Public Enemies

by Ann Aguirre

  “You angered the Harbinger only to get his poor pet killed … and this is what you saved dear Kian for?” The cold god chuckled. “Sometimes I wonder if you’re as clever as academic records imply, Miss Kramer.”

  “Maybe not,” I gritted out.

  “Pity. Your plans never seem to work out as you hope. It would’ve been kinder to let Buzzkill execute Kian Riley. Much quicker than poison.”

  The ember burned my palm but I didn’t open my fingers. Some quiet instinct whispered that if he saw it, he would take it by force, and I couldn’t let that happen. A glance at Buzzkill told me he was weighing his options, but in the end, he kept quiet. I didn’t know why. Something like hope shivered through me, delicate as cricket feet. Excruciating pain now, but I couldn’t let on.

  “I’ll take care of him. Go.” The last word came out gritted through my teeth. For a few seconds, I feared Wedderburn would linger and then I’d die of shock, but instead he swooshed away in a showy departure of winter wonders.

  Moaning, I slammed my hand into the snow the cold god left behind. It cooled the stone to bearable proportions, and the throb in my palm died away to numbness, probably not a good sign. I was more worried about Kian, who still hadn’t stirred. Lifting myself off him, I made sure he had a heartbeat. Yeah, faint but there. Panting, I rested my head against Kian’s chest.

  “You can’t keep Dwyer’s heart in a snowbank. He’s weak now but he’ll be back for it.”

  “Why didn’t you tell Wedderburn? He probably could make great use of this.”

  “Probably,” he admitted. “And … I’m not sure. Technically you’re my boss right now, so I could say it’s because I knew you wanted to keep it a secret.”

  “But that’s really not why.”

  He shook his head, taking on the nondescript bodyguard role again. “Hang on a sec, I’ll see what I have to help you.”

  “Huh?”

  Rather than answer, he rummaged around in his case and produced a small square box. “This should do the trick.”

  Buzzkill popped it open to reveal a lead-lined container. My whole arm felt dead, and it took most of my strength to lift the stone and drop it inside. He sealed it up and handed it back to me. My head was fuzzy from exhaustion and pain as I tucked it into my jacket pocket, but I couldn’t pass out.

  “I’m going into Cuppa Joe for a sec. Gotta tell Shirl that we need cleanup in aisle death.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  Poor Aaron.

  But I couldn’t even grieve because I was so damn worried about Kian. While Buzzkill went inside, I tried to bring him around, but nothing worked. His inhalations grew lighter and fainter, until I feared I could hear the death rattle in his chest. Oh my God, no. Not like this. Fear and rage went battle royale in my brain. Maybe it was futile to feel this way when he had an expiration date. In a few short months, he was turning twenty-one, and on his birthday, the Harbinger would drink him like a refreshing beverage.

  The first tears were falling when Buzzkill stomped back toward me. “Get that meatsack on his feet, or we’re leaving him. Find his keys.”

  His brusqueness jolted me into movement born of sheer antipathy. A glance at my compact told me Cameron had only a little juice to give; he was a faint shadow, but I showed no mercy in calling him again. The whispered word left me with an empty mirror and just enough energy to hoist Kian over my shoulder.

  “Bullshit,” I said. “Did you complete driver’s ed? Because I did.”

  For once, Buzzkill was speechless as I stumbled past him toward the Mustang. He followed with a few choice imprecations about me not knowing when to quit, but I ignored him. I slung Kian into the passenger seat and called Raoul while waiting for Buzzkill to get in back.

  My guardian/mentor picked up on the second ring. “What’s up, mija?”

  “I hope you’re not far,” I said shakily. “Because this is an emergency.”

  IN AN EMERGENCY, CALL THE KILLER CLOWN

  Quietly I updated Raoul. He listened without interrupting and then to my vast relief, he took over, his voice flat with fear. “Meet me at his apartment. I have to get a couple of things, and then I’ll be right there. Get rid of the clown.”

  “Understood.” I started the car without turning around.

