“I am okay,” Nick said, the pain now gone from his face. “But for how long I wonder.”
He looked hard into Lizzie's eyes. “How long before you come wiz your fahzer? How long till you come wiz ze Spear searching for me?”
Lizzie shook her head. “I...I wouldn't...” she stammered.
“You know what you are, zen?” Nick seemed to grow taller before her eyes, his eyes intent. “You are an heir of Longinus. You are a Spear Reaper.”
“But I wouldn't...I wouldn't...”
“But you will. It is in your blood. Your ancestors haf wip't out hundreds upon hundreds, and zey took ze goot wiz ze bad. Elves and fairies and sprites, beautiful, and peaceful, gone now. What for? What did zey ever do to man?” He closed his eyes, shivered, and stepped back unsteadily. “I must go.”
“No, wait,” Lizzie said. It couldn't be true. What the Long family had been doing couldn't be so horrible. And she wouldn't use the Spear on Nick. She couldn't.
“Be careful Lizzie Long,” Nick said, and again she saw a shiver of pain go through his body. Stepping behind a tree, he vanished.
Birdie rolled onto her paws and stood up. Lizzie scratched her behind the ears. “You okay?”
The dog responded with a vigorous shake and a stretch.
Without looking, Lizzie knew the crow still watched her from above. She felt a sudden rage swell up from her gut so strong it made her hands tremble. “Come on girl,” she said quietly but urgently, “let's get out of here.”
She jumped when she heard the flutter of wings, and she turned to see a black streak—the crow—negotiating through the tangle of branches, and disappearing deeper into the woods.
Chapter 18 - Phenom
Gordon had called Manuel at home the night the imp had tried to steal the chain of pendants. After making certain Manuel was fine, he told Manuel that he couldn’t visit anymore. Akers would have spies watching the trailer. They would watch him come, and then leave, and follow him home. Manuel wasn’t even allowed to call the magician, except in an emergency, because the call might be traced.
Since then it had been a week, and Manuel missed spending time with Gordon.
Soccer on the varsity squad had been both good and bad. His teammates were bigger and faster than his middle school team, which made it harder, and he liked that. But they didn’t talk to him.
On that first day, most of the boys just ignored him, but one of the boys teased him. His name was Martin, he was a head taller than Manuel, and he had a silky thin mustache that had looked like dirt to Manuel until he got closer. “You’ve got to be crapping me, coach,” he said when Coach Simpson introduced him.
On the field Martin asked Manuel if knew how to tackle.
Manuel shook his head. Tackling was for football, not soccer.
“When I get a chance,” Martin said, “I’ll show you.”
Manuel guessed this wasn’t good, but he didn’t reply.
After running several exercises, they scrimmaged. The first time he touched the ball he began to drive to the goal.
“Pass the ball,” Coach Simpson shouted.
He looked around. He could pass it over mid-field to a teammate there, but it would be easier just to keep the ball. Besides, he wanted to score. He wanted to show these guys what he could do.
“Pass the ball,” Coach Simpson shouted again.
Manuel passed the ball. He noticed, after a few minutes, that the coach didn’t yell at other players to pass the ball.
But when next he got the ball, Simpson again yelled for him to pass it. It didn’t seem fair, but Manuel did as he was told.
Then the ball went up in the air and came his direction. He could shoot to score from here, he thought. No excuse for the coach to shout to pass the ball.
But Martin was in the area too, running hard for the ball. He was closer, but Manuel was faster. He prepared to plant his foot for a crushing kick, but then Martin slid feet first; Manuel reached the ball an instant before Martin crashed into his ankle with his cleats.
Manuel went down hard on his shoulder and rolled; when he stopped he reached down and grabbed his ankle. It was bleeding.
“Now you know how to tackle,” Martin said, quickly back on his feet and standing over Manuel.
“Martin. OUT!” Coach Simpson screamed.
“I was going for the ball,” Martin complained.
“OUT!” the coach shouted again.
Another boy showed up as Martin walked away. “Great shot,” he said, smiling. He offered Manuel his hand and helped him up.
