by Kelly Meding
Chapter Fifteen
51:50
We left Alex’s car by the train tracks. I had no intention of returning to the abandoned station, and by now the make and plate had been given out to every cop in the city with a working radio. Isleen led us to her stashed vehicle—late-model sports car with tinted windows. It looked like something a rich lawyer would drive.
She surprised me by walking across the weedy parking lot without any protection—no hat or gloves or even an umbrella. Vampires are highly allergic to direct sunlight. They burn like paper under a blowtorch—sizzling skin, smoke and odor, and mighty pain.
Yet Isleen walked with confidence radiating from her pale, lithe body. I kept pace, waiting for her to explode in a fiery ball under the harsh glare of the afternoon sun. Nothing, not even a flinch of discomfort. Next to me, Alex shot curious glances my way, but didn’t ask. I was wondering the same thing.
Alex barely fit in the tiny sports car’s backseat; it was designed more for looks than function. I scooted forward as far as my knees allowed. Isleen reached forward and turned the key in the ignition. Up close, I noticed the shimmer on her skin. Not sunscreen—there wasn’t an SPF high enough to protect her particular skin type. Something else.
“Where?” I asked.
“South,” she said. “There is a Sanctuary. Few know of it. It will be safe enough to let our guard down.”
Says you. There were protected places in the city—buildings or just rooms considered sacred by Dregs. Magical hotspots, places where the magic of their world below (or above, or next to) bled into ours, sort of like hot springs. They were the invisible sources of the Fey’s power and well guarded by them—and apparently, also by vampires. Places where the Gifted were born. Similar to churches or cathedrals; but very few of Dreg-kind respected human faith.
The major difference was that the Dregs didn’t hang signs on their Sanctuaries, advertising their presence. For all I knew, hotel room 29 at the Holiday Inn Express could be one.
I rarely ventured into this part of the city. South of the East Side, but still on the opposite riverbank from Uptown, it was a blend of low-rent motels, abandoned storage facilities, car dealerships, and factories. The city seemed grayer there, less bright. Full of secrets in a way that even Mercy’s Lot could not challenge. The side streets were quiet for mid day and we zipped past block after block, moving farther south. We didn’t speak. The radio stayed off.
Isleen turned left at a blinking light, taking us down a road with a self-storage center on one side of the street and a used-car lot advertising “Very Clean” cars on the other.
A shadow bolted out of the used-car lot, swifter than man or beast had any right to move, on a collision course with our car. Isleen yanked the wheel. I saw black fur and razor teeth an instant before the hound slammed into my door. Metal groaned. Glass crackled. Tires squealed as the car skidded sideways.
I banged into Isleen’s shoulder. She kept control of the car, depressed the gas pedal, and we shot forward. The engine roared. So did the hound tracking us. I righted myself in what space I had. Half the door was smashed in, uncomfortably close.
“Evy?” Alex asked.
“I’m okay.”
I twisted around in the bucket seat. The hound was trailing us, seeming unfazed by its headlong tumble into solid steel. It kept pace with its four muscled legs, each springing leap taking it as far as we could drive in the same span of time. And it was gaining.
“How did it track us in a car?” I asked.
“It was following me,” Isleen said. “I killed another this morning. I may have failed to properly wash its kin’s blood from my tires.”
“You drove over it?”
“Through it, actually.” The corners of her mouth quirked. It was almost a smile. “Hold on.”
She said it too late and yanked the wheel hard left. I slammed shoulderfirst into the impacted door. Needles of pain danced up my arm, and I cried out. My back hit the dash. I slipped and found myself in the uncomfortable position of being stuck ass-down on the floor, with my feet in the air.
“Apologies,” Isleen said.
“Is it still gaining?” I asked.
Alex peered out the rear window. “Yeah. What the hell is it?”
“No idea,” I said, tugging myself up. No small feat, given the zigzagging pattern Isleen was making through traffic. And I couldn’t imagine what passersby thought of the animal chasing our car down the street.
