Deadly Descendant (22 page)

I picked up my pace to a brisk jog as I told Logan about the police report. We dove into the car, and I pulled out with an embarrassing shriek of tires.

“If the jackals have been spotted,” Logan said, holding on to the oh-shit bar, “we’re already too late.”

“I know,” I answered, hoping I wasn’t being unfairly snappish. I gave the car a little more gas,
though I didn’t dare go too fast, or I’d attract police attention. I could just see trying to explain to the nice officer why there was a sword in the backseat and why I was carrying an illegal concealed firearm.

Logan and I rode in silence for a few minutes as I worked to contain my impatience and not run any red lights or stop signs. And then a thought hit me.

“Weird that Kerner would let someone see his jackals and live to tell the tale,” I said. “They’re invisible unless they’re in use, as far as I can tell.”

“Maybe it really is just a pack of stray dogs,” Logan suggested.

My foot eased on the gas pedal as something inside me shouted that this wasn’t right. “Maybe. Or maybe it’s some kind of trap. He knows we’re out looking for him, and he’s decided to lure us somewhere where he feels he has the advantage.”

I slowed even more. The car behind me honked in indignation, then roared past me. The driver was probably giving me the finger, but I was too distracted to care. My gut was clenching with dread. I came to a stop as yet another theory popped into my head, one that resonated strangely.

“Or it’s a diversion,” I said. “He’s luring us away from where he really means to strike.”

I was halfway into the U-turn before I even realized I’d made a decision. I hit the gas, creating another scorched-rubber screech.

My heart was hammering with adrenaline now, and I was certain that we’d just been duped. Someone was going to die because I fell for the trick and ignored
what my gut had been telling me from the very beginning.

“How could he lure us to Rock Creek with his jackals and still make an attack at Oak Hill?” Logan asked, bracing himself against the dashboard. I bet he’d think twice before getting into the Mini with me again. “I’m not sure how far there is between the two exactly, but it’s a few miles at least.”

He was right, and I had to admit I was puzzled. But something inside me was telling me Oak Hill was still the target, and as badly as I understood how my power worked, I felt certain my reluctance to leave the area was driven by more than a suspicion.

“I don’t know how he created the diversion, but it doesn’t matter. Like you said, if he’s at Rock Creek, we’ll get there too late to do any good. If he’s at Oak Hill, we
might
get back in time to stop him.”

Logan glanced at the dashboard clock doubtfully, and I wasn’t that much more confident. We’d wasted a buttload of time rushing off after the red herring—if that’s what it was—and instinct told me he would already have selected his victim by the time he created the diversion.

My former parking space was still available, so at least I didn’t have to circle the block searching for a new one, but we’d been gone at least fifteen minutes, and I had a sinking feeling that we were too late.

I held on to the remnants of hope as I parked. I got out and hurried around the car to the sidewalk as Logan leaned in to retrieve his sword once more. When he stood up, his eyes suddenly widened at
something he saw behind me. I started to turn but not in time.

A pair of furred bodies sailed through the air, impossibly high off the ground for such small creatures. They both slammed into Logan’s chest.

His sword was still in its scabbard when he hit the ground. I fumbled for the gun in my shoulder holster, then froze when a voice spoke over the snarls of the jackals.

“Move, and they’ll tear his throat out.”

I looked around, trying to spot the source of the voice, but the only human form I saw was Logan. He lay on his back on the sidewalk, a jackal’s jaws at his throat, teeth pricking his skin. There was no sign of blood yet, and we now knew how to cure the supernatural rabies, but I wouldn’t put anyone through that if it wasn’t absolutely necessary.

A second jackal stood on Logan’s chest, its ears flattened to its skull, its teeth bared as it snarled directly into his face. I could almost feel its fierce desire to attack, but so far, at least, Kerner was holding it back.

I stood absolutely still, my heart pounding in my throat as I frantically searched for a way out of this mess. But I already knew the only way to stop the jackals was to stop Kerner, and it’s hard to stop a guy you can’t even see. Especially when you’re standing stock still and hoping he won’t order his jackal to tear out someone’s throat.

