Starling (Southern Watch Book 6)

by Robert J. Crane

  “You know I’d never open up my door to evangelicals, Nick.”

  “Then I ain’t got a clue how you’d hear about demons, short of them rip-shredding their damned way through your house at high speed.”

  “Hmph,” she said. “Sounds to me like you’re doing a pretty shit job of communicating, Nick.”

  “Well, riddle me this,” Reeve said, still trying to find the most expedient way to get out of this conversation, “how’d you hear about the vote today, then?”

  “Saw it on a sign as I was driving past the precinct a few days ago. Had to exercise my God-given rights, you know.”

  “Well, if you didn’t know about the demons,” Reeve said with a fierce squint, “or the murders, or any of the other shit that’s been going on around here … why’d you vote against me?”

  “I just don’t like you,” Mary answered immediately. “You always got that look in your eyes like you think I’m about a second away from whacking you upside the head.”

  “Wonder where I got that idea,” Reeve muttered, shaking his head. That headache was only getting worse as the day wore on. Was it too soon to take another round of Tylenol?

  *

  “Let’s have a talk in here,” Guthrie said as Erin followed her into the depths of the jail, Mary Wrightson’s strident conversation with Reeve echoing along the corridor behind them. Erin didn’t really want a piece of that discussion. She didn’t care for the thought of trailing along after Arch, Duncan and Hendricks either, mostly because of that last one. They said they were heading to Surrey’s, because it was about that time, and while she might have thought it rude a few weeks ago if Arch had gone to lunch without asking her if she wanted something, it was a new world now, and Hendricks had bowled through and fucked shit up too, and that meant she was just as happy to not be asked now.

  Well, mostly.

  “Why in here?” Erin asked, following him toward the sealed door that led into the confinement area. She didn’t know who was on duty in this part of the jail, but she’d be finding out pretty quick.

  “I’ve been pondering about this fella in here,” she said as she stood by the door. “I wanna see him for myself.”

  “I’ve seen him,” Erin said as Guthrie waved through the little window to the jailkeeper. “Ain’t nothing going on behind the curtains.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Guthrie cast him a smirk. “Do they match the carpet?”

  Erin frowned. “What?”

  Erin pushed through into the waiting area. They stepped inside, and there was Chauncey Watson, his eyes magnified by those massive glasses he wore. “Hey, Erin,” he warbled in greeting, raising his hand to her. He had a few metal miniature figures on the desk in front of him, and the air smelled of acrylic paint. She wrinkled her nose in response.

  “Hey, Chauncey,” Erin said. “You’re looking mighty settled in.”

  “It ain’t exactly the most mind-intensive duty,” Chauncey said, grinning weakly. His cheeks were covered in a dark layer of scruff, like he hadn’t shaved in a day or two. “I pretty much just sit here for a few hours, then go home. Maybe push the door to buzz somebody in a couple times.”

  “Sounds lonely,” Erin said.

  “Huh?” Chauncey blinked. “Awww, no, it’s wonderful. It’s a lot better than my day job.”

  Guthrie scratched at her head. “Wait … isn’t it Tuesday? If you’ve got a day job …”

  “Oh, I called in sick,” Chauncey said. “Somebody had to watch this critter until Sam gets done with his shift.” He looked down, a set of tiny paint brushes laid out on a paper towel in front of him. “Reckon he’ll be here to spell me after a while.”

  “Uh, Chauncey,” Erin said, “Sam died last week.” She stared at the unblinking eyes behind the Coke-bottle glasses. “He got ripped to pieces by those hellcats we ran into in the woods.”

  Chauncey just stared for a moment, then thudded back against the seat’s rest, slowly, like he’d been knocked over by a feather. “Well, shit. Last week? I swear I had a conversation with him yesterday!”

  “Unless he’s a ghost, no,” Erin said. “You really didn’t notice he’s been gone?”

  Chauncey stared, deep in thought. “You know, I thought my shifts here had been going a little longer. And Bernie’s been relieving me instead of Sam, come to think of it … he used to be the shift after me … I didn’t even notice.” His lip curled. “Well, damn. Did I miss the funeral?”

