“What’s wrong now?” Carpe said.
I hit the button again that should have activated the teleport spell Carpe had sold me. Nothing. “Hey, did you sell me a faulty teleport scroll?”
“Umm, no—that’s below my standards threshold.”
“Then why the hell isn’t it working?”
“Give me three,” Carpe said.
While I waited, I flipped open my inventory and equipped myself with my prized possession: a pair of dragon goggles, two steampunk-ish green orbs that sat on Thief’s face like a pair of fly eyes. Dragon goggles are few and far between in World Quest. Not only do they let you see in the dark but they also let you see magic, infrared, heat—basically anything a dragon can see. I won’t go dungeon crawling without them. Why waste a torch when you can slide on these babies? Come to think of recent events, I wonder how accurate these are . . .
The room was small and circular, providing just enough space to stand. I made my avatar walk the entire way around. No doors, no cracks. I started tapping sections of the wall, looking for weak spots. All I heard was solid brick.
“A perfect replica of the Ah Puch Mayan temple, fourth set of catacombs down,” I said.
“Hey Byz, that room you’re in is magic blocked. Any spell Level fifteen or lower won’t work. Is there a door?”
“No, nothing—no writing, no doors, no seams, no cracks.” I looked up. There was only the thin chute I’d fallen down. “Oh for the love of God, I’m in an Oubliette.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s French for a deep, dark, doorless pit.”
“OK. How do you get out?”
“You don’t. That’s the point. No doors or windows means they can forget about you,” I said.
“I’m up top, can I pry the trapdoor open—”
“No! Not that I don’t appreciate it, it’s just a really bad idea. Liable to set off another trap.” I tried shooting at the trapdoor with my crossbow. Not even a dent.
“Owl, try Reveal Magic. It’s a Level nineteen spell. It should work in there,” Carpe said.
“That’s a brilliant idea. Why the hell didn’t I think of that?” I said, and set the Byzantine Thief casting.
“By the way, I have some bad news about Paul.”
I snorted. “Can’t possibly be bad enough.”
A message appeared in my inbox. I opened it, and a Wanted poster unfolded on my screen. It was for Paul and promised a reward of a rare spell book, one out of Carpe’s stash, and better than gold. I checked the view rate. One hundred thousand and counting. It put a smile on my face. Paul wouldn’t last the week. “Carpe, you never cease to impress. Remind me never to get on your bad side.”
I watched the Reveal Magic spell set as gold-orange writing covering the walls started to solidify. I zoomed the screen camera in to get a better look at the ones on the ceiling.
“It’s going to take me a while to puzzle through this—Oh, you got to be fucking kidding me,” I said as the symbols came into focus. They were the same kind of symbols and ring series as the Balinese inscriptions.
“What?”
I folded my head against my keyboard. “Nothing. Just the universe screwing me over. Again. Look, there’s no sense in you sticking around. I’ve got an alarm set if anyone attacks, but honestly, I don’t even think a rat could find me here.”
“All right. Shout if you need help. I’m playing for the next few hours.”
“Roger Wilco,” I said.
I was still working through the puzzle when I heard the knock at the door.
“Room service,” I said to Carpe and took my headset off.
I checked the door peephole. It was the same scared girl I’d seen before. “Just a minute,” I yelled as pleasantly as I could and threw on a T-shirt and sweats. I checked my reflection and pulled my wet hair into a respectable ponytail. I was dead set not to scare the crap out of her for the second time in a row. I looked very all-American this time, not one bruise, not even a little black eye. I practiced a quick smile and answered my door.
“Hi there,” I said.
Instead of looking scared out of her wits, the girl gave me a shy smile. “Can I bring this in?” she said.
It worked! Point and match for a friendlier, more personable Owl. I nodded and held the door open as she pushed the tray in.
My laptop chimed, twice. Carpe.
“You can put it over there,” I told the girl, pointing to the dining room as I went to check what he’d said. I smelled urea and wondered if Captain had peed somewhere, although he was with Nadya. Owl, whatever you do, do not open the door. It’s not safe, there’s someone trying to kill you, right now. Run. Get out of there, and call me, I can help—
I turned around. Too late.
