Mortal Danger (26 page)

Even from this distance, the wind from his wings stirred the sand, getting grit in her eyes. She was blinking them clean when she caught his last words:
Sam. I believe you may call me Sam
.

TWENTY-SEVEN

LILY needed clothes. Cynna’s belt had to be snug to keep the pants from falling off, and snug hurt. She also had to do something about Dirty Harry.

So after checking herself out, she sat in the back seat of Cullen’s old Bronco, fists clenched, trying not to think about what might be happening to Rule while she took care of her cat and her damned grooming. One of the officers had driven her car back to her place last night, and Rule’s car had been impounded.

For a few blocks she leaned her head back and shut out the sound of Cynna and Cullen arguing. She needed to see Beth, talk to her. She didn’t want to. Not when Beth was staying with their parents. But a phone call wasn’t enough, not for this. She needed to know how badly Beth had been scarred by last night.

God, she was tired. She closed her eyes, but there was no rest inside her. Not with everything humming like an overloaded power line.

She was scared. All the way down scared. Not so much of dying, though she wasn’t in denial about that.

Death was a strong possibility, but she knew how to keep going in the face of that sort of risk. As a cop, she’d usually had backup going into a dangerous situation. Barring that, she’d had training to fall back on. You identified your goal, made your plans, and did the best you could. Fear was normal, just one more factor to account for.

What was grinding at her wasn’t as clean as the fear of death. The shaky feeling came from the fear that she wasn’t enough. She didn’t know enough, couldn’t be enough or do enough to get Rule back. Her Gift was gone. She wasn’t sure there was enough of her left to do what had to be done.

Maybe, even with her Gift, there wouldn’t have been enough. What they were planning—or, so far, failing to plan—was nuts. One lupus sorcerer, one female Finder, and one damaged former homicide cop were going up against who knew how many demons on their home ground. How do you plan for that?

One step at a time, she told herself. If she couldn’t tell if she was going in the right direction, tough. She still had to take that next step.

Up front, Cynna snorted. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. There’s no technical difference between opening a big gate and opening a little one. It’s just a matter of power.”

They should have taken Cynna’s rental. The Bronco’s engine knocked so badly she wondered if Cullen kept it running with sorcery. But Cullen had insisted on driving, and Cynna wouldn’t let him behind the wheel of her vehicle. Even one only temporarily hers.

“I don’t imagine you’ve ever heard of McCallum’s Theorem.” Cullen sounded like an adult talking to a sweet but slow child.

“He’s got a theory about hellgates?”

“No, it concerns the difference between relevance and resonance, but it suggests that—”

“There’s only one kind of relevance that matters with gates. Now, if we were talking about voodoo—”

“Pretend you’re more interested in figuring this out than one-upping me,” Cullen said. “You won’t embarrass yourself so much.”

Lily wondered if she was going to have to kill them both, or if taping their mouths shut would be enough. “Bickering is one way of dealing with tension, but it isn’t doing much for mine. Since neither one of you knows how to open a gate, can we talk about something more to the point? Make some plans?”

“Believe it or not,” Cullen said, “our discussion is very much to the point. In a roundabout way.”

“Sure. Right. Now I understand.”

“We’re trying to settle what kind of gate to open,” Cynna said. “Single-relevance or multi-relevance. Only there isn’t such a thing as a multi-relevance gate, so you’re right. We’re wasting time.”

Cullen hissed. That’s what it sounded like—a cat’s hiss. “Lady save me from small-minded hedge witches. Just because you’ve never heard of something doesn’t mean it’s impossible.”

Lily tried once more to get them back on track. “Because you don’t know how to open a gate anyway, the discussion is moot.”

Cullen was impatient. “We know the general principles behind it.”

“Right,” Cynna said. “That’s like saying we don’t know how to build a television, but we know the general idea behind how one works. Cullen thinks that once we get our TV we should tinker with it. I think that would be too dangerous. We’ve got no reason to think his idea is even possible.”

“It’s possible,” Cullen insisted. “McCallum’s Theorem—”

“Hold off on the theorem talk a minute,” Lily said.

“What kind of risks are we talking about if you tinker with the spell? What advantages?”

“Ritual. Magic on this level requires a ritual, not just a spell.”

“Whatever. Risks and advantages, Cullen.”

“The major risk is that the ritual won’t work. We don’t get a gate. In which case we can back up and try again with the unaltered ritual.”

