Raven Cursed jy-4

by Faith Hunter

  “Or the pointy boots,” Dave added, with a sly smile. I looked down at my Luccheses.

  “Damn, girl.” Mike boomed in his version of a murmur. “You go over and those boots’ll fill up and weigh you down till you drown. What’re you planning to do, paddle or ride a bull?”

  “Both,” I said, thinking about the danger of going up against a vamp on his home turf.

  Dave skirted up and slid into his small boat, secured himself into the craft and pushed off into the current, nimble as a duck. In contrast, I crawled into Mike’s raft like a landlubber, sitting on the bolster and inflated side wall as instructed, tucked my five-inch-toed boots into the crack as ordered, and took a beginner’s class in paddling as we drifted downstream in the dark.

  “I’ll scout,” Dave said over the roar of rain. Both men looked tense, as if this little trip was dangerous or difficult. And maybe it was in the dark. In the flood. And sudden wind.

  This gig wasn’t looking so promising now, and I almost said to beach the boats and hike back. But my cell vibrated in my pocket with a text from Reach. I read, trying to protect the delicate electronics. “Couple missing from karaoke bar. Car in lot. LEOs found blood. Waiting for security footage.” LEOs were law enforcement officers. The bar was just off the highway that Thomas Stevenson would have taken to get to his homeplace.

  We took the first rapid, the boat tilted, and I slid my body into the raft bottom. “That’s nothing, girl. We got big water ahead.” I nodded to show I’d heard, but before I could speak, the heavens opened up, proving that the previous hard rain was nothing. Rain pounded down, on the raft, the men, raising a mist on the creek, overriding the sound of rapids. The M4 and blades made sitting impossible, and I half kneeled, hanging on to the ropes at the sidewalls. I held on for dear life as the water whipped and whirled and dunked the raft, and I got more soaked than if I’d actually swam to the site, and I tried to breathe without getting rain and river into my lungs. Twice I called out to Beast, but still she didn’t answer.

  As indicated by the GPS data, the address of Thomas’ family farm was hard river right, up a hill, about a hundred yards from the creek, invisible in the storm. “There’s nothing there,” Mike called over the white-noise of drumming rain on land and on river. But I could smell vamp and human blood.

  “It’s there,” I shouted back. “Let me out.” With a gesture that sent the raft whirling and swirling to scrape on shore, the river guide beached the small craft. The smell of blood was carried on the chilled breeze, diluted by the pounding downpour. I crawled out of the small raft, my boots full of water, my jeans wet, my body filled with a fine tremor from adrenaline and the cold. I pulled off the poncho and tossed it into the boat bottom.

  “Get to the other side of the river. Wait for me where you can see this bank. If I’m not back in hour, get out of here. It means I’m dead. If anyone else comes to shore, or if anyone comes back to shore with me, peel out and get downstream fast.” I handed him my cell. “Even if I call out for help. Even if I’m bleeding. Don’t come back here unless I’m alone and moving under my own power. If I don’t come back, hit SEND to call Leo Pellissier’s right-hand man, George Dumas. Tell him what happened. He’ll handle it. Got it?”

  Mike boomed out, “Paddlers don’t leave people behind.”

  “If I’m not alone, it’ll mean I failed and he rolled me. If the vamp is still alive, rolls me, or kills me, it becomes Leo’s problem to take him out.” I wasn’t trusting Lincoln Shaddock for anything, even if I knew where to find him. Leo would have to figure it out.

  Dave nodded and made a little skirling motion with his paddle, maneuvering his tiny boat back into the current, nimble as a duck. Mike sealed my cell into his waterproof dry-box and rotated his raft back into the current. I waited until both men had their boats secured on the far shore before melting into the trees, walking hunched over, making myself deer-sized, trusting in the ten-year-old security system to mistake me for the local fauna. Beast was still silent, but I have my own memories of the stop-and-go motion of deer, the slow stroll punctuated by quick dashes, to stop suddenly, unmoving.

  Dawn, delayed by the heavy clouds, gave me just enough light to see my way, the trees and underbrush providing cover even as they dumped rain down my collar, my clothes hanging wet and heavy, the silver and titanium necklace icy on my skin. As I moved, I went over what I knew and what I could infer about the vamp I was here to take out, weighing my strengths against his, trying to stay mentally and physically loose and ready. Trying not to think about the empty place in my soul. Beast? She didn’t answer.

