Taken By Storm (2 page)

"Fuck."

"Yep."

I hear someone yell in the background, and a muffled sound as Mira covers the mouthpiece. I can still hear her, though. "Hey, get your fucking shit together, Mittens. That sword has a pointy end, and if you stick it in somebody not from the hells, you're gonna be on splat duty till you're fifty."

A moment and a couple more barked orders later, she's back.

"Sorry, Storme. Fucking children."

"They have you training Mittens?" Mittens is the pet name for Mediators-in-Training, and the thought of Mira doing whatever she's doing is like seeing my bunny Nana doing calculus.

Aw. Nana.

"Yeah, Alamea thought it'd be a good idea to keep me out of the main Summit business." Mira's voice has the quality of a wood chipper, so I drop it. Alamea knows what she's doing. I think. "So. You need a place to live."

"Nobody's going to rent to me."

"No shit."

That's what I love about Mira. She doesn't bullshit you or wipe your ass for you. Just chucks the roll of toilet paper at your head.

"I'm not sure what we're going to do. Evis and the others might be able to go Paul Bunyan on me, but if I don't have running water I'm going to start slicing up the populace."

"Give me an hour. I'll call you back."

"What, you got Bungalows for Blackballed Badass Bitches on speed dial or something?"

"Or something. Watch your gods damned stance!" She bellows it into the phone, and I hold it away from my ear.
 

"I'll talk to you soon," I say.

"Yeah, I'll call you back after I whoop these babies into shape." She hangs up.

I drive into town, not sure where I'm even going. In daylight the tiny Kentucky town looks almost more pitiful. The tattoo shop where Carrick stole the machine for mine has been repaired, and I'm sure the owner is suitably perplexed by the new machine I gift wrapped and left in her studio. We had to replace the one we stole — couldn't risk any norms accidentally getting a shade blood tat. There's a diner on the next block, and I parallel park in front of it. At two in the afternoon, there's nobody around except a couple regulars who cope with their retirement by drinking more caffeine per diem than anyone should drink in a week.

Sometimes I miss coffee and tea, but since Gryfflet Asberry, the cabbage-faced, two-faced witch used my beloved morning coffee to drug me and kidnap me, I've soured on it. I sit down at the bar, thankful at least that the people in this town haven't asked me any questions and whatever Mediators patrol this territory haven't realized I'm here. I order a Coke and ask for the newspaper.

The owner brings me the paper and a glass dripping Coke over the rim. She and her wife run the joint, and her brother runs the little convenience store attached to the north side. She nods at me, doesn't make eye contact, and walks away. I open the paper, unsure what I expect to see.
 

There's nothing on the front page except the usual norm news. Homicide in Lexington, the demolition and of a long-unused coal mine to the east which makes the news because it's apparently the last in the country, nothing of interest to me. I comb the classifieds, but all I find are the normal apartment complexes and single family homes that won't admit a censured Mediator and three half-demons.

Even though I just ate, I order some cheese fries and eat them, burning my tongue and not caring because it now heals almost immediately.
 

I fold the newspaper and slide it back across the counter, leaving cash without asking for the bill. My phone rings as I jingle the bells on the door and cross the threshold back onto the street.
 

"Hey, Mira."

"Found you a place." She's in a quieter location now, but her voice sounds tense. "Well, I didn't. Wane did. She's got a friend of a friend with a cousin in Kentucky still in your territory range who has a cabin he's willing to rent. Cash in hand, six months in advance."

I stop on the sidewalk, not believing what Mira's saying. "You found me a place?"

"Yep." She rattles off directions, and I dig in my car — it's been cleaned and it feels wrong to not see my back seat full of crap — pulling out a note pad just in time to jot down what Mira's saying. It's about an hour from here, and it's dangerously close to the edge of my territory. Close enough to that boundary that if I go for an evening patrol and walk a couple miles north I might double over with nausea.
 

But I can't be picky. "Just tell me where to take the money."
 

She does, then pauses. "Nana's doing fine, by the way."

I know she doesn't mean for there to be any recrimination in her words, but guilt stabs me anyway. "Thank you."

I hang up, my fingers feeling numb. Nana is my bunny, a little red velvet hopster. She was a gift from Mason, the first shade I got to know who became my lover and then ran away to Egypt. I miss Nana and her little flumpy hops around the living room. I miss her twitchy little nose and soft fur. I miss the way she'd hop up to my foot and lean against it. Having a small furry creature dependent on me made my life a little better and a lot more full of cuteness. Gave me another good reason not to get dead. I look up from my phone, about to get into my car.
 

Someone's staring at me from across the street. When the wind blows my direction, my newly heightened sense of smell makes my hands twitch toward the knives in my boots. It's a Mediator across the street. The first I've seen here. I don't know him. We're far enough away from the Nashville Summit that he probably reports to Lexington or Louisville.
 

I don't have time to wonder if he's going to attack me.

His sword is drawn and he's halfway across the street in the time it takes me to unsheathe my knives.
 

And suddenly, I'm out of his way.
 

I haven't been hunting or even training since the tattoo, but when I see the Mediator's baffled face, covered in day old stubble, I realize that maybe the sense of smell is the least of it.

He recovers quickly and comes at me again. I dodge. I don't want to hurt another Mediator, not really. I don't kill norms.
 

But this guy probably thinks I do.

"I don't want to hurt you," I say, but I'm going to have to and I know it. Even if he doesn't yet. I won't kill him, but I have to incapacitate him.

He's in range. I parry his sword thrust with one knife. My foot flicks out and slams into his knee before he regains his balance, and a crack slices through the air.

