The Awakening (38 page)

“And why would these things be happening to Finn as well as Megan?” Jade said. “Actually, he's the one who cut his hand on the dragon in Morwenna's shop. According to our conversations, they both lost hair to that creature thing at the hotel the first night they were playing.”

“Maybe they're both supposed to die,” Lucian said.

Jade shook her head, sitting back. “That doesn't make sense. I agree with Finn. What does make sense is the concept that she's to be an offering to this demon. ‘Bac-Dal wants you.' That could mean he wants her alive in a sexual content—especially if you listen to their stories about their dreams—or else he wants her alive, and then dead. The murder of the girl in Boston could have provided the blood they needed first, and more—Finn went through Boston that night. He was
compelled
to stop there. So, here they are in Salem—obviously at odds with one another, since—no matter how discreet they've been, locals will know that he stayed at Huntington House while she moved in with her aunt. Megan's body is found—and Finn winds up accused of both murders. And certainly, there would be evidence planted to assure that he was convicted.”

Lucian had been idly turning a pen forward and backward and studying the practiced movements of his hands. He looked at Jade then.

“Maybe.”

“It makes sense. Unless, of course, Finn is evil, doesn't know it, and did murder the girl in Boston, is a disciple of Bac-Dal, and has brought his wife here to be sacrificed.”

Lucian arched a brow. “That does remain a possibility.”

She stared at him, frowning. “You mean . . . he may already be under possession by the demon, or something like that?”

“As I said—it remains a possibility.”

Jade closed the book she'd been reading. She shook her head. “The answer is here, somewhere. I don't believe that Finn Douglas can be that dual—even if possessed by a demon.”

“He does have a certain charm,” Lucian commented dryly, but he was smiling, and Jade knew it.

“When he talks about Megan, you can see . . . he would rather die than ever hurt her.”

“People don't always have that choice.”

“I think you're wrong,” Jade said.

“Maybe I should have sent you out to meet people,” he said.

“Oh?”

He shook his head. “Either everyone I've come across is as pure as the driven snow, or the protection Bac-Dal can provide is immense. I'm managing to do nothing but make people wary.”

“No hint of anything from anyone?”

“No,” he said, and stood. “I'm blinded here, in a way I've never been before.”

“You got us a room in an overbooked hotel,” she reminded him. “And I hear some ladies downed their coffee quickly; that's for certain.”

He smiled dryly. “We wouldn't want to have to wait for coffee.”

“Coffee now would be good.”

“It would be, but why don't you keep at it a little longer?”

“I'm just about cross-eyed now,” Jade said.

He grinned. “Just about doesn't cut it.” Then he said seriously, “Tomorrow is Halloween.”

“I know,” she said. “And I'm still missing something. Lucian, do you think that back in the early seventeen hundreds, when the people attacked Cabal Thorne . . . were they part of the Alliance?”

“Maybe. I don't know. I wasn't here in the seventeen hundreds,” he said lightly.

“Brent is here, you know. He called me.”

“Yes. I'm aware of that.”

“Of course. You would be,” she murmured.

There was a slight tone of sarcasm to her voice, but he didn't note it. He lifted his hands, distracted. “This should be . . . hell, between us all, it should be easy.”

“But it's not.”

“No, and it's not going to be, because . . . well, it's strange. It's kind of like fear, which can exist in the imagination with devastating effect. So much that is going on is in the mind—the dreams, for instance. You can't hunt down and destroy a dream. And what bothers me more than anything is this . . . this veil that exists. Like the blue fog. You don't always know what you're seeing through it. Let's assume it is the demon. And then the high priest, or priestess, who came across all the right rituals to bring Bac-Dal to life. Whichever, however, there is an incredibly strong power than can enter into the world of the mind. I'm afraid that we could capture a dozen followers who are merely on the fringes, and there would be a dozen more to take their places. The thing is, we've got to get to the absolute root of what is going on.”

“And then?”

“Then, I believe, we'll need to know the right rituals ourselves to counter everything that is going on. I've got to leave. And you have to keep reading, and bear that in mind—that our strength may not be sufficient, despite the fact that we could mow down dozens of people. We're going to need to do all the right things, not barrel in like an army.”

“Where are you going now?”

“It's getting late—places to be, people to see. If I don't come back for you in an hour, head on to the hotel without me. I'll meet you there.”

“Lucian!” Jade rose, calling his name. But by that time, he was already halfway toward the door.