  According to Reach, the perimeter of the house itself had decent security: cameras, motion detectors, and laser lights queued into a wailing alarm. But old motion detectors might be fooled, especially with the movement of rain and wind. Branches were swaying, rain was falling so hard it obscured my footsteps, even to my own keen ears, and filled my faint tracks with water.

  Vamps aren’t dead to the world by sunlight. They had a hard time staying awake once the sun came up, especially the young ones, like a kid trying to stay up past bedtime and being pulled under by the lure of dreams, but unless injured they seldom fell over in an undead snooze.

  Once I breached the house, any advantage gained by the water access would be lost. I had speed, unexpected attack, silver bullets, and silvered blades. And while Thomas was a soldier and a black belt in several kinds of martial arts, he hadn’t practiced since he was turned. Another thing in my favor—Thomas Stevenson was no vamp master. There would be no master’s speed, no master’s mind tricks honed over decades or centuries of hunting and mesmerizing prey. He was a young vamp with a god-complex and no vamp-experience. But he was also a vamp and Beast was absent, which was putting me severely off balance.

  Once I was at the house, I could only hope that surprise, my own down-and-dirty brand of fighting, the blades, stakes, guns, and daylight filtering through the trees would be enough.

  The house came into view, sitting on a bluff high above the creek, high enough to be safe from even the worst flood-stage rains, an early 1900s post-and-beam farmhouse, built around the original log cabin, updated in the late nineties with a state-of-the-art metal roof, vinyl siding, new windows. The grounds still showed the signs of a landscaper’s hand in the placement of trees and shrubs, but likely hadn’t been touched since Thomas was chained in the basement to cure. The area around the house was overgrown with knee-high grass, weeds, oversized trees in need of pruning, all moving with wind and rain, which would stress the security system. It would chirp, moan, buzz, and whine through the storm, and there was a chance that, like any homeowner, he would simply turn the system off. I could hope.

  I made my way up the small hillock and moved slowly around the house, studying the windows and doors, all heavily draped or solid wood. They were under a twelve-foot-wide covered porch that circled the house, a porch made of old wood that would likely squeak when I put my weight on it. It wasn’t a fortress, but it was well built. The doors looked securely set into the frame, like the portcullis in a castle wall.

  A car was parked in back, a 1987 Cadillac Allanté convertible, top up. I could hear the engine ping from the woods. I could also smell blood and see two lumps in the backseat. I dropped to my elbows and knees in the wet grass, crawling to the car as river and rainwater drained from my boots. Half-hidden from the house by the car, I squatted and duckwalked close. Raised up and looked inside.

  Two people—or what was left of them—were sprawled there, heads together as if posed, a man and a woman, both in their twenties, mostly naked, missing throats, covered in blood that looked black in the poor light. The rain let up as I stared, growing softer and fainter. Water trickled down my face. My arms. My spine and thighs. My hair was plastered to me, my velvet jacket sodden and heavy as lead. Their wrists were gouged and slashed as were their inner elbows. The girl’s femoral arteries and veins had been worked over. She had a barrette in her hair and a small tattoo of a blue butterfly on
her hip. I felt oddly light-headed, and forced in a breath. Smelled semen. Thomas Stevenson was not squeamish about feeding and raping at the same spot.

  I wanted him dead. Something at the core of me went hard and dark and cold. I breathed shallowly, fighting to control my anger. I dropped back to the earth, the faces of the couple the last thing I saw inside the car. The scene was made worse by the fact that they were smiling, as if they had died happy. Silent, I crawled back to the cover of trees and made my way to the front of the house. I was taking this guy out. From inside, I heard a soft sound. A whimper. The sound a young girl might make after her first kiss. Or a woman might make as she died. Rage thumped a gout of adrenaline into my bloodstream. Beast! I thought. Talk to me. My mind was silent, empty, as if her soul had never been part of me. But with the adrenaline spike, I was feeling strength and speed, keener hearing and sight, all Beast-traits that had become part of my own body. That was at least something.

