House of Slide: Hunter

by Juliann Whicker

  I searched for darkness and found it. These woods had depth, awareness, as though it knew me and was prepared to fight. I unconsciously unsheathed my knife, gripping my blade in my hand as I slid through shadows, weaving among trees and bushes like mist, ready for the inevitable attack. I almost forgot Osmond, searching for my prey.

  “Dariana, we’ve gone too far,” he said, only slightly out of breath. His voice stopped me short. I turned to look at him and stared. His position on the ravine above me left him silhouetted. For a moment I saw Lewis.

  A hiss was my only warning before something hit me from behind, knocking me to my knees. I rolled, bringing my knife down as I moved, slicing through the air. Whatever had hit me retreated back into shadows.

  I heard Osmond curse as I jumped to my feet and crouched, waiting. The hiss came in time for me to leap to the side, avoiding the greater part of the strike but I only saw a flicker of gray scales. The third time, the moment of the hiss, I spun, bringing my dagger up and down, slicing through a handful of tentacles but missing the body of the creature.

  I held my position as it shrieked and charged me, a slithering, tentacled creature so fast, I could barely see it. I didn’t need to see. I closed my eyes and could sense it, could lean it as it struck, confusing it, giving me the opening that I needed to drive my knife through its belly.

  I stood there panting as I watched it die. I forced myself to listen to the shrieks it made, hissing and shrieking like a balloon with all its air out of it as Osmond came to my side.

  “You fought that like an ordinary girl. You should never leave yourself so defenseless. You have runes. Use them. You have leaning. That creature should never have touched you.”

  I looked up at him, shocked at the anger in his voice. I touched his shoulder, feeling the warmth of his body heat through his shirt. I pulled my fingers away as if burned, turning my back to him as I began walking back the way we had come.

  “If I wanted to show you my skills, I would have had us sit and make something come to us. This was more interesting, don’t you think?” I said, my voice coming out different, tough, more like the girl in the reality where I’d been obsessed with him.

  “And this? Did you plan this too?” Osmond said as we walked into a clearing and found half a dozen creatures in our path.

  Osmond moved before I’d had time to identify a familiar looking creature, dog shaped but nothing like a dog in the way it smiled at me, sniffing the air and licking its teeth at my approach.

  Osmond moved, a pair of knives in his hands all he needed as he sliced through the fray. I’d wanted to show off but this, the way that he balanced, changed direction, dodged, used them against each other, it was all technical precision. Nothing touched him. Not a speck of drool stained his pants when he’d finished slaughtering the pack of tainted dogs. A few slunk away into the shadows, whining piteously while Osmond cleaned off his knives before turning to give me a direct look as if to say, ‘that is how you do it.’

  “Very nice,” I admitted, stalking past him. “Still, I got the first death.”

  “You got knocked down,” he corrected, following me closely.

  “And got back up,” I replied lightly. “I guess you’re stuck with me.”

  He muttered something too low for me to hear, but when I glanced at him, his face looked smooth and calm.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said, welcome to Oz.”

  Chapter 13

  Aiden was right about the frat boys, but there was no beer drinking idiocy as I walked into Osmond’s camp that day. Silence followed me as Osmond showed me around the camp scattered among the trees with ravines on one side and a river on the other. The way that people looked at Osmond, it could only be called respectful bordering on worshipful.

  I recognized faces from the Hybrid camp, but no one smiled back at me, not even Chloe. I could read her discomfort when she saw me, ducking out of sight when Osmond took me into the mess tent where Jones scooped stew into bowls.

  Jones beamed at me when he saw me, but I only waved a little bit before we left the tent. Osmond kept quiet, only naming things, “Mess tent, Men’s latrines, women’s showers,” there he stopped, looking down at me while I shifted uncomfortably.

  “Dari, you have taint from the fight in the woods. You should change. There are two, one’s water, the other acid that eats away taint. And skin, so don’t linger. Why don’t you have dinner in my tent after you get cleaned up?”

  I looked at him, down at my blood-spattered hand and shook my head. “I think I should actually do more training. I’ll grab something from Jones. Osmond,” I added when he turned away, nodding. “If me being here is a threat to you, you need to tell me. Otherwise, I’ll do my best to be a good Hunter.”

