The Wicked City (13 page)

June had no idea what they were looking for, so she stayed in place. Kevin and Robbie walked over to the doors and began perusing the labels below them, while Sam did the same, moving in the opposite direction. After a minute, freaked out standing in the middle of the room alone, June stepped closer.

Sam finally stopped, peering closely at a label beneath an upper door. “I think I found one.”

June flinched. “Found what?”

Sam looked over his shoulder at Kevin. “It says she died yesterday. Will that work?”

“As long as it’s been less than twenty-four hours, I guess,” Kevin said.

“You guess? You know more about this than I do.”

“I never asked my grandmother for details. She said it works within a day. I assume that means twenty-four hours.”

“All right.” Sam stepped back and nodded to Robbie. “I guess we’ll try her.”

Robbie walked over to Sam and focused on the door. A
clink
sounded. June's heart leapt. The door swung open in a slow arc and ice vapor rolled out, like something from a horror movie. June made a little whiny sound in her throat and backed up.

A metal slab slid out, appearing from the vapor like a magician’s trick. On the slab, the unmistakable shape of a human body rested beneath a white sheet. The form didn’t jiggle naturally when the slab jerked to a stop, like a living body would. Little tendrils of mist rose from the sheet.

“What is going on?” June summoned every bit of courage to remain standing in place instead of bolting for the door.

Kevin pulled something out of his jacket pocket. The white box.

“June.” Sam hurried over to her. He stepped behind her and gripped her arms above the elbows. June widened her eyes. “I know you don’t like being here,” he said. “I don’t blame you one bit.”

This couldn’t be going anywhere good.

“Something very messed up is about to happen, but I desperately”—Sam shook her—“need you to stay here.”

“What are you talking about?” June asked.

“You want to save your brother, don’t you?”

“I fail to see the connection.”

“You will, momentarily. You need to stay right here. For Jason.” Sam looked around at her. “His name is Jason, right?”

Kevin opened the box and dropped the lid on the floor.

“I don’t wanna touch the body.” June didn't care how pathetic she sounded. “Please don’t make me touch it.”

“No, you don’t have to touch it,” Sam said. “I promise.”

Kevin, delicately, took something out of the box: a small, glass vial with a black stopper, filled with dark red fluid, like blood.

“I hate this,” Kevin said.

“Your debt will be paid,” Sam spoke to Kevin over June’s shoulder. “For you, at least, the past will be put to rest.”

Kevin shook his head subtly, his lips in a tight line. He squared his shoulders and stood up straighter.

“What the
hell
is going on?” June asked.

Sam held her arms tighter. “Please try to trust me. I’m the smartest man you’ve ever met.”

With a screwed-up expression of distaste, Kevin gripped the edge of the sheet and peeled it back. The fabric made a crackling sound.

“Gah.” June jerked.

Sam held her in place.

The woman under the sheet was young, slender, and tiny with sharp features and short blond hair. Her skin was unnaturally white, almost gray, and her closed eyes and lips darkly purpled. In delirious horror, June noticed her ears were gauged.

Kevin grimaced. “Can I get a glove or something?”

Robbie walked off and returned briefly with a box of latex gloves. He held the box out to Kevin.

“Thanks.” Kevin held the stopper of the vial between his teeth while he pulled out a glove and worked it onto his right hand.

June tried to look away, but her fascination overcame her horror. “Whatever’s about to happen isn’t going to be cool, is it?”

“I guess it depends on your idea of cool,” Sam said.

Kevin pushed a gloved fingertip between the woman’s cold-bruised lips and pried them open. June cringed.

After making a gap, he uncorked the vial and tilted the open end over her mouth. The room had gone so quiet June heard a soft gurgle as the liquid dribbled out.

“Be careful,” Sam warned. “Don’t lose a drop.”

“Do you think I’m stupid?” Kevin didn't look up.

Kevin poured the entire vial and then shoved the stopper back in the end. He slipped the vial into his jacket pocket and stepped back. Robbie stepped back as well. June tensed.

“I’m sorry if I seemed offended,” Sam whispered, close to her ear. “That kiss was spectacular.”

“What?”

June realized a second later Sam wanted to distract her, when the body let out a hiss of air.

