She shook her head. "I can't do this alone."
"I don't know how. I shut it away, just like you said. My parents told me I was imagining things . . . that I'd had a shock, and they understood, but I couldn't let it upset me so much." I made a gesture of futility with empty hands. "I don't know how to do it."
"I'll help you. But you have to agree to come with me. All the way." Her eyes were unexpectedly compassionate. "You were a cop once. You'll have to be one again."
After a moment, I nodded. "All right."
She sat down on the carpet and gestured for me to do the same. The collar lay between us. "We will reach out together, and we will pick it up together."
"Then what?"
"Hold it," she said simply.
"How will I know if it's working?"
"You will."
"What if it doesn't work?"
"It will." She saw something in my face. She extended her left hand. After a moment I closed my right around it. "Now," she said.
I saw our free hands move out, move down, then close upon the collar. I felt the braided nylon, the slightly frayed strands where something had rubbed, the cool metal rings.
And tasted—
—blood in my mouth. Blood everywhere. It splattered my legs, matting fur together; drenched my paws. Leathery pads felt it against the sidewalk, slick and slippery, drying to stickiness. I smelled it everywhere, clogging nostrils, overwhelming my superior canine olfactory sense.
Movement. The scent, the sharp tang of human surprise, fear, panic. Hackles rose from neck to the base of my curled tail in a ridge of thick, coarse hair. I heard a man's voice, a blurt, a bleat of sound, shock and outrage. Another man's breathing, harsh and rasping; smelled the anger, the hatred, the cold fury that overwhelmed any comprehension of what he did beyond stopping it, stopping them; ending it, ending them; ending HER—
—crushed grass, leather, torn flesh, perfume, aftershave—
—aftershave I knew—
—had lived with—
—it was him, HIM, the man, the man I knew—
Knife. Long blade, red and silver in the moonlight. A woman on the ground, slack across the concrete, pale hair a tumbled mass turning red and black and sticky.
—I know the man—
—the man who once fed me, walked me, petted me, praised me—
HIM. But what is he—
So much blood.
Everywhere.
Blood.
—and the other man, falling. Bleeding. Breath running out. Two bodies on the ground.
Blood is everywhere.
I lift my voice in a wailing howl.
In the moonlight, I see him turn. In the streetlights, I see him look at me. Black face. Familiar face.
Knife in his hand.
Blood on the knife.
Blood is everywhere.
He turns. Walks away. Back into the darkness.
I bark.
But he is gone. Two bodies on the ground.
I bark and bark and bark—
I yanked my hand away from hers, let go of the collar. Felt rage well up. "That son of a bitch!"
She was white-faced and shaking. Like me, she had released the collar. It lay again on the carpet. "That poor woman."
"And the kid," I said. "Poor guy, wrong place at the wrong time, like everyone said." I closed my eyes, then popped them open again as the memory, the smells, threatened to overwhelm me. "I was the dog."
"Yes."
"We saw what he saw. The Akita."
"He was the only witness," she said, "except for the murderer."
"That son of a bitch . . ." I rocked back, clasped hands on top of my head. Breathed noisily. "And it's not admissible."
"Double jeopardy," she murmured.
"But I know, now—we know . . ." I squeezed my eyes shut.
Her voice was very quiet. "You left the department after the trial. That was the case that went bad."
I opened my eyes. "After the lawyers got through with us, I had no heart for it anymore. We knew we had the evidence. But they played the department. Played the media. And cherry-picked the jury."
Tears shone in her eyes. "You took the Akita's collar home. To find out the truth."
I grimaced. "I was desperate. I knew even if it worked, even if somehow it worked, no one would believe me. Are you kidding? But I thought maybe it would give me a lead, if I could put myself there that night, behind the dog's eyes-find something we missed, something no one could manipulate . . ." I shook my head. "Nothing. I couldn't do it. I didn't have the—magic—anymore."
She smiled. "Is that what you called it?"
