One
Finch
Being in Ryann’s apartment made my heart pound like a kangaroo caught in a spin cycle. Clammy hands, cold sweats, clenched throat—my body gave me all the red flags.
Plus, everywhere I looked, I faced another nightmare… snapshots of Captain Canada with his arm around Ryann, all megawatt smiles, and a couple of obligatory “funny” pictures where they’d stuck out their tongues. Not to mention Ryann’s bedroom was right there. The sweet scent of vanilla and fake strawberry drifted toward me.
Be cool. Be cool. The Medela serum might’ve sent the gremlins into a coma, but that hadn’t stopped my penchant for inner monologuing.
“Do you want something to drink?” Ryann called from the kitchen. Well, she claimed it was a kitchen. Honestly, it was more of a shoebox with a sink and a toaster.
“Uh… sure. What do you have?” I crossed the living room and perched awkwardly on her cracked leather couch, a remnant of the sixties that didn’t look like it had been cleaned since the Beatles were at number one.
“Coke? Coffee? Some Japanese drink I don’t know the name of. I think it’s got bits of plants in it. Aloe vera or something.”
I cleared my throat. “Coffee sounds great.”
While she clattered away in her shoebox, I took in my surroundings for the hundredth time. She had another sixties throwback for a coffee table, and a TV mounted on the plain wall. Shelves to either side contained rows upon rows of books, all crammed in to resemble an overstuffed mouth of yellowed teeth. She’d added a few Ryann touches, of course: candles, ornaments, a few prints of Lautrec dancers, and miles of string lights. But she’d only recently moved in, so I guessed the apartment was still metamorphosing into an independent woman’s pad.
I’m in Ryann’s apartment… I’m actually in Ryann’s apartment… I gulped, feeling like a fish out of water. All sense of normal human behavior had flown right out the window, leaving me no idea what to do with my various limbs. Did I cross my legs, uncross them, fold my arms, stretch out like a cat? No clue.
She’d moved out to get some autonomy from our beloved Mr. and Mrs. Smith. There was nothing like parents to cramp one’s style, especially with a boyfriend. Plus, given her recent forays into the magical world, she’d wanted to keep the Smiths in relative safety. Living at home meant they could be used as potential targets… again.
Ryann came back with two mugs of steaming coffee, handing one to me. “Don’t worry if it tastes a bit… uh… metallic. Apparently, it’s just the way the water on this block tastes, but the super said it’s completely harmless.”
“Comforting.” I eyed my mug warily as I set it down. I had no intention of drinking it, even if that made me a rude houseguest. “You sure it’s okay for me to be here? I know you want to show off your fancy new digs, but we could’ve just met at a café, or somewhere in the SDC.”
“Why wouldn’t it be okay? And who wants to spend six bucks on coffee when you can get one for free?” She chuckled and sipped from her mug of hazardous waste.
I shrugged. “I don’t know… is the boyfriend cool with this? I know I’ve only met the guy a few times, but I sensed he didn’t like me much. Wouldn’t want to cause any lovers’ spats, especially involving the Boston Strangler. He might creep in my window while I’m asleep.”
“Finch!” Ryann scolded. “Adam wouldn’t mind at all. Besides, I’m not expecting him anytime soon, and he’d call before he showed up. Canadian manners at their finest.”
Again, Nash’s potions had dimmed my gremlin paranoia and accompanying delusions, but it did nothing for good old-fashioned nervousness about a big, buff Canadian coming in and catching me having coffee with his missus. I doubted anyone had a serum or a potion for that. Not even the Atlanteans. Speaking of which…
“So, tell me what Erebus said again,” Ryann prompted, as though reading my mind. Man, I hoped she couldn’t. I was still thinking about her bedroom, having caught a glimpse of her minimalist setup—grays and creams, with a battered-looking bunny toy sitting on her bed that could have been center stage in a horror movie, one eye falling out of its head and one ear barely hanging on. Kill me now. Put me out of my misery, it had seemed to beg me.
“Right. Erebus. Bane of my life.” I sighed and pulled out my phone, pulling up the text he’d sent last night. “It says, ‘Have no fear, this is not a summons yet. This is merely a forewarning of our next steps. Now that we have the key, we must open the Gateway to Atlantis. But first, we must find it.’ That’s all he wrote, Erebus being his usual helpful self.”
Ryann took another sip of swamp water. “Have you thought any more about breaking away from your deal?”
“Whoa there, one dilemma at a time.” I mustered a smile. “And yes, that’s pretty much all I can think about, now that I know it can be done. But I’m not a Necromancer, and I don’t know where to find Davin, so how about we focus on a problem we can solve?”
“Do you remember anything about the gateway on that map you drew? Didn’t you take a picture of it?” Thankfully, she switched back to business mode without comment. I didn’t feel like getting frustrated about escaping my servitude. Every time I thought about it, and about Davin managing it, I wanted to rip out my brain.
“You can’t just take pictures of powerful magical things like that. It’s warded against copies being made, as are most creations of that kind. I did try back at the Winchester House, when I had half of it redrawn, and every picture showed a black screen. Oh, I couldn’t have just photocopied it either, before you ask,” I replied.
She smiled. “Okay, got it, no copies. What does your memory say?”
I paused. “There was something about a Gateway between Life and Death, but Melody ran a check through her mind palace and came up with nada. That could be because it’s related to Atlantis, but it could also just be a gap in the Librarian’s knowledge.”
“Well, fortunately for you, I believe there’s no substitute for a bit of ordinary, thorough research.” She leaned down and hoisted two massive tote bags onto the coffee table, which buckled under the weight. They were stuffed with books. A stale, old-timey smell wafted off them, reminding me of opening the package of a first-appearance comic.
I gaped at the bags. “Did you take these from the SDC?”
“Where else would I have gotten them?” She pointed to two more bags stowed beside the threadbare armchair across the room. “I took those, too.”
“They just let you walk out with that many? O’Halloran must be slipping on his security protocols.”
Ryann laughed. “He gave me permission to check them out from the libraries, actually. That’s the beauty of working for Miranda Bontemps. I say it’s for her research, and I get the all-clear.”
“I can’t believe you’re still working for her after Daggerston’s elite shindig,” I grumbled, recalling that nasty party. At least I’d had the pleasure of guillotining Davin, even if it hadn’t stuck.
“She’s a victim of Daggerston’s charm offensive. She believes whatever he tells her, including the lies about Davin. Perhaps that makes her guilty by association, but I genuinely don’t think she’s like Daggerston or Davin. So far, she hasn’t given me any reason to believe otherwise,” Ryann replied. “We spoke in depth about what happened that night, leaving out you, Garrett, and Saskia.”