The drive was a short one. I parked a block away, then crossed an intersection and three stop signs on foot to get to the store. I was only harassed by one motorist and one panhandler, so I figured my day was improving markedly.
I was greeted inside the Quik-Mart by a sleepy-eyed girl who looked barely old enough to vote. Perhaps greeted is too strong a word because she actually looked disappointed to see me, like I’d interrupted her life-in-progress and she wanted only to go back to her regularly scheduled programming. I wanted to tell her I could relate.
“How fast can you develop this?” I asked, handing her the camera.
“The sign says an hour.”
“I need them in half that.”
“So does everyone else, lady. Can’t do it.” She pushed the camera back at me and turned away.
“This says you can,” I said, sliding a hundred beneath the box. She looked from the money to me, and returned to the counter.
“You’ll have ’em in twenty.”
She may have been lazy, but she wasn’t stupid.
I decided to wait outside, thinking twenty minutes was enough to get started on at least one comic. The November air was sharp, but freshly so, and comfortable enough with the turtleneck on. I sat with my back against a stuccoed pillar and pulled the stack from my duffel bag, wondering where to begin.
Light, I decided. Definitely. I chose the one with the earliest date—volume two, number twenty-five—and flipped it open to learn more about the “independents” Warren had so distastefully mentioned the night of my metamorphosis. Apparently independents—also known in less flattering terms as rogue agents—were a constant threat to a troop’s equilibrium. In a world where lineage meant everything, the competition for open star signs was fierce, and even those of the Light had been known to take out their matching star sign just for the opportunity to usurp them in the Zodiac. That meant the independents weren’t liked or trusted by established troop members, and were rarely tolerated within city boundaries.
Fortunately, most of the time there was no disputing a star sign’s lineage; it went from mother to daughter, or if there was no younger female left, to the eldest son. But every once in a while a sign opened up with no obvious heir, and according to the manual, that’s when things got “interesting.”
I grimaced and flipped the page, remembering the way Warren’s mouth had curled when he spoke about the independents. Why did I get the feeling “interesting” was a euphemism for “deadly”?
I also had to wonder how my ascendancy into the Archer sign would be viewed by the star signs in his troop. If the Archer sign had been empty since my mother’s disappearance, might some of them liken my sudden appearance to that of a rogue agent? At the least, wouldn’t it be seen as “interesting”?
Not having these answers, and not liking the direction my questioning was taking, I quickly flipped that manual shut and picked up another. This time I ignored the chronological ordering and just snagged the one with the best-looking superhero on the cover, shoving the rest back into my pack. Stryker, it was called. Agent of Light.
“Stryker is striking,” I murmured, settling back. The rating on it was PG-17, and I could see why; leather clung to the man’s thighs, snug in all the right places, and a loose-knit cashmere sweater revealed tremendous biceps…as well as the glyph pulsing like a heartbeat on his chest. It was, in fact, pulsing on the page. Though no expert in astrology, I thought it might be the glyph for Scorpio, the sign and month before mine. Stryker was holding what I assumed to be a weapon, bent like a crossbow, but with a chain attached. Its use was totally unfathomable to me.
“I’d be willing to find out, though,” I said, my eyes grazing his figure again. Note to self: side benefit of being a superhero? Getting to know other superheroes.
I paused as my eyes caught the author’s name stretched across the top band in black stencil. Zane Silver. The same Zane who worked in the shop? I wondered, before my eye caught the second name illustrated there. Carl Kenyon, penciler.
“Wookie-boy?” I wondered aloud, shifting so the comic was lit from the streetlight above the store.
Ten minutes later I had a tenuous grasp on some of the events that had plagued me recently. I followed Stryker—a character, or a real person?—through a series of events leading to his metamorphosis. He’d been taken to an empty warehouse on Industrial and Pollack, and was surrounded by eleven other men and women, though it was difficult to tell one sex from the other. Each person wore a loose-fitting robe, white and dotted with what I took to be golden-threaded constellations.
“Nice job, Carl,” I said, placing a finger on one of the sparking star clusters. It pulsed warmly beneath my hand. I smiled and continued reading.
