“Go grind, Mouse. I ain’t afraid of the dead.”
Still, Mahlia avoided the floating half-man and went straight for the alligator, ignoring the boy’s smirk. Together, they grabbed hold of the massive reptile and started hauling it toward shore.
They paused to rest. Mouse leaned his elbows on the floating corpse. Wiped sweat out of his eyes. “Must’ve been epic fighting,” he said. “They got ring fights in the Drowned Cities. Use their deserters and the other warlord soldiers. Panthers. Coywolv. Anything that’ll fight. Bet that old monster would’ve done good in the ring.”
“Sure, Mouse. Let’s carve up the lizard and get gone.”
“Fight like this one, people’d pay Red Chinese cash to see it. Soldier boys would’ve loved it. Battle to the death. Epic ring.”
“Soldier boys do all kinds of dumb stuff.”
They started hauling on the gator again, but suddenly the going got slow. Mahlia leaned into the weight, annoyed. Mouse liked to bait her into doing the work and then slack off. Typical.
“Grind it, Mouse! Quit lazing off.” She glanced back. “Hey! What you doing?”
Mouse wasn’t even helping. He’d pulled out his knife and was wading back toward the floating half-man.
“Got an idea,” he said.
“Come on, Mouse! I don’t want to be out here in the dark with raw meat. Last time that happened, we ended up sleeping in the trees with a bunch of coywolv down below. Let’s get gone.”
“We can sell its teeth,” Mouse said. “Lucky teeth, off a real dog-face. How many soldier boys got real dog-face teeth? They’d buy ’em for sure. Bet I can find one of these soldier boys who’d pay me all kinds of Red Chinese cash. Good luck, right? Better than a Fates Eye or one of those necklaces the Army of God thinks makes the bullets bounce off. If we take these down to Moss Landing when Mahfouz trades for meds, we can sell ’em quick to the R-and-R boys.”
“You’re sliding. Soldiers will just take ’em from you. Pay you with a bullet, most likely. Or else just recruit your ass.”
“I’ll get a nailshed girl to do the deal. They won’t even see me. No worries.”
He reached the floating monster and leaned on the body until its face came out of the water. He pried open its mouth and hefted his knife.
“Damn, these dog-faces got a lot of teeth.”
The monster’s eye snapped open.
6
“MOUSE!” MAHLIA SHOUTED, but it was too late. The monster exploded from the water. Mahlia watched, stunned, as Mouse flew through the air and hit the bank with a wet thud.
Fates, it’s fast.
Mahlia turned to run, but the half-man lunged. He covered distance in a blur, seizing her before she even took a step. Her head snapped and the world spun. She was flying, she realized. The half-man had flung her high in the air, the way a dog tossed a rat.
Swamp waters flashed far below. She glimpsed the half-man, teeth bared, waiting for her to come down. Water rushed up.
“Ugh!”
She slammed flat against the water. Swamp swallowed her. Stunned, Mahlia tried to swim for the surface. The dog-face was coming for her. No time no time no time. She surfaced, gasping. The monster was fifteen feet away.
Mahlia thrashed through the weeds, fleeing, but it was like fighting through molasses. The monster leaped and crashed down beside her. A wave of swamp water threw her off her feet. Coughing and retching, she tried to stand. The dog-face loomed. She was surprised to see that it already had Mouse, one huge fist wrapped in the red tangles of his hair.
With an easy swipe, the monster collected her as well. Mahlia tried to scream but the half-man shoved her down into the swamp. Mahlia fought, but it was like a mountain was sitting on her.
I’m going to drown.
With a tooth-rattling jerk, the half-man yanked her up again. Air and sunlight. The flash of tree leaves. She tried to get a breath but the monster sank her again. Slime and hot muddy water jammed down her throat, up her nose. Her face hit mud.
Mahlia flailed at the dog-face’s fist, trying to pry free. It was like fighting concrete. The monster didn’t care what she did.
Unbidden, Mahlia remembered seeing a squad of soldier boys drown a puppy. They’d taken turns holding it down with one hand as it fought and shook. Then they’d let it up to breathe, so they could laugh at it, before sinking it again. She was a toy, she realized. A kill toy for a monster.
