Hellbender

by Dana Cameron

  “A bath?” I tried hard to keep the disbelief out of my voice, and failed.

  “We have an excellent hot spring near here; this house is a retreat used by our kind in times of trouble, and so we have many more amenities than most houses.”

  I thought of the very nice shower I’d just had. I’d never had a prescription for a bath before. “A bath will help me, how?”

  “It’s very relaxing, good for the skin, excellent for your muscles, and helps fatigue. You should try it. Our American Cousins will be happy to show you how. The girls have become quite addicted.” Almost a frown crossed his face. “Ash, not so much.”

  “That sounds lovely.” My stomach rumbled, embarrassing us both.

  Ken-san took the cue. “If you’ll follow me, I think Okamura-san has prepared a proper meal for you.”

  “Thank you!” My heartfelt gratitude for the food reminded me of other manners. “And thank you for examining me. My Family—”

  “If I understand correctly, they’re still fighting. It will take some time to get news. Also, you would like to go home, but you have no papers? No entry stamps, no passport?”

  “I don’t.”

  Ken-san frowned with concern. “That is difficult but not insurmountable. As I say, time enough to arrange that. We will get you home very soon.”

  “Thank you.” My relief could not have been greater.

  Another man came in, nodded to me, and spoke quietly and rapidly to Ken-san. After a short exchange, he bowed and left.

  Ken-san turned to me, his lips tight. “We’ve tried, repeatedly, to contact the Family in Boston but with no luck. It could be they are still engaged with the—what did you call them?”

  “Fellborn. The Order.”

  “Yes, we know of the Order, of course. They’ve become very bold lately. And we heard from our Cousin Toshiharu Yamazaki-Campbell about the Fellborn—he’s out there, too, correct? The Family may be following only local communication, too busy fighting and controlling the information about the existence of the Fangborn at the moment. In which case, it is only a matter of time before we hear from them.”

  One way or the other, I thought. Let’s hope it isn’t via the twenty-four-hour news networks.

  “And now, if you are ready, there is food.”

  I tried not to actually drool as I followed him to the next room.

  The tiny little plates worried me at first, but they came in quantity. And quality—there were many types of seafood, mounds of rice, seaweed. I smelled vinegar, soy sauce, and a number of things I couldn’t identify. It didn’t matter—it was all delicious.

  Ash was there and apparently so were the sisters he’d mentioned. As he’d said, they were triplets, and while Ash was similar looking to his sisters, if it hadn’t been for the girls’ radically different styles, it would have been impossible to tell the two of them apart.

  They were nearly of a height, a few inches taller than me, maybe five eight, five nine. Brown hair, blue eyes, freckles, symmetrical features.

  I only noticed now that I was fed that Ash was the picture of retro-prep: buttoned down, slicked back, and creased to within an inch of his life. It made me fidget just to look at him. I wanted to mess his hair or yank out his shirt so the tails hung outside his sweater vest.

  The one I learned was named Rose was as gothy as they come. She wore drapey black with hints of jewel tones, which were a relief to the eye and yet somehow made the black all the darker. And speaking of eyes, if I’d had the money to buy stock in eyeliner and black nail polish, based on Rose alone, I’d make a killing. Her hair was dark black, but it was obviously the sort of home color job I used to do, because it wasn’t exactly the right shade to go with her pale skin. It washed her out, which, come to think of it, might have been the point. But with the sapphire eyes she shared with her siblings, it was a striking combination.

  Ivy looked to me to be the most normal of the lot. Which meant that she looked closest to how I usually dressed: jeans, layered tees under a jacket. Judging by the leather stains on her toes, she owned the boots I’d seen out front, nearly new. Her hair and Ash’s matched, though hers was longer, pulled back into a sloppy, pretty knot.

  The Trips talked nonstop while I took them in, which was nice, because it got me off the hook for having to join in the conversation.

  “We were born at noon at the summer solstice,” Ivy said.

  “Well, you came at noon, and we shot out not too long after,” Rose corrected. “Zip, boom, squish.”