"'Magic'? Yeah, as a kid. Hell, I didn't know what it was—I still don't . . . it's as good a word as any."
"I'm sorry," she said.
I nodded. "Yeah." Then the world revolved around me, began to gray out. "Whoa—"
"Lie down. I've got some energy bars in my purse . . . lie down, Mr. Magnum."
"Mag—" Then I got the reference. Laughing, I lay down as ordered, sprawled on my back. Heard the rustle of torn paper peeled away. Felt the nubbly surface of a granola bar shoved into my hand.
"Eat it. Then eat another. In a few hours you may feel like getting up. It's just backlash, from the energy expenditure. It's always best to do this on a full stomach, but, well . . . sometimes it doesn't work out that way."
I bit off a hunk of granola bar. "What about you?"
Her words were distorted. "I'm already eating mine."
I lay there a moment, chewing. Contemplating. "Will my life ever be normal again?"
"Nope."
"Didn't think so." I finished the first bar, accepted a second from her. "It's a curse, isn't it?"
"Sometimes. Now you know what happened that night in front of the condo, when two people lost their lives because of an ex-husband's jealousy. You will never be able to forget it. But it's a gift as well."
"How is it a gift, when you can experience something like that?"
"It's a gift when you can tell a frail, terrified old woman who's had nightmares for years that her beloved husband did not die in pain, and wasn't afraid because he was alone. It's a gift when you offer peace of mind." Her smile widened. "A piece of mind."
I considered it. "Maybe that'd be all right." I sat up slowly, steadying myself against the floor. "I need to leave. But I want to come back . . . talk to you more about all of this."
She watched me stand up, noted my unsteadiness. Refrained from suggesting I wait. "Where are you going?"
"Cemetery," I said. "There's someone I need to visit. To tell her I know the truth." I glanced back. "That we know the truth. Finally."
She nodded. "Peace of mind."
I paused in the doorway, stretching open the screen door. "Never found a man who could understand you, huh?"
"Not yet."
"Yeah, well . . . my wife didn't understand me, either. Maybe it's better if we stick to our own kind."
"Maybe," she said thoughtfully, climbing to her feet. She paused in the doorway, caught the screen door from my hand as I turned to go. "Excuse my bluntness but, well . . ." She plunged ahead. "You're bitter and burned out, and dreadfully out of shape. Now that you know what you are inside, what you can do, you need to clean up your act. It takes every piece of you, the—" She paused, smiling—"magic. You need to be ready for it."
I grimaced, aware of my crumpled shirt, stubbled face, bloodshot eyes, the beginnings of a pot belly. She wasn't ultra-fit because she was a narcissistic gym rat. It was self-preservation in the eye of the hurricane.
I turned to go, grimacing. "Yeah."
"My name, by the way, is Sarah. Sarah Connor."
I stopped short and swung back. "You're kidding me."
Color stole into her cheeks. "I take it you saw The Terminator."
"Hell, I own the movie. On DVD."
She thought about it. "I guess if your name isn't Arnold, we'll be okay."
I laughed. "No, not Arnold. That I can pr
omise you."
"Well?" she asked as I turned away again. "What is it?"
I threw it back over my shoulder as I reached my little sidewalk. "Clint East—"
"No!" she interrupted, wide-eyed. "Really?"
"Just East," I said. "But the guys in the department, well. . ." I grinned. "They called me Woody."
Sarah laughed aloud.
As she closed her door, still grinning, I stuffed hands in my pockets and went whistling next door to mine, feeling good about myself for the first time in months.
~~~~~~~~~~
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~~~~~~~~~~
Just Hanah
By Doranna Durgin
Oh, I am so sentimental about the heart of dog. There, I've said it. I am. Thank you for being there right along with me.
—Doranna
~~~
I linger near the slash of exposed rock, surrounded by stunted trees, the cinder gravel rough beneath my pads. The power trickles up through my paws...it drifts on the air to set my hackles upright. It tickles my nose.
