Archive of Our Own ^beta

"We can pretend he's my brother," says Gary, once they’ve soaked in Jonathan’s seething silence for a good ten minutes. "Don't you see the resemblance, Jon?"

Gary and Alanna both mug for him, Alanna leaning forward from the back seat, but Jonathan just scowls harder at the road, his knuckles going white on the wheel.

“Does Myles even know you’re here?”

“Of course he doesn’t,” says Alanna, exasperated. She wouldn’t have had to hide in the trunk if he did.

She likes Myles a lot, is grateful to the extreme he took her in while Coram keeps up the search for Thom. But he still thinks she's too young to hunt, even if she can out shoot any of the guys who pass through Myles' place looking for info or advice.

She can out shoot Gary, who will admit it, and she can out shoot Jonathan, who won't.

But of course the only reason they haven’t already turned the car around is because they were already halfway to Madison before either realized she was stowed away. That, and because Gary thinks it's hilarious.

"How is anyone going to take us seriously now?" demands Jonathan. "With a - " He catches himself, but Alanna can still hear the word girl, unsaid and damning. She cringes. "With a thirteen-year-old kid hanging around?"

Alanna wants to hit him. He's been weird ever since he found out she’s girl, even though he swore he wouldn't be.

"Jon," says Gary with even humor, "you can't even grow a beard. No one is going to take us seriously regardless."

Jonathan finally cracks a smile. The first Alanna's seen since they lifted the trunk and found her napping there. She feels a pinprick of jealousy. Gary can handle Jonathan, can always calm him down or make him laugh. Alanna can only ever seem to make him worse, once he's gotten himself into a mood, fire adding to fire.

“Fine,” he says grudgingly. His eyes flick to the rearview mirror, and he catches Alanna’s gaze there. She freezes, pierced.

“But you have to listen to everything we say, got it?”

Alanna grins and settles back, making herself comfortable.

“Got it,” she says.

*

“He won’t stay mad long,” says Gary, unrolling a map onto the tiny plastic table by the motel window. “He just worries about you.”

Alanna glares at him. Of course Jon’s worried about her, she thinks, but that isn’t any kind of excuse. She worries about Jon, but that doesn’t mean she gets to pitch fits and sulk.

Gary shrugs at her glower and starts methodically placing pins in the map. She inches closer and realizes it’s a map of the city, its geography dominated by two large lakes that squeeze the city to a finger’s breadth middle. Gary’s pushpins are random, some even scatter out to the surrounding towns. She counts twelve in all.

“That’s a lot of bodies. How has no one noticed?”

“It doesn’t seem like that many when it’s over twenty years or so,” says Gary. “And it’s just all the mysterious deaths in Madison; some of them probably aren’t connected at all. Hell, none of they may be connected. We don’t have enough information right now.”

He taps a white pushpin set in the isthmus. “For example: 1976. Gary and Lisa Fischer. Found by their daughter in their home, no discernible cause of death.” His hand moves down the curve of one lake and he taps a red pushpin. “Tommy Knight. Four days ago. Pretty obviously stabbed to death, in a room that was locked from the inside. There are enough similarities to be worth investigating. But I don’t think they’re actually going to end up being connected.”

Alanna’s eyes settle on the red pushpin.

It’s not far from where they’re staying.

*

Jon comes back an hour later with pizza, two rented suits, and the address for Tommy Knight’s funeral service the next day.

Alanna crams pizza into her mouth and sits cross-legged on the chair besides the map. Gary gives her one short warning not to get any grease on it, and then he and Jonathan both ignore her. They’re talking through their plan for the funeral tomorrow, something which doesn’t particularly interest her as they’ve both agreed she’s not going.

She studies the map, figuring out the quickest route to Tommy Knight’s house. She doesn’t have a particular plan, but she’s used to improvising. She feels a little guilty. She doesn’t go out of her way to get in trouble, but something about the red pushpin calls to her. She almost feels like she could just close her eyes and walk to Tommy Knight’s house by the pull in her chest alone.

And usually when she gets a feeling like that, it means something important is going to happen.

They finish the pizza, and Jon and Gary wrap up their plans, and, finally, close to midnight, Jon points to the bed furthest from the door.

“That’s where you’re sleeping, Alan. Gary and I’ll take the other bed.”

Gary raises his eyes incredulously. “Why can’t one of us share with Alan? He takes up less room than my cat.”

“He kicks,” says Jon.

Alanna waves her hands incredulously at Jon from behind Gary’s back. He can’t be serious about this. Jon resolutely refuses to look back at her.

“Christ, Jonathan. I’ll sleep on the floor if you’re going to be weird,” she says.

“You don’t – ” starts Jon, but Alanna’s already started stripping the comforters and a couple of the pillows off the bed. She has a sleeping bag she smuggled along, too, and she makes herself a comfortable nest between the two beds.

“You’re impossible,” says Jon, with a sigh, but he doesn’t argue further.

*

Gary’s been snoring peacefully for a count of 2000 when she finally lets herself get up. Jonathan’s breathing is slow and steady, too. Neither react as she creeps to the door and opens it. They should probably both be lighter sleepers, given their chosen line of work.

She has her bowie knife, a vial of holy water, a cannister full of salt, the silver crucifix Myles makes her wear, and Gary’s coat and scarf. She’s prepared enough to swipe and run if things get dicey.

It’s a twenty-minute jog to Knight’s house.

The night is still and brittle with cold, the sky clear in a way that bodes an even worse chill, the scant heat of the day escaping into the atmosphere. Her breath plumes in front of her and then wraps around her. But she warms herself up by jogging, to the point that she’s even sweating a little by the time she makes it to Knight’s.

Knight’s house is small and dark, with clapboard shutters and a truck in the driveway, rusted at the wheel wells from years of winter salt on the roads. The blinds are lowered and the crime scene tape has already been taken down. There’s nothing about the house to suggest that the man inside died violently, died recently, died alone.

