Twenty Palaces (30 page)

Then he slammed into me, knocking me against the folded wheelchair. I tripped over it, scattering tee ball bats onto the floor.
 

I looked up. Jon was gone--he'd burst through the door into the hallway--and I wasn't holding the ghost knife any more.

I rolled onto my knees and looked around. So much baseball crap had been knocked onto the floor that I couldn't see my spell in the clutter. I closed my eyes, concentrated, and
reached
out for it.

There it was, out in the hall. I held out my hand.

Jon stepped on it. "Hey,
buddy
," he said. "You looking for this?"

I started to stand. "Jon--"

I didn't know what I was going to say--even what I could say that I hadn't said before--but Jon cut me off by pointing a .22 caliber pistol at me.
 

Then he smiled. "Can you believe this is still in the house? Even after what happened to me--after what you did to me--Dad wouldn't get rid of his collection. Well, except for that
one.
"

The inside of the barrel was dark. "Jesus Christ, Jon."
 

He took a silencer from his pocket and screwed it on, moving so fast that he'd finished before I realized what he was doing. I was still down on one knee, and I tried to imagine a way I could rush someone as fast as he was. Nothing came to mind except all the tricks I'd failed with before. "Cops outside," he said, tapping the silencer. "You know, before we attacked the hotel, I said: 'Let's go get some weapons from my house.' But Echo didn't seem to understand what guns were, and Macy--"

He charged across the seven feet separating us with startling speed and kicked me square on my chest. I fell back, spinning, and landed on my stomach. My tattoos protected me from the kick but ammonia smeared across my lips, choking me.
 

Jon stepped on my back, pinning me. The pressure against my ribs was intense and painful. Then he placed the barrel of the gun against my spine.

"... Macy hates guns. Considering her line of work, I can't blame her."

"Jon," I said, trying to keep my voice calm and failing, "I've been trying to help you!"

"Thank you, buddy. If only I had more people like you
helping
me. In return, you can have my old wheelchair. You're going to need it in a couple--Wait! I have a better idea." He jammed his foot under my ribs and flipped me onto my back. I fell against the desk, a shower of baseball cards falling onto my hip. Jon pointed the gun at my forehead. I shielded myself with my left hand.

"Your aunt is going to be pretty hungry in a few." Jon cocked the hammer. "I should set the table."

My thoughts were all jumbled together in an incoherent mess. My ghost knife was too far away and Jon didn't understand that he needed my help to save Karl and Theresa before they were infected but why hadn't Annalise put a spell on my face and Callin's friend was going to destroy the city and I should have been terrified, but all I felt was disappointment that I couldn't set things right and it was all because I had failed to save my oldest--

Jon squeezed the trigger.

It was a tiny noise, like a robot's sneeze. My hand burst into white hot fire just as I thought it would be embarrassing to die without the big, booming gunshot I deserved.

As if in slow motion, I saw the tattooed skin on the back of my hand bulge outward, then snap back with tremendous force, tearing through my palm again.
 

The sigil on Irena's glove also burst apart in a jet of iron gray sparks and black steam. The jet shot toward Jon's face, and just before he was engulfed, I saw a bullet hole appear in his forehead.

The pain in my hand rushed up my arm, freezing me in place. The jet of ruined magic receded, and Jon staggered backward, bright red blood trickling down his face.

Animal rage surged through me. Jon had tried to kill me. After everything I'd put myself through for him, he'd tried to put a bullet in my brain. I snatched up a tee ball bat with my good hand and rolled to my knees. With all my strength, I slammed it across Jon's shins. He fell to the floor, his expression empty and his face slack.

Then I was on my feet. My left hand hurt so much it might as well have been on fire, but I still held the bat in my right. I smashed Jon's wrist with it, sending the gun bouncing into the hall, but it wasn't enough. My pain and fear had control of me, and the urge to
fight fight fight
was overwhelming. I slammed the bat down onto Jon's head and his eyes fell closed.

I swung again and again. Red blood spattered against the wall and I began to hit his arms and his legs, too, then his battered skull over and over. I realized I was screaming, and as I kept swinging, my scream became words as my terror poured out of me.
 

