And then I realize what she is. A Shifter. Witches who perform spells to change into various animals; in this case, a cat. The transformation is only partially complete. “I’m looking forward to eating yow.”
I suck in a shaky breath. Not what I expected her to say.
Another voice chimes in from somewhere behind me, where I can’t see. “My sweet Flora, you will not be eating our prisoner.” The warl I heard earlier, the one who seemed to be the leader. Prisoner? The magic-born I’m used to meeting kill first, take prisoners later. Like the Necros. Only all their prisoners are dead.
Flora hisses at the newcomer and I flinch.
“Prisoner?” I say, trying to keep my voice steady.
“Haven’t you heard?” the warl says, stepping forward so I can see him. He’s tall, but an inch or two shorter than me, with dark eyes and a firm jaw. He’s wearing a tight tee and jeans. As far as I can tell, his body’s not undergoing any changes like Flora’s.
“Heard what?” I say.
“You’re a hot item these days, although I have no clue why. You’re just another witch hunter as far as I’m concerned…”
“What do you mean?” I ask. My heart is pounding, and I’m not sure why.
“You really haven’t heard, have you?” he says, tapping his teeth with his fingernails. “Interesting. Why would the Necros want you?”
“The Necros?” I say, my heart beating even faster.
“Don’t play dumb, it doesn’t suit you,” he says, but I barely hear him because I’m still thinking about what he said before: The Necros want you.
When he grabs my chin and squeezes, my attention jerks back to him. “I swear I don’t know,” I say. Unless…but they couldn’t know I’m following them. I’ve been careful, stayed out of sight, kept my distance…
His hand tightens, crushing my cheeks and lips. He leans in closer, his face inches from mine. “We have ways of getting the truth,” he says, releasing his grip slowly.
“I don’t know anything,” I say, looking straight into his eyes.
“Now can we kill him, Ax?” Flora says.
“No,” Ax says, “but we can hurt him.”
~~~
I’m sick with my own weakness. I’ve failed again. Failed to save them. Does that prove Mr. Jackson was right to ignore the cries for help from so many innocents?
For once, I don’t feel so sure in saying no.
We’re in some kind of a cellar, lit only by a lone, dusty bulb dangling from a wire. Hex is still in his cage, his chin resting on his paws.
The dead children hang from hooks descending from the ceiling, their skin so white it’s like they’ve been bleached. Their blood has been drained from their innocent little bodies. When Mr. Jackson explained how Shifters perform their spells, I didn’t want to believe it. The key ingredient is fresh blood from living children. A noxious mix of self-loathing and rage swirls through my chest. How could they kill children with such indifferent ease?
Their mother is propped up, her lifeless eyes open, angled as if she’s looking at her children. I thank whatever higher power might be out there that she can’t really see them.
I’m sitting up now, still bound, moved by the strong hands of a gargantuan warl. The one that was arguing with Flora earlier. They’ve been calling him Sledge. Shirtless, his dark skin bulges in all the right places. The beginnings of curving scythe-like horns extend from his forehead. There’s no doubt as to what he’s transforming into: a bull, the kind that tosses cowboys into the air at the rodeo.
A fourth member of their gang, a tall shadowy witch, stands silently in the corner, her face covered in bandages, only her black-lined lips protruding. The one who snuck up on Hex and me. If mysterious was a person, it would be her. So far, she doesn’t seem to be changing into an animal.
Flora prowls between me and the kids, almost fully transformed now. Not a housecat, but a panther, with razor sharp teeth, a lean sinewy body, and all the predatory instincts that come with the territory. She can still speak, but her words are higher pitched and tend to end with a “yow” sound.
“I’m hungry,” she says.
“Eat the kids,” Ax says indifferently, sending waves through my stomach.
“I want him,” she says, her tail flicking back and forth as she stares at me.
“He’s off limits,” Ax says.
“Just a lick then. His toes?” I feel a crash of revulsion tremble through me.
“You’re sick, you know that?” Ax says.
“C’mon—just a taste. I have needs,” Flora says, stalking past me, her tail curling around my neck, tickling my skin.
