Banshee Cries

by C. E. Murphy

  "Lie back down, Walker. You're white as a sheet."

  I felt white as a sheet. I felt like all the energy that I usually ignored had been bleached and left out to dry. Part of me wanted to argue, because Morrison was the one telling me what to do. The other part thought falling asleep for the rest of the day sounded like a good idea. I started to nod, but Morrison's finger under my chin kept my head from dropping.

  "I sent Holliday to get your drum. That'll help, right?"

  I nearly kissed him. Instead I closed my eyes and bit my lower lip, nodding. "Yeah. Thank you." My nose prickled with embarrassing tears. "Thanks."

  I didn't hear him answer, but I felt the rumble of his voice through his touch.

  "I'll just lie down until Billy gets here, or food does." I didn't need to hear my own voice, either, to know that it was full of stings and thorns; that was how my throat felt. I hoped I just sounded tired, not angry or about to burst into tears. Morrison wrapped a strong hand around my biceps and helped me lie back down. I pulled a pillow over my head and knew nothing for a little while.

  * * *

  Billy didn't just come back with my drum. He came back with Gary, who found me in the laundry room, washing the broom-closet sheets. By the time he found me I'd eaten and rinsed out my ears, which made me feel considerably more human. I was leaning against the washing machine, feeling it do its thing, when Gary poked his head in and said something I couldn't hear. I grinned a little and pointed at my ear, which made him huff and puff like the big bad wolf.

  Getting anything useful out of the drum when I couldn't hear proved to be awkward as hell. I eventually sat down directly across from Gary and kept my fingertips on the drum's edge while he knocked out a beat.

  I'd never felt the drum actually call up energy inside me before. It was like a well filling, a few bubbles in the depth of me turning into splashes and then into a steady trickle. I said, "Faster," and Gary increased the beat until the power of the drum made me laugh with the feeling of life well lived. It was an entirely internal celebration that took my breath and made my blood run thinner and faster in my veins. I wanted a hundred drums all around me, so their vibrations shook the very air, making it safe for me to dance even without being able to hear the beat.

  I burst through the top of my head and into clear sky so cold even the blue was leached from it. I could hear my own labored breathing as I tried to catch oxygen from the thin air, but I knew with great certainty that I was hearing an illusion. My spirit might be unharmed—at least with regards to this particular instance—but the body I'd left behind needed repair work.

  The first analogy that slid through my mind was that of blown-out stereo speakers. I folded my legs and sat in the clear thin air, just as I might have within my own garden, and began the process of removing the destroyed stereo components and replacing them. I overlaid the idea on my own body, and called for the renewed power that lay coiled inside me. It sprang up, eager for the call, and swept through me.

  I had a completely horrid sensation in both my ears at once, as if bugs were crawling out of them. I stuck a finger in one and wriggled it, coming away with a tiny smear of bloody flesh. I let out a ragged yell and flapped my hand frantically, getting rid of the icky bit, then repeated the whole ritual, including the frantic flapping, on the other side.

  That part didn't hurt.

  The next part did. I could feel the power in me rebuilding my eardrums, fitting the right amount of newly created flesh into the cavity in my ear. It felt like an ink-jet printer was zipping back and forth inside my ear, making one tiny line of new eardrum after another. Heat ran down my eustachian tubes and into the back of my throat, tasting like blood and feeling increasingly like someone had poured molten gold into the delicate tubes.

  I kept coughing and trying to gag the feeling away. Nothing worked, the boiling feeling continuing to zip around in my ears, until they popped abruptly and wind shrieked against my new eardrums. I fell back inside my head, the ringing of the drum suddenly impossibly loud, and yelled again, this time scaring the bejeezus out of Gary, who stopped drumming and threatened me with the drumstick. Then he leaned over the drum and hugged me without warning, mumbling, "You get in all kinds of trouble when I'm not around, lady. You oughta watch yourself."

  "Yeah, well, you should see the other guy." I wrinkled my face. "Actually, I guess that's the problem. We can see him now."

  "Am I s'posed to understand that?"

