Soc Au' Lait! They were all zombies. Was this a trap?
I hesitated when I saw a familiar face in the crowd. It was the motorcyclist that was killed in front of me weeks ago. Had that... had that been a test? Had she had the man sacrificed just to see if I were a Raven Maid? Apparently he was in on it, so he must have died willingly. Now he was just as much as puppet as the others.
Zombie Suit spoke, startling me, “Mrs. Risner is expecting you.” He made an ushering motion again.
I snapped, “Yes yes, so you've said.” I moved cautiously through the silent lounge, all eyes were on me, and I was peripherally aware of the bass beat of the dance music from the dance floor below thumping like a monstrous heartbeat. My own heartbeat thrummed in my chest as my Raven desperately tried to claw herself to the forefront of my being.
We stepped out onto the patio, and if it weren't for the fact my panic was trying to take me, I would have realized just how spectacular the view was, glass and steel towers all around, with glimpses of Puget Sound shimmering in the distance between buildings.
I hesitated as two familiar imposing figures stepped in front of me. Mr. Chocolate and Mr. Vanilla were here. Humans helping out the abominations again. I wondered what was in it for them and Goatee. Mr. Vanilla lifted his arms a bit.
I muttered, “Oh for fuck's sake.” Then raised my arms as that oddly detached portion of my mind found it humorous that Rin's foul language was rubbing off on me. I lifted my arms, and the man did a thorough but professional pat down again.
I looked between the two after they stepped aside to either side of the door again, “You know what these things are, don't you? You know what you are serving?”
They just stood there impassively. Of course, they did. I wondered about the ungodly sum of money they were likely being paid. Then hesitated, or was it something else? A life eternal? They could see that these undead people were virtually mindless drones, couldn't they? Or maybe they were promised free will like Collette apparently had been granted.
I hoped it was just the money, because if they knew that those creatures around us were actually rotting meat sacks no matter what they may look like, they'd not want that happening to them. My eyes flicked around to the few tables and shivered in the chill air. Of course, none of those seated out there felt the cold. And all of their stares were intent on me.
We stopped at the middle table where Collette Risner was taking a dainty bite of steak. She looked up like she had just realized she had company on the patio. She put her fork down, patted the corners of her mouth with a white linen napkin and stood with a broad smile on her perfectly made-up face.
Every bit of her still screamed poise and elegance, and now that I knew what I was really looking at, I could tell she was part of the sickness and decay I had barely sensed before in her presence.
She gave me a sly smile as she made a gesture to the chair across from her and said almost sweetly, “Please, Adelaide, sit.” Then she added with humor tingeing her tone, “Now there's the look that was missing from our first meeting.”
I sat slowly glancing around and at the other tables, then the two lumbering zombie guards she had with her from the conference room of the Risner Institute, as they just stood motionless behind her.
She asked, “Would you care for anything? The chef here is one of my finds from back home in New Orleans, his creations are divine and guaranteed to melt in your mouth. I put in a word for him here with the late owner of the Mongoose.”
I just stared at her a moment. The sarcastic voice in my head wanted so badly to say something about the irony of meat eating meat. Instead, I asked, “Do you even need to eat?” I gestured to the gris-gris pouch nestled in her bosom.
She sighed in disappointment at me, I don’t know what she was expecting. She shook her head as she picked up her knife and fork and cut off another dainty piece of steak. “No. But the smell and taste of it make it an exercise worth doing.” Then she cocked her head. “Though I do admit, my tastes are a little off from when I was... well, you know.”
I was noting she didn't like reminders of what she was, she couldn't even say it just then. A cruel part of me spoke before I could think about my own self-preservation in this sea of zombies, “I know you're just one of Abigail Truit's zombies. Where is she?”
Her grip tightened on her utensils then she exhaled loudly and put them down as she visibly calmed herself, and made a show of dabbing her mouth with her napkin again. Then the look of anger at me over calling her what she has melted away into a big grin as she asked incredulously, “You really don't know, do you? You poor girl.”