“What do you want?” I asked. This was a calculated ambush, and I’d walked right into it, even parking in the same space I’d left from.

“Start by slowly putting your hands in the air,” he said. For a psycho who was infected with rabid insanity, he sounded awfully calm.

I was finally able to pinpoint the sound of his voice, and I realized he was hiding behind a parked SUV. Even if I managed to pull my gun, I’d have no shot. My aim might be ridiculously good, but I wasn’t carrying armor-piercing rounds.

Licking my lips and trying to stay calm, I did as he ordered, splaying my hands to show him I had no weapons. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that three more jackals had joined the first two, menacing Logan. The three newcomers circled him restlessly, snarling and growling, every nuance of their body language showing how badly they wanted to attack. Even more disturbing, they had streaks of blood on their coats, and their muzzles were wet and red with it. I hoped Kerner’s hands were steady on the reins.

Kerner stepped out from behind the SUV. He couldn’t have seen me comply with his command, so I supposed the jackals were working as his eyes and ears in addition to being his attack dogs.

“What do you want?” I asked again as Kerner came closer and I could get a better look at him. And, unfortunately, a better smell. He was dressed in a filthy trench coat and too-long jeans. The cuffs of those jeans dragged on the ground and had collected a revolting crust of … whatever. And the smell wafting from him was rotting garbage, outhouse, and unwashed body.

I must have wrinkled my nose unintentionally,
because Kerner stopped and made a point of sniffing the air. Then he shrugged.

“My apologies,” he said, smiling at me like we were having a pleasant conversation. “I’m so used to it I can’t smell it anymore. I’ll try to stay upwind.”

This was not what I was expecting. His voice was calm and level, his words perfectly rational. There was no manic gleam in his eyes, no insane laughter or gleeful rubbing together of hands.

“You obviously want to talk to me,” I said as my mind kept trying to figure out what the hell was going on. “So go ahead and talk.”

“I would like you to stop interfering,” Kerner said.

I blinked at him. “You ambushed me to tell me that? Hate to tell you this, but I could figure that out on my own.” I braced myself, thinking maybe a show of attitude might bring out the screeching maniac I’d been expecting, but Kerner just smiled.

“I’ve pissed you and your friends off by killing civilians. I’ll only get to kill the real Konstantin once, and that’s a great pity. He deserves so much more after what he did to me. You have no idea …” Kerner shuddered, and I couldn’t help a moment of pity as I thought about what he’d been through—and what he’d be going through for all eternity if we captured him and I couldn’t persuade Anderson to do the right thing.

Kerner was a sadistic serial killer, but he hadn’t been before the Olympians had screwed him up, and somewhere beneath the madness of Lyssa’s seed was a scared, damaged
human being. A scared, damaged human being I couldn’t afford to feel sorry for, I reminded myself. A lot of serial killers have sob stories, but they’re still monsters.

Kerner shook off the horror of his ordeal at Konstantin’s hands. “But never mind my sad story. While I won’t deny I enjoyed killing Konstantin in effigy, I have moved on to worthier prey. My quarrel is with Konstantin and his pack of gutless, soulless cronies, not civilians.”

All right. This guy was crazy after all. “Let me get this straight. You want us to leave you alone so you can have your jackals rip various and sundry Olympians into shreds. Is that the gist of it?”

He furrowed his brow as if thinking, then nodded. “Yes, that’s the gist of it. Once the world is rid of Olympians, it will be a much better place. And I love the irony of it all, that they used me as their lab rat to test Lyssa’s seed and that in doing so, they created the one and only being who could destroy them.”

Except for Anderson, of course, but Kerner didn’t know about that.

“I wouldn’t call it irony so much as poetic justice,” I said. And if Kerner hadn’t already killed four innocent victims, I might even have believed it.

