Eep, 12 already. I've got to stick with it, though, since there will be no updates on Daemon Rising from the 26th to the 17th. I might sporadically give a shout out, but not regular-like. That's assuming everything goes through. Anyway. Chapter XII

***

My calf was pretty torn to hell, but not so badly that they couldn’t fix it. A few stitches and a stern lecture later, I was putting my full weight on it. “It’ll hold, but don’t stress it too much.”

“No five mile runs while being shot at by submachine guns,” I quipped with a roll of my eyes. “I get it.” The doctor raised an eyebrow, his tone turning angry, “If you feel the need to do that anyway, Ms. Lucifel, our psych ward is on the fifth floor. I can have an orderly direct you.”

I barked a laugh at that—I couldn’t help it. But the stern doctor just glowered. It only made me laugh more. Merula finally grabbed my arm and gave me a questioning look. “It was funny,” I shrugged. “Thank you doctor, but I was being sarcastic. I’d rather check myself into your psych ward than be shot at.” I didn’t add that the latter was way more likely than the former. “Thank you,” I gave him a nod, suspecting quite rightly that if I offered my hand, he wouldn’t shake it. I walked away and Merula simply followed me. When we were well down the white hallway, I touched her arm. “You and I need to talk. You have anywhere else to be tonight?”

She shook her head, and said, “Probably, but you’re right. We need to talk.”

“Fine. But not right now right now.” She raised an eyebrow, and I just made my way to the elevator. I hit the button for the fourth floor and waited. Merula gave me another one of her intensely curious looks.

“What’s on four?” she asked finally as the doors closed and we lurched into motion.

“Rehab,” I replied tersely. But I remembered how much I owed her—my life to be exact—and decided I also owed her a better answer. “I’ve got a friend in here. She’s had some tough times and doesn’t really speak anything but Elfish yet. It helps if I visit.”

“Will she be alright with me? I mean…stranger, witch, and not exactly your everyday pop-in-and-say-‘hello’ type of visitor.”

I smiled at that. “She’ll be alright. She doesn’t have anyone right now, so she’ll have to be okay with it.” Merula gave me a part-nod-part-shrug that I returned. The nurses at the rehab station gave us the compulsory once-over to ensure that we weren’t bringing her drugs, but it was obvious they did it just because they had to. The nurse gave me a wink as she ushered us in.

“Thorough,” Merula said softly. I rolled my eyes, but gave her a terse nod.

“Alayna?” I poked my head into the room, and smiled at the sight of her frail form sitting upright and reading one of the books I’d sent.

“Lucifel!” Her voice chimed, but nearly an octave lower than before. Her smile was just as bright, but the sheen on her face was not from excitement.

“Are you alright?” I hurried to her side to wipe away the sweat gathering on her brow. “You look worse than before.”

“It’s the detox process,” she managed, her voice losing some of its confidence. “They say that it will get worse. The doctor left you a letter…?” she turned over to the table in the room and nodded at a white envelope. “They said it was because my English is so poor still.” She made a face at me, but sobered when she saw Merula over my shoulder. “Who…” she cleared her throat and tried in English, “Hello. Who are you?”

Merula raised an eyebrow at me, and said, “I’m Merula. Lucifel tells me that you’re Alayna, right?”

She took a moment to puzzle all of it out before nodding. “Yes. I am. What brings you here?”

“I…” Merula looked at me for assistance and I intervened in Elfish.

“Merula was with me when…” Shit I didn’t even know how to tell her this. So I started slow, “Alayna, I was working and there was…” I took a deep breath, unsure how to tell her that our people had put a hit out on me. “There were complications,” I managed finally. “I got shot at a few times.”

“Shot! How badly?”

I took her hand gently and shook my head. “No, not bad. My leg and one grazed my shoulder. I’m fine. But they brought me to the hospital to make sure it was alright. Merula was there at the cemetery. She helped me fight off the shooters.”

“Thank you,” Alayna said to Merula, who smiled at her.

“It was my pleasure,” she managed, and Alayna nodded.

“They brought me to this hospital, so I decided to visit you when I was done torturing the doctors.”

“Thank you,” Alayna said again, in the common tongue this time. “I think I need to rest now, though. I’m very tired very easily,” she said softly, and I patted her hand.

“Sleep, sweetheart. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She nodded in return, and I nodded to Merula. “Let’s talk at my place,” I told her as Alayna drifted off.

*&*

To her credit, Merula was polite. She rode with me in the cab and made idle chatter. The cops had made me leave my car, and most my firearms, with them at the scene, for processing. I didn’t remember disarming, but I knew that was where they were. Maybe the EMS guys had given them the guns after I blacked out. They’d also given them my ID, which meant my wallet. But Merula was kind enough to pay the driver before I could even think to run inside, giving him a wink and a large tip.

At least my keys were still in my coat pocket. I unlocked the door, and Merula stayed outside until I’d turned off the alarm. “The threshold…” she reminded me politely.

“Ah. Sorry. Please, make yourself welcome in my house,” I said to her with a touch of formality. “I forgot you needed invited over the threshold.”

She shrugged, “We’re not really bad—witches that is—and we can cross over the threshold without permission. It just severely limits us.”

I led her to my office and gestured to the seat. “How so?” She gave me a curious look, and I shrugged. “The firearms they left me need put away. And I’m curious.”

