Hunt: An Urban Faery Tale (The Faery Chronicles Book 1)

by Leslie Claire Walker

  Oscar left them alone. It took Kevin a couple of minutes to feel his feet on the floor. And Rude didn’t move an inch, either.

  Kevin cleared his throat. “What does ‘all bets are off’ mean?”

  “Imminent. Mortal. Danger.”

  Rude had to be kidding. But looking at him, Kevin could see he really wasn’t. “Jesus, dude. What kind of place is this?”

  “The kind where they grant wishes.”

  Wishes were good things, weren’t they?

  Rude held out his hand. “Give me the paper.”

  Unfolding it, they read the street and number written in red ink that reminded Kevin of blood. He didn’t recognize it.

  “It’s in the warehouse district downtown,” Rude said. And he didn’t look happy about it. In fact, he looked scared.

  Kevin had never seen him like that. Rude was fearless. At least, he was supposed to be.

  “What’s there, at this warehouse or whatever?” Kevin asked.

  “A girl. If we’re lucky.”

  What was so frightening about a girl? And what if they weren’t lucky? Did he want to ask? Rude didn’t exactly vibe forthcoming. His face had closed up tight. The Rude was Closed.

  Until he checked his watch. “What time does your dad go to bed?”

  The last couple of nights, who knew? “Probably by nine,” Kevin said. “Or at least he’ll be in his room by then.”

  “Then I’ll pick you up at nine. That’s cutting it close, but it’s better than if you can’t get out at all.”

  Kevin planned it all out in his head. The right timing. Go out the window or the front door? What would he say if he got caught coming or going?

  Rude tapped that watch. “It’s six now.”

  “I’m late.” His dad would be home by now, wondering where the hell he was, why there was no dinner on the table, why his son had disobeyed his law. And probably whether he’d be having another visit from the cops. “And I’m in deep shit.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  BUT HIS DAD HAD apparently come home, grabbed a six-pack out of the fridge, and gone to his room. No sound at all issued from inside—no TV, no music. Kevin waited for his dad to storm out. To let him have it.

  The kitchen clock tick-tocked. Someone drove by outside, the rumble of their engine fading to gone.

  Maybe his dad didn’t care about Kevin breaking the rules. And if his dad didn’t care, maybe he wouldn’t be all about grounding or whatever other punishment he had to have dreamed up over the last couple of days.

  Except his dad hadn’t talked to him in twenty-four hours. More silent treatment. It’d gone way past weird, all the way to worrying.

  Maybe something had happened to his dad. Maybe he was hurt?

  Kevin walked down the hall to his father’s room. He balled up his fist, ready to knock, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He already had punishment coming to him. What kind of lame-ass brought that on himself? Better to leave it alone. To leave his dad alone. If his dad was too pissed to talk to him, wait until the anger passed. Avoid. Thank the powers that be for his luck, not having to deal with his dad tonight. Do his thing and be ready to jam when Rude pulled up.

  But he couldn’t bring himself to walk away, either, because something was definitely wrong. More than what his eyes and ears told him, he felt it in his gut. A great big ball of—what?—fear? He’d been afraid for his dad before, not that he’d told anyone. Because, his dad? Should be the grown-up, on top of stuff, in charge. The one who if you screwed up too bad would fix the problem. Dads did that. His tried, when he could. And that was something. Not enough, but something.

  He’d never told a soul, not even Scott. Who would understand? Nobody, that was who.

  He listened outside the bedroom door for what felt like forever. Finally, he heard the hiss of the shower in the master bath.

  Kevin went to his room, but left the door open so he could keep an eye out. He finished his Grendel essay. He couldn’t concentrate on the Stat homework, all of the problems on page thirty-eight. He microwaved a frozen pizza. That helped some. Still, he only got halfway through the math before Rude texted him to say he’d be by in five.

  Kevin considered sticking with his original plan and going out the window. But it seemed stupid to sneak out for no reason. His dad wouldn’t know the difference.