When the body fucking
moved
.

June shrieked. She tried to dart away, but Sam held her fast. She struggled.

“Stay here,” Sam ordered. “It’s the only way to save your brother.”

“What the fuck!” June yelped. “What the fucking fuck!”

The dead girl turned her head toward them. A cracking sound like ice breaking rent the air. The girl’s eyes were still closed, but she opened her mouth, a dark maw in her ashen face. Kevin averted his gaze to the ceiling. Robbie had somehow managed to widen his eyes even farther.

“Don’t panic.” Sam fought to hold June in place. “Kevin, cover her up!”

Kevin grabbed the sheet and threw it back over the girl’s face. She still moved underneath, turning her head from side to side. Then she spoke.

“Assssssssk.” The sound resembled air escaping a balloon. Not a human voice. Hollow and emotionless. Dead.

“What is this?” June demanded. “What the hell?”

“It’s an oracle,” Sam said. “The Oracle of the Dead. They know things the living don’t.”

“An oracle. She’s gonna tell the future?”

“Oracles don’t tell the future. They give counsel. But you can only ask her one question, and then the spell is broken. You have to act quickly.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You have to ask her how to get your brother out of the Institute.”

The thing under the sheet still twitched. Kevin looked at the walls, the ceiling, at everything but the animated corpse beside him.

“This is some messed up shit,” June said. “Fuck!”

“Kevin’s grandmother was very powerful,” Sam said. “She gave us this particular Oracle. I couldn’t do this without him. But I can’t do this without you, either. Only a family member can make inquiries about someone.”

“You better hurry up,” Kevin said. “And also, I think you could do this just fine without me.” He sounded bitter.

“June, if you want to save your brother, you have to ask her,” Sam said. “Suck it up and do it.”

Scarcely a thing in the world could make June get closer to the slab. The movements under the sheet were getting slower, more languid.
Scarcely
a thing, except the thought of Jason under that sheet.

June inched forward, forcing her feet to move, glad Sam stayed at her back and kept pushing her. She reached Kevin, way too close, and couldn’t take another step.

“Ask her,” Sam urged.

June had no idea what to say. She didn’t want to hear that voice again. She drew a shuddering breath and leaned forward a tiny bit.

“How—how do I—” Her words were shaky. “How do I get Jason out of the Institute?”

The body snapped its head toward her. June lurched back. The room seemed to brighten and spin.

“Dooon’t gooo inssssiiide,” the voice breathed out, every sound elongated in a sigh. “Maaake them briiing hiiim ouuut.”

June stared, trembling.

“Puuublic pressssure.” The voice seemed to be getting softer, weaker. “Gooo tooo the presssss.”

“The press?” Sam asked.

The corpse rolled her head slowly into a supine position. “Ethaaaan Robertssss…” The sound faded with a slow hiss and fell silent.

After a moment, when she didn’t speak again, June pulled at Sam’s grip. “Let me go.”

Sam did. “Don’t leave yet,” he said. “We need your help to get out.” He turned to Robbie. “Put her away.”

Through the buzzing in her ears, June heard the slab slide back in and the door clang shut. Her knees had gone weak. Her stomach turned.

Sam grabbed her arm. “Let’s go.”

June moved mindlessly as they made their way out of the building, down the white hallway, through the reception area, past the security desk. She spoke to people, her power surging warm inside her cold body, but she barely knew her own voice.

Outside, the icy air shocked her back to reality. She stumbled to the back of the car and vomited. Sam slid up beside her and placed a reassuring hand between her shoulder blades as she gagged and retched.

“It’s all right,” Sam said. “Most people react like this their first time.”

After the heaves passed, June remained hunched over, trembling, equal parts stricken and resembling the world’s biggest tool, her forehead pressed against the cold metal of the car. Her mouth tasted bitter, and her throat burned. Sam kept his hand on her back.

“Oh, for God sake,” Kevin muttered.

“Shut up,” Sam said. “Or else.”

Cindy had gotten out of the car. She stood a few feet away, nose scrunched up.

“You want some water?” Cindy asked. “I got some in my bag.”

Sam removed his hand, but grim understanding glowed in his eyes.

