Greywalker

I gasped, clutching my very sore belly, and lay back into the chair.

"Maybe we should rethink our schedule, Harper."

"Huh?" I mumbled. I didn't think I could move. The chair was drawing me into its old, worn shape, muffling me with the comforting smell of warm leather and old files. My eyelids were as sore as the rest, so I closed them.

"You seem pretty wrecked. Maybe you should rest a couple of days before we go after that organ."

"Can't. Carlos and Edward laid plans. 'Sides, longer we wait, better chance the ghost will find it, or something like tonight happens again. Can't take much more of this. Have to cut it off, now…"

Cameron sighed a long, sad stream of blue fog. "I guess." I heard him say as the soft mist folded over me and I faded down to unconsciousness.

The buzzing of my pager woke me. My office was chill and empty but for me and a sound in the hall. My chest ached more than the rest of me.

Clank and scratch, something pushed on my office door. I started to raise my head. A flicker passed the edge of my vision. I peered side-ways and the Grey blazed in sunrise colors around the door, centered on a furious, red shape. I whipped my head to look, letting the Grey well up all around, flushing the room with rippling strands and a thin, cold mist.

Alice flew through the door at me. By reflex, I flung up my hands, shoving back against the grim crimson of her fury. She stopped inches from me, teeth bared and hands like reaping hooks.

She was a horror. A long slash had rent away part of her cheek, deforming her mouth and leaving a band of muscle exposed. Her clothing was tattered and her limbs were misshapen, showing broken bones and gouges that oozed black. Fury, pain, and violence whirled around her, reeking of blood and eviscerated bodies.

Looming over me, she hissed through her broken mouth, "Trickster witch. I would shred you, but your blood will feed me better."

My heart racketed and choked me. I barely dredged up the words, "No harm, Alice. You promised."

"Lied to me. Betrayed me. You die for it."

I rolled out of the chair and leaned on my desk, weak-legged. "I agreed to make a path to Edward and stand aside. Only that. I did that. I didn't stand in your way. I told you to be patient. You misplayed your moment." Barely keeping my brain functioning, I was dizzy with fatigue, and the Grey twisted through me, wringing out my strength.

She howled rage, frozen by her promise. My geas had worked.

She leveled burning eyes at me, catching me, pressing her command against me. "I will find a way and you will stand aside. You will neither help nor hinder. You will do nothing and you will go unharmed. Break this promise, and I will kill you for days, dine upon you slowly, drinking your screams like wine."

I couldn't pull away from her. I was too exhausted to push or dodge. It wouldn't matter, though, once the organ was gone. I found myself nodding, panting, "All right. I'll stand aside."

She spun away, the door crashing behind her as I fell to the floor.

I woke at five o'clock, stiff, cold, and miserable, huddled on the floor. I dragged myself home.

A phone call awakened me again at ten. Nightmares of the night before left me incoherent when I answered, but the voice on the other end chirped, "Good morning. May I speak to Harper Blaine, please?"

I grunted and prepared to dump her into telephonic oblivion. The last thing I could deal with was a telemarketer.

"Ms. Blaine? Edward Kammerling requested that we call you and confirm your appointment and ask if everything was still on schedule."

"Uh… yeah. Edwards OK?"

"Oh, yes. He wanted you to know that everything is on track for tonight's party, but that you will have to make your own transportation arrangements. He has his own way in, of course. Will that be a problem?"

"No."

"That's what we hoped to hear. Everything else will be taken care of. Thank you and have a nice day!"

My stomach gurgled and I pitched the phone back into its cradle, burying my head under the pillow and wishing damnation on all TPM employees, living or undead.

Getting out of bed was difficult. My limbs were stiff with scabs and bruises, I felt like I had the flu, and too many sleepless nights weighed me down. The previous night was muddy in my mind, nightmare differentiated poorly from reality. The night ahead didn't promise to be any better.

I called Will, hoping to touch normalcy. Michael answered.

"Where's Will?"

"He's out at the police station."

"Is he OK?"

I could hear him shrug, unhappily. "I guess… I gotta go to class. I'll tell him you called, though."

That would have to do. I wandered around the condo, listless, aching. I kept picking up the ferret and cuddling her, hoping that things weren't as awful as they seemed and that hiding my face in her warm, fragrant fur would somehow make them better. Chaos didn't appreciate the attention and jumped out of my stifling arms, skipping off to throw books down from shelves. I hoped I'd see her again and I left a note for my neighbor, just in case I didn't.

I called Mara and told her about my meeting with Edward and what I needed from her now. She said she'd have to discuss it with Ben. Dragging my feet, I gathered up my stuff and hauled myself to the office.

I paged Quinton between bouts of uninteresting paperwork and frustrating phone calls. He strolled in a little after noon and glanced at the boarded-over windows. "What happened? Somebody try to break in again?"

"Rough client."

"Not your guy with the Camaro."

"No, the one who doesn't show up on video."

He growled, looking me over. "He roughed you up?"

"I fell on some stairs."

He shot a queer glance at me.

"It's the truth. Look, Quinton, I have a problem a lot worse than a tumble on the steps."

"What do you need?"

"I need to get past a security system so I can break something."

He blinked a few times. "Umm…. that's often illegal."

"Yeah. But I can't come up with another option. If it doesn't get done—I just have to."

He frowned at the desperation in my voice. "Must be something pretty bad. Why do you need to do this?"

I shook my head at myself. "It's nuts."

"What can be weirder than putting an alarm in a car trunk for a vampire?"

"How 'bout exorcising a ghost and defusing a paranormal time bomb?"

He rocked on his heels and nodded. "OK. That's weirder. How did you get mixed up in that? Your client?"

"The guy who broke my windows. He's a ghost. I didn't know it when I took the job."

Quinton sat down and waited for the rest.

I sighed. "He hired me to find a piece of furniture. I found it, but couldn't get it for him. He got rough and I figured out what he was. I didn't want to keep working for him. He made it clear he would do whatever it took to get what he wanted and if I stood in his way, he'd go through me. I can't run from him—he's a ghost—and I can't imagine what he's capable of. I figured the only way to get rid of him was to find out why he really wanted the thing. Now I know. And it's terrible. There is no option but to stop him."

I closed my eyes a moment, tired, but relieved to have gotten it all out. I wondered if Quinton thought I was crazy yet.

He mulled it for a moment. "Why does this job fall on you? Why do you have to stop it?"

I played with a pencil and didn't look at him. "I'm afraid that this thing will hurt me, too. I'm a little bit ghost or monster myself, connected to all of this stuff. Horrible things have happened, and I'm just too much a coward to let this happen, too. This is the only thing I can think of to stop it."

Quinton was quiet. I continued playing with the pencil and breathing around the stone in my chest.

Finally he asked, "So what building are we breaking into? Give me all the information you've got and I'll hunt down the rest. By the way, when are we doing this?"