by Rob Thurman
She walked past me the same way she had Tig, so I took the tray out to the hall to give them quality vamp-human time. Cherish was waiting out there in black-on-black with a collar of gold, pearls, and onyx. She liked the shiny stuff, no way around it. She and Robin, they would always be thieves, but there were worse things to be. As long as the thieves were on my side when the chips were down, their private lives were none of my business. Hair swept up into a smooth coil pinned with more pearls, she held the hand of Xolo. He was in a parka, new from the sheen of it, with a hood that kept anyone from seeing anything but large shadowed eyes.
“You saw him again, then? Oshossi?” Her leather-gloved hand tightened on Xolo’s.
“You could say that.” I dumped the tray on a metal cart loaded with other dirty ones. “You could also say you owe us a car.” I folded my arms and leaned against the wall beside her. “I’m hoping you’ve never seen this guy fight, because I’d like to think you’d have mentioned he invented ass kicking and has a black belt in taking names.”
“No, I never saw him fight.” Her mouth, painted the color of poppies today, tried for a smile but didn’t pull it off. “I saw other sides to him. I do know he has never lost prey once he’s started the hunt. He’s very proud of that. Too proud, I thought. Arrogant, perhaps even foolishly so. But I was the fool. This is it, then?” she said more to herself than to me. “You and the others have faced him and barely escaped with your lives. I am a fighter.” The blackness fogged her eyes, and I saw her fangs, if only for a second. “An excellent fighter, but I’ve seen you and your brother . . . with the cadejos and the ccoas. You’re hunters, just as Oshossi is. If you can’t take him, neither can I.”
“Hey.” I wasn’t sure if I was insulted or felt bad for her. I rolled a meditation bead against my wrist and had a flash of that insight everyone’s always talking about. Know thyself.
Yeah . . . I was insulted.
Okay, okay, I felt a little bad for her too. “It’s not just you, remember? It’s all of us. Robin’s been around longer than Oshossi, you can bet that. When he has to, he can fight like hell. He might not like it, but he can do it. And if it hadn’t been for the car thing, I think Niko would’ve given Oshossi something to think about.”
I touched another bead. “Niko’s human, but . . .” I stopped and thought about it. “He’s a Caesar, an Alexander, a Genghis, a Minamoto no Yorimasa.” And he’d always said I never paid attention to the history books he’d used to teach me. “Some people are born warriors. He’s one of them. What it takes some creatures hundreds of years to learn, Nik was born knowing. Every once in a while the world comes up with a natural-born predator. We’re lucky nature screwed up and gave Cyrano a conscience along with it, or it’d be Alexander all over again.”
Huh. I’d gone through the entire mala, bead by bead, and hadn’t noticed. And I’d talked more than I usually did about personal things, and what the hell was up with that? So what if Cherish was Promise’s daughter, and Promise was with Niko. So what if that sort of made her family. So what if . . . damn, I was getting soft in my old age. Twenty—who knew you went to instant pudding then.
I grabbed my cynical nature and pulled it back into place. She was not family. She might have come around to care for someone other than herself, but that didn’t mean I trusted her.
My phone rang, and I walked down the hall from her. I’d brought my cell out of the room with me to call Robin. I’d called him last night, and I was hoping he’d learned something between then and now. He’d beaten me to the punch. “How’s Niko?” he asked.
“Good,” I said. “Once he gets his CT scan we’re out of here. You find out anything about Oshossi yet?”
“I did indeed,” he responded smugly. “He’s renting a brownstone in Harlem, the entire thing. He apparently likes his privacy.”
“It only makes things easier for us.” I pressed against the wall as a gurney went flying by, nurses doing CPR as they ran. It was pointless. I could smell the death on the guy.
“Easier?” Robin said incredulously. “You did say he flipped over your car last night, didn’t you? I can’t see there will be anything easy about this.”
“Hell, he might just spank us and send us on our way,” I said wearily. That hour of sleep hadn’t done me much good.
