Libriomancer (32 page)

Lena pressed the barrel of the gun beneath her chin.

“Oh.”

A true sorcerer could have manipulated the gunpowder in the bullets, transforming it into something inert. I needed my books, and a way to pause time or freeze Lena in place before she pulled the trigger.

“Show me how you claimed that body for your own, and I will give Lena back to you.”

Give him and the darkness that infested him the ability to take a new form, one which would be all but unstoppable?
“This isn’t your fault,”
I said softly.
“You didn’t know what was out there.”

Hubert jabbed the cross at Lena. “I will kill her.”

I looked down at myself. I could try to drain the magic from the cross, but that would take too long. I couldn’t risk Lena pulling that trigger.

“And the delusions of their magic art were put down,”
I whispered, finding the corresponding text on my body that shielded me from hostile magic. Two years ago I had performed libriomancy without a book, channeling the magic of
War of the Worlds
through myself to destroy the zombies that would have slaughtered me. Now
I
was the book. I concentrated on that single line of text, the spell which shielded me from outside magic, and flung it around Lena and Smudge.

Metal blocks fell away from my body and clinked on the floor. I hadn’t counted on that. Having extended that spell to others, I had lost its protection for myself . . . but it did what I had hoped. Slowly, Lena lowered her weapon.

Deranged and dying, Hubert was still a genius. He was several geniuses, in fact, if you included the various characters in his head. He looked from Lena to me, and his face twisted into a snarl as he put the pieces together. He pointed the cross toward me, and I felt its magic take hold of my mind and body. “Kill her.”

To my horror, I moved to obey. Lena jumped to the side and fired the gun. Hubert fell, blood dripping from his arm. The silver cross clattered away, but didn’t release me from his final command. I swung at Lena with my remaining arm.

She rolled out of the way, then jumped over one of the open repair bays. She picked up Excalibur from the floor and lunged at me. The blade chipped deep into my right arm. The blackened wood cracked, and the lower part of my arm fell away.

“I’m sorry, Isaac.”

I swung again, then jumped forward, using the weight of my body to knock her off-balance. She stumbled, and I kicked at her knee. She twisted to avoid the worst of the blow, but my foot caught her thigh, and she fell.

I felt Hubert’s will guiding mine, manipulating my thoughts . . . and then the strings snapped. I froze, my leg raised to stomp Lena’s chest. Slowly, I lowered my foot and turned around.

Hubert screamed. Standing atop the silver cross was Smudge, doing what could best be described as an eight-legged jig. White-hot flames danced over his body.

I straightened.
“You should
not
have pissed off the fire-spider.”

A ruby fell free and rolled across the floor as the cross softened beneath Smudge’s onslaught. Hubert crawled toward it on hands and knees, his shoulder leaking blood. He snatched up the ruby, then reached for the cross.

Lena and I both shouted at him to stop, but he ignored us. His hand closed around softened metal, and I heard the sizzle of burning flesh. Smudge skittered back, his work done. When Hubert lifted the cross, it sagged and melted around his hand.

The winged vampire had entered through the garage door. Fangs bared, he clutched his rifle with both hands, looking from Lena to me to Hubert.

Tears poured down Hubert’s face. His hand shook violently. One bar of the cross broke free and fell to the ground. “Why?” he demanded. “Why do you protect
them
?”

I glanced at the vampire, who tossed the gun to the floor and bolted away.
“They’re what we made them. Our magic. Our belief. Our books.”

Hubert’s sobs changed to laughter. He looked up, and his eyes literally shone. “You can’t stop us,” he mumbled.

I studied the pattern of magic, trying to discern who or what was speaking. Charles Hubert was all but gone, drowned in the whirling energies trapped in his body. They were consuming him, burning his life from the inside.

Burning . . . I started toward him as I realized what was happening.
“Charles, don’t!”

I was too late. The light in his eyes spread, destroying him just as he had destroyed his vampire slaves. One by one I watched the other minds die, until only one remained. Eyes of flame stared into mine. I had touched that presence once before, and it terrified me. The hatred was just as powerful as the last time, but now it was personal. I felt it studying me.
Remembering
me.

And then it, too, was devoured, and nothing remained of Charles Hubert.

Chapter 22

“I
SAAC?” LENA FLUNG THE GUN AWAY
and stepped cautiously toward me. “Are you all right?”

“I’ve been better.”
One of my arms ended at the elbow; the other was a charred, brittle mess. On the other hand, considering that I had recently been stabbed, plummeted through Earth’s atmosphere, and destroyed four of Gutenberg’s automatons, I was doing pretty well.

“You look like flame-broiled crap.” Lena touched my arm. I could see the magic flowing through her, trying to strengthen the wood. Trying to strengthen
me
. She hissed and pulled her fingers back as if she had been burnt.

“What’s wrong?”

“The limbs are too far gone. It’s . . . disturbing. Like touching death. Isaac, what did you do to yourself?”

