Suddenly, without warning, the crowd erupted. Gabriel and I both jumped, and Trace came running. I helped Gabriel turn and I looked to see if I could figure out what was going on. Gabriel stood with his hand gripping my shoulder.
Trace shielded his eyes as he scanned the crowd, looking for whatever it was that was igniting a near riot. “What is that bastard doing here?” he said.
“What bastard?” I asked, looking around. Shit, they all looked like bastards to me.
“Indigo.”
Trace said the name like he was spitting out something nasty and rotten. Gabriel tightened his grip on my shoulder.
“Indigo?” I asked. “As in, the guy who will stop at pretty much anything to get to me? That Indigo?”
Trace looked at me like I was a moron. “Like there could be more than one. You don’t have to be too bright to predict waves, do you?”
Now, that was just uncalled-for. “Hey. Does that mean that he’ll kill you to get to me?” I asked hopefully.
“That’s the fucker,” Trace said bitterly.
“Well, let’s get him on over here.”
Gabriel took the hit for me. How he had known it was coming was beyond me. I guess, like Gabriel had said, he knew the man. Gabriel pushed me hard and I fell on the steel floor. But that was better than taking the punch. It dropped Gabriel to his knees.
On me, it would have broken my jaw. Stupid, Blue, I chastised myself. Stupid. Stupid. Again, how could I get Gabriel out of here if got myself killed first?
A green-and-blue hand reached down to offer to pull me up. I didn’t take it, just pushed up myself. Cobra bent down and looked me in the eyes with those white slits of his.
“Be very careful of Trace,” he said. “If you continue on this way, you will be dead by morning. And he’ll leave nothing of you behind, not even—”
“Don’t tell me, Snake Man—a trace.”
“And do you know the reason for that, miss?”
Miss? A polite Snake Man? I raised a questioning eyebrow.
“He eats them.”
I felt the color drain from my face.
“He just doesn’t like the ears.”
I looked at the man, wondering if he might be lying, but no, there it was: the look of truth.
“Well.” I took a breath. “Good to know.”
As I turned to find Gabriel, Snake Man said, “Tell Gabriel that I’m sorry. I have few choices in these dark days.”
As Trace stormed off for a better look at the approaching Indigo, I ran over to Gabriel, who had managed to stand on his own. A trickle of blood ran down a split lip. My guy sure was getting it tonight. Wait. My guy?
Putting my arm around him, I whispered, “You okay? I’m so sorry for the punch. And for, well, my mouth.”
“Better me than you,” he said as he folded his arms around me.
“Well, yeah,” I said. “You do deserve it more. You know, Ring Girl and all.”
Once more the crowd exploded with noise. The music blasted louder than ever, and the flames in the oil drums, doused with kerosene, shot twenty feet into the air.
Trace appeared and yanked me from Gabriel’s arms, twisting my wrist until I cried out in pain. He drew a knife and ran it along Gabriel’s jaw. Gabriel couldn’t see the blade coming and flinched as the cold metal sliced his skin. “I would slit your throat now, Black, but you might come in handy as a trade with Indigo. Let’s see what your precious Indigo thinks of you losing Tsunami Blue to me.”
I looked past Gabriel’s shoulder and saw the approaching entourage of Indigo and company. It looked like a traveling circus. And I swear, maybe it was just my eyes playing tricks in this smoke-filled light, but Indigo looked blue. I thought of ears and body parts on crackers and cream-of-human soup. It was time to change employers.
I wrenched away from Trace, nearly dislocating my shoulder in the process, and ran over to the mesh and snagged a bullhorn.
“Hey, Indigo, there’s someone up here who wants to meet you.”
Trace moved toward me with death in his eyes. It wasn’t like I hadn’t been warned.
“Who?” came a reply.
I had just enough time to shout into the bullhorn, “Tsunami Blue.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
I yelled into the horn as loudly as possible. The entire stadium of people stopped whatever they were doing, saying whatever they were saying, and stared at the cage.
Trace had reached me. He grabbed the bullhorn out of my grip and threw it aside. But this time I was ready for him. I flattened myself on the floor just as the swing came. He swung so hard that it threw him off balance and he staggered to keep his footing.