“I’m going,” Cherish said over my shoulder, having moved up behind me. “That will keep him there. After all, it’s me he wants. Anything, anyone else is incidental.”
She had a point, although he’d known her location when he’d sent the ccoas after her and his cadejos had followed her. He hadn’t been there then either. The only time he’d shown up was to warn the rest of us to back off, and that’s what it had to be because he could’ve made things much more nasty for us if he’d wanted. Maybe he wanted his animals to do his work for him to show the contempt he had for a common thief.
Whatever it was, it didn’t matter. With Promise involved, we were up to our necks in it. I looked back toward Niko’s room. Not that I liked it, not one damn bit.
“You coming back to the house?” I asked Goodfellow.
“No. But I’m on the move and, no offense, I’m better off on my own. I’ve honed my escape abilities over the years.” That was probably true. The fact that he’d stuck with us for so long, confined unnaturally for any puck, yet had been ready to help when the fight came, that said something about Robin. Something better than you could say about me.
“But I am staying in those hotels worthy of my presence,” he continued. “If you need help, you’ll know where to come for me.” That was the thing about traveling. I had to know where I was going. I couldn’t open a gate blindly to a place I’d never been or seen at a distance. And Robin had filled me in on what hotels were good enough to suit him. . . . There weren’t many. I knew all their locations, passed by their doors in my years in New York. “And call me when you’re ready to take on Oshossi. Just make sure there are no cars readily available when you do.” With that he disconnected.
I shoved a hand through my hair. I needed a shower too. I’d cleaned all of Nik’s blood off me in the sink last night, scrubbing until my skin was red and stinging, but there were moments where I could still feel it. It was something that was happening way too much lately. It was easier to be irritable than thinking about that, and I turned my attention to Cherish and Xolo. “Seriously,” I asked with annoyance, “what is up with that thing? Why don’t you just get a dog? Alpo’s easier to come by than goat’s blood.”
“Some of us aren’t as fortunate as the four of you,” she said with an edge of bitterness, and turned to walk back to the room. “Sometimes pets have to do.”
Not many pets played Go Fish, but she was right. I was lucky, and I intended to stay that way. No matter what I’d thought on the beach when the Auphe had taken the eel. No matter that I thought we were going to die. No matter that I’d found out it was even worse than that. Whatever happened to me happened, but I was keeping Nik safe and alive. The real shitfest had yet to come. So let it. I wasn’t going to lose what I had, even if I lost myself.
Denial: Sometimes it was all that kept you going.
I took my shower while Promise and Cherish watched over Nik, who would’ve been offended that I thought he couldn’t take care of himself even with a concussion. They came to take him to CT while I was in the shower. Promise went with him. By the time they came back I’d gotten our weapons back from Rafferty’s, where I’d tossed them before the ambulance had come. The hospital had metal detectors at the ER entrance, but Cherish had said the front doors were clear. Good news, because walking out of this place unarmed wasn’t my idea of smart. Promise and Cherish had brought extra blades for us, but I felt more comfortable with my own and I definitely felt better with my gun—not that it had done me any good with Oshossi.
I’d shoved them in the closet. With Cherish standing outside the room door guarding it, I passed over Niko’s katana and various other blades. As he dressed, he slid them into place and p
ut his coat on to conceal them all. His clothes were clean except for a blood-stain on the shoulder of his coat and the shirt beneath. I was still in the scrub top. My jeans were all right, though, as was my jacket. The nurse came back to say the CT had come back normal, and Nik would be discharged soon. When soon dragged into the second hour, we left. What the hell? The ID they had was false, and no one noticed as we walked out.
No one but the Auphe.
We were on the stairs when the gates opened. I didn’t have to warn anyone. They opened on the landing a floor below us. A straight shot and that’s what I took, firing several shots at the first of the seven, but it had already slid to the side as my finger pulled the trigger. Then I felt two more gates open behind us. Nine of them, four of us. That wasn’t even odds, nowhere near. One of the ones who’d appeared behind us was carrying something. At first I didn’t recognize what it was. I didn’t recognize it because I didn’t want to.
