ELEVEN
At Fletcher Maguire’s bidding, she followed him and his son to the guest elevator, a rarified contraption that May had only cleaned, never ridden. At the sight of the three of them approaching, the operator stepped out of the elevator and held the door open for them. May stationed herself as far as possible from the men, pressing her back into the wooden wall. To her surprise, the young man in the gold-piped maroon uniform and cap did not join them, but rather let the door close behind them. Sterling shifted around his father, taking the utmost care not to jostle him in the tight space, and produced a large and substantial-looking key. After inserting it into a hole in the brass plate, he gave it a turn to the right, released it, and then twisted the control to the left. May felt the elevator begin to descend. She watched as the hand on the dial that showed the floor shifted from 1 to B for basement, then continued to move counterclockwise as the car descended farther than she’d believed a body could go.
The car came to a smooth stop, and a moment later the doors opened. Sterling removed the key and grabbed hold of the handles of his father’s wheelchair, easing him over the space between the elevator carriage and the floor. When May didn’t move, Sterling looked back at her. “Come,” he said.
She stepped out of the car and into a hallway that seemed to run close to the full length of the hotel above. Lights shone down from overhead, but rather than filling the length of the hall, the beams just provided dots of light in the surrounding gloom. The walls, floor, and ceiling appeared to be made of the same concrete—uniformly gray, but polished so that it gave off a sheen in those places where light reached it.
May watched in silence as Sterling inserted that key of his into a panel on the wall and turned it right. The doors of the elevator closed of their own accord, and May heard a hum as cables lifted it up, returning it, she assumed, to the hotel’s main floor.
The hall was bereft of any sound other than the squeaking wheels of the elder Maguire’s chair along the stone floor, syncopated by the tapping of his son’s leather-soled shoes following behind. If May’s tread made any noise, it was drowned out by the beating of her heart.
Each spot of light gave way to shadow, and in those dim places in between, May sensed a presence, reaching out from the emptiness of the hall, craving the light she carried in herself, or perhaps only yearning to blot it out. Feeling something brush up against her, she quickened her pace so that she could follow the Maguires in a tighter pack. Then, repulsed by their nearness, she lied to herself, trying to dupe herself into believing there was nothing lurking in the shadows, that she’d disturbed a cobweb and nothing more. She allowed herself to drift back once again, but this time something small and furry ran across her feet, brushing up against her ankle. She felt the tickle of unseen fingers along her forearm. An invisible hand grasped her wrist. She gasped and pulled away, rushing into the next circle of light. Sterling looked back over his shoulder at her. His smile lifted only one side of his mouth, and there was a gleam of dark joy in his eyes. Her fear amused him. She was left in a dance of gooseflesh and queasiness; left to choose between the devils she knew and the ones that traveled unseen.
Sterling stopped his father’s chair before a red door dominated by a brass knocker in the shape of a grimacing, bearded face. Though May would be happy to be out of the long hall, she found herself wondering what horrors might lay behind the incongruous door. Sterling grasped the bottom of the beard and knocked three times before reaching down and turning the oversized doorknob.
“You’ll want to enter backward, my girl,” Maguire called out to her, “or you might not like what you see. I do have a wee bit of magic left to me despite your mama’s best efforts.” Sterling opened the door wide, then gripped the handles of his father’s chair and backed it into the room. She hesitated, not wanting to turn her back on the men, but she didn’t see as she rightly had any choice. Grasping hold of the door frame, she stepped backward over the threshold. As soon as she cleared it, she turned to face the interior—it was a large room, bigger even than the hotel’s grand ballroom, but still, as far as her eye could tell, a perfectly normal room.
Six square pillars, constructed of the same buffed concrete as the hall, were spaced evenly around the room. The walls were also concrete, but two were covered in murals wrought by a hand that had brought a nearly photographic quality to them. Their coloring was far more natural than any of the painted photographs May had ever seen. One featured a pine forest that looked natural enough to walk into, and the other, a long stretch of beach, buffeted by blue sky overhead and what looked to be miles of white sand stretching off in the distance. A third wall remained blank gray concrete, and the fourth was painted white with what appeared to be the early stages of a sketch of a pasture with tall mountains.
