House of Slide: Hunter

by Juliann Whicker

  I sighed as I turned the key and shoved the door open. “What do you want?” I asked as the lights flickered on showing an space with immaculate shelves carefully organized.

  “The other day I was woken out of the first good sleep I’ve had in a week, ever since the broken bond I’ve been less impressed with sanity, and I felt my whole body burning. From what I can remember that has something to do with the return of the Hollow One.”

  I walked into the garage, leaving Aiden to close the door behind me. “He killed my father,” I said as I walked down the first row of shelves, searching their depths for the stone without actually touching anything.

  “Do you know who the Voice was?” Aiden asked after a moment of silence.

  “Aric, but I don’t think he stayed long,” I said pushing aside a piece of fabric that revealed a collection of various skulls neatly displayed.

  “Your dad killed him, started the war,” Aiden said like that made sense.

  I turned and glared at him but he only shrugged.

  “We all have sins we have to pay for.”

  “I’m a little tired of paying for sins I haven’t committed,” I said turning back to my search.

  “What are we looking for?” Aiden asked, following me.

  “We aren’t looking for anything. We are leaving me alone.”

  “Aren’t you looking for something to stop him?”

  “Who?”

  “Your daddy’s murderer.”

  I turned around and cocked my head as I studied him. “You look good, Aiden. If you want to go and give that hot body to a Lost Soul, you’re welcome to do so. I am not going against the Hollow One. My enemy is the demon mistress.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “You think I’m hot? You’re not looking so shabby yourself.”

  That made me laugh. Oh yeah. I wasn’t shabby at all, all ripped and torn to shreds and glued back together.

  “If I was looking for an unstable boyfriend, I’d go find the Hollow One.”

  He grinned at me. “I could come with you.”

  I shook my head and went back to my search. Aiden was crazier than ever. Had he leaned himself like I had? He didn’t seem as unstable as I had been, but his hair was different and so were the multiple piercings with screws and other metal bits and pieces dangling from his ears.

  “What do you know about the demon mistress?” I asked, ignoring his offer.

  “She’s fighting a band of Hunters southwest of Sanders.”

  I spun around and grabbed the front of his shirt. He was much taller than me and heavy even to my rune enhanced arms. “How Close to Sanders? What band?”

  “Easy,” he said, smiling at me with sharp white teeth. “I’ll think that you want to play.”

  I let go of his shirt and turned in disgust, searching the shelves as quickly as I could.

  “It’s that nice boy. They call him the Wizard of Oz. He organized this phi delta kappa group from his college, training all these frat boys to kill demons. Highly irregular, but no one’s been disposed to argue with everything else going on. He’s got Hybrids working with him, Hotbloods, others who aren’t welcome anywhere else.”

  “Why aren’t you there?”

  “I’m not nice enough for him. I drained one of his Hotbloods on accident.”

  “You drained someone on accident?”

  I stared at him while he shifted uncomfortably.

  “Had an episode, wasn’t sure what was real.”

  “You’ve been leaning yourself,” I said feeling hollow inside.

  He raised his eyebrows. “That was empathy right there. What did you do while you leaned?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing really. Destroyed a library. Sewed a really bad outfit. But Matthew was there to bring me out of it.”

  “Carve. That’s convenient. I had Bruce.” He grinned and wiggled his eyebrows.

  “Why am I talking to you?” I muttered as I turned back to my search.

  “Because I understand,” he said, following me, picking up a few of the skulls that he began to juggle. “I’m still leaning myself, but only a little bit to take off the edge.”

  “Go ahead and drain me if you like,” I said trying to block him out.

  “No, Dari. You’ve got to stop the Hollow One.”

  I shook my head. “It’s not Lewis. He’s gone. He killed my dad. He doesn’t remember me.” My voice tripped on the precipice above hysterical.

  “He doesn’t need to remember us. We’re bound to him. We’re his connection to the world. We need to bring him back.”

  “How?” I asked, sorting through a pile of gems that looked promising. A diamond the size of my eyeball sat beside a tennis ball.

  “I don’t know,” he admitted.

