Irregulars, page 47
In response Falk growled a throaty word and spat on the blade. Even with his glasses on, Jason saw the white flame that gushed up from the silver spittle.
“Whoa!” The little man dropped his soldering iron and hopped back to his troll companion’s rocky shins.
“Nothing to fear here.” Falk stepped into the room, smiling like he was delivering a punch line. Wisps of white mist rose in his wake and Jason felt the difference in the atmosphere like a sudden frost in the air. Black shadows churned at the edge of his vision.
“I just thought you two might want a night-light for the dark when I open the shade lands.” Falk blazed as brightly as the flame of his blade.
Phipps issued a weak, sick groan from where he lay, spilled across the broken bed. A weirdly childlike screech escaped the troll and it shook its rumpled head wildly. At its feet the leathery little man blanched to dull gray.
“No need to turn nasty, badge.” He gave Falk a terrified grin, displaying teeth as ragged as bottle caps. “Linda and me believe you. We’ll just be moving along.”
“You got till the count of three to scram,” Falk replied coldly. “And I’m already on two.”
They bolted through the door. Jason had to step back to avoid being rolled over. He watched them race to the stairs and clamber up in a racket of metallic scrapes and odd curses.
When he stepped inside the cramped room, he found Falk straightening Phipps up to sitting. Not even a hint of the murky darkness of the shade lands remained. The overhead light cast bright white illumination across Phipps and the squalid little room.
“Thank you,” Phipps said to Falk. He brushed his silver-gray hair back from his face and made a hopeless attempt to straighten his torn silk pajamas. A large bruise was already darkening the left side of his face. The holes in his clothes afforded Jason a view of red abrasions.
“No,” Falk replied. “Don’t thank me. I’m likely to do worse to you myself.”
Phipps glanced quickly, searchingly, to Jason and then swallowed like it hurt.
Despite his harsh words, Falk dragged a tiny table to Phipps’s bedside and, after rummaging through a couple drawers in his dresser, brought over a bottle of what looked like wine. He produced a tin cup from his coat pocket and set it in front of Phipps.
For his part Jason didn’t know what to feel. Half of him still felt indebted to Phipps for the kindness he’d shown him. But that only made him feel all the more betrayed, knowing now that the man had sold him like some knickknack.
Jason leaned against Phipps’s wooden dresser, trying to affect an air of indifference.
“Well, you certainly have the advantage over me—I take it that you are Irregulars?”
Falk just gave a curt nod.
“You’ve come calling to discuss something you discovered after you broke into my business, I suppose?”
“Right again,” Falk allowed.
“Jason Shamir…” Phipps nodded to himself as if there could be no other answer. “I had wondered how quickly you’d penetrate the anonymity spell placed on him. I hadn’t thought quite so soon.”
“You mean not before Cethur Greine set you up with asylum in exchange for the information you gave him, yeah?” Falk’s tone remained conversational. It reminded Jason a little of his own interrogation.
“Yes. Another day at least.” Phipps sighed heavily, then glanced forlornly to the battered mass of his door. “I really do need to look into recovering my security system.”
“You might want to invest in something electronic this time.” Falk found a chair and seated himself across from Phipps. “The ghosts of murdered little girls just aren’t as reliable as they used to be.”
Phipps raised his eyes to Falk.
“I take it that you were the one that got in.” Phipps offered Falk a mock salute. “I had wondered how those fresh-faced fascists made it through the door so very quickly.”
“Maybe you just left it unlocked.” Falk picked up the wine bottle, pulled the cork free, and set the bottle back down in front of Phipps.
“Very civilized of you,” Phipps commented. “Or is this to be a last drink for a condemned man?”
“That would depend on how cooperative you decide to be,” Falk responded.
Phipps filled the tin cup himself and swallowed the contents in a single gulp.
“Ask what you want.” He refilled the cup. “I’ll tell you everything I can.”
“Let’s start with exactly what information you sold to Greine,” Falk prompted.