Unlike the sparsely lit hall, this room was as bright as midday. May’s eyes drifted upward to find the source of the light, surprised to see that the ceiling overhead appeared to be a blue summer sky. The light itself was projected by a single golden source in the center of the room that, for all the world, May would have sworn was the sun itself. It astounded her to think she had worked at the Pinnacle for years without knowing this subterranean room existed.
May felt the weight of the men’s eyes on her. She turned to face them. “What is this place?”
Maguire’s face beamed with joy, his eyes widening and a genuine smile rising to his lips. “It’s a work in progress, is what it is.” He slapped the side of his chair and waved his hand forward, signaling for his son to push him closer to May. “But when it’s finished,” he said, “it will serve as sanctuary, a refuge . . .” He held up his hand to tell Sterling he should stop. “A shelter.” He raised both hands and gestured around the chamber. “When the big boy drops,” he said, “and I assure you he will, this will be the place to be.”
May shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“No,” Maguire said, then laughed. “You wouldn’t. But take my word for it. There are greater waves washing over this world than anything you or your mama could’ve ever kicked up. And I intend to ride that wave, May, but I need you to set me right before I can do that.”
May felt a chill and pulled her arms around herself. “I done told you, I don’t know what you want from me. Even if I had magic . . .”
“Oh, you do, May. You do. That much has been clearly established.”
“All right,” she said, “but I still don’t know how to use it. I don’t know how to undo what you say my mama did.”
“You don’t need to worry about that, my dear. A battery doesn’t need to understand a flashlight. It just needs to provide the power.” He looked back over his shoulder at his son. “Is everything in order?”
“Yes, sir.” Sterling spoke the words without taking his eyes off May.
Maguire still clutched the jar that held the demon. He now lifted it using both of his weak and trembling hands. “We won’t be needing this, will we, May?” His eyes twinkled up at her, seemingly pleased by what they read on her face. He looked back at his son. “Return this to safekeeping.” Sterling took charge of the container, then wandered off to the far end of the room. May watched as he unlocked a panel in the floor, opened a trapdoor, and replaced the jar in the hollow beneath it. After he closed the door and locked it, he rushed back over to rejoin them.
“Move us into position,” Maguire said, waving his arm toward the far corner of the room. Obedient as always, Sterling began pushing his father in the direction of the older man’s impatient gesture. May followed a few paces behind, keeping an eye on the door, calculating the speed at which she’d have to flee to reach it before the younger Maguire could catch up to her. May realized her worn-out joints could never carry her quickly enough. As she followed, she cast a glance around this room of illusions, thinking that this unnatural space might be where she breathed her last. She began a prayer for safety, if not for herself, at least for her girls. Even if she managed to do what Maguire wanted, how could she be sure that he wouldn’t still come after them?
“I’m a man of my word,” Maguire said, like he’d somehow read her mind. “You do as I ask you, and you will see your granddaughters as soon as we’re done. So step quickly.”
When May joined them near the blank gray wall, her attention was soon drawn downward to a marking carved into the floor that resembled the number eight lying on its side. Each half of the eight was large enough for a body to stand inside. This reclining eight was encircled by a band of red, whether painted or inlayed, May couldn’t say. Far from being the outer boundary of the image, the circle served as the center of an eight-pointed star.
“The Star of Regeneration,” Maguire said, answering a question May wouldn’t have considered asking. She didn’t want to understand the star’s design or purpose. All she wanted was to put this nightmare behind her. Maguire placed his hands on the wheels of his chair and took control of its movement, wheeling himself into the center of the star.
“You, May, are the battery, and this,” he said, motioning to the space on the floor around him, “is the flashlight. Come closer, but don’t step into the circle.”
May hesitated, testing it before committing by touching her toe against an outer point of the star.
Maguire laughed. “Really, girl, it won’t shock you. I keep telling you, it’s you who’ll supply the current.” May took a couple of steps toward him, but stopped well out of his physical reach. “Your mama damaged this body,” he began, once again unrolling his sleeve to show his damaged flesh. “She did her best to kill it.” His wording, saying “it” rather than “me” struck May as strange, but most things about this horrible man seemed off to her. “Damned near did what she set out to do, too. I’ll give credit where credit is due. She took my legs. And she took my power.”