“Maybe,” Cynna said dryly. “If we all survive. We’re talking about a major ritual here, involving forces we don’t understand. There’s no sure way to predict the outcome.”

Lily frowned. “That’s a big risk.”

“And the advantage,” Cullen said, “is that if it works we’d have full control of the gate and who and what passes through it.”

She was silent a moment. Cynna and Cullen had needled each other about all the demons who weren’t ravaging the countryside, but if they opened a gate they couldn’t control… “That’s a big advantage. Big enough to outweigh the risks
—if
this multi-relevance thing is possible.”

He switched lanes with typical split-second timing. “Let’s go back to the basics. You know gates are magical constructs, right? Located on or very near a node.”

“Got that. The Azá were trying to open theirs right on top of a node. They needed the power from it.”

“In part, yes. But nodes are also the places of greatest congruence. Think of them as spots where the realms almost touch. Now, magically speaking, congruence is one of the five fields of relevance. It’s spatial. There’s also physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual.”

Lily shook her head. “I’m getting dizzy already. I thought spiritual stuff and magic were different. That’s how Nettie was able to do some healing on me—because she wasn’t using straight magic.”

“Depends on who you talk to. Theories abound.”

“Such as?”

“My early training was Wiccan. They consider spirit one of the five types of power—earth, air. fire, water, spirit. Chinese practitioners work with five energies, too, though they substitute metal for spirit and see the spiritual as entirely separate. So do many Protestant faiths. Catholicism is hopelessly muddled on the subject. Most shamans say there is a difference between spirit and magic but just smile mysteriously if you ask what it is.”

“Like Nettie.”

“Exactly. Houngans and mambos—‘”

“Who?”

“Male and female voodoo priests. Their magic is spirit-based, so naturally they don’t distinguish between magic and spirit. And Buddhists…” He shrugged and added in a singsong, “Spiritual, nonspiritual—no difference. Duality is illusion.”

Cynna chuckled. “I used to know someone who would have said just that.”

Lily drummed her fingers on her thigh. “They can’t all be right. What do sorcerers say?”

“Mostly we ignore the question. Spiritualism has that good and evil thing going on. Confuses things.”

“And sorcerers hate to be confused,” Cynna said. “They can’t see spiritual stuff, so they treat it the way ungifted humans treat magic—as if it isn’t real. And if it is, it shouldn’t be.”

Cullen gave a quick laugh. “Biased, but not completely inaccurate. Of course, the
Msaidizi
were faith based.”

“The what?” Lily asked.

“Dizzies.”

Oh. “What does this have to do with a hellgate?”

“The gates are magical constructs, like I said, but they were closed using a combination of spiritual and magical energies. To reopen a gate, we’d need spiritual energy as well as magic.”

“That’s what the Azá were doing, wasn’t it? They believed in their goddess, and that belief was part of what

She needed to get that gate open.“ That plus a little bonus from death magic.

“Exactly. We can’t supply a large faith-based community, so even if we knew how, we couldn’t reopen a gate.”

“But you’re planning to open one.”

“Open, not reopen. We’ll have to build a new gate. Cynna and I have been arguing about how to, ah, tether it. She thinks congruence is the only criteria. I agree it’s essential—we don’t want to step out into thin air or the middle of a mountain, so the two spaces have to be congruent. But I think that with a small gate, other relevancies can be used, too.”

Cynna spoke. “He means you.”

“What?” She shook her head. “That’s a joke, right?”

“Nope.” Cullen slowed. They’d reached her apartment complex. “Five fields of relevance, remember? Spatial, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. The more fields we use, the more stable the gate and the greater our control.”

“Theoretically,” Cynna added darkly.

Cullen ignored that. “The mate bond gives us two more fields to use—physical and emotional.”

“I… see. Sort of. Because Rule’s there and I’m here, the mate bond is already sort of a gate. But once I’m there, too, that won’t be true.”

“That’s why you need me,” Cullen said cheerfully, pulling into the space next to Lily’s car. “To figure out the hard parts. If I get it right, the gate will close behind us as soon as we cross. It will open again when you want it to, and nothing will be able to pass through it without your permission.”

Whew. Lily ran a hand through her hair. “What happens if I’m killed?”