It was then that I kicked him in the crotch.
And when I say kicked, let’s just say it was a perfectly placed, powerful strike. I had lived with Runners most of my life. Learning to kick a two-hundred-plus-pound man in the balls and keep him down? Slam dunk.
He went down screaming, calling me names even I hadn’t heard before. Who knew Trace, a cannibal and a collector of ears, had such a flair for words?
Trace stayed down long enough for Indigo’s men to swarm the cage.
The men surrounded Trace, who lay moaning in a heap, holding his crotch. My brand-new employer was rolling on the floor and still swearing and—wait; tell me he was not crying. Because if he were, these Indigo guys would put it in the wind and he’d never, ever live it down. So not good for the New World king, or whatever he said he was going to be.
Next they swarmed me. Surrounded by Runners with blades drawn, I had no choice but to wait. I didn’t have to wait long. Within minutes, the music stopped, the crowd hushed, and a large man with a bone necklace made of fingers announced, “Indigo on board.”
I was so glad he didn’t say, “Indigo in the house.” That was so twenty years ago.
The necklace, I gotta say, disappointed me. This was Indigo’s guy, and I had hoped the whole body-part thing might be left behind with Trace. I mean, come on. We live on islands. How about puka shells?
“Pay attention, Blue.”
Gabriel had come up silently behind me; blind or not, he still had his stealth thing going. The Runners who had their blades trained on me had parted and led him to me. I reached out and took his hand, relieved to see him, because Indigo’s men had swarmed him too and I hadn’t been able to get near him.
I noticed lotion around his eyes and iodine on his wounds. His beautiful golden skin had been painted orange with the stuff. Still, I took it as a good sign that Indigo’s men were looking after him. It must mean they weren’t going to kill him. And if they cared enough to tend his eyes, they wouldn’t let Trace and his men kill him either. So. We had a case of Runner versus Runner. Trace the Cannibal against the Blue Crew. May the best men win. Unfortunately for me, in this case there were no best men. Only homicidal, maniacal, power-hungry killers.
And the worst part of all? Gabriel was one of them. A Runner who had been sent as a delivery boy to hunt and deliver a small but lethal package. Me.
As Indigo drew nearer, some kind of horn sounded, and a flurry of banners unfurled bearing the trademark 666 with daggers. Six men walked ahead of Indigo, all Runners, and started pounding handheld drums made of human skin. I knew the drum covering was human skin because Seamus had tried to give me one for my eleventh birthday. Plus, they just sounded different.
I pressed into Gabriel and he sensed my fear. He pulled me closer.
“What do you see?” he whispered.
“Drums. Please tell me you don’t own one.”
“I don’t.”
Thank you, God.
“What else?”
“Wolves. Five in all.” On leashes hooked to harnesses, the animals looked lean, too lean. With hollowed haunches and sunken eyes, the wolves looked ready to make anyone their meal. Runners kept their animals on the edge by keeping them hungry. It made them meaner, deadlier. They were also beaten on a regular basis. It made them killers.
“Stay far away
from them, Blue.”
I couldn’t help thinking of Max. How could he have survived these animals? Then again, in the end, he probably hadn’t.
The crowd was on its feet, cheering and throwing bottles and debris.
The chanting began. “Kill, kill, kill, kill…”
At last Indigo stepped into the cage.
And, yup, the man was blue.
I must have gasped, because Gabriel leaned in and asked, “Is he here?”
“Yeah. You couldn’t have at least warned me about the whole blue thing?”
“Don’t let it throw you off. He’s dangerous.”
“Like Trace isn’t?”
“Worse,” said Gabriel. “Much worse.”
Well, that gave me pause. What could possibly be worse than collecting ears and eating human flesh? “Damn it, Gabriel, you really, really need to find new friends.”
“I agree.”
“So this is the famed, the elusive, the amazing, the fantastical Tsunami Blue.”
Indigo stood right in front of Gabriel, who had taken a protective step in front of me as the feared Runner leader approached. Wow, what a buildup. It might be hard to live up to that kind of reputation.