She had looked at pictures of him on the rest of the drive into Madison. He had been a light-haired man in his thirties, with soft dark eyes, a girlfriend, parents, a brother, a job at a local auto body shop, and no reason that could be found for anyone to kill him.

But that’s just how it is sometimes.

Alanna settles on the curb across the street from Knight’s house to ponder her next move. She could break in, but both Gary and Jon have been vague about what exactly it is they’re looking for, though it sounds like it’s probably a ghost.

Madison is cold. Far colder than she expected. Far colder than South Dakota even. The sweat on her back makes her colder than she should be. She starts to shiver as she sits, even in Gary’s coat and scarf, the freezing concrete of the curb slowly turning her thighs numb.

“I don’t why you thought this was a good idea,” she tells herself critically. In the closed off silence of Knight’s street, her voice is over-loud, startling even to herself.

She still feels that pull in her chest, that call to come inside. Maybe she should break in. See what happens.

She stands up and starts pacing. It doesn’t do much to help her warm up, but that’s when she notices the car.

There are plenty of cars parked on the street. But there’s only one with someone inside, and he’s parked with a great view of Knight’s. The head of whoever’s inside swivels as she walks over. She keeps her hand on her knife, ready to draw.

Once she gets close, she can see there’s a man inside. He’s chosen a spot just outside the radius of the nearest streetlights, so he’s mostly outline. But he can tell that he has curly hair and he’s young, probably only a few years older than Jonathan and Gary.

He unrolls his window when she knocks on his door and greets her with a skeptical smile. He has a big nose, kind eyes. Alanna takes the measure of him with a quick look.

“Evening. Bit late, don’t you think? Past your curfew, lad?”

“What are you doing here?” she asks.

His smile turns genuine – and mocking.

“Are you neighborhood watch?”

“I’m cold,” she tells him shortly. She shrugs a shoulder back in the direction of Knight’s house, and then bites her lip, decides on making the gamble. “And I’m working the same case you are. Let me in or I’m going to freeze to death.”

Her mouth is starting to feel odd, her lips flabby and slow. It’s hard to get all the words out.

The man blinks at her, taken aback.

“You’re not some kind of ghoulie, are you?” he asks. “I’m not generally a fan of creatures pretending to be creepy children.”

Alanna bristles. “I’m fifteen,” she snaps. “I’m not a child.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Small for your age.”

She glares at him, remembering too late that as far as almost anyone knows, she’s thirteen. He sighs and leans over, unlocking the passenger door.

“That’s an impressive scowl you’ve got. Now get in, or you really will freeze to death. I’m getting cold just keeping the door open.”

Alanna sneers and nods at him, then crosses over to the passenger door. She knows she should be smarter than to trust him, but trust him she does. And at least her knife is a comforting weight against her hip.

He flips on the dashboard light once she’s inside. He has a blanket pulled over his lap, and beneath it she thinks she can make out the shape of a gun. She’s not concerned. She’d think he was stupid if he didn’t have a gun on him.

“Christ alive,” he says once he’s gotten a good look at her. “You’ve got the most unnerving eyes I’ve ever seen.”

His accent is soft, reminds her of warmth and clean earth.

“Thanks,” says Alanna. She spots the thermos in his cup holder and brightens. “Is that coffee?”

“Mostly,” says the man. His mouth quirks at one end, half a smile.

“What’s the rest?” asks Alanna, but she’s already unscrewing the thermos.

“Nothing a kid should be drinking.”

She takes a long drink of it anyway. It is coffee, black as good dirt and sweet as toffee, with a sharp bite underneath that warms her all through in a way the actual heat of the coffee doesn’t. She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and lets the warmth course through her. She’s only had alcohol a few times, and only ever a couple sips when one of the younger hunters passing through Myles’ place thought it would be funny.

“Thanks. That’s good,” she says.

“That’s why I drink it.”

“What’s your name?” she asks.

“George,” he tells her amiably. “What’s yours?”

“Alan.”

“Alan?” he looks her over, too perceptive for her comfort, and she shifts uneasily. He smiles slightly again, same quirk of the same side of his mouth. “All right, Alan. It’s good to meet you.”

He takes the thermos back from her and drinks.

“Where are your parents?” he asks, handing the thermos back to her.

“They’re dead,” says Alanna shortly. She doesn’t take another drink, but wraps her hands around the thermos and enjoys the heat radiating from it.

“I’m sorry to hear that. So’s my da. Dead parents or no though, you’re a bit young for a hunter.”

“I’m working with people,” she says. “Are you?”

He smiles like she’s made a joke.

“No, I’m working this one alone. I have a cousin I work with sometimes. Wonderful woman. Thinks I’m a moron.”

“Are you?”

“A moron? Almost certainly. I’m here making nice with a teenager when I could be home in a warm bed.”

She snorts. “Most hunters I know work in pairs. My – ” She pauses. She’s never really sure how to refer to Myles. It’s not usually relevant. Everyone in the hunting community knows who Myles is, knows about the stray he’s taken in.

“My guardian says it’s foolish to work alone.”

George smirks. “I’m not like most hunters you know, Alan.”

She smiles in spite of herself and unscrews the thermos for another sip.

“How long have you been sitting out here?” she asks.

He gives her an amused look. “About an hour.”

“See anything?”

“Just you.”

She peers at him, trying to tell if he’s keeping something from her. He looks blandly back at her. Butter couldn’t melt in his mouth. She rolls her eyes. She wonders whose death or legacy it is that has him out here, making small talk with a teenager outside a dead man’s house. They sit in companionable silence for a while, and Alanna slowly feels herself start to warm up.

“Any theories?” she asks, once she’s fully warm. She looks at the house. It’s still dark and quiet. She still wants to go inside.

“One,” says George.

Alanna waits. When it becomes obvious George isn’t going to say anything, she scowls.

George laughs.

