Wrath & Bones (The Marnie Baranuik Files Book 4)

by A. J. Aalto

  “One more thing,” I said, stalling her. “Is Colonel Jack Batten really dead?”

  Sayomi’s fine features flickered with uncertainty and the Blue Sense reported that she wasn’t comfortable with the answer. Finally, she shook her head. “You won’t find him. He’s been Soul Leached. His body is gone, dead, burned. This is all I’ve been told. I can say no more. You must not tell the grandson. If he comes for his grandfather, he will not be pleased with the outcome.”

  She was telling the truth, the Blue Sense reported, and reluctantly so. I nodded.

  Declan and I didn’t stay to watch her leave. After spending a moment of silence sadly wishing Pia’s spirit an easy journey, we piled in the taxi and spun out, leaving the corpses in the sand and the guardians to wander the tomb. If there had been more than one tomb guardian, we never got a glimpse of it. Probably, that was a good thing. I could live without ever meeting Babi the Baboon.

  After we ditched the taxi in the parking area, Declan and I charged into the airport, grateful to be away from the tomb and the bodies and the DaySitters and the werefox and the uncertainty.

  It wouldn't be overstating things to say I had more than enough sand in my gitchies.

  I made it to the second bathroom past the security checkpoint before yarking the contents of my stomach up. On inspection, there didn’t seem to be any meaty bits. I really hoped that meant that I had digested enough to get the benefit of whatever Declan had been talking about. Part of me wondered if the cheeky Irishman just wanted to see me eat the damn stuff. I inspected my bite mark. My forearm had a generous gash in it, and the edges of the wound were an ugly, bilious green. Lycanthropy. It had to be. Should I attempt to eat some more mellified man? A whole-body shudder told me otherwise.

  “Goddammit, Folkenflik,” I said, picturing Gunther in his straight jacket. That was quite common for werewolves and other furry people. Their disease had a tendency to cause myriad mental health issues, including psychosis and violent outbursts. A full ninety percent of known lycanthropes ended up in mental institutions or prison after a couple of decades or so. Was that my future?

  I wobbled out of the ladies’ room and found Declan with our bags. “I’m going to need about five shots of espresso before I have the strength to tell you I can’t do this anymore,” I told him.

  “You promised, and we are doing this.”

  “Think they’ll get off our backs now?”

  “Don’t know. But we’ve got a few days left, by the Overlord’s timetable, and no one is going to get in our way.” When I looked at him doubtfully, he showed me a weak smile. “If anyone can do this, Glenda, it’s you.”

  I stared at him for a long beat and finally cracked a tired smile. “Where the fuck do you get this delusional faith in me, Irish?”

  Chapter 30

  Before I lost my mind completely to the lycanthropy, I thought I’d check in with Batten to see how he was faring in Nepal. I took a deep, calming breath and dialed his cell.

  He didn’t answer.

  I called Devarsi Patel next and found myself smiling while I waited for him to pick up. He was like the wild, brash, Steve “Crocodile Hunter” Irwin of the preternatural biology world, or that was the face he showed the public. The moment he felt comfortable with you, however, Patel soon revealed a vast array of imaginary illnesses and conditions, and the closer you got to him, the sicker he became. A hardcore hypochondriac, the only real thing holding him back were his doubts, if you didn’t count the leg he’d lost in a mountain climbing accident. Oddly enough, that was the only thing he didn’t complain about, though you can bet he leveraged it when he needed to.

  I braced for the way Devarsi liked to say my surname. He ignored the first bit and focused on butchering the middle and end — NEW-ick — like I was a freshly discovered type of phlegm. Maybe five years in India, Nepal, and Pakistan had changed the way he talked. Born in Vancouver, he’d started out with the same flannel-wrapped Canadian accent I had, but he enjoyed putting on any number of accents for the press. The media loved him as much as they hated me.

  “‘Nuik!” He bellowed into the phone. “You need me, eh? Must be tough. Must prick ya, eh? To ask me for help?”

  My smile did not fade. Despite his eccentricities and his tendency to rib me, I truly enjoyed Dev. I hoped I wouldn’t get him killed, too; people around me were dropping like flies lately. Or being swatted like them, anyway.