He began unbuttoning his shirt, and May’s stomach turned as she saw the newly exposed flesh, from collarbone to navel. Just like his arms, it was covered by the burn-scarred patterns of a collector. The markings had spread to his left arm as well, down to his elbow. She trembled, wondering how many lives he’d ended to complete this hellish pattern. “This took a long time to accomplish,” he said, catching her eye, “and, yes, many deaths. And your mama took it all from me in a moment.”
He held up his arms, and Sterling stepped up to help him remove the garment. He slid back into his chair, smiling at her, giving her the time to take in the full horror of what sat before her. The burned tattoos weren’t the worst of it—a mass sat over where his heart should be, woven from layer upon twisted layer of the ugly filigree, veins knotted and woven together. All the filaments that ran over his arms and torso seemed flattened, dead, and they gave off a scent that bore witness to that ruin. May brought her hand over her mouth. Her eyes returned to the center of his chest, drawn by the pulsing of the inky purple tangle there.
Maguire pointed to the movement. “That’s it, May, the last of my magic. And it’s fading fast.” He rocked the wheels of his chair, maneuvering himself into the right side of the figure eight.
May jumped at Sterling’s touch. He had come up behind her and grabbed her by the upper arms. Shifting her a good two feet backward with a strong, rough jerk, he said, “We need you here,” and shoved her down. She found herself sitting, her legs bent together and splayed out to the side, in the dead center of the design’s lowermost triangle. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small folding knife. After flipping it open, he knelt before her, grabbed her right hand, and made a quick slice in her palm. It hurt like hell, so she drew a quick breath, but that was it. She’d be damned before she gave him the pleasure of seeing her suffer. He placed her bleeding hand over the point where two lines intersected. Then he did the same with her left hand, which he also arranged at a crossing point of two of the star’s intersecting lines.
“Stay there,” he said, his bright blue eyes boring into her.
Sterling stood and stepped around her to join his father at the center of the circle. Once in position, he stripped off his own shirt and tossed the garment aside, using enough force for it to land beyond the design’s boundaries.
“My son will serve to ground your power, helping to focus it and channel it through the star. Really, you have nothing to worry about. He’ll be doing the work for you.”
May’s mouth went dry. She ran her tongue over her lips. “What do I need to do?”
The old man chuckled. “All I need from you is to stop resisting. Let the power you’ve been fighting flow through you freely.” Sterling knelt in the leftmost portion of the figure eight, but he stationed himself close enough to his father that the two could reach out and take hold of each other’s hands. “Imagine it, May, it will be so easy. The power wants you, and whether you want to admit it or not, you crave it. Let go of those promises you made your mother, the promises you made yourself. It’s time.”
Through the tears blurring her vision, May could see the blue-green sparks begin to dance along her fingertips. If she felt she had a single choice left to her in this world, she would have forced herself up from the floor and fled this place as fast as her feet could carry her. Maguire was right that the power did seem to want to fill her, but he was wrong about her wanting it. No, May had never wanted the magic. May wanted security. She craved love and companionship. She dreamed of a happy and peaceful life for her grandchildren. Not this.
“You have to accept the power. You have to invite it in,” the elder Maguire said. “Or perhaps you’ve changed your mind? Should I have Sterling fetch Barron after all? Maybe you’ll be more willing to cooperate after he’s tasted one of your sweet girls.”
May looked up at him, and it was in that precise moment she lost her lifelong battle—not her struggle to resist the power, but her struggle to resist hate. She let the magic surge through her, though her fondest wish was that it would destroy the old man and his son, wiping the Maguire seed from the face of the earth.
She felt heavier, as if gravity had grown stronger, or the floor beneath her had caught hold of her and was trying to pull her down. When she looked down at her hands, she was astounded to see the magic flowing through them—no longer tiny sparks, but liquid blue flames jetting out of her own body and into the design on the floor. The strange fire tore along the path set out by the intersecting lines and engulfed the circle at the center of the star.
“It’s working, Father,” Sterling said, his eyes wide with joyous amazement.
