Silence (30 page)

It was cool; the way ice was cool when touched through thin gloves. Colder when she puled, because she could pul at it if she concentrated. She tried, and Georges said, “Yes, Emma?”

She hadn’t built it. It had existed before her. But she’d used it.

She was using it now, in some ways. She let go of Georges’

hand in the darkness, and whispered, “Dad.”

She couldn’t see him, but she could feel his sudden presence growing. With it came memories, some good, some bad. They were hers, but they were his as wel, seen on opposite sides and from different angles.

Sprout.

“Dad, take my hand?”

He did. She heard him say, “Helo, Maria. I’m Brendan Hal, Emma’s father.”

Emma’s father.”

She touched her father. If she tried, she could feel the cold— but it wasn’t as sharp as Georges; it was the difference between a winter day and solid ice. She tried to pul at him in the way she had puled at George, and it was harder. But it was—barely— possible.

But his power had flowed into her when he wanted it to.

We’re bound, Em, he told her, and she could hear the affection in his voice so strongly it almost hurt. I love you.

She looked at him, then, and her eyes teared. She started to tel him it was the smoke, then stopped and smiled instead. It was a weak smile, and she added, “I’m fine, Dad,” before she could stop herself. “I miss you.”

He touched her face for just a second, and his smile deepened.

She looked, last, to Maria. Maria, whose chain she didn’t hold; Maria, whose love she didn’t have. The only thing they had in common was the desire to save a four-year-old boy from decades of terror and pain—and Emma knew her desire was nowhere near the equal of Maria’s.

But the desire to try was as strong, and that would have to do.

She took a breath, and she tried to reach for Maria Copis. Al she felt in her hand was Maria’s hand.

She reached for her father again, and she felt the cold. This time, she was more careful. She approached the fact of his death slowly, as if he were not, in fact, dead at al. She could see him.

She could speak with him. She could, if she wanted, hug him. He She could speak with him. She could, if she wanted, hug him. He stil loved her. He stil worried about her.

What he couldn’t do, she didn’t think about—not now.

She felt the cold. But instead of shying away from it, she reached into it, and then, as if it were a wal, she pushed beyond it. For a moment, the cold was sharp and cutting, and then she felt a slow and steady warmth. She opened her eyes and stared at her father, who said, and did, nothing.

“I think,” Margaret said in the distance, “she might have it, Suzanne.”

“He’s dead,” Suzanne very correctly replied. “The boy’s mother is not.”

“No. You make a point. But stil.”

Emma let go of her father’s hand, and the warmth receded.

She wanted to cal it back, because in it, for a moment, she felt safe. She felt safe in a way that she couldn’t remember feeling, even as a four year old; what pain could touch her, there? What worry, and what loss?

“Maria,” she said, and she held out her free hand.

Maria took it.

“Think,” Emma told Maria, “of the good things. The good things about Andrew. Not his death, not his loss, but al the reasons you feel the loss so strongly. Can you do that?”

“I…I don’t know. I’l try.”

Emma had never doubted it. She watched Maria’s face, and after a moment, Maria grimaced and closed her eyes; she’d been staring at the spot in midair where Andrew stood because she could no longer see—or hear—him. And this was probably for could no longer see—or hear—him. And this was probably for the best, because there was no way she could have done what Emma asked, otherwise. As it was, climbing Everest with toothpicks for pitons would probably have been easier.

Emma watched Maria’s face. Her eyelids flickered and trembled, and her lips turned at the corners, tightening and thinning. The smoke was thick in the room, and Emma sat; she wanted to lie flat across the floor, remembering her elementary school lessons about moving in fires. But she crouched instead, waiting, and trying not to feel the passing time.

Bit by bit, Maria’s expression relaxed, her lips losing that tight, pained look, the lines around her closed eyes slowly disappearing as she bowed her head toward Emma. Emma, both hands locked around Maria, just as they had previously been locked around her son, closed her eyes as wel.

She reached out for Maria Copis the way she had reached out for her father; she didn’t move her hands, didn’t open her eyes, didn’t try to physicaly grab anything.

And doing so, she remembered the first night that she had seen—and touched—her father. Her body had been in a chair, beside Michael. But she had been standing in the middle of the waiting room in front of Brendan Hal, her hands outstretched, her palms and fingers splayed wide to catch him before he vanished.

That part of her—it was inside her now, and had been ever since that first night. Maybe it had always been inside her.

Maybe what she saw, somehow, was not actualy what was there. Maybe it wasn’t something eyes could actualy see—but there. Maybe it wasn’t something eyes could actualy see—but her mind was doing the translating and giving her images that she could recognize and hold.

Eyes closed, she looked for her father.

And she saw him, standing in the darkness, limned in light, his face bright with that smile that meant she’d done something that made him proud. She looked for Georges, and she saw that he was standing beside Catherine; they were holding hands, and where their hands met, the light was bright and unfaltering.

She nodded at them but didn’t speak; instead she moved on, searching now for Maria Copis.

She saw Andrew first, his face tear-stained, his hair matted to his forehead, his eyes wide and wild. He wasn’t solid; he wavered in her vision like a—like a ghost. But he stood in the way, and she felt that if she could move past him somehow, she would reach Maria.

Instead, for the first time in this darkness of closed eyes that had nothing at al to do with her living, breathing body, she held out a hand. Or at least that’s what it felt like she did; when she looked, she couldn’t actualy see her hand. Or her arm. Or anything at al that looked like Emma Hal.

