21 Shades of Night, page 204
I nod. “Seems like the best shot. Unless—can you talk to them?”
He shakes his head. “Gibberish. Just like last time.”
I shiver. “We have to cut the strings then. Lure out the demon, kill him, and reap them.”
“Looks like it.”
I sweep a glance over the men hunkered down shoving knives in their socks. “That means me, right? It nearly killed you, reaping them last time.”
Abel looks pained. “You don't have to—”
“Take out the handler when you see them. I'll play with the hounds.”
I throw myself out the window, ignoring the strain on my meatsuit, before Abel can stop me.
Chapter 43
Old Blood
GLASS SHATTERS AROUND me as I fall, and I barely remember to catch myself in an acrobatic roll. Something keens behind me, and I dart forward, only to see two more in front. I draw the knives in my waistband, and slash wildly, keeping them back. They shrill in thwarted fury, and more close in on us. How many are there?
There's no humanity to their forms, though they wear human shapes. Their features are eerily distorted, as though the memory that created them was blurry. The colors are wrong. One's lips are a rich purple, and another's are bloodless and pale. I whip my knife across the purple one's throat, and it falls mid-gurgle.
But the gurgle shifts to another one, “Pretty—” and another one after that, “Quick—” and another after that “Move.” It round robins around them, sound ricocheting from one to the next. One voice from many separate throats. “Won't save you. Kill. Hunt.”
One of them throws itself into me, and its nails rake me before I throw it off, and stomp on its ribs, hard. “Blood,” it gasps, fluid spraying from its lips. Where the drops land, it starts to burn into me, dissolving clothing and flesh alike.
I back away, and the others gather around their wounded brother and touch it, assessing it, reassuring it.
A gunshot sounds near me, and another imitation human falls. I flash John a peace sign; these things won't actually die, so there's no point in wasting the ammo. Crippling them will suffice.
They begin to surround me then, and I jab at them wildly. It's an act, though; the real weapon is the flask in my pants pocket. I flick one of my knives closed, seize the flask, popping its top off as quickly as I can, and throw it. I know my aim is shitty, and it's a horrible tool for me to use; I get sprayed in the process, and my flesh burns, nearly as bad as the hounds' blood. I'm losing my form, bit by bit.
But there's a growl near me, more controlled, more human than these hounds. Their handler is close. I fake a seizure, dropping my body and abandoning it to the pack. It's useless now, anyways, but if they think they have me, the others can...
As I sever the last string connecting me to it, I reach out for the nearest body I can replace it with. And come up with four paws. Apparently Dastan's not the only one who can grasp a canine mind; Emmy doesn't feel too dissimilar from an overly fresh coma patient.
Dastan looks at me in horror, but shifts to pull from John, instead. John sways at the strain of hosting two incubi. He won't be able to hold them long; I need to get the fight through fast. “Please, no, don't let her get hurt,” he says, and the others turn away from the carnage at the window.
Abel looks at me. “Gene, you in there?” There's ungodly worry in his face, telegraphed clearly enough that Emmy's instinct is to lick his hands and console him. But Emmy's not in charge.
I make my form nod, though the order makes no sense to Emmy. Dastan sighs, and I feel a shift as he transfers himself to make John host him, instead of the beast.
Then Abel's attention snaps away, and he throws his first knife. He has a skill with thrown knives I've yet to master, and his aim is true. The holy water-dipped blade lodges in the neck of a woman emerging from the treeline, only the bone ridges and strange hinges marring her anatomy cluing us to her purpose. The hounds fall, and I jump through the broken window to gather their pieces.
The knife won't kill her; we have only a moment of opportunity.
Abel knows what I'm doing, and coaches the others on how to do the most damage, in a low voice. I jump through the dog's flesh with the leash in tow, but she's already rising, and charging me. I grasp for her, but miss her, her smooth soul providing no weakness for me to seize.