The half-man jerked her out of the water again. Mahlia sucked air, coughing and retching. Mouse was still underwater. His hands poked up from the depths, waving like desperate reeds.
The creature’s massive pit-bull skull loomed close. Scars and torn flesh. Animal and human, crushed together in one nightmare beast. Ropy gray scar tissue covered one eye, but the other eye was wide open, rabid and yellow, big as an egg. The monster growled, revealing rows of sharp teeth. A gust of blood and carrion washed over her.
“I am not meat,” it snarled. “You are meat.”
Mahlia pissed herself. Urine streamed down her legs. She didn’t feel shame. Didn’t feel anything except terror. She wasn’t a person anymore. Just prey. It was as if the monster had cut her open and spilled out her guts. She was nothing. Dead already, even if her heart still pounded. Prey for other bigger, stronger animals. Just like all the civvies she’d seen gunned down as she’d fled the Drowned Cities. Mouse was still thrashing underwater, but he was dead, too. He just didn’t know it.
Do something.
A joke. They were no match for this monster. Grown soldiers with guns and machetes died like flies before half-men.
The monster stared at her malevolently. The stench of its killing breath overwhelmed her. Mahlia closed her eyes, waiting to be ripped apart.
Go on. Just do it.
But nothing happened. Instead, she heard Mouse come up, gasping. And then she felt herself being lowered into the swamp. Mahlia opened her eyes.
The monster was staring at her with…
Was that fear?
The creature dropped to one knee. Sank lower. Swamp waters rose around them. Mahlia tried to pry away, but the monster’s fist still held her like a vise. The half-man tried to rise. It took a staggering step toward the bank, dragging them both with it, then toppled. They slammed into the mud. The monster’s breath gusted out in a dull huff.
Mouse was coughing and choking, still trying to fight his way free of the monster’s grip. The creature bared its teeth and growled, a sound like boulders crushing bones.
“Hold still, boy.”
Mouse froze.
The monster’s breath came in short gasps. Mahlia realized that they were surrounded by blood. A sea of red, all through the water. The half-man’s.
The monster slumped against the muddy bank, half in and half out of the water, its chest working like a bellows, gasping for air. Its yellow dog eye slowly closed, a membrane nictitating over the iris. The lid lowered.
“It’s dying,” Mouse whispered.
The creature’s eye flared wide. Mouse gasped as the monster tightened its grip. “I do not die. You are dying. Not I…” Another pained exhalation, and a gathering of energy.
“I. Do. Not. Die.”
But Mouse was right. Now that Mahlia could breathe, she could see that the monster’s wounds were extensive. Teeth marks. Slashes. Festering torn skin. Blood ran freely from where the king alligator had torn deep into the half-man’s shoulder, and those were just the wounds that she could easily see.
The monster’s grip was loosening again. Mahlia waited… In one sharp jerk she twisted free. The half-man tried to resnare her, but it was slower now. She danced out of range.
The half-man fell back, but its eye still burned with predatory viciousness.
“So,” it growled.
It drew Mouse into a bear hug, keeping him close. Mahlia wondered if she could find their machete, if she could stab the beast somehow. Kill it before it snapped Mouse’s neck.
Where was that machete? Lost in the swamp. But she had her own knife.
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Maybe if she stabbed it in the eye…
As if sensing her murderous thoughts, the monster said, “Your friend is mine.” Its muscles flexed and it began to push Mouse down under the water.
“Mahlia?” Mouse began to struggle, but he was no match. The half-man pushed him lower. Water lapped around Mouse’s chin.
Mahlia started forward, barely stopping short of the half-man’s reach. “Don’t hurt him!”
“Do not test me, then.” The monster allowed Mouse to surface, sputtering.
Mahlia paced the shore, still hoping to catch sight of the machete. “Let him go.”
The half-man smiled, showing the sharp teeth Mouse had wanted to harvest. “Come a little closer, girl.”
Mahlia tried to make her voice reasonable. “Let him go.”
“No.”
She hesitated. “I can help you.”