  Drawing on that strength and speed, I pried a rock out of the ground—bigger than a football, smaller than a Smart Car—and hefted it, testing its weight and balance, a pitted oval of forty pounds or so. My best bet for getting inside fast was the large window in the front room. I pulled the M4, tucking it under my arm, a finger in the trigger guard. I drew in a long slow breath. Let it out. Drew in another. Beast? She didn’t answer. I bent low, still imitating a deer, and sidled up to the house, feeling exposed out from under the trees. My breath was too fast, my heart raced. The smell of human blood grew stronger as I got closer. The moaning grew more frenzied.

  When I was at the edge of the porch, I stood upright, tossed the rock gently into the air, still testing, like a player with a basketball at the foul line. On its third bound, I dropped my elbow and swiveled my body. I launched the ball, half Olympic shot put, half NBA. It flew through the gentle rain. Time slowed so that the rock seemed to float. The M4 was wet and cold in my palms. My vision narrowed, growing sharper. The toe of my boot landed on the porch as I launched myself after the rock.

  It impacted the window. Shattered glass exploded inward, flying shards dirty in the morning light. The rock disappeared inside, bulging the drapery. Pulling it from the rod in a puff of blues and greens and dust. Into the darkened room. Dim daylight filled the room. The stench of blood and semen billowed out in a soft, stinking poof.

  I rammed the stock of the M4 forward, smashing the window at top, bottom, and to both sides, clearing the glass still hanging or standing in the frame. It fell, prolonging the crash. The element of surprise was gone. I leaped through the opening. From Reach’s files, the floor plan of the house was crystalline in my mind. The kitchen was to the left, living room to the right of the door, hallway straight through, dogtrot style. Thomas hadn’t expected to be turned. He hadn’t planned to be a vamp, so there was no lair here, buried underground. He would be in the master bedroom, top floor, windows heavily swathed. I landed in the dim room, balanced and ready, spinning the shotgun forward, bracing it against my side. Pulled a vamp-killer left-handed, blade back for close-in fighting, the elk horn comforting in my grip. And I thundered up the stairs.

  At the top, on the landing, Thomas Stevenson appeared, burning with pink light, red and black motes zinging all over him. Somehow, he’d been spelled by Evangelina. Or maybe the vamp who had set him free had passed him an amulet. He was vamped out, inch-long fangs pale in the dusky light. One hand was down, out of sight, a girl in the crook of his other arm, supported by the railing. Blond hair hung around her face, over her shoulders. Tiny breasts. She was naked. Blood trailed from her groin. She was no more than fifteen. She took a breath. Thomas threw her over the railing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  I Was So Going to Hell

  In an instant, I saw how she would land. Table and chairs, two wingback chairs facing the couch. She would miss them all unless—

  I leapt. Springing back down, over the railing. Pushing off with all the strength in my thighs and back. Torquing my body. An impossible angle. I dropped the blade. It spun away. I caught the girl around the waist. Pulled her against me. Into my spiral. I fell toward the couch, twisting in midair. I fired the M4 where Thomas had stood, into the ceiling above. It exploded. The recoil slammed my shoulder. I hit the couch. The girl’s body landed on mine. My breath whoofed out.

  Elbow as fulcrum, I pushed her to the floor. Gun barrel leading. Finger on trigger. To my feet. Thomas was in front of me. Pupils blacker than the doorway to hell, open in bloodred sclera. Fangs out. A short sword in each hand.

  He cut forward with both, a scissoring motion. I fired the shotgun again. Point blank range. I could have sworn I saw the silver fléchettes fly. I whipped up with the barrel, into the path of one sword. Threw my body after it. Felt the other blade slice into my side, even as I twisted out of its way. The blade followed my motion, the cut from side to belly, upward, away. I drew another vamp-killer as I fell, this one a long slender blade. Throwing as it left the sheath.

  It hit him at an odd angle, lower left side, above the hip. Missing anything internal that might kill him quickly. I wouldn’t survive until silver poisoning did its work. Thomas gripped and yanked the blade out. Tossed it to the side. He had a hole in his belly from the shotgun, big enough for my fist. It was pouring blood, filled with the swarming red and black motes of the spell. The lower hole, where the knife had been, bled too, his blood saturated with the pink spell. His skin was scorching from the dim light, but he was so full of blood he was fighting off both the burn and silver poisoning. Only then did I realize he was naked. And aroused. Vamped out, fully.