Jade sat back down at the table, staring at the array of written material before her. She picked up an old volume, but set it back down again.

“The necessary items,” she murmured softly to herself. “Hair of the victim . . . blood of the victim . . .”

Finn Douglas had hurt himself on a dragon in Morwenna's shop. A decorative “monster” had ripped hair from the heads of both Megan and Finn. Personal objects could have easily been acquired from the two as well.

Jade gnawed on a pencil eraser.

She glanced at the store phone on the desk, then decided against it, reaching for her shoulder bag and digging into it for her cell phone. In a few moments, she'd found Megan's and Finn's cell phone numbers, but decided against dialing as well, and hoped that, when she'd interviewed them two weeks earlier, she'd had the sense to put both their cell numbers into her own phone.

She had.

She dialed Megan's number. Megan didn't answer with “hello?”

“Mike?” Came Megan's voice again. “I've got to get going, Finn is waiting.”

“Megan, it's Jade.”

“Oh, Jade. Hi, I'm sorry. I thought you were a friend calling back. Is anything wrong?” Megan asked. “Or, more so than before, I should say.”

“No. I was just wondering—Megan, have you hurt yourself while you've been here? Just a scratch, anything?”

There was a long hesitation on the other end.

“Megan?”

“Well, this is a little weird. And it's very strange that you should ask . . . wait, just a minute. I'm going to close the door. I'm at Aunt Martha's packing up . . . Finn is just outside.” She was gone for a second, then returned to the line. “I didn't want to say anything to him. For several reasons, a few I'm still sorting out myself. But I dreamed last night that I was walking in the woods, and this morning, when I woke up . . . well, my feet were dirty and I had cut the bottom of my left. It's nothing, really, just a scratch, as you were saying.”

Jade stared at the phone.

“Jade?”

“I'm sorry, I'm here.”

“Please, don't say anything to Finn.”

“No, no . . . I've one more question. Are you missing anything?”

“No. Yes! I lost it when we first got here.”

“What?”

“A bracelet. A really beautiful bracelet that my father gave me. A claddagh bracelet.”

“Ah.”

“How about Finn?”

“Did he lose anything, do you mean?”

“Yes.”

“Not that I know of, but . . . Finn can be careless sometimes. He goes through guitar picks by the dozens. Of course, those wouldn't really be lost because he expects to use them up just like tissues. Jade, why are you asking all this?”

“I don't know yet. I'm just trying to get to bottom of what's going on, figure it all out.”

“You'll call me back if you think of anything . . . if we should know anything that you've found.”

“Of course! And we'll be there tonight. Maybe a little late, but we'll be there.”

“Great.”

“I'll let you go now.”

“Thanks. See you later.”

Jade pushed the button to end the phone call, staring thoughtfully at her cell. A sound drew her attention to the doorway.

She looked to the outer room. There were a number of customers browsing the shelves.

And Eddie Martin was striding away from the door area.

He'd been listening to every word she had said.

Finn carried Megan's bag out to the car.

Martha stood in the parlor, smiling, and yet Megan thought that she still looked uncomfortable.

“It's all right, really,” Megan told her.

“Honey, I'm sorry, I'm just worried about you. I like Finn very much. And I may be old, but I certainly see your attraction to him. It's just that . . . there's never any excuse for violence,” she said very softly, speaking as if she wished she could mind her own business.

“Finn has never been violent. With me,” Megan amended.

The way Martha stared at her, she found herself explaining further. “If that story about defending myself by crashing a wine bottle over his head reached you, no such thing ever happened. He never attacked me. I was just angry and hit him with a loaf of bread.”

“But you said that you're having strange dreams—”

“I had the strangest one here last night. In fact, I think I went sleepwalking out your front door.”

“Megan, no!”

“Cut my foot and everything,” she said dryly.

“Does Finn know about it?”

“No, and don't say anything. It was just a scratch. I don't want him insisting I sit all night. I've been walking on it all day and it's fine. Oh, Martha, I know you're worried, but we're going to be fine together. We've talked a lot of things out.”

Martha shook her head unhappily. “You're going to leave on November first, right when we could have spent some real time together.”

“Right now, Aunt Martha, I want to get home to New Orleans.” She hesitated. “You come and visit us! Then we'll have some real time together.”

“It's just terrible that you've come home . . . and been so unhappy here.”

“I haven't been unhappy here. Just—stressed,” Megan said. Martha still looked so depressed that Megan put her arms around her and hugged her tightly.