This is why I'm here...why I am. To find the power. To warn about the hidden spots, the lurking spots...the spots in becoming.
My HanahPup, do you hear?
~~~
Hanah slipped on volcanic cinders scattered over granite, catching herself with a wild flail of arms. Irritation rose. She didn't see the intensity of the sky, deepest clearest blue in this high ground. She didn't see the intensity deep between scrubby green leaves and the rich, rusty trunks of the pines.
Earlier in the day she'd seen those things, and even appreciated them. She'd taken long, deep breaths of the pine-scented air; she'd listened to the cocky songjays.
She'd been prepared for this to be the day when Sharlie found her voice.
When Sharlie finally found her voice.
But Sharlie had remained mute, and Hanah's pleasure in the day faded.
Sharlie looked down at her now from high rock, her body language a confusion of signals. Her naturally erect hackles ran from behind her wide, solid head to the base of her normally graceful tail—but now those hackles ran flat, and that same fringed tail wagged low and quick and nervous. Her ears—large and erect, edged with black—flicked forward and back, signaling her uncertainty.
Beautiful, graceful, powerful...and uncertain. That was Sharlie.
Sharlie was of the best breeding. Sharlie, like her sire and dam and all the generations before them, had the instincts and temperament to protect Hanah's people—and to connect to her trainer in the rare symphony of thought that made the FlashGuard brace teams.
If only she found her voice.
Hanah put her fists on still-boyish hips, frustration making her throat a tight and painful squeeze. "You know they said I was too young for training," she told the caydog. "You're only going to prove them right."
Sharlie wagged her tail even faster, ducked her head slightly, and reached out with one beseeching paw, her spurclaw spread in submission.
"No!" Hanah's tight throat made the word harsh. "You're just not trying."
Hanah knew the masters at Stark Academy doubted her—and thought that at fifteen, she was too young, no matter her aptitude with Flash theory: how to find the unpredictable openings to that strange plane of existence, how to survive the encounter, how to recognize the dangerous stray Flash creatures that sometimes blundered into her own world. The masters thought, too, that assigning her a puppy had been a waste of a good caydog.
They thought that Hanah's tragic personal loss ten years earlier had left her too embittered to join the brace teams.
But Hanah knew that her bitter memories—her mother, father, and little sisters disappearing into the bright Flash, their terrified screams and her father's deep shout of despair echoing forever in her mind—only made her stronger. More determined. More prepared for what inevitably lay ahead.
Hanah had another layer of memories, too—Sharlie as a young and squirmy armful of brindle puppy fuzz, teeth too sharp to bear and tongue fast and neat against Hanah's cheek. Sharlie the youngster had been so responsive, so eager to please, so attached to Hanah.
But now they had almost a year of brace exercises behind them, and still Sharlie hadn't found her voice.
In fierce response to those suddenly painful thoughts, Hanah turned on Sharlie. "They'll take you away from me!" she repeated. "I'll never join the FlashGuard, and you'll be stuck at some breeding kennel!"
Sharlie lowered to her belly, paw still reaching.
Hanah sighed. Think positive and let the moments happen, she'd been told.
For how long? How long would the masters wait, with the Flash waxing, casualties rising, and unpredictable disasters peppering the city of Sprenten?
Not much longer. Time to find more moments, and to jar Sharlie out of her uncertainty and into boldness. And then once she found her voice, they could move ahead into full brace training.
They'd face the Flash...and they'd conquer it.
~~~
Uncertain, so uncertain! I need to be what she wants, to please my HanahPup.
She wants to leave this place. We should not, not without marking its dangers.
But I will.
For HanahPup.
~~~
With water skin empty, lunch sack depleted, and leftover bits of roasted liver still stinking up the small leather treat bag, Hanah headed for home—her cousin Guarie's house at the rim of the Sprenten city wheel.