  I shook my head, disgusted. “Well if you figure it out, let me know. Until then,” I said, smiling as I found the stone. I used my knife to push it off the shelf, catching it in the leather of my shirt that I rolled up, covering the stone but showing off my stomach.

  “Later, Aiden. Take care or whatever crazy people do.”

  “You came for a rock?” he asked, scratching his head. “Your scars are looking better. I guess Carve’s pretty amazing. Are you going to be fighting the demon mistress with him?” The leer was impossible to mistake.

  I choked on my own spit. “He married my mother.”

  Aiden raised his eyebrows. “Really? I thought that whole thing was spin.”

  “Really. They’re celebrating their wedding night as we speak.”

  He grimaced as though the idea was as revolting for him as for me. “All happy people should die.”

  I rolled my eyes and opened the door. I held it open, waiting for Aiden to pass before I closed and locked it, tucking the garage keys into my pocket.

  “Those are my keys,” Aiden protested.

  “Were your keys,” I said, walking to my brother’s car. “Lewis left me everything.”

  Aiden sighed. “I was going to give them to you anyway. Why don’t you give me a ride,” he said, shifting from foot to foot.

  “The only ride I’m giving you is to a morgue,” I said as I slid into my brother’s car, dropping the stone on the seat beside me. I twisted the key in the ignition but hesitated before I backed down the alley. I rolled down the window.

  “Let me know if you figure out how to bring back Lewis,” I said, hope hurting so bad in my heart that I ground my teeth together as I shoved down the pedal and exited that alley, backwards, fifty miles an hour.

  The drive to Sanders passed in a blur of anxiety. The demon mistress couldn’t fight Osmond. He didn’t belong in that fight however stunning he’d been in the woods with Satan and Snowy against monsters. She was different. If she touched him, he’d be corrupted. Goodness had to be protected along with innocence.

  Finally, I passed over the stone bridge that crossed the river that protected Sanders from the rest of the world. I drove past the gothic cathedral where I’d gone to high school with Lewis. Pain flashed through my heart at the memory of his scarred hands holding an old book. Jane Eyre. I shook my head and gripped the steering wheel with my perfectly manicured hands. My nails were tipped silver. Maybe I really could dip my nails in metal. I needed armor if I was going to fight the demon mistress.

  I pulled up to the white house on the hill, black shutters visible from the light of the moon and the dim reach of the streetlight. I killed the engine and sat there, breathing in my brother’s scent, something spicy, aftershave, something dangerous, acid, and opened the door, careful to hold the stone with my leather shirt. At my door I turned the handle, or tried to. The door was locked. Of course it was locked. I’d left my mother at Slide with Satan and my dad didn’t live here even if he wasn’t dead.

  I shook off a sudden lethargy and brought up Devlin’s keychain.

  I fumbled for the house key and grabbed the stone. Before I could drop it, I saw another reality.

  Chapter 11

  Osmond smiled at me, his hair spiked with a piece o
f metal fitted from one ear to his chin. His mouth curved in a smile both intimate and dark before he pulled me against him and kissed me, his lips deceptively soft, pressing against mine with heat that I responded to, wrapping my arms around him, pulling his head down, running my hands up his neck, kissing hard until I tasted his blood, a taste that made me dizzy with euphoria.

  “Ms. Sanders?”

  I blinked awake and groaned as the dream faded leaving me in the world’s most boring class taught by the world’s most evil teacher.

  Ms. Briggs stood with her usual scowl, glaring at me, daring me to admit that I hadn’t heard her question.

  “I’m sorry, Ms. Briggs, I must have been dozing. Would you repeat the question?” I batted my eyelashes at her while my classmates giggled.

  I glanced over to see Osmond, Ms. Brigg’s aide where he sat grading papers. His mouth tightened but he didn’t look up. I felt my smirk fade. He disapproved. He knew that I could feel it, wanted me to feel it.

  I sighed and tried to feel sorry for making Ms. Brigg’s day worse. It wasn’t her fault that her personal life was a shambles so she took it out on students. She was a good teacher if you got past the prickly exterior; she genuinely wanted students to learn. Too bad I couldn’t care less.

