Midnight Alley

Amelie had made sure she was safe, all right. Shed done it by locking Myrnin up.

Claire dropped her backpack at the bottom of the stairs -- she always put it where it was easy to grab in mid-run -- and spotted a new addition to the lab: a cage. And Myrnin was inside of it.

"Oh my God -- " She took a few steps toward him, navigating around the usual haphazard stacks of books, and bit her lip. It was, as far as she could tell, the same cage that the vampires had used to lock up Shane in Founder's Square - heavy black bars, and the whole thing was on wheels. Vampire-proof, hopefully. Whoever had locked Myrnin in had been nice enough to give him a whole pile of books, and a comfy (if threadbare) tangle of blankets and faded pillows. He was lounging in the corner on the cushions, with a pair of old-fashioned Benjamin Franklin-style glasses perched on the end of his hooked nose. He was reading.

"You're late," he said, as he turned a page. Claire's mouth opened and closed, but she couldn't think of a thing to say. "Oh, don't fret about the cage. It's for your precaution, of course. Since Samuel isn't here to watch over you." He turned another page, but his eyes weren't moving to follow text. He was pretending to read, and somehow, that was worse than heartbreaking. "Amelie's idea. I can't say that I really approve."

She finally was able to say, "I'm sorry."

Myrnin shrugged and closed the book, which he dropped with a bang on the pile next to him. "I've been in cages before this," he said. "And no doubt I will be let out once your appointed guardian is here to chaperone. In the meantime, let's continue with our instruction. Pull a chair close. You'll excuse me if I don't get up, but I'm a bit taller than -- " He reached up and rapped the bars overhead. "Amelie tells me you have enrolled in advanced placement classes."

Claire gratefully took that as an opportunity not to think about how disturbing this was, seeing him locked up like an animal in a cage, because of her. She read off her class schedule, and answered his questions, which were sharply worded and a strange mix of expert knowledge and complete ignorance. He understood philosophy and biochem; he didn't know anything at all about Quantum Mechanics, until she explained the basics, and then he nodded.

"Myth and Legend?" he echoed, baffled, when she read off the class title. "Why would Amelie feel it necessary ... ah, no matter. I'm sure she has reason. Your essay?" He held out his hand. Claire dug the stapled computer printout from her bag and handed it over. Six pages, single spaced. The best she could do on the history of a subject she was only just now starting to understand. "I'll read it later. And the books I gave you?"

Claire went to her backpack and pulled them out, then came back to her chair. "I read through Aureus and The Golden Chain of Homer."

"Did you understand them?"

"Not -- really."

"That's because Alchemy is a very secretive field of study. Rather like being a Mason -- are there still Masons?" When she nodded, Myrnin looked oddly relieved. "Well, that's good. The consequences would be quite terrible, you know, if there weren't. --As to alchemy, I can teach you how to translate the codes that were spoken and written, but I'm more concerned that you learn the mechanics than the philosophy. You do understand the methods outlined in the texts for constructing a calcining furnace, yes?"

"I think so. But why can't we just order what we need? Or buy it?"

Myrnin flicked the silver ring on his right hand into the bars of his cell, setting up a metallic ringing. "None of that. Modern children are fools, slaves to the work of others, dependent for everything. Not you. You will learn how to build your tools as well as use them."

"You want me to be an engineer?"

"Is it not a useful thing for one who studies physics to understand such practical applications?"

She stared at him doubtfully. "You're not going to make me get an anvil and make my own screwdrivers or anything, are you?"

Myrnin smiled slowly. "What a good idea! I'll consider it. Now. I have an experiment I'd like to try. Are you ready?"

Probably not. "Yes sir."

"Move that bookcase -- " He pointed to a leaning monstrosity of shelves that looked ready to collapse. It was groaning with volumes, of course. "Push it out of the way."

Claire wasn't at all sure the thing would hold together to be pushed, but she did as he said. It was better built than it looked, and to her surprise, when she'd pushed it aside, she found a small arched doorway. It was secured with a big heart-shaped iron lock.

"Open it," he said, and picked up the book he'd dropped upon her entrance, leafing randomly through the pages.

"Where's the key?"

"No idea." He flipped faster, frowning at the words. "Look around."

