“Well, I don’t have one,” Jack growled.
George peered through the trees. “You said William and Cerise are leaving tomorrow. Who does the wyvern belong to? I got stuck at fencing, and when I made it here, the wyvern had landed already.”
“Kaldar. He has a mission in the Democracy of California. He came to ask them for help, but they’re leaving on their own thing tomorrow, so he’s taking Gaston with him instead.”
George thought about it. “When?”
“Tomorrow evening. He has to give the wyvern time to rest before the long trip.” What did that have anything to do with it?
“That’s a large cabin,” George said.
“So?”
“If they’re flying to California, they’ll pack it full of supplies, right?”
Jack looked at the wyvern. It was a large cabin. Large enough to hide in, especially if it was packed with crates and bags.
“Let me talk to Gaston. We can’t pull it off without him. If it goes well, we pack tonight,” George said. “We’ll tell Declan and Rose we have an overnight camp for school. By the time they realize we’re gone, we’ll be in California.”
“Gaston won’t help,” Jack said.
“Let me worry about that.”
Jack stared at his brother. “If we go, it will be the same thing as if I ran away. The search and the torches.”
“We’ll tell Lark where we’re going, and she will tell Declan and Rose when the time comes. They won’t be happy, but Kaldar is on a Mirror mission, and Declan and Rose won’t jeopardize it. Besides, it’s clear across the continent. Did you see the pile of stuff on Declan’s desk? It’s not like he can just take off and leave the Southern Provinces to be overrun by criminals. Lark will tell them that Kaldar will take care of us.” George smiled. “There will be hell to pay when we get home, but they can’t send you off while you are in California. This will work.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“We’ll think of something else. Now we have to go home and quietly pack. Tomorrow, we have to go to school, like normal, and be very well behaved.”
They started down the forest path.
George’s leather boots creaked as he walked. He needed to oil them or something, Jack reflected.
If George came with him, they would both be in trouble.
“You don’t have to do this,” Jack said. “I can do this by myself.”
“You remember when you beat up Thad Mosser?”
Thad was a mean Edger kid. He had it in for George, but it was years ago, back when they lived in the Edge. Besides, it only took one fight and some stitches to get it settled. “Yeah.”
“We leave tomorrow evening,” George said.
They didn’t talk any more until they got home.
THE cabin was cramped. Jack stirred in his small space, squished between the wall of the cabin and the wall of wicker trunks Gaston had stuffed into the cabin. Across from him, George leaned against the cabin wall. His eyes were closed.
They had been flying for most of the night. At first, Kaldar and Gaston talked. Something about some thieves from the Edge stealing a magic thing from West Egypt and trying to sell it to the Hand. Things didn’t go well because they broke a fountain, and one of the Hand’s people had been blown to bits. Kaldar had found something called a crack pipe, whatever the hell that might be, and taken it to the cops in the Broken. They found a fingerprint on the pipe, and it belonged to someone named Alex Callahan, who was checked into a “rehab” in the Broken’s California.
“How much did that nugget of information cost you?” Gaston had asked.
“A few trinkets from the Weird,” Kaldar had told him. “Turns out our boy has a rap sheet a mile long. The State of Louisiana got him for possession and burglary. He also earned a couple of warrants in Florida: theft and possession with intent to distribute. And his rickety 1990 Nissan Sentra was involved in a high-speed chase and somehow gave the cop cars the slip.”
“That tells me nothing,” Gaston had said.
“He outran a racehorse on a donkey.”
“You think he went into the Edge?”
“He had to,” Kaldar had said. “The high-speed chase netted him another heap of charges. Then he popped up in Alabama and Tennessee, theft and possession again, and right now his fingerprints show him checked into the Rose Cliff in northern California. The Rose Cliff is where you put your addict relatives when you have money.”
“This guy seems mostly small-time,” Gaston said.
“ ‘Seems’ is the key word here. We only know about the things he got caught on, and on each one, he was so addled, it’s a wonder he could find the ground with both feet. You and I were both Edgers once. You know how they operate.”
“Family,” Gaston agreed. “Somewhere in the Edge, someone knows him.”
