Spirit And Dust Part 11

That would teach me to judge a shade by her hairstyle.

"Thanks, Doris." Her faded form had sharpened at the edges while we'd talked. How long had she been asking "Can I help you?" and getting no answer? I made a point of telling her, "You've been a real help."

She beamed, literally brightening with her smile. "You're welcome! Have a nice day!"

Grabbing my shopping basket, I hurried to the aisle I wanted. I didn't linger over my choices, just snagged the cheapest netbook that would serve. My fifteen minutes was almost up, but as I headed for the front of the store, a thought slowed me down. How long had Doris been greeting people who couldn't hear her?

I went back to Accessories. Doris's shade still stood behind the counter, still smiling, still in the loop that had been her life.

"h.e.l.lo!" she said, starting from the beginning. "Welcome to Walmart! Can I help you find something?"

"Would you like to go home, Doris?" It was hard not to speak to her like a child. That was sort of what she was. A lost lamb, all habit, no home.

Her eyes were pale, in a face that hadn't seen sunlight in years, expression numbed by endless, mindless repet.i.tion. And that was before she died. The pattern was slow to break, but finally comprehension sparked, like light in a curtained window of a vacant house.

"You mean my s.h.i.+ft is over?"

"Yes." I set down my shopping basket, glancing at the big clock at the front of the store. This crossing would have to be quick and dirty.

I pictured my psyche rus.h.i.+ng to my skin like a blush, pulsing with my heartbeat-not fast and frantic like when the geas had hold of me, but a strong and powerful song. The air around me hummed an echo, and the Veil appeared in front of us like a beaded curtain of gla.s.s.

Doris gasped. "My dogs! They've been waiting for me all this time I've been at work. They must be so hungry!" She took a step forward-through the counter, feeling the pull of the next world.

I loved this part. It made everything else worthwhile. "Your dogs are going to be really happy to see you," I said with a grin. "Ditch the ap.r.o.n and go, Doris."

Pulling off the smock, she let it fall into nothingness and ran through the mercury beads that gated her eternity. As she disappeared, I caught a whiff of candle wax and a strain of Conway Twitty.

She didn't say thank you. They never did. They were too excited about what was ahead to think about what was behind, and that was all the thanks I needed.

The Veil blurred and softened to a silk ripple, and I reached with my psyche to close it, to still its vibrations like damping a ringing bell.

But I stopped when I glimpsed a black figure on the other side, like a stalking shadow on a moonlit curtain.

Free me, Daughter of the Jackal.

The words whispered through my head as the Veil closed.

My ears rang. My head rang. Nothing had ever spoken through the Veil before. Eternity was hidden from the living. That was the rule.

At least, that was my rule, because I'd never seen anything different. I was ninety-nine percent convinced I'd imagined this in some sort of stress-and-magic-induced waking fever dream.

The other one percent was certain I shouldn't be certain of anything.

I made for the checkout on shaking legs and paid for my stuff. I'd barely stepped outside when a late-model Mazda sports sedan zoomed up to the curb.

"Get in," Carson said through the open pa.s.senger window. I could tell he was p.i.s.sed because he was so careful not to look that way.

I popped open the door and jumped in. Carson hit the gas as soon as my foot left the pavement, trusting me to get the door closed before we were up to speed.

"What part of 'fifteen minutes' was hard to understand?" he asked with icy calm. "The part where I was idling around the corner in a stolen vehicle?"

"Sorry," I said. But some emotion must have laced my voice, because he spared me a glance as he pulled onto the service road to the interstate.

"What happened?" he asked. "Are you okay? Did you have trouble with a guard?"

"No. Something with a remnant." I s.h.i.+vered in spite of myself. Remnants saw things beyond the Veil. I did not. Ever. Until tonight.

"Is that why you didn't manage to buy a coat?" He leaned over to turn up the heater.

His tone ignited my temper, burning off the s.h.i.+vers. "I didn't manage to buy a coat," I said, reaching into one of the bags and yanking out the netbook in its box, "because I was blowing my cash on a way to look at that flash drive. Ingrate."

He smiled and turned his gaze to the road. "That's better."

"I should have just taken the money and run," I grumbled. "How did you know I wouldn't?"

When he glanced at me again, he summed me all up, and it was somehow not smug, just droll. "I don't know, Gertrude. You tell me."

