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Mike shoved his hair back out of his face and panted. Peter’s kite was still nowhere to be seen, and now he wasn’t sure how far away from the Pad he was.
It had seemed like a reasonable idea to split up to look for the kite when the string had snapped. At the time, Mike had figured it couldn’t have gotten very far; whoever found it should have been within easy yelling range of the others. But that had been nearly half an hour ago, and now Mike was on a stretch of beach that looked unfamiliar.
He tugged his windbreaker tighter around him and wished for his denim jacket instead. When had it gotten this chilly? Cool breezes came up off the Pacific all the time, but this one seemed downright cold, even for autumn.
“Hey, Davy?” he called, scrambling to the top of a low rise that barely merited being called a dune. “Pete? Micky?” There was no answer; the sand seemed to swallow up his voice, leaving no echo. His friends were nowhere to be seen.
He turned and paced towards the water. Maybe the kite had gotten washed away? They might never find it, then - the tide was on its way out.
It all seemed hopeless. Why was he out here chasing after a child’s toy? How did he think he was even going to find it on this huge stretch of beach? They’d lost sight of it in the sun - he didn’t even know for sure which way it had gone.
Somehow, the wind seemed to get even colder. Mike squinted; had the clouds started to roll in? It was dimmer, now; the bright sunshine that had blinded him when Peter lost the kite was fading fast.
What did he think he was doing? He wasn’t the sharp-eyed one of their group; that was Micky. He wasn’t the fast one; that was Davy. He wasn’t even the one with odd intuitive leaps; Peter was more use out here than he was. Mike dropped, squatting on his heels, as the misty gloom wrapped around him.
Useless. He was useless. His uncles and aunts had always said so; so had Uncle Sam, when he’d washed out of the Air Force. He had never been able to hold down a steady job, either in Texas or once he came out here. He barely managed to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table, and that was due as much to Davy’s natural charisma and Micky’s trickery as it was to any of his feeble efforts.
Mike’s head dropped forward and he buried his face in his hands. Suddenly, the churning water of the Pacific seemed strangely inviting; it would only be a few steps through the thick fog, and then - no more worries about snarling landlords or snooty club owners. The others would be fine without him, after all; Peter was the musical heart of the group, and Micky and Davy were the singers, the face men. He was dead weight, he always had been; why had he ever thought coming to California was a good idea, or that he could be good for the guys?
“Mike!” called a voice somewhere far in the distance.
Ah, great. He’d gotten himself lost, and someone was looking for him. How useless could you be, a grown man getting lost on a straight east-west beach? Better to just make friends with the undertow and be done with it, right? If only he could get together enough motivation to move . . .
“Mike, no!” That was Peter’s voice. “Mike, you have to fight it, you have to get away from it!”
Away from what? Mike pulled his hands from his face - why were they wet? - and stared up into a black hood, dripping wet with seaweed and something slicker. A long, dead-looking hand hovered just above his shoulder, and the shape wheezed, as if it were trying too hard to breathe.
With a yelp, Mike sprang back, his boot heels kicking up a spray of wet sand into the empty space the thing’s used for a face. He scrambled backwards on all fours, like a crab, as Peter dashed to his side, putting himself between Mike and the black shroud.
“It’s that thing again,” Mike gasped. “The - Micky called it a dementor, right?”
Peter made no sound; he only trembled. Mike edged forward, still on his hands, and turned to face him; Peter’s eyes had gone wide and unseeing, the beginnings of tears welling at the corners. The dementor had clearly changed its focus; the wheeze turned into a rattle as Peter’s eyes closed with a sob.
“Oh, no.” Mike hauled himself to his feet. “You can mess with my head all you want, but you’re not getting at Pete - not while I’m here,” he declared, brandishing a fist right under where the dementor’s nose should have been.
The rattle pulsed, rhythmically. Was this abomination laughing at him?
Peter dropped to his knees, shivering uncontrollably. Mike shoved his own body between Peter and the hulking shroud, but he could feel the cold numbing his exposed flesh. Even if this thing could only get into one mind at a time, it was still sucking all the heat out of the air.