  I landed on the floor. Sprawled. A leg bent under me. With a sword, he batted away the shotgun, the sound clanging, the blow reverberating up my arm. He leaned toward me, cutting at my clothes. Buttons popped and flew. Cold steel cut me, a paper cut of pain. Air hit my bare skin. With almost balletic grace, incongruous against his bestial expression, he set the swords aside. He moved my shirt away, exposing breasts, wound, and blood from his cut. I drew another vamp-killer as he fell forward. Lips back, exposing killing teeth. Fixated on blood. I braced the knife on my belt. Angled up. And he fell onto me. Onto the blade.

  I felt it push through his stomach and up, into his aorta. Blood fountained over me. Hot and fast. As if his heart beat. His eyes changed. Looking puzzled. Confused. The pink haze of spell coalesced on his chest, at the point where the knife entered. Red motes swarmed in his blood, stinging my hand where his blood gushed over me.

  I put an arm around his waist. Drew him closer, his face against the silver rings of my defensive collar. His flesh sizzled, scorching. I angled the blade higher. Shoved. He tried to roll away. I hooked a leg around his and let him push us over. Until I was on top. My favorite vamp-killer was beside his head. The one with the elk-horn handle. I didn’t remember losing it. I took it in my left hand and cut into his throat. Severing windpipe, veins, arteries, tendons. I had never seen so much blood spray from a dying vamp, blood drenched in the pink light of the blood-diamond spell. It was a fountain, blinding me even as he tried to heal from the wound. The Naturaleza had fed fully and the power that much blood gave him was unexpected, startling. I kept cutting. Sawing. Knowing that to kill a vamp and not have him rise as a revenant, I had to take his head. The pink spell whirred and whirled, an angry buzzing, stinging my skin.

  At some point, his embrace relaxed. His arms fell away from me. His blood slowed to a trickle, the pink light hazing to a dull glow. But it still was not enough. I cut until there was only spine left, the bony protuberances and ragged tissue and blood. Blood everywhere. I wiped my face. Stood and found his swords. They were nicely balanced, the edges a gray, swirling steel. Using one, I swept down and through the spine in a single cut that I barely felt. I kicked the head away and stood over him. Hearing only my breathing, the soughing of the wind through the broken window, the softer breath of the girl he had been killing. The pink light of the spell died.

  I looked around the crime scene—yeah, crime scene:
dead bodies outside, dying girl—not sure what to do next. Confused. Hurt. I looked down at my bloody gaping wound. Hurt bad. I needed to shift. Beast? Beast! Nothing. A hollow, echoing emptiness. The girl moaned. I needed to call her an ambulance. I felt for my cell, but the paddlers had it. I needed a phone.

  I walked to the kitchen, opened drawers until I found one with dishcloths. I wiped my face and pressed a handful to my side. Took several clean cloths to the moaning girl, pressing them into her wounds, which were less deep than I had thought.

  I rolled her until her own body would keep the cloths in place and covered her with a blanket from the couch. Unlike the drapes, it wasn’t dusty, and as I stood, looking around the room, I could tell it had been cleaned in the last few weeks. Weird, the things you notice when you were nearly killed while killing and beheading a vampire, and now were trying to make logical decisions while bleeding to death.

  I spotted a phone on a small table. It was an old one, but did at least have push buttons and not one of the weird rotors telephones used to have. I picked up the receiver and leaned against the wall, weaker than I should be. I almost dialed 911, but couldn’t remember where I was. Did they need to know? Could they figure it out?

  The room swirled about me. I was light-headed, dizzy. Shock spread through me, paralyzing. My hands felt cold, and the pain from my side cut deep, filling me like water fills a lake bed.

  Surprised that I remembered it, I dialed Bruiser’s private number. Bruiser answered with a curt, “George Dumas,” sounding all British and uppity and snobby. “Hiya, Bruiser,” I whispered. “I just killed Thomas Stevenson, and . . . I think I’m dying.”

  “Jane?” He sounded unsure, maybe just the unfamiliar number on his caller ID.