Coach still yelled at Manuel to pass during practice all week, but when they played a real game he hadn’t said anything. He kept Manuel on the bench.
Manuel didn’t complain, though the game was close and he couldn’t wait to play. He told himself that Coach Simpson hadn’t recruited him to play varsity to leave him on the bench. Maybe not this game, he thought.
But with around fifteen minutes left the coach sent him in. Booker T was down by a point. Manuel scored three goals.
Manuel started the next game and played both halves, but this time he had specific instructions. Score three goals and no more.
So after quickly scoring his goals he passed the ball, and he began to relearn the fun in that. Even though he wasn’t scoring the goals, he was orchestrating the game, forcing the opponents into bad positions, setting up his teammates for sweet shots.
And the other players on his team started to give him high-fives and call him by name. And Manuel began to feel that maybe the coach knew what he was doing.
After the game a woman with a notepad and a man with a camera on a tripod approached the coach, and Simpson then waved Manuel over.
“This is Lisa Arnot of the Tulsa World. They want to do a story about you.”
Manuel smiled, but not too big. Be cool, he told himself.
“I hear you’re the next phenom, Manuel,” the reporter said. “And after seeing you play, I’m a believer.”
“Thanks.”
They took some photos of him with Coach Simpson, and some photos of him posing with a soccer ball. Lisa asked him questions about himself, what grade he was in, how long he’d played, what he thought about his teammates, and so on.
Then Manuel looked up and saw his mother. He thought she would be proud, but she had a worried look on her face.
He was going to be in the newspaper. What could be wrong with that? Did she think that somehow they would discover that she was an illegal immigrant?
And then he realized the real problem. He had told her about the string of sigils. And she already knew about Congressman Akers. And she knew that the sorcerer knew Manuel’s face. If he saw his picture in the paper he would know his name. And it wouldn’t be that hard to find him after that.
“Please,” Manuel said suddenly. “I don’t want you to put me in the paper.”
The reporter followed Manuel’s glance back to his mother. She stared at Manuel’s mother a moment, then said, “Mrs. Garcia?”
Manuel’s mother nodded, even though she wasn’t a ‘Mrs.’
“I’m Lisa Arnot of the Tulsa World.” She shook his mother’s hand.
“Please,” Manuel’s mother insisted, “we can’t be in the news.”
“It won’t be a problem,” the reporter said solemnly. “Don’t worry.”
Manuel felt relieved, surprised the woman agreed without an argument. But he wondered how long it would be before the TV crews would come around. Maybe it would be safer if he just didn’t score at all.
Chapter 19 - Raum
“Man-You-,” Margie stopped mid-shout, and then corrected herself, “Man-Well! Look! Look!”
Manuel turned and smiled at his biggest fan. Then his smile fell when he saw what she held in her hand.
“Phenom!” Margie said, her eyes bright. “You are in the paper!”
Manuel asked “May I?” even as she put the paper into his hands.
There he was, second page sports, and he thought he look
ed pretty foolish with that half smile on his face and his curly black hair frizzed up to almost an afro. He read the caption: “Tulsa’s Manuel Garcia—Soccer’s Next Phenom?”
“What’s wrong?” Margie asked, “You should be happy. You are a star!”
Manuel forced a smile. “Nothing. Thanks Margie.” He handed the paper back.
The reporter had lied. Well, maybe not, he thought. She hadn’t said she wouldn’t print the story. She just had told him and his mother it wouldn’t be a problem. And maybe the reporter had thought that whatever they were worried about wouldn’t be a problem. Of course, the reporter could have never guessed what kind of trouble they would be in if the story was published.
Manuel considered trying to sneak out of school and make a run for home. But it would be a long, long run—Manuel rode the bus and lived miles across town. He wasn’t even sure if he could find his way. No, he would have to wait until this evening.
Anyway, he thought, maybe he was just being paranoid. Madison Akers lived in Mississippi, not Oklahoma, so it didn’t seem likely he would be reading the Tulsa World.
