Burn Artist

Chapter 9

Vyacheslav did not explode so much as simply ignite. The fire roiled out from deep inside him while he slumped against the edge of the bar, stupefied. As I ran to him, he turned to face me. His mouth opened as if to speak in bewilderment. He vomited flame instead, and I was suddenly overwhelmed by the heat and noise as the bartender, dancer and patrons screamed and shouted around us.

“Slava! What the fucking… SHIT!’ Rodion barreled toward us.

“Get the fire extinguisher!” Vassily’s voice pierced the cacophony.

Everyone was so loud that I couldn’t concentrate enough to try and fight what was happening, but even I had been able to work the Art, there was no helping him now. Eerily soundless, Slava folded in on himself, his body spurting gouts of yellow flame. His face contorted in agony as he first went to his knees, then his face, writhing and popping. The fire was contained to his torso, but it was so hot that the linoleum underneath him liquefied.

It was Nic who came up with the extinguisher, dousing Slava and the bar – also on fire – in a cloud of white foam. The bartender finally got her wits about her and got her own smaller extinguisher from behind the counter.

“What the fuck!?” Petro was hysterical, pacing around with his hands in his hair. “Alexi, why the fuck… what the FUCK, man?”

As we did our parts to fight the fire, Slava finally started screaming: five, maybe six seconds of helpless, raw, bloodcurdling agony. I backpedaled from the writhing pyre, closing my eyes and clamping my will into place as I felt out for the link to my tracer ward. I forced myself to filter the cacophony of the room, focusing on the colors and textures instead of the noise. It all throbbed into a strange background symphony against the threads of magic, burning white and taut in my imagination. I hooked into the flow of magic fueling his immolation, grasped onto the energy I’d woven into his ward, and hauled on it like an angler.

There was a moment of intense resistance, a deep black void of nothingness that fought back against me like a marlin on the line. My will won out, and I was suddenly swamped by the sensation of furious light and heat, the smell of molten metal, burned rubber, and dust. I heard something grinding, a deafening churning, mashing sound, and saw lines of cars tumbled against towering black mountains of debris, all of which disappeared in flame as a maw – part fire, part beast – roared at me and tore the link apart.

I stumbled back with a shout, flailing for something to ground me. My hands found the edge of the dance stage; I righted myself there, panting and enervated, sweat pouring down my chest. When I finally opened my eyes, I saw everyone milling around a smoldering pile of ash and embers. The only things left of Slava were his hands and feet, the ends of the bones charred black. Bizarrely, his shoes were intact, barely burned. Where he had stood, there was only a small round circle of melted slag… and the amulet I had made him.

Mo and Petro crossed themselves. Rodion was paralyzed with shock. Vassily and Lev had disappeared. The only one who seemed unaffected was Nicolai, who looked down at the burn site, then up at the spread of soot across the ceiling with raised eyebrows and a sloped mouth. The only sign of stress was his cigarette, quivering on his lip.

“Jesus and Mary,” he said. “Haven’t ever seen that happen before.”

“What the fuck was THAT, Alexi?” Rodion turned on me. “What the fuck is this shit? Why didn’t you stop this?”

“The magic circumvented the protective ward in the talisman,” I said, quickly. “It’s like… it’s like someone stuck a pistol under his bullet proof vest and shot him. The armor was there, but—”

“You were supposed to stop this!” Rodion roared. “He’s fucking dead!”

“I tried.” I strode over to the amulet. The linoleum was soft under my shoes as I bent down to pick it up. It was warm, but the bone and the magic had held up. “Look. You can see it survived.”

“Then why the fuck didn’t it work!?”

I sighed. “He predicted our move. Fighting another spook from a distance is like playing chess with a blindfold on.”

“Fuck!” Rodion paced like a tiger, and then roared and smashed his fist on the table. “That fucking piece of shit Maslak!”

“I have a trace on the source of the spell’s energy,” I said. I was already shaky, burned out from the rough disconnection. “It came from a junkyard, an auto wrecking site.”

“There’s a million of those!”

Thank you, Captain Obvious. “I can find it. And I’m going alone… if this spook can light people with their own body fat, I don’t want any blanks near the place. Let me handle the spook; get someone else for Maslak.”

“Hey! Boss!” Vassily called from the security entry across the room. “Lev’s got some clown on the phone that wants to speak to you.”

“All of you, come with me,” Rodion snapped. He stalked for the door. “Except you, Petro. Get your big boy pants on and call Vanya. We need a cleanup team. Tell him to… bring an urn or something.”

Nicolai and I followed Rodion to his office, tongues thick and still with tension. Lev was at Rodion’s desk, his face a stiff mask. He looked exhausted, green around the gills. He held out the receiver; Rodion snatched it from him, and took the seat as Lev stood up and moved aside. I tuned into the room, careful not to screw up the line, and felt – and smelled – the same weird, faint odor I’d smelled before. Burned wax or plastic. I drew a cross over myself, like the others had done before, but my cross was not an Orthodox crucifix. I used the Kabbalic Cross, symbolically touching and warding through multiple layers of reality.

Rodion banged the speaker button, broadcasting to the room. “Jacob, you sniveling piece of shit. The fuck do you think you’re playing with?”

The speaker squealed with a sound that went straight to my teeth, and then resolved into a whickering roar of white noise.

“My client demands you withdraw immediately,” a voice rasped out in English. Male, female, it was hard to tell. “To avoid a repeat of what occurred today.”

Vassily murmured aside to Lev and Semyon, translating for them. Their English was haphazard, at best.

“Your ‘client’ and you can hole up in a cell together and fuck each other inside out, big man,” Rodion said. “So check your attitude before we knock you and your whole fucking family.”

“Call it off, Brukov, or the next one burns tomorrow.” The phone disconnected with a sharp ‘clack’.

“Who the hell does this guy think he is?” Vassily said.

“Someone who can cause people to spontaneously combust from a remote location,” I replied grimly. “They’re arrogant, but I can probably find them or the place the spell originated from.”

Nicolai’s face rippled with irritation. “Can you find him or not?”

They wanted black and white, but there was no such thing in life or in magic. It was always like this with the Organizatsiya. “I’m fairly sure it was Kozlowski and Sons. I won’t know until I visit the site.”

“Do it,” Rodion flicked toward the door with a dismissive wave, scowling. “Twenty-one grand for this asshole.”

I inclined my head. “Consider it done.”

“Hey boss,” Vassily said. “I didn’t really get a chance before, be we were outside, but we also saw something yesterday. Your man was hanging around Bruno Accorso, one of the Manelli Caporegimes.”

“Are you sure?” Lev blinked, pushing his glasses up along his nose.

“Absolutely sure,” Vassily replied. “It was Bruno and two of his soldiers. Maslak looked pretty strung out about it, too.”

Rodion growled. He and Lev and Nicolai exchanged glances.

“I’m going to call the Pakhun for this one,” Rodion said. “Go do your thing. Take out the spook and we’ll get back to you about Maslak. We can still sell off those shares, can’t we?”

“Our half.” Vassily fidgeted with his zippo, fingers light and quick. “We’ll break just slightly under even if we do, adding up all the costs and the loan to Maslak, but we’ll lose his shares if they aren’t transferred to us. I could probably find someone to forge them over to us, but that’s iffy.”

“Right. Then we’re taking over the company and liquidating it.” Rodion thumped his fist on the table, and sat back. “Bring me that asshole’s hands, Alexi. Once we nab Maslak, I’m going to feed him pieces of his pet spook until he chokes.”