  After class, I walked into the two-story hall, colored light from the stained glass skylights shining down on the buzzing students. I soaked up their anticipation as they streamed around me. Friday with a three day weekend was worth celebrating.

  Osmond walked behind me. I knew he was there without looking. I slowed down so that I could fall in beside him, subtly.

  “Hi, Osmond,” I said smiling at him as I looped my arm through his, the better to lean him.

  “Dari,” he answered without looking directly at me.

  He didn’t used to be so aloof, but in the last few years he’d gone from being just Osmond to being my brother’s friend, a friend entirely too proficient at blocking my leaning.

  “What are you doing this weekend? Are you going Hunting with us?”

  “Maybe.”

  “How is school going so far?”

  “As expected.”

  “Wow, you’re really talkative today.”

  “Sorry, not much to say,” he said, dropping my arm as he turned to spin the knob on his locker. I leaned against the one next to it, staring at his profile. He was perfect, particularly when he got all disapproving about something I’d done that he thought I shouldn’t.

  “Do you want to go out?”

  I fought down the blush as he took his time answering. My heart pounded as he put his books in his locker, took down his dark jean jacket and shut the door. Would he just ignore me?

  “No, thanks,” he said, giving me a quick smile to soften the blow.

  I scowled as I followed him.

  “Why not?”

  He exhaled as he gave me a short frown. “You want to know why?”

  “That’s why I asked. If you didn’t block me, I wouldn’t have to ask.”

  “You’re my best friend’s little sister.”

  “So?”

  “So, it would be awkward to date you knowing how Devlin feels about it.”

  “He doesn’t care.”

  He glanced over at me with one light colored eyebrow raised. “I care.”

  “Come on, Osmond, one little date, and if it’s horrible, I’ll never bother you again.”

  He laughed. “That’s tempting.”

  I scowled again while he laughed. I stopped walking with my arms crossing my chest, staring at his back. If I could have leaned him, I would have turned him around and have him falling on his knees. No I wouldn’t. If I could have leaned him, he wouldn’t have interested me. Devlin had somehow taught Osmond to resist leaning, the same way he’d taught him how to kill demons without getting killed himself. I had no idea how he did it. If I did, maybe I could have figured out how to undo it.

  “Still trying to catch Osmond?” Snowy’s lilting voice taunted before I felt her delicate fingers on my shoulder before she pulled her hand away.

  I didn’t bother acknowledging her, not when I could stay watching Osmond walk away. There had to be a way beneath his indifferent exterior.

  “I know. We can have a double date, Devlin and me, and you and Osmond. We wouldn’t tell Osmond it was you until it was too late.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered as we walked down the hall beneath the skylight two stories up, the kaleidoscope of colored glass shining brilliantly on Snowy’s pale hair. I was almost tempted to take her up on it, but Devlin would never agree. It wouldn’t be honest. I rolled my eyes to myself. Life was too short to care too much about fudging the truth a little.

  “Hey!” Snowy exclaimed as a gangly kid with long reddish hair came careening around the corner and ran into her, knocking her back a few steps.

  “Sorry,” he said with a grin before his smile faded and he backed off, looking nervous. Snowy got her imperious face on for a second before switching it out with her compassionate queen look.

  “Of course. You can’t help it,” she said oozing sympathy.

  Ouch.

  I waited until we were through the doors to the girl’s locker room before I turned on her. “You’re doing your really great impression of evil queen again.”

  She rolled her eyes as she paused in front of the full-length mirror hanging on the stone wall. “He doesn’t belong here.”

  “I don’t know, I kind of like him. Maybe I’ll ask him out. What’s his name? Smoke?”

  “His name is Bob,” she sneered as she glared at me. “And if you dated him, you will become a social pariah just like him.”

  I frowned at her. “I was kidding.” I couldn’t lean Snowy either. It was annoying that Devlin taught the people closest to him how to not be manipulated by him. Also admirable, I had to admit. Her reaction had been strong, too strong for indifference. Usually she really was gracious and benevolent with her power.

