The Hunter

by T R Kohler

Those were the rules.

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  The passenger seat of the VW Bus held an odd assortment of items, things that Ember would have never considered riding shotgun for her as recently as a couple of days ago.

  A handheld mirror that could give whoever looked into it the ability to see beyond the external for anything walking the Earth. A bullwhip that sprang to life in the presence of Heaven’s disciples, turning into a perverse form of tiki torch.

  And a cellphone that was pink and bedazzled, lifted from Kaia hours earlier.

  How she had managed to come to possess so many disparate items over the course of less than a day, she hadn’t a clue. What she might come to amass in the coming months or years, she’d rather not even think about.

  One thing at a time for now.

  Grabbing up the cellphone from the seat, Ember balanced it across her thigh. Glancing down only long enough to thumb her way through the menu screens, she pulled up the most recent call in the log and hit send, the sound of ringing echoing through the car.

  Leaving the phone in place, she lifted her attention to the world outside. Just after two in the morning, most of the city had finally succumbed to slumber, fast food joints and gas stations extinguishing their neon and sitting silent.

  Leaving behind only the stanchion lights lining the freeway, the world seemed finally at peace, calming down in anticipation of a new day ahead.

  An irony that was not lost on Ember, considering what was to come.

  Snatched up after the third ring, a series of deep breaths gave the impression Typhon had been sprinting to get to the phone. Swallowing, he managed, “Yeah?”

  “I interrupt something?” Ember asked. Glancing into the rearview mirror, she saw the events of her multiple encounters with Micah splayed across her face.

  Mottled blue and purple, some swelling had set in, giving her a lopsided appearance.

  At a glance, someone who could see her true form would be hard-pressed to think she wasn’t a demon of sorts herself.

  “What do you want?” Typhon asked, pushing past the comment. The strain of the last day was evident in his tone.

  Apparently, her hanging up on him during their last call was still close to the surface as well.

  “I know where Jonas is,” Ember said. Stated in a flat tone, she left her reply at that, knowing it would be sufficient to help Typhon push by whatever wounded ego issues he might be having.

  “You-” he began, pulling up short to allow her statement to sink in. Letting out a long breath, he eventually said, “How?”

  “Rocco,” Ember said. “They sent him to Tam’s house to keep an eye out for things.”

  “And they left him there?”

  “Apparently,” Ember said. Why, she hadn’t given much thought to. Perhaps they thought maybe she would return. Maybe they were waiting to see if anybody else showed up.

  Or, more likely, they just hadn’t thought to call him off yet.

  “And he just told you where to find Jonas?” Typhon said, a hint of disbelief in his tone.

  Glancing over to the side, Ember took in the whip beside her, thinking on the incident that had just played out. Even now, a half-hour later, she could smell Toby’s burnt fur, could see a few spots of his blood on the base of the weapon.

  “Turns out the Patron Saint of Dogs can’t just willingly sit by and watch one get tortured,” Ember said. Even if the last word was a bit of an overstatement for what had happened, it wasn’t a long way off. “They have a safe house in New Mexico. An old abandoned barn sitting on a cliff overlooking the Cimarron River.”

  A series of low mutterings slid over the line, the last part sounding something like, “I’ll be damned.”

  Not bothering to follow up, still feeling like she was a long way from anything resembling praise, Ember pressed, “And I need you to tell me how to get there.”

  In the last two days, Jonas and Micah had shown up at multiple locations. Where they had come from, Ember hadn’t known, assuming they were nearby and had just been going through the same investigative steps she was.

  Now she knew different.

  “What makes you think-” Typhon began, a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

  “Cut the shit,” Ember said, not in the mood for any more discussion of rules or whatever else governed them. “I know Jonas has been hopping states back and forth whenever he wants.

  “Now, it’s my turn.”

  A moment of silence passed, Typhon thinking it over. With each second that slid by, Ember could practically project every argument he was thinking about, every thought moving through his mind, resisting sending her over.

  She wasn’t ready. She didn’t know what she was doing. Didn’t realize who she was up against.

  What he didn’t realize was, she also didn’t give a damn.

  Making the deal she did wasn’t her idea. It was a reaction to a specific situation, an arrangement she would maintain because she had no other choice.

  She couldn’t die. Not again, anyway. So anything else that happened to her along the way, so be it.

  “Normally, you couldn’t,” Typhon said. “Making those jumps are reserved for people at the middle tier or higher. People like Kaia or Jonas.”

  Gripping the wheel tight in either hand, Ember squeezed long enough she could feel her left arm ache, knowing that more blood was probably oozing from the wound.

  Though, to be honest, the pain was almost refreshing. In a lot of ways, it was the most real part of this entire experience.

  “But since Kaia isn’t here...” Ember said, picking up what Typhon was hinting at.

  “Right,” he said, letting the word slide out slowly, “and since you have the whip...”

  His voice trailing away, Ember chose to let him continue pondering things. For someone like her, used to rushing straight ahead, his hesitance was a bit of a surprise.

  Knowing it was probably tied to the damn rules and whatever stipulations they carried, she wasn’t nearly as shocked as she could have been.