“I’ll tell you later.”
I dropped to one knee and reached for Smudge with my blackened limb. He approached even more warily than Lena had. He brushed his legs over the misshapen lump of my hand, smelling me. Whatever he found must have satisfied him, because he raced up my arm and onto my shoulder as if nothing had changed.

Had this body been capable of it, I think I would have wept then. Whatever I had become, however badly I had damaged myself, Smudge knew me.

“What happens now that Hubert’s dead?” Lena asked.

Any vampires he had enslaved were once again free. Most would return to the nest, though I suspected some would take advantage of the chaos and freedom to indulge their darker natures.
“I don’t know. The automatons are able to act independently, to some extent. They might simply revert to their original instructions.”

“Or they might continue to follow Hubert’s last orders.”

We both turned toward the office where Gutenberg lay unconscious. Hubert had locked the door. Lena started to reach for the frame, but I simply forced my arm through the upper corner and pried the whole door free.

Inside, Johannes Gutenberg lay unconscious in a metal cot wedged into place beside the door. He was bound by magic and medicine both. An IV tube snaked into his left arm, the needle and tubing clumsily taped to his flesh with duct tape.

He was shorter than me. Shorter than my human body, I mean. A bushy black beard and mustache hid much of his pale face. His shaggy hair came past his ears, and he had the worst case of bedhead I had seen in a long time. He reminded me a little of a young, skinny Santa Claus.

I turned in a slow circle, checking the room for any unpleasant surprises. Empty metal filing cabinets lined the wall. A few key rings hung from a large pegboard to the left. Books were scattered over the large desk in the corner. I recognized some of the locked books from our archive in that careless pile. Others had fallen onto the floor. One book in particular caught my attention: a thick leather-bound tome that crackled with old magic.

Lena bent over Gutenberg and pinched the skin on the back of his hand. “He’s dehydrated.”

I turned away from the books to study Gutenberg’s form more closely.
“I think I can remove the magic Hubert used to keep him down.”

She hesitated. “Isaac . . . are you sure this is the right thing to do?”

I didn’t have to ask what she meant. When I concentrated, I could see the Grail’s power in every cell of Gutenberg’s body, trying to regenerate the damage Hubert’s drugs and magic had done, keeping him young and healthy and alive. Such power was forbidden to the rest of us, but Gutenberg had made himself the exception.

As an automaton, I could dissolve that spell.

Was Gutenberg so different from Charles Hubert? Like Hubert, Gutenberg had enslaved his enemies, trapping their spirits within the bodies of his automatons and forcing them to serve him throughout the centuries. Who had Katherine Pfeifferin been? A criminal who deserved imprisonment, or a would-be lover who had spurned Gutenberg and paid the price?

Saving Gutenberg’s life meant restoring him to his position of power over the Porters. It meant allowing him to continue to manipulate the minds and magic of those who broke his rules.

Nobody truly knew Johannes Gutenberg. He had watched over the Porters for so long, and his presence
had
maintained a degree of peace and stability. But how far would he go to protect the organization? What had he done to maintain his seat as de facto lord of all things magical?

I looked down at the frail, pale figure of the world’s most powerful libriomancer and whispered,
“I don’t know.”

A new voice from the doorway said, “Whatever you choose, I suggest you choose quickly.”

Lena reacted before me, snatching up Excalibur and pointing it at the ghostly man standing behind us. The office was dimly lit, and the man’s form was unfocused, but both the voice and the magic emanating from his form identified him as well as a fingerprint.

“Aren’t you forbidden from leaving Spain?”

“Which is why I’ve not left. Physically.” Ponce de Leon chuckled and limped past us, passing through Lena’s sword like a ghost. He leafed idly through the books on the desk. His fingers never touched them, but the pages fluttered open in response to his power. “Charles Hubert is dead?”

“He killed himself,” said Lena.

“Did he, now? I wonder . . .” He clucked his tongue as he studied a copy of
Rabid
. “Clumsy work on these locks. Like he was trying to reshape the Venus de Milo with a chainsaw.”

He stepped toward Gutenberg. I raised my arm, but he merely chuckled. “I couldn’t hurt him if I wanted to. Not in this form, at any rate.” He reached out to brush spectral fingers through the hair on Gutenberg’s forehead. “Oh, Johannes. You knew this couldn’t last forever.”

“What couldn’t last?” asked Lena.

De Leon ignored the question. “You’re unhappy about the choices Gutenberg has made? You think someone else could do better?”

“You mean someone like you?” Lena asked.

De Leon raised his hands as if warding off an assault. “Chain myself with politics and bureaucracy again? Oh, God, no.” He looked up at me. “Isaac, on the other hand, shows potential. Magic is both art and science, and judging from what he’s done to himself here, he’s got a handle on both. I imagine, with a little work, he could figure out how to control the remaining automatons, and from there it’s a pretty straight road to the top spot.”

“I don’t even know how to free myself from this body,”
I protested.
“Could you—?”

