Gorgon Read online

  She couldn’t see anyone, but she had a guess that there was someone in Benjamin’s chair behind his desk.

  “Eloi Anadidd’na Anu’dd,” she said. “Show yourself.”

  There was no noise. She looked at Kelly, who appeared to be gagging, then went in on her own. He had her back well enough from there, and she needed to see.

  The walls, below the glass, were painted in drying blood that had been mixed with aromatic herbs that Samantha knew. She put her hand to her mouth, but forced herself forward, toward the desk, around the desk, edging the chair to spin around with her toe.

  Benjamin was there, his arms tied to the chair. His eyes took her in as he went by.

  His head was almost backwards.

  She saw him swallow, saw the black thorn pressed into his throat above a trickle of blood. He would be able to breathe, but unable to speak, with that.

  “His neck is broken,” she said to Kelly.

  “Walking dead,” Kelly said. Samantha gently pushed the chair back to where Benjamin could see her, squatting so she was at eye-level with him.

  “The downside of writing excellent contracts is that they have to get creative to get around them, don’t they?” she asked. He swallowed again and she nodded. “You’re going to die, Benjamin. You know that, don’t you?”

  Swallowed again.

  His clothes were black with blood; the blood on the walls was likely his as well. It had taken them hours to do this. He’d been healthy this morning, and it would have taken him some time to manufacture the potions they’d paid for. It didn’t leave a lot of time.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get here faster,” she said. His expression changed minutely, but she couldn’t read it. She looked back at Kelly.

  “Get Carter,” she said.

  “I don’t know how,” Kelly said. She pointed at the phone on Benjamin’s desk.

  “Dial for me.”

  He picked up the receiver, and she shook her head.

  “Speakerphone.”

  He changed it over and waited as she gave him the number. She waited until it started to ring, then pulled her hair pin.

  “Sam, I need you,” she said, the twang of the bond pulling taut with a familiar pain. She didn’t like being this far from him because of the pain that came with distance. He pulled back at her, just an acknowledgment, and a flurry of feelings flew back and forth between them.

  He was unhappy, but not in an important way; he put it away immediately when he touched the urgency she was feeling, the despair. He couldn’t see her. Could hear her, because of the phone. Psychics and phones.

  “I know he doesn’t want you to tell him what to do, but I need you to make him,” Samantha said.

  “Make this worth it,” Carter answered the phone.

  “Benjamin,” Samantha said. “They’ve put a walking dead on him. Broke his neck, bled him out, spiked his throat.”

  There was a silence.

  “Nothing I can do,” he finally said.

  “Yes you can,” Samantha said.

  “I don’t want to,” Carter said.

  “I’m not sending him across like this,” Samantha said. “You come get him or I promise Sam’s going to get a lot harder to manage.”

  There was an affirmation from Sam.

  “Why are you involved?” Carter asked.

  Samantha rolled her eyes, wishing she didn’t have to tell him.

  “I lost Isobel.”

  More silence. Query from Sam. Affirmation back to him. Yes, she’d screwed up and she felt awful about it, but she was making it work. No, she could manage without him. Yes, she wished desperately he was here, but… He emphatically told her that he needed to stay. He was where he needed to be.

  Odd.

  She hadn’t expected that.

  “All right,” Carter said. “I’m on my way.”

  Samantha nodded, returning her attention to Benjamin. His eyes were wide, just to be able to see her.

  “I know you can’t communicate,” she said. “I understand the blackthorn magic well enough to not ask you to. I’m going to do what I can to make you comfortable, and then Carter is going to get you through the magic so that you die of your injuries. It’s the best we can do. I’m sorry.”

  She set her bag on the floor, glancing at Kelly and feeling some sympathy for him. He looked positively green. She sighed.

  “Go get Jason. I could use a hand.”

  “I’ll stay,” he said, his voice full of a false bravery.

  “He’s built for this. You’re not,” Samantha said. “Go get him. I’ll be here.”

  She glanced up at him.