  “We’ll be twenty-one next year,” Ash added.

  “We always work together,” said Ivy.

  “But we can work with other oracles easily, which is kinda rare,” Rose said.

  “It’s a real gift,” Ash said. “We get a lot of work because of that.”

  “It’s nice to meet you after focusing on you for so long,” Ivy said.

  “I’ve been seeing you for ages,” Rose said.

  “Like I said before, she nagged and nagged until we came here.” Ash sighed.

  “We usually wait until two of us have it, but this was different, somehow. So, yeah, I nagged.”

  “And it was a good thing, too.” Ivy nodded. “It was the missing part to a puzzle the oracles had over here. They were expecting someone.”

  “It took them a while to realize that we weren’t the ones they were expecting.”

  “Because we’re totally famous.”

  I was starting to get the hang of them continuing each other’s sentences, one complete thought shared among the three of them.

  “Now, now,” Ash said suddenly. His voice took on something of Okamura-san’s quality, when I noticed her hand on his. “That’s enough talk about you.”

  But the triplets had to have the last word. “Perhaps you’ve heard of us?” Rose said.

  “Um, no,” I said. “Sorry.” Maybe it was a triplet thing, that finishing a sentence for each other, but I was willing to bet that like other oracles, they were completely weird. They were bright enough, but they certainly didn’t act as though they were from our planet.

  “She’s a stray,” Ivy explained.

  “That’s not a nice word!” Rose protested.

  “Baka!” Ivy spat back.

  “And that’s a worse one!” Ash said. Then his voice changed. “I think that will be enough,” Okamura-san via Ash said. “Now!”

  “We’re sorry,” all three said.

  “Well, it’s true, I wasn’t raised in the Family or with Fangborn culture. ‘Stray’ is as good as anything to describe me, I guess. Is there anything you can tell me about what you saw?” I said, setting my chopsticks down.

  “I saw the mess in Boston coming,” Ivy said. “That’s why everyone thought we should be there.”

  “I saw the mess in Boston, too,” Rose said, “but I saw you, and you weren’t in Boston. You were here.”

  “So we hightailed it over here, having exchanged a few emails first.”

  “And nothing more about me?” I asked. “Or why I’m here?”

  “No, nothing like that yet.” Rose laughed.

  “But we can do a reading tonight,” Ash said.

  Silence from the other side of the table.

  Ash and Rose stood up. “Ivy?”

  She’d dropped her chopsticks. Her eyes were blank, staring straight ahead.

  “Ivy?” the other two said again.

  Ivy screamed.

  Chapter Three

  Somewhere in an unoccupied part of my mind, I heard the crash and tinkle of breaking porcelain. It occurred to me that this was exactly how pottery entered the archaeological record, and I wondered briefly if it could be repaired.

  The other 98 percent of my brain was riveted on Ivy’s screams and the reactions from everyone around the table.

  Rose and Ash pulled out soft gloves
and put them onto Ivy’s hands. Once that was done, they held her hands carefully. Ash stroked her head as she continued to scream. Rose dipped a napkin into some water and brushed her cheeks with it.

  Okamura-san got a notebook, a pile of maps, and a pen.

  Ivy’s siblings joined hands and closed their eyes. Ivy gasped a bit longer, then began to speak. “One of us, in the dark. One of us, in new enemy hands. One of the enemy—how quickly he appeared!”

  “How close?” Ash asked.

  “Medium range,” Rose said.

  Ash kept his eyes closed; Okamura-san picked up the map, glanced at him, and then took a pair of dividers and found the scale. She put one point on a part of the map and turned the dividers in a small circle, no more than two inches across. She pointed at where the line intersected a fresh red mark and paused, staring intently, waiting for Ash’s next unspoken communication.

  “Ivy’s telling us the Order has made an attack on one of our safe houses,” Ash said, “which is not far away. They used one of our oracles to time it. They’re fighting now. Somehow someone who shouldn’t be there is.”

  A sick feeling began to well in my stomach. I was pretty sure I knew who it was.

