Darkest Night - Smoke and Shadows Part 20

Phone cradled between ear and shoulder, Arra tossed another handful of lemon balm into the vodka. "You might want to write this down, Nightwalker. He's at the Four Corners Bakery and Coffee Shop on Oak by Fifty-first-in South Granville. It's right by Schara Tzedeck, the Orthodox synagogue."

"You did a locator spell."

"No, I called Amy, his friend from work." A sniff of the steam and a bit more elecampane root. "She overheard Tony and Zev talking as they were heading for the parking lot."

"Tony and Zev?"

"Uh-huh." She pushed Zazu away from the stove with the side of her foot and wondered if she shouldn't have waited until the last minute to add the catnip.

"He had a date?"

"He's young, he's single, and it's Friday night." Arra grinned as the Nightwalker sputtered. "Jealous?"

"No. I am not jealous! I am . . ." The pause lasted long enough for her to get the cap off the jar of bay leaves. ".. . appalled. How can he consider dating, knowing what he knows about the Shadowlord."

"Knowing what he knows, he's wise to enjoy himself while he can." She could feel the grin slipping away. "I'll have potion enough for seven ready before the gate opens again."

He started to say something, but she shrugged the phone down into her hand and hit the disconnect. If he wanted to find Tony and if the two of them wanted to s.h.i.+ne bright lights on the Shadowlord's spies, that was their business. Eventually, one of two things would happen; they'd realize they were whistling into the wind or they'd die fighting.

Since they'd already forced her involvement, she'd continue to make sure the taken had a chance to recover. Having done it once, balking at doing it again seemed foolish. And it put her in no more danger than any other person on this world.

This world.Just another place she couldn't save.

There were people in the building who'd take the cats when she left.

"I saw you this morning."

"Yeah? So?" Tony had pressed himself back as far into the bucket seat as he could, trying and failing to get away from Mouse's shadow pooled in his lap like a big, black . . .

really creepy thing! It moved continually, like liquid but not, and in a futile attempt to get out from under its cool weight, his b.a.l.l.s had climbed up so high they were practically sitting on his shoulder.

"You ran to Lee's side."

"Because he fell!"

"No." Mouse glanced over at him and then turned his attention back to Friday night traffic on the Granville Bridge. "You moved before he fell. You know something."

"I don't know anything! I just did what anyone would do."

"No one did."

"Did what?"

"What you did."

Tony rolled his eyes. Mouse had always been one of those guys who saw no point in using five words if three would almost do the job. "I was already there, so no one else had to do anything, did they?"

The cameraman/minion of the Shadowlord shrugged; a minimalist move of one burly shoulder that was all Mouse. As was the two-wheeled turn onto Hastings Street and the speed he was using to maneuver the Mustang around lesser vehicles. Tony thought the driver of a dark green Chevy Impala flipped them off as they pa.s.sed, but they were by too quickly for him to be sure. Oh, sure, if he drove like this across the border in the US, some guy with a Bud tucked in his crotchd get so p.i.s.sed off he'd haul out the shotgun and pop a few off which would get the cops into the act and we'd end up on the next episode of FOX TV's High Speed Chases heading for a dramatic finish where minion-guy here rolls the Mustang and I get rescued!

Unfortunately, they were in Canada and the worst that could happen would be having the license plate recorded by the occupants of a police car who weren't allowed to partic.i.p.ate in a high speed chase lest someone get hurt. There were times, and this was one of them, when that whole peace, order, and good government thing totally sucked.

And if Mouse allowed himself to be pulled over? A ma.s.sive fine, six points off his license, and no chance in h.e.l.l any cop would believe Tony's story. Amy hadn't believed him and Amy was his friend. Of course, years of experience with cops meant he'd have no trouble coming up with the kind of commentary that'd get his a.s.s hauled out of the car. Police brutality, use it wisely. Then Henry'd come bail him out and he'd be safe. His moment of hope faded when he realized Mouse- or rather the minion riding in Mouse-would never allow himself to be pulled over.

A sudden lane change-closer to a lateral movement than should have been possible in a thirty-year-old Ford-nearly threw the shadow off Tony's lap. Without thinking, he caught it and scooped it back into place. It sloshed a bit and then settled, cool and weighted, against him.

His hand felt . . . soiled. He scrubbed it against the side of the seat."Stop that."

"But ..."

