Harsh Gods

by Michelle Belanger

  When he woke up from surgery, he started screaming about all the people he had murdered. No one in recovery paid attention at first because for some patients, waking up from anesthesia is like tripping balls—they say all kinds of wild things that they never remember. After a while it becomes white noise for the nurses.

  Then Garrett ripped out his IV and tried killing himself by jamming the needle repeatedly into his throat. He knew to go for the carotid artery, not the jugular, so hospital staff had a real mess on their hands before they got him sedated.

  They moved him into a psych ward after that.

  Nothing was going to go to trial until he started giving up the dump locations for the bodies of no less than thirteen vagrants. He described their murders in explicit detail. His buddies on the force still didn’t want to believe it, but DNA evidence linked him decisively to the mutilated corpses.

  His lawyer had no trouble submitting a plea of insanity.

  * * *

  I got the ongoing details of the trial secondhand from Bobby Park. He’d been working behind the scenes to keep my name out of the mess.

  We walked along Ford to Euclid, heading for Brewster’s Coffee next to Ninja City. Across the street, the black polyhedron of the MOCA building caught lights from the evening traffic in countless angled windows. Students from Case and the Cleveland Institute of Art took advantage of the balmy spring night, hanging out in the concrete park that sprawled around the Uptown museum. They lounged with books at picnic tables or chatted beneath slender birches, sleeves rolled up and jackets tied around their waists.

  Snippets of their conversations carried intermittently over the sounds of horns and motors, full of youthful speculation on the nature of life, debates on world politics, and one rhapsodic monologue praising the elegance of physics.

  “They can’t find records of that friend of yours anywhere,” Bobby said. “The prints on the gun belong to a dead woman. The wrecked Sebring is registered to a lady in her eighties who has Alzheimer’s so bad, she doesn’t remember her name, let alone whether she bought a car in the past ten years. Officially Lil’s a ghost.”

  “This is my shocked face,” I replied, pointing to my deadpan expression.

  “Is she like you?” Bobby pursued. “What was the word? Anakim.”

  The term still felt strange rolling from his tongue, and I fought an irrational urge to shush him. Still, I’d been the one to open that door—after everything he’d witnessed at Lake View, Bobby had earned some insight into my world, so I’d offered. He’d jumped at the opportunity, meeting every revelation not with terror or incredulity, but with open curiosity.

  I hadn’t told him everything, though. Just enough.

  “Not exactly,” I hedged. “She’s something else.”

  Bobby pulled ahead to be the first through the door to the coffee house, short legs pumping. Inside, the place was packed, the line threading halfway to the door. The scent of dark roast and flavored syrups hung heavily on the air.

  We took our places in the queue.

  “She’s immortal,” I allowed. “As to the rest of it, I honestly don’t know—and she likes it that way. I wouldn’t dig if I were you.”

  “I’m not the one doing the digging,” Bobby insisted. “I’ve been running interference, like you asked, but I get a lot of questions. Garrett is—was my partner.” At the slip, his mouth took a downward turn, and he restlessly scrubbed a hand across the buzzed part of his scalp.

  “Not your fault,” I reminded him. “Not any of it.”

  “You could have told me sooner, you know.”

  “This again?”

  The wounded look in his eyes made me immediately regret how sharply the words came out.

  “Look, Bobby,” I said, trying to copy Father Frank’s trick for weaving positive emotions through my tone. All I managed to do was speak so quietly, he had to lean forward to hear. “I’ve told you a hundred times now, nothing you could have tried would have changed anything. And the minute Malphael knew you suspected him, he’d have killed you.”

  “You can’t know that for sure.”

  He said it too quickly.

  “You saw everything else he did. Death is the only solution he understands.”

  The guy in line ahead of us edged a little closer to the young couple in front of him, doing his absolute best to ignore whatever snippets he caught of our conversation. He side-eyed me, decided he really didn’t want to know, then slipped a phone from his pocket and resolutely focused on its glowing screen.

  I resettled my cowl—more reflex than necessity.