Claire looked around the lab in complete frustration. "In here?" Where was she supposed to start? It was all piles and stacks and half-open drawers, nothing in any order at all that she'd been able to determine so far. "Can you give me a hint, at least?"

"If I remembered, I would." Myrnin's voice was dry, but just a little sad too. She shot him a glance out of the corner of her eye. He folded the book closed again and stared out of the cage -- not at her, not at anything, really. There was a careful blankness in his face. "Claire?"

"Yeah?" She pulled open the first drawer near the door. It was full of bottles of what looked like dust, none of them labeled. A spider scuttled frantically out of sight into the darker recesses, and she made a face and slammed it shut.

"Can you tell me why I'm in this cage?" He sounded odd now, strangely calm with something underneath. Claire pulled in a deep breath and kept looking in the drawers. She didn't look directly at him. "I don't like cages. Bad things have happened to me in cages."

"Amelie says you have to stay in there for a while," she said. "Remember? It's to help us."

"I don't remember." His voice was warm and soft and regretful. "I'd like to get out of here. Could you open it, please?"

"No," she said. "I don't have the -- "

--keys, except that she did. There was a ring of them sitting right there in front of her, half-hidden by a leaning tower of loose yellowing pages. Three keys. One was a great big iron skeleton key, and she was instantly almost sure that it fit the big heart-shaped lock on the door behind the bookcase. The other one was newer, still big and clunky, and it had to be the key to Myrnin's cage.

The third was a tiny, delicate silver key, like the kind that opened diaries and suitcases.

Claire reached out for the keyring and pulled it toward her, trying to do it silently. He heard, of course. He got up from the corner of the cage and came to the front, where he held on to the bars. "Ah, excellent," he said. "Claire, please open the door. I can't show you what you need to do if I'm locked in this cage."

God, she couldn't look at him, she just couldn't. "I'm not supposed to do that," she said, and sorted out the big iron skeleton key. It felt cold and rough to her fingers, and old. Really old. "You wanted me to open this door, right?"

"Claire. Look at me." He sounded so sad. She heard the soft ringing chime of his ring on the bars when he gripped them again. "Claire, please."

She turned away from him and put the key into the heart-shaped lock.

"Claire, don't open that!"

"You told me to!"

"Don't!" Myrnin rattled the bars of his cage, and even though they were solid iron she heard them rattle. "If you open that door, you'll die! Now get me out of here! Now!"

She checked her watch. Not enough time, not nearly enough; it was still at least an hour to sunset, maybe more. Michael was still stuck in the car. "I can't," she said. "I'm sorry."

The sound Myrnin made then was enough to make her glad that she was across the room. She'd never heard a lion roar, not in person, but somehow she imagined that it would sound like that, all wild animal rage. It shredded her confidence. She closed her eyes and tried not to listen, but he was talking, she couldn't understand what he was saying now but it was a constant, vicious stream in a language she didn't know. The tone, though -- you couldn't not get the evil undercurrents.

He'd kill her if he got hold of her now. Thank God, the cage was strong enough to ...

He snarled something low and guttural, and she heard something metal snap with a high, vibrating sound.

The cage wasn't strong enough.

Myrnin was bending the bars away from the lock.

Claire spun, key still in her hand, and saw him rip at a weak point in the cage like it was wet paper. How could he do that? How could he be that strong? Wasn't he hurting himself?

He was. She could see blood on his hands.

It came to her with a jolt that if he got out of that cage, he could do the same thing to her.

She needed to get out.

Claire moved around the lab table, squeezed past two towering stacks of volumes, and tripped over a broken three-legged stool. She hit the floor painfully, on top of a pile of assorted junk -- pieces of old leather, some bricks, a couple of withered old plants she guessed Myrnin was saving for botanical salvage. Man, that hurt. She rolled over on her side, gasping, and climbed to her feet.

She heard a long, slow creak of metal, and stopped for a fatal second to look over her shoulder.

The cage door was open, and Myrnin was out. He was still wearing his little Ben Franklin glasses, but what was in his eyes looked like something that had crawled straight out of hell.

"Oh crap," she whispered, and looked desperately toward the stairs.

