The Book of War, page 9
“I know.” I sighed and traced the line of chrome beneath the window with my forefinger. “I guess it makes me more uncomfortable than I thought it would. It’s not like I object to guns in general, and I appreciate how yours has kept me safe. It just doesn’t feel like me.”
Malcolm squeezed my hand lightly. “I will never force you to go armed if it isn’t what you want. But you’ve faced enough dangers that I feel comfortable knowing you can defend yourself. And…this isn’t about my comfort.”
“I’ll try to remember next time.” I pulled out my phone. “I just realized I should warn Judy that we’re all coming over. She and Mike—”
I snapped my mouth shut on those words, but it was too late. “She and Mike, what? Mike who?” Malcolm said.
“It’s nothing. Just…oh, hell. Judy and Mike Conti have been seeing each other.”
“They what?” Malcolm exclaimed. “I thought she hated him.”
“She doesn’t hate him. Well, obviously not, if they’re seeing each other. It—Judy wanted it to be a secret. Promise you won’t tell, or let Mike know that you know.”
“Helena, how am I supposed to do that? Mike’s my best friend. I can hardly pretend I don’t know something this big.”
I rested my hand on his thigh. “Of course you can. And it’s not that big. Just…maybe Mike will tell you himself.” If he and Judy worked things out, maybe neither of them would try to keep it secret.
Malcolm’s brow furrowed. “Mike and Judy. I never would have guessed.”
I didn’t feel I should share any more details, but it was a relief not having to keep that secret from my husband. I loved being able to talk to Malcolm about anything.
I tapped out a message to Judy and waited, watching the darkened streets slip past. No response. After five minutes, I tried again; still nothing. I pocketed my phone and said, “Well, I tried. If it’s a horrible surprise, it’s not my fault.”
“We don’t have to go upstairs,” Malcolm pointed out. “It’s not really an intrusion.”
“True.” It still felt like an intrusion, since I’d once lived in the apartment over the store and could imagine how I would have felt hearing people tromping around downstairs after dark. We’d just have to make this quick.
We pulled into the parking lot at the rear of the store, trailed by Acosta and Mangesh. The Ford Explorer was already there, the engine idling. So was a car I didn’t recognize, parked next to the beater nobody in the area was willing to claim ownership of. Malcolm’s eyes narrowed as we pulled up next to the unknown car. “That’s Mike’s,” he said.
“I guess Judy said he’d be over tonight.” Specifically, she’d said she was going to tell him how her feelings toward him had changed. I hoped Mike’s car still being there meant good things for both of them.
My four guests got out when we did. Victor had a gleam in his eye. “Nice car,” he told Malcolm as we all hurried inside.
“Thanks. It’s one of my indulgences,” Malcolm said.
“Mine’s a Camaro.” Victor’s gaze swept from the Mustang’s nose to its tailpipe. “Not a lot of places to really open her up in Atlantic City, unfortunately.”
I could see Malcolm’s own eyes gleaming and forestalled half an hour’s automotive talk by saying, “Let’s make this quick, all right?”
I led everyone through the back hall, where stairs led up to Judy’s apartment and a single door opened on the office. I had to admit Judy had had a point about having the desk facing away from that rear door. It wasn’t hard to imagine someone sneaking in, even though the security on the outside door was the best Campbell Security could provide.
Ines regarded the office curiously. “It is not large, is it?”
“We don’t need a lot of space for what we do,” I said.
Nyla was looking at Silas’s picture. I had a momentary urge to snatch it away from her, as if her regard were something disrespectful. But I didn’t want to explain the wall safe behind it.
“Who’s this?” she asked.
“Silas Abernathy. He was a custodian, years ago.” I pushed open the door to the hallway and beckoned to Nyla to follow me. At the end of the hall, I switched on the lights, though they didn’t do much more than cast deep shadows over the bookcases. To me, the dimness was comforting, as if someone had turned the store into a blanket fort like I’d made as a child. I wondered how my guests felt about it, whether they, too, were comforted, or just wished they could see more clearly.