  Drifting to the outer lane of traffic, Ember pressed harder on the accelerator. Driving to nowhere in particular, she watched as signs for places like Lake Murray and La Mesa filed by, each as nondescript and suburban as the one before.

  “You know that Rocco has probably already called to warn them.”

  “I know,” Ember said. “That’s the point.”

  Taking a moment, Typhon said, “Meaning?”

  Glancing over to the Seeing Eye sitting beside her, Ember didn’t bother filling him in further, knowing he would only disapprove of the plan she was putting together.

  “Meaning, just tell me how to get my ass to New Mexico.”

  The law enforcement officer in Ember said she should leave her son where he was. She didn’t know the full extent of his injuries, had no way of ensuring his safety if she tried to release the seat belt holding him in place.

  The mother inside her dictated there was no way she could leave her son in such a position. Not when he was already injured.

  It had taken everything she had to wrest him from the car, her broken ribs fighting her each step of the way, but eventually she had managed to pull him free. Now ten minutes later, she was sitting with her back against the side of the vehicle, her coat as a barrier between her and the slushy ground.

  Positioned with his body inside the car, siphoning off whatever warmth remained, Emory’s head was balanced on her thigh.

  The wound along his temple had stopped bleeding, the thick ooze already dried and beginning to crust. The entire right side of his head was stiff with it, his blond locks extended at odd angles.

  Without the wail of the music inside the car, the world seemed oddly silent. The sleet that had pelted them earlier had given way to snow, nature’s soundproofing falling thick and fast around them.

  Which made the sound of the voice all the more startling, completely unexpected, the first noise save Ember’s crying in more than ten minutes.

 
“You look like you could use some help.”

  Jerking her head to the side, Ember found a man standing before her, his hands clasped behind him. Dressed entirely in black, he cut a harsh outline against the pale backdrop.

  Walking to within just a few feet of her, he stopped, a look bordering on a smile on his face.

  “Where did you come from?” Ember asked. Lifting her head from the side of the car, she peered into the distance, seeing no other cars. Not once had she seen any taillights, or heard the sound of an approaching engine.

  “You called,” the man replied.

  “I...” Ember began, her face crinkling slightly. “Wha? My phone was ruined in the crash. It wouldn’t even turn on.”

  The man dipped his head slightly, revealing a head full of black hair, not a single snowflake marring it. “True, but that’s not quite what I meant.”

  This time, there were no words. The events of the last half hour had made it almost impossible for Ember to think clearly, the confusion on her face making as much obvious.

  Releasing the grip behind his back, the man extended a finger toward the side of the road. “Now, what you probably didn’t realize given the snow and the limited visibility is that right there is the entrance to Pawlson Road.

  “Nothing more than an old logging trail, it does however satisfy one of our clear requirements.”

  Again, myriad thoughts spurted across Ember’s mind, none any clearer than the others.

  “Requirements?” she whispered.

  “Yes,” the man said. “See, it’s not enough just to ask for our help. You also have to have drawn blood, and you have to be sitting in the middle of an intersection.

  “Or, as some would prefer to say, a crossroads.”

  Waving his hands to either side, he said, “Sort of our own vetting process.”

  Who this man was, what he was prattling on about, Ember didn’t have the slightest interest in. Tilting her gaze back down to her son, she could see the ghostly pallor of his cheeks, his lips parted just slightly.

  “He’s hurt badly,” she said. “He needs help.”

  “I know,” the man replied. “That’s why I’m here.”

  It took a full moment for the words to resonate, for Ember to let their meaning sink in. Raising her gaze toward the man, she made no effort to hide her confusion, her features crinkled slightly.

  “Who are you?”

  “My name is Typhon, but that is really rather unimportant. What is important is who I represent, and what I can do for you.” Using his chin, he gestured to Emory. “For him.”

  Hot moisture underscored Ember’s eyes as she again looked down to her son.

  He was gone. There was no denying it. Whether it had happened from the impact or from blood loss didn’t much matter now.

  “You can’t help him,” she whispered. “Or me.”

  “I beg to differ,” the man replied. “I can see that your son has met an unfortunate end, and that you seem intent on fast joining him, but I have a proposal that could change things for both of you.”

  Ember was in no mood to argue with this man. Whatever illusions of grandeur he held didn’t concern her. Nor did most anything he had to say.

  All she wanted was for it to be over.

  “Go away.”

  “As you wish,” the man replied. Returning his hands behind his back, he took a step away. Turning on a heel, he took another before pausing.

  “But don’t you at least want to hear that there could be another way? Since you seem so determined to end things for yourself, what if I told you it was possible to save your son in the process?”

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  The wrap around the bottom of Jonas’s leg felt like it was getting tighter with every step, as if the bandage was made from pure elastic. He could feel it digging into the raw flesh, grinding against the exposed nerves.

  Back on his path outside the barn, each time he put his right foot forward, he could feel the underlying muscles clenching, sucking sharp breaths in through his teeth.

