Irregulars: Stories by Nicole Kimberling, Josh Lanyon, Ginn Hale and Astrid Amara (43 page)

Deven decided not to answer that. He didn’t need to complicate matters with his feelings about August.

“You want to return to Aztaw.” August said it; it wasn’t a question.

Deven opened his eyes. “What does it matter to you? If I finish the job I’ve been paid for, I can do whatever I like.”

“Of course.” August clenched his jaw. “But you’re making a mistake.”

“You don’t know what it’s like,” Deven said.

August scowled. “What? Being lonely? Feeling out of place? Not being able to relate to anyone around you? Welcome to the fucking Irregulars club, Deven. The difference is that here you have people who will help you. Friends in the division who understand that isolation. Occasionally even lovers.” Something dark crossed August’s eyes, but he blinked and cleared his expression before Deven could read more into it.

“You left Aztaw because everyone was trying to kill you,” August continued. “You think that’s changed?”

“I left Aztaw to keep a promise to my lord. If I preserve his house power here I can return.”

“And serve what cause? Show your affection to whom?”

Deven opened his mouth to speak, but someone coughed in the doorway and both he and August turned to look over the back of the sofa.

One of the front security guards stood there, holding two plastic bags of takeout. “You order this, Agent?”

“Yeah, thanks.” August winced as he stood but walked straight-backed, offering no hint of weakness. He took the bags from the guard and set up their meal on the coffee table.

Deven watched this little domestic routine, his throat feeling thick.

He pulled the pen from his hair and stared at its intricate carvings. He had not necessarily been happy back when he’d served Lord Jaguar, but he’d known who he was at least.

“Here.” August’s voice was gruff and he shoved a paper plate onto Deven’s lap with no finesse. Deven returned the pen behind his ear and steadied the plate on his knees. The food looked unfamiliar—and to his surprise, it was cold.

“Eat up,” August ordered. He dug into his own meal, which steamed with heat and was wrapped in corn husks.

Deven had to hold the soft, folded taco in two hands. It was stuffed with diced vegetables and what looked like seafood and a creamy sauce. He had no expectations, so when he bit into the sour, fatty, cool creaminess of the seafood ceviche he was startled by the complex flavors and textures. His mouth watered and he instantly craved more, stifling a groan of delight as he bit into avocado that mingled with the lime and onion and snapper so perfectly Deven thought he was in heaven.

He polished off the meal with hardly a breath between bites, and when he was done, he turned to see August had barely started eating, his gaze focused on Deven, eyes glinting with mirth.

“What?” Deven asked, clearing his throat. Some juices from the taco stained his fingers and he licked them clean.

August smiled but didn’t say anything. A contentment sank through Deven’s tired bones as he leaned back against the couch and relaxed into his calorie high. He watched August’s long, beautiful fingers deftly manipulate the husk wrapping his tamale. He made mundane gestures look elegant.

His fondness for August must have shown, because August stopped his gestures and gave him an open, curious look. The two stared at each other for a long moment, and something warm and tremulous tugged at Deven’s heart, made him flush with contentment.

Just this
, he thought.
Maybe this could be enough.

August reached out and tucked a loose strand of hair behind Deven’s ear. The touch vibrated through Deven’s body, sharp and shocking as a wound and almost equally as painful in its brevity.

August turned back to his dinner and Deven glanced at his empty plate, wishing there was more. He might even consider abandoning his new plan to ally with Lord Knife for the prospect of a second ceviche taco in his future.

This shows why people become obsessed with food
, he thought, and then he corrected himself.

More likely, this showed that he wasn’t entirely convinced he wanted to return, if it took only a taco to convince him otherwise.

***

Deven slept solidly for several hours, luxuriating in the secure setting and the privacy of his own room for the first time since he’d arrived in Mexico. He charged his phone and its alarm awoke him an hour before sunrise.

He expected he’d have to rouse Agent August so he was surprised to find him awake, dressed impeccably as ever in a pressed suit. He sat at the kitchen table with a steaming cup of coffee, flipping through screens on his phone, the odd greenish tone of the screen contributing a ghastly shade to his already pale face.

“Trouble sleeping?” Deven asked, yawning. He shuffled into the dark kitchen. Only a dim light over the oven was turned on.

“It’s uncomfortable,” August admitted, and Deven didn’t need to ask what “it” was.

“You sure you feel strong enough to meet with Fight Arm?”

“Is that his name?” August smirked, but there was no warmth to it. “I’m fine. 72 is waiting outside.”

“Don’t the starys ever sleep?”

“They have a hibernation schedule.” August refilled his coffee and handed a cup to Deven.

“Thanks.”

“Stay alert,” August ordered.

It was still dark outside and Deven nervously fiddled with the knife at his belt. He wondered what Lord Knife’s reaction had been to the news of Night Axe’s return and Deven’s presence. He couldn’t imagine what Aztaw was like now—the revolution had radically changed the place in only a few years. For all he knew, every dynasty seat could have burned to the ground, the villages eradicated, the fields left untended.

Or something more positive could have sprung up in the place of destruction, as August would have hoped, although what such a reality would look like was unimaginable to Deven. Aztaw had always been endless dark, punctuated with grand palaces for the lords, pyramids of sacrifice, and the frightening tombs where humans waited to be bled. With all those elements under siege, Deven suspected anything could rise up and take its place.

72 parked his black sedan behind El Angel Hotel. Although Deven’s spectrum-enhanced sunglasses altered the colors of the world around him, he still saw pink in the sky as daylight broke. A murky smog hovered over the city. August and Deven passed once more through the service entrance toward the lobby.

Inside the hotel, all was quiet. A solitary, bleary-eyed woman attended the front desk, watching a
telenovela
with the subtitles turned on and the sound turned off. She offered a disingenuous smile as they crossed to the front doors.