Too far. Way too far, too many obstacles between her and safety, and he could move like a snake. He'd get there first.

She was closer to the door with the lock on it than the stairs, and the key was still clutched tight in her hand. She'd have to abandon her book bag, no way to get to it now.

She didn't have time to think about it. The cut Jason had put on her wrist was still fresh, Myrnin could still smell it, and it was ringing the dinner bell loud and clear.

She kicked stacks of books out of the way, jumped over the pile of junk, and raced for the locked door with the key outstretched. Her hands were shaking, and it took two tries to get the oversized key into the hole, and when she started to turn it there was a terrible moment of utter panic because it wouldn't turn ...

And then it did, a smooth metallic slide of levers and pins, and the door swung open.

On the other side was her own living room, and Shane was sitting on the couch with his back to her, playing a video game.

Claire paused, utterly off balance. That couldn't be real, could it? She couldn't be seeing him, right there, but she could hear all of the computerized grunts and punches and wet bloody sounds from whatever fight game he had on. She could smell the house. Chili. He'd made chili. He still hadn't taken some of his boxes back upstairs. They were piled in the corner.

"Shane -- " she whispered, and reached out, through the doorway. She could feel something there, like a slight pressure, and the hair on her arm shivered and prickled.

Shane put the game on pause, and slowly stood up. "Claire?" He was looking in the wrong place, he was looking up, at the staircase.

But he'd heard her. And that meant she could just step right through and she'd be safe.

She never got the chance.

Myrnin's hand landed on her shoulder, dragged her back, and as Shane started to turn toward them, Myrnin slammed the door and turned the key in the lock.

She didn't dare move. He was crazy, she could see it, there was nothing in him that recognized her at all. Amelie's warnings screamed through her head, and Sam's. She'd underestimated Myrnin, and that was what had gotten all the other would-be apprentices killed.

Myrnin was shaking, and his broken hands were crunched into fists. His blood was dripping on an open copy of an old chemistry textbook that lay by his feet.

"Who are you?" he whispered. The accent she'd noted the first time she'd met him was back, and strong. Really strong. "Child, what brings you here? Do you not understand your danger? Who is your Patron? Were you sent as a gift?"

She closed her eyes for a second, then opened them and looked right into his eyes and said, "You're Myrnin, and I'm Claire, I'm your friend. I'm your friend, okay? You should let me help you. You hurt yourself."

She pointed to his injured fingers. Myrnin looked down, and he seemed surprised, as if he hadn't felt it at all. Which maybe he hadn't.

He took two steps backward, ran into a lab table, and knocked over a stand that held empty glass test tubes. They fell and shattered on the dirty stone floor.

Myrnin staggered, then sank down to sit against the wall, his face covered by bloody hands, and began to rock back and forth. "It's wrong," he moaned. "There was something important, something I had to do. I can't remember what it was."

Claire watched him, still scared to death, and then sank down to a crouch across from him. "Myrnin," she said. "The door. The one I opened. Where does it go?"

"Door? Doorways. Moments in time, just moments, none of it stays, it flows like blood you know, just like blood. I tried to bottle it but it doesn't stay fresh. Time, I mean. Blood turns, and so does time. What's your name?"

"Claire, sir. My name's Claire."

He let his head fall back against the wall, and there were bloody tears running down his cheeks. "Don't trust me, Claire. Don't ever trust me." He bounced the back of his head off the wall with enough force to make Claire wince.

"I -- no sir. I won't."

"How long have I been your friend?"

"Not that long."

"I don't have friends," he said hollowly. "You don't, you know, when you're as old as I am. You have competitors, and you have allies, but not friends, never. You're too young, far too young to understand that." He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them, he looked mostly sane. Mostly. "Amelie wants you to learn from me, yes? So you are my student?"

This time, Claire just nodded. Whatever the fit was, it was leaving him, and he was empty and tired and sad again. He took off his glasses, folded them, and put them in the pocket of his coat.

"You won't be able do it," he said. "You can't possiby learn quickly enough. I nearly killed you tonight, and next time I won't be able to stop. The others -- " He stopped, looked briefly sick, and cleared his throat. "I'm not -- I wasn't always like this, Claire. Please understand. Unlike many of my kind, I never wanted to be a monster. I only wanted to learn, and this was a way to learn forever."

