Sacrificial Magic

  If she lost that, she’d lose what made her special. She’d be happy, yes. She’d find some other man eventually, probably, and maybe he’d be good enough. She’d look different, act different. Be different.

  She would never again feel that, though, that feeling of being the most special woman in the entire world, of knowing no one else could possibly be as happy as she was because they honestly didn’t know how lucky they were, how truly and amazingly lucky. Because they didn’t feel like they’d been lost their entire lives and they’d finally found home.

  If she gave up the memories, she’d lose that. She wouldn’t remember it, it would fade like tissue paper in the sun.

  She wouldn’t quit. She wouldn’t give up. She’d never done it before and she wouldn’t now, she’d fought all her life to be someone and something and she’d done it, and maybe she wasn’t the greatest person in the world but she was a person and that was enough. She was a person who’d achieved something, and if other people thought it wasn’t good enough, that she wasn’t good enough, that her weaknesses were all that mattered? That was their right, but she was still a person, and she still deserved to be proud of her achievements.

  She wanted those back. She wanted that love back. Wanted her friends. Wanted it all, because it was who she was, and if she gave it up she wouldn’t be herself and she truly would be dead.

  Before she could stop herself, before she could doublethink it, she ripped the power out of her chest and mind and soul, ripped it out and threw it at the hole as hard as she could.

  For a second nothing happened. Oh no, what if it didn’t work, what if she’d lost anyway, what if it wanted her first sacrifice, her original sacrifice, what if she had to give up the old Chess because she didn’t have a choice?

  Then the old Chess would have died saving them all, and that would have to be enough.

  The screaming grew louder so slowly, so steadily, that she didn’t realize at first she heard it. The second she became aware of it she couldn’t hear anything else. It was there, and it was everything, so loud it hurt her head, hurt her all the way down.

  It was her scream. Not an audible scream; her mouth wasn’t even open. It was the scream of her soul, the screams inside her, all of those memories and pain and horror and shame and everything else. All of it coming back, hitting her so hard it knocked her over. She barely felt the ground beneath her, it was so loud, she cringed on the floor, curled up and wrapped her arms around herself, her hands over her head, trying to hide. So awful, it was so awful …

  Arms around her. Hard, strong arms, the kind that could keep her from flying apart at the seams. Terrible’s arms. Shit, he was holding her, making her safe, and the screaming quieted enough for her to grab hold of him and bury her face in his neck. Tears poured from her eyes, tears because of what she’d lost and what she’d gained, what she’d almost given up and what she had given up. Tears because she knew she’d forget it soon, that she’d never remember making that decision and how it felt.

  “I chose you,” she managed, choking out the words in a strangled, warbly sounding whisper. “I chose you, I chose you all but I chose you, I love you so much and I chose you—”

  His lips brushed her forehead. “Hush now, Chessie, I know, ain’t nothin—”

  “No, no, it is. I could have given it all up and been different.” Her long, shuddering breath burned in her chest, but she couldn’t stop. Had to get it out before she forgot. “I could have been not me, some other girl who didn’t—but I didn’t do it, I stayed, I stayed because I love you, and I want to be with you and if you weren’t there I wouldn’t want to be. I chose you.”

  He always smelled good. Even before, even when they’d first met—well, not when they first met but when they first spoke, really spoke, the night he took her to Chester Airport. The night her entire life changed. She’d noticed it even then, that it felt kind of nice to be close to him.

  Now she knew what it was. He smelled like home.

  “Love you, too, Chess.” He held her tighter, almost as tightly as she held him. If she’d had fingernails to dig into him she would have, hooks to catch him with and never let go. “You got that, aye? Ain’t you know it? Love you right, till it hurts. Ain’t goin nowhere, don’t need to cry, ‘sall right up—”

  She kissed him. Kissed him as hard as she could, as deep as she could. She’d never be able to explain what had happened. Hell, he’d be hurt if he knew she’d even considered leaving him behind.

  And it was already fading anyway, disappearing from her head, sinking below the surface of the blood-red memory ocean. Almost gone. No one would ever know that other Chess or know she’d existed, not even her.

