Waking the Serpent Page 23

  “I know exactly what I want.” Phoebe crossed her arms. “Just go.”

  Rhea shrugged and grabbed the car keys from the coffee table. “See you in a few hours, then.” She gave Phoebe a hug. “I’m sure it’ll all turn out to be a misunderstanding—a flat tire or something—and you’ll be calling me to head right back.”

  “I hope so.” Phoebe knew she wouldn’t be.

  Theia studied Phoebe as Rhea headed out. “So, what are you going to get?”

  Phoebe didn’t hesitate. “A resplendent quetzal.”

  * * *

  The numbness of the pulque had started to lessen, but other effects were becoming apparent as movement returned to Rafe’s limbs. Unadulterated pulque had a high that was almost hallucinogenic, but whatever Hamilton had put into his concentrated brew was seriously starting to mess with Rafe’s head.

  The rain had stopped falling a while ago but Rafe’s skin kept rippling with sensation, as if drops were falling on it and slithering down his body. The invisible raindrops seemed to take on a translucent form, like tiny, clear snakes.

  Hamilton had left him for a while, but returned periodically to observe him, as though waiting for something specific to happen. When Rafe started feeling the “snake” drops, Hamilton watched him with a smile.

  “I see it’s beginning. Are you having visual hallucinations or just creepy-crawlies?”

  Rafe tried to open his mouth to tell Hamilton to go fuck himself, but his muscles still weren’t responding to his brain.

  “What you’ll see, once they begin, is your true self. Like the original Tezcatlipoca, I am the smoking mirror to which you are being held up, and as you experience your true self, your power will pass through the plane of reflection and become mine.”

  Smoking mirror. It was the English translation of Tezcatlipoca’s name. Hamilton’s narcissism and presumption were mind-blowing. What he had was more like smoke and mirrors. Hamilton’s magic was all tricks, spells he’d perfected, perhaps, but no innate power. Rafe could feel his own power in his limbs, though he couldn’t yet access it. All he had to do was wait.

  But something was happening in the glass around him. Hamilton had turned off the lights inside the house, and the flickering candles on the makeshift altar were throwing shadowy reflections on the surface of the glass. Instead of being reflections of what was inside the pool—Rafe on the St. Andrew’s Cross—it was like a movie projection dimly seen, as though projected onto smoke.

  To his left, he saw himself on his last night with his father, face twisted with self-righteous anger. There had been no reason for Rafe to bring up the fact that his father’s best friend had been screwing his wife. But he hadn’t been able to resist in the face of Rafael’s criticism.

  The realization struck him like a blow to the gut. He’d been blaming his father for what Ford had done to him, when it was Ford who was to blame, Ford who’d violated his father’s trust, and his mother’s—and violated Rafe. His father hadn’t done anything to him, and it had been cruel to lay that at his doorstep. And worse to keep digging at him about his mother’s infidelity.

  But the images on the right now caught his attention. It was Gabriel’s shade, on the night Rafe had forcibly crossed him. His younger brother knelt, pleading, as Rafe ignored him and continued the invocation. Around this image, other scenes played—Gabriel in middle school and high school, drinking to excess as he’d done from the first time he’d broken into their father’s liquor cabinet with his friends at age twelve. Twelve. Jesus Christ. Gabriel had been acting out, just as Rafe had at that age. By then, Rafe had blocked it all. He was busy with college, getting his life together. And he’d left Gabriel to take his place.

  Rafe’s mouth and limbs might not yet be responding to his brain, but he was able to weep, and he did so, gut-wrenchingly, as he began to realize how thoroughly he’d abandoned his brother, too absorbed with himself at every turn to hear Gabriel’s cries for help.

  In front of him, Hamilton seemed to have become transparent. Rafe was still aware of being watched, but Hamilton had ceased to matter to him. Through him he saw the reflection in the sliding door of the enclosure—Rafe’s shame and rage in his youth, his fumbling attempts to “be a man” as his father wanted him to be, which had only ended in humiliation with the women he’d desired.

