Half-Off Ragnarok: Book Three of InCryptid (36 page)

The lindworm might not have been very smart, but it was a predator, and it knew when the odds had shifted. It fell back, snapping and snarling at the transformed Lloyd. As for Lloyd himself, he ignored the lindworm in favor of pursuing a much more appealing target: me.

I ran.

It wasn’t easy with Shelby in my arms and an uncertain terrain beneath me—the lindworm had ripped gouges in the floor, which complicated my escape. I could hear Lloyd slithering after me as I reached the hole in the wall and ducked outside, Shelby dangling heavy and unmoving in my arms.

I had barely stepped onto the flat ground outside the barn when strong hands grabbed me and yanked me roughly to the side, nearly causing me to lose my grip on Shelby. I took a breath to protest, and stopped when I realized that the man who had grabbed me was familiar: it was Walter, Dee’s brother. The current leader of the fringe.

“Give the girl to me,” he said, speaking quickly. “I’ll see her to the doctor.”

“But—”

“
Give her
!”

I could still hear Lloyd’s scales against the barn floor. He had stopped, for whatever reason, without crossing the threshold. Swallowing hard, I transferred Shelby into Walter’s arms. He nodded curtly, like this was the only sensible thing that I could possibly have done, before he turned his back and walked away into the woods.

Shelby’s blood was hot and sticky on my shirt and hands. I pulled my gun back out of my waistband as I turned to face the barn, ready to challenge Lloyd more openly now that Shelby was out of the line of fire—and stopped as yet another surprise layered itself on top of what was already a surprising afternoon.

Lloyd hadn’t emerged from the barn because his way wasn’t clear. Dee was standing in front of him, the snakes atop her head coiled in full strike position, her mouth open and her fangs extended. I’d never seen my normally mild assistant look so terrifying.

“Dee?”

“This isn’t your fight, Alex,” she said, voice only slightly distorted by her mouthful of fangs. “Run, and don’t look back.”

I wanted to. It had been a long time since I wanted anything as much as I wanted to do exactly as I was told. If I ran, I could catch up with Walter and Shelby, and leave Lloyd to be handled by his own people. And if something happened to Dee?

If something happened to Dee, I would never be able to forgive myself.

“I can’t,” I said, and walked over to stand beside her, bracing my gun against my left wrist as I aimed with my right hand. Lloyd’s outline was clearly visible against the doorway, standing a good nine feet off the ground now that he had a serpent’s tail to lift him up. “Come out, Lloyd. Maybe we can still end this peacefully.”

“Any chance of that ended a long damn time ago.” Lloyd’s head turned. I couldn’t see his eyes, but I knew from the way that he was angling himself that his attention was on Dee. “Isn’t that right, little sister?” The lindworm lurked in the shadows behind him, clearly steeling itself for another attack.

“It was always going to end badly, but it didn’t have to end like this,” replied Dee. “You chose this when you killed those people—when you endangered us. Why did you do that, Lloyd?” There was a pleading note in her voice that hadn’t been there before, and as she spoke, the impact of Lloyd’s words hit me. He was her brother. His father had left Hannah and gone on to find a mate of his own species, one who could give him children who wouldn’t be outcast like he was. Walter and Dee were Lloyd’s half-siblings. They were his
family
.

It was unfair on so many levels that I didn’t even know where to begin. There wasn’t time for me to decide. Lloyd slithered forward, emerging from the shadows of the barn. I had just enough time to see the ragged, diseased-looking line where his tail joined with his torso, half-formed scales melting into blotchy skin. There were gaps in the flesh of his tail, places where his legs hadn’t quite merged properly. He hissed, displaying outsized fangs. I adjusted my aim, preparing to take the shot, and Lloyd lunged—

—not at me, but at Dee. She shrieked, backpedaling, and I turned, calculating the shot in the instant before I pulled the trigger. My aim was true. My aim has always been true.

Gunshots are always loud. This one seemed louder than most. It sounded like it should have carried for miles.

Somehow, we still heard Lloyd hit the ground.

Dee ran to Lloyd as soon as he fell, gathering him into her arms and sobbing into the motionless snakes that were his hair. The fact that he’d been preparing to hurt her was forgotten in her sorrow. Crow was already in flight, arrowing toward me. I managed to shove my gun back into my waistband before Crow hit my chest and buried his head under my arm, tail lashing. I wrapped my arms around him and held him, letting him shiver himself back to calm.

