Hounacier (Valducan Book 2)

by Seth Skorkowsky

  The animal stopped rolling and just stared at him.

  One of the other containers held water. He'd seen them using it the night before, but what good would it do? Atabei's people might not be back for days, maybe weeks. He considered the gun in his hand but quickly pushed that thought away. There wasn't any food he could see inside, and opening the gate on a hungry, wild animal probably wouldn't end well for either of them.

  The wolf rolled onto its stomach. It extended its front paws and pressed its chin to the floor.

  "You like chicken?" he asked, remembering the coop.

  The animal whimpered.

  He could fill the bowl then push one of the birds though the bars. While it was distracted, Malcolm could just open the latch and walk away. Then what? Let a wolf, an animal completely foreign to this area, just roam free? "This is a waste of time." He turned to walk away but stopped. This thing was a victim too. Atabei's victim. Screw it.

  Hand tight on the pistol, Malcolm reached up, twisted, and flipped the latch.

  The wolf sat up onto its haunches.

  "You be good. Stick to the bayou, and no one will bother you."

  The animal cocked its head.

  Leaving the door shut, Malcolm backed away. "You just stay in there until I'm gone, buddy."

  The wolf didn't move.

  Malcolm rounded the corner and sneezed. He heard the metal gat creak open, and he sneezed again then again. Paranoia of a hungry wolf on the loose rising, he wiped his eyes and hurried back to the car, glancing over his shoulder the entire way. Jesus, that was stupid.

  Something fell from his pocket when Malcolm fished out the car keys. Puzzled, he looked down, seeing the silver ring in the weeds. When had he taken it off? An icy chill ran up his spine. Could it have…?

  No. It must have slipped off when I put the key in there. Malcolm picked it up and shoved the ring on his middle finger, forcing it over the knuckle. No way would it fall off now.

  The Taurus took two minutes to start. It just had to get him to the city. He managed the car around on the narrow road and headed back.

  Atabei's declaration came to mind as he drove. She'd called him a murderer. Said he'd killed her husband. Herm…Hercule. That was it. He didn't remember any Hercule. Then again, he rarely knew the names of those he had killed. No…set free. He'd never murdered. Not until…not until last night. But Atabei had told him a demon killed her husband. So how…?

  No. Because of a demon. She never said the demon killed him. He died because of it. After that, she'd learned how to transfer their essence, move them to an animal or other vessel. The demon hadn't killed him. It had possessed him.

  He remembered her words. There were many funerals before Ulises came. Then only one. The last.

  They'd killed her husband with Hounacier's blade. She'd spent years plotting revenge. Now, Ulises was dead, killed with a machete. Malcolm was damned, and Hounacier was hers. She'd coaxed their trust with masks and promises of power, and he'd fallen straight for it.

  The Order needed to know. By his own code, he should die. The monster inside him had to be stopped. Atabei had to be stopped.

  The car coughed and slowed. Malcolm pressed the gas. The needle revved, but the Taurus only slowed. Fuck!

  He steered the coasting vehicle to the shoulder of the road. Please, God, not now. Malcolm turned the car off. After a minute of cursing, he managed to get it restarted, but the car wouldn't go into gear. Malcolm rubbed his forehead. He was still a couple miles outside the city limits, maybe a dozen from Alpuente's. Pushing the frustration aside, he turned off the car, pulled on his ugly hat, and got out. It was only time before the demon took him again, and it was only time before a cop stopped to find him in a stolen piece of shit car and packing a stolen gun. He needed to get moving.

  He walked, the sun beating down on him. There were no trees along the road and nothing to shade him. The oversized shoes rubbed with every step. The thought of popping out his thumb to ask for a lift came to mind, and if he wasn't a living time-bomb waiting to kill and eat, he would have. But being alone in a car with some Good Samaritan wasn't something he could do. Demons loved hitchhiking about as much as they loved picking up hitchhikers. No, he couldn't risk that. The urge only mounted as the blisters formed along his heels.