Claire bit her lip. "I want to learn, too," she said. "I --Amelie wants me to help you, and learn from you. Do you think I'm smart enough?"

"Oh, you're smart enough. Could you master the skills, given enough time? Perhaps. And you'll have no choice in the matter; she'll keep you coming until you learn, or I destroy you." Myrnin slowly lifted his head and looked at her. Rational again, and very steady. "Did I remind you not to trust me?"

"Yes sir."

"It's good advice, but just this once, ignore it and allow me to help you."

"Help -- ?"

Myrnin stood up, in that eerie boneless way that he seemed to have, and rummaged around through the glass jars and beakers and test tubes until he found something that looked like red salt. He shook the container -- it was about the size of a spice jar -- and opened it to extract one red crystal. He touched it to his tongue, shut his eyes for a second, and smiled.

"Yes," he said. "I thought so." He recapped it and held it out to her. "Take it."

She did. It felt surprisingly heavy. "What is it?"

"I have no idea what to call it," he said. "But it'll work."

"What do I do with it?"

"Shake a small amount into your palm, like so -- " He reached out for her hand. She pulled away, curling her fingers closed, and Myrnin looked briefly wounded. "No, you're right. You do it. I apologize." He handed her the shaker and made an encouraging gesture. She hesitantly turned the shaker upside down over her palm. A few red chunky crystals poured out. He wanted her to keep going, so she did, quick jerks of the container until there was maybe half a teaspoon of the stuff piled up.

Myrnin took the shaker back and set it back where he'd found it, and nodded at her. "Go on," he said. "Take it."

"Excuse me?"

He mimed popping it into his mouth.

"I -- um -- what is it, again?"

This time, Myrnin rolled his eyes in frustration. "Take it, Claire! We don't have much time. My periods of lucidity are shorter now. I can't guarantee I won't slip again. Soon. This will help."

"I don't understand, how is this stuff supposed to help?"

He didn't tell her again, he just pleaded silently with her, his whole expression open and hopeful, and she finally put her hand to her mouth and tentatively tasted one of the crystals.

It tasted like strawberry salt, with a bitter after-flavor. She felt an instant, tiny burst of ice-cold clarity, like a strobe light going off in a darkened room full of beautiful, glittering things.

"Yes," Myrnin breathed. "Now you see."

This time, she licked up more of the crystals. Four or five of them. The bitterness was stronger, barely offset by the strawberries, and the reaction was even faster. It was like she'd been asleep, and all of a sudden she was awake. Gloriously, dizzyingly awake. The world was so sharp she felt like even the dull battered wood of the table could cut her.

Myrnin picked up a book at random and opened it. He held it up in front of her, and it was like another burst of light in the darkness, brilliant and beautiful, oh, so pretty, the way the words curved themselves around each other and cut into her brain. It was painful and perfect, and she read as fast as she could. The essence of gold is the essence of Sun, and the essence of silver is the essence of Moon. You must work with each of these according to its properties, gold in the daylight, silver in the night ... It all made sense to her. Total sense. Alchemy was nothing but a poet's explanation of the way matter and energy interacted, the way different surfaces vibrated at different speeds, it was physics, nothing but physics, and she could understand how to use it now.

And then ... then it was like the bulbs all dimmed again.

"Go on, take it," Myrnin said. "The dose in your hand will last for an hour or so. In that time, I can teach you a great deal. Enough, perhaps, for us to understand where we should be going."

This time, Claire didn't hesitate licking up every last bit of the red crystals.

Myrnin was right, the crystals lasted for a little more than an hour. He took some as well, one at a time, carefully measuring them out and making them last until finally even a red crystal couldn't drive the growing confusion out of his eyes. He was getting anxious and confused, by the end. Claire started closing the books and stacking them up on the table -- the two of them were sitting cross-legged on the floor, practically buried in volumes. Myrnin had jumped her from one book to another, pulling out a paragraph here, a chapter there, a chart from physics and a page from something so old he had to teach her the language before she could understand.

