Hunted

by S W Vaughn

  Zane had managed to prevent the anxious humans from entering this room again. Still, the scene would have to be contained. It would take him the better part of a day to obliterate the evidence. He'd have to stop the local police from responding to the call placed minutes earlier by a woman who cleaned rooms for the motel. Alter the police logs and the dispatch records. Modify the memories of every motel staff member along with any friend or family member they might have contacted. Purge the room itself to prevent human forensics experts from discovering anything.

  Fire was the cleanest, most efficient method of purging evidence. He would begin with that and work his way through the rest.

  When he eventually caught up with Lorin, she would regret causing him so many problems. And pay for her sins with her life.

  * * * *

  After breakfast, Megan announced her intention to sleep for a while. The ordeal of the morning had exhausted her. She curled up across the aisle, and succumbed to sleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow.

  Grace envied her. Even before she'd been stricken with her bizarre gifts, she'd never been able to rest easily. And being on the run certainly hadn't improved her ability to relax.

  She settled in with the goal of e-mailing a message to Comp. It would take a bit of finesse to get her point across, but she suspected he'd understand. She could send him the numbers from one of the checks easily enough for payment. Before she'd hauled her laptop out, a pleasant heaviness settled over her. Maybe a quick nap would help clarify what she wanted to know and how to ask for it.

  She reclined the seat, closed her eyes. And dreamed.

  The forest glittered with light. Not the rich gold of the sun, but a blazing and silvered white that caught each leaf and blade of grass in sharp definition. Grace shielded her eyes with a hand and made out the ravine a few tantalizing yards ahead. The brilliance hanging in the air seemed to flow up and out from the chasm, a phantom ocean swallowing the land to infect everything with luminescence.

  She stepped forward. The ravine retreated. Frustration welled inside her. She crouched and leapt ahead, but the distance remained the same. Why was she forbidden this place? What had she done to be denied the satisfaction, the peace awaiting her there?

  As though responding to her thoughts, the quality of the light flooding from it changed. It thickened, darkened, became translucent mercury. A wave of the stuff arched above the ravine wall. It crested and broke and washed over her where she stood.

  Unspeakable anguish consumed her body, robbing any breath she might have used to scream. Something filled her head—not sound, but the idea of sound; a drawn and plaintive suggestion of keening that echoed the agony she felt. At last the light ebbed, leaving her unscathed and bereft.

  Run.

  A male voice, a broken and whispered plea. Almost familiar. Father? she thought despite the certainty she'd never heard her father speak.

  Run. Now.

  Grace pivoted and sprinted away from the ravine. Half blind with panic, she crashed through the woods, careening from tree trunks and catching her clothing on stiff branches. A powerful presence ate ground behind her and gained feet for every inch she progressed. Ghost fingers brushed the back of her neck. She jumped. Her upward momentum carried her above the trees until the forest became a green patchwork below. A gleaming silver crack marked the ravine like an alien wound. Grace stopped, mesmerized at the sight.

  And began to fall.

  She woke abruptly on the train. Her stomach performed a dizzying swoop and her throat clenched on a jagged intake of breath. She exhaled forcibly. Tremors set in.

  What the hell was that?

  Grace glanced across the aisle. Megan slept on, oblivious to the world. Just a dream. It had to have been or Megan would have felt it ... wouldn't she? But they'd already determined their abilities weren't quite the same. And it hadn't felt like a dream.

  She sat up slowly. So much for rested clarity. She stood and wavered her way to the bathroom, locked herself in, and stooped over the tiny sink to splash cool water on her face. A habitual glance in the mirror confirmed her contacts were still in place. She grabbed for a paper towel, stopped. Stared.

  A smear of silver liquid gleamed on her skin along her collarbone. Right where she'd felt the touch of fingers in her dream.

  Horrified, she scrubbed at the mark. She succeeded only in smearing it further. The stuff acted like blood, tacky and drying to flakes when it thinned. She wet the towel and wiped at the glittering substance with deliberation. It came off clean. She crumpled the sodden brown paper, started to throw it away, and reconsidered. Instinct demanded that she hold on to it, if only as proof to herself that she wasn't completely insane. She straightened the towel, folded the silver blotches inside and stuck it in her pocket.