Obviously I didn't have to. I reached up to touch my medal. Symbol or saint, I'd picked her for a reason.

And Carson was right. There'd never been any question what I'd do. It was what I always did. I found lost souls and brought them home. I had to do the same for Alexis, no matter what it took.

15.

WE STOPPED ONCE in Wisconsin to switch drivers, then again near Rockford just before the sun came up. I grabbed my Walmart bag and used the restroom of the Starbucks to wash up and change into the clothes I bought.

When I came out and looked for Carson, I almost didn't recognize him. He was at a table, poking around on the netbook, wearing a T-s.h.i.+rt and hoodie and a pair of rectangular dark-rimmed gla.s.ses, his hair spiked and messy with damp. He actually looked like a college student, harmless and sort of adorable.

I set the bag with my stuff in one of the chairs. "If you're wearing skinny jeans, I refuse to be seen with you."

He looked up, then had to take off the gla.s.ses to see me properly. "You're one to talk. We both had the same idea."

Right. I'd gone for hipster camouflage, too-jeans, layered T-s.h.i.+rts, skinny scarf draped around my neck-but I'd kept my studded accessories and skull-covered sneakers.

Carson held up a twenty-dollar bill. "Grab something to eat while I look up directions to the Inst.i.tute."

"Don't look at the flash drive without me," I warned, and accepted his acknowledging wave as a promise.

I returned to the table with an egg sandwich, a fruit cup, a m.u.f.fin, and a venti nonfat latte. Carson didn't comment on my breakfast, just slid over to make room so we could both see the ten-inch computer screen.

"Wait," I said, putting my hand on his when he went to plug the mummy flash drive into the port. "If whatever is on here sends us straight back to Minnesota, I don't want you to say I told you so."

"But I didn't tell you so," he said, confused. "I had no problem following your hunch."

"I know." I let go of his wrist. "Which is just going to make me feel worse if we've crossed state lines in a stolen car for nothing."

Rather than offer empty rea.s.surance, Carson just plugged in the drive, and I held my breath.

This memory device is pa.s.sword protected.

c.r.a.p. I would rather have listened to "I told you so" all the way back to Minneapolis.

Carson reached for his coffee and contemplated the empty pa.s.sword box and flas.h.i.+ng cursor. "Any ideas?"

"Does she have a pet? A favorite color? A favorite movie?"

He started typing things in-birth date, favorite actor, mother's maiden name-with no luck at all. Finally he rubbed his eyes and closed the netbook. "It's okay," he said, when he saw my disappointment. "We're not any further behind than we were before. We can be in Chicago by the time the museum opens."

Jeez. It really was that early. I felt like I'd lived a week since heading for cla.s.s yesterday morning.

A few hours later, we left our stolen car in a park-and-ride lot and caught the commuter train into Chicago, then switched to the subway. I played it cool, copying Carson and trying not to look too freaked out by the close quarters in the train car.

"Not a fan of closed s.p.a.ces?" he asked as we bounced along the underground track. When I cut him a glance, he nodded at my hands, white-knuckled on the metal pole. I guess I wasn't fooling anyone.

"It's not the s.p.a.ce. It's the people." I loosened my death grip, no pun intended. "The psychic baggage gets a little overwhelming, all packed in here like this."

"Almost there," he said, sympathetic. Then he hooked his elbow around the pole, took out his wallet, pulled out a card, and handed it to me. "Here. You might need this."

"A Starbucks gift card?"

I didn't think that was funny, but he laughed. "Are you always hungry?"

"Dude. It takes a lot of calories to run this much psychic genius."

"I'm sure it does." He tapped the card. "Lauren gave me this for you. This looks like whatever the viewer expects it to look like. You might need ID."

I looked again and found nothing but a credit-card-sized piece of blank white plastic. I tried not to look as impressed as I was. "Do you know how many college students would give their eyeteeth for one of these?"

He flashed a grin that said he knew very well. "Don't bother listing it on eBay. It's only good for a day or so, and it won't pa.s.s a hard inspection. Oh, and don't try to buy any Starbucks with it. It doesn't work on credit-card machines."

I turned the card between my fingers. It must have taken a lot of magical mojo to make, even with the limitations. Lauren might rub me the wrong way, but she was one seriously kick-a.s.s witch.

"How did your boss find her? I mean, is there a listing on Monster.com for witches for hire?"