  “It came with you!” Rose said. “That new enemy! You brought it here.”

  “Please,” Ivy pleaded. Her eyes were open now, tear streaks drying on her cheeks. “We need to get them out now. Who is this new guy?”

  I nodded. “If it’s what I think, it’s a member of the Order named Jacob Buell. Somehow he got dragged along with me when I ended up here. I think I might have brought him here, trying to defend myself. Or maybe he contacted them or had a tracking device and they found him.”

  Okamura-san discussed something briefly with Ken-san, and they both nodded when she pointed to a place on the map. There seemed to be some disagreement after that, however.

  “We should go immediately,” Ash said, translating for Okamura-san.

  “They’ll be expecting us,” Rose protested. “And if they have an oracle, it’s possible they’ll have noticed his connection with Ivy.”

  “We can’t wait,” Ivy said numbly. “We have to go now.”

  I agreed. One of our Family was in the hands of the Order and would be tortured for information or research.

  Without a word, we began our preparations. I borrowed some gear and helped the others with theirs. It gave me direction I sorely needed and objectives I could meet. What kept me from begging off and pleading exhaustion, which wouldn’t have been hard to argue, was the idea that the Order, and potentially the presence of evil among them, would be a test of my ability to Change. I needed to know if I could Change more than I needed sleep, and doing it among my own kind seemed like the safest way, even if it was in the middle of a fight.

  A van was packed and a small car readied to follow. I was about to ask why we needed something so big when I saw the backboard and the medical kit go into the van. We had no idea how many of the Family were there and what shape they’d be in when we found them.

  If we got there in time.

  We drove north, along a cliff overlooking the ocean. The place we were looking for was meant to look like a family compound. We stopped partway down a long, winding drive that led to a high wall, plastered and painted. Two stone dogs with red cloth scarves stood outside of a small building near the gates, and I wondered if they were Fangborn signals or Japanese art. I realized with a shock that there were two trees near a small shrine in front; a rope was tied and suspended between them. Along the rope were carefully knotted pieces of paper. Ash explained those were prayers, but I had seen them before, in a vision at Ephesus. I’d thought I was seeing a tree covered in ghosts.

  The Trips insisted on doing a reading. I became really apprehensive when they asked me to join them, not knowing what would happen if I tried to use my powers. I’d assumed they were doing a prognostication on the raid we were about to undertake. But no.

  “We’re still getting way too much interference from you,” Rose said. “If we drain off those visions first, maybe we can check for the raid after.”

  I shrugged and made a corner to their square. It felt very silly to pause for any reason in the persisting rain. I could hear the ocean waves breaking on a beach somewhere beyond the cliff on which the house stood.

  The Trips required physical contact to use their gift, and like many other oracles, they also used talismans to help them concentrate and align their power. Some oracles used crystal balls or stones to help them tune out the real world. Some used bones or trinkets they’d found. It was always a personal choice.

  The Dickson Trips used smartphones.

  Rose and Ash each took one of my hands. They linked arms with Ivy, who pulled up a Tetris-like game app.

  “Old school,” I said.

  “It helps with concentration,” Rose said.

  “No storyline to distract us,” Ash added.

  Ivy said nothing, but she didn’t need to. She turned her attention to the screen and stared, her thumbs jabbing the screen, slowly, and then picking up speed. Her eyes started to glaze over.

  Plug in, turn on, tune out.

  “Oh, boy,” Ivy said. Her eyes rolled back in her head. Same with her siblings.

  It took a lot for me not to pull away from them. They were nice kids, but this was just freaking me out. Sure as sin, it was no fake. Power came off them in waves. Somehow I felt I was completing the circuit, and what they shared was coursing through me. I saw fragments of their lives in a rush of impressions. I saw my shock mirrored in Rose’s face.

  “Hey, she isn’t supposed to be able to do that!”

  “Well, she is, so get back to work,” Ash muttered, his eyes still closed. “We’re nearly there.”

  Everyone who had been discussing our plan or checking gear looked up and waited.