“Good boy,” I murmured, watching as Dee cried over the body of her brother. “You’re always such a good, good boy.”

A soft scuffling sound from inside the barn drew my attention. I glanced over to see the lindworm’s tail pass by the opening, heading back out into the forest. I smiled a little despite the seriousness of the moment. The lindworm hadn’t done anything but allow itself to be annoyed by Crow, who was admittedly very good at being annoying. There had been enough blood shed already, and I didn’t need to add another lindworm to the total.

Blood . . . “Dee, where did Walter take Shelby? Which way is Frank’s office?”

“West,” she said, voice muffled by her position. “Walk west, and you’ll find it.”

My day had included a homicidal gorgon crossbreed and an angry lindworm, and there was still a cockatrice somewhere around here that needed to be accounted for. This wasn’t the time to worry about any of that. Shelby was hurt. Shelby might be dying. And she needed me.

“I’m sorry about your brother,” I said softly. Then I turned, still holding Crow against my chest, and ran into the woods.

My parents insisted that my siblings and I learn how to navigate by the cardinal directions before we were allowed to start first grade. It didn’t come easily for all of us; Verity used to get confused, and nearly had to repeat kindergarten. I’d always been good at that sort of spatial orientation, and I ran without hesitation, somehow managing to navigate the uneven terrain without tripping over anything and slamming face-first into the dirt.

It was something of a shock when the woods finally ended and I emerged into the open field surrounding the gorgon community. I didn’t slow down, but kept running, tossing Crow into the air as I went. He took wing, cawing angrily. Hopefully, his irritation would be enough to keep him in the trees and prevent him from accidentally locking eyes with any gorgons. It was a miracle that he hadn’t been petrified yet, and I wanted to keep it that way.

I work hard to stay in shape, but that doesn’t involve very many sprints through the forest. I was panting and weak-kneed by the time I reached the door to Frank’s trailer. The door was closed. I stopped myself just short of pounding on it, managing to make myself back off enough to knock politely.

The door opened a moment later. Frank’s form filled the doorway, and his expression as he looked down at me was utterly impassive.

“Where is my wife?” he asked.

“In the woods, with her brother,” I replied. “He’s dead. She’s not. Where’s Shelby?”

“Here.” Frank stepped aside, allowing me into the trailer.

I’ve entered homes that had been taken over by ghouls. I’ve walked into Apraxis wasp hives. And I don’t think I had ever taken a single harder step in my life. I stepped inside and turned toward where I’d seen the surgical beds when we were in the trailer before.

Shelby was lying there with a blanket pulled up to her shoulders. Her eyes were closed, but her face wasn’t covered. I took a slow step toward her. “Is . . . is she . . . ?”

“She lost a great deal of blood,” said Frank. “I’ve sent a car to get some supplies from the hospital. She’s stable for now. He missed her major organs. She was, if you can believe it in a situation like this, lucky.”

“Lucky,” I echoed, as I walked to her bedside. Her cheek was warm beneath my fingers. She didn’t open her eyes. I sat down in the chair next to where she lay, leaning forward to rest my forehead against the edge of the bed. I would wait there for the next emergency.

I fell asleep in that position. The emergency never came.

“Good for you. Now survive the next one.”

—Thomas Price

The reptile house of Ohio’s West Columbus Zoo, a private back room where no one reasonable goes

Six weeks later

T
HE BASILISKS WERE AWAKE,
circling each other in their carefully darkened enclosure with their wings outstretched and their tails lashing in what was either a mating dance or a precursor to bloody combat. I kept my eyes glued to the glass, waiting for the moment where one of them would make a move.

The male stopped circling, picked up a piece of the hard rocky shell that had protected him while he hibernated, and placed it gently at the female’s feet. She hissed. He offered her another bit of rocky shell. She lashed at him with her tail. He offered her a third fragment. She accepted it, striking him with her tail again—but this time it was less of an attack, and more of a caress. Beginning to croon, she turned and walked away into the high grass. He followed, head bobbing in what could only be interpreted as a victory dance.

“You go on with your bad self,” I murmured, smiling.

“Who’s going where, then?”