Before I could speak, she wiggled a finger at me almost playfully. “You're just a fledgling aren't you? Just come into your Raven Maid power? You see, we weren't really sure about you. That's why I met with you at the Institute. Curiosity was killing me. But instead of one of Danbala and Marinette's Vodoun bogey monsters that I was going to take pleasure in killing... and more, I found only a delightful med student.”
She absently looked into the mirror sitting on the table near her and primped her hair before looking up. She had an almost predatory look on her face like she knew something I didn't. I wasn't a fan of being in the dark about whatever game she was playing, and my mouth was moving before I could think, nudging my chin at the mirror, “It's just an illusion. Your beauty. You had been gorgeous in life, but you know what lies beneath that glamour now. That's why you keep checking.”
Her face twisted into one of rage and she swept the mirror from the table, and it shattered on the concrete pavers on the roof. Then just as swiftly as that rage came, she was smiling slyly at me and shaking a finger. “Oh, you're good. Just like your mother.”
She was trying to strike back at me with that comment, and I had to bite the inside of my cheek to stop from reacting. I said in a level tone instead, “Where's Abigail? You tell me, and I may give you a head start before I come for you. You seem special to her, especially if she left you with your free will.” I waved my hand around, “Unlike these others.”
She pressed her hand on her chest and said over dramatically, “You'd do that for me?” She batted her eyelashes at me, then chuckled out, “And why are your panties in such a twist over Abigail that you'd offer that?”
She leaned forward a bit, her full lips crooked in a smile as she reached across the table and brushed her fingers through my curls. “I've been told that you prefer the fairer sex. Why don't you forget all this Abigail nonsense and work with me? I could make it well worth your while.”
I recoiled from her words as much as from the whiff of rotting flesh which the night breeze brought to my nose from her. I said through gritted teeth, “Your benefactor killed my mother and my Gran.” When she didn't look surprised, I added more to hurt her than anything else, “And I'm not into necrophilia... and wouldn't sleep with money anyway.”
Though her eyes showed her anger over my words, she asked in curiosity? “Your Gran? I knew of Geraldine, but your grandmother?” Then her eyes narrowed like she was putting two and two together, “Lisette? She was Geraldine's mother?” Then to nobody, in particular, she murmured, “So the Raven Maids do run in families.”
She spoke absently to herself, “Then I've been going about this all wrong this whole time. I'll have to go back and rectify my oversight.”
She looked up at me with a cruel smile and said, “Thank you for that information. Now I can end the Raven Maid threat altogether. Once of course, I dispose of you and that annoying Rindia Bastien. Such a thorn in my side for someone so young.”
My eyes shot wide at the realization at her words, “You're Abigail.” It was an accusation, not a question.
She chuckled and said too cheerfully, “Guilty as charged.”
In an explosion of feathers, I let my Raven manifest. It was that almost full form, not quite as pronounced as Rin's.
Abigail moved back slightly, her cocky attitude wavering a moment. Her two man mountains moved forward a bit. She
held her hand up, and they stopped moving, and she said to me with her eyes narrowed with challenge, “You don't want to be doing that dear. I have a little something of yours.”
All the people at the other tables stood and looked at me, and the other zombies from inside started filing out to fill the patio along the glass wall of the lounge, blocking my retreat.
Then she gave me that cruel smile again and explained, “Actually, you'll want to be coming with me. I need to know where Rin Bastien is so I can get rid of the threat your detestable kind represent to me, Adelaide dear. Unless she's dead already, my spotters said she was shot twice. If that is the case, I'll be needing her body.”
I looked at her, then the pack of her mindless corpses blocking my way as my heart threatened to pound out of my chest. My fight or flight instincts were all messed up. I intellectually knew I needed to get out of there as fast as I could go, but my Raven, who was becoming more and more a part of me every day, was preparing to tear into them all, to send them all along their final path, to cleanse the world of the sickness they had brought into it.
