“Sorry, kid,” he said. “Time is of the essence.”
I prepared to swing at any sign of Cyrus, but when the door fell open, the sight before us caused me to forget all pursuit. We had been prepared for a secret escape route. We were not prepared for a pile of bodies. My arms went weak and the bat fell from my hands.
Cyrus was nowhere to be found. My first impression was that Connor and I had entered some kind of mass tomb, except it struck me (morbidly so) that there was no stench of rot or decay. The dark room smelled only of the unwashed, some of whom stirred lethargically in response to the thin column of light pouring in behind us. At a quick count, there were close to twenty people lying on the ground-and they all looked like utter crap, but I was relieved that they all looked alive. There were men and women, some old and some young, but they all had one thing in common: their hair was completely white.
“What in God’s name is going on in here?” Connor said softly.
I stooped over a girl in her midtwenties and moved her head from side to side gently, looking for bite marks. Despite the lack of vampires in a city like New York, I had no idea what else it could be. The girl seemed barely aware I was in the room. She looked quite gaunt, though physically unharmed. Connor bent over, scooped something up, and turned to face me. In his hand was a small clay pot, roughly the size of a tennis ball.
“Look familiar?” he said. “All those broken shards of pottery in the alley that night…”
“They looked strung out,” I said.
Connor handed me the pot. It was empty, but whatever had been in it had left a sickeningly sweet smell, like overripe fruit. A drop of opaque residue clung to the container’s lip. “What is it?” I handed the pot back to Connor, who slipped it into his coat pocket.
“It’s a residue left by the plasmic energy generated from the electrical impulses of a spirit when it’s been confined to a tiny area for too long.”
“Spirits are tangible?” In my dealings with Irene, I hadn’t been able to touch her, but it made sense that there must be some level of corporeality. As Connor had pointed out, she could sit on a chair or walk across a floor without constantly drifting through it.
Connor nodded. “Some spirits more so than others. Depends on their after-death strength. Like your Irene, for example. There’s not really an exact science to it, although I hear that Haunts-General is doing some fantastic phantasmagoric research in that area.”
“If these jars are here and the residue is here,” I said, “where the hell are the spirits?”
One of the bodies near my feet stirred, rolled over, and resettled on my shoes. I stepped back gingerly, careful not to disturb anyone in the process.
“That’s what I’m getting at,” Connor said. He looked sadder than I had ever seen him. “This is some serious stuff going on here, Simon. These spirits have been entirely destroyed by this group of junkies. They’re Ghostsniffers.”
I stared blankly at Connor.
Connor simply looked at me and continued. “The Fraternal Order of Goodness basically put a stop to this type of activity over thirty years ago, kid. Certain cultists and spiritualists became addicted to the momentary high experienced when a spirit passes through a living person. When an uncontained spirit passes through someone, no harm really comes to either party, unless you count the hair damage. Thing is, the spirits that were in these jars have been purposefully packed tight into containment. These addicts have been mainlining concentrated plasmic energy straight into their systems.”
“Sounds ghastly,” I said.
“Ghastly?” Connor said. “Christ, that’s an understatement. Just look at them! Even for Ghostsniffers, they look bad. Something’s amplifying the effect on these people like some kind of supercrack. Normally they’d have streaks in their hair, like mine, but they’ve gone totally white. Whatever is juicing things up is shocking out the pigment entirely.”
“Maybe the fish has something to do with this,” I suggested. “I mean, we asked Gaynor to point us toward the fish and this is what we find.”
“Maybe,” Connor agreed, “but we still don’t know the why of it all.”
I looked down at all the people lying around us. These had to be some of the sickliest-looking people I had ever seen. Not only were their eyes sunk deep into their sockets, it seemed like their very souls were sunken as well.
“This is bad juju, Simon. It’s a taboo practice even among the more hardcore cultists. It wouldn’t be so bad if the spirits survived the process, but it absolutely destroys them when they’ve been forcibly concentrated like this. We’ve got to figure out who’s been processing these spirits. Containing them, distributing them…it’s not an easy task.”
“You mean this isn’t just Cyrus’s doing?” I asked.
Connor shook his head.
“I don’t think so,” Connor said. “It’s too large a project. Look around. This is just a flophouse. There’s no equipment set up for this type of operation here. At the worst, it looks like he was running a Ghostsniffing lair, like one of those old opium dens.”
“I’m still going to hold Cyrus accountable when we catch up to him,” I said. “This is not cool. Not coolat all.”
I wished I knew what to do to help these pathetic souls, but this wasn’t my area of expertise at all. I pulled out my phone, but there was no signal. “Once we’re outside, I’ll call it in.”
“We need to get these people help,” Connor said. “Have them send a Shadower team to watch the store in case Cyrus comes back. Make sure they put someone on Cyrus’s apartment, too.”
I nodded.
“I’m sure Greater and Lesser Arcana would like to get their hands on some of these books,” Connor continued. “They’ll probably want to get one of their agents in here to run the store until the Enchancellors figure out exactly what to do with Tome, Sweet Tome.”
I looked down at the pile of near lifeless users on the floor. They were our first priority. Catching Cyrus would have to wait.
23
As expected, the Inspectre was disturbed by our find at Tome, Sweet Tome, but both he and Director Wesker seemed quite pleased to add the Black Stacks to their list of departmental acquisitions. Representatives from every division showed up, especially a large contingent of archivists from the Gauntlet. I spied one of their rank-and-file members, Godfrey Candella, grinning from ear to ear, despite the abominations that had happened there. He and several other agents chased a few eager-to-escape books around, scooping them into fishing nets.
At that point, there wasn’t much for me to do. Using my psychic ability over and over to track Cyrus had exhausted me, and I no longer felt of any use. I’d offered to try to use my power on one of the clay pots once it came back, but Connor’s face had gone white. “I would not recommend that, kid,” he said, stricken. “You might not come back.” Since there was no update from Shadower on Cyrus’s whereabouts and I had little expertise in dealing with a roomful of ectoplasmic nose-candy junkies, I quietly dismissed myself from the store and let those better equipped to do so work the scene.
I made my way back to the Lovecraft, but stopped by my desk only long enough to grab Jane’s journal. I didn’t want to do this, but the stakes were getting higher and higher. Maybe the journal would give me some insight into the Sectarian involvement in all this. I walked out to the coffee shop after deciding to forgo the office environment entirely for the comfort of an enormous puffy chair. The steaming hiss of the espresso machine did little to relax me while I waited for a coffee. I stared at the unopened book. Its cover was gilded with astrological signs. Tension mounted thick across my shoulders.