  I gave him a lopsided smile. "Not really. C'mon. I need to go talk to Billy."

  * * *

  "My mother called it the blade. Blade." I tried it out without a capital letter and with one, wrinkling my nose. "Its master's blade, specifically."

  "And its master is?"

  I shrugged. Billy looked at the ceiling like he was asking strength from God. I spread my hands. "I thought getting any kind of name from a woman who's been dead for three months was pretty good."

  "Well, can you go get more?"

  I slid down in my chair, glaring futilely at Billy's computer screen. "What have I done for you lately, huh?"

  "It's the nature of the beast, Joanie. Can't get no satisfaction." He gave me a sideways look. "Are you really okay?"

  "Right as rain." I scratched my jaw where the blood had been. "I don't know how real this thing is, Bill. I'm not sure if it's something you can catch. Whatever Mother did to it set it back a lot of years, but she thought she'd have the power to destroy it, and that was a big fat bust. And whatever it is has got a master."

  "Forget about the master. The master isn't the thing stringing girls out by their guts, right?"

  "Right." God, I hoped I was right.

  "Then he's not our problem right now. By the way, Melinda wants to know if you're still coming over for dinner."

  I blinked. "What?"

  "It's the equinox tonight. She invited you last week, remember?"

  "And you think to bring this up in the context of masters? Or was it being strung out by your guts?"

  Billy fashioned a crooked grin. "You know Mel. She's a slave driver."

  I laughed. "So a little bit of both. Yeah, I don't see why not. I mean, you tell me. I know it's the first forty-eight hours of a murder investigation that are most critical, but we're kind of way the hell past that. Is taking the night off going to make a critical difference?"

  "If it does, it's my ass in the hot seat, not yours. You're just a beat cop, remember?"

  "A beat cop who isn't doing her job today. Crap." I got to my feet. "Did Morrison put somebody on the Ave to cover for me, or am I going to get beaten within an inch of my life the next time he sees me?"

  "You're fine, Joanie." Billy's voice was gentle. "People who spontaneously rupture eardrums, even if they follow it up with a little lay-your-hands-on-me action, are generally considered out for the day."

  I sat back down. "Yeah? That happens enough to have a protocol for it?" Probably only with me around. Great. "Can I bring Gary to dinner? Petite's still in the shop."

  Billy looked around. "Where'd he go?"

  "Back to work. Some of us," I said in my best gruff Gary voice, "gotta work for a living, darlin'."

  "Oh. Sure, bring him. Mel cooks enough to feed an army anyway."

  "That's because you have four kids, Billy. That is an army." I scooted forward, nodding at his computer. "Okay, so I'm Detective Holliday's personal assistant for the day, I guess. What do you want me looking for?"

  Billy snorted. "I can look up weird shit on the Net, Joanie. You're the one with the direct line to higher powers."

  "Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick, Billy. Don't say things like that. Higher powers my ass." I actually shuddered.

  "Whatever you want to call it, you've got a bead on something I can't access. Even the captain knows it."

  A fact which did not fill me with joy and glee. I sighed, dropping my chin to my chest. "Last time I went into the wonderful world of the weird, my eardrums exploded, Billy."

  "Look at it this way.
At least nobody shoved a sword through your lung." He gave me a sunny smile that held up to the glare I shot his way.

  "Thank you. Thank you, Billy, that really helped a lot. Bastard."

  "Hey." Billy looked injured. "My parents were married."

  "Mine weren't." Huh. I'd never thought of myself as a bastard before. Interesting, what you can get through almost twenty-seven years of living without thinking. "Look, Billy?" I heard myself get all quiet, like I was about to impart something important. Billy heard it, too, and leaned forward.

  "My mother had the chance to eliminate this guy back when she faced him. She didn't because she was pregnant with me and she didn't want to risk me. So this whole thing is kind of my fault." I wrapped my arms around my ribs, staring at a broken corner of tile beneath Billy's desk. "I mean, the fact that there are more dead women now. I know I'm being sort of a jerk, because I hate all this crap, but…I really want to get this thing solved. I need to. Whatever it takes."