My brain won out, there were too many, and it would be foolish for me to attempt to take them all on. The smug smirk on Coll... Abigail's face told me she knew the thoughts going through my head and she knew she had the upper hand. I should have listened to MawMaw and Uncle Bo.
Then I would have smiled if my small hooked beak could have done it, as I looked down at my feather-covered arms, then the short brick parapet of the roof. I'd never jumped from this height before, but Rin had from three or four stories, and she could glide. So would this height be any different?
Her four guards started closing in around me as I started edging toward the wall. Abigail's eyes widened when she realized what I was going to do. She hissed out, “Stop, you don't want to be doing that. As I've said, I've another guest tonight. Someone you know.”
A guest? Someone... my blood ran cold. She thought whoever it was, was important enough to me that it would stop me from trying to escape. Did she have Gran or Bo? My mind was racing. She didn't have Rin, or she wouldn't have asked about her. I refused to think of the only other person in my life who would give me pause.
She made a beckoning motion toward the VIP Lounge, and in my hesitation, Mr. Chocolate and Mr. Vanilla grabbed my hybrid wings in their vice-like grips, keeping my long taloned fingers away from them. My blood ran cold, and I felt myself revert back to human as two men walked out onto the patio on either side of a frightened looking Shannon, grasping her arms.
She faltered a step when she saw me then dropped her eyes. I blurted, “Shan, are you ok? Did they hurt you?”
Then I stopped my own struggles when the men released her, and Abigail stepped up to the girl with the honey blonde hair who I saw as my best friend and crush. The meat sack grabbed both her hands like they were old friends and smiled broadly, “Miss Kingston, how nice of you to join us.”
Confusion was swirling around in me, making me a little light-headed. They knew each other? Abigail kissed each of Shannon's cheeks then released her hands as her two huge black man mountains placed their hands on my friend's shoulders.
Abigail tittered like a socialite then grinned widely at me and teased, “You didn't know did you, ma chere. I was paying Shannon here to keep an eye on you and report back to me.”
My heart sank, and all the fight drained from me at the shock of the betrayal. She had to be lying. I searched the guilt on Shannon's face, trying to see it in her eyes.
She looked up at me and tears were streaking her cheeks as she shook her head and blurted, “No, it wasn't like that Addy. She had hired me to get close to you at school and tell her if you acted strangely, or anything odd happened around you.”
Her eyes pleaded with me. “I thought she was just an eccentric rich woman who was making sure her scholarship investment was sound, and what student couldn't use some extra cash? But after I met you, I called her and told her I didn't want her money. I swear!”
She looked so broken. Half my heart felt utterly crushed, betrayed, and it hurt so very much. The other half reached out to the girl who had so easily wormed her way into my heart and life, and every fiber of my being wanted to believe her.
My eyes snapped over to Abigail, who was studying me. I growled out, “Keep her out of this. This is between you and me.” I felt my scalp tickling again as my Raven made herself known. This made the woman take a half step back again. She was deathly afraid of Raven Maids, and it was a fear she couldn't hide.
She hissed out, “Come with me now Raven bitch, I'm done playing. It's time for us to have a little conversation, then I think I'll have fun toying with you. I broke the last one, so I'll take it slower this time.”
What the ever-loving fuck was the woman talking about? I hissed as feathers started covering my arms where my leather jacket had been, “Va te faire enculer, zombie bitch!” I yanked one arm from Mr. Chocolate, my enhanced strength apparently a match for his iron grip.
Abigail looked incensed at my insult, and she actually took a step toward me, hand raised as if she was going to slap me, but paused and looked at her hand, then, me. She lowered that raised hand with a cruel smile on her face when she looked between a struggling Shannon and me.
Then she warned me as I pushed away Mr. Chocolate's attempts to re-restrain me as Mr. Vanilla increased the pressure of his grip, “Stop now!” She opened her other hand toward Shan and blew a white powder she had evidently had in it, at the woman who so confused all my emotions. Confusion and then ecstasy crossed Shannon's face as her eyes glassed over and she just sort of relaxed and stopped struggling.