Mike took a deep breath and took a swing. He was slightly surprised to feel his fist actually connect with something; it was soft and slimy, with what felt like bird bones crunching underneath, and it was colder than anything he’d ever touched, so cold it almost burned.
The shroud had no eyes, but it clearly looked at him, changing its focus once more. Immediately, the same despair from before swept over Mike, the same sense of uselessness and worthlessness; he was ashamed to even exist. Voices clamored somewhere beneath him - his mother, telling him she was disappointed in him; his father, shouting about how he had no son, after all; his uncle, telling him that choosing a guitar over a girl made him the worst sort of queer -
Micky and Davy, shouting something he didn’t understand, in unison, somewhere over his left shoulder.
“Expecto patronum!”
Mike forced his eyes open as two silver streaks leaped over his head, one shaping itself into a monochome lion, the other much less distinct but with a horse’s mane and hooves. The dementor fell back, one pace, two, as the two spells crowded between it and Mike. Mike scooped up Peter’s limp body into a fireman’s carry and beat a hasty retreat as Micky and Davy ran up, wands out and pointed levelly at the cadaverous shape.
“What is it doing out here in the open?” Micky hissed through his teeth.
Davy shook his head, his hand trembling with the effort of maintaining the spell. “Remember,” he said, “the Muggles can’t see it.”
“Yeah, well,” Mike growled, “we can sure as hell feel it. It damn near had me throwing myself to the fishes before Peter showed up.”
Micky’s eyes went huge; he growled and gave his wand a sharp thrust. The lion pounced, bowling the dementor over, as the half-horse whirled around and kicked it down the beach with its back hooves.
Mike let Micky and Davy advance past him before setting Peter down on the sand. He rubbed his hand on his shirt, then checked Peter’s pulse; it was steady and strong, and Peter was breathing fine. He must have just passed out. No real surprise there; Mike suspected he’d been close to the same before the wizard cavalry arrived.
Micky’s face was still set in a snarl as the two patronuses drove the dementor back into the sea. As the waves closed over its head, the unnatural greyness began to dissipate; sunlight gleamed low in the sky and began to warm Mike’s back. He stretched, feeling the warmth sink into his chilled skin as Davy jogged over and joined him at Peter’s side.
“Is he all right?” Davy asked, his face still flushed.
“No, but I think he will be once we get him warmed back up,” Mike said. “That thing had me pretty good, and then Peter got between us and got its attention. I don’t know what-all it did to him, before I got it together to do something about it.” He glanced over to the surf line. “What in the world is Micky doing?”
Davy shuddered. “Dementors aren’t supposed to like going around in the daylight,” he explained. “They’ll only do it if they’re acting under orders. And we thought this one was sent for me. There shouldn’t have been any way it would have come after you, or Peter, in the middle of the afternoon.”
Mike nodded. “Yeah, I got that. That doesn’t tell me what Micky’s doing.”
Micky’s feet were in the surf, and the beadless drumstick that was his wand was still outstretched, emitting the occasional flash of light or wisp of smoke. His lips formed words that Mike couldn’t hear over the waves and probably wouldn’t have comprehended even if he had, but judging from the hard look on Micky’s face, they weren’t gentle ones.
“He’s throwing some pretty serious hexes at it,” Davy admitted. “Stuff I can’t do at all. I don’t know if they’ll keep it from coming back, but at least we should have plenty of warning if it tries.”
Mike looked down at Peter, who hadn’t stirred. “We should probably try and get him back to the Pad,” he said quietly.
“And get some hot cocoa into him,” Micky agreed as he strode over from the water’s edge. “I think, between the undertow and the whammy I just laid down, that’ll keep it from catching up to us -”
“Halt!” shouted a voice from above them. “Stay where you are!”
“Oh, no,” Micky groaned, “it’s the fuzz.”
“What?” Mike asked, as the air above them rippled and revealed a muscular young fellow in a blue pointed hat with a badge, a short black robe, and what looked like purple harem pants, riding a broomstick with a flashing red light attached to the handle.
On a broom. Right. Of course wizard police rode brooms; why wouldn't they?