  He smiled slightly. “You’ll have to stop falling on your knees with every little tentacle you run into.”

  I sighed. “You’re not going to let me forget that.”

  “Make me forget it. Be safe. We aren’t here to prove something, to take pointless risks that get people hurt, killed, or tainted. We’re here to stop the darkness from spreading. There is no room for ego, so if you’re here to make a point, go home. I don’t want your blood on my hands.”

  He looked so serious. I reached out and touched his face, barely pulling back before my bloody hand touched him. I gritted my teeth before I forced a smile.

  “I’m here to stop the darkness. I’m sorry I was cocky earlier. I’m trained, though. I can do this. I won’t get in the way or make problems for you. You’ll barely know I’m here.” Staying away from him was the sanest course of action while I had Devlin’s keychain in my dad’s bag, slung over my shoulder. He looked skeptical, leaving me with a slight smile to face the showers.

  I hunted.

  Days passed of training before I joined a team that worked hard together, all with specific roles that one never overstepped. Smoke joined us, but he wasn’t usually on my team. They hated me. I wasn’t sure why and I didn’t want to know. Whatever the reason, with my mother responsible for the demon problem and my father responsible for the Hollow, I deserved it.

  One night, I ran right into it, the shadow that resolved into a rough furred body with a face full of teeth I barely managed to dodge.

  I heard a war cry, then bullets. Smoke. I feinted left then lunged, hitting the dirt and sliding under the creature, ripping through its soft underbelly, but unfortunately I didn’t slide all the way out from under him and got covered in the most disgusting scented, wet, oozing insides.

  I gagged as I wiped my face with the back of my arm, preferring the dirt to the guts, but I only managed to mix them together. I kicked the body of the creature off me then stumbled to my feet, disoriented for a second before I forced myself to breathe, to breathe in spite of the revolting stench that clung to me.

  I ran through the trees, blending into the woods, being one with them. Matthew would have been so proud. Finally, I was there, right in time to see Osmond’s face lit up red-orange as he fired a flame launcher type thing at this gross creature that looked put together inside-out, bad enough before Osmond lit it on fire.

  Smoke had a gun with a very large clip in one hand and a long metal bar in the other. I could feel the energy in the bar and wasn’t surprised to see the furry two-headed creature he faced scream and shudder when he brought the bar down against its side.

  I came in feeling a little bit under armed with just my knife, but the Nether blade was lethal to whatever it cut, whether the wound was deep or not.

  “What took you so long?” Smoke asked as he shot something just to my left.

  I turned around and sliced what looked like a giant mosquito. “I had to do my hair,” I said chopping at a leg.

  “You’re supposed to be in the right wing,” Osmond said as he threw a knife then dodged to the side so that I could swipe the flank of the next furry beast.

  “Isn’t this the right wing?” I asked grimacing as I knifed another monster. There was n
o shortage of monsters. That was the trouble. I’d started feeling like we were wasting time. Every day another army of beasties full of malevolent awareness to fight, but no demon mistress, no demon men, none of the truly terrible creatures that I’d been created to destroy.

  “If you can’t follow directions, you should go back to Slide,” Osmond said, frowning as a monster twisted his knife out of his hand.

  I heard something that made me smile, a shrieking scream that set my teeth on edge and made the rune metal embedded in my skull ache.

  Demon men. Real demon men were coming.

  “You have to give me instructions that don’t keep me away from you,” I grinned at him as darkness exploded around us, swirling shadows that centered on a creature with glowing red eyes and skin that glowed blue with visible purple veins in his face.

  Osmond pulled a package out of his pocket and ripped it open. He swallowed the contents while I studied the monster. Eight feet high, thicker than my mother’s refrigerator, this was a real demon man, the kind with real dedication to the darkness.

  “What did you do to your hair?” Smoke asked before he screamed a crazy warrior ninja scream as he shot and stabbed another monster.

