Grim Tidings (5 page)

Leo coughed, and then leaned over and vomited into the snow, flopping back with a low moan when he was done. “What the hell, Ava? I lie down at that motel hoping for a nap, maybe a little vodka and a hand job to ease the pain of going through a fiery car wreck, and I wake up tied to a chair in Satan's locker room.”

“You're pushing it with the hand job,” I said. “And at least you didn't wake up hanging from the ceiling being yapped at by the Hellspawn's answer to Gordon Gekko.”

Leo's face hardened, underneath the bruises and the crescent-shaped cut beside his eyebrow where someone wearing a ring had hit him. Owen was wearing a big crop of chintzy gold rings, I remembered.

“Did they hurt you?” Leo asked. I shrugged.

“Nothing a few dozen Valium, a hot bath, and a bourbon won't cure.”

He shook his head, nostrils flaring. “I'm going to kill every last motherfucker in that place. This was my favorite shirt.”

I stood up, brushing wet snow off my legs and butt, and offered a hand to Leo. “You have a dozen white shirts.”

“Yeah,” he said, accepting my hand. “And this one was my favorite.”

Leo's weight almost knocked me back into the snowbank. He grunted when he leaned on me, and I could tell a couple of his ribs were broken. “We can't stay out here,” I said. The wind cutting between
the dark buildings around us made my teeth rattle. I aimed Leo at the intersection, punching the crosswalk button with my free hand.

“I'm fine,” he insisted. “Just give me a minute to get myself together.”

“Freezing to death for the second time in two days is not going to help us,” I said. “Now get your stubborn ass indoors.”

Leo grinned at me. “Yes ma'am,” he said. Even with the bloody mess the reapers had made of his face, I felt myself smiling back.

I was headed for the strip club—at least they had booze in there—when a beater pulled up to the curb, spewing black smoke and Motown. The driver threw open the passenger door. “Get in!” she shouted.

Across the highway, I saw the first signs of movement outside the big gray box that the reapers called home. I nodded at Leo and helped him onto the big front seat. The inside of the car was as wide and plush as a champagne booth in the strip joint behind us, and I barely got the door shut before the driver hit the gas.

“You don't want to be standing there when they get their act together,” she said. “Trust me.”

“
They
would be . . .” I said, trying to gauge whose car we'd just gotten into.

“Reapers, stupid.” The driver pressed her foot down to the floor, roaring through corridors of snow punctuated by streetlights and burned-out warehouses. Aside from the eye shine of the occasional bum or very, very determined hooker, we were alone in the blackout. “Well, some of the reapers. Who d'you think?”

“The Easter Bunny, maybe,” I said, and she shot me a glare.

“Guess you think you're pretty funny.”

I returned the look. “Guess I do.”

“Ladies,” Leo muttered, his voice gravelly with pain. “Can we keep it down to a dull roar?”

The driver shook her head, dislodging a few pitch-colored strands from her short Mohawk. They fell in her face and she huffed angrily. “Typical. I risk my ass to get you out of there and y'all are just as pathetic as the rest of us.”

“The only thing you're risking now is a busted axle.” I winced as the car bounced over a mound of dirty ice cast off a truck tire.

“You just hush until I make sure none of those suits is following us,” she snapped. We drove around for another twenty minutes, taking random turns through the wasteland and finally getting on the interstate, heading north.

“Are we being kidnapped?” I said. “Surprise party? Where are you taking us?”

“He's the one, right?” the driver said. Her eyes never left the road, and her knuckles were so tight on the wheel I could see the bones. “The new Grim Reaper?”

“I sure hope so,” I said, watching as the speedometer climbed past 70. She showed me her teeth in that masking smile that never really hides fear.

“Me too.”

“So where are we going?” I asked again, trying for a softer approach. She was so twigged I was half-scared we'd go flying off the shoulder and end up in a snowbank until some unfortunate state trooper found us come spring.

“Safe house,” she said. “The empty suits at Headquarters might not have been happy to see you, but we are.” She turned her eyes to me, and there was white all the way around. “We all are.”

