The daylight's come, and much to our surprise
We find that we've become the things we fear
So hard to tell the truth instead of lies
Much easier to cut them down to size
And smile a little, hoping no one notices
The emptiness behind the masks we wear.
And who's to blame for how things came about?
So many scapegoats, and so little time
Why ask us, when it's easier to pout?
And turn our own reflections inside out
Be careful when you talk, lest someone hear you
And in that hearing, give yourself away.
And very soon, yes very soon
We'll howl beneath the poison moon
And dance around the faerie rings
With ghaunts and draugs, and other things
Too terrible to mention here
And for what's left, we'll shed a tear.
Don't ask me how I came here to this place
Just know that what you see is what you get
Yes things look bleak, but they're not over yet
Me? I'll sit here quietly with my pet
And watch as darkness overcomes the light
And all the colors melt and run away.
I like it so much here.
I think I'll stay.
October 2010
"Remind me again why we planted pumpkins this year."
Blair straightened up and squinted at Jim through fogged-over glasses. "Because Jimi and JT are old enough to think carving jack-o-lanterns is
neat. Bet Delaney likes them too, even if he's too young to make one."
"Never give an eight month old a knife, Chief." Jim carefully lifted the pumpkin onto the sledge. "That's all the big ones. You want to take
a few smaller ones for decorating?"
"God, you've turned into the Martha Stewart of the post-apocalypse." Blair gave him a quick kiss. "If we wanted to do the fall decorating
bit we should've planted some gourds and ornamental corn, just to even things out."
"You can't eat gourds and ornamental corn." Jim said decisively, grabbing the rope handle of the sledge. "If we're going to make a go
of the Tribe..."
"I know, I know," Blair held up his hands. "We have to be 100% self-sustaining. Though you can make dippers and bowls out of gourds. And we could
always feed the ornamental corn to the birds."
They started back towards the cabin. "It's going to be strange to have Mike living here, instead of dropping by every couple of months."
"I don't notice Megan complaining."
It had been five years since Blair's return, and Ellison's Tribe had added a few new members. Adam and Shy now had their own cabin, and
Jimi, who was going on five, had a baby brother, Delaney Joseph Frees, born March 24, 2010, making him the third, Burn-free child born on the
mountain.
Megan had her own cabin as well, where she lived with her and Joel's son, Joel Taggert Connor, otherwise known as JT, who was four. She'd
realized she was pregnant several months after Joel's death, and though her pregnancy had been a hard one and they'd come very close to losing
her during labor, JT had arrived without a trace of the Burn.
"I didn't set out to fall in love with Joel," she'd told Jim midway through her pregnancy. "He was just a good mate to begin with. But we
were together for so long, it got to the point where we were acting like we were married. And it made the world seem more normal; maybe he
was going to die of this eventually, but in the meantime we still had each other. I just wish he could've lived to see JT."
Mike Macabbria had remained a regular visitor until September, when he'd finally decided to the join the Tribe; or, more specifically, to join Megan and
JT. This had surprised Jim, which Blair thought was funnier than hell. "Jesus, Ellison, you are so clueless. You think he's been coming up
here all this time to partake of your excellent company?"
In retrospect, he saw what Blair meant. Mike had been interested in Megan from almost the very beginning, but she'd been too worried about
Joel, then too scared during her pregnancy before and too busy with JT after, to really notice. At some point she'd obviously noticed, which
meant JT now had "really live daddy, like Jimi and Del."
Only Bryn remained in the main cabin. Nicki's death in the summer of 2008 had hit him hard. Adam said she lived the longest of anyone with
the Burn he'd ever seen; though Blair insisted sheer force of will alone kept her going the last year.
When Adam and Shy moved into their cabin, freeing up the front bedroom for Jim and Blair, Bryn and Nicki had taken over the back one. They
were an amazing couple; volatile, pig-headed, and so much in love it hurt to watch them together. Nicki, with her usual disdain for
weakness in any shape or form, had simply soldiered on until she dropped. She'd spent the last months of her life bedridden, with Bryn
taking care of her. When she finally died, a week after her 19th birthday, they'd buried her next to Joel. Bryn had carved wooden
plaques for both their graves; it wasn't unusual, when the weather was good, to see him sitting cross-legged in front of her headstone,
tracing her name over and over with one finger.
Since her death he'd become quiet and sober, spending most of his time alone. Jim was worried that he hadn't bounced back yet, but Blair
insisted he had to be allowed to mourn at his own pace.
"This has gotta be killing him." They were unloading the pumpkins onto the front porch. "God, Jim; he's lost his parents, his girlfriend AND
his wife, and he's not even 21 yet."
"Megan was with Joel longer than he and Nicki were together, and she's pretty much over his death."
"She had a lot longer to get used to the idea. By the time Joel died it was a relief to everyone, including him. And Megan's changed a lot
from the know-it-all exchange officer that made you wreck Simon's new car that first day."
"But her changes have been moving her forward, not back. The way Bryn is now is the way he was when he first showed up. He only came out of
his shell because Nicki dragged him out kicking and screaming "
"She was something. From what Adam's said, most people who get the Burn seldom live more than 2-3 years after they develop the first lesion.
Nicki had it for five years. She'd still be alive if her body hadn't just deteriorated to the point it could no longer function."
"Thinking of getting your degree in medicine, Dr. Sandburg?"
"Don't make me come over there."
In the last five years almost everyone on the mountain had ventured back to Cascade. Jim only managed it once; the sheer level of death and
destruction still remaining sent him reeling into the first major zone he'd had since before Blair left for San Francisco. It'd taken a
frantic Blair nearly half the day to bring him out of it, and another 48 hours before his senses came back online correctly. Two days of
'seeing' sounds, 'smelling' colors and 'hearing' scents had been more than enough to convince him the city was no longer an option.
Blair went with Mike whenever he could get away, interviewing the medical personnel working at the hospices to gather data for a book
about the Burn he hoped to write. Once JT was old enough that she could leave him with one of the other Tribe members, Megan had gone as
well. Jim knew she was searching for information as to the whereabouts of H, Rafe, or anyone else from Major Crimes, and he also knew she had
yet to get even a glimmer of hope. By the military's best estimate, roughly 45% of Cascade's population had died within the first year of
the Burn, with the oldest and youngest going first. The likelihood of anyone they'd known still being alive, never mind 'finding' them, was
rather like looking for one particular corpse in a mass grave.
Shy had taken Jimi down when she was two "to let her see what a city looks like." By then the Guard had made major inroads into cleaning
things up and beginning to rebuild. The gangs had been given a choice: Either work to remake Cascade and ensure they had a future in running
things or be warehoused in the city and state prisons. Not too surprisingly, most of them agreed to work. Blair had pointed out that
being offered regular meals, a place to live and medical care probably had a lot to do with their willingness to give up scaving, though there
had been sporadic trouble with renegade Pervs who'd grown a little too fond of their lifestyle. They'd since been locked up for their own,
and everyone else's, safety.
While Adam had made the trip a couple of times with Shy, or by himself, Nicki refused to go back. "Jus' as soon remember it the way it was
'fore everythin' fell apart," she'd said.
Bryn had made his first and only trip down in May of that year, coming back with a box of books he'd /borrowed/ from what was left of
Rainier's campus library.
"Fool kid insisted on going inside even after I and half-a-dozen other guys told him the damn place was dangerous," Mike had been
understandably angry. "Gone nearly an hour, then he comes back with all these books! Still don't know how he managed it; they've been
holding off bulldozing the building because the higher-ups wanted to get as many of the books out as they could, but no one's ever been able
to get inside without the ceiling threatening to fall in."
He'd been strangely reluctant to let Blair see what he'd found, saying they were just books on things like history and math, and that he'd
"promised Nicki I'd make up for the fact I dropped out of school in ninth grade." Later, he'd brought Blair two medical texts he'd 'picked
up by accident,' and asked him if he could read Latin.
"He's hiding something." Blair was arranging the pumpkins according to size.
"What could he have gotten out of a campus library he'd want to hide, Sandburg? Under-the-counter porn?"
"It's not porn, it's erotica. And they didn't keep it under the counter; they kept it in the tower."
"You know, I lived in Cascade all my life and saw the campus library who knows how many times, and I don't remember ever seeing anything
remotely resembling a tower."
"It wasn't an actual tower tower. The library was built on three levels; the first and second levels could be entered from outside, but
the third level could only be reached by going behind the check out desk and up a flight of stairs. And you could only go there if you had
a pass from one of your professors saying you needed to access the material. It's where they kept all the antique manuscripts, as well as
the more extreme erotica and just plain offbeat things, like books on demonology and witchcraft. Anything that was too
rare or too old to risk having students taking it back to the dorms. At some point in Rainier's history the students started calling the
third level "the tower" because it was so damn hard to get into, and the name stuck."
