Magicians game, p.3
Magician's Game, page 3
FOUR
Dharma
Ivan slept all afternoon. When I tried waking him, he was groggy and sort of zombie like. His temperature was also up, hovering between a hundred and a hundred and one. I assumed that dousing he got with cold water, followed by the drive in my hot car might have given him a cold. Five o'clock came and Ivan still wasn't getting up. It was time to call in reinforcements.
"Bell, Book and Candle. Kyle speaking."
"Hey, Kyle. It's Dharma. You have a second?"
"What'd he do?"
Kyle's abrupt assumption Ivan did something wrong made me snort. "He did nothing. Well he did something, but that's not…" And then it occurred to me, I had no idea how to explain the situation to ask for help.
"Okay, so…did he fall asleep online again?"
"No."
"Is he out late? Not calling?"
"No, he's home. He's just…" Dryden's request to find the file and destroy it was a Cleric duty, a request made from a boss to an employee. Me. Sharing this with Ivan took this way beyond the realm of insubordination. I wasn't ready to tell Kyle that I'd involved a civilian fledgling Witch with really weird powers. But I also knew the danger of not being honest. "He uploaded a file today that gave him trouble."
"Trouble?"
"Yeah," I leaned back on the couch as Ivan's cat Pyewacket, a beautiful black and white Maine Coon, jumped up on the back of the couch and dipped her head for scratches. "He had to play the file to download it, and after he did that—" Was this the correlation? Not the bath in pipe-stale cold water, but the file itself? "He's been in bed all day and he's running a temperature."
"Oh," Kyle didn't sound worried. "Is he throwing up or just real lethargic?"
"Lethargic. He barely ate lunch."
"Ivan didn't eat? Yeah, he's sick. You want Jack and I to swing by on our way home? I might do a quick healing—but if it's a virus, no amount of magic will get rid of it quickly, okay? Those things have to run their course."
I thanked him and set my phone on the coffee table. Pyewacket took that opportunity to move from the back of the couch to my chest where she settled and vibrated me, and the couch, with her purr. Kyle's mention of a virus started me thinking. Viruses made computers sick. And Ivan was sort of like a computer. Had he contracted a computer virus? Was that possible?
After a brief cuddling time with Pyewacket, I cooked to keep my mind from dwelling on the events of the day. Kyle and Jack arrived just as I finished sautéing onions, green peppers and garlic.
Jack gave me a warm hug as Kyle moved past us into the bedroom with his bag.
"He still in bed?" Jack asked.
"All day," I admitted as I headed back to the kitchen. Jack approached the laptop Ivan used earlier. I left it on the table; open but asleep.
"This looks like Sam's old laptop."
I handed him a rag and pointed to the table, indicating he wipe it down. "It is. She gave it to him. He uses it as his off-grid computer."
Jack cleaned the table after he closed the computer and put it on the couch. He set the table for four as I diced olives to go on top of the picadillo. Jasmine rice steamed as I spooned it into a bowl. By the time Kyle emerged from the bedroom, the apartment was filled with the smells of onions, peppers and garlic.
Jack and I stared at Kyle as he stepped into the kitchen. No Ivan. And I didn't like the look on Kyle's face.
"What's wrong?" I took a step closer to Kyle.
He didn't have his bag with him and put his hand on the wall next to the fridge. "I—I honestly don't know. It's not anything I've ever seen before. I've tried every herb I have with me that I know cures illness. Nothing's working."
"So it's a virus?"
"I'm not even sure of that. He's awake. If you talk to him, he answers you. And he's pretty damn truthful if you ask him a question. It's like he's in a weird…I don't know…trance."
Trance? I turned everything off and headed into the bedroom. Ivan lay on his back, his shirt rolled up to his chest, his eyes closed. He was breathing evenly and he looked peaceful. As I got closer I saw the symbols Kyle painted on his chest during his attempts.
I put my hand on Ivan's forehead. He was clammy but still warm. "It feels like he broke his fever though."