  He scribbled an excuse and left it in plain view on his desk, just in case his dad came out and found him gone. Better to know where Kevin had gone and when he figured on being back. He might be in the worst trouble of his life when he got home, but at least there’d be no worst-case imagining or calling of friends’ parents or dialing hospital emergency rooms.

  He set the timer on his desk lamp, the one they’d always used when his mom had been alive and they went out of town. If it could fool a burglar into thinking the house was occupied, then it ought to fool his dad.

  If his father heard his footfalls in the hallway or the ring of him pulling his house keys off the brass holder by the front door or the squeal of the hinges, he gave no sign.

  Rude’s Explorer hulked in the driveway, casting a big shadow in the glow of the streetlamp. The big guy had killed the headlights, but the engine made plenty of noise. Enough to draw a dad out of the house to ask his grounded kid where the hell he thought he was going.

  Nothing like that happened.

  Kevin climbed in, into a heavy-metal wall of sound, and slammed the door as loud as he could.

  Still no sign of his dad.

  “Something wrong?” Rude asked.

  Yeah—everything. But he shook his head. His dad would be there to deal with when he got home. Until then, he had his own problems to handle.

  The drive into downtown took up half an hour. The freeway dumped them into the deserted business district, into claustrophobia-inducing steel and glass and concrete canyons. Far down the way, the blue-neon-lit Ferris wheel beckoned, promising aquariums and restaurants and clubs. That was where all the people would be. There, and across the way at the fancy theaters where the ballet and the symphony played.

  They turned away from all that, toward the deserted baseball stadium and the warehouses, driving one-way roads narrowed with orange construction barrels. They passed a landscaped park with a sign that said something about UNDER CONSTRUCTION / OPENING NEXT SPRING, and parking lots with knee-high weeds and potholed pavement.

  Kevin didn’t like it. Then again, what had he expected? That shady Oscar would send them to a sunshiny place?

  Rude turned onto a dead-end street skinny enough to be an alley, warehouses with boarded windows growing up three stories on either side. The address they’d been looking for? Spray-painted in fluorescent orange on the last building. All dark, no sign of life that Kevin could see.

  Not so with the rusted yellow school bus that rested in front of it. Faint light shone inside the thing’s windows and open door.

  “Oscar sent us to a school bus?” Kevin asked.

  Rude killed the radio and the ignition. He lit up a smoke with trembling fingers. “It’s a very special bus, dude.”

  And now he felt like he’d been pulled into a very special episode of RUDE’S BEEN HERE BEFORE.

  “It might take us a while to get inside,” Rude said.

  “The door is open, man.”

  Rude laughed and hopped out. “C’mon.”

  Kevin did. “Who’s the girl you mentioned earlier?”

  “I couldn’t tell you about her if I wanted to, Kev.”

  Great. An indescribable girl.

  In the shadow of the warehouses, Kevin saw hardly any stars, fewer even than at home. The red light of a passing plane winked overhead. A breeze kicked up, sweeping a crumpled newspaper in the gutters.

  Their shoes crunched on broken beer bottles. The temperature dropped the closer they drew to the bus. The cold knifed through his clothes, turned his skin to gooseflesh.

  Rude stopped before he got to the door. “Oscar sent us,” he called.

  No one answ
ered.

  Kevin sidled up to him and kept his voice low. Not sure why; but it seemed like he ought to stay quiet. “You sure anyone’s home? It’s early, but maybe they took off already.”

  “No,” Rude said. “Just wait.”

  A wind blew again—this time from inside the bus. The hairs on Kevin’s arms stood up like antennae.

  “That’s our cue,” Rude said.

  A well and truly freaked-out cue. “Whatever you say.”

  Rude climbed the steps. Kevin half-expected him to get struck by lightning or vanish into thin air. Why would he think that?

  Any case, nothing bad happened. Rude glanced over his shoulder. “It’s all right.”

  Kevin didn’t wait to be told twice. His life may have taken a dumpster dive in the last couple of days with people talking about him behind his back, but whatever they called him, it wouldn’t be chickenshit.