A second too late, Owen hurdles the window and throws his flask on her. She shrieks, and it begins dissolving her away, but she is stronger than that, and it's her natural form, not a placeholder like mine. I drag as many of the hounds as I can with me again on my spiritual freefall to Limbo, but there's no way in hell I can grab them all. I have to hope the others can hold their own until I get back.
Damnit. I missed her.
Chapter 44
Passenger, John
THE DOG IS just a dog again. Its eyes look the same, but it's no longer a tactical fighter. Specifically, it's already running the short distance into the bushes. And whatever's out there knows it's a distraction. The inhuman-looking woman is on her feet, flanked by shadows. The bullets hit her, but don't phase her, though Abel assures me they'll poison her, eventually. All I know is it's only a matter of seconds before she is close enough to fight through the door, or the window. Whichever she prefers.
Abel hefts his flask of holy water. “It'll do more damage, up close. Just stay out of the way. Me and Gene, this is our job. She'll be back in a sec to help.”
Owen looks terrified, all the moreso for Genie's disappearance. I haven't had time alone with him to talk much on this trip, but it's perfectly obvious that they have some manner of friendship and trust. I'd say more, from the way they carried on, tracking Dastan.
The scene seems surreal; an inhuman woman forcing her way into the house, two disappearing men with fucking occult looking weapons, and a woman who passes from corpse, to dog, to—wherever she went. I can hardly lift my weapons; my own fear chokes me, amplified far past the point of control or resistance. Some part of me doesn't trust that, wonders when the hell I got to be such a coward. But that doesn't make the panic back off me, or help my throat open.
Owen seems to be similarly affected, but to a lesser extent. Dastan and Abel engage the shadows as the woman ushers two shadows through the window, and makes a break for the door, to open it for the rest. Abel is a terror—disappearing, reappearing, scalding them with a cascade of something that must be far more deadly than the holy water.
A dim part of me flashes to the Jonas' bodies, the strange acid that burned them. And with that thought, my purpose becomes clear.
“You killed them.”
Serve and protect. Kill those killing others.
Anger and aggression overwhelms me, to have finally found those innocents' murderer. I could claw his throat open with my bare hands, or bash his skull. Make him feel every ounce of pain they did as they died. I can almost feel his flesh tearing under my fingers, my teeth.
Justice. That's my purpose.
I throw myself at Abel and my blow lands. Worst yet, I feel the strength he's taking from me, and fight to squeeze the tap shut. His form wavers, fades to incorporeality. I can't make him leave completely, but I can deprive him of the ability to hurt others.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I can't tell who's yelling, but it doesn't matter anyways. I can take Abel out. He's bound to me. I raise the gun to my face, and ready my finger on the trigger.
Owen lunges into me, knocking the gun away. I reach for it again, and he slams my head against the floor. I don't even feel the impact, but the world swims around me, ripples distorting the air as the woman throws Dastan to the side.
Owen hesitates, torn between protecting a father he's barely known, and trying to hold still until the other killer—Genie, her name was; it feels distant and I have to grope for several seconds to find it—comes back.
Chapter 45
Exorcism, Gene
THE HOUNDS STRUGGLE, but are no match. And whatever's happening, the incubi are aware of it. A group of them meet me in my favorite clearing when I reach Limbo. A succubus I don't know stretches out her hand to me, and I pass the connections to her, leave the hounds wailing in her grip as the world purges their existence.
I have to go back; there's still more to do. I try to remember the way it felt to be in Emmy's skin, but I can't pick up the connection again. Reluctantly, I reach for the other meatsuit, now mutilated by the remaining hounds. It takes all of my attention to force torn muscles to action, as I try to wiggle back into the house. I've barely made it to the doorway—no way I can climb in the broken window with hamstrings torn by clumsy fingers—when the demon handler strikes Owen down.
A protective impulse blossoms, driving away my caution, and I throw myself at her, dragging her, and the remaining hounds back to hell with me. She screams. The sound tears at my broken eardrums, but without the connection between mind and body, she's done for. I release her and her mortal spirit evaporates. I want to look around, to know that everyone's okay, but I don't dare. Between the strain of managing this useless form and holding the hounds, it's better to hurry with my work. I haul the remaining hounds to the edge of Limbo.