I’d never realized just how crowded the stacks were with eight people passing through at once. The corridors formed by the bookcases were narrow enough that only one person could pass at a time, but what made it feel crowded was the noise of all those people shuffling along, breathing loudly enough to echo off the shelves, and their murmured conversations as they stopped to look at the books. I had to suppress impatient comments more than once. “Please, just come through to the front of the store,” I finally said. “The books are unimportant unless the oracle has chosen them.”
Once everyone was gathered near the counter, I turned to Jun and said, “If you want an augury, you need to write it down in the form of a question.” I tore a page from the back of the augury ledger and ripped it in half, then handed Jun and Nyla each a half. I was going to need to buy a new ledger, we’d done that so many times. “And nothing starting with ‘who?’ or asking how to commit a crime.”
“It will answer anything else?” Jun asked.
“No, sometimes it just chooses not to answer, but there’s no way to predict those.”
Jun regarded me narrowly. She turned away to write her question, shielding the paper with her hand even though no one was close enough to read over her shoulder. She folded the paper in quarters and handed it to me. Nyla, in contrast, wrote in big letters I could almost read from several feet away and didn’t fold the paper at all. I indicated she should hold onto it for now.
“Thanks,” I said to Jun. “Oh, and be prepared for it to cost a lot.”
“Meaning that you’ll extort money from me?”
I bit back an annoyed retort. “I don’t set the prices. The oracle does. You’re just going to have to trust that I don’t lie about auguries in any way.”
Jun’s eyes narrowed again, but she nodded once, a curt gesture that conveyed both the meaning I agree and You had better not be wasting my time. I nodded back, took three steps, and the oracle’s presence rose up around me.
A golden glow filled the air, soft like a sunset. I rarely did auguries after dark, and I’d forgotten how beautiful it was. The air smelled fresh like laundry just out of the dryer, filling me with memories of folding sheets with my mom when I was little. I breathed it in and felt some of my tension melt away. After a few seconds, I came out of my daze and unfolded Jun’s paper. Where is my mother’s brooch? I frowned. I’d expected her to ask something about whether she should trust me, or if joining the Wardens was the right thing to do. I didn’t know what to make of this question.
“I hope this convinces her,” I said as I paced the narrow corridors between bookcases. “I guess, if you give her an augury, and she interprets it and answers her question, it will be harder for her to argue that none of it is real. But that won’t necessarily bring her into the Wardens’ fold.”
The oracle was silent, only half its attention on me. Ahead, blue light gleamed, and I walked faster. “Tomorrow night is the attack on the Mercy’s stronghold, or headquarters, or whatever it is,” I went on. “I hope the Wardens succeed. They’ve certainly received enough auguries…you’ve been so cooperative, it helps me feel less afraid for Malcolm. I know Lucia is confident that she’s chosen the right time to attack, but I can’t help thinking how disastrous it would be if some Mercy operative found out and warned them the Wardens were coming. I’ll be glad when it’s over.”
The augury shone brightly in the golden ambience, a hardcover book missing its dust jacket. Imprinted on the tan binding was the title In This House of Brede. “It would be nice if Brede was a real house somewhere, and Ms. Li’s mother’s brooch was there,” I said, opening the cover to find Jun Li, $25 written on the title page in silver ink. “Nice and simple.”
I looked around for a second blue glow, just in case, but it seemed the oracle wasn’t going out of its way to be helpful tonight. “I was sort of thinking,” I said as I walked back to the entrance—though the oracle wasn’t laid out to have anything so simple as one entrance— “that maybe Ms. Li wouldn’t take us seriously if you gave her a cheap augury. But I won’t second-guess you.”
No one had moved in the time I’d been gone, though Malcolm and Victor were talking in low voices off to one side, probably about cars. I handed Jun the book. “It’s only $25.”
Jun raised an eyebrow. “You said it would be expensive.”
