The Hunter And The Hunted

by Kelley Armstrong

  “Yes, I know, I should have warned you. I realized that later, but you worked so hard to plan our honeymoon, and I didn’t want this mutt ruining it. I thought I’d give him a good scare and send him packing before you noticed him sniffing around.”

  “Huh.”

  I tried to sound surprised. Tried to look surprised. But her gaze swung to mine, eyes narrowing.

  “You knew he was following us.”

  I shrugged, hoping for noncommittal.

  She smacked my arm. “You were just going to let me take the blame and keep your mouth shut, weren’t you?”

  “Hell, yeah.”

  Another smack. “That’s what you were doing at dinner, wasn’t it? Breaking his jaw. I thought it looked off, and I could swear I smelled blood when we were walking back from the restaurant.” She shook her head. “Communication. We should try it sometime.”

  I shifted, putting my arm under my head. “How about now? About this trip. You’re bored.” When she opened her mouth to protest, I put my hand over it. “You’re tired of St. Louis. There’s not a damned thing to do except hole up in our hotel room, run in the forest and hunt mutts-which, while fun, we could do anywhere. So I’m thinking, maybe it’s time to consider a second honeymoon.”

  She sputtered a laugh. “Already?”

  “I think we’re due for one. So how’s this? We pack, head home, see the kids for a couple of days, then take off again. Someplace where we can hole up, run in the forest and not have to worry about tripping over mutts. A cabin in Algonquin…”

  She leaned over me, hair fanning a curtain around us. “Wasn’t that where I suggested we go when you first asked?”

  “I thought you were just trying to make it easy on me. We can rent a cabin anytime. I wanted this to be different, special.”

  “It was special. I was stalked, chased, attacked… and I got to beat the crap out of a mutt twice my size.” She bent further, lips brushing mine. “A truly unique honeymoon from a truly unique husband.”

  She put her arms around my neck, rolled over and pulled me on top of her.

  Off-Duty Angel

  Getting an audience with the Fates is like getting an invitation to tea with the queen. Most people in our world never receive one. To actually wrangle one yourself? Damn near impossible. Unless you’re me: Eve Levine-dark witch, half-demon, part-time ghost, part-time angel. I’m in their throne room so often they might as well install a revolving door. Most times, I’m getting hauled in and chewed out-a fake chewing out, as the Fates pretend to upbraid me for breaking some rule or other on a mission, while they’re really just relieved that someone got the job done. Which I do.

  Today, though, I’d requested the audience. So they were making me wait in their reception room, watching the mosaics subtly changing as the story of life and death played out on the walls. Finally, the floor turned and deposited me in the throne room, at the foot of the Fate’s dais.

  “I have a deal for you,” I said to the oldest Fate, as she snipped a length of life-yarn.

  “We’re honored,” she said, peering down with a withering look. “The answer is no. We’ve had quite enough of your deals, Eve.”

  “Really? Huh. Then how about you undo the one that makes me a halo-slave for six months a year? If you’re regretting that, we can renegotiate. Or just forget the whole thing.”

  She morphed into her sister, a middle-aged woman with long, graying blond hair. “You wouldn’t want that, Eve. No more than we would. While I’m quite certain any offer of yours is not to our advantage, we’ll hear you out.”

  “Good.” I reached back to pull off my Sword of Judgment, so I could lean on it, as I usually did in the throne room-if only to make the eldest Fate sputter. But I didn’t have it. I was off-duty. Which was the problem. “I’d like to offer you seven extra days of my time. I’ll voluntarily go back into the angel corps for the next week. In return, you give me two weeks off during my regular shift.”

  The youngest Fate came on, laughing. “Truly? You give us one week and we give you two? That is a deal.”

  “It is, because you can schedule my downtime whenever you want it. Anytime things get slow, you give me shore leave. Totally at your convenience.”

  “Kristof’s still in court, I presume?” The middle Fate had returned.

  “Sure, but that’s not why-”

  “It is exactly why.” The oldest Fate now. “Your lover is busy. You are bored. You want us to entertain you. Absolutely-”

  “Not so hasty, sister.” The middle one came back. “I believe her angel partner would be very happy for her assistance right now.”