Manuel might as well have skipped school as far as learning was concerned. He couldn’t think about anything but the string of sigils and the Congressman-cum-Sorcerer. Never had he been a great student since coming to Middle School; he did well on tests, but he did poorly on homework. In elementary school homework didn’t matter much, but now his grades suffered. Still, he couldn’t bring himself to do schoolwork at home; he wanted to be a magician, and grammar and mathematics seemed to be beside the point. And today he’d even done badly on a test, only finishing half his science test before the bell rang.
When Manuel finally found himself getting off the bus, he decided to go around the back way to his house. He felt silly for doing the whole cloak and dagger thing, still telling himself how unlikely it was that Madison Akers would have seen the article in the paper, much less traveled all the way to Tulsa already from Mississippi or Washington DC. But, again, it couldn’t hurt to play it safe.
He didn’t have a plan. Gordon had told him not to call unless it was an emergency; the magician had been calling Manuel on a regular basis from different places around town so he couldn’t be traced, but of course any call to Gordon’s mobile phone could be traced. So, he wondered, was this an emergency? Should he wait for Gordon to call? While Gordon did often read the paper, he would probably not open the sports section; American sports didn’t interest him, and he often complained about what Americans called ‘football’. “They carry it around with their hands,” he would say. “How is that foot ball?”
To get to his backyard, Manuel ran through his neighbor’s yard in a crouch, hoping that they were not home, hoping they weren’t watching him now. He rolled over the chain link fence, ducked behind a cedar tree, sidled around it, and looked in through the kitchen window.
Every cabinet door stood wide open, pots and pans were strewn about the floor and counters. Beyond their small dining room table he could see tufts of white fiber floating in the air. Then he saw a black streak fly to the bookshelf, and he knew it was the imp.
He thought about how upset his mom was going to be upon seeing this mess. The snowy white stuff he saw floating in the air must be from the couch...the creature was tearing the house apart. It made him mad, and he wanted to run inside and stop it.
But he remembered the imp’s razor sharp claws, and his hand automatically went to his chest and felt the bumps of the thirteen stitches across the three slashes in his skin. The ER doctor had looked skeptically when he’d said it was a cat.
“Bobcat?” the doctor had asked.
Manuel crept to his window. When he got there he found it broken and the screen ripped to shreds. It was easy enough for him to stick his hand inside and unlock it. As quietly as possible, he slid the window up, and crawled inside.
He slid down onto his bed and a splinter of glass embedded itself in the palm of his hand. He bit his lip against the pain, and pinched the splinter out. Carefully, avoiding the springs poking up through the mattress and the glass from the shattered window, Manuel climbed off the bed and onto the floor. More feathers than seemed possible, considering he only had two pillows, carpeted his floor. Moving on his hands and knees, he crawled through his room, all the while hearing the crashing and rending noises from the living room. He looked around the corner of his door and saw the hallway empty. Trying to move quick and quiet, he went to his bathroom.
Here all the cabinet doors were open too, and all the cleaning supplies opened up and poured all over the floor. It smelled strongly of ammonia and pine scent, and he had to force down the urge to gag. Crawling through the mess, his knees and hands wet, he began to unscrew the trap under the sink.
There were twelve sigils on the silver chain, ranging in size from the size of a nickel to the size of a half dollar. He had been able to fasten the chain to the sink stopper lever securely enough that he knew that the pendants wouldn’t slip free and go into the sewer. Sure, the water didn’t drain from the sink as quickly as it normally would, but it was a great hiding spot. In any case, the imp hadn’t found them.
“What the hell is—” Manuel heard the landlord’s voice, and then a prolonged scream. Manuel guessed that the landlord had once again let himself in, and this time he had met the surprise of his life.
For a moment there was silence, then the door slammed, another moment of silence, and then the sound of the imp’s destruction continued.
With the pendants clutched tight in his hand so they would not jingle, Manuel went back out through his window, and retraced his steps through the neighbor’s backyard.
Now he had a plan—a simple plan. Run as fast as he could to Gordon’s trailer. The magician would know what to do, and they could call his mother and warn her not to go home.
