Though I’d like my coat now. And some ammo. And for my birthday I’d really like a pony. Ignored the thought, my foot flicked out, and I kicked the dreadlocked ’breed in the face. The impact jolted up to my hip, taking a break in my still-healing femur, and I screamed as she did, two cries of female effort.
No, three. I couldn’t worry about the third one. I dropped back down onto the SUV’s roof, and the ’breed twisted. For one eternal moment she hung in the air over me, time slowing down and I braced myself because her claws were still out and this was going to hurt when she landed. I had nothing but the gun and it was rising but the ammo wouldn’t help.
The third voice was a stream of obscenities cutting across the ’breed’s desperate howl and my own. Gunfire crackled and the dreadlocked ’breed tumbled aside, half her head evaporating in a mess of black ichor and zombie oatmeal.
What the fuck? That wasn’t me!
The newcomer uncoiled over me with a bound that was pure poetry, long leather duster flapping once like wet laundry shaken with an authoritative crack! Silver sparked and popped in her hair, beads tied to tiny braids in the straight shoulder-length mass, and her blue eyes were alight with hard joy. The ruby above and between her eyebrows was a point of living flame, and she turned in midair, firing at another hellbreed streaking out of the shadows.
Holy shit, I know her!
But I could not for the life of me come up with her name. An angry swarm of buzzing scraped the inside of my temples as I strained, frozen for a few critical moments.
The Trader who landed on the hood of a small black sports car, legs swelling with muscle and his entire body lengthening as he exploded out of the crouch and for her back probably didn’t know her name either. He’d never learn it, either, because I shot him four times in midflight, the recoil jolting up my arm controlled almost as an afterthought. The hollow points tore up his head and chest bad enough to put him down on the road with a thud.
Hopefully the bleeding out would do the rest, but if it didn’t I’d figure something else out.
Horns screeched. A rending crash, a blue minivan rear-ending another SUV down the line. Someone was screaming from the sidewalk, I hoped it wasn’t collateral damage. Fucking civilians, we’re doing this out in the middle of the road, what the fuck?
The woman landed, her right-hand gun blurring into its holster and her fingers jerking at something attached to her belt. “Status! ” she yelled, and wonder of wonders, I understood exactly what she meant.
She was asking if I could fight. I could, I’d be more than happy to, it would make me ecstatic, I just needed some goddamn ammo that would put these fuckers down.
“No ammo!” I rolled off the SUV’s roof and landed with a jolt on the road. My legs burned, bone messily healing, crackling as etheric force jerked at them to set the breaks correctly. It was the gem on my wrist doing it, and I didn’t care. Traffic was at a complete standstill. “Civilians all over! Werepanther up on the rooftop, hope he’s headed for the barrio! Fucking hellbreed chasing us! Perry! ”
“Figures.” She half-turned, eyes roving. Every piece of silver on her ran with blue sparks under the surface, and the ring on my third left finger responded with crackling of its own. “What you packing?”
“.45. One. Nothing else. Regular ammo.” Frustration turned the words into hard little bullets, but I sounded tight-mouth amused.
There was another impact. We both turned, guns coming up, and the thing in her right hand was a bullwhip, sharpsilver spines jingling at its end. She twitched it a little, assuring free play, and my fingers suddenly itched. I wanted one, too, in the worst way.
Theron rose from a crouch. “Devi.” He tipped his head. “Look who’s back.”
Her name lit up inside my head, another klieg light of memory and meaning. Devi. Anya Devi. I let out a sigh of relief. If she was here, things had just gotten exponentially better.
So why did my heart suddenly pound in my wrists and throat for a moment, before training clamped down again? Why did I feel suddenly guilty?
Her face twisted a little, smoothed out. “Barrio?”
He shrugged, eyes lambent. “Was trying.”
“Galina’s.” She glanced at me like I would protest, but I didn’t have a damn thing to say. I scanned the perimeter, kept my fool mouth shut.
Theron looked relieved and stubborn all at once. “Can’t make it. Too many of them, wait for daylight.”