  “We’re at a crossroads,” Ivy said to no one in particular.

  “You are the crossroads,” Ash corrected, his head jerking toward me.

  “Whatever comes next, you’ll decide everything,” Ivy said.

  “The Family will never be the same again,” Rose said.

  “The world will never be the same again,” Ash amplified.

  “Go down, deep, into the ground.”

  “Climb up, high, among white stone pillars.”

  “Close the box you’ve opened. It will be a pity if you do.”

  “Drink Family blood, rend Family flesh.”

  “Splitter of worlds, binder of all.”

  “If you don’t destroy us, we will perish.”

  The beeping that signified the end of the game broke the silence that followed, broke the spell over us. The Trips shook themselves and dropped hands with me, checking each other, reassuring themselves they were all safe and well.

  “Yeah. Seriously,” Ivy said to an unspoken comment. There was a shuffling among the non-oracle Cousins, and a cough. It had been as unsettling to watch as to participate, I guess.

  “Sounds like you’re pretty well screwed, whatever you do,” Rose said.

  “Thanks, guys,” I said, shaking. “You couldn’t give me anything more solid to go on?”

  “Nope. But you can’t afford to fuck it up,” Rose said.

  “Big help.”

  Rose shrugged. “At least you can stop worrying that you’re evil.”

  I glanced around at the nervous adults around me and caught Kenichiro-san’s eye. “See? Just like Claudia Steuben said.”

  “Yeah,” Ivy said. “You’re definitely gonna end the world, but we didn’t get that you were actually bad.”

  “This should help quiet the Family buzz about that,” Ash said. “That’s a lot of bad reputation to be running around with.”

  My shoulders slumped. “Well, that’s something, I guess. You guys gonna stay here with the vehicles?”

 
The three shared a look; all three shook their heads. “Not all of us.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “One of us goes with you,” Ash said.

  “I think it’s me,” Rose and Ivy said at the same time. Perturbed, they looked at Ash, who shrugged.

  “I can’t see it,” he said.

  “I’m a better fighter,” Ivy said.

  “But I’m the one who saw Zoe coming—our paths are entwined,” her sister replied. “I feel it, Ivy.”

  Once again, they looked to their brother. “We get to an impasse like this, we go by protocol,” Ash said.

  Rose and Ivy nodded, and then, at the same time, both held up a fist.

  “Once, twice, thrice,” they said together.

  Rose’s hand was flat; Ivy’s was still bunched up.

  “Rose,” they said together.

  They were deciding my fate and theirs with “Rock, Paper, Scissors.”

  The gate was unlocked, ajar, and we pulled it open to see a wooden building in what looked like a traditional style, emerging at the end of a short, winding garden pathway. At the end of the path, we saw that the building formed the right side of a courtyard; a second, similar building abutted the far end, forming an upside-down L, with the branches to our right and ahead of us. The courtyard was completed with the continuation of the wall on the left and the side through which we’d entered.

  A battle was raging in the courtyard. I saw seven Family members: four werewolves half-Changed so that they resembled humans with fur, claws, and wolf-like visages, and three vampires with their even weirder snakelike heads and scaled, clawed hands. They were fighting maybe twenty members of the Order in their hateful black uniforms, and one of the Fellborn. I was glad it was one of the earlier Fellborn models, which was vicious and unthinking, and moved somewhat like apes, with loose skin covered with gray fur. The Mark Twos were nastier, smarter, and stronger, but even so, it took one vampire and one werewolf to keep this Mark One from doing more damage than it already had.

  The remaining vampires and werewolves were using everything in their considerable arsenals to get past the Order’s best weapon against us, after the Fellborn: their blasters. A combination of a compound that included a lot of black hellebore, which I knew had a horrible, sickening, disorienting effect on us, and electricity, which further scrambled our circuits and made us even more vulnerable to the hellebore. The vampires were slowly able to glamour or “suggest” that some of the Order assailants put their weapons down. Some were spitting venom. When one ran out of venom, I saw him emulate his werewolf kin and pick up a blaster and bash its owner over the head.