"And you think he was raiding the third level?"
"I didn't say that. But those medical textbooks he 'accidentally' picked up date back to the early 1800s. Plus, he keeps coming to me
with Latin words scribbled on paper, asking me to translate them."
"Can you?"
"So far, though my Latin's kind of rusty. But I know he's got an English-Latin dictionary because he told me he did, which makes me think the stuff
he's asking me to translate is too archaic for it."
Jim was frowning. "So what's in the writing he's asking you to translate?"
"That's just it. It's a line here, a few words there; it doesn't form any coherent sequence. Could be history, could be philosophy, could be
an incantation to call up the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse; though I think it's a bit late for that, given that they've already been here
and gone."
"All four of them?"
"Pestilence, War, Famine and Death." Blair ticked them off on his fingers. "I suppose some people would argue over whether or not War
was here."
"War was what started the damn mess."
"Uncle Jim! Uncle Blair!"
Jimi was running up the incline towards their cabin, dragging JT behind her. Megan, Mike, Adam and Shy were following a bit behind; Adam had
Delaney riding on his shoulders.
The two of them skidded to a stop in front of the steps. "See," Jimi said to JT, "I tol' you they had jacks-of-lanterns."
JT was studying the pumpkins in awe, milk-chocolate eyes wide. "He didn't think you'd have them yet," Jimi confided. She'd grown into an
ethereal little girl, tiny as a pixy, with black hair that Shy kept cut short and almost emerald-green eyes. Though she had almost a full year
on him, she was smaller than JT, who favored his father as far as build went, though his skin tone was much lighter, almost café-au-latte, and
his hair was a coppery-red.
He looked at them and grinned, "Pumpkins!"
"You got it." Blair picked him up and gave him a high five. "We're gonna carve faces in them and bake the seeds."
"Yucky!"
"Not if you know how to make them right. And I'm sure Blair does." Shy came up, carrying Delaney on one hip. "See, Del? Pumpkins."
"He's too little to carve pumpkins," Jimi told Jim solemnly. "And I can only do it if a grown-up helps me, right?"
"Right." Jim picked her up and sat her on his lap. "Have you decided what sort of face you want yet?"
"Yeah, you need to decide how you want the face to look," Blair put JT down and pulled a piece of chalk out of his shirt pocket. "You tell me
how you want the face and I'll draw it on. Then after we take off the tops and clean them out, we'll use the chalk to help us know where to
cut."
JT took hold of Shy's free hand, looking vaguely distressed. "It gonna hurt when you cut them?"
"No, JT, they're not alive. They're like trees. You've seen daddy and mama chop down trees, haven't you?" He nodded. "It's just like that.
It doesn't hurt them at all."
"Not live like people, silly," Jimi slid off Jim's lap. "Let's go pick out which ones we want."
Jim walked over to where Adam, Megan and Mike were standing. "Think JT'd follow her off a cliff if she told him to?"
Adam laughed. "Meg was sayin' they've had a few talks 'bout him doin' whatever Jimi wants."
"I think the fact he's bigger than she is confuses her." Megan was leaning against Mike; he had his arms around her waist. "She has this
idea that he must be older than she is because he's larger, so it's okay for him to do the same things."
"She's a firecracker." Mike shook his head. "Can't imagine you ever being that rowdy, Adam."
"I had my moments in my younger days."
Jim smiled. "You're all of what, 22 now?"
"Hadda grow up too fast, man. That's why Shy n' me are here; to make sure Jimi n' Del can be kids long as they need to. Excuse us, please."
He took hold of Jim's arm and steered him over beside the truck. "I need to talk to you in private."
"Something wrong?"
"Not sure. I could use some advice."
Jim looked towards the porch. "Chief? Adam and I are gonna go around back for a while."
Blair nodded and continued drawing faces on the pumpkins.
They ended up in the small clearing behind the garden, just before the woods started. "What's going on?"
"You believe in ghosts, Jim?"
"Ghosts? Like things in white sheets that go 'boo'?"
Adam ran his hands through his hair, a sure sign he was nervous. "Not ghosts. spirits, let's call'em. You believe in spirits?"
"I pretty much have to, Adam. I've told you about Blair and my spirit guides."
"Yeah, but we're not talkin' animal spirits here. We're talkin' people spirits." Jim could smell his fear.
"Explain it to me."
"It started with Jimi. You know the sort of imagination she's got, every rock n' bush's got fairies livin' under it. She was like that
even when she was real little. Hell, you let her get to talkin' n' she'll halfway have you believin' there 'are' fairies under the rocks."
"We moved Del's cot into her bedroom last month; he don't hafta be fed durin' the night anymore, an truth to tell, we wanted a little privacy.
He was kinda cranky the first couple nights, but him n' Jimi go to bed the same time, an she'd talk to him when he cried, which settled'im
down enough to go to sleep."
He began to pace back and forth. "Two weeks ago Shy woke me up middle of the night 'cause Jimi was talkin'. Turns out it'd happened before.
Shy thought at first she was talkin' in her sleep, then she though maybe Del'd woke up n' Jimi was talkin' to him to make him go back to
sleep. So she got up to check, an both times Jimi was awake n' Del was asleep. When she asked Jimi who she'd been talkin' to, she jus'
shrugged an said 'a friend.'"
"An imaginary playmate, maybe?"
"That's what Shy figured. So she told'er to be a little quieter. But the night she woke me up things was different, she said. Cause if you
listened it was like Jimi was carryin' on a conversation with someone, but it was one-sided. She'd ask questions n' nobody'd answer'em, but
she'd act like they had. I was all for gettin' up an seein' what the hell was goin' on, but Shy didn' wanna scare her. Said we'd wait till
mornin' n' ask her at breakfast."
"Did you?"
"Yeah. Wisht I hadn't." He stopped pacing and looked at Jim. "Asked her who she'd been talkin' to the night before, an she jus' smiles n'
says 'Aunt Nicki.' Kinda hit me hard...loosin' Nick was almost worse than loosin' mama. I said to her, 'Jimi, don' lie to daddy,' an she
looked me right in the eye n' said she wasn' lyin'. Said Aunt Nicki' came to visit her most every night."
Jim felt an icy finger trailing down his spine. "She knows the difference between the truth and lying?"
"Oh yeah. Shywolf don' put up with lyin'. Shy says to her, 'Jimi Kat, Aunt Nicki's been dead goin' on two years. No way she could be
visitin' you.' Then she went into the livin' room n' got that picture Mike took of us, the one with Shy n' me an Bryn n' Nicki out in front
of the cabin. She brings it into the kitchen n' shows it to Jimi n' says, 'This' Aunt Nicki, but she died when you were little n' we buried
her next to JT's real daddy, out back of Uncle Jim and Uncle Blair's house.' Jimi looks at it n' says she still pretty much looked like
that, cept she kind a glowed. That made Shy mad, n' she says, 'Jimi Kathryn Frees, you know what dead is n' there ain't no way someone dead
can come back an talk to you.' Jimi jus' says Aunt Nicki tol' her it was okay cause someone called her back."
"She had to be dreaming, Adam. She might still retain a vague memory of Nicki from when she was small, but there's no way she could remember
her that well. And what did she mean by 'someone called her back?'"
"Wondered that myself. Asked her, n' she said she didn' know what it meant, but that's why Aunt Nicki was here, an if we didn' believe her
to wait till later that night, then come into the bedroom an see."
"And?"
His eyes were haunted. "She was tellin' the truth. Shy n' me both saw her. She wasn' real though; more like people think of a ghost as
bein'."
The icy finger spread into a full-blown shudder. "Or a spirit."
"Yeah. What Jimi called glowin' was the fact you could see through her."
"Did she say anything to you?"
"No. Shy was pretty much dumbstruck. I asked her what she was doin' back here now that she's dead, an she looked kinda sad n' faded away.
We took turns watchin' the next couple nights, but she hasn' come back. Jimi says its cause she's lookin' for whoever called her." He wiped a
hand over his mouth. "It isn' natural, Jim. Even if you believe in spirits, an I guess I don' got much choice now I saw her myself,
they're not sposed to be up wanderin' around."
Jim turned away to stare at the woods. "I saw one once?"
"A spirit?"
"More what people would think of as a ghost. She'd been killed in a building that was scheduled to be torn down. And I could only 'see' her
in a mirror over where the fireplace had been. Blair was in the room with me most times when she appeared, but he never saw her."
"What'd she want?"
"For me to find out who'd killed her. Blair said she couldn't move to the next stage until whoever did it was brought to justice. And if
they weren't found before the building was demolished, she'd be stuck between death and the afterlife forever."