  “You could have let me make the decision for myself,” Bobby said with quiet fervor. He turned his gaze to the window. The shadows that marched across his features weren’t reflections from the street. His hand strayed to the badge he wore clipped to his belt, fingers tracing the lines of the shield. “It’s my life to save or risk for my partner—that’s part of what I signed up for when they swore me in. But you kept me in the dark, Zack—you didn’t even give me the option.”

  Helplessly, I shrugged.

  “It’s the decision I made at the time,” I said. “Can’t change it now.”

  New lines on his face deepened, and I could tell he was reliving those breathless, awful moments in the cemetery. We both were.

  “No, you can’t,” he finally sighed. He turned his earnest eyes back to me and some of the shadows remained. “Has he turned up since?”

  “Not yet,” I responded, honestly mystified. “The first couple weeks, I stayed vigilant—given his posturing at Lake View, I was certain he’d come after Halley the minute he found another host. But, so far? Nada.” I thrust my hands in my pockets, hunching my shoulders.

  “How’s she holding up?” he asked. “She really scared me at the hospital when she started seizing.”

  I closed my eyes, not trusting myself immediately to answer. The guy in line behind me bumped my elbow and I was so wound up, I almost punched him out of reflex. My hands remained fisted in my pockets—just barely.

  “Zack?” Bobby prodded.

  “She’s good,” I said too quickly. “At least, better. The grand mal seizure she had a week after her rescue was a setback, but she’s rallying. Just… she hadn’t had one that bad in a while.”

  Despite Halley’s own assurances that such seizures were normal for her, I blamed myself for their increased frequency—that trip through the Shadowside had cost her.

  Better than the alternative, I reminded myself.

  It didn’t help.

  “Father Frank and I are taking turns looking after her. Tammy’s grateful for the extra hands,” I said. “I’ve warded the fuck out of their house—it’s one of the only things I know how to do to protect the kid,” I admitted.

  The line crawled forward. We shuffled after it.

  “And in the meantime, you wait.” He didn’t sound thrilled about it.

  “Believe me,” I said. “I’d hunt Malphael down if I had the first clue how to look for him. I don’t.”

  Bobby rubbed the back of his head again as coffeehouse chatter surged around us. It cycled in rhythms, intensely loud one moment, dropping to a murmured hum the next. I wondered idly if any of the mortals had a conscious sense of the shifting tides of their collective emotions.

  “Any chance he just forgot?”

  I snorted unhappily. “Not likely.”

  The enormity of Malphael’s promised return settled palpably around us. I tried to shrug it off—worrying wasn’t going to solve the problem, and I’d already done everything I could. Terhuziel’s sealed idol was hidden in my stash, locked down with even more protections. Halley’s secret heritage was as cowled as I could make it. And Father Frank had my back. If Malphael—or anyone—came for Halley, we would do our best to fend them off.

  Our best would have to be enough.

  A third barista emerged from the back and the pace of the line picked up. Awkward Phone Guy ordered his double-shot soy latté and got the hell out o
f Dodge, casting a final, nervous glance my way. My height or the leather jacket spooked him. Probably the combination of the two. He didn’t look smart enough to be afraid for better reasons.

  I was still scowling after him when the tattooed kid behind the counter asked me for my order. He had to repeat himself to get my attention. Peering up at a menu board crowded with a bewildering variety of steamed, frothed, and flavored drinks, I experienced a sudden, poignant longing for the black and bitter coffee of an old-school diner.

  For a moment, my whole field of vision narrowed to that vivid scrap of memory. There’d been a waitress who’d always looked after me. Hazel eyes. Cute uniform. I almost remembered her name.

  Annoyed now, the barista asked a third time, raising his voice in case I was deaf, as well as stupid. Moving briskly, Bobby stepped in and rescued me. He flashed his badge as he rattled off the details of his drink, then nudged me in the ribs once he was finished.

  “Zack, did you want anything?”

  “Uh… coffee,” I answered. “Just coffee.”

  The barista’s eyebrow twitched.

  “Light, dark, or blonde roast?” he asked, nipping the ends of the words.

