Blood & Dust (22 page)

The front page, and yesterday's television and radio coverage, showed they'd got away with it.
But it was getting harder to paper over the cracks. Hiding behind his false IDs, calling in favours
from their plants in the media and the cops and the government; all the bullshit made him long for
the good old days of kicking in doors and breaking heads and leaving the explaining to someone else.
Where was Felicity when he needed her?

Still, this gig had its rewards.

Mira called.

Reece took a last inhale of his ciggie, a slurp of coffee, scooped the Monaro's keys into his
pocket and headed inside.

He checked the second bedroom. The Night Rider moll lay cuffed to the soiled bed. Mira had spent
two long sessions with Kala since they'd brought her in. The second time, after it was clear that
Taipan and Kevin Matheson were not among the dead, he was fairly certain the torture had involved
some of Mira's hoodoo. The red-eye was barely conscious, but her body was mostly healed. A bath and
a decent feed, maybe a transfusion, and she'd be good to go. He picked up his pace, arriving at the
master bedroom as Mira called him again. Taipan's escape had infuriated her; sure, she'd found
compensation, but he didn't want to risk aggravating her further.

Clothing littered the carpet like oddly shaped stepping stones. The curtains were closed. The
bedside lamplight revealed a wine bottle and glasses, the remnants of room service he'd ordered
after midnight. Green eyes regarded him from the gloom. Mira lay, propped up on pillows on the
rumpled king size in a white silk robe, remarkably clean amid the splatter. Bhagwan's two red-eyes
lolled naked and listless at her side.

'Think I might've found a suck-up present for Jasmine,' Mira said, her voice languid from her
all-nighter. 'These two cow pokes are both very good in the saddle.'

She slapped the male on the arse and told them both to leave the room.

Reece waited patiently by the door till they'd slunk out, looking like the survivors from a
natural disaster. Chests scratched, skin blotched and pale. Their matching ankh tattoos struck him
as being too cute.

Mira gestured him over. She was surprisingly chipper. The upside of a night of blood drinking, he
supposed, her frustrations drowned for the time being.

'We made the front,' he said, waving the paper as he walked to her side.

'All you'd have to do is run down the main street naked to do that. Assuming there was anyone
around to notice.'

'Nothing the television didn't have last night. Amphetamines on a commercial scale, tied into an
outlaw motorcycle club. Rival gang or a falling out in the ranks. Yada yada. Bhagwan would have a
purple fit.' If he wasn't on ice in a wardrobe, waiting for Mira to decide whether to let him keep
his head.

'Then he'd be a hypocrite. He was one of the biggest drug suppliers in the state.'

Past tense: didn't bode well for the veggo. 'I'm not sure cow's blood counts as a controlled
substance.'

'A substance of addiction, nonetheless. Did you enjoy your cigarette?'

'Very much, thanks for asking.'

'It ruins your tastebuds and your sense of smell.'

A small price to pay for the irritation it caused her. 'It's good for my nerves.'

'Jackals aren't supposed to have nerves.'

'Us Hunters do. Keeps us alive.'

'If the smoking doesn't kill you first.'

'We both know that's not likely.' Although, the way he'd been feeling lately; what would happen
if her blood lost its power to maintain his body in this strange almost-stasis? Would all those
years come rushing back at him like a rubber band stretched tight and released, or would he just
pick up where he'd left off, going sedately into old age with only memories of when he'd been damn
near indestructible?

Mira studied him, detecting his mood, he supposed; the blood didn't lie, not to her. She had to
know he was tiring. That he was approaching a T-junction of mortality and immortality. No, a
cross-roads: 'involuntary retirement' was also an option.

'No further word of our Taipan, I take it?' she asked.

'Not since he took out the roadblock last night, heading west. Coppers aren't happy.' Two dead,
two in hospital. No, there was nothing to be happy about there. Poor bastards never stood a chance.

Mira didn't acknowledge his disapproval. The cops were just pieces on the board to her; so was
he, for that matter, especially now that he was entering what some called red-eye menopause.

'Taipan and the boy have gone to ground,' she said. 'The grease monkey is shutting me out.
Resisting me.'

'He can do that?'

'Oh yes, especially at this distance. He was still in the change when I bled into him, and not
even I can predict what effect that will have had. I suspect he's got a little of me in him.'