"Did you find'em?"
"Turned out she'd had an affair with a married man who was an artist, guy by the name of Sam Bromly. He was a sculptor and painter; evidently
she'd posed for him a couple of times, that's how they got involved. He was going to leave his wife and run away with her, but he changed
his mind at the last minute. He tried to talk her into breaking it off, but she threatened to go to his wife and tell her the truth, so he
killed her. A kid who lived in the building saw him do it, and he threatened to kill him too if he ever told anyone."
"Sounds like a real nice guy."
Jim sighed. "That's what made it so sad. When we finally tracked him down he was in a wheelchair and had Alzheimer's; most days he couldn't
remember who he was, never mind anything else. And the kid who saw him kill her, Robert Dunlap, ended up a paranoid schizophrenic living on
the streets. Funny thing was Dunlap could see her too. I didn't find that out till later. We finally talked Bromly's nurse into bringing
him to the building, and it turned out he could see her as well. Shocked him back to his senses long enough for him to confess to
murdering her."
"They couldn't' have charged him for it, though. Not old as he was."
"They didn't have to. He had a heart attack after seeing her. Right before Blair and I left the building for the last time, Molly appeared
to me outside the mirror. She kissed me, then faded away."
"Molly?"
"Her name was Molly Charles. I think the kiss was her way of thanking me for setting her free." He shook himself. "So if you say you and Shy
and Jimi have seen Nicki I'd be the last person to argue with you. What I can't figure out is why she'd be here. Blair believed the fact
that Molly died violently was part of what enabled me to see her; my Sentinel senses somehow knew someone had been killed. Nicki died of
natural causes, if you want to consider the Burn natural."
"See, Shy n' me discussed that too. What we keep comin' back to is her tellin' Jimi that someone called her back. Lord knows I miss her, but
I've seen enough people die from the Burn to know that their passin' on is a mercy. Shy's the same way; she n' Nick were like sisters, but she
wouldn' wish her back alive."
Jim stopped dead. "Oh my God, Blair was right. He does have something to hide?"
"Who?"
"The one person who could conceivably be selfish enough to want her alive again. Bryn."
They came back to find the front porch in chaos, littered with gutted, half-carved pumpkins. Jimi, with Mike's help, was deeply engrossed in
cutting out the eyeholes on one. Delaney had apparently gotten into the bucket Blair put the pulp in, and was now decorated with yellow-
orange slime and seeds. Blair was sitting on the bottom step bandaging one of JT's fingers.
"Looking good, Chief."
Blair stuck out his tongue. "You'd think four adults for three children would be a decent ratio, wouldn't you? Especially when one of
them can't walk yet." He tied off the bandage and drew a smiley face on it with his chalk.
Adam came over and knelt. "Get wounded in action, JT?"
"It was my fault. I wasn't watching where he put his fingers. He was just trying to help by holding the pumpkin still, weren't you, squirt?"
JT sniffed dramatically and held up his finger. "Blair's knife slipped an he cutted me. But he didn' mean to."
"Del!" Blair had just caught sight of Delaney, who was making another foray into the bucket. "Christ, Adam, I'm sorry."
"No problem. Takes Shy n' me combined to keep an eye on'im, n' we're used to it. Come'er, ya little gremlin." He picked up the very sticky
Delaney. "Gonna hafta have a bath now, boy."
"Baf," Delaney agreed, patting him on the cheek with one hand, leaving several pumpkin seeds stuck in his beard.
Jim drew Blair off to one side. "Where's Bryn?"
"Not sure. I saw him earlier this morning going out to check the traps, but I don't know if he's back yet."
"He could've come in through the back door, though if he had, Adam and I would've noticed. Look, can you leave Mike and Adam to help with the
pumpkin carving for a while? I need your help." He glanced around. "Where'd Megan and Shy go?"
"To Megan's to get some more candles." Blair wiped his hands on his jeans. "What's going on?"
"I'll tell you when we're alone. But if what Adam said is true, you were right; Bryn does have something to hide."
Mike and Adam were more than willing to help the kids carve their pumpkins, so they took a walk down to the end of the driveway, where
Jim told Blair what Adam had said.
To his surprise, Blair was initially skeptical. "You're sure he's not stretching the truth?"
"He's too scared to lie, Sandburg. You know how grounded in reality he and Shy are. If he says they saw Nicki, then they must have seen her.
Though I can't understand why she'd appear to Jimi first."
"Because she's a kid. Children tend to accept things as they come; they don't have the necessary life experience to react negatively if
something is 'strange'. And you know how Nicki felt about Jimi; she was practically a second mother."
"But if I'm right, if Bryn did call her back, why wouldn't she go to him?"
"The spell probably wasn't focused. If he's messing around with necromancy, he has no idea what he's doing. Before I got the apartment
off-campus, part of the reason I go it, actually, was that my last roommate at Rainier was into sorcery big-time. Had a pentagram painted
on the floor, black drapes...I spent most nights sleeping in the hall while he was trying to conjure up demons. If you believe what's been
written, sorcery, witchcraft, voodoo--whatever you want to call it-requires a tremendous amount of time and concentrated effort to get
right. It can literally take centuries to become an adept. Bryn's been at it for four or five months. The spell he's using probably
wasn't pronounced correctly, given he can't read Latin. I'm amazed he actually managed to call her back."
"Adam and Shy don't find it amazing. And I'm inclined to agree with them."
"You'll get no argument from me on that. If she's anything like Molly, she's probably confused as to why she's here. We need to get him to
undo the spell and send her back before things get ugly."
Jim's eyes narrowed. "Before things get ugly?"
"Look. I saw some pretty funky stuff during my anthropological travels, okay? Most societies, no matter how disparate their cultures
are otherwise, have definite taboos about messing around with the dead. Some places they kill you if they even suspect you're a sorcerer. Or
cast you out of the tribe, which in a lot of cultures is the same as being dead. The few groups that don't have a total taboo on it allow it
under very specific circumstances. Only a Shaman would attempt it, and he usually has to undergo several days of purification rituals to
protect himself before he tries. It's almost a universally held belief that the dead would just as soon be left in peace. And if they
aren't, then things can get a little dicey."
"Are we talking "Night of the Living Dead" here?"
"Not quite that extreme. But the dead don't have to worry about getting tired. Time moves differently for them than it does for us.
Another universally held belief is that the dead tend to be extremely strong, much stronger than they were while alive. If they decide they
don't want to leave you can have one hell of a time, pardon the expression, making them go."
"What I don't understand is where Bryn picked all this up? He dropped out of school in 9th grade; last time I checked, sorcery wasn't an
elective in Middle School."
"Most of it's probably my fault."
"You want to explain that to me?"
"You remember when you had the major zone after trying to go to Cascade?"
"I remember seeing your voice while you talked me out of it."
"You did? Cool. What'd it look like?"
"It was blue and purple with red shadings. Go on."
"It took a couple of days to get your senses back to normal; you were completely off-kilter until then. And I didn't want to sleep with you
because I was afraid my proximity would just mess things up worse. I mean, you were 'seeing' my voice; God alone knows what an orgasm
would've done."
"It couldn't have been any more bizarre than 'tasting' colors."
"I kept a close eye on you, but I spent most of both nights out in the living room with Bryn and Nicki. It was close to Halloween, a couple
of weeks before, actually, and we got to telling ghost stories, which somehow or other turned into me telling them, or more specifically
Bryn, about some of the stranger things I'd stumbled across. Nick usually dozed off in the middle of the conversation."
"And you told him about the tribal customs?"
"And my roommate Howard's obsession with finding a copy of The Necronomicon. And the fact he just disappeared from campus one day,
leaving everything he owned behind."
"You're joking."
"Actually, no. The staff claimed he was called home due to a family emergency, but everyone in Cooper Hall figured he'd finally managed to
conjure something up and it ate him."
"Sandburg!"
"Jim, I didn't realize he'd take me seriously! We were laughing about it at the time. I explained to him how voodoo worked, the drugs
involved. I told him about Molly and the waiting room; he was intrigued by the idea that if someone was killed they couldn't move on
until their killer was brought to justice. I got carried away. It's been years since I taught, but there's a part of me that can slip into
'lecture' mode very easily, especially if I'm talking to someone younger."
"I know that. And you couldn't have suspected he'd be fool enough to actually try it. He put on a pretty good show of accepting it when
Nicki died."
"Maybe he did accept it at first. Then something happened to remind him of our conversation, and the idea took root. I as much as told him about the
books in the tower at Rainier. I never mentioned anything specific because, truthfully, I didn't really know exactly what they had. I
know they did have them arranged in sections according to subject; it's likely that even given time and decay, they'd still be in the same
general areas."
