After returning to the station, I found that the small crowd had grown by one member. The new addition seemed out of place, trying too hard to blend into the gathering. Entering the passenger car, I took a seat behind the man who wished to move unnoticed. I watched him for some time before realizing he was looking back at me through the reflective chrome that wrapped around a handrail.
“I have no head for this sort of game,” the man said, our eyes locking upon the reflection of the other. “I’m far too impatient. It’s the chaos I’m chasing. The faster and faster I go . . . I just love it. You?” I said nothing. My sister was already near to hand, and I couldn’t deny how badly I wanted to express the artistic inspiration gained via my sleeping glimpse into The Great Darkness.
The man—as if knowing that any untoward movements would lead to his death—slowly lifted a piece of water-stained paper from his front pocket. He unfolded it, briefly holding it within view. It was a kill list, replete with crossed-off names and numbered entries.
“See?” the man said. “I don’t think you’re on here. Or at least, you’re not next on my list. I’m embarrassed to say that it took me some time to finally know the true face of my next playmate, and you certainly don’t look anything like the Breath Taker. And from the fact that I’m still talking, I’m going to assume I’m not on your list, either. Are we permitted to kill out of order? If so, I suppose we may have a problem.”
“You would have the problem, I’m afraid,” I said, effortlessly sliding my sister through the fabrics and plastics of the seat between us, gently resting her deadly smile against his back. “But I’ve had no inclination to pursue the names out of order, thus far. However, there does seem to be an implicit formality to all of this. So for now, I’m willing to consider the order of the names as something of an unspoken rule.”
“It’s the damned linearity of this list that has me wanting to quit this awful game,” the man replied. “As an artist, I’m sure you must feel the same, yes?” He knew who I was. That interested me.
“Why do you think you know who I am?” I asked.
“You’re gigantic,” the man said, “with what could easily be an enormous axe wrapped up and strapped across your back. To be honest, I’m not sure how you’ve lasted so long with such an appearance, and traveling via public transportation, no less.” He still hadn’t turned to face me. “Do I have you at a disadvantage, my friend? Have you no idea with whom you are speaking? I wonder how many faceless names you’ve already scratched off that list of yours, all the while having no idea as to the paths you’ve destroyed. Shame on you, if that’s true. I mean, we’re not, any of us, living inferior lives, are we? We’ve spared ourselves very little waste by way of lost opportunities. Again, as an artist, I assume you to understand the gist of what I’m saying. But the chance to see all the faces face the right way, follow all the lost paths . . . why, it’s just too tempting to permit a little killing, even if ultimately misplaced, to give us pause. Killing to make the killing unnecessary, yes? That is what we’re doing, isn’t it? We’re being made to thin our own ranks, in order for one of us to fill the world with their will. Or have you a grander explanation to share?”
The man was intriguing enough to warrant a response. “First, I knew something about the better majority of those I hunted, and those who hunted me. The others weren’t permitted a proper introduction, I’m afraid. As to the nature of the game, I’ll keep my opinions to myself. And while I admit to a temporary loss in our little naming game, your interest in lost opportunities and faces tells me more about you than the fact that you won’t show me your face—or whoever’s face that is. Even the moonlight falling from behind me can’t reveal the unmoving portions of dead skin that make up that wonderful mask you’ve constructed. Although, as soon as you’re on the move again, you’ll turn it around, revealing a face on both sides of your head. Am I correct, Janus?”
The man laughed. “That’s the reason you’ve proven so elusive! You’re a clever fox, indeed! Yes, you’ve guessed correctly!” Still laughing, the masked killer finally turned to face me. I stared into eyes as lethal as the dagger that swiftly knocked aside my sister’s gleaming smile.
CHAPTER EIGHT
It wasn’t the moonlight that alerted me to the fact that the man wore another person’s face over top of his own. The precision of the mask’s fashioning was clearly exquisite, even superhuman—but the fit was too perfect. It was as if the victim had been genetically designed to blend into the features and nuances of the killer’s face. But I knew the artist known as Janus the Two-Faced had been host to many faces, and the mask’s fit was likely due to the skill of its designer, not some shared biological element.