“Even if I knew all of Gutenberg’s secrets, which I don’t, his geis on me prevents me from interfering in such matters.” He laughed, a tired, bitter sound. “I can’t help you, but neither can I protect him should you choose to end his life.”

“What would you do?”

He shook his head, his eyes going distant. “I’ve held power over people’s lives before. In time, I learned that I should not be trusted with such power. Whatever mistakes Gutenberg has made, I suspect I would have done far worse.”

“I don’t want to run the Porters.”

“Which makes you better qualified than many to do so,” de Leon countered.

He couldn’t be serious. I was a failed field agent, utterly unprepared to run a global network of magic-users. To make sure nonhuman races remained hidden from the public, and to enforce the peace between various races. To supervise my own people. To oversee the locking of potentially dangerous books.

“You’re unlikely to have another chance,” he continued.

“Why are you telling us this?” Lena asked. “Did you come here to persuade us to kill your rival for you?”

De Leon merely chuckled. “What I want is for you to consider the consequences of your choice, whatever choice you make.”

“How can we know that?”
Gutenberg had chosen to allow the vampires to establish a nest in Detroit. As a result, a rogue vampire had murdered Charles Hubert’s brother. Gutenberg had locked Hubert’s mind and magic instead of imprisoning him. Years later, an explosion had shattered that lock, creating a murderer. Who could have foreseen any of that?

De Leon merely shrugged and examined another book.

All I had wanted was to be a researcher, to see how far magic could take us. To truly understand magic.
“When Charles Hubert died, I saw the characters that had crept into his mind. I saw something else, too.”

“Something that frightened you,” said de Leon, nodding. “Something old and terrible and unstoppable.”

“Yes.”

“What you saw is the reason Gutenberg allows creatures such as vampires and werewolves to exist and multiply.”

“Why is that?” asked Lena.

“Because if that thing ever finds its way to our world, we will need their strength to defeat it.”

I thought of Hubert’s attack on the Detroit nest, and my meeting with Alice Granach.
“Why would they help us?”

“Survival.” He stepped past me and looked down at Gutenberg. “Choose quickly, libriomancer. But whatever choice you make, be certain you’re prepared for what comes next.”

“What do you mean?”

He sighed. “Johannes is a brilliant, stubborn, prideful man. The Porters did their best to cover up his disappearance, but this night has destroyed their efforts. The world of magic will know what has happened. After all this time, we know that Gutenberg is vulnerable. There are those who would exploit such vulnerabilities.”

“Tell me what I saw in Hubert’s mind.”

He shook his head. “Only Gutenberg knows the truth.”

And if Gutenberg died, that truth went with him. If I wanted answers, I had to restore him.

Ponce de Leon’s mouth quirked, suggesting he knew exactly what I was thinking. Had that been his intent all along, to make sure I saved Gutenberg by reminding me how much knowledge would be lost if he died?

De Leon bent over the body and planted a soft kiss on Gutenberg’s lips. “Te amo, you old fool.”

I stared. Over the years, I had often wondered what would happen if Ponce de Leon and Johannes Gutenberg were to confront one another face-to-face. This had never come up as a possibility.

De Leon cupped Gutenberg’s cheek, then backed away. “Suerte, Isaac Vainio and Lena Greenwood.”

“Good luck to you, too,”
I said automatically.

He walked through the desk and the wall beyond, disappearing like a ghost.

I turned my attention to Gutenberg. Whatever sins he had committed, he knew more of magic than anyone alive. If destroying a book was an act of evil, how much more evil was it to destroy a mind? I nodded to Lena.

She set her sword aside and peeled back the tape of Gutenberg’s IV. The flesh beneath was red and raw. Blood seeped from damaged skin. Lena tugged the needle free, and a single drop of dark blood trickled down his arm.

I reached out with my remaining arm, touching the magical web Hubert had woven to suppress Gutenberg’s power. With what remained of the automaton’s magic, I tore Hubert’s spell away like cobwebs.

Johannes Gutenberg bolted upright in the cot, blinked at Lena and myself, and vomited onto my legs. Lena grabbed his shoulder to steady him.

When he finished, his face was pale, and beads of sweat had broken out on his forehead. He wiped his lips on his sleeve. “I’m sorry about that. Thank you, Lena.” He nodded a greeting to her, then turned his full attention to me. “Isaac Vainio? What are you doing in my automaton?”

“How did you know?”

“You’ve inscribed yourself into the text, for those with the ability to read it. Also, the fire-spider gives you away.” He rose on shaky legs, leaning on Lena for support. “What of Charles Hubert?”

“Dead,” said Lena. “Consumed by magic.”

“A shame.” He combed his fingers through his hair, his movements becoming visibly stronger from one second to the next. I could see his magic at work, like antibodies devouring the remaining drugs in his system.

He brushed his hands over his wrinkled purple silk shirt and black trousers. His silver belt buckle gleamed like polished chrome. “Hubert was brilliant, but undisciplined. He used magic to protect the men in his unit ten years ago. He killed six enemy combatants. That . . . was not his first violation.”

“You punished him for protecting his own people?”