"What, medicines next to sorcery in the Dewey Decimal system?"
"Sarcasm ill becomes you, James. The question now, I guess, is what are we going to do?"
"We are going to go have a private talk with Bryn. Just you and me; Adam's too deeply involved to remain objective. And he promised he
wouldn't tell Mike or Megan anything; I don't know how receptive they'd be to the idea of a rogue spirit wandering around."
"The less people that know the better. Jesus, Jim, I can't believe anyone could be that stupid!"
"I have a hard time picturing it myself. I always thought of Bryn as being as down-to-earth as Adam, Nicki and Shy. But he really did love
her, and people in love do strange things. Like spend four years hitchhiking from California to Washington State to get back to their
Sentinel."
"Or hole-up in the Mountains to wait for their Guide to come back?"
"Things like that. Now come-on, we need to get a plan of action laid out before we confront him."
It was almost midday before they decided what to do and went back to the cabin. Between them Adam, Shy, Megan and Mike had managed to get the pumpkins
carved, they were lined-up neatly on the front porch drying. Shy had taken the bucket with the seeds into the kitchen, "To keep Del out of it," she
told Blair. Adam had discovered that if you shaved the eye and mouth pieces into little slivers, the birds would come and eat them; he was
presently entertaining Jimi, JT and a sizable flock of wildlife in the side yard.
Blair was apologetic. "I'm sorry you guys ended up doing all the work."
"Well they 'are' our children, Sandy," Megan grinned at him. "By the way, Jim; we're not entirely sure, but Shy and I thought we saw a
couple of people down by the edge of the forest."
Jim's head jerked around. "People?"
Mike spoke up. "I checked just to be sure; it does look like someone was walking around down there. But the perimeter traps are all still in
place."
"Could've jus' been our 'magination," Shy put in. "Meg n' me were tellin' each other ghost stories while we were gettin' the candles."
Jim could hear her heart beating fast, despite her outward calm.
"Could you tell what sex they were, how old, anything like that?"
Megan looked at Shy, who nodded "A man and a woman, maybe late 30s. It was hard to tell much beyond that, they were almost in the forest
itself. Like Shy said, we probably spooked each other with the ghost stories."
"Just the same, everyone be on the lookout," Jim's mouth was set in a tight line. "I've always been afraid the day might come that strangers
would wander up here. That's why everyone's got an emergency bell in their cabin. You've all got ammo for your guns, don't you?"
"I doubt it'll come to shooting anyone, Jim." Megan came over and patted his arm. "Look, Mike and I are going to take JT home for some
lunch and a nap. When were you planning on lighting the pumpkins, Sandy?"
"As soon as it starts to get dark. We got enough candles?"
"Should be one for each." Shy stood up, careful not to wake the sleeping Del. "Adam n' I need to get Jimi n' the boy home, get
somethin' to eat too. We'll be back 'round dark, 'kay?"
"Good enough. I'll try to get the pumpkin seeds baked by then, though I may not have them dried in time."
They watched as Megan, Mike, and Shy wandered into the side yard, gathered up Adam, Jimi and JT, and started towards their respective
cabins.
Blair looked at Jim. "People in the woods?"
"It's not that they were in the woods, it's that they were there in full daylight. Adam and Shy only saw Nicki at night. We could have
unwanted visitors."
"You know it's a common fallacy that spirits only appear at night. It's just you can't usually 'see' them during the day. That doesn't
mean they aren't there."
Jim tried to ignore the sweat trickling down his back. "Let's get this over with. One crisis at a time is more than enough."
Inside the cabin all was silent. The door to Bryn's room was closed, but that didn't necessarily mean anything; he kept it closed whether he
was there or not. Nonetheless, Jim knocked first. "Bryn?" He extended his hearing, then turned to Blair. "Not here."
"I feel like I'm violating his privacy," Blair muttered, as Jim swung the door open.
"Screw his privacy, Sandburg; this is 'our' cabin."
The room looked like ground zero of a nuclear detonation. It took Jim a minute to realize the chaos was simple messiness. Bryn had
apparently never been taught to put things away.
He moved into the room, Blair behind him. "How the hell can you tell if he's doing anything in here? It looks like a twister went through."
Jim shook his head. "Organized clutter. What are we looking for again?"
"Oh maybe something like this," Blair turned from the dresser, holding a huge folio volume bound in black leather, with gold letters on the
spine and cover. "'Der Vermis Mysteriis.' Jesus, I thought it was a joke."
"What was a joke?" Jim was trying to place a scent hanging just on the edge of his sense of smell; very familiar, but something he hadn't
smelled in a long time.
"This book. "The Mysteries of the Worm." It shows up in Lovecraft's horror stories about as often as The Necronomicon." He sat it down and
picked up another one, much smaller and bound in blood red. "'Preaoccupor Morte.' Oh shit!"
Jim had traced the scent to one particular corner. "What's that mean?"
"'Depends on how you translate 'preaoccupor' Most literal title would be "Obsessed with Death.' You were right; he raided the Tower."
"Got it," Jim pulled back the edge of the rug to expose what looked like the tip of a star drawn on the floor, except the inside was
crowded with strange symbols. "What the..."
"Jim, step away from that, please."
Blair's voice was soft, but with an undertone of steel, and Jim instantly obeyed. "Jeez, Sandburg!"
"Step back," Blair said, still using the same tone of voice. He moved past Jim and took hold of the edge of the rug. Mumbling under his
breath, he suddenly pulled it off the floor; it reminded Jim of the trick magicians did where they pulled the tablecloth off the table
without disturbing the place setting. "You know what that is?"
Jim looked over Blair's shoulder at the blue chalk star that took up most of the floor. What he'd initially seen was the farthest tip.
Just like that one, the inside of each point was overflowing with weird icons. "I take it that's a Pentagram?"
"Very professionally done too. Not quite up to par with Howard's, but then, he claimed to have used actual blood to draw his. His own,
presumably."
"And I'm thinking I really don't want to know WHY Bryn Sherwood has a Pentagram drawn on his bedroom floor, do I?"
"Considering the books lying around, no you don't. Try not to step on it, and whatever you do, don't scuff the chalk and make a break in the
lines."
"Christ, Sandburg, you sound like a Saturday Horror Matinee host."
Blair turned and looked at him. "Pentagram's can serve two purposes, Jim. They can be used to keep something out, hence the bare spot in
the center for the sorcerer to stand, or they can be used to keep something in. I don't know about you, but I, personally, have no
desire to find out which purpose this one serves."
"Lots of candles," A group of them was haphazardly perched on the windowsill. "Part of the ritual?"
"If you look close you can see traces of melted wax on the Pentagram tips." Blair picked up the copy of "Preaoccupor Morte" and sat on the
edge of the bed, opening it to a spot marked with a stripe of blue-lined notebook paper. "Tollere Mortus...cadavera...de animus...oh
fuck." He shut the book with an audible 'snap'. "You know, I'd been hoping right up to this very minute Adam was wrong."
"I take it he wasn't?"
"Given the first spell book-marked is one for raising the dead, I think he was on the money."
"What the fuck!" They both looked up to find Bryn standing in the doorway. He was trying to look defiant, though Jim thought he looked
more scared than anything else. "What're you doing in my room?"
"I think the question is, what are YOU doing in your room?" Blair gestured at the blue chalk pentagram. "Bryn, please tell me you
haven't been fooling around with what I think you have."
Bryn stared at the floor a minute. "I can't, okay? I know it was stupid, but it's not like it worked or anything."
Jim studied him. "What do you mean, it's not like it worked?"
"Do you see Nicki? Or my mom and dad? Or Kayla Rodriguez? No you don't, cause it didn't work." He gestured at the book in Blair's
hands. "I couldn't read the spell correctly. Nothing happened."
"Your mom and dad?" Blair repeated tonelessly. "Would they be, say, a couple in their late 30s?"
Bryn stared at him like he'd grown two heads. "How the hell could you know that? I never told anyone what mom and dad looked like except
Nicki."
"The same way we knew what you were doing." Jim was advancing on him, the edges of his vision starting to go red. "You've lived here for
going on eight years, Bryn; since when have I EVER invaded your privacy?"
"Jim."
"Save it, Sandburg. So nothing happened, huh? You chanted the spell and did the bit with the pentagram and burned the candles, and nothing
happened?"
"Do you see Nicki sitting around here?"
"No, but that's probably because she's been down at Adam and Shy's cabin visiting Jimi. As for your parents, I think they're out wandering
in the woods right now. I don't know about Kayla, but I'm sure she'll turn up eventually." He grabbed the front of Bryn's shirt. "You
moron! The damn spell worked just fine! Except you forgot to tell them where to go! From what Adam says, Nicki's been wandering around
for nearly a month trying to find out who 'called her back.'"
