Carrie Vaughn - Discord's Apple

“I have to tell you,” he said. “I might have given her the key to the house’s magic. I—I have another curse, you see. Apollo made this chain so that I must always tell the truth. I’ve found some fairly contorted ways of speaking around the truth. But sometimes I have no choice. I’m afraid I’m a terrible spy. Not like the old days.”

That was what happened when one tried being a double agent. She knew that from subplots of the comic book. As for the key to the house’s magic, and why Alex would know what that was—she didn’t understand. Still, some knowledge eluded her.

“Everything you’ve said is true?”

“That’s right. Or true to me, at least.”

He said he couldn’t lie, and that he’d die for her if he could. What could she say to argue with that?

“Why are you telling me all this?”

“Because I want to.”

She ought to ask Alex to tell stories about her family. All of them, back through the centuries. She didn’t know anything about her family.

“I’m going to try to rest.” She smiled thinly, touched his arm as she passed him, and went to her room, shrugging off her jacket, the weight of gold still pulling at its pocket.

“This is taking too long,” Robin said as he paced back and forth near the Marquis. Through a windbreak of cottonwoods, they could see the Walker house in the distance. The intrepid heroes had successfully defeated the Curandera’s coyotes. She had collected the animals from miles of prairie and turned them to her will, but they were only animals in the end. They could harass, but they didn’t know how to break into the house.

This had all taken too long. They should have been able to overcome the mortals in the cemetery. Hera should have been able to make the girl hand over the apple. The whole affair with the elder Walker had proceeded clumsily. And now he was set babysitting the self-important magician.

He’d stopped caring about any of that.

The Marquis had cleared the weeds and brush from a space until only flat dirt remained. On the tablet of dirt he traced a series of figures in powdered chalk. A square, and in the square was inscribed a circle, and within the circle a star, with Greek letters at the points. Incense burned in a brazier. Red candles flared and flickered in the wind.

“Time is master of us all,” said the nobleman. “Please be quiet.”

“Can you really break through the magic guarding the house?”

The Marquis’s lips tightened and he managed a brief glare at Robin, who was pleased at the reaction. “Prometheus built these enchantments and his magic is very old. But now that I know their maker, I’ve learned the nature of his spells.”

He sprinkled a new powder on the brazier, which flared green. He held his hand over the star and seemed to meditate for a time. Impatient, Robin watched. This seemed like such a cumbersome way to practice magic. Artificial, structured, dependent on too many patterns, rituals, tools. Robin didn’t understand; magic had come easily to him. He’d been born in the wild and raised to its rhythms, had always felt the world’s power in his blood. He was part of that power, immortal, forever young. He had only to think, to wish, to be, and his magic came to him. He pitied the Marquis, who studied magic as a science and surely didn’t feel the power in his blood. Surely he would never be a god.

“It didn’t take this long to find the path here.”

“Yes, it did,” said the Marquis, unperturbed. “You were simply more patient then.”

Robin was five times as old as this whelp. How dare he be so smug. “I don’t think you can do it.”

“You certainly aren’t making the task easier. This is a different sort of problem, Master Robin. Finding the place was like following a blazing arrow pointing the way. It had already been found, and I had only to mark the path. This is more like storming a castle.”

“Why couldn’t Hera do this herself?” That was always the rub, wasn’t it? Did you want to serve a greater power that needed your help? A truly great power wouldn’t need anyone’s help. He didn’t need anyone’s help.

The Marquis said, “The risk. If I do it wrong, the house might kill me. Now, if you’ll pardon me.”

Robin stared at him, curious for the first time all day. Now, this could get interesting. . . .

The magician left the ritual markings and walked in a wide circle that swept around the property. Robin followed. The man had created another space, with similar markings, candles, and incense, exactly opposite the first. When they reached the other ritual site, Robin felt a tightness close in, a hum of power that hadn’t been there before. The Marquis had closed a circle of magic around the Walker house.

“Remember, Hera only wants the protection gone. She wants the magic in the Storeroom maintained.”

The Marquis sighed. “Will you let me do my job?”

Robin couldn’t interpret the gestures he made, or guess why he did what he did, but he couldn’t deny the power, the shape of it, the tremor closing in on the house. It raised the hair on the back of his neck. He wondered what would happen if he kicked a little dirt over one of those symbols. The Marquis didn’t even see him do it.

There was a presence, a force inside the house, and the Marquis was opposing it. Robin watched the house, expecting it to collapse, or burst into flames, or shoot lightning at them.

Then the feeling went away.

Expressionless, the Marquis let his arms hang loose at his sides. He said, “It’s done.”

Then the Marquis dropped to his knees. He didn’t make a sound, just worked his mouth for a moment or two as if trying to draw breath. His arms hung as if paralyzed, and the realization seemed to pass across his face that while he had succeeded, something had gone wrong. Then he fell, facedown into the dirt, and lay still, dead, after what must have seemed too short a life after all.

Robin clicked his tongue. “So much magic requires sacrifice. Hera will surely mourn you.” He kicked a bit of dirt on the Marquis’s nice coat.

Time to fly, Robin thought, smiling. Nothing had frustrated him like this in centuries. He wanted to break something. It was invigorating. He raced away, light as air.

Alex had become . . . overwhelming. If it were any other time and place, if her father weren’t dying and the world weren’t ending . . .

And why should that make any difference?

She curled up in bed, pretending that she might actually be able to sleep. Alex had said he was going to sleep in the armchair. She’d left him alone in the front room. She should go back, to keep an eye on him. Keep him company.

She should stop thinking about him at all.

A distant roll of thunder sounded, rattling the windowpanes. A winter thunderstorm. Rare, but not impossible. There might even be snow. A white Christmas. The holiday was still a couple days off. She’d forgotten. Evie pulled the pillow over her head and hugged it there. She was supposed to be pretending to sleep.

An ache caught her gut, a feeling of such profound dread, she almost vomited. She pressed her hand to her stomach. She’d felt this when she got the call about her mother’s death.

She sat up. Someone had died. Her father—

Mab started barking, loud enough to shake the house, when she should have been resting. A door opened, squeaking. Her father’s door. She heard him say, “Mab, hush!”

She stifled a sob. He was okay.

A man jumped onto the bed.

Before she could scream, he straddled her and shoved her back, pinning her with his legs and body, and locked his hand over her mouth. Glaring up at him, she struggled, but he only held tighter. Despite his slight form, he was strong.