A Maze of Glass, Chapter Thirteen, Pt. 2
Omar and Zoe held the embrace for a long time. The car Omar had stepped out of with his kit bag had pulled away seconds earlier. People passed them on the sidewalk, at least one of them noticing. Still, they held on. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, not knowing what else to say after so many months.
“It wasn’t your fault,” he soothed.
She hadn’t always been as good a mentor as Sung-ho had been.
“It wouldn’t’ve happened if I hadn’t fucked up…”
He pulled away from her just enough to hold eye contact, his endless pools and her gray-blue shallows. “Everyone fucks up,” he said. “You still pulled me out in one piece.” “
It’s less impressive when I’m the one who put you in the shit to begin with.”
His lips parted, not quite a smirk but not quite not, either. “Funny.”
They drifted away from each other inch by inch. “What?”
“I know you’re talking about what happened in New Mexico, but I was just thinking…it’ll be ten years ago this winter. When we met.”
She blinked. Laughed. Some of the tension aching along her spine melted away. “Oh, my god, I really am the one who put you in this shit to begin with.”
Omar’s face lit, cheeks high, a grin so wide it almost split his face. “Exactly.”
She laughed again, more falsely this time. “Well, I’m sorry for that, too.”
“Hey, don’t be. It made my life.” Omar used a rolling suitcase as a general gig kit, a ‘tactical’ fanny pack for proper runs. He popped the handle up and tilted the case to roll. “Besides, if I was really holding onto anything, I wouldn’t be here right now.”
They walked down Boylston toward the Public Garden and Commons. Zoe chose the rendezvous point for its clamor; a place too busy for them to stand out. “Thanks, by the way,” Zoe said.
“Thank me when we win.” This one was a smirk. “So. You mentioned an active opposition on the phone.”
“I think they’re with the Belgian’s people. And I think they burned my last rental.”
“Wait, they burned it?”
“Not literally. Just…they compromised it.”
“I was kidding,” Omar said. “But if you’re right, that means they got a hell of a head start.”
“They do.”
“So how do we come back on ‘em?”
“I’m still figuring it out. I just know…on my own, I can’t do this. Even with everything Jill and her people are doing inside the house, there’s just too much. We’re losing. I’m losing.”
Omar rolled his neck, shoulder-length ‘locs spilling down. Something popped and he noised that it felt good. “Well,” he said, after, “that’s just a numbers game. One of the best witches in the world is still just one witch. Now you’ve got backup. And in case you forgot, I’m pretty good at this, myself.”
She stopped walking. He went on a few more paces before stopping, himself. He turned toward her with a face lined in questions. “I was so scared you wouldn’t show up,” she admitted. “Or that it would be someone else from ASOD waiting to drag me in front of the Arbiters.”
“Zoe…it’s me, remember? I’m one of the good guys.”
“It just…thank you.”
A phone rang. One of her burner phones, though now she had several all cluttered at the bottom of her purse. She dug through gig supplies, foundation, a snack bar, and a water bottle to reach the phones. She grasped them one by one, feeling for a vibration.
When she found the right one she pulled it out, frowning. It was the number she’d given Jill, but Jill hadn’t called it, yet.
“Hold on,” she said, signaling for Omar to stop moving. She leaned against a column outside of a clothing store. “Jill?” she asked, answering the call.
“Something bad’s coming. Soon.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t. Darnell’s a psychic, Zo’.”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
“You think I don’t know how it ‘works?’” Jill almost snarled. “It’s been keeping him up, waking him up…it’s been hitting him at work, blindsiding him. His sixth sense is going crazy. He knows. And whatever it is, it’s happening soon.”
“There are a lot of spells targeting you, right now. Psychic attacks, dream magic, astral—”
“He knows,” she repeated as if cursing. “Just believe me.”
“Okay, I do, I do,” Zoe soothed.
Omar watched, rucking his brow.
“What if we just moved?” Jill asked.
“You’d never show up at your new house and you know it.”
“I don’t know what to do. My—the kids, they’re so scared.”
“We’re putting things together,” Zoe said. “Just…hold out for me, okay?”
“They’re winning, aren’t they?”
Zoe changed tactics. “I need your people to bunker down. Whatever jobs you’ve got, you and Karen and Darnell, use your PTO or you sick days or something, but stop going.”
“We can’t—”
“Just for now. Just until we can get closer to these guys.”
“Isn’t there something I can do besides reinforce defenses and wait?”
“Anything else you do will expose you to attack.”
“Then let them attack me!”
Anger roughed Zoe’s voice, “No! Goddammit, stop!”
“What!?”
“I can’t—” (lose you), “I—I just…you’re the best witch in that house. If you go down, if something happens, who’s going to protect everyone else?”
“Darnell’s a psychic and Karen—”
“They’re not using bullets. Karen can hide you and Darnell can see shit coming, but sooner or later…they’ve got oneiromancers and anti-psychic specialists and spells that can hum subsonic vibrations through a whole house.”
“There’s got to be a way out.”
“There is,” Zoe said. “I’m putting it together, myself.”
For five out of the eight people living there.
Zoe cleared her throat, taking Jill’s silence as an invitation for more. “I need to neutralize some of the more powerful spells targeting your school and I’m putting together an evac plan to extract you, after. There is…there is a catch.”
“I don’t care,” Jill replied. “Whatever the catch is, please, just…get us out of here.”
“I will. I’ll do everything I can to keep you safe.”
And who knew, maybe she even could.
“I’m sorry I’m so…” Jill sighed, the breath expressing too many emotions at once. “I’m just sorry. I thought I was out of that world but I guess nobody ever is and…and I just don’t want all these other people to get hurt because of me.”
Zoe peered back at Omar, questioning with her eyes. Omar scoffed, nodding. “We’ll do everything we can to stop that from happening. Just please…do whatever you can do stay inside.”
“I love you, Zo’.”
“I love you, too.”
The call disconnected.
“Sorry,” Zoe said, not looking at Omar anymore.
“Sounds like the A-team and the B-team have a head start on us.”
“Like I said, I’m losing.”
Omar put a hand on her shoulder. Some other time, years ago, he might’ve pulled her to him. But this wasn’t that time, anymore. “We’ve got a lot of work to do,” he said, his voice soft and calm. “Let’s not throw out the white flag until we’re done with it.”
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