  Then he saw himself with Phoebe. Though he knew the scenes were Jacob animating him, he seemed like a predator to himself, trying to seduce her, and then nearly allowing Jacob to consciously assist him that night at his house, like a fool. God, he didn’t deserve Phoebe. How could she even stand the sight of him?

  Another image formed in the smoky glass—Rafe with Barbara Fisher. His heart rate accelerated as he watched himself arguing with her. He couldn’t hear the words. Then she was stepping out of the room to answer the door while Rafe’s body sat slumped in a chair.

  His soul seemed to shrivel inside him as her other visitor came into view. Rafe’s apprentice, Matthew, gave the psychic a shockingly intimate kiss. But as he stepped back, his expression transformed—as though he’d become someone else—and Barbara stumbled away from him. She’d been hosting a shade and had transferred it to Matthew. And from the look of fear in her eyes, she knew why.

  Rafe turned away from the vision, eyes fixed on Hamilton with hatred, as Matthew’s image in the glass donned the leather gloves. He couldn’t watch any more. Hamilton had destroyed Matthew—an eager and promising young witch—to spite Rafe.

  But in front of Hamilton’s transparent form, someone else’s image took shape. A dusty-haired man in his early twenties stood watching Rafe, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. His head tilted as he realized he was being watched back.

  “Hello, Rafe.” The gentle twang of his voice, mildly tinged with surprise, was familiar. Jacob’s shade was addressing him, here in the present. “You can see me.” He came closer when Rafe said nothing, walking through the rainwater pool toward him. “But you can’t answer me.” Jacob glanced back at Hamilton, who showed no awareness of his presence. “I was looking for Lila. Sometimes it’s hard to track her, so I focus on Tezcatlipoca. She’s never far.”

  Jacob circled Rafe with interest, shaking his head as he came back around to the front. “I could step in and help you speak, but not much else. He’s got you strapped in pretty tight. Like a steer about to have a bolt shot into its skull.”

  Rafe managed to move his head slightly, trying to signal to Jacob to step in, anyway. If he had volition, even if it were Jacob’s volition, he might be able to use his quetzal power to break the restraints.

  Jacob didn’t seem to notice the movement. “I see your lovely Phoebe finally got the quetzal to come out and play.” He grinned. “Congratulations on your success, my friend.”

  They were hardly friends, but Rafe was in no position to refute him. Around him, the images of his true self were still playing out, but Jacob seemed unaware of them.

  The shade glanced at Hamilton, who was still oblivious to Jacob’s presence. “I’ve tried stepping into him. Thought maybe I could get him to release his hold on Lila. But I pass right through him. I think he has some kind of protective amulet that keeps us out.” Jacob moved toward Hamilton and passed his hand through the necromancer’s. “Probably this ring.”

  He wandered back toward Rafe, his scuffed cowboy boots, incorporeal manifestations of Jacob’s self-ideation, unaffected by the water he waded through. “There is one thing I could do for you, though. If you’ll do something for me.”

  * * *

  There was still no word from Rafe by the time Rhea returned from her place in Tempe with her tattoo kit.

  Phoebe had found a picture online of the resplendent quetzal in flight, its curled tail plume gloriously displayed, and had it printed out and waiting when Rhea arrived.

  Rhea studied it after she’d set up her equipment. “Don�
��t get mad at me, Phoebes, but I don’t think you should get this.”

  Phoebe bristled. “What? Why? It’s what I want.”

  Rhea looked up from the printout. “I know this is hard to hear, sweetie, but what if something happens between you two later? Do you want his symbol on your skin forever, reminding you of a fling? Hot guy or not, you barely even have a relationship—”

  “It is not a fling.” Phoebe glared at her. “We have a relationship. I don’t need weeks or months to know I’m in love with someone.”

  Rhea searched her eyes. “Have you said that to him? You nearly swallowed your tongue last night when you almost called him your boyfriend on accident.”

  Heat rose in her cheeks. “No, I haven’t said it. Because I’m an idiot and I was scared he wouldn’t say it back.”

  “And what if he doesn’t? Say we find him, everything’s hunky-dory, you tell him you’re in love with him and he says, ‘Thanks, that’s sweet’?”