  He passed a bank of graffiti-caked pay phones outside a gas station and considered calling Tasha or Jim for a lift. But being alone with them was just as bad as hitchhiking. He needed to get to the shop. The mask would protect them from him. After his warnings to Jim, Malcolm knew the priest wouldn't just bring it to him, not after Malcolm hadn't come home the night before. He'd told him to lock it up and not move it for anyone or anything. The big priest wouldn't unless he was one-hundred-percent sure it wasn't some trick of Atabei's.

  Pinkish hues tinged the sky by the time he made it to a bus stop. Malcolm took the bench and waited. A busload of people would be safer than one-on-one in a car. Demons weren't that reckless. Ten minutes later, a flat-faced bus rolled up, and Malcolm got on. His sweat-slick skin goosebumped at the rush of air conditioning. A woman near the back fanned herself, evidently not appreciating the cool air as much as he did. The bus stank of body odor, and Malcolm wondered how bad he must smell. He slid into a narrow seat and blew out a relieved sigh as the bus began to move.

  Malcolm watched the streets roll past, and new dread began to form. Atabei knew he was staying at Jim's. What if she had spies watching for him to return there? How many eyes did she have? He needed to be careful. Maybe approach slow, mingling with a crowd of tourists.

  A sudden realization broke his thoughts. Malcolm looked down to see that he'd been fiddling with the silver ring and had pulled it off. Swallowing, he shoved it back onto his finger and closed his fist. He needed to get to Jim's fast.

  The sun had set when the bus let him off three blocks from the shop. His fist clenched, Malcolm followed the streets, searching for any overly interested faces in the crowd. The nervous weight in his stomach continued to swell. Cold sweat broke out along the back of his neck. He hurried across the street, the fully-formed blisters stinging with each step.

  Two more blocks.

  His face grew hot, and the sudden feeling like he might throw up came down on him like a wave. A quartet of tourist women clutching neon green plastic glasses laughed at the mouth of an alley, all peering at a phone screen.

  "Excuse me. Excuse me,'' he panted, pushing past them. The heavy weight in his stomach roiled and shifted. He continued down the narrow alley, not much wider than his shoulders.

  Wait, he thought. He hadn't chosen to come down here. He'd just done it. Malcolm watched himself turn into a small alcove mulched with cigarette butts and torn wrappers. The sick feeling receded, and Malcolm, not controlling his own body, lifted his clenched hand. A scream erupted deep inside him, unable to escape his unresponsive lips.

  The silver ring was gone.

  Malcolm felt himself smile as the walls of his mental self tore away like tissue, revealing a wide, open sea of memories far larger than anything he could grasp. His consciousness plunged beneath the sticky waves of other thoughts and emotions. They pulled him deep into hopeless darkness as Malcolm continued his inward scream.

  "Not yet," a smooth, somehow familiar voice whispered through his mind. "You're mine."

  II

  The stink of fish and assorted feces permeating the village curls Gulmet's nose. He wishes to leave it as soon as possible and return to Rajik, but first, he must interact with these disgusting humans. The supply of goats lasted far shorter than they'd anticipated. Rajik's hunger is insatiable. Gulmet had found a pair or travelers on the road and brought them home. They lasted two days. But there is too much risk in hunting humans while Rajik is unable to transform. If anyone were to go looking for a missing family, they might come by the cottage and find her.

  So for the next three months, he shall play Iosif, the human that Gulmet wears. Husband, father, unable to hold his alcohol, and deathly afraid
of serpents. He will purchase provisions and act as a human until the birthing. While Rajik craves only meat in her wolven form, Gulmet plans to find some breads and fruit for himself. The diversity in palate is one of the few advantages in wearing a human. Leading his mule and two-wheeled cart, he follows the steep road down to a pen of snorting pigs.

  "Iosif," says a mustached man beside the pen. His face is pitted with scars. "I haven't seen you in weeks. How have you been?"

  "Hello, Pavlos," Gulmet says, recalling his host's memories. "I am well."

  "And your family?"

  "Very well. Melina is growing fast." Gulmet smiles. "She takes after her mother. Stubborn."

  Pavlos grins, revealing a chipped front tooth. "That's all women, my friend."

  Gulmet laughs. The men chat of the weather and gossip. Pavlos' eldest will marry in three weeks' time.

