A Mate Worse Than Death (25 page)

“What is she Seeing?” Cal asked. “What’s so bad that it causes” he paused, working to find some unaccustomed tact and finally finished rather lamely “that kind of reaction? All screamy and stuff?” Ogres just weren’t prone to fits of tact and didn’t
do it well.

“She seems to see herself, but the self she sees isn’t exactly her, and this other Tony is apparently being tortured. I think. That’s the closest I can come to understanding what she describes when she’s in the throes of an episode. She can’t remember what she Sees, so in that sense it is typical of all Seers’ experiences. She is only a conduit.”

Amanda, listening to Phil describe Tony’s Vision, got whiter and whiter, but as he finished the last sentence, she murmured, “Tortured!” and fainted. Cal managed a lucky grab before she hit the floor face first and hauled her over to a couch sitting in the hallway. Just as they got her over to the couch, the doctor gestured to Tony’s room, “It’s worn off! Go, Mr. Akkadian, go!” Phil ran back to Tony’s room to try to magically dispel the crippling pain coming from whatever she was Seeing, and the doctor dealt with Amanda’s faint.

Phil’s attempts to relax Tony physically took much longer to work, and when they did, this time Tony passed out completely. Phil looked down at her still form and shook his head.
“This isn’t right,” he muttered. “I’ve never seen this happen before.” He grabbed a tissue and carefully wiped some of the sweat from Tony’s face.

Outside in the corridor, the doctor brought Amanda out of her faint, then started asking her medical questions. She abruptly stopped him, holding out a hand and putting the other to her mouth as if she would hold back her own words if she could.

“This doesn’t have a thing to do with my health,” she finally told them in a choked whisper. “I need to tell you something, Anthony. And I don’t know if I can.” She sat up a bit straighter.

Anthony squatted down on the floor beside her, all dignity forgotten. “Amanda, there is nothing you could tell me that should upset you so much you faint. If it will help Tony?”

She turned and looked at him, “I don’t know if it will help her, but it may explain this. I need to tell Mr. Akkadian, in case it might help him do something for her. And, the children should be here as well.”

Anthony frowned in concerned. “My dear, surely ther
e is nothing so grave that you need--”

She stopped him and turned to Cal. “Please, Calvin, get Melly and Fred over here, can you?”

“Sure Mrs. N, I’m on it!”

Anthony sat for a moment, looking at the woman he’d been married to for thirty years, a confused look sitting uncomfortably on his strong features. Anthony Newman was rarely confused, but at this moment, he was at a loss. Finally, realizing that his knees just weren’t young enough to squat for much longer, he stood up and then sat beside his wife, taking her hand and patting it. She kept her face turned resolutely forward, as if she couldn’t bear to look him in the eye. The doctor moved on to other patients.

Calvin worked his contacts and soon had Melly and Fred picked up and brought to the ICU to join the rest of the family. Tony had not recovered consciousness since Phil’s last spell, but the doctor pronounced her vital signs steady and gave them hope that she might wake naturally. Amanda insisted on gathering in her room, though the doctor wasn’t happy to have so many people in one of the critical care units.

Phil had moved into the shadows to one side of Tony’s bed, and the rest of the family had crowded around her.

Melly and Fred hadn’t seen Tony’s seizures, so they were less affected by the sight of her in the ICU. However, within minutes of their arrival, the heavy atmosphere of the rest of the group settled over them.

“So,” Melly drew the word out. “Why did Calvin come and get us?”

“Tony’s not dying or anything, is she?” Fred asked carefully, making sure his voice didn’t crack.

Anthony turned to his wife. “Your mother has something she needs to tell you.” He stopped and gestured to her to continue.

She looked at Phil. “Mr. Akkadian, can you first tell my children why their sister is here?”

“I can shed some light on it,” he agreed, giving her a pointed look as he added, “However, I believe you will be the one who tells us all why she is here.”

Amanda nodded, flinching under Anthony’s sudden stare.

Phil looked at Melly and Fred. “When Tony and I went to Fairie, she had a premonition just as we got to the portal’s door. It was not particularly strong or specific, and I could not talk her out of going.”

