Ayashe’s face fell. “Hang on. What?!”
“Yeah, I know.” Jenner rubbed her mouth, grimacing. “It was really-”
“No, Jenner. You don’t get it. It’s not John,” Ayashe said, nearly tripping over her words. “That’s Michael. Michael changes into a white-tail deer.”
Chapter 37
“Holy freaking shit,” Angkor said.
All of us were frozen as the terrible gravity of betrayal settled over us like a leaden shroud. Zane blanched, his warm brown skin turned the color of weak coffee. Jenner didn’t seem to absorb it for a long moment, before her eyes widened and she coughed, putting a hand over her mouth.
“Jesus fuck,” she said. “I… I just assumed…”
“We all did,” Zane said. “I figured, that… you know…”
“No. Michael’s the deer,” Ayashe said. “I’ve seen him shift. Us herbivores hang out together in the good grazing spots sometimes.”
“What is John’s Ka?” I asked.
“I…” Ayashe looked aside at Jenner and Zane, then back to Angkor and I. “I don’t know. He never shifted in front of me. He had his own changing ground… he went there alone.”
“Fucking hell.” Jenner muttered something in Vietnamese.
“The kids are probably at Vanya’s dock complex,” I said. “But they could be at John’s house, or his changing ground. Can Weeders use magic?”
“I’ve heard that some of the oldest Elders can use magic of a kind,” Jenner said. “But… Michael was the one who would have known. Fuck. Oh fuck, none of us even ever thought to ask him.”
“John could have been the Deacon all this time,” Angkor laced his fingers through his hair and pulled it with a sound of frustration. “He knew I was going to the Ross changing ground.”
I didn’t think John Spotted Elk was the Deacon. The dark priest had a sensual, smug gravity that John lacked. The mage was patrician, confident, one of those magi who considered their ability to be a manifestation of their own greatness, their own chosenness.
“He hadn’t known I was going to Moris Falkovich’s house, but if he knew the Deacon and he could use time magic, someone could have foreseen it. Or he could have just arranged it as soon as I began to make any inroads on the case,” I said. “Even though Falkovich was badly decayed, you can’t tell how old a body really is with DOG killings. The kids had been moved from that house recently, I know it… the smell was still in the air. There were jail cells. Plenty of them. They’ve been moved at least once since that time.”
Zane drew a deep, steadying breath. “But where?”
“Vanya has the facilities to imprison multiple people,” I replied. “There is a company called AEROMOR that uses Docks Four and Five at the Red Hook shipyard. He owns all the warehouses and runs the union.”
“They could have just as easily been taken to John’s house,” Ayashe said, drawing herself tall. “He has a huge property up in Ossining. The Vigiles doesn’t have the resources to raid more than one site.”
“Then we do it.” Jenner lifted her chin, hands planted on her narrow hips. “Vigiles go to one site, we go and do the other.”
Ayashe ground her teeth until I thought her face would crack.
“Regular police can’t take on Morphorde,” Angkor said. “You know they can’t. They’d die by the score, Ayashe. All they have is munitions.”
“It’s true. Ain’t no one teaching the NYPD how to use a sword these days.” Ayashe regarded us all with a grim eye, hard and determined. “Jenner, if you lead a team to John’s, I’ll call in the cavalry and go down to Red Hook. It’s likely to be messier there. Besides that, we’ve got enough on that computer to make arrests, especially if Rex willing to testify in exchange for protection.”
“I’m not,” I said. “I am willing to provide an anonymous statement and help you match tattoos. You should be careful at Red Hook... Vanya has a lot of extremely dangerous men working for him. Be prepared for anything.”
“The more of them I can throw in the wagon, the happier I’ll be.” Ayashe jerked her chin forward and tossed her head. “You watch yourselves. I don’t think we ever knew the real John Spotted Elk, and we have exactly no idea what he’s capable of.”
***
Zane, Jenner and Talya went to confer with the rest of the Tigers. Exhausted, battle-weary, and starved from rapid-fire shapeshifting, they ordered more pizza than I’d ever seen in my life and gorged on at least four thousand calories apiece. It ended up with everyone clustered around the pool table with a map and a route drawn out on copy paper, laid out in front of us like a table-top roleplaying game. The property was outside the New York City limit, occupying a huge plot of forest land at the end of a cul-de-sac.
