Seanan McGuire - Midnight Blue-Light Special

“You’re going to die here,” said Robert. He sounded surprisingly calm, considering the situation he was in. “All of you. And you, witch, wherever you are, we’ll find you. You’ll pay for what you’ve done.”

It took me a moment to realize that he was talking to Sarah. I actually laughed a little, snorting indelicately through my nose. “Oh, dude. She’s not a witch. Witches are way less dangerous.”

“Cuckoo to you, too,” said Margaret/Sarah, digging the barrel of her gun a little deeper into Robert’s temple. “Verity, can you walk?”

“I don’t really know.” Honesty is sometimes the best policy. “I do know I wouldn’t get very far if I tried. So I’m sort of opposed to trying.”

“Verity!” She sounded genuinely upset. No real surprise there. “I can’t hold her for much longer. She’s fighting me!”

“I didn’t know you could hold someone like this at all. It’s a new trick for you.”

“It was Kitty’s idea.” Margaret/Sarah’s face contorted like she’d been punched. “She’s fighting me hard , Very. Come on. We have to get you out of here before I lose her. Please.”

“Yes, do run,” said Robert. “You’ve killed one of us already. You’ve shown us where our weaknesses are. We’ll find you. And when we do, you’ll wish to God that you’d let us take you here and now. Or you could surrender. Let us treat your wounds, tell us where to find your witch, and submit to the mercy of the Covenant.”

“I wasn’t aware that we were in the business of mercy,” said Margaret, all cold fury and hate. Her voice was her own again, all traces of Sarah gone as she pulled her gun away from Robert’s temple and swung it toward me. I widened my stance, trying to cover both of them at once. It wasn’t going to work, and I knew it. From the satisfied gleam in her eyes, so did she. “You’ve befouled my mind, you little bitch. Do you know what that means?”

“It means you lose,” said Uncle Mike, stepping through the doorway behind her and aiming his crossbow at the back of her head. Istas was only half a step behind him, deceptively sweet-looking in a little pink pinafore. Her hair was pulled into girlish pigtails and tied off with white bows. She was smiling. That’s never a good sign with Istas.

“You’re outnumbered,” I said, with as much bravado as I could muster. “Drop your weapons. I promise we’ll be more fair to you than you were going to be to me.”

“No,” said Margaret, and cocked back the hammer on her gun—

—only to freeze as Istas calmly reached forward and fastened one rapidly expanding hand (already better classed as “a paw”) over the gun, completely engulfing both it and Margaret’s hand. “You may fire,” said Istas, as if she were conferring some great favor. “I will remove your entire arm a moment later, but you may fire.”

“I’d really rather she didn’t,” I said. The black spots were spreading. I teetered, catching myself at the last minute, and kept aiming my gun at Robert. “We have to . . . we gotta . . . this has to end. They can’t walk away from this.”

“But we can’t kill them, either,” said Dominic. He appeared in the doorway behind Uncle Mike. His face was set in a blank, expressionless mask. It didn’t waver as he looked past the heads of the Covenant agents to me, filthy, naked, and bleeding all over the warehouse floor. “If we kill them, the Covenant sends more.”

“We win,” said Robert.

Istas squeezed Margaret’s hand. Margaret yelped, unable to help herself. “I am not so sure of that,” said Istas. “There is a difference between ‘living’ and ‘retaining all your limbs.’”

“They can’t leave,” said Uncle Mike. “They know who Verity is. It’s not safe to let them go.”

“So they can’t live and they can’t die.” It was taking everything I had just to keep myself upright. “Oh, and here’s one more for you: Dominic can’t stay here if we send them home. They’d never forgive another defection.” There was no way to win. There was no way to get out of this with everyone still standing.

“No. But they might be willing to bury a traitor.” Dominic stepped around his former colleagues and crossed to where I was standing. He took the gun from my hand, aiming it at Robert as he slid an arm around my waist, holding me up. I let myself sag into him.

Then I realized what he’d just said. “What? No! No. We’re not going to kill you.” I wanted to pull away and glare at him. I didn’t have the strength.

“I wasn’t going to ask you to,” said Dominic. “Sarah?”

“I’m here.” Sarah stepped up behind Uncle Mike, moving into the room on silent feet. “Istas, let go of Margaret’s hands. Robert’s anti-telepathy charm is attached to his medal of St. George. Take it off him.”

“Yes,” said Istas. She released Margaret—although she didn’t release Margaret’s gun, and from the way Margaret groaned as Istas yanked it away, she broke at least one of Margaret’s fingers in the process—and turned toward Robert. To his credit, he didn’t flinch when Istas reached for his throat with her vast, taloned paw. The chain on his medal snapped easily when she pulled on it. Istas looked at the medal curiously for a moment, then shrugged and tucked it into the neckline of her dress.

“Sarah . . .” I said.

“It’s all right, Verity.” She smiled at me, uncertainly. “I can do this.”

“I don’t know . . .”

“We have no choice,” said Dominic softly. He tightened his arm around me. “They have to live. I have to die. I can’t let them endanger you, or your family. This is the only way.”

“But Sarah . . .”

“Trust her,” said Dominic.

I closed my eyes. “Okay.”

Cuckoos are natural memory manipulators. It’s part of how their power works. They fit into the world without leaving a seam, and that means they have to insert themselves, retroactively, into the lives of every person they meet. It’s an autonomic function most of the time, something that just happens around them, as easy and as natural as breathing. Sarah spent her days working to keep that very thing from happening; she wanted to be known and cared about for who she really was, and not because everyone she met decided that she was their long-lost sister, daughter, or best friend from college.

Even autonomic functions can become intentional, if you’re willing to work for it. I opened my eyes to see Sarah standing in front of Margaret and Robert, her eyes glowing such a brilliant white that it actually chased the black spots away from the edges of my vision. Margaret looked terrified. Robert looked resigned, like this was the fate he had been preparing himself for since the day he reached American soil.

“You’ll pay,” he said, in a calm, quiet tone. “We found you once, and we can find you again. Eventually, your whole stinking family will have to pay for your crimes against the Covenant, and against humanity.”

“Maybe that’s true,” I said, letting myself slump against Dominic. “But you know what? You won’t be the ones to come looking for us.”

“Hold them up,” said Sarah. I think I’m the only one who heard the tremor in her voice.

Istas grabbed Robert while Uncle Mike lowered his crossbow and grabbed Margaret. Sarah reached out and touched their foreheads, making skin contact. Skin contact always made it easier for her. The Covenant agents went limp.

That seemed like a good idea. I couldn’t feel my feet anymore, and I was so tired. I stopped fighting to keep myself upright at all. Staying awake and on my feet didn’t matter. We’d done it. The Covenant didn’t know—wouldn’t know—that the family survived. There would be no purge of Manhattan. We’d won, and that meant that I could rest.