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“Shut that thing up,” Maguire shouted, and the younger man reached forward and gave Willy a rough shove between the shoulder blades, causing him to lunge forward and almost stumble. “And while you’re at it, shut your own trap, too, boy.”
“It’s gonna be okay, baby,” Jilo called out, though she wasn’t sure if she meant the words for Robinson or Willy. Both of them, she realized. No help was coming. Jilo would have to do whatever it took to protect those she loved. “What do you want from me?” She looked up at Maguire, shaken to the core. “I’ll do anything. Just tell me what you want. I’ll do it. Please just leave us be.”
“I done told you what I want,” he squatted down next to her. “I’ve even gone to the trouble of summoning her. Now all you got to do is take her in.”
“I don’t understand what that means,” Jilo shook her head.
Maguire lifted up from his haunches and bent over her. Grabbing her wrist, he yanked her off Guy, the force of his effort lifting her several inches off the ground. He dropped her down onto her own two feet. “It’s always the same with you Wills women. Your grandmother. Her mother. Even her mother before that. The Beekeeper, she follows you around, attaching herself to you, though I’ll be damned if I can figure out why. She pours her magic out at your feet, and all you do is turn your noses up at it. You, my girl, you’re gonna accept her gift, and then you’re going to do me a little service.”
He spat on the ground, right next to Jilo’s foot. “I need her help. This body, should’ve known it was a weak one. Forty-two years old, and already it’s failing. Cancer.” He said the word as though it were an insult to his stature, to his manhood, even, as if it were a disease meant for those who were weaker, perhaps even less well-placed in society. “You and my son Thomas, here. You two are going to stop it from eating me alive. You two are going to help heal me. And as an incentive, if you move fast enough, you might just have enough time to fix what’s ailing him”—he nodded over at Guy—“too.”
After crossing the yard to his son, Maguire relieved the boy of the pistol. “Go on, you know what to do. Get started, and be quick about it.” As Thomas took off around the side of the house, Maguire wagged the pistol at Willy. “Come on, boy,” he said, “you look like you might be pretty fast. Why don’t you drop that little ape you’re holding and see if you can sprint out of here? I’ll even make it sporting. I’ll count to ten.” Willy looked first at him, then at Jilo, his eyes round with horror. He clutched Robinson even tighter, placing one hand behind the little one’s head, doing his best to shelter the boy from all that was going on around them. Jilo blessed the day Willy had followed Binah to her door. She was going to take care of him, take care of them both. She cast a glance in Guy’s direction. The truth was finally clear to her now, in this horrible moment—she would never share a life with this man, but she couldn’t let him die. Not like this. Not if she could help it. Especially since for once it looked like Guy was blameless; this mad buckra had only used him to get at her. If it were true this Beekeeper could heal Guy, Jilo would take care of him, too. She didn’t care what it might cost her.
The younger Maguire returned, holding a sword, one of those Confederate officer’s sabers she’d often seen carried by men dressed in Confederate gray and Kelly green as they marched in the Saint Patrick’s Day parade. He stripped down to the waist, then stabbed the sharp point of the saber’s slightly curved blade into the earth. He began cutting lines in the soil, his movements quick and practiced. Jilo knelt beside Guy, first tracing her hand along his brutalized cheek, then placing a hand on his still-rasping chest. “I’ll fix this,” she whispered into his ear. “I’ll make it right.”
She rose and began to cross to Willy and Robinson. “Uh-uh,” Maguire said, shaking his head. “No sweet reunions till we’re done here.” He took aim at Willy’s head. Jilo nearly jumped away from the boys. “You had your chance,” he said, addressing Willy. “Don’t go getting any ideas now.”
Maguire’s gaze softened. “Ironic really”—with those two words his tone changed from threatening to wistful—“that I’m reduced to using this popgun to keep you in line.” He sighed. “There was a time when I could have set loose the very hounds of hell on you, or at least a reasonable facsimile thereof. But what can I tell you? I cut the wrong ties. Backed the wrong side leading up to the war. A man lives. He learns. And now, well, you’re the first step toward helping me regain all I’ve lost.” Only then did Maguire lower the pistol, though Jilo figured the gesture was more for his own comfort than for any other reason.
