The Elder Gods give to those who serve them well, almost as often as they consume them. The Elders are hungry, and ever since the shadowy Lords of the Trees locked them away from our world they’ve grown hungrier. The Sorrows can’t hope to undo the great sorcery the Imdarák worked; a whole race burned up its life to seal the Elder Gods behind a wall.
But that wall could sometimes be breached. That was Sorrows’ business.
Melisande looked like she’d been worked over pretty good. There was something clasped around her neck, too. A gleam of iron, but I couldn’t see it through the writhing of the silvery chains.
Last time she’d played wounded on me, too. In conjunction with Perry. A shiver of loathing threatened to rise up my spine, was repressed, died away.
I examined everything from the door. What the hell had happened in here? Sorrows and hellbreed don’t mix. At least, they don’t usually mix. ’Breed wanted this world for their own as well, and they don’t play nice or share.
I surprised myself by stepping into the room. Hellbreed taking my Were might not lead here, but Perry was bound to be my first suspect. And just look at the interesting things I was finding. The Talisman warmed against my skin, its chain vibrating slightly.
Of course it would react to the woman who had torn it from Mikhail’s chest after she slit his throat. Or it could have been my response triggering the Eye’s notice. The adrenaline dumping into my bloodstream, the rage rising, the little click inside my head threatening to occur yet again. That click is the sound of a bullet loaded into a clip. It is also the sound of lifting away, breaking free, of little things like mercy and compassion closed away so you can get what needs to be done, done. Without counting the cost, and without hesitating.
I don’t know if I am a hunter because of the click… or in spite of it.
I kicked through shattered chairs, working my way up the side of the table. Every inch of silver on me warmed and ran with blue light. I swept the room with my left-hand gun, tested the walls with every nonphysical sense I possessed. No traps.
Nothing except the soft slither of the chains moving. The scar ran with soft wet fire, tasting the misery pressing down on every exposed surface. It pulsed, silently, and the chains shivered. Their slippery clashing intensified, and Melisande Belisa’s breathing body sagged against their loosening. The thing around her neck shimmered faintly, but at this distance and with the interference of the orichalc chains I couldn’t tell what was going on. Her eyelids fluttered. Her breathing changed, from shallow sipping to harsh rasps. Heaving against the chains, blood-crusted blue silk moving over her ribs.
It was not the throat-cut gurgle of Mikhail’s body clasped in my arms, the life leaving him in great scarlet gouts. Red as the light, his blood, with no tinge of black. But then, I bled red, too. Without a single trace of corruption.
I wasn’t going to start believing Riverson’s lies. Not now.
Cold sweat stood out all over me. I lowered my right-hand gun. I didn’t trust myself not to shoot her.
Goddammit, Jill, put her down. She’s a Sorrow. Just like a goddamn rattlesnake. Kill it now before it bites.
But shooting her now would not help me get to the bottom of this. I breathed carefully, trying to calm down and think clearly. Also trying to get in enough oxygen through the nauseating, cloying reek.
I’d been held down by orichalc-tainted chains once. A bugfuck-crazy Sorrows Grand Mother wanted to use me to incubate one of their hungry, trapped Elder Gods. Melisande had baited me into the trap, and double-crossed Perry as well. If this was his idea of a gift, like a cat leaving a mouse at its human’s door—
His gift to you.
But no. No. It was too easy, too simple. There was a hook in this bait. And if Perry had taken Saul, all bets were off.
I could not be absolutely certain Perry was responsible. But who else would do something like this?
Any hellbreed who hated me. Which meant any hellbreed in Santa Luz, or at least any ’breed crazy enough to think I would not tear the city apart to find them and administer vengeance.
I took another step. Agony raced up my right arm, cramping my fingers and sawing against the nerve strings. I exhaled, hard, against the sensation. It was for all the world like a red-hot key turning in the scar, digging in, tumblers clicking.
What the—
The chains moved. They slid away like fat snakes, and Melisande Belisa’s body fell, a limp-jointed doll. Her skull cracked against laminated wood flooring laid over concrete. I felt a nasty burst of satisfaction, quickly smothered. I weighed the advisability of taking a closer look at that iron collar she was wearing. It looked like a heavy piece of work, and thin golden light glinted on it. I shifted my weight to step forward.