"You son of a bitch! You fucking son of a bitch! I couldn't--"

I stopped, then staggered backwards, nearly falling against the wall. My left hand was still in terrible, terrible pain, and that seemed to steal the strength from me. I dropped the bat and cradled it. Tears streamed down my cheeks.

Jon lay still on the carpet, his head a misshapen pulp. "I couldn't save you," I said. My voice was raw and I sounded like the stupidest man alive.
 

I stumbled into the hall and fell flat on my belly, my face against the carpet. If Echo came upstairs to investigate the fight, I'd be helpless, but so what? I'd failed Jon, just as I knew I would.

But my aunt and uncle were downstairs, not to mention that sickly little girl. I stumbled into the bathroom, yanked a hand towel off the shelf and wrapped it around my gunshot hand. It bled steadily, so I pressed the wound against my ribs. The pain helped clear my head.

On my way to the stairs, I
reached
for the ghost knife, letting it zip into my hand. Then I gripped it between my teeth and picked up the gun.

It was time to put an end to this. It was time to kill Echo.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

I expected to fall on the way down the stairs back stairs, but I held it together somehow. I had blood on my shirt from where it had leaked through the bathroom towel, and I pressed harder against my chest. I was no expert on bullet wounds, but I knew I needed pressure to control the bleeding. My knees were shaking, but whether that was from blood loss or adrenaline, I didn't know.
 

I stumbled into the kitchen. It was dark, but a dim night light showed me that it had been completely remodeled. I made my way around the table, being careful not to bump the chairs. It was ridiculous to try to sneak around after everything that had happened, but I was doing it anyway.

As I crossed the room, I glanced the length of the house and saw the shadows moving against the frosted glass beside the front door. Was it the bodyguards? The old woman with the bad hearing? It didn't matter to me, as long as they didn't interfere.
 

The basement door was still in the same place; I pulled it open. It sounded like a gale was blowing down there, but the noise was slowly dying. The spell was almost finished. I hurried down the stairs, my feet clumping heavily on the wood.

Another bodyguard stepped into view. He was the biggest of all of them, and his big brown eyes and long jaw gave him the good looks of a movie star. Over his shoulder, I could see the painted sigils on the floor flashing as they--and the floor--began to vanish.

I pointed the gun at him to control him, then I spit out my ghost knife and caught it between my gunshot hand and my chest. "I've always heard that shooting someone with a .22 wouldn't kill them, just annoy them."

He backed away as I descended the stairs. I had a sudden memory of Jon at 13, his shirt punching into his belly as the bullet hit him, the sound of the gunshot and the terrible flow of blood. The thought made me dizzy, but I could squeeze the trigger again if I had to. If I had to. "I've heard the same thing," the bodyguard said in a rich, deep voice.

"Well, I have enough bullets in here to be the most annoying guy you'll ever meet in your life."

"Okay, sir, but I'd rather we all kept our cool."

"Good," I glanced around the room. The design on the floor looked even bigger here than it had in the house, but that may have been because, in clearing space for it, Echo and Jon had piled everything into walls of clutter. Cardboard banker boxes had split open from the weight of scrap wood piled onto them, family pictures half-tumbled out of broken laundry baskets, bird houses and wood-working tools both had been thrown onto work benches, all to clear floor space.

Which was barely large enough to accommodate the spell. The circle the little girl in the pretty dress lay in--which was about one o'clock from where I stood--was physically under the work bench--she couldn't have sat upright if she'd wanted to.
 

Aunt Theresa was in the center and Uncle Karl was over at ten o'clock. The huge plywood model train layouts leaning against the clutter were so close to the outer circle that a cat couldn't have passed through. The only way I was getting to any of them was by entering the circle or hiring a bulldozer.
 

Neither had noticed me. Both were staring downward, into the Empty Spaces.

But Echo herself was in the seven o'clock position, just on my left. She looked at me with a strange mix of hatred and hunger that made me want to shoot her just on principle.

At four o'clock was Skullface. He was the easy way to break the spell. "Here's the best way for all of us to keep cool, then: Pull your boss out of the circle."