  Billy clapped his hand on my shoulder, solid and reassuring. "We'll figure it out, Joanie. We'll get this guy. You'll get your piece."

  Or maybe he said peace. I wasn't sure.

  Seven

  The drumming hadn't been enough to fill me up. Not all the way, at least. Maybe a hundred drums would've poured so much energy and power into me that I'd have been good to go for the rest of the day, the rest of the week, as long as it took. But by midafternoon I was stumbling like Petite did when she ran short on gas, and nothing I did brought me even one whit closer to figuring out what the Blade was or how to stop him from killing someone else.

  So I did what any sensible woman would do. I went—no, not shopping. My idea of an ideal shopping experience was walking into the store, finding exactly what I wanted on the first rack I stopped at, buying it, and being out of there in five minutes. I was a retailer's nightmare.

  But I was also a well-trained Seattleite. When the chips were down, I went for coffee.

  The Missing O was half a block down the street from the precinct building, run by an entrepreneurial young fellow who thought the idea of opening a doughnut and coffee shop next to a police station was pretty funny. After a while the cops started thinking it was funny, too, and began to take a certain pride in being the O's number-one clientele.

  A barista greeted me not by name, but by drink: "Tall hot chocolate with a shot of mint?" I waved an agreement and went to pay without ever having to say anything. A minute later I was ensconced in the corner, hands wrapped around the drink.

  A coffee shop with a mug of hot chocolate was no place to solve the world's problems from, but it beat a sharp stick in the eye. I let my eyes half close, watching the world through a blur of lashes and waiting for inspiration to strike.

  Inspiration, last I checked, did not come in the form of Captain Michael Morrison. Well. He was certainly inspiring in some ways. He frequently inspired me to mouth-frothing argument, for example. At the moment, though, he stood a few feet away, frowning down at me as if unsure how to approach. I untangled my eyelashes and looked up at him. "I don't bite." I thought about that statement, then nodded, determining it was true. I couldn't remember having bitten anyone in my sentient years.

  Morrison let out a fwoosh of air and shrugged his shoulders. He was wearing a seaman's coat with big black buttons, so out of fashion it looked like haute couture. "That's a great coat."

  He looked as startled as I felt. To the best of my recollection, nothing like a compliment had ever passed my lips when I was speaking to the captain. He shrugged again, hands in his pockets, which made the whole coat move like a woolen wall with a purpose in life, and sat down. "Thanks. Belonged to my father."

  "Seriously?" I supposed it was unlikely Morrison had sprung fully formed from the forehead of his mother, but I'd never given much thought to his family. "He was a sailor?"

  "Merchant marines. He died when I was twelve."

  Neither of us knew what to say after that. I slid down in my seat and wrapped my fingers around my hot chocolate tightly enough to bend the cardboard. "So," I said after a while, just as he said, "Your hearing's back." I twitched a grin at the plastic top of my cup and nodded. I didn't see if Morrison smiled, too.

  "You and Holliday learn anything yet?"

  "We would've mentioned it if we had." It came out sarcastic. I hadn't meant it to. I saw Morrison's bulk move back a few centimeters, like he was responding to my nasty tone and putting extra space between us. Good, Joanne. Antagonize the boss. Again. "I'm trying, Captain. I really am."

  He muttered, "You certainly are," under his breath, making me look up in amused offense. His expression hadn't changed. Maybe I was the only one who thought he was making a joke. Great. Just great.

  "I really want to solve this." I kept my voice low, afraid he'd think I was kidding. After a moment something relaxed in his gaze, a little gleam of approval coming into it. I annoyed Morrison for a variety of reasons, starting with knowing a lot more about cars than he did, and ending, emphatically, with wanting a career as a mechanic when it was his opinion I could be a good cop. It was possible I'd taken one tiny baby step toward a better relationship with him by genuinely wanting to solve this case.

  "Has it occurred to you that you might be in danger, Walker?"

  The chocolate was hot enough to keep my fingers stinging with warmth, or I'd have dropped it in my lap, hands suddenly numb from surprise. "Sir?" I never called Morrison sir. I don't know which of us liked it less.