Outside, in the well of the Monde, I heard movement. A high, thin giggle. And Riverson’s despairing scream.
14
I just barely cleared the hall. Normally I’d want them to come at me one at a time, but Riverson was still screaming and I didn’t want to be trapped with Belisa at my back, even if she was unconscious when I left her in the shattered conference room.
Four ’breed, dark-haired males. Just as many Traders, all of them frozen and snarling as I burst through the hole in the wall where the iron door used to be. One of the Traders—pale, shark’s teeth, claws and joints altered strangely so he crouched like a spider—hunched over Riverson, tittering. My first shot took the titterer in the shoulder and he folded down shapelessly, a gout of black-laced crimson hanging in the air behind him as time slowed down and the mark turned into a live coal against my skin.
There’s one certain way to get your ass handed to you while you’re fighting hellbreed. That’s to do it while distracted. Everything vanished but the fight in front of me, and it was a relief.
The Monde is familiar territory. I’ve fought there before, and I know its interior. I should have worked back along the wall to my left and gained the high ground of the stage. Instead I ended up in the middle of blank space, Traders circling and the ’breed hanging back, Riverson moaning like a child caught in a bad dream and twisting against the handcuffs.
I did not particularly care if he came down with a severe case of dead. I did care if he did so without giving me all the information he had, and I wasn’t fool enough to think that he had. Yet.
When they recovered from the shock of finding me here instead of Perry, things were going to get ugly. So, I got ugly first.
Sometimes, the best defense is an attack. I put the one in front of me down with two shots, and the hole in the circling ring closed almost instantly. A half turn, another shot, but this one went wide because my instincts screamed and I threw myself aside, aiming to break for the stage. It was still my best shot, especially since all of them were focusing on me and not on the screaming blind bartender.
It just became a question of which ones were going to be in my way when I broke for it. But first I had to deal with the Trader leaping on me. The whip cracked, silver jangling.
No hunter carries a whip just because. We do it to give ourselves extra reach. It buys us those critical seconds of shock and pain, extends the circle of how far we can lay on the hurt. And this time it just might save my ass. If I could kill a few more of them.
The Trader dropped without a sound. Then they all jumped, and it became a melee.
When you’re clearing a hellbreed hole, there’s one good thing. You don’t have to worry about where you’re shooting, because every shot will get someone who deserves it. All I had to do here was avoid hitting Riverson, who technically did deserve it, but still.
The click inside my head sounded, and every edge and surface stood out in sharp clarity. The shining path of action and reaction unfurled inside my head, and I dropped into that state of fighter’s grace where every bullet bends to your will and each one is a life taken. Hellbreed ichor splattered, I was somehow on my knees, bending back while firing, the whip curling. Then I was up again, a shutterclick of motion and I rolled sid
eways, gaining my feet in a convulsive leap as the body hit the concrete with a sound like a wet, rotting pumpkin tossed from an overpass. The stage was coming up fast, nobody between me and it, but any moment now one of the smarter ones might get the idea to head back toward Riverson and see if I twitched.
So I spun, heels skidding and striking sparks, and bolted straight for them again. They scattered, one of them keening in a high, unearthly wail. One more down, the blood exploding from his mouth and painting the floor in a splattering gout. I shot him again to make sure, calculations flashing through my brain. How much ammo was left in the gun, what the next move was, how far it was to Riverson, who was crawfishing wildly on the floor, trying to get out of the handcuffs. I could have used a silver-laced grenade, but the chances of fragging the person I had to question further were too high, and if I slowed down to get him behind the bar with me I might end up dead.
A copper-pale streak in the corner of my peripheral vision. What the fu—
The world turned over, hard. Down on the floor, trigger pulled, the ’breed on top of me snarling. It was the one with long greasy dreadlocks and a tubercular flush, cherry red lips widening and spraying me with hot acid spittle. Scrabbling, hand slapping a knife hilt and pulling it free, stabbing and twisting and had to move to get him off me, or I’d be swarmed and they would pull me limb from limb like a fly in the hands of a cruel little boy.