  It made Smoke sound a little more interesting.

  The next day I knocked on his door. A cute little red-head girl poked her head out and stared at me with big eyes.

  “Aren’t you the girl who lives in the mansion?”

  I soaked in her awe and blatant admiration. Even if she was six.

  “Yep. Is Smoke here?”

  “You mean Bob?”

  I shrugged.

  “Sure. Do you want to come in?”

  I shrugged again and walked through the doorway while she held open the screen door for me. She brought me into a small kitchen with a round table on the side. I accepted when she offered me ice cream. I lived with too many health nuts to turn down sugar.

  “I’ll be right back,” she said after she gave me a spoon and a carton.

  I took off the lid and grabbed a scoop of dark brown chocolate punctured with lighter brown chunks. Mmm. Chocolate toffee.

  “Hey, what are you doing?”

  I looked up and blinked at Smoke/Bob, the tall red-head.

  I smiled as I leaned him, shoving back his confusion and anger, smoothing over his emotions until he smiled back at me, but the thing was, he didn’t smile back. If anything, he scowled deeper until he snatched the spoon out of my fingers, flinging it into the sink.

  “What are you doing here?” he demanded.

  “I was eating ice cream,” I said, eyeing the carton then looking back up at Smoke. “So, are you a friend of Devlin’s?”

  He sneered, actually sneered as he grabbed the carton and put the lid on.

  “Very funny.”

  “If you’re not Devlin’s friend, why are you acting like this?”

  He stopped with his hand on the freezer’s handle. “Your brother’s friends usually are mad at you and want to kick you out?”

  I shrugged. “Basically. Without leaning I’ve got zero social skills.”

  “You don’t seem to mind. I would mind that people like me because I force them to.”

  I cocked my head and really looked at him. He wa
s almost cute in a scowling, I-hate-your-guts, kind of way.

  “I do hate it, but what else am I supposed to do? It’s what I am. I don’t even realize that I’m doing it half the time; it just happens.”

  “That’s bull crap,” he said sitting back down at the table with the ice cream, like he’d forgotten about it. “People should be able to choose how they feel about you.”

  “Some of them can, Devlin’s friends, anyway.”

  “Like Snowy.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed and didn’t add Osmond.

  “Don’t you want to be your own person? To have people see you for who you are instead of some synthetic wannabe reality? I mean, you’re a person, you have to have something about you that makes you, you know,” he mumbled.

  “Uniquely, Fantastiquely you,” his little sister chimed in.

  Smoke glanced over at her sweet smiling face and back at me with a shrug. “Yeah. So, what are you doing here?”

  I smiled at his little sister. “Uniquely, fantastiquely you, hm? I like that. Your soul is really pretty, like you.”

  Most souls depressed me, but hers was so happy, a swirling violet vortex with vibrating threads of red, like her hair.

  “Thanks. That’s what Ash says.”

  “Ash?” I asked, but Smoke grabbed my arm and was already escorting me to the door. “Who is Ash?” I asked, but with one push, I was outside and he closed the door in my face. I stared at the white wood for a second before I turned and slunk down the cement steps. Maybe Snowy didn’t like him because he was so rude, or maybe she liked him because he resisted leaning just like she did.

  Either way, I couldn’t believe I’d spent my whole life in Sanders, but never noticed how interesting he was. Who was he, and who was Ash?

  Sunday I went to church with the family, my dad even went although he spent most of the meeting longing for outdoors. He wasn’t overt, of course. I was the only one who seemed to think it was pointless to pretend like I wasn’t manipulating people, to pretend like they had a choice in whether or not they accepted me. My mother frowned at me when I’d let myself slouch down on the uncomfortable bench.

  After church, my mom talked to Osmond’s father while he and Devlin talked about the pros and cons of letting JV play Varsity. I stared at Osmond, at the nice way he talked, like everyone was his friend, and more interestingly, the way that everyone talked to him. He couldn’t lean, but everyone liked him. He couldn’t lean, but people would do anything he wanted, just like Snowy.