  "Your mother turned this killer in thirty years ago. If he puts you together with her—"

  I sat there staring at him, slack jawed with stupefaction. "It's unlikely," I finally heard myself say. "Different country, different names, pretty much no connection…."

  "Except whatever the hell you've got going on up there." Morrison pointed a thick finger at my head. I touched my own temple guiltily. The man had a point. Crap. He had a point, and I had no idea what to do if he was right. I blinked at the table, hoping it might come up with a brilliant answer or two.

  "Is this going to turn out like the last case?"

  Then again, maybe I hadn't taken any steps toward him approving of me at all. I curled a lip at the top of my hot chocolate, doing my best James Dean impression. "You mean with a dead body and no actual proof of guilt aside from the word of a semi-hysterical teenage girl?"

  Morrison gave a credible growl that rumbled up from the depths of his chest. I took that as a yes, and shrugged uncomfortably. "I'm putting my money on ‘probably.'"

  Silence stretched over the table long enough to break. I looked up when it snapped, to find Morrison glaring out the window, his mouth set in a thin line. At least he wasn't glaring at me. "Get me some answers, Walker. Tell me how to stop somebody else from dying."

  I lowered my gaze to the cup again. "For what it's worth, Morrison, I don't like this any more than you do."

  He stood up, the chair feet squeaking back against the wet floor. "That's the only thing that makes it bearable."

  I didn't feel any less alone, watching him leave, shoulders broad and strong in the seaman's coat.

  * * *

  I locked myself in the broom closet back at the station and struggled to get inside my own mind. When I finally did, my garden looked like somebody had dumped ash all over it, making it as tired and gray as I felt. It was not reassuring. Nor was the fact that it took Coyote a very long time indeed to show up, or that he looked distracted when he did. How a dog could look distracted, I didn't know, but there you had it.

  "I'm not," he said for the umpteenth time, "a dog."

  One of the few thoughts I seemed to be able to keep to myself around him was the private glee at being able to get on his nerves with something as simple as calling him a dog. It made me feel better right away. I even managed a bright grin. "Sorry. I need your help."

  "God helps those who help themselves, Joanne."

  I startled. "What, you're a Christian now?"

  "Is that so strange?"

 
; "Is it strange that my shape-shifting coyote spirit guide is a Christian? You tell me."

  He finally looked at me, little spots of brighter-colored fur above his eyes lifting like eyebrows. "No," he said. "It's not. You've got too many preconceptions, Walkingstick."

  "I wish you people would stop calling me that." I didn't like having my original last name bandied around. Especially not when I was dealing with psychic realms I didn't really understand. The idea that names had power was one I could grasp, if nothing else. Which actually brought me to my point: "I need to know how to protect myself, Coyote."

  He snapped his teeth at me and got up to pace toward me, looking alarmingly like a predator instead of a scavenger. "You should've been learning that for most of the last three months."

  "So sue me. Are you going to throw me to the wolves just because I'm slow on the uptake?" More than slow, I admitted. One might go so far as to say recalcitrant. Deliberately recalcitrant.

  I could live with that.

  At least, I could live with it as long as he gave me the help I needed now. Possibly, very possibly, this was not a good long-term game plan. I promised myself I'd think about that later. Preferably much later. I did my best puppy-dog eyes on Coyote.

  Note to self: puppy-dog eyes work better on people who do not actually possess puppy-dog eyes themselves. Coyote looked disgusted. I retreated on the puppy-dog defense and tried a verbal one. "All I need to know is how to protect the very core part of me, Coyote. My name. That kind of thing. I don't want the bad guys to be able to get to it easily."

  "A thought which only strikes you now that a bad guy is looming."

  "Yeah."

  Coyote dropped his head in a very human motion, and sighed so deeply I was surprised he didn't start coughing. "You know how to do it, Joanne. Think in metaphors."

  "What?" I found myself grinning just a little. "Like airbags and steel frames keeping my little ol' name safe?"

  He gave me a look that would reduce a lesser woman to blushes of embarrassment. I valiantly ignored the burning in my cheeks and mumbled, "Oh."