The Mediator yells and spits, wobbling sideways on his remaining good leg. He tries to slash at me again with his sword, and this time I aim my kick at the blade, knocking it out of his hand. It clangs to the pavement. I kick it out of range, pointing my daggers at his face. Peripherally, I see that people are sticking their heads out of the few shops along the main drag. A couple move this direction. They know this guy, I'm sure.

"I know what you did," he says. He tries to snarl the words, but with a broken knee, all he manages is a gasp.
 

"I sincerely doubt that."

"You've got some half-hellkin half brother, and I'm going to put him down like the demon he is."

That he manages to say loudly enough that the people on the street flinch.

"You don't know what in the hells you're talking about," I breathe. I kneel a couple feet away from the Mediator, sure he's got more blades stashed on him. I see the bulge of a knife at his side in an inner pants holster, and another at his ankle. But I want him to hear me. "You know nothing about the shades or who they are. And you know nothing about my brother. If you want somewhere to stick your sword, try aiming it in the direction of Gregor Gaskin, if you can find him."

The man in front of me is tense like a coiled spring, and his eyes have locked on mine. I know what he sees.

"You're not one of us anymore," he says, again loudly enough for the townies to hear him.

I don't know what to say to that. It's true. "I'm still on your side. And you shouldn't open your mouth about things you don't know shit about."

"Tell you what I do know." He props himself up on his elbow, smart enough not to go for his blades, but I know he's aware of the small contingent of townies advancing down the sidewalk. He's not expecting them to attack me — they've got brains. But he's banking on me not wanting to fight them. Correctly.

"What do you think you know?" I ask flatly.

"If it's not me to take your demon brother's head off, it'll be somebody else."

I get to my feet and look behind the Mediator at the people coming my way. I walk directly toward them, toward my car.
 

They step back a foot to let me pass, but I hear the murmurs, the whispers, the heartbeats racing.
 

Mediator Assassin: 1. Ayala: 0.

He's right.
 

They're going to keep coming. Safety is an illusion.

Looks like I need a new cheese fries dealer.

CHAPTER TWO

I manage to keep the incident to myself until we get to the new cabin.

Nestled in a small valley fifty miles from the double wide, I drop the shades five miles away so their nudity doesn't freak out the owner. I meet the landlord at the cabin, fork over six months of rent in cash, and he salutes and leaves in an SUV. There's no internet, which makes me twitchy, but it's got a landline phone, gas heat, a satellite dish with more hunting channels than anyone should ever watch, and electricity, all of which he included in the rent. I don't know if I'm being overcharged, and I don't really care. The little two bedroom cabin looks like heaven to me.
 

Heaven has decade-old vinyl siding, kudzu encroaching from the hills, and smells like moth balls, but I'll take it.

Carrick's the first of the shades to make it to the cabin, and he raps his knuckles on the screen door before walking right in. "Ayala?"

I give him a wry smile from the living room, which is almost in the kitchen. There's not a lot of space in the house. Good thing the shades are indoor-outdoor creatures and they can climb a tree if they start feeling cagey.
 

"Want me to show you around?"

He shakes his head. He's got a leaf in his long auburn hair.
 

It's almost nice to be alone with Carrick. After a rocky start in which Gregor-who-I-intend-to-kill dumped him at my apartment, twisted his plans into killing norms, and betrayed him, we sort of bonded. Shaky trust turned to actual trust, and since Carrick is the oldest living shade at around four hundred years old, I'm glad he's on my side.

He's also a considerate roommate and taught me that it's okay to like romance novels for the happy ending. Let it not be said that I'm incapable of changing and growing.

"Where are Jax and Evis?" I ask. My spine feels like a xylophone someone's run the mallet up and down, and I shiver. I wish Evis were here. There have to be Mediators out there looking for us.

"Hunting." Carrick sits down next to me on the sofa, which is about twenty years old. He sinks in, grimacing. A few crickets begin to chirp outside, late for the season.
 

Reaching over to pluck the leaf from his hair, I take a deep breath and tell him about the Mediator who attacked me. He listens, his quietness and near-statue stillness telling me that this disturbs him.
 

"They're going to come after Evis," Carrick says.
 

"I can't let anything happen to him." My quiet admission startles Carrick into silence, and he gives me a queer look.
 

"You might not be able to protect him." The traces of remaining English accent show through in his words, and I hate the truth in what he says.

"I have to try."

"I know you do. But this is bigger than him."

"Then what am I fighting for?"
 

Carrick's forehead bears few lines for his age, though he doesn't look like a nubile seventeen-year-old, either, and just now the lines deepen into creases. He reaches out and takes my hand, giving it a squeeze. His mannerisms are always more human than the others', but the tightening of that hand contains a strength no norm could manage.
 

"You have more than just him to lose," he says, voice soft.
 

There's a rustle of leaves outside, and Carrick and I turn simultaneously to look. I catch a small twitch of surprise in him that I heard it too. A moment later, Jax and Evis come through the door without knocking. Outside, I can see a white-tailed deer dangling off the side of the small porch, already bled out.

Jax's brown skin is spotted with blood, and Evis has a few smears against his paleness as well. They're getting less messy about how they hunt. The first few shades I saw eating left chunks everywhere and gnawed on the bones. I'm acutely aware of my position, to see an entire new species find its footing in a hostile world. I wish I could convince the Summit of that. I want these people to be safe. They didn't ask to be born. They're trying so hard.

In spite of their bloodied appearance, both Evis and Jax come up and gently touch my shoulder. I return the gesture, even though by now it shouldn't be necessary. They trust me, I trust them — but this is a fragile ritual in a still-fluid people group. I won't break it.