“Yes,” Maguire responded, “it is.”
The energy jumped from the circle to the figure eight within it. Sterling began laughing, cheered on by their success, but the laughter abruptly stopped. He began making strangled, whimpering noises, and the look of joy in his eyes turned to one of fear. “It burns. Why does it burn?”
“Because,” his father said, “it’s fire.”
May watched as the flames rushed away from Sterling and turned full force toward his father. For a moment May hoped she’d have her wish, that she would watch this monster burn, but he seemed to welcome the fire. He watched as the flames climbed up his worthless legs, then threw back his head in a triumphant gesture. Rather than consume him, the flames entered him, traveling into the now-writhing marks of the collector.
Sterling reached over with his free hand, trying to pry himself from his father’s grasp, but the old man’s fingers fixed on the younger man’s arm like a steel trap. The collector’s marks rose up from Maguire’s body, deserting first his left arm, then his torso. The whole design, now a living band of energy, wound its way around his right arm, forming a tight coil. Then it rose up, in a sudden flash of activity, and a head like a serpent’s shot out and buried its fangs into Sterling’s arm. The younger man began screaming, but May could only feel contempt as she noticed urine puddle on the floor around him.
The head of the marking buried itself into the young man’s otherwise unblemished soft pink skin, then writhed its way through his arm. Just below his agonized cries, May could make out the sound of flesh separating from muscle to make way for the mark. It may have taken a mere minute, maybe two, but soon the marking had completely deserted the father’s body and insinuated itself fully into the son. The pattern that had once covered Fletcher was now in the same configuration on Sterling. Fletcher’s body had been left with nothing but the scars of May’s mama’s attempts to end him.
Then there was a bright flash of light, one so blinding it caused May to remove her hands from the figure etched into the floor and shield her own eyes. That light, she realized in a breath’s length of time, had come from those same hands. For a few moments the world around her was drowned in piercing light, then her right vision slowly came back to her. When it did, she could see in an instant something had changed.
The elder Maguire sat staring down at his wrinkled and spotted hands, his eyes wide in horror. “Father,” the old man’s voice creaked out as he looked up at Sterling. “What have you done?”
A wide smile broke across Sterling’s face. “I thought you agreed it was a shame to let someone waste their potential.” The voice belonged to the younger man, but something in his tone spoke of Fletcher Maguire.
“You,” May began, not quite sure how to phrase it, “you took your own son.”
“Ah, May, don’t look at me like that,” Sterling said. “A body can only be marked as a collector once. You get one mark, and then you have to tend it, like a garden. Your mama corrupted that body,” he nodded to the old man in the wheelchair, “she salted the fields, so to speak. I had no choice but to find new accommodations.”
The old man raised his head. “Help me,” he called to her. “Help me.”
“Now, now,” Sterling said, crossing the room to retrieve the shirt that had been cast aside earlier. “Why on earth would she want to do that?” He pulled the shirt on, and began buttoning it, clearly delighted with the nimbleness of his new fingers. May stood, never once taking her eyes off the pair, and stepped away from the diagram.
Once he was dressed, Sterling knelt by the old man’s wheelchair and started to button up the shirt that had been his own just moments before.
“Father,” the old man pleaded.
Sterling reached back and slapped the old man, the sound of the blow echoing in the large room. “Don’t ever call me that again, or I’ll have you committed. And it would be a shame for Fletcher Maguire’s reputation to be ruined by having him end his days in a madhouse.”
Sterling looked up at May. “You’re free to go,” he said. “You’ll find there are stairs at the far end of the hall.” He smiled and gave her a wink. “Of course the exit lets out at a different point each time. Let’s hope you don’t find yourself stranded too far from home.”
May had no idea what the man was saying, but she started backing her way toward the door all the same.
“Oh, May,” Sterling called. “One more thing.” She froze in place. “Now that you have access to all that magic, don’t go thinking you’re done with me. What’s yours belongs to me, girlie, ’cause you belong to me.” He stood and grabbed the handles of the wheelchair, nearly running as he pushed the old man’s body right up to her. “And don’t be thinking about trying to run away either, ’cause I got ways to cure you of your drapetomania right quick.”