“No,” Ax says.
“Fine,” Flora says, “I’ll take the kids.” I look away as Flora leaps up and cuts the children down. In my peripheral vision I see her drag them into the adjoining room. The awful sound of eating—chewing and smacking and crunching—wafts into my ears until Ax mercifully shuts the door.
“Don’t let her back in,” Ax says to Sledge, who merely grunts in response.
As Sledge moves to block the door, Ax drags a folding chair over and sits across from me. “I don’t like being used,” he says, his face as hard as stone.
“Who does, Boss?” Sledge says. I swear his horns are an inch longer than just a moment ago.
Ax’s eyes roll toward the ceiling in frustration. “If you can’t keep your mouth shut, you can join Flora in the other room,” he says.
“But how will we torture the prisoner if he’s in the other room?” Sledge asks. Wow. This has to be one of the most pathetically stupid gangs of witches I’ve ever come across.
“I meant you, you idiot,” Ax says.
“But how can I guard the door if I’m in the other room?” Sledge asks, scratching his horn.
“Sheiloff,” Ax says, and the freaky tall witch, who’s been as still as a statue up to this point, thrusts her arm in Sledge’s direction. There’s a sound like the cracking of a whip, and Sledge’s mouth is gone. Not gagged or covered by a piece of cloth, just gone, as in not there anymore. From his nose to his iron chin, there’s just dark flesh.
That’s when I realize: The witch Ax called Sheiloff isn’t a witch at all. She’s a wizard. This gets better and better.
Sledge reaches his hands up to touch the spot where his mouth used to be, only his hands are now hooves. He accidentally kicks himself in the face, his eyes flashing with pain. Dropping to all fours, he stares miserably at Ax.
“That’s better,” Ax says. He turns his attention back to me. “If you want to avoid some serious pain, all you have to do is tell me why the Necros want you alive and in their possession.”
“That’s something I’d be interested to know, too,” I say.
His eyes narrow. “Very well. Have it your way. Sheiloff, you’re on!”
The bandaged she-wizard strides forward and places her hands on my forehead. They’re surprisingly warm. I wonder how she can even see me with bandages over her eyes. Maybe she sees from her mouth?
At first nothing happens, and I wonder if perhaps she used up all her magic on removing Sledge’s mouth. Wishful thinking, I know.
It starts slow, the pain. At first, just around my temples, where her fingers are touching. A slight ache, nothing to worry about. But then it spreads, upwards to the crown of my skull, downwards through my cheeks, my spine, my chest, my arms, my legs—everywhere—growing in intensity with each passing second. The aches sprout sharp pains, like needle pricks all over my body. Then daggers, thrust deep: penetrating flesh and bone and organs; ripping at my heart, at my brain, at every last nerve; shredding me inside and out.
I yell something unintelligible, clamp my eyes shut, snap my teeth closed, biting my tongue, feeling the warm flow of blood in my mouth, not caring because I can’t feel such a minor pain amongst the agony roaring through me…
And then it stops, so suddenly it takes my breath away, and I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to breathe again.
But I do, slowly at fir
st, taking a hesitant breath, then another, my heart racing, my skin sheened with sweat. The tip of my tongue throbs, a dull pain that’s almost welcome compared to what I’ve just endured.
My eyes open when Ax speaks. “So, Rhett Carter, why would the Necros offer such a substantial reward for your capture? Their offer is so generous they’ve got every willing witch gang looking for you. But more importantly, why do they want you alive? The Necros are seekers of the dead, and yet the instructions were very clear: No reward unless you were brought in unharmed. Why is that?”
I wish I knew. Every last taut muscle and frayed nerve in my body wishes I knew. But… “I don’t know,” I say.
Sheiloff’s hands close in.
“Wait!” I say. “Wait.”
“Willing to talk?” Ax says.
“No, I mean, yes.”
“Which is it?”
“I’m willing to discuss this. Trust me, I want to know why the Necros put out a reward for me every bit as much as you do.” Unless they somehow figured out I’m hunting them, I think. I could see how that would piss them off.
