Boreal and John Grey Season 1 (3 page)

“Why isn’t Simon with you?” Dave rolled his car window down and leaned out to look past her at the empty construction site.

“I’m fine, thanks for asking.” Well, she’d determined nothing bled and nothing was broken. She’d be one giant bruise come tomorrow, but she’d live.

Dave ignored the jab. “Simon’s always been reliable.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, well...”

“Jump in, I need to talk to you.”

“I’m tired, Dave. Can’t we do this tomorrow?”

“I’m here now. George will drive your car back.”

She glanced over where George stood. He waved at her, a little too cheerfully. Maybe it was because he didn’t have to ride back with Dave. Then again he hadn’t just faced a battalion of Shades and barely pulled through. He had every right to be in good spirits.

“Fine.” She threw George her key and climbed into Dave’s car, gritting her teeth as pain stabbed her back. Her knee creaked when she folded her long legs under the dashboard.

Before she had a chance to buckle in, Dave turned the car around and they were rolling through the lit streets of the commercial district. Many shops were still open and their signs blinked rhythmically in neon colors. Customers slipped in and out, plastic bags clutched in their hands, children crying for candy and toys. Normal people, blissfully unaware of the other side.

“Did you see the caller?” Dave asked. He held the wheel hard, as if he feared it might escape.

“No.”

They usually didn’t. Callers weren’t stupid enough to stick around. If they escaped the Shades, they never looked back.

They drove east, took the tunnel. Graffiti-covered walls streaked by. A guy stood by an emergency exit, his back to them, holding a can of spray. A spiral decorated the back of his black jacket. Ella craned her neck as they sped by.

“What’s the matter?” Dave asked.

“Nothing.” She straightened, frowning. The spiral reminded her of something — images floating in her memory, intermittent flashes of dark and light, a cruel face, a white hand...
A nightmare?

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Dave said. “Something I should know?”

“Just haven’t been sleeping too well.”

Dave harrumphed. His cheeks were grey with stubble and he had dark bags under his eyes. He probably wasn’t sleeping too well, either. “So tell me about tonight.”

“God knows how many kobolds, one huge fucking goblin. Loads of fun.” Exhaustion made her snappy, and her limbs felt like they weighed a ton. If she wasn’t pumped full of adrenaline, she’d probably be dozing on the soft leather cushions of Dave’s car. “What’s going on? A month ago we bought a round of drinks when we as much as glimpsed a kobold, let alone a goblin. Most Shades came through half-formed and sickly, and now I get the whole rugby team in one night?”

“I know,” Dave said darkly. “Can’t buy enough rounds for that one, can you?” He shot her a sideways glance. “Joseph spotted a group of them over at Dreambay Wharf, eating something that looked human.”

Ella stiffened. “That’s new.”
God
. If tonight had turned out differently, she might have been Shade fodder too. “Hey, Dave? My knives and bullets didn’t seem to harm them much tonight.”

Dave hummed a little tune. He did that when he was stressed. “Steel used to stop them.”

“Well, not anymore. I need an alloy higher in iron. Or maybe pure iron.”

“In this weather? It’ll last a week, tops, before it rusts and falls apart.”

“Who cares? You didn’t see them. I...” Ella bit her lip. “I was lucky.” She hesitated to talk about the strange man, the way he’d fought, how he’d saved her in the nick of time. “Do you know of any independent hunters?”

“Here in town?”

She shrugged. Her right shoulder twinged, and sparks of pain ran from her hip to her knee. She’d need to wear a knee band again, dammit, and she’d managed without one for two months.
A new record
. She’d have a hell of a bruise where she’d hit the floor, too, and her side burned.

“Not that I know of. Why?”

She shook her head. “Nothing.”

The car turned into her street. “Get some rest.” Dave stopped at the entrance of her building and tapped his fingers on the wheel. “We’ll see about the weapons.”

“Right. And if you talk to Simon,” she said, getting out, “send him my fucking love.”

“It’s not funny,” Dave said. “Standing up a partner is unacceptable. I’ll have a long talk with him.”

“You do that.” She closed the car door and headed to her building. Damn, she was tired and every inch of her body ached. She had to clean her knives before the ichor ate the blade away, but the thought of sitting with a rag, buffing away, was enough to make her cringe. Her eyelids drooped.

She took the stairs out of habit and half-way up she wished she hadn’t. The key gave her trouble, and she fought with the lock until the door finally opened with a whine.

A pair of small yellow eyes appeared in the gloom, and she went for her gun before her brain connected. Her hand dropped to her side. “Dammit, kitty.”

Miss Meow stared at her, tail standing up, ears flattened, then jerked back when Ella finally entered.