"Jim, let go of him." Blair's hand came down on his shoulder. "He knows he blew it, okay?"
Jim looked at Bryn's face, which had gone completely white, and realized his hold on his shirt was all that was keeping the kid on his
feet. "He's gonna faint, Sandburg. Help me get him into the living room."
Together, they managed to maneuver Bryn into the living room and onto a couch, where he slumped like a puppet with its strings cut, mouth
hanging open. Blair sat down next to him. "Bryn, you honestly didn't think the spells worked?" He shook his head. "When did you cast
them?"
Bryn looked at Blair, a little color coming back into his face. "About a month ago, I guess. That's when I cast the first one. I got the
books in May, but it took me a while to figure out which one I needed, and how to draw the Pentagram correctly and make the candles. Then I
tried to translate the spell into English because I don't know Latin, but I had to keep asking you to define words, and maybe I wrote the
words down wrong or I read them wrong because a lot of the translations you gave me didn't make any sense in English so I had to use the Latin
version of the spell, but I didn't know how to pronounce the words right, and I was afraid to ask you for help because I knew you'd ask
what I was doing so I just went ahead and tried it, and nothing happened, I swear to God, nothing happened!" His voice was starting to rise. "So I
figured I wasn't pronouncing it right, and I reread the book and tried using the glossary in the Latin-English dictionary I had, but Latin's a
dead language, gotta use a dead language to call up the dead I guess, and I still couldn't get the pronunciation right, so I figured fuck it,
it was a stupid idea anyway. Oh God, I did it, didn't I? I called Nicki back!"
Blair nodded. "Apparently your parents, too. I don't know about Kayla"
"I'm not even sure she's dead. She could've lived through the Burn and ended up with one of the Scav gangs. I was just so goddamn lonely!
You can understand that, can't you, Jim?" He glanced over at Jim, tears in his eyes. "You know what it's like to be that lonely, you
were like that before Blair came back. And I was lonely because my parents were dead and I didn't know what happened to Kayla. Then Nicki
came here with Adam and Shy, and I wasn't lonely anymore. I know it's stupid, I knew when I fell in love with her she was gonna die
eventually, but after JT was born okay I got to thinking maybe that meant she wouldn't die; that if Meg could have a Burn-free baby as bad
as Joel was, maybe Nicki wouldn't die of the Burn after all." He wiped his face. "She told me not to be stupid; she said life wasn't a fairy
tale, we both knew that, she tried to make me see she was gonna go, but I still didn't expect her to die! I didn't! And it wasn't fair!
You've got Blair, and Adam and Shy have each other and the kids, and Megan had JT, and now she's got Mike, and I don't have anyone! I'm
alone, and I loved her so goddamn much, and I miss my parents, and I c-c-couldn't stop thinking about Kayla!"
Blair sighed and put an arm around him, letting Bryn bury his head in his shoulder. "You know, Bryn, you could've come and talked to Jim or
me about feeling alone. Because before we finally caught the clue bus, we spent a whole lot of time alone. Hell, man, I spent four years
walking from California to Cascade because I thought for sure Jim must still be alive. Know why?" Bryn shook his head. "Because I loved him
so much I figured that if he were dead, I'd be dead too. I wouldn't want to go on living if he wasn't alive."
"I didn't want to go on living after Nick died." Bryn's voice was thick. "I was gonna go out in the woods and shoot myself after we
buried her. But I promised her I wouldn't; she made me promise her that right before she died. Said she knew me well enough to know what
an idiot I was. Said there was no sense in both of us dying; that it wouldn't have made any sense for Megan to lie down and quit breathing
after she lost Joel, cause she was still young and healthy, and if she had she would've never known about JT. She said things wouldn't always
be this bad, and someday I'd find someone else who loved me, and I'd love them back. Not the same way I loved her, but it'd
still be love. And I promised her because you know damn well I never could tell her no."
"And if you'd tried, she would've gotten off her death bed and beat you up," Jim's voice was soft.
Bryn looked at him and smiled. "Yeah, she would've. And I know, at least in my head, that she was right. But the rest of me...it just
hurts all the time. She was ready to go; she was so tired of living the kind of life she did. Once she was dead, she said, she'd be free to
fly like a bird anywhere she wanted. And she'd get to see her mama and Mr. Taggert again, and meet my parents. And someday, when I finally
died, she'd be waiting for me. I wanted to believe that, Jim. I really did. But I've never had Nicki's faith in the future.
How could she have been so hard and so soft at the same time?"
"Because she was a very special woman." Blair looked at him intently. "There aren't many women like Nicki around, Bryn, and it's doubtful
you'll ever meet anyone like her again. But you've been incredibly irresponsible, you've been fooling around with something that's
dangerous like it's some sort of toy. From what Adam told Jim, Nicki's not happy. She's confused because you didn't focus the spell right;
all she knows is that someone called her back, but she doesn't know who or why. If you really loved her as much as you say you did, you
would've respected that she was ready to leave."
Jim cleared his throat, and they looked at him. "Back before the Burn broke loose, when Blair went to San Francisco for that conference...I
didn't want him to go because we hadn't been lovers for that long. He'll tell you I'm the world's most insecure jerk when it comes to
love, and he'd be right. I was afraid he might meet someone who was more attractive to him, someone closer to his own age, someone better
looking than me. But in the end I let him go because I knew, underneath all the insecurities, that he really did love me. I had to
prove to myself I could live without him for five days." He took a deep, shuddering breath. "And I ended up living without him for nearly four
years. But I never stopped loving him, Bryn. And even if he'd never come back, I would have kept on loving him until the day I died. But I
was a 40-something cop. You're not even 21 yet. You've got too long a life ahead of you to just give up now."
"And what about your parents?" Blair picked up the thread. "You told Jim they were murdered. Was that true?"
"Yeah."
"But you didn't see them get murdered, did you? Why was that, Bryn?"
"Cause I'd snuck out to see Kayla."
"So you survived. If you'd been there, you probably would've been murdered too. But you survived that; you survived long enough to make
it into the mountains and find Jim's cabin. And he took care of you when you were sick, kept you alive, and once you got better, you
stayed. Why did you stay?"
"Nothing to go back to Cascade for. I figured Kayla was already dead, or running with some Scav gang. And it was peaceful up here. Jim and
I got along good."
"So you stayed. And eventually Cassidy came, then Adam and Shy and Nicki. Jim says you didn't even like Nicki when you first met her, but
you ended up falling in love with her, even though you knew she was going to die eventually. Do you think you could've kept yourself from
falling in love with her if you'd tried?"
"No."
"So you fell in love with her knowing she was going to die eventually. You had, what, almost five years to get used to the idea? And you
couldn't just let her go peacefully?"
"What I'm worried about is your mom and dad." Jim spoke up suddenly. "If it 'was' them Megan and Shy saw out by the woods...Blair told you
about Molly, didn't he? About how she died violently and couldn't rest until someone brought the man who killed her to justice?" He nodded.
"What makes you think your parents are going to be any different? Good God, Bryn; you've endangered the life of everyone in the Tribe!"
"I didn't mean to! I didn't think it worked! If I'd known it worked..."
"You would've done it anyway." Blair's voice was soft. "You didn't 'think' at all, Bryn. If you had, you would've realized that what you
were doing was wrong. But you didn't think about it, you just went ahead and did it. And now Nicki's wandering around somewhere trying to
find you, and your parents are here when they should've been left to rest peacefully. And the only person who can clean this whole mess up
is you."
He looked at Blair, panic-stricken. "How can I clean it up? Jesus, Blair, I'm not even sure how I got them here!"
"Yes, but that's because you were doing it alone. This time, I'll help you translate the spell to send them back. I'll coach you as best I
can on pronunciation. But you'll have to be the one that casts the spell. You brought them here; only you can send them back."
Bryn looked at Jim, who nodded. "I don't know much about the occult, but it would make sense that whoever cast the spell be the only one
able to undo it. At least when it involves waking the dead."
Blair stood up. "So let's get cracking, man."
"We're gonna do it right now?"
"As soon as we can get the spell translated, yes." He grabbed Bryn's arm and hauled him off the couch.
"B-but..."
Blair swung around and got right up in Bryn's face. "Let me lay it on the line for you, Sherwood. Tonight just happens to be October 31,
2010. Now the Druids and certain other religions believed that the veil between our world and the next became very thin in spots on Halloween,
which meant the dead could slip through more easily. When you cast that spell, you created...let's call it a crack, okay? You created a
small crack between our world and the netherworld. As long as that crack is open, there's a danger of someone or something you DIDN'T call
coming through. Tonight is going to be the first time Halloween's officially been celebrated by Ellison's Tribe, and I'll be damned if
all the work done on those jack-o-lanterns, to say nothing of all the time and effort Shy and Adam and Megan and Mike put into making the kids
costumes, is going to be disrupted by a remake of "Armies of Darkness." Because I * don't * have a chainsaw handy. Clear?" Bryn nodded,
though it was obvious he had no idea what Blair was talking about. "Good. We've got until nightfall to translate the incantation and send
your parents, Nicki, AND Kayla Rodriguez, if she's out there too, back to their well-deserved rest. So march."
