Greywalker - Kat Richardson [124]
Nightmare faces and boiling Grey began to heave into a panorama around the instrument. I saw Sergeyev’s face appear for a moment. His mouth opened in a silent scream and then was sucked backward into the organ. A kaleidoscope of other faces followed, shattered fragments of terror. I didn’t recognize any of them. A weird, muted chorus of grim cries and muttering rang around Carlos. His shoulders heaved once in a while and I saw his hands flicker before him. Otherwise, he was still.
A gust of black and red light burst from the organ above the keyboard. Carlos ducked, and it shattered on the circle of Mara’s magic. Her shimmering sigils faded and the room was filled with a sudden howling and chittering. Carlos stepped forward and laid both his hands on the keyboard.
The organ shrieked in agony. Then came a roar, growing around the organ, pushing against Carlos like a bodiless wind. A fetid stink rose with the sound. I started up again, ready to bolt, the pulse of the Grey in my chest fluttering with my racketing heartbeat and twisting like a knife. Mara backpedaled and grabbed me by the shoulder. Her eyes were wide, and I thought she was on the verge of breaking and running herself. Her breath was loud.
Carlos raised his hands and slashed out to both sides. Silence. The Grey aura around the instrument faded, collapsing to its writhing red and black gorgon’s corona again. He eased back until he had crossed the line Mara had made; then he turned and walked to us. His eyes were ablaze with a frightening excitement.
“Up,” he ordered.
I got up, and he herded us to the door and stood on the threshold. “Now go,” he said.
I started to turn, feeling exhausted and ill and wanting to leave.
Mara held on and remained facing him, a rock against his wave of influence. “No.”
He raised an eyebrow, and the force of his demand hovered like a black swarm.
Mara glared at Carlos. “You can’t push me as easily as that, Carlos. I’ll not let you have it.”
“You can’t stop me.”
“Common sense will stop you. It is necromantic, isn’t it?”
His bladed half grin came back. “Why else would I want it?”
TWENTY-NINE
Standing in the hall, Mara glimmered as she opposed Carlos. “If you try to take it, you’ll uncork the bottle and let the genie out. Even you couldn’t put the cork back in fast enough. You saw the size of the power nexus it’s feeding on. It’s stuffed full of energies just wild to escape. You can’t use it here, so you’d have to move it. But you can’t move it without unleashing the energy stored in it. It’s too ripe.”
He glowered and gleamed black. Something shimmered between them. I was too drained to try to see it or understand.
Mara continued. “I imagine there’s only one person who can control the energy cascade that will start the moment it’s disturbed. Am I right?”
Carlos stilled.
Her voice glistened and resonated, throbbing through my bones. “Answer me!”
He bared his teeth and snarled at her. His immaterial black cloak billowed ire. “Don’t try to command me, witch.”
“Don’t be stupid!” she snapped back. “Do you want to destroy the whole fabric of energy here? That would be worse for creatures like you than for me, and I don’t care to contemplate how bad I’d have it.”
Carlos snarled one last time and took a step back from her, his blackness subsiding. He cast a glance over his shoulder toward the organ.
He growled. “You’re right. It’s too dangerous. But we can’t let it remain for someone else. We’ll have to get rid of it.”
Mara objected. “We don’t have enough reserves to contain and control it right now.”
“Of course not.” Carlos reached back and closed the parlor door, then brushed past both of us and headed down the stairs. I rocked back from the force around him.
Mara led me away. I felt muzzy-headed, dazed, sore, and sick. The cold ache in my chest had returned.
As we reached the foyer I asked, “Are we leaving?”
“Yes.”
I gave a wobbling nod,