  “Yeah,” Erin said gingerly. “You did. But I wouldn’t worry about it.” When Chauncey cocked his head, clearly asking without asking about what she meant, she said, “Lotta people been missing funerals lately. It’s kind of a thing.”

  “Well, this is all very lovely,” Guthrie said, brusque as ever, “but while you work through your five stages of grief and eventually get back to nerding—” she pointed vaguely to the miniatures on the desk in front of Chauncey “—would you mind letting us in before I keel over of boredom?”

  “Oh, sure,” Chauncey said, apparently either not offended by the shot Guthrie had taken at him or just oblivious to it. He picked up the key and unlocked the door, opening it for them.

  “Thanks, darlin’,” Guthrie said with a smirk, and then winked at Chauncey, who appeared to miss that too. Guthrie headed through the door into the prisoner detention area and waited until it closed to say, “What a fucking idiot.”

  “Chauncey’s a good guy,” Erin said with perhaps a little excess defensive zeal.

  “Good does not equal smart,” Guthrie said. “The two qualities are, in fact, almost completely unrelated. See for evidence—evil geniuses, and morons with a heart of gold. Like Dan Rather.”

  “Which one of those is he?”

  “Your mileage may vary,” Guthrie said, then nodded at the specimen in front of them. “Speaking of drooling morons—look at this sad motherfucker. An empty vessel, all the wine poured out.” She looked back at Erin. “You ever wonder what it’s like to have your whole life taken over and run for you by powers beyond your control?”

  “Well, I’m still technically a teenager, so I have a pretty vivid memory of what that’s like, since … strict parents.” Erin’s cheeks burned as Guthrie grinned back at her in undisguised amusement. “How long do you suppose he was possessed before he ended up … this way?” She’d searched for a better way to put it, but all she came up with was like a fucking vegetable, or, appealing to her darker instincts, the kind of shit she’d only say when really hammered, like Bill Longholt?

  Guthrie was perhaps too interested in staring at the man in front of him—or the empty shell of a man—to pick up on her discomfort. “I’m guessing at least a hundred years. I mean, he probably receded into nothingness before that, but—I’m guessing they used his body for over a hundred years, judging by the state of his teeth.”

  Erin frowned. “What? His teeth?”

  “Take a look at ’em,” Guthrie said, sidling over and opening the man’s mouth. They were in pretty shit shape; Erin didn’t take a step back, but she was tempted to. “See, they’re not in total disrepair, and being possessed by a demon essentially stops the clock on things like abscesses and infections, turning you into a shell for your new host. No sickness, no disease, none of that during the period of possession, these little elements of demon physiology layered over your physical form. So this shit with his teeth? It predates his possession.” She ran a finger over his front teeth; they were yellowed, plaque-stained, and whitish deposits covered the cracks. “Being a possessed person sucks, but at least the dental plan is pretty good.” Guthrie shot her a smile. “Stasis and an end to the pain.”

  “So … did his teeth look like this the whole time he was possessed?” Erin asked. “And what makes you think a hundred years?”

  “Well, because he’s not entirely lost them all, and looks to be thirty years of age,” Guthrie said. “That means dental hygiene wasn’t totally medieval, but it wasn’t exactly in an advanced state either. Ergo, a hundred years or more. Unless he’s
just a hillbilly.” She gave the man a little slap on the cheek. “When were you born? What year?”

  He actually blinked from the tap, which looked to have been just sharp enough to cause some pain, disturbing the tube that ran up his nose, wiggling it along its length. The man moaned lightly, as if discovering his voice.

  “What the fuck?” Now Erin did take a step back. “He’s never reacted like that before, at least not that I’ve heard.”

  “You people are all pussies, that’s why,” Guthrie said, and drew back to slap him again. She didn’t draw back far, but then, she didn’t have to. Demon strength meant she could keep her hand an inch from the man’s face and still snap his head around with the force of impact.

  “What the fuck, Lern—Guthrie!” Erin started forward to stop her.

  Guthrie just grinned, letting him have it, then stepped away as the man toppled over. He made another sound. “You idiots are content to just let him sit in here like a vegetable.”