“Your first life cycle ended at puberty, and the second ends tonight.” The words bubbled up from a man who looked suspiciously like Warren. Only it couldn’t have been Warren, I thought, tracing the image with my fingers, because Warren had never been this clean-shaven. “To enter the third life cycle, you must go through metamorphosis and be willingly initiated into the seventh house of the Zodiac, under your mother’s sign of the Scorpio. Do you accept?”
“Crap dialogue,” I muttered. “Who wrote this shit?”
“I accept,” Stryker said with dignity befitting the gravity of the ceremony. “As my mother did before me.”
“And you do so of your own free will?” the man asked, a slash of lightning outside the warehouse sinking him into silhouette. The storm clouds, I knew, were gathering outside. I could almost hear them erupting in my head the way they’d once erupted around and above Olivia’s apartment.
“As my mother did before me,” Stryker repeated, inclining his head. Behind him the windows had begun to streak with rain.
“At least you knew what you were choosing,” I muttered, turning the page. A shaft of light shot up from the pages. It was like a paranormal pop-up book! The manual trembled between my fingertips, and the words, panels, and dialogue bubbles dissolved in an explosion of thunder. I watched as Stryker was pummeled by the same force that had entered me not long ago, dropping him to his knees and turning him into a helpless supplicant. The other star signs made a tight wedge around him—their bodies shown from above to create the symbol of his star sign—Stryker at the center. The book was more of a screen now, revealing images that flashed and burned away in turn, only his bright star immobile in the middle of the page.
There was a crack so great it shook the pages between my fingers. I almost dropped the whole thing as the sound of the sky rending in two joined the stabbing light, and with it a cry as horrible and intensely feral as I’d ever heard.
“No!” I heard a voice, perhaps Warren’s, scream in response.
The symbol was broken, its bright points—the other agents of Light—splintering and turning outward to face an invasive red glow. I couldn’t follow, the action was too chaotic and confused; like I too was caught in the turmoil. Blows rained down around my head, the air filled with words I’d never heard before…nd screams I wished I hadn’t. Every so often the action would slow, like a tape being caught in a recorder, and a clear image—one more reminiscent of a traditional comic—would pause, burning on my retina, before being swallowed again into chaos.
I saw Warren slaughter a man with nothing more than a rope and his fists.
I saw Micah use his surgeon’s hands to slice first the scalp and then the face from an attacker’s falling frame.
And I saw, with a sort of disbelieving numbness, the man who’d attacked me as a teen. A name bubbled up through the air in long capitalized letters—JOAQUIN, followed by SHADOW AQUARIAN—then it popped, the lettering cracked into shards and shooting out beyond the confines of the pages, gone.
“Joaquin,” I said aloud. I knew him. I knew the look of death on his brow.
And I knew, as I turned the page, that he would kill Stryker.
And there he was. Gorgeous and helpless and immobile in the center of this maelstrom, his head gra
sped between Joaquin’s large hands. The Shadow Aquarian began to pull, and I watched, horrified, as the strong but tenuous cording in Stryker’s neck stretched, the tendons beneath straining, a cry catching in his throat. Then, in what seemed like slow motion, his flesh gave. A horrible gurgle was yanked from a newly rent hole in that throat, and his head, popping, was hauled from his body. The light in the center of the page blinked out and was no more. The red glows dissolved and were simply, suddenly, gone. And the cacophony of martial voices died until there was only one.
A woman, dressed in the same robe as Stryker’s, rushed forward and sobbing, lifted Stryker’s head—just the head—into her lap. It lolled there, and she bent to it, crying and stroking his hair. I could see the familial resemblance through the tears and faint lines webbing her face.
Our lineage is matriarchal.
“God.” Unable to bear the scene any longer, I turned the page.
The woman was still there, but she was standing now, fists clenched, eyes burning, her shift sodden with her son’s blood. “There’s a traitor among us,” she said in a destroyed voice.
Jesus, I thought, slamming the comic book shut. This was a Light comic?
And was that what I was up against? Beings who appeared out of nowhere to rip heads from bodies? Off of superheroes?