The dagger that deflected my sister quietly tore through the headrest of the seat in front of me, stopping just beneath my chin. The dead skin of the mask smiled at me, somehow obeying the movements of the living skin beneath. The mask only slightly betrayed its inanimate nature via a small, solitary crease from the right corner of its pale lips to the right eye-hole. Visible only when the wearer smiled, I assumed his smile must have occurred in quantities sufficient to cause the crease in the first place.
“Cleverness is an admirable attribute,” Janus said, “but speed is no less essential. Now tell me, Family Man, what do you know of all this monkey business?” His blade remained still as he peered at me over the headrest, cocking his head to one side. “Try as I might, I’ve only heard from this person or that of a weird little Shepherd who has an affection for herding wolves. The general thrust of the title suggests the Shepherd is some kind of master of murderers, and we’re all his angry little hounds. Now, while I’m a big fan of wolves, I’ve never considered myself a suitable analogue for the hairy things. Besides, everything boiled down, we’re all predators. And it should go without saying that any living thing could be, from the right rhetorical angle, analogized to wolves. It’s really quite a lazy comparison, if I’m being honest.”
He carried on in a relaxed and casual manner, as if we were old friends conversing over coffee. “Now, those that I must rescue from the path most trampled, they could be wolves—nearly programmed, from embryo to corpse, to wander the paths they walk. No, that’s not quite right, is it? They don’t even wander, those two-faced buffoons. Wandering would imply that they begrudged chance some teeny-weeny sway over their lives. But that’s rarely the case. Never the case, actually. Well, until now.
“You know, Family Man, I never sorted out a life that faced the right way before—those with only one face, I mean to say. Take this one here, the one I’m wearing. It’s the likeness of the Boiler Man. We met a short while ago. Wonderful fella, I have to say. He exhausted every last bit of his potential, practically wrung it out with his bare hands. He was a man who willed his way through the world—every curiosity satisfied, all chances taken. What the hell business do I have with his face? Sure, I’m wearing it. More as an apology than anything else. But he has no other face, nothing hidden. He is what he concealed. And I killed him—I destroyed what I’ve spent a lifetime promoting. And yet, here I am—here we are—chasing victory over top the bodies of our brethren. Still, I can feel the hidden face of the world, the right one—slowly turning around, with every “wolf” I topple. So, I suppose that makes it all just hunky-dory! But perhaps you feel differently? Speaking of different, I do sense a sort of incompleteness to you, a hidden face, something I could properly wear . . . .
In principal, the killer said nothing that I strongly disagreed with (except wearing my face). His reasoning was sound enough, save for matters that pertained directly to his worldview. However, I did take issue with the blade he’d placed under my chin, as that would certainly need to be remedied.
I used my free hand to wrench the seat in front of me sideways, jerking the knife away from both my neck and the killer’s hand. As his knife fell to the floor, I plunged my hand through the hole in the intervening seat and grabbed the killer by the
wrist. I pulled his arm through the hole, twisting it into an unnatural position, disallowing him access to any more surprises.
“Strength is also an admirable attribute,” I said, revisiting his earlier comments. “When combined with cleverness and speed, you have a rather effective trifecta indeed. Also, I’ve no idea how you assume anything in this world complete, mask-maker. You don’t strike me as a fool, so you must realize nothing in this world is as it should be. You don’t have enough thread to sew up all the holes. Perhaps, should we live long enough to face one another in the truer spirit of the game, we can debate the issue more completely. But for now, tell me, Janus-of-the-Two-Faces, have you dreamt of him, this Shepherd?”
Janus laughed. “My, you are rather strong at that. My arm feels like it’s trapped in a vise. But if you don’t intend on killing me, I’d greatly appreciate it if you would loosen up a tad bit. Otherwise, you’ll give my next scheduled opponent an unfair advantage, as I’ll only have the effective use of one arm.”
