“Well,” he said. “This certainly changes things.”
EIGHT
WE ALL HAVE DIFFERENT WAYS OF HANDLING such situations. If I’d been alone, I would have run without a moment’s hesitation. Hell, it had worked once. Victor automatically crouched into a fighting stance. I don’t think he even knew he had done so; it was just a reaction as unconscious and natural to him as breathing. Eli simply walked forward until he was two feet away. He gestured toward the darkness where the fake Ifrit had vanished.
“Was that your doing?”
The Wendigo smiled, but it wasn’t bright and cheery this time.
“Not at all. I would imagine your clever stone circle attracted it.”
“Quite possibly,” said Eli. “So, you’re free. What now? Are you going to help us or not?”
You had to admire him. Eli just assumed, matter-of factly, that there was no danger now that the Wendigo was free. He just carried on as if nothing about the situation had changed. I’ve seen him do that before. Mostly, it works, but that’s because it’s Eli. If I tried something like that, I would most likely end up as lunch. But the Wendigo seemed more than happy to play along. Maybe he’d been telling the truth after all.
“Again, what’s in it for me?” he said. “You don’t seem to have as much to offer now.”
Eli pointed at the stones scattered on the ground. After the test runs and the trap, they were barely glowing.
“You absorb magical power. Those stones have enough to keep you going for I don’t know how long-months, at least, I’d say.”
The Wendigo glanced down at them.
“Not anymore, they don’t. They’re almost used up.”
“Yes, but we have more of them. We’ll trade you-stones for Sherwood. You bring her back and we’ll give you enough of them to last quite a while.”
“Now, that is tempting.”
“He claims Richard Cory is back safe,” I put in. “If he is, if he’s telling the truth, great. But if not…”
“You’ll hunt me down like a dog?”
“We can at least make your life difficult,” said Victor.
“I’m sure you could. And if I just take care of you all right now? I could, you know.”
“Possibly,” said Eli. “But to what purpose? You wouldn’t get any stones that way. And maybe it wouldn’t turn out for you as well as you might think. Those stones are not our only tools.”
Eli seemed to grow in size and bulk, and his voice became quietly menacing. He was an impressive figure, and anyone or anything would think twice about taking him on. What the Wendigo didn’t know was that it was entirely a bluff. Eli of course has great intellect and presence, but no real intrinsic power. Victor would put up a fight, but even with my help I had a feeling we’d be badly outmanned. But it worked. I don’t know if the Wendigo was unsure of our powers, or if he simply had no bad intentions, or if he really wanted those stones, but it worked.
“Deal,” he said. “I’ll be at your house tomorrow morning. I’ll call back this Sherwood for you, and you’ll hand over the stones.”
“My house?” said Victor. “You don’t know where I live.”
“Don’t I? I’ll see you there.”
He walked off, brushing by me. Lou looked over at me, asking if I wanted him to follow, but I shook my head no.
I WAS AT VICTOR’S EARLY NEXT MORNING. IT hadn’t been a bad night’s work. We’d found the Wendigo and got him to agree to do what we wanted. The fake Ifrit had been a surprise, but at least no one had got hurt.
Victor was eating breakfast and grudgingly provided me with coffee. Lou didn’t even bother to beg; he knew it was useless. Victor looked tired as well, which was unusual for him. His earlier leg injury must have taken more out of him than I’d thought. He hadn’t even got around to reading the morning Chronicle, still secure in its orange plastic wrapper.
“Do you think he’ll show?” I asked for the third time. Victor had thrown open the tall front windows, and the early sunlight was streaming through. A pleasant breeze came off the ocean, uncharacteristically warm for so early in the day. For once there was no morning fog. I was sipping coffee, Eli was pacing back and forth, Maggie was sitting by the window, and Lou was lying on a rug, hogging a patch of sun and catching up on his interrupted sleep. He hated mornings almost as much as I did.
We’d got home late, since as soon as we’d left Fort Point I’d driven down to the Bay Bridge to try to find Rolf. He wasn’t around, and even Lou had some trouble tracking him down, so it was a while before we’d run him to ground. And yes, it turned out Richard Cory had indeed returned.
“Was he okay?” I’d asked. “Can I talk to him? He must have some information about this Wendigo.”
“Depends on what you mean by okay,” Rolf had answered. “Weirder than ever-he’s finding it hard to keep a human form these days. And I’m sure he could tell you a lot, but I don’t think he’ll talk to you-I’m not sure he could even if he wanted to. But otherwise, yeah, he’s fine.”
I didn’t bother to complain that he might at least have informed me. It wouldn’t have done any good. But if that much had turned out to be true, there was a good chance our Wendigo would be showing up. And if he did, there was a good chance he could do what he said he could. Otherwise, why bother to make an appearance?
I don’t know what I expected. Maybe for him to materialize in the middle of the study with a puff of smoke, or something equally dramatic, so when the knock on the front door came it was an anticlimax.
Victor answered the door, and there he stood. His forest garb had been replaced by a colored tee with a picture of Elvin Jones behind a drum set and a pair of jeans. He stood in the doorway and looked around appreciatively.
“Quite the warding system,” he said. “Very impressive. I’m not sure even I could get in here without your permission.”
That was something of a relief. The wards around Victor’s house were not strictly his own-Eli and a lot of other knowledgeable practitioners had helped design them, as well as contributing their own power into keeping them strong. The wards around my own house are clever and subtle, strong enough to do the job, but nothing special. Victor was protected by state-of-the-art constructions, utilitarian, sleek and gleaming, and composed mostly of lines of sheer and forbidding power. It was reassuring they could block even a magical creature of power.
Victor reached out and touched him on the shoulder. An almost invisible spark of energy passed between them, providing the Wendigo with the magical equivalent of a key card. Once he was inside, Victor led the way up to the study.
“Very nice,” said the Wendigo, looking around at the dark paneling, huge fireplace, and tall windows. “A bit too faux Victorian for my tastes, but nice, nonetheless.”
“Thank you,” said Victor without the slightest trace of sarcasm. “Let’s get down to business.”
“You have the stones?”
Eli opened the old messenger bag and showed the stones to him, then closed it firmly. Like at Mama Yara’s botanica, it reminded me of nothing so much as a dope deal, complete with suspicion on both sides. The Wendigo turned to me.
“I’ll need your help,” he said. “Or rather, it will be a lot easier if you’re involved.”
“Okay,” I said. I still didn’t trust him, though. “Are we actually going somewhere, physically, or is this just a psychic journey?” I remembered asking Eli the same question when I’d gone seeking the origin of the rune stones, more than a year ago.
“Ahh, well, that depends on how you look at it,” the Wendigo said. I should have known.
“Let me guess. It’s not an either/or question.”
“Exactly. I’m glad you understand.”
“Yeah, me, too. But on the practical side, what if something happens to us there?”
“Well, then the question becomes academic, but we won’t wake up safe in our beds; that I can assure you.” He held out his hand, impatiently. “Here, just relax; take my hand. Envision the place where you were when you saw her.” I wasn’t that eager to let him touch me, but I did it. His hand was warm, pulsing with magical energy. Nothing else happened. “It might be easier if you close your eyes and block out your present surroundings.”