Cambriel’s head.
It was held by a handful of copper hair, the normally neat braid a tangled mess, the light brown eyes filmed. “I brought you a present, treasonous cousin. Traitorous brother. To put you in the breeding disposition. We hope it pleases you.” Scarlet eyes were bright with homicidal glee. “We made sure that he knew he died because of you.” The metal teeth flashed. “He had a long time to think of that before we finished. So very long.”
I didn’t think about that. I couldn’t. If I did, I’d make a mistake, and we couldn’t afford one now. “Mi Dios,” Cherish murmured in dread. She had called me Auphe, but now she saw the real thing. Walking, talking carnage. Even vampires feared the Auphe, were their victims like anyone else.
We hadn’t been able to handle two before between four of us with Niko in top shape and Robin with his thousands of years of experience there. I didn’t think we could take nine. I knew we couldn’t take nine.
I didn’t know if I could build a gate around all of us, four and Xolo too. That would be a big one, bigger than I’d attempted before. And a half-ass gate? I didn’t know what that would do. Take half of our bodies out of here, leave the other half? It was risk that might be as dangerous as the Auphe. So I opened one behind us, between the two Auphe and us. I concentrated. I stayed in control . . . God knew how. They were there. Right fucking there, and if we didn’t get out of there someone was going to die.
My gate was open, tarnished and greedy and big enough for two people to pass through at the same time. “Go!” I rapped. Promise didn’t hesitate. Cherish did for the briefest of moments, but then followed, dragging Xolo behind her. The Auphe watched them go, unmoving—their silver teeth showing in wider, contorted grins. Then Niko and I lunged for the gray light of the gate.
The Auphe closed it in our faces.
I felt them jerk it out of existence, collapse it into nothingness.
I hadn’t known they could do that. I hadn’t . . . oh, Jesus. It was Niko they wanted first. Last time, this time. The one person I could least afford to lose. The one I couldn’t lose.
The two who had appeared behind us on the upper stairs moved apart, leaving the way clear between them. “Run,” the one with Cambriel’s head said. “Give us our chase. Give us our thrill. Run, meat. Run, whore. Run.”
We did. We ran up eight flights. For anyone else with a concussion it probably wouldn’t have been possible. For Niko it was not only doable, but he had to slow down so that I could keep up. Ultraconditioned athlete or machine, take your pick.
At the fourth-floor landing a man in scrubs and a lab coat was scanning a clipboard. With one quick motion Niko gave him a hard shove back through the door and slammed it in his face. We went up four more before the scream came. He hadn’t stayed behind the door like he should have. I didn’t have time to feel guilt over his death. I didn’t have time for anything but the running, lungs burning and legs propelling with all the strength they had. We were still ahead of them, but only because they let us be. They were taking their time, drawing it out. Having their fun.
The last door was locked. I shot out the lock and we were on the roof. We could’ve gone out onto one of the occupied floors, but I didn’t think that would stop the Auphe. Not this time. They were in the heat of the chase, insane with it. A cold insanity and ready. They were so damn ready. Niko and I ran to the edge. At least sixteen floors up, there was nothing below us but the street. Nothing to hold on to, no way to climb down.
The door slammed open across the roof and they were there. Blood on their teeth and claws, dripping down pointed chins. Running. So quick I barely had time to point the Glock, but not time to pull the trigger—they were so fast they were almost on us when Niko tackled me and we went over the edge. I felt the concrete ledge hard against my knees, the breath-sucking tumble. Then there was free fall, lights flashing past us, and the hard thud of the ground beneath us. Not the street, but the bristle of winter grass.
I’d tried one last time. Tried one last time on the way down to be Auphe, and the Auphe had let me.
Niko rolled off of me to lie at my side, and I stared at the morning sky above Rafferty’s backyard. I waited slow seconds as the air finally began to wheeze back into my lungs. I’d created the gate one floor down as we fell from the hospital roof, the gate open one moment and closed the next. The Auphe had allowed it. Why? Because even in the madness of the hunt they knew what they wanted.