BUCHENWALD CONCENTRATION CAMP

DECEMBER 1944

Jacob was the one who finally moved, pulling the door in a swift motion and hopping back. A sobbing man fell into the room, blood splashing the front of his brown uniform like a sash on a beauty queen.

I didn't move until Jacob slammed and locked the door again; then I nudged the sobbing man with my foot. “You know him?”

Jacob nodded. “He's a soldier. He's a bad soldier. That's why they keep him here sitting at a little desk signing the party members in and out.”

I kicked the soldier again. “Stop crying!”

He clearly didn't speak English, but the kick got the message across. He gulped and looked up at me, looked to Jacob. “
Wer ist sie?
”

“All right,” I said, going back to my search of the drawers and cabinets for anything I could use against what was happening outside. “What's with those people outside? The short version.”

Jacob was bent over, examining the man in the uniform. He wasn't really a man, I saw as he sat shaking, his close-cropped head in his hands. He couldn't have been more than seventeen or eighteen. A couple of months ago he'd probably been happily heiling his way through a Hitler Youth meeting, with no idea that the Fatherland was being crushed around him like a tin can in a vise.

“How about you give
me
the short version?” Jacob said, turning the man's head from side to side and shining a small light into his eyes. The soldier flinched, and Jacob squeezed harder until he stopped struggling. “I have been here for two years and never seen an American who wasn't a prisoner at death's door, and now that you are here, everything is going to Hell.”

“There are no scalpels in this place?” I demanded, deciding to ignore his comment. I tossed the instrument tray to the floor. It clanged, and the soldier whimpered. “Not even a damn pair of scissors?”

“They lock up the instruments so we don't steal them,” Jacob said mildly. “Who are you, really? Why are you here?”

He reached for gauze and a needle and thread, gesturing at the soldier's arm. “Roll up your sleeve.”

The soldier shook his head violently.
“Nr. Ich werde nicht von
einem Tier genäht werden . . .”

“Hey!” I drew back my foot. “You want one that actually hurts? Shut your Nazi trap and let the good doctor work.”

Jacob's mouth twisted into an almost smile as he poured disinfectant on the soldier's wound, wringing another shriek out of his thin, bloodless mouth. “You are a liar, but I confess I like you. What is your name?”

“Ava,” I said. “Like Gardner, not Braun.”

“One of those dying prisoners was the first,” he said. “An American. Many of them arrive sick, and Kubler uses most as fodder for the anatomy lab, or for his hypothermia tests. But this man was different. He was . . .” Jacob trailed off, his eyes narrowing as the dimensions of the soldier's wound became clear.

“Now, I'm not a doctor like you,” I said as the twin half-moons of purple, bloody squares dribbled a little fresh blood, “but that's a human bite mark.”

Jacob hissed something under his breath, jumping back from the soldier as the man bared his own teeth in a stiff, bloody grin. His gums were bleeding, his nose, even his eyes were pooling with runny red tears. He let out a long croak, unfolding from the floor like he was spring-loaded.

Jacob wasn't fast enough. Nobody who was only human would have been. The soldier grabbed him by the throat and they both crashed into the exam table, Jacob ramming the thick roll of gauze into the soldier's snapping jaws before they could close on his neck or his face.

“They change!” he shouted as the soldier let out an anguished roar, a welt of thick, black blood oozing from his mouth as he vomited. “The doctors that the GI attacked, and now—”

He trailed off as I landed on the soldier from behind, wrapping
one arm around his neck. I couldn't use the knife, even now. It held Kubler's soul, and if I didn't come back with that, I might as well just leave myself for whatever was outside the doors.

The soldier jolted upright, swinging around and trying to shake me off, but I pressed down with all my strength, using my forearm like a bar to press down on his windpipe and the fat veins of his neck that got blood to the brain.

He sank his teeth into the meaty part of my forearm, but I held on. Even when he ripped and pulled at the flesh, I held on. If only one of us was walking out of here, it was going to be me. I'd be damned if some Nazi grunt got me to buy the farm after I'd survived this war, five years of blood, mud, shit, and more dumb warlocks than any one person should have to encounter in their life.

