Race of Thieves

by S. M. Reine

  Actually, Cage had closer to forty minutes. Brigid had distracted him thoroughly.

  But he nodded.

  “I can’t guarantee a distraction,” Vex said. “You’re going to have to keep those pants on somehow. Nod if you can handle it.”

  This time, Cage’s head-bob was caught by Lucifer. The vampire’s eyes were hot as they scanned over Cage’s body. “Do you come here often? I feel like I would’ve noticed you if you did. You’re so pretty.”

  Pretty? That was an odd way to pronounce ruggedly masculine and intimidatingly chiseled. “This is my first time in Imaji Nation,” Cage said. “I confess, this isn’t my usual subculture, but the people here aren’t hard on the eyes.”

  Lucifer’s eyes swept down his body. “No. They’re not.”

  The pseudo-ancient vampire wanted to fang-bang Cage. Shucks. He was so flattered.

  When Vex next spoke, his voice was fading as Vision moved further away. “I’m going to see if I can spot Gutterman. Thirty minutes, Cage. Do whatever it takes…”

  He was gone.

  Lucifer guided Cage to Kleio. Judging by the number of drinks on the table, they had found each other while Cage was distracted by Brigid.

  Thinking of Brigid…

  His gaze skimmed the crowd for the rival thief. He spotted Brigid downstairs, talking to her assistant.

  What’s Ameria doing here? She was much more social than Vex, but her ideal night of socializing was at one of the community covens’ farms, dancing skyclad with her sistren.

  She was an adorable witch, short and curvy with big round glasses. Her hair was twisted into giant fluffy buns studded with witchlights tonight, but it was usually the tallest mohawk Cage had ever seen. Even Ameria had thought to go to casual drag route. She was just wearing a baggy t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers.

  Cage realized that Kleio had been trying to speak to him for several seconds, and she was now snapping her fingers in front of his face. “Hey! Shat!” she barked.

  “I told you not to call me Shat,” Cage said.

  “Finally, he pays attention,” Kleio said. “Where are the Death Underpants?”

  “I have a better question for you,” Cage said, slouching into the booth so that the Underpants would stop riding up his butt crack. He’d accidentally tied them too tight in a hurry to get away from Brigid’s irresistible vagina. “Prove to me that you’re gonna be responsible with the artifact.”

  Kleio gave him a look that was so blank that it seemed like the world had opened up underneath her feet and devoured her soul.

  By contrast, Lucifer looked amused. He swirled his sludgy red martini in its glass. “You do have the artifact, don’t you? I need verification before this chat can continue.”

  Cage glanced at his watch. Twenty-seven minutes. Time had slowed down. “All right. Fine.” He unbuttoned his pants and showed them the waistband of the artifact.

  Kleio’s face had become incredibly blank. Blanker than a white wall in a field of snow kind of blank.

  “I really hoped you would dry clean those before giving them to me,” Lucifer said calmly.

  Cage dropped his butt back to the bench. “Happy? Clearly you can see that I will have to go to the bathroom to take these off and deliver them to you. So give me one minute and I will—”

  “You just came out of the bathroom. Your time for modesty is gone. Take them off.”

  “Here?” Cage licked his lips. “Now?” Their booth was front and center in Imaji Nation. The DJ booth was right below them. A music witch spun tunes with flares of light on her fingertips, and the glittering colors meant that the club was illuminated like a technicolor dream. He’d be visible to everyone if he did a striptease. “It’s too cold out here.”

  “I don’t care,” Lucifer said. He probably didn’t. Cage couldn’t imagine that vampires had too many problems with body heat.

  Cage wasn’t kidding about the cold. A chill was marching up his shoulders and making the hair stand upright. His breath was even starting to come out a little foggy. “Why have they got the AC turned up so high?”

  Kleio gave him a weird look—even weirder than usual. “What are you talking about? I’m sweltering.”

  The club was also getting darker by the moment. Cage almost felt like he was standing on a hill, and if he turned around, he would see the grass dipping below him. He would see a starlit city slumbering under a silent night. He’d see a tombstone with nobody’s name on it.

  Cage hadn’t imbibed psychedelics, so that could only mean one thing.

