Chapter Five
Chapter
Five
A couple of days later, I was wrapping up back day in the gym, finishing off by running the rack of mismatched dumbbells with bent-over rows, starting at hundred pounders and moving down in five-pound increments without stopping between sets.
My form wasn’t fantastic, but it didn’t need to be—this one was about endurance.
Will was up on the third floor of the castle, working with Michael Carpenter and his people on getting the living quarters made livable.
I had gotten down to thirty pounders when Bear came stomping into the gym. “Hey. Boss.”
“Hnghf,” I gasped. I finished the set with the thirties and shifted immediately to twenty-fives.
“There’s this stocky little bald dude with a seriously spooky vibe standing in the entry hall with a kid, maybe twenty. Says he knows you and needs to talk.”
“Mort?” I groaned. My lats were on fire. “Mort Lindquist?”
“Yeah, I think,” Bear said.
“Almost…nnnngh…done.”
“Yeah, those twenty-fives are doing you dirty, Mighty Mouse.”
“Bite…mmmmngh…me.”
“You’re all bone. Be like eating sparrow wings.”
I had a snappy comeback, honest I did, but I didn’t have enough breath to give it to her. So I worked until my body was too full of exhaustion for me to notice my mind and heart, and when I finished the last set with a pair of fives, I had to use hip action to get them back up onto the damned rack.
Bear tossed me a worn but clean towel, and I mopped at my face with it, the chill of the castle, a steady fifty-five degrees, even in the heat of summer, settling over my sweat-soaked body almost instantly.
It felt fantastic. By the time I looked up, Bear was handing me a canteen full of cold water, and I drank down half of it before I said, “Thanks.”
“I been to the bad place a few times,” she said. “Seen a lot of men there. Tough fight?”
I thought of the sound of falling buildings and the sight of smashed baby carriages. Then the direct psychic exposure to the mind-ripping hatred of a Titan. “Little bit. Memories.”
“Those are burdens,” she said, her voice serious. “Lot of times, they never get any lighter.”
“Yeah,” I said. “So I’ll get bigger.”
The Valkyrie gave me an approving nod. “You hang in there, string bean,” she said. “You’re on the right road. Hey, what’s the kitchen making for lunch?”
—
I went down to my office, which had been a rather large cleaning supply closet a few weeks before.
Now it had room for a small desk with a chair, a couple of filing cabinets, and one chair for a visitor.
I finished the rest of the canteen of water on the way, and in a few minutes Bear appeared with Mort Lindquist.
Mort was only a little taller than Will, and his thickness had more to do with age than muscle.
His usually bald head had grown out some stubble, and his eyes looked sunken and tired.
He wore his black suit and black shirt, but they hung a little loose on him.
Well. Pretty much everyone in town except Bear was getting thinner.
Mort had a young man with him, and I recognized Fitz immediately from my days being mostly dead.
He’d grown maybe three inches in that time, and filled out with more muscle.
He had sort of reddish hair and came from a heritage more mixed than a barrel of bar nuts.
He, too, wore black, though with him it was black jeans and a black hoodie, so that he looked a bit like the shadow Morty might cast behind him from a low-angle light.
Fitz had been a street kid. No parents. Mixed up with bad company in his day.
I knew he’d been hanging around with Mort in the years since, but there was something about him that reminded me of a feral cat.
He stood with a kind of constant, restless wariness, with one eye always on the door, showing about as much trust in his safety as a plate of cookies in a kindergarten.
I leaned across the desk to shake hands with both of them, and Fitz said, “Finally I can put a face to the voice.”
“Heh,” I said. “I heard you’d taken up with Mort as an apprentice ectomancer,” I said.
Fitz glanced back and forth between me and Mort uncertainly.
“Yeah,” Mort said. “About that.” He took a deep breath. “Harry, you know I don’t screw around with the White Council. There are seriously scary people there.”
The White Council of Wizardry had kicked me out on my ass in the aftermath of the battle. Apparently they found a rogue wizard with his own city-killing Titan in a Poké Ball a little intimidating. They were not notable for their kindness and tolerance.
“Yeah, I’ve got to watch my step with them myself these days,” I said. “What have they got to do with your visit?”
Mort hooked a thumb over his shoulder at Fitz as he sat down. “The kid bloomed.”