The man in the robe dismounted from his broom and pulled out a small notepad and a black feather. “Now, what’s going on?” he demanded. “We just got a major unauthorized magic alert from this area.”
“Well, sir, you see -” Davy started, but Micky interrupted him.
“A dementor attacked my friends here,” Micky announced. “I had to defend us, and my other friend helped.” Micky’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Last I checked, officer, that wasn’t against the law.”
“A dementor? In Malibu?” the wizard cop scoffed.
“Check for the residue,” Davy suggested. “You’ll see he’s right.”
Mike pointed down at Peter’s unconscious body at his feet. “Got him real good,” he said, playing up his accent slightly. “Nearly got me, too.”
The cop pushed his hat back slightly and scratched his ear. Then he unslung his wand from a leather holster at his belt; it was shorter and thicker than Micky’s. “Hazardus locatis,” he announced, and seemed surprised when the wand pivoted in his hand to point out to sea. His eyebrows went up as a curl of colored smoke rose from the end of the wand and formed a glyph. “Tituba’s curls, there’s a dementor about a hundred yards out!”
“Told you,” Davy sniffed.
The black feather scribbled something hastily on the pad, without the cop touching it; this did not surprise Mike as much as it probably should have. What did surprise him was the cop’s folding the top sheet into a paper airplane and touching it with the tip of his wand. It shot off as if it had been fired from a ballista, and the cop clambered back onto his broomstick.
“So, these two,” the officer said, nodding at Mike and Peter and twitching his wand again. “They’re mundanes?”
“Actually,” Micky corrected him, “we think Peter’s a, uh, a Squib.” He swallowed and looked embarrassed, as if he had just said something his mother would have him choking on a bar of soap for later. “At least, the wizard-finding charm thinks he’s not a mundane.”
Davy nodded. “And Mike could see the dementor when it was right on top of him, although he couldn’t before that,” he added. “If he was a complete Muggle, he shouldn’t have been able to see it at all, isn’t that right?”
The cop blinked, then sighed. “Invenio veneficus,” he pronounced, and pointed his wand at Peter with a flourish. A curl of smoke wafted up from the wand’s tip and snapped into the shape of a bright blue question mark, accompanied by a sound not unlike a slide whistle.
The officer shook his wand and tried it again, with the same results. “That’s not supposed to happen,” he said, his voice rising almost as if he were asking instead of announcing it.
Micky shrugged. Davy bobbed his head, and pointed out, “It did that when we tried it before. That’s why we figure he must be a Squib.”
“No, Squibs have a different mark,” the cop protested. He turned the wand on Mike and repeated the flourish.
Mike felt his breath catch, and his eyes squeezed shut despite himself. Peter, at least, would get out of this with his memories intact, but as soon as the cop got confirmation that he was just a normal person, Mike knew he was going to get his mind wiped. He only hoped that Micky and Davy wouldn’t get into too much trouble on his account; Davy had mentioned before that deportation might be a possibility.
A second whistle sounded. Mike opened one eye to see another blue question mark hovering at the end of the cop’s wand.
“Hey, that’s -” Micky blurted; Davy kicked him discreetly in the shins.
“That’s the same thing again, isn’t it?” Davy said innocently as Micky yelped and hopped on one foot. “So if they’re not Squibs, what does it mean?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” the cop said, shaking the wand and tucking it back in its holster. “But if there’re no mundanes on the scene, then there’s no clean-up required, and I’d just as soon let get back and let Magical Pest Control know we have a dementor on the loose.” He shoved his hat further down on his head and nodded in Peter’s direction. “He’ll need chocolate, and possibly a warm bath. Can you get him somewhere safe on your own?”
Micky stopped hopping and mumbled something inaudible at Davy. “Sure,” he replied to the officer.
“All right. You boys stay safe and keep your noses clean!” The wizard cop tucked his heels back, and the broom rose straight up into the air.
“Don’t forget to put your camouflage spell back on,” Micky called up.
The cop’s eyebrows jumped; he touched something on the handle of the broomstick, and immediately disappeared from view. Micky seemed to be able to still see him, or at least tell where he was, as his eyes tracked something across the sky moving rapidly eastward.