“Everything I knew and a few things one might call conjecture.” This time Phipps took a more refined sip of the white wine. “The boy was obviously in possession of the Stone of Fal. I knew that the moment I heard him singing. And once I managed to glimpse past that anonymity spell I realized that he was the spitting image of Cethur Greine himself—”
“What?” Jason couldn’t help himself. Falk shot him a silencing glance, then returned his attention to Phipps.
“By that you mean you suspected he was the Greine’s son?”
“Exactly,” Phipps replied. “There have always been those rumors about the fruit of Greine’s wedding night. Born dead, thrown into the sea. Supposedly eaten, if you trust the word of a certain Moth Man—”
“Never have before,” Falk replied. “Wouldn’t start now.”
Phipps nodded.
“None of my informants agreed on what fate had befallen the child, but they all agreed that the princess had borne Greine an heir. And I realized that he hadn’t died at all. He’d grown up in the earthly realm of his ancestors. When I passed that on to Greine he seemed quite pleased.”
“Why the hell wouldn’t he be?” Falk drew his own flask from his pocket and took swig. “You gave him exactly the ammunition he needed to lay legal claim on Jason and the stone.”
“If it matters at all, I’d like to point out that Greine wasn’t my first choice,” Phipps stated. “If your raid hadn’t ruined everything, Jason would have been back in the hands of his mother’s agents by now.”
“You mean those two who just left?” Falk raised his brows. “Because I got it from one of their colleagues that they’d rather kill Jason than chance him falling into Greine’s grasp. So you’d be doing him no kindness there. Or did you mean that you tried to sell him back to the mother who hid him away in the first place?”
Phipps pulled a pained face that made Jason want to slap him. “It wasn’t as if I were spoiled for choices, was I? I contacted the princess first but heard nothing back. Then I found out that she’d been locked away, sleeping in a tower for the last decade. Shortly after that I was approached by that gruesome brownie about locating the Stone of Fal…And, well, I’d already located it, hadn’t I?”
“I—” Jason barely caught himself; he felt so betrayed—and not just by Phipps but also by his revelations. By the fact that some tyrant had claim over him as his father while the man Jason had known and loved…Jason didn’t even know who he had been. And his mother— if possible, he knew even less of her.
“I read that Jason Shamir had only been working for you for seven weeks,” Jason ground out. “Did you start looking for buyers the minute you hired him, you ghoul?”
“Yes. I knew he was something rare and valuable the moment I laid eyes on him and such commodities are what I deal in.” Phipps drew himself up straight as though there was some dignity to be claimed by the admission. He narrowed his gray eyes at Jason. “But don’t pretend that you Irregulars are just going to pat that boy on the head and turn him over to his daddy. We all know that’s not the case. Your people want the stone just as badly as anyone. Unless Cethur Greine acts very fast, your so-called Research and Development people will have carved the stone out and slapped together some zombie patch job to fob off on him.” Phipps sneered at Jason. “You Irregulars like to claim that you’re defending us all from ourselves, but isn’t it just so convenient that to do so you have to seize every talisman and charm you can impound?”
Jason fought to maintain a neutral expression. He didn’t know anything about the Irregulars as an organization, but he trusted Falk and didn’t believe Phipps.
Falk scowled but denied nothing.
“For all you know I’ve done the boy a favor.” Phipps took another drink. “At least his own father might not be quite so keen to strip him to the bone.”
At that, Falk gave a derisive snort.
“Yeah, Greine’s well known for his decency and compassion,” Falk replied.
Phipps shrugged, but something like melancholy showed in his expression. He took another slow, measured drink from the tin cup.
“I would have preferred it if Jason had ended up with his mother,” Phipps admitted. “I did like the boy, actually. He was the best employee I ever had.”
Jason glared at Phipps. Clearly he hadn’t liked him enough to resist the temptation to sell him.
“You’re such a hypocrite,” Jason snapped. “You auction someone off to the highest bidder and then sit around looking morose and making accusations about other people’s evil intentions! What utter bullshit!”