“I said it could be expensive. I never know how much an augury will be, unless the question has something to do with saving a life, and those are generally free. The oracle charges what it thinks is fair.” I didn’t actually know this, but it was a safe assumption.
Jun had a shiny black patent leather clutch dangling from her left wrist. She opened it and withdrew a twenty and a five. “Cash is acceptable?”
“Yes. We aren’t set up to take debit or credit cards.”
“Sounds inconvenient,” Nyla said.
“Only for our customers, but my co-worker and I have discussed changing store policy to allow it. There’s really no reason to reject any form of payment.” We’d actually have to get approval from the Board of Neutralities to change that policy, which was the real reason we hadn’t already done it—the Board, with one notable exception involving me, changed for no one. But the sports didn’t need to know that kind of detail.
Jun examined the book. “No dust jacket.”
“The condition of an augury doesn’t matter, only the contents.” I felt defensive on the oracle’s behalf; Jun had sounded simultaneously critical and amused, like a parent handed a macaroni necklace by a child and asked to pretend it’s diamonds.
Jun just nodded and turned away, thumbing through the first pages of the book.
I turned to Nyla and held out my hand for her augury slip. “Should I be worried?” she said. “I didn’t bring a ton of cash.”
“I’m sure the oracle takes that into consideration,” I said.
This time, I saw no blue glow anywhere. The air continued to glow gold and didn’t turn red, the sign that the oracle refused to give an augury, so I set off in search of the book. Nyla’s question was more in line with what I’d expected: Should I join the Wardens? “She’s got it tough, though,” I said. I folded the augury and tucked it into my pocket next to Jun’s. “I don’t know if she can afford to pay someone to care for her mother, if she has to be here. Though…I guess she doesn’t have to be in Portland to work with the Wardens. She’d help whoever is in charge of her area.”
It was the first time it had occurred to me that all these people had lives and jobs and families far from Portland, and discouragement filled me, followed closely by embarrassment. Despite what I’d told them, I’d been thinking, selfishly, that I’d get to know them all and maybe even become friends. But the oracle hadn’t said we would be friends; it had said the sports were important to fighting the war. And that could happen anywhere.
I rounded a corner and finally saw the blue glow. This one, by contrast to Jun’s battered book, was a hardcover in perfect condition, its dark blue cover shiny with newness. The title was Jane, Unlimited, and Nyla’s name was inside, along with $25.
“Interesting,” I said. “Very egalitarian of you, not to charge more or less.”
When I handed the book to Nyla, she turned it over a couple of times as if looking for the augury to be printed on the dust jacket. “So I just…read the book?”
“Study it,” I said. “Sometimes that means reading it through and taking notes on what pops out at you. Sometimes it means thinking about your question and then opening the book at random to see what a particular sentence or paragraph says. But generally it’s more than just skimming it.”
A loud clap startled me into looking at Jun, who’d slammed her augury shut and slapped it down on the countertop. “I’ve seen enough,” she said. “I’ll be leaving in the morning.”
Gaping, I stammered, “But…you have your augury…”
“It doesn’t answer my question.”
“You have only had it for ten minutes,” Mangesh said. “That is not enough time to know—”
“Believe me, I know,” Jun said. “I’m not interested in being part of your club, or whatever you call it.”
“It’s not—” I began hotly, then took control of myself when I saw Malcolm draw breath to respond in anger. “Ms. Li, I’m sorry if we’ve wasted your time. Thanks for being willing to listen.”
“I’m out, too,” Victor said. “I won’t say it’s not interesting to know I’m not the only one with a talent, but it means nothing to me in any practical sense. And you haven’t told us what, specifically, the Wardens want us for. So thanks for everything, but I’m going home.”
I cast a despairing glance at Malcolm. He turned his attention to Nyla and asked, “What about you, Miss Priest?”
“It’s Ms. Priest,” Nyla said, but without rancor. She looked once more at the cover of her augury, tucked the book under one arm, and said, “I’m not making a decision until I’ve studied this. I asked a question, and it’d be rude to turn all y’all down without getting an answer first.”