  A shudder worked through her as she returned to her seat. Clear or not, she decided to e-mail Comp right away. If there was any chance the woman chasing her was involved with SARET, she had to know. Something waited for her, and whoever she—or it—was, wanted her dead.

  She kept the message simple. A link to the SARET website and three brief statements: Need the 5 W's. Can you? How much? She sent it off and started some digging of her own.

  * * * *

  When the train stopped in Denver around dinnertime for a thirty-minute breather, Grace half expected to find the witch waiting for her. It was more likely she'd turn up in Chicago, but a little extra caution didn't hurt. She saw no sign of the woman or her monster.

  More than herself, she feared for Megan. Would the woman be able to tell that the girl had become whatever Grace was? And what could they do about it?

  "Oh, man. Does it ever feel good to stretch out."

  Beside her, Megan folded her fingers together and thrust her arms over her head. They stood in the station's main concourse. A handful of kiosks hocking merchandise that varied from tee shirts and jewelry to posters and cheap novelties dotted the floor, and a few restaurants were spaced along the borders of the open area. Any of them would be better than train food.

  "Yeah. Feel like I've been sitting in a movie theater for ten hours.” Grace fingered the cash in her pocket. “You hungry?"

  "Starving. Subs?"

  "Perfect.” You read my mind.

  Ha, ha. Megan smirked. “Think we've got enough time to wait for mozzarella sticks too?"

  "Sure.” Grace smiled. They'd been practicing their silent communication all day on the train and Megan had improved quickly. She didn't have any luck with electronics though. Grace only hoped she didn't start flying. That would be tough to hide.

  They headed for a pizza and sub shop on the left side of the concourse. Megan slowed as they approached a lone booth with a dazzling display of sterling silver jewelry and stopped in front of one of the glass cases. “Whoa. Check this out."

  Grace glanced at the case. An array of weapons lay on a red velvet spread: ornamental daggers, functional switchblades and stilettos, brass knuckles. Torch-style cigarette lighters crafted into tiny guns, grenades, and even a few dragons marched down the right-hand side. The lighters had caught Megan's attention—but the blades held Grace's interest. She still wasn't convinced the people hunting her were anything more than people like her. And if she cut them, they would bleed. Armed, she and Megan might stand a chance.

  The stall owner, an old man with leathered skin, gray-white hair and a bandana twisted around his head, noticed them and hobbled over from the other side of the display with stern features. “Choo wan’ sometin'? Choo gels gotta pay fer dis stuff, hey.” His toothless mouth garbled his already accented words.

  Megan bristled, but Grace put a hand on her arm. He's been robbed before. It's nothing personal. She smiled and produced a fifty, pointed to a pair of black-handled stilettos with silver accents. “Are those spring-loaded?"

  "Neh. Gravity. Choo know loaded, is not legal. I got legal here."

  "All right. Guess we'll look somewhere else.” Grace started to replace the bill. She knew the stal
l owner was lying, but he was still debating whether he wanted the money more than he wanted to risk a bit of harassment from the cops.

  "Not loaded. A-seest. I got spring a-seest. Legal. Tiss one here.” He pointed under the glass to a polished knife with a blood-red swirled marble handle.

  "Spring assist?"

  "Yeh. A-seest. Means it got safety. You wan’ it, forty dollar."

  Grace glanced at Megan. “Do you have two of them?"

  Megan frowned. What are you doing?

  I'll tell you later.

  "I got tree, four. Two, I give discount. Sixty dollar."

  "All right. We'll take two. And one of those lighters.” She inclined her head toward the case and caught Megan's puzzled gaze. “Which one did you like?"

  Megan grinned. “The blue dragon.” You rock. Thank you!

