by Massey,M. D.
Elias did a double-take. “You were a hunter? You? Look, I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, or who you’re working for, but this is serious, Colin! You have to cut me out of here, and right now before that thing gets free.”
His eyes darted back and forth between the creature and me; clearly he was thoroughly confused and frightened. Perfect.
“I’ll get you out,” I replied. “But not before I get some answers. Tell me what you know about the Tathlum.”
“Tathlum? What the heck is a tathlum? I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”
There was a loud ripping noise just at that moment, and one blue-green clawed arm thrust up through the net just a few feet away. “Time’s running out, Elias. I’d start talking if I were you.”
He cringed and tried to move away from the kappa, to no avail. “Okay, okay! I’ll tell you what I know. Ananda Corp hired me last year to put this group together, said I could make a whole lot of money capturing rare animals. I was working for a rescue zoo at the time, making hardly enough to get by. I have a graduate degree, for Christ’s sake! With the money they offered me, I jumped at the opportunity.
“I didn’t know anything about, you know—” he looked over at the kappa, which now had its arm and shoulder through the net “—them, before I took the job. But after that first capture the pay was so good, I couldn’t tell the people from Ananda no.”
“And what are they doing with the creatures?”
Elias glanced over at the kappa again, which was doing it’s damnedest to wriggle out of the hole it’d made in the net. The creature kept looking at the helpless man beside him while licking its lips, muttering in Japanese all the while. I didn’t speak much Japanese, but I caught the words for “eat” and “hungry” a few times. Elias made a little whining noise in the back of his throat and attempted to squirm away.
“Gah! They’re taking them and torturing them, man. Asking them questions about artifacts, objects of power—forcing them to reveal whatever they know about mythical weapons and objects and whatnot. I think Ananda Corp is either dealing in them, or someone behind the scenes is a collector. Usually they interrogate the creatures at a farmhouse outside of town. It’s where they have me make all my deliveries, once we’ve captured them.”
“I’m going to need directions to that farm, Elias.” I made a show of cleaning my fingernails and buffing them on my shirt. “But I haven’t got all day—or rather, you don’t have all day.”
There was a loud ripping sound, and the kappa’s head burst through the net. It began wriggling free in earnest, and would be clear within seconds. Elias yelped and tried to squirm away again, and a wet stain appeared on the front of his tan safari shorts.
“It’s programmed into my phone’s GPS! Here, take it!” He pulled a phone out of his pocket and shoved it through the netting. I grabbed it and pulled up his GPS app, finding it among his saved locations.
“Hey, this is out near Barton Hills Farm—I used to go to the corn maze out there when I was a kid. Huh.” I stuck the phone in my pocket and began to walk off.
“Wait! Don’t leave me here. Colin, you promised, man!” At that moment the kappa tore free from the net and stood up, looking back and forth from me to the easier prey still caught in the net. After a brief deliberation the creature’s eyes locked on Elias’, who began crying hysterically.
I shook my head. “Alright, you big baby,” I exclaimed. I pulled out another cucumber from my bag, tearing it in two pieces and waving it around to get the kappa’s attention.
Just as it turned its eyes toward me, I made my move, bowing deeply from the waist at a ninety-degree angle. I kept my eyes on the ground while holding my bow, and was soon rewarded by a splashing sound. I looked up and saw that the kappa, honor bound to return my show of respect, had spilled the contents of his skull cup on the ground before him. Drool ran freely from his beaked mouth, and he swayed drunkenly on his feet at half-mast.
Elias looked over at me and back at the kappa. “What, that’s it? That’s all I had to do to capture these stupid things?”
“Yep. Once they spill that water from their heads, they’re basically brain dead until someone refills their skull cup.”
He shook his head and swore. “So, you’re going to get me out of this net, right?”
“Nah, I think you can handle it.” I began walking back to the van. Elias yelled after me as I departed.
“These Ananda people, they’re bad news, you know. They’ll kill you once they find out you’re onto them. And I hope they do, you little shit!”