“Of course not!” Melly exclaimed. “She’s always wanted to travel to Fairie. Why would you even try?”

Phil smiled at her and explained, “For someone with magic, someone who is not aware of it and does not control it, entering Fairie can be dangerous. The exposure to high amounts of naturally occurring magic can trigger unexpected reactions.” He frowned and added, “In hindsight, it is possible that had she never gone to Fairie at all, she might have only experienced the occasional premonition.” Then he shrugged. “I did not want her to risk it, but she insisted. You know your daughter.” He looked at her parents as if he needed their approval. “I watched her closely, and I saw no negative effects when we first got there. Even when we questioned the first person on our list, Tony seemed completely normal. However, when we went to the second person on the list, Tony had a Vision that time, a powerful one. She fainted.”

“You should have returned her then,” Anthony said angrily.

“Perhaps she would listen to her father, but to me? No. All I got was the detective, determined to finish the case. She woke from the faint, and Naama, the Being we questioned, did not indicate that it would be a problem. Naama is a Seer, a very powerful one, and a good friend. So I assumed that it was not a problem.” He sighed. “We finished our task of three interviews and returned.”

“How could she have the Sight?” Fred asked Melly. “Don’t you have to have magic in the family?”

Amanda mo
aned a little under her breath.

Everyone turned to look at her.

Phil gestured to her with both hands, the magician showing his trick. “I believe that it is your turn, dear madam, “ he told her, his voice filled with pity. Then he looked down at Tony instead of staring at her mother as she talked, to spare her at least one set of eyes boring into her while she told her tale. It was then that he realized that Tony, whose eyes were still shut, was no longer in an unconscious state. He hesitated long enough to decide that it might be easier for Mrs. Newman if he didn’t call the whole group’s attention to the silent eavesdropper in the center both of the room and of the story being told.

“My great, great grandmother.” Amanda put her hands up to her face, then brought them down. “She tricked my great, great grandfather into marrying her. He was a Natural. She was a witch.”

Cal managed not to twitch, but it was a close thing. With so little room to move, a twitchy ogre would be a bad thing.

“But mom, witches don’t marry. They, well, they reproduce,” Melly said, quoting her textbook.

“Euphemia was the attractive sister in her coven. They aren’t supposed to marry, just mate, and they aren’t supposed to marry Nattys because it dilutes the magic in children and breaks the chain. But Euphemia had a mind of her own and wanted to live here in the Mundane lands. She didn’t produce six or seven daughters and a son or two. She married a mortal, settled down, and had three children. And with each generation down to my own children, the line diluted.”

Anthony shook his head, still confused, “So Tony has some magic in her and the portal gates trigger it?”

“That is part of it, yes,” Phil said. “I told her after the first premonition that she probably had Fairie blood in her, but she laughed it off, said no one on either side of her proper family would ever marry magic.” As casually as possible, he took Tony’s hand in his and squeezed it. When she gripped his hand, he shifted to cover her movement from anyone else around them.

“According to my Grandmere’s diary, her
own grandfather never knew that his wife was a witch. He was not a particularly curious man, and she was a very beautiful, very skillful woman,” Amanda told them.

Melly pounced on specific detail. “You have your grandmother’s diary and you haven’t shown it to us?”

“Child, I had a good reason for keeping that diary to myself,” Amanda told her gravely.

Phil nodded, “And that reason is why Tony is experiencing such disorienting Visions?”

Amanda’s shoulders slumped and she nodded.

“Best to get it out, my dear,” he told her kindly, feeling all three thousand of his years in that advice.

“Grandmere wrote at length about how her grandmother managed to escape her coven sisters and leave Fairie for Mundania. She made an arrangement with the community’s elder, Caridwen, to allow her to pass through a portal and escape her witch’s fate, to bear fatherless children and carry on a line of sisters. But the price was high.” Amanda’s voice cracked, and they all waited for her to regain her composure. “Twins run in our family, but for several generations, the only twins were boys.” Tears started to roll down Amanda’s face as she continued.

Phil nodded, as if, at this point, the end of the tale had already unfolded, but the rest of the group stood, breathless in anticipation of the blow they all felt coming.