“Trust you? Trust a witch hunter? If you weren’t bound, you’d be doing everything in your power to kill me, and I’m supposed to believe a single word that slips from your lips?”
“I have no reason to lie,” I say.
Ax strokes his chin, glances at Sheiloff. Her lips move, but there’s no sound. “Mmm hhh,” Ax says, as if reading her lips. “That’s a good point.” She’s speaking in his head. Weird. “Let’s try once more, shall we?”
Sheiloff bows once and pushes her lethal hands toward me.
I close my eyes and wait for it.
“Eat steel, ya bastards!” a familiar voice shouts.
BOOM!
Chook-chook!
BOOM!
Chook-chook!
BOOM!
My eyes flash open as the room erupts in gunfire. Sheiloff dives for the floor, but the shots aren’t aimed at her. Ax takes all three rounds in the chest, his t-shirt blossoming with wet, red roses of blood. He flies back, all the way into Sledge, who knocks him aside and charges across the room toward an open door I hadn’t even noticed, white light flooding down at an angle, illuminating the attacker, whose voice I recognized instantly.
Laney raises her shotgun and pulls the trigger once more.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Whoomp, whoomp, whoomp!
The heavy flap of wings resonates through the cellar door and, in a burst of feathers, Laney is thrown inside, her shotgun spilling from her hands and sliding to rest at my bound feet before she can fire again. She curses and tries to push herself up, but it’s too late. A massive, vulture-like creature unfolds itself through the entrance and pounces on her, pinning her chest-first on the hard cement floor. Its clawed talons tear holes in her shirt, which quickly fill with spots of blood.
No. She’s not even supposed to be here.
The vulture—who I only now realize is part warlock, a fourth Shifter I wasn’t even aware of—arches its back, preparing to peck at Laney’s head…
“No!” I shout. “Please…don’t!”
“Do it, Crake,” Sheiloff hisses, floating up from the floor, where the dark wizard had sought cover from Laney’s shotgun blasts. “She killed Ax.” My eyes dart to where the gang leader’s shotgun-pellet-riddled corpse is crumpled on the ground. Holy crap. Laney just gained one on me in the warl-killing category.
“If you spare her, I’ll cooperate,” I say quickly. “I’ll do whatever you want. You’ll get your reward.” Just don’t kill her.
For once, Laney is quiet, unable to speak as she gasps and squirms, trying to suck a breath into her compressed lungs even as she attempts to free herself.
Crake the vulture-warlock cocks his head, as if considering. Long, dark, greasy hair hangs tendril-like over his black eyes, which almost appear sleepy and bored. And then he rears back once more, and bucks forward…
“No!” I cry, a choked sob whimpering from my throat at the same time as there’s a vicious crunch. My vision blurs as I stare at Laney’s slumped form, no longer gasping, no longer struggling under her captor’s mutant weight.
Torn in half, I wait for the blood to pool around her, for the monster to finish the job, to tear at her flesh with its soul-cracking beak.
But wait. Wait. There’s no blood.
Crake crawls off, his beak morphing into a mouth and then back to a beak, his wings becoming arms. Like the rest of the Shifters, he’s still in transition, in-between warlock and the freakish creature he wants to become.
Behind him, Laney’s limp body expands and contracts as she breathes. Still alive. Hurt, but alive. The vulture knocked her out with the side of its hard beak, the slight change in the angle of his attack saving her life.
I let out a deep breath, wait.
“What are you doing, Crake?” Sheiloff says, her voice floating eerily from the abyss that is her cloak-shrouded face.
“What’s the girl to you?” Crake says, ignoring the wizard, his attention focused completely on me. His beak is a mouth again. Then not. The back and forth is really starting to freak me out.
I hesitate. What difference does it make? If I say she’s a friend or an acquaintance or a stranger, will that change his response? I’m faintly aware of the looming boulder-like presence of Sledge moving closer, waiting for my response.
“We’re in love,” I say, trying to hide the lie. It’s not hard, not with my face twisted in horror as Crake’s red wrinkled face leans in.