Einstein stated long ago that time is relative, but Jim had never truly understood what the phrase meant until now. By his best estimate they
had maybe five hours of daylight left, and while he'd seen Blair do some pretty amazing things during their time together, even he wasn't
sure his lover could translate a Latin spell to lay the dead, coach someone else on exact pronunciation, and manage to send three (maybe
more) wandering spirits back where they belonged before dark.
And it wasn't like he was worried about Nicki. Lord knows the girl had a mean-streak, but she'd never intentionally hurt anyone when she was
alive and he doubted she'd do it now that she was dead.
It was more the idea of Bryn's mom and dad, who'd died violent, bloody, senseless deaths, wandering around his property. Even if you didn't
buy the whole occult thing, it still made sense that the dead would probably just as soon 'stay' dead, and that getting woken up against
their will might make them a bit cranky.
So he paced, and tried to read and failed miserably, and paced some more. He managed to distract himself for about half an hour by rinsing
the pulp off the pumpkin seeds, but having to go outdoors to lay the screens in the sun so they'd dry made him nervous; he couldn't quit
looking over his shoulder. The fact that he was a Sentinel and would very likely be able to 'see' spirits during the daylight hours in no
way eased his mind. He'd felt somewhat the same during the whole thing with Molly, except there was more at stake here than just one soul
stuck in between. These people were his tribe now, just as Cascade had once been his tribe, and the Chopec before that. Their safety was his
responsibility. How was he supposed to keep them safe against something he didn't know how to deal with?
Back in the cabin, he could hear murmuring behind the door to Bryn's room. If it hadn't been for the fact they were on a tight schedule, he
would've been tempted to knock and ask them if they were ready yet.
"Trust Blair, you idiot," he muttered to himself, moving into the living room and collapsing into his chair. If anyone could figure a
way out of this, it would be Sandburg.
And what was he going to do with Bryn once this was over? There was no written list of rules governing the tribe; everything had been decided
on by mutual agreement and what worked best for the majority. Dissenting opinion was always given consideration, but in the end
majority ruled. Everyone knew they had the option of leaving if they wanted; truth be told, he'd halfway expected Bryn to do just that after
Nicki died. And while he and Blair had bandied the idea back and forth in private, there's never been anything said about the possibility of
having to expel someone from the tribe forcibly. With the Chopec, there had been a tribal council and Incacha to decide whether or not
someone should be cast out. It wasn't something they did lightly, it being known and accepted by
the Chopec's neighbors that to be shunned by your own tribe was to be shunned by all. No tribe who wanted to stay on good terms with the
rest would allow a cast-off to join them. And in a world where your survival depended very much on cooperation with those around you, cast-
offs generally didn't survive long on their own.
Cascade, of course, had laws and the police. The system didn't work perfectly, but by and large it kept the more dangerous lunatics locked
away where they couldn't hurt anyone. Being sent to prison could be seen as modern society's casting out; it was less likely to be fatal,
but it still left you marked in a way that meant you'd have trouble being reaccepted amongst your own people again. The CChopec system had
been simple because the needs of the tribe had been simple. The Cascade version was more complicated because a city of several hundred
thousand people was much more complicated than a tribe that consisted of 50-75.
Ellison's Tribe had 10 members. Two had been lost to death, and Cass-he wasn't quite sure what Cass had been lost to. Fate, maybe. Ten
living members, three of them small children. And three, maybe four, disquieted spirits wandering around the property. Confused and
possibly mad as hell.
Not for the first time, he wished he could transport himself back to Peru. Things had been so much simpler there.
Something banged against the front door, and he damn near jumped through the ceiling. Only when it banged repeatedly, followed by
Mike's voice shouting, "Jim? You home?" did he relax enough to get up and open it.
Mike was standing there with his rifle, looking more than a little wild-eyed. Megan stood behind him, cradling a sobbing JT against her
shoulder. "Jesus!"
"Don't think so." Mike shouldered his way past, carefully guiding Megan and JT to the couch. "Think you'd best shut the door. Might
wanna make sure it and the backdoor are locked, too."
Jim threw the bolt on the front door, then slipped down the hall into the kitchen and did the same with the back. He extended his hearing as
he passed Bryn's room; Sandburg and the kid were arguing over something. Part of him wanted to pound on the door and ask if they
could please hurry things up a bit, because it looked like they might be having company sooner than expected.
He came back into the living room to find Mike by the front window holding the curtains back. Megan was rocking JT. "What the hell
happened?"
"Wish I knew." Mike let the curtains fall closed. "Meg, you were the one who saw him first. You wanna talk about it?"
Megan nodded. "We'd just finished lunch and I put JT down for his nap. Went out into the living room and sat down to read a book, and a few
minutes later, he screamed loud enough to wake the dead." Jim winced. "I ran in, and he was hiding under the covers babbling something about
there being 'bad people' outside his window. I thought about the people Shy and I saw earlier, so I went over to the window to look
out..." she trailed off, face white. "There was, I think it was a man standing outside the house. But he-Jim, I know this sounds ridiculous,
but he was dead!"
JT started to sob again, and Megan began to rock back and forth. "He had blood all over him, you see. But where he wasn't bloody, his skin
was too white. Like a fish's belly. And his eyes..." she simply trailed off completely and turned her head to one side, crooning
wordlessly to JT.
Mike motioned for Jim to follow him into the kitchen. "Did you see any of it?"
"Unfortunately, yeah, I did. Jim, his eyes were gone. All he had left were empty sockets."
"Christ." Jim felt the shudder of earlier run up his spine. "What happened?"
"Guess I sort of freaked when I saw him. Meg and JT were screaming, so I grabbed my rifle and ran outside, but he'd disappeared. And there
weren't any footprints. You know how damp it's been this last week. There should have been footprints under the window, but there weren't
any. All I could think of was to get Meg and JT over here; your cabin's stronger than ours, got fewer windows. Jim, what the hell's
going on?"
"I think I can answer that question," Blair was standing in the kitchen doorway, holding the copy of "Preaoccupor Morte" in one hand. In the
living room, Jim could hear JT sniffling. "Mike, do you think you can make it to Adam and Shy's cabin and back okay? Tell them to bring Jimi
and Delaney and come here." Mike nodded dumbly. "Good. I've got to get back to work. Once everyone gets here I'll explain what's going
on. You want Jim to go with you?"
Mike shook his head. "He'd best stay here and keep watch over Meg and JT. Him being the Sentinel and all."
"Good enough. What say you go out the back door; Jim, you wanna unlock it for him?" Jim undid the bolt. "Mike, listen to me very carefully.
If you see the man again, don't try shooting him. It won't help. Just go as quick as you can and get the rest of the tribe."
Mike nodded once, looking back down the hall towards the living room. "Jim, you take care of them for me." Then he slipped out the door and
was gone.
Jim relocked the door and turned to Blair. "Nothing that extreme, Sandburg?"
Blair shrugged. "We're almost there. The spell's relatively simple, once you get it broken down. You go keep Megan and JT company, I've
gotta get back to working with Bryn. Love you."
Love you too, Chief." Jim wrapped him in a tight hug, letting him go reluctantly. Blair slipped back into Bryn's room and closed the door.
Jim resolutely squared his shoulders, and went down the hall to the living room.
Megan looked up when he came in. JT had apparently cried himself to sleep; she had him lying with his head in her lap, stroking his copper-
red curls. "Where's Mike?"
"I sent him to get Adam and Shy and their kids."
She nodded. "Something queer's going on, isn't it?"
Jim thought about lying to her, and realized she was too good a detective to buy it. "Yes."
"So the man with no eyes was really dead?"
"Um hum."
"And this is somehow related to Nicki?"
"How the hell do you know about Nicki?"
She smiled slightly. "Don't be daft, Jim. You think Shy isn't going to talk to the only other woman in the tribe about the fact that her
dead sister-in-law's been paying late-night visits to her daughter?"
He considered this a moment. "No, actually, it's one of the few things I've heard today that makes sense. Does Mike know?"
"Of course he doesn't. Just like Adam doesn't know Shy told me. We girls have to stick together; we certainly can't expect you guys to
tell us what's actually going on."
"That's because we guys didn't have any idea anything was going on until this morning, when Adam told me about the late-night visits."