“Grandmere Genevieve said that her grandmother agreed to trade the second-born daughter of the first set of girl twins in the family for her freedom from the witch’s fate. And Caridwen accepted her offer. Grandmere found out about the curse when she was pregnant with twins, my uncles Louis and Luc. Her mother found out after she had born all of her children and had had no twins.”

Anthony must have sensed the blow coming for him. He began to blink uncontrollably.

“My mother told me when I married, but I thought nothing of it, until I was pregnant with Antonia...and her sister.”

The room went still.

CHAPTER THIRTY

The stillness lasted only a second.

“How?” Anthony asked, barely voicing the word at first, then louder, “HOW? I was in the delivery room with you! I helped you! I was your Lamaze coach, for God’s sake! How could I have a daughter whom I didn’t know existed?”

Cal knew that Mr. Newman was too much of gentleman to hurt Mrs. Newman, but since he was standing in for his partner, he got closer to the both of them, ready to grab him if things got a little too physical.

Phil looked at Amanda, who was obviously at the end of her ability to talk. “I believe I can answer that, sir.”

Anthony would never hurt his wife, but he had noticed this man’s interest in his daughter, and now that it was abundantly clear that Akkadian had misrepresented himself as a Natural, he was fair game. “Why? Did you have something to do with this?” he hissed.

Phil’s face
hardened with three thousand years of hauteur. “Not this particular deal, no.”

“But you’ve sepa
rated families before, haven’t you, you bastard. I looked into your past, you know. Akkadian isn’t a particularly common last name. It wasn’t hard to find out who you really are, you cradle-robbing freak!”

“Dad!” Fred squeaked, appalled to see his father
lose his temper so uncharacteristically and completely.

Anthony ignored everything but Phil, who was stroking his beard again, a smile on his face that Tony would have itched to smack right off it if she had had her eyes open. “I make whatever deal is suggested to me by the interested party. I rarely set the terms of the deal. I simply collect the price of it.”

Melly turned and looked at him, “You are so not helping here. And by the way, I looked you up, too. I know who you are.”

Phil gave her a bow and salaam by way of answer, all the while still holding Tony’s right hand in his left.

“You facetious wretch!” Anthony made a move to jump Phil, and Cal intervened. Ogre intervention is a sight to behold--except for Anthony, everyone else just stepped back to watch, and Phil made sure that Tony, who was peeking, stayed quiet beside him in her hospital bed.

“Okay,” Cal said after he had Anthony completely immobilized. “I want you to stop and think about this, okay? What would Tony do? What would Tony want you to do? Would she want you to attack someone right after you got some bad news? No, she would not. Am I right?”

Anthony had struggled for a few seconds, but he was too smart to keep up a pointless exercise in futility. He calmed down and listened.

“You are right, my friend. You are right.”
Then Cal kind of ruined it. “I mean, they aren’t even officially dating yet! Of course, the office pool now has 10 to 1
odds on that lasting more than another two days. Y’know, this guy could be your son-in-law.” When Anthony burst into movement, Cal realized that he should have stopped while he was ahead. Instead, he tightened his hold on Anthony until Phil interrupted him.

“Calvin, do not think that I am unappreciative of your efforts on my behalf. Hearing that most of Tony’s friends and associates are betting on me to...” he looked at the rest of Tony’s family and changed his wording, “to manage a date soon is encouraging” adding, when he saw Fred’s nostrils flare, “date, I say, because I highly respect and admire Tony Newman.”
He looked at Cal and spoke faster, “However, Cal, I think you may be cutting off Mr. Newman’s blood supply.”

“Uh oh,” Cal muttered and loosened his grip. Then he tried to look around his massive arms at Anthony. “How you doin’ there, pal?”

“Terrific,” Anthony squeaked out.

“Gonna stay on this side of the bed, hear the rest of the story?”

All of the fire went out of Anthony as he realized he had much more to worry about than whom his daughter dated. “I will stay by you, Calvin.” Cal loosened his hold.

“All right then,” he looked at Phil. “I think Mrs. N. needs an assist here.”