After a good thirty seconds, he finally started to slump, and I used the tiny slackening of his fury to shift one hand to his forehead, bringing his neck around with a crisp snap that filled up the tiny exam room.

Jacob let out a slow, shaky breath as the soldier's body toppled, and me with it. I was pumping blood like a fresh oil strike, rich and red as the armband on the asshole I'd just dropped. “I'm so sorry,” he said, backing away from me, fingers already scrabbling through the door. “You saved my life. I'm so sorry to leave you to this fate.”

“Jacob,” I said. “Jacob!” louder when he was still trying to fight his way out of the room in a panic.

“You'll change,” he said, almost apologetically. “And then you'll be one of them.”

“
Jacob.
” I gritted. “I would really like to not bleed to death, so could you at least toss me that gauze?”

He tilted his head to one side, watching me. I glared at him as we just stood there, the adrenaline screaming through me like a hot shot, his heart throbbing in his neck so hard I could see it jumping under his yellowed collar.

“What is happening?” he said after what felt like a century.

I stood up and ripped the gauze from his hand. Vertigo slammed down on top of my head, and I stumbled against the table, wrapping up my arm tight as I could. The bleeding had mostly stopped, but I was missing a chunk of skin and muscle. It'd be a couple of days before I was right and even longer before I could turn into the hound without being lame. “Son of a bitch,” I muttered as I tore off the end of the gauze with my teeth.

Jacob muttered something that sounded like a prayer and I threw the gauze back to him. “Yeah, all right, I'm not human,” I said. “But on the bright side, I'm not trying to empty you out like a canteen, so I suggest we both find the silver lining and get the fuck out of here.”

After a long second he nodded, and I unsnapped the soldier's holster, pulling out his pistol. Only four bullets sat in the clip. “Perfect,” I muttered as we gingerly opened the door.

“Are you a good shot?” Jacob asked, sticking so close to me he might as well have been growing out of my shoulder. “Americans are crack shots, yes?”

“You've been watching too many cowboy pictures,” I whispered, pausing in the lobby where the nurse had attacked me.

The hallway was still deserted, but there was a sound coming from outside now, a rising and falling drone of screams and cries. “It's spreading,” Jacob whispered. “There are thousands of people out there. Innocent people . . .”

“I'm sorry,” I said as I peered through the frost-covered window to the outside. “But there's nothing we can do.”

Jacob squeezed his eyes shut, sliding a hand over his face. “I can't do this. I was meant to die here. I just . . . I don't want to die like this.”

“Jacob.” I grabbed his sleeve as he started to back away. “Don't you quit on me now,” I said.

He slumped. “Why do you care? You are not one of us. Those people, the sick ones—they are not either, not anymore. And they will take the lives of all the people trapped here with no more thought than you killed that man in the exam room.”

“I died,” I said. It just came out, as the shapes moving beyond the door lurched and groaned, one pressing bloody hands against the glass. We pulled back, pressing ourselves against the wall. The grip of the gun was sweaty in my hand. “I died,” I said again. “And they haven't managed to keep me down yet.”

I reached down with my free hand and squeezed his. “I'm not going to die here, and I'll try my best to make sure you don't either.”

Jacob stared at the bloody hand prints on the window, but his fingers squeezed mine in return. “They're strong,” he said. “Fast. Anything they haven't bitten, they'll chase down like a pack of wolves.” He met my eyes. “Do you know what they are?”

“It doesn't matter,” I said. Better than admitting I had no fucking idea what was happening. Hellspawn didn't do this—Gary would have a conniption if he got a spot on his tie, never mind bathe in blood. Demons didn't have the need to cause mass chaos when they had the Hellspawn to do it for them. Vampires turned victims with venom, more like a venereal disease than whatever this was. That
left deadheads, corpses raised by a necromancer, but Kubler was dead. All of his walking corpses should have dropped with him.

We stepped outside, and I almost fell over Kubler's body. What was left of it, anyway. The crowded yard behind the barbed wire was swarming with the same languorous, bloody monsters I'd seen inside. Jacob flinched as a few turned their eyes on us. The eyes were pure black—or so clouded with blood from ruptured vessels they looked black. I crouched slowly, not breaking off eye contact.