I tilted my head and studied them both. Fitz’s talent had been minor and erratic at best, the last I checked. “In ectomancy?”
Mort shook his head slowly. “In everything. I think he’s Council material.”
I settled back in my seat and let out a low whistle. “That so, kid?”
Fitz shrugged uncomfortably. “Things just kept getting easier. And during the battle, things went nuts and there was this old couple running away from this Uruk-hai-looking thing and I”—he waved a hand vaguely—“set it on fire.”
I stared at the kid for a moment. “Did you.”
“I worked with him, best I could,” Mort added, nodding.
“Showed him what I knew, but I pretty much only deal in spirits, Harry. The kid can access all the elements, and he gets stronger every day. I don’t know much, and what I do know tells me that he could get out of control fast. He needs guidance from someone with real experience, before… ”
Mort let it hang, but I knew where his thoughts were going. The Wardens of the White Council spent a whole hell of a lot of their time hunting down rogue wizards. Unfortunately, a lot of those rogues were kids whose talent had gone out of control and hurt or killed somebody.
“I hear you,” I said tiredly. I shook my head. “Look. I’m not much these days.”
“I heard,” Mort said quietly. “My condolences. She was a remarkable woman. I saw her shade once…” He studied me closely for a moment and frowned. “Harry, look. I don’t have the tools he needs to get his gift under control. You do. Otherwise, I have to go to the Wardens and ask for their help.”
“Neither of us wants that.” I sighed. “And I guess I owe him a favor or two, don’t I?”
“Seems like that,” Mort said seriously.
“How about it, Fitz?” I asked him. “I can show you how to not hurt anyone. That what you want?”
The young man grimaced. He looked between me and the door warily. Then he said, “No.”
I traded a look with Mort. “Go on,” I said.
“My whole life I’ve…been on my own. In the system. In the street. Even in the gang.” He lifted his chin a little and said, “I used to think I’d be dead by the time I hit twenty. Now there’s this whole new world. I…I want to see how far I can go.”
I exhaled through my nose. “That’s a very different kind of request, Fitz. If the White Council finds out I’ve taken you on as an apprentice, that could get real violent, real fast.”
“I don’t want to cause you any trouble,” he said quietly. “But…I’ve seen what the White Council does to people.”
“Oh, they’re definitely a freight train of dicks,” I said. “But they know their business. I’m not exactly in good odor with them right now. They hear I’m training you up, that could go bad for both of us.”
“Oh,” Fitz said, frowning and looking down. “I didn’t realize.”
“Well, you’d best start realizing things,” I said. “Especially if you’re going to be working with me.”
“You’ll do it?” Fitz asked, his face brightening.
“Not yet,” I said in my grumpiest wizard voice.
“You’re going to have to think about this one.
Sleep on it. Mort, you know how the White Council operates.
Answer his questions. Give him some perspective.
” I looked back at Fitz. “Kid, once upon a time you did me a real solid. So, if you have a long talk with Mort and you still want it, yeah. I’ll train you. ”
Fitz blinked several times and then his face brightened. “Thank you!”
I held up a hand. “Lesson one. Too soon. Wait a few years to see if you owe me thanks or a punch in the nose. Sometimes it can be hard to tell.”
“I…Okay. Yeah, okay, right,” Fitz said.
“Go on, kid,” Mort drawled to Fitz. “I need to talk to him alone for a minute.”
“Sure,” Fitz said, nodding, clearly elated. He stepped out of the office, and I heard his light footsteps heading down the hallway toward the stairs up.
“I’m not sure you’re doing the kid a favor here, Mort,” I said, once he was gone.
“Me?” Mort asked.
I waved a hand. “I’m not sure I am, either. My outcome record with apprentices isn’t exactly sunny.”
“Look. I’ve met a bunch of White Council assholes,” Mort said.
“You’re the only one of them I know who ever seemed to give a damn about people.
You were me, which would you choose?” He looked over his shoulder and his face became troubled.
“He’s a good kid, Harry. I mean, he walks around like a cat at a dog convention.
He ain’t got much in the way of trust. And there’s something chewing at him he won’t talk about, not even after all the time he’s worked with me.
But he’s kind. Gentle. You should see him handling the shades of children. Helping them on their way.”
“They’re all good kids,” I said quietly. Even you, Harry, once upon a time.