Mike hoisted Peter up over his shoulder again. “Come on,” he announced, “he hasn’t come to yet, and I’m starting to worry that thing did some serious damage.”
“Right.” Micky stretched out his left hand towards Mike and his right elbow towards Davy. “Grab on. This won’t be fun, but it’ll be faster.”
Davy swallowed, but took the proffered elbow. Mike shrugged and laced his fingers through Micky’s. Micky took a deep breath and traced a complex sigil in the air before shouting, “Statim reversus!”
Everything seemed to stretch, and Mike felt as if he were being turned inside out. He clutched at Peter and Micky convulsively, as if they could anchor him somehow, even though he knew Micky was the cause. After a second, the world seemed to snap back like a rubber band, and Mike’s legs gave out; he and Peter landed in a heap on the floor of the Pad, just in front of the bandstand.
Apparently Micky and Davy hadn’t landed cleanly either; Mike looked up to see them untangling their legs from each other next to him on the floor. Davy bounced up first, and ran to the kitchen without a word. Before he could say anything, Mike found half a chocolate bar in his hands, and Davy was crouched at Peter’s side trying to coax his mouth open.
“This is nuts,” Micky grumbled as he pushed himself to his feet. “Why in blazes would the dementor go after you guys?”
“Maybe it was trying to flush Davy out?” Mike offered, around a mouthful of chocolate. He wasn’t sure whether it was the candy or just being home that made him feel so much warmer.
“How did you do that?” Davy protested. “You’re not supposed to be able to apparate people other than yourself.”
“It’s not a straight apparation,” Micky explained, his eyes tracing the edges of the doors and windows, as if he were checking something, although Mike couldn’t see what it might be. “It’s strictly an emergency-return spell, keyed to a specific object or person and a specific location - in this case, me and the circle I traced out on the floor here.”
Mike looked down. Sure enough, someone had drawn a perfect circle on the floor about nine feet wide, in crayon, in a color that almost perfectly matched the floor. He’d have never noticed it under the layer of crumbs and dust bunnies that their poor housekeeping habits left behind if Micky hadn’t mentioned it.
“So it’s sort of a portkey?” Davy asked.
Before Micky could answer, Peter twitched. “Oh, good, he’s coming around,” Micky blurted. “Someone get him a blanket while I heat up some instant cocoa.” He dashed into the kitchen and hunted for a clean pot.
“Easy there,” Davy crooned as Peter tried to push himself up. “You got in between Mike and the dementor. It did a real number on you, you know.”
Peter swallowed the chocolate Davy had force-fed him and protested, “And then Mike got between it and me. He was almost as bad off, Davy, he looked like he was just going to give up and stop breathing, Mike, I was so scared -”
“Easy, there, big fella,” Mike reassured him. “Yeah, it was looking pretty grim before you showed up, but I’m all right now, see?”
“You are not all right,” Micky called back from the kitchen. “You were white as a sheet when we found you, and you’re still two shades paler than you should be.”
Davy pressed another square of chocolate into each of their palms. “Give it a moment,” he pleaded. “Once you get your strength back, then we can go from there.”
Peter shuddered and rolled onto his side. “What are those things, Davy?” he asked, his voice weak and quavering. “I mean, you told us what its name was, but - what is it?”
“No one really knows,” Davy admitted, shrugging. “I mean, they’re sentient, they can understand language and follow directions. But no one knows if they’re really alive or not, or where they come from, or if they’re natural or were made by some spell gone wrong sometime long ago.”
For a long minute, the Pad was silent except for the sound of Micky’s spoon scraping the edges of the pot as he stirred. Peter broke the silence with something not entirely unlike a sob as he pulled himself up to a seated position. After a moment of staring at his hands, he asked, “But why do they pull up all the muck from the bottom of your heart like that, and then drown you in it?”
Micky hissed and swore under his breath. Davy blinked, replying, “I don’t know, Peter. That’s just what they do.” He swallowed. “I mean, it’s after me,” he continued, “so - I’m sorry that it’s doing that to you. Is that what happened the first time, when it broke in here?”