“Gabriel, let’s have a look at our little weather vane, shall we?”
Weather vane? What a letdown. I’d really liked the fantastical part. I guess once a Runner asshole, always a Runner asshole. It didn’t matter how good your vocabulary was.
Gabriel gently brought me out from behind him. He did everything by touch, caressing my skin with long fingers. He maneuvered me in front of him but kept an arm around my midriff.
Up close and personal, Indigo was an intimidating man. Long shanks of light blue hair hung to his waist, spilling out from under a crushed-velvet top hat that looked borderline ridiculous. Who wore velvet in the Pacific Northwest? His parachute pants and tie-dyed tee did little to camouflage a powerful and fit body. He looked…well, he looked silly. But I knew only too well to never underestimate a Runner. He might have looked like a Blue Meanie crossed with MC Hammer, but I could plainly see the promise of death in his eyes.
A glass vial filled with blood hung around his neck, capped by duct tape. I thought of rumors of Runners who drank blood, and suppressed a shudder.
He reached out and pulled me away from Gabriel, and let me tell you, Gabriel didn’t let go easily. It took a smack to his wrist with a bone club.
Trace, who was being detained by a bevy of blades, shouted, “She’s mine, Indigo, you blue fucking bastard!” That hushed the crowd.
“Finders keepers,” Indigo said in a voice that whispered of death. He crossed his arms and began to walk around me. Stopping, he pulled a wicked machete from one of his men and pointed it under my chin. I refused to blink.
“You have a brave one here, Gabriel,” he said. He spun, swinging the machete so fast the blade blurred. He stopped just short of my neck. I still didn’t blink. But I was glad that Gabriel couldn’t see it. He would have overreacted. And it may have cost him his life.
Indigo motioned to one of his men to bring the bucket of water over. Within seconds the cold water was poured over my head. The mud ran from my body. My fully exposed tattoo shimmered. Indigo kicked the bucket over and jerked me up on it. I now stood precariously on the metal bucket in full view of the crowd. I shivered from the wet and cold, and my nipples hardened as I stood freezing. The surrounding men looked at me with lust and rape and death in their eyes.
Still, I knew that the time for my death, even in this wicked and unholy place, was not now. Not tonight. I had value to these men. And for once in my wet, miserable life, I believed in the value myself. And I was going to somehow, some way, parlay that into freedom.
Indigo stood in front of me and faced the crowd, spreading his arms wide. “I present to you the one, the only, the unholy Tsunami Blue.” He bowed deeply, letting the crowd get a look at me.
The audience exploded. The mesh became our shield as everything imaginable was thrown at it. They screamed my name. They called me witch, devil, monster, and worse. So much worse. And when they rushed the ring, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds strong, I lost my balance and tumbled to the floor. I tried desperately to stop trembling. This time it wasn’t from the cold. It was from the fear. I’d never seen so much hate in one place. I had never felt so much evil.
They fear what they don’t understand, Blue.
Gabriel’s words wrapped around me like an embrace, his embrace.
Armed with flamethrowers, Indigo’s men beat the crowd back into submission. The effect was brutal and the air filled with screams and burning flesh. I wiped at the tears stinging my eyes and watched Indigo.
Indigo continued in a circle, dragging the blade along the stainless-steel floor. Scraping metal against metal, he circled and circled, like a great white. I knelt and sized him up too.
He wore rings made of abalone shells.
I approved. Hey, I’d wear ’em.
The human-tooth necklace, though? No. Not so much.
At least ten different knives hung from a belt similar to Gabriel’s. Only the blades on Indigo’s were longer. Big approval. Unless, of course, he used one on me.
White, even teeth, but not as white or as even as Gabriel’s. Approval. Now I’d met two Runners who owned a toothbrush.
And so the list went. Long nails that curved. A definite no. He continued to circle, moving the blade in ever closer.
I spotted a little crystal lapel pin. Would I want it? Maybe. It would depend on the story behind it.
And then I saw the earring. It was a thick scroll of horn from a water buffalo.