  Gutterman.

  He must’ve been outside.

  “I’ll tell you a secret,” Lucifer said, his gaze molesting its way across Cage’s generous artificial cleavage. “I’m friends with Silverclaw. He asked me to help vet his new hire to The Reliquary. Impressing me is part of your test, and looking pretty isn’t going to help if I don’t have that artifact in my hands before I leave the booth.”

  At that, the vampire stood to sidle away.

  The music witch’s magic turned to chillier hues and tension rolled over the room. The shift in tenor was so subtle that most people wouldn’t have noticed it, but most people weren’t carrying half of a twitchy squirrel’s spirit inside of them.

  Cage’s twitchy squirrel mind raced, too.

  Need to wait twenty-five minutes. Need the rest of the money. Vex has nothing of value left to sell. But if I don’t give Lucifer the Underpants now, I’m going to lose the job.

  “Okay, I’ll take the Underpants off!” he said, right before Lucifer could step out of the booth. “But I want to close the curtain on the booth first and I need you to go, Lucifer. I’m only comfortable doing this in front of Kleio.”

  She recoiled. “No way! I’m getting out of here. Give the vampire the underwear. I am so done with this job.” She stepped out and slid the booth’s curtain shut.

  Lucifer remained, sitting stubbornly still, arms folded. “I won’t molest you. I’m not that kind of vampire.”

  Cage decided it was better not ask what kind of vampire he considered himself.

  But he was running out of options. Gutterman was getting nearer—he could tell by the slither on his spine, the gooseflesh rising on his shoulders, and the hair standing upright on his arms. There was no chance that he could wear them long enough to deflect Gutterman at this rate.

  He was going to have to try a radical tactic.

  Truth.

  “Okay, man, I’m not worried about you ‘molesting’ me,” Cage said. “The thing is, I’ve been withdrawing money from the Underpants to repay my debt to someone. This dude’s a real asshole. He’s gonna kill me if I can’t get the whole sum to him, and I need to wear these Underpants for the next twenty-two minutes so I can get enough money.”

  Lucifer’s long lashes batted with slow, feline satisfaction. That was the smugness of a politician who had just gotten blackmail material. “You owe Gutterman. That’s why he’s here. He’s come to collect.”

  Cage gaped. “You can read minds?”

  The vampire’s tongue slid over the ridges of his upper front teeth, studying Cage anew. “It’s not that I can read minds. It’s that you did the most obvious thing. It doesn’t take a psychic to predict what someone as transparent as you will do.” He reached across the table to catch Cage’s wrist. His thumbnail pressed lightly against the lightning bolt of blue under his pale skin. “Take off the Underpants.”

  “Damn,” Cage said, “seriously? You’ll just leave me to Gutterman like that? I know you’re cold, but you don’t have to be cold.”

  “The hour limit on Nábrók is per person,” Lucifer said.

  “The what now?”

  “Nábrók,” he said again. “The Death Underpants. If you take them off, I’ll put them on, and I’ll get your final withdrawal for you.”

  Realization dawned over Cage. If the withdrawal was per person, then he could have swapped with Vex—or even Brigid—and been done with them by now.

  He undressed faster than an
y other time in his life. “I’ve been dying to take them off anyway,” Cage confessed. “Leather on leather sucks. I’ll be a lot happier in my club-appropriate disguise once I’m not wearing a dead guy under it.”

  Amusement made Lucifer’s crimson irises pulse like a beating heart. His dilated pupils drank in the sight of Cage and made him look like a tomcat about to pounce. “This club isn’t about going in disguise. Drag is never about disguise. It’s about self-expression. Honesty.”

  “Kleio’s not expressing her real self,” Cage said, jerking his head toward the closed curtains.

  “That masculinity was once part of her real self. She tries it on, takes it off, and plays with the idea of it. Then she returns to life, and that alternative is safely locked away.” Lucifer gestured to Cage. “Your concept of a woman is one much like you. A dangerous female willing and capable of fighting in boots. That tells a truth about you, and in this you hide nothing.”

  “Maybe I just dressed to my assets because I look amazing.” He threw the Underpants in Lucifer’s face. “Your turn.”

