Oliver nodded and set the case down, opening it and removing the shotgun. It was loaded. He pulled out a handful of shells and pressed them into the pockets of his wool coat, then nodded to indicate he was ready.
Kitsune raised her hood, her jade eyes lost within. “Be careful.”
Even as she turned she changed, diminishing as she dropped to the ground. It was as a fox that she slipped out in front of the house and darted across the narrow, rutted road that led to the northern farms. The street lamps on the Truce Road were out, leaving only celestial light, pinpoint glimmers of gold in the night sky. Kitsune was a dark shape, moving low to the ground. From their cover, Frost and Oliver watched her slip into the deeper darkness between two cottages across the way.
The winter man turned to Oliver and nodded gravely. The wind picked up, dancing around them, and stole Frost away. The entire substance of him was carried away on the wind, crumbling to snow and sleet that spiraled up into the sky above Oliver’s head. In the darkness up there, above the height of any cottage or house, the winter man would storm briefly across the night and then pause to wait for him on the other side of the road.
All along he had realized that he was a burden to them, but now Oliver realized precisely how significant a burden.
It’s me,
he thought.
I’m going to get them killed.
With the cherry-tree demon, he had taken a hand in saving their lives, but now he knew that his companions would not have been in that predicament were it not for him. Kitsune had stealth and cunning, Frost the ability to disappear into the night, into the wind. Oliver had only a weapon with which he was hardly an expert.
So why bother with me?
he thought. By now, Frost surely owed him nothing, no matter what he might believe. They were all fugitives, and that created a kind of kinship. But they would be better off if they left him behind.
They were allies, certainly. But were they also friends? Could it be that simple?
All right, then. We stick together. But that means not getting them killed. Not being a liability.
As these thoughts crossed his mind he slipped the strap of the shotgun case over his head so that it was across his back and would not fall or get in the way of his aim. He held the cold metal of the shotgun firmly in both hands and left the cover of the house. In the silence of the sleeping village, the noise of his footfalls seemed incredibly loud in his ears. He breathed evenly and hurried without running, scanning north and south. To the north the road continued past perhaps twenty or thirty cottages and then there was no more village, only the farms in the distance.
To the south was the Truce Road and the intersection that could only be the center of town. In the square there he could see a horse stable and a two-story building with what appeared to be a general store in the windows of the first. A sign squeaked as it swung in the breeze. Somewhere, real wind chimes sang their strange, lonely melody.
The village square was empty.
His throat had gone dry without his realizing it. Oliver ran his tongue out to wet his lips and his step faltered. The barrel of the shotgun swung in an arc in front of him as he scanned the street, the houses in plain view, and the village square.
The street was empty.
Nothing moved but the wind, that creaking sign in front of the general store, and the weathervane on top of that very same building. Some dust blew up from the road and the grit was in his eyes. He blinked it away as he swung the barrel again, blinking at the impossible. Kitsune had their scent. The Kirata were
here
.
Hunting them.
He made a complete circle on that very spot. As he glanced around, the collar of the wool coat rasped against his unshaven cheek and an image leaped unbidden into his mind, a tinted home movie half drained of color, little Oliver standing on top of the toilet lid watching with furious scrutiny as his father shaved, wondering what that was about. When he had been very small, his father had loved him. Had picked him up and blown raspberries on his belly and tickled him and held him tightly, and on the weekends when he would go without shaving, the stubble had sometimes scraped the boy. Sometimes it had hurt. But he had never minded.
His nightmare returned. His mother in her parlor, and his father out across the shifting sand. Most of the dream was lost now, but he remembered those things. And something in his father’s face. Fear. But not for himself.
Oliver knew he had to get home. Even if he could find a place for himself in this world, he owed Julianna and Collette— and even his father— some word to indicate that he was all right, so they would not have to worry.
Bitterness rippled through him and lifted the corner of his mouth. As if Max Bascombe would worry. The old man might be frustrated, furious, and profoundly disappointed. But he wouldn’t worry.
Oliver shrugged off these phantoms of his mind that had come to plague him at the most inopportune time. He looked into the darkness between cottages, where Frost and Kitsune undoubtedly waited for him, though he could not see them. For a moment, he scuttled sideways, letting the shotgun barrel linger in the direction of the village square.
Then he was in motion again, somehow quieter and more focused. The shotgun felt more comfortable in his grip. He would feel better in the company of his friends.
As he reached the edge of that glorified cart path, the front door opened on a cottage off to his left and a Kirata stepped out into the night. The monster had to duck to get out, and its fur was bright stripes of orange against the night, for the black stripes were lost in the darkness. The effect was troubling, making the creature seem ethereal.
He was downwind, but it didn’t need his scent. It saw him.
The Kirata opened its jaws in a roar that seemed a gruesome promise, and suddenly it was all too real. An answering roar came from the south and he twisted round as he ran to see another of the Hunters coming around the corner in the village square. It wore filthy, matted pants that came down only halfway to its ankles, and no shoes, for its feet were more like large paws and the muscles in its legs stood out as it sprang along the street toward him, leaping at first and then breaking into a run.
Oliver never slowed.
As he passed between the two cottages, following the path his friends had taken, he gripped the shotgun more tightly, its case bouncing against his back. As he sprinted into the backyards, still heading east, he saw no sign of Kitsune or Frost. He searched the sky for a gust of winter weather, frantically sought a glimpse of the fox slipping through a garden or beneath shrubs. But they were gone.