  I perked up. “Trsiel’s hunting? Who? Or what?”

  “It’s a what. He’s hunting for answers, deep in the bowels of the Great Library. We’ve asked him to research the political ramifications of a proposed treaty between two djinn factions. We expected it to take a few weeks, but with your help…”

  “Right. Um, now that you mention it…”

  “You’ve suddenly remembered another pressing obligation?”

  “Yeah. Sorry. Thanks for your time. And if anything-”

  “-more exciting comes up?” The Fate smiled. “We’ll call you.”

  ***

  I flopped onto the front porch swing of my Southern manor. The Fates were right, of course. Kris had been tied up in afterlife court for the past week, and it didn’t look as if it would end anytime soon. I should point out he was the defense attorney, not the defendant. Kristof Nast would never be found in a defendant’s seat. He always bribed, threatened or manipulated his way out of trouble long before it reached that point.

  So he was busy and I was bored. That sounds bad, as if I rely on him so much that I don’t know what to do with myself when he’s gone. Actually, I’m more accustomed to being alone. I’d spent most of my mortal life by myself-or with our daughter, Savannah. Even now that Kris and I had been reunited after death, we were apart more than we weren’t. There was my angel gig, for one thing. And we have our own lives outside that. We’ve even kept our own afterlife homes-my manor and his houseboat-though if we’re in the same plane, we rarely sleep in separate beds.

  I was bored because I was nearing the end of my latest shore leave. Whenever I first returned from angel duty, I had a long list of things to do. Check on my spirit guide, Jaime. Check on Savannah. Check on Kris’s boys, Sean and Bryce. Check on my afterlife contacts, see if they have anything interesting for me. Call in some chits. Chase down new contacts. Explain to them why it’s really a good idea to have Eve Levine in their Rolodex. Just maintaining my contact network is a job in itself.

  But that work was long done. This was the time when I truly would be taking a little R &R. With Kris. Even after nine years here, there are endless nooks and crannies and planes and dimensions we haven’t explored. I suppose I could go on my own, but it really wasn’t the same.

  Someone turned onto my block. That wasn’t unusual. I have neighbors, of course, and the regions aren’t exclusive. Ghosts travel. But what caught my attention was the figure itself. A couple of inches taller than my six feet. Late forties. Thinning blond hair. Broad shoulders. Carrying some extra weight, but his big frame hid it, as did his expertly tailored suit.

  I flew off the swing, sending it rocking as I raced down the steps. Along the front path, through the gate, down the road, like a war bride spotting her discharged husband.

  Kris caught me up in a hug and kiss.

  “I thought you didn’t get a break until tonight,” I said.

  “I wrangled a recess,” he said. “It’s a brief one, but I wanted to come by. I may have a job for you.”

  “Seriously?” I paused. “It’s not research, is it?”

  He laughed. “Never. It’s a real celestial-bounty-hunter-worthy mission.”

  I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him. “I love you.”

  “Uh-huh.” He leaned back. “Did I just get a bigger kiss for giving you a job than I did for the surprise visit?”<
br />
  “Maybe.” We started walking back to my house. “So what’s the mission?”

  “I need you to follow someone. I don’t know the what, the where, the how or even the why. Just the who.”

  “Intriguing. Is it connected to your court case?”

  “I don’t know. Someone came in to speak to the prosecutor during the trial. It was important enough to earn her a five-minute recess. As I was using the opportunity to stretch my legs, I caught a name and enough of the context to know that the name is very important to the prosecution. Case-changing important. My case? Perhaps. That would explain the urgency, but even if it isn’t mine, finding out more could be useful.”

  In life, Kristof and I couldn’t have had more different careers. He’d been heir to the Nast Cabal; I’d been a purveyor of the dark arts. Yet whether it’s the boardroom or the black market, there is one commodity more valuable than any widget or spell: information. And when it came to buying, selling and trading it, no one knew the marketplace better than we did. If this mystery guy couldn’t help Kris’s case, he might be able to help the case of someone who would, in turn, help Kris.