  But she’d remember this, this moment, this suspended moment outside of everything else. This moment alone in his arms, with his mouth passionate and fierce on hers.

  His hands touched her cheeks, slid into her hair. He always touched her like she was special, like she was precious to him, and for the first time she thought maybe she could believe that she was. His body under her palms, her fingers—his hair, his face, the breadth of his shoulders, the hard muscles of his back and arms and chest—she didn’t ever want to stop touching them. It felt like if she stopped, her hands themselves would start to cry.

  But she had to, and she knew it. Because the rest of the world was still there. They weren’t done yet, damn it, as much as she wanted to be done they weren’t, and even as she thought it, she heard a discreet cough and looked up to see Beulah and Lex, their pale faces and pink-rimmed eyes aimed carefully toward the ceiling.

  Her first instinct was to jump away, but what was the point? They’d seen what they’d seen, and fuck it, it wasn’t like they didn’t know anyway. Obviously they did.

  Besides, she had something more important to say, didn’t she? It was still there, something in her head that felt important even though she wasn’t sure why. She kept her hand tight in Terrible’s and cleared her throat. “I chose you guys. I didn’t have to stay but I chose to, because I didn’t want to leave you. Any of you.”

  Lex’s brow furrowed. “You right, Tulip? What got you, what was on the happening?”

  What did happen? Something about memories, and she’d seen something different, or felt different? She’d had a fuckload of power, she remembered that, she’d felt like she could actually create a whole new life or a huge change or something, but for herself. A new life for herself.

  But she couldn’t explain that. So she just said, “I had—I could’ve—I can’t explain. But I thought about you guys, all of you, and I chose you.”

  Even through the thick unhappiness coating their faces, she thought they looked pleased, and that felt good. At least she could—

  Yeah. The good feeling disappeared, replaced by something else she’d almost forgotten. Slobag. Slobag was dead and it was her fault. She was supposed to save him but she hadn’t. She’d failed, failed hard-fucking-core, and he was dead.

  Another death on her head, on her hands. He could join Brain and Randy, Jia Zhang, the hookers she’d failed to help in time, Bruce Wickman who’d died in the City—along with some of Lex and Terrible’s men, also her fault—because she hadn’t figured out the Lamaru’s plan soon enough to stop the battle from starting.

  Now Slobag stood with them, another solemn disapproving face sneering at her from the murkiest depths of her mind.

  Another disapproving face she deserved. “I’m sorry. I’m— Shit, I’m so sorry, I had him untied, he was helping me, he was dragging Aros off me and then …”

  If she were lucky, if she lived in the kind of world where things went smoothly, one of them would interrupt her to fill in the blanks: “Monica shot him,” or whatever. But this wasn’t that kind of world, not one little bit. They didn’t say a word.

  She swallowed. Where was her bag? She’d kill for a drink right about then. Oooh, a drink and her Cepts. It sounded like the heaven people used to believe in.

  But she had to get the words out first
. “Aros was choking me, inside the circle. Really choking me, I couldn’t breathe.”

  Terrible’s hand twitched in hers.

  “Slobag did something—knocked him on the head or something—and he started to let go. So I could take a breath. He saved me, really.” That wasn’t entirely true, necessarily, but that didn’t matter. He’d certainly helped her, and that mattered and they deserved to know it; he deserved to have them know it, because they hadn’t been able to see anything beyond that glowing purple wall.

  “He’d almost pulled Aros off me and I heard the gunshots, and Aros grabbed me again and I saw him fall … It was really fast, he didn’t feel it. I know he didn’t feel it, he was gone before he hit the ground, he wasn’t there anymore. He didn’t suffer or anything.”

  Somewhere in the middle of her story Beulah’s face had crumpled again. Seeing it, feeling the sadness and pain from across the wide cement floor, felt horrible, made her ill. She didn’t want to feel it. She had enough of that already, enough for a lifetime, for two or three—

  The screaming in her head—

  But she couldn’t help it. Well, she could have, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t because it was her fault Beulah felt it, she was responsible for it. She deserved to feel that pain, too, and she owed it to Beulah—to Beulah and Lex—to feel it along with them.

