The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)

An Intersection of Interests

Previously: "A Kind of Professional Consultation" 

Knuckles rap against your bedroom door. You shove the notes you're studying under the bed covers and hop over to the door.

Your mother is standing there when you open it. Her eyes are puffy and red. You freeze at the sight.

"Nicholas and I are going out for a bit," she says in a husky voice. "I don't know when we'll be back."

Ice encloses your heart. "You are going to come back, aren't you?" you gasp.

Your mother starts, then laughs.

"Yes, we'll be back, sweetheart. I just don't know what time. Anyway, I'm telling you in case you come looking for us and can't find us."

She turns to go. "Mom," you call. She glances back, her eyebrows up. You swallow.

You want to run up to hug her, to tell her that everything is okay, and that everything will be okay from here on out. You want to tell her that Nicholas is a changed man.

Hell, you want to tell her that you killed him and replaced him with a magical robot who will be her and your slave.

Of course, that would be a foolish thing to do.

But it would be equally foolish to tell her anything else. Twenty-four hours inside the mind and skin of Nicholas Lawhorn has shown you that. As patient as you were with Sydney's mother last night and today while playing her second husband, it didn't and couldn't change anything for them. There is just too much poison now between them for that.

So instead of telling her Everything will be alright, you say, "I thought you had book club tonight."

"I cancelled it."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

She shrugs. "We'll be back before you go to bed. And there's leftovers in the fridge."

You nod, and softly close the door after she's moved off.

As you settle back on the bed, you wonder how Sydney herself would have handled her mother and her relations with the pedisequos.

But of course, you have to wryly remember as you clasp your strong, smooth, brown legs in your arms, you are Sydney now.

And she would press on with her plan to establish a Brotherhood of Baphomet inside Westside.

* * * * *

"I mean, I already knew it because, dur, that's why they brought Nicholas out here," you tell your pedisequos on the drive out to school the next morning. You texted him right after getting up, asking for a ride. "But to see it on the map in front of me! Whoa!"

"Uh huh," Will mutters while glaring straight ahead, and you're tempted to slap him for not paying attention. But when he adds, "I always knew there was something really witchy about the school," you realize he was just concentrating on the road. The truck jounces and creaks as he navigates the crush of cars flowing toward the high school.

"What I want to know now is," you continue, "where exactly the intersection is. I mean, the school's a pretty big place. You don't have to get exactly on top of one of these spots in order to use them, but you need to get within at least ten feet of them. Oh, jeez! Wouldn't it just figure if it was inside the principal's office!"

Will gives you a sidelong glance. "Couldn't we use one of the other spots? Didn't you say there were three of them? Making a triangle?"

"The intersections? Yes, but the other two are already taken. I thought I told you. The Sovereign Vicegerent—"

"That's the big boss?"

"Right. He's got his office in the old railroad museum, which is where the most powerful of those intersections is. The other two, one's at school and the other's where the Sovereign Seneschal has his pool cleaning service."

"What's a seneschal?" Will stumbles over the word, even though you just pronounced it for him.

"It's like a sheriff. In a Temple, the Sovereign Seneschal is basically the cop."

"So he's this cop they're talking about bringing out to the school?"

"No, that's the Temporal Marshal."

"Oh Jesus." Will pinches the bridge of his nose.

It's very simple, you want to tell him. Except you already told him all this and apparently it went in one ear and out the other. Now you know why your mother sometimes gives you those looks.

The Van Dief Temple is divided into two 'courts'. The Sovereign Court has five members, and is the court that runs things. The lower court, which Nicholas is a member of, also has five members, and is called the "Temporal Court." Each court has offices that are equivalent to each other. So the equivalent of the Sovereign Vicegerent is the Temporal Commander, and the equivalent of the Sovereign Seneschal is the Temporal Marshal.

And because Mr. Walberg has signed on for another year of teaching at Westside, the Temple can't follow through on its plan to re-infiltrate Westside by getting Nicholas hired as a social studies teacher. ("Re-infiltrate," because until last year, when he died, Mr. Sloan of the English department was the Temple's agent inside the school.) So instead they are going to try to get Rick Chandler, the Temporal Marshal, who is on the city police force, hired as a security guard at the high school. As for Nicholas, the Vicegerent wants to give him—

"Oh hey, this is something you'll find interesting." You poke Will in the thigh as he turns into the student parking lot. "I told you— Well," you stammer, "Sydney told us." Briefly you lose your voice. "But ley lines need two anchor points to establish them, right? Well, one of the three ley lines that run through town goes right alongside the railroad tracks. And one of the anchors is at the old depot, and the other, get this—" You clutch his arm. "Is under the Warehouse."