  Lucifer rose languidly. “Wait here.”

  “Wait, you said you’d—”

  “Relax,” he said. “I’m only going to change in the bathroom. I’ll return.” The vampire slithered between the gap in the curtains. Just that brief peek of the club outside seemed to let in a fresh spike of cold, and Cage clutched his stomach. He tasted brine. He felt grass under his feet, even though he looked down to see nothing but floor as he tried to dress again.

  Here lies a man of no name…

  Cage turned to see who was talking to him from behind the booth.

  Instead, he saw an unmarked tombstone on the top of an empty hill.

  That was his grave. He knew it.

  “Gutterman,” Cage whispered.

  He yanked his leather pants over his hips. They were a lot more comfortable now that he was going commando again—his preferred state. Then he whipped open the curtain, fully expecting to find Gutterman on the approach.

  Instead, he found the dancers of Imaji Nation muttering among themselves.

  A party crasher had shown up, but it wasn’t a nightmare demon.

  The new arrival wore a dress so elaborate that it took up the entire balcony. There was something French Revolution about it—or maybe Madonna’s MTV performance of “Vogue.” It integrated glamours that made it appear covered in living butterflies. The fabric was sort of silken, like really nice curtains.

  Cage gaped so long at the dress that he didn’t look at the wearer’s face until he was already halfway down the stairs.

  Bastien Daladier.

  Leave it to that gorgeous motherfucker to do drag better than Cage, too.

  Vision came whirling out of the fog. “Cage! I have to warn you—”

  “Bastien Daladier is here?”

  “Yes, and Gutterman’s gotten in through the back door. He’s on his way now. But I need to apologize because—”

  “You didn’t warn me in time? It’s okay.” Cage twisted the flame charms on his fingers, warming them up.

  “Because Bastien caught Vision,” Vex said. “I’d been bringing you a northcoin wallet keychain with all the money from my sales on it, using the magnetic hook on the optic nerve, but he took it. Bastien’s got the rest of the loan money.”

  And now the other thief had spotted Cage. His eyes, framed by artificially thick lashes, were bright with equal parts resentment and smug satisfaction.

  Cage scooped Vision out of the air, tucking him into his cape again. “Don’t beat yourself up about it. I’ll take care of this.” He jumped from the dais that the booth stood upon, landing on the dance floor.

  More fog was creeping into the room. It was colder by the moment, wrapping around Cage’s ankles like icy serpents trying to drag him to that unmarked grave.

  Daladier smirked cruelly at the sight of Cage fighting through the crowd.

  Probably because he knew Cage wasn’t going to be able to reach him.

  “Shatter Cage,” rumbled a frozen voice.

  Gutterman’s head appeared in front of him, congealing out of all that fog. The instant he appeared, the club reacted: there were shouts and screams and a torrent of bodies attempting to flee. Cage’s boots were stuck to the floor. It felt like the money bag at his hip was weighing him down too—simultaneously too heavy and too light. A reminder that he didn’t have everything that he owed Gutterman, because Bastien Daladier held a grudge better than a Jewish grandma.

  “I came all the way up to this strata for payment, so you better have my money right this moment,” Gutterman said, “or else I’m gonna eat you whole.” His big, flapping mouth certainly looked capable of opening wide enough to swallow Cage down. If not in one bite, then certainly in two.

  “I have the money,” Cage said, “in theory.”

  “My bank doesn’t get fat off theories.” The nightmare grinned, and it kept growing wider, until the smile seemed to stretch right off his turgid face. His new tattoo from Arawn ripped open. Gelatinous green fluid dribbled down his temple, his lip, and into his mouth. “You’re mine, Cage!”

  “No!” someone else roared. “He’s mine!”

  Lucifer stormed out of the hallway where the restrooms were hidden. He clutched the Death Underpants in his fist, and he looked furious.

  Worse, he looked betrayed.

  Cage instantly understood what had happened. “Oh my gods,” he said. “I’m dead. I’m so dead.”

  Brigid had somehow swapped out the pants while they were fucking. Lucifer couldn’t withdraw money from the fake artifact. And now the real one was probably leaving town with Ameria, her rarely-seen assistant, ensuring that Brigid could turn them over to Silverclaw at a more convenient time.

