Page 76 of Blackwicket
Jack was panicking, and the Drudge he’d consumed fed off this turmoil, growing stronger and pushing me further aside. I’d been so close, but the tainted power was more determined than ever to consume what remained of the boy, and I could no longer sense the thread of his natural power.
I was going to fail—kill another child, the same way I’d killed Thomas, through my ineptitude, my lack of strength.
“Hey, kid,” Victor’s voice startled me, stern. Jack’s eyes turned to him, wide, the whites yellowed. “You think they’d get past me?”
The boy shook his head slow, delirious. Inspector Harrow raised his hand to block the view of the creature hanging above us, trembling with anticipation.
“Not a chance in hell, but if I’m being honest, it’s not me they’re scared of,” he said in a conspiratorial tone, nodding in my direction. “As long as she’s here, no harm’s coming to you. Understand?”
This unexpected vote of confidence fueled my determination, and I continued my work with renewed focus, promising myself I would reflect on the strangeness of this moment when it was all over and Jack was safe.
“Like Fiona,” Jack said, his exhaustion overcoming him. I lifted my head, exchanging a brief look with Inspector Harrow.
“Yeah,” Harrow said at length, and I knew he wasn’t sure it was true.
“I’m really tired,” Jack said, and I shook my head in a small, quick motion, signaling to the Inspector that the boy shouldn’t sleep. I was too afraid he would never wake again. A little at a time, I tore pieces of the Drudge away, the corrupt fragments drowning in my more mature magic. But I’d made limited headway, the boy’s terror and belief he’d never survive strengthening the curse even as I weakened it.
“I got myself in a pretty bad scrape like this too,” the Inspector said, and Jack’s heavy eyelids flicked up. Mine almost did as well. “Used to make a nuisance of myself in Devin when I was your age. Caused a lot of trouble. There was this Authority man, Chief Barrick Harrow. Mean.”
He sucked a sharp draw of air between his teeth to emphasize the last statement. I marveled at how different Inspector Harrow sounded while talking to this frightened child.
“I was scared to death of him, knew what the Authority did to kids like me. I knew everything back then.” There was a smilein his voice. “I was pretty crafty, good at getting out of scrapes, and it took him a whole year to catch me.”
The story did its job and when Inspector Harrow grew silent, Jack gasped in a lungful of air, gathering his energy to rasp, “How’d he get you?”
The Inspector obliged.
“See, I got into a row with these older boys. They wouldn’t pay me for some magic I scalped for them. I was angry and stupid and started a fight. Almost didn’t make it. Chief Harrow broke it up, took me to the hospital. He thought I was a goner. I did too.”
“Were you scared?” Jack asked, his strength continuing to fade, the light of his magic growing ever dimmer.
“Sure, I was,” the Inspector replied, “Anyone who says they aren’t scared to die is a liar. But you know what Chief Harrow, the scariest man in all of Devin, did when I woke up?”
“Huh?” Jack was locked onto this tale, and I believed with my whole soul it was the only thing keeping him alive while I searched with increasing desperation for a path to the heart of the magic.
“He cried.”
“Yeah?”
“Like a baby. Nurses told me later he’d sat by my bedside for three days, barking orders, praying prayers, willing me to pull through. That’s why I’m alive. Someone was there to walk the hardest road with me, believing I was strong enough. You’ve got the same here, kid.”
Inspector Harrow abandoned shielding the boy from the sight of the monster and instead took Jack’s other hand, encapsulating it between his palms. The effect was immediate: Jack’s magic surged, breaching the horrible miasma. I grabbed hold as quickly as I could, like reaching for the hand of someone drowning in dark waves, intertwining my power with his.
I laughed in disbelief and utter relief as the Drudge came apart, dissolving piece by piece in the warm current. Gradually, the white vapor rose, not only from my lips but from Jack’s as well. Tendrils of mended and tainted magic merging to become pink, diaphanous clouds before fading, running clean.
Jack was curse eating.
At length, his breathing grew even, his magic calm, and he fell asleep, just as the last of the Drudge passed from him. His feverish skin cooled, though there remained a purple cast below his eyes, a gauntness to his cheeks that would be relieved with rest. Pale helixes of restored magic circled our heads, finding their way into cracks and crevices, sinking into gaps in boards, searching for sanctuary, a place to hide until it was well and could move on. Surprising me, the Drudge remaining in the room didn’t rush to these strands of power, letting them pass with scant curiosity, attention firmly on the boy. They no longer seemed to be waiting for something to consume, instead, they watched him as they’d once watched me.
“They want to be near you,” mother had said one night when Fiona and I had run to her bed in fear, cuddling close.
“Why?” I’d asked, pressing my cheek against her chest, comforted by her powdery scent. There were Drudge in this room too, but they kept their distance, never stood at the foot of the bed.
“Because you two are special. You remind them of their home.”
“But you said we didn’t come from Dark Hall,” Fiona’s words had been teary. She’d always been the most sensitive, the sister most likely to cry.
“You came from me. Dark Hall’s in your blood.”
