MORTAL COILS (75 page)

“So
tell me about this girl.”

“How
did you know . . . ?”

Louis
placed his hand over his chest. “I have worn the look on your face many times.”
He gestured back up the street. “I was walking this way. Would you care to
accompany me? We can talk for a bit.”

Eliot
glanced toward home. Grandmother and Cee were probably wondering where he was.
And Fiona surely needed him.

But
Eliot had needs, too. And right now, he needed another guy to talk to about
Julie.

“Okay,”
Eliot said. “I can only stay a few minutes, though.”

“That
will do.”

Louis
turned and Eliot followed. Louis walked at a brisk pace and Eliot trotted to
keep up.

“So
there was this girl. I thought she and I . . .” The words stuck in Eliot’s
throat. “But she never showed up.”

Louis’s
smile vanished and his lips pursed. “Hold a moment.” He stopped. He placed his
long hand upon Eliot’s chest like a doctor performing a checkup. “Your heart
yet beats,” Louis whispered. “It is wounded, but strong. You’ll live.”

He
turned and they continued to walk, but slower.

“You
may not believe it now,” Louis said, “but in a week the pain will lessen. In a
month, it will still hurt like hell, but it will be more memory than real.”

Eliot
could almost believe that. Louis seemed to know what he was talking about.
Certainly he had dealt with women before, too.

“She
was special . . . different. A girl like that has never even given me a second
look before.”

“She
was beautiful?”

“The
prettiest girl who’s ever come to Del Sombra.”

“Really?”
Louis stroked his chin. “Pretty and new in town?” His eyes narrowed and his
face darkened. “Of course they would tempt you.”

Eliot
didn’t like this look on Louis. He’d seen him crazy and confused. He’d seen him
in loving concentration when he had played Lady Dawn. But never before had
Eliot considered Louis dangerous, until now . . . his eyes smoldering.

Eliot
changed the subject. “I found the music you left for me.”

This
snapped Louis out of whatever thoughts clouded his mood.

“In
the alley. Chalked on the sidewalk,” Eliot explained. “I found it just before
the rain washed it away.”

Louis
smiled, but it was as if the grin had frozen on his face, and behind it
something else was going on.

“How
fascinating,” Louis said. “How lucky for you.”

Twilight
shadows flooded the street, and the concrete sidewalk ahead became squares of
solid gloom.

Louis
set his hand on Eliot’s shoulder. “Let’s discuss this music before we go
farther.”

Louis
knelt next to him. He drew a set of lines and dotted notes on the sidewalk. It
was the nursery rhyme he had taught him.

“‘Mortal’s
Coil,’” Eliot said.

“Indeed.
It is the first part of the Sinfonia di esistenza; that’s Italian for The
Symphony of Existence.”

“I
saw the rest, the middle, and even the end. Although that last part was a bit
smeared. I figured it out, though.”

Louis’s
smile completely faded. “Did you?”

“Sure.”

The
raindrop-painted notes blazed in Eliot’s memory. It was tremendously complicated,
but he nonetheless tried to reduce it so he could hum it for Louis—prove that
he knew it.

Louis
held up one finger. “There is no need for that. I can see it like a bonfire
burning in your thoughts.”

He
stared deep into Eliot’s eyes. It was like one of those soul-penetrating gazes
Grandmother gave him when she was displeased . . . only this was something
Eliot had never before seen. Louis actually looked proud.

“You
have done something even I could not have.” Louis squeezed Eliot’s shoulder. “You
are already better than I.”

“There’s
no way.” Eliot felt himself blushing—and embarrassed by this, he blushed even
harder.

“Do
not be modest. Ever. People will always try to make you less than you are. Do
not assist them.” Louis got a faraway look. “Yes, a violin. Naturally, strings.
I should have foreseen that you would inherit great gifts.”

“I
don’t understand, sir. I’m sor—”

Eliot
was about to say again he was sorry, but then remembered Louis’s admonishment
to stop apologizing for everything. That was Grandmother’s and Cecilia’s
influence on him: always their “good little boy.” Maybe Louis was right; he had
to stop feeling so worthless.

“When
I play, it’s like . . .”

“Like
the world listens? The sky and the earth accompany you? That the entire
universe is your audience?”

Eliot
nodded. “There were these rats in the sewer, and a calliope in a carnival . .
.”

“I
know. I have heard every note, carried to me by the winds.”

That
wasn’t possible. Louis was talking crazy now.

And
yet he was the one who had showed Eliot how to play Lady Dawn in the first
place, the one who had brought his talent to the surface.

Louis
wasn’t normal. That was for sure. But just how un normal was he?

He
wasn’t like Uncle Henry or Grandmother or anyone else in the family. He wasn’t
like any person he’d ever met, sane or otherwise.

“Who
are you?” Eliot’s question came out as a squeaky whisper, as if asking it broke
some unspoken cosmic rule.