  He shouldn’t have worried. He’d been right—no one home. Plus, the occupants had to be hippies. Or else hippies had exploded all over the inside of the bus.

  The sweet scents of pot and patchouli incense permeated the whole place. Tiny, tinkling wind chimes hung near the windows. Every available ceiling space had been papered with black-light posters, so many he couldn’t make out the images on them. Along the edges of the center aisle, candles burned in deep glass jars, their glowing wicks almost drowned in melted wax.

  Bicycle handlebars and chains and pedals lay strewn on the ripped vinyl bench seats. Except on every third seat, where pillows and blankets had been gathered into piles to protect unframed oil paintings on stretched canvases. Good paintings, as far as Kevin could tell.

  The longer they stood there, the thicker the air got. And charged. With electricity. The kind that shocked. Or if it got strong enough, the kind that could do some damage. It wasn’t enough that the hair on his arms stood up. All the hair on his head did, too. Rude got lucky, having that buzz cut.

  Rude cocked his head, listening. To what?

  “She wants a song,” Rude said.

  “She who?”

  “The one who lives here. They want offerings, or we have to leave.”

  Rude launched into a rousing, off-key version of “Every Rose Has Its Thorn.” Which Kevin couldn’t believe Rude even knew. Kevin had never heard him sing before, and he felt pretty sure he never wanted to again. The whole thing couldn’t end fast enough.

  When it did, the quality of the air had changed. He could breathe better. He didn’t feel like he might be electrocuted any minute.

  And there was a girl at the back of the bus. A girl with actual attached gossamer wings.

  CHAPTER NINE

  SHAGGY RED HAIR STREAKED with purple framed the porcelain skin of her face. Her blue eyes glinted with—Kevin could only call it power, no matter how fantasy-movie that sounded.

  She wore a sleeveless, gauzy black dress that had been shredded on the bottom. As she walked toward them, Kevin could see a lot of leg and a pair of scuffed black combat boots. Her dress dragged through the burning candles, but it didn’t catch fire. And those wings? They looked like they belonged to someone more delicate, more angelic. He could see the muscles in them move, the blood coursing rhythmically in their veins.

  He stared. He couldn’t think of anything else to do.

  She didn’t return his gaze, though. She only had eyes for Rude.

  “What do you want?” she asked, in a voice that raked through Kevin like fingernails on a chalkboard. Definitely not delicate.

  Rude took a deep breath. “Your help.”

  “How obvious,” she said. “Do you want a spell cast? Information? A curse? Do tell.”

  A curse? Kevin tried to step back, to put a little more distance between himself and the magic curser, but his feet wouldn’t move right.

  Rude crooked a thumb in his direction. “It’s for him.”

  “But you made the offering, Rudolph Diamond Davies III.”

  “I want you to help him,” Rude repeated.

  “You know it doesn’t work that way,” she said.

  The conversation reminded Kevin of the things Oscar said back at the restaurant about Rude paying a price for breaking the rules. As in, his friend argued with this girl about paying another price. For him. Nothing wrong with helping out a friend, but this didn’t feel right. He didn’t want someone else paying his way.

  “What way does it work?” Kevin asked.

  The girl turned to him then, and he wished he’d zipped his lip. The full force of her gaze burned him. And not in a good way. Also, his eyes had to be broken, because he could swear that hers were ringed in red. People didn’t have red eyes. Supernatural-movie bad guys, maybe.

  “Do you want to bargain for yourself, Kevin Xavier Landon?” she asked.

  In two seconds, she ruined all the work he’d done since kindergarten to make his friends believe he didn’t have a middle name. Also, it didn’t help that he blushed. He couldn’t help himself.

  “Xavier?” Rude whispered.

  “Shut up.”

  The girl waited for an answer.

  Be careful, Rude thought.

  Kevin heard that loud and clear. Oscar’s words scrolled across his mind, that the ability to hear thoughts went hand in hand with imminent mortal danger.