I hollered back over my shoulder. “So I guess that means I don’t get the internship?”
17
Journal Entry—9 Months, 14 Days A.J.
Maureen has managed to keep Finn away from the liquor store for twenty-four hours. She called and said he’s in withdrawal, so we’d better come over quick because it’s not safe to make someone his age go cold turkey.
Right. He’s practically immortal; that’s what two millennia of magic use will do to you. It actually kind of cheers me up to think that he’s still vulnerable to a nasty hangover, though. I know I’m being petty, but the man ruined my life. It’s going to be hard to face him when he’s sober.
I guess I’d better head over before he crawls back in the bottle again.
-McC
Austin, Texas—Present Day
Margie was nowhere to be found when I got back to CIRCE’s offices. The SUV was also missing, so I assumed she was on her way to pick up Elias from Mr. Graves’ ranch. I wouldn’t lie and say that I didn’t borrow a few things from CIRCE before leaving the van back at their offices; I figured they were ill-gotten goods, and therefore free for the taking. They had some pretty neat toys, and frankly I thought some of it might come in handy before this Maeve gig was finished. I snagged a few goodies, whatever I could fit through the opening of my Craneskin Bag, and left the keys to the van on Elias’ desk.
With that unpleasant task out of the way, I went home and took a nap. When I woke I cleaned up and changed clothes, then sent Sabine a text telling her to meet me at Luther’s place. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when I left the junkyard, cruising up Congress on the Vespa with dreams of cold, strong coffee and a warm panini dancing in my head.
I checked my phone when I pulled into the alley behind La Crème, being sure to scan the shadows just in case Crowley was waiting to ambush me again. Sabine still hadn’t returned my text, which was weird; she always texted me back right away. Maybe her phone died. She’s probably waiting for me in the cafe, I thought.
With my stomach growling, I headed inside and found Luther working the counter as usual. Most older vamps slept less and could handle being active during daylight hours. With so much time on his hands, I think he preferred hanging out at La Crème because it kept him busy. He waved me over as I walked in from the back of the cafe.
He looked concerned. “The garden gnome mafia left a message for you, maybe a couple of hours ago. Hope you’re not doing business with those clowns.”
I shook my head as I grabbed the envelope from him and tucked it inside my jacket. “Not on your second life. You seen Sabine today?”
He shook his head. “Nope. When she didn’t stop in for her morning latte, I figured she was with you. You want your usual?”
I nodded. “And a roast beef and provolone sammich, if you don’t mind. I’ll be in back. If she comes in, tell her I’m here, okay?”
“You got it, stud.” I glanced around again on the odd chance we both might have missed her, and turned back a second later as he was handing me my cold brew. Vampire speed was damned spooky sometimes.
After waiting for my sandwich, I munched it on my way to the back room. I grabbed a chair and pulled out my laptop to check my email, just in case Sabine had decided to go retro on me. No messages there, either. I called and left her a voicemail, then pulled out the envelope the dwarves had left.
Of course, it had
been made by cutting and pasting individual letters that had been clipped from assorted magazines and newspapers. Duh, I already knew who left it. Losers.
The note read:
“WE hAv tHE glAIsTiG. BAck oF oR ShE dYes.
p.S. – tEll ThE oLD MaN hE sTiL oWeS uS.”
My hands started shaking as I finished reading the note. “Oh, you weaselly little cock-juggling ass bandits—it is on,” I muttered as I crumpled the note and tossed it on the table in front of me.
All things considered, I had to give them points for spelling glaistig properly. But the fact was, red caps didn’t normally deal in kidnappings, at least not for money or leverage; they tended to eat the people they abducted. Besides, they mostly were concerned with keeping their drug money flowing, and shaking down any of the weaker fae who fell for their stupid protection racket.
No, this pointed to someone working behind the scenes. Somebody hired the dwarves to kidnap Sabine, either to distract me or to scare me off of whatever I’d stumbled on at CIRCE. Chances were good that Elias reported directly to someone at Ananda Corp, and he’d probably called them as soon as Margie showed up at Mr. Graves’ place.