The inky are still there, the first hounds still shrilling, though quieter as the world drains them, chews them away. “Is it over?” one of the overseeing incubi asks me.
“I don't know. I've got to get back, got to see.”
I turn the spiritual leashes on the remaining hounds over, and let them continue.
I force myself into the broken body awaiting me. John is unconscious on the floor, and Abel is barely there. But Owen; I can't figure out what the hell is wrong with Owen. Dastan wrestles with him, words falling from him like a chant. After a moment, I realize what they are. Not again, not again, not again, not again.
I try to reach out, tell Owen it's over, he's safe, but he can't hear me, can't feel me. He sees me, though, and his focus changes in an instant. Strong hands close around my throat, and I redouble my efforts to reach him telepathically.
Finally, I break through his barriers, into the carnage in his head. Demons surrounding him, all of us demons. Fears, taunts, laughs, all forming into sharp blades that slice into him. He has to kill us, kill us all to be free.
John stirs on the ground near me, his eyes widening as he wakes. The demon we fought is gone, but lives on in Owen, through his own fears. John raises his pistol, though I try shaking my head at him, saying “no” with the remaining breath I have.
But it's too late. Owen's head explodes over me, dousing me in bone fragments that are entirely the wrong makeup to be human. He doesn't look so different than I did, when I was reborn. He's definitely an incubi. No guesses or hedged bets.
Shit.
Dastan looks at me, eyes wide with fear. “I didn't—I didn't know. I didn't know he'd snap like that...”
I glare at him as I shove Owen's corpse off me, and he touches my cheek. He looks to the body, and I understand. I push myself into what remains of Owen's head one last time, recover the last memory in there.
A memory blossoms when I shut my eyes.
A scrawny, cowering child, labeled a freak and tormented, frightened for his life. His clothes are dirty, poorly made. His caretaker is harried, preoccupied, and his mother no better. He's sick, so very sick, and still finds no rest in that lodging. As the violence gets worse, he turns inward, fights to find some way of protecting himself.
And then he breaks through, finds it. He flexes his caretaker's knuckles, demands her to punish those who have hurt him.
Later, he calms, sees the carnage, hears his father murmur “What have you done,” even as strange beings surround them. His father warns him to stay quiet, and he does. And his father's not Dastan, but another man with black eyes, his reddish hair catching the light and setting off deep-set eyes and strong cheekbones.
Owen's body feels strange; it doesn't feel like his fingers and toes are his anymore. His father says the fault is his, and laughs, guilt and worry compounding until Owen wishes he could cry to ease the man's pain. Owen—or whoever he was, back then—wants to argue; he finally managed to defend himself, just like Mother told him he needed to. But he can't. He can't even feel his mouth, can't feel if he still has a mouth.
The strange men confer, and one approaches his dad—Dastan. Something passes between them, and Dastan nods. Owen's father vanishes, his spirit torn away by the strange men, and Owen finally forms a mouth enough to cry.
Dastan picks up the formless child, and consoles him.
Dastan looks to me for understanding. “Benito said the child deserved better, that he didn't wish to see him enslaved by his people. He asked me to hide him, see that he had a chance to grow.”
“And instead Owen never could.” Raw anger fills me, but the connection with Owen still hasn't closed. It takes me a minute to push further and realize why. “But he still has a chance.”
Dastan wants to protest, but thinks better of it. I'd probably deck him if he tried. “Do what you must. Benito would have wanted that, and will forgive me for failing him.”
“Whatever helps you sleep at night.”
I accept Owen's pain as mine, pull him into my consciousness. Something dark leaks from his body, sinks into me. His physical form withers to nothing in the air, even the chunks of bone melting and flowing toward me as though pulled toward the ocean. I feel him there, though he's still a mess of pain and terror.
“I'll be back soon.”