He was alone with the Hunters.
The roar of the Kirata echoed all around him, some distant and some much nearer. Over his shoulder he caught sight of the two he had seen out on the road as they gave chase, barreling between houses and into backyards, clawed feet tearing up flower beds and vegetable gardens. One dropped on all fours and came on even faster, and Oliver forced himself to look ahead, afraid he would stumble, knowing he could run faster if he bent himself to it.
He could practically feel their claws tearing his flesh.
Ahead of him, behind a small, simple building whose tall windows suggested a schoolhouse, there was a playground. A slide and a wooden swing-set and a trio of seesaws, all in a row.
Two more Kirata stood there, the wind ruffling their fur. One, taller and more lithe than the others, was white and black. Oliver glanced around, looking for some exit. To the left was only farmland, and beyond that, open country. To the right were cottages and the Truce Road, where he would be completely exposed. But it couldn’t be more dangerous than the situation he was in, so he diverted toward that opening, feeling the vulnerability of his unprotected back even more.
Images he had seen a thousand times on television flashed in his head, big jungle cats bringing animals down and tearing at them, dragging their bloody viscera through tall grass.
Screams built up at the back of his throat but he could not set them free. His legs ached and his chest hurt with the pounding of his heart and his fingers were white with terror where he gripped the shotgun.
The Kirata closed in.
A roar split the night above him.
Above
him.
Oliver staggered to a halt and stared upward at the Kirata that perched on the roof of a cottage. The tiger-man tensed to spring. Oliver swung the shotgun barrel up, set the stock against his shoulder, braced his feet, and pulled the trigger.
The blast blew a hole through the tiger’s upper torso. It hit the ground a corpse and its blood rained down, spattering Oliver, the copper stink of it filling his nostrils. His hands shook, but his grip on the shotgun never loosened, even as he muttered something that was half curse and half prayer.
The way out to the Truce Road was open, but he knew that there must be more out there and there were probably others on the way. Those giving chase were almost upon him. He had nowhere to run. Trapped in the space between two cottages, he turned and cocked the shotgun, wishing he had a better weapon, or that they would wait patiently while he reloaded.
It was a twelve-gauge. Five shots. Then he was dead. And that was if the Kirata even let him get five shots off.
He took a step toward the Truce Road, turning in jerky motions, knowing there were no options left. The two Kirata who’d first spotted him came tearing around the corner of the cottage on his left. Oliver was surprised to find his breathing steady as he crouched into a firing stance and pulled the trigger. The shotgun bucked in his hands and the blast echoed off the cottages. The Kirata running upright was taken in the shoulder, fur and blood and bone flying as it spun around with a roar of pain almost as loud as the shotgun itself.
Three rounds left.
But the second Kirata was on all fours, running low to the ground and faster than the first, tearing up grass and soil with its claws as it knifed toward him through the night. The other two had come around the cottage on his right, but they were an afterthought. A low growl like a car engine rumbled from the throat of the tiger-man as it bore down on him.
Oliver tracked it with the barrel of the shotgun, trying to get a bead. He misjudged its speed. The monster was too fast, and the realization sent a shiver through him. He pulled the trigger and the ground a foot to the right of the Kirata thumped with the impact, throwing up clods of dirt.
Then it was upon him. Too late to fire again, he lifted the shotgun up in front of him with some vague intention of defending himself, using it as a club or even jamming the stock into its jaws. It would buy him only seconds of life, but he found in that moment that he wanted to wring every possible second out of it.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly, not sure to whom the apology was directed. Perhaps Julianna. Perhaps his family. Perhaps himself.
The Kirata leaped, claws snickering through the night air and jaws wide. He thrust the shotgun out in front of him.
The fox struck the Kirata from the side, appearing as if from nowhere, looking tiny and insignificant next to the thunderous locomotive power of the tiger-man. But Kitsune had been stealthy and quick, and her jaws closed on its throat in midair. The moment seemed eternal and he saw her twist in the air, paws pressing against the beast’s head, using leverage and tearing. The Kirata’s throat ripped open and blood fountained from the wound. The two animals crashed to the ground together. Kitsune rolled and was up almost instantly, springing back on her four legs in defense, copper fur glinting in the moonlight, ready for more.
The Kirata staggered as it tried to get up onto two legs. Its eyes were putrid yellow in the night and gleaming with predatory lust. A flap of skin and fur hung down from its throat and blood ran from that ruined flesh like rain from an overflowing gutter. Then it faltered, and collapsed.
Oliver could not breathe as he looked at her. Kitsune barked, her focus not on him at all, and he spun to see the other two— including the white tiger— racing toward them, both upright.
He leveled the shotgun and fired, and the orange and black Kirata’s leg gave way in tatters and broken bones. It went down, but the white tiger came on. Oliver had one shot left and he knew he had to make it count.
Which was when the blizzard hit, gale-force winds and driving snow that existed only in that space between cottages. The Kirata roared in surprise and perhaps even fear as the wind drove it backward. It dropped to all fours to combat the wind and shook snow from its eyes as it started toward Oliver and Kitsune again.
The winter man took form just beside it, reached out with his left hand even as the blizzard died, and grabbed a fistful of its fur and skin. The Kirata grunted and turned, claws coming up to attack . . . and Frost drove the elongated ice dagger fingers of his right hand into its face, puncturing its eyes and thrusting deep into its brain.
It fell dead in a light dusting of snow.
The wind ceased, save for the ordinary nighttime breeze.