  I didn’t actually have my license, as I’d only finished taking the class at school. Which was why I didn’t drive Davina back from New Hampshire, but this was life or death. I couldn’t let a laminated card stop me from getting Kian some help. Hospitals would probably be a waste of time, considering the supernatural quality of the venom. When I got there—if I got us there—I’d confirm with Raoul. Much as I wanted to check on Kian, I didn’t dare take my hands off the wheel or my eyes off the road.

  City driving was terrifying. I’d done behind-the-wheel practice as part of the course, but since Blackbriar was located in the burbs, traffic was nothing like what I faced at the moment in Boston. My knuckles went white on the wheel. If I clipped somebody or took out a fire hydrant, that would delay us, and Kian couldn’t afford me to screw this up. Saving him before was a choice I made, not a wild drive across town on unfamiliar roads when I’d driven a car for exactly twelve hours before, always with a professional instructor on the passenger side equipped with his own brake and steering wheel. My heart felt like it would lurch out of my throat.

  Finally, I pulled up outside the apartment building and ran around to see how Kian was doing. He didn’t look good. The places where the snake god had bit him were turning black with red streaks raying out from the punctures. Buzzkill didn’t say anything; he just slung Kian over one shoulder, probably knowing I had nothing left. As we went toward his door, I freaked out silently. If Raoul’s there … but, no, he said immortals shouldn’t recognize him. But I was none too eager to test our luck. So far, it had mostly been bad and worse.

  I unlocked the door with Kian’s key and said, “Put him on the couch.”

  “If you don’t do something, he’s dead in under an hour.” The quiet statement made me shove Buzzkill toward the door. “Ugly dying too. Want to hear how it’ll go?”

  “Shut up already!”

  He paused, resting a hand on the door frame. “Wedderburn might be able to do something, but I’m sure you already know, he never works for free.”

  “Kian would rather die than go back in hock to Wedderburn.”

  Buzzkill nodded. “Try not to piss anyone else off. You have more than enough enemies.”

  “Very public enemies,” I agreed.

  How angry was the Harbinger? He’d said I had almost exhausted his powers, but maybe that was an exaggeration. Mentally I ticked off the things I’d done to agitate him: ruined his party, stole Aaron from him, refused his weird offer to make me his pet, and finally … got the poor kid killed. Knots formed in my stomach, Gordian whorls of grief and regret.

  The clown observed Kian for a few seconds, and whatever he deduced made him shake his head. “I could kill him. Just this once, I’ll make it quick and painless.”

  “Get out.”

  “That’s no way to thank a comrade in arms.” But he went, reducing my problems by one.

  As soon as the door closed, I knelt beside Kian and took his hand. “Hey, you have some time left. You can’t quit on me now.” His lashes fluttered but his eyes didn’t open. Tears dripped from my cheeks to his, one rolling toward his lips, where it trembled and spread. In fairy tales, the tears of your one true love would be enough to cure him.

  He didn’t stir.

  Either I’m not his true love or happy endings are a lie. Crying quietly, I touched my brow to his, listening to the dry rattle of his breath. It sounded like he could leave me at any moment, and I wasn’t ready. There were so many things we hadn’t done together. I didn’t expect forever, but I wanted more time.

  A few minutes later, Raoul burst through the door with a paper sack. He barked an order as he skidded to a stop beside the couch. “Boil some water.”

  In seconds I
had a pan on the stove while he unpacked various objects: an agate cup, amethyst pendant, a bone spoon, a rock I couldn’t identify, what looked like shark teeth, and something even weirder. I paced, waiting for the water to heat, and as soon as I saw bubbles, I grabbed a pot holder with my good hand and raced into the living room. Silently Raoul poured the water into the cup, then added all the other objects. If he was making a magic potion, it didn’t sizzle, steam, or turn colors. To me it just looked like he was soaking strange stuff.

  “What is all that?”

  “Supplies,” he said tersely. “We’ll talk afterward.”