“Exactly. And that someone suddenly got a lot of money and checked Alex into rehab. Most Edgers don’t have forty grand lying on the shelf somewhere.”
Gaston whistled. “That’s serious money.”
“One has to wonder how Alex’s family came by it. If I had time, I would knock on some doors in the Edge around Macon where he first blazed a trail, but we don’t have that luxury. We know where he is, so we go to him and we ask him how his crack pipe ended up in the town square in the Weird next to the bits and pieces of the Hand’s agent.”
None of it made a lot of sense, and now everyone was quiet.
Jack fidgeted. It would’ve been much cooler to sit up front, where he could see the sky and the clouds and the ground far below. The heat rising from the wyvern’s back and the blankets Gaston had given them kept the cabin warm, but it wasn’t exactly toasty. He fidgeted again. Bored. Bored, bored, bored. He’d slept, he’d read through the book he’d packed in his bag—it was all about the Weird’s nobles on the Old Continent fighting against the ancient raiders. The book was okay, and the hero got to cut the bad guy’s head off at the end, which was fine.
They had stopped a few times, and Gaston snuck them out to relieve themselves, but that was hours ago.
Jack stretched his legs, bumping his brother. George opened his eyes, and mouthed,
“Stop it.”
“You stop it,”
Jack mouthed back.
George raised his arm and pretended to scratch his armpit.
“Ape.”
Jack kicked him. George kicked back, and his heel landed on Jack’s thigh. So that’s how it is? Fine. Jack lunged across the space and grabbed George by his arm. George elbowed him in the gut. Jack rammed his fist into his brother’s side.
“Did you hear that?” Kaldar asked.
“I’ll check on it.”
George sank a fist into Jack’s ear. Pain exploded in his head. Ow. Jack punched him in the ribs.
A huge fist landed on his head. The world got fuzzy for a second, and Jack went down. Half a second later, George sprawled next to him, clutching the back of his head. “Nothing, just some crates shifting,” Gaston called out.
Jack pointed to the front of the cabin and put his fist into his palm. George nodded. When they got out of here, Gaston would be in for a treat.
“How long till we land?” Gaston asked up front.
“A couple of hours. Almost there,” Kaldar said.
“So what’s the plan?”
“The plan is for me to visit Mr. Alex Callahan and ask him some questions.”
“Do you think he’ll answer?”
“Not without some persuasion,” Kaldar said. “As it happens, persuasion is my specialty.”
“I take it I’ll be staying with the wyvern?”
Kaldar laughed. “Unless you want to panic the entire city of Red Grove with your serrated teeth.”
“Are you sure? One look at me, and Alex will spill his life story. If that fails, I could always be convincing.”
“By breaking one of his limbs?”
“If necessary.”
“It may come to that.”
“Is something bothering you, Uncle?” Gaston asked.
“This guy. Alex Callahan. He’s a junkie. A rap sheet a mile long, all of it with drug charges over the last six years.”
“Aha.”
“The Pyramid of Ptah is a tough nut to crack even for the best picklock. These guys walked in and out. Popped fourteen locks in record time. It would take me days.”
“You’re thinking magic?” Gaston asked.
“Probably. That means if Alex is the picker, he would’ve never done the job.”
“How do you figure?”
“Anytime he wants a hit, he can break into anything in the Edge or in the Weird, sell it, and get high. If this lock-picking talent is magic, then it only works in the Edge and the Weird. So why does Alex Callahan have a trophy wall of theft charges in the Broken? Why steal where you’re at a disadvantage?”
“Maybe he’s stupid.”
“Junkies are clever; they have to be to keep the addiction going, and long-term junkies are too far gone to plan ahead. They’re only thinking of the next high. An addict will steal anything, and he will sell it to you for twenty bucks. That’s the going price of a meth hit. No matter what the item is, the fence will offer the addict twenty bucks for it, and the addict will take it. To them a five-hundred-dollar DVD player for one hit is a fair trade because they have no use for the player. The Pyramid of Ptah is a risky and complicated job. The chances of getting caught are high, and to top it all off, whoever took the item sold it to the Hand. Callahan wouldn’t have done the job by himself, and even if he had, he would’ve unloaded the item at the first fence along the way. No, Alex might have been there, but he wasn’t the picklock. Someone else set this job up.”
