Slayer

by Kiersten White

  Still wigged out by Artemis’s violence, but also bothered that it should have been me staking the vamp, I take a soft, well-worn blanket off the end of Cosmina’s bed and drape it over her body. Leo stands over her, staring down.

  Artemis puts her cross away. She glances under the bed. “The phone really is gone, though. So our killer demon is either a thief or there was something worth having on there. Let’s go.”

  “What about the body?” There’s a framed picture lying on the floor. The glass is cracked between two girls. One is a much younger, chubby-cheeked Cosmina. Her hair is dark and pulled back from her unmangled ears. The other looks like a sister. I run my finger along the crack between them.

  “What about it?” Artemis steps over the frame. “Come on. We still have a demon to find.”

  “Shouldn’t we look into this Sean guy?”

  “Loose demon is a bigger threat than loose human. And I don’t agree with you that Doug couldn’t have done this. Honora said he was a killer.”

  “For once, could you please listen to me and trust that—”

  Artemis has already left the apartment.

  I look to Leo for his opinion, but he’s still staring at Cosmina’s covered body. I can hear Artemis stomping down the stairs beneath us. But I can’t quite force myself to move away from Cosmina. Once we leave, she’s alone. Forever. I doubt her parents or her sister know where she is.

  Rhys has taken whole courses on how to dispose of demon bodies. But what about the human bodies demons leave in their wake? Bradford will get as traditional a Watcher send-off as we can manage. Gone are the days of funeral pyres on seaside cliffs, but he’ll be cremated. The worst fate a Watcher could have is to come back as a vampire. We’re never buried. Always burned.

  Except my dad. There was no question that his death was permanent.

  “That’s not going to happen to you.” Leo’s voice is as hard and cold as the cement floor beneath Cosmina’s body. “I promise. Whatever else happens, you’re not going to end up like her.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” I take one last look at the ducky pajamas. If Cosmina’s phone were still here, I could call the police anonymously. That way I’d know she’d at least be found quickly. But I can’t even give that to her.

  I pick up the photo and set it reverently on the nightstand next to a white business card. I stare at it in surprise.

  Cosmina came through for us, even if we failed her.

  • • •

  We catch up to Artemis at the car. “Hold up,” I say. “We aren’t going home yet.”

  “Where are we going, then?” she asks.

  “To visit a demon drug dealer, demon dogfight organizer, and probable source of information. You want to find out more about Doug, and I want to make sure Sean didn’t kill Cosmina.” I hold out Sean’s card, listing a business address for a place called Naked Grains. “It’s our only lead.”

  “No, our only lead was the actual demon that you let escape.”

  “That was Honora’s fault!”

  Artemis drops the card onto the ground. Her eyes blaze with fury. “Honora was trying to do the right thing—the thing you should have done! I can’t believe you’re still blaming her.”

  “Why can’t you trust me? She—”

  Artemis holds up her hand. “I know about the poetry, Nina. She told me herself. She wanted to apologize to you, but you wouldn’t let her. So because of one bad joke, you’ve held a grudge and decided Honora can’t be trusted, and now a demon is loose and a Slayer is dead. So don’t ask me to trust your judgment.” Artemis gets into the car and slams her door.

  “Are you kidding me?” I kick the tire. The whole car shakes. I slink back, abashed. But I can’t believe Artemis knew about the poetry and never brought it up. Never asked me for my side. She heard all about how poor Honora suffered and left it at that.

  Artemis is pretending like Sean isn’t our best lead just because she’s mad at me. It’s absurd and immature. Aren’t Watchers the ones who are supposed to be careful and check out every lead and piece of information while Slayers get to be single-minded about a hunt?

  Leo picks up the business card Artemis dropped on the sidewalk. “I want to get back to the castle. I need to talk to my mom.”

  “We have to follow up on Sean, though.” I’m miserable that he too doesn’t think I’m making the right choice. “He’s connected to Doug, and now Cosmina. And if Doug is somehow the killer—which I don’t think is possible—then it’s my fault. I have to know.”

  Leo considers it, then relents. “Okay. It’s on the way.”