I lowered my gun, did another half turn. Traffic was hell-to-breakfast higgledy-piggledy, and people were actually starting to get out of their cars to get a closer gander at the trouble. Idiot lookie-lous.
But then, they didn’t know hellbreed were on the loose. We kept it a secret, we hunters.
Monty’s going to have kittens over this. Was I in the middle of a case? Were the cops betting on when I’d show up again, was Vice running the pool on sightings of me, nervous because I’d been out of action for a little bit?
We had to vanish soon, or the crowd would get hurt. As it was, the cops were going to have trouble with this one.
The woman sighed. “Goddamn stubborn Weres. Jill? You with me?”
Do you even need to ask, Devi? But I probably would’ve asked me, too. “Yeah.”
“Are you safe?”
I looked over my shoulder, shaking aside my tangled hair. The scar down her right cheek was flushed, and she didn’t look happy. Her gaze was disconcertingly direct, and for a moment I thought I could see all the way into the back of her brain. I didn’t look away. “Safe?” I sounded honestly puzzled. I was a hunter. What was she really asking?
“Never mind. Here.” Her left hand flicked, tossing something; I plucked it out of the air.
It was an extended clip, and I caught a glint of silver from the top bullet peeking out. Silverjacket rounds, just the thing to pierce a ’breed’s tough shell and poison them, weaken them enough so you could tear them to itty-bitty pieces and make the night a fractionally safer place.
For the umpteenth time that long, long night, relief swamped me. The waves of feeling under my skin were like caffeine jolts, or like some drug that hadn’t been invented yet.
Thank you, God. My fingers flew, drawing the old clip out, clearing the chamber, racking the new clip, chambering a round. The relief turned into a calm steadiness.
Now we can do some shit. Oh yeah.
She drew her left-hand gun again. A howl rose on the exhaust-laden wind, and sirens began baying in the distance. The ruby at her forehead gave a sharp glitter, and I saw old yellow-green bruising on the side of her neck. “Stay low. You hear me, Kismet? No heroics. Stay low, follow Theron, and I’ll do the rest. And Jill?”
“Yeah?” My throat was full. The buzz inside my head crested, threatening to shake me. Her territory was over the mountains, why was she here?
I said goodbye to her once. And she promised to do…something. What? What was it?
“If you become a liability, I’ll put you down myself.” She was braced for action, I realized. As if I was the enemy.
Or as if I was a question mark.
That was new, and unwelcome. We were hunters, she and I. It’s a bond deeper than blood, and there are no lies told or implied, no quarter asked or given. Why would she even say that?
My right wrist ached, and I had a sudden, very bad feeling about all this. But the first wave of hellbreed had massed and moved out into the streetlamp glow, civilians were screaming, and Theron arrived right next to me, his hand curling around my left arm again. Devi let out a short sharp breath, and every inch of silver on her ran with blue light.
“Time to go,” Theron said, and the race was on.
II: Kyrie Eleison
12
Ramshackle frame houses slumped in a jam-packed neighborhood deep in the barrio’s seethe. The street here was maybe paved once, but patches of dirt rose up through the ancient concrete-like mange. Chain-link fences enclosed haphazard, yellow-grassed, postage-stamp yards, and patches of sidewalk here and the
re were linked together with dusty boardwalks that looked ancient as the Mayflower. Everything looked deserted, but I would have bet my roll of stolen cash and my gun that there were eyes on us.
I leaned against Theron, my stomach empty and a hot weight of bile rising in my throat. “Fuuuuck,” I whispered, drawing the single syllable out, and Anya Devi laughed, a sarcastic bark. Her coat was flayed by hellbreed claws, her hair was scorched, and her eyes were alight. Dried blood crusted her hair and her cheek, and thin blue lines of healing sorcery sank into her skin, pulsing through her aura.
I’d wanted to help apply the sorcery, since God knew I had enough etheric force humming through my right hand. But she’d shied away. Just like I’d twitched away from Perry.
I didn’t know if I liked that.
She was braced against a graffiti-scarred storefront, leaning forward, elbows on her bent knees while her sides heaved. Her breathing evened out, and she shook her head, silver chiming. “They want you bad, sweetheart. That’s a good sign.” She checked the street. “We’re clear. Theron?”