  “Unnnnhhhh,” the man said, face now against the floor. He didn’t move, just moaned.

  “Because torturing a fucking prisoner is inhumane,” Erin said.

  “Yeah, well, so am I,” Guthrie said. “And if you want this guy to come out of a hundred or so years of being crushed under the weight of a million demons in his head, you better do something to kickstart his reactions. Hunger ain’t doing it.”

  “We’ve been feeding him,” Erin said, looking at the pile of a man lying on the ground like he was going to spring up and slap her for Guthrie’s misdeeds. “That’s what the tube in his nose is for, I guess. Aren’t those supposed to be painful?”

  “They’re no picnic, I’m sure,” Guthrie said, “but if you want to bring this guy back to life, you’re gonna need some sharp relief for what ails him. His brain’s muted, and dull aches ain’t gonna draw him out. You need the snap, the hit, the sudden, jarring pain to make him feel wherever he is in there.”

  “I can’t let you beat him,” Erin said, letting her palm rest on her gun. It was stupid not to bring her baseball bat in here, she realized now. She’d inadvertently trusted Guthrie.

  “If you can’t beat ’em,” Guthrie said, and motioned to the man, his ass up in the air, “I guess you could always join ’em.”

  Erin froze. “Is that—did you just suggest a course of action, or were you just repeating a cliché?”

  “Little of both,” Guthrie said, “though I wouldn’t suggest trying to join the demons around here if you can’t beat ’em. Because the only thing you’ll be joining is your death to their total lack of mercy.” She nodded at the man on the ground. “Seriously though. Let me slap him a few more times, we’ll get him back to functioning on a basic level.”

  “What—no!” She drew her gun now, and kept it at her side. “You can’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you can’t hurt someone who’s in custody and completely unable to defend themselves!” Erin gripped the pistol, carefully keeping her finger off the trigger as she argued with the demon. Her heart was thundering, caught in this confined space with someone so dangerous. How could she have been so stupid as to be lulled by Lerner—Guthrie?

  “Funny thing about that,” Guthrie said, folding her arms in front of her. “Something no one really thinks about, but—surgeons do gross bodily harm to people every day. They cut them open, invasively, sometimes without their permission. Car accident happens, lady gets a ruptured—I dunno, what ruptures on you people? Spleens? They bust, right? Lady gets a ruptured spleen and gets wheeled into a surgical bay where a doctor cuts her wide open, leaving a massive wound. It’ll take weeks, months, maybe even years to heal fully—if you heal fully at all. If a street punk did the same damned thing to you with a knife in an alley, we’d call that assault with a deadly weapon, and they’d get punished for it. A doctor does it … ehhh, let’s just overlook this gross bodily harm we did to this person without their permission.”

  “Because it’s to save their life,” Erin said. “They’re doing it to—” She looked at the fallen form of the man, who had gone silent once more.

  “Exactly,” Guthrie said. “And I’m not beating a helpless person for the kicks, okay? I could do that in any city in the world and probably get away with it, if I were so inclined. Why, I’m almost virtuous.” She grinned. “I’m trying to help this poor bastard come back to us. I’m like a surgeon, focused on the result rather than the fact I’m ripping into a human being with a knife and causing gross bodily harm. Why won’t you let me help this poor fucker?” Guthrie settled into a look of pure amusement, mingled slightly with the satisfaction of knowing she’d just rhetorically bitchslapped Erin.

  Erin felt the sting of it too, and it ached her brain slightly, knowing she’d gotten pushed to a conclusion she found … distasteful. “You’re not a doctor.”

  “Pffft, I could have been,” Guthrie said, “as many medical shows as I’ve watched over these years. My point is, though, you’re all focused on the means rather than the desired result. ‘Ohhh, it’s hurting him, the poor prisoner.’ You don’t think being a vegetable is hurting him more? I’m talking about bringing him back to life, and all you can focus on is how he’s feeling an ounce of pain as I perform a surgery to bring him back to whole again.” Guthrie leaned toward her. “Stop focusing on the pain. Start looking at the desired result.”

  Erin paused. She was holding her breath and didn’t even realize it. She swallowed, her face feeling hot. “You could really hurt him.”