  And with that ringing vote of confidence in my plan, we’re off to Naked Grains. I don’t even want to know what kind of establishment it is. We’ll find out soon enough.

  24

  “THIS IS DEMON DRUG DEALER Sean’s headquarters?” Artemis asks.

  Her scathingly doubtful tone doesn’t hurt my heart this time. Based on the name, I had assumed Naked Grains was some sort of strip club. I mean, demon-dogfight-runner-slash-demon-drug-dealer using a strip club as a front made sense to me.

  But this?

  “Sorry,” a woman shouts. We turn around from where we’re standing next to the car. “Are you leaving? I want your spot.”

  “No,” Leo answers. “We just got here.”

  Scowling, she pulls away. The tiny parking lot is full in spite of the late hour. People are streaming into the store and leaving with bulging bags of produce. There’s an added urgency since it’s almost closing time. Everything is bleached of color under the yellow parking lot lights, rendering the scene surreal.

  “Have you tried their new kale smoothie? Savagely good,” a girl says, walking arm in arm with her girlfriend toward the sliding glass doors of the trendiest health food store I have ever seen in my life. It looks like it belongs in Southern California, not Dublin. Even the buildings nearest it seem to lean away as though to say, We aren’t with him.

  “This can’t be the right place.” Artemis scowls at the entrance.

  “We won’t even blend in,” I whisper. “We’re not nearly cool enough.”

  Leo has a pensive but dubious expression. “We could shave half your head.”

  I squeak and reflexively cover my hair with my hands.

  He cracks a smile. “I would never.”

  “Let’s get this over with.” Artemis grabs a basket from a stack by the doors and holds it like a shield. The store greets us with the heady scent of citrus, underlaid with rich, bitter coffee, a hint of fresh bread, and the overall sensation that we’re healthier just for breathing it all in.

  “I hate these stores,” Artemis says.

  “Not exactly demonic, though.” Leo’s not as dismissive as Artemis, but it’s obvious he wants to get back to the castle. He sped the whole way here, and he has one eye on the door.

  We walk the perimeter. It isn’t huge, but after two years in Shancoom, where the post office doubles as the town shop and has three whole rows, it’s overwhelming. There’s a bakery on-site and an entire section for buffet-style food. Most of the people are there, loading up for a late dinner. My mouth waters. Being a good Watcher-slash-Slayer leaves so little time for eating.

  “I don’t see anything alarming,” Artemis says. “Maybe Sean works here on the side.”

  “But isn’t this whole place kind of weird? It doesn’t belong.” I found this lead, and I desperately want it to pan out. I have to prove to Artemis I can do something right. I have to get her back on my side.

  Besides, when I’m right, she’ll know Honora was wrong.

  We walk up an aisle that’s entirely coffee beans. When did coffee start coming in so many varieties? Is there really a difference between coffee beans grown in Kenya versus Guatemala? If so, what?

  We turn into the next aisle—loose tea—and Artemis stops so fast we almost bump into her. “Look at the salesclerk,” she mutters.

  The rest of the clerks are all twentysomethings with effortlessly
beautiful hair and elegant tattoos. But this guy is hulking. Buzzed head, aggressively tattooed, the Naked Grains apron straining around his bulging neck muscles. He stands, feet apart, arms folded.

  Leo leans forward to inspect a label. “Wearing a gun on his hip,” he whispers. Sure enough, there’s a bulge covered by the apron that’s decidedly gun-shaped. He’s a security guard disguised as a clerk.

  Guarding . . . tea?

  We meander. There are a few varieties of tea I recognize—English Breakfast, which I like. Earl Grey, which tastes like old ladies’ underpants soaked in perfume. Chamomile and ten different types of green. But then there are bins with weird names and descriptions of the effects. Those don’t have any prices listed.

  “Excuse me.” Leo steps in front of the fake clerk with an air of vague annoyance. “There are no prices. How much is the ‘Dreams of My Enemy’s Weakness’ tea? Is it caffeinated, or is it like Sleepytime?”

  The guard raises one scarred eyebrow. “That’s available by special order only.”