He ran his free hand back through wildly mussed dark hair. The bruises were getting better, but the circles under his eyes were so dark they looked painted on. His shirt flapped low on his right side, crusted with blood, but he was moving all right. “I could use a burrito. And a good stiff drink wouldn’t go amiss either.”
“In a few minutes. Jill?”
I wiggled my left toes. I’d somehow lost a sneaker, and my sock was torn up and filthy. I wasn’t bleeding very badly. Everything on me ached, but the wounds just closed up on their own each time the gem sent another hard, high burst of singing rattles through me. It felt like a jet plane just before takeoff. “Food sounds good.” Booze sounds better. And a chance to sit down and think about some shit wouldn’t be bad either.
“Good fucking deal.” Devi hauled herself up. “Wait a second, though.”
Her hand came down and gripped my right wrist. I almost flinched, the motion controlling itself as she turned my hand palm up, the gun pointed off to the side. Theron had my other arm, and I was effectively trapped.
But I suffered it. For a bare half second I wanted to twitch away, but my control reasserted itself. She was a hunter.
I could trust her.
She studied the gem in the streetlamp glow, blue eyes unblinking. “Huh. Where’d you get that?”
“It was on me when I woke up.” I weighed it as she glanced up at me, decided to drop the other shoe. “In…in a grave.”
“Yeah?”
“Shallow. Out in the desert. Just off a railroad line. I caught a ride into town last night.” I shuddered. There was a diner, and a blue-eyed man who gave me my gun back. And Martin Pores, nice guy who pulled a vanishing act. “Almost got mugged. Then I went to Walmart.”
Theron made a small sound. We both looked at him. His mouth was twitching. Another snorting half laugh escaped him, and one corner of Anya’s mouth twisted up.
She sobered almost immediately. She eyed the trickle of hot blood easing down from my scalp. Head wounds are messy; this one had been caused by a bit of shrapnel, and it was still weeping a little. I’d probably have lost most of the pints I was carrying if not for the healing.
Superhuman healing. As if I was still hellbreed-tainted. But the gem didn’t feel like Perry’s mark on me—the scarred lip-print, a hard little nugget of corruption working in toward the bone.
This was something different. And I didn’t like the idea that she might be checking me for…what?
Which just brought up the question of what the hell had happened, what had ended up with me in a shallow grave and a hole in my memory the size of the breathing city itself.
Her free hand came up, and she smeared a little of the blood on my forehead. Rubbed it between her fingers, considering, and actually sniffed it. Examined her fingers in the warm electric glow from the bodega’s porch light. Racks of novenas in the window behind her rippled, and I blinked, swaying.
“Devi?” Theron, carefully.
“She’s clear. I don’t know how or why, but she’s clean.” Anya blew out between her lips, her bindi winking at me. This close, I could see that it was, indeed, a subdermal piercing. You’d think the prospect of getting hit in the face would’ve made her refrain, but I so wasn’t one to throw sartorial stones. “I suppose if you knew what’d happened to you, Kismet, you’d let me in on it?”
“I have some memories,” I repeated. My eyebrows drew together as the hornet buzz returned, threading under the surface of my brain. “Fragments. I remember…I was on my way to the Monde to question Perry. Because…Saul. They had Saul.” And now I had a question of my own. “What are you checking me for, Devi?”
“Great.” She said it like a curse, and let go of my wrist, wiping her bloody fingers on her leather pants.
I seriously wanted a pair myself. My jeans were torn and flapping. Some of the pints I’d lost were a result of roadrash—you get to going faster than the average human, and you can erase a metric fuckton of skin.
“Devi?” Very carefully, each word calm and neutral. “What are you checking me for?”
She shook her head, silver beads chiming. “Later. All right, Theron. You’re right. Let’s go. But then I’m taking her to Galina’s.”
He nodded. “Come on, Jill. Someone wants to see you.”
I took hold of my fraying temper. If Devi wanted to clue me in later, fine. I could trust her that far. “Great.” I didn’t have to work to sound sarcastic. “Is it someone else who wants to kill me?”