I hesitated as Abigail smirked at Shan while keeping an eye on me, this gave Mr. Chocolate the chance to reacquire my arm with a bone crushing grip. She said, “Miss Kingston? Be a dear and step up onto the roof parapet please.”
I stopped resisting when Shannon smiled in a dreamy manner like she was stoned out of her gourd and stepped over to the low brick parapet. I yelled out, “Shannon! Stop!”
Her honey blonde hair flowed back in the wind as she swayed and stopped. Looking back at me almost adoringly. It made my heart ache.
I growled out to Abigail, “What did you do to her?”
She grinned maniacally and provided, “Just a little Voodoo recipe from a powerful boko I once knew. An ex-lover shall we say?”
I hissed, “The lover who made you this walking abomination?”
She hesitated, I saw the rage flash through her eyes, and she continued in a clipped voice, opting to pretend I hadn't spoken, “It makes the subject quite agreeable and pliable. Quite open to suggestion in a state of euphoria for a short time.”
I felt a sense of relief, part of me was afraid that Abigail had somehow made Shannon into one of these mindless monsters of hers. I still felt betrayed by the girl I had felt was becoming part of my family, but my feelings for her, no matter how inappropriate wanted nothing more than to get her out of here, and out of danger.
I figure that zombie-dust or whatever it was, did sort of the same thing, though it apparently wore off, which was good. My knowledge of these sorts of things was less than zero, and if we all survived this, I was going to have to have MawMaw explain it to me so I'd feel so helpless again.
Abigail raised her hand palm up to me and leaned her face in as if to blow. I pulled back and inhaled sharply, holding my breath. She just laughed cruelly and dropped her hand, letting me see that there wasn't any of that powder in it. “Oh, that was priceless. It doesn't work on Raven Maids for whatever reason, or I would have already used it on you and be done with it.”
Then her eyes narrowed. “No, I have other ways of dealing with your kind and getting you to talk. I... unfortunately, broke the last one before I got everything I needed from her. She got even more obstinate in death. But you... you just gave me a gift, by letting me know how to end the threat of the Ravens forever.”
She looked over at Shannon who was starting to look confused where she stood by
the parapet, then back at me. “The last thing I need to know is where that little Bastien bitch is. You'll tell me, or I'll kill everyone you ever cared about, starting with Miss Kingston here.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Ah, or was I mistaken about your attachment to the girl?” She shrugged. “Eventually I'll find someone you really care about.”
Behind her, Shannon was looking at her own hands, confusion and that artificial euphoria warring on her slack face, the drug was already starting to wear off. But she straightened up like a puppet on a string when Abigail said casually over her shoulder, “Shannon, ma chere?”
I prepared to try to yank myself free to stop her, but before she could tell Shan to jump, we heard automatic weapon's fire coming from up high. Abigail, the two human guards restraining me, and myself, looked up to see flashes of gunfire on the top of the Columbia Center building far above. Then we heard a man screaming as first one, then another flailing body were ejected from the roof.
I winced at the wet thuds as they hit the concrete far below. Then the screaming from below began, as people enjoying the nightlife were interrupted by the violent deaths at street level. Then a third, dark form seemed to vault off the roof, arms spread wide as the person seemed to glide down toward us at breakneck speeds.
I smirked as my avian eyes made out Rin's determined Raven face as she angled toward us. The men released me and drew their weapons while the other zombies started surrounding Abigail in a protective ring. I said as the gunmen opened fire, “You wanted to know where Rin was? She's right there.”
I winced and looked away as Rin came swooping down, her feathers fluttering in the wind generated by her immense speed, and she swung her legs up and slammed into Mr. Vanilla. Her foot talons driving through his chest as the momentum slammed him into the concrete roof pavers.
The building shook a little as one of the pavers cracked along with every bone in the man's chest. I blinked at Rin, she stood on the dead man's chest in a crouch, her winglike arms crossed over her chest, and she sprang up, doing a midair cartwheel as she whipped her arms wide.
Raven Maid: Out of the Darkness Page 11