“I did what I could for him,” Phipps snapped back. “But it wasn’t as if I could have kept him a secret! That anonymity spell placed on him may have hidden him through his childhood, but it wasn’t going to last much longer. And especially not if he kept singing. I could see it wearing away day by day. In a week’s time it would have burned out completely. In place of a plain-faced nobody for an employee, I would’ve had a shining sidhe prince working my till and enchanting half the city with his songs. How long do you think it would have taken the revolutionaries or Greine to notice him after that?”
“Who knows,” Henry answered. “But you didn’t try, did you?”
“Oh, go to hell,” Phipps replied. He glowered between the two of them, lifted his cup, and then set it down without drinking. “I did try, actually. Not that it’s any of your damn business.” Phipps sounded almost defeated. “The day after he started working for me I cast a second anonymity spell over him. It should have lasted three years, but he seared through it like a flame through paraffin. An hour after I cast it, the spell had burned off. Even if I’d decided to, I couldn’t have kept him.”
“I’m pretty sure he wasn’t meant to be kept,” Falk replied. “Did you provide Greine with means to verify Jason’s paternity?”
“Blood. He cut his hand once while restringing a harp for me. I lent him my kerchief but didn’t wash it afterwards. Blood like his always has a use.”
Jason remembered that afternoon. At the time he’d been embarrassed about letting his hand slip and then bleeding all over Mr. Phipps’s work table. He’d also been touched by Phipps’s concern for him.
God, he’d been a pathetic sucker.
He had to look away from Phipps’s self-satisfied face to keep from giving this whole charade away with a furious tirade of obscenities and accusations.
Not that he wanted to keep standing here, listening to Phipps recount all the ways he’d been deceived and used. What an idiot he’d been. What a fucking idiot.
He didn’t want to stay in this dank little room one more minute.
He stole a quick glance to Falk only to catch Falk considering him in return. Whatever Falk read in his expression, it seemed to displease him. He dropped his flask back into one of his deep pockets and stood.
“I think that’s about all we need to know for now,” Falk told Phipps. “Can’t say it’s been a pleasure, but you were certainly informative.”
Phipps gave a wave of his hand as if he were shooing away flies.
“Don’t let the door hit you on the way out,” he replied.
Falk smiled and replied, “If I were you I’d be more worried about trolls hitting me on their way in.”
***
Henry saw it coming, though it impressed him that Jason got all the way to the Elysian Fields before he blew his lid. He possessed a remarkable level of restraint for such a young man, particularly one of sidhe heritage.
Though right this moment he looked mad enough to chew nails and spit rivets. The muscles of his jaw worked like flexing fists.
He kept silent and still while Henry called the glamour of Agent August’s guise off him; Henry drew the illusion into his own lungs like he was taking a deep drag from a clove cigarette. He swallowed the slight burn, tasting both the sting of faerie dust and the natural spice of Jason’s body.
Watching Jason as the glamour receded, Henry wondered how he’d previously failed to notice the subtle bronze luster of his skin or the gold gleaming through his dark eyes. The anonymity spell shielding Jason must have once been truly powerful to render such a presence unremarkable.
But Phipps hadn’t been lying about the speed at which the spell was degrading. Little to none of it would be left by the day’s end.
Even scowling and bristling with anger, an unearthly grace permeated Jason’s motions. The hint of a hot, sweet spice perfumed the air around him.
Jason shoved his battered glasses into the pocket of his red sweat jacket and then wheeled back from Henry, scattering the creamy white butterflies fluttering on the flowers all around them.
“That son of a bitch!” Jason kicked at the ground hard. Clods of soil and miniature lilacs went flying. “Just sitting there looking sorry for himself while he fed us that bullshit about how much it pained him to sell me out! Literally—fucking—sell me out!”
Henry kept his trap shut. No doubt, Jason had been screwed over. Offering him some lip service about how things could have been worse or counseling him to take a philosophical view would only further insult his justifiable anger.