The girl was right behind me, leaning against the wall. “You know this one is terrified of you. She’s convinced you’re some kind of hit woman, or spy. Her essence is shaking, even now as I stand here,” she said with a strong Russian accent, just like Nadya when she was angry or smashed.
I wrapped my hand around the empty Corona bottle and swung at her head. I was too slow. She leapt at me and in a moment had me pinned to the plush carpet. “It” grinned, and I saw the serrated yellowed teeth.
Skin walker.
Skin walkers are the kind of monster nightmares are made of. They don’t possess you like a genie or demon, they rip your skin off and wear it. It gets worse; before you die, they steal your essence so they can do a passable job pretending to be you.
“I’ll have fun wearing you around I think,” the girl-wearing skin walker said. It had lost the Russian accent in favor of the girl’s mid-American. That made things worse.
“Really doubt that,” I said and bridged up, arching my back and throwing all my weight into it. This close I could really smell the urea seeping out from under its skin, a natural disinfectant that keeps the stolen hides preserved a few days longer.
The skin walker was lighter than me and growled as I tossed it off. I reached for the beer bottle, broke it against the table leg, and rammed it into its face as hard as I could.
It screeched and covered its face, giving me some space to back up. I ran for the door, but not fast enough.
My hand was on the handle when it snarled. I glanced back as it readied to pounce, moving the girl’s legs like a cat’s hindquarters. “You’ll regret that,” it said and leapt for me.
I grabbed its wrist as it slammed me into the floor for a second time. I cringed; its skin looked normal from the outside but was clammy to the touch, and I could feel its spindly bones underneath. I struggled even more to get it off me. I started to scream, but it clamped its hand down over my mouth and breathed yellow gas in my face before I could make a sound.
The wooziness hit me. Damn it, how come there was no mention about yellow gas in the textbooks?
As the skin walker leered over me, it dawned on me that the reason there was nothing written about the yellow gas in textbooks was that no one had ever lived to tell the tale.
My head hurt. And I was cold.
And the bathtub was running.
I opened my eyes, or at least the one I could. The one that wasn’t swollen. I was handcuffed to the corner of the antique wrought-iron bathtub I’d been enjoying . . . whenever that was.
The girl’s skin was discarded over the back of the chair. Yet another person who’d ended up dead because of a passing association with me. Who needs an end of the world when all I have to do is look at you? I was turning into the angel of death.
The skin walker was kneeling over the running water, humming a pop song I’d heard on the radio. Probably stolen it from the girl’s head before it killed her. I’d read something about skin walkers needing water to get in and out of the skins, one of the reasons they’d never spread outside Russia until after the Industrial Revolution, when trains had been invented. It was also something I’d never hoped to see in practice.
“I know you’re awake,” the skin walker said, its
voice no longer high and feminine but low and raspy, like a car running over loose gravel.
“I suggest you listen,” it continued. It moved around the tub and sat on its haunches in front of me. Its thin yellow hide covered its bones like plastic wrap, probably evolved to better slip into other creatures’ skins. And its face, well, it was like a skull wrapped under cured leather. And the smell. I coughed as I choked on the ammonia.
“If you tell me where the translation is, I will kill you quickly. I won’t even wear your skin like I did this girl’s. However, the clock is ticking.”
It picked up the girl’s skin and held it over the bathtub. I realized the ammonia wasn’t just the urea from the bare skin walker. It had filled the tub with lye, something that could dissolve a body.
“I need to walk out of here in something. It can be this skin or yours. It makes no matter to me which it is.”
I coughed. “What? No ‘I’ll let you live’? Just die bad or die worse? What kind of choice is that?”
Its smile widened. “An honest one. Consider it respect paid a worthy adversary. Or more worthy than this girl at any rate. I do hate it when humans freeze up, so much better when they struggle.”