"I think he did," Kyle said as he joined me in the room. "But I don't think it was because of anything I did. It's the weirdest thing. Like, watch this." He cleared his throat. "Ivan."
"Yes." Ivan's voice was soft and monotone.
"Raise your hand."
"Parameters require specific inputs."
Kyle and I looked at each other. "Right hand."
Ivan lifted his left hand.
"That's the wrong hand." Jack said from the door, but Kyle waved him to be quiet.
"Ivan, lower your hand." When the hand lowered, he said, "Lay flat."
Ivan sat up, eyes still closed.
I panicked. "Why is he doing the opposite of what you say?"
"Even more confusing, why is he doing it with just certain requests? He still raised his arm, and he lowered it when told to. This is the damnedest thing I've ever seen." Kyle looked at me. "You mind if I call my aunt?"
By aunt he meant Arden Vervain, the self-proclaimed Witch Queen of New Orleans, and recently elected High Witch of the local branch of Parliament. She was Sam and Crwys's least favorite person right now. In fact, all four of us had been making a point of staying clear of Arden. So him suggesting we seek out her advice told me Kyle was really out of his wheelhouse.
Jack said, "What can she do?"
"She's the best source we got right now in dealing with the unknown, especially with Crwys and Sam incommunicado." Kyle gave Ivan a gentle push and he rested on his back. He put his hand on Ivan's chest. "Yeah, I think the fever broke. I just don't know what his system's fighting to create the fever. It's not like he's asleep. I can't wake him up."
"Fine," Jack said. "You want me to call her?"
"I'll do it." Kyle gave me a worried look. "Watch him," he said as he stepped out of the bedroom, pulling his phone from his pocket.
Jack moved from the door to the bed and stood over Ivan. I noticed Jack looked a lot less put together than usual. "You having a bad day, Jack?"
"You could say that." He sat next to Ivan and watched him as he talked. "Something weird happened with the water system in the building I work in. Whole thing just flooded the top floors and caused a big mess.”
Every muscle in my body tensed at that statement. "What building do you work in? I thought you worked at the store with Kyle?"
When he said the name of the building my Undine flooded, I stared at the floor. Which was okay because he wasn't really looking at me but at Ivan. "Just got the job a week ago working with Cline Electronics. Needed to bring in more money than Kyle makes so I can afford my place." I felt him look at me. "I was working at Bell, Book and Candle to fill the space and spend time with Kyle, though that guy's dead serious at work."
"Isn't…isn't Edmund Blackwood's company in that building?"
He laughed. "Yeah, I found that out today when I heard what company was on those floors. And I'm ex-FBI. You'd think I'd have known that, right?"
Jack had been in that building. What if something had gone wrong and my Undine had lost control? What if I'd drowned people? What if I'd hurt Jack?
"Dharma?"
"Why did you quit the FBI? I mean I'm pretty sure it took a lot to get that job to begin with."
"It did. But I missed too many days during my transition period with the pack. So it was either I quit or they fire me."
The pack. Jack Roberts is a Lycan, but he's an apogee Lycan, meaning he was made by the venom of a perigee Lycan, or a born Lycan. In laymen's terms, Jack's a Werewolf. And Kyle is his boyfriend. A Witch and a Werewolf. About as odd as the Dragon and the Witch. Jack's local pack is known as the Aces and run by a huge red-headed Alpha named Bastien Dante LeBlanc.
He was looking at me again. "Everything okay in the pack?"
"No…but I shouldn't get into that right now. I'm sure Bastien'll clear things up when he's able." The tone of Jack's voice and the look on his face when I risked a glance told me something was up with the Aces. "What I can't figure out is why only the floors of Blackwood Construction flooded."
"Yeah…that is weird."
"Not as weird as Ivan's wet clothing on the bathroom floor."
I stepped away from him. "How did you—"
He pointed to his nose. "I can smell the chemicals in the water when he was doused by the sprinklers. Everyone that got wet on that floor smelled like that." He nodded to me. "Your Undine did that, didn't she?"
I really didn't want to answer him.
"It's okay, Dharma. I'm assuming Ivan was there because he went after that file of Sam and Kyle?"