  "I'll see you at the wedding," Pavlos says as Gulmet loads a pair of sows into his cart.

  "Of course." Gulmet must maintain appearances. He'll find an excuse for Efimia and Melina's absence. Sickness? Death? No, death brings mourners and well-wishers. Efimia's sister lives in Patras. He'll tell them she has grown ill and his wife and daughter went to be with her. The lie decided, Gulmet wishes Pavlos farewell and leaves the stinking village behind. Once the cubs are born, they will raze it and its filthy inhabitants.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Malcolm woke, his cheek resting against cool, red bricks. Scrunching his eyes, he tried to grasp the tattered remnants of the dream he'd had, buying pigs from an ugly man with an enormous moustache. It was important somehow. But then it was gone.

  Black iron legs of patio furniture stood just a few feet before him. Shards of broken glass lay scattered about, edges glinting in the sunlight. Cars rumbled nearby. Birds twittered somewhere behind him, and in the distance, bells tolled. A faint breeze slid across his naked skin, stirring a wind chime.

  Where the hell am I? He sat up, and his cheek peeled off the worn paving. His stomach lurched at the movement, so full it hurt. Malcolm saw the partial face-print of drying blood on the brick, and the icy horror took hold. Feeling it come, Malcolm rolled onto his knees as his stomach heaved. Blood, strings of chewed flesh, and grayish chunks sprayed out across the paving.

  Panting, Malcolm wiped his mouth and looked around. He was inside a small courtyard with potted flowers and moss-coated walls. A balconied, two-story house loomed above him, making up one and a half sides to the yard. Its large glass doors stood a few feet behind him, cream-colored curtains blocking the view inside. Above a stone wall, crowned with broken, up-thrust colored glass, stood a neighboring house. A gunmetal gray BMW sat on the far side, beneath a copper-roofed carport, and facing a green sliding car door. He was in the French Quarter, but where?

  There were no exits but the curtained doors and carport. The glass-topped walls posed no difficulty for a werewolf, but for him, naked, was a different matter. Now you're just fucking with me, asshole. But the tall, defensive glass appeared too complete to account for all the shards scattered about. None of that was colored or from curved bottles. He looked up. Mint green curtains hung out from a broken, second-floor window, framed in jagged glass. The demon had been inside that house.

  Malcolm stood, careful not to step in the bloody mess now running in little streams between the paving bricks. Inside was dark. Only a faint square of light from a distant window was visible through the curtains, their folds patterned in a colorless floral design. He checked the knob. Locked.

  Shielding the sides of his eyes, he pressed his face against the glass, seeing no more than the shapes of furniture. Malcolm glanced up at the neighboring house that overlooked the small yard. He didn't see anyone. He hurried over to a window. It was also locked. You're really just fucking with me. He wondered how the werewolf had removed the ring without his knowledge. Why hadn't he noticed? He remembered the voice right before he lost consciousness.

  "Not yet. You're mine," it had said.

  A shiver ran though him. They'd always assumed demons couldn't control hosts until they manifested. Until then, they could only watch through their eyes. He remembered Shane on the drive. The demon talked through him. They'd been terribly wrong. Was it in control now?

  No. It was dark. The sun had gone down when it took me. It was night when it spoke though Shane. Malcolm checked the sky. Still morning. They sun hadn't yet crested the top of the courtyard wall. If he moved, he could get to Alpuente's before they opened.

  Brown spots speckled the curtains. Malcolm peered through a slender gap between them and saw a crumpled form lying face-down on a blood-smeared kitchen floor. Oh God.

  He'd seen werewolf victims before, their throats torn and bodies ripped open, allowing access to the tender insides. But…but he had done this. He had killed them.

  It, he corrected. It killed them.

  The thought didn't help. How many more victims were inside? Was anyone alive? How many more would die by him before he grew the balls to do what he had to do? He had to die. No. First, I have to tell the Order.

  Anger mounting, Malcolm headed back to the curtained French doors. He picked up a small clay bunny standing in a planter, its huge, upturned eyes shyly hopeful. With a hard throw, he smashed the figure through the plate window. It caught in the cream curtain and slid to the floor with a heavy thud.

