Apparently I wasn’t the only one tired of the long drive. I settled for rolling down the window and letting the humid Louisiana air roll across my face, imagining I was poling my skiff through a cypress swamp while trees draped with Spanish moss soared high around me.
And they say I’m not a romantic.
The mental exercise had the added benefit of helping to calm the anxiety I had been feeling for the last hour. By the time we reached the other side of the lake and entered the city proper, I was back to my usual grumpy self.
Denise began to work her way through the part of New Orleans known as Metairie, not far from the infamous 17th Street Canal breach that played such a big role during the flooding after Katrina. Unlike the average individual, I hadn’t been able to watch the news reports as they’d come in during the storm and so I hadn’t seen the pictures of either the flooding or the aftermath. At the time, I hadn’t particularly cared; all of my attention had been focused on my search for my daughter, Elizabeth. But now that I was here in person, I was struck by the desire to experience it for myself. Call it academic interest, call it morbid curiosity; all I knew was that I needed to see it for myself, to get a sense of the lay of the land before we got involved in whatever it was that Denise’s patron deity had in store for us.
I tapped Dmitri on the shoulder from the backseat.
“Mind if I have a look?” I asked.
He must have been feeling apologetic for his surliness earlier, for I felt him shrug as he said, “Suit yourself.”
I’d borrowed Dmitri’s sight before and quickly made the connection. Borrowing the sight from a Mundane makes everything appeared washed out, like a colored shirt left too long in the sun, but borrowing the sight from one of the Gifted like Dmitri is the closest thing I’ve found to being able to see normally again.
It took me less than five minutes of looking around to realize something about New Orleans.
It was a city of ghosts.
And I don’t just mean the literal kind, although there were plenty of those to go around, too. No, what I mean is that New Orleans has a way of haunting itself, a way of showing its true face to those who are smart and clever enough to look for it and of hiding it away from those who are not, like a spirit that can be seen only by those who truly believe in its existence in the first place.
First there was the City-That-Was, an ephemeral sense of a time gone by that still lingered in a kind of mystic echo, one that would suddenly rear its head in the glimpse of a face in the window of a Garden District plantation house or in the swagger of a sailor fresh off one of the boats along the lakeshore. From the narrow streets and wrought iron balconies of the French Quarter to the aboveground cemeteries that dotted the city haphazardly, the past cried out for recognition.
Then there was the City-That-Has-Been, the spirit that stubbornly refused to bend in the aftermath of disaster, the remnants of what was left after the devastation wrought by the ravages of Mother Nature and the greedy nonchalance of the men who believed that nothing could ever harm their precious jewel of a city, no matter the warnings or the dire predictions that came before. Hurricane Katrina did more than just destroy a few billion dollars of property: it stole the innocence of the city’s residents and snatched away their hope of the future, one aspect of the city murdering its own descendant before it had even been born.
Five years after the disaster and still the evidence remained: Block after block of destroyed homes, some no more than moldering piles of debris, others still standing but forever branded with that discoloration at waist height that marked the high point of the water’s reach and, just as often, the markings of the searchers themselves in the aftermath, those ubiquitous National Guard unit IDs and numbers spray painted on the outside of the families’ homes, noting the presence of their dead and the number that each house contained. Neighborhoods in the midst of rebuilding. Families making do the best they could. Like a cancer that couldn’t be cut out, the ghost of that city had burrowed in deep and haunted the souls of those who remained, just as it would for a long time to come.
Finally, there was the ghost of the City-That-Might-Yet-Be. You couldn’t see it all that well just yet, for it remained cloaked in darkness, hiding from the light. But if you turned a corner in that precious moment when the sun was setting and night was only just beginning to fall, you could see it there, struggling to get out, to show us that the old girl had some life in her yet.
The ghosts of the past, present, and future, all vying for dominance.
Denise began scouting around for a hotel that wouldn’t ask too many questions, where we could come and go at will without being noticed. After driving around for a half hour, we finally found a place that looked like it would suit our needs.
It was called the Majestic, which was the height of irony, for there was nothing at all majestic about it. I didn’t even need my vision to tell me so. The crack of the decades-old linoleum underfoot in the central lobby, the stink of mold and body odor that wafted off the walls, the tepid air that barely stirred as we passed through it, all those things told me the dilapidated old place had probably never heard of better days, never mind seen them. Calling it a roach-infested dump was giving it way too much credit.
The lights in the lobby, though dim, were still bright enough to keep me from seeing much even with my sunglasses on, so I kept myself to the left of Denise and let her motion subtly guide me along. I could have used my cane, but I didn’t want to make it obvious that I was blind. We were a long way from Boston, but the proliferation of shows like America’s Most Wanted meant it was best if we kept as low a profile as possible. Besides, the FBI had placed a fifty-thousand-dollar reward on my head, and in this economy there were too many people who would consider that easy money.
Dmitri went over to the registration desk while Denise and I waited, our backs turned slightly so that the clerk couldn’t get a good look at either of us. Dmitri came back with the keys to two rooms on the third floor and the news that the elevator was “out of service.” Given the state of the place, I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had been that way for the last few decades.