“Maybe tomorrow,” Martha suggested, “you and Finn could both come here for dinner before going to the club. Halloween night. No restaurant in town will be able to make anything decent—it will just be too crazy.”

“I think we'll just be too crazy,” Megan murmured. Lucian had warned them not to say anything about leaving. But this was Aunt Martha.

Martha was studying her keenly though. “Um. I see. You're going to bolt out on Sam Tartan, huh? Megan, have you seriously thought about what that will do to your careers?”

“We're not bolting out on anyone,” she lied blithely. “I just want to say a real good-bye now, in case we don't get time together tomorrow.”

“You really think you should go back to Huntington House with Finn? Maybe you should have both stayed here,” Martha said firmly.

“We'll be fine,” Megan said. She wished she believed it.

Finn came back to the door for her. “Ready? Martha, you know, you've been wonderful. To both of us. Thank you so much for everything.”

“I'll see you two sometime tomorrow,” she said stubbornly.

Finn gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Sure. Megan, ready?”

She hugged her aunt tightly again. “I love you,” she said. Arm in arm with Finn, she walked out to the car.

As they drove, she looked over at him. “We've got one small problem, you know.”

“Hm?”

“What about the equipment?”

He stared ahead for a moment, then turned to her with a rueful smile. “Nothing is worth our lives, or our marriage,” he told her. His fingers curled around hers where they lay on the seat.

Megan smiled. The world around them was dark out here by Martha's, yet she suddenly felt she could see the light at the end of a very long tunnel.

 

 

The shift was changing at the hospital. There were three shifts of nurses each day, but it didn't matter who came on, when Dorcas considered herself to be the authority on her ICU patients.

Janice Mayerling, twenty-eight, attractive—and with an actual life outside the hospital, thank you very much—listened to Dorcas, trying to control her temper as the other nurse gave her a long list of commonsense instructions having to do with Andy Markham.

Janice didn't really know Andy—she had recently moved to the area, having heard that the hospital was in need of registered nurses and that they paid well. She hailed from Connecticut, not so terribly far, but far enough, and close to New York, where the world might be somewhat insane, but constantly so busy that there could be no silly fixation with one period of history, as there was here in Salem. She didn't mind working tonight because she was off the next night, which meant that she had Halloween to party.

If you were going to live in Salem, you had to take advantage of a good party night.

“A lot of people around here think that they can say they're next of kin to old Andy, and they'll try to get in. You don't let them. I already let Martha see him for a minute, hold his hand, talk to him. There was no change. A flu bug can kill Andy in seconds flat. Quite frankly, I doubt that he'll make it anyway, but he always was a good old codger, despite his flights of fancy, so we're going to do our best to see that he lives. Understand?” Dorcas demanded.

That was it.

Janice did lose her temper. “Dorcas, I don't know about you, but I do my best to see that every patient in my care lives!”

Dorcas stiffened down to the soles of her nurses' shoes. “There's no call to get uppity, Janice. None at all. I'm stressing that this patient needs extra attention.”

“Martha, it's an intensive care unit! Our patients are here because they need extra care.”

She wasn't going to back down. Neither was Dorcas.

“I had best come in tomorrow and find out that Andy is alive and still holding his own!” she warned.

Janice bit her lip. The third floor nursing supervisor was coming down the hallway. She wasn't going to stoop to a brawl in front of the woman.

“Good night, Dorcas,” she said firmly, and turned away.

She waited until Dorcas had finally departed and went in to check on old Andy Markham. IV running, vital signs weak, but steady. He would still be termed critical, but stable.

It was going to be a long night, Janice thought.

She went to read the rest of the doctor's notations at the nurses' station. “Trust me, Dorcas, the old bugger will still be kicking when you come in tomorrow,” she muttered.

She frowned, suddenly, a shiver ripping through her as the lights seemed to dim, as if giant bat wings had swept through a corner of the hospital.

“They've got to fix that air-conditioning!” said Toby Wyatt, hugging herself where she sat at the phone station.

“And the lights,” Janice agreed. She hesitated, then set down her notes and walked back down the hall to look at her patient, Andrew Markham.

No change.

She was still . . . cold.

And little shivers still seemed to trickle down her spine, one after the other.

 

 

Finn showered and changed at Huntington House.

Megan had been sitting on the bed, waiting for him, but when he came out of the bathroom, she wasn't there.