I don’t think I’ve ever been more scared in my life. My coping mechanism? Run my mouth off. “Get rid of the handcuffs and I’ll show you just how much trouble I can be,” I said.
“Before you make your decision, think on this. If I leave in your skin, I’ll know every secret, every heart’s desire, every fear. I’ll hunt down those you love and torture them. Then I’ll wear their skins and do it all over again. Why? Because it’s in my nature.” It leaned in and smelled my skin. “Now, where is the translation?”
Somehow, I didn’t think this was the situation Rynn had had in mind when he’d suggested I stop mouthing off to supernaturals. “Go to hell,” I said.
It slammed the back of my head into the bathtub. My ears started to ring.
“You think your friends would know?” It smiled and shook its head. “They won’t. No one ever does, not after I rip your mind apart. Otherwise I wouldn’t be in business.”
“Who sent you?” I said. I could barely hear myself with my ears ringing.
It smiled. “No one of any consequence.”
I kicked at it and it grabbed my neck, squeezing. “Where is the translation?”
Lady Siyu or Marie. It had to be. The dragon would have just tortured me. “Joke’s on you, I don’t have one.”
It turned my head from side to side and sniffed my skin. I cringed as a pink, wormlike tongue flicked out and tasted my cheek. It sat back and laughed, more gravel.
“I believe you are telling the truth,” it said. “I can smell it on you, you know. A lesser-known trait of ours. Pity. You do realize I will have to eat your soul now? Just to be on the safe side.” It let the girl’s skin slip into the lye-filled tub. It hissed, and smoke rose in a fog of ammonia.
Think, brain, think, what hurts skin walkers . . . I glanced around the bathroom, looking for something, anything.
It twisted my neck until I was looking it in the eyes, black and pupil-less. “Now be a good girl and look at me.”
I closed my eyes and spit in its face. It slapped me. Hard. On a hunch the skin walker was male, I kicked up.
I guessed right.
It crumpled over and grabbed its crotch as soon as I connected. I worked on the handcuffs, trying to slip my hands through.
He grabbed my wrist. “I’m done playing nice,” he said and twisted.
“Funny, I’m not done telling you to fuck off yet—” I screamed as I heard a snap and a sharp pain travelled from my wrist up to my shoulder.
“You know you don’t need to be conscious to have your soul stolen?” he said. I grimaced as my thoughts, memories, things I hadn’t thought of in years flooded to the front. My dad leaving for Mexico, my mom’s death, friends I’d forgotten about, Rynn, Nadya—everything flowed out of me, every personal detail. I tried to hold back, stop it . . . It was like an ice pick was being driven into my thoughts, again and again. I couldn’t stop it.
I heard a door kick in somewhere, and the skin walker growled.
I couldn’t be bothered to open my eyes. Maybe whoever it was would help me die a little faster.
“Stay here, little Alixandria the Great,” the skin walker said, using a name only my father ever called me. “I’ll be back in but a moment. Perhaps I’ll take a skin for the road.”
I couldn’t do or say a thing—not even yell a warning—as it opened the door on Rynn. I was too empty. I could watch though. Maybe that was what the skin walker wanted.
The skin walker grabbed Rynn by the neck and dragged him to the ground. It pinned him down and crawled onto his chest, but not before glancing over at me and smiling.
I didn’t even have the strength to look away.
“Now, look into my eyes, mercenary—No!”
The skin walker jumped off Rynn in surprise and clutched its head, shocked and hurt. Rynn got up, unharmed, and walked towards it. The skin walker held up its leathery hands in defense, backing towards the bathroom as Rynn followed.
What the hell was going on?
“No, I was tricked, I was not told about you, you sneaky, vile—”
The skin walker never finished its sentence. Rynn hit it across the face, and its head cracked into the porcelain of the bathroom sink. It dropped unconscious to the floor beside me. Rynn checked the skin walker first, then knelt beside me. He frowned when he touched my broken arm. I couldn’t blame him. It was bent at an awful angle.
I swallowed. It was hard, as my mouth was dryer than I expected. “Told another supernatural to fuck off,” I said. It was a bad joke. Rynn didn’t laugh.