“I don’t mean any offense,” he says. “But I usually work alone for a reason.”

“Which is that you’re a moron,” says Alanna, with a slight smile. “We covered that much. Have you ever considered being smart for once?”

George laughs again, but this time it’s because of her, not at her. Alanna feels a small flicker of warmth in her chest that has nothing to do with the alcohol. George has an open, easy laugh that makes his eyes crinkle at the corners.

“Fair enough, lad,” he says, shaking his head. “Seems to me, Knight collected vintage blades. He went to a knife show a couple weeks ago in Chicago, and then he got stabbed to death in his locked room.”

“So you think he bought a haunted knife?”

George taps his nose. “Something like that.”

That would make sense, thinks Alanna. That would explain why Gary hadn’t been able to dig up any other similar deaths.

“How’d you figure that out?” she asks. She figures if George has been talking to Knight’s family already, she should let Jon and Gary know.

“Ah,” George shakes his head. “That I won’t share.”

Alanna scowls again, but this time he’s unmoved.

“All right,” she says. “So if you know what it is, why haven’t you gone and done anything about it?”

“And get stabbed to death myself? No, lad, I prefer to sit a bit and figure out the best way to approach things.”

“All you’d have to do is destroy the knife,” points out Alanna. “You’d just need a strong enough fire.”

“And you have to know what knife it is,” says George. “Do you think a man who regularly attended knife shows is just going to have one knife lying around?”

Alanna looks at the house. She feels the pull in her chest again.

“I could pick it out,” she says.

George gives her odd look. Alanna doesn’t let herself react to it. She’s had a lifetime of practice.

“Maybe we’ll wait til it’s light to see about that,” he says. He checks his watch and grimaces. “It’s late enough now that I don’t think we’ll see anything interesting. Where are you staying? I’ll give you a ride back.”

Alanna fixes him with her best stare, and he looks back, mild and unflinching.

“I’ll tell you, but if you drive me somewhere else and murder me, I will come back as a ghost and kill you.”

She doesn’t think he’s going to murder her, but she figures there’s no harm done in threatening him.

“I don’t doubt that,” says George with another laugh. “You’ve nothing to fear from me. I don’t think you’ve anything to fear from anyone, if I’m being perfectly honest.”

She grins. “Now you’re just flattering me.”

He winks, and something in Alanna’s stomach seems to flutter and contract. Stupid, she thinks. Must be the alcohol.

George turns the radio on as they drive back to Alanna’s hotel, and something sweet and poppy plays.

George sings along to it.

*

“Alan? Is that you?”

Jon comes charging out of the motel room, just as Alan gets out of George’s car. Gary’s only a few steps behind him.

“Oh, damn,” says Alanna, frowning.

“Everything all right?” asks George. His eyebrows draw together slightly, and he opens his door, clearly intending to get out.

But Jon gets there first.

“Who the hell are you?” demands Jon. He grabs George’s shirt and pulls George roughly from the car.

“Jon!” yells Alanna. She runs around the car towards them.

George’s answering smile is grim and thin.

“George Cooper.”

It doesn’t mean anything to Alan, but Gary’s eyes go big and he whistles low. Jonathan goes paler in his rage.

“What’s a thief like you doing here?”

“The same reason a Conte is, no doubt,” says George. He grabs Jonathan’s wrist and yanks Jon’s hands from his shirt. “There was an interesting death in the area recently.”

Jonathan snorts. His hands are still clenched.

“So you’re here to profit off it.”

“I’m here to stop the deaths, same as you. And if I get something in return for that? Well, I think that’s only fair.”

Jonathan looks like he’s about to take a swing, and Alanna rushes him. She tries to grab him and pull him away, but he shakes her off easily.

George retreats, back against his car and fists squared and up.

“That’s enough!” bellows Gary, and he actually does manage to grab Jon by the shoulder and pull him away.

“Alan’s fine, Jon,” he adds, keeping a tight grip on his cousin. “Look – he’s fine.”

“Yes! I am!” says Alanna. “Jesus Christ, Jon! What is wrong with you?”

Jon says nothing. He glowers at George and rubs his hand, like he’s still thinking of taking a swing. Alanna stares at him. She’s seen Jon angry, but she’s never seen him like this. Even when he’s pissed, he’s usually sensible.

“You keep interesting company, Alan,” says George lightly. He nods at her. “Maybe it would have been better for me if you were some kind of ghoulie.”

Alanna flushes and opens her mouth to say something, then shuts it. She’s too loyal to Jon to try to make excuses for him, even if he is being an ass.

“You’re welcome to work with us,” she says, and ignores both Jon and Gary’s noises of dismay.

George laughs, and it’s nothing like his other laughs have been. There’s an edge of cynicism to it that she doesn’t like.

“Some other time,” he says, and then he makes gesture like he’s tipping his hat and gets back in his car.

“You won’t be seeing me again,” he tells Jon and Gary, before pulling the door shut. “I know when I’m being chased off.”

Alanna watches him drive off. Jon finally manages to yank himself out of Gary’s grip. She can feel him glaring at her, but she doesn’t give him the satisfaction of looking up. Eventually, he turns and goes back inside. Alanna shivers. She’s starting to get cold again.

Gary places his hands on her shoulders, and she looks up at him.

“You do understand why he’s upset, don’t you?” he asks.

“Yes,” says Alanna grudgingly. “But I was fine.” She pauses, hoping it’s a long enough hesitation to sound contrite, and then asks, “But what did Jon mean? That George was going to make a profit off what’s going on?”

Gary’s face folds into an expression every bit as impressively disapproving as his dad.

“Cooper is a thief, Alan. Not a hunter. He fences supernatural items. There’s a whole market for it. Cooper’s said to be the best.”

Alanna takes this in. It’s the sort of thing Coram would disapprove of heartily, and it might even give Myles pause – though, Myles has enough strange items of his own that maybe he’d have a more nuanced opinion. She tries to square the image of an amoral thief with the kind-eyed man who drove her home.