  And on the heels of those verbal gems, the realization that Oscar hadn’t told him the thing that mattered most. He hadn’t said anything about how to interpret what he heard.

  Rude wanted him to watch himself. That meant whatever Kevin decided to do—or not—could get one or both of them killed. Wasn’t that sweet?

  He had a very strong urge to bolt out of there. He might’ve, except he still couldn’t make his feet move. And leaving? That would be a decision, too. Wrong or right?

  He needed more information.

  “What does ‘bargain’ mean?” he croaked, then cleared his throat.

  “If you break it, you die,” the girl said.

  Which Kevin found helpful. Down to brass tacks, direct was the best way to have a conversation. “I tell you what I want, and then you tell me what I need to do to get it, right?”

  She shook her head. “We deal first. Then we work together as friends.”

  Rude pleaded, Please be careful, man.

  Kevin wished he could shut that thought and the sound of it out of his brain. Rude, begging. It threatened to leech away what little confidence he could summon.

  It hit him that Rude could’ve said something out loud. He could’ve warned Kevin off like that, or changed the subject, or called the whole thing off. It looked like he was trying to, only his lips just quivered instead of forming words. The girl had done something to him—just like she’d made it so Kevin couldn’t run.

  He forced himself to keep on talking. Hopefully, he would ask the right questions and he’d get the answers he needed. “Why?”

  “To decide whether I’ll be working with you at all, I have to know you.”

  “And I’ll know something about you,” he said. “An even trade.”

  Dude! Rude thought so hard, it seared Kevin’s head.

  He closed his eyes a half-second, steadied himself.

  “As you wish,” the girl said, in a tone that told Kevin he’d screwed up big-time. She had one over on him, and he was too stupid to understand what he’d given up.

  She can’t lie, Rude thought. And she can tell if you’re lying.

  Kevin gave a silent prayer of thanks for that piece of info. “You first,” he said to the girl.

  She nodded. “One night of your life. It need not be this night.”

  In human time, Rude thought.

  Kevin went with the flow because it sounded good. “In human time,” he said.

  The girl flashed him a very human smile. “All right. With that condition, do you agree?”

  “No,” he said. “What do you want it for?”

  “I won’t hurt you.”

  That made him feel like a goddamned wuss. “I get to say what I want i
n return first. That’s how trading’s done.”

  “Not here,” she said. “I’ll give you what I deem fit. It’s always equitable.”

  If Rude was right and she couldn’t lie, then he would take that at face value. “What do you deem fit?”

  She moved toward him, chilling the space to freezing as she went. Kevin’s breath frosted the air. But hers didn’t. She didn’t appear to breathe at all.

  She leaned into him and opened a mouth full of too-sharp teeth and he swore to God she was going to take a bite out of him.

  But she spoke in his ear instead. For him alone to hear.

  “My name is Simone,” she said.

  Just like the rocker girl who was supposedly murdered at Rude’s party. Simone, not exactly a popular name.

  “You can’t say my name aloud in front of any other living being,” she said.

  “Not even Rude?” Even though he stood only a foot away. He might even have heard what she said. His hearing could be good enough. It could happen.

  She shook her head.

  “Not even in an emergency?”

  “Not even then,” she said. “It’s strictly between you and me. And when you call me, I’ll show. That’s guaranteed.”

  And that was worth what? “That’s all?”

  “That’s the deal, Kevin Xavier Landon.” She raised her left arm and leaned against the metal partition behind the driver’s seat. She had a tattoo there, a red and blue sparrow. And a banner in black and gray that said ROCK ‘N ROLL FOREVER.

  What kind of supernatural creature had tattoos like that? Maybe a singer in a rock band.

  He opened his mouth to get a bigger bang for his buck. To ask her for her full name, and the other question he’d come here with, but he never got the chance.

  The girl and her ink and the bus grayed out. Kevin tipped over. He couldn’t even move a finger, much less reach out and stop his fall.

  He expected to hit the floor. But he didn’t. He fell and kept on falling.

  When he came to, he and Rude lay in the street beside the car. The bus was gone.