  Chastened, I slumped to the floor, cradling my bad hand against my chest. Likely I needed medical attention. I could also use a plan, because Buzzkill was right; Dwyer wouldn’t wait long before coming after the ember I’d pulled from his chest. I suspected it would probably act as a tracking device too. As long as I had it, he’d be able to home in on me like I was GPS-chipped.

  Ignoring me, Raoul kept stirring while I shivered. Reaction set in, heavier and harder than shock. I remembered Rochelle’s warning about getting hooked on the rush from using my spirit familiar and I bowed my head. My hair smelled of smoke, and the ragged ends I could see tumbling over my shoulder were black and charred. I didn’t get up to check it out.

  Finally, just as I wrestled with the urge to tell him to hurry up, Raoul cut the fabric away from Kian’s bites, then he simply poured the hot water into the punctures. Where there had been no response, Kian screamed, a raw, awful sound, but he still didn’t wake up. Raoul repeated this process until the water was gone, and there were only those strange objects in the bottom of the cup, damp and inexplicable.

  “Did it work?” I demanded, studying Kian anxiously.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You should have all kinds of resources—Black Watch artifacts, why aren’t you sure?”

  “They have given me nothing,” he said. “Would my master have asked me to steal from Wedderburn, if he had anything sufficiently powerful to conceal me?”

  “Then it sounds like they’re worthless,” I muttered.

  “Perhaps. But they’re also the only ones who know about the game.”

  I ignored that. “Explain what you did to him before I lose my mind.”

  “Everything I have here is from the ancient world, items that people believed would counteract the effects of poison. A hornbill spoon, a chunk of a celadon dish, an agate cup, fossilized shark teeth, snakestone—”

  “So if enough people believed in one of these objects, then it’ll work. If not…” I couldn’t complete the sentence.

  Neither could Raoul. Instead he nodded quietly.

  “What’s snakestone?”

  “Ammonite fossil, an extinct sea creature similar to the nautilus. Ancient civilizations prized them because they resembled a coiled serpent.”

  “Sympathetic magic?” I guessed.

  “Seems likely.” Raoul went quiet then, and in his expression I read infinite sorrow.

  Kian wasn’t wrong in thinking this guy cared about him. I bet he hated taking off.

  Knee-walking closer to Kian, I cupped my hand around his. For now, he was still breathing. His wounds were still puffy and dark, but maybe the red streaks didn’t look so bad? That might be wishful thinking. Raoul stayed beside me, on his knees as well. To a random observer, it would probably look like we were praying. I held the pose until my shins ached, along with all my other damage.

  “Should we take him to a hospital?”

  He shook his head. “The doctors wouldn’t know what to do. Antivenin treatments are primarily successful for modern medicine when they have a specific antidote on hand. Sometimes people die even after getting treatment because the doctors can’t get a hold of what they need soon enough.”

  “That’s not helping,” I whispered.

  Frowning, Raoul peered closer at me. “You’re the one who looks like you need a doctor.”

  “Yeah.”

  My hand was definitely screwed up. I couldn’t unfurl my fingers; they were curled atop the burn I’d taken stealing Dwyer’s heart. My back, stomach, and sides hurt too, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been in the lab. My spirit familiar shielded me to some degree.

  “Let me see.”

  I recoiled as he took my hand, not because it hurt. Because it didn’t. That seemed worse; I couldn’t feel it when he forced my fingers open. From the wrist down, it was a dead zone, and when I saw the charred mess my palm had become, I almost threw up. I turned my face away, tears starting in my eyes.

  “Mierda,” he breathed. “What did you do, grab a live wire and refuse to let go?”

  Right, he didn’t know about the heart in a box. “Something like that.”

  “We have to get you to an ER right away.”

  “But Kian—”

  “You could lose the hand if we don’t act fast.”

  “I’ll risk it,” I said quietly. “Kian will either wake up from your maybe-cure … or he won’t. Either way I won’t leave him alone.”

  I sat beside him for an hour, longer than Buzzkill predicted he’d live. We used ice packs to keep the swelling down and Raoul got him to swallow some water. That gave me hope that he might be turning the corner. Two hours later, his fever spiked, but generally, that was a good sign, right? It meant the body was trying to fight an infection.