  “Dark—black. Whatever,” I said.

  “Name?”

  “Westland.”

  He scrawled it on a cup and whirled away.

  Our drinks came up, and we headed over to a remote table at the back. It wasn’t exactly quiet, but it was one of the few spaces still open. Cleveland’s Uptown was hopping—probably the weather.

  Bobby pulled out his chair, carefully setting down a wide-brimmed mug filled with some caffeinated confection that was more whipped cream than coffee. I plunked down my to-go cup, just then noticing that the barista had written “Wasteland” on it.

  “Cute.”

  I turned the cup around so Bobby could read it, too. He snorted.

  “Making friends wherever you go,” he observed dryly.

  “It’s a gift,” I answered.

  Dragging out the chair across from Bobby, I swung it around to sit on it the wrong way. As I leaned my arms across the back, the new wrist-sheaths of my twin daggers pressed into my forearms, not exactly comfortable, but too familiar to annoy.

  Silently Bobby etched swirling patterns with a plastic stirrer through his drink’s crown of whipped cream. I took an experimental sip from my own cup. With a grimace, I put it right back down.

  “Pretty sure that kid gave me decaf,” I grumbled.

  “I should arrest him,” Bobby joked.” Coffee is serious business.”

  “Protect and serve—but never decaf?” I chuckled. “Don’t sweat it. I didn’t come for the coffee, anyway.”

  Reaching inside my jacket, I fumbled around for the sheet of notes I’d stuck next to the letter that hadn’t left the interior pocket since I’d found it at Holy Rosary. Unfolding the page, I angled it toward my friend.

  “I’ve got a favor to ask,” I said.

  He leaned forward, squinting at my crabbed handwriting. Taking a sip of his coffee, he somehow managed not to wear half the whipped cream across his upper lip.

  “You need me to track these people down?” he inquired.

  “Right now, I just need more information than what I’ve got,” I explained. “I don’t have last names, descriptions, or dates of birth. I know they’re mother and daughter. There’s a connection to Parma and to a safe deposit box.”

  “Not much to go on,” Bobby murmured.

  “Tell me about it,” I said sourly. “I’ve done all the digging I can, but I’ve hit a wall. I need access to better records than the crap I can search on the Internet.”

  With one nail, he tapped the paper. “Why are these ladies important?”

  “They’re keeping something of mine.” Anticipating his next question, I said, “I don’t know what.”

  “Dangerous?”

  “Probably.”

  On impulse, I pulled out the letter itself. It had been folded and refolded over the past couple months, dogeared and crinkled from riding around in my pocket. With hands that threatened to tremble, I spread it on the table.

  There were things in there I hadn’t told anyone—things I was reluctant to accept even for myself. Every instinct I possessed clamored against letting him read it.

  This is stupid, a voice said. There’s no way this will end well. I closed my eyes and told my instincts to shut the hell up.

  “This is—here are those names in context,” I said. My tongue fell over itself.

  Bobby’s brows knitted as he glanced at the date. He caught and held his breath, digesting its implications.

  “Isn’t this from when you went missing?” he asked.

  Wordlessly, I nodded. Sal’s oath about the Eye prickled in the back of my head, limiting what I could say—but not what Bobby could read. Still, I had to flatten my hand against the table to keep myself from snatching the letter back on reflex.

  Bobby’s features darkened as he scanned the first few lines. “Are you sure this is something I should be reading?”

  “No,” I answered bluntly. “You can stop if you want to. Fold it up, shove it back at me, walk away.” I swallowed against a sudden dryness in my throat. “I wouldn’t blame you if you did.”

  He pushed back thoughtfully from the table. From the tension fighting through his shoulders and neck, he seriously considered it.

  “It’s more than just Malphael and your friend Lil,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

  Again, I nodded. “When I told you the incident on the Scylla was tied up with the weirder parts of my life, I didn’t tell you how tied up it was.” Puffing my cheeks, I relinquished my grip on the letter. It sat on the table between us—a door or a barrier, depending how this went. “The rabbit hole goes deep, Bobby. Real deep. You may not like the ride.”