  Phoebe’s eyes prickled with the sudden sting of tears. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Because I love you, Phoebes. And I don’t want you to regret this for the rest of your life. A tattoo is forever. Unless you’ve got a lot of money and you want to go through a lot of pain to get rid of it. And I won’t take part in branding you with something in the heat of the moment that could hurt you later.”

  The tears spilled over. “What’s going to hurt me later is if he dies because I didn’t do everything I could to help him.”

  “Oh, Phoebe, honey, don’t cry.” Rhea put her arms around her. “We can find something else that isn’t so personally related to him that still means something to you.” Rhea studied the printout again. “Besides, this kind of detail would take hours. And I don’t think you want to wait that long.” Phoebe hadn’t even thought of that. Of course it would.

  Theia picked up the paper. “What about the tail feather?” She handed it to Rhea as Phoebe surreptitiously used the edge of her shirt to wipe her eyes. “That’s less specific, more of a symbol of spiritual guidance and self-reliance. And, in this case, a celebration of your individuality, because the plume is so unique.”

  Rhea nodded. “That wouldn’t take too long, depending on how big you want it and where. Maybe an hour.”

  Phoebe felt like crying again as she gathered them in a group squeeze. “You guys are awesome. That sounds perfect.” She took off her shirt and turned to one side. “And I don’t want it too big, just here on my right shoulder blade, extending down and angled toward my spine. Maybe six inches long?”

  Rhea smirked. “You trying to find a way to personally relate it to him, after all?”

  Phoebe turned back and shoved Rhea’s arm as her sister laughed. She held Rhea’s gaze deliberately. “Make it eight.”

  Chapter 28

  Ultimately it took Rhea two hours to draw and ink the tattoo to her satisfaction. It wasn’t elaborate, mostly shaded color within a thin outline, without the detailed definitions of the feathering. Rhea promised to work on it more at another time to do the image justice, but even the basic tattoo, Phoebe thought, was lovely. Rhea had mixed the perfect blend of jade and aquamarine to fill in her graceful, curving outline, giving the tattoo an almost wispy thinness to keep it in proportion with the length Phoebe had chosen. An actual-size plume would have been at least two feet long—which Rhea couldn’t resist joking about as she worked.

  Phoebe looked at it over her shoulder in the bathroom mirror when Rhea was done, already feeling a connection to Rafe—even if her sisters wouldn’t approve. Still high on endorphins, she went back out to the living room.

  “I love it, Rhe.” She gave her sister a hug and a kiss on her cheek. “Let’s read it.”

  Rhea stripped the latex glove off her right hand and placed her palm against the tattoo while Phoebe concentrated on Rafe’s whereabouts. This time, something happened immediately, as it had with Theia’s tattoo.

  Phoebe saw an image of water falling against glass, like a room made entirely of windows. Then Rafe appeared, but it was a memory of him from the night she’d spent at his house—Rafe telling Phoebe his last words to his father had been a dig about Rafe’s mother’s infidelity. Then another image appeared—one of the Diamante Construction and Excavation billboards with Rafe’s father’s picture on it—before the vision dissipated.

  Theia, sitting opposite her, leaned in as Phoebe opened her eyes. “What did you see?”

  “Water and glass. I have no idea what that means. Then something about Rafe’s father—a billboard for the business.” Phoebe shook her head, turning to Rhea. “Did that make any sense to you?”

  Rhea ran her fingers through her bleached-blond pixie cut. “What was the question you had in your mind?”

  “I was thinking ‘Where are you, Rafe?’”

  “So the answer could be literal—in a glass room full of water made for Rafael Diamante Senior by his construction company.”

  “Where in the world would that be? Who would have a glass room full of water? What is it, a shower?”

  “A rain catcher,” said Theia. “I saw it on some program showcasing homes of the wealthiest Arizonans. It’s in Mr. Diamante’s house.”

  Phoebe stared at her for an instant before she tackle-hugged her. “Thank goodness you watch even more TV than I do.”

  Rhea peeled off the other glove. “So, where’s Diamante’s house?”

  “I don’t know. But the address has to be online somewhere, right?” Phoebe grabbed her tablet from her bag and pulled up the browser.