  That left Cage in the middle of a Bermuda Triangle formed of Princess Daladier, a floating Garbage Pail Kid, and a vampire who desperately pined for Stuart Townsend’s 2002-era wardrobe specialist.

  And all of them wanted him dead.

  Lucifer was closing the distance from the rear, and Bastien was protected by a wall of people attempting to evacuate. The only way out was through Gutterman. Or into Gutterman’s semi-corporeal throat.

  “Shapeshift and run,” Vex urged through the Link. “It’s the only way you’re going to survive.”

  “I’d rather be dead than have all these people know the truth,” Cage said.

  Oh gods. I can’t get out.

  Lucifer’s cold hand shackled Cage’s shoulder, just millimeters to the right of Vision. Gutterman’s mouth was widening.

  “Run!” Vex said again.

  “I can’t,” Cage said. The fear was too strong. They’ll know I’m a squirrel. They’ll mock me, and I’ll die anonymous. I’ll fail. I’m ruined.

  His roommate was begging him. “Please, Cage! Just do it!” Vex sounded so desperate.

  Vex, who couldn’t even put his own earplugs in on the flight home.

  Vex, who had gone all the way around the world to help Cage anyway.

  Vex, whose family would judge him for needing help getting his weekly groceries.

  I have to shapeshift and run.

  Cage gathered his fire and prepared to destroy his life.

  “Wait!”

  All of Imaji Nation went silent simultaneously. Cage was cringing away from Gutterman’s drooly maw, so it took a moment to realize what the quiet meant.

  Lucifer fell back, and Cage scrambled up to the curtained table again, getting as much distance between them as he could. Not much distance was possible, unfortunately. The crowd was still jam-packed by the doors, so few people had escaped, leaving the floor chaotic. They’d stopped trying to squeeze out, though. Every set of eyes was fixed on the DJ booth.

  Cage turned.

  He’d seen the man standing on the DJ booth before, but only in marble. In real life, Silverclaw was somehow so much more awe-inspiring. He radiated excellence, from the tips of his silver hair down to the metal plated toes of his boots. He’d gotten into c
owboy boots with those silver tips as part of his brand back in the ‘40s, and Cage remembered stuffing his child sized feet into cheap Walmart versions for Halloween.

  He was there. The only thief Hero, Silverclaw himself, was really there.

  And he was looking at Cage.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Gutterman broke out of his reverie first. He swirled toward Silverclaw, looking fit to swallow the Hero whole. “What are you doing here? You don’t come to this garbage.”

  “No, I’m a retired man these days.” Silverclaw’s salt-and-pepper beard matched his salt-and-pepper mane, which made him look so epic in his golden years. He could’ve passed as the grizzled old god of thunder.

  Except Cage didn’t think that any vision of the god of thunder depicted him wearing a bolero tie and a baby blue jacket. His hat glittered. Cage realized with a thrill that Silverclaw had to come in drag too. The outfit was so Dolly Parton.

  Cage could not hold back the squeal. He clapped his hands over his mouth and it still came out.

  “It looks like y’all’ve got quite the party going here. Don’t stop on account of me.” Silverclaw hopped down from the DJ booth, agile despite his visible aging. His cult security appeared out of nowhere. They swept the room, herding people in a rapid, organized fashion to make space.

  One moment, Cage was trapped with his enemies by partiers.

  In the next, the floor was empty.

  “Is there a reason you’re interrupting my debt collection?” Gutterman snarled.

  “I’m just here to hire a guy, if he’s the one to be hired,” Silverclaw said. He waved a bejeweled hand, and Kleio appeared at his side, sullen and quiet as usual.

  “You can’t hire a dead man,” the nightmare said.

  “And you won’t hire someone who didn’t get the Death Underpants,” Brigid said. Cage could have sworn she wasn’t at the bar moments earlier, but she was there now, nursing a bright-gold cocktail. “That’s the whole point of all this, right? You’re going to hire whoever gives the Death Underpants to Lucifer.” She tossed back the last of her cocktail.