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“Hello?”
“Dustin? Hello? Dustin Graves, is that you?”
It was a woman’s voice, vaguely familiar. “Who is this?”
“It’s Luella Brandt,” the voice said shakily. “Sebastion’s mother.” I’d met her once, when Bastion had taken me and Sterling to investigate a homunculus breaking into their enormous mansion. “I need to know, Dustin. Have you seen my son?”
“What? No, I haven’t. Has he gone missing?”
“Well, no,” Luella said. “Not exactly. I’m not sure how to put it. He was here at home half an hour ago, but he left. Angrily. He burst through the front door.”
“I’m hoping you mean that in a metaphoric sense,” I said.
“No, I do not. He burst through the front door. And the walls. And a large part of the mansion gates. Please, Dustin. I don’t know what’s become of him, and he doesn’t have his phone. It’s how I found your number. If you hear anything about my son – ”
A loud crack whipped through the night, cutting Luella off, instantly silencing the chatter of Prudence and Gil’s voices. The bang was accompanied by a shower of rubble and broken glass, thrown into the house from the massive hole that had very suddenly appeared in the wall.
“Shit,” I muttered. “Shit shit shit.”
I should have asked the others why we were tackling this problem ourselves. I should have asked why the Lorica wasn’t already there for cleanup. This was a setup.
“Dustin?” Luella’s voice shouted. “Is everything all right? What’s happening?”
“Call you back,” I yelled into the receiver.
I stuffed my phone back into my jacket, slipping the flap of my knapsack back, because I already knew what was coming. The dust of broken concrete and debris settled, showing me that Prudence and Gil were lying prone on the floor – and that the three of us had found Luella’s son for him.
“Dusty,” Bastion said, in a voice that sounded distant, yet still thick with characteristic disdain. “It’s been a while.”
His eyes were silver. Like Mona’s, the night of the massacre.
“Bastion,” I breathed. “You’re not in your right mind. Something’s taken over. You have to know that.”
“Oh, really?” He tilted his head curiously, the light spilling from his eyes flickering when he blinked. “I hadn’t noticed. And here I thought I was just doing my job.”
Prudence sputtered and coughed into the dirt, pushing off the ground with shaking arms. “And what job is that?” she spat. “You work for the Lorica.”
Bastion’s eyes turned on her like searchlights, the light flooding even from his mouth when he spoke. “I work for the greater good, Prue. And the three of you are standing in the way of that vision.”
Gil growled, springing from the floor with terrifying speed, hurling himself bodily at Bastion. He stretched out his hands, blood bursting from his fingers as his wolf claws broke free fr
om his human form.
Bastion held out one hand, fingers splayed, a faint, circular shape glimmering in the air: a shield. The first thing I heard was the crack as Gil’s talons splintered, then fell from his hands. The second was his scream of pain, a sound that came from the wolf within him, the blood-curdling howl of an injured beast.
“Heel,” Bastion said. He gestured again, and Gil was thrown across the room.
“Bastion,” Prudence said. “No.”
She hobbled to her feet, her fists wreathed in blue fire. I had to hope that she would knock some sense back into Bastion – or alternately, smack him out of his mind control. I curled my fingers, calling on the searing heat in the palm of my hand to form into a clump of fire, and with my other hand, I threw my backpack open.
Willing the fireball to maintain its form, I reeled back and hurled it straight at Bastion’s body. Like a missile Vanitas streaked out of his pocket dimension, sword and scabbard slicing and smashing. Bastion waved his hand, invisible shields springing up from out of the ethers to block both sword and flame. Prudence struck at him with her full power, or whatever was left in her body after Bastion’s initial explosive arrival. The azure blue of her fist-fire was guttering out, and fast. It was only a matter of time before Bastion decided to stop toying with us and launch a counterattack.
But there had to be a limit to what he could do. Mages had their own stores of power, after all, and at the end of the day, a depleted sorcerer was just another fleshy, fragile human. We had to wear him down. I reached inside myself, calling to the Dark Room, the split at my lip going warm as new blood trickled from it.
Hurt him, I thought. Hook him, entangle him, just hurt him. Enough to make him stop, to bring his mind to the present, to bring him back to us. But don’t kill him.
Slender coils of solid night burst from the shadows, whipping and slashing at Bastion’s body, their ends tipped in barbs and hooks meant to snag, break, and bleed. Yet not a single spike hit home. Bastion had encased his entire being in a single, supremely powerful shield. He tutted, shaking his head.