She couldn’t bear to see the tears running down Willy’s cheeks, so she looked away. Her eyes fell on Thomas’s handiwork, all the while thinking how his movements as he carved up the earth reminded her of the Beekeeper’s dancelike stroll. She stepped far enough back to take in the larger picture. The young man had cut the symbol for infinity into the earth. Each of the two loops was around three, maybe three and a half feet in diameter. He drew a circular band around it, then began making long strokes, slices that came together to form an eight-pointed star.
When the final point had been joined, Thomas stopped and looked up at his father with an expression that seemed to combine great pride and expectation. His efforts had left his broad shoulders and taut chest glistening with sweat.
“Good boy,” Maguire said, then pointed with his free hand at the young man. “That,” he said, addressing Jilo, “is a good, strong body. I saw to it this time. Made sure the boy was disciplined, not soft and coddled like this body was raised to be.” He spoke as if he thought any of his rantings should make any sense to her. “And he’s going to share some of that strength with his father,” Maguire said, though his intonation told Jilo the words were meant as encouragement for his son, rather than for her own ears. “He’s going to share some of that glowing health, and once he’s got his old man set right, the two of us are going to go out and take over the world, aren’t we, my boy?”
“Yes, sir,” Thomas replied. “The whole damned world.”
Jilo remained silent, not daring to open her lips lest she begin screaming at Willy to run, to hold Robinson tight and run as swiftly as his long, strong legs could carry them.
“That’s my boy,” Maguire said, holding his free hand out to Thomas. “Bring me the saber, then take your place. Let’s get this finished.”
Thomas jogged to his father’s side, holding the sword out so that the elder Maguire could grasp its hilt. For a moment, Thomas turned his gaze on Jilo. The boy seemed so full of pride, so certain that this world was his birthright, his to carve and his to wound, his to rule or destroy, depending on his whim. He turned and strode into the inner circle, stationing himself in the left loop of the lopsided figure eight.
To Jilo’s surprise, Maguire held the saber out to her. “You’ll need this.” When she didn’t move, he shook the blade, angling its hilt toward her. “Good God, girl, come take it.”
She approached him with great care, fearful that at any moment he might swing the blade around and cut her down. Seeming to read her fears, he laid it down on the ground by his feet, then strode into the sign Thomas had cut into the wounded earth, entering the right loop of infinity. “Here, take this,” he said, holding the revolver out to Thomas. Once they had traded off the gun, Maguire reached out with his right hand and grasped his son’s left.
Jilo went to where the sword lay, looking down at its glinting blade. “What do I do with it?”
“Pick it up,” Maguire said, “and bring it to the edge of the sigil.” She hesitated. “The picture,” he gestured with his free hand to the design surrounding him.
A bit of anger broke through her wall of caution. “I know what a sigil is.”
“Then pick it up and get on with it. Come on, it’s a saber, not a rattlesnake.”
She bent over and grasped the hilt, lifted the sword from the ground. It was heavier than she’d imagined it would be, but she could still raise it high enough to cut this monster down, to put an end to both him and his seed. She wondered if she could find it in herself to drive it through his heart, and she decided that yes, to protect her own, she could. She could do it without a qualm. And if even the slightest of opportunity arose, she would. A wave of sadne
ss descended on her—because of this man, she now had murder in her heart, something she’d never expected to find there.
“That’s it,” Maguire said, his voice rising, waxing eager. “Bring it over.”
Jilo glanced at the boys and tried to give them a calm, reassuring smile. Willy’s face showed he didn’t buy the story she was trying to sell. He stood there, nearly vibrating with the urge to flee. To save himself. To save Robinson. But Jilo knew that if he gave into that urge, his heart would cause him to remember her and hesitate. Then he would be lost, and probably her Robinson, too. She shook her head, signaling for him to hold on for just a bit longer. To have faith in her, even if in this moment, she, herself, was without faith.
She carried the sword to what she assumed was the base of the sigil.
“Stop,” Maguire said. “That’s far enough. Whatever you do, do not enter the circle drawn around us.”
“All right,” Jilo responded. “What now?”