  Can't take a trip without a souvenir. Grace watched the stall owner place a flat white paper bag on the display case and slide a hand inside to open it. He bent and came up with two slender boxes, bearing Chinese or Taiwanese writing and photographs of the red knife. His movements were slow and precise, and it took him nearly five minutes to get the knives and the lighter into the bag. “Semty five dollar, all,” he said.

  Grace separated one of the hundreds from the folded stack in her pocket and handed it to him. “Keep the change,” she told him. “We're in a hurry. And thanks."

  "Neh. I got legal. You take change.” He turned toward the cash register with the speed of an eroding rock.

  "No, really. Keep it."

  The stall owner hesitated. “You take bonus, den. Gift."

  Before Grace could protest, he turned toward the back of the stall. He returned quickly with a small object wrapped in worn silk. “Gift for you. Buddha. Brink you luck.” The old man flashed a gummy smile. “You like, gel. He pretty Buddha."

  "Thank you.” Grace accepted the bundle and unfolded the wrap a bit. Something silver gleamed inside the cloth. She decided to look later.

  "Yeh. Tanks.” The stall owner shuffled over to glare at a thirty-something yuppie looking at the necklaces hanging on the opposite side of the booth.

  "Too weird,” Megan muttered.

  "I'll say.” Grace slipped the silk-wrapped figure into her bag. “We've got just enough time for a smoke, if we grab something to eat on the train instead.” We need to talk.

  "Okay. I can deal with another burger."

  They made their way out to the platform and selected an isolated pillar to stand by. Grace handed Megan the lighter, then one of the knife boxes. “Have you ever stabbed anyone?"

  "Uh, no."

  "Me neither. Let's hope we don't have to.” Grace extracted the other box, crumpled the bag, and glanced around the pillar. No one paid attention to them. She took the knife out and slid it into her front pocket. “That psycho woman knew I'd show up in Salt Lake. It isn't hard to get train schedules. She knows I'll transfer at Chicago. Hopefully, she doesn't know about you."

  "What if she does?"

  "That's what these are for.” Grace nodded at the box in Megan's hand. “If you have to, use it. I told you what the monster—the guy can do."

  Megan took the knife out and held it on her palm. “Slick. How does it work, press this?” She jabbed a finger on the button near the hilt. The blade sprang out from the top of the handle. “Shit!” Her hand jerked back, opened. The knife clattered on the ground. Blood welled from her thumb and pattered down in fat, rapid droplets.

  "Oh my God. That's bad. Crap.” Grace yanked her bag open and pawed through the contents, searching for something to stem the flow. The only fabric handy was the silk wrapped around the silver figure. She pulled at it, but it snagged on something. “What if you need stitches? Can you see how bad it is?"

  "Grace..."

  "Hold on. You can wrap it with this.” She finally worked the silk off the figure and yanked it out.

  "Grace. Look."

  Megan's voice shook. Still clutching the material, Grace looked at her outstretched hand. It wasn't dripping any more.

  "What..."

  With slow, trance-like movement, Megan plucked the cloth and wiped the blood from her thumb. The skin beneath appeared untouched.

  "I fixed it.” Megan gazed at her thumb as though she'd never seen it before. “I felt what was wrong and I put it back.” She bent to retrieve the knife. “Watch."

  "Megan, don't!"

  The blade flashed across her palm before Grace could stop her. Her skin split, a moist pink smile that filled rapidly and discharged a stream of bright crimson. Megan turned her hand toward Grace. The blood running from the wound slowed, then stopped altogether. Her flesh seemed to stretch, meet, and close the split, forming an angry red line. In less than a minute, no evidence of the cut remained.

  "Damn. Why can't I do that?"

  Megan snorted laughter. She wiped the blade clean with the silk and stuffed the knife in a pocket. “I don't think I can do much more than that. At least not yet. I'm beat."

  "Let's not push our luck then."

  "I don't plan on it. And next time, we can test it on you. That hurt."

  Grace chuckled. “I never would have guessed. We'd better hurry, the train'll be leaving in a few minutes. How fast can you smoke?"

  "Pretty damned fast if I'm not getting another one for five or six hours."