I thrust my booted foot out and stopped him. “Where”—I clipped the words one by one for emphasis—“did you get that?” I pointed at his ear and felt my fear dissolve, replaced by growing rage.
Indigo moved so fast I didn’t see it coming. But Gabriel, with uncanny senses, must have heard him coming at me.
He tried to lunge for me, but he couldn’t see me. One of the men tripped him and he went down. Gabriel got a steel-toed boot to the kidney. As the boot started to come down on Gabriel’s skull, I screamed and scrambled on all fours, trying to shield him.
“Enough.” The order came from Indigo.
The boot stopped in midair.
I collected Gabriel in my arms. “Blue.” He gasped.
“I’m okay,” I whispered. “I’m okay.”
I was yanked up by the hair. Indigo again. Gabriel was right: There was nothing nice about this man. Nothing at all.
I stood before his blueness, glaring. If I had my knife I would stab out his eyes, then take his heart—if he had one—and feed it to the vultures.
That was how much I hated this man. But first I’d disembowel him, slowly, so he lived while I did it. The same way he had done it to my uncle. In all the years I’d known him, Seamus had never taken out that water buffalo–horn earring. It had been given to him by my father, his brother, before a woman came between them and my father had to choose. That woman had been my mother. Seamus had loved her first.
And Seamus had died protecting me. Even under torture, he hadn’t revealed to Indigo where I was hidden. He had died doing something honorable for once in his unhappy, miserable life. He had died saving Lilly’s daughter.
I hurt all over. Not only physically, but deep within my soul.
“I expected more from you, Tsunami Blue.”
“I expected a better hat from you, Indigo.”
“Your eyes are remarkable, but the rest”—he gave a wave of his hand—“scrawny. And you’re a muddy mess.”
“You look like a Smurf. Only not cute. In fact, you give the color blue a bad name.”
I got a smack for that. He could beat me around all he wanted, but I knew he wouldn’t kill me. He wouldn’t hurt me too badly. He needed me to tell him about the waves. All I had to do was bide my time and stay alive.
But me being me, I just couldn’t keep my mouth shut. Plus my hatred for Indi
go ran so deep I almost didn’t care about the beatings. I would stay alive no matter what. Just to kill him. For me. For Gabriel. For Seamus. I felt the rage surge again.
“Too bad you’re not pink. You could have gotten a job as the tooth fairy instead of an asshole.”
“Chemical poisoning, bitch. You think I want to be blue? And if you don’t watch that mouth, your new color will be red. From all the blood.” He grabbed my forearm and nicked my pale flesh with his blade. A crimson line formed and droplets of blood dripped on the steel.
Gabriel leaned against the mesh and shook his head. I knew he was heartsick. I knew he wanted me to shut my mouth and survive. Try, at the very least. Indigo hit me again, and the crowd roared. But I’d been hit before. Many times. I was tough. Hardened. I had Seamus to thank for that. He had taught me how to survive. I’d heal.
It was Gabriel I was worried about. They had seen his loyalty to me. He complicated things. I knew the feeling. He complicated things for me too.
The sea whispered. Coming, coming, coming, Blue. Be ready.
“It’s about time,” I said. Indigo looked at me and shrugged.
I looked at my moon watch. The wave should have hit a half hour ago. But really, what did it matter? It was coming. People would die. I only hoped it wasn’t me.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Someone off the streets had come in shouting that water was receding near what used to be Stanley Park. Totem poles, long submerged, poked their heads out of the water for the first time in a decade. Little by little the beautifully carved cedar totem poles bearing the images of a raven and beaver, the orca and eagle, regained their place in the New Vancouver skyline.
But not for long.
The sea was merely taking a deep breath. This temporary reprieve signaled awful devastation to come.
I’m coming, the water whispered. Run, Blue, run.
My mind raced as I thought of all the different scenarios.
Gabriel and I could drown in here.
Right now.
Together.
But no. I refused to let him drown until we had an official date. Or at least a few more practice sessions. Besides, who wanted to die with all these morons who had refused to listen, chanted for me to fall to my death, and watched me get pummeled by a Smurf? Not the kind of crowd I wished to spend my last moments on earth with.
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