"I can't do that," the bodyguard said. He was watching me warily, waiting for his chance to move, but he was being smart about it.

"You don't understand. What she's doing is going to kill him."

"The man has pancreatic cancer. How much worse could it get?"

Worse than you can imagine
, was what I almost said, but that wouldn't have gotten me anywhere. No one else in the room had noticed me yet, and the spell had reached the point where silence had fallen. No one would hear what I said next except the other guard.

"Pull him out of the circle or I'm going to put a bullet in that little girl."

The bodyguard's eyes were wide and blank, but I knew it wasn't shock. He was taking my measure. "Son, you can't even bring yourself to point your gun at that little girl. I don't think you're going to shoot her. I'm guessing you've seen what bullets can do. Am I right?"

I couldn't believe he'd seen through my bluff so quickly. "Are you so sure about that? Are you gonna take that risk?"

"That's my job and I'm good at it."

I glanced over at my aunt and the others. The floor had vanished, and the lights were swirling upward. "Look at this! This is what you're defending?" I was nearly shouting. "Get on your knees."

He did, smoothly. I knew it wouldn't slow him much if he decided to go for me, but I needed every advantage I could get. I pivoted and shot Echo.

I aimed for her head, but my hand was shaking so much that the bullet struck her knee instead. She didn't move, didn't even flinch. My stomach felt hollow. I'd hoped to drive her out of the circle, but I knew that wasn't going to happen, not if shooting her only made her sit and glare at me harder.

There was a shuffle behind me and I turned toward the bodyguard. My look froze him in place. I fired at Echo again--missing this time--and then the gun wouldn't fire again. It had jammed.

Maybe if I'd had both hands, I could have cleared it quickly and kept firing, but it was already too late. The lights swirling below the design began to push against it, then they burst through the floor and floated around Aunt Theresa.

I heard the guard getting to his feet, but I didn't spare him a look.
You think you've paid your debt...
I took one long step toward the circle, and then I jumped.

The circle flashed white as I passed through it, and suddenly I was inside the void.
 

It wasn't cold, or hot, or any other feeling I could identify. There was a sense of deadness against my skin, as though my sense of touch had been switched off. After an instant of weightlessness, in which it felt as though I was falling from a great height, I realized I was simply floating toward my aunt. There was no gravity here and I might have floated across the room if not for the sigils inside the central spot, drawing me in.

It seemed as though I was moving slowly, terribly slowly across the open space. I made progress, but each moment felt as wide and as deep as the universe.
I
felt as wide and deep as the universe, my mind and my senses expanded to fill so much space that I lost all sense of myself. My every thought, memory, and emotion broke apart into tiny specks and flew away from me until they were like single dust motes hanging in the spaces between galaxies.
 

And still I floated forward, feeling like a wave so small it was indistinguishable from its surroundings.
 

After an eternal second, I broached the edge of the circle my aunt was sitting in, and I suddenly collapsed in on myself. It was like returning to consciousness from a moment of blessed oblivion, and I could suddenly see, smell, touch, everything. My whole life rushed back at me, every fight, every fuck, every moment of shame or fury. I became myself again.

But on a conscious level my thoughts continued uninterrupted: Aunt, cousins, Echo, ghost knife. My feet silently struck the invisible floor inside the central circle--as I'd hoped, it had been large enough to hold Echo's corpse, so it was large enough for two people--and I found myself standing over my aunt.
 

She looked up at me, as shocked as if I'd flown down out of the sky, and I saw her say my name. I still couldn't hear a thing. She gaped at the sight of my bloody hand. A glowing light circled near her mouth.
 

I bit down on the Velcro strap holding Irena's glove on my right hand, yanked it off, then stuffed it into my mouth with the palm--and the sigil on it--facing outward.
 

The circle was full of the glowing lights, now. They spun around us quickly, excitedly. I pulled the ghost knife from beneath my bloody hand, sliding it over my clothes to wipe it off, then crouched down to pull my aunt closer to me. Just as her weight braced against my legs, one of the lights entered her mouth. At nearly the same moment, I slid the ghost knife into the back of her neck.