When it became clear that I wouldn’t oblige his request, his mask somehow conveyed a withering look. “Well, I can’t say for sure that I’ve had a mystical visitation in my sleep,” he continued. “I’m pretty sure that’s what you’re getting at. But I have had a few unusual dreams. The first occurred just before I acquired my most recent appearance. I was looking over the face of a terribly perturbed sea when I quickly realized the whitecaps were completely unjustified. There was no storm to cause them, not even the slightest breeze. So, I bent close to the water, trying to sneak a peek beneath the foaming waves. That’s when I saw the wolves under the water, thousands of them, biting, frothing, and killing. It was their battle that stirred the water, and let me tell you, it was quite the donnybrook.
“I was thoroughly enjoying the show when from the middle of the sea there emerged a figure. Now, I’m not all that knowledgeable when it comes to what a shepherd is supposed to look like, so who’s to say what the being actually was? Although, he did have one of those lovely curving rods I know shepherds sometimes carry about. It was the color of freshest blood, and he lifted it from the water, up over his head. After a few seconds, he slammed the butt of the rod back down into the water, which seemed to have the effect of transferring the blood-red color of his staff to the sea. The waves rose and swept me into the depths, where I joined with the wolves in their war. Again, my arm, please. I’ll be needing it all too soon.”
I loosened my grip slightly, for which he thanked me. I had no desire to rid the world of—or even injure—yet another muse if I didn’t have to. It was then, fully joined in conversation, that we noticed it—a cold blast of silence coming from the car in front of us. I released Janus from my grip, and we both slid into the shadows to investigate.
When we entered the next car, we discovered a space of emergent dreams—headless bodies, overstuffed with additional organs leaking like lolling tongues from their smiling stomachs, and tiny flames hopping and shivering from within an assortment of hanging, brightly grinning heads. The carved jack-o-lantern faces were just open windows to the small lights that burned within them, illustrating a fact beyond flesh—this was clearly the work of the artist known as Jack Lantern. He was in the passenger car beyond us. From that distant room, I could hear the methodic sighing of a busy blade, occasionally punctuated by the small ticking sounds that spoke to the fine adjustments of a knife working bone.
Jack Lantern was perhaps the most notorious living killer of all. Unlike so many of us, he hunted the same killing grounds, haunting Autumn City with his wonderful human jack-o-lanterns, evading capture and spreading nightmare. Not since our great forbearer, Dooley Hines—also known as Sleepy Head—who had nearly enveloped the entire city of New Victoria within his killing dream, had there been such an artist. For the first time, I found my chances of winning the Shepherd’s Game lessened—if only slightly.
He stood at the very edge of the shadows, only slightly visible. Initially, I could barely tell he wore a mask—but as I strained my eyes to glimpse the face of the killer, I could just make out the dim orange of a smiling jack-o-lantern. As for Janus, he disappeared into darkness, prowling closer to the killer. Somehow, he’d managed to don his signature two-headed mask—a terrifying goblin-thing faced forward, while a monstrous goat glared from the back. He also wore a spectacular cloak made from the continuous, unbroken skin of one of his victims, giving the impression that the goat had a corresponding body.
Just as I was about to join Janus in his hunt, something delightfully unexpected brought the impending conflict to the very brink of bursting. The webs of silence I’d left in my wake had been lightly plucked by a careful predator—another newcomer was trying to blend his silence into my own. I whipped around and burned my gaze through the imposter-stillness, slowly approaching it as Jack Lantern’s lilting voice filled the shadows. “Happy Halloween, Fredrick! And thank you for bringing me to this splendidly dark train! I absolutely love trains! Autumn City has some fantastic trains, but nothing so wonderfully claustrophobic.”
The Carver of Souls, as he was also called, had come for Janus. I was somewhat disappointed the pumpkin-faced killer had not come for me. But when our eyes had met, I became certain that he was not averse to killing out of order, so there was no telling his intentions.