Phil looked at her with concern and pity. “I assume that when the two babies were born, Caridwen appeared in the hospital room?”

Amanda nodded and continued her tale, “She seemed to stop time after Antonia was born. Only she and I existed, and the second child. She looked like some nightmare version of Snow White--skin as white as snow, hair as black as ebony, ruby lips.” She shuddered, “But her eyes. Her eyes sat like black stones in her face. She bespelled the entire room except me and made sure that I knew that she had come for my great, great grandmother’s tithe to her. She left our first-born, Antonia, but she took her sister, whom I had planned to name Adele.” Amanda turned to Phil. “They are identical twins. I think that is who Antonia sees in her Visions.”

Phil nodded. “I think you’re right.”

Anthony tapped on Calvin’s arm from underneath after carefully pulling one of his hands free. “Cal, my friend. I believe my wife needs me. You can let me go now.”

Cal dropped Anthony to the floor and watched in relief as he saw his partner’s parents embrace.

While everyone was distracted by watching the Newmans, Phil leaned down to Tony and whispered, “I believe you are going to have to open your eyes now and face your parents.”

She gripped his hand harder.

“Like a Magic-Aide, rip it off and look,
a voila
, no scab, yes?” he suggested.

She sighed, and opened her eyes. It was a few moments before anyone noticed since Melly and Fred were asking their mother questions, and Cal and Anthony were trying to calm them down. Under normal circumstance, Amanda tended to be the calm parent and Anthony the excitable parent. They were in full role reversal, and it created an unaccustomed tension for the family. Tony’s condition came to their attention when the doctor came back to the room to check on her.

“Oh good,” he said, walking through the tense family discussion as if he didn’t even see it. He went to the left side of the bed and addressed Phil. “I’m glad to see she’s come out of the faint she was in. I don’t think we would call it a coma, but it is better that she woke naturally.” He took her left hand and started timing her pulse.

At that point, the rest of the room went silent. Then Anthony and Amanda came over to the bed, their arms around one another.

“Antonia, are you all right?” her mother asked tremulously.

“Hi little Mama,” Tony said. “I think so. My muscles are really sore, like I just ran the hardest obstacle course at the police academy about twenty times in a row. But other than that, I’m okay.”

The three looked at each other for a minute. Then Melly broke the silence.

“Well? Are you going to tell her, or what?”

Tony sighed and told them, “I know.”


Amanda looked confused, but Anthony looked at Phil’s hand twined around hers and said, “You woke at the beginning of this, didn’t you?”

“Yeah,” she paused and swallowed. “I guess I figured it’d be easier for Mama if she wasn’t telling me, so I kept quiet.”

The doctor interrupted, “Well, you need to keep quiet now so I can examine you.” He turned to the rest of the Beings in the room, “and you all need to step out while I do that.” When no one moved, he added, “Now. That wasn’t a request. Move it.”

The family shuffled out with Cal behind them.

As they left, Tony suddenly barked out, “Shit!”

The doctor and Phil turned toward her in concern. 


“What is it? Another Vision?” Phil asked her anxiously.

“No, no. Did we find Serena? Was she caught?”

“Calm yourself, detective. We caught her. You were out when it happened.”

Tony looked up at Phil, “Seriously? How?”

“That story can wait,” the doctor told her and then turned to Phil. “You can stay, just in case.”

“In case of what?” Tony asked, wincing when she moved her arm.

“In case I need him to bring you out of another of the
seizures you’ve been having,” the doctor told her, earning a frown from Phil.

Phil attempted to reassure her, “The seizures are probably done with. We are far away from any portal. And now that we know the cause, I can work with the hospital’s magical practitioner to shield you from the effects of your Visions.”

“If you shield me, then I won’t be able to See what is happening to my...my sister.”

“My dear, whatever is happening to her right now is about to kill you, and I don’t think that your mother will survive losing you as well as little Adele.”

Tony looked up at him, stricken. “I have to know, Phil. I have to know what’s happening to her.”

The doctor interrupted them. “Mr. Akkadian is correct, Detective. If you continue to have the Visions that induce these seizures, I believe that you will go into cardiac arrest.”

