Stacia Kane - City of Ghosts

“You figured right,” she said, regretting having asked. Because now it all flooded back; Lauren, the First Elders, the psychopomps, those awful psychopomps, and the pain and blood and …

Shit. The hangover would be more than worth it, because the only thing standing between herself and a total fucking breakdown was the hard shell of her high and the determination not to make herself look like even more of a pussy than she probably already did.

“Had the knowledge where you was,” Terrible said. “Where I dropped you, anyroad. You ain’t still there—checked all them rooms, aye? The whole building—so we guessed on them … dumpin you off somewheres.”

“You looked in every apartment in the whole building?”

He shrugged.

Heat rushed to her face. After a second she said, “Wait. So nobody was in Lauren’s place? Did you find her place?”

“Aye. All empty. Meaning, got furniture and all but them not in it. Lookin like they leave in a fuck of a rush, dig, all scraped. An—”

“What about the skulls?”

“Skulls?”

“Yeah, there was—she had a room full of—ow!”

Shit. And double shit, because she’d just caught the implications of Terrible’s words. Yes, it was possible that when the two men had gotten to the building, Lauren and her Lamaru pals had been out making their fun little Dumpster deposit—she hadn’t thought it was possible to be more pissed off at Lauren, but it didn’t really surprise her to discover it was—but why would they all have gone along on that ride?

No. Better odds were that they’d headed off to the Church, to take their places before the Dedication ceremony.

“You right, Chess?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah, yeah, just—I need to make a phone call.”

It was five in the morning; damn, she’d been out for, what, three hours? Four? Okay. The Dedication was scheduled to start at dawn, which was only a little less than an hour away. It was entirely possible Elder Griffin would be in.

His phone rang once. Twice. Three—

“Elder Griffin’s office, Facts are Truth.”

“Hi, I need to speak to—” Wait. There was something very familiar about that voice. “Dana?”

“No, this is Cesaria Putnam,” said the girl on the other end.

Her entire body went numb; for a second the phone threatened to slip from her grasp and get lost in the haze of red covering her vision. No. No, that wasn’t possible.

“Lauren?” The name came out like a growl. “Lauren! Don’t you dare, don’t you fucking dare—”

“Cesaria? Shit, you’re still alive?”

“I swear on fucking Truth, if you don’t—”

Lauren gave a soft laugh. “Sorry, I have to go. The ceremony will be starting soon and, of course, I have to be there—I mean, you have to be there, since Inquisitors don’t attend. Enjoy the rest of your day, though—I’m sure I’ll be seeing you later.”

“Lauren! Don’t you hang up— fuck!” Chess pulled the phone away from her ear. She’d try again. She’d try all the extensions, she’d keep going until she got somebody, anybody, surely someone would believe her—

Except they wouldn’t. Not if she wasn’t standing right in front of them so they could see for themselves. Nobody she’d ever heard of had been able to cast personal glamours strong enough to fool a witch. Nobody in the Church would believe it was possible—hell, she still couldn’t believe it was possible, even after hearing her own voice talking to her on the other end of the phone. Even after finding that fetish designed to cast glamours just like that, and seeing the picture of the girl who wasn’t her.

No answer when she tried Elder Griffin’s office again. No answer in Goody Tremmell’s office. No answer for Elder Ramos, Elder Thompson, the library, the Archives, the Liaising office … She even tried the supply room, the prison, and the Grand Elder’s office.

Nothing. Nothing but a recorded message informing her that due to the passing of a Church official, the offices were closed.

Fuck.

“What’s troubling, Tulip?” Lex lit a cigarette, watching her drop the phone into her lap and rest her head on the back of the seat. Beside her, Terrible’s arm tensed; she realized he was twitching every time Lex called her “Tulip,” but couldn’t figure out a way to tell Lex to stop it without calling attention to it.

“I can’t reach anyone. They’re all—they’ve all gone down to the City, and Lauren is—ow!—impersonating me!”

“What, like got she magic make her look like you?”

She nodded.

“Ain’t knowing were possible, me.”

“Yeah. I didn’t think so either. Shit! The ceremony is about to start, they’re all heading down to the City, and I don’t know what they’re doing but I have a feeling it’s—ow—bad.”

“Give you the tell what else bad. Them dogs? They all in my tunnels, dig, all over. Ain’t can get down there.”

“What?”

“Aye, why I gave you the ring up on the earlier, aye? When you screaming. Right before it them dogs started down there. Fillin all up, they are.”

Her mind whirred. Okay. So the ceremony was about to start and the Lamaru were in on it, would be in the City, ready to unleash their crazed ghost-destroying psychopomps.

Meanwhile Baldarel must have had his own psychopomps in the tunnels. The tunnels that he knew led to the train platform—at least she assumed he did.

So what was he doing? Was he planning to burst into the City and—what? Kill the Lamaru and take over? Use his psychopomps to deliver the ghosts from the—No, because his psychopomps couldn’t go above ground, right? Or at least they hadn’t before.

“Tulip?”

“Yeah, I’m—I’m thinking. Shit.” Her hand was cool on her forehead; she pressed her palm against it, hard, trying to squeeze the answers out.

Okay. The Lamaru’s psychopomps tore up ghosts. If they were planning to set them loose in the City, the carnage would be—She couldn’t even picture it. Didn’t want to picture it.

“Where I takin you?” Terrible swung the car around a corner; they weren’t far from her place, or from the highway.

She wanted to go home so bad. Take a quick shower, wash off everything that had happened and come out fresh and ready. Ten minutes was all she needed.

But it was ten minutes she really couldn’t afford, and the state of her clothes didn’t matter, not when—Oh, right.

“Are you planning to come into the City with me? I think the La—I think there’s going to be some fighting down there.”

Lex hesitated. Terrible didn’t. “If you’re needing, aye.”

“Aye, me too, then.”

“You’ll have to wear robes. Over your clothes, but you have to wear them.”

“Thought you tell me before nobody wearing clothes down there,” Lex said.

“The Liaisers don’t. This is for a ceremony, so it’s a little different.”

They shrugged. The car roared up the entrance ramp to the highway. They were coming with her, they would help her. She would have smiled with relief at any other time; as it was she didn’t think she’d ever be able to smile at anything ever again. The image of the City grew in her mind, the City empty of all but her coworkers’ screams.

It spread and got worse. A world without ghosts meant a world without the Church. A world of anarchy. It was easy to imagine humanity happily settling into freedom, celebrating its escape from the constant threat of spectral attack.