  “I’m not leaving you here on your own,” he said.

  “Then come back,” she said. “It’ll take you three minutes.”

  He considered for a moment, then nodded and glitched out.

  “He means well,” Samantha said absently to Benjamin. “He’s just not made for this world, you know? He goes through demons like they aren’t there.”

  She looked up, going to put a trigger on the door, just in case, then went back to work.

  Pain relief is a tricky thing. You have to know where the pain is coming from in order to get after it, and with magic involved, there are so many different sources of pain.

  She tried not to look at Benjamin for the first couple of minutes, then she forced herself to move to where he could see her, and glance at him from time to time as she worked, narrating what she was doing.

  Frozen in his body like that, no real hope for anything other than death, there wasn’t much else she could do for him, but at least she wouldn’t leave him alone.

  After a while she looked up to find O’na Anu’dd standing in the office with her, arms crossed.

  “We don’t need you yet,” she said. “Carter’s going to get him through to the end of the spells.”

  The angel’s eyes were angry. This abomination of magic to mistreat life like this… This was why the other angels had quit. O’na Anu’dd had seen it more times than Samantha could understand, but he continued to show up when they needed him. She nodded to him and he nodded back, staying watch with her as they waited on the others.

  Some time later, Kelly rejoined them, but he couldn’t bear to be in the office and he soon left to sit in the waiting room.

  Although Carter was significantly closer to the office building than Abby’s apartment, it was no surprise that Jason and Kara arrived first.

  “What’s up, sweetheart?” Jason asked as he arrived, casting a quick look at Benjamin. “The kid couldn’t really tell us much.”

  “No,” Samantha said. “I expect he’ll have a hard time talking about this much.”

  “What do you need?” Jason asked.

  “What happened to him?” Kara asked.

  “They killed him, but they wouldn’t let him die,” Samantha said. “I expect it’s part of the specific language he used in his contract with them, when they hired him. He can’t tell us who hired him or where Isobel is.”

  “What do you need?” Jason asked again.

  “Pull the thorn,” Samantha said, indicating the end of it sticking out of the base of Benjamin’s throat. “I can’t touch it.”

  Jason didn’t hesitate, just grabbed the end of the woody projection and pulled it out. Benjamin swallowed.

  “I know it hurt,” Samantha said, “but you know it’s got poison in it. I’ve got to undo everything in the right order or you’ll die too soon.”

  “Do you need me to kill him?” Jason asked. Samantha shook her head.

  “He’ll do that on his own when we let him.”

  “You’re going to keep him like that?” Kara asked.

  “He’s soulburnt from all the magic on him,” Samantha said. “He was helping demons hide an innocent woman from me, so I’m not holding out a lot of hope for his eternity, but I’m going to give him a fair shot.” She glanced at him and back at O’na Anu’dd. “Now’s the time, Benjamin. Do what you need to do.”

 
; “Is that what he wants?” Kara asked.

  “So long as he’s got the blackthorn poison in him, he can’t communicate with us,” Samantha said.

  “He can blink,” Kara said.

  “It’s a magic, not a physical issue,” Samantha said. “He can’t communicate.”

  “What’s next?” Jason asked. Sam was listening to her, Jason was here. She was in control again.

  “I need him out of the chair. Over there on the floor.”

  “You’re going to move him?” Kara asked.

  “It isn’t going to make anything any worse,” Samantha said. “And I need more space to work.”

  “Done,” Jason said, pulling a pocket knife out of his jacket and cutting the cords that bound Benjamin’s arms.

  “He’s bloody,” Samantha said.

  “No kidding,” Jason said, putting his shoulder to Benjamin’s chest and tipping the man forward.

  “I can’t touch it,” Samantha said.

  “Why not?” Kara asked.

  “Because of the amount of magic in it,” Samantha said. “It’s really, really dark magic, and it’s going to get in my way if I get any of it on me.”