  “I could really hurt a lot of people, sweetheart. But I don’t.”

  Her words just didn’t sound right to Erin. It was like the old Lerner was peeking out from beneath the facade.

  Erin holstered her gun, barely realizing she’d done it. She swallowed again, feeling like she’d taken down an apple whole, and it had lodged in her throat. Who the hell was this guy, anyway? How had he ended up with a demon legion in him? These were questions that had rankled her for a while. It was the same shit that bounced around her mind when she thought about how she’d ended up in the path of the demon legion, how she’d become a tool for them to do … all the vile shit they did.

  “No,” she said, and to Guthrie’s credit, she didn’t do more than sigh and roll her eyes. And with that, Erin beckoned toward the door, and Guthrie went first, rapping on it to get them out. While they waited, Erin helped pick up the man on the ground, dragging him back to sitting. There was no movement in his eyes, nothing, and as she left him behind, she wondered if—just maybe—she shouldn’t have let Guthrie try things her way.

  *

  Archibald Stan is the man who will bring about the end of the world. Those words popped into Hendricks’s head as he drove, Arch in the passenger seat, looking restless at not being in control of the vehicle, and Duncan behind him, not making a goddamned peep. Hendricks just had to keep steering the car as that unsettling, shitass feeling washed over him again, same as it always did whenever those words came to mind.

  “Your head is not a fun place to be,” Duncan said.

  “No shit,” Hendricks tossed back. It was really fucking annoying how he did that, and extremely shitty to contemplate how much the demon could read. Probably another reason why Duncan kept it to himself of late. He was a little more in tune with the stuff that unnerved humans than Guthrie seemed to be. Or more circumspect about it, at least.

  “You reading his mind?” Arch asked.

  Hendricks didn’t think Duncan could actually do that—or maybe that was just wishful thinking on his part. He’d heard the explanation at one point, but it all sounded fucking vague and full of caveats. It seemed to be like a condom; when it worked, it just ruined the fun, and when it didn’t, it had the chance to ruin everything.

  “Not exactly,” Duncan said. He didn’t elaborate, and Hendricks tried not to sigh in relief. Until he waited a few seconds and sort of did: “Your bodies aren’t some mysterious thing, you know. And neither are your brains.”

  “My brain
seems like a total fucking mystery to most,” Hendricks cracked, trying to get the OOC to shut the fuck up.

  “Your brain is neurons. Physical reactions. Chemicals. Synapses—”

  “Thanks for the biology lesson, Bill Nye minus the bowtie,” Hendricks said. “What does that have to do with you and your special soul-sensing powers?”

  “These are physical phenomena,” Duncan said. “They can be measured and charted. Maybe not by your scientists, entirely, just yet, but they’re there. They exist. They can be perceived, with the right instrumentation.”

  “And you’re the right instrument?” Arch’s deep voice sounded interested.

  “Sometimes,” Duncan said. “Sometimes … not.”

  “So when you’re perceiving this demon that we’re chasing all over the place—” Hendricks waved to the road ahead—they were bumping along a back road surrounded on either side by fence posts strung with barbed wire “—you’re not actually perceiving his mystical, magical essence or whatever the shit? You’re really just using the equivalent of a built-in demon radiation detector to track him?”

  “Something like that,” Duncan said.

  “So how do those things—those talismans we pick up from dead demons—how do they interfere with your sense?” Arch asked. He seemed to be really engaged, which was something Hendricks hadn’t seen much from the man of late.

  “That’s a good question,” Duncan said quietly. “You should ask Guthrie.”

  “Why the fuck would I go out of my way to have a conversation with Guthrie when you’re sitting right here?” Hendricks asked. “Do you just not know?”

  Duncan didn’t blink. “No. I don’t know. And I haven’t given it a lot of thought.”

  Hendricks actually exchanged a look with Arch, then went back to the OOC. “Why the hell not? You’ve got this special power but you don’t think about it?”

  “How often do you give a lot of thought to how your sense of smell works?” Duncan asked. “I mean, you clearly can smell things. Rotten eggs. Roses. But how does that work? How do you perceive—”