  “Not necessarily. Super-rich businessman and politician? He wouldn’t exactly advertise it.”

  Phoebe realized Rhea was right as soon as she started searching. Maybe if he were someone like John McCain, who couldn’t really hide from the public eye. But anyone less famous but equally wealthy would be a challenge. “Any ideas, Thei?”

  She thought Theia might remember the street or neighborhood the house was in, but, as usual, Theia’s answer was the one that should have been obvious but would never have occurred to anyone else.

  “Ione. She’d have the alumni list for the Covent.”

  Spot-on or not, Phoebe didn’t relish bringing Ione into this. She was bound to get an earful no matter what she told Ione, but if she had to tell her about Carter Hamilton, there was no telling how Ione would take it.

  “Any other ideas?”

  “We have to tell her about Rafe’s lawyer, anyway.” Trust Rhea to zero in on what Phoebe was leaving unsaid. “Everyone in the Covent is in danger from this nut-job. Even if he’s not the necromancer and just a garden variety fuck-pig.” No one could accuse Rhea of mincing words.

  Phoebe bit the bullet and dialed Ione on speakerphone. After three rings she was afraid it was going to the machine, but Ione picked up before it rolled over.

  “Phoebe.” The flat intonation said she was still pissed about the Taizé service.

  “Hey. It’s the Three Musketeers. Rhea and Theia are here.”

  They greeted her in unison. “Hey, Di!”

  Ione’s voice became considerably more animated. “What are you two doing here? When did you get in?”

  “Rhe came up to see me after finals. We just drove down on a whim.” Theia’s innocent-sounding answer conveniently avoided actually answering either question. Phoebe smiled to herself. She’d taught them well.

  But Ione wasn’t easily fooled. “And what are you doing calling me at one in the morning? You three haven’t been drinking, have you?”

  Phoebe sighed. “No, we have not been drinking. I need to ask you for something, and it’s really important, so please try to listen with an open mind before you refuse outright.”

  Ione’s answering sigh was audible. “Phoebe, you don’t talk to me for months, but when you want something magical, all of a sudden I’m really
important to you. It’s pretty shitty.”

  “You’re right, and I’m sorry. But this is an emergency.”

  “What do you need now?”

  “Do you have Rafe’s father’s home address?”

  “Rafe’s father? Why would you need his address? He’s dead.”

  Phoebe tried to keep her voice calm. “Yes, I know he’s dead. But I think Rafe is in trouble, and I’m pretty sure he’s there.”

  “We did a reading,” Theia added. “He’s there.”

  “You did a reading?” Ione’s voice was clipped. “What are you fooling around with, Phoebe? If this is more shade nonsense—”

  “Ione, his life is in danger.” There was no time to dance around it. Phoebe would have to come clean. “We found out who’s been manipulating the shades. The man who killed Barbara Fisher, and probably Rafe’s father, and my client Monique Hernandez—he’s a necromancer. And I think he has Rafe.” The silence that followed was so long, Phoebe thought the line had dropped. “Are you still there?”

  “If you think Rafe is in danger, you should call the police.”

  “Ione—”

  “I’m serious, Phoebe. I’m not going to give you privileged information so you can run off and get yourself killed playing detective. And Theia and Rhea with you. What are you thinking? If you want to be respected as a lawyer—and an adult—maybe you should start acting like at least one of those things.”

  Phoebe’s face went hot and she couldn’t speak.

  “Ione, it’s Theia. We totally love you and respect you, but you’re dead wrong about Phoebe. This guy’s been targeting her, and the police aren’t going to be able to handle him. I know Phoebe doesn’t want to ask, but we need more than just the address. We need the Covent’s help.”

  “Theia!” Phoebe grabbed for the phone to take it off speaker, but Theia held it out of her reach.

  “You can bind his magic, can’t you?”

  “Bind his magic?” The low pitch of Ione’s voice said she wasn’t messing around. “How would we be able to bind some random necromancer’s magic? How would we even know what spells he uses? You don’t understand how magic works, Theia. None of you do. And you shouldn’t be messing around in—”