I nodded.
“Sergeant Murphy told me what happened.”
I felt my neck tense. “She saw it?”
He nodded. “Reckon so. Hell of a hard thing to do.”
“It wasn’t hard,” I said quietly. “Just cold.”
“Oh, Hoss,” he said. There was more compassion in the words than you’d think would fit there.
Figures in grey gathered at the bottom of the stairs. Ebenezar eyed them with a scowl. “Time for me to go, looks like.”
I nudged my brain and looked down at them. “You brought them here. For me.”
“Not so much,” he said. He nodded at the sleeping child. “For her.”
“What about the White Council?”
“They’ll get things sorted out soon,” he said. “Amazing how things fell apart just long enough for them to sit them out.”
“With Cristos running it.”
“Aye.”
“He’s Black Council,” I said.
“Or maybe stupid,” Ebenezar countered.
I thought about it. “Not sure which is scarier.”
Ebenezar blinked at me, then snorted. “Stupid, Hoss. Every time. Only so many blackhearted villains in the world, and they only get uppity on occasion. Stupid’s everywhere, every day.”
“How’d Lea arrange a signal with you?” I asked.
“That,” Ebenezar said sourly. “On that score, Hoss, I think our elders ran their own game on us.”
“Elders?”
He nodded down the stairs, where the tall figure with the metal-headed staff had begun creating another doorway out of green lightning. Once it was formed, the space beneath the arch shimmered, and all the hooded figures at the bottom of the stairs looked up at us.
I frowned and looked closer. Then I realized that the metal head of the staff was a blade, and that the tall man was holding a spear. Within the hood, I saw a black eye patch, a grizzled beard, and a brief, grim smile. He raised the spear to me in a motion that reminded me, somehow, of a fencer’s salute. Then he turned and vanished into the gate. One by one, the other figures in grey began to follow him.
“Vadderung,” I said.
Ebenezar grunted. “That’s his name this time. He doesn’t throw in often. When he does, he goes to the wall. And in my experience, it means things are about to get bad.” He pursed his lips. “He doesn’t give recognition like that lightly, Hoss.”
“I talked to him a couple of days ago,” I said. “He told me about the curse. Put the gun in my hand for me and showed me where to point it.”
Ebenezar nodded. “He taught Merlin, you know. The original Merlin.”
“How’d Merlin make out?” I asked.
“No one’s sure,” Ebenezar said. “But from his journals . . . he wasn’t the kind to go in his sleep.”
I snorted.
The old man stood and used his right hand to pull his hood up over his face. He paused and then looked at me. “I won’t lecture you about Mab, boy. I’ve made bargains myself, sometimes.” He twitched his left hand, which was still lined with black veins, though not as much as it had been hours before. “We do what we think we must, to protect who we can.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“She might lean on you pretty hard. Try to put you into a box you don’t want to be in. But don’t let her. She can’t take away your will. Even if she can make it seem that way.” He sighed again, but there was bedrock in his voice. “That’s the one thing all these dark beings and powers can’t do. Take away your ability to choose. They can kill you. They can make you do things—but they can’t make you choose to do ’em. They almost always try to lie to you about that. Don’t fall for it.”
“I won’t,” I said. I looked up at him and said, “Thank you, Grandfather.”
He wrinkled up his nose. “Ouch. That doesn’t fit.”
“Grampa,” I said. “Gramps.”
He put his hand against his chest.
I smiled a little. “Sir.”
He nodded at the child. “What will you do with her?”
“What I see fit,” I said, but gently. “Maybe it’s better if you don’t know.”
Both pain and faintly amused resignation showed in his face. “Maybe it is. See you soon, Hoss.”
He got halfway down the stairs before I said, “Sir? Do you want your staff?”
He nodded at me. “You keep it, until I can get you a new blank.”
I nodded back at him. Then I said, “I don’t know what to say.”
His eyes wrinkled up even more heavily at the corners. “Hell, Hoss. Then don’t say anything.” He turned and called over his shoulder, “You get in less trouble that way!”
My grandfather kept going down the stairs, walking with quick, sure strides. He vanished through the doorway of lightning.
I heard steps behind me, and turned to find Murphy standing in the entrance of the temple. Fidelacchius rode over one shoulder, and her P-90 hung from its strap on the other. She looked tired. Her hair was all coming out of its ponytail, strands hanging here and there. She studied my face, smiled slightly, and came down to where I sat.
“Hey,” she said, her voice hushed. “You back?”
“I guess I am.”
“Sanya was worried,” she said, with a little roll of her eyes.
“Oh,” I said. “Well. Tell him not to worry. I’m still here.”
She nodded and stepped closer. “So this is her?”
I nodded, and looked down at the sleeping little girl. Her cheeks were pink. I couldn’t talk.
“She’s beautiful,” Murphy said. “Like her mother.”
I nodded and rolled one tired and complaining shoulder. “She is.”
“Do you want someone else to take her for a minute?”
My arms tightened on the child, and I felt myself turn a little away from her.
“Okay,” Murphy said gently, raising her hands. “Okay.”
I swallowed and realized that I was parched. Starving. And, more than anything, I was weary. Desperately, desolately tired. And the prospect of sleep was terrifying. I turned to look at Murphy and saw the pain on her face as she watched me. “Karrin,” I said. “I’m tired.”
I looked down at the child, a sleepy, warm little presence who had simply accepted what meager shelter and comfort I had been able to offer. And I thought my heart would break. Break more. Because I knew that I couldn’t be what she needed. That I could never give her what she had to have to stand a chance of growing up strong and sane and happy.
Because I had made a deal. If I hadn’t done it, she’d be dead—but because I had, I couldn’t be what she deserved to have.
Never looking away from the little girl’s face, I whispered, “Will you do me a favor?”
“Yes,” Karrin said. Such a simple word, to have so much reassuring mass.
My throat tightened and my vision blurred. It took me two tries to speak. “Please take her to Father Forthill, when we get b-back,” I said. “T-tell him that she needs to disappear. The safest place he has. That I . . .” My voice failed. I took deep breaths and said, “And I don’t need to know where. T-tell him that for me.”
I turned to Murphy and said, “Please?”
She looked at me as if her heart were breaking. But she had a soul of steel, of strength, and her eyes were steady and direct. “Yes.”
I bit my lip.
And, very carefully, I passed my little girl over into her arms. Murphy took her, and didn’t comment about the weight. But then, she wouldn’t.
“God,” I said, not two full seconds later. “Molly. Where is she?”
Murphy looked up at me as she settled down to hold the child. The girl murmured a sleepy complaint, and Murphy rocked her gently to soothe her back to sleep. “Wow. You were really out of it. You didn’t see the helicopter?”
I raked through my memories of the night. “Um. No.”
“After . . .” She glanced at me and then away. “After,” she said more firmly, “Thomas found a landline and made a call. And a navy helicopter landed right out there on the lawn less than an hour later. Lifted him, Molly, and Mouse right out.”