The Iron Hunt (7 page)

I
glanced at Raw, and he winked into the shadows. A moment later, the back doors
swung open. I saw a mattress, and the boy. He was unconscious. Wrists and feet
bound.

Raw
sidled close and carefully cut the bindings. Hesitated, then trailed one claw
down the boy’s dirty cheek. Raw could cut through steel with his hands. He
could make stone bleed. But the boy remained unharmed.

“Raw,”
I said, and the little demon glanced at me. His eyes were mournful. Gave me a
shock. I had never seen such emotion in his face. Not since my mother died.

Zee
appeared. He stared at his brother, then the boy.

“Ah,”
he murmured.

“What?”
I asked.

“Sicily,”
he replied, and patted Raw on the back. I had no idea what that meant, but it
was clear the boy reminded the demons of someone. And it was not a good memory.

I
leaned over the boy, smoothing back his dark hair. He looked younger with his
face relaxed. He smelled sickly sweet, like chloroform.

But
he was alive.

I
slowly exhaled, and got out my cell phone.

GRANT
arrived in ten minutes. He drove his old Jeep, which had been rigged to accommodate
his bad leg. Pulled up, opened the door, and reached out with one long arm to
grab me close for a rough hug. He smelled like cinnamon and sunlight, warm as a
fire in winter. Grant was always warm.

His
flute was in the passenger seat. Weapon of choice. He let go of me and reached
behind for his cane, then limped to the back of the van. I followed him. Heard
his breath hiss.

“The
boy saw Badelt,” I said.

“That’s
why he’s here?”

“Hard
to say. But he was used as a shield for a zombie. ”

“Tell
me,” he said, and I had to take a moment. Not because the story was hard. Went
deeper than that.

Grant
would never understand what it meant to me, to stand with another human being
who knew me, all of me, and have a simple question asked with such casual
expectant intimacy. No one could appreciate, except the boys, just how alone I
had been, all those years. How alone I had thought I would be, for my entire
life.

Or
how important these small moments were. How much I loved them.

I
explained what happened. Including Edik’s message. Grant caught my wrist, his
eyes dark, thoughtful. “You okay?”

“No,”
I said, and crawled into the van. I carefully hauled the teen into the cool
night air and slung him over my shoulder. He was light for his age, and I was
stronger than women my size. Most men, too. I had to be in order to handle the
weight of the boys. They were dense, and their bodies weighed the same, whether
flesh or tattoo.

The
teen remained unconscious. I slid him into the Jeep. Grant glanced around to
see if anyone was watching us, but it was just Zee and the others scouting the
edge of the parking lot. Eating broken glass. In the distance I saw headlights.
My face was wet. Rain.

Grant
shut the back door. “Is the boy still in danger?”

“I
don’t know.” I hesitated, thinking of the girl with brass knuckles. “This is my
fault.”

“No.
Badelt, what happened to this child—”

“—wouldn’t
be an issue if I had still been on the move.”

He
said nothing. Just looked down between us, the long fingers of his left hand
twitching, like he was playing the piano or flute, thinking and seeing in
melody. Which was the literal truth.

Grant
had a neurological condition. Synesthesia. When he played music, heard
voices—any sound at all, from the clatter of a pan to the song of a bird—he saw
color. Color in people, too, regardless of what sounds they made. Reflections
of souls and spirits, the essence of a human heart, mirrored in shades of light
and energy. Auras, singing.

And
when Grant sang back… things happened.

He
touched the ends of my hair, delicately. The sensation, the sight, ran warmth
down my spine, into my heart. I craved that heat.

“Sweet
heart,” he murmured, and I could hear and see the separation in those words,
because he wrote me notes like that, offhand scribbles when he wanted to remind
me of something, or when he woke up first in the morning.
My sweet heart. My
heart.

Not
sweet enough. I pressed my forehead against his shoulder, savoring the hard
strength of his hand creeping up my waist beneath my jacket. I was so tired.
Grant pushed back my hair to kiss my ear, and scratched under Mal’s chin. Dek
purred.

We
got into the car. Grant drove. The boys sat at my feet, resting their bony
cheeks on my knees as I stroked their heads. Zee crawled into my lap and closed
his eyes. I cradled him like a child. He stuck his thumb in his mouth. Someone
needed to watch Yogi Bear tonight.

“I
found Badelt’s office,” Grant said. “It’s in Chinatown. ”

I
leaned my head against the cold window. “Did you call?”

“I
got an answering machine. Then I went in person. No one was there. Or at least,
no one who wanted to answer the door.”

I
nodded, threading my fingers deeper into Zee’s hair. I would have to check it
out. Men like Badelt did not stay in business without some kind of
organization. There would be payment records, names, and numbers. Maybe an
appointment book. Something that would lead to the person who had given him my
name.

It
was important. Too few humans had ever heard of me for it not to be. Not that I
was invisible. I had bank accounts, a house in Texas. Apartments in Chicago and
New York City. Lawyers in San Francisco and London who handled the various
trusts and estates passed down from mother to daughter over the past five
centuries, a process begun by an Italian Hunter, a noblewoman by marriage, who
had understood that guarding the prison veil was not a call to poverty.

I had
a different name on the paperwork, though. Not Maxine Kiss. Maxine Kiss had
never existed for anyone but my mother and the boys. Some zombies. Grant.

Living
off the grid. A paper trail would have felt like a cage.

Not
that it had kept me safe from the Seattle Police Department.

Grant
pulled in to the parking lot outside the homeless shelter, and we sat with the
engine ticking, rain pattering against the glass. He glanced down at Zee and
tickled the demon’s belly. He was the only other person who could. “What was
the message? What did Blood Mama tell you?”