Me. And Niko had played on that when he’d pushed us over the edge. Him they wanted dead, but me they needed alive. They’d still been at their homicidal vengeful play, trying to take him, then the others. I had a feeling, though, playtime was about to be over. They might live almost forever, but they didn’t know that I would. They’d tire of the chase and soon. Torture was good fun and all, but they had their plans too. Then they would all come, and it wouldn’t be long. Not two, not nine, but every last one of them—which would accomplish both their goals. A massacre, and me pulled back to hell to remake the Auphe race.
I coughed and said hoarsely, “I never thought my dick would save our asses.”
“You had to say it, didn’t you?” Niko studied the sky with me. Blue and clear—a good day to still be alive. “But in this case you’re an idiot whose penis did save our lives. And I hope I never have to say or think that again.” It had been our only chance, Nik’s plan, the only way I wouldn’t have seen my brother die before my eyes while they held me back.
And if for some reason it hadn’t worked, hell, hitting the pavement would’ve been one goddamned better way to go.
12
Niko
I hadn’t known that the Auphe would let us escape the relatively painless death of a sixteen-floor fall. I’d strongly suspected, but I hadn’t known. I had known the only other option was not preferable. I turned my head, the grass rustling in my ear, and watched as Cal continued to stare at the sky, memorizing it, as if it were the last one he’d ever see. The faith he’d once had at the beach, the determination since, had drained away, leaving his face blank and empty. I watched it go as the stomach-wrenching nausea from the gate slowly began to subside. Cambriel, and the stranger who’d gotten in the Auphe’s way at the hospital—it was all hitting him now.
He’d kept his word, anticipating the Auphe twice . . . as much as anyone could. You could anticipate a tornado, a tsunami, yet there were times when there was no place to go to escape them. This, I thought, was one of those times.
“Did you flip them off on the way down?” I asked.
“Hell, yes, I did.” He gave a small smirk, but it faded away almost instantly, and the emptiness was back again.
I sat up, reached over him to take his right hand that still held his gun, and placed it on his chest. “If the time comes and we can’t win,” I said steadily, “you go first.” I’d done all I could to protect him his entire life. I would protect him at the end of it as well.
His knuckles tightened on the Desert Eagle. “That won’t stop them from killing the rest of you.”
“No, but it will infuriate the
m, madden them. If I take the one chance their race has at survival, they’ll take the rest of us quickly. They’ll be too infuriated to do otherwise.” And if they didn’t . . . we’d fight until our choices were gone. If it came to the torture the Auphe had promised, we would have an escape. A clean death. I’d rather die by my hand than the hand of an Auphe. Either way, Cal wouldn’t have to see it. I might not be able to save his life, but I could save him that, and I could save him from much worse. I would never let the Auphe take him again.
He looked at me with eyes unutterably exhausted and far older than they had any right to be. “Together.”
“Together,” I promised. I held up a hand and he let go of the gun to clasp it, hard and desperate, then he pulled himself up to a sitting position.
He let go and rubbed his face. “I think we have codependency issues.”
“There’s no one I would rather have them with, little brother.” I stood and nudged his hip with my foot. “Up. You need to sleep. One hour in a day and a half doesn’t quite qualify.”
“Cyrano,” he responded. The shadows under his eyes had advanced to circles so dark they were almost black. “I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again.”
I thought he would’ve proven that true had I not palmed two sleeping pills at the hospital. Slipped into his coffee, he’d collapsed on the living room couch, dead to the world. Promise, who stood beside me, leaned down to brush the hair from his face. She didn’t bring up the breeding remark the Auphe had made on the hospital stairwell. Either she didn’t truly want to know or knew Cal wouldn’t want me to talk about it. “We’re not going to survive this, are we?” she said softly.
I said nothing. It was answer enough.
“Perhaps you, Cherish, and Robin would if you ran,” I said eventually. “If you hid. Once Cal and I are gone, they’d have little reason to follow you. You can’t torment those who are already dead. Wasting their time on you would be pointless.”