I learned languages. I learned ... I learned so much. He'd shown her a diagram, and it hadn't been just a diagram, it had been three dimensional and as intricate as a snowflake. Morganville hadn't just happened, it had been planned. Planned around the vampires. Planned by the vampires, carried out by Myrnin and Amelie. The Founder Houses, they were part of it -- thirteen bright hard nodes of power in the web, holding together a complex pattern of energy. It could move people from one place to another, via the doorways, although Claire didn't yet understand how to control them. But the web could do more. It could change memories. It could even keep people away, if Amelie wanted it to do that.

Myrnin had shown her the journals, too, with all his research conducted over the last seventy years into the vampire's sickness. It was chilling, the way his notes degenerated from meticulous to scrawls at the end, and sometimes into nonsense.

But isn't this a good thing? The question kept battering at her. Isn't it a good thing that the vampires will die out?

And what about Sam? What about Michael?

The influence of the crystals was dimming now, and Claire felt horribly tired. There was a steady ache in her muscles, a feverish throb that told her this stuff wasn't exactly kind to the human body. She could feel every heartbeat pounding through her head, and everything looked so dark. So ... so confusing.

She felt a breath of air stir against her cheek, and turned toward the stairs. Michael was descending, moving faster than she'd ever seen him, and he came to a fast halt when he saw her sitting beside Myrnin.

"He's supposed to be -- "

"Locked up in a cage? Yeah, I know." Claire knew she sounded bitter. She didn't care. "He's sick, Michael. He's not an animal. And anyway, even if you lock him up, he'll get out."

Michael looked young to her, all of a sudden, although he was older than she was. And a vampire, on top of that. "Claire, get up and come to me. Please."

"Why? He's not going to hurt me."

"He can't help what he does. Look, Sam told me how many people he's killed -- "

"He's a vamp, Michael. Of course he's -- "

" -- how many he's killed in the last two years. It's more than all the vampires in Morganville combined. You're not safe. Now get up and walk over here."

"He's right," Myrnin said. He was losing it, Claire could see that, but he was desperately hanging on to be the man who'd been with her for the last hour. The gentle, funny, sweet one, ablaze with excitement and passion for showing her his world. "It's time for you to go." He smiled, showing teeth -- not vampire teeth. It was a very human kind of expression. "I do all right on my own, Claire, or at least there's rarely anyone for me to harm. Amelie will send someone to look after me. And I usually can't leave here, once I -- forget things. It's too difficult for me to find the keys, and I can't remember how to use them once I have them. But I never forget how to kill. Your friend is right. You should go, please. Now. Continue your studies."

It was stupid, but she hated leaving him like this, with all the light going out in his eyes and the clouds of fear and confusion rolling in.

She didn't mean to do it, it just happened.

She hugged him.

It was like hugging a tree; he was so surprised, he was as stiff as a block of wood. She wasn't actually sure how long it had been, since anybody had touched him like this. For a second he resisted her, and then his arms went around her and she felt him heave a great sigh. Still not a hug, not really, but it was as close as he was likely to get.

"Go away, little bird," he whispered. "Hurry."

She backed away. His eyes were strange again, and she knew they were out of time. Someday, he won't come back. He'll just be the beast.

Michael was beside her. She hadn't heard him cross the room, but his hand closed around hers, and there was real compassion in his face. Not for Myrnin, though. For her.

"You heard him," Michael said. "Hurry."

She bumped into the table, and the small jar of red crystals shuddered a little, nearly tipping over. She grabbed it to put it back upright, and then thought, what if he loses this? He loses stuff all the time.

She was only keeping it safe, that was all. It helped him, right? So she ought to make sure he didn't knock it over or throw it away or something.

She slipped it into her pocket. She didn't think Myrnin saw, and she knew Michael didn't. Claire felt a hot burst of something -- shame? Embarrassment? Excitement? I should put it back. But really, she'd never find it again if he moved it around. Myrnin wouldn't remember. He wouldn't even know it was gone.

She kept looking back, all the way up the stairs. By the time they were halfway out, Myrnin had already forgotten them, and he was restlessly flipping through a pile of books, muttering anxiously to himself.

Gone already.

He looked up at them and snarled, and she saw the hard glint of fangs.

She hurried to the door at the top of the stairs.