  “It hurts so badly,” I gave him. “Are you giving my assistant trouble?”

  “Assistant? What assistant? That goddamn vampire hunter who called me? You thought I’d tell him anything?”

  “Batten’s not there yet?” I asked.

  “He doesn’t know shit about Gigantopithecus giganteus. But he’s asking? Why’s he asking? What does he really want from me?”

  “He wants nothing, Dev,” I assured him. “It’s for me. I need it. He's my minion.”

  “And I need painkillers, what have you got for me?”

  “You don’t need painkillers, Dev.”

  “The hell I don’t. Ever had your leg torn off? No? It hurts.” He hissed as though just talking about it caused him a fresh sting. “It hurts real bad.”

  “I have no doubt. The doctors will you give you what you need.”

  “Sisterfuckin’ doctor bullshit crap-packers,” Dev said, and paused to spit.

  “Look, I need this, Dev. Serious business going down with the dead guys.”

  Patel said something that sounded like fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh. There was no -ck.

  I asked, “You got my back on this one?”

  “You know how I am,” he equivocated. “I mean, I got problems here of my own. You have no idea. You want something? What’s in it for me, right?”

  “How about I don’t come to Kathmandu and rip off your other leg?”

  “Whoah, whoah, okay, settle down,” he said. “You on the rag? Cripes.”

  “I’m on my way to Nepal. I need you to show Batten the nearest yeti den when he gets there.”

  “Haven’t seen a yeti in—“

  “Cut the shit, Dev. That might fly on your TV show, but it won’t fly with me.”

  Dev cooed into my ear. “You watch my show!”

  “No, I don’t,” I said. “I see badly-subtitled gifsets on tumblr. What kind of drugs do you give the closed captioning people?”

  “Well, I don’t read your articles in Fast Science Quarterly.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “Okay, I do,” he admitted, “but only to track the dead pool on you.”

  “Aaaaallll right, I think we’ve heard enough outta science for today,” I said.

  “I have twelve hundred dollars riding on May fifteenth.”

  “I’ll try not to disappoint you,” I drawled. Declan flashed our tickets at me, pointed at his watch, and then held up four fingers. “We’ll be hitting a plane in four hours. You will be seeing me.”

  “Ugh. Plane germs. Wash your fucking hands before you get to me.”

  “I’ll shower in alcohol. Don't want the germs costing you that bet, right?”

  “One more thing…” Dev said. “Got a friend who could use a hand for a day. Would you mind if I borrow your assistant when he gets here?”

  I felt a quiver of unease. “Who, Batten?”

  “Yeah, you don’t need him,” Dev told me, “but I do.”

  The Blue Sense prickled to life to sting the side of my face under the phone. “He’s all yours. No skin off my nose.”

  “How much you want for him?”

  I smirked at the thought of renting him out, and remembered how irritated Batten had been when I’d offered him to Netta at Skulesdottir. “I can’t ask for a dime, Dev. Not a dime.”

  “Even better,” Patel said, sounding happy. He hung up abruptly.

  Declan must have seen a funny look on my face. “Problem?”

  “Of course there’s a problem,” I said. “Just not sure what it is.”

  Chapter 31

  Making connecti
ng flights from Egypt to Nepal can be a complicated and intimidating thing for an unseasoned traveler; I didn’t doubt that Batten had sailed through his flight from Ireland with no trouble, but Declan was accustomed to traveling by boat, and his special passports aroused plenty of suspicion, extra security checks, and basic human fear on both take-off and arrival wherever he went. Cairo was no different. I remembered my first meeting with Declan, and a confession on the long drive to my cabin that he preferred to cross the Atlantic by water. “All the best by sea and sail,” he’d said. Now I saw why. To put an immortal in the air in a cabin full of human beings was always a pain; putting a one-of-a-kind critter like a dhampir on a plane could, in some countries, present a nightmare of red tape and security concerns for the human passengers, from the airline’s point of view. They didn’t know what he was, what he might be capable of, and furthermore, they couldn’t guarantee his safety. There were waivers to be signed, and it was a good thing we’d lucked into several hours for this in our schedule, because while Cairo International Airport had dealt with revenants and the occasional lycanthrope, there was much explaining to do about the nature of the dhampir.