“Ex-Excuse me.” Jolted, I looked up to find the photo clerk staring at me, eyes wide, face pasty, a scattering of photos at her feet. She swallowed hard, and I didn’t have to wonder how long she’d been standing there. “Th-These are the f-first few. I thought you might want them immediately.”
I tried out a smile on her. She took a step back, not that I could blame her. I sat forward, gathering the photos. “Go finish,” I said.
She ran back inside with a whimper, all the teen defiance gone. I leaned back again, wondering how I’d explain this away, and tried to catch my breath. Good thing too, because one glance at the handful of photos from the ground had the air fleeing my body again in an involuntary cry.
These images didn’t flash. They didn’t blur or glow or shoot light from the paper they were printed on. My photographer’s eye saw a dozen different ways to improve the composition, but there was absolutely no way to improve upon the moment. I lifted the top one close to my face, unable to keep my hands from shaking, and studied the one-dimensional and utterly heartbreaking image captured there.
I knew my man.
I’d known how to angle myself in the encroaching dawn so as to maximize the lighting without using the flash. I knew every angle and smoothly sculpted plane of his sturdy face. I knew the length and breadth of his fingertips, and the way they felt stroking my own. I knew what color his eyes were in the morning, their intensity deepened by dreams.
And I knew, at the moment this shot had been taken, Ben Traina had been thinking of me.
It had been just before full sunrise, and dawn was breaking beautifully over his face. The smile was secretive, too small to cause his eyes to crinkle up at the corners in the way I loved, but it was the contented smile of a man who was expecting to wake up and face the first day of the rest of his life. He thought I was alive. He didn’t yet know of a man named Butch and bodies tossed out plate-glass windows. I compared the image with the man who’d stopped me earlier today, and knew he’d never be this happy again. And neither would I.
A gust of air, carrying the scent of a nearby Dumpster, brought me back to the present. I looked up, mildly surprised to find myself still in front of the Quik-Mart. I’d been unaware of the passing time. I glanced at my watch, heard laughter—probably a man stumbling from the bar down the street—then shut it out, sighing over the sound.
Perhaps Warren could help Ben, I thought, turning my attention back to the photo. If he could change an identity, maybe he could erase a person’s memory so they no longer mourned a loved one. I bit my lip. Did I want to be forgotten? Did I want him to get over me, and turn those smiling morning eyes on someone else?
I recalled kissing him and I didn’t. Then I thought of how I’d seen him look after he thought me dead and I did. I thought of the lust that had ignited so effortlessly between us again, and I didn’t. Then I recalled the fury I’d seen on his face this afternoon, and I did.
“God, Ben,” I said, pressing the photos to my chest as I closed my eyes. “We’re never going to be this innocent again.”
Laughter sounded behind me again, closer.
The fear that punched at my heart was a physical blow. I rocked into a standing position instantly, my legs braced wide, head up, and I sniffed. Rot on the air. Decaying hate, bloodthirsty hunger. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
Ajax. I don’t know how he’d found me, but he was coming, and quick.
I shoved the photos and comics into the duffel bag, zipping it as I raced into the store. I ducked down the first aisle and zigzagged to the back of the store, past cosmetics, lotions, shampoos, candy, and condoms, the security globe above capturing my every move. I fled past aisles stocked with visors and cheap T-shirts, there only because the words Las Vegas were splayed upon them in some manner, and quickly discovered that among the mundane and the kitsch and the items that made life oh-so convenient, there was one thing missing. A place to hide.
I should have run, I thought, blood churning. I should have taken off in the opposite direction of the stench and laughter, and run all the way to the Peppermill. To the safety of Warren or someone else who might know what to do.
Nobody can know who you really are, do you understand?
I looked again at the mirrored globe, and cursed Olivia’s reflected image. If Ajax didn’t kill me, Warren was surely going to do the job.