“No.” The monster shook its head. “As your little friend says, I am dying.”
“What if we could get you medicine?”
“There is no medicine.”
“I know a doctor. In town. He could fix you. Me and Mouse could get him. I know how to doctor, too.”
“Ah.” The monster regarded her. “You have a doctor, and you will fetch him and he will give the half-man the medicines and care that will save its life, and all will be well.”
Mahlia nodded eagerly.
“A pretty fairy tale from the mouth of a pretty child.”
Mahlia bridled at the mockery. “I’m telling the truth! Ask Mouse.”
A tired snort of amusement. “Your doctor… does he waste his medicines on monsters? When he has humans that already go begging for treatment? When war and pestilence stalk the land, and your kind already pines for help, will he spend his precious medicines on a dog-face?”
“He’s not like that,” Mahlia said. “He listens to me. Me and Mouse, we can get him to come. He’ll help you. If you let us go, we’ll bring him back and he can help you.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I do not bargain with liars.”
“I’m not lying!” Mahlia felt herself starting to cry with frustration. “I got a doctor. We live with him! He can fix you! I can fix you!”
The monster just looked at her, and then she realized it was observing her missing hand. She could see the contempt in its gaze, seeming to say, Please tell me more of your silly lies, cripple girl.
There had to be a way to save Mouse. Could she make Mahfouz help? Could she convince him? Mahfouz was kind. He took care of everyone. But this was a half-man.
“I can steal the medicine,” Mahlia said, finally. “I can just take it and bring it back to you.”
“Oh?”
Mahlia felt a surge of hope at the monster’s interest. “Me and Mouse. We can get you medicine. You don’t even need the doctor.”
“Yeah,” Mouse said. “I make a distraction, Mahlia gets the meds, and you get all fixed up.” He nodded vigorously.
“The two of you,” the half-man murmured. “One to distract and one to steal.”
They both nodded eagerly.
The monster snorted amusement and shoved Mouse underwater.
“Mouse!”
Mahlia plunged forward. The half-man lashed for her ankle. She tripped and barely scrabbled out of reach, watching in anguish as the half-man drowned her friend. The muddy water churned.
“Let him go!”
To her surprise, the half-man let Mouse rise again. The boy surged to the surface, retching and coughing, water streaming from his freckled face. The monster shook him once with its huge fist.
“A bargain, girl. Go find your medicines and bring them to me. If they are sufficient, I will let your friend live.”
“But—”
The half-man overrode her. “If you bring the wrong medicine, or if you bring soldiers, I will hear you coming and I will snap your friend’s neck. And if you fail to return, I will fill his lungs with mud and water. Do you understand?”
“It’ll take time,” Mahlia protested. “I can’t just snap my fingers.”
“You cannot bargain with me. My heart is the clock. Find medicine before it ticks dry, and buy your friend’s life. Fail and his corpse is all you will find here.”
Mahlia started to protest again, but the half-man’s glare froze the words in her throat.
“Run, girl. Run and pray to the Fates that you are fast enough.”
7
THE JUNGLE TORE at Mahlia, tripping her with vines, clawing her skin with ragged leaves. Already, darkness was falling. Deep amongst the trees, the light faded fast. Shadows leaped at her. Mahlia tripped and sprawled. She scrambled up, ignoring skinned knees and painful scrapes on her palm.
The jungle’s paths twisted and crisscrossed, a confusing tangle of deer trails and coywolv hunts and wild pig runs. The darkness made it worse. How long did she have? How long until the half-man’s blood ran out?
Mahlia hit a fork in the trail. She crouched, staring at the ground, trying to see a way. Which way had they hacked their way through?
Fates, it was Mouse who liked to track things, not her. She chose the left-bending trail and pelted down it, praying to the Fates, and the Rust Saint, and Kali-Mary Mercy that she wasn’t about to run into a minefield.
She hit open water. Tripped and plunged right in.
“Grind it!”
She slogged back out of the water, dripping and angry and scared. Doubled back, looking for the last split. She knew she needed to keep her fear in check, to keep her eyes open, to stay smart in the jungle, but even as she tried to convince herself that she wasn’t panicking, she could feel gibbering terror rising in her.