"Now."

No mistaking the threat in Mouse's low growl, but it almost wasn't enough. Tony'd never wanted his hands clean quite so badly. And, once, way back, he'd held vomit. Someone else's vomit. Sitting there, suddenly terrified, he understood why people took wire brushes to their own skin.

A little surprised that a kosher bakery hadn't closed for the Sabbath-although there was no actual reason all the staff had to be Orthodox or even Jewish for that matter-Henry picked up Tony's scent on the door. He wasn't inside, he wasn't anywhere in sight, and it was still almost raining in that ubiquitous West Coast more-than-a-mist not-quite- actual-drops way. It wouldn't be easy to track him.

On the bright side, in this neighborhood at this time on a Friday, there weren't a lot of people on the street.

Maybe he'd gone home with Zev.

And if he has . . . The growl sounded low in his throat before Henry could prevent it. An elderly man sitting at one of the bakery's small tables glanced up and, feeling a little foolish, Henry turned back toward the street. He should just call the wizard for Zev's address. The music director was a nice guy, attractive, smart-Tony could do worse.

Perhaps a little of Arra's end-of-the-world pessimism had rubbed off and Tony was taking advantage of an opportunity to do what any young man would do in the same circ.u.mstances. Perhaps he'd decided to celebrate their victory over the shadow that had possessed Lee Nicholas. Perhaps whatever had happened with Lee Nicholas at the studio that morning had driven him into the arms of another.

Henry shook his head to clear that last thought. Perhaps I've been writing romances for far too long.

There were any number of valid reasons Tony hadn't called him.

But the wizard's phrase "were he able" kept sounding over and over again in Henry's head.

If Tony hadn't gone home with Zev, he'd have taken the bus north up Oak. A three- meter walk to the transit shelter would settle it once and for all. If Tony's scent wasn't in the shelter, he'd call the wizard for Zev's address. If it was . . .

It was.

The damp air had kept the scent from dissipating. Scent of Tony. Scent of fear. Scent of another world.

Seven shadows had come through that morning.

One of them seemed to have been studying the city map on the side of the shelter.

A mix of the two-one dragged by the other against the outside wall.

Away from the shelter, the rain had washed most of the Tony scent away but had had little effect on the other. Even the weather seemed to be avoiding it. It was easy enough to follow, though.

Henry snarled as the Hunger surged up at the scent of blood; faint, diffused, but unmistakable. Unmistakably Tony's.On the sidewalk, caught in cracked concrete.

Again at the edge of the road, a drop against the side of the curb barely above the water running past in the gutter.

The obvious explanation: Tony had been flung, injured, into a car. The shadow-held had followed.

And the car had then been driven away.

He could be anywhere.

They were heading for the studio. There was no other reason for them to be in Burnaby.

Well, actually, according to the Burnaby Chamber of Commerce there were any number of reasons, but in this specific instance Tony had a feeling that only the studio and its gate to another world was actually relevant. "I won't tell you anything."

Mouse merely swung out around an SUV, muttered, "f.u.c.king Albertans," and kept driving.

"I don't know anything!"

"You see me."

"Total fluke, I swear. I had a few years there where I did a lot of drugs. Probably melted the I don't see you' parts of my brain." He was babbling. He knew it, but he couldn't seem to stop the flow of words spilling out of his mouth. "I've seen a lot of things, you know. Things you wouldn't believe. That's probably why I see you. That's all."

Racing the end of an amber light, Mouse turned his head, eyes narrowed. "What have you seen?"

s.h.i.+t.

"Nothing like you!"

The shadow pooled in Tony's lap began to slosh slowly back and forth, its movement independent of the movement of the car.

"Like what?"

A truck roared by in the other direction, horn blaring.

"Like watch the f.u.c.king road, man!" Heart slamming against his ribs, half convinced that the puddle in his lap was significantly warmer than it had been, Tony fought to bring his breathing under control as Mouse calmly swerved back into the eastbound lane. What would happen to the shadow if its host was jam under an eighteen wheeler? And since I'll be jam right alongside him; do I really want to know?

Arra had no intention of getting into the Nightwalker's car. She'd bring the two thermoses of potion down to the curb, pa.s.s them over, and wish him G.o.dspeed. Pick a G.o.d. If Tony had been taken by one of the shadow-held- Well, it was a shame, but it wasn't her concern.