  The solution, it seemed, was to book a private plane. Even still, they had questions and concerns. I wasn’t allowed in the room with Declan and the security guys (and there were about a dozen who had come to see what the fuss was, though only two were conducting the “interview”). I sat waiting, occasionally answering questions posed by an interpreter who left the interrogation room, looked at my papers and passport, and then went back in. Customs and immigration staff were very concerned about Declan and his bag.

  I, as a garden-variety human, was uninteresting. I played dumb, opened my bag for them briefly to peek inside, plopped my Glenda wig on my freshly-shorn head, and did a little playful booty shake. Facing matching scowls, I smiled brightly and tried to assure them with hand gestures that the mellified man was just a snack. One of them was happy to buy my bullshit, but the other had his doubts and wanted to watch me eat it. I stapled a rictus-like smile on my face and swiped a finger through the honey bit, hoping I was misremembering how bad it tasted. I slipped the finger into my mouth and made exaggerated mmmmmm noises. I offered him some. He waved me away. If the translator came back and spoke to me, I might be in trouble with trying not to yark on his khakis, but the dudes who didn’t fully understand me had no interest in trying further; story of my goddamn life, right there.

  Eventually, we were put on a private jet plane with what I assumed was some sort of air marshal. The plane belonged to a curious Saudi prince was more than pleased to offer it when he’d heard about the “Irish monster looking for a flight” clear over in arrivals; his jet made Harry’s plane look like a crop duster, so I was hardly crying into my Royal Doulton china. The air marshal was blank faced and cool, but loose at the joints and fluid, reminding me more of de Cabrera’s easy grace or Hood’s non-stop physical energy than Batten’s brick wall of tactical prowess. He did a great job of pretending to ignore us as we babbled on about stuff. I tried texting Harry’s phone on the off chance that things had drastically and unexpected improved at Skulesdottir, but got no reply. I texted Golden to check on her. A few seconds later, my phone rang.

  “Hey. You’re alive,” she said, sounding surprised, if not entirely sober. “What are you up to?”

  “Same old,” I said. “Kickin’ ass and catchin’ dick.”

  Declan choked on his mimosa and did a spit-take. I shot him a wink and a single finger gun and he shook his head, dabbing his lap with his napkin.

  “No, you’re not,” Golden purred over the phone, knowing better. “Where the fuck are you?”

  “I’m on a billionaire prince’s private jet on my way from Egypt to Kathmandu to give a yeti a pedicure.”

  “No, you’re not.” She reconsidered the possibility while I didn't say anything. “Holy shit, you are.”

  “Where are you?”

  She made a surprised, guilty glurk noise. I was pretty sure I heard ice rattle in a heavy crystal tumbler. “Uh…”

  “You’re drinking in the spa again, aren’t you?”

  “Only to appease your guilt for leaving me behind. I'm trying to be depraved and decadent. It's hard work!”

  “Oh, my guilt is gone. I did you a huge favor by leaving you in Hammerfest. Huge.”

  “How do you figure?” she squawked. “I wanted to see noble renevants. Rev-a-nants.”

  “They’re gross, scary assholes in fancy clothes,” I retorted.

  “The fancy clothes are probably cool.”

  “Also,” I said, “what did you have for dinner?”

  “Reindeer,” she said. “It was amazing. And some kind of Viking vodka schnapps. What did you have?”

  “Google 'human mummy confection' later,” I dared her sourly. “Anyways, listen, I need you to do me an FBI favor. Do some digging on the disappearance of Colonel Jack Batten,” I said. “You might have to contact the RCMP, as he was last seen in Ontario. Do some schmoozing. See if they ever found a body.”

  “I'm totally into schmoozing right now.” I could hear her shift gears, dialing down to serious business, kind of. “Have things changed?”

  “Just covering all my bases, here. Thanks.”

  “Hey,” she said, “what are friends for?” We hung up, and I stared out the window for a bit. I thought about texting Batten with what I knew about his grandfather, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you did with your thumbs. Hey, your gramps might be alive, just in a different body. Smiley emoji. Kiss kiss emoji. I sighed and thought about trying to sleep, but I’d last track of how the back-and-forth jetlag would be working on my system.