“Oh, no.” He paused. “At least, I’m almost sure he doesn’t.” He seemed to find this hilarious, and snickered at his own joke as he drew me away from the bodega and out into the street. Anya drifted behind us, rearguarding. Dust rose on the faint night breeze, Santa Luz taking a deep breath in the long dark shoal before dawn.
“Wonderful.” I let out a short, choppy, frustrated sigh. “But I would like to know what the fuck happened to me.” Boy, would I ever. And I want weapons. And some more silver.
And while I’m dreaming, I’d like a pony, too.
“Later, Jill.” My fellow hunter didn’t sound happy. “When we get to Sanctuary, I’ll tell you everything I know. We’ve pieced together some of it. But the only person who knows everything is you.” She paused. “Was you.”
Fantastic. That’s just great. This is getting better and better.
Still, things were looking up.
13
The house looked like a ruin, its porch sagging and groaning under our weight. But when Theron opened the unlocked door, a heavenly smell of bacon and eggs came drifting out, and the entry hall was brightly lit and tile-floored. Stairs went up to the second level, a wrought-iron banister rising in a sweet curve, and it was obvious someone had spent serious time making the inside as beautiful as the outside was decrepit.
I stood there, my sock foot smearing blood and dirt on the tiles, and blinked. Down the hall was even more bright light, and someone was humming tunelessly as a hiss of something cooking in a pan reached us. Devi crowded in behind me, sweeping the door shut and locking it. “Jesus.” She blew out between her teeth, and you could hear her eyes roll as if she was a teenager. “I mean, really.”
“Who would try to break in or steal from us here?” Theron swept his hair back. He was perking up big time. “Hello the house! Break out the cervezas and bring me a burrito! Look what I’ve got!”
The arch off to our left was suddenly full of motion. Two women, their long, tawny hair hanging loose except for twin braids holding it back from their faces, appeared. Weres, I realized, seeing their fluid economy of motion, their wide, high-cheekboned faces. Their arms were bare and rippling with clean muscle, both of them in flannel button-downs with the sleeves ripped off. Barefoot and dark-eyed, they were both utterly beautiful.
Something hot rose in my throat. I blinked.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” the one on the right said, staring at me. “It’s…is it? It is!??
?
I realized I knew her face just as Theron laughed again.
“Amalia.” I studied her. And the other female. Lioness, both of them. From the Norte Luz pride. The sensation of puzzle pieces sliding together, dropping with a click, was beginning to be disconcertingly constant. “Rahel.”
They stared. Their jaws dropped, but Amalia pulled herself together first. “He’s upstairs.” The hall was suddenly crowded as she pushed past Theron, stepping close to me and brushing his hand away. “It’s…brace yourself.” A glance at the Werepanther. “Have you told her?”
He spread his hands helplessly. “Look at us. There hasn’t been time. I was over by the Monde, just poking around—”
“Ah, yes,” Anya Devi piped up. “This was the story I wanted to hear. Come on, I need food. And absinthe. Please tell me you have some.”
Amalia’s grip on my arm was just short of bruising. “He hasn’t told you anything?” She pulled me up the staircase, each hardwood step sanded and glowing mellow gold. The good smell of healthy Were and cooking mixed together, and I began to feel like I might have survived the last few hours. “You look awful, by the way.”
“Thanks.” The word was turned into sandpaper by the rock in my throat. “There wasn’t time to say anything. We’ve been on the run. Look—”
“He’s fading. But you’ll fix that right up.” She virtually hauled me upstairs, and the balustrade turned out to run all the way along the open hall. Bedroom doors opened up off to the right, and at the end of the hall an antique iron mission cross hung on the bathroom door. I knew it was the bathroom because the door was half open, and I saw a slice of white tile and scrubbed-gleaming chrome, the edge of a claw-footed tub. “I’ll bring you something to eat. Maybe you can persuade him to eat too, he needs it. He’s going to be so…” She stopped dead, took a deep breath. “Listen to me babbling on. How are you? Are you all right?”