"But it's your fault! You opened the gate to this world! You gave him a way to get here!""I did not." She shrugged into a bright yellow raincoat and pulled her umbrella out of the painted milk can by the door. "All right, technically, I opened the gate, but it closed behind me. I went through it and it closed, and that's where my part in this ended."

Zazu rubbed up against her ankles and she pushed her away from the door. "Don't even think about it." A thermos tucked neatly into each of the huge yellow pockets. "I'll be back in ..." Whitby raced down the hall chasing invisible invaders. Fur up, tail to one side, he slid to an undignified heap under the coffee table. Arra sighed. "Well, I'll be back."

"You're thinking of no one but yourself!"

Locking the door to her apartment, she headed for the elevator, ignoring with the ease of long practice the voice shouting accusations in her head.

"Caring means nothing!"

Her own voice had taken up the litany. That was new.

"If you're expecting me to argue that, think again," she muttered as the elevator doors opened.

Julian Rogers, her neighbor from across the hall, s.h.i.+fted his chihuahua to his other arm and sniffed disdainfully as he pushed past her. "Talking to yourself again, Arra?"

"I find it's the only way to have an intelligent conversation around here. And your dog is fat," she added with the doors safely closed.

The Nightwalker's car pulled up to the curb seconds after she arrived. If he'd taken a little longer, given her more time to think . . . but he hadn't, and when he reached across the front seat and opened the pa.s.senger door, she folded her umbrella, shook it once, and climbed in. She wouldn't waste either her time or her strength fighting the Shadowlord, but if the Nightwalker intended to rescue Tony, she had information that might help.

Might.

Might not.

Of course the whole thing would be moot if she died in a fiery car crash before she even got her seat belt done up. Thrown left and then right as the Nightwalker roared back onto the street and then around the corner onto Denman. The thermoses were making it impossible to do up her seat belt, so she pulled them out and set them at her feet- under her feet after a particularly angular lane change cracked one against her ankle.

"What makes you think the shadow-held is taking Tony to the studio," she asked, finally managing to buckle up.

"He's being taken somewhere and the only somewhere these things have is the gate."

"That's logical enough, I suppose."

"You suppose? If you have a better idea ..."

"No. And watch the road!" As he turned his gaze back to traffic, Arra tugged at a plastic fold in her lap. "I won't face it. I won't get that close to the shadow-held. Not again."

"Then why are you here?"

"We used to say, in my world, in my order, that knowledge is power."

"We say that here as well.""Duh."

A muscle jumped in the Nightwalker's jaw. "You have knowledge I can use."

She shrugged, the plastic over her shoulders crinkling. "I have knowledge; whether or not you can use it, that's up to you. What I know is theory, extrapolated from past experience and the little I've observed since this . . . invasion began. The first shadows were scouts with no independence. It was as though the Shadowlord swept dark sponges through the gate and then squeezed out what they'd picked up. A second- generation scout followed us away from the studio on that location shoot and then returned with us. Then he sent through a shadow specifically seeking to know if there were lives here he could use . . . and Nikki Waugh died. He examined her life and decided that, yes, these were lives he could control."

"How do you know what he decided?"

"The people here are very like my people were-a little more technologically advanced but otherwise not so different." The streetlights divided the night into flickering shadow.

Arra stared at the dashboard. "And that was what he decided the last time; when his shadow brought him one of our lives. Now, he sends spies to gather information to ease his conquest. The shadow in Lee Nicholas was what we called a rider, designed to live his life for a time and then return to be-reusing the sponge a.n.a.logy-squeezed dry. On my world, the first riders stayed no more than a couple of hours. Then days. The last two we destroyed had been within their hosts for just over a week, making over those hosts into dark shadows of themselves."

Two members of her order died screaming, darkness pouring from them.

Arra shook herself free of the memory. "If one of the shadow-held has grabbed Tony ..."

"One has." The two words were a low growl.

"... then they're showing a greater degree of independence than he granted them in the past."

"He's had some years to work on refining them. In the time since you left, he could have created a whole new kind of shadow with, as you say, a greater degree of independence."

"So you're saying my information is out of date? Useless to you?"

Eyes locked on the road, he ignored her question. "I think he's sent these shadows through to discover what destroyed the shadow that was in Lee Nicholas. I think he sent them through looking for the light."

"It was a carbon arc lamp ..."