I still didn't answer.
Jack watched me. "The file did this to him."
"File?"
"You told Kyle that Ivan uploaded a file before he got sick."
I held up my hands. "Please don't be angry—"
"What did the two of you do?" Jack faced me, his eyes blue in the fading light of the bedroom. "Dharma—"
Ivan moved fast as he sat up, eyes open and glowing a soft green, and caught Jack's wrist in his hand. "I suggest you back off my girlfriend, Jack. What she did was because I asked her to."
Jack didn't pull his wrist free, but I noticed a smile on his face. "Welcome back to the land of the living. How do you feel?"
As Ivan released Jack's hand, he swung his long legs over the edge of the bed. I scrambled to him to give him my support if he needed it. I wasn't sure how to tell him how worried I was. "Like my head's full of cotton. I think I have a head cold."
"I'm sure you've got something, but it's not a head cold." Jack moved to the door. "Come with me."
Ivan pulled me to him and pressed a soft kiss to my lips. "What time is it?"
I blinked. "You don't know? You always know the time."
"I can't see my clock. It's zero'd out."
One of the first things I discovered about Ivan and his world was that he always saw a clock in his peripheral vision. Its makeup and design always changed with his moods. "What does that mean if it's zero'd out?"
"I don't know." He stood on wobbly legs as I moved to give him support. He put his hand on my shoulder as we left the bedroom to find Jack at Ivan's triple monitor screens on the desk between the table and the couch.
"Ivan," Jack said as he closed out all the browser windows. "Pull up the URL for YouTube."
Ivan pulled a chair from the table and sat beside Jack. The left monitor launched a browser and the front page of YouTube loaded, then switched to an X-rated site. We were suddenly treated to a close up of large breasts and naked woman parts.
"Ivan!" I couldn't help but yell at him.
"I didn't do that!" He stared at the computer, opened another browser and pulled up a local restaurant's site, and again, halfway through the load it switched to another X-rated site, but this site had bit torrents available for XXX rated films.
"How do you even know these sites exist?" I asked him as the browsers disappeared.
Ivan's usual calm expression with its hint of a sarcastic grin was gone. He narrowed his eyes at the monitor and a third browser window opened. It moved from CNN to another X-rated site. "I don't understand."
"I do." Jack pointed at the screen. "Close out all the open apps."
Suddenly, every app in the computer opened, stalling out the CPU. Even I knew the more apps open on a computer, the slower it gets.
"I didn't…"
"I know, Ivan. Now close them. Concentrate on closing them."
I watched as Ivan leaned forward, focusing his eyes on the screen. My own sense of panic summoned my Undine, who appeared to my right and sat on my shoulder to soothe my nerves. Slowly, the applications closed, one by one. By the time they were all gone, Ivan's face was red, and he was sweating profusely.
He was shaking.
"What's…what's going on?" He looked at Jack as he took my hand, seeking it out on his own.
"One more thing, Ivan," Jack said as he typed something. "Open a browser, load up a site, and let's watch it."
A browser opened, it loaded to the restaurant site again, but switched back to X-rated elements. We sat and watched as odd windows slowly rose from the bottom of the browser. Advertisements for more girly sites and oddly enough, a Mac hard drive cleaner
Ivan's eyes widened. "I know what this is…this is malicious code. But how is it in my computer? I scrub my CPU and networks clean every day."
"It got in your computer the moment you accessed your root drive to control the CPU," Jack said. "The code's in you, Ivan. I think that's why you got sick and you're still suffering from it."
Ivan put his hands to his chest. "It's me? I have a malicious code in me?"
"The file you stole today—did you open it?"
"Yeah—"
"On which computer? Obviously it wasn't this one. Was it the laptop?"
"No."
I looked at Jack and then Ivan. Moment of truth. I knew about Ivan's ability to digitize and upload things to his brain's memory. Sam knew. Grey, her familiar, knew. But did everyone else?
"Ivan this is important. Where did you open the file?"
