Vanished

The first guard we came across was looking down the hall the opposite way. An ordinary-looking man, except for his blood-tainted aura and the small submachine gun—entirely illegal in England—slung high under his arm. He had his back to the wall quite a few feet away.

“Here, can you get round him through the Grey?” Marsden whispered.

I nodded. I’d look like a ghost and there would be nothing I could do to the guard while I went, but if I popped out fast enough and hit him hard enough, it should work. I only wished I could go behind him, but he’d left no room and I didn’t want to try walking through him.

I eased deeper into the Grey and the catacombs sprang up in fiery lines through the silver mist. Knots and tangles of power that looked like messy coils of barbed wire dotted the hallway—traps. I skirted the nearest one, hoping Marsden could see it, too, and glided to the other side of the guard, who looked like a red-and-yellow smear as I passed him, the gun a cold, dark block swinging by his side.

The guard stiffened and turned his head toward me as I slipped back to normal. He yanked the gun up, bracing against the sling as I punched him just below the sternum. He grunted as his breath was driven from his lungs, and Marsden pounced on him from behind, forcing him to the ground. The guard’s finger must have tightened on the trigger as he collapsed, but his body muffled the short burst of gunfire. I felt a sharp tearing sensation in my chest and head as he died, and I clamped down on a cry of shock and agony, biting my tongue.

The guard lay in a clumsy heap as a thread of blood oozed out from beneath him. A furious haze of red energy rose off the downed guard and resolved into a ghost that glared at me and spat a few vile words before the heat of his ire was sucked away into the grid. The memory shape of the dead man dissipated with the odor of rotten eggs.

Marsden picked himself up, pulling his knife from between the corpse’s ribs. “Next time, just cut his ruddy throat,” he growled, sidestepping to avoid the magical trap on the floor.

“Don’t you. feel them?” I asked, still aching.

“Yeah, but you learn to turn it down after a while. You’ll get used to it.”

I hoped not. I didn’t want to have cause to get used to the sensation of fresh death.

We slipped back into the Grey and stalked the next one, who was turning to see what the noise had been. Marsden slipped, jumping over time and space, to exit the Grey next to the guard. I had to run the distance through the mist, over the hot lines of the grid and around the cold bulk of stone walls toward the bright, living shape of the guard. Marsden cut the man’s throat before I could reach them, and the knife of pain and shock ripped through me again. The blood ran across the stone floor, blazing with white light that flashed away like a magician’s trick smoke.

Marsden reached through the thin barrier between normal and Grey and hauled me out. “Quicker.”

“What are you—?” I started, furious and disgusted and hurting, but he clapped a hard hand over my mouth.

“We have minutes. Only minutes. You’ll have to bear it and save your man. I’ll manage the guards.”

He nodded toward a heavy wooden door in the wall—the portal to an ancient cell. A metal observation plate hung slightly open in the door’s surface. I peeped in, checking for other humans. I could have slipped through, but I couldn’t leave with Will that way, and I was willing to bet there was no keyhole on the other side.

The room within was dark except for the shaft of dusty light that fell through the observation door. I shifted around, trying to see into the gloom without obscuring the light. “Will?” I whispered.

I could hear a shuffling noise beyond the door. I pulled back and studied the door for further traps. A blue gleam shone though the planks between the ancient bulks of wood. There was something magical on the other side. Another shock hit and I slipped painfully into the Grey, trying to get a better look at the spell in the cell.

It was a tangle, meant to hold someone or something in place for a few minutes. Just like one of Mara’s, the heart of the spell was a braided ring of thorny bramble. The whole mess was tied to the foot of the door, so anyone sneaking in or sidling to the door for a peek outside would be stuck to the door itself. Admirable ingenuity, but I cursed Simeon bin Salah nonetheless. The working zone of the spell was almost a foot wide, which would make it hard to open the door with it in place. I fell back into normal, feeling the pressure of time and the stabbing aches of the dying, wondering how I was going to get past this.

Down the hall I heard a thump and a slithering sound as another death-shock hit me. It wasn’t as bad this time—it was farther away—but it still doubled me up. I didn’t want to look, but I cast a quick glance over my shoulder. I couldn’t see any bodies on the ground but I could see stains that shone with the same bright white light and liquid red as the second guard’s blood. My stomach rolled, but I pushed my sense of horror aside. When the vampires woke, they’d smell the blood and be on us like hounds on a rabbit. And I wouldn’t have been surprised if some of the lower ranks and demi-vamps slept down here in the catacombs. I had to move faster no matter how it hurt, but I also had to be careful.

I couldn’t use tools well in the Grey—normal things became difficult to hold—so I had to do it like a normal person. I knelt down on the floor and passed the knife under the door, hooking the threads that held the tangle in place and slicing through them. I felt a tiny electric jolt as each one parted. Not sure where Will was in the room, I didn’t want to move the tangle until I had the door open.

I shuffled Dad’s puzzle until a key shape clicked into place that buzzed happily. I looked around as I put the key into the lock and saw Marsden trotting back to me.

“What’re you dawdlin’ for?” Marsden demanded. “Get ’im and get a move on!”

“There’s a spell tangle on the inside of the door. Give me your cane.”

His face creased into a scowl, but he pulled the cane out and flicked it straight. I unlocked the door, the mechanism rolling freely to my odd key. Then we both heaved on the heavy door, pulling it open to its widest.

I took the cane and probed for the tangle, not sure if the magic would be conducted by the stick or if the cane might become gripped in the trap. I felt the trap bloom and clutch the cane, which yanked away from my grip and stood upright in the middle of the doorway. But the trap was sprung, and Marsden and I rushed into the cell and stopped short.

Will cowered in the farthest corner, the watery light from the corridor barely glinting off his filthy hair. His clothes were dirty, torn, and bloodied and he’d lost his glasses. The smell in the tiny, unventilated space was worse than the sewer: blood and waste and unwashed clothes stiff with fear sweat and dirt. I took a step toward Will as Marsden turned back toward the door—the blind man standing lookout.

Will turned and scrabbled at the wall with his bandaged right hand as if he could claw his way out, muttering, “No, no. please, no more. ”

“Will, it’s Harper. I’m getting you out of here,” I said, walking closer, relieved that I could see the bulk of his left hand swathed in a startling white bandage—they hadn’t cut it off. The visions I’d had in Los Angeles must have been exaggerated by Simeon’s “new techniques.” At least I hoped so, hoped that the odd shape under the bandage was indeed his own whole, living hand.

“Harper?” he questioned, peering in my direction against the light, which made me a black blot in the doorway. Then Will panicked, throwing himself against the wall and cringing into a ball, covering his face with both unwieldy hands, wrappings extending up his arms as far as I could see. The sight of those bandages almost brought me to my knees, but the worst was when he started crying. “Get away, get away! How can you do this? Just kill me and get it over with. Dear God, please. ”