  I hadn’t done anything to it, of course. I’d been staring at Devlin’s stones, trying to read his imprint instead of mine. I’d watched Osmond and I countless times, but hadn’t been able to break through to what Devlin wanted, what he saw in those realities. The stone from Lewis’s garage had been hugely disappointing. More of me and Osmond, but at the end I got to watch Lewis kill Osmond, destroy everyone I loved, and leave me alive. My Lewis. I’d watched so many times. It never stopped hurting, blinking the world into focus and seeing the dark outline of my tent, hearing the murmured voices of the Hunters who were pretty sparse, and knowing that Lewis was dead, that Lewis had killed my father in this reality, that he might still destroy everyone I loved.

  “I did a hair mask to make it shiny,” I said cheerfully before I swiped at another tainted dog, feeling a rush at the piling up death absorbed into my blade. There seemed to be an endless supply of tainted dogs. The demon man watched us, his burning eyes seeming to observe without emotion. Where was the customary hatred?

  “I’ve got to try that,” Smoke said jogging to my side with a broadsword in easy reach over his shoulder.

  I looked at his red hair. He’d French braided it to keep it out of the way. He’d come to camp on foot, looking cheerful, but without Snowy. He wouldn’t talk about her, only said, “You know Snowy,” and I did. I also knew all about marriages that fell apart. I didn’t want that for Smoke or Snowy, but you couldn’t force people to do what you wanted, even if that thing was what they needed.

  “Focus,” Osmond said, coming to my other side as we faced down the demon man. Osmond had already cast defense runes around us, protecting us against the assault. Osmond had skills that I’d assumed no average warm-blooded human could have. He could cast runes, although his were more yellow than green, and had seemingly supernatural stamina.

  It didn’t surprise me, not when I’d watched his development along with mine. She, the alternate reality me, fought dirty. She liked hand-to-hand, blood-in-the-air, overwhelming odds fighting. I’d absorbed the stones so much, sometimes I forgot who I was. Sometimes I looked at Osmond and thought we lived in a world where we were happy together. I hated that. It was always followed by a surge of agony as I remembered Lewis, felt torn by guilt and despair. There was no moving on for me, not when Lewis killed everyone I loved.

  I felt no fear as I looked into the demon man’s red eyes. I felt pity and a slight wish that the monster could kill me and end the agony of waking up every morning knowing that I’d face another day without hope of my own happiness, but that wouldn’t destroy the demon mistress.

  “Steady,” Osmond said, sounding strained.

  I frowned at him. “Not steady,” I said as I stepped away from him, focusing on the monster. “We need a tempo more upbeat than that. Staccato.”

  I stepped forward, my feet thudding against the ground in a growing sound that echoed around me in the trees. He’d asked me to dance with him I remembered as I spread my arms wide and called to the sky, to the trees, to the world all around. The dark woods resisted, but beneath the woods, the heart of the trees still spoke life.

  “Dari,” Osmond said at my side, his pace matching mine.

  I spun to him, then kicked off his solid chest which sent him stumbling back and launched me into the air. I flicked out the black silk wings rimmed in feathers and glided to a low branch. I perched above the demon man who kept his gaze on me, watching me with an uncanny knowledge that made my metal runes ache.

  I braced myself to leap on the monster, but something in his eyes made me hesitate. My heart thumped in my chest. Staccato. Thump. Thump. Thump. Cicadas screamed every other heart-beat. A screech swelled in the distance until other dark figures coalesced beside the one in front. More demon-men.

  I looked back at Osmond, Smoke, other Hunters, who still fought off the ordinary monsters. I closed my eyes, spread my arms and flew.

  I danced with the Lewis, my beautiful knife sheathed on my thigh. I used the demon men’s weapons against them; maces, bones, sending my beautiful buzzing energy over their skin, melting it while I kept a cascade of runes falling in time to my dance.

  I leapt, amazed at how far I could leap, into the pack and dragged a demon man’s head back, almost ripping it off in my rune-enhanced jerk.

  I whirled around, a borrowed blade in my fist, separating limb and body, head and torso, embracing the chaos, the buzzing shriek of the demon taint as it sang its song, counter rhythm to mine. My laugh sounded insane even to me, but it didn’t matter, not when it fit the rhythm. I let my mind drift off as I moved as I never would have fought if I’d kept my soul, never tasting Stephen’s death.