  “Pick your spot,” Jason said with a grunt as he lifted Benjamin and began dragging him across the carpet. Samantha went to stand next to her bag and pointed.

  “Here is good.”

  Jason put Benjamin down as gently as he could, but his neck twisted further around, regardless.

  “Sorry, man,” Jason said, standing back up and glancing at his clothes. “That’s bad stuff.”

  Samantha looked at him and nodded. The blood was still wet, but it was already black.

  “I’ll take care of it when I’m done,” she said, returning her attention to Benjamin. “All right. A lot of pain, and then you get a break. You know what’s coming.”

  She set up candles in a circle and burnt the tray of herbs. She heard Kelly stand, in the waiting room, and in a moment he was in front of her, kneeling on the floor inside of the circle. She held up the dish and he blew the ashes into the air with a short puff of air. Samantha withdrew to the edge of the circle and waited as the ash settled. Two, three minutes, and then she took out the dropper of lotus suspended in benzene and dripped it on Benjamin’s forehead from well above. It hissed on contact and Benjamin twitched, an involuntary reaction. She added one more drip, and another. The third stayed liquid. She took a dry sprig of gasprey and lit it on one of the candles, then touched the flame to the tiny pool of liquid on Benjamin’s forehead, stepping back quickly as his entire body lit off in green flame.

  His back arched hard enough to get his hips off the ground, thrashing and straining against broken bones, and his neck failed him again, then it was done.

  She knelt again, pulling his face forward and dropping a petal onto his tongue before putting a pot of pinkish cream on his chest. Kelly helped, smoothing the ointment over all of Benjamin’s exposed skin as quickly as they could, and slowly Benjamin’s breathing returned to normal.

  A magical version of morphine, the stuff was strong enough that Samantha was now numb up to her armpit. It would wear off quickly for her; for Benjamin it would last much, much longer because of the mingling of magics on him, now. He closed his eyes, and Samantha stood, gathering the candles.

  “Elegantly done,” Carter said. “You have some explaining to do.”

  <><><>

  O’na Anu’dd was gone.

  They gathered in the waiting room and closed the door to the office, sitting down on Benjamin’s expensive black leather couches.

  “So, explain to me how you lost the woman,” Carter said.

  “I went to Nuri’s,” Samantha said. “They got her while I was there.”

  “And why were you at Nuri’s?” Carter asked.

  “I don’t know,” Samantha said.

  “You’re cracking,” Carter said.

  “I have it under control,” Samantha answered and he shook his head.

  “I will pull you out of there, if you can’t take it,” Carter answered. “You know I will.”

  “I know.”

  “So what do you want me to do with the living corpse in there?” Carter asked.

  “Get him through it and let him die,” Samantha said.

  “Why is he involved?”

  “They used him to shield Isobel,” Samantha told him. Carter scratched his chin.

  “So he knows where she is.”

  “I’d say so.”

  “There are things I can do,” Carter said. “Make him outlast the blackthorn.”

  “No,” Samantha said. “He doesn’t deserve that.”

  Carter made a dismissive little shrug with his mouth.

  “I’d say he does.”

  “No one deserves that,” Jason said, glancing at the closed door.

  “You let him die when it runs its course,” Samantha said.

  “You’re deciding something important for a lot of people,” Carter said.

  “I’m going to find her,” Samantha said.

  “How?” Carter asked. “Benjamin is top of the line.”

  “Was,” Jason said. Carter glanced at him, but didn’t answer.

  “I’ll take care of it,” Carter finally said. “You get this brute to carry him down, and I’ll get the other one to carry him up, and I’ll do the rest.”

  “What about the office?” Kara asked.

  “Sam can clean it,” Carter said, slapping his knees and standing. “I’m bored. Let’s get going, brute.”

  Jason checked with Samantha, who nodded.

  “If he fragments, you’re gonna have to do the speech,” Samantha said.

  “Like I know it,” Carter said. “I’ll just put him in the elevator and send him back up.”

  Samantha sighed at him, but let Jason past her to go get Benjamin. The man appeared to still be asleep.

