"Yes." Ebenezar's face looked like something carved in stone, and his voice was quietly harsh. "When there is no choice. When lives are at stake. When the lack of action would mean-" He cut himself off, jaw working. "I didn't want it. I still don't. But when I have to, I act."
"Like at Casaverde," I said. "You hit Ortega's stronghold when he escaped our duel."
"Yes," he said, still remote. "Ortega killed more of the White Council than any enemy in our history during the attack at Archangel." His voice faltered for a moment. "He killed Simon. My friend. Then he came here and tried to kill you, Hoss. And he was coming back here to finish the job as soon as he recovered. So I hit Casaverde. Killed him and almost two hundred of his personal retainers. And I killed nearly a hundred people there in the house with them. Servants. Followers. Food."
I felt sick. "You told me it would be on the news. I thought maybe it was the Council. Or that you'd done it without killing anyone but vampires. I had time to think about it later, but... I wanted to believe you'd done what was right."
"There's what's right," the old man said, "and then there's what's necessary. They ain't always the same."
"Casaverde wasn't the only necessary thing you did," I said. "Was it."
"Casaverde," Ebenezar said, his voice shaking. "Tunguska. New Madrid. Krakatoa. A dozen more. God help me, a dozen more at least."
I stared at him for a long moment. Then I said, "You told me the Council assigned me to live with you because they wanted to annoy you. But that wasn't it. Because you don't send a potentially dangerous criminal element to live with your hatchet man if you want to rehabilitate him."
He nodded. "My orders were to observe you. And kill you if you showed the least bit of rebelliousness."
"Kill me." I rubbed at my eyes. The pounding in my hand grew worse. "As I remember, I got rebellious with you more than once."
"You did," he said.
"Then why didn't you kill me?"
"Jehoshaphat, boy. What's the point of having a license to ignore the will of the Council if you aren't going to use it?" He shook his head, a tired smile briefly appearing on his mouth. "It wasn't your fault you got raised by that son of a bitch DuMorne. You were a dumb kid, you were angry, and afraid, and your magic was strong as hell. But that didn't mean you needed killing. They gave the judgment to me. I used it. They aren't happy with how I used it, but I did."
I stared at him. "There's something else you aren't telling me."
He was silent for a minute. Then two. And a while later he said, "The Council knew that you were the son of Margaret LeFay. They knew that she was one of the wizards who had turned the Council's own laws against it. She was guilty of violating the First Law, among others, and she had... unsavory associations with various entities of dubious reputation. The Wardens were under orders to arrest her on sight. She'd have been tried and executed in moments when she was brought before the Council."
"I was told she died in childbirth," I said.
"She did," Ebenezar confirmed. "I don't know why, but for some reason she turned away from her previous associates-including Justin DuMorne. After that, nowhere was safe for her. She ran from her former allies and from the Wardens for perhaps two years. And she ran from me. I had my orders regarding her as well."
I stared at him in pained fascination. "What happened?"
"She met your father. A man. A mortal, without powers, without influence, without resources. But a man with a good soul, like few I have ever seen. I believe that she fell in love with him. But on the night you were born, one of her former allies found her and exacted his vengeance for her desertion." He looked up at me directly and said, "He used an entropy curse. A ritual entropy curse."
Shock paralyzed me for a moment. Then I said, "Lord Raith."
"Yes."
"He killed my mother."
"He did," Ebenezar confirmed.
"God. You're... you're sure?"
"He's a snake," Ebenezar said. "But I'm as sure as I can be."
The pounding spread up my arm, and the room pulsed brighter and dimmer in time with it. "My mother. He was standing three feet from me. He killed my mother." A child's pain-the emptiness in my life the shape of my unknown mother, my unfortunate father-swelled and screamed in rage. The source of that pain, or part of it, had finally been revealed to me. And in that moment, had I known where to strike, I would have eagerly embraced murder. Nothing mattered but exacting retribution. Nothing mattered but taking righteous vengeance for the death of a child's mother. My My mother. I started shaking, and I knew that my sanity was buckling under the pressure. mother. I started shaking, and I knew that my sanity was buckling under the pressure.
"Hoss," Ebenezar said. "Easy, boy."
"Kill him," I whispered. "I'll kill him."
"No," Ebenezar said. "You've got to breathe, boy. Think."
I started gathering power. "Kill him. Kill Kill him. Everything. All of it. Nothing left." him. Everything. All of it. Nothing left."