  It was really the least she could do.

  The silence felt even better than she’d expected. Almost as good as her pills felt—would feel, when they kicked in. They’d do that any minute, and she couldn’t wait.

  Meanwhile, she busied herself scooping up the last of the salt ring, dumping the salt along with the herbs into an inert plastic bag to dispose of later. No way was she throwing that stuff into the school’s trash. Not when Monica or Aros—or Wen Li—might have taught those kids anything.

  “Hello.”

  She jumped. So much for silence.

  Martha Li stood by the hall entry. A respectable distance away, a deferential one. Maybe losing her husband had knocked some of the snot out of her.

  That was shitty. The woman had just lost her husband. Lost her husband, and probably learned he’d been cheating on her, too. No matter how big a bitch she was—probably was, had seemed to be—she didn’t deserve that. Maybe it would be good to give her a break.

  “Can I help you with something, Mrs. Li?”

  Mrs. Li made a face, one Chess couldn’t quite interpret. Anger, sadness, disgust? Maybe a bit of all three.

  Whatever it was, her walk was still the stride of an officious woman, one who was used to being obeyed. It wasn’t until she got close enough for Chess to see her eyes, see into them, that she slowed, that her steps became uncertain. “I’m wondering how my husband died.”

  Shit. She’d been afraid of this. Best to just stick to the facts, she guessed. “He was shot.”

  “Can I—can I see him?”

  “I’m sorry, no. Church law.” The body had to be buried behind the Church grounds immediately so his grave supplies could be created, then sent to the Crematorium three days later. She didn’t think Mrs. Li needed to have the process explained, though.

  Mrs. Li nodded. Kept nodding. Like one of those baby dolls with its head on a hinge or something. Or like she was having some sort of spasm. Or maybe she didn’t know what else to do, which seemed the most likely.

  Wasn’t like Chess knew what to do either, but she didn’t have the other woman’s discomfort. She probably would have, but she had Cepts and the thick velvety rise of them in her stomach up to her chest, that feeling that was both exciting and soothing at the same time.

  So she could stand and wait for Mrs. Li to decide what she wanted to say.

  “He cheated on me for years. Almost since we got married. I always pretended I didn’t know, because … it would be so embarrassing to admit I did. To have him punished. To divorce him. Everyone would know then, they would see how I’d failed …”

  That was not at all what Chess had expected to hear. Wasn’t anything she was prepared to answer, either. What was she supposed to say? Sure, that makes sense? I can totally understand why what a bunch of strangers think of you matters more than the fact that your husband treats you like shit? People could be so fucked up sometimes—most of the time—and their priorities even more so.

  But Mrs. Li apparently didn’t want an answer, or need one. “This time was different, though, with her, with Monica. He was—obsessed with her, I think. Hardly ever home. And when he was, he started … He’d get out his old books, notebooks and things, love letters, all of that stuff. From when he was in school. With her.”

  “With Monica? Chelsea, I mean?”

  “With Lucy. I expect you know about that, about him and Lucy, when they were in school. They— I always thought maybe he cheated on me because I wasn’t her. And when I couldn’t have children, well, that made it even worse. He’d lost the only one he’d ever had.”

  “What?” Oh, damn, of course. Wen Li was the father of Lucy’s baby. Had his obsession with Lucy created the situation? Or had it been Monica— Chelsea? Which had the idea first, when they met up again after all those years?

  Did it matter?

  Chess had turned in Monica’s gun. The labs would be able to determine if her bullet had been the one that killed Wen. Whether it had happened because Monica wanted to be rid of him or because she’d seen the plan was going to fail or, hell, because he’d asked her to, or it had been an accident, she’d never know.

  Slobag’s body had gone with Lex and Beulah, not that it mattered. Chess didn’t need a lab to tell her which gun took his life.

  Better that one was never analyzed.