“I’m twenty-eight years old, so how in the hell could I die from cardiac arrest?”

The doctor shook his head. “I could show you the action images of you having a seizure, and then I think you’ll see why. It’s almost like you’re being hit with a defibrillator, but worse. Great if you were having cardiac dysrhythmia, but not so much when you aren’t.”

Phil frowned at the doctor again. “Doctor Miller, I believe that your bedside manner leaves much to be desired. Please finish and send in the magical practitioner, Ms. Beaumont so that I can work with her.” And Phil turned his back on the man, three thousand years of living near the top of the Supernatural food chain apparent in his dismissal of the Natty doctor. Doctor Miller, having survived Natty medical training filled with egos to rival even Mephistopheles’s, rolled his eyes, winked at Tony, and left.

“One minute I’m in your office fighting off wolves, and the next I feel like Alice down the rabbit hole.”

“She was such an annoying child. What a relief when she made it back to her own nursery.”

Tony shook her head. “I have got to hear that one.”

“It will cost you at least one date.”

T
ony stared at him. “We’ll end up proving the office pool was right, which I kind of hate, but I really do want to hear that story.”

He stroked the hand he ha
d yet to drop from his own. “I hope that date will lead to getting more from me than stories.” He waggled his brows at her.

She snorted. “Keep it slow, buddy. As you just found out, I apparently come with more baggage than Edgar Allen Poe.”
She put up her other hand, palm out. “Don’t you dare tell me he was a client as well!”

“If he had just returned to Fairie where he belonged!”

Tony rolled her eyes, but then got a bit serious. “Look, I know you think blocking me from Adele’s projection is a good idea, but I need to find out...” she paused, not sure of her next word, “well...everything about her.”

“I will help you. I sat through the three episodes, from the office to the hospital. I also recorded the images.” Phil grimaced. “Now I’ll sound like that incompetent doctor of yours. It will be very disturbing for you to watch those images, but I think it will convince you to allow me to shield you. It may help you remember what you Saw.”

She gripped his hand again. “Let’s do it.”

At that moment, Cal and the Newmans came back in, having seen the doctor leave.

“Do it? Do what?” Cal held out a meaty hand. “Never mind, never mind. I do not want to know anything specific.”

Tony grinned and told Melly, “Give that ogre a smack for me, would ya? Cal, get your mind out of the gutter. I was talking about work!”

Melly shook her head, “Any ogre smacking that happens in this room comes from you, sis.” Then she looked stricken at having used the “s” word.

Tony got the problem immediately. “Hey,” Tony told her, “none of that now. We are sisters. We have another sister. I hope we can find her and help her, but there is no way you need to tiptoe around me.” Then she looked at her mother.
“You either. I can’t believe that you have had to walk around with that secret all these years and felt couldn’t tell us. You must have felt like Jacob Marley’s ghost, hauling around a pile of chains.”

Amanda smile
d a bit at her daughter’s whimsy, but the smile died as quickly as it lived and she teared up, “There were times that I wished that creature had erased my memory, too. I did tell your Aunt Elise and Uncle Francis so they didn’t have to tell your cousins about the...situation. My mother warned all of us on our wedding days,” and then she burst into tears.

“Mama,” Tony finally let go of Phil’s hand and held hers out to her mother. “Come here, Mama.”

Cal and Phil looked at each other and nodded.

“Okay! So who wants some ice cream?” Cal asked Melly and Fred.

Melly rolled her eyes. “Uh, Cal? I’m twenty-one years old.”

“You’re never too old for ice cream, kiddo, right?” Cal told her, gesturing at the bed.

“Oh,” Melly shrugged. “You’re so right. C’mon, Fred. Let’s go get some ice cream,” and she tugged his arm.

Anthony looked away from his wife and oldest daughter to the rest of the group. “I think I should take them for ice cream, Cal. Aren’t you expecting Lieutenant Azeem soon?”

“Yeah, yeah, he’s on his way.” Cal nodded. “I’ll stay here.”

Anthony reached over to shake his hand. “It has been an interesting week, my friend. I am glad to have had your help.”