‘Try to avoid that.“ He shut off the engine and opened his door. ”It’s a damned good way of keeping the other side from making use of our gate, though, isn’t it?“

“Theoretically.” She pushed her door open, too, and got out. The burn throbbed, protesting the pressure from the belt. She eyed the stairs to her apartment grimly and started forward. “You’ve convinced me it’s worth a try, though.”

‘i knew you’d see sense.“ She heard the click-click from the car’s lock behind her. ”If it’s any consolation, I couldn’t do it if you still had your Gift.“

She acknowledged that with a nod. She wasn’t ready to look on the bright side.

“If you were still Gifted, it might not have been a good idea for you to cross,” Cynna added, coming around the car. “Considering what they say about sensitives in hell.”

“What do they—hey!”

Cullen had swung her up into his arms. “Who says I’m not a thoughtful and considerate guy? You don’t need to climb those stairs. All right,” he added to Cynna as he headed for the stairs. “I’ll bite. What
do
they say about sensitives in hell?”

“ ‘Feendly armies in foul affray dide fighte,’” she recited, “‘ ’for who wolde holde the sixewitte hral. Bihood thes brutall beistis, who wolde their yvel powers incresen—and drinken of hir precious herte blood!‘ Here, give me your keys. I’ll go ahead and open the door.”

Lily dug them out of the side pocket of her purse. “I don’t know what you said, but I didn’t hear anything about sensitives.”

“
Sixewitte
was the medieval term.” Cullen started up the stairs behind Cynna. “The five senses were the five
wittes
. The way they saw it, sensitives had a sixth sense. Sixewitte.”

“Ah… if I caught the gist, that’s whose ‘precious herte blood’ the feendly hordes planned to drink.”

“You got it,” Cynna said, sticking Lily’s key in the lock. “Feendly hordes being demons. Supposedly they get some special power from the blood of a sensitive.”

Cullen reached the landing. He wasn’t even breathing hard. Pretty good for someone pushing sixty. “I’ve never heard that verse. What’s it from?”

“ ‘The Furiel Pyne of Helle.’ It’s pretty obscure. Fourteenth century, and it might be pure fiction, but the monk who—oh. Good grief. What are you doing here?”

FIVE minutes later, Lily sat in her one and only chair petting Dirty Harry, who had his motor going full-blast. The cat had claimed her lap when the man who’d been keeping him company stood up.

“I’d offer you a sandwich, but Harry and I ate the last of your ham,” Abel Karonski said from her kitchen, where he was refilling his coffee cup. “Anyone want some coffee?”

“Why does everyone feel entitled to break into my place?” Lily asked the ceiling. “Sure, I’ll take a cup, since it’s my coffee and all.”

Karonski rejoined them, carrying two steaming mugs and looking around vaguely as if her place might have sprouted another chair in his absence. His gaze paused on Cullen. “Seaborne,” he said with a nod. “We met at your, ah, adoption ceremony. When you joined Nokolai, I mean.”

Cullen was wearing his inscrutable face. “I remember.”

“At the risk of repeating myself,” Cynna said, “what are you doing here?” She was silting on one of the floor cushions by Lily’s big, square coffee table, the only other seating in the pocket-size living room. Cullen occupied the other cushion.

“I’m not really here. Think of me as a figment of your overheated imaginations.”

“Nothing personal, Abel, but you’ve never figured high in my overheated imagination. Here.” Cynna scooted off her cushion onto the floor. “Sit down and give those old bones a rest.”

“Mouthy. Always mouthy. I’m only ten years older than you.” He handed Lily a mug that read,
Don’t Make Me Release the Flying Monkeys
! “You’re not looking so great.”

“Neither are you.” The pouches under his eyes were looking more like duffel bags.

“Tired, that’s all. We found the leak, and it’s big. The biggest I’ve seen. I’ve called a Gathering to close it.”

“A Gathering?”

“Multiple covens,” Cullen said. “Anywhere from three to a dozen. That’s a major working you’re talking about.”

“It’s a major leak.” He lowered himself awkwardly onto the cushion and then scowled at Lily. “I don’t know why you don’t own chairs. Everyone owns chairs.”

“My figments have never complained about the seating before,” she commented. “Or helped themselves to my ham. Maybe you’ll explain why I’m imagining you’re here.”

“Officially I’m still in North Carolina. I’ll be flying back as soon as we’ve talked.” He sipped. “Good coffee.”