Sheiloff laughs deeply, raising every hair on the back of my neck. “That’ll make killing her all the more fun,” she croaks.
Sledge cracks his knuckles.
“No,” the vulture says.
“What?” Sheiloff says. “You can’t be serious. She killed one of our own.”
“Boss?” Sledge says, raising a heavy hoof and letting it hover over Laney’s head. His mouth is back, either because the spell wore off or because the wizard decided to have mercy on the bull while showing none toward Laney. All he has to do is let gravity take over…
“No!” Crake says, more sharply this time. Slowly, grudgingly, Sledge lowers his hoof just inches from her cheek. “With Ax dead, leadership of the Shifters falls to me. Any who dare to disagree will be punished as a traitor.”
“I’m not a Shifter,” Sheiloff says. From the darkness that seems to surround her, a bony, white hand appears, palm out.
“We had an agreement,” Crake says, venom in his tone.
“My agreement was with Ax. And the only rule was that we wouldn’t kill the witch hunter.”
“The rules have changed. Deal with it or leave. If you so much as touch one hair on the girl’s head, every Shifter will hunt you to the ends of the earth.”
A creak and a slam turn everyone’s attention toward the other side of the room. Flora’s black, slinking form steps soundlessly inside. Two balls of yellow eye-shine pierce the gloom of the cellar. “What’d I miss?” she says, licking her lips, her pink tongue streaked with red.
Sheiloff turns and strides out the door. “You can keep your reward,” she says over her shoulder.
Inwardly, my heart leaps. With the wizard out of the picture, maybe we have a chance of surviving this.
“Take them upstairs,” Crake says to Sledge.
I don’t even have time to brace myself before the bull head butts me in the forehead and I black out.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Rumbling in the distance.
A storm, moving away. Lightning flashes through a rain-streaked window and I groan, my head aching. When did it get so bright?
No.
Not bright.
Just not dim. There’s a big difference.
I try to move but I’m tied to a chair, my arms behind me, my legs shackled together.
As lightning flashes again, I remember the hooked-beak vulture, Crake. What he said to Sledge just before he smashed his iron skull against mine. Take them upstairs. W
e’ve been moved out of the dark gloomy cellar and into a dusty, slightly brighter—although admittedly still cast in shadows due to the storm—attic. At least we’ve got a window, except there’s not much to see except a weed-choked lawn filling up with puddles, and occasional jagged slashes of lightning from the heavens.
Mr. Jackson’s many lessons sit in the back of my mind like clay pots, filled to overflowing with dozens of iterations of the same three words.
Never. Trust. Anyone.
Mr. Jackson’s advice and training have gotten me this far, but can things really be so absolute, so black and white, like the difference between the mountains and the sea? Somewhere there must be gray. Somewhere.
At least that’s what I tell myself. Laney tried to save me, how can I not trust her? How can I not do everything in my power to repay the favor? And just because I want to protect her doesn’t mean I trust her, not really. Does it?
“Hey jerkwad.” The sharp voice snaps my gaze away from Mr. Jackson’s three words and the storm.
Laney, tied to a similar chair, glares at me with one eye closed, as if she’s in considerable pain.
“You’re alive,” I say.
“No thanks to you,” she says, trying to open her other eye. Thinking better of it, she keeps one eye shut. “Nice lump,” she adds as an afterthought.
Sharp voices cut through the floorboards, and I glance down. “They’ve been arguing for a while now,” Laney says. “One of them, Cat Woman, wants to take us to the Necros immediately. Bird Man thinks they might be able to get a bigger reward if they hold out for a while.”
I sigh. “You shouldn’t have come,” I say.
“Neither should you,” she says, accusation in her voice.
“I had to,” I say. Didn’t I? “I had to save them.”
“Really?” she spits. “How’d that work out for you?” Low blow. I close my eyes, feeling the lance of failure deep in my chest. “You didn’t even know them. They’re not family,” she says.
“They’re still people,” I say, not opening my eyes. “And it’s not like you’re my family either.”