“It is a vampire and goblin crossbreed,” Isleen explained. Her tone remained even, without a hint of the panic that was singeing my nerves at the very idea of such a combination. “The two species are not sexually compatible, but with the advent of genetic cloning, many things are possible.”
“There’s something else in there, too. I know goblins run faster on all fours, but this thing’s got some beast in it.”
“It is possible, but I do not know its exact origin, or how many more exist.”
“Wyatt and I killed one, so that’s at least three,” I said, climbing back to a semisitting position on the front seat. “The miracle of modern science.”
“ ‘A malady of modern science’ is a more appropriate euphemism.”
I couldn’t argue with that. “Got any weapons?”
“In the glove compartment.”
Naturally. I popped open the dash, expecting the customary assortment of registration papers, napkins, trash, maybe a parking ticket or two. Instead I was presented with a slim leather case containing the registration and insurance cards, and nothing else. I felt along the edge of the lining until my nails caught. I ripped it away and found three Glocks.
“Center weapon,” Isleen said. “The bullets should be able to pierce the hound’s hide.”
The gun was too heavy in my hand—a foreign object I hated using. I flicked off the safety. One centered kick popped out the fractured door window, and we left it behind on the street. Isleen made another sharp turn. I held on to the door handle this time and managed to keep my bearings.
My head, shoulders, and arms went out the window. Air blasted my hair in front of my face, creating a curtain of brown that was difficult to see through. Missing my old, short hairstyle, I took aim at the snarling hound and fired.
The bullet struck its left foreleg. Murky blood and flesh exploded from the wound. The hound wailed its pain and fury, drawing back thin lips and fixing its wild eyes on me. I aimed for those eyes. Squeezed the trigger. The car hit a pothole and bounced, and the shot went wild. My ribs slammed against the door.
“Goddamnit,” I said.
“Apologies,” Isleen replied.
From Alex, I got, “Jesus, Evy, be careful.”
Third bullet hit the same foreleg, a few inches higher. Blood trailed in a slick stream, but didn’t slow it down. Give me a blade and an open field any day. Guns were just a pain in the ass.
“Stop missing,” Isleen said.
“Would you like to do this?” I tried to get another bead on my target. The damn thing was learning, weaving now, making sure I couldn’t get him in my sights. “Shit.”
Isleen snorted—a surprising sound from her. “Hold on to something.”
The car surged forward. I clutched the smashed door so I didn’t fall out the window. We flew through an intersection to the tune of honking horns and screams. The hound leapt neatly over the hood of a braking sedan, hit the pavement, and was promptly struck head-on by a careening van. The van came to a sudden halt, but the hound’s body rolled. It came to rest against a street sign on the far curb.
An ounce of hope was quickly shredded as the hound crawled back to its feet, seemingly unfazed by its collision. It continued to track us, oblivious to the shrieking pedestrians. Every scream echoed in my ears. It was the most blatant display by a Dreg I’d ever seen. No way the brass could explain this one away.
Of course, I’d said that about the gremlin strike and been wrong.
“Didn’t work,” I said to Isleen. “Got any more ideas
?”
“Just one.”
Brakes squealed. She spun the car, turning my side to face the street we’d just come down. I used the momentum to leap through the window. I tucked my head down and struck the pavement on my left shoulder, followed through with the roll, and came up unsteadily on my knees. Ungraceful by my standards, but probably the most acrobatic thing Chalice’s body had ever managed.
The world spun, but I steadied fast. The odors of burnt rubber and oil stung my nostrils, sharp and cloying and immediate. Screams faded into the distance. My vision tunneled, focusing only on the rampaging hound, leaving bloody prints everywhere it stepped. I raised the gun, using my left arm to steady it. A car horn honked somewhere, muffled and unimportant.
Down the sight of the revolver, I gazed at the hound. At its chest and hair, to the point where its heart should reside. Each step forward widened the target, but I didn’t need a large field. I had him. I felt it. I squeezed the trigger.
A dark blur on a bicycle toppled over, shrieking in pain.
