The Iron Hunt (18 page)

“Stop
it,” he hissed.

“Give
me what I want,” I told him quietly. “Or sit there. The boys will bleed you
out. You’ll be dead in ten minutes. ”

“And
if I leave this body?” Rex drew in a shaky breath, looking at me with hate in
his eyes. “If I run? Would you still kill the host?”

“I’d
kill you,” I replied. “I’ll kill you, either way. But only if you don’t talk.”

“I
did not betray Grant,” Rex snarled. “Not him. Not his trust.”

“Touching.
Answer my questions.”

“I
don’t know who killed the investigator,” he insisted.

“But
you knew he was asking questions.”

“I’d
heard rumors, but I didn’t believe them. It made no sense.”

“And
Edik? The
veil
? What game is Blood Mama playing? ”

“Blood
Mama does what she must to survive. But if you’re asking if she made a deal, I
can’t tell you that. I don’t know.”

“You
know enough,” I retorted. “You must have some idea.”

“I
have an idea that all the inmates want to tear the prison down. Isn’t that
enough?” Rex closed his eyes, shaking his head. “The only reason Blood Mama
hasn’t ordered my execution is that she thinks I’ll be useful with Grant. She
hasn’t given up on him. She never will, Hunter.”

I
took my hand off his leg. My palm was warm, dry. The boys felt cozy on my skin.
They liked snacks. “Blood Mama and I have an agreement. A bargain made by one
of my ancestors. Grant is off-limits. Anyone I mark is safe.”

I
felt like an idiot saying those words. It was a lie. No one was ever safe. Rex
gave me a disdainful look. “Old bargains. You and your kin, striking deals for
descendents. Nickel-and-diming your souls.”

“You
don’t know anything.”

“I
know more than you.” His mouth curled, grim. “Don’t be so righteous, Hunter.
You’ll do the same, eventually. They all do. Even your mother.”

I
slammed my hand against his throat. “Say that again.”

Rex
wheezed, clawing at my arm. I heard voices at the end of the hall and released
him just as some children appeared, accompanied by one of the day-care
professionals, a retired teacher named Betty. Nice old woman. She made June
Cleaver look like a hack job, though her husband was serving a thirty-year
sentence for a string of bank robberies committed in the early nineties. The
police had never recovered the money.

“Mrs.
Sansbury,” I said politely. Rex leaned over his knees, coughing.

Betty
frowned at him, steering the children away. “You should cover your mouth, Mr.
Mongabay.”

Rex
grunted, still hunched over his stomach. Betty shook her head. I smiled and
waved at the kids, who were sweet and smiled like angels should. When they
passed out of sight, Rex muttered, “Don’t ruin this for me.”

“Ruin
what?”

“This
life.” He turned bloodshot eyes on me, his mouth crooked. “My freedom, what
little I have. It is
all
I have.”

“You’re
a demon, Rex. You are
not
a man.”

“I
can be both,” he hissed. “Just like you. I can change. I
have
changed.”

“Only
because of Grant. He forced you.”

“He
opened a door I didn’t know existed,” Rex replied, with a fervor that had
always unsettled me. “He broke my link to the Queen.”

“She
still controls you.”

“But
not here.” The zombie pressed a fist against his chest. “I am not just one of
her mouths anymore, Hunter. I am not a feeding tube. I am
me
. I am this
man.”

“Stolen
skin.”

“He
didn’t want it.”

“Convenient.”

Rex
leaned back, rubbing his throat. Hate in his eyes. “You’re no better than a
serial killer, Maxine Kiss. Dress it up all you like, but you can’t live without
the hunt. It’s in your blood. All of you Hunters, feeding the addiction.”

“And
your kind?”

“My
kind are available. And all these years you’ve had the moral high ground. You
gave yourself permission because we hurt the humans. Fed on their pain. But
it’s harder now, isn’t it? What Grant does makes it impossible for you.”