“Yes,” Peter said, his voice still small and quiet.
Mike shifted so that his shoulder was next to Peter in case he needed support. “The first time it showed up, I mostly felt cold,” he admitted. “But this time - yeah, dredging up the swamp muck from my subconscious sounds about right.”
“You said - at least, you implied that it was making you feel, um, suicidal,” Davy said, his lip quivering.
“Yup,” Mike said. Somehow, he failed to find anything more to add to that; the admission hung in the air as Micky paced back across the floor holding a pair of steaming mugs.
“Drink that,” Micky ordered, brandishing one of the mugs in Peter’s face. Peter took it and sipped obediently as Micky handed Mike the other one and skittered back into the kitchen.
“Do you - I mean, you don’t normally feel like that, do you?” Davy asked. His gaze failed to quite meet Mike’s.
Mike pondered how to answer that. “Not in a long time,” he finally replied. “I used to, sometimes, back before I quit school, and then again for a little bit when I washed out of the service. But not since I came out here.” He paused to take a long swallow from his cocoa, then added, “And definitely not since I met y’all.”
Micky reappeared with another pair of mugs; he handed one to Davy and then sank crosslegged to the floor with the other clutched in both hands. “Good,” he said sharply, and then buried his nose in his cocoa.
Peter leaned forward and set his empty cup on the floor. “Are you mad, Micky?” he asked.
Micky sighed deeply. “Not at you, Pete,” he answered. “Not at any of you guys. Maybe at myself, a little bit, and definitely at whoever sent a gosh-darn dementor all the way to Malibu. Why?”
“You’re not saying much,” Peter explained. “It’s not like you to let Davy do all the talking.”
Micky ran his hand down his face and then shook his head, hard enough to bounce his curls. “For once, I don’t know what to say,” he confessed. “I mean, now this thing’s shown up twice, and both times it’s gone for you guys, not me. I’ve read about what those things are supposed to do to you, but - other than it making it freezing cold, I haven’t been the target.” He gazed into his mug and snorted. “Honestly, I think you guys have held up better than I would. You’ve seen how quick I go to pieces.”
Peter shook his head and put a hand on Micky’s arm. “I don’t think so,” he said quietly. “I mean, you have more energy than we do, and you know how to fight back. I’m glad it’s been dumb enough to target the rest of us, really - your big silver lion is what’s saved us both times.”
“It’s called a patronus,” Micky explained, “and part of the spell to conjure it is thinking of your most happy memory. I don’t know if that part by itself would be enough to slow a dementor down, but it might be worth a shot if it shows up again.”
“You don’t trust the wizard cops to catch it, then?” Mike asked.
Micky allowed himself a chuckle. “I trust them to look for it,” he answered, “and that’ll probably keep it out of our hair for a little while, but catch it? No, probably not. The California Magic Troopers are way understaffed, and this isn’t something they’d have procedures for.”
Davy glanced aside. “I was hoping they would, actually,” he admitted. “Otherwise, what’s to keep it from coming after us again?”
“Nothing,” Micky stated flatly. “I’m about 90% sure it’ll be back eventually.” He took another swallow from the mug. “Mike, you couldn’t see it at first, you said? But then you could?”
“Not until Peter warned me about it,” Mike agreed. “Then, wham, it was right there in front of me.”
“So you can’t see it until someone magical points it out to you,” Davy mused, “but then you share their perceptions? That’s a little weird, isn’t it, Micky?”
“It’s nothing I’ve ever heard of before,” Micky said, “but then again, I didn’t go into diagnosis at all back at the academy.” He finished off the mug and scrambled to his feet. “Now that the wizard-finding charm has flaked out on Peter twice, I think I need to take him in to see someone who can tell for sure whether he’s got the talent, and I think I want to take you two with us,” he announced. “Mike, are you okay with delving a little further into the weird?”
“I don’t see as how I’ve got a choice, if that thing’s gonna keep popping up,” Mike answered. “I wasn’t kidding about it nearly getting me, and my punching it didn’t seem like it was slowing it down much.”