There were no watchbirds. There were no people. At that hour only a few cars passed by, the rest of the city sunk in sleepy early morning silence.

They stepped through the revolving hotel doors. Deven turned and recognized Fight Arm as four tzimimi lowered torches to his trussed-up body and set him afire.

Chapter Fourteen

Fight Arm’s screams shattered the serenity of the morning. His body whooshed, covered in accelerant. He was bound in traditio-nal Aztaw funerary style in a squatting position, rope binding his thighs and arms tied behind him so he was unable to flail.

Deven rushed forward. He threw one knife at the nearest flying spirit, but all four of them took flight, talons clenching at the morning air as they streaked into the dawn.

Deven tried to help Fight Arm, who shrieked as he struggled. Heat rolled over Deven’s body, and August grabbed him by the shirt and wrenched him back. It was already too late. With a last howl Fight Arm’s efforts ceased and the flames charred his paper-thin translucent skin to ash.

“My God! I call police!” cried the hotel lobby clerk, breathless from her run outside.

“I’m with the police,” August told her, flashing his Irregulars badge. Deven hovered helplessly over Fight Arm’s burning corpse, the glow of his bones hidden under the flames and blackening ash. Deven glanced up, but the tzimimi were long gone. He saw no signs of any of Night Axe’s minions, and it looked as though nothing remained of what Fight Arm might have brought with him to their meeting. The only unnatural presence he could detect with his sunglasses was the thin ribbon of blood coursing out of August’s body and hovering down the road.

“Go back inside!” Deven heard August yell. He saw the hotel clerk rush indoors, fearful. August mumbled something under his breath, then came to Deven’s side.

“She’s going to call the cops.”

“Didn’t like your badge?”

“Didn’t like my attitude.” He glanced upward, his sunglasses reflecting the early light. “Did you see where they went?”

“The tzimimi? It doesn’t matter.” Deven leaned down and picked up his knife.

“We have to fucking capture them,” August growled. Deven remembered that August still held them accountable for Carlos’s death.

“They’ll no longer be a threat once we get Night Axe,” Deven assured him. He glanced back at the clerk. “Should we stop her from calling?”

August was already texting furiously on his phone. “Too late. I have to preempt the police force. Damn it!”

Deven kicked through the smoldering remains, hoping some piece of Fight Arm was left to save. He found his enemy’s jade necklace and lifted it carefully with the toe of his boot, separating it from the wreckage. He glanced at the glyphs carved on the jade. It was covered in a distraction spell, the one that had been keeping him unnoticeable. Deven pocketed it, fury throbbing through him. Fight Arm and Deven had spent thirteen years fighting for their lords and had survived war, assassination attempts, famine, and a brutal revolution. For Fight Arm to have died on a simple fact-finding mission on Deven’s behalf made Deven sick to his stomach. But he needed a clear head. He would kill Night Axe, at all costs. He didn’t care about the official Irregulars policy.

Given the lack of traffic at that hour, the Irregulars’ cleanup team arrived quickly and consoled the hotel clerk with their more authentic-looking Mexico City police identification. August spoke with one of them at great length, leaving Deven crouched beside the smoking remains of his nemesis, feeling a greater sense of loss than he should have, given the situation.

On the drive back to the embassy, Deven said, “There’s another way we could attempt to weaken Night Axe. We could bleed him.”

August seemed distracted. It took a few seconds for him to focus his attention on Deven. He scowled. “What?”

“Night Axe. If we bleed him out, he’ll lose the blood he needs to fuel his transformation house power.”

“Bleed him? How?”

“We cut loose the other sacrifices. Losing blood from twenty-nine severed arteries would weaken him. Then we use the connection to you to hunt him down and behead him.”

August looked disgusted. “Are you fucking nuts?”

“It would work, August.”

“No. I’m not sacrificing two
dozen
civilians, Deven. Think for a minute!”

August turned back to the window, angry. Deven swallowed, realizing he’d fucked up again. In a vague sense he understood August’s protests, but honestly, those other people were strangers, and meaningless, just casualties of a war.

But August was worth saving.

At the embassy August was immediately called into the office of a woman who looked as finely dressed as August and equally as pissed off. Deven made to follow, but the woman in the pinstripe suit held out her hand and stopped him.

“No. This is a private conversation, no consultants.” She slammed the door. Deven noticed the window was marked Director’s Office and realized that, indirectly this woman had hired him. He wondered if he should thank the person who gave him a job. He doubted the traditional Aztaw gift of a pulsing human heart would be welcome, but honestly, he had no idea what kinds of gifts were exchanged in the natural world, and other than distant memories of Legos and toy trucks for Christmas before his mother died, he hadn’t received any gifts except from Lord Jaguar.

Deven wandered the halls of the NIAD branch office, unsure how to occupy himself. Across from the director’s office he found a staff kitchen and ate several sticky pastries, putting one aside for August. He then considered visiting the armory but assumed the pixie would be as welcoming as the director.

A tired-looking older agent with an attractive profile and impressively shiny white teeth entered the kitchen and watched Deven for a few moments. He had a trim, graying moustache and pepper-gray hair. He didn’t wear a suit, but the badge clipped to his belt showed he was also an agent.

“You the Aztaw consultant?” the man asked, his accent thick.

“Yes.”

The man poured out two cups of thick black coffee. He offered one to Deven. “I’m Agent Rafael Ortega.”

Deven took the coffee. “Thank you.” It tasted like burned tar and he had to grimace a smile to stop from spitting it out. “You located the other sacrifices?”

Agent Ortega nodded. “Zardo’s bringing them to the hospital now.”

“Won’t that alert Night Axe that we’re on to him?”