Shoulda’ let that kappa eat him, I thought. I squeezed my hand into a fist so hard my knuckles cracked.
Suddenly I realized that I’d made a serious miscalculation with regards to how ruthless my unknown adversaries were, and just how far they’d go to keep me from getting to the bottom of the whole screwed up mess I’d stumbled into. Right now, my next step was finding Rocko and his crew so I could squeeze them for every bit of info they had, including who hired them and whether they were connected to this mysterious Ananda Corp and Maeve’s missing magic rock.
Unfortunately, red caps were known to be mentally unstable and bloodthirsty as hell. And the longer they held Sabine, the greater the risk to her life—regardless of what they’d been tasked to do by whoever hired them. If I didn’t find the little bastards, and soon, it was quite possible they’d kill Sabine out of sheer boredom and eat the evidence just to cover their tracks.
Only one person I knew could reliably lead me to their hide out. And as much as I hated asking Finn for help, he’d be sure to know where to find them. I chugged the rest of my coffee, grabbed my bag, and ran out the back door, thinking of all the hurt I was going to put on those little sociopaths, just as soon as I got my hands on them.
It was after seven o’clock when I got back to the junkyard, because five o’clock traffic in Austin was a bitch to drive in, even though I was splitting lanes the entire way. By the time I arrived, Ed had already closed up shop and headed home, deciding years before that he preferred working banker’s hours and that the trickle of customers who came in after five o’clock simply weren’t worth the effort. I unlocked the gate and pushed my scooter inside, and nearly had it closed when a small Toyota beater pulled up, blinding me with its headlights.
I waved them away. “We’re closed!” I yelled.
I saw the silhouette of a large man’s head poke out from the driver’s side window. “Hey, Colin—check out my new wheels, yeah? Got it off some boy racer who was doing the ton and got stopped by some plod. His parents made him sell it, ’cuz he was skint and couldn’t pay his fines. His loss, my gain, yeah?”
I held my hand up to block the headlights from shining in my eyes. “Hemi, is that you?”
“’Course it’s me, you silly yank. Came to take you up on your offer to show me around town.”
“How’d you find me?” I yelled over the sound of the little four-banger’s engine and exhaust as he revved it up.
“Nice, right?” he hollered back.
Sighing, I pushed my scooter out of the way and opened the gate so he could park. I needed to get rid of him, and fast, and there was no way I could do that while we were yelling at each other over all the racket his new tuner made. Hemi pulled his car in and parked it, then he hopped out and walked around the car, admiring his new ride.
“Got a small ding from a prang the kid got in, but nothing a little work can’t fix right up.” His face beamed as he showed his car off to me. “Hop in, we’ll go for a strop.”
I had to admit, it was a pretty cool car, a seventh-generation Celica that had been dropped and kitted out with some nice rims and wheels, custom exhaust, a carbon-fiber hood, and a body kit that gave it a much more aggressive look. It had been painted flat black and looked like it could run. On any other day, I’d be geeking out over it; right now, though, I had to find Sabine.
“Hemi, man, I’d love to hang out with you, but just not tonight. Something important came up, and I have to go help a friend.”
He perked up and cocked an eyebrow, an expression that made him look exactly like the Rock. “Colin, you got someone who needs smashed, you just point me at ’em, yeah? We’ll take care of ’em, then go get pissed after. A perfect night out!”
As much as I wouldn’t mind having the big Maori on my side, I didn’t want to drag him into my mess. “Hemi, my man, as much as I appreciate the offer, I—”
Just at that moment, something slammed into the wards and seals on the front gate of the junkyard with a tremendous crash, sending showers of sparks and arcs of blue light twenty feet above the fence line.
Hemi dropped into a crouch, reaching behind his back and leaving his hand there. “Oy, mate, what the hell was that?”