“It’s
a puzzle,” I admitted. “But I’m not losing any sleep.”

“Of
course not.” The zombie leaned in, eyes glinting. “But if not us, then who,
Hunter? Who will you kill if you can’t have us?”

I
tilted my head, studying his eyes, the flicker of his aura. Steady, strong.
“Your morality is nothing but artifice. Illusion. Grant gives it to you. He
could take it away.”

“Playing
God,” whispered Rex. “And yet, you don’t question
him
.”

If
only he knew. I yanked on my gloves. “The boy. Explain that.”

Rex
looked down at the hole in his leg. Bleeding had stopped. “Leave it alone,
Hunter. You’ve got bigger problems. ”

More
and more, every minute of the day. “I want to know.”

He
closed his eyes. “You don’t. Trust me.”

“Rex.
I need information. The veil opened. Something came through.” Something small
and nasty and full of piss. Wearing my face. A sour knot twisted in my gut.
“What escaped?”

“A
scout.” Rex looked suddenly weary. “More than a scout. Something that should
never have been locked away.”

I
hesitated. “Is it not a demon?”

Rex
looked me dead in the eye. “What is a demon? You think you know? Is it
everything that isn’t human? Or is there a sign on our foreheads that marks us
with a big red ‘D’?” He briefly closed his eyes, shaking his head. “You,
Hunter. You are so ignorant. Better ask yourself what
you
are, before
you come after us.”

He
had a point, which I was loath to admit. Or maybe I had been around Grant too
long. I was beginning to think of zombies as individuals. Not just… meat.

I
touched the spot just below my ear, which tingled. “What do you know about a
demon with knives for feet?”

Rex
stared. “What?”

“Toes
like knives. Big cloak, black hat. Dances like a charmer.”

He
flinched, and stood. I caught his shoulder, feeling the demon squirm beneath
his human skin. I saw terror in his aura, stark and hot. “What is it?”

Rex
wrenched away. I grabbed him again, and he punched my stomach. It did not hurt,
but it surprised me so much I let go. He staggered backward, staring at me as
though he was seeing my face for the first horrifying time. Reminded me of
Jack’s reaction to seeing Oturu’s mark on my face.

I
lurched toward the zombie. “What is it?”

He
danced away, then stopped, frozen. Behind him, I heard the children, laughing
and shouting.

“Rex,”
I breathed.

“The
Hunt,” he whispered. “You’re going to kill us all.”

LATER,
I understood why my mother ripped those pages from her diary.

There
were things I could never confess. Not to my daughter, should I live long
enough to have one—and not to Grant. Not the boys, though I suspected they
could read my mind. Some thoughts, the ones that lingered, were better left as
ghosts.

Some
things should remain beneath the skin.

REX
ran. I went after him, but he was fast, slippery, and I lost him once he got
outside. Hell-bent for leather, pedal to the metal—like a man with his heels on
fire—and if I had not been entirely certain of his need for Grant, I might have
imagined him burning tracks out of town. Right now, never coming back.

I did
not waste time searching. I had alternatives. But I went back to the apartment
first. There were some things I needed.

It
was quiet upstairs. Grant was already gone. I looked inside the guest bedroom,
thinking of Byron. My promises to him. How I had failed to keep even one boy
safe. One boy, when there was an entire world that needed protection.

Talk
about screwed.

In
the living room, I gazed at the large windows, the deep couches, the guitars
and piano, the Triumph motorcycle, polished to a loving red sheen. Masks and
photographs covered the brick walls, along with stones and other knickknacks
scattered on tiny tables. So many books, smiling from their shelves; mostly
religious in nature, covering Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism; even
Shamanic faiths; myths and legends. Archaic texts, some of which were in Latin,
Italian, and French.

My
mother’s trunk sat against the wall, underneath a Tibetan tapestry that hugged
the edge of the long table where Grant carved some of his flutes. Amongst his
tools, different kinds of wood had been laid out: bamboo, walnut, cherry.