I shot him twice more, the silver smashing through his torso. This time I didn’t have to switch to knives; the stupid bastard was lying on my guns. Crunching. Wet rasping sounds. A howl. A scream, cut short on a gurgle. I shoved the mass of decaying hellbreed off me and gained my knees—
—and stopped, staring in amazement.
Melisande Belisa, stark naked except for a heavy iron collar running with thin golden scratches, the bruising of Chaldean crawling over her skin and aura, twisted the last Trader’s head in her delicate hands. The greenstick crack of a neck breaking echoed, and Riverson’s screams died away. He hitched in a breath, but some instinct probably warned him to keep quiet and hope neither of us noticed him.
Those black eyes came up to mine, and under the mask of bruising on her face, the Sorrow smiled gently. Her teeth were small and white, one of the front ones jaggedly broken, and as I watched it fell out, hitting the concrete with a small definite sound. That gaptooth grin was wide, friendly, and utterly chilling. A new sliver of white broke through the bloody pink cavern in her gums.
Just like a shark, I thought. There’s always another tooth waiting.
Broken bodies lay strewn around. The last ’breed hit the door at a good clip, tumbling out into sunlight. I stared.
The Sorrow rose fluidly from her crouch. Took two tiny staggering steps. Then her black eyes rolled up into her head and she slumped, going to her knees and keeling over. The collar ran with weird gold wires of light. She ended up curled in the fetal position, and a rumble of sorcery died away, swirling back into her bruised, coppery skin. Shadows moved, like the dappled shade of leaves on a hot day, over her flesh.
Chaldean sorcery. How many of them had she put down?
Riverson was making a soft sucking sound like a child caught in a nightmare. For a few moments I just knelt there and stared.
Then the need to get moving started deep in my bones, an itch like chickenpox. I hauled myself up and dug in my pocket for another set of handcuffs.
Perry had redecorated, but not much. Plush white carpet, a mirrored bar gleaming along one side ranked with pristine clear bottles, either empty or full of shifting gray smoke that made screaming faces when I glanced at it. The bank of television screens was there, but only the closed-circuit ones were live, showing the interior of and entrances to the Monde. The others, usually filled with news feeds, were blank and dead like gouged-out eyes.
The bed, draped with white gauze and a snowy counterpane, was there too. Belisa’s nakedness lay tossed over it, shadows crawling over her skin and retreating. The Chaldean sorcery would repair her inside and out, bringing her into perfect order soon enough. She hadn’t taken nearly enough damage to put a Sorrow down.
I held the gauze down over his head wound, taped it. Didn’t care if I caught his graying hair on the tape and he’d have to pull it off. Riverson shuddered. His filmy eyes blinked madly. His upper lip was slicked with snot.
At least he was still breathing.
“There.” I took a deep breath. “Who were they, Riverson? Where do I start looking?” And where is my Were? I still couldn’t rule out Perry taking him. Though I had to consider that maybe the masked ’breed could have something to do with it—but why would he, or whoever he was working for, distract me with a pile of bodies and take Saul? As an opening gambit? Why not just kill him, too?
That was an unhelpful thought. To say the least.
I glanced at the bed again, checking the Sorrow. She was out cold, or at least she looked like it.
I couldn’t kill her just yet. I had to find out what she was up to.
I was beginning to wish I had access to some of those chains downstairs, though. Silver-plated handcuffs were not going to cut it for a Sorrow, though the collar looked vaguely familiar. The golden light turned out to be runes running under the surface of the metal, the queer, fluidly spiked writing of the Chaldean ceremonial alphabet.
Which was thought-provoking. The runes marched in orderly streams, like ants following formic trails.
He was shivering so hard his graying, blood-soaked hair quivered. “I. Thought. Thought we were. Dead.”