I pull Owen to Limbo.
I fight to protect him, cushion him from the turmoil shifting the ground around us, slicing pieces out of my head. But I'm not enough of a fool to believe I'm actually helping much. And his mind has degraded to the point that even our connection fails us. So I speed up my steps, focus on the archives. No matter how much every inch of me, mind, body, and soul, aches. Owen's agony compounds with mine, numbing me to the world, to my words, to my memories.
The archives are empty. I call through, send queries and vibrations through the landscape to shake a caretaker out of their tasks. Finally one of the librarians materializes in front of me with an apologetic and irritable nod.
I offer Owen to her, and she accepts. His dark substance fights to take a form, but fails. I leave one of my hands against him as I tell her what happened, and she reassures me that he'll be just fine, though only time will know how much of his life, death, or even me he remembers. I nod—the others might still need me batting cleanup.
I need to focus on what comes next, rather than linger here. Regretfully, I pull my hand back from Owen.
Once again, he fights, but fails to form. Can't get further than five fingers clutching me. I stroke him with my other hand, and squeeze those fingers. “You'll be fine, and I'll come check on you.”
The librarian looks at me with a combination of amusement and impatience.
“You're in the right hands.” Poor choice of words.
One finger at a time, Owen releases me. And one lonely moment at a time, I release him.
I nod at the librarian, and push myself out of world, leave him to his true family.
Chapter 46
Baby Steps
I CAN’T GO back to the Hub. The incubi insisted.
I can't blame them. When their power was threatened, the elders tried to use Reaper assassinations to suppress an incubi uprising. Now that that tidbit's in the open, everyone's aware that they've actually pushed the incubi into full-formed rebellion. Abel and I got caught in that crossfire. We're considered no more trustworthy than the inkies who drove the elders away.
Now that the word of the assassinations is out, the incubi are in revolt against the elders for targeting their own. It caused a rift between the Reapers and their handlers. Most won't accept assignments or even intel from the incubi. And the Reapers themselves have split, some of them bearing more allegiance to the demons they live with than the faceless incubi who worked with them, but also shunned them since their turning.
There's gonna be a civil war in the streets, as the demons turn against the Reapers, not knowing who accepts orders from whom. Standing orders from the Hub are to overtake any rogue inky or Reaper for 'reassignment'. The second pack of hounds' memories collected, it's easy to see what that means. It shows their slow fragmentation, from one complete individual, to the scattered, suggestible mess they are. Abel said he tried to make a few of the other Reapers look, but that they refused to believe it was anything other than a fabrication. Oh well, it's their lives on the chopping block.
If these are the weapons the others will be using against us, the fight'll be bloody. Lots of collateral damage, and public messes.
If I go back to the Hub now, there's a good chance I'll be taken for a traitor. But it's still home, and abandoning it chafes me.
“I won't hear of it,” Abel'd insisted. “We're still partners. We're safer together, and you're safest with me.”
To make me feel welcome in the space carved out for himself in Limbo, he's even ventured into the Hub while disguised, to bring back dresses for me. I tried to tell him not to, since he's in just as much danger as me, from our former bosses. The gesture's sweet, but I'd give anything for a comfy pair of jeans or leggings. Those flowing garments seem like they belong to someone else entirely.
So far, a fragile truce has held; our war must not reach human streets. That would be mutually assured destruction.
But with the tensions lingering, the escalating violence, it's only a matter of time.
I don't feel right distanced from that war. Not since I in many ways helped cause it.
Abel takes regular messages to John, to keep an eye out for shenanigans there. But John is a scared little bunny compared to the forces that he watches. I don't feel right abandoning him.
Still, it's safer for him if I stay away.
Abel is the only one who talks to me. He tries to make me forget my anger and loneliness with little distractions and gifts. He tries to touch my mind, rekindle whatever it was we had. But I just can't do it. And every time I push him out, it hurts him a little more. He pushes apologies into my head, whispers them in heartfelt tones, but I can't make myself believe they're more than empty words.