"Harry," Ebenezar snapped. "Harry, let go. You can't handle that kind of power. You'll kill yourself if you try."
I didn't care about that, either. The power felt too good-too strong. I wanted it. I wanted Raith to pay. I wanted him to suffer, screaming, and then die for what he had done to me. And I was strong enough to make it happen. I had the power and the resolve to bring such a tide of magic against him that he would be utterly destroyed. I would lay him low and make him howl for mercy before I tore him apart. He deserved nothing less.
And then fire blossomed in my hand again, so sudden and sharp that my back convulsed into an agonized arch, and I fell to the floor. I couldn't scream. The pain washed my fury away like dandelions before a flash flood. I looked around wildly and saw the old man's broad, calloused hand clamped down over my burned, lightly bandaged flesh with bruising strength. When he saw my eyes he released my hand, his expression sickened.
I curled up for a minute while my pounding heart telegraphed consecutive tidal waves of agony through me. It was several minutes before I could master the pain and sit slowly up again.
"I'm sorry," Ebenezar whispered. "Harry, I can't let you indulge your rage. You'll kill yourself."
"I'll take him with me," I got out between gritted teeth.
Ebenezar let out a bitter laugh. "No, you won't, Hoss."
"How do you know?"
"I've tried," he said. "Three times. And I didn't even get close. And you think your mother went without spending her death curse on her murderer? The creature who had enslaved her? Might as well ask if a fish remembered to swim."
I blinked at him. "What do you mean?"
"He's protected," he said quietly. "Magic just slides off him."
"Even a death curse?"
"Useless," he said bitterly. "Raith is protected by something big. Maybe a big damned demon. Maybe even some old god. He can't be touched with magic."
"Is that even possible?" I asked.
"Aye," the old man said. "I don't know how. But it is. Does a lot to explain how he got to become the White King."
"I don't believe it," I said quietly. "She'd been close to him. She must have known he was protected. She was strong enough to make the White Council afraid of her. She wouldn't have spent her curse for nothing."
"She threw it. She wasted it."
"So now my mother is incompetent as well as evil," I said.
"I never said that-"
"What do you know about her?" I said. I had my right hand clamped around my left wrist, hoping to distract myself from the pain. "How would you know? Did she tell you? Were you there with her?"
He looked down at the floor, his face pale. "No."
"Then how the hell do you know?" I demanded.
His words came out in a harsh croak. "Because I knew her, Hoss. I knew her almost better than she knew herself."
The fire crackled.
"How?" I whispered.
He drew his hand back from the puppy. "She was my apprentice. I was her teacher. Her mentor. She was my responsibility."
"You taught her?"
"I failed her." He chewed on his lip. "Harry... when Maggie was coming into her power, I made her life a living hell. She was barely more than a child, but I rode herd on her night and day. I pushed her to learn. To excel. But I was too close. Too involved. And she resented it. She ran off as soon as she could get away with it. Started taking up with bad sorts out of sheer rebellion. She made a couple of bad decisions, and... and then it was too late for her to go back."
He sighed. "You're so much like her. I knew it when they sent you to me. I knew it the minute I saw you. I didn't want to repeat my mistakes with you. I wanted you to have breathing space. To make up your own mind about what kind of person you would be." He shook his head. "The hardest lesson a wizard has to learn is that even with so much power, there are some things you can't control. No matter how much you want to."
I just stared at him. "You're an assassin. A murderer. You knew about what happened to my mother. You knew her and you never told told me. Good God, Ebenezar. How could you do that to me? Why didn't you me. Good God, Ebenezar. How could you do that to me? Why didn't you tell tell me?" me?"
"I'm only human, Hoss. I did what I thought was best for you at the time."
"I trusted trusted you," I said. "Do you know how much that you," I said. "Do you know how much that means means to me?" to me?"
"Yes," he said. "I never did it with the intention of hurting you. But it's done. And I wouldn't choose to do it any differently if it happened again."
He moved, got the sack, and hunkered down by me so that he could rest my forearm over one knee and examine the burned hand. Then he reached into the bag and drew out a long strand of string hung with some kind of white stone. "Let's see to your hand. I think I can get the circulation restored, at least a little. Maybe enough to save the hand. And I can stop the pain for a day or two. You'll still have to get to a doctor, but this should tide you over if you're expecting trouble tonight."