  “That’s all I have,” he said. “A name and the hope that it’ll be useful.”

  “A mystery,” I said. “Exactly what I’m in the mood for. And-if you’re in the mood and have time-I’d be happy to make up for that kiss.” I waved at my house.

  That was one offer Kris never refused.

  ***

  Even if Lewis Stranz wasn’t up to something, he was certainly keeping me on my toes, which was a pleasant surprise. Tailing people usually involves long periods of sitting in one place, trying not to let my attention wander, because, as soon as it does, I know my mark will actually do something.

  Stranz didn’t seem to be doing anything of import. He was just very, very busy. Going here, going there, meeting this person, meeting that one. With every encounter, I had to get close enough to figure out what was going on. That’s not too tough for a witch who’s also an Aspicio half-demon.

  My father is Lord Demon Balaam, which makes life as an angel just a little more interesting. It does help in stalking, though, because the power he confers on his offspring is vision enhancement. If I can get on the other side of a wall when Stranz meets someone, I can clear a “peephole” and watch. If I can’t, then that’s when my witch powers come in handy, with blur spells for getting close and cover spells for staying there.

  After all that work, I’d discovered that Stranz was simply socializing. Getting together with friends for a walk, a chat, a drink-while we may not need sustenance, we still partake in the rituals of human social life.

  As for Stranz himself, my research hadn’t given me any hints to explain the prosecution’s interest. He was a shaman, which meant in the mortal world he’d had a spirit guide, could astral project and had healing abilities. Stranz still had his ayami-his spirit guide-except now the guide inhabited the same plane and had truly become his life partner, as often happens. And healing and spirit travel are absolutely useless in the afterlife. As if to compensate for this loss of powers, ghost shamans get special access to the teleport system, and what Stranz seemed to do with that access was make himself a wide and varied circle of friends. Which was a fun challenge for me, chasing him across the globe. But it wasn’t all that interesting. Until he went to London.

  ***

  Stranz’s first stop in London was the British Museum, which operates a little differently in the afterlife. In the mortal realm, if you visit a museum exhibit on, say, cave paintings, you’ll get photos of faint-colored lines on dimly lit cave walls, with artist reconstructions of what they might have looked like and theoretical crap about the artist, the purpose, blah, blah, blah. But in the afterlife, if you’re interested in cave paintings, you get yourself over to France and hike out to the caves at Lascaux, and there they are, the colors just as vivid-and the animals just as misshapen-as they were when first painted. If you want to know how or why they were done, you ask one of the painters himself, who lives there, happily telling visitors about his life’s work.

  Same goes for pretty much everything you’d find in the British Museum. If you want to explore the past, you just travel. So what is in the afterlife British Museum? Artifacts, pretty much as you’d find in the mortal world version, complete with temporary exhibits. But each artifact is actually a touch portal, which can take you to its natural environment. Access is available to all afterlife residents, except those who’ve had their basic teleportation privileges revoked.

  Stranz’s access was fine. From what I’d dug up, he didn’t seem like the kind of guy who’d even need to worry about revocation. A real straight arrow. Born during the Depression, died in the eighties, worked as a family doctor, never had more than a parking ticket in his life. In other words, the sort of person I usually had zero contact with, which made the prosecution’s interest all the more intriguing.

  My guess? Stranz was an unwilling-and probably unwitting-pawn in some scheme. A patsy. His squeaky-clean background made him perfect for it, as did his vast number of acquaintances. It was a good bet that one of those “friends” had set Stranz up, either to unknowingly transport goods or information or to take the fall for something.

  Which meant, if I was right, that I’d not only be helping Kris, but I’d be helping an innocent guy. That would win me brownie points with the Fates. They get excited when I do good deeds off duty, as if the whole angel gig is finally rubbing off. I might be able to parlay this one into an extra vacation week.

  As Stranz climbed the museum’s massive front steps, I lurked in a crowd of the recently dead. You can tell by the dresses and suits-they hadn’t yet learned how to change out of their grave clothes.

