad combination. This might be the one to finally give him an ulcer.

“Start with the immediate problems and work out from there,” he said, focusing his thoughts. That meant the job they had been hired to do. “If this creator was a Frankenstein of sorts, creating life from random bits, then it might make sense that someone might assume that he had a magical object that allowed him to do this.” The ironic thing was that, according to P.B., Mary Shelley had it right: there was less magic and more science involved, although only if you assumed that it was electricity rather than current that had animated the monster….

“This
dermo
makes my head hurt,” Sergei muttered, refolding the paper and putting it back into his pocket and looking at his watch, a wafer-thin gold indulgence that had somehow managed to survive several years of close contact with Wren. “Almost quitting time,” he said, although he had told Lowell this morning not to expect him back at the gallery the rest of the day. “Maybe I’ll—”

“Sergei Didier?”

It was nice to know that his reflexes were still what
they used to be, even if his eyesight wasn’t quite. The small pistol he had started carrying again—despite Wren’s silent but pronounced distaste—was out and aimed at the speaker by the time the last syllable of his name—horribly mispronounced, Sergei noted in passing, was uttered.

The sight of his handgun triggered an instant re action—the woman reached into her own jacket, and then froze, as though realizing how that kind of motion could be interpreted.

“You are Sergei Didier, then,” she said, not moving.

“I am going to take out my identification, all right?

Please don’t shoot me.”

He nodded, alert to everything going on around them, in case anyone else happened to stop by, either to “help” his would-be assailant, or misguidedly at tempt to protect her from the guy with the gun.