Our rooms were at the end of the hall, though not adjacent to each other. It didn’t matter; we had no intention of using that first room anyway. We’d rented it simply to keep the desk clerk from asking too many questions or remembering us for all the wrong reasons. Dmitri let us into that second room, the one farther down the hall from the stairwell. There were only two beds, but that wasn’t a problem for us; in a place like this, one of us was always going to be on watch while the others slept. The rougher parts of New Orleans had always been, well, rough, and in the aftermath of Katrina they’d gotten considerably worse. I wouldn’t have put it past the clerk in the lobby to sell us out to some of the local riffraff as an easy way to make a few bucks. If they looked for us in the other room first, we’d hear them. If they tried this one …
Dmitri settled down in front of the door without a word.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Playing guard dog,” he said.
Denise was a smart gal; she didn’t need him to spell it all out for her. But I’d forgotten about her quick wit.
“Nice to see that you know your place,” she said over her shoulder as she slipped into the bathroom. I could imagine the mischievous grin she was wearing as she closed it behind her.
“Laugh away, sweetheart, laugh away,” he called after her. “But when a pack of ravenous zombies bursts through the door, you’ll be happy that there’s a food source between you and them.”
I thought it was a pretty good comeback, but Denise obviously didn’t. She yanked open the door and said, “Sweet Gaia, Dmitri! Zombies are nothing to joke about. Especially here in New Orleans. What’s wrong with you?”
At which point she shut the door again, leaving the two of us to wonder if she was serious or having another joke at our expense.
As I settled down to catch some sleep, I hoped like hel
l it was the latter.
10
HUNT
Dmitri woke me just after midnight for my turn to stand watch. The room was dark and so I had no difficulty seeing him there, crouched over me where I slept on the mattress he’d tossed on the floor earlier.
“Any trouble?”
I kept my voice low, not wanting to wake Denise.
He shook his head. “Some shouting from down the hall earlier, but nothing that concerns us,” he said.
I climbed to my feet as he slid into the bed I’d just vacated. I knew he’d be asleep in seconds; at some point in his life he’d learned the old soldier’s trick of snatching sleep whenever he could get it. In our months on the run I’d seen him sleep through noise that could wake the dead.
In the end, the night passed without incident; the marauding packs of ravenous zombies must have gone elsewhere for the evening. We took turns using the shower to freshen up from our cross-country odyssey. With my hair still damp and a fresh set of clothes on my six-foot frame, I was ready to play psychic detective and track down whatever Denise’s vision had meant her to find.
Provided I got a cup of coffee in me first, of course.
We asked at the front desk where we might grab a bite to eat, and the clerk directed us to a quaint old place a few blocks from the hotel. It wasn’t much to look at from the outside; the window from the street was intentionally soaped over in big white circles, preventing you from seeing in, and the sign on the door simply read EATS. But once inside I was overwhelmed by the rich, thick smell of roasted coffee and crisp bacon. My stomach grumbled hungrily in response.
It was too bright inside for me to see much of anything, but the presence of the ghost in the corner was as clear as a light in the darkness. He was a grizzled old man, dressed in the whites of a short-order cook, complete with a spatula in his hand. He watched us the way the dead always do, his gaze full of such longing that I had to turn away and pointedly ignore him.
We chose a table in the back and were halfway through our meal when I felt Dmitri stiffen. We’d been together long enough that I didn’t need to be told that someone had suddenly taken an interest in us.
“How many?” I asked, without turning my head or giving any other indication that I’d noticed the newcomers’ approach.
“Three,” he said, sotto voce, and then, louder, “If you’re looking for trouble, I’d reconsider if I were you.”
There was a brief snatch of laughter, as if the newcomers weren’t worried by Dmitri’s confidence. That meant they were either the size of small elephants themselves or stupidly overconfident.
My guess was the latter. If they wanted a fight, we could give them one.
I reached out to the old ghost sitting in the corner and, with the flick of a mental switch inside my head, borrowed his sight.
There was a flash of pain and a deep roar that swept through my consciousness like a runaway freight train and then I could see again.
I turned my head to look.
All three of them were large muscular men in their midtwenties with that disciplined sense about them that suggested a good deal of training, possibly even military in nature. Their hair was cropped short; they were dressed similarly in jerseys, jeans, and hiking boots; and they fanned out in front of us in an inverted V shape that, if things got ugly, would provide them with the best fields of fire without endangering each other. It was clear from how easily they fell into their roles that they had done this kind of thing before. The confidence in their stance told me that whatever was about to happen, they weren’t expecting us to put up much resistance.
We’d see about that.
If it hadn’t been for the fact that the one in front had a thick goatee I might not have been able to tell them apart; all three looked like they’d been popped out of the same mold. I found myself wondering if they were brothers or even cousins, maybe.
Through the veil of the ghostsight I could see a bright silver glow flickering around the edge of each of their auras. I’d never seen that particular manifestation before. It made me wonder. Were they human or something else?