“I hate skin walkers,” he said. “Bottom feeders.” I heard the bathtub drain, and I was glad the ammonia would be gone. He was on the phone, Nadya maybe, it sounded like Russian . . .
“How did you know?”
“Oricho was delayed by a disturbance on the casino floor. Skin walkers. They almost always travel in packs. I tried to get hold of you, and when I couldn’t, I worried.”
I tried to lift my arm but couldn’t. I was light-headed and didn’t like the way it jutted out at an angle, like a rag doll’s. I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t have to look at it.
“It didn’t break your arm, only dislocated it,” Rynn said, his voice soothing.
“I’m pretty sure it’s broken,” I said. He touched my face and pried my eyes open with cool fingertips.
“No, it’s just twisted. The poison is making you see things.” I heard water running and the lye in the bathtub drain away. Good riddance.
Part of me wanted to believe it, it made so much sense . . .
His blue eyes flared. “Stop being so pigheaded. Your arm isn’t broken.”
I shook my head.
Rynn gave up and fetched a set of keys from the unconscious skin walker. I winced as the cuffs were pulled off. He checked my hands where I’d tried to pull them through and swore under his breath. “You made a mess of your wrists. They’re too small to slip handcuffs.”
He lifted me, and I protested.
“I’m putting you into the bathtub so I can ice it.”
“Just put ice on it then,” I said. He stuck me in the tub anyways. I yelped as ice-cold water hit me from the tap, but my eyelids were getting heavy. I wondered for a moment if having my clothes on or getting wet with my head this light was a great idea. In the end I couldn’t be bothered. I started to drift off. Fine, if Rynn didn’t want me to think my arm was broken before I passed out, so be it. “Fine, you win, my arm is fine.” Even as I said it I started to feel better, and started to believe it. And drift off . . .
I woke aware of being carried. I was out of the tub, and though my hair was still wet and cold, sweats and a T-shirt had replaced my soaked clothes. I lifted my head and fought the dizziness. I lifted my arm. It was fine. Bruised, yes, but not broken.
“See, it’s worthwhile li
stening to me sometimes,” Rynn said and deposited me in my bed. Before I could force my slow mind to come up with something snappy, a knock at the door had Rynn’s attention.
I knew I should probably get up and see who it was; I pushed myself to sitting and slid my legs over the side. My head revolted, and I had to lie back down.
“I gave you a sedative. You need to sleep the poison off,” Rynn said, and threw the covers over me. They were heavier than I remembered, and I was in no condition to argue. I heard voices coming from the door outside the bedroom, and I strained to listen. They weren’t familiar, but I tilted my head to get a better view through the crack left in the bedroom door.
Two of the nymphs I recognized from the pool came in and picked up the skin walker. For harmless supernaturals, I was finding it unnerving how often they disposed of dead bodies . . . I strained to hear some of the words, but I couldn’t make them out . . .
The door closed, and I felt Rynn sit on the side of the bed.
“How often do those guys deal with dead bodies? And how the hell did you learn to take out a skin walker?” I said.
“Go to sleep,” Rynn said.
His voice was enough to remind me how tired I was. “I need a hospital,” I said, and stifled a yawn. I was losing the battle with sleep.
“Train wreck,” Rynn said.
I think I called him a whore before drifting off.
18
I NEED TO STOP LETTING MONSTERS BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF ME . . .
I’ll be damned if I know what time it is.
I was handcuffed to a bathtub, a yellow-skinned monster driving an ice pick down towards my face. I pulled at the cuffs and heard the snap as my shoulder came out of its socket. The skin walker leaned in, breath reeking like rotting meat. A pink tongue licked my face . . .
I sat up with a start, and Captain howled as he toppled off the bed.
I took a quick inventory of my room as I wiped cat saliva off my cheek. Besides Captain, my room was empty. I was still dressed in sweats. The blinds were drawn, but sunlight peeked through the slats.
At least a night had passed, maybe more.
Owl and the Japanese Circus Page 32