Carson shrugged. "He has a lot of resources. I think her actual job t.i.tle is 'arcane adviser.' "

He had deadpan down to an art, that was for sure. "So, what's your t.i.tle?" I asked.

"Court jester," he answered, with funereal gravity.

"No, really." We stood holding on to the same subway pole, our shoulders brus.h.i.+ng with the movement of the train. Close enough that we didn't have to raise our voices over the noise of the rails. There was a peculiar sort of privacy in the crowd.

"Really," he echoed, lightening his tone but sticking to his script. "I'm the king's fool."

I studied him with a bit of a squint, trying to bring him into focus, figuratively speaking. "I think you're wise enough to play one. I'm really out on a limb here with you, and I don't even know if Carson is your first or last name."

He gave in with a sigh, his eyes on the sign over my shoulder, displaying the next subway stop. "I'm management in training. Don't ask me more than that."

"Why not?"

The train came to a halt, and I almost missed his answer in the shuffle of riders to the door. "Because I don't want you to think even worse of me than you do. Come on. This is our stop."

He caught my arm so we wouldn't get separated in the jostle on the platform. I was glad to let him steer while I processed what he'd said. That he cared about my opinion. That he was at least ambivalent about his role in the Maguire organization. He seemed to dislike, maybe even hate Maguire. It was a safe bet he didn't work for the man by choice. But what hold did the big boss have over him? It couldn't be as simple as college tuition.

Maybe that was wishful thinking, only why would I wish that? I didn't like morally ambivalent bad boys. I liked good guys-like rookie FBI agents open-minded enough to take on cold cases with a teenage psychic. But as we emerged into the biting Chicago wind and I glanced at Carson's Roman coin profile, I wondered why I didn't think worse of him than I did.

The Oriental Inst.i.tute was located on the University of Chicago campus. It didn't look Near or Far Eastern, but totally Western, with gables and ivied stone walls and Art Deco accents.

We arrived minutes after the posted opening time. On the front steps, I paused like I was studying the carved panel above the doors.

"What's wrong?" asked Carson.

"Nothing." I was just getting ready to enter a building with a millennium or two of history inside it. "Museums can be tricky. Just reel me in if I start talking to mummies or singing ancient Sumerian drinking songs."

"Awesome. A floor show." He pulled open the heavy front door and gestured me in with a flourish. "I'll look forward to that."

The building felt of age and academia, and I found myself treading lightly, like in a library. Only the smiling volunteer behind the info desk convinced me we weren't trespa.s.sing.

"Are you students at the university?" she asked, handing us a brochure map of the place. "Or visiting from out of town?"

Carson gave her our prearranged cover story. We'd decided we couldn't be students in the Egyptology department, because they probably all knew each other. "We have this crazy sketching a.s.signment for one of our cla.s.ses. It's sort of like a scavenger hunt."

The volunteer gave a sympathetic nod and a glance at our clothes. "Ah. Art students."

"Our art history teacher's a little bit of a head case," Carson said, with just the right mix of drama and indifference to fit the stereotype. He was scary good at this. "We're supposed to sketch something called the Oosterhouse Jackal."

The woman's frown seemed genuine. "I've never heard of any pieces called that."

"Any jackals you can think of?" asked Carson, with a hint of that devilish grin.

She smiled back like she couldn't help it. I rolled my eyes for the same reason. "Down that hall and to the right is the Egyptian gallery," she said, pointing to a pair of double doors leading off the foyer. "I'm sure there are plenty of jackals represented there."

"Thanks," said Carson. "One more question." He took out his phone and pulled up a picture of Alexis. "This is the girl we're trying to beat to the prize. Has she been in here recently?"

The lady looked carefully at the photo, then shook her head. "I've never seen her. But I only work here on Thursdays."

Carson thanked her again, and she waved us on, wis.h.i.+ng us luck.

I'd already started down the hall, drawn by the ginormous carving at the end of the gallery. It covered most of the wall-a winged bull with a man's head. a.s.syrian, maybe? The distinction was probably important to someone who knew it.

There were no individual shades or remnants that I could sense. But the carefully curated artifacts saturated the air with history, bearing ancient witness to births and deaths and dynasties. My head was full of s.n.a.t.c.hes of sound and color-Iron Age forges and sun-saturated desert.