I screamed. The hound leapt over the flailing biker and landed in a crouch, ready to spring. Epithets poured from my mouth, streaming faster than I could properly articulate, my fury dripping out with each syllable. The hound pounced, its massive body on a collision course with mine. I tucked and rolled without waiting, counting on the hound’s speed to carry its mass over me. Heavy feet hit the pavement. I came up and fired.
The back of the hound’s head exploded, spattering the side of the car with bone and hair and gore. Its body jerked as it fell, still fighting out of instinct even though its brain was gone. It twitched once, twice, then lay still.
“Evangeline, we must go!” Isleen shouted from the car’s interior.
Her commanding voice snapped me back. I stood, fist tight around the gun. Onlookers stared from the safety of sidewalk benches and parked cars, wide-eyed and openmouthed. Some were on their cell phones. No one made a move to help the young man on the bike, who clutched his bleeding thigh with both hands.
I’d shot an innocent.
As a Hunter, it was my duty to protect Joe Citizen. Innocent bystanders were not to become victims of the Dregs and their violence. Yet I had brought that violence on someone by my own hands. I expected revulsion, but felt only pity. Pity that, while shot and in pain, this man would never know the extent of what had happened that day. Getting shot sucked, but being ripped to shreds by a rampaging hound from Hell was a fate far worse.
“Someone call an ambulance,” I said, even as I heard the first faint sounds of sirens.
“Evangeline!”
“Evy, come on!”
Feet first, I slipped back into the car and into a spattering of dark blood. It was on the dash and the edge of the seat, the odor almost more than I could bear. Isleen sped away. I let myself fall back against the seat, still clutching the gun. The muzzle was hot; it scorched my chest. I didn’t care. The heat felt good. The sirens faded.
Alex squeezed his broad shoulders between the seats. Worry clouded his gentle eyes. He touched my cheek, featherlight. Affectionate. “You okay?” he asked.
“No.”
He took quick visual stock and seemed to realize I didn’t mean physically. I wasn’t injured. I just wasn’t okay, either.
“You didn’t shoot that man on purpose,” he said.
“Doesn’t matter. I still shot him.”
“It was an unfortunate accident,” Isleen said. “One you cannot afford to dwell on if you are to complete the task ahead. Much depends on our success. There will be time for self-pity at a later date.”
“For you, maybe.”
Alex winced. Isleen only tightened her fingers around the steering wheel. The leather cover creaked.
I recognized our new direction. She made another turn. A block away stood the fading, deteriorating skeleton of the Capital City Mall. Abandoned fifteen years ago when the new mall opened uptown in Briar’s Ridge, Capital City had slowly rotted away. The vast parking lot was cracked and overgrown with grass and weeds. Time chipped away at the paint and tile walls, mottled glass doors, and rusted delivery bays. Graffiti adorned surfaces no longer repainted.
It was shaped like a U, with the main entrance on the front curve and anchored on both ends by former department stores. Isleen drove across the rear parking lot, and we entered the interior of the canyon, straight across pavement that had once been the patio of a diner, and into a wall.
At least, I thought it was a wall.
But it turned out to be an impressive illusion of a wall, because we drove right through it—down the mosaic tile corridor, past a row of boarded-up storefronts, and straight to the center of the mall. Skylights illuminated a dry fountain that hadn’t run in years. Empty beds surrounded it, devoid of soil and no longer sustaining the dense foliage of yesteryear. It smelled of dust, dry and lonely, and something else I couldn’t place. Something faint, hinting at power. It buzzed in the air, a gentle caress from an invisible hand. I felt the energy of Isleen’s Sanctuary.
Alex and I climbed out on the driver’s side. I’d had my fill of going in and out of car windows. My sneakers squeaked on the floor and echoed harshly in the oppressive silence. We followed Isleen past abandoned kiosks, benches that hadn’t held someone’s weight in over a decade, and stores long boarded up and forgotten.
The odor of the hound’s blood followed us, absorbed in my clothes. I’d have to change soon or be stuck with the offending stench—not something I cared to live with. I’d been covered with it twice in twenty-four hours.
“Do you feel it, Evangeline?” Isleen asked. Somehow, her voice did not echo. It simply hung in the air.
