Urban Shaman

“Don’t tell me you think that’s weird, after all this,” Gary said.

I shrugged my eyebrows. He had a point. I pinched the bridge of my nose, as much movement as I could convince myself to make. “Suzanne Quinley’s parents are dead.”

Gary let out a puff of breath that steamed in the air. “What about her?”

“Not here. I don’t think she even came home from school.”

Gary nodded. “What next?”

I couldn’t decide if I liked him assuming I knew what to do next, or if the idea of being in charge terrified me out of my mind. “Next I see if I can sit up without puking.” I gingerly slid my hand under my head. There was water from melted snow and rain, but there didn’t seem to be any mushy bits that would indicate my brains were leaking. Gary offered me a hand and I took it with my free one, letting him pull me up slowly while I kept my hand clamped to the back of my head.

“Y’know.” I tried to imagine the pain away. “I used to think people who believed in all this crap were soft in the head. If they all get into messes like I’m in, they really are. If I get hit in the head one more time, I’ll be…” My imagination failed me, both in terms of what I’d be and in making my head stop hurting.

“A monkey’s uncle,” Gary supplied. I winced.

“Don’t say that. The way things are going around here, anything is possible.”

“Got any brothers or sisters?”

“No, and I’m a girl, too, but at the moment I’m not willing to discount any absurdities. Okay, help me stand up.” I clung to Gary’s arm rather more than I wanted to, trying to keep my balance. “I don’t feel very good,” I reported, once I was on my feet.

“Gee,” Gary said dryly, “I wonder why.”

“I think it’s all the caffeine,” I said seriously, and spread one hand when Gary looked at me. “I should eat some real food. I read something saying you should eat and drink after you’ve been running around out of body. To ground yourself again.”

“There’s a pastrami sandwich in the car.”

I looked up at him gratefully. “I would worship at your toes for…” I was having a hard time completing thoughts. “For as long as I could stay awake,” I finished, feeling it was something of a triumph to manage to get through the sentence. Gary laughed.

“I don’t figure I’m in for much worshipping, then. Can you stay up?”

I spread my hands a little more, judging my balance. “Yeah, I think so.” He stepped away, toward the car. I maintained an upright position for about five seconds, then decided the stairs would be nice to sit on. My butt was already cold and wet anyway from the spill I’d just taken. “How long was I out, Gary?”

“I dunno. Two minutes, maybe.”

“Oh.” I wondered if you actually had to travel to fairyland to experience the more-time-passes-here-than- there phenomenon. Thus far, all my experiences had seemed much longer to me than to the mundane world around me. Gary handed me the sandwich and an unopened bottle of water. I gobbled the sandwich down so fast I almost didn’t taste it, and drank most of the water before I even thought to thank him.

Right about then the cops showed up. Under normal circumstances—which is to say, in any case I wasn’t involved with—Morrison would not have been heading the pack. As it was, I wavered on how to feel about it, but ended up just going with tired. I didn’t try to stand up. He could yell at me while I was sitting down just as well. “Two bodies upstairs in the master bedroom,” I said to his knees. “Suzanne Quinley’s parents.”

“You went in there?”

“Not physically.” I sounded like my voice was coming from somewhere a very long way away from me. I wished the high I’d gotten from my first attempt at a trance was with me now. Right now anything I did took everything out of me. Borrowing power from the city and from the people around me was the only thing that was letting me function as a seminormal human being.

“Not physically?”

I stood up, half-concussed or no. I was on a higher step and stood four inches taller than my boss. “Don’t,” I said flatly. “Just don’t. Okay? Can we not do this, this time?”

Morrison pressed his lips together, staring up at me. I admired him: he didn’t climb the step to put himself on an even keel with me. I doubted I’d have been able to resist. Morrison was a better man than I.

Well, duh.

“What happened,” he said after a long few moments.

I stared at him, then looked away. “I got here too late. I don’t know if I could’ve gotten here on time. Maybe—” My voice sounded hollow. Maybe if I hadn’t fallen for Cernunnos’s little seduction, if I hadn’t fallen on the steps, if I hadn’t gone to lunch with Kevin—

Truth was, I hadn’t had the information on who Suzy was in time to have done any good at all, and if I hadn’t fallen on the steps, I’d have gone to Suzy’s school anyway. I simply wouldn’t have been here to stop Herne. Somehow the thought didn’t really help.

“They’re dead. I’m sorry.” It was the only thing I had left to say. Morrison kept looking up at me, a scowl written around the edges of his mouth. Then he let out a quiet sigh and shook his head.

“All right. What’s next?”

I looked at him without comprehension for what felt like a long time. “I already know what happened here. I don’t understand a lot of it, but I need to find Suzy. She’s—she’s okay still.” God, I hoped I was telling the truth. “I need to get a hold of Jen and ask her some stuff, and I need to find Herne.”

“You don’t know where he is?”

I gestured to the southeast. “That way.” I couldn’t even feel his wall obscuring the city right now. I was as ordinary as I’d been a week ago. Less than an hour ago, that’d been all I ever wanted. Why didn’t it make me happier?

“You’re not filling me with confidence, Walker.”

“Great. That’s two of us.” I moved cautiously onto his step. “Do you have a cell phone I can call Jen with?”

“Use the radio.”

Oh. “Right. Thanks.” I wobbled down the last step. Gary offered me his arm. I leaned. Morrison turned to watch us.

“Walker.”

I didn’t want to stop. I didn’t want to look over my shoulder and see censure in the captain’s eyes. Anything was better; our endlessly antagonistic relationship was much better. My shoulders tensed up as I looked back at him.

“Be careful.” Morrison inclined his head, then took the steps up to the Quinley house two at a time, leaving me gaping at his broad shoulders.

“Toldja,” Gary said. “He likes you.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Gary.” I groaned and staggered down to Morrison’s car, flopping across the front seat and picked the radio up. “This is Car I87, over.”

“Your voice sure has changed, Captain. Over.”

I grinned wearily. “Hi, Bruce. What’re you doing on dispatch? Is Jen still there?” He sounded as if everything were completely normal. I wanted to hug him.

“Amber’s on a potty break and Jules called in sick. Yeah, she’s here, hang on.”

A minute later Jen’s faint accent came through the radio. “What’s up, Joanne?”

“That kid who has a crush on Suzy.”

“Yeah?”

“Got his name? Number? Anything?”

“You ask for the damnedest things.”

“Part of my charm.”

Gary, leaning on the door, snorted. “That’s my line, lady.”

I cackled over the sound of my stomach rumbling. It had noticed the sandwich and was now on the warpath for more. I rubbed my hand over it, whimpered when I hit the bruise, and sat on my hand.

“All right, give me a few.”