BOOM! Whatever it was slammed into the front gate again. I shifted my eyes into the supernatural spectrum, and saw that my wards and seals were straining under the force of whatever was trying to get inside the yard. I quickly vaulted on the hood of Ed’s work truck nearby, climbing on the roof to get a look over the fence. From that vantage point, I saw a headless figure astride a horse on the other side of the gate, and he was swinging a huge battle axe at my wards.
I waved frantically at the Maori and pointed toward the other side of the junkyard.
“Hemi, this thing outside—it’s dangerous. I don’t have time to explain, but you have to get out of here, now. Drive around to the back of the yard and you’ll see another gate. Once you’re out keep going, and don’t stop for anything.”
He looked at me and scowled. “You want me to run? Pfft. Maori warriors don’t run from nothing. Besides, we shed blood together, you and I. You may as well be part of my hapu now, yeah? Let’s not piss around about it. I’m not going anywhere.”
Without waiting for a response, the big man turned and locked his eyes on the gate while pulling a glowing greenstone mere from behind his back. The mere was a small, flat club with a lanyard on the handle, used by the Maori much like the Okinawan people used the nunchaku. The fence shook with an impact again, and in response Hemi began making frightening faces, sticking his tongue out and chanting while stomping out a haka, a war dance Maoris used to invoke their god of war.
With every lyrical chant, stomp, and slap, his weapon and tattoos seemed to glow a little brighter. Well I’ll be damned, I thought to myself. He’s warding himself for battle.
I shrugged and decided I’d better be ready for the Dullahan as well, and went over to the corner posts that held up the roof over the warehouse dock. They were made of iron; I’d engraved them with magic wards and symbols, and had been shoring it up on a weekly basis for months now. I touched them each in turn to activate them and the symbols began to shine a bright yellow, glowing and fading with the rhythm of the Dullahan’s attacks on the gate. He was going to be in for quite a surprise when he broke through.
I didn’t have time to get my hunting gear out of my room and put it on, but I did have a moment to reach into my Craneskin Bag and pull out the only weapon I trusted myself to wield. It was a spear, roughly seven feet long, wrapped in leather at the balance point of the shaft, lightly carved with runes down its length, and shod with silver at the butt and haft. The spearhead itself was nothing to look at; leaf-shaped and roughly a foot long, it gleamed dully as the razor-sharp edge caught the lamplight of the yard.
But the spear was deadly to mortals
, and an effective weapon against most supernatural creatures and fae as well. I’d made it myself, with a little help from a leprechaun who’d owed me a favor. I could wield this weapon at a distance, and doing so would keep me out of the fray. In that manner I hoped I could avoid being driven to madness, thereby preventing a dangerous transformation and keeping my ríastrad at bay.
I hefted my spear and looked over at Hemi, just as he was finishing up his haka. “Look, bro, I know you’re ready to fight, and I don’t doubt your courage one bit. But if you see me start to—change—then it really will be time for you to run for your life. I won’t know what I’m doing at that point. Just trust me—if I change, you run, and don’t look back.”
He gave me that Dwayne Johnson eyebrow waggle again and smiled. “If you say so, I guess. But I gotta get me a piece of whatever’s coming through the gate, yeah? So maybe you just hang back and toss that spear, and let Hemi’s war club win some mana for us both.”
Before I could respond, the gates burst open in an explosion of blue sparks and light, and then the Dullahan charged right for us.
18
Journal Entry—9 Months, 16 Days A.J.
Peyote. I can’t believe this… I’m road-tripping to South Texas with Belladonna to find an illegal plant with psychedelic properties. Nope, couldn’t be something completely legal, like holding a séance or using a crystal ball. Finn’s plan just had to involve collecting an illegal controlled substance. Great.
Apparently there are only a few places in the state where this stuff still grows, because between the drug dealers, hippies, and shaman types, they’ve practically harvested the plant out of existence. Supposedly if you’re a member of the Native American Church you can collect this stuff legally. But since I’m not even one-sixty-fourth Native American, I have to go all Breaking Bad.