You grin, but Will only blinks. "The party spot?" he asks, sounding confused.

"Exactly! So all the stuff that goes on out there? That permanent rave? It frigging powers that ley line! I mean, my goodness! All those hormones, all that dancing, all those kids going upstairs or backstairs and fucking each other blind, it all pours into that anchor point and sluices like floodwater along the—! Oh hey, there's Reagan! Honk at her, will you?" Will leans on the horn; Reagan Hackett looks around, and smiles when you wave at her. "Anyway, the Vicegerent wants Nicholas to take over as one of the suppliers out at the Warehouse. You know, as one of the adult dealers who keeps the high school suppliers, uh, supplied. That way he could get access to the anchor point out there, which isn't as good as having an intersection, but at least it's something for him." You make a face and add, "Nicholas is sure scuzzy enough to be a drug dealer."

Will pulls into a slot, and you start to gather up your stuff. There's a tap at your window, and you swing around to beam at Reagan. "Hey, girl!" the two of you exclaim in unison as you clamber out.

Reagan is a big girl, but fit (she's on the volleyball squad), with all her mass concentrated in leg, butt, and shoulder muscles. With her wide hips and great bust she looks like she could litter a dozen kids at a go, and with her bold nose and even bolder stare she could chase off any predator smaller than a T-Rex.

She's also one of your candidates to act as a "scout" inside Westside.

"Oh my God, Josie's study party!" she laughs as you and she and Will walk toward the school. "The gift that keeps on giving!"

"Like how?"

"The dog that didn't bark?" Reagan grins and rolls her eyes so hard the whites show. "Raymond wasn't there."

"Which Raymond?"

"Koepp. The band guy I pointed out to you yesterday?"

"Oh yeah yeah. So he wasn't—"

"But Haley was, and now—"

Reagan breaks off to look past you. At first you think she's giving Will a hard stare, but when she waves you see she's beckoning someone over.

Make that two someones. A tall, cheerful Chinese-American kid (who you recognize but can't place firmly) and a short, round-faced kid with short, frosted blonde hair, elfin eyes, and a stud in his left ear. Reagan squeals as she gives the Chinese kid a squeeze around the waist. "Oh my God, I was just telling Sydney about Raymond and Haley!" she exclaims as you all meet up next to the gym. "You gotta make sure I tell it right!"

So it turns out that the Chinese guy—Jack Li is his name—is the source of Reagan's story, the short version of which is that Raymond and Haley Flanagan are supposedly going out together, but Raymond skipped going to Josie Holden's with her on account of he had a study group to meet with, but Jack was part of that study group and Raymond never showed up, so just where the hell was he?

"Fucker." The frosted-hair kid laughs and punches Jack in the arm. "You were supposed to cover for him while he was off with—"

"I didn't know he was supposed to be studying with us!" Jack protests. "So when Stephanie comes over and asks me about him—"

Everyone starts talking at once, and not until the frosted-hair kid jogs off to join some girls headed for the natatorium do you notice that Will has slipped away. It gives you a hard pang to find him gone without saying goodbye.

You cover for yourself by asking Reagan who the frosted-hair kid was. "Matthew Adams," she tells you with a distracted sniff. "He's on the swim team." She giggles. "He'll find out what the girls on the swim team are saying about Raymond and Haley."

"Oh, he doesn't give a shit," Jack says. "He's a sophomore," he explains to you.

You've decided you need a "scout," a face you can use to find likely converts to your cult, given that you yourself aren't in the social swim, and Sydney is still new to school. Besides Reagan, you were leaning toward using party girl Catherine Muskov, or gossip Deanna Showalter. But as a result of this conversation, Jack Li has just volunteered himself.

And it occurs to you that the sophomore class might be an even better hunting ground than the senior class.

Next: "Through Another's Eyes" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 4)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)"