  Grace reached into her bag. Her fingers brushed cold metal. She glanced down and finally saw what the silk had caught on. The “Buddha” was well-defined and muscled, not the typical fat man with a complacent smile. And he had wings.

  Just what she needed. An angel.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter 12

  Kitten: Of course. Make it an even trade. 5 W's for 5 G's. Just send the numbers. CR

  Grace smiled and clicked the reply button. As the train rumbled through deepening night, she began entering the number string from the bottom of a cashier's check by the light of her monitor. She ran a finger along the screen to double-check them and added a post-script.

  If you don't find anything, say so. Don't make something up. Thanks.

  She hit send and tore the check in half. Once she got to New York, she'd have to find someone like Comp to cash the others for her. She made a mental note to ask him for a reference when he wrote back.

  Megan slept, reclined in the seat beside her. Grace had no desire to sleep. She didn't want her last dream, or whatever it had been, to come back for an encore.

  She signed out of her e-mail account and navigated to a search engine. Her own investigation into SARET hadn't yielded much. She'd leave that to Comp and put her mind to other mysteries.

  She worked her way methodically through thirty pages of results for “Nephilim,” rejecting the obvious rehashes, screwballs, and references to bands. Metal and Goth musicians in particular seemed to like the term. After an hour without discovering anything new, she changed the search term to “real angels.” She found plenty of so-called evidence and true stories about angel intervention, but real angels were universally described as spirits or energy: auras, balls of light, vague shapes or patterns in swirling mist. There were cases of angels “possessing” people, but no mention of them in actual bodies of their own.

  Grace frowned at the screen. Broad, general searches obviously wouldn't get her anywhere, but she didn't have enough specific information to find what she was looking for. Whatever that was. If she couldn't stumble across anything significant, she'd just have to try another approach. Something she knew related to everything awful, strange, desperate and hopeless in her life. Her mother.

  She typed “Kendra Carrington” in the search bar. Nearly ten thousand results returned. She wasn't surprised.

  The top result link read Where Is Kendra Carrington? Grace clicked on the link and found an article from a recent California newspaper:

  Shock waves pounded the jet set in the Beverly Hills community last night when eminent California socialite Kendra Carrington failed to make an appearance at the an
nual Kingsford Charity Wine Sale Gala. Carrington had been scheduled to receive a prestigious humanitarian award from the Kingsford Foundation for her recent generosity to several scientific research projects said to promote “the advancement of the human condition."

  Close friends of Carrington were unable to comment regarding the heiress’ whereabouts, though it seems she has been out of contact for several weeks. Some speculate that she may have launched an ambitious underground effort to locate her daughter, Grace, who disappeared from their Palo Alto area home two years ago. Others have hinted at a burgeoning relationship between Ms. Carrington and an unknown young male seen recently in her company, and believe she may have embarked on a lover's holiday.

  Key members of the Kingsford Foundation have expressed puzzlement, bordering on indignant outrage, in regards to Carrington's recent behavior...

  Grace rolled her eyes and returned to the search results. Ambitious underground effort. Yeah, right. The woman's attempts to locate her consisted of throwing money at anyone who might do the work for her. Personally, Grace believed the second theory. Her mother's notorious string of affairs with playboys, aspiring actors, and the sons of rich men had been a source of endless humiliation for both of them—though Kendra neither noticed nor cared.

  Three more pages of drivel about her mother's “generosity” interspersed with tabloid-style accounts of her exploits yielded nothing Grace didn't already know. She started selecting results pages at random, scanning them for anything different. On page seventeen, the words wedding announcements caught her eye. Her mother had never married. She clicked the link, expecting to discover some other Kendra Carrington. Instead she found: Wealthy California Debutante Kendra Carrington Announces Engagement to “Mystery Man” at Private Adirondack Camp.

  Grace jolted upright and nearly knocked her laptop to the floor. She scanned the text on the page, read the usual rhetoric regarding the general outcry her mother's impulses caused among the social set. A single sentence stood out: Carrington's beau, whom she identifies only as “Beckett,” refused to confirm or deny the engagement when approached by this reporter.