  Gad was good. Considered by many to be the best at what he did, it was why Jonas had made a point of snatching him up early. More than once, he had been instrumental in getting someone like Tam back on their feet, rendering them useful for whatever was needed.

  For as skilled as he was, there was little that could be done for the damage on Jonas’s leg. Wounds like those inflicted by the whip, or the puncture given to Kaia, were created by weapons specifically designed by for use on their kind.

  They were meant to cause more harm and to be much longer in the healing process.

  Something that only made the animosity Jonas felt spike as he continued pacing, trying to will himself past the pain. Knowing better than to stop moving, to let the leg get tight, he forced himself to keep going, waiting for that moment when the body’s natural defenses would kick in and the agony would recede.

  But after more than an hour, that hadn’t yet happened.

  The longer it took, the more hostility Jonas carried. Enough that the idea of going back into the holding cell entered his mind. Allowing his thoughts to seize on the notion, on the various things he could do to an incapacitated Kaia, he almost missed the buzzing of the phone in his pocket.

  Locked on images such as those of Tam the day before, it wasn’t until the fifth or sixth pulse of the device on his hip that Jonas thought to pull it free, checking the screen.

  And saw a name that truly surprised him.

  “Rocco,” he said, slowing his pace to just more than a creep. “What is it?”

  Knowing the man was not one for socializing, especially at such an hour, there were only so many reasons why he would be reaching out.

  None especially good.

  The first sound resembled sniffling, short pulls of air followed by a loud clearing of the nose. Feeling his brows come together, Jonas listened another moment before saying, “Rocco?”

  “Hey, Jonas,” Rocco replied this time, his voice breathy. “Sorry to be calling, but I just had a visitor, and I wanted to let you know you’ll soon have one as well.”

  The words were something Jonas had known since getting back, though that still didn’t stop the surge of electricity that rifled through him. “Ember.”

  “Ember,” Rocco repeated.

  His feet continued to move through nothing more than muscle memory, his mind elsewhere as he shuffled along. The safe house was chosen because it was well out of sight, the sort of place someone only found if they knew where to look.

  The fact that Tam had been held with no problem for days only confirmed that.

  The first time the place had been used, the number of people who knew where it was could be counted on one hand, none willing to give it up easily.

  “Are you hurt, Rocco?”

  “No,” Rocco replied, barely a whisper. “You know if it were that simple, I would have never said a word.”

  Jonas did know that. He had worked with Rocco before, and while he wasn’t a fighter, he was a savant at those things he did do.

  Observation, surveillance, research. It was why he had been brought along in the first place.

  He also had one enormous weakness, saddled by it through no fault of his own.

  Clamping his eyes shut, Jonas looked to the sky. He cursed himself in silence for forgetting to pull Rocco out the moment they returned, before asking, “Is Toby okay?”

  Again, Rocco blew his nose. It was a state he would likely be in for the rest of the evening. “He will be...”

  Falling away for a moment, he pulled in a breath before adding, “I’m sorry, Jonas. I didn’t want to, but-”

  “The rules,” Jonas said, nodding. He did know how it went. Every single being that was allowed to walk the middle realm was saddled with at least one thing, one way of leveling the field.

  Love for dogs was Rocco’s, something that Ember had exploited to the fullest.

  And now she was coming his way.

  “It’s okay,” Jonas s
aid. “Not your fault. Thanks for the warning.”

  Lowering his phone, Jonas was about to cut the call when he heard Rocco yell, a sudden urgency in his tone. “No!” he called out. “That’s not all!”

  Returning the phone to his face, Jonas reversed his course. Walking back over the same footprints he’d made just moments before, he headed toward the barn.

  There were preparations to put in place, things to get squared away.

  “Yeah?” he asked. “What else?”

  “The woman – Ember – she has the Seeing Eye. She’s coming your way because she wants to make a trade.”

  Stopping where he stood, Jonas felt his eyes go wide. Any concern for his leg, or anything else, bled away, his focus entirely on the call.

  “What’s she want?”

  Already he had an idea, though he needed to hear the words. He needed to know how to best prepare.

  “Tam or Kaia?”

  “Both,” Rocco said. “She told me to tell you she wanted both for the mirror, and she’d see you soon.”

  Chapter Sixty

  When trying to imagine how she would be getting from San Diego to New Mexico, Ember had imagined a streak of blinding light coming down out of the sky. Like a scene from Thor, it would deposit her right outside of Jonas’s compound, leaving a charred indentation on the ground, announcing her presence with authority.

  Standing in the center of it, she would be bent forward at the waist, a knee to the ground, sticking the landing, ready to do battle.

  The reality of the situation was a far cry from that.

  The process was more like teleportation. One moment, she was standing in an empty Target parking lot on the far outskirts of San Diego. The bag now completely destroyed, she carried the whip in one hand, the mirror in the other.

  The phone she slid into her rear waistband, bringing it only for the unlikely circumstance that things went off the rails and she needed to call on Typhon for damage control.

  What little of that he could actually provide.

  Muttering the brief incantation that had been given to her, she gripped the handle of the whip tight, pressing on the button imbedded in it.