The center hub held the stolid, practical administration buildings; the FlashGuard academy and barracks filled an entire spoke. The southern spokes of rolling grasslands and unimpeded views held the watch towers and the homes of the elite. The west spokes held the merchants, leaving modest homes scattered north and east. Inward of the merchants sat the nastiest areas, crammed and tight.
With Sharlie at her side, Hanah didn't fear to take those back streets; she used the paths and alleys to sidestep the crowded merchant spokes on her way across the city. They moved swiftly, avoiding the dank shadows, intent on reaching home.
But Hanah's spilled out into an oddly emptied cobbled street, and hesitated. Sharlie, too, walked on tentative and wary feet, as though uncertain she should take the next step...but then, she often seemed just that uncertain these days.
An argument rang loud against the silence. "—Too dangerous!" cried an older woman, her voice quavering.
The answering voice shouted something defiant and crude; a door slammed. Leather soles slapped against dirt and Hanah pivoted in time to see a young man run the path she'd recently crossed, snaking between sagging old houses to head for the merchant hub.
"Fool!" the woman shouted after him, but there were tears in her voice.
No one else reacted at all.
No one else seemed even to be here.
Sharlie looked back over her shoulder, brown-rimmed amber eyes round with worry. Hanah said, "Let's see what's going on," and was gratified when in this, at least, Sharlie seemed to find accord. She even led the way, breaking into a little jog until Hanah called her back.
And so it was as they approached the main spokeroad that Hanah was fretting about how she and Sharlie should have been moving with silent teamwork and not demanded recalls—and so it was that she burst out upon astonishing, insensible chaos without warning.
Flash chaos.
While others hung back along cross-spoke streets and alleys, mouths agape, hands fisted, bodies poised to act but never quite moving, Hanah stood in the middle of the street and looked down the block to the next turning point in her life.
Where were you when—? people would ask each other, and Hanah would never answer, because she was too close to pretend she hadn't seen the smallest detail and too far to have been any real part of it...and she just wanted to forget every bit of it.
But she never would. She knew it in an instant, as Sharlie threw herself back against Hanah's thighs, cringing close for comfort. Hanah staggered back and then held her ground, gaze riv
eted on the conflagration in the middle of the street. Awnings hung ripped from their storefronts; outdoor displays lay scattered like toys. People lay scattered like toys, boneless cloth dolls in broken poses, or huddled against brick and stone in abject fear.
Flash creature.
Soundless lightning filled the street, blue and white and clouding the air; a spark of something floated to the ground by Sharlie's feet, and she pressed even harder against Hanah's legs.
But Hanah couldn't look away from the center of the street, where a lone brace team stood against that roiling nimbus of movement and its combination of flesh and energy. The man had Flash-tanned gloves to compliment his leggings and vest; he and his similarly protected brace dog looked tiny against the looming bulk of living light so cool and sharp it hurt Hanah's eyes. She thought she saw the lash of a tail...the spark of claw.
Another brace team ran in, already armored up. By the time another four teams arrived, lugging a net of rope so heavy it required a cart and mule, Hanah had absorbed the complexity of the scene—the deep rumble of the creature, fresh from the Flash and furious to find itself here. The stink—a dry crackle in her nose mixed with stone dust and burned air. The buffeting wind, itching fiercely against her skin and raising the flush of sudden sunburn on her cheeks.
Sharlie had somehow pushed Hanah back against the cobbler's shop on the corner. The shop's gaily striped awning flapped and struggled in the unnatural wind; down the street the brace teams worked to contain the unworldly creature, hauling the immense Flash-treated net to the rooftops while the remaining brace teams used Flash powder delivered by hand-shot to keep the creature's attention on the ground.
Some of the Flash creatures could be canny, as smart as the best of brace dogs. This one seemed all fury and reaction, striking out mindlessly. It bowled a brace team up against a building, leaving the human too dazed to move and the dog scrambling to stand on three legs—still guarding its partner with ferocity as it leapt at the tail that struck at them.
The Heart of Dog Page 28
