A Bone to Pick, page 13
And I had one chance to get my own magic back. I headed for the nearest restroom.
The room was half full, not a good sign for me. But nobody looked twice when I ran water in the sink and splashed it on the soot-touched face in the mirror. Then I slipped the four Bones from my pocket.
I held the dice hidden between my palms, and scrubbed my hands together in the stream of water. And I whispered the words I’d stolen from the Scarecrow:
“Shalassa lua.”
The shapes in my hands turned colder than ivory, colder than ice, as they drew in something other than heat from the water. I gasped, saw faces glance halfway toward me before looking away. My fingers felt stiff, dead... but this was tap water, too processed from its natural form, and power only trickled into the Bones. Feeling faded from my hands, and I had to rub them together by sight alone, fighting to keep some awareness in them and not let one of the dice slip from my numb grasp.
When I’d held them as long as I could stand, I stepped back and let the faucet shut off, shook my frozen hands dry, and fumbled the Bones back into my pocket. Away from my drained hands, the cold in them felt more muted, only enough to give me some uses of the Pulse.
I walked out at a bracingly quick step. The shock of cold sharpened my memory, and I went straight for the elevator up and across the next floor, and to the way back down to a point beyond where we’d left Broken-Nose. It felt good, knowing I’d gotten by for so long with so little of the Pulse, and now having some of it back again.
Staff and visitors passed me by, each heading their own way. I watched for that first glimpse of Jason that would let me confront him, or even a chance to spot another mob thug.
Then I reached the victim’s room, and a uniformed cop sat in front of it.
So the police did think the people who’d shot up Eagle Square might want their victim silenced. I studied the cop, a rangy-looking black man glancing between the corridor and his phone. Keeping clear of him was one option, but so was identifying myself, or using the Pulse.
I walked up to him. In my best ordinary, not-too-wide-eyed voice, I said “So cops really do this. You’re standing guard over the patient in there?”
The cop smiled back. “Can’t answer that. It could be my partner seeing his mom, or a witness, or anything, and I couldn’t say.”
“I see what you mean.” I could only make out a bit of the room through the door’s window, just the edge of some blocky monitor in a nest of wires. The Bones told me there was only one presence inside, sunken in something dimmer than sleep—and that the cop rippled with suspicion in spite of his friendly look.
I could tell him I was another witness, about the thug lurking around, and try explaining this to Poe... It was just a fleeting thought, that would never get me closer to finding out about Jason. I nodded to the cop and walked back the way I’d come, like someone who’d only wandered over out of curiosity.
Ian and Lucy, where were they? I drew out my phone and called Lucy, but I got no answer. That could simply mean they were busy, or it could be they’d reached here or walked into more of the thugs themselves, or into Jason.
But, all I had were my best guesses. I believed Jason would be on his way here, and Maya’s “shortcut” must still have brought me here ahead of his cab, and long before Ian and Lucy could reach here. So I was still betting he’d come up here, either past me or on Maya’s side of the corridor.
With the floor map to guide me, I circled up and down the corridors where I could watch each person who approached the turn to Lawrence Neal’s room. The way Jason had been tearing down the street, he’d either be here within the hour, or we were wasting our time.
I tried to keep the Pulse to limited use, and each time brought the hospital worry and regret pressing in on me. But I moved, tested...
Until I caught something grim and forbidding closing on the turn behind me, that sent me sidestepping into an empty room before I tested it again.
That presence was headed right for the patient. And I’d read it wrong—the fierce drive I’d felt was tangled up with glaring guilt, with regret and more determination. And pain.
I peeked out to see him walk away around the bend. That was Jason himself, dressed in an orderly’s coat and moving so naturally that from behind only the Pulse gave him away.
From the corner, I watched as he spoke to the cop. Their voices were low, but I didn’t need the Pulse to see the cop growing angry, while Jason simply held his ground. He showed the cop a sheaf of papers... and the man stood up and stomped away.
I ducked back to let the cop go by. I knew Jason had tricks he hadn’t shown us, but sending a cop away from his post? It was all I could do to keep myself out of sight until that officer had stormed past me. He had to be going to protest whatever was in those papers, and that meant Jason had to finish his work fast.
Then I reached the door. I could confront him now... or trust him with the patient...
I held back, and stared through the side of the door’s window.
A figure lay on the bed—I saw mostly the end of a shape, under blankets, and wires running to machinery. The monitors’ beeps could just reach me through the cold glass, the slow pace of a life lost within itself.
Jason slid on Ian’s ring.
He leaned over the bed, and his body blocked the rest, but I knew he’d be laying his hand and his stolen ring on the patient.
The Pulse tracked it all. Jason’s determination sharpening like a cutting torch, sputtering against guilt and doubt, as he strained his will at the magic. Lawrence Neal’s dim, faint spark of feeling... that lay untouched and unaffected by every struggle Jason made, while the monitors paced how Lawrence’s own “pulse” never changed at all.
Jason slumped in defeat. A stream of low mutterings came from him that could only be a rush of curses.
I swung the door open.
He looked up with blind shock in his eyes, and then he blinked to force the pain away.