I didn’t know. That, along with their body language so far, made me a bit nervous.
Goatee looked us over, his gaze settling briefly on me and Dmitri before turning his attention to Clearwater. “The Lord Marshal would like to see you,” he said to her.
Now I didn’t know who, or what, the Lord Marshal was and frankly I didn’t really care. The way these guys came in, full of confidence and expecting us to follow orders like a bunch of trained dogs, pissed me off.
“That’s nice and all, but I don’t particularly care what…”
I never finished my sentence. Denise laid her hand on my arm, squeezing just hard enough to cut me off before I was through. I looked at her, the question plain on my face.
Into the silence she said, “We’d be happy to accompany you to see the Lord Marshal,” she said, “provided you give us your word as his representative that we will not come to any harm, intentional or otherwise, while under his care and hospitality.”
Her words had a certain ritual sound to them. I wasn’t the only one who noticed, either, for Goatee raised one eyebrow before answering in a similar fashion.
“So swear I,” he replied.
Apparently we’d left twenty-first-century America behind in favor of an afternoon romp through the Renaissance. Any minute now I expected them to start spouting “wherefore art thou’s” and “by your leave’s.”
Denise smiled primly in Goatee’s direction, and I had the clear impression that the score was Clearwater one, Goatee zero, but that could change pretty quickly. Especially since we didn’t have any idea what this was all about.
We paid the check and got our coats. The old fry cook followed me to the door, so I was able to see the Expedition idling at the curb. A second vehicle waited behind it.
I snagged the sleeve of Denise’s coat. “Are you sure about this?” I whispered. Agreeing to a meeting was one thing. Letting them take us to that meeting under their control was something else entirely.
Denise shrugged off my concerns.
“They’ve given their word under oath,” she said. “We’ll be perfectly safe.”
I stared at her. Given their word? Hadn’t she ever heard of lying?
Apparently not, it seemed, for she left me standing there alone and marched over to the lead vehicle. I looked over at Dmitri, but he simply stared blankly back at me. Was I the only one who saw a problem with this?
I’m gonna regret this. I know it, I told myself and then followed her into the Expedition, Dmitri at my heels.
The driver was cut from the same mold as the other three. He glanced up in the mirror as the three of us slid into the seat behind him, but he didn’t say anything. Goatee climbed into the passenger seat, riding shotgun, while the other two rode in the second vehicle behind us.
No sooner had we buckled up than the driver pulled away from the curb and headed east, toward the Quarter. My connection with the fry cook faded, and I was left in the light, unable to see anything more for the time being.
The ride passed in silence. I was burning with questions, but I didn’t want to ask any of them in front of Goatee and his companion for fear of revealing my ignorance. Knowledge is power, they say, and they were already quite a bit ahead of me in that department. No need to give them any more of an edge.
We drove for something in the neighborhood of fifteen, maybe twenty minutes before the Expedition slowed and then pulled to a stop.
“Wait here, please,” Goatee said, and then both he and the driver proceeded to get out of the vehicle, leaving the three of us alone.
It seemed a good time to ask Denise what the hell was going on, something I did with more than a bit of fervency.
“Want to fill me in?”
She laughed. “You really are in the dark this time, aren’t you?”
“And will continue to be unless you spill what the heck has been going on. We�
��ve probably got a minute, maybe two, so stick to the highlight reel, okay?”
She thought for a moment. “Okay. I probably don’t have to tell you that cities like this attract all manner of creatures—Gifted and Preternaturals alike. They come for all the same reasons that normal folks do—better jobs, better opportunities, better chances to reach out and seize the American dream for themselves and their families.
“At least, the good ones do. The others have different things in mind, like hunting and feeding off of the one thing they are strictly forbidden to hunt—the Mundanes.
“To help prevent this, a system was set up to keep the overly aggressive species in check, complete with a means of imposing control over those who refused to abide by the rules. Around the turn of the century, a High Council was established in each of the major American cities, a group of elected officials who are in charge of making sure that those who choose to live and hunt and exist within its boundaries keep to the rules without violating them. Are you with me so far?”
I nodded my understanding.
“Each Council appoints someone to act as the Lord Marshal in the area under their control, a kind of mystical equivalent of the local sheriff in the Old West. It is the Marshal’s job to maintain order within the city limits, see that the Council’s edicts are obeyed, that kind of stuff. He has a team of wardens who carry out his requirements.”
Now things were starting to make sense. It was the Marshal’s job to vet any newcomers to be certain that they weren’t involved in whatever mischief might be going on, hence our “invitation” to pay him a visit. It was the old “I’m the only sheriff in town” routine. He’d sent some of his wardens to collect us, knowing that they could handle any problems that might arise in the process, perhaps even to intimidate a bit if necessary.
Trouble was, I didn’t intimidate easily.
As this so-called Marshal was about to find out.
“When we get inside, just let me handle it,” Denise said.
Sure, I thought. Right up until the moment they piss me off again.
King of the Dead (Jeremiah Hunt Chronicle) Page 6