She shrugs.

“He was nice to me.”

Gary snorts. “Just because you’re a conman and a scoundrel doesn’t mean you’re willing to let a teenager freeze to death. Jesus Christ, Alan, it’s 15 degrees out! And now I’m going to freeze to death because you’re wearing my damn coat.”

“I was fine,” says Alanna again. She hesitates, and it’s a true hesitation this time. “But we can go inside if you want.”

She doesn’t want to yet. She wants to give Jon his space.

Gary seems to read this in her face because he sighs and wraps his arms around himself, tucking his hands into his armpits.

“I can probably last another couple minutes out here before I turn into a popsicle.”

“You’re pretty big,” says Alanna. “I think it would take a lot longer than a couple minutes.”

Gary laughs, and Alanna feels her shoulders loosen a bit. Jon being upset with her has become increasingly if depressingly commonplace, but Gary being mad would really mean she’d done something wrong.

“I wasn’t just being a nuisance,” she says. “I found something out: George thinks it’s a knife. He says Knight was at a knife show in Chicago recently.”

Gary looks surprised and then thoughtful.

“An item would make sense. Especially an item from out of town.” He gives her a dry look. “And that would explain why Cooper’s here; he’s probably known about it and been tracking it for a while. Did he say anything else about it?”

Alanna shakes her head.

“Not about the case, no. But… He was just sitting outside, observing. Wouldn’t it have made more sense for him to just go in and look for it?”

“Not if he’d seen you there for first. Or he may have just been doing basic recon, same as you. He was probably going to wait til tomorrow at the funeral to actually break in.”

“I could wait there and see! While you and Jon are at the funeral.”

Gary replies with a snort.

“Oh, no. Sorry, Alan. But you’re not getting out of going home. Not after that stunt. We called Myles as soon as Jon noticed you were missing.”

Alanna stares at him. “I wasn’t even gone for more than a couple hours! And I solved the case!”

Gary rolls his eyes, but he’s practical-minded enough not to lecture.

“Then next time don’t let Jon drink anything before bed. But we caught you this time, so you’re going home.”

And with that, he goes back inside. Reluctantly, Alanna follows him.

*

The next morning, Jon sits on the curb, waiting with her. He’s already in his suit for his funeral. It should make him look like an adult, but it doesn’t. It just makes him look young, ill-fitted for the job at head. There are dark circles under his eyes, and Alanna almost – almost – feels guilty for putting them there.

“You don’t have to treat me like I’m a girl,” she mutters, drawing her knees to her chest.

Jon sighs and runs his hand across his face. “You are a girl, Alanna.”

He says her name carefully. He likes to use it when it’s just the two of them, and Alanna doesn’t know how to feel about that. As far as almost everyone else in the world knows, Alanna Trebond perished in the same freak accident that claimed her father. Even Myles – who knows – calls her Alan.

“But I’m also useful,” she says. She’d heard Gary tell Jon that morning about what she’d found out, heard Jon’s low murmur of admiration.

Jon rubs his face again. “I don’t think you can’t do the job because you’re a girl, Alanna. I don’t want you to do it because you’re a kid. You shouldn’t be out here fighting ghosts. You’re going to get yourself killed.”

Alanna scowls at him. “You’ve been hunting since you were my age.”

“Yeah,” says Jon, his jaw tight. “Well, no one gave me much of a choice, did they?”

“No,” says Alanna, a little sadly. The Contes are practically hunting royalty, but, as far as she can tell, that mostly just means hell for them. She rubs her knee, and adds, quiet, “But I don’t think I’ve got much of a choice either.”

She can still feel the knife – if it is a knife – calling for her. She wonders when she’ll stop feeling it, if she’ll be in back with Myles in South Dakota and still feel it. She wonders if Tommy felt that pull, if that’s why he bought it.

She wonders if George feels it.

Jon doesn’t say anything in response. But he reaches over and rubs the back of her neck. His palm is heavy and warm, and she bows her head a little beneath the weight. He touches her hair lightly, and then withdraws his hand, looking troubled.

“You’re going to make a great hunter someday, Alanna,” says Jon. “I just want you to live long enough to make it there.”

*

Myles doesn’t say anything when he picks her up. His look of mild disapproval is enough. Alanna quails beneath it, and hunches in her seat, picking at loose threads in her flannel.

“I didn’t mean to worry you,” she says.

“No,” says Myles calmly. “And yet, you’ve somehow managed to go and do it anyway.”

“I’m sorry,” she says. She fidgets, still unsure how to explain the pull in her chest, and, even beyond that, how hard it is for her to just stay with Myles, when her brother is out there, when there’s so much good she could be doing.

She sees Myles smile faintly.

“You shouldn’t apologize,” he tells her. “I know you well enough to know this won’t be the last time you run off like this. If you get in the habit of apologizing, people might end up expecting you’ll feel bad enough to change someday.”

Alanna takes this in. It sits with her uneasily.

“So you’re saying I shouldn’t apologize when I make you worry?”

“Not if you don’t intend to stop doing things that make me worry.”

Alanna ducks her head, acknowledging the point.

“I don’t like making you worry, though. It doesn’t seem fair that you just have to live with it.”

“I’m told that’s rather what fatherhood is,” says Myles.

Alanna feels her heart leap and her face turn pink. She covers it by looking out the window, at the big, ice-covered lake sliding by them.

Myles, graciously, doesn’t press the point.

“Otis Redding died in that lake,” he says instead, choosing the safe, neutral territory of history and tragedy. “His plane crashed.”

She studies the lake. It’s calm and frozen, the ice opalescent. She can see the dark, squat shapes of ice fisherman moving on it. Like Tommy Knight’s house, it doesn’t look like the site of a violent death. Most places rarely do.

“Otis Redding?” she asks.