“We’ve got twenty-three miles between the site and the Tappan-Zee Bridge,” Jenner said. “We’re going to face one of three possible scenarios. Number one, they’re still there and we have to lay into the house. Number two, we get there in time to find them driving off. Number three, they’ve already left and we have to report to Ayashe so that the highway patrol can get on it. Assuming one or two, if they get the kids to the tollgates in cars or trucks we’re going to find it hard to keep on chasing them. There are cops all up that stretch of highway, and we’ll get pulled up if they’re not in the loop.”
“We should send an advance car.” I pointed at the map. The streets formed a rough circle. “There’s two possible exits to Saw Mill River Road. If we station parties at each exit, we can close on them in the event of a flush.”
“We’ve got shortwave radios on the bikes and in the Lincoln,” Zane said. “Suits me.”
Jenner nodded, leaning on her hands. “Right. Call an Alpha if you see them loading, Bravo if they’re taking off, Charlie if you can’t see any activity. Echo for emergency.”
“If I’m in the advance car, I can probably feel out for signs of life in the house without needing to get too close,” Angkor said, pizza still in hand.
“I’m going,” I said. “I’d rather be in a car.”
“And me,” Talya added.
“Y’git a taste for blood now, kitten?” Big Ron grinned at her with a mouth full of gray teeth. She replied by thumbing her forehead at him.
“I’ll drive.” Zane folded his arms across his chest. “If I could drive a Jeep in Iraq without getting anyone killed, I can do it here.”
“Good,” Jenner said. “Now, you lot listen up. These fuckers ruined my old man, killed Duke, killed a bunch of children and made funny-films with the rest. You wanna kill ‘em? Then kill ‘em. Don’t play around. If any of us end up in the can for this, we’ll be the fucking heroes of the joint once the people inside know what we’re in for. The Big Cat Crew takes on the critters, and the rest of you take on the HuMans. We’re going full Mad Max on anyone we find, you hear?”
The room erupted with noise loud enough to make me wince, and I took that as my cue to leave. Talya and Zane remained, while Angkor and I went to the bunkroom.
Josie was no longer there, spirited away by Ayashe now that the coast was clear. We lay out tools and sundry, and took opposite ends of the same lower bunk to clean our weapons in the humid stillness of the room. Angkor had borrowed jeans and a leather jacket from Jenner, and he was disassembling, cleaning and loading a rifle with the kind of expertise that spoke of protracted military training. The bedroom still smelled faintly of corruption, the rotten flesh smell I’d dragged in here from Moris’s house. While noticeable, Angkor’s floral scent was not as intense as it had been when we’d first found him. He’d been burning the magical wick at both ends since he woke up.
Watching him, I tried to imagine leaving New York and going to Berlin, hanging up the knives and the pistols, living a life without violence. It was easy enough to visualize – the trappings, at least. The lean European buildings, the university office. Myself, ascetic and professional in a turtleneck and suit jacket. A doctor, preparing lessons, writing thesis after thesis, or a surgeon. But I couldn’t imagine it a
s a reality. Vassily and me had been bred to this life. He and I were picked and reared as carefully as dogs for the blind.
I could take my degree to Germany, turn it into a Masters, then a PhD. And then what? Pretend I'd never killed anyone as I listened to men complain about their overbearing father or bossy wife? Pretend to empathize with women's relationship problems? Sure thing: me, the angry virgin from America who felt crippling pain with every unintended erection. What could I advise them? To find closure by swinging a sledgehammer into the back of their abusive father's head?
Pride had gotten me here. I was proud to have contacted my Neshamah and attained power, and proud enough to ignore his advice. I’d been proud enough to resort to homelessness instead of finding someone to ask for help. I fought pride as I struggled with my words, trying to frame the question I wanted to ask of Angkor.
“What?” He spoke first. “You look like you’re about to choke on something.”
“You… mentioned something before,” I said, finally. “Something about a HookWyrm.”
Angkor didn’t look up from his rifle. “Yeah.”