It was her turn to shrug. “We can’t do white magic, or even the gray stuff. Strictly black only, because only a black witch would force herself over the threshold.” She gave me a sorry smile, “I hate to say it, but I don’t think you wanted to talk to me about witching.”

“Maybe. What I really want to know is obvious. Why were you there? Who was it with you?”

She looked me in the eye, at least. Bonus points for her. “I was hired to be there. I admit, it isn’t my usual work, but I’ve always had a flair for combat witching.” She laughed, “Hard to believe, looking at me, but I do a lot of body guard work. So someone who knew about what was going to happen to you hired me to keep an eye out.”

“Who was it?”

“The other person in the graveyard was the person who hired me. He expressly wished to remain anonymous. I’m sorry,” she shrugged at me. “I can understand that you’d want to know. I can. But if you know, I don’t get paid.”

She was being reasonable. She really was. But I wasn’t about to be reasonable. That was why I’d invited her into my house, not my home. It was far more formal and it still allowed me some liberties. Like pointing a gun at her. “In all fairness,” I said, holding the Casting level, “you haven’t really lied to me. But I am not sympathetic enough to give a shit if you get paid. I suppose I can live without this person’s name, but I would damn sure like to know why he is protecting me, how he knew about the hit, and why he wants to stay anonymous. Think you can cover those bases?”

She swallowed. “I’ll try. All he ever told me was that he knew someone who made a reference to the hit. He wanted to stop it. He said you didn’t need to know about his help.”

“Who put the hit out?”

“I…I’m sorry, Lucifel. I am. But I don’t know. And I don’t think he’ll tell me.”

“Call him up,” I said, nodding at my phone and relaxing the Casting. “You have to be able to get in touch with him somehow to get paid. And he has to know me to know if you told me who he was. So call him up, and ask him who put the hit out.”

“Sorry, Lucifel. He calls me. And before you ask, the number is always restricted.” She eyed the barrel of the gun. “I don’t much like not knowing what’s going on, and I certainly don’t like being on the business end of a pistol. But the latter is not a cure for the former.”

I sighed and put the gun away. “My apologies, Merula. I’m in a tight spot, with no loopholes I can see. Any ally I may have and any enemy could mean the difference between not just my ass staying alive, but that poor kid in the rehab ward. And now, it probably means your ass and your mom’s and your great Aunt Sue.” I sighed. “Fuck.”

“No great aunts, and no one named Sue,” she said with a shrug. “But I know a lot about my craft. And no offense, but I want to stay on this case.”

“Beg pardon?”

“I want to stay on. Seriously, watching your ass—metaphorically speaking of course—is the most exciting and lucrative spot I’ve got in the middle of a long ass dry spell. Pudgy, blonde witches are not your average pick for a top-line bodyguard. And it makes me want to spell myself thin and muscular, but thin and muscular stick out. As do, I’m sure I do not need to tell you, large, unique tattoos.”

“I don’t blend well,” I nodded with a touch of amusement. “Makes me easier to follow. Of course, usually that’s negated easily by knowing when someone’s following you.”

She shrugged. “Not always—I followed you well enough.” “I’m not hard to find,” I agreed. “Considering that the cemetery required me to make a million calls and release signed form in triplicate. They all but printed it in a newsletter.”

“Memo,” she corrected, coughing slightly.

“Beg pardon?”

“It was a memo. To all the staff, that the cemetery was going to be ‘disturbed’ by a necromage named Lucifel. Not hard to find you then.” I laughed outright at the sheer absurdity of it, and she grinned with me. Maybe the idea of a memo from a cemetery is the most ridiculous at three in the morning.

I sighed, leaning back in my chair. “So what do we do now? No offense, but I haven’t really done a whole lot of this lately.”

She cocked her head to the side. “What do you mean?”

“I’d bet you’ve told me all you know, at least right now. So what do I do? Force you to stay here? Call the cops? Beat it out of you?” She turned white at the latter, but I simply shrugged. “You won’t tell me or can’t. So what do I do now?” She sighed, hanging her head down. “I don’t know either. I do know that my help is yours as long as you need it.” She dared look me in the eyes as she continued, “You can’t face down whatever this is all by yourself forever—you wouldn’t have made it tonight without me. You need someone to cover you. May as well be me.”

“I’ll consider it. I’m used to being on the contracted end of this deal, rather than the customer.”

“Your unseen benefactor offered to pay for it already, should I decide to stay on,” she offered with another shrug. “If you want it, you’ve got backup.”

I nodded against my will. “I think, Merula, I will need it. If you would excuse me now, though, I need to be alone. I’ve got to cope with the fact that not only did I shoot one of my own kind tonight, but my own kind want to see me dead. And I don’t think I want to be around company when that breaks.”

“I see,” she nodded. “I’ll call you tomorrow…er…later today. Much later.”

“Fine,” I said, leading her to the door. She nodded as I wordlessly closed it behind her and locked it, reactivating the alarm. I think she supposed I was going to burst into tears. I didn’t. I walked very calmly to my basement and silently regarded the punching bag. I wanted to have that anger that allowed me to beat on it until the foundations shook. But I couldn’t. All I could do was think that my own people had developed a hate of me so great as to hire Death’s Touch. Someone out there, an elf like me, hated me badly enough to send elfin assassins after me. And I had to kill them. I’d had to kill my own people to save my miserable hide. No matter that they’d attacked me and been willing to kill me. All that mattered was that simple fact. I’d killed them.

I slumped down at the foot of the punching bag and sobbed like a child.