The horrors of the swamps loomed, wild and hungry. Kudzu vines became coiling pythons, dropping from above. Coywolv flitted from tree to tree, pacing her. The jungle had teeth, and suddenly it had become alien and feral.
Mahlia leaped over rotten mossy logs, and nearly tripped again. Had she come this way before? She didn’t remember deadfall from their journey out.
Where was she?
There was no way she’d make it to town and back to Mouse before full dark. She’d have to come back by lantern light. Could she even find her way? They’d wandered so aimlessly as they hunted for food, and Mahlia had paid less attention than she should have, never thinking that she’d be coming back in the dark—
Abruptly, jungle gave way to cleared fields.
Mahlia sobbed with relief. She was on the far side of town from where she’d intended, in the fields where everyone tilled crops because the ground was more open, but at least she wasn’t lost. Mahlia skirted the dark liquid square of a basement pond and dashed across the fields, weaving around the fins of old crumbled walls that broke the earth.
Ahead of her the town beckoned, oil lamps coming on, familiar yellow glows, soft and comforting. Mahlia slowed, pressing at a stitch in her side. She’d never been so glad to see Banyan Town. Habitation. The sound and smoke of cylinder stoves crackling. The smell of spices. Candles burning beside little metal reflectors, making everything bright as she ran through.
Ahead of her, the doctor’s squat loomed in the darkness.
Please be there. You have to be there. Don’t be gone on some house call. Be there.
A human shadow stepped out from behind a ruined wall, blocking her path.
“Where you running, girl?”
Mahlia skidded to a stop. More shadows materialized before her, malevolent ghosts rising out of the darkness.
Soldier boys, a whole squad of them.
Mahlia turned and plunged back toward town, but a dog lunged from the shadows, snarling. She leaped back. Hunted for a new path of escape. The dog stalked her, growling, herding Mahlia back toward her captors.
More soldier boys emerged from the darkness. Guns gleamed dully. Bullet bandoliers and scars draped their bare chests. Ugly triple-hash brands scored their faces. UPF for sure. Colonel Glenn Stern’s for life. Some of them had blue bandanna
s tied around their heads, as if the brand wasn’t enough. The boys came closer. Eyes bloodshot with red rippers and crystal slide studied her with snakelike hunger. Mahlia scanned the darkness for a way to run, but the soldiers were all around. A perfect ambush.
One of them came up and grabbed her. He twisted her arm behind her back. She felt him scrabbling for her missing hand, and then he laughed.
“Got a stumpy, here!” he said.
His fingers probed at her stump. “Can’t even cuff her.” The others laughed. Mahlia struggled to get away, but the soldier jerked her around.
“I do that to you?” he asked, gazing at her stump. “How’d I miss your other hand, girl?”
This close, his loyalty brand stood out strong, pale ropy scars against brown skin. Three across, three down. UPF, through and through. Spikes pierced his lower lip. Three in a row, gleaming. Mahlia wasn’t sure if they were for decoration, or if they were some other official thing that the Colonel did to his recruits.
“Was that me?” he asked again, but before she could answer, he straightened, surprised.
“Check out her eyes!” he called. “Got us a collaborator, here! Pretty little peacekeeper girl.” Mahlia tried to bolt again, but he yanked her back and pulled her into a tight embrace, twisting her arm so hard it almost dislocated.
“Not so fast,” he whispered in her ear. His voice had gone cold, dripping with new menace. Before, she’d been a toy to him; now she was something less. “I got plans for you, castoff.”
Castoff. His words ran through the rest of the soldier boys like an electric current. Peacekeeper. Castoff. Mahlia knew how this would go. First there would be screaming and then there would be blood and then at the end, if she was lucky, she would be dead.
She fumbled for her knife, but with her good hand twisted behind her back, it was pointless. Seeming to sense her intention, the soldier pulled out her knife. Brought it up to her neck.
“What you doing here, collaborator?”
Mahlia felt sick. Already, a part of her mind was preparing for what was about to happen. It was going to be just like when the Army of God got hold of her. Different army, same story. They were all the same, in the end.