“I don’t know anything about it except that it chokes my magic.” I had to force each word out. This was not how I wanted anyone to find out about my magical emasculation. “I haven’t been able to work the Art since the start of September.”
“I know what they are, but I only know one way to get rid of them without killing you. You need Gift Horse blood.” Angkor grimaced, shaking his head. He didn’t look up at me, focusing on the gun. “You said it was put into your body by an old vampire?”
I paused in my work as nausea panged deep in my belly. “Yes.”
“Okay. There’s a kind of creature that is commonly known as a Wrath’ree.” Angkor rubbed his face, leaning back against the wall. “They’re basically GOD’s white blood cells, okay? Their purpose is to eat Morphorde, and they’re really good at it. They seek out and consume corruption. Evil magic or anything that’s made of dirty Phi.”
“Right.”
Angkor gestured with a hand. “Feeders have a special relationship with Wrath’ree. That’s way too much to try and describe right now, but the short version is that some really old, really powerful vampires can enslave a Wrath’ree and turn them into things they use to fuck up your day with. That’s what this little guy is. He’s an enslaved Wrath’ree, and his native Phi-eating ability has been turned into a kind of magical trap that blocks you from the rest of GOD.”
“So that’s it? We can’t get rid of it without a Gift Horse?” I had no earthly idea where to find one. The only one I’d met was dead, and I couldn’t even remember her face properly.
Angkor sighed, and tipped his head back against the wall. It was a gesture that bared the long brown line of his throat and the depression at the base of his sternum. “Pulling it out will kill you both. The Wrath’ree doesn’t want to die, and they don’t really know how to… de-escalate a conflict or listen to reason under the best of circumstances. I’m sorry.”
I turned my face, So, that was it. Three tries, and the best I’d been able to do was unwrap the lousy thing from my organs. Until we had the resources, I wasn’t a mage. I wasn’t anything.
No. That was sissy-talk. Even without magic, I was still something. I had beaten my way through a GOD-damned wall. I’d survived the Tigers’ Den. I’d pulled Angkor out of the fire. Zane and Talya were out there, waiting for me.
I drew a deep breath, clapped my hands to my knees, and stood. “Then that is how it is. You did your best. If we can find a Gift Horse, we can remove it?”
His head snapped up, eyes dark and fierce. “If we can find my Horse, I’ll do it in a heartbeat. But the Feeder who did this – Sergei? – must be extremely old to be able to create one of these. If it’s anything, I know for a fact that this Wrath’ree isn’t any happier about this than you are.”
“I find it hard to have sympathy for something that’s cutting me off from my soul.” I tested my limbs, rolled my shoulders, cracked my neck. Everything worked, though I was still achy. My body was probably at about seventy-five percent. It would have to be enough.
“The HookWyrm is cut off from its hive mind, which is basically the soul of its kind.” Angkor shrugged. “Neither of you are in a great place right now.”
“My heart bleeds,” I said. “How do you know all this, anyway? I never found it in grimoires, and not for lack of trying.”
“That’s because it can’t be written down. It gets taught orally, person to person,” Angkor replied. “How do you feel?”
“A bit better,” I grunted. “I still hurt, but I hurt less now.”
“Healing is never comfortable.” Angkor leaned in towards me, his eyes hooding to dark crescent-shaped slits. He had very thick lashes. Before I knew it, he was close enough to kiss. “Anyone who pretends healing doesn’t hurt has never had to heal anything, right?”
The skin of my chest prickled with gooseflesh. “For a pretty-boy, you certainly do talk like an old man.”
“Funny you say that. I’m older than I look.” He licked his top lip with a short, sultry laugh, and sat back with a smile. I cleared my throat and stood.
“Well, let’s go and get Jenner and the others. We have to make our plan of action.” I caught up my shoulder holster and slung it on, settling it in place while I went to the closet. I pulled a clip on tie, hooked it over my collar, and straightened it until it looked tied and not clipped on. Angkor got to his feet, slung the rifle strap over his shoulder, and turned to his own preparations.
“Thank you, by the way,” I said. “For helping me.”
