Dust + Ashes, page 36
Sarah stopped pulling the door open and frowned. She looked back at the table. Both her fathers, real and biological, were standing now, side-by-side and watching her. There was something oddly identical about them, despite the vast difference in their appearances. For a moment, Sarah couldn’t quite place what it was and then she realized they were both standing with the same at-ease posture. Marcus looked like the laid back, smiling man he’d been before Hope Falls had hardened him. Eddie seemed to be, unintentionally, mirroring him.
Sarah gasped and covered her mouth. “Dad?”
“It’s okay, Sarah,” her stepfather said. He smiled. “I don’t like the situation any more than you, but it’s what we have to work with. And as much as I do not want to trust this son-of-a-bitch, God help me, he’s sincere. He’s sincere about wanting to stop the Greater.”
“But he wants to bring the Greater here. He wants me to do it. He wants me to destroy the world.”
“Yeah,” Eddie said. “Of course I do, out there. Because that’s what the Greater wants. It wants that more than anything in existence, so it throws all its Will at us to make us want that, too. It uses us like puppets. But in here, I can honestly say that is not what I want. I, Edmund Reginald Greene the Fourth, have never wanted that.”
“So, why don’t you resist it?” Sarah asked. “I do. Every minute of every day.”
“How’s that been working out for you? You already forget that you can’t trust your own mind, because it’s not really your mind, not entirely? You’ve been in the mix for five years now and you’re already feeling the strain.” Suddenly, Eddie looked exhausted. Wrinkles appeared around his eyes, his styled hair greasy and too long, and the soft, boyishness of his face hardened. He didn’t transform; it wasn’t glamour, or the lack thereof. He was just a tired man dropping all pretense and being himself. “Try for over twenty.”
“That’s your excuse for being a bastard?” she said. “You’re too tired to fight it anymore? You’re just worn down?”
“Aren’t you?”
She bit her tongue. She was tired, but she didn’t want to agree with him and prove his point.
“You’re strong, Sarah,” Eddie went on when she didn’t answer. “Far, far stronger than any of the Lesser or Blood, including me, just as I was far stronger than my father. Because that’s how we were made.” He paused, glowering at nothing for a moment. “When my father died, his body was returned to the Rend. The Greater recycled and refined it, tempering its biological material to create the seed that would become you, the Vessel capable of containing its entirety and power. Before that, my grandfather died so that I could be born—fabricated—and so on and so on back to the first poor sap that was thrown into the Rend to provide the genetic foundation for the Greater’s tinkering. And it does all this just so that it can deconstruct the very reality it went through all that trouble to exist within in the first place.” He snickered. “My daughter, the hazmat suit-wrecking ball combo.”
Sarah said nothing. She glared down at the tabletop. Eddie went on.
“We’re its Blood. We share its body and its mind and are imbued with a fraction of its power—the Will. We are it, and that’s how it dominates us. We were created to be autonomous but still part of the whole, and the whole has mastery over all of its parts.”
“So, no matter what we do, it will control us? Is that what you’re saying?” Sarah asked and lifted her head, shifting her glare back to him. Any hope she felt had shrunk to a dismal proportion, but strangely, Eddie smirked.
“It is our failing as Blood. And as weak-willed humans.” His smile widened. “But I believe that’s also our greatest strength. We have an edge. Our shared material is why it can’t punish us like it does the Lesser. We’re tied to it, so de-evolving us would risk undoing all of its careful work. And, then there’s the Will itself to consider.”
“The Will?” Sarah lifted a hand to her chest, almost expecting that terrible pressure of the pulse to begin. When it didn’t, she took a deep breath and looked at Marcus. He still appeared clear-eyed and relaxed. He nodded to her. Keep listening.
“It’s not limitless. It’s a tool, an ability that allows the Greater to manipulate primordial energy and the matter it corrupts. Each of the Blood have been imbued with a fraction of it, but the Greater would never create something it couldn’t control. It wouldn’t allow a fabricant sharing its formidable body and mind to rival itself in power and have autonomy, as you and I do. It’s built into our design, but that’s how we can use it to fight back.”