  I cluck my tongue. “Bummer. What about . . .” I peer around the guard to an empty container. “What about ‘Happiness in a Cup’? That sounds yummy. Ooh, guaranteed to cure depression and ease anxiety! Maybe I’ll slip it in my mom’s teacup the next time I want to ask for more allowance. Is it like Saint-John’s-wort?”

  “It has similar effects to psychotropic drugs,” the guard says, his expression as friendly as a machine gun. “All organic, of course. It’s a natural mood enhancer.”

  “I think I heard about that from a friend!” I look heavily at Artemis and Leo. “You remember. My friend I met at Cillian’s. When will it be restocked?”

  “The supplier’s having technical difficulties. You can sign up for our mailing list.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a piece of paper. I take it with a smile. It has a website listed under the Naked Grains logo. Along the bottom is some weird triangley symbol, like a logo.

  “Thanks! Do you have any—” I try to think of the most absurd food product imaginable. “Probiotic chocolate?”

  “Aisle four.”

  “Fantastic!” I hurry out of the guard’s aisle and go several down before stopping to huddle with Artemis and Leo. “An armed guard for tea?”

  “All the tea with no prices had a special symbol on the bottom of the label,” Leo says. I hold up the mailing list slip. He nods. “That’s it. The interlocking triangles.”

  “There might be something here after all.” Artemis studies the back of the store. I use every ounce of Slayer strength I possess not to shout I TOLD YOU SO.

  There’s an employees-only door along the back wall. It’s closing after someone, and I see a flash of gray leather. I recognize that outfit. “She was at the pit!”

  Artemis cracks her knuckles. “We need a distraction. Nina, go pull over a shelf. Make a mess. A big one.”

  My irritation flares. Why does Artemis get to call the shots? She’s not the Slayer or my Watcher. But this isn’t the time or place to fight about this. I go to the coffee aisle. Glancing to either side to make sure no one will get hurt, I reach between two coffee bins, grab the metal shelving support, and tug.

  The shelves groan and tip at a dangerous angle. I dart to the next aisle and am rewarded with the sound of plastic crashing and thousands of beans of coffee—expensive, expensive coffee—spilling onto the floor. I guess I’ll never know the difference between Kenyan beans and Guatemalan beans. And neither will anyone trying to clean them up.

  Artemis and Leo are waiting, staring at a display of organic salt conveniently located next to the staff door. Several employees run out. Artemis hooks her foot to catch the door before it closes.

  The room is about what I’d expect from an employee room. Two tables, some chairs, a vending machine filled with more preservatives and fake cheese powder than the rest of the store combined. But against the back wall is a metal door, heavily reinforced, with a keypad lock.

  “Bingo,” Artemis says. “Nina, you know the code.”

  “I do?”

  “Your fist.”

  I glare at her, but at the same time, it doesn’t escape me that she’s starting to accept I have these powers. Maybe asking me to use them is her way of finally acknowledging this isn’t going away.

  I punch through the keypad and pull out all the wires. There’s a clicking noise, and Artemis opens the door. We creep down a winding metal staircase, then through another fortified door to a massive basement space. It arches overhead like at one point it had been a cellar. Or a sewer. It has to run beneath the entire block.

  And it’s filled with cage after cage of demons.

  “Split up.” Artemis turns but pauses. “Be careful. Promise?”

  “Promise,” I say. “You too.”

  She disappears, sprinting down the length of the wall toward the back.

  Leo and I ease cautiously down the nearest row. I’m glad he didn’t leave my side. The cages are almost all filled. It’s much more orderly than the derelict warehouse that held the other cages. That seemed like a temporary setup. This is very permanent.

  Seeing demons in tiny cages, curled up sleeping or slouched and staring dead-eyed at me, is unnerving. I know, rationally, that if I ran into them on the street, I’d be terrified. But here, like this, they’re not the drawings and dire warnings I’ve studied. They’re . . . beings. None of them react to us. None of them make a sound. Either they’re drugged or they’re used to visitors. Or they’ve been caged so long, they don’t care about anything anymore.