“What should I be feeling?” I replied, even though I did feel it. There, yet intangible, like static electricity.
“You’ll know.”
“If it helps,” Alex said quietly, “I don’t feel anything.”
“Nor should you,” Isleen said.
He shrugged it off, taking no offense at the dig. The shell shock seemed to have worn off a bit, and he was taking in his surroundings, absorbing salient details, remembering. I reached out and curled my fin-gers around his. He squeezed back.
Isleen turned down a narrow service corridor, past a bank of pay phones that advertised local calls for a dime. A few more yards down, she stopped in front of a veneered door. I stared at the blue plaque pasted to the wall next to it.
“Are you serious?” I asked. “This is the Sanctuary?”
She nodded.
Alex blanched. “The women’s bathroom?”
“We do not choose the locations,” Isleen said. “However, once the Breaks are discovered, we do what we can to protect them. Why do you think this mall was rendered inoperable and closed down?”
“Bad Chinese at the food court?” I said.
A flutter of her eyelids was the closest Isleen got to rolling her eyes at me. She pushed the door open. I swallowed before following her inside, prepared for an onslaught of horrible smells and disgusting sights—rotting waste and stained floors, stale urine and broken mirrors.
Instead, the faintest hint of incense, tangy and bitter, tingled my nostrils. Candles adorned the polished sinks and counters, their light reflected by the spotless mirrors. Plush, forest green carpet covered the floor. The stalls had been removed. Three toilets were covered and resembled comfortable side chairs. The air was warm, but not oppressive. It felt inviting, almost invigorating. All-encompassing. My entire body tingled. I tried to ignore it, to dim the sensation lest I fly apart.
“I’ve never felt anything like it before,” I said.
“This is the fanciest bathroom I’ve ever seen,” Alex blurted out.
“It is a Sanctuary,” Isleen said. Her voice adopted a sharp edge, revealing her protectiveness of the place. “It is no longer meant for its original purpose.”
Alex held up his hands in surrender. “I meant no disrespect.”
“I risk much by bringing you both here. The wrong person could do great
damage with the location of a Break. Irreparable damage—”
“We aren’t telling anyone, I swear,” I said to stave off her speech. I knew the risks. I also knew I didn’t trust anyone outside of that room, except for Wyatt. I sort of still trusted Rufus, but that could swing either way. It all depended on his phone call at dusk. Still nearly two hours away.
“A Mo’n Rath is a private ritual,” Isleen said. “Do you wish your friend present?”
“I trust him.”
Under Isleen’s direction, I lay on my back in the middle of the plush carpet, arms at my sides, toes pointed up. The fibers were soft and smelled faintly of dust. Isleen knelt at my head. Cool fingers massaged my temples in gentle circles. Tension fled my body, replaced by relaxation and a vague sense of safety tempered by intangible power. I closed my eyes.
She placed her palms over my cheeks, thumbs still on my temples, skin unnaturally cool. She spoke words that I didn’t know. They sounded vaguely Latin, peppered with garbled nonsense. My mind began to wander, and rather than fight, I let it. I was both there and elsewhere, drifting along like a leaf on the wind. Back through recent memory: the car chase, interrogating Rufus, my first meeting with Alex. Into impenetrable darkness that seemed to last forever.
Until it spit me back out into dim lamplight.
And Wyatt’s warm, comforting embrace.
Chapter Sixteen
May 14th
Lights from the street cut intricate patterns across the thread bare carpet of the motel room, shifting from red to green to blue and back again, all in time with flashing neon signs. I cannot sleep. Too many thoughts plague me. Fear of what lies ahead, affection for the man next to me, uncertainty of our futures.
Wyatt’s arms tighten around my middle. I tense, but he does not wake. He is dreaming, muttering. It may be a nightmare, but I allow him to sleep. If he wakes, he may want to talk. I don’t. I have committed a grave error by sleeping with him. I gave him an attachment, and Handlers cannot function if they are too attached to their Triads. It is their job to order us into dangerous situations. Into certain death, if need be.