Will didn’t answer, and as I looked at him I realised he never would. His eyes had glazed and as I watched, the slow rise and fall of his chest stopped.
I stared down at his body for a long time, then turned and began, very slowly, to retrace my steps.
By the time I made it back to the laboratory the battle was over. Smoke hung in the air, but the fires had been starved to nothing and only smouldering patches marked where the flames had raged. The nauseating stench of burnt flesh filled the air, thick and sweet and horrible.
Captain America was propped up against one of the benches, his face pale from blood loss. His leg was gone at the knee; an open first-aid kit lay next to him and he’d managed to put a tourniquet on. It didn’t look like he was going any further.
I could have finished him but just the thought of killing anyone else made me want to throw up. The adrenaline rush from my battle with Will had worn off and I was bone-tired and sick, drained of emotion. I tapped the point of the jian against the stone, the noise echoing in the silence.
Captain America’s head snapped up and he peered through the smoke at me. His eyes were hazy and his movements sluggish and I knew he had to be in shock, but even so, looking through the futures I saw him pull out a gun and level it at me. “Please don’t,” I said wearily.
Captain America hesitated and we stared at each other for a long moment, then I saw the futures of violence thin and slip away. “Where’s Will?”
I didn’t answer but looked at him steadily. Captain America’s eyes flickered from me down to the jian. Will’s blood was still on the blade.
“Lee?” I said.
“Gone,” Captain America said. His voice was weak, but he held his head up. “You’re not catching him.”
“I never wanted to catch any of you.”
The tread of heavy feet echoed from one of the side corridors. I thought about dodging back and hiding but I was too tired. I stood my ground and waited.
Cinder came out of the darkness, massive and steady. A red glow hovered at his shoulder but he didn’t have any attack magic active, not yet. His eyes registered me, then turned to settle on Captain America. Cinder came to a stop, looking at the adept, and the message was clear. Take your shot.
Captain America stared back at him. He didn’t draw a weapon and he didn’t look away. After a few seconds Cinder glanced at me. “Verus.”
“Where’s Deleo?”
Cinder tilted his head, as if deciding whether to answer. “Gate chamber.” He studied me. “But they weren’t here for that, were they?”
I was silent.
“They wanted you,” Cinder said. “You led them here. Got us to handle them. Sneaky.” He studied me, then shrugged and nodded towards the exit. “You better go.”
I glanced at Captain America. “What are you going to do with him?”
Cinder looked at me steadily. “Not your business.”
I hesitated.
“Don’t try anything, Verus,” Cinder said. “Been a long day and fighting you is just a pain in the balls. I’m not in the mood.”
I looked Cinder up and down, then turned back to the boy I’d thought of as Captain America. “Your name’s Kyle, right?”
Captain America—Kyle—looked at me. “Yeah.”
“For what it’s worth,” I said, “I never had anything against you.” I turned and crossed the laboratory, my steps heavy. I skirted Kyle just in case he tried a last desperate attack, but nothing came. He and Cinder watched me go.
I walked down the tunnel in the darkness and through the chapel. The pile of dust had been scattered in the battle and there was no trace that anyone had been left there. I didn’t hear any sound from behind. I could have stopped to spy on Kyle and Cinder, see what Cinder was going to do, but the thought of staying here any longer filled me with nausea. As I trudged up the steps to the mansion’s ground floor I pulled out my phone and dialled. Variam picked up almost instantly. “Alex?”
“It’s over,” I said. I felt utterly drained, so much that it was all I could do to put one foot in front of the other. “I’m coming up.”
“Gate’s ready when you are,” Variam said.
I hung up and started the long walk back to where Variam was waiting to take me home.
Chapter 14
It was a few days later.
I stood under the trees of the South London cemetery. The sky was overcast, low clouds forming a thick blanket that held in the heat, and the weather was close and humid and tiring. I held still, the tree obscuring my silhouette enough to make me easy to miss, and watched the people gathered around the new grave in the far corner. It wasn’t a large crowd—less than a dozen—and the priest was reading from a small leather-bound book. I couldn’t make out what he was saying and I didn’t want to get close enough to hear. Up ahead, through the legs of the crowd, I could see Catherine’s grave, her parents’ tombstones just behind. A new grave marker had been added next to hers, of the same size and shape.
I’ve never been to many funerals, though God knows I’ve been involved often enough in what causes them. When someone bites it in my line of work it tends not to get advertised, either because no one wants the publicity, because there isn’t enough left to bury, or both. It had been a long time since I’d been to one, and I hadn’t really known what to expect. Few had shown up. Either Will’s lifestyle had left him without many friends, or they just hadn’t wanted to come. Those who had were either young—his age—or sixty or more.
You’d think there’d be something more dramatic about the passing of someone from this world to the next, but I guess by the time the funeral comes it’s all done. All that’s left is to go through with the ritual. So I stood alone and watched, and the priest read through the ceremony and the guests listened in silence, until eventually it was done and the small crowd began to disperse, people splitting up in twos and threes. Maybe it was my imagination but they seemed to move a little more briskly as they walked away, as if they were returning to the world of the living and leaving their brush with death behind. None came in my direction, for which I was glad. I stayed in the shadows and let them pass by in the sun, going back to their lives.
There was one person, though, whom I couldn’t hide from. I’d seen him in the crowd, standing next to a girl I didn’t recognise, and I knew he’d seen me. It was what he did, after all. I didn’t make a move towards him and as the crowd broke up I expected him to disappear, but instead he said something to the girl and walked towards me. He stopped just outside the shade of the tree, as if afraid to come out of the light.
Lee looked very different from when I’d first seen him. It had been less than ten days since we’d first met on the roof of my flat and he’d aged harshly in that brief time. There was a haunted look in his eyes now, and in his funeral clothes he looked less youthful, more careworn. It’s one thing to see someone forced to grow up; it’s something else to make it happen. Lee didn’t speak at first and neither did I. We looked at each other for a while. “Why are you here?” Lee said at last.
“Not for you, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“You killed them,” Lee said. I expected him to be angry but he just sounded bitter and tired. “Those two might have done it but you were the one who set it up.”
“You shouldn’t have tried to kill me first.”
“It was Will who wanted you dead. Not us.”
“Then why’d you follow him?”
Lee was silent. “You know, everyone’s been talking as though this was just between me and Will,” I said. “You know what I think? The one who really made all this happen was you.”
Lee stared at me. “What? I just—”
“You just find people. Like I just found Will’s sister.” I looked at Lee. “I saw how Dhruv and Will treated you. Your magic isn’t for combat so they acted like you were less important. But you were the one who was really driving everything. Everywhere the Nightstalkers went, they went because you pointed them there.”