“It’s just me, Missy.” She bent down to stroke the cat’s head and found empty air. Miss Meow trotted off to the kitchen to check if her bowl had miraculously filled with food.

Ella sighed.
Typical homecoming
. Maybe she should work on getting some human friends, maybe a boyfriend... Someone to open the door for her, have dinner cooked or at least some take away. Someone who’d miss her if she didn’t return.

Boy, talk about depressing thoughts
. The fist of the goblin coming at her had probably shocked her more than she cared to admit to herself. Near death experiences tended to do that to you.

Dropping on her couch, she bent over to remove her boots and took a deep, calming breath. This evening had sucked big time, although the image of the stranger fighting, moving like a dancer, had been a nice highlight. And not only that.

She owed him her life. And she didn’t even know his name.

Shaking her head, she pulled off the boots, dropped them to the floor and went in search of a drink. Almost nothing left in her cupboards, but she found a bottle of Frangelico, sweet almond liqueur, and damn if it wasn’t almost empty. She didn’t even bother looking for food in her fridge; nothing there, at least nothing that hadn’t come back as a zombie. It was time to go shopping. She made a face and sighed.

Snagging the bottle, she settled back on the couch, propping her socked feet on the scratched coffee table. She took a swig and closed her eyes, smiling when Missy jumped on her legs and curled up, purring. “Hey, kitty. You won’t believe what happened today. I barely made it out alive...”

And that was her last memory until her phone rang the next morning.

***

“What do you mean,
‘gone’
?” Ella wedged her phone between shoulder and cheek as she worked herself out of her pants. She reeked of sour sweat and bitter ichor, and she was covered from head to toe in dust from the construction site. No way was she going into HQ like that. “Have you checked his apartment? Simon tends to oversleep when he’s had a few too many.”

  “He’s gone, Ella,” Dave’s voice rumbled from the other end. He sounded tired. “We’ve looked everywhere. His girlfriend doesn’t know—”

“He’s got a girlfriend? Since when?” She managed to pull off her tee and her bra without dropping the phone, but she stumbled over her sneakers. “Damn.” She limped to the shower. Where ichor had touched her, on her hands, arms and neck, the skin had blistered and reddened. It hurt like a bitch.

“He’s nowhere. Just vanished.”

Ella frowned as she turned on the tap, waiting for the water to run hot. “Maybe some family business or some such shit came up and he had to leave suddenly.” Which sounded implausible even to her own ears. Simon’s only family was his uncle, Mr. Greary, at the elderly home. She’d know if he had more relatives —
right?
If she had one friend and one friend only, that was Simon. He slept over sometimes, even had a pair of sweatpants and t-shirts in her closet. He didn’t keep secrets from her.

Right
. Like she knew he had a girlfriend.

“Listen, Dave, I’ll be in before nine, okay?” Missy meowed from the door and she sighed. “Make it after nine. Then you can tell me everything you got.”

Dave grunted and hung up.

Where the hell was Simon? She called him, half expecting to hear his sleepy voice answering. After fifteen rings, she flipped the phone closed.

Shit
.

She stood under the hot spray and scrubbed herself with her generic soap, something vaguely floral and chemical, watching the water run black down the drain. Some of it was dust, some ichor. The Grey tainted whatever it touched. Her clothes were holed and eaten. She’d need to buy new ones.

She wanted a raise. And to punch Simon, but that would have to wait.

Drying herself roughly with a towel, she thought again of the strange man. He knew how to fight.
A professional hunter of Shades?
Few did this on their own, mostly those who’d been caught in the mess, like most voyants. What to most people looked like a gathering darkness and wind, malfunctioning appliances and strange noises, to a voyant it showed its true form — twisted creatures caught between dimensions. What if the man had suffered from them and decided to strike back?

Like you did?
She pulled on clean jeans and a red t-shirt with a band logo and pulled on thick socks and boots. It was possible, she supposed. Or else he worked for someone else with a grudge against the Shades.

Missy meowed and rubbed herself on Ella’s shins as she dished out canned food in the cat bowl. Still, Ella knew better than to try and pet her again. She’d found Missy in the midst of a gang of gangly boys who’d tied a can on her tail and had run after her, beating her and shouting. The kitten would need time to trust again.

Don’t we all?
Ella made sure there was water in the kitten’s other bowl, then pulled her hair up in a ponytail. “Stay put, Miss Meow,” she told the cat, glancing at the dark skies outside. What was with the freak weather? Making a round of the apartment, she made sure all windows were fastened shut. “Not the day to escape and wander outside, hear me?”

The kitten flicked an ear in her direction and went on eating.

With a sigh, Ella grabbed her backpack, her guns and knives, and stepped out. After locking up, she checked that her iron charms were in place, nailed outside the door. No way could Shades enter.