He dressed quickly, and went into the dining area and then the parlor, looking for her. Sally, the pretty young blonde, was sipping tea, minus her husband. She smiled at Finn. “Hi, how's it going?”

“Good, thanks. Have you seen my wife?”

“Actually, yes. She was in here getting a cup of tea. Strange, too! Susanna walked in and saw her, and nearly dropped the tray she was carrying, she was so startled to see her, though why she should be startled to see a guest, I don't know. Anyway, Megan, your wife, helped her pick up the mess she made, got her tea in a to-go cup, and headed outside. I think she wanted to talk to Mr. Fallon, because he had come through the parlor before going out to water some of the plants by the house.”

“Thanks,” Finn said, and turned quickly.

“Hey, we'll be there tonight!” she called to him.

“Thanks, we appreciate the business,” he told her, calling over his shoulder. He didn't know why, but he didn't want Megan alone anywhere near Fallon.

When he came out the front entry, though Megan was on the walk, Fallon was nowhere to be seen. He hurried to Megan. “Hey! You scared me. And I'm not so sure you should go looking for Fallon on your own. The old fart is creepy.”

Megan smiled. “I think he's all right. Just a Wiccan.”

“Oh?”

She kept smiling.

“So . . . ?” he queried.

She lifted a tiny velvet bag.

“And what's that?”

“It's a little satchel of some stuff called burdock,” she said, and went on to explain, “It brings luck—and wards off evil spirits.”

“You really think a little bag of stuff can help?”

“It can't hurt.”

“You got it from Fallon?”

“Yes.”

“Are you certain that it is the stuff called bird-whatever?”

She laughed. “Pretty certain. I've seen it at Morwenna's.”

He nodded. “Okay, if it makes you feel better.”

“Actually,” she said, “it does.” She stroked his cheek. “I'm wearing a pretty little medieval cross I picked up at a shop today, too. One or the other might just kick in.”

“Sure,” he said.

But he wondered unhappily just how many vulnerable young murder victims had been found clad either in their gold crosses or Jewish stars.

“We'd better get going,” he said.

From the window of Huntington House, Susanna watched Megan and Finn go around to the parking lot. When they were gone, she hurried outside.

At first, she saw no sign of Fallon.

Then he came ambling around the house, the garden hose in his hands.

She marched over to him furiously.

“What the hell were you doing?”

“Taking care of business,” he snapped back at her.

“You stay clear of those two,” she warned.

“You mind your own business, woman, and let me tend to mine,” Fallon said.

“You steer clear of them!” Susanna persisted.

“I know what I'm about,” he told her angrily, and turned on the hose. He didn't spray her, but made it darned obvious that he would, if she got in the way of his watering.

“I'm warning you!” she said, turning to walk away.

“Don't
you
warn
me
, woman,” he said.

She swore at him then, but she was certain he didn't hear her. The old fool—always determined to have the last word.

The hell with him.

She marched back into the house.

Fallon could dig his own grave, if he so chose.

 

 

It was a full house.

The dance floor was packed.

Every table in the place was taken.

Costumes had grown more bizarre. A giant spider with twinkling colored lights at the end of each foot roamed the room, every spider leg issuing from the shoulders of the man beneath batting everyone he walked by. Black cats abounded among the women, but then, the black costumes were mostly very good, and very sexy.

There were witches galore. If Morwenna was out in the audience, she was surely about to have apoplexy by now. There were many stereotypical costumes, hag noses, broomsticks, tall pointed hats, striped hose beneath jagged hemmed skirts.

One woman had done an incredible job with face putty, creating huge warts and a nose that dipped to her chin.

There were also fairies, princesses, harem girls, and a number of women in far more beautiful costumes. Wings were plentiful that night, and, like the legs of the spiders, they brushed those in the crowd. A number of wings were bent already.

There were monks, lots of them. Grim reapers, and more—brown capes and cowls worn with masks were easy costumes, and they, too, littered the dance floor.

Theo Martin had kept his word as well. Finn didn't know if Sam Tartan had put some money into it or not, but there were a number of police officers, in uniform, just outside the doors, as well.

At their first break, Megan told him that she was going to take a look around and see if Morwenna and Joseph were there. He set about changing a guitar string, looking out at the crowd as he did so.

There was a grim reaper standing about fifty feet from the stage, talking with a Barbie doll. He didn't know the man, didn't think that he did, at least, and yet something about him was vaguely familiar. A sense of unease filled him, but then, he realized, that didn't mean a damn thing because he was always uneasy these days.