Page 66 of Blackwicket
“Fiona was supposed to make everything better,” Mr. Farvem roared. “We had an agreement!”
The nearest refuge was the kitchen. Although its doors swung both directions, Mother had installed a latch when her compulsive baking peaked, and she didn’t want to be disturbed by the outside world.
I made it, grabbing the door and pushing it too hard. It swung out first, and I was forced to lunge, grab hold of it again, as Mr. Farvem raced to stop me. He aimed a swipe at my fingers, missing barely, as the door found its casing, and I slammed the metal lock home. It wasn’t a strong thing. It hadn’t been meant to keep out insane old men with sharp objects, only curious, lonely teenage girls who missed their mother.
The force exerted against the wooden panels was remarkable for a man in his nineties, each impact exceeding the last, rattling the pans on the wall and unsettling the spices on the shelves.
“I knew better than to work with a Curse Eater,” Farvem yelled. “But decided to have faith! I helped her!”
Bang.
“Itrustedher!”
Bang.
The door was splintering. I stood straight, trying to find a controlled breath in my panic, as blood dripped from my chin onto my arms. I hurried to the wooden block table, where all the jams sat wrapped in their satin ribbons for gifting. I attempted to push it, but it budged only an inch.
Please. Please.
I pleaded with the house, lowering my defenses, reaching for any help it could offer, no matter what I’d be asked to give in return, and it came alive. Like curls of smoke from a snuffed candle, drudge materialized in corners, behind pantry doors, beneath the table. Something grazed my ankle—a leathery, cursed creature clawing its way from beneath the sink. The wood holding the latch in place cracked and splintered, sending themetal flying, crashing onto the table in an explosion of glass and pulpy blackberry jam.
Mr. Farvem entered, eyes wide, his frail body no worse for wear from all the turmoil he’d put it through. Immediately, the Drudge converged, scrabbling up his figure from the floor and dropping from above to engulf him. I braced for his screams, anticipating the garbled choking sounds as they invaded his body, but all I heard was a chilling stillness. Then Mr. Farvem, obscured by the gaseous ashes of the Drudge, began to walk toward the table.
“They can’t penetrate my defenses, Eleanora,” he said, lifting his arms as though showing me a trick. The scalpel caught the fading light of day filtering in from the tiny window, which offered no prospect of escape. “I run a tight ship. Learned that in the infantry. To survive, you can’t let the curses in. I’ve encountered more impressive monsters than these paltry bags of dust. Humans and Drudge joined in terrible union.”
Despite the confidence in his voice, he became agitated by the swarm, swinging the scalpel in wild punctuation to his final remarks. The Drudge, bewildered and uncertain, retreated, creeping to their corners to observe the events as they developed, waiting.
By calling on the Drudge, I’d unwittingly put myself at a disadvantage. If I invited one in to bolster my magic, they would all come. I leaned into the power I already had, hoping it wasn’t so under-used it wouldn’t respond the way I needed it to. What I was preparing to do would be painful, and risked dangerously depleting my energy, but it would give me the opportunity to put some distance between us. Mr. Farvem’s strength was unnatural, driven by magic, but I thought I might still have a chance of outrunning him.
“What are you doing, girl?”
I thrust the table, power erupting in a panicked, desperateburst, sending the heavy piece of furniture flying several feet forward. Jars crashed, breaking one by one, the corner rocketing toward Mr. Farvem. But instead of being knocked down, he slammed his hands on the tabletop, heedless of the glass, and vaulted over it, as nimble as a boy, sliding through the remnants of sticky jelly. He seized a handful of pinned curls near my temple, and I slipped on the mess I’d created in my useless efforts.
“Don’t take it to heart, young lady,” he said, kicking my feet so that I slipped further down in the glass, weakening my ability to stave him off. “I bent the rules a little bit, took on a bit of nasty cursed magic to regain some of the vitality I’ve lost over the past twenty years. Disgusting but necessary.”
“Mr. Farvem, don’t do this. I only wanted to help.” I gasped, both hands wrapped around the wrist holding the blade, barely keeping it from coming any closer to my neck. At the angle he was holding me, I had very little leverage, and if I slipped any further, my arms would buckle.
“So did Fiona. She was supposed to stop the Brom, set it on fire from the inside. Instead, she created a living hell for us all. So many dead. My Patrick, murdered.”
The scalpel came ever closer, and I sobbed. The Drudge were moving, sneaking in like carrion birds waiting for their chance to feed.
“Magic abandoned us.” Spittle dripped from his mouth as he yelled. “The Fiend is our punishment if we keep trying to bring it back. Your sister became a monster, and I’m going to make sure it doesn’t happen to you. Let me save you, Eleanora!”
The sound of gunfire shattered the air. Two shots.
Mr. Farvem fell against the table, an awful gurgling rising from his missing throat, blown away by two well-aimed bullets from the gun Inspector Harrow held steady in his hand at the threshold of the decimated kitchen door.
Seeing their opportunity, the patient Drudge converged, burrowing into Mr. Farvem’s red mouth with such feral vigor that his jawbone snapped. As he slid to the floor, the flesh between his jaw and neck tore, making room for more Drudge to settle in, feasting on whatever magic remained. But not just the Drudge moved towards this source of sustenance. From the debris of jam, rose furls of red. Breaths of curses tucked in each jar.
Inspector Harrow holstered his gun, and in a few strides, he was leaning over me, tucking an arm under mine and another behind my knees, scooping me off the floor. He smelled of gasoline and smoke; his clothes filthy with dirty snow and soot, skin smudged with the same, blood seeping from a gash above his eye.
I held onto him, burying my face in his neck, anguish twisting my features while I struggled to suppress tears of relief rooted in the reality that neither of us were dead.
Wordlessly, he carried me up two flights of stairs, and slipped into my family suite. He kicked open the bathroom door with the toe of his shoe, and deposited me on the vanity stool with a care I hadn’t believed him capable of.
“How are you alive?” My trembling made the words a shaky vibrato.
“Halfway to the gate, the front driver’s side wheel started to smoke. I worked two car bombings in Devin, and the acrid smell was familiar.” His voice was strained. He was stifling emotions that had gathered like ants under his skin, whether it was anger or panic, or concern, I couldn’t tell. “These bastards barely knew what they were doing; the spring-loaded trigger wasn’t balanced, the fuse was too long. Gave me enough time.”