“A musician,” says Myles. “A good one. I think I – ”

His hand shuffles around, looking for his cd album. Alanna finds it for him and flips through it, until she finds a cd with Otis Redding’s name on it. She puts it in, and a voice comes on, plaintive and warm, singing to them from across the years.

*

They stop at a gas station in Minnesota to use the restroom and grab some snacks. Alanna’s in the restroom when a blinding headache splits through her like a beam of burning light.

She topples sideways with a cry of pain, feels her shoulder slam against the sink, but it’s a distant pain. It pales in comparison to how her head feels. She sobs and falls further, onto her hand and knees, and fights to keep her stomach from rebelling. Her whole body feel clammy and –

Gary is covered in blood.

She’s on her hands and knees in someone’s living room, and Gary is covered in blood. He’s lying on his back and his eyes are open.

She can’t see Jonathan, but she can hear him. He’s shouting. She hears the meaty sound of a blade hitting flesh and a scream. She tries to get up, but her stomach rebels, and she lurches forward, gagging. The carpet beneath her hands is rough, thick-textured, brown. She can see a coffee table, a couch, Gary covered in blood.

She closes her eyes.

The carpet turns back to cool tile beneath her hands.

She opens her eyes. She’s back in the restroom.

“Myles!” she screams. She scrambles to her feet and races out the door. She can feel tears and spit on her face. Her whole body is shaky. “Myles!”

Myles looks up from where he’s leaning against the car, a book already open in his hands. He drops the book when he sees her and reaches for the gun she knows he has hidden.

“Alan! What’s wrong?”

She sprints to the car. Her side flares with a stitch of pain.

“We have to go back!” she yells at him. She runs to the passenger door and yanks it open. “We have to go back to Madison! Jon and Gary are in trouble!”

Myles, to his credit, doesn't question her. He gets in the car and starts driving, back the way they came, faster than what's legal. Alanna digs through his glove compartment frantically, looking for the heavy black flip phone she knows he keeps there. She's clumsy with the buttons and it feels like an eternity before she finds the contact for Gary.

The call goes straight to voicemail.

She finds Jon's contact next.

That call goes to voicemail, too.

They're just at the funeral, she tells herself. Panic rides a wave of bile in her throat.

"They'll be okay, Alanna," Myles tells her steadily. "They're both experienced hunters."

"They're eighteen," she whispers. She clutches the phone in her hands and stares at it like it's s talisman, like it might be able to save her friends.

And then a desperate hope occurs to her.

Myles knows a lot of people, and he knows a lot of people who know people.

She scrolls back up to the Gs, and there he is.

George Cooper.

She calls him, and, on the second ring, he picks up.

"Myles Olau," says George, mild and pleasant. "This is unexpected."

"George – it's Alan," says Alanna, and she can't keep the hysteria out of her voice.

"Alan?"

“Yes – I. I’m with Myles. We’re not in Madison any more. But Jon and Gary are in trouble. I need you to – can you find them? I think they’re at Knight’s house. But don’t go in if they’re not!”

She hears a catch in George’s breath, the prelude to all the questions he’s about to ask.

“I need you to believe me,” she says, furious and near tears over her own helplessness. “We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

“All right,” says George. “This is fair strange. But I’ll do what you ask. Call me when you reach Madison.”

*

They make it back to Madison in great time. Evening hasn’t even begun to set in. She spots George leaning against his car as they pull onto the street by Knight’s house. He’s bundled up and has his thermos cupped between his hands. He squints at their car, and when he spots Alanna, raises one hand in greeting. His face lights up with relief. Alanna doesn’t even wait for Myles to park properly before she launches herself from the car.

“Are they all right?” she asks. “Did you find them?”

“They were at the funeral,” says George matter-of-factly. “Last I saw them, they’d cornered the poor man’s priest to ask him some questions.”

Alanna nods and lets out a long, shaky breath. She tries to remember what time of day it had seemed like in her vision, but she comes up blank. Knowing Jon and Gary though, they probably weren’t planning on coming by the house until after dark. They must have really believed George was giving them the case.

George looks at her, more concerned than curious.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

“Yes,” says Alanna. She rubs her shoulder, where it still aches from when she fell against the sink. She’ll have a bad bruise, she’s sure.

“Then can I ask what had you so scared? I don’t get the impression you’re one to frighten easy.”

Alanna bites her lip. She’s never sure how much to tell. But George – for all he’s a thief – has only done good by her so far. And she owes him at least a little explanation.

“I get… visions sometimes,” she admits. “Of things that could happen. I had one of Jon and Gary.”

George raises his eyebrows. “And I take it Jon and George weren’t looking too good in this vision.”

Alanna shakes her head and looks at the house.

Whatever’s inside it is still calling her. She takes half a step towards it and then stops herself. George puts a steadying hand on her shoulder.

“Easy,” he says. He reads something in the blank expression on her face and frowns. “You’re not having another one of these visions, are you?”

“No,” says Alanna. She closes her eyes, like maybe if she can’t see the house, whatever’s in it won’t pull at her so strongly. But it only gets worse, like the attraction between two magnets right before they snap together.

“But there’s something in that house that wants to meet me.”

George lets out a low whistle. “I knew you were spooky. I just didn’t think you were this spooky.”

“It does grow on you,” asserts Myles cheerfully, finally finished with his parking job and bundled up. He looks between the two of them. “I take it we’re not currently in a crisis situation, then?”

“I’ve no doubt it does,” says George. “And no, not currently.”

Myles claps Alanna gently on the back, and she leans into him. She can feel the adrenaline crash creeping up on her.

“Your guardian, I take it,” says George to her. He nods at Myles.

“It’s a difficult job, but I enjoy it,” acknowledges Myles. He offers his hand. “And you must be George Cooper, in the flesh. It’s good to finally meet you in person.”

George flashes a charming smile back. “You as well, Myles Olau. The things I’ve heard about your library. The things I’ve sold to your library. A man might dream of breaking into that.”