His
tone was gentle, but strained. He had his own issues with Blood Mama: her
attempted possession, how she had almost killed him just to weaken his mind. No
other demon could have done it. Grant was too strong.

But
the memory kept me up some nights. Grant was a good man. He would make a
terrifying monster.

Aaz
and Raw twitched. Dek and Mal stopped purring. Zee turned his face away,
burying his head in my stomach. “No. Private.”

Grant
frowned. I shook my head. If the boys had made up their minds, nothing would
change them. Scared me, though. All of it. Building in my gut, the same awful
sensation that had crawled through me earlier, but without the pain. I did not
like mysteries. Especially when they involved me. Too much about my life, my
bloodline, was already a question mark.

The
teen made a small sound. I reached for his hand. Grant whispered, “Come on.
Let’s get him in.”

Inside,
home. Grant lived above the shelter: three adjoining warehouses bought years
ago with money inherited from his father. Local and national newspapers
published regular stories about the place, though I suspected that had less to
do with raising awareness, and more with the fact that the reporters were women
and Grant was dead hot. And a former priest. Some chicks dug that.

Green
grass and young oaks covered the grounds, along with winding sidewalks and
small benches illuminated by old-fashioned pewter lanterns. There was a garden,
part of which had been converted from an adjoining lot. Some of the homeless
regulars had green thumbs. Grant let them work their magic. No flowers blooming
this time of year, but the roses had just been pruned, and the smaller, native
plants nestled in the transplanted roots of evergreen and cedar were green and
lush. Less than an acre, but an oasis, sheltered in the city with a hush.

Grant
moved fast with his cane. Kept his flute tucked under his arm and clipped up a
short path that cut through the southern corner of the garden. The boys slid
between shadows. The damp air smelled cold and sweet. I heard glass break some
distance away, and drunken shouts. Bad night for someone else.

Grant
had a private entrance to his apartment. He unlocked the door, and I walked
past him, carrying the boy up the stairs. A lot of stairs. Grant said it kept
him in shape, helped his balance. I thought he was a masochist.

The
apartment took up the entire upper floor of the southern warehouse. Good views
of the city, soft wood floors, brick walls, and miles of bookshelves. Other
things, too: a motorcycle, a grand piano, my mother’s battered oak chest of
journals and other artifacts. Lights were on, and the air was golden and warm.
I glanced at Grant as he limped up the final steps, his breathing slightly
rushed, and he pointed to the spare bedroom near the kitchen.

No
one had used the room in the two months I had lived here. Grant did not have
many visitors; fewer now, I supposed, since my arrival. Zee and the others
would have made it difficult for guests, even if the boys stayed out of sight.

The
spare bedroom was just that, though: spare, almost empty except for a bed and
nightstand, and a battered oak wardrobe that had been bought from an antique
shop. Grant pulled back the covers. I laid the boy down and took off his shoes.
He did not respond, or make another sound.

“He’s
hurt. In his heart.” Grant leaned hard on his cane, staring at the teen. His
left hand made a fluttering motion. “Something is… off.”

“Good
or bad?”

Grant’s
frown deepened. “He’s not going to go looking for the kitchen knives. But he
might run. He’s not going to trust us.”

“Some
psychic you are.” I lightly punched his arm. “I could have told you that.”

A
smile flitted across his mouth. “I can try to heal him. Or at least take away
some of the fear.”

“Not
yet. Not unless you think he’s going to hurt himself or someone else.”

“He
won’t.” Grant pointed at the boy’s chest. “He’s got a soft spot, right there. I
wish you could see it, Maxine. It’s a light, pulsing, above his heart.”

I
wished I could see it, too. “Means good things, I assume. ”

“Means
there’s hope,” he said quietly. “Means he’s a good kid, deep down.”

I had
thought as much. “I need to check Badelt’s office. ”

Grant
said nothing, not right away. Just regarded me with that silence I had come to
think of as another kind of music, his quiet voice. A faint smile touched his
mouth. “You’ve got that soft spot, too, Maxine.”

I
looked down. “Probably the size of a pin.”

“Try
the sun,” he said. “Bigger and better than the sun.”

Heat
flooded my face. He bent and kissed my cheek. “I’ll stay with the boy. Just in
case he wakes up.”

I
rubbed my hand against my thigh, still thinking about his words, how he affected
me with them. “Try not to let him get away.”

“Don’t
let this bum leg fool you.”

“Like
greased lightning,” I said, trying to smile, and failing. I peered up into his
face, wanting to ask him if everything would be okay, if we would survive even
past the end of the world, but that was stupid and sentimental, and saying it
out loud would have frightened me. I wanted to be here, in the moment, and not
worry about the future. Because even if Edik was wrong, and the veil remained
until my death, I was still going to die. Everything ended. Nothing lasted
forever.

“Better
go,” Grant said. “Before you scare me into keeping you here.”

I
hesitated. “I’m that obvious?”

“You
can’t hide your soul, Maxine. Not from me.” His gaze grew strained. “Go. Call
if you need help. Keep the boys close.”

Close,
or death. No alternative, not in my life.

Not
in theirs, either.

I
missed the Mustang, but it was—hopefully—still parked by the university, and
the Jeep had a good engine. Little hands appeared from the shadows by my knees
to fuss with the radio. The boys found the eighties station. Whitesnake wailed,
then rocked into AC/DC. Dek and Mal boogied, the tips of their tails thudding
against my collarbone. I drove fast.

I
reached Chinatown in ten minutes and found the address Grant had given me. It
was a small brick building crammed between the glowing neon lights of a crowded
noodle place that had red Chinese characters emblazoned on the steam-clouded
front window; while on the other side, pounding with loud music, was a movie
rental shop plastered with international posters, yellowing with age.