I turned, my smile widening at the sight of Shelby Tanner standing behind me in the dimly-lit room. She was the second person to have the code—not for any scientific reason. Just because I wanted her to. Crow was cradled in her arms, his tail swishing lazily back and forth. He’d been spending as much time with her as he could since we came home from the gorgon community. He loved having a second human to cuddle with, especially one who was endlessly willing to give him the petting and adoration he deserved. I didn’t begrudge him the attention. He’d earned it when he saved us both.

“I think my basilisks are finally mating.” I gestured toward the enclosure. “It’s not much to look at right now, but in a few months, we’ll have chicks.”

“Oh, yay, more horrible things to turn me into stone,” said Shelby. But she was smiling, and she kept smiling as she walked over to kiss me on the cheek. “Ready for lunch?”

“In a minute,” I said. “And basilisk chicks are surprisingly adorable. They have blue feathers.”

Shelby had been stable but very weak for the first few days after Lloyd attacked her. She hadn’t been strong enough to come home, and her injuries would have been hard to explain to the human hospital, unless I wanted to be arrested for assault. Luckily, Frank had done a more than competent job. He was a very talented surgeon. She couldn’t have been in better hands. Thank God.

She walked over to peer into the enclosure, where only the rustling of bushes betrayed the location of my basilisks. “Blue, you say. All right. What happens after the chicks come?”

“We raise them to maturity and then send them off to the people who need them. Walter has agreed to take these two on a long-term basis, and trade their offspring for whatever the fringe requires.” It was a tidy way for them to make a little money without betraying their ideals. Much. “Are you still coming to dinner tonight?”

“What, like I’d miss the opportunity for your cousin to school me at Scrabble again?” Shelby laughed. “I’ll be there at six, as planned.”

“Oh, good.”

Sarah wasn’t exactly “schooling” anyone at Scrabble, since half the words she used were made up, but she had fun, and she was getting better at keeping up with the conversation. Really, she was getting better at everything. She could reliably tell me from Shelby, which was a real accomplishment, considering how far gone she’d been when I’d first come to live with my grandparents. I was actually starting to think she might get back to her own personal definition of normal.

Shelby wrinkled her nose at the rustling bushes. “This is getting dull,” she said. “Anything else going on around here?”

“Just the usual,” I said, plucking Crow from her arms and dropping him on the floor. “It’s been blissfully dull all day.”

“Oh, really?” Shelby took her cue, sliding her arms around my shoulders as Crow croaked in aggravation. “Sounds like you need a little excitement.”

“Honestly, you’re about all the excitement I can handle right now.”

I’m a scientist. Excitement is supposed to be something that happens mostly to other people, and I’d been right at the center of way more than I wanted over the past few months.

Hannah had been devastated by Lloyd’s death, even if she wasn’t surprised. She’d been expecting this for a long time, and it had just been a question of when and how it would happen. I was pretty sure Shelby and I were no longer welcome at the gorgon community. I didn’t mind. We didn’t belong there, and any debts between us were paid.

Dee had kept her job at the zoo, thankfully. Shelby had been bedridden for several weeks after I brought her home, and I wouldn’t have been able to take the time off to care for her if Dee hadn’t been at the reptile house, keeping things running smoothly. I was glad she’d decided to stay. I would have missed her.

Lloyd’s cockatrice was still out there somewhere. It hadn’t shown up in any urban areas, and we were all assuming Lloyd had taken it back to the woods with him when he abducted Shelby. A cockatrice loose in the woods near the gorgon community was nowhere near the threat that a cockatrice loose near humans had been. As long as we didn’t see any further signs of it, we were willing to live and let live.

Shelby leaned forward and kissed me slowly. I slid my arms around her waist, shutting out Crow’s angry squawks as I focused on the business at hand. When she finally pulled away, I was a lot less interested in basilisks, and a lot more interested in her.

“Lunch?” she asked again.

“As long as it’s not in the tiger garden, that sounds good to me,” I said, before kissing her again.

I had my work; I had my family; I had my friends; and I had Shelby, who was a distraction from everything else, but only in the best of ways. Things were changing. I was changing with them. That was all right, in the balance of things; after all, people have paid a lot more to come away with a lot less. As I tightened my arms around Shelby’s waist and sank into another kiss, I couldn’t help thinking I was a very lucky man. I was a very lucky man indeed.