Myles laughs, a deep, surprised laugh, and Alanna finds herself unexpectedly flooded with relief that Myles seems to like George.

“A man might,” agrees Myles, eyes twinkling. “And he’d be welcome to try.”

“A challenge for another day,” says George, and the smile slides off his face as he looks at Alanna, and then the house. The sky is starting to pink at the edges.

“But we should decide what we’re doing about this one.”

“We wait for Jon and Gary, I assume,” says Myles.

“No,” says Alanna. She shoves her exhaustion down and straightens up. “We go inside. I don’t want them getting hurt.”

“And we won’t?” says George.

“No, I know what we’re looking for.”

“Which is?”

“I’ll know it when I see it.” She fixes him with a stern look. “And I think you will too, George Cooper.”

George doesn’t even bother to feign bashfulness. He just smiles softly.

“In my defense, I just thought the damn thing was magic. I didn’t think it was cursed.”

“Care to clue the rest of us in?” asks Myles.

“There’s a knife in there,” says Alanna. “I think. And there’s something… off about it. But I think I can fix it.”

She sees the look Myles and George exchange at that and is surprised by how much it hurts. People have been exchanging looks around her almost all her life. She should be used to it.

“We believe you,” says Myles softly. “But I still think it’s best if we wait for Jon and Gary.”

They’re spared the argument, as, that moment, Jon and Gary do pull up. Jon jumps out much as Alanna had – before Gary has time to park. He runs over.

“I see where you get it from,” mutters George.

“Myles,” says Jon sharply, looking between the three of them. “What’s going on?”

Myles gestures at Alanna.

“I think it’s best if Alan explains.”

She looks at Jon.

“I saw Gary die,” she says quietly, and she watches how his face shifts, horrified. “I had to come back. I couldn’t let you go in alone.”

*

George makes quick and impressive work of the alarm system, and quicker work of the backdoor. Jon makes a face of grudging respect, and Gary elbows him, grinning. Myles waits outside, as a just in case. It had been a hard, swift argument to let Alanna in, too, but Myles had ruled on her side, and that, at least, had been enough to shut Jon up.

The house is silent, no smell of death to it, just emptiness. Knight’s possessions are half packed, and Alanna wonders when his family will come back for the rest. When her father died, the house had gone with him. There’d been nothing to take from the ashes but herself.

She moves quickly to the cellar, where Knight died. She remembers from the newspaper clipping she read that no murder weapon had been found on the scene, but that doesn’t mean much when the knife is supernatural. George keeps close to her, while Jon and Gary keep investigating the living room. That makes her nervous. The living room is where she’d seen Gary’s body. But the pull is straight to the cellar, so she goes.

She steps inside, onto the cellar stairs. George is right beside her.

The door slams shut.

At once, Alanna wheels around and slams her fists against the door, shoving past George to do so.

“Jon!” she screams. “Gary!”

If they’re on the other side of a locked door, she can’t help them. She slams her fists again and then rattles the doorknob. The door won’t budge. She tries the lock. It’s jammed.

“Alan?!” she hears from the other side. Jon’s voice, frantic. “Alan – are you okay?”

“Alan,” says George behind her, his voice the kind of calm that means he’s not calm at all. “I think we should be more worried about ourselves right now.”

She turns.

Standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at them, is the ghost of Tommy Knight.

“What?” says Alanna, and then Knight lifts his hand. A blade flashes in it.

Now that she has a look at the blade, she can see that it’s more of a dagger than a knife. It’s straight and double-edged, and the hilt is studded with gems. A crystal pommel sits in the pommel. It feels old, even from a distance.

“We have to get it from him,” she says, and she grabs her bowie knife with one and holds her canister of salt with the other.

She advances down the steps. Dimly, she can still hear Gary and Jon pounding on the door. George makes a half-yelp behind her and tries to get in front of her, but the stairs are narrow and he can’t get past her without knocking her down.

When she gets close to the bottom, the ghost lunges at her. She catches his blade with her knife and a bolt of something passes through her, like an electric current. Her arms shake and go slack. She almost drops her knife. Knight then slashes, backhanded, but Alanna skips away, drawing him past the steps and giving George room to maneuver.

Knight is quick with the blade, and he has a ghost’s advantage of never being where Alanna expects him to. He flickers to her left, and then her right, and then behind her, the blade in his hand slashing all the while. There’s something odd about his movements, mechanical and jerky. He doesn’t see her when he looks at her.

It’s all she can do to block him, and he still manages to cut her – shallow cuts across her cheek and arm.
But she keeps moving, until finally she has him between her and George.

George fires his shotgun, and rocksalt bursts through Knight’s form. He shrieks in rage, and, for a moment, disappears.

But the dagger doesn’t drop. Wherever he’s gone, he’s taken it with him.

George looks at her with wide eyes.

“What do you plan on doing once you have the damn thing?” he asks. He switches his shotgun to his left hand and pulls out a knife of his own with his right. It’s an impressive looking artifact; the blade is silver.

“I’ll figure it out,” says Alanna.

Knight pops back into existence to her left. He stabs at her, a swift, underhanded blow. Alanna parries and steps back swiftly. George moves into the space she leaves, blocks Knight’s next blow with his shotgun. He slashes at Knight’s hand with his knife, trying to knock the dagger down. Knight is quicker though. He disappears, appears beside Alanna this time. He lunges and almost catches her in the shoulder. She brings her knife up just in time.

It’s cold in the cellar; Alanna can see her breath. But even so, she’s starting to sweat, and the sweat makes the cuts on her cheek and arm burn. They’re going to have to finish this soon, she thinks.

She darts forward, directly at Knight. George shouts. It’s a move that works well on humans sometimes; they don’t usually expect someone small as Alanna to try a direct attack and it knocks them off balance. She doesn’t know if it’ll work on a ghost.