He had a right to blow off some steam. In his position Henry would have probably loaded a pistol and blown off much more.
“And this Greine asshole is not my father!” Jason growled. “I don’t give a shit what some blood test says. My father was Levi Shamir—the man who raised me. The man who died—” Jason’s voice broke and he sent another clump of earth and flowers sailing through the air. “I don’t care if he wasn’t my biological father. He loved me and that’s all that matters.”
“I truly wish that were the case, Jason,” Falk told him. Someone had to.
Jason turned back to Henry and Henry wasn’t certain if his expression displayed more betrayal or anger.
“The son of a bitch who murdered my father,” Jason ground out, “does not get to take his place.”
Suddenly Henry wished that they didn’t have to have this conversation. But Greine’s lawyers could be depended upon to exploit every aspect of the arcane fine print of any number of treaties. Henry could guarantee that they had already pointed out that Jason had been born a sidhe and never legally emigrated. As a sidhe he was a year short of his majority and so technically still under his biological father’s guardianship.
If his father had been some shiftless gnome, it wouldn’t have mattered. NIAD would have simply trotted out their own retinue of lawyers, filed an injunction, and delayed until Jason came of age.
But Greine commanded a vast army of goblin mercenaries and exerted immense financial influence as a highly valued trade partner. He would be appeased and Jason would be handed over to him—very quietly and very soon.
The knowledge ate into Henry like a shot of battery acid.
“The problem is that he’s got the law on his side,” Henry said.
“What are you talking about?” Jason demanded.
“Legally, you’re a sidhe minor of the Tuatha Dé Dannan clan, not an American citizen—”
“You’re saying I’m an illegal alien?” Incredulity almost tempered Jason’s outrage.
“It’s a little more complex than that, but basically, yeah,” Henry replied. “As such, it’ll fall to the Irregulars to turn you over to your guardian.”
“So that he can butcher me for some fucking mythical rock?” Jason glared at Henry. “What a great law! How about putting dingos in charge of daycares while they’re at it?”
“I never said it was right—”
“No, you said that going to Phipps and finding all of this out would help somehow.” Jason pinned him with a stare as hard and sharp as a razor. “Has it helped?”
“It’s given us warning of what we’re up against and a little time…” Henry told him.
“When you say ‘us’ do you mean you and me or you and your Irregular buddies?”
Henry could read suspicion spreading across Jason’s face as Jason belatedly realized how little he really knew of Henry or NIAD.
“It’s not the same thing, is it?” Jason asked.
“No, it’s not,” Henry admitted. Gunther had all but told him that Research and Development wanted a crack at prying the stone from Jason’s body before they had to hand him over to Greine. Phipps had been right about that.
“Phipps wasn’t just bullshitting when he said your people wanted to carve me up for the stone and turn me into a—a zombie patch job, was he?” Jason stepped back out of Henry’s reach, but he didn’t run. That showed just how little he truly understood of the danger Henry posed to him. Or perhaps it simply betrayed Jason’s desire to trust him even now.
“Phipps wasn’t wrong. Gunther sent me a note this morning. R&D wants me to turn you over.”
“But you’re not going to…” Jason took another step back but then stopped and stood, staring at Henry warily.
All morning Henry’d shied from asking himself what he’d do when the moment came to pack Jason up and hand him over to the dowdy, merciless creatures that populated the R&D laboratories in DC. He hadn’t suspected that his own conscience would kick quite so hard. The Irregulars had created, trained, and kept him for nearly a century; the institution was a great gyre that carried his wreckage, making him look alive and full of purpose.
Jason, on the other hand, was nearly a stranger. They’d had sex, but Henry wasn’t one to mistake that for anything beyond a momentary respite—more pleasurable but certainly not more meaningful than sharing a drink and a laugh. It’d been a good time but taking it for more than that wouldn’t have just been whistful but damn unwise. Yet Jason’s gaze affected Henry more than he wanted to acknowledge; the smallest spark flickered in the darkness of his dead heart.