Manuel headed for the Mingo River trail, running for speed, not worrying to pace himself. Getting away now seemed to be the most important thing. As he ran through the neighborhood he worried that he might be seen...by another demon, or the crow he’d seen before, or by the sorcerer himself.
When he reached the trail it seemed that the most dangerous part was behind him.
“On your left,” a cyclist called from behind. Manuel reflected on how odd he must look, in his purple knit shirt and his khaki slacks running full tilt on the pathway. Not that there would be many people out here on the trail, and not that he particularly cared considering his situation. The biker soon was out of sight and he was alone on the trail.
As Manuel ran into the culvert that ran under I-44, he saw the piles of sticks and trash that had gathered at the edge of the trail from the swollen river when the storm had raged the night the imp had come to steal the pendants from Gordon’s trailer. The night he had clung to a log and had been swept through the culvert with the rest of the debris.
When he came to the first of the large square drainage tunnels he remembered his notion that tentacles might reach out and drag him under and into the dark. He’d always been uncomfortable with the tunnels, with their eerie endless darkness and the cool damp air that sometimes seeped out from them. He crossed the faded yellow line and kept as far away from the tunnel as the trail allowed. He felt foolish for feeling so scared, but he dared not turn his head to look.
Out of the corner of his eyes he saw a blur of black. Manuel ducked automatically, though he did not believe. Not real, he thought. My imagination. Or just a bat.
A whistling blow passed where his head had been. The shadow he saw on the concrete was big. It was too big for a bat. Too big to be the imp.
With the momentum from ducking, his legs pumping full speed while his upper body leaned forward, Manuel struggled to keep his feet underneath him.
An iron grip caught his ankle. His body slammed down hard onto the concrete and bounced. He groaned and rolled onto his side. A pterodactyl size bird talon held his ankle. Manuel followed the hard golden-black banded legs up, over a glossy black and puffy outfit co
vering an abnormally short torso, and finally to the demon’s face. Beady black eyes glared at him above an impossibly long beaklike nose.
Bending stiffly at the waist in a sudden movement, it grabbed Manuel by the throat and plucked him up. The demon wasn’t any bigger than he, but it carried him easily, dragging his feet behind. Manuel tried to breathe but his windpipe was sealed shut; his head felt like a balloon about to pop. The sky disappeared and the sunlight quickly faded away as the monster dragged him deep into the tunnel. When they stopped, it stood him up against the wall in the darkness.
“I am Raum. Do you know me?” the demon asked, its breath smelling of rotten eggs.
Manuel thought of the crow he’d seen with Madison Akers. He made the connection quickly. The crow and this creature holding him were the same. Raum. Manuel nodded.
“I’ll take the sigils now,” Raum said.
Manuel felt his diaphragm spasm as his body fought for oxygen. But the skinny but strong fingers crushing his windpipe would not let him breathe. His vision began to grow black around the edges. How long before he passed out? How long before he died?
“Would it be quicker for me to snap your neck and search your body?” Raum asked.
Manuel reached into his front pocket and pulled out the sigils.
The grip on his throat released; the chain of sigils were torn from his hand. Manuel slid down the wall.
A moment later he heard a sound like a wet dog shaking, followed by the sound of flapping wings.
Manuel did not wait for his strength to return. He crawled to the tunnel opening, panting and coughing. After a couple of minutes in the sunshine, he stood.
Raum had taken the sigils. The sorcerer had won. He had failed.
But there wasn’t time to indulge in self-pity. He began to run. He still had to make it to Gordon. He still needed to call his mother; he needed to tell her about the imp so she would not go home.
Chapter 20 — Resonant Sigil Signal
Gordon held Manuel’s chin in his hand, looked at Manuel’s throat, and shook his head. “I’ve been a blooming fool.”
“Had to be done,” the shrunken head argued. “If Sparky had known, the demon would have guessed.”
“Guessed what?”
“That we have an ace up our sleeve,” the shrunken head said. It made a rapid hissing sound Manuel guessed was laughing.