  His eyes flicked from me to the paper and back again.

  “Thank you,” he blurted.

  “Hunh?” I asked, totally thrown. “Why?”

  “For letting me make the decision myself this time.”

  Setting aside his coffee, he pulled the letter closer and started reading.

  Upside down, I made myself read along with him, all the way to the end.

  Zaquiel–

  If we’re reading this, then things went badly out on the lake—but we’re not stuck in some jar, so I hope we got the Stylus like we’d planned. If you’re not Zachary Aaron Westland any more, then all we did was get ourselves killed. That’s actually good news. The alternative is uglier, because if you don’t remember being me, that means Dorimiel got his hands on Neferkariel’s icon, and that is a whole level of fucked I’d hoped to avoid.

  If I’m dead, hopefully I’m drowned, with the icon or icons at the bottom of the lake. That’s the priority. Those things need to be buried deep where no one can use them any more. All the silt at the bottom of Erie will make them a bitch to recover, even if Dorimiel figures it out. Lailah knows the plan. Problem is, she’s the only one who knows how deep this rabbit hole goes, and I can’t hear her any more. Not even a whisper. That’s not a good sign.

  Check the Gandhi statue in the Cultural Gardens for the jars. We couldn’t break the seals in time. Some idiot at the museum leaked the find to the press. I know that’s why Dorimiel showed. Must have made him crazy when the looters hit that stash.

  I have to include Sal on this last part—I can’t get close to Dorimiel otherwise. He’s a paranoid fuck. Don’t breathe a word to her about the Stylus. She doesn’t know. The Eye’s my bargaining chip—even the chance that it’s there. She saw what it did to Remiel during the Wars. She wants it buried again as much as we do.

  On that note, keep Remy the hell away from that thing. It nearly ate him once.

  On the topic of Remy, he’s the executor for Westland’s will and for Damien Walsh both. Find him. He’ll get you keys to the properties he knows about. And if he’s been good, he’ll have boxed everything in the main residences once we’re officially dead. Most
of the codes for the stashes and other things are hidden in the manuscript pages.

  Remy doesn’t know about that part.

  I’ve left this same letter in five of our stashes. I figure you’ll sort out how to get to at least one of them. I hope you’re standing in the basement of Holy Rosary right now, because the blades were a gift, and there’s only one other set left. Those are in Chicago. Lailah will know.

  If Frankie’s still kicking, make sure you thank him for leading you here. He’s been good to us.

  None of our eggs are in one basket. Try the place on Euclid Heights first, then the one in Tremont. Lots of redundancy, so don’t worry if something gets destroyed. That’s just how this game works. Marjory has the key to the second safe deposit box. She’s in Parma, as of this letter. She knows to leave it to her kid, Tabitha. Phone’s in Holy Rosary. Number’s in the phone. You’ll crack the codes no problem.

  Best-case scenario, Dorimiel’s in a jar, dropped down along with the icons. Doubt that will happen, but I can wish. But you have to remember—he’s only a pawn. They’ve puffed him up to think he’s a major player, but this conspiracy runs deep. It’s not just his tribe. There are others. Now that they know we’re onto them, they will be coming.

  Ending this with “good luck” seems pretty self-serving. But we need it.

  Good luck.

  Bobby pushed back from the table again, skin taking on a greenish cast as he blanched. He took a long swallow of coffee, staring at a point beyond my ear. The sound and feel of all the people swelled suddenly, pressing like some rough beast against my cowl.

  A sigh escaped him. A portion of the young detective’s innocence seemed to flee with the sound.

  “The human monsters are bad enough,” he murmured.

  “What happened to Garrett wasn’t usual. Things like that…” I trailed off, acutely aware that my next word could be a lie.

  The time for lies was over.

  Bobby studied me for a long moment, then his gaze strayed to the people gathered in the coffee house. He lingered on each in turn, keen eyes taking in details of their stance, their dress—all the little stories each telegraphed unconsciously about their lives. He turned solemn eyes back to me, all but pleading.