  I skirted them and hurried on, earning catcalls and whistles from a group of toga-clad young guys lounging on the stairs. I told them where they could shove it-in ancient Latin. That stopped them. One of the gifts that comes with ascended angelhood is a permanent universal translator in my brain. The Fates can’t rescind that when I’m off duty. They’ve just warned me that I should avoid using it for frivolous reasons. Which I do. My definition of frivolous just doesn’t always match theirs.

  I spotted Stranz as soon as I entered the museum. He took a left at the Rosetta stone-which, by the way, I can fully translate-then headed through the wing to the room containing pieces of the Greek Parthenon. From there, he teleported to the Acropolis itself. I waited behind Assyrians sighing over friezes as they lamented the late, great sport of lion hunting. Then I cast a blur spell, hurried to the next room and crossed over into ancient Athens.

  ***

  Like every other place that has passed its heyday, Athens is stuck in its glory years-the good old days of Ancient Greece, before the Romans took over and renamed all their gods. And long before the Ottomans used the Parthenon as an ammo dump and a stray flame reduced it to pretty chunks of marble. Because irreplaceable historic buildings make great places to store gunpowder.

  In the afterlife, the Parthenon is still standing, its marble buildings shimmering blindingly white under the midday sun. The grounds were covered with picnickers in garb from across the globe and the centuries. Tourists wound their way through the Acropolis. There were a few guards, but mostly just to make sure no one tried to set up residence.

  Most tourists flocked to the Parthenon, the most famous temple on the Acropolis, the one with the forty-foot-tall ivory and gold statue of Athene. When Stranz exited the portal, he headed down the sloping road to the Erechtheion on the Acropolis’s north side. It’s a smaller temple, dedicated to yet another aspect of Athene. Don’t ask me what aspect. I’ve been here; I’ve explored; I’ve never taken the tour.

  Stranz headed straight into the temple, meaning he wasn’t touring either. He was meeting someone. Sure enough, as he made his way through the Erechtheion, a woman broke from the gaggle of gawking ghosts and slid after him. I could see they were both heading to the south porch and was about to go around
outside to eavesdrop, when the woman… pulsed.

  One second she was a solid, fully materialized form, then she faded a little, becoming slightly translucent, before “firming up” again. No one else noticed. I only did because the ability to spot glamours is yet another part of my angel package.

  I concentrated on the woman, trying to see what lay beneath her glamour. For a moment, she was just a woman. Late twenties, dark hair, pale skin. Then her skin went as white as the surrounding marble. Her dark hair began to writhe, snakes slithering through it. Two more snakes encircled her arms and a third acted as a belt. Her short skirt and boots stayed the same, but she accessorized with wings. Put the wings together with the snakes and the huntress costume and there was no doubt what I was seeing. An Erinys. Better known as a Fury.

  I zipped out of the temple and around to the south, where I cloaked myself in a cover spell and hid under the row of Caryatids-the marble maidens that stand watch over the porch. I could hear three people above speaking in ancient Sumerian, which sounded like they were waxing poetic on the beauty and majesty of their surroundings… until I realized they were just trying to figure out where to grab lunch. I presumed Stranz and the Erinys were up there, waiting for the others to move on.

  Erinyes are, technically, demi-demons. But that’s a catch-all term that basically means “not a ghost or celestial spirit.” Within it, the actual degree of demonic varies wildly. You have creatures like Nix, whose sole purpose is to convince mortals to act on their darkest desires. Clearly demonic. Then you get entities like djinn, who take advantage of human greed and offer a deal that usually won’t go in your favor. More mischievous than evil.

  Further along are the Erinyes, who were known by the Greeks as goddesses of vengeance. You call on them to avenge yourself on someone who has wronged you, and by “wronged” I don’t mean “cut off in traffic.” It has to be a serious offense, like murdering a loved one. Erinyes have ethics. Strict ones. However, they aren’t going to talk you into turning the other cheek. That’s why they’re classified as demons. They may intend to mete out justice, but they can wreak serious havoc doing it.