“Well”—June spat into the puddle of puke at her feet—“I guess we better do what the dead body says.”

When June and Sam entered the hotel room, Micha was curled up in a chair asleep, Muse sitting on one of the sofas watching TV. She swiveled around and Sam gazed at her, not speaking. June got the impression he was sharing telepathically what had happened.

Micha stirred and lifted his head. He blinked slowly. “Oh.” His voice was thick and he licked his lips. “You guys are back.”

“Yeah.” June peeled off her jacket.

Micha's eyes were glazed, his face pale.

“You all right?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Micha sat up. He raised his eyebrows. “Wow. That’s some crazy stuff.”

“What is?” June asked.

“What you just saw.”

June stepped back, startled and confused.

Sam breezed past, coat over his arm and cell phone in hand. “I’m going to make some calls. Try to get in touch with Ethan.”

“Okay.” June said absently.

“Ethan’s a busy man,” Sam said. “I’m not talking to his voicemail.”

Micha sat up fully and placed his feet on the floor. “What did you guys get up to today?”

June didn’t answer, still too addled to handle anything else. She went out on the balcony to smoke and to bask in the cold air so she could clear her head and get her senses working again. As she finished the cigarette and contemplated another one, Sam stepped outside. She ground the butt out on the railing.

“I’ll be in touch with Ethan Roberts shortly,” he said. “I don’t know why I didn’t come up with this myself.”

“Why didn’t you tell me what you were planning at the morgue?”

“If I had, you wouldn’t have gone.”

“I would have had a choice.”

“There was no choice.”

“I would have at least been prepared.” She pulled her cigarettes out of her jacket pocket. Her fingers were numb. “You had no right to make me face that without warning.”

“I told you how the Oracle of the Dead works. You had to be the one to ask.”

“That’s not the point.” She nearly crumpled the pack in her fist. “You could have told me why we were going there, explained to me what was about to happen.”

“And you would have resisted. You know so little about yourself and the people like you. You’re a child in the wilderness. That’s why you’re in this position right now.”

She shook a cigarette out and pulled the matches from the bar out of her pocket. “You’re a bastard.” She cupped a hand around the end of the cigarette and lit it, shaking.

Sam's eyes glittered. “Am I?” He turned and went back into the room.

June smoked the cigarette. Now she had guilt to deal with on top of everything else. When she went back inside, she could barely feel her hands and feet. Sam sat in the bedroom, on the end of the bed. Muse had disappeared, and Micha was slumped in his chair, staring at the TV.

June plodded into the bedroom and sat down stiffly on the end of the bed, next to Sam. He had the TV on as well and was watching the news.

“It’ll probably be morning before I hear anything,” Sam said flatly. “I was just being optimistic.”

“Look. Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for me. Everything you’re
still
doing for me. I appreciate it. Even if your methods scare the shit out of me.”

Sam stared at the TV.

“Sam—”

“It’s perfectly reasonable to be disturbed by what you saw today,” he said. “Hell, I’d be shocked if you weren’t. But there are horrors in this world, and though I don’t wish them upon you, you’re in a place right now where far more horrifying things may happen. Prepare yourself.”

“Yeah, I figured.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “I don’t scare easy. But I don’t like the thought of—mortality, I guess. Corpses and…ghosts.”

“Death is not easy to get used to.” His voice dropped a notch. “But someday you’ll have to accept it.”

She pictured the glass at Navy Pier, the angel leading the woman into death.

“I’m sorry I called you a bastard just now,” she said. “I didn’t mean that.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t warn you.”

They were quiet for a minute. The two televisions blared in stereo. Micha was watching the same thing.

“So,” she said, groping for some social grace she knew she must possess. “Your…brother. I take it he’s dead? Or disappeared, since you said ‘was.’”

“He’s dead.”

“Older? Younger?” she asked. “Twin?”

“He was older than me.”

“When did he die?”

“Some years ago.”

“How did he die?”

His expression was unreadable. He didn’t speak.

“Sorry,” she muttered.

After another minute, Sam got to his feet. “I need to go take care of some things. Muse will be in the hotel tonight, watching over you. If you need anything, simply call out to her. She’ll hear.”

“So she’ll be monitoring our thoughts all night?”