“How? You just said—”
“You were created with the potential to contain the entirety of the Greater and wield the full extent of its Will, but you were only imbued with maybe a quarter of that power. I’m half as strong as you, but I have experience on my side. I know how its mind works, what it overlooks, and what it punishes. Neither of us is strong enough to resist the Greater’s shareholding majority without being quashed, so it easily dominates us. But together we might stand a chance.”
Sarah frowned. “What, like, both of us thinking the same thing at the same time?”
“Sort of. By breaking up its body and its power to create us, the Greater weakened its self. Because you’re not just an empty Vessel waiting to be filled, Sarah, and neither am I. We still have our human minds, our own thoughts and desires, our own wills, our souls, tied into the Greater’s, while simultaneously being part of its mind. It fractured its psyche to create us and must exert more energy with less Will to keep each of us in line, but I think we can change that if we both focus. The problem is, I can’t guarantee that I’ll be cooperative once we’re outside this place. I’m the weaker, more conditioned, of us. All it needs is to dominate me again, and it’ll use my power against you, like it has in the past. And even without me aiding it, you’re going to have a heck of a time staying focused if it decides to launch a full-on attack on you.”
“This isn’t very reassuring,” Sarah said. “How is this a strength?”
“We’re not alone. There’s a third autonomous player in the game: the Loyal.”
“The Loyal?” Sarah asked, frowning.
Marcus perked up. “I know this. They’re a sort of Godparent or overseer to the Blood. A normal, if extremely devout human who’s made Lesser and given additional powers to act as a shepherd, or gardener, to the Blood and the rest of their extended family,” he explained.
Eddie nodded. “Since each generation must be imbued with more Will than the last, it increases the likelihood of a, let’s say, rogue agent before they’re mature. Kid’s rebel. It’s a fact. So, there must be a third source of Will in this reality available to help guide the stronger, younger generation. Not only that, but they help temper the younger Blood by feeding additional power to us as we develop. In the case of our family, it was poor, old Archie Tillman. Poor man was given enough Will to keep us Blood and our Lesser in check and with it enough lifetimes to make sure the job’s done.”
“La Llorona was the Loyal to her family,” Marcus said.
“I thought she was the previous Vessel’s mother?” Sarah asked.
He nodded. “She was. Her husband killed his previous Loyal and transferred the power to her to save her life during childbirth. He thought her capacity of faith and direct relation to the Vessel made her the perfect candidate to protect and guide the child, and accept the Greater as a new god, but Rona never swayed in her belief.”
“Which makes her endlessly fascinating to the Greater,” Eddie added. “It likes to understand things, and she is one heck of a specimen to study. It devised an experiment to test her faith in the form of a wager, and it’s held to that wager for centuries. However, it must understand that her continued existence and capacity of Will poses a threat, but since she seemed content to stay out of picture, it compartmentalized her existence from the rest of the hivemind and let her be.”
“Until I dragged her out of retirement,” Marcus said.
“I only discovered she existed because you did,” Eddie said. “You got her to open up to the Greater, and I got to see inside her head.”
“You possessed her,” Sarah said. “I remember.”
Eddie shrugged. “A Loyal’s purpose is to aid us and, eventually, to relinquish their power either to a new Loyal if the situation demands it or to the Vessel when the proper time comes. That’s what was supposed to happen in the caves all those years ago. The Final Sacrament. Archie Tillman was open, prepared to relinquish his everlasting life and pass all of his power to you, as he was meant to, but something,” he shared a look with Marcus, “disrupted the transfer.”
“Benji knocked him out and Mr. Nash dosed him with valerian,” Marcus said. He shuddered. “Remember the scene in Last Crusade where the Nazi drinks from the wrong grail? It wasn’t pretty.”