Kyle stepped back inside and closed the door as Jack asked the question. Ivan tapped the side of his head with his long finger. "Here."
FIVE
Camila
Desperation and fear drove Camila to work the rest of the afternoon on Blackwood's request. The desperation came from her need to get her mother out of a bad situation. Her fear, well, that came from a lot of different sources.
Fear of losing her job. Fear of disappointing her mom. Fear of losing everything she'd worked hard for. And last, and best, her fear of Edmund Blackwood. She was pretty sure everyone that worked for him, whether legitimately at the company or in secret like she'd been relegated to, was terrified of him. Blackwood liked his employees and followers to know what he was capable of and often held demonstrations with those who displeased him.
She still had the most recent punishment visible in her memory. Blackwood's specialty was Fetches. Terrible little demons he conjured out of whatever was available that did his bidding. Every Fetch was different with a different personality. They took on the elements that formed their bodies. For this particular example, the guy who'd disappointed him this time had been responsible for purchasing some kind of lumber from a certain distributor. Only instead of buying the cheaper wood, the employee bought the better grade to rebuild a block of houses in the Ninth Ward. Katrina had been a boon for Blackwood and his construction business when they gave insurance agencies the lowest price to rebuild subpar housing.
Camila knew it was a bad and dishonest move on Blackwood's part, but what was she supposed to do? She dreamed of having enough money no one could touch her and then she felt she could expose all the wrong happening in New Orleans. Especially the crap that happened under everyone's noses.
Like working for the FBI for instance. She learned in their cyber division there weren't any rules. And if there were, they'd break them just to catch whomever they believed was guilty. Then again, it wasn't always real guilt, but what they could prove. If something went wrong with a hacker, and the hacker wasn't easily located, they found someone local to fit the demand. Set them up. Prosecute them. People were happy. And the real hacker is hunted in secret and disappears.
It was one of those cases that ended her career with them. Several months ago, her division investigated one of the magic and herb stores in the French Quarter. It'd been the store owned by Samantha Hawthorne, Bell, Book and Candle. The Witch Blackwood called his mortal enemy. Camila's bosses didn't believe there was real magic and that every shop that boasted selling spells and hex bags were grifters and charlatans. All they wanted was someone to blame for cyber terrorism. She watched them arrest one of the employees and interrogate him, and they weren't happy when she and her teammate discovered there was no way this guy could be tied to any crimes.
The bosses weren't happy when they had to let their suspect go, not just from the lack of evidence but because a local figure with a lot of money and clout applied pressure at the right spot. And of course, in turn, they needed someone to blame for their failure.
They didn't blame her teammate because he'd already tendered his resignation with reasons of family issues. That left Camila with a pink slip and a less than stellar recommendation from the FBI.
At first, she thought no one would hire her. She was also pretty sure they were watching her since she'd been on the path to becoming a black hat when they brought her in for the job. Being fired from the FBI…well…in some circles that was bad and in others, it was impressive.
Luckily, Blackwood Construction had been on the impressed side and hired her right away, but with the caveat that Blackwood knew about her magical ability and he intended on supporting its use. Even Camila wasn't sure what that meant.
Blackwood made good on his first promises to her. Good paycheck. Good recommendation for an apartment. Paid off her student loans. And when he had her where he wanted her, he promoted her to team leader and jerked the rug of reality out from under her when he ordered her to write her magic code and slip it purposefully into the networks of his competitors. She embedded it into the links of business emails. One click and their computers belonged to Blackwood.
Then he assigned her more accounts like delinquent clients whose websites and information disappeared, only to be restored when they paid their bills.
This had become her job and her teammates were unaware of their true purpose of silently committing cyber terrorism, the very thing she'd worked against when she was an agent. She felt bad about it, sure. But this job paid the bills, and it afforded her health care for her mom.
Until she refused to embed an actual spell into the metadata of private file Blackwood insisted on keeping on a secure server within the company walls. She couldn't read all the symbols in the spell that looked so much like a veve, but she recognized enough to know this was more than just malicious code. Whomever got this in their system was doomed.