“My pleasure.” He winked at me sidelong, arched his eyebrows, and wound sinuously out of the room. “Come on, grasshopper. Let’s go kill some monsters.”
I snorted, shook my head, and followed him out. Pretty as he was, Angkor’s posture, his confidence and steady hands and gaze all spoke of the same thing. He was a ruthless killer with a side of chutzpah. As Jenner had said of me, I could say of him – I liked him despite myself, but I couldn’t trust him.
Chapter 38
We tore up the nearly-empty highway from Brooklyn to Ossining, chewing up forty miles in under an hour. We quickly passed the city, leaving Manhattan far behind as we entered the wealthy forest suburbs north of Yonkers. The cabin of the car was tense and mostly silent, everyone preparing in their own way for what we might find at John Spotted Elk’s country home. Angkor was meditating over his rifle-and-ax combination in the front passenger seat; Zane was intent on the road, mouth grim whenever he looked into the rearview mirror and I glanced his face. Talya chewed her nails, popping the already short ends of them under her teeth.
I studied the map for half that time. The aging Tappan-Zee Bridge was the starting point for one of the major trucking routes from New York to Illinois. The house was at the end of a private lane off a narrow, winding forest road. We got onto the Taconic State Parkway, the road I normally took to get to Bozya Akra, and gunned north along the abandoned highway at twenty miles over the limit until we merged onto Saw Mill River Road.
“It’s the next left, Zane.” Talya’s voice was high and nervous. She had the radio, thumbing the trigger nervously. “Then take the second right, then follow the road to Marian Place. The house is the one right at the end of the cul-de-sac.”
“Roger that,” Zane replied, barely slowing as he took the hard corner and rumbled over the uneven asphalt. “Everyone ready to go?”
“As ready as I can be.” Angkor unwrapped his rifle and loaded a round, then wound his window down. We all did the same thing. Behind us, the motorcycle escort slowed at the entry to Inningwood Road, one of the two ‘mouths’ that opened up onto the highway. Looking back, I saw Jenner give us the thumbs-up.
From my position behind Zane, I could get the best view of the road outside. As we took the road deeper into the woods, flying at sixty in a thirty zone, I leaned out to get a look at what was coming up around the curve.
Three cars
roared out of Marian Place just was we were coming up on it. They screeched as they swung around on the turn and rushed us headlong in both lanes.
Zane wrenched the handbrake and threw the wheel to drift us as the first car clipped our bumper and flew by, followed by the zip-zip of the other two as they passed at high speed. I was flung back into my seat by centrifuge as the Lincoln about-faced, coming to a smoking standstill as a semi-trailer clawed up the shallow hill like a dinosaur and thundered off down the road. There was a shipping container on the back of the truck.
“Bravo! Echo!” Talya shouted into the radio.
“Damn this fucking- HOLD ON!” Zane slammed the accelerator, starting off in a cloud of burned rubber and swinging us in right behind the truck.
Angkor chambered a round into his rifle. “Get in closer! I can shoot out the tires.”
“You get in closer, asshole!” Zane snapped back.
We gained on the semi when it had to turn. I leaned out again, further this time, and aimed the Glock at the rear wheels of the truck just ahead of us. I exhaled, focused, and then nearly flew out of the car and onto the road as an unseen vehicle slammed into us from behind.
Zane held on as the car wobbled and threatened to twist and spin, but the suspension and his strength kept us moving forward. The car that had rammed us pulled up alongside, a black Jeep with Duke at the wheel. His formerly handsome face was barely recognizable as human: his cheekbones had been shattered, his face slashed from side to side. His skull was deformed, dented and shot through with razor shards of glass from every wound. He had a pistol leveled at Talya’s head.
“Down!” I was already headed for the floor.
Talya dropped, arms over her head, as one bullet zinged overhead and the second hit with an explosion that took a huge chunk out of the edge of the doorframe. I smelled phosphorus. Incendiary rounds.
Zane steered us away as the side of the car took several more bullets, and then ran our low-slung car into the taller Jeep broadside, trying to destabilize it and knock it off the road. Angkor braced against the passenger-side door and set the rifle against his shoulder, holding steady through the shoving match.
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