  By this point, I was beyond shaky. “Okay, I think I better see a doctor. You stay with him, okay?”

  Raoul nodded. “I’ll text you if there’s any change.”

  I stumbled out of the apartment and down the steps with a dish towel hiding the massive eyesore my right hand had become. Dwyer’s stone heart was still burning a figurative hole in my coat pocket, safely inside Buzzkill’s mystery box. The killer clown fell into step with me, coming out of nowhere, as I wobbled toward the station. It wasn’t far to the hospital where Brittany died. For obvious reasons I didn’t want to go there, but in my current state, I couldn’t find my way anywhere else.

  “You have absolutely no plan, do you?” Buzzkill sighed.

  “Did you work that out all by yourself?”

  “Don’t be an asshole to someone offering you a freebie. Come on.”

  “Huh?”

  Instead of the hospital, Buzzkill took me to headquarters. When I realized we were outside WM&G, I nearly broke my ankle trying to run away. But the clown collared me and dragged me in through the lobby, where I found the receptionist done in ominous shades of orange to match the scary new décor. Iris looked like something out of a weird fashion magazine with a towering updo, the kind that required wire and scaffolding during the French Revolution. The rest of her was straight out of the sixties, polyester skirt and jacket with tall boots and insanely long fake eyelashes.

  She reached for the security button until she registered Buzzkill behind me. “Are you taking responsibility for her?”

  “Don’t sweat it, doll.”

  I raised incredulous brows, but Buzzkill had a hold of my elbow, drawing me toward the elevator bank. He pushed the call button and scanned his card when we got into the first one that opened. He took me to the thirty-sixth floor, a part of the complex I’d never seen. As we rose, a bizarre canned version of “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” came on. Like things weren’t weird enough, Buzzkill whistled along.

  “What are we doing here?”

  Before he could answer, the doors slid open, revealing a sign on that wall that read MEDICAL and RESEARCH with arrows pointing either way. We swung right, following the scent of antiseptic, like a hundred times stronger than you’d find in a hospital. There was also an odd unidentifiable odor, similar to hot metal.

  “Patching you up,” Buzzkill answered eventually. “I know you’d rather see Boss’s head on a stick than ask for help, but there are certain perks available.”

  “You said it would cost me to get him to save Kian,” I protested.

  “He’s out of the game, remember? Whereas you, chickadee, are still Bo
ss’s favorite little play-pretty. How’s that stupid saying go, don’t bite off your nose, and all that. Unless you’re actually biting off someone’s nose. In which case go ahead. But remember, there’s a surprising amount of gristle.”

  “You are everything that’s wrong in the world.”

  “If you knew how much self-control I’m exerting to keep from fileting you, kid, you’d pin a medal on me.”

  “Let go!” I struggled, convinced he was taking me to be dissected. Wait, no, he had all the knives, and now we were headed to the perfect setting. There was probably a drain in the floor to hose off the blood afterward.

  In answer he shook me like I’d seen mama cats do to fractious kittens. When he dropped me, I stumbled through the doorway to Medical, drawing the attention of two things working inside. They weren’t human but they didn’t seem like monsters either. Actually they looked like medical droids from various SF films: shiny, cylindrical, balanced on two wheels, with multiple appendages, though attachments might be the better word. The closest one enveloped me in a blue beam, then an image of me popped on holo along with a list of my physical issues: slight anemia, various contusions, a tiny gastrointestinal perforation likely caused by blunt force trauma, and a third-degree burn on my right palm. On closer inspection, the room seemed to be a clinic of sorts. I recognized the names on some of the bottles on the shelves from my chemistry classes. My breathing dropped away from the risk of hyperventilation.

  “Just let the thing work on you,” Buzzkill said with visible impatience. “You think you’re the first idiotic catalyst to run afoul of the opposition? That’s what this is for. It’s not like I need a health-care plan, genius.”

  “Oh.” Now I did feel pretty stupid. If I’d known, I could’ve come here after the Harbinger’s party, but nobody had given me a membership packet.