"It does not need wit. What one of you would have to do by craft, it will do by instinct, for lack of a better word. It is terrible in its implacability. It will follow its quarry wherever he goes, in whatever world, without pausing to rest and without a single qualm or hesitation. It does not think, not as you and I do, but it does not need to. It will take new bodies as it needs them to pursue its quarry, so it will never grow weary. Eventually — inevitably — it will find him and cleave to him, and then it will bring him to us. Clutched in its grip, the one you want will tell you anything, do anything, give up anything he has, just to be free of this hungry, gnawing thing."
"Ah. I see." Hellebore nodded. "It is very good."
"It is… horrible," said Lord Foxglove.
"It is both," said the Remover. "In all the spheres there are only a few perfect things. This is one of them."
When the three lords left the warehouse room, they found the two ogre bodyguards halfway down the corridor, staring up at the ceiling with mouths slack and arms dangling uselessly. Their legs worked just well enough for them to plod after their masters, but it was only when the black coach's doors had thumped shut and the horse-faced chauffeur had laboriously turned it around and driven it back out of the narrow street toward the freeway that the bodyguards began to blink their eyes and mumble. By the time the long black limousine passed out of the waterfront district they could talk again, but the huge gray creatures still could not remember anything that had happened to them while they waited in the hall.
5
BOOK
"But, hey, you'll be getting some money from the house, right? You could buy your own PA system."
"I don't know. I don't think so — not right now."
"I'm serious, man. What they did sucked. I'd quit tomorrow if you wanted me to. We could find some other musicians, no problem. Guitar players, man, they grow on trees. The world is full of skinny guys who sat in their rooms all through high school learning to play every Van Halen solo."
Theo couldn't help smiling, even though Johnny couldn't see him. "Yeah, just what I need. Hook up with another worshiper of the extended guitar break."
"Whatever, man. Hell, we could get a keyboard guy, instead. We could play anything. You used to write some cool tunes, Theo. And lyrics, too — remember that thing you wrote about your father was a storm, or lightning, something like that? You should start writing again — you were wasted with the Clouds, anyway. You need to get back to your roots, dude. When I first met you, I used to think, 'Man, this guy's definitely going somewhere,' and I just wanted to hang onto you 'til you got there. You could be that guy again."
"What is this, National Theo's-Over-the-Hill-Month or something?" Cat had said something like it, too. Potential. A great word for people to use about you when you were twenty, an embarrassment when you hit thirty.
"What are you talking about, man? I'm just saying that you got tons of talent, Thee. You need to use it."
It was hard to talk. It had been good to hear Johnny's voice, to get past the stumbling apologies and into areas in which they were both comfortable (like what an asshole Kris Rolle was), but now he was tired. He hadn't been talking much lately and he was out of practice.
"I don't know, John-O. Maybe. Maybe later on. Right now I don't feel much like playing music, anything like that. You keep playing with the Clouds boys. Kris is pretty talented, really, even though I can't stand the skinny little bastard. Maybe you really will get a record deal. Don't give that up for me."
"But you're my friend, man!"
That caught him short. It took a moment to move forward, to continue letting go. "Thanks. Really. You're my friend too, John, don't ever doubt it. I'm just not going to be very good at friendship stuff for a little while. I'm… I don't know, I'm just out of juice. My batteries are empty."
"So what are you going to do, now that… ? I mean, you gonna go back to Khasigian's?"
"Not right now. I'm going to sell the house, take a little time. You know that old joke — 'Death is life's way of telling you to slow down'? Well, it works best when you're the one that dies, but I found out it pretty much works no matter what." He hesitated, unwilling to wander too far out into the things he had been thinking about. It wasn't really the kind of shit his friend wanted to hear, or would even understand. "I'm just not ready to be in the world right now, Johnny. Give me some time, I'll be back."
"You better, or I'll come over and kick your ass."
When he was off the phone he took a deep breath, stared hard at the pile of real estate forms on the dining room table, and decided that it really wasn't too early for a second beer after all. You could pour things into an emptiness like this all day but it would never fill up.
Hey, I'm doing paperwork, selling property, right? That means I'm employed. I'm just lucky enough to have a boss who allows me to drink in the afternoon.
He emptied half the beer in the first few swallows, then rubbed the cool bottle against his forehead, wanting everything to soften up, to get smooth and simple. Sure, he was drinking too much, but give a guy a break. He'd lost his girlfriend, their baby, and now his mother, all in a few months. Not a therapist in the world would fault him. And if he bumped into one who would, well, he'd smack him in the mouth.
Shit. He stared bleakly at the forms, at the boxes of his mother's carefully ordered papers. The house was oppressing him, everything staying just where he left it each day because no one else lived there. All the clean, desolate surfaces, the empty rooms, his mother's things already stuffed into boxes and moved out to the garage because it was just too damn depressing to look at them any more. But yesterday the real estate lady had been in two or three times with clients, and seemed in her horrifyingly chipper way to think that she had a few serious buyers already.
Thank God for a strong housing market. The faster it sold, the less time he'd have to live there.
He finished off the beer, contemplated briefly getting two or three more out of the fridge and just cashing in the afternoon in front of some stupid television movie — not that he'd find anything decent, because his mom had never bothered to get cable, but that wasn't the point, was it? The point was to blot out the long hours, to smear the transition into evening, when he would have the excuse of going out to get dinner somewhere; then he could come back and safely, responsibly drink a few more beers like any normal householder, fall asleep watching the late news, and not have to think until the morning sun was blazing through the windows again.
Something gurgled in his throat. It took a moment before he realized it was a scream bottled in his innards, a blast of misery trying to force its way out. He felt a chill across his hot skin, like the first signs of a bad flu.
What am I doing? I don't belong here.
He forced himself to get up and go to the table, staggering a little as he went — had it been four beers already, or just three? He sat in front of the boxes and spread papers, the tidy big blue envelopes from the realtor, his mother's address book and card files, but he found he couldn't move. The light suddenly seemed wrong even with all the drapes pulled, as though the entire house had been lifted out of the warm but unexceptional Northern California sunshine and dropped down onto the boiling surface of the planet Mercury. Worst of all, he felt something else staring out through his eyes, as though like a television image gone out of sync there was suddenly more than one Theo. It was the dream, the terrible dream that came to him so often, but he was awake. The alien presence was just… there, no thoughts he could share, nothing but a vague, oppressive sense of connection.