'Can he back-trace you?'

'No.' She took his hand and laid it on her left breast, directly above where the nipple pushed
through the silk of her robe. The top curve and point of her pentagram tattoo peeked out from under
the rim of the shiny material. 'I took the requisite precautions. I've always been a big believer in
practising safe sex. You can never quite tell just what kind of monster a child will grow up to be.'

She kissed his hand and released him.

'Besides, despite the anchor,' she waved her left wrist with its fleshy bracelets at him,
'bloodlinks lose potency with time and distance. Even without his active resistance, I doubt I'd be
able to trace him back to the nest, not with the bloodbitch throwing up interference.'

'So they've escaped.'

'We've destroyed the body, now we have only to take the head. I have a new plan to draw them
out.' She gave a mischievous chuckle. 'Jasmine is not going to like it.'

'Back to the Siding, then?' He kept his voice neutral, hiding his weariness. Maybe it was the
tropical heat, wearing him down, but he had seriously hoped that this raid would be the end of it.

'Back to the Siding. Tell Felicity to expect us. But first,' she propped a leg up; her robe fell
open to the groin, 'I think you've earned a drink, Hunter Reece.'

Mira drew a nail down that tender skin, opening a beaded line across her upper thigh.

He kneeled, and as he went to it, she cracked the paper open.

'Mm, nice pictures. We did make a mess of Bhagwan's spread, didn't we?'

He lifted his head, his tongue coated with her blood. 'Was all that firepower really necessary?'
he asked. They'd heard the explosions and gunfire in Mt Morgan, so the paper reported. Like a war,
one resident had been quoted as saying.
What's the world coming to?

'Well, I did consider hanging you out the door on a piece of rope with a crossbow, but I have
grown fond of your insubordination.'

She pushed her thigh at him, and he traced the wound again with his tongue, hungry for the
rush.

'Nice job on the chopper,' he murmured. 'Having all the toys tucked away like that.'

'Worth the delay.' She popped her head around the paper to smile at him. 'We can't fly around
with cannons and rocket pods hanging off us, can we? People would talk.'

'They'd all want one.' And finally, the blood rush hit, sweeping him away. He buried himself in
her blood, loving it and hating himself at the same time.

'Exactly. When you're done, find some clothes for Taipan's red-eye and dump her. Let's see which
way our courier pigeon flies. Oh, and Reece - you'd better give her back her little knife. I need
her to arrive in one piece and the roads, they just aren't safe these days.'

Kevin lay panting in his shallow grave, letting the memories of the night before,
the nightmares of the day, subside. Mira had come to him, and he'd fought her off, kind of, and he'd
fallen back into his torpor. Now, exhausted and hungry, he struggled to orientate himself once more.
Earthen walls, his healing foot paining as if it'd been wrapped in broken glass, and the rising fear
- his old friend Fear. Had Mira worked out where they were? Did she really have Kala prisoner? And
where was Taipan?

He pushed the lid up a fraction. A trickle of dust came in, threatening to make him sneeze. Warm
twilight air carried the aromas of stale hay and petrol. He opened the lid higher. No ambush, no
enemies, no Taipan. But the bike was still there. Kevin sat on the lip of the hole, then used a
nearby drum to pull himself upright. He shook himself free of the dust he'd collected overnight,
then tested his half-formed foot. The blob of flesh wouldn't take his weight. The bones had yet to
harden inside the gelatinous lump; toes were mere suggestions of bumps along the front. Dirt stuck
to the soft meat.

'You wake up early, that's good. It'll keep you alive. Must be a bit'a blackfella in you, eh.'

Kevin jumped at Taipan's voice, muffled from outside.

Kevin lurched to the door, wincing as his new-born foot felt every pebble, and stood, crane-like,
the sore foot off the ground as he used the lopsided jamb for support. Taipan sat just outside the
door, bare-chested and cross-legged, as though he hadn't moved since they'd arrived.

'I didn't know if you'd still be here,' Kevin said, his voice harsher than he intended. Crows
called, reminding Kevin death sat within a few paces.

'You mean you ain't happy to see me?' Taipan's tone was as dry as the dust in Kevin's hair. 'Or
just that you didn't know if you'd wake up alive?'

Kevin limped around so he could see the biker's face. 'Both, maybe.'