Janus snaked his response through the shifting arms of darkness between the weak beams of cold moonlight, careful to keep his words from giving away his location. “Oh, please! Spare me your pretentious yammering about Halloween, and let’s just get on with it. And by the way, those masks of yours are the height of amateur hour. Such hack jobs could hardly manage to conserve more than a mere crumb of chaos. Just look at all the precious potential you’ve left to spoil, you blithering dimwit! It looks as if I’ll have to show you how the make a proper mask, and how to do so without spilling so much as a single drop of distilled chance—though I’m afraid you won’t long outlive my lesson.”
Slowly, I made my way into the slightly inferior silence of the unknown killer. A gruff voice dragged against the quiet. “For such a big fella, you’re plenty vigilant, aren’t ya? As I speak, you’re sneaking sideways inta the shadows, all quiet and lethal. Yer almost graceful—or just a bit more delicate than you look. I haven’t decided which. Either way, a big dude like you squirreling around just doesn’t seem right, ya know? I can picture you slipping behind a light post with nothing of yer giant body stickin’ out, like some big dumb cartoon character. Now, that’s your ‘sister’ you just put in yer hand, right? I can see why you like her smile so much, but ya really oughta think about gettin’ her teeth looked at. They look a bit worn down.”
I inched closer, testing my tendrils of silence, homing in on the newcomer’s location as he continued. “By the way, I caught a dream of yers the other night. It was interesting. But it spilled some big fat secrets about some of yer favorite huntin’ techniques and whatnot, so I came prepared. Oh, and that odorless gas you’re not smelling? Well, it’ll knock ya out soon enough. I didn’t want to spoil the surprise, but I did want you to know that you’ll wake up from it okay. And when you do—oh, boy!”
I wasn’t completely sure with whom I was dealing, but I had some ideas. Regardless, it was quite plain the killer knew nothing of me, despite what my loose-lipped dream might have intimated. I decided to make him aware of the fact. “I’ve a fairly hearty constitution, friend, but I do appreciate the insight. Of course, I’m speaking of the insight into your whereabouts, not your undetectable mists. Also, if you did indeed learn anything about my particular methods from a dream, you apparently neglected to focus on my fondness for sounds, and how I determine from which direction they emanate. If you had attended to that fact, you would have realized I’ve long been able to detect you just fine. If you get another chance at this, which I seriously doubt, you may wish to consider looking into fixing your own teeth, and how you might learn to keep them from chattering on and on.”
My sist
er flew like a grinning bullet, slamming into his chest a moment before my shoulder did the same. The man was wearing some kind of body armor, along with a gas mask, night vision goggles, and other combat accoutrements. His handguns clattered to the floor as my shoulder connected. He reached for the shotgun slung across his back as he tried to keep his footing, and I tore it from his grip. About to use it as a cudgel, an intense flash of light filled my vision. The slightest bouquet of ozone filled my nose as my body filled with pain. I fell to the floor, writhing and spasming—the shock from his homemade stun gun and the effects of the knock-out gas were wearing me down.
“Now,” the killer said, “I know ya were awfully close with your mommy, big man. Where are her bones, I wonder? Did ya turn her into a switchblade, or maybe some kinda letter opener? Or did ya save her remains fer something a bit nastier?”
It was a base taunt, to be sure, but one that could not go unanswered. I rose from the floor and seized the man, lifting him into the air. I sent him soaring into the wall of the train car, but not before he managed to touch me once more with the stun gun. I stumbled backward from what felt like a kiss from a lightning bolt. I heard the rising din of blades dancing merrily behind me as Jack and Janus busily conducted their fatal affairs. Suddenly, Janus was sent staggering toward me. I grabbed him before he fell to the floor, allowing him to steady himself. Janus and I took our places in the middle of the orange-lit passenger car, back-to-back, our would-be killers closing in from opposite sides. I could feel laughter growing in my chest.
The Red Son Page 9