"It's Bryn, isn't it?" She snorted at the look of surprise on his face. "For pity's sake, Jim, who else would it be? Adam and Shy
certainly aren't going to try and conjure her up; they're too level headed. Bryn, on the other hand, is young and stupid, and was
terribly in love with her. That still doesn't explain the man with no eyes."
"I think that's probably his father. The woman you saw earlier was his mother."
"Good Lord, he didn't call Joel back, did he?"
"Thankfully, no. Truth to tell, Connor, until about two hours ago, he didn't know he'd called 'anyone' back. He though the spell hadn't
worked, because he hasn't seen Nicki or his parents."
Megan's mouth was set in a tight line. "I've half a mind to take him over my knee and spank him soundly. Of all the irresponsible stunts to
pull! He thought he could just call people back from the dead and then make them leave after a short visit?"
"You're taking this awfully well, considering we're talking about the dead walking around."
"I lived in the outback as a child, very near to where some aborigines made their summer camp. I used to play with the kids; they were the
only other people near my age for several hundred kilometers. Learned enough of their language to communicate; they let me sit in on a couple
of rituals. I won't say I've seen the dead walking before, but I've seen things just as strange."
"I'm not even going to ask what they were." He nodded at JT. "You think he'll be okay?"
"Probably. Children are amazingly resilient. He's survived this long with me as a mother. Given that I've never had the slightest idea what
I was doing, I think that speaks well for his skills."
"I'm not sure parents ever know what they're doing. Lord knows, my old man didn't."
"Do you ever think about him?"
"Sometimes. And I feel guilty for not trying harder to stay in touch. Just like I feel guilty for leaving the rest of you and Simon on your
own."
"You didn't have a choice, Jim. Sandy explained to me why you had to leave. If you'd stayed, I doubt things would've been any different. Nothing and no one
could have saved Simon, just like nothing short of an act of God could've saved Joel."
"But you still keep looking for H and Rafe and the rest."
"Actually, I've sort of given up on that. The last time I was in Cascade, when Mike told me he wanted to move up here and live with me--
they've got the records well-enough organized that if they were anywhere, even in a hospice, they could find them. I doubt either of
them are still alive." She gave a harsh laugh. "I suppose we should feel grateful Bryn didn't know about them; he doubtless would've tried
to conjure them up too. Where is the little rat?"
"In his room with Blair, learning how to reverse the spell."
"And if he can't?"
"He'll be able to," Jim said softly. "He's got Sandburg to help him with this; he's not fooling around with it on his own. Blair will help
him reverse the spell."
"And then what? Even if he can get rid of Nicki and his parents, and whoever else might've decided to come visiting, none of us will ever
feel safe around him again. We'll never be able to trust him, or at least I won't. And I doubt you will. either."
"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. The important thing now is to get the spell reversed and everyone sent back where they belong."
A frantic knocking on the front door woke JT up; he whimpered once or twice, then fell silent. Jim opened it to find a Mike and Adam on the
porch, with Shy, holding Jimi's hand and carrying Delaney, sandwiched between them. He motioned them in, then shut and locked the door.
Adam and Shy sat down on the other couch. Delaney was perched on his mother's lap with his fingers in his mouth, looking worried. Jimi
immediately went over to where Megan was comforting JT.
"Is he sad?" She asked plaintively, reaching out to pat JT's arm.
"No, dear, he just had a scare."
JT twisted around to look at her. "I saw a bad man." He said solemnly, rubbing his red-rimmed eyes. "He was a bad man looking in my window."
Jimi nodded. "We saw him, too. But he wasn't looking in our window; he was down by where the woods are. And he had a bad lady with him.
Daddy says they're both bad people."
Adam abruptly pushed himself up off the couch. "Where the hell's the little fuck hiding?"
"Adam!" Shy smacked his ass. "Don't swear in front of them!"
Jim took a deep breath. "He's not hiding, Adam. He and Blair are in his room, working on a way to reverse the spell."
"Spell?" Mike had been leaning against the front wall looking out the window; he turned to Jim, puzzled. "What the heck's a spell got to do
with it?"
"Quite a lot, actually." All eyes turned towards Blair, standing in the hallway door. "Guess everyone made it okay. And from what Jimi
said, you've all seen them?"
"I've seen them, but I still don't see what a spell has to do with the two yahoos wandering around outside."
Blair chewed on his lower lip a minute. "Megan, Shy, do you think it would be a good idea to let the kids play in Jim and my's room?"
"Don' wanna go," JT said resolutely, grabbing hold of a fistful of Megan's shirt. "Wanna stay with mama."
"Me too." Jimi went over and crawled onto the couch next to Shy. "The bad people might come into your room and take us away. They made JT
cry."
He looked at Jim. "I'm not sure we should be discussing this sort of thing in front of kids."
"I think they're too young to understand what's going on." Megan said. "At least JT and Delaney are. Jimi might be able to grasp it, but from
what I understand, she's already seen Nicki anyway."
"Seen Nicki?" Adam looked at Shy, dropping back onto the couch. "You weren't sposed to tell anyone!"
"Everybody knock it off!" Mike snapped. "I don't have the slightest idea what's going on here, and if someone doesn't explain it to me in
about a minute and a half, I'm going to go outside and shoot at the bad people whether it does any good or not. Now what the hell is going
on?"
Blair rolled his eyes towards the ceiling and mumbled 'on your own head be it' so soft only Jim heard him. "Okay, Mike, here's the condensed
version. Remember back in May when Bryn went down to Cascade with you and visited the library at Rainier, even after you told him not too?"
Mike nodded. "The books he brought home that day were mostly about sorcery and witchcraft, the occult, that kind of stuff. He went and
got them because he wanted to try and bring Nicki back to life."
"Aunt Nicki's dead." Jimi piped up, crossing her arms. "Mama and daddy said so."
"Yeah, she is, Jimi. But there's a certain kind of magic, and it's not good magic, that can make people who are dead come back. They're still
dead, though. It doesn't make them alive again, it just brings them back to where they died."
"An someone called Aunt Nicki back." Jimi looked smugly at Shy and Adam.
"And that someone was Bryn. He read the books he brought back, but the problem is, they're written in Latin, which is a very hard language to
understand even if you've studied it. So when he made the spell that called Aunt Nicki back, he didn't do it correctly. She ended up at
Adam and Shy's house instead of here. And he thought it hadn't worked, because he never saw her."
"Just a goddamned minute," Mike broke in. "Your trying to tell me that those people wandering around out there are dead?"
"I'd have thought you could figure that out yourself, Mike. You told Jim what the man looked like; surely you don't think someone who's
missing..." he raised his eyebrows at the kids, "a necessary part of their body's just going to be wandering around under their own steam,
do you?"
"So who're the other people?" Shy spoke up. "I know Nick, but I've never seen the man n' woman in my life."
"That's because they're Bryn's parents. They died before he ever came here."
"They was killed." Adam said softly. "Killed by Scav's. 'Member the way he acted the day we showed up, Shy?"
"Let me get this straight." Mike looked like he might spontaneously combust any minute. "Bryn's dead parents, and Nicki, who's also dead, are
wandering around the property?"
"In a nutshell, yes."
He looked at the assembled group. "You people are crazy! The dead do not just get up and walk around!"
"Actually, they do. Though usually not under their own power. That's where Bryn came in. He called them back. But, as I said, the spell
was written in Latin. That's what he and I have been working on all afternoon."
Adam looked up. "What?"
"I've been teaching him the spell to send them back. I can read Latin fairly well. I've taught him the spell in English. And in a few
minutes, once he finishes redrawing the Pentagram, he's going to recite it and end this unfortunate scenario once and for all."
"And then we're gonna kill him." Mike hefted his rifle.
"Nobody is going to be killing anybody." Jim stood up. "Assuming the spell to send them back works, the Tribe will decide what sort of
punishment Bryn deserves."
"What he deserves is to get his fuc.... oww!" Adam yelped, as Shy smacked him again.
"Blair?" Bryn's frightened voice came from behind Sandburg, "I've redone the Pentagram like you said. Guess it's time, huh?"
Blair looked over his shoulder at him. "Yeah, it is. Jim, I want you to come along as a witness. The rest of you," he staked them all with
a glare "are to stay right here. No matter what you hear or see, you WILL NOT disturb us, understood?" He waited until everyone had nodded
okay. "Good. Because I'll tell you something right now, the best way in the world to skew a spell is to interrupt the magician while he's
doing it. If you're stupid enough to do it--you deserve everything you get. And I don't think it'll be pleasant. Megan?" She looked at him.
"Jim's going to give you his pistol. I'm appointing you designated watcher. I don't think we'll have to worry about Shy or the
kids being stupid enough to try anything, but if either Adam or Mike so much as twitch wrong, shoot to maim. Agreed?"
