Greywalker

Chapter 28

Tuesday started out raining. Even though I felt weak and calcified, I ran until my chest hurt from something purely physical for the first time in days. My body was fine but I was falling apart in all other ways. I ran on, amazed that I could, considering how often I had thought of simply stopping over the past few days. And I got furious with myself for my self-pity and self-doubt. I was still afraid, still weak and unsure and in the midst of the unknown, but if I stood still, there was only one possible end. At least, going forward, I stood a chance, however small.

I ran. Sweat and rain washed away my stupidity and despair. I wanted to stay in the clean downpour until everything washed away, but I had made a choice and I would stick to it.

From the office, I called the curator of the Madison Forrest House and persuaded her I needed to see the organ that night. She agreed to let us in at nine, though she was not pleased. With another phone call, Mara agreed to come, too.

I chased down some more prosaic business, keeping my mind busy, and was interrupted by a call from Will.

He sounded tired. "Hey, Harper. I checked up on that Tracher organ some more." "That was quick." "A lot of the records have been computerized over the last few years and I know the right people to call in Europe. Anyhow, I don't know what your client wants it for, but that organ is a fake-up."

"Totally fake? It looked old."

"Parts of it are too old, actually. The frame and action numbers didn't match. There's some additional paneling behind the mirror and over the pipes which is older than the case and shouldn't be there at all. According to Tracher, the frame came from an instrument that was damaged in a fire in Amsterdam in 1923. The case was written off by the insurance company and sold to a furniture jobber. He probably installed the action, which came from another organ built in 1902. But there's no way to tell."

"Which part is the 'action'?"

"In this case, just the keyboard—the rest wouldn't have fit. What-ever your client told you about the instrument, it's probably not true. The organ disappeared for a while and finally turned up again in a Swiss estate auction in 1957, where it was bought by the last owner of record, a G. Sergeyev of Bern. I tried to track him down, but the best I could do was a news article about his death in 1960. He doesn't seem to have had any relatives to inherit the organ, so I don't know what happened to it between 1960 and when it was shipped out of Oslo."

My ghostly client's clothing and speech predated the 1950s, so he certainly wasn't the man from Bern.

"Did the obit say what the last owner died of?"

"It was a news item, not an obituary. He was crushed by a trolley. There's not a lot else, except a partial provenance on the organ from the estate auction, but it's completely bogus. It claims the family— Mandon was their name—was the original owner, but they only had it thirty-three years, at the most, and that hardly makes it an heirloom. And there's one creepy thing: the Mandons died of asphyxia from a gas leak in the house. That's, what, five owners who all died in accidents."

I wondered how many more of its owners had met unexpected deaths. And what had happened to the organ during its lost years?

Will broke my silence. "Harper? Are you there?"

"Yes My mind was wandering. Thanks, Will, that's helpful.

Will sounded grim. "Good, because I wanted to ask you a favor now.

I had trepidations. "Sure. What do you need?" "This fake provenance got me to thinking about some thing at work, so I looked into them. And I need to talk to the police."

"What sort of things?"

"I don't want to go into it yet. I had the impression you would know who to talk to, though. Do you?"

I didn't have to think about that. I gave him the number of a detective I knew at SPD-the most honest cop I had ever met. "Thank you." "Hey. Call me later?" «Sure» He hung up, sounding distracted.

I wondered what Will had found to upset him, but had no time to explore the question. I gathered my stuff and headed to the Danziger's; I wanted to talk to Mara before we met Carlos.

Mara and I were sitting in the living room about an hour later. Adjusting to the change in the Grey was not easy, and I had just made a hash of the same simple exercise of moving in and out at will.

Dizzy and frustrated, I pounded on the arm of the sofa. "Damn it. Why can't I do it when I want to? I can fall in and out when I'm not thinking of it, but I can't do it when I'm trying." "You're still fighting."

"It just looks so different. It feels different." "But it hasn't really changed. It's you that's changed. When you don't think of it, you've no difficulty. It's when your mind is in between you and the Grey that you have troubles." "I can't not think."