  Careful not to step on broken glass, Malcolm pushed the curtain aside and stepped through. The sharp, unmistakable stink of entrails hit him, almost pushing Malcolm back. Arcs of drying blood splattered the wall and a blue ultrasuede chair. Beside it, the shredded corpse of a man, his featured lost to claw marks and hidden beneath red-caked hair, lay on the ground. Loops of mangled intestine spilled across the floor in dark puddles. Malcolm could see up into the man's chest cavity. Werewolves almost always ate the heart.

  Bloody footprints, paw-like but too long for any natural animal, stained the rug and shiny, pale tiles. Malcolm's eyes followed their path from the chair to the adjoining kitchen. It had leaped onto the back of a sofa, its claws tearing the fabric. One set of tracks led to the back door, their short stride and full print suggesting a simple walk. He turned, seeing bloody prints on the lock.

  The werewolf had locked the door then escaped out the upper floor into the courtyard intentionally, leaving him to scale glass naked or to find this house of horrors. It was fucking with him.

  Stomach churning at the scene laid out just for him, Malcolm walked into the kitchen. A woman, her right arm torn free, lay sprawled on the glossy tile; her blood had run down the grout, forming a grid-work away from the carnage. A steel butcher's knife lay among the gore and scattered shards of a broken plate. The woman's gnawed and fleshless arm lay discarded in the adjoining hall, the carpet matted in wet blood. He pictured the monster sitting there on its haunches chewing the limb like a dog with scraps. Malcolm's stomach lurched, and he dashed to the sink, nearly slipping in the sticky blood, and vomited what little remained in his stomach.

  He wiped his mouth and turned on the faucet, gargling and rinsing it out before drinking. Pink chunks swirled in the bottom of the stainless sink. Malcolm slapped a wall switch before him, and the disposal chewed and ground the bits away.

  Eyes teary with sick and hatred, he turned his head, seeing the faces of the family he'd eaten smiling out from a digital picture frame. A young couple, standing against a metal rail, the sun setting behind them on an ocean horizon. The picture changed. Now, they were posing with another couple around a table, late thirties it appeared, the men's features so similar it suggested relation. It changed again. A young boy grinning up from a pile of torn wrapping paper, a shiny cardboard box clutched to his chest.

  A cold dread seeped into his empty stomach, filling it like lead. The picture dissolved into a photograph of an older couple dressed in Sunday best. Malcolm turned to the refrigerator near him, its black surface buried beneath crayon drawings on colored paper.

  Not another child.

  The digital pic
ture slid aside to show a new photograph of the now dead mother and father posing with a sandy-haired boy, maybe five, and fat-cheeked baby in the mother's arms.

  Malcolm gripped the counter behind him, his knees nearly buckling under the weight inside him. He clenched his eyes. The picture's image still burned in his mind. Their smiles, their joy, gone.

  He drew a breath, counted to five, then released it. He needed to know. Malcolm followed the paw prints out into the hall, past the stripped arm, and up the stairs to the second floor. "Brian," read a plastic street sign on one of the doors. Clothes and brightly colored toys littered the floor. Malcolm winced as he stepped on a gray Lego.

  The nursery was empty as well.

  Maybe they weren't here. Maybe they were off at grandma and grandpa's, he hoped, remembering the old couple in the photograph.

  His tenuous hopes died as he entered the parents' room. The cracked closet door hung open, clothes and plastic hangers strewn about, soaking the blood from the red-stained carpet. They were inside. Most of them. The boy, Brian, wore shredded cartoon-print pajamas, his body nearly torn in half, mouth open, his face somehow almost completely clean save a pair of thick, dried drops beneath his left eye. The infant, whom he had hidden in the closet with as a monster ate their parents, was only pieces. A tiny, pale leg, broken off at the thigh, was the only part not gnawed and shredded.

  Malcolm's head swam. Staggering, he caught himself against the bed and closed his eyes. He was a monster. He needed to be stopped. The fallen butcher's knife in the kitchen came to mind. One quick motion, and he could finish what the terrified mother had tried.

  But the demon wouldn't die. Only Malcolm and the knowledge of what had happened to Hounacier. Malcolm wiped his mouth and nodded. He knew what he had to do.