“Get as much blood as you can,” I said, gesturing at the pile of ground meat and entrails that used to be Kubler. “Cover yourself.”

Jacob did as I said, retching as we both smeared the sticky, cooling blood over our faces and hands, down our fronts. While I was at it I ripped off the red armband. It fluttered into a pile of bloody snow and got trampled underfoot.

Beyond the fence surrounding the hospital, I could see more shadows in the gray half-light. Some were shuffling as if they still had control over their limbs; some were lying on the ground, quivering as the people still upright walked past without even looking at them.

“Where will we go?” Jacob whispered. “The guards . . .”

Sirens began to wail from outside the fence and a Klieg light snapped on, sweeping the yard and lighting it up brighter than the sun. Snowflakes twirled in the cone of light, turning red where they touched the bloody ground.

“The guards have bigger problems than us,” I said. Like the universe wanted to back me up, a burst of automatic gunfire clattered through the freezing air from far off in the camp.

Sticking to the rough hospital walls, Jacob and I eased past the mob of creatures. I didn't want to think about what could be going
on here. Deadheads were fast and hungry like these, but if they bit you all you were going to do was bleed, not turn into a pissy cannibal yourself. No vamp I'd ever met could rip a person limb from limb, even on their best day. I was still left with a big fucking
I DON'T KNOW
blinking over these things' heads, and I didn't like it.

By the time we'd made it to the fence, we were both almost weak from the tension of moving slowly, freezing every time one of the things turned our way and sniffed the air. Jacob grimaced at the sight of the wire. “You can fit. I am not so small.”

I shrugged out of the thick linen shirt I'd stolen. It was ruined anyway, so I wrapped it around my fists, trying not to wince as the barbs bit through the layers into my palm. I used my foot to push down the bottom strand and jerked my chin at Jacob. “Go.”

Jacob bent down, trying to fold himself in half and sliding under the top wire. He looked back at me. “What about you?”

“I'm right behind you,” I said. It wasn't a lie until I felt a hand clamp down on my shoulder hard enough to pull my collarbone back. “Jacob, run!” I screamed, as I landed in the freezing mud.

He ran. To his eternal credit, he ran and didn't look back. He didn't freeze, or try to be a hero. I would have grinned if I wasn't spending all my effort on breathing after getting slammed to the ground. I'd been right. Jacob wasn't going to die here. He was a survivor. Like recognizes like.

A foot tucked under my shoulder and rolled me over. The spotlight lit up a man's face, hard-carved with sharp cheeks and chin, like someone had hacked him out of wood. He looked at me, steam rising from his mouth as he breathed hard in the snowy air. “And who might you be?”

I lashed out with my foot. He was a big bastard, at least six and a
half feet, so I didn't bother aiming for the groin. Kneecap is much more accessible when you're on the ground, and he let out a startled grunt when I made contact.

I managed to get up, but he grabbed me again, slamming me into the fence. The sensation of a hundred hot pins digging into my back and thighs as the barbs bit my skin forced me to make a sound, and he smiled.

“You're not one of them,” he said, looking at me with his head cocked, like I was some kind of rare creature he'd caught in a trap. I wondered if I was about to lose my skin.

“No,” I whimpered. “I'm not a Nazi.”

He pressed me harder against the wire, and I hate that tears were leaking out of my eyes. Men like him wanted me to flinch, wanted me to cry and beg. Usually that was the quickest way out of whatever mess I'd found myself in, but this time the man's eyes were dead. Nothing was going to get me out of this. I knew that kind of man by sight too.

“That's not what I'm talking about,” he sighed, almost in my ear. His breath was hot and he smelled—not like offal and blood, but something strong and herbal, which chilled my nose and all the way down the back of my throat. “You're so small,” he said. “Like a bird. I see birds caught on this fence. Their feathers get so heavy with blood they can't fly away.” He pushed again, and I felt one barb dig into the back of my head, all the way through the scalp. The man moaned into my hair.