Kerner looked delighted with what he must have taken as my agreement. “Exactly. And I think it only fair that Konstantin watch the ones he cares for die one by one, knowing he’ll face the same fate himself, just as he made me watch as he slaughtered my family.” He made a face. “Not that Konstantin truly cares about anyone but himself.”

My research had turned up very little family for Kerner. His father had died in a supposed car accident near the time Kerner went missing, and I had no trouble believing Konstantin had killed him in front of Kerner’s eyes. That didn’t exactly sound like watching his loved ones die “one by one,” but maybe Kerner thought it made him sound more sympathetic.

I nodded. “Like I said, poetic justice. But I’m still kind of getting stuck on the killing-innocent-bystanders thing.”

Kerner stuck out his lower lip in a twisted pout. “I already told you I’ve moved on. I only meant to take out Olympians, but then I bumped into that first guy. He thought I was some panhandler harassing him for money.” For the first time, there was a hint of a manic gleam in Kerner’s eyes, one that said he wasn’t as sane and rational as he pretended. “He was a condescending asshole, and he looked so much like Konstantin … then he got spooked and started running away, just begging me to chase him.” He shrugged. “I probably would have been able to contain myself if the stupid shit hadn’t started running.”

“So it’s all his fault he’s dead?”

Kerner’s eyes flashed with anger, but his voice remained level. “When it was over, I felt more like my old self than I had since I was forced to take Lyssa’s seed, and I realized I could get my revenge on Konstantin and stop being so …” He made a circular motion beside his head with his finger. “… at the same time. Two birds with one stone.”

“And that makes it okay for you to kill people
just because they have the bad luck to resemble Konstantin?”

The jackals snarled their disapproval of my tone, and I reminded myself that antagonizing a crazy man who commands a pack of rabid jackals wasn’t the brightest idea.

“I keep telling you, I’m finished with that,” Kerner growled. His voice had deepened, and he sounded strangely like his jackals. “It was fun while it lasted, but I know now that it was stupid and unnecessary.”

I glanced at the jackals and once again saw the blood on their coats. They had killed already tonight, and it sounded as if their victim had been an Olympian. Better than a civilian, but still … it was an awful way to die.

“Who?” I asked, not sure why I wanted to know.

Kerner smirked. “Someone whose loss Konstantin might actually regret a little. A pretty little blonde, descendant of Apollo. The Olympians call—
called
—her the Oracle.”

I fought to suppress my reaction. Phoebe had no redeeming qualities that I could tell. And yet it freaked me out enough to learn that complete strangers had been torn to shreds, partially eaten. Learning that something like that had happened to someone I
knew
… My stomach gave an unhappy lurch.

“There is one less Olympian to blight the earth tonight,” Kerner concluded with obvious pride.

I swallowed hard to keep my gorge down. “But she’ll come back,” I said. The body would somehow
mend itself, regenerate the missing organs, and come back to life in the throes of the supernatural rabies.

“No, she won’t,” Kerner said with a smug smile. “Konstantin made the biggest mistake of his life when he chose me to host Lyssa’s seed. The madness
infected
the seed—which means it operates on a metaphysical level as well as a physical one. Pair it with death magic, and you have something that can destroy a
Liberi,
body and soul.” His voice was replete with satisfaction, then he frowned at me. “But
you
didn’t die,” he said speculatively. “I thought at first it was because my jackals didn’t eat your heart—did you know the heart was the seat of the soul?—but the Oracle expired before they’d managed to do more than nick her heart. I felt her seed snuff out, right here.” He patted the center of his chest. “Even without having directly contacted your heart, the infection should have worked its way there eventually. I wonder why it didn’t.”

I tried really hard not to picture a jackal tearing my heart from my chest and devouring it, but my stomach heaved anyway. I had no intention of letting Kerner in on the secret of how I’d survived. “No idea,” I mumbled.

The physical effects of his death magic were somehow mirrored on a metaphysical level. So much so that when the infection reached the heart, the body and the seed of immortality were both destroyed. If Anderson hadn’t broken my neck, if he’d let the super-rabies run its course, I would have died. And
stayed
dead.