“Well, we’ll find out in a couple of hours, right?”
“Right. Whoever this picklock is, I can’t wait to meet him.”
Gaston laughed. “Remember, you work for the Mirror, Uncle.”
“I remember. Still, the possibilities are intriguing. I’m sure this guy and I could come to an understanding.”
The voices fell silent.
Jack stirred in his small space, sighed, and curled up. Two hours. He could sleep for two hours.
IT was more like three hours before the wyvern dipped down and another fifteen minutes or so before they landed. Jack sat quietly while Kaldar got out, changed clothes, and gave some final instructions to Gaston. Finally, a thump resonated through the cabin as Gaston’s fist pounded on the wood and wicker. “Up, ladies. He’s gone. I’m going to get some water and mix catalyst feed for the wyvern. Piss, stretch your legs, do whatever you need to do. And stay the hell away from the boundary. We’re really close.”
Jack looked at George. They were close to the boundary. They hadn’t been in the Broken for almost three years, not since the last time they went to visit Grandma, and they hadn’t been in California ever.
The light of the early morning glowed ahead, sifting through the front windshield of the cabin. Jack leaped over the crate, pushed the wicker door open, and stopped. A few steps ahead, the ground plunged down in a sheer cliff, and beyond it, a vast ocean spread to the horizon, blue and pale silver. A wind gust shot from under the cliff and hit him in the face. A thousand scents exploded all around Jack: the smell of pine resin and eucalyptus; the fragrance of small blue flowers, hiding between the crags; the distant stench of seagulls screaming overhead; salt; wet sand; ocean water, clean and slightly bitter; seaweed; and, as an afterthought, a faint aroma of smoked fish flavoring the breeze.
For a second, Jack couldn’t process it all, then he jumped, arms open wide like wings, and dashed down the near-vertical slope to the waves below.
THREE
THE Rose Cliff Rehabilitation Center could only be described as posh, Kaldar reflected, walking through the glass door into a foyer. Huge windows painted the cream and pale peach walls with rectangles of golden sunlight. The floor was brown marble tile, polished to a mirror sheen, and as he walked across it to a marble counter, his steps sent tiny echoes through the vestibule. Normally, he preferred shoes that made no sound, but the set of Broken clothes had to be obtained quickly, and he didn’t have a lot of choices. Now he felt like a shod horse:
clack, clack, clack.
The mirrored wall behind the receptionist presented him with his reflection: he wore a dark gray suit, a white shirt so crisp he was half-afraid the folded collar might nick his neck and draw blood, and the cursed black shoes. His dark hair was slicked back from his face. He’d shaved, trimmed his eyebrows, and dabbed cologne on his skin. He smelled expensive, he made noise as he walked, and he projected enough confidence to win a dozen sieges.
The blond receptionist behind the counter smiled at him. “May I help you, sir?”
“My name is Jonathan Berman.” He held out his business card. She took it and studied it for a second. Silver foil cursive crossed the dark blue card printed on the best stock money could buy. It read: SHIFTING THE PARADIGM. Below it his name was printed, followed by a phony Los Angeles address.
“Good morning, Mr. Berman.”
Kaldar nodded. Amazing how the Broken worked: all those forms of identification, but hand someone a business card, and they forget to ask you for your driver’s license. He’d had business cards in twenty different names, one for each region of the country. Each communicated something different. This one said money, confidence, and success, and, judging by her even wider smile, this fact wasn’t lost on the receptionist.
“How may I help you, Mr. Berman?”
“I’m here to see Alex Callahan.”
The receptionist glanced at her computer screen. Her fingers with very long nails colored canary yellow flew over the keyboard. “Mr. Callahan was admitted three days ago. Normally, we recommend that our guests refrain from distractions during the first two weeks of treatment.”
Kaldar leaned on the counter and gave her a knowing smile. “What’s your name?”
“Bethany.”
“Well, Bethany, Alex is my cousin. I understand he came in with his parents.”
That was a wild stab in the dark, but who else would make a deal with the Hand, then blow all of that hard-earned cash on a rehab for an addict? That kind of love came only from parents. If Alex had a woman, she was either an addict like him or penniless like him.