“You almost were.” And you’re close to it now, too. I stepped back, my boots leaving dark prints on the carpet. There was a trail from the door to the bed, and I kept half an eye on the closed-circuit screens. “Start talking, blind man. You’re a lucky bastard, you know that? Who were they? Who do they work for? What faction wants me dead this much?” And where the hell is Perry?
He swallowed several times, throat working. “I…”
A slow singsong female purr came from the bed, the sibilants slightly slurred. “Oh, don’t be shy.” Melisande was awake. “Have you been telling secrets? You’ve been naughty, little man.”
If you’ve ever heard a Sorrow pronounce the word man, you’ve heard the very meaning of contempt. There are two functions for males inside a Sorrows House—warrior drone or slave.
Neither has a very long life span.
Now I had to keep an eye on Belisa too, as well as the closed-circuit. Fortunately I’d settled myself against the bar at an angle where I could see everything and the door, too.
I would have bet it was right where Perry habitually stood. The thought filled me with unsteady loathing. That is, any sliver of me the red tide of rage wasn’t flooding.
“Don’t pay any attention to Chaldean whores, Riverson.” The words fell flat in the motionless air. Here in Perry’s bedroom, the corruption was thick and rank, and the scar plucked wetly against my forearm. The Talisman vibrated against my chest, a second heartbeat. “I’m all you need to worry about right now.” And boy howdy, should you be worrying.
“I can tell you who has taken your pet, Judith.” Soft and slip-sliding, she spoke as if she was in the incense-dark hush of a House. “I can tell you much more besides. I see my gift reached its destination intact. Do you like having it back?”
I was halfway to the bed without realizing it, the gun free in my hand and Riverson shrinking back against the glass and chrome of the bar. The effort of stopping made sweat spring up all over me, prickling as if each droplet was a fine hair.
That name. That goddamn name.
She’d cherry-picked it out of Mikhail’s files, and it had won me the chance to slip free of the monthly visits to Perry. If Perry hadn’t been so hot to use his newfound psychological leverage on me, I might have fallen neatly into his trap. Instead, I’d fallen into Belisa’s.
And here she was again, mouthing the name of a dead girl. A girl with dark hair, wide, brown eyes and a bright, needy smile. A girl who h
ad shivered on a street corner, whose ghost Mikhail had pulled out of a snowbank and remade.
The shadow of my right-hand gun twitched against pale carpeting. I forced the barrel down.
Careful, Jill. Be very careful. She’s in cahoots with Perry. Don’t do something that will damn you. There wasn’t a good enough reason to kill her yet.
When she was on her feet and ready to fight back, when I knew what was going on and how she fit into it, when I had Saul back and this little situation all tied up neatly, that was when she could die.
But it would be so satisfying to blow her head off. And there she was, naked on the bed, one of her coppery haunches lifted as her body lay torqued. Her hair, tangled and sticky with dried blood and helbreed ichor, made small whispering sounds against the comforter. The bruises were fading, driven back by the leaf-dappled shadow of Chaldean. The collar was thick enough to clasp her neck and rest on her slim shoulders, and the Chaldean script on it made me uneasy.
“Funny.” The word stuck in my throat. “Perry said it was from him. You two should get your stories straight.”
She was wriggling over on her side to look at me. I lifted the gun again, and there was a small, definite click. She froze, and that was good. Because if she kept this up I really was going to empty a clip into her. And hope it worked.
And hope that killing someone when I knew I shouldn’t didn’t damn me enough for Perry to take out a mortgage on the parts of me he couldn’t touch.
Still, one of her black eyes peeped over a fold in the coverlet. “Their little games. They always have to have their little games.”
“Just like Sorrows.” Cut it short, goddammit. Something nasty is going on here, and you need to get to the bottom of it.
“Our games are bigger, Judith.”
Fury rose wine-dark inside me. The Talisman hummed. “Call me that one more time, Belisa, and I will ventilate your skull.”
It didn’t faze her. Then again, not much fazes them. “You haven’t killed me yet. You’re uncertain. I’ll tell you a few things and you’ll take the handcuffs and this damnable slave-collar off me. Then we will find your hellbreed friend, and after we bar passage to his superior we will spread his bowels upon the earth.”
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