  Declan was checking his phone. “Weather’s kind of chilly in Nepal.”

  “It’s January,” I said with a nod. “Kind of expected it would be.”

  “How the hell are we going to find a yeti nail in the Himalayas in the middle of winter if we can’t get through the passes? Those roads are bad enough in the summer. Most of them will be impassable right now.”

  “One thing at a time,” I said, patting the go-bag on my lap. I didn’t dare put it down, now that I had two quests down and one to go. I wasn’t letting it out of my sight. “We find Devarsi Patel and get some intel on yeti sightings.”

  “Will he be forthcoming?”

  “I may have to play sucky face a bit,” I admitted. “But Glenda will not be stopped! Not when she’s so close!”

  Declan rolled his head against the seat to look over at me with a tired, lopsided smile. “Still got your wig on.”

  “I miss my blonde hair,” I said.

  “I meant to ask, but I thought it might be a fashion choice.”

  “To have black and blue hair I could trip over?” I knew I’d be hacking my hair again soon, because it would likely be at my shoulders by morning. It was already covering my ears. “Ghost touched me before going beyond the veil,” I told him. “Left her imprint.” I gave him a brief rundown of my poltergeist case back home in Canada, and then said, “It could have been worse. Constable Schenk’s hair went pure white.”

  “Didn’t know ghosts could affect this realm,” he said.

  “Neither did I.”

  “Paper?”

  “Two,” I said, and brought up my work on his phone for him to read. While he did so, I tried to get some sleep in one of the generous bunks. When that didn’t work, I took a shower in the prince’s amazing flying mini spa, trimmed my hair so it was an even bob, and used some pomade that smelled like jasmine. I wouldn’t tell Golden about this part of my trip. The towels were the best I’d ever felt, and I wondered if I could just sleep naked in a mound of them. When I returned to my seat, I fell asleep quickly in a subtle, delightful haze of herbal decadence.

  ***

  Devarsi did not meet us at KTM airport, nor did he meet us in Kathmandu, or answer my calls. We roamed Dubar Square, dodging motorcycles, returning the friendly greetings of locals, and admiring the orange robes of some Sadhus with
elaborate forehead markings. The vibe on the streets was busy and welcoming, loud with honking and motorcycle rumblings. When asked about their TV celebrity, Devarsi Patel, people were happy to claim him as their own, although he’d been born in Canada to a pair of Canadian-born parents. We got conflicting instructions to finding Patel, but soon figured out that this was because he liked to bounce around, staying with different families. I put Harry’s beat-up coat back on, leaving the scarf in my go-bag wrapped around the canopic jar; the weather in Kathmandu was in the mid-sixties, the sun was bright, and there was no snow, but the wind was brisk. We sampled some street food, snagging a plate of deep fried shapale to share. We soon found we were starving, and one of us — it might have been me — really needed a coffee and a good cry to wash the reminder of mellified man out of my mouth and life forever. We ordered more shapale and stuffed our bellies before moving on.

  When we finally tracked Devarsi down, it was in one of his known haunts, a mustard-and-tomato colored building that looked like a drunken giant had built it out of off-brand Lego. A woman who did more nodding than speaking brought us inside, and the Blue Sense blasted me the minute I accepted her invitation; hope. She felt trapped by her own hospitality, and saw my arrival as an escape. I took this under advisement. We were led into a back room with a tiled floor and big, exposed beams across the ceiling. At a table laid with fried rice and vegetables and pickles and steamed momos, Devarsi Patel sat with his head in his hands. He looked up, and to me he appeared even more tired than Declan and I were.

  “Namaste,” I said, and repeated it to the lady who brought us a tea tray.

  “Dumpling?” Dev offered, waving at the momo. “They’re great. Sarmeela is an incredible cook.”

  “You’re trying to avoid me,” I accused.

  “Nonsense.” He blinked. “Did you shower?”

  I nodded. “I’m clean, Dev. How are you feeling?”

  “Never mind that now. Listen, you should turn back. See this weather?”

  There was no snow. The sun slanted through the open window behind him. “It’s practically balmy,” I said.