Now the dean stirred sugar into his cup. “I appreciate your quick thinking, Pamela. We
can’t afford another …” He trailed off. “We just need to see the year out and …” Again he
let his sentence dissolve as if he’d dunked it into his tea.
“And what?” Alex nudged. Because she really did wonder what was supposed to come
next. Dawes was standing with her hands clasped as if about to sing a choir solo, waiting,
waiting.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Sandow at last. He sank down into a wing-backed
chair. “We’re ready for the new moon. I’ll pick up Michelle Alameddine from the train station Wednesday night and bring her directly to Black Elm. I have every hope that the
rite will work and that Darlington will be back with us soon. But we also need to be prepared for the alternative.”
“The alternative?” said Dawes. She sat down abruptly. Her face was tight, angry even.
Alex couldn’t pretend to understand the mechanics of what Dean Sandow had planned,
but she would have bet Dawes did. It’s my job. She was there to clean up the messes that invariably got made, and this was a big one.
“Michelle is at Columbia, working on her master’s. She’ll be with us for the new-moon
rite. Alex, I think she could be persuaded to come up on the weekends and continue your
education and training. That will reassure the alumni if we have to”—he brushed his finger over his graying mustache—“bring them up-to-date.”
“What about his parents? His family?”
“The Arlingtons are estranged from their son. As far as anyone knows, Daniel
Arlington is studying the nexus beneath San Juan de Gaztelugatxe. If the rite fails—”
“If the rite fails, we try again,” said Dawes.
“Well, of course,” said Sandow, and he seemed genuinely distressed. “Of course. We try every avenue. We exhaust every possibility. Pamela, I’m not trying to be callous.” He
held out a hand to her. “Darlington would do everything he could to bring one of us home.
We’ll do the same.”
But if the rite failed, if Darlington couldn’t be brought back, then what? Would Sandow
tell the alumni the truth? Or would he and the board invent a tale that didn’t sound like We sent two college kids into situations we knew they couldn’t handle and one died.
Either way, Alex didn’t like that it would be so easy for Lethe to close Darlington’s chapter. He had been a lot of things, most of them annoying, but he had loved his job and
Lethe House. It was cruel that Lethe couldn’t love him back. This was the first time
Sandow had even broached the possibility that Darlington wouldn’t return, that he couldn’t just be yanked from between the interdimensional cushions of a cosmic couch.
Was it because they were only days away from trying?
Sandow picked up the empty glass coated in film from the vile green milk drink.
“Axtapta? You were attacked by a gluma?”
His voice had been smooth, diplomatic, pensive, while he discussed Darlington—his
dean voice. But at the thought of a gluma, a deep crease appeared between his worried brows.
“That’s right,” Alex said solidly, though she still wasn’t entirely sure what that implied.
Then she made the leap. “I think someone sent it after me. Maybe Book and Snake.”
Sandow huffed a disbelieving laugh. “Why would they ever have cause to do
something like that?”
“Because Tara Hutchins is dead and I think they had something to do with it.”
Sandow blinked rapidly, as if his eyes were defective camera lenses. “Detective Turner
says—”
“This is what I think, not Turner.”
Sandow’s gaze snapped to hers, and she knew he was surprised by the surety in her voice. But she couldn’t afford the deferential dance she knew he would prefer.
“You’ve been investigating?”
“I have.”
“That isn’t safe, Alex. You aren’t equipped to—”
“Someone had to.” And Darlington was far away.
“Do you have evidence a society was involved?”
“Book and Snake raises the dead. They use glumas—”