“And I,” Ines said, “would like to have more information. I think it is remarkable that an oracle sees in me something of value to a greater cause. I would like to know what that is.”
In despair at seeing my hopes falling apart, I said, “Ms. Li, Mr. Crowson—”
“You can call me Victor,” Victor said. “Look, it’s not that I don’t believe all of this. I just don’t see what it has to do with me. And you don’t have an answer to that question.”
“But—”
Malcolm put his arm around me, startling me because I hadn’t been aware of him coming up behind me. “It’s late,” he said, “and this is a lot of information to take in. Your hotel is paid up through tonight at least. Give what Helena’s said some thought, and return here tomorrow morning at nine. If you’re still of the same opinion—” He nodded at Jun, whose chin lifted defiantly— “we’ll bid you farewell, and no hard feelings.”
“I won’t change my mind,” Jun said. “But I can give you that much.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Jun walked past me toward the rear of the store without waiting for my guidance. Rather than annoying me, it sent me into deeper despair. I should have waited until I knew what the oracle had in mind for the sports. Or waited until Lucia came up with something. Now half of them were going to walk away, and the other half were undecided, and none of them had jumped at the chance to be Wardens. I couldn’t help feeling I’d let the oracle down.
The storm hadn’t let up at all while we were inside. Icy rain stabbed my exposed face like a million needles, and it had crusted the windshield wipers and the door handles. I sat in the car and watched Malcolm defrost the wipers as the Explorer drove away. Mangesh hadn’t said anything when he left, just shrugged, but that gesture told me he felt as defeated as I did. Acosta had been silent too, just nodded to me, and that gesture, I couldn’t read. Well, this wasn’t his fight, and he was already a Warden.
Malcolm threw himself into the driver’s seat and held his hands over the heater vent. “This is some storm,” he said, flexing his fingers. “I hope it blows itself out soon.”
“Me too. I don’t want to drive to work in this tomorrow.”
“I’ll take you if it comes to that. I know you don’t like driving when the roads are icy.”
“Thanks.”
Malcolm put the car in gear and backed out of the parking lot. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I sighed and leaned against the window, then thought better of it—the glass was freezing. “What’s there to talk about? It didn’t work.”
“That depends on the outcome you wanted. You succeeded in revealing the Wardens and the Long War without anyone telling you you’re crazy.”
“True, but…Malcolm, is it bad that I wanted them all to be eager to join the fight?”
“Helena, you have a passion for justice and a driving need not to sit still when evil threatens. It’s not unnatural that you hope others feel the same way. But you know not everyone is like you.”
“I know.” I sighed again. “And Victor was right. I couldn’t give them something concrete the oracle wants them to do. I knew that going in, but I guess I didn’t realize how much it would matter.”
“You have until tomorrow morning for them to think about it and possibly change their minds.”
“Do you really think Ms. Li is going to change her mind? Really?”
Malcolm shook his head. “But something happened to her when she studied her augury. I was watching her, and there was a moment when something startled her. Something meaningful. I believe, contrary to her assertion, she learned something from the augury and is resisting admitting that to herself.”
That raised my spirits a bit. “I wish I felt more comfortable talking to her. But that’s probably her force field at work.”
“I wish Victor would change his mind,” Malcolm said. “He has the build to be a front line fighter, if not the temperament. If he were sufficiently motivated, that would make up the difference.”
“Do you think—no, maybe not. I was going to say, do you think someone could really be a front line fighter without being a magus, but it occurred to me that you use magic in the fight, so it’s probably still important.”
“Possibly. I don’t use magic nearly as often as you might think. Weapons training matters more. So someone like Victor, with the right training, could be as effective as any steel or wood magus.”
“Except Victor’s not interested.”
Malcolm pulled into our driveway and waited for the garage door to open before parking inside. “Let it go for tonight, love. You’ve done everything you can. The rest is up to them. Unless you think you should be allowed to make their decisions for them?”