It didn't take him long, and I tried to sort through my thoughts. They were buried under a storm of raw emotions, all of them ugly. I lost track of time again for a minute. When I looked up, my hand didn't hurt and it seemed a little less withered beneath the white bandages. A string of white stones had been tied around my wrist. Even as I watched, one of them yellowed and began to slowly darken.
"The stones will absorb the pain for a while. They'll crumble one at a time, so you'll know when they stop working." He looked up to my face. "Do you want my help tonight?"
An hour ago it wouldn't even have been a question. I'd have been more than glad to have Ebenezar next to me in a fight. But the old man had been right. The truth hurt. The truth burned burned. My thoughts and feelings boiled in a blistering, dangerous tumult in my chest. I didn't want to admit what was at the core of that turmoil, but denying it wouldn't make it any less true.
Ebenezar had lied to me. From day one.
And if he'd been lying to me, what else had he lied about?
I'd built my whole stupid life on a few simple beliefs. That I had a responsibility to use my power to help people. That it was worth risking my own life and safety to defend others. Beliefs I'd taken as my own primarily because of the old man's influence.
But he hadn't been what I thought he was. Ebenezar wasn't a paragon of wizardly virtue. If anything he was a precautionary tale. He had seemed to talk a good game, but underneath that surface, he'd been as cold and as vicious as any of the cowardly bastards in the Council whom I despised.
Maybe he'd never claimed to be a shining example. Maybe I'd just needed someone to admire. To believe in. Maybe I'd been the stupid one, putting my faith in the wrong place.
But none of that changed the fact that Ebenezar had hidden things from me. That he'd lied.
That made it simple.
"No," I whispered. "I don't want you there. I don't know you. I never did."
"But you'd fight beside someone like the Hellhound."
"Kincaid's a killer for hire. He never pretended he was anything else."
The old man exhaled slowly and said, "I reckon that ain't unfair."
"Thank you for your help. But I've got things to do. You should go."
He rose, picked up the paper bag, and said, "I'm still there for you, Hoss, if you change your-"
I felt my teeth clench. "I said get out."
He blinked his eyes a few times and whispered, "A hard lesson. The hardest."
Then he left.
I refused to watch him go.
Chapter Thirty-six [image]
I sat in the silence of the old man's departure and felt a lot of things. I felt tired. I felt afraid. And I felt alone. The puppy sat up and displayed some of the wisdom and compassion of his kind. He wobbled carefully over to me, scrambled up onto my lap, and started licking the bottom of my chin.
I petted his soft baby fur, and it gave me an unexpected sense of comfort. Sure, he was tiny, and sure, he was just a dog, but he was warm and loving and a brave little beast. And he liked me. He kept on giving me puppy kisses, tail wagging, until I finally smiled at him and roughed up his fur with one hand.
Mister wasn't about to let a mere dog outdo him. The hefty tom promptly descended from his perch on my bookshelf and started rubbing himself back and forth under my hand until I paid attention to him, too.
"I guess you aren't nothing but trouble," I told the dog. "But I already have a furry companion. Right, Mister?"
Mister blinked at me with an enigmatic cat expression, batted the puppy off the couch and onto the floor, and promptly lost interest in me. Mister flowed back down onto the floor, where the puppy rolled to his feet, tail wagging ferociously, and began to romp clumsily around the cat, thrilled with the game. Mister flicked his ears with disdain and went back up onto his bookshelf.
I laughed. I couldn't help it. The world might be vicious and treacherous and deadly, but it couldn't kill laughter. Laughter, like love, has power to survive the worst things life has to offer. And to do it with style.
It got me moving. I dressed for trouble-black fatigue pants, a heavy wool shirt of deep red, black combat boots. I put on my gun belt with one hand, clipped my sword cane to the belt, and covered it with my duster. I made sure I had my mother's amulet and my shield bracelet, sat down, and called Thomas's cell phone.
The phone got about half of a ring out before someone picked it up and a girl's frightened voice asked, "Tommy?"
"Inari?" I asked. "Is that you?"
"It's me," she confirmed. "This is Harry, isn't it."
"For another few hours anyway," I said. "May I speak to Thomas, please?"
"No," Inari said. It sounded like she had been crying. "I was hoping this was him. I think he's in trouble."
I frowned. "What kind of trouble?"
"I saw one of my father's men," she said. "I think he had a gun. He made Thomas drop his phone in the parking lot and get into the car. I didn't know what I should do."