But for the first time, Andrew seemed to sense her. Chase had caled him powerful, and maybe he was—but not here. Here, he was weak, wavering like a heat mirage in the air before her; here he was so damn lost it was hard to see him at al. She held out her hand again.

This time, he reached for it.

This time, he reached for it.

Come on, Andrew, she told him, as gently as she knew how.

Let’s go find your mom.

“AMY. SKIP. GRAB THE LADDERS. They’re not coming down any time soon.” Eric turned to speak to Alison; he turned back when he realized that the ladders weren’t coming down.

“We need to move. Quickly.”

“And if they need to come down in a hurry?” Amy’s hands lodged themselves on her hips, and she shifted her stance.

Eric resisted the urge to point out that she was not, in fact, holding the ladder at this moment. “Skip,” he said, over her, “it sounds as though your friend Longland is going to make an appearance. I’d suggest you get ready to hightail it out of here with your sister, if you can get her to leave.”

with your sister, if you can get her to leave.”

Skip let the ladder go and turned to his younger sister. For the first time, Eric saw the similarities between the siblings, not the very obvious differences. Amy was obviously angry; on her, it looked good. “Amy.”

She turned so her back was squarely facing his voice.

“Amy, we’re leaving.”

“I’m not leaving Emma—”

“Eric’s staying.”

“Eric’s barely known her for a month. I’m not—”

Skip grabbed one of the arms that was attached, by her hand, to her hip. “You’re leaving. You can carry a ladder, or we can leave the ladders behind—but I’l be carrying you.”

Her eyes rounded in an almost operatic way; Eric thought she was going to slap her brother. “The kid’s dead.” Skip spaced the words evenly and slowly, as if English were not Amy’s native tongue. “If what you said about last night is even halfway true, you’re going to join him if we can’t get away before Longland shows. I personaly don’t give a shit if you die here,” he added.

“But it’l kil Mom and Dad.”

“Amy—” Eric began.

She lifted the arm that wasn’t gripped by Skip. “Fine,” she told her brother. Skip puled the ladders down as Eric turned to Alison.

“Alison, take the baby. You and Michael get as far away from this house as you possibly can.” He glanced at Michael, who was in Cathy’s world and had failed to hear anything, and he decided that Michael and his compliance were going to have to be Alison’s problem.

“I’l take Amy and Skip,” Alison told him, after a smal pause.

“Michael’s not—”

“Michael is the only person who seemed to be unaffected by whatever it was Longland did at Amy’s.”

Which was interesting. “Probably because his brain’s wired differently. It’d be worth some study—at another time. This is not that time. If Longland is aware that Michael somehow resisted the very, very expensive compulsion that affected everyone else in that house, he won’t bother with subtlety. He’l kil him, probably quickly.

“Once he’s committed to that, he’l kil al of you,” Eric added.

“But Emma—”

“Emma has Chase.”

“Why is Longland here?”

“If I had to guess? Andrew Copis has a lot of raw power, and Longland has, at the moment, a need for raw power.”

“He—”

“If he’s adept, he can sense it. He can’t sense the rest of us; we’re probably not his target here. That’l change when he arrives, and I’d rather not risk any of you.” He slid his hands into his pockets. Nestled against his thigh were iron rings, warmed by constant contact with his leg. He puled them out and slid them on. “If he’s done any research at al, he’l have some idea of what he’s facing.”

“Could he go into a burning building and drag Andrew out?”

“Could he go into a burning building and drag Andrew out?”

The fact that Emma, Maria, and Chase had failed to emerge passed without comment, but the worry was there on her face.

“Hard to say. It wouldn’t be his first choice, if our own records of Necromancers are anything to go by. If we’re away from the building, and he sees the same fire that Emma sees, he might try to find a different power source. He probably hasn’t had the time to gather any.”

“But you’re not coming with us. You don’t think he’s going to leave.”

“If he decides to risk it—” He shook his head. “If he decides to risk it, he’l have safer passage than Emma did; he knows how to use the dead, and he only has to reach Andrew. No, I’m not coming with you. Emma isn’t close to his match yet, but she has all the others. Even if he gives up on Andrew, Emma’s got what he needs—he can just take that. I’l hunker down out of sight, and I’l see what he does. But the rest of you have to leave now.

“Aly,” he added, when she failed to move, “I’l have enough to worry about. If you al stay here, you’l slow me down when I can’t afford to be slowed.”

She hesitated again, and Eric looked, very pointedly, at the baby she held in her arms. He could see that she wanted to argue. She didn’t. But she shifted her grip on the baby, and she bent to grab the diaper bag before she retreated as far as Michael. She tapped Michael on the shoulder, and he looked up instantly; Eric couldn’t hear what she said. But he saw Michael’s expression darken in utterly open concern.

Eric understood why Emma valued them both so highly. Why, Eric understood why Emma valued them both so highly. Why, in fact, she loved them, even if that word was out of vogue among the young. He had thought, watching Emma, Alison, Amy, and the rest of Amy’s mafia, that Michael was simply a burden they’d chosen to adopt.

But he watched Michael pick up Cathy, as if Cathy were his baby sister, and he watched as Michael’s mouth moved over words that distance silenced, and he understood that the burden of care, if that’s what it was, was not by any means shouldered on just one side.

He could see only Alison’s profile, but she was, at this distance, measured and calm for someone who was also, clearly, in a hurry.

Michael lifted Catherine, and they headed down Rowan Avenue. Skip and Amy joined them, and Amy’s denunciation was the clearest sound in the street. Skip was ignoring her, rather than engaging. Arguing was, admittedly, hard to do when they were both lugging ladders.