  I fought with Lewis, pushing the horde back with a flock of fluttering birds until a blur of silver fell from the sky, hitting the creature to my left. After the huge bird ripped off the demon man’s head, it turned its eyes on me, an invitation that I accepted after I spun once more in the throng of darkness.

  I fought with the Nether bird and Lewis, working in synchronization as we continued pushing the demon men away from camp.

  I danced tirelessly, slicing off heads, ripping out hearts, all movement and energy, a buzzing knife without hesitation. It had probably been hours, but with Lewis and the Nether bird, it didn’t feel like time had passed, not until a sliver of horizon paled until light spread across the sky. Fingers of red curled over the horizon, like blood spreading in water.

  As the sky grew brighter, the creatures dissolved until I had nothing to kill.

  The bird took off, screaming her cry, leaving me to stare into the eyes of a demon man. I smelled his fear as I raised a long, curved dagger with a rusty blade then brought it down. I couldn’t remember where I’d gotten it. For half a heartbeat, I didn’t feel anything, but with the bodies on the ground, the blood and taint that covered me, the dance was over. Lewis was dead. Worse than dead.

  I turned to look at the camp and stared at the band of Hunters lined up behind Osmond.

  They stared at me in silence, but Osmond was alive. I couldn’t read him. Disapproval? Disappointment? I couldn’t tell.

  I had to get the taint off of me. I stumbled around feeling dizzy, searching for some death to drown in, but there was nothing to kill to keep the impulses that had made me forget about everything, to forget that Lewis was really gone.

  Gone.

  I fell to my knees as I tried to breathe. There was no air, nothing but blood, sticky, cooling on my hands and face.

  Voices rose and fell around me, but in spite of the daylight, I couldn’t see.

  “Hey.” Smoke’s voice broke through the echoes as he put his hand on my arm. “Let’s get you out of here.”

  I blinked until he came into focus then jerked my arm out of his grip. The taint… I couldn’t get taint on Smoke.
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br />   “Dariana, you with me?” Smoke asked, leaning over me with his hands braced on his knees, not touching me.

  Good. No one should touch me. The Hollow One would kill everyone who touched me. Kill, not possess. Like he killed my father and Lewis. No. The Hollow One didn’t kill Lewis, Lewis killed my father. He still fought in the dark woods. I had to find him. I had to…

  I leaned myself away from the abyss, then a little bit more so that I could get to my feet from where I’d been crouched on the ground. This reality. Here. Not too much leaning. I wasn’t happy. No. I’d never be happy again, but alive, and so were Osmond and Smoke. My friends as well as the other fighters, the ones who waited behind Osmond.

  “Okay.” I sounded like a computer recording, the kind without a cool accent. I should have had a cool accent. I blinked and felt something, but only a flicker before it was gone. I wasn’t soulless, just in shock. I could acknowledge that even when everything else seemed far away.

  “Dari, are you ready to go?”

  “Just a minute,” I said as I went to the largest tree in the area. I closed my eyes and leaned against it. The tree felt off. Its energy was twisted somehow.

  “Dari?” Smoke said, putting a hand on my shoulder.

  “These woods are dark. The creatures here are dark. How can the taint corrupt innocent plants and animals? It shouldn’t be possible. There are no chinks in their souls. It’s not fair. They must absorb their environment. I suppose we’re all influenced by our surroundings. The demon man, I didn’t kill him. Did Osmond get him?” I asked, turning to Smoke, my hand still against the spongy bark of the tree.

  Smoke smiled and shook his head like I’d said something funny. “It stayed out of reach. It didn’t want to dance with you. I’ve never fought like that. It was incredible. You kind of freaked everyone out.”

  I frowned at him. “He got away? He was testing us. Demons aren’t supposed to form alliances. Their tendency to break down whenever they’re in large groups has been the greatest point of safety we’ve had historically. Now, with the demon mistress, who knows how many other Wilds…” I felt a pain in my chest that had me bent over, trying to breathe.