  Mrs. Li’s face took on that I-know-something-you-don’t-know look Chess hated so much, and found so typical of women like her, women who lived for public opinion. Even in her grief it made her happy to feel like she was in the know or some shit, like she was the important one who had the information. “Lucy was pregnant when she died. You knew that, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, of course. I just—” What the hell. The case was done, the ghosts were gone, and it didn’t matter anyway. It was a side issue. “I thought someone else was the father at first. The teacher.”

  The ha-ha look disappeared. “Yes. So did I. And then I found this. After Beulah called me, told me he and Monica had both been killed, I—anyway, I found this.”

  Chess’s heart jumped. It couldn’t be the— No, of course it wasn’t. That notebook, the talisman, had been destroyed. Probably exploded the way Monica had.

  But the one Mrs. Li held out to her, in stubby hands with rounded fingernails painted the sickly pink of unhealthy gums, looked just like it. Identical. Wen and Lucy had probably bought them together, wrote notes to each other, or …

  No. Or not exactly. It was a journal. Wen’s journal; but as Chess flipped through it she saw notes in a different hand, a girlish hand. Lucy’s, she imagined, and when she read the notes she saw she was right. It wasn’t a regular journal, it was notes back and forth. Love letters.

  In the beginning, anyway. As it continued, references to other people started slipping in. Other men—well, boys. Boys Wen thought Lucy was too close to. Jealousy and anger dripped off the pages, rose from them like noxious fumes. Bill Pritchard, the drama teacher … other names.

  The entries got angrier and angrier. Chilling, really. That kind of possessiveness, that kind of need to control … Chess had known people like that, grown up with them. They hadn’t seen her as a person, just a plaything, something they owned.

  “Read the end. The last pages.” Mrs. Li’s voice barely carried over the sound of shuffling paper.

  The last entry was dated April 3, 2001. Dear Lucy, blah blah blah … Holy shit.

  Mrs. Li met her disbelieving stare with a nod, her face sagging more with each one. “I didn’t know. I never knew, I never had any idea … I never thought he could kill someone. Kill someone he was supposed to love, and let that … how can you ever really know someone, if
my husband could do that? How can you ever trust someone, commit to them, when they can hide something like that?”

  The words chilled Chess even more than the knowledge that Lucy’s death hadn’t been a suicide. She was murdered. Murdered by Wen Li. Murdered when she suggested they take some time apart, that they think about whether they wanted to keep their baby or give it up for adoption.

  He’d killed her, and then he’d written her a letter—several letters—telling her what he’d done and why, blaming her.

  Pretty fucking chilling, yeah. But not a surprise. No horrid little bit of madness and evil people cooked up in their sick twisted heads could really surprise her. So Wen Li had killed a girl in a fit of jealous rage, a girl he was supposed to love—probably did love? So how did that make him different from any other person, any other sick fuck pretending to be normal? It didn’t.

  But that was the scary part. He’d fooled lots of people. He’d fooled his own wife; she’d been a good cover, Chess figured, to make it look as though he’d gotten over Lucy.

  His wife had believed he was a certain person, and he wasn’t. She’d believed that he loved her, and he hadn’t. He’d hidden all of that from her so completely and fully that even after reading the words in his own handwriting she looked at Chess with a plea in her eyes, begging to hear it wasn’t true, that it was some kind of mistake.

  But Chess couldn’t tell her that.

  “I don’t know,” was what she said. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Li, but I don’t know.”

  Love was full of secrets. Love masked so many evils. Love controlled people, it lied to them, it made them believe things that weren’t true and it hid the truth from them. People said love was blind, but what they meant was that love blinded them. It made them more vulnerable than anything else could.

  And it felt so fucking good.

  Almost like her Cepts, really. Except those didn’t lie to her. She’d always known what they were, what they would do to her. Most important, she’d chosen them. She’d gone to them, she’d sought them out. No matter which sack-of-shit “parent” had given them to her in the beginning as a reward, or to keep her quiet, or to stop it hurting so much after they were through with her, she’d still gone to them in the end. She’d made the decision.