“No. It wouldn’t have been,” Eddie said. “The man was nearly two hundred years old.” He glanced out the window at the dark clouds swirling overhead. “Anyway, Archie’s Will was lamentably reabsorbed by the Greater. But La Llorona’s still in the tower, and she still has a Loyal’s measure of Will. If you can convince her to help us, I think the three of us, united, might stand a chance. We might be a match for the power the Greater still holds for itself.”
“Might is a telling word,” Sarah said. “Even with the Loyal, we’re still the minority if your math is correct.”
Eddie tapped his bottom lip. “Sometimes what matters most is quality rather than quantity. Wouldn’t you agree?”
He looked around suddenly, and Sarah realized the diner had fallen silent. The jukebox had gone dark. Through the order window, the kitchen light flickered.
“Okay,” Sarah said. “With La Llorona we can almost match the Greater for strength. But then what? How do we beat it? Can it be beat? Can it... die?”
“I honestly don’t know,” Eddie said. “It was the master of its own Creation. In terms of that, anything is possible.”
“So, what do we do?”
“Close and repair the Rend, for one. That’s the only way to ensure the world is safe.”
“And what does that mean for Sarah?” Marcus asked. He looked back and forth between the two of them. “What does it mean for both of you, for London, and anyone who’s been infected by the Greater’s corruption? What happens when its influence is cut off? Are they all going to go gooey?”
“We could purge the corruption,” Sarah said. “You said anything’s possible. And we saw Dean Lafferty restored to humanity. Mostly. His memories were sketchy, and it didn’t last long, but the Greater did restore him.”
Eddie scratched his chin, thinking. “Interesting. I don’t think that’s ever been done before or had to be done. It’s not the Greater’s style, but the Will allows you to control the corruption and whatever mutation it causes.”
Marcus grimaced. “We’re talking about human beings who’ve been mutated into Lesser and abominations. I don’t think it would be pleasant or survivable to just rip out the mutagen.”
“No, probably not,” Eddie agreed. “If you want them alive after the process, you’re gonna need a bit of finesse to restore and purge them.”
Sarah frowned at her hands, remembering the scouring torrents of power she was capable of unleashing. She’d managed to open the portal with some measure of finesse before the spiders had ripped control away, and her own power had overwhelmed her. “I think I can manage that.”
“Get to Blackwing, find Rona, find Lilian and Dad, purge the viels, close the Rend, save the world.” Marcus ticked off the objectives on his fingers. He sighed. “No big deal. Easy as pie.”
“Easy as pie,” Eddie echoed and smiled at his daughter, enigmatic. The diner rumbled. Overhead, the lights flickered and, one-by-one, went out. Eddie’s smile faded with them. “I think that’s about all the time we have, folks. You’d better get going.”
“What about you?” Sarah asked. “Aren’t you coming with us? Where’s Tia?”
He glanced back at the kitchen door and half-shook his head. “Tia and I have to go a slightly different route, I think. But I’m sure we’ll all reach the finish line together.”
The kitchen doors banged open, revealing an inky blackness on the other side. The sides of the door trailed wisps of fraying thread into it. Sarah squinted at it. She thought there was someone standing in that blackness, just out of sight.
“That’s my cue,” Eddie continued. “Oh, and one more thing.” He stood and removed something from his pocket and slid it across the table to her. “You forgot this. Thought you might want it back. Consider it a belated birthday gift.”
Sarah goggled at the object: her iPod, left behind in the safehouse that had burned and vanished from reality. Picking it up, she studied it. It was hers, the same one she’d received for her fifteenth birthday just before her entire world had been flipped upside-down. “How did you get this?”
He shrugged. “I told you, I’m an acquisitions lawyer. I did a little negotiating and had a friend pull some strings. You have some good tracks on there. Thank God you inherited a decent taste in music.” He grinned. “Anyway, it’s all charged and ready to go. It should help keep the edge off.”
“It will. Thank you.”
“Psssh. No worries. And... good luck. To both of you.” He jogged toward the kitchen door. Just before going through, he paused and looked back. This time, the sadness in his smile was plain. He said nothing more, took a deep breath, and dove through into the darkness. As soon as he was gone, the diner began to fade around them.