Feeling better, she turned to go. Her neighbor’s door was ajar. Mike liked to air his apartment in the mornings, letting a draft go through. Said it cleared his head. She tiptoed by. Mike was always chatty and she wasn’t in the mood. At least he’d hung the charms she gave him — old horse shoes and four-leaved clover made of iron.

Then she went in search of her car, her body vibrating with tension. Above, the clouds swirled in spiral patterns and faint clicking filled the air.

The oncoming storm had nothing natural about it.

Chapter Two

Grey

Ella found her car not far, in a side street. George had parked it right outside a bakery. The baker cast her dark looks as she approached. She pretended not to see him.

Traffic was loose, and she made it to police HQ earlier than she’d predicted. The offices buzzed, phones rang, and when she stepped into the lift, she had to jostle for space. Everyone else filed out before sublevel three, though, leaving her to ride down the next four levels in quiet, broken only by her thoughts — the alley, the kobolds, the goblin, the shining symbols on the man’s arms.

The lift dinged and she walked out into the bare-bulb lit corridor of the Paranormal Bureau. Hidden, unacknowledged, secret.

With the veil thinning at this new speed, she wondered how much longer it would be kept a secret. Most calls the police HQ got nowadays were redirected to them. Camilla, their coordinator, had asked for an assistant with the phone. Of course, money being tight, she’d never gotten one. Which meant it was each for himself. You got a mission, you went and did it and came back to nurse your wounds. Simon called them the MB: The Masochists’ Bureau. Her mouth twitched as she rapped on Dave’s door. Mabel, his secretary, frowned at her from her desk.

“Dave’s on the phone,” she said. She wore mascara so thick her eyes looked like two black moths had landed on her face.

“Then I’ll wait,” Ella said, bypassed Mabel and entered Dave’s office. She closed the door behind her, ignoring Mabel’s protests.

Dave swiveled his chair around, the receiver held at his ear in a white-knuckled grip. His face was pale with anger and his jaw clenched tight. He hummed.

Ella sank in one of the plastic chairs and hooked a leg over her knee. Absently she scraped dried mud off her boot.

“Yes, sir, I understand,” Dave said, his clipped tone belying his politeness. “Of course.” He listened for a few minutes longer, while Ella continued cleaning the mud from her boot, the pieces falling on the linoleum floor. Then he hung up and huffed.

He gave the pile of dirt a pained look.

 “Finally done?”

“Manners, Ella.”

She rolled her eyes and straightened from her hunch. “Any news from Simon?”

“I’m afraid not.” Dave rearranged a few heaps of documents on his desk. He placed two pens on top of a file, then changed his mind and lined them by his computer screen. He started humming again.

It knotted Ella’s muscles with tension. “Dammit, Dave, what’s going on?” 

“Language, agent.”

“Give me a break. We’re secret and officially don’t exist. Plus I was assaulted by some pretty nasty Shades last night, the attacks are increasing, and my fucking partner’s gone.”

Dave scowled, flushing with anger. “Don’t push it, Ella. We’re informal most of the time, but you’re going too far.”

So it was going to be one of those days, was it? “Fine. Sorry.”

Her squad captain nodded and sat back. “As I said, Simon’s gone. Nobody knows where he is. We’re filing a missing person report.”

Jeez
. The cold in Ella’s stomach intensified. “I’m sure he just forgot to let us know,” she said, “something must have come up—”

“He’s gone, Ella.”

She drew a shuddering breath. This couldn’t be happening. Hunting Shades, sending them back to the Grey had never been risk-free, but it hadn’t been that dangerous, either, not if you knew what you were doing. And Simon knew damn well what he was doing. Hell, he’d trained Ella.

“Could be unrelated to the Shades,” she whispered.

“Are you in full denial mode today?” Dave snapped. “What, you think a truck ran him over and nobody noticed to report it?”

Denial, right
. She nodded at the phone. “I need his girlfriend’s address.”

“So you go poke and upset her more? We’ve asked her the questions that had to be asked.”

“He’s my partner. I’ll ask my questions.”

He sighed, then rattled off an address. She memorized it; she knew the place. “So, spill, Dave. What did the powers above say?”

“About what?”

“Don’t. Simon’s missing, and last night could have been my last. You owe me honesty.”

“Wasn’t in the contract.”

“Fighting goblins wasn’t in it either. But here we are.”

Dave sighed. “You know as much as I. The Veil is thinning.”

“Has been, for centuries, here and there, but never like this,” Ella said. “Why is it getting worse, fast? What’s up?”

“I don’t know. I’d tell you if I knew.”

“Come on. I saw your face when you were on the phone. What did they tell you?”

“I said I don’t know.”

She got up, anger swelling in her chest. “Fine. I’ll go talk to Greary, Simon’s uncle. He may give us a clue.”