Softly, I said “I knew you had a reason.”
CHAPTER NINE: GRIP
“What are you doing?” Jason whirled to face me, dropping into a fighting half-crouch.
Alright, if he’d only give me simple, shocked reactions, I’d work with the obvious. “Looking for you.” I kept the tone neutral.
He circled away from me, edging around in the tight hospital room. Drawing me away from the still figure in the bed.
“I know you’re trying to help him,” I said. “This might not work, but...”
I reached over to the victim, with Jason’s eyes on me. Lawrence Neal’s face still looked empty, and touching his arm could have been touching a manikin, except for the give of flesh it had.
Even by touch, my magic felt only that tiny spark of a presence. I pushed, pulled, and breathed confidence and fear and every other emotion at him that might shock him awake. Using fear made the heart monitor give one louder blip, but no more. Like that single spark, blowing on it made no difference when it lay on cold hard wood.
Jason watched me as I worked, when he could have made a run for it. When I drew my hand back, he said “You tried to fix this, and that’s something.” Now he took another a step to the side of me. “But every time I let my guard down with you, you side with those Duvals, and things start blowing up.”
No, tell that to Maya... But instead of protesting, I said “How did you get that cop to leave? Why send him away instead of just talking yourself past him?”
Jason only looked back at me, mouth and face closed off. But the chance to show his work must have drawn him: “Each hospital’s forms—they aren’t as different as they think. All I needed was something to impress him.”
“And you didn’t need to keep him away long? That means he’ll be back.” I grabbed the door.
“Good point.”
I heard his feet shift behind me—I drew on the Pulse to feel for suspicion outside and track Jason at my back, the same position he must have jumped Ian from—
His emotion flared with sudden intent—
I ducked away and spun around, but he wasn’t lunging at me. He’d actually twisted half away from me, and now he was just turning back and drawing his hand from his pocket, empty.
Then he stepped across to the patient again, and he laid his hand and Ian’s ring down and his face wrenched in concentration. One more desperate try to wake the man who’d been shot for standing near us.
And the monitors shifted, from empty beeps to... one feeble louder blip, like a car battery’s useless chugging sound and no more. My magic felt no change from him, and only regret and guilt from Jason.
Jason glanced along the monitors and sighed. “At least he’s still stable. Come on.”
Whatever else he was, Jason seemed to know his medicine. We stepped into the corridor.
As scattered people moved around us, I kept an eye on Jason beside me. He’d attacked Ian once, but the ring he stole could be replaced; it was Jason who might get himself killed if I let him go. Who the hell was he?
I looked ahead, around, for Broken-Nose or any other mobsters I knew—oh, our victim will be left unguarded if the cop doesn’t come back soon, damn it—
Back up the corridor, Maya came walking toward us. Slowly, purposefully, closing the gap.
“You’re going to take the next left.”
Jason didn’t whisper it, he said it so calmly we could have been discussing plans for dinner, and nobody glanced our way.
He went on “Then you’re going to keep walking and not turn back, or I’ll... shout that you’re harassing a patient,” and his voice did hush just to say that before adding “I’m dressed so they’ll believe me. You aren’t.”
So he was making his move. But if he did try to leave and Maya stepped in, she could blow my last chance at making him listen— I wiggled my hand, the hand down at the side screened from Jason’s sight, waving it at the wrist to signal keep back toward Maya behind us.
Then I said “And I’ll tell them you’re hiding a broken arm. And that’s before I say that you stole that outfit.” I glanced over at him—at the corner of my eye I saw Maya drawing back, good. I added “Then the staff will start digging and find out that you’re...”
“Alright, alright. No need for that.” I caught an edge of fear in his words.
Yes, Jason had secrets. There had to be a way to get answers from him, but using the Pulse to twist and pick his emotions open one at a time was too likely to get spotted. And it was no way to treat someone I’d called a friend.
Maya had fallen back and let us walk on.
Then I spotted Broken-Nose up ahead, slumped against the wall in a picture of frustration, barely looking around at all. He’d been on guard too long, and any belief he’d had that we’d show up must be long gone.
Before we came close to the mobster, Jason turned away up an intersection, and I followed. Had he spotted the thug too, or had he meant to move this way? The corridor seemed a bit less busy.
I tried asking him “So where will you go?”
“Away.”
I waited, but he left it as his whole answer. We walked on past room after room, and the number of patients began to dwindle among the staff.
My phone buzzed. Is that you, Maya, is this what it takes for you to call me? I reached for it.
Motion whirled beside me—I dodged back as Jason grabbed out at me, I bounced off the wall and backpedaled out of his reach.
Jason halted there, eyes on me. I saw his bad arm clenching against his side and the pain on his face. People around us glanced over, ready to judge if that one moment of motion between us was what they thought they’d seen.
Jason walked away. In a simple, casual stroll, looking back at me as if he were waiting for a friend to follow, not watching a threat.
I moved after him. “That arm’s still hurt, isn’t it?”
“Ian never could fix it.” This was Jason’s casual, camouflaged tone again, and it had no emotion about the friend he’d followed and then betrayed. “My trying to fight with it doesn’t help.”