Megan looked at Mike and Adam, giving both of them what Jim thought of as the patented "Connor glare," then nodded. "Clear."
"Jim, you wanna get your pistol? And while you're at it, you might want to take Mike and Adam's guns and lock them in the cupboard in our
bedroom. No sense in putting temptation before them."
Jim collected the rifles (which were parted with grudgingly) and took them into the bedroom, propping them against the bed. He was the only
person in the tribe who had the key to the main armory; it never left his possession day or night. Now he unlocked the cupboard and stored
the rifles away, then pulled out his service revolver, checking to make sure it was loaded. As an afterthought, he took out his back-up piece
and slipped it into the waistband of his jeans. He knew it was silly, but it's presence made him feel safer. Then he shut the doors,
relocked them, and went back out into the living room, to find Megan doing a very thorough pat down of Mike. Adam had apparently already
been subjected to the same thing; he was sitting on the couch next to Shy looked like he wasn't sure whether he should laugh and cry.
She finished patting down Mike. "Trying to be sneaky, love?" She pulled up his pants leg and removed his hunting knife from its sheath.
"I'll just keep this somewhere safe."
"You realize this changes things," Mike was looking murder at her.
She simply smiled. "Be surprised if it didn't, Col. Macabbria. Maybe you can give Bryn a ride down to Cascade when you leave."
She accepted Jim's service revolver graciously, waited until he and Blair had gone past, then pulled out a chair and stationed herself in
the middle of the corridor. "Sandy? Jim?" They looked at her. "Good luck."
Blair smiled wanly. "We're gonna need it, Megan. Remember what I said about shooting to maim."
"Don't be ridiculous, Sandy. Unlike 'some' people in the room, I'm not inclined towards killing one of my own."
Bryn's room was nearly dark, lit only by glow from the five candles on the Pentagram, and a couple more on the dresser. Blair carefully
closed the door behind them and locked it. "Jim, could you stand over there?" He gestured at the far corner.
Jim nodded and positioned himself at the foot of Bryn's bed. Bryn looked at him and smiled sickly. Jim gave him what he hoped passed for
an encouraging nod.
"Ready?" Blair asked.
Bryn nodded and took the book, carefully picking his way through the tangle of symbols and lines until he stood in the middle of the
Pentagram. "Remember what I said; no matter what you see or hear, don't stop reading the spell until you're done. Otherwise it's liable
to turn on you. Understand?"
He nodded, and carefully opened "Preaoccupor Morte" to the page marked with the same stripe of notebook paper.
"This is going to work, right?" Jim whispered to Blair.
"It's better. Otherwise, Ellison's Tribe will go the way of the dodo."
Bryn raised a hand. "By the Powers of the Air, and Above the Air, by Things Beyond, and Things Not Seen, I summon those who walk and yet do
not live to appear before me. By the Names of Those on High, and Those Below, I adjure you spirits to cease your wandering and come stand for
judgment, that you may be returned to the rest from whence you were raised. I call you here by the powers I wield, that what has been
broken may be mended and what was done wrong be righted. This I say by the power I draw upon, by the power of these signs and symbols, by the
power of the Earth and Sky. For a grave wrong has been done..."
Jim's vision seemed to be gong fuzzy. He shook his head sharply, then realized it wasn't his vision at all. 'Something,' several
something's, actually, were beginning to appear in the bare spots between the star's points.
Bryn was sweating; Jim could hear hid heart thudding like a drum, but he didn't look up, though he certainly must be aware that the spell was
working. "I accept my wrongdoing in this matter and desire only to make things right; to return those who do not live to the realm of the
unliving, to lay to rest the souls of those I have disturbed, to break the bonds that tie these souls to this mortal coil."
People. What was appearing were people. Specifically, a man and a woman, both of them covered with clotted gore. The woman's throat had
been slit to the extent her head was nearly severed; it flopped loosely to one side. The man, of course, had no eyes; only empty sockets that
stared at nothing.
The third figure--his chest was suddenly tight. The third figure was a young girl, thin and pale, wearing the same blue flannel shirt and
jeans she'd been buried in. Her blond hair was cropped close, almost a military buzz-cut. He remembered the day Bryn cut it off for her; the
hair rubbing against the back of her neck was making the pain from the damaged nerves worse.
"So stand before me now, for those who are dead have no need of congress with the living. Those who have left this earthly vale of
tears need not return." He glanced up and saw Nicki, and for a minute, Jim just knew he was going to stop the spell and all hell would
break loose.
Surprisingly, he didn't. He forced his eyes back to the book. "Those who stand before me now, Edward Sherwood, Martha Sherwood, and Nicole
Frees Sherwood. I release you from the spell binding you to this earth. May you go and rest in peace, and be troubled no more with
thoughts of what were and was not. This I give you freely, without reservation." There were tears rolling down his face. "Leave this
world, and return to where you belong."
The spell ended, and Bryn looked up at his parents sniffing slightly. "Mom, Dad, I'm sorry about what happened. I should've died there with
you that night, but I was too wrapped up in myself. I just hope you can forgive me." Even as he spoke, the man and woman began to
dissolve, like early morning mist once the sunlight hits it. Within a few seconds, they'd faded from sight all together.
He turned to Nicki, who was watching him with a small half-smile. "Nick. God, I am so, so sorry I'm such a dumb, self-centered bastard.
I never meant to make you suffer. Death was your freedom. You accepted it as such, and I don't know why I couldn't just accept it, too. But
I've missed you so much. I thought I could bring you back and look at you awhile, and everything would be okay. Instead, you ended up
wandering because I couldn't even read the damn spell correctly. Can you forgive me?"
"You wanna come with me?" Nicki's voice was the same; rough-edged and husky. "I can take you with me when I go, Bryn, if you wanna. You'll
be dead too, but we'll be together."
Bryn looked at Blair and Jim; they could see in his eyes the decision had already been made. Maybe, Blair would say later, there was never
any other choice. "Jim, Blair, I just want you know I've been happier here than I ever was in Cascade. And this'll save everyone the trouble
of having to agree on whether to bury me alive or run me off the mountain. Sometimes, you've got to be willing to walk for four years
to get back to who you love, right Blair?" He grinned. "But sometimes, all you have to do is step over the line between life and
death. Tell everyone goodbye for me; tell Adam and Shy I never meant to hurt them. Tell Megan I'll tell Joel all about JT. I love you
guys."
He turned back to Nicki, who was holding out her hand. Smiling, he stepped out of the protective space in the center of the Pentagram and
took hold of it. She pulled him into a hug; entwined in each others arms, their bodies gradually broke apart into a million little scatters
of light, which darted around the room, then shot out the half-open window into the sky, leaving nothing behind but the guttering candles
and the faint smell of the coming winter.
EPILOGUE
Much later, after the pumpkins had been lit, and the costumes admired at length, after the mulled apple-cider punch (with apple juice for the
kids) had been handed out, after everyone had been told what had taken place and said their good-byes, Jim and Blair were alone.
They ended up on the rug in front of the fireplace, Blair in between Jim's spread legs, leaned back against the solid warmth of his body.
"You think he'll be happy, Jim?"
"Bryn?" Blair nodded. "Probably. I don't think life meant much to him after Nicki died. Now they're together forever."
"Adam feels really bad about what he said."
"Adam is a maudlin drunk. Last time we give the man anything with alcohol in it. Shy said he'll regret it tomorrow morning. Had a
wicked grin on her face when she said it, too."
"It's so strange; neither of them really acts like a young person, but I swear, Shy's more mature than Adam any day."
"Women usually are. Look at Connor."
"Think Mike'll go back to Cascade?"
"I think the fact he's spending the night on Adam and Shy's couch says volumes. Guess it's a good thing Megan found out what he's really like
now, instead of six months from now."
"It's amazing the things you don't know about people. He always seemed like such a nice guy."
"That's because we didn't have to live with him."
"True." Blair let his head fall back against Jim's chest. "So. Wanna play hide the pumpkin?"
Jim chuckled. "I'd sooner put out all the candles and play 'Let's find Blair in the dark.'"
"No way, man. You're a Sentinel. And you cheat."
"I do not cheat!"
"Yes you do. You can see in almost total darkness and I can't. That constitutes cheating. Now, say we were to put a blindfold on you
first..."
"yeah?"
"That'd even out the playing field. Then neither of us would be able to see the otr's forehead. "Race you to the bedroom."
FIN
Thanks:To Lisa and Patt, for putting up with my inability to meet deadlines; to Mary for quick, concise betaing and her kind words, and
to everyone else on the MME list for carrying on in the face of so much RL crap. This one's for all of you.