Mara leaned forward and caught my eye. "You can stop fighting it. You must. We've been wrong about so much, but of this I am certain. You must accept what it is and that it's part of you. When you are fighting it, it's like a snarled rope that tightens and knots up with every tug. Relax and the rope relaxes, too. I can see it happening."

I frowned at her.

"I can see that knot in your chest if I try. It ties you to the Grey, and the harder you fight, the more taut it goes. When you simply let it be, it spreads out and you become more Grey."

"I don't want to be more Grey!"

She sighed. Shivering spears of honey gold light combed through her hair and lit the wall behind. "I am sorry, Harper. You haven't that choice anymore. Accept what is and the rest will follow. Then this will all be easy—or at least easier. Coming and going, pushing and peeking—things we've not thought of, even—will be as automatic as walking or swimming." She looked up at the beginning of sunset through the rain outside. "You are meant to be part of that world and you can only exercise the powers you have when you accept that."

I turned away to look at the soggy sunset, rubbing my hands over my face and wiping off the heavy frown that had settled there. Tension and exhaustion bore on my shoulders. I leaned my cheek on the sofa back, watching the shafts of sunlight that broke through the clouds turn pink, while the vibrant yellows and whites of the house nexus glimmered like a fairy fence between. The low, bleak cloud cover looked like the storm-mist of the Grey.

I heard Mara get up and walk out of the room. I was too tired to follow her. The floorboards sang as she returned and stopped near me.

"It's almost time to go. I made you something for tonight. I hope it will help."

I looked up at her.

Mara held out a small leather bag on a long thong. It reminded me a bit of the thing I'd seen peeking over Dr. Skelleher's collar.

"What is it?"

"It's a charm against dark things. It should help push back the organ's monstrousness a bit. Just a little thing, but can't hurt. Put it round your neck."

I shrugged and took it from her, dropping it over my head. The little bag plopped onto my sweater, right over the ache in my chest.

I gasped, feeling as if I'd suddenly breathed in clean air after a night in a smoke-filled bar.

Mara grinned. "Any use?" "Yes."

"Brilliant. Tuck it away, though. I suspect your necromancer shan't like the sight of it."

"Why not?"

"Bit of a monster, himself, isn't he?"

"Maybe I should just wear it all the time."

Mara showed me a mock frown. "Not too sociable of you—wearing charms against your helper. Besides, it won't hold long if the artifact is drawing power. It's just a trinket."

She looked at the descending sun. "You'd best get going. Wouldn't be wise to let him get there first. I'll be along after I check on Brian and hand him off to Ben."

I braced myself and headed out.

The cloud cover contributed to an early darkness and the sky was lumpy black when I pulled into the wet gravel lot across from the Madison Forrest House. The scent of more impending rain thickened the air. I sat in the Rover, waiting and watching the front door.

An orange and green taxi pulled up in front of the museum. Carlos rose out of the backseat and stood looking at the building a moment while the taxi drove off. From this distance, his presence didn't affect me. He turned his head left and right, then was still. He whirled and walked straight toward me. It startled me and I jerked in my seat.

He strode to my side of the truck and looked in. He beckoned.

Coming to his sign seemed like I was ceding control to him and I'd done quite enough of that lately. I didn't think it would be a good idea, either. On the other hand, if he wanted to harm me, he'd had plenty of chances before this.

I rolled down the window. "You made it," I said.

"Yes. Where's your witch?"

Mara pulled in just as I started to answer. He turned to look and I got out of the truck while his back was turned.

Mara seemed to tumble out of her car. Her hair was a bit wild and her eyes were sparkling. Holding on to her purse, she rushed to the side of my truck.

"Sorry I'm late. Someone didn't want to go to sleep." She looked Carlos straight in the eye with no sign of discomfort. "Hello. Ready to go?"

He nodded. Then he looked at me. "No introduction?"