The
sun was warm. I could see, through the window, the metal and glass of downtown,
sparkling.

I
knelt before the trunk and fumbled at the combination lock. I opened it. The journals
were stacked on top. Leather-bound books, bundled sheaves of loose paper,
folders with newspaper clippings. A Bible. An old cloth box full of photographs
sitting beneath a stuffed bunny, loved and stitched and full of rambling
patches. A battered leather jacket, a pair of gloves, also leather. Black,
supple, small. Custom-made for my mother’s hands. Looking at them made me
light-headed.

At
the bottom of the trunk, beneath a false panel, I found the weapons. Two
pistols and the old twelve-gauge, cradled on boxes of ammunition. I tried to
ignore the guns. I remembered my mother cleaning them, sitting cross-legged on
hotel beds with the news on, or Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd.

I
remembered her body, too. On the floor. Blood, everywhere. My twenty-first birthday,
candles still burning on the cake. The boys, weeping. All of us, orphans.

I
took a deep breath. Reached for the bundle wrapped in black velvet. Held it in
my lap, then on the floor, sitting back on my heels as I unrolled the rich,
heavy cloth.

Inside
were my mother’s knives. I had not seen them since she died, had not thought
about using them. I had promised myself I would not.

The
blades were simple, noble. Custom-made. No hilt, just steel, folded and honed.
Razor-sharp, double-edged, both ends pointed and serrated. Touching them was
dangerous. Required thick skin, or gloves with iron embedded. My mother had
inherited them from her mother, as had my grandmother from hers. Old, but still
strong. Full of history.

I
took off my gloves and pulled the turtleneck over my head. Naked from the waist
up, every inch of my skin up to my chin covered in the boys. I picked up the
first knife, and the steel blended with the scales and spikes covering my palm
and wrist, glinting like the silver embedded in my flesh. I remembered my
mother also holding her knives, just so, and the memories grew stronger as I
began to sharpen each blade—all twelve of them—against my arms.

Sparks
flew. The boys loved knives. They loved my mother more. I wondered what kinds
of secrets, if any, they had kept from her.

The
leather brace fit like a shoulder holster. I slipped it on, and the fit was
perfect. The knives rested against my ribs. I fingered my jacket, then pushed
it aside for my mother’s leather coat and gloves. Stupid. I was going too far.
But it made me feel better, and the leather was soft, supple, every scratch
like a scar.

I put
everything back inside the trunk, except for the box of photographs. Those I
left on the workbench, for Grant. Just in case. He had never seen them. I had
never brought them out, unwilling to make a production out of it, watching his
reaction.

The
stone circle was warm in my back pocket. I patted it, then stopped in front of
the mirror on my way out.

Edik
was right.

I did
look like my mother.

THERE
was always a cab or two around the Coop. I got a ride back to the university
district to pick up the Mustang. Still morning, and Seattle was hopping. Good
weather brought folks out in droves, all of them stripped down to shorts and
T-shirts and those odd, clunky sandals that seemed to be a fad in this part of
North America. The temperature was only fifty degrees, but it might have been
Arizona in summer for all the skin I saw. Poor sun-starved bastards.

The
Mustang was where I had left it. “Bohemian Rhapsody” on the radio. I cranked
the volume up and rolled the windows down, enjoying the crisp salty air in my
lungs. The boys slept heavily against my skin: dreaming my life, dreaming
others‘, women dead and gone. My only promise of immortality, lost in blood, memory.

The
art gallery was open. No blood splattered on the walls. Only one person inside,
a young pretty blonde dressed in jeans and a peasant blouse. She sat behind a
small desk and stood when I walked in. I said, “Sarai and Jack are expecting
me.”

“Oh,
yes,” she said. “You can go on up.”

I
paused before the painting of the unicorn trapped in battle. I did not see a
name or date. “Sarai painted this, right?”

The
woman nodded. “It’s not for sale, though. None of her work is.”