Louis’s
mouth worked but no words came. He finally managed, “I am someone who cares
very much about you.” He sighed. “Apparently even more than I realized.”

Louis
looked up and Eliot followed his gaze.

The
shadows that seem to be absorbing the sidewalk crept closer.

“We
don’t have much time. There are plans to consider.” Louis looked again at
Eliot, emotions fighting for control of his features. “And plans to reconsider
as well.” Louis stood and turned his back to the darkness. “I must get you
home. It is late to be in this part of town.”

Eliot
didn’t want to go home. Louis knew things about music. Did he know about the
family, too? The Council? How could someone who lived in an alley know
anything?

“You
know what’s happening, don’t you? My family . . . the trials . . .”

“I
will never lie to you, Eliot. Yes, I know, part at least.”

“Who
are you? Really?”

Louis
hurried Eliot along. He was stronger than Eliot imagined, forcing him to walk
back the way they had come at a brisk pace.

“I
have had so many names.” Louis glanced over his shoulder. “All you need to know
is that I’m your friend, maybe the only one who places your well-being before
their own.”

“Please
tell me. I’m a great listener.”

“I’m
sure you possess that rare talent as well.” Louis stopped. “But, alas, here we
are . . . as far as I’m permitted to go.”

They
stood at the exact spot where Eliot had bumped into him.

Behind
them, the darkness was somehow . . . darker. As if part of Del Sombra had been
swallowed by a void.

But
that was silly.

Streetlights
flickered on overhead, casting pools of illumination along Midway Avenue up to
Oakwood Apartments. The other way, however, back toward Ringo’s, the
streetlights were broken. All of them.

“There
is so much I want to tell you.” Louis cocked his head as if he heard something
far away. “But there is no time. They are already coming for you.”

Finally,
someone who actually wanted to tell Eliot something. “So tell me,” he pleaded.
“Quick.”

Louis’s
lips fused into a single white pressure line. “Do you trust me?”

Of
course Eliot did, and he started to tell Louis so . . . but something inside
him hesitated.

He
looked carefully at Louis—really for the first time. Before, his features had
been obscured by tangles of hair and half-shaven stubble, but now he saw Louis
had a sharp, pointy nose and his ears stuck out . . . a bit like Eliot’s.

Could
he be related? Like Uncle Henry, but not from that side of the family, rather
from his father’s people?

“Do
you trust me?” Louis repeated.

Eliot
took a tiny step backward. “No . . . yes. I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know.”

Louis
nodded. “Honesty between us will be best. Always. Go with your first impulse.”

“I
want to.”

“Tut-tut
. . .” Louis’s face brightened. “There is one thing I can tell you.” He gently
tapped Eliot in the center of his chest. “In here you are strong—despite the
vagaries of women who will doubtless plague your life. Your sister is strong,
too, but in another way. Together you are more than the sum of these strengths.
Stay with her, for now.”

“Fiona?
What does she have to do with you?”

“Oh,
regrettably, everything.” Louis looked down the street.

Along
Midway Avenue a black shape rocketed from the shadows. A gleaming silver grill
and mirrored chrome rims reflected the orange street-light.

The
car headed straight for Eliot.

Louis
wrapped his arm about Eliot’s shoulder, draping his camel-hair coat over him.

Closer
now, Eliot glimpsed a silver v-12 emblem on the car’s hood. He froze in its high-powered
halogen headlights.

The
tires of the limousine smoked, skidded to a halt, and parked perfectly at the
curbside.

The
driver’s door popped open. Robert leapt out.

Robert
stayed where he was, though, keeping the bulk of the car between them.

“Get
away from that creep,” Robert ordered Eliot.

Eliot
blinked, recovering from the shock of almost getting run over. “What are you
doing? You could’ve killed us!”

Robert
shook his head, but otherwise didn’t acknowledge Eliot. His eyes were locked on
Louis.

Louis
stared back. He held up one hand. His other arm and camel-hair coat, however,
still wrapped protectively around Eliot.

“Get
away from that guy,” Robert repeated. “He is a black hat.”

Eliot
didn’t understand. Louis wasn’t wearing a hat. Or was that another
popular-culture reference that any ordinary person would have understood?

“In
this particular drama,” Louis said, “I wear neither white nor black hats.” He
withdrew his arm from around Eliot and stepped away. “But I do have better
things to do, so I will have to say good-bye for now.”

“Wait,”
Eliot said. “We were going to talk.”

“And
we will. Soon. I promise.”

“Don’t
listen to him,” Robert said. “All his kind can do is lie. Just get into the
car.”

“No.”
Eliot wheeled on Robert, the anger in his voice surprising them both. After
surviving two heroic life-or-death trials, Eliot found that he had more than
enough willpower to stand up to cooler-than-humanly-possible Robert.