“There are,” I said. “First and foremost, you’ve got to keep your grades up. School comes first.”
“Totally.” Melanie’s head bobbed like it was on a spring. I could have told her she’d have to walk a tightrope across the Grand Canyon, and I would have gotten the same answer.
“And,” Caitlin added, “I expect I won’t be receiving any more disciplinary reports. You’ll be on your best behavior at all times and comport yourself as a dignified representative of our court and our prince.”
I looked her way. “Which one of us are you talking to?”
“Both of you.”
That was fair.
“Okay,” I told Melanie, “that’s it, then. Report to the Scrivener’s Nook tomorrow after school, and we’ll get started. You’ll need two pairs of black shirts, two pairs of black pants, one pair of combat boots, two pairs of black socks—”
“Wait, wait!” Melanie grabbed her phone, tapping with both thumbs as fast as she could. “I need to write this down, start over.”
“No, I was quoting a—” I blinked at her. “I mean, have you never seen Fight Club?”
She looked up from her phone. “You do know that movie came out the year I was born, right?”
“Subconsciously, I think I must have realized that on some level, but pointing it out really drives home how old I am. Thanks for that.”
“Anytime.”
Emma folded her arms and met my gaze.
“Welcome to my world,” she told me.
Maybe Jennifer had been right, back when this whole mess started. Maybe I was having a midlife crisis and my search for a legacy was just a symptom. But I couldn’t shake the hunger to make some kind of a difference, some kind of an impact before I was gone, and I hadn’t been too good at it lately.
I had tried to help Harry Grimes and show him a better way. In the end, all I could do was put him down like a rabid dog. I held out my hand to Fleiss and she slapped it away.
But here was someone who needed a hand, who needed the skills I knew I could teach. The only thing holding me back was Desi’s ghost.
And the only one keeping her alive was me. Besides, I think she would have liked Melanie if they’d ever met. And if anyone would approve of me getting back on the horse and taking on another student, it was Desi. She would have kicked my ass for waiting this long. It was time to let go of the past. Learn from it, yes, but let it go. And try again.
This time, I’d get it right.
Epilogue
There used to be a village nestled deep in the province of Nuevo León. It isn’t there anymore. Survivors streaming into Monterrey, lugging the remnants of their lives in bags and backpacks, told an all too common story. A cartel had been hiding product in a farmer’s storehouse. The mayor talked to the federales. And by night, men with guns came to deliver their punishment.
That was the story, anyway.
A dusty, bone-dry day brought new arrivals, rumbling in a convoy along a broken road. Four semi trucks—trailers unmarked, plates mismatched and stolen—ran convoy behind a single white limousine. They followed the ping of a satellite transmitter and left the road, tearing across scrub grass and dirt.
At the end of the line, they circled ranks and stopped at the edge of the dead village. From a distance, their passengers might have been astronauts, buried under bulky helmets and lime-green Tychem pressure suits. They rolled out hoses and drove stakes into the barren earth, erecting sealed plastic tents.
By sunset, the village had become a CDC-grade biohazard unit.
The most prominent—and most secure—encampment was dead center, erected over a lonely pit in the earth. Rough-hewn steps led down to a tunnel where a couple of the new arrivals swept bright white LEDs across the ancient masonry.
“They didn’t know it was here?” one asked, voice muffled under his hood.
“The old-timers knew. Didn’t know what it was, but they knew it was bad news and to keep people away from it.”
“And here we are. Not too bright.”
“Shh,” his partner said. “He’s here. You don’t want to get downsized, keep your mouth shut.”
The tunnel dipped and turned and dipped again, a black corkscrew gouging a wound deep into the earth. Then the passage leveled out, and a putrid yellow glow rippled, like light on water, off the walls ahead.
“Is that…” one of the men breathed.
They stood before the portal and froze in abject horror.
“Eden,” said Mr. Smith.
He stepped up behind them, beaming. The glow washed over his face, his forehead pink and soft like the skin of a newborn baby.
“Isn’t it beautiful?”
*
Northlight Tower held vaults within vaults. This one was secured close to the Enemy’s penthouse, so he could keep a close eye on the treasures within. Fleiss often found him wandering the room, muttering to himself, his flickering form reflecting off the polished stainless-steel walls.
“Not so smart now, are you?” he would say. “No. Not smarter than me.”
This time, she stood alone, surrounded by pedestals of white Italian marble. Each plinth bore a tiny brass placard and a red velvet pillow, and each pillow bore the tools of a stage magician’s trade. Brass linking rings, a length of sturdy cotton rope with a knot on one end, steel cups and red foam balls.
Two of the pedestals, reserved for Howard Canton’s wand and top hat, stood empty.
The terror gripped her, like it always did when she had to report her failure. It sank bone-deep and nailed her feet to the floor.
“Amazing,” her creator said from the doorway. “Everything going swimmingly, our allies from the Network were doing their part, then you were placed in charge of the final phase. And promptly didn’t obtain the hat, didn’t obtain the wand, and lost Faust.”
“That isn’t fair.”
She froze in shock as the words fell from her lips. So did he. She felt his power wash over her, probe at her, as his shadow loomed.
“Excuse me?” he whispered.
Fleiss bowed her head. “I…I just mean…my lord, you can’t trust these people. The Network will betray you in a heartbeat.”
“Of course they will. I’m certain they’re planning on it. But if I can buy their momentary cooperation with the gift of a trifle I don’t even care about, it’s worth the risk. Do you think me a fool, Fleiss?”
“No, my lord! I just want to watch out for you. Care for you.” She looked up at him. “I love you.”
He nodded. “I know you do. It pleases me.”
Daniel Faust’s words on the rooftop, when Fleiss cornered him at Elmer Donaghy’s lair, drifted back to her now.
“He does love me,” she had insisted, infuriated by his disbelief.
“Has he ever told you that?”
And now she realized—as if a patch of fog had been lifted from some far corner of her mind, unveiling something that had been right in front of her all along—that the answer was no.
“Do…you love me, too?” she asked.
His flickering fingertips traced the curve of her jaw.
“You are a very valuable servant,” he replied.
Then he turned and gusted away without another word, leaving her standing alone.
She deliberated in silence, then took out her phone. She had arrangements to see to, matters to contemplate further.
Decisions to make.
Afterword
Change isn’t easy.