It does. Knight raises the dagger, clearly unsure what she’s doing. She keeps barreling forward and brings her own knife up, then smashes the hilt against the dagger, putting all her momentum behind it.

The dagger goes flying. It hits the wall and clatters to the ground.

She jumps on it, dropping her own knife, and clutches it close to the chest. The crystal on the pommel pulses with a strange light.

Knight lets out a bellow of rage and lifts his arms. Alanna goes fetal position instinctively, hair rising on the back of her neck, careful to keep the dagger from poking into her. But there’s another shotgun blast from George. It buys her time.

She straightens up and quickly dumps a circle of salt around herself.

“Keep him off me,” she says to George.

“Oh, sure, easy,” snaps George.

She ignores him and lifts the dagger up, high above her head.

And then she slams it hilt down onto the concrete floor of the cellar, trying to crack the crystal. The impact rings through her arms, makes her bones feel suddenly hollow, weak.

In her periphery, she sees Knight flicker back into view. She ignores the ache in her arms and the sting of her wounds and smashes the crystal down again. Tiny fissures spiderweb through it.

George fires off another shot of rocksalt behind her and she hears the ghost scream in rage and pain. She brings the dagger down again, and there’s another ghostly wail and then –

“Alan!” yelps George. His body hits the wall in front of her, and he drops to the ground, stunned. It breaks the salt line.

She whirls around, on her knees. Knight’s ghost is behind her, blood pooling from his mouth, pouring from the wide, dark slash in his throat. His eyes are empty, milky-white, not the soft brown from the pictures. He reaches for her, and Alanna screams, feels a stabbing pain in her throat and chest. There’s blood in her mouth and in her throat, and it chokes her scream.

She gags, bending over, and scrabbles for the salt canister. She brings it up in a wide arc. Salt flashes through the ghost. He shrieks and shimmers and for a second, and Alanna’s able to get her breath back. She spits out blood and tightens her grip on the dagger. It burns in her hand and she swears and nearly drops it. But she holds on, even as pain lances through her fingers. The ghost resettles in front of her, and Alanna drops the salt canister, raises the dagger high above her head with both hands. She’s choking on blood again, and her body jerks and gags of its own accord. Her vision swims with bright lights.

Her ears and neck both burst with a sudden flash of pain, and the ghost shudders again and disintegrates in front of her. George fired, she realizes. He’s up.

She slams the dagger down. This time, the crystal shatters. Knight’s form flickers, once, back into view and then, in a screaming swirl, explodes.

Her vision goes double. She’s still in Knight’s cellar.

But so is her brother.

“Thom!” she shouts.

Her brother looks up. He’s pale and haggard. His eyes are bright and liquid, feverish. In his hands, he holds the dagger.

“Alanna?” he says, eyebrows drawn together, squinting, like he can’t quite make her out.

“What’s that, Thom?” says a voice. Alanna looks up. A dark-haired man stands behind Thom, his hand on Thom’s shoulder. He looks familiar, but his features are obscured. A cobwebby light halo’s his face and blurs it. She knows who he is, she thinks with certainty, she just can’t remember.

Behind them, lies Tommy Knight’s body. Blood pools beneath it.

“Thom,” says Alanna again, quieter, but more urgent. She struggles to get to her feet, but she’s pinned down, struggling beneath an unseen weight. It’s like her worst dreams, when she wakes up and knows something terrible is about to happen, but she can’t move to stop it. Myles calls it sleep paralysis, but Alanna doesn’t know.

“My si – ” starts Thom, but then he blinks and looks confused, like he can’t even see her any more. “Nothing.”

He shakes his head, clearing it. He looks down at the dagger.

“Are you sure this will work?” he asks skeptically.

The man squeezes Thom’s shoulder.

“Of course,” he says. “Don’t you trust me, Thom?”

Thom nods, but his expression is uncertain. He looks dazed. He doesn’t look like the brother she remembers – vinegary and brilliant.

“What’s happened to you?” she asks. “What’s going on?”

But he doesn’t hear her. He raises his hand. Alanna watches in horror as Knight’s body convulses with a wet, meaty sound.

From it, rises Knight’s ghost.

The crystal flashes in the pommel, and Knight’s ghost is sucked in.

Alanna blacks out.

When she comes to, George is shaking her shoulder gently, and her cheek is pressed to the floor.

“Lad, lad. Come on now. You’re all right.”

“Thom,” she whispers.

“It’s George, actually,” he says, helping her into a sitting position.

She shakes her head.

“No, that’s… Someone else. Thom is someone else.”

“Ah," says George. He straightens up and leans against the wall, passes a hand over his face and studies her.

"You look terrible," he says.

“So do you.”

He laughs. “Fair enough,” and then his expression grows serious. “I’m sorry about hitting you.”

She touches the back of her neck. The skin there is torn and she can feel blood. It’s a sharp, stinging pain. She shrugs. It seems like she just got the edge of the blast.

“You mostly hit the ghost. It was my fault I was in the way.”

"Glad to see you're being reasonable about it."

He smiles at her and slides slowly down the wall, collapsing into a boneless pile on the floor.

The door to the cellar bursts open then, and Jon and Gary come running down the stairs.

Jon bolts to her.

"Are you all right?" he asks. He kneels beside her and touches her face.

“Yes,” says Alanna, dazed.

"Jesus," he hisses. He pats her down quickly. His hands are warm and light and comforting. "You're hurt."

"Not that badly," she says. "I'm just bleeding a little."

She looks down. There’s blood all down her front.

“I don’t think that’s mine,” she adds.

"God," says Jon, and he crushes her in a hug. It hurts her shoulder, but he smells nice and she finds herself pressing in to him a bit.

"Don't mind me," says George. "I didn't help at all."

Alanna peeks over Jon's shoulder and laughs. George is still crumpled on the floor.

“Are you just going to stay down there?” she asks.

“Yes, I think so. It’s much more comfortable down here. Safer, too.”

Gary squats down by him and grins. “I think it’s all safe now, Cooper.”