  There’s a demon with only the thinnest layer of skin. I can see its muscles, veins, tendons, all showing through the translucent outer layer. I tug on Leo’s arm. “Is that—”

  “An unpellis demon.”

  “The one that jumps out of its skin! No way!”

  “I’ve heard the skin can be used to seal wounds and heal scars.”

  “Eew.” I can’t imagine wanting to use a demon’s discarded skin as my own. But also . . . if it’s in a cage, and it looks like it’s recently been de-skinned . . . how often has that happened?

  The demon blinks at me, and it looks less horrifying and more unimaginably weary. Its eyes are set far back on either side of its head, like a rabbit’s. Which, according to biology, hints that this isn’t a predatory species. Unlike humans. I want to set it free. Which surprises me, because I’d almost gotten used to my instincts to punch first, ask questions later. Either my Slayerness is broken or this demon is so pathetic even a Chosen One can’t feel like it deserves any more pain.

  Leo moves on, but I pause again in front of a pale demon, humanoid in form but with no mouth. It stares at me with mournful eyes. Across the aisle is an identical demon. It lifts its hand, reaching out to me. It needs my help. I lift my own hand, and—

  “Wouldn’t touch them,” says a cheerful voice that I last heard announcing odds on my death. “Unless you fancy telepathy so powerful you’ll go mad within two days. Good in small doses, though, innit? Provided you also purchase the antidote.” The man—Sean, I assume—is in another sleek, expensive-looking suit, his hair pulled back into a ponytail.

  He waggles a radio at us. “Security’s on hold, but I’d rather not call them. I suppose you two are the source of my cleanup on aisle four?”

  “Surprise?” I’m glad he isn’t armed.

  “Not really. I’ve been expecting you after your performance the other night. Is Cosmina here too?”

  “Nooo.” I draw the word out, watching him. There’s no indication he knows she’s dead, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t behind it. He could have a great poker face beneath his excellent exfoliation and artful stubble. Leo, master of his own poker face, is silent and still. But I know he’s ready to spring into action the second Sean does anything threatening. Leo neither provokes reactions nor reveals anything. Ever. No wonder he stayed alive so long. He has a way of blending into the background until he needs to act. Gods, he’s an amazing Watcher.

  “Come into my
office,” Sean says. “You could have asked for me, you know. You wasted a lot of coffee.”

  I feel sheepish now that he’s being so reasonable. “Can you sort it and, uh, wash it? Put it back?”

  He laughs. “I’ll refill the bins with the same cheap, manky coffee beans they held before. It’s all the same, innit? These stooks’ll buy anything if you put a fancy label on it. Especially if the label says ‘Organic.’ Technically everything is organic.”

  “Charming business ethics,” Leo mutters.

  Sean leads us to a portion of the giant cellar in the opposite direction Artemis had run. Unlike the rest of the stone-and-brick space, his office is boxed in and finished. It’s brightly lit, all clean modern lines, with a fish tank that takes up an entire wall.

  “No way!” I lean close to the tank. What some might take for an eel turns in a lazy circle to reveal a human eye watching us all with disturbing awareness. “That’s a remora demon, isn’t it?”

  “You know your stuff.” Sean sits at his desk, leaning back.

  I point to it, looking at Leo, more excited than I should be. “In the open air, they grow to fit whatever container they’re in. Water pressure keeps them from expanding in aquariums, though. Otherwise they just keep going. And they eat lead and turn it into gold! It was actually a Watcher way back in the Middle Ages who used one to turn lead into gold to fund our whole operation. It started all the rumors that caused alchemists to try and re-create turning lead into gold. But they never could, because hello, demon. They’re super rare!”

  “And picky eaters.” Sean frowns. “I’m lucky to get a nugget a month from the damn thing. Hasn’t even paid itself off yet. Now. To the point. What do you want? I’d apologize for the other night, but to be fair, you were the one who jumped in the pit. And you killed all my best hellhounds and several of my highest betters. So you really ought to apologize to me.”

  “I didn’t kill anything except the hellhounds and the zompires!” I say defensively. “Serves you right, throwing a Slayer in the pit!”

  “She was in on it.”