“It was still impressive,” Davy assured him. “It took a couple steps back. I’ve never seen anything other than a patronus do that to a dementor before.”
Micky turned to Peter. “Pete, I know you’re into peace and love and not so much into the fighting thing,” he explained rapidly, “but I think you might be able to learn to defend yourself from the stuff that’s being thrown at us.” He paused and swallowed hard. “If the dark wizards that had an issue with Davy in the first place are behind this, once they figure out the dementor’s not working, they may try other stuff, too. Worse stuff. Do you think you’d be okay with learning a little wizarding self-defense?”
Peter’s eyes focused on something far away for a moment, and Micky bounced on his toes, waiting for a reply. Finally, Peter nodded. “If it were just me,” he said, “I might say no. But I’m not okay with someone trying to hurt Davy just because of the way he was born. I really wanted to be able to do more to help Mike out there. And I’m not sure I think the dementor is a person, exactly, anyway. So if there’s a way I can help, I want to.”
“And if plain ol’ mundane muscle can help at all, count me in,” Mike announced.
Micky looked like he was about to say something, then thought better of it as he scooped up the mugs and dumped them in the sink. “We’ll find something for you to do, Mike,” he finally said. “You can bet on it.”
Peter suddenly looked troubled. “We never did find the kite,” he lamented. “Do you think the dementor found it and hid it?”
“Or destroyed it,” Davy suggested.
Micky stopped stock still, then slapped himself on the forehead. “I’m such a dummy,” he growled, clambering onto the bandstand and throwing open the door onto the deck.
“No, that’s me,” Peter said mildly. “What are you doing?”
Micky plucked his wand from his pocket and waved it. “Accio milvus!” he shouted, and stretched out his other hand; a few seconds later, a sopping wet kite sailed up and dropped into his empty palm.
“Actually,” Davy chuckled, “you don’t have to use the Latin for what you’re summoning. You could have just said ‘accio kite,’ you know.”
Micky shrugged. “I felt like showing off,” he said as he draped the kite over the railing to dry. “Especially since if I’d thought of that earlier, none of this would have happened. Mike, Pete, do you guys feel strong enough to take a trip into town, or should we wait until tomorrow?”
Peter glanced past Micky through the window to the golden sunset sky. “I’m not sure I feel safe traveling after dark with the dementor still out there,” he admitted.
“I’ll happily run that son-of-a-gun down,” Mike muttered darkly.
“Possibly not a good idea,” Micky hedged. “I don’t know off the top of my head if it can affect engines, but I know it can mess with electrical lights.” He stuck the wand back in his pocket and closed the deck door. “Okay,” he announced, “I’m going to lay some serious mojo down around this place for the night, and we’ll head out bright and early in the morning.” He yawned theatrically. “Ten A.M. sound good?”
Davy and Mike shared a look. “He thinks ten is bright and early,” Davy noted.
“Well, considering how often he’s still up after midnight, no wonder,” Mike added.
“Yeah, yeah,” Micky groused, “so I’m not exactly a morning person. Davy, you wanna help me with the counterhexes?”
“I’ll do what I can,” Davy agreed. “Mike, Peter, why don’t you have a seat on the couch? The floor might not be the best place while we’re working on this.”
Peter pressed his cheek to Mike’s shoulder as they climbed up onto the chaise. “Why do I feel like this is going to get scarier before it gets better?” he asked, shivering.
The house shivered back, as if it were being shaken by soundless thunder, as Micky’s wand spat showers of yellow sparks that ran up the walls and along the beams. Mike watched the indoor fireworks and leaned back into Peter. “Because it probably will,” he said, trying to sound as calm as possible as he wrapped an arm around Peter’s shoulders. “But you’re in good hands, Pete.”
“I’m in yours,” Peter agreed, closing his eyes against the flashing lights the two wizards were throwing across the room and leaning back against Mike.
Mike blinked. “I meant Micky’s,” he corrected Peter, but the bassist seemed to be instantly asleep again. Mike curled his other arm around Peter’s chest and waited for the light show to be over.
If the frantic expression on Micky’s face as he worked was anything to go by, it might well be the last time any of them would really get to relax for a while, Mike realized.