He swung a door open, and I saw stairs behind him. When he stepped through he made one try to shut it in my face, but I caught it and followed him down the steps. He still walked with his head turned back to watch me,
I could grab at him if I had to, when we came to one of the landings... but I remembered how he’d tried reaching for me, and that hadn’t looked like a grappling move. More like my own fear touch. Did he think that healing ring worked as a weapon too? All I felt from him was guarded suspicion, too hard to interpret.
“You tried to help that man.” My words caught in the low echoes of the stairwell. “And I guess you tried healing yourself. So what do you do now? Hole up somewhere and working on your arm until you get it right?”
Jason only kept walking, eyes still on me.
“Can you do that? You try to forget you knew people who were using this to help the world? People who fought for you? That’s what I do, I bring people together who can help each other, and I try to protect them from the dangers out there.”
That’s what the Plan is, how I’ve been trying to live, except I’ve never said it so grandly. Now it whispered up and down the shadows of the stairwell... and Jason still only walked away.
“What was it, weeks, months, you spent with Ian and Lucy? Now you decide they can’t heal you and you’ll just give up everything except trying it yourself?”
“Maybe I will.”
A response, finally. And he thought he could keep the magic—
“You won’t, because none of them work like that. How long do you think that ring’s going to last?” Something twitched on his face, and I added “You think you’ve figure it all out, right? But you didn’t know they all work by gathering in power, and once that’s drained you don’t know how to restore it. You’ll be left with nothing.”
I waited for the reaction, and used the Pulse to measure it—
Total calm.
“I’ll take my chances,” Jason chuckled. “Sounds like the kind of lie you’d want me to believe.”
“Are you sure?” I should just grab him, but I’d gone too far trying to make him listen. “You’ve used it, and you can’t feel it getting weaker? Or, how about all the times you watched Ian—yes he fooled you about how he did it, but are you sure there were no times when he just stopped trying his ‘gift,’ that could be when he’d used it up and had to sneak off and recharge it? Think about that.”
Jason rounded on me. “What are you trying to do?” he hissed. “Make me give the thing back? Go apologize, to that...”
“Right, why would you do that? All you did was attack a friend.”
“Friend? You’ve met Ian.” Jason turned away and starting clumping down the steps again. “He was never my friend—”
“You worked beside him how long?” I cut in. “Sure he lied to you about how it all worked, but all that time you believed in the same goal—”
My rising voice caught the echoes and splashed up and down the stairwell before I stopped. No need to get like that—am I still talking about Jason, or Maya? But she only changed on me, she never lied.
I went on “Then you turned on Ian, and you robbed him. You think he deserves that? You think you deserve to turn into the person who does that?”
Jason was slowing on the steps. His head turned back again... but as I finished he twisted away. “Good try. But I’ve wasted too long with all of you.”
“Wasted?”
Lucy strode around the stairs below us. Her gaze bored into Jason, burning with anger and hurt.
She’s here? There had been that call I didn’t get to answer—
“I didn’t...” Jason’s head tilted, sagged to his chest. “I mean, he was lying to you too.”
“Not like you were, the whole time, not if you could ever just turn around and attack us. I’ve been wracking my brain the whole way here, trying to think what could get into your head. Now, you look at me—tell me why.” She stood on the steps below him, one hand locked on the bannister ready to push back against him.
Jason sighed “You wouldn’t believe me.”
“That’s another lie, and you know it—”
“There you are,” Ian snarled.
He closed in behind Lucy, and as she looked back he slid around her to advance on Jason. The outrage in his face made me wish I could jump between them myself.
Ian went on “Trying to move around in the back of a medical space? Who do you think taught you that?”
“Lucy, mostly,” Jason flung back.
“Alright,” I said. “At least remember, Jason took the ring to go help a man who got shot for standing near us. The one you said you couldn’t wake up.”
“And you did?” Lucy said. “You brought him to consciousness?”
“No.” Jason looked away. “And we both tried.”
“Not so easy, is it?” That was fierce satisfaction in Ian’s voice, any thought for the patient pushed aside now. “Now it’s time for you to make things right.”
And he held out his palm to Jason, and waited. Like there was nothing else to say.
Lucy added “Sorry for Ian’s attitude—remember, someone just hit his head. But still...” She trailed off.
I looked down at Jason, surrounded by the three of us, staring his nemesis and his guilt right in the face. Please, don’t make me grab you now...
Jason took a single step down toward Ian, and he slid the ring off his hand. “I guess this is yours.”
Ian nodded. “You couldn’t keep it anyway. You wouldn’t even know how to recharge it.”
“Adrian told me that, too.” The faintest smirk edged into Jason’s voice, as he held the ring out.
Ian didn’t reach for it. “Then there’s the other thing you got wrong.”
“What?” Jason’s hand pulled back.
“I have two kinds of rings. That one closes up wounds and trauma. But for a coma patient, you wanted the one that works on nerves.”
His hand clamped around Jason’s palm, and his other hand seized his wrist. And Jason screamed.