She expected Dave to say Greary wasn’t right in his head, that he’d checked all leads. But he didn’t.

“Just swing by the downtown HQ afterward,” he said. “I want you to talk to the chief officer there, Martha.”

“What for?”

“She may be able to See the Shades. We need every single voyant we can find.”

“What about Listeners?”
Oracles
most called them. Those who heard the whispers of the Shades through the Veil. “Since Anya left the Bureau, we haven’t hired anyone.”

“Don’t you have a neighbor who’s an oracle? Ask him if he could help.”

“Mike? He’s a hazard to himself. I can’t involve him in this.”

“You were the one talking of oracles,” Dave said.

Damn him. She turned to go.

“Ella?”

She stopped. “What?”

“You’ll need a new partner.”

It was a punch to the stomach. She fought not to bend over. “I’ll be fine.”

“No you won’t. You need another voyant to fight by your side. Martha—”

“I said I’ll be fine. Simon will be back.”

“Well, you can’t fight solo while he’s away. Too dangerous.”

“Then assign me someone until Simon is back.”

“I will. Martha, as soon as you tell me she’s a Voyant.”

Ella shook her head and strode to the door. “I said I’ll be fine on my own. And I’ll find Simon.”

“And if you don’t?”

“Simon
will
come back.” She let the door slam behind her and marched toward the lift. The walls pressed against her. She couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

***

Officers she barely knew cast her curious glances as she marched through the lobby and out of the HQ, her eyes burning. Dave, damn him, talked of Simon as if he was dead. He wasn’t. No way.

Where the hell was he, then? Greary had to know something; Simon visited the old man often.

People didn’t just vanish.

Meet Greary. Find clues. Bring Simon back. Feed the cat. Fight the Shades. Make it through the day.
Small goals
.

The institution was located in a small park of pines in the outskirts of town. It even sported a duck pond up front. She gave her name and signed a form at the reception desk. She put “family” in the small box and thought with unease that, from now on, she could well be Greary’s only visitor.

No
. Simon would return. She’d see to that.

An unhappy-looking nurse led her through long corridors and left her in a sitting room with Greary and with stern instructions not to open any windows or doors and to notify the reception after leaving the room.

 The old man didn’t seem to notice Ella at first and she wondered if his mind was completely gone. Old age or Alzheimer’s, she couldn’t remember which. Simon hadn’t talked much about it. Greary sat by the French doors, looking out into the garden. A bare tree spread its branches outside, black against the overcast sky. Pale sunlight filtered through.

“Mr. Greary, it’s Ella,” she tried. “Do you remember me? Friend of Simon’s.”

The mention of the names seemed to rouse him. “Simon. Ah. He should’ve married, had kids. I always told him that.”

Ella looked away, bit the inside of her cheek. Simon and her, they’d tried dating a year back, but it hadn’t worked out. Would it be any use telling the old man Simon had gone missing?

 “Yeah, well.” Something caught in her throat and she swallowed hard. She stepped closer to the window, into the frail sunlight. “Nobody could ever get to tell Simon what to do.”

“Stubborn son of a bitch,” the old man agreed. “Like his mother, bless her soul.”

Ella nodded; not that she’d ever met Simon’s mother. “When Simon last came to visit you, how was he?”

The old man didn’t reply. He was staring outside. “Do you see them?” he asked, a little breathless.

“See what?” The air was bright and clear. Sheets of light fell through the clouds.

“His fingerprints,” he said and patted the blanket on his legs. “Everywhere.”

Ella pressed her lips together. Was he talking of god? She couldn’t remember if Simon had said Greary was religious. “Where?”

“John Grey.” Drool dripped on his chin. “Grey.”

With the clouds spanning the sky, it was hard not to see grey. “Well, winter’s coming.”

“Winter, yes.” He kept staring at the fogged-up glass panes and she followed his gaze. Someone had drawn a symbol, a small spiral.
Flashes of darkness, a long road covered in snow. A winged shadow flying against the moon
.

“Where’s Simon?” Greary asked and she jerked back. He’d turned his gaze on her. A white film covered his eyes. Cataract. He was nearly blind.

She blinked. “He had work. I came instead.”

“Did he find what he was looking for?”

At last, information
. “What was he looking for?”

“The soldiers...” He looked confused. He blinked and blinked, twisting his hands in the blanket. “The guards. The grey.”

Deflated, she nodded. “Right. The guards.”

“Did he?”

“Did he what?”

“Find them?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Greary. Did Simon tell you anything? Was he going somewhere?”

“Simon... He always looked out for you.”

 “Yeah. He did.” Ella rubbed her eyes and turned to go. “I’ll come to visit you again soon, okay? Take care.”