  It was a terrible death. She had an aching guilt that she hadn’t gotten here sooner, to prevent it, but there was no telling what would have happened, if she’d been here.

  There was no changing the past.

  “How does he expect you to clean in here?” Kara asked, standing in the doorway with Samantha.

  “With flame,” Kelly said softly from the far side of the waiting room. “Sam, I can’t be here.”

  “Go back to the hotel,” Samantha said. “We’ll meet you there.”

  He vanished without another word.

  “Why can’t he be here?” Kara asked.

  “Because of the stench,” Samantha said, raising her palms. “It’s going to be bad enough for us.”

  <><><>

  “She had flame come out of her hands,” Kara said, sitting cross-legged on the bed facing him. He knew he wasn’t supposed to bend time, but they hadn’t said anything about hellflame.

  And she was just in the next room, if something went wrong.

  He was pretty sure he could control it.

  Jason put his hand out, like offering something to Kara, and he focused, feeling the power, the heat, the path down to the core of himself it would take, then closed his eyes. Felt the spark of power and heard Kara gasp.

  “You can do it?” she asked. He opened his eyes to look at the small flame all the way at the heel of his palm, glittering and black, mesmerizing as it ever was. Swallowed, controlling himself carefully to not feed it more than he wanted to. The first time he’d done this, he’d nearly burnt down a hotel room.

  “She taught me,” he said. “It burns red on blood.”

  “Yeah,” Kara said. “I saw that part.”

  Jason nodded. He was kind of glad he hadn’t been there for the cleanup.

  “Elliott, I don’t know how you do it,” Kara said, looking him in the eye. He closed his hand to extinguish the black flame before he forgot himself and let it get away from him.

  “Do what?” he asked.

  “This,” she said. “I mean, you guys have always kind of gone on about how rough it is, but…” she looked over her shoulder
for a moment. “I thought you were covering Sammy’s back. You know?”

  “Yeah,” Jason said. “They don’t have much fun.”

  “They don’t have any fun,” Kara said. “How do you keep coming back?”

  “Well, there’s you,” he said with a sideways grin. She smiled back, sending a rush of heat rolling down his back, and he leaned in to kiss her, her mouth against his like home plate. He let the kiss drop, leaning with his forehead against hers, his fingers tracing the curve of the back of her neck slowly.

  “That man,” Kara said.

  “Yeah, our demons aren’t quite as sophisticated as Sam’s,” he agreed. “They can do some serious bad, around here.”

  “You can’t un-know it,” Kara said.

  “So?” Jason asked. He kissed her again, just once, unable to keep himself away from her at this distance. She shifted closer, her legs across his lap now.

  “Doesn’t it make the stuff the Rangers do seem trivial, by comparison?”

  He grinned.

  “It’s my life, Kara. We do what we do, because someone’s gotta, but being a Ranger’s a hell of a lot more fun.”

  She laughed, the sound close and wet and clearly an invitation. He kissed her again, turning his head to the side to trace the length of her jaw, her neck, her shoulder.

  “Sammy needs you,” Kara said.

  “Right now,” he answered. “She’s got Sam.”

  “I’m fine on my own,” she said, pinching his ear between her teeth. His fingers were looking for the bottom of her shirt.

  “You aren’t getting away that easily,” he said.

  She laughed again and he sighed.

  Who the hell cared if none of it made sense? He was doing just fine.

  <><><>

  She had her hair pin in again. The physical strain of being away from Sam was just too much and, with a mutual agreement, she’d shielded the link again that morning.

  She’d spent some time on the paradise plane, gathering her thoughts, soaking up the peace and the light there, then crossed back to get ready for the day. Somewhere in the room behind her, she heard Jason fall down.

  “I got him,” Kara called.

  Samantha stared at her own reflection, feeling numb, and she wasn’t sure how much time went past as she got lost.

  “Mistress?”

  She jerked and Maryann squealed, jumping away.