The automatic doors at the front of the store slid open. Through the security globe I saw a figure slide inside like a wisp of smoke, then disappear. He was following my scent, the fear now, and whatever emotion or pheromone that had alerted him to me in the first place. Seconds ticked by like bombs, and I felt the frantic despair rats must feel in a maze. There was, very simply, nowhere to hide. Then my eyes fell to the clearance bin in the middle of the aisle. Nowhere to hide, I thought, except in plain sight.
Tossing my duffel aside, I dove for the mishmashed items; remaindered Halloween costumes made of colored felt and cotton meant to wear away in one washing. All I needed was a mask. I tossed aside bear bodies, bumblebees, superheroes—ha!—and butterfly wings, and finally unearthed a cheap plastic mask. It would only cover half my face, but it’d fit. Fumbling it over my head, I snagged a baseball cap sporting the famous Welcome to Las Vegas sign on it, and tucked Olivia’s golden locks up inside. Then I turned, breathing hard, and waited.
His laugh, the one I’d mistaken for drunken mirth, was the first thing to reach me. But if Ajax were drunk, it was with the intoxication of anticipated success and unrestrained violence, not hard alcohol.
When he appeared, the first thing I noticed was his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat, then the anticipatory twitch of his long fingers; those effective, effeminate hands. His lanky skeleton pressed beneath his skin as he moved, and I was almost surprised his bones didn’t clack together when he walked. Already in place, his feral grin widened when he saw me.
“I have to hand it to Warren. This is his best disguise yet…other than his own, that is,” and his laugh was so cruel it was clear he wasn’t speaking of Warren’s vagrant persona. “I’d have never guessed it was you.”
My eyes, beneath the slit of plastic, flickered up to the mirrored ball. A pink pig’s snout protruded from beneath the rim of the hat, but my face—Olivia’s face, and her hair—were perfectly hidden. Dignified it wasn’t, but it did the job.
“I’m guarding my identity,” I said, unnecessarily.
“I see that.” Ajax took a step forward, his long coat swirling around his ankles. I mirrored him, taking one step back. “But, very soon, neither your plastic mask nor your veil of flesh and bone are going to matter. I’m going to rip your head from your body and swim in your blood.”
I t
hought of Stryker and shuddered. Ajax laughed. “God, but your fear is delicious! It’s like an aperitif…a promise of delights to come. Can you see it the way I do? Every emotion emanating from your body in a silvery wave, rolling in sheets of phosphorescent emotion. See, there goes a particularly strong one. Like the tide rushing from the sea, nice and foamy at the edges as it roars for escape.”
I clenched my teeth and brought a mental barrier slamming down in front of me, the way Micah had taught. I held my breath until I was sure I could control it, then exhaled slowly. Ajax frowned. “Quick learner, aren’t you, Jo? I didn’t expect you to find your glyph so quickly either, but of course you’ve had help.”
I glanced down. The symbol that had been sprayed on my chest earlier that day was suddenly pulsing with light, a white heat throbbing beneath my black turtleneck. Damn it, I thought. I bet that Yulyia bitch wasn’t even from the Ukraine.
The rip of steel through air had my head whipping up. Ajax had his poker gripped in both hands, point down, poised in front of him like a walking cane. One with extremely sharp teeth.
“Tell me, do you also have your conduit?”
“Yes,” I lied.
“Let’s see it.”
I swallowed hard, motioning with my chin. “It’s in that duffel bag.”
Smiling, he sheathed his weapon and lifted the bag by its soft handles. “Never leave your conduit unattended, Joanna. You, more than anyone, should know the power in turning an enemy’s own weapon against him.”
He lifted the bag, but hesitated, brows drawing in closely, nostrils working like a rabbit’s. He was sensing my lie. I had to distract him, fill the air with an emotion other than anxious hope.
“Powerful,” I agreed, “and Butch’s scimitar was particularly fun. Do you know I began by chopping his hands off at the wrists? I think the majority of blood loss occurred there, but I also forked his tongue and watched him choke on his own blood. I’ve never seen so much blood,” I said, shaking my head, and that was true. Remembering, I was able to conjure up the taste of molten vengeance in my mouth. I exhaled the memory in Ajax’s direction.
The Scent of Shadows Free with Bonus Material Page 23
