Somehow I had survived, and someone had brought me home. That same someone had bathed me, twisted my long black hair into a single braid, put me in a clean nightgown, changed my bedsheets and bandaged the palms of my hands. Since I wasn’t close enough to anyone who could have performed such intimate services for me, I was more than a little freaked out.
“Beezle!” I shouted. He flew in through the bedroom door so quickly he must have been hovering in the kitchen just outside.
“Maddy,” he said. “How are you feeling?”
“Better,” I said, surprised to hear myself say it. I felt . . . rested, more rested than I had felt in a long time. “But how did I get here? Who brought me home?”
Beezle looked surprised. “No one brought you home. You brought yourself home.”
“No, I didn’t. I remember someone picking me up and carrying me. I could hear you arguing with him.”
“With who?”
“Whoever carried me home, Beezle! Why are you acting like you don’t remember this?”
“Well,” he said slowly. “Maybe because it didn’t happen?”
“Who were you talking to, then?”
He looked affronted. “I don’t talk to any humans except you. And ...”
“Don’t you think I’d remember coming home, taking a shower, braiding my hair? I never braid my hair.”
“You did last night. I mean, you did seem pretty out of it, but you told me that you were okay to walk home.”
“You’re telling me that I got up and walked home and did all of those things?”
“Yes.”
“Why are my hands bandaged?”
“Burns,” Beezle said, and he frowned at my palms as if they offended him.
“From what?”
“That ball of fire you conjured up. The burns were there when we got home. You put some cream on them and wrapped them up.”
I didn’t remember doing any of it, and I was certain I’d heard another voice. My head started to ache as I strained to remember.
“How did you do that, by the way?” Beezle asked, and his voice sounded funny.
“Do what?” I asked.
“Call up nightfire.”
I stared at him. “Nightfire? What the hell is that?”
“Funny you should mention hell,” Beezle muttered.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Beezle said, shaking his head. “Anyway, how did you call it?”
My brain felt a little fuzzy around the edges. “I have no freaking clue. I didn’t even know that Agents could call nightfire.”
Strangely, Beezle looked relieved by this pronouncement. “So what happened, then?”
“I don’t know. That thing was talking about Mom . . . talking about eating her as if she were an hors d’oeuvre. And I just got so angry. All of a sudden I felt all this power build up inside and it hurt me to keep it there, so I let it go. Wait,” I said, remembering why I had been below that overpass in the first place. “Wait. What happened to the monster? To Patrick?”
“The monster . . . ran away,” Beezle said. There was something about the way he said it that made me think he wasn’t telling me the whole truth. But before I could pursue that line of inquiry, he spoke again. “Patrick was dead, Maddy. He was dead before we even got there.”
I slumped back onto the pillow and felt tears burn the backs of my eyes. I swiped at my face with an impatient hand. “Did I just leave him? Did I leave his body there?”
“I don’t think there was much of his body left.”
I closed my eyes in pain. “Very tactful.”
“I’m sorry,” he growled, and it looked like he meant it. “But you were out of it. You couldn’t have helped him even if you’d tried.”
“He was my friend, Beezle. Pretty much my only friend. I can’t believe I would just walk away from him, no matter how ‘out of it’ I was. And why was that thing after him in the first place? It doesn’t make any sense unless ...” Realization dawned. “Unless it was after me, and it used Patrick to get me there. Which would mean he died for me, because of me.”
Beezle looked at me sternly. “I know what you’re thinking, and you just get it out of your head right now. Your mother charged me with your protection and you are not going haring off to find Patrick’s killer.”
“That thing didn’t only kill Patrick. It killed my mother. And I’ve spent a lot of years wondering what happened to her, and why no Agent ever came for her soul.”
“How do you know that no Agent came for her?” Beezle asked, watching me carefully.
“I checked the Hall of Records. Every dead soul is recorded there, and so is their choice. My mother’s soul isn’t there. No Agent came for her, and if she wandered the Earth, she would have come to me. I know she would have.”
Beezle looked at me with something like pity in his eyes.
“Don’t lecture me,” I said, holding up a warning hand. “You loved her, too. It’s the only reason you stayed to watch over me.”
He looked away and grumbled something.
“What?”
“I said, Katherine Black was special.”
“Yes, she was. And I’m going to find the thing that killed her and Patrick. And when I do, I hope I can call up that nightfire again. Because when I find it, I’m going to make sure it dies screaming.”
4
I DRESSED, PULLING ON A PAIR OF FADED BLUE JEANS, a long-sleeved black T-shirt, and a pair of ankle-high black leather boots with chunky treads. My wardrobe mostly consists of jeans, cords, black tops and black shoes. I don’t want to have to think about coordinating anything, so it’s best if all of my clothes are already coordinated when they come out of the closet. Besides, what color is more appropriate for an Agent of death than black?
I had a soul to pick up at ten forty-three P.M. tomorrow—James Takahashi at the corner of Clark and Belmont. Other than that, I had the next couple of days completely free. Free except for a few niggling little details—like running a credit and background check on Gabriel Angeloscuro, finishing up the recipes for the article on pears that I was writing for a magazine that featured low-fat cooking, checking the Hall of Records for the whereabouts of Patrick’s soul, and finding my mother’s killer. Just an ordinary day’s work.
I contacted Charlie McGivney, the P.I. who’d agreed to handle the background checks for me. I read him Gabriel’s information from the apartment application. The application was written in a freakishly neat print, almost like a typewriter. Charlie said he’d get back to me in a day or so. One task down.
I yanked on my black peacoat and called to Beezle, who was doing his broody thing on the mantelpiece again. “I’m going to see J.B.”
“What for?” he grumbled.
“So I can find out what happened to Patrick,” I said. “I need a pass from him to get into the Hall of Records.”
“But you hate J.B., and he hates you, so why should he do you a favor?”
“I don’t hate him.”
“Yes, you do,” Beezle insisted.
“No, I don’t. I just find him to be a little smug. And condescending. And annoying.”
“And your boss.”
“That, too,” I said as I stepped to the side window and thought about going to the Main Office. As I pictured the building, my wings sprouted from my back.