Sarah gripped her iPod, gaping at the vanishing walls and 1950s decor. Within seconds it was all gone, and she and Marcus were left standing in an empty construction lot. Beside her, Marcus bent and picked something up.
“What is it?” she asked.
“A doll,” he said, showing it to her. It looked like a yarn doll she had given Tia years ago, except this one had yellow hair and green button eyes, instead of pink and black. He handed it to her, and something resonated from it, like Tia, a clear and calming note.
“Let’s get this over with,” she said, tucking it into her pocket.
In her head, the Greater’s pulse began to thunder.
XI.
SO, I’M CAUGHT. TO trust or not to trust. It’s not the first tricky situation I’ve faced, and right now, my only ally is my worst nightmare. Except...
Except...
I don’t want to die. Not down in this hell, not knowing that you’re still in danger, still a danger. Not if there’s a chance to save you and our family and the whole rest of the world. I’ve made hard decisions to trust dangerous people before, and I remember now. I remember all of it, not just what Dr. Lane hid away, but also what your father did, too. To protect us.
When I took my chance and ran from Stephen Tillman in that grocery store, I only wanted Melanie to take me home. I still thought there must be some mundane, rational reason for my marital distress. But then all of the secrets came out once I got there. Mom was overjoyed at my return, of course, but she knew the truth about your father’s family, what you were, the war between humanity and eldritch monsters. And she knew the secret defenders of our world hidden among the very people I had grown up with, family and friends. Melanie was one of them, and it is to Melanie’s credit she didn’t call all of the Crows down on us. Instead, she only called their leader, poor, cancer-ridden Anna Nash, and begged for mercy.
And Anna listened. Before the rest of the Crows would be involved, she and Morrigan came over to determine the situation for themselves. Of course, Mom had an ace up her own sleeve.
She had an interest in keeping you, her granddaughter, safe. But she confessed that her involvement in the matter went much deeper: Kellen Fenhauer, your grandfather, had been a spy for Blackwing, stationed in Hope Falls to observe and report on both the Crows and the Greenes. His falling for a local girl and settling down to start a family helped his cover, but your grandparents did love each other. Dad trusted Mom completely and told her everything. It was a dangerous town, after all, and she had friends that were Crows: she might be targeted by either group, so she needed to know the truth of the situation to protect herself. But they decided I wouldn’t need to know, at least not while I was still young and innocent.
But then Dad died. I tried to be the good daughter; I knew Mom still hurt from Dad’s death, but she was still trying to control everything I did. I know now she was just trying to keep me safe in a dangerous place, but back then it just felt so stifling. I became a teenage rebel—at least, I thought I was worst kind of rebel. In truth, I mostly misbehaved in secret, mainly meeting up with your father to make out or running off occasionally to drink and smoke with Morrigan.
When Mom started moving on, I took it the wrong way, accused her of disrespecting Dad. We started having blowouts. I’d ride off and spend nights in town with Becky, or wherever Morrigan might be holed up. At home, Mom pressed me on school: I wanted to study the environment, and she started finding programs at universities far from Washington. I wondered if she even really cared about me if she wanted me so far away. I made a point to throw out all the out-of-state applications where she’d find them.
On the night we graduated from high school, your father proposed. I didn’t look back. I was all in. But when we announced our engagement, it seemed like the entire town was against me. Even Becky said I was throwing my dreams away, getting married so soon. I didn’t care. I could have it all, marrying someone like Eddie Greene, a rich someone who actually loved me and wanted me around, who’d see my every wish fulfilled.
I don’t think I expected to get pregnant right away. I know I still intended to get my degree. But there were, quite literally, other forces at work.
Despite all my past transgressions, Mom welcomed me home with open arms when Melanie rescued me. She called Blackwing for help even before Melanie called the Crows. When both groups arrived at odds, she explained quite calmly that if there were any way to save you, she’d take it, whether she had to force the two disparate groups to work together herself. The three Crows, Anna, Morrigan, and Melanie, agreed. My mother, your grandmother, was a formidable woman.