“Yeah, but I’ve seen what the Council does to them.” Mort shook his head. “I think the kid is at a crossroads. He could go either way. I’ll take my chances with you.”
I wasn’t sure I had it in me to be the kind of stable presence an emergent wizard needed to help him embrace his power effectively and wisely.
But I was sure I didn’t have it in me to turn him away.
I’d been Fitz once.
“You think I can help him?” I asked.
Mort blew out a breath. “I think you have a shot. Better than me, anyway. Sure as hell better than those pricks on the Council. If you can get him to open up with you, I think it could go a long way.”
And if I couldn’t, it could go a long way, too. And I wasn’t in the best of shape.
But I had to try.
“Okay,” I said. “Have him show up with a couple of changes of clothes and as many books as he wants.”
“Thank you,” Mort said quietly.
I nodded. “How about you?” I asked him. “How’s your side of town?”
Mort shook his head. “Business is…booming, I suppose. I’ve spent the past couple of weeks sorting through crowds of newborn shades. The Eye of Balor killed a lot of people and left a much higher percentage of shades than natural deaths.”
I sighed. “I hadn’t thought about that one. But it makes sense. What’s happening?”
Mort shrugged. “They’re confused as hell.
A lot of them don’t even have a proper grave yet.
They have to go back to their corpses to get away from the sun.
That doesn’t bode well for their sanity.
I’ve been sending in tips to Lieutenant Stallings about where there are bodies that still haven’t been found, but…
Jesus, Harry, the death rate in town has tripled or quadrupled at least.”
“Killings?” I asked.
“Some of them,” he said. “But a lot more are just people dying of things that could have been recovered from if the town hadn’t been blown to hell.
Heart attacks, accidents, illnesses. I’ve got an old crystal radio, so I can get some of the news, but nobody has any real idea of what’s happening in the city.
Until we get communications back up, everyone’s on their own. ”
I sighed and rubbed at my head. “Halloween is going to be the spooky season for real this year.”
“Most likely,” he said, nodding. “Me and Fitz been doing our best, but there’s only two of us—and now it will just be me.”
“It’s not just you,” I said quietly. “We’re all in this train wreck together.”
Mort gave me a cynical tilt of his head. “You don’t get out of the castle much, do you?”
“Not for a few days,” I said.
“There are groups forming,” he said. “Some of them have been going after people they think are connected to the supernatural. Showing up at night. Harassing them. Tagging their apartments and homes.”
“Violence?” I asked.
“Not yet. But we’re getting there.”
I exhaled slowly.
I should probably start paying more attention to things outside of my routine. But the very thought sent quavers running through my belly that might have sent the shade of my breakfast spewing from my mouth.
When I looked up at Mort, he was watching me with a troubled expression.
Hell’s bells.
He wanted me to tell him what to do.
My breakfast struggled to manifest into the physical world. I didn’t want to do this. I wanted to stick to my routine. To grieve. To heal.
I just needed time.
Instead, I spoke. “Talk to Artemis Bock,” I said.
“His bookstore is still a hub for our people. Ask him to start gathering information on what’s going on.
Before you do that, head for the kitchen.
The Ordo Lebes is there. They’ve coordinated on establishing protection for the community before.
They’ll be some of the best folks to figure out what can be done now.
” I nodded. “After that, I want you to keep doing what you do, and keep me informed. If things get really bad in the ghostly way, maybe we can put together some kind of ritual to keep things under wraps.”
“What about McAnally’s?” Mort asked.
“There’s a market set up in the parking lot,” I said. “Mostly our people. Good place for information. But Mac wants his place peaceful and neutral. He wants in, he’ll let us know.”
Mort closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. “Yeah. Okay. Makes sense.”
I’d just been making it up as I went along. But I supposed there was no need to burden Mort with that. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll…uh, I’ll expect you to go over the risks with Fitz. But we both know he’ll want to do it. Tomorrow. Six a.m.”
“That early?”
“Might as well start the way I mean to continue,” I said.
“He’ll be here.” Mort rose to leave but paused by the door. “Harry…thank you. You do a lot that people don’t see. I know what that’s like. So thank you.”
I felt responsibility piling up on my shoulders like lead weights.
But I nodded at him and said, “Sure, Mort. You’re welcome.”