George passes his hand over his face again and takes a deep breath. “Glad to hear it. Now help me up.”

Gary helps George to his feet, and Jon does the same for Alanna, though it's a little too much like Jon picking her up for her comfort. She half-thinks he'd carry her if he thought he could get away with it.

“What happened?” asks Jon, once he seems sure Alanna’s not about to bleed out and swoon in his arms. As if she’d ever allow such an indignity.

George picks the dagger up off the ground and hands it to Jon. Jon nods, and a flicker of respect crosses his face.

“It was Knight’s ghost who attacked us,” he says. “And it stopped when Alan broke the crystal here.”

Gary frowns. “Then who killed Knight? Is there another ghost?”

“No,” says Alanna.

They all look at her, and she flushes. She can’t tell them about Thom.

“I – when I passed out – ”

“You passed out?”

“Only for a minute, Jon! When I passed out, I saw who killed him. Or. Sort of. I saw a man, but I couldn’t tell what he looked like. I think he did something to the dagger, to make it cursed. Or possessed or whatever.”

“Then how’d he lock the doors from the inside?” asks Jon.

George shrugs. “There are men with the power to do that. Not many, but some, and I’d wager anyone strong enough to make a haunted item could also lock or unlock any door he pleases. It’s a powerful artifact on its own already though. I don’t know why someone’d go through the trouble of cursing it and not just take it for themselves.”

There’s a pause as they all consider the why of it.

“Because they wanted a hunter to come looking for it,” says Jon slowly. “Because this was a trap.”

“But who would do that?” says Gary.

Thom wouldn’t, Alanna tells herself, and she says nothing. It’s the fault of the man he’s with.

If only she’d been able to tell who he was.

*

She says good-bye to George by his car. Jon glances over once, but seems content to leave them alone. She's grateful. There's something she wants to ask George.

Before she can, though, George pulls something from his pocket and hands it to her.

It's the dagger. She stares at it.

"How - ?"

George gives her a grin and a wink, and her stomach swoops.

"Nicked it off Jon, didn't I? But it should belong to you. You earned it."

"I'm not sure I should have it," she says. She thinks, uneasily, of her vision of Thom.

“Nonsense,” says George. “It called to you, and you won it. Show it to Myles there once you’ve gotten some distance from Prince Charming. He’ll be able to tell you a thing or two about it.”

She curls her hand around the dagger uncertainly. The crystal is cracked and dark, but the rest of the gems gleam in the orange light of the streetlamps. Holding it now, without a ghost trying to kill her, she can tell that it’s surprisingly light. It feels oddly right in her hand, and a friendly warmth seems to emanate from it.

It trusts her, she realizes.

“Thanks,” she says to George. Then she throws her arms around him and hugs him tightly.

“For everything,” she adds, whispering into his chest.

George lets out a surprised laugh. He pats her back carefully.

“There’s no need to get teary-eyed,” he says.

“No,” she says choked up. She pulls away reluctantly and discreetly pockets the dagger. “But I am thankful for the help.”

“Don’t mention it, truly. But,” George hesitates. Alanna looks at him curiously. George doesn’t strike her as the type of person to beat around the bush.

“Since I’ve been kind enough to help you,” he says finally, “will you answer a question for me?”

“Sure.”

“What’s your real name?””

“Oh.” She bows her head. It’s a moment before she can bring herself to answer. “Alanna.”

“Ah. Pleasure to meet you, Alanna,” says George. "Can I also ask why?"

She laughs, though it’s not a happy one, and then shrugs and looks back up at him.

“It’s safer if everyone thinks Alanna is dead.”

The look George gives her is unreadable, but at least it’s not a look of pity. She meets his gaze steadily.

“Good luck to you, then, Alan,” he says. He holds out his hand and she takes it. They shake. His hand is warm and large and callused in a way that means he’s just as familiar at holding a gun or knife as Gary or John.

“I hope we meet again someday,” he tells her solemnly.

She grins up at him and replies, honest, “Me too.”

But then she goes quiet, serious. George raises his eyebrows at her.

“I want to ask you something, too, actually. If you see someone who looks like – who looks just like me – can you get word to me?”

“Just like you?” says George.

“My twin,” says Alanna grimly. “Thom.”

His eyes light with recognition at the name. He nods and claps her on the shoulder.

“I will, lass. I promise.”

*

She settles in the back of Myles’ car and pulls a blanket over herself. She’s exhausted, her head nodding on her neck, and her eyes barely able to stay open. It’s well dark outside and the temperature is dropping fast, but she rolls a window down a crack, to try to catch what Myles and Jon and Gary are discussing. They stand in a somber clump, talking in low voices.

“No idea who’d be strong enough to do that,” she catches Gary saying.

Through her slitted eyes, she makes out Jon nodding his head in agreement.

“Alan says he couldn’t tell who it was… But maybe if I ask Roger, he’ll have some ideas.”

No, thinks Alanna, not Roger. But as soon as she tries to catch that thought and focus on it, it’s gone. She tunes back into the conversation, a muffled confusion cast over her thoughts that doesn’t feel like it has to do with how tired she is.

“I’ve been getting reports from all over,” says Myles, “that hunts are going worse than they should be. We lost Nond the other day.”

There’s a long pause as all three seem to reflect on Nond’s death. Alanna can feel sleep tugging at her. Much heavier than it had even a moment before. A shuttling darkness sweeps across her vision. She blinks, and loses the thread again, only comes back in time to hear Myles speak once more.

“Alan saw what was going to happen.”

“But he’s not connected to any of this,” says Gary.

“He’s connected to the two of you,” says Myles, but he doesn’t sound convinced by his own logic.

A shudder passes over her. She’s going to have to tell Myles eventually. She touches the hilt of the dagger, safely tucked between her flannel and undershirt. It’s warm.

Thom, she thinks, willing her words to reach him, where are you?

And who are you with?