"Carlos," I started, glancing toward Mara, "this is…." She gave a sharp shake of her head behind Carlos's shoulder."…our witch."

He frowned, making my innards churn. He glanced back at Mara and nodded at her.

She smiled and spoke in a pleasant tone. "Tricky bastard, aren't you?"

He went still. Then one side of his mouth turned upward. "I am."

"Shall we go?" Mara suggested. "You can almost see the bloody thing glowing from here."

We all turned and stared toward the house. The upstairs parlor windows seemed to have become red glass. Shadow-light limned the trees in the yard a gory crimson to my Grey-adapted sight. I did not want to enter that building. I shot a look at Mara, who made a face and took my arm in a warm grip. With a steady stride, she walked with me to the gate. Carlos followed behind.

I rang the intercom and, after a delay, the curator let us in. "You mind if I don't come up?" she asked. "As long as I'm stuck here, I've got some paperwork to get through. Just buzz the intercom when you leave and I'll lock up. OK?"

Her relaxed attitude surprised me, until I noticed both Carlos and Mara looking very hard at her. More than one tricky bastard in this lot.

Once she was gone, we started up the stairs. At the top, I stopped and swayed, momentarily nauseated. Mara supported my elbow. Carlos brushed past both of us and opened the parlor door.

A rush of horrors poured out of the room. I jerked away before I realized I had seen more than felt them. My heart raced and I felt ice on my spine, but I could stand it.

Mara nodded at me and led the way into the parlor. Carlos was a few feet in front of the organ, staring at it. He turned his head to glance at us. An ugly smile oozed across his face.

"Amazing."

"Disgusting is more like," Mara replied. She pushed me into a chair as far from the organ as possible. "Let's get on with it."

Carlos shrugged his eyebrows and turned back to face the organ. Mara stepped back a pace and made a few sparkling signs in the air behind him. They rained a curtain of mist and white pickets. I could hear Carlos muttering, and a thin, sour odor threaded through the room. Mara walked in an arc behind him, creating a shimmering semicircle stretching from wall to wall and cutting off the pulsing miasma of the organ's aurora of light, shadow, reek, and noise.

Nightmare faces and boiling Grey began to heave into a panorama around the instrument. I saw Sergeyev's face appear for a moment. His mouth opened in a silent scream and then was sucked backward into the organ. A kaleidoscope of other faces followed, shattered frag-ments of terror. I didn't recognize any of them. A weird, muted chorus of grim cries and muttering rang around Carlos. His shoulders heaved once in a while and I saw his hands flicker before him. Otherwise, he was still.

A gust of black and red light burst from the organ above the key-board. Carlos ducked, and it shattered on the circle of Mara's magic. Her shimmering sigils faded and the room was filled with a sudden howling and chittering. Carlos stepped forward and laid both his hands on the keyboard.

The organ shrieked in agony. Then came a roar, growing around the organ, pushing against Carlos like a bodiless wind. A fetid stink rose with the sound. I started up again, ready to bolt, the pulse of the Grey in my chest fluttering with my racketing heartbeat and twisting like a knife. Mara backpedaled and grabbed me by the shoulder. Her eyes were wide, and I thought she was on the verge of breaking and running herself. Her breath was loud.

Carlos raised his hands and slashed out to both sides. Silence. The Grey aura around the instrument faded, collapsing to its writhing red and black gorgon's corona again. He eased back until he had crossed the line Mara had made; then he turned and walked to us. His eyes were ablaze with a frightening excitement.

"Up," he ordered.

I got up, and he herded us to the door and stood on the threshold. "Now go," he said.

I started to turn, feeling exhausted and ill and wanting to leave.

Mara held on and remained facing him, a rock against his wave of influence. "No."

He raised an eyebrow, and the force of his demand hovered like a black swarm.

Mara glared at Carlos. "You can't push me as easily as that, Carlos. I'll not let you have it."

"You can't stop me."

"Common sense will stop you. It is necromantic, isn't it?"

His bladed half grin came back. "Why else would I want it?"