'Well, like I told you, you can stop ya worryin'. Fact is, I made you; I ain't gonna put you
down, not unless you give me reason, and then it'll be to ya face, not in ya sleep.'

He looked away, through his latest breath of smoke to the descending night.

'We both got fucked up by that Von Schiller mob, okay? There'll be a reckonin', don't you worry
'bout that. Then, if me and you reckon we still got business, we can sort it out.'

'Still-'

'Later. It's the best deal ya gonna get, so take it, fella.' Taipan rose slowly to his feet,
seeming reluctant to stand, dusted off his pants.

'I had another dream,' Kevin told him. 'A Mira dream.'

'What did that bitch have to say for herself?'

'She,' he hesitated, not sure how much he should tell - but if Kala was in trouble - 'she's got
Kala.'

'How did it feel?'

'Bad, of course.'

'Did it feel like truth?'

'How should I know?'

'Don't matter. You tell her where we was?'

'I don't think so.'

'That's somethin', then.' Taipan grabbed a T-shirt - a faded and holey Midnight Oil - from where
it was draped over a nearby bush. Taipan juggled his cigarette as he shrugged into the shirt. 'We'll
make a mile, eh.'

'What about Kala?'

'What about her?'

'If Mira's got her-'

'Myxo's ain't like us, fella; the blood's just Botox and a good time to them. Kala ain't bin to
the new nest. All she knows about Mother is a phone number. Mira can ring it till her finger bleeds,
it ain't gonna give her shit.'

'Still, if Kala's a prisoner, shouldn't we go get her?'

'And walk right into their trap? Nah. I had all the stakin' I need jus' lately.'

'Can't you tell where Kala is - just so we know for sure?'

Taipan shook his head. 'That girl's alive, I reckon, but she's weak and far away. Listen: if
Mira's got her, then there ain't nothin' we can do. If Mira ain't got her, then that girl can get
her own arse to Mother's nest.'

'God, I hope she's all right. I hope all of them are.'

'Yeah.' Taipan crushed his cigarette butt into the ground. 'Hungry? I'll rustle us up somethin'
to eat.'

'Out here?'

'Ain't you ever heard'a bush tucker?' Grinning, Taipan let his head fall back as though he was
stargazing, but his eyes were shut. He extended his hands, fingers wide, as though enjoying a breeze
Kevin couldn't feel.

Stars had started sprinkling through the descending night, unmarred by city lights, just the
moonlight for competition. Kevin breathed deeply, luxuriating in the sense of space, of belonging.
It took him back to his childhood; another life ago. Anger kindled - the biker shared that memory,
now; Taipan had not only stolen his future, but his past as well.

Kevin heard the rhythmic thuds of approaching cattle. Two grey shapes appeared out of the dark,
their ears flopping on either side of their coffin-shaped heads. Brahman-cross steers. They padded
up to Taipan, nuzzled his hands with their moist noses, their shoulders the same height as his. The
biker moved slowly, ran a hand over their necks and humps. The steers flapped their ears; one
brushed its tail up over its hindquarters.

Taipan drew his knife. Sweat glistened on his face.

'Hard work?' Kevin asked softly, afraid of upsetting whatever spell Taipan had cast.

'Yeah, but a fella's gotta eat. You wanna get us a mug from them saddlebags there?'

Kevin found a dented metal mug. His face must have shown his hesitation.

'Don't worry, fella, I ain't gonna kill'em. No point shittin' in our nest. Just takin' enough to
put back some of what we lost.'

He pointed to Kevin's new foot. 'Might have a spare pair'a boots lyin' 'round here, too. We can
take a look when we fuel that bike up. Tucker first.'

He brushed his hand down the neck of one steer, speaking in low, soothing tones. He found what he
was looking for, pinched a handful of skin.

'Hold that mug here.' He cut through the vein. The steer twitched as the blood spurted out,
boiling and black in the faint light, until a grey froth covered the top of the cup. The smell soon
overpowered any squeamishness. Taipan pinched off the vein as Kevin skolled the brew.

'It's good,' Kevin said, wiping his mouth and putting the gory mug back into position. 'Not
as
good, but good enough.'

Taipan chuckled, but focused on the steers. The one he'd cut was shivering, its tail lashing. It
stared back from the corner of its wide eye.