The Getaway God (31 page)

“It's fucking ridiculous.”

“I take your arrogance and give you a jack of hearts.”

“How do we know who's won? How do we add up the points?”

“I'll show you when we get through the deck. By the way, the winner gets to take one of the loser's fingers. Your stunt last night is what reminded me of the game.”

“The guards won't let us have knives.”

“Then the winner will just have to gnaw off his prize.”

We play a few more hands and the game doesn't make any more sense than when we started. I can't find a pattern in the taking or giving. Mason is tossing out numbers, body parts, places, and animals. There's nothing I can do but follow his lead.

“I don't know what the hell I'm doing.”

“Did you always know what you were doing in the arena? Just keep going.”

I draw a card.

“I don't believe you about Candy, by the way.”

“Believe what you want. You heard what she said.”

“Whatever you drugged her with, it scrambled her brain. That wasn't truth coming out. It was paranoid hallucinations or something.”

“She's a creature that needs shelter. Her doctor friend, Kinski, died. You were convenient. Don't mistake refuge for love.”

“I take you trying to mind-­fuck me and give you a six of clubs.”

“You should take this more seriously. Remember sweet Alice? Thinking about her let me beat you once before. All these little ­people you think you care about now are ruining your concentration. Don't make the same mistake you made eleven years ago.”

We run through a few more nonsense hands. I'm not going to win. I have to salvage something from this.

“Tell me about Blackburn.”

“The late great. What about him?”

“Why did you kill him?”

“Did I?”

He takes my soul and throws a five.

“Saint Nick sure did. And I know there's not another Saint Nick because you have too big an ego for that.”

“The reason for killing Blackburn should be obvious. Without the Augur, the Sub Rosas will panic and split into factions, attacking each other. Of course, I've been busy. How do you know it wasn't my friends who killed Blackburn?”

“
Der Zorn Götter?
Forget it. I've seen their hoodoo and it would take more than that to get to the Augur.”

“If anyone needed to get to him.”

“An inside job? Ishii is an asshole, but he's better at his job than that.”

“Play,” he says.

“I take your sense of satisfaction and give you a queen of spades.”

“Now you're talking,” says Mason. “Of course, what if Ishii was Saint Nick? For a few minutes, I mean.”

“Possession? I don't buy it. One of his ­people would have noticed if he showed up for lunch with a chain saw and twenty feet of intestines.”

“I was just throwing out hypotheticals. No. Ishii isn't a good candidate at all. No. You'd want someone who can come and go and get as close to Blackburn as they want.”

“Tuatha?”

Mason rests his hand on his cards for a minute before moving. His heart is beating faster.

“Poor dear. Having your soul ripped out the way Aelita did to her, well, you're never quite right in the head again.”

“You made Tuatha kill her own husband?”

“I take your disbelief and give you a four of diamonds.”

He throws down the card.

“I didn't say Tuatha was made to do anything. We were just speculating on the best subject for a possession. Besides, the key is in Hell.”

“But you know who has it. And you could get a message to them.”

“If you say so.”

“If Tuatha did it, where's the body?”

“You're not playing.”

“I take your lies and give you a ten of hearts.”

“The Blackburns have a lovely mansion,” he says. “You'd be surprised how well these modern garbage disposals deal with bones.”

I look at Mason, trying to read him. The light is shitty in here and I can't get a good look at his eyes. But his heartbeat is up and he's not sweating. It's not fear that's getting him excited.

I say, “What are the chances she'd ever remember doing something like that?”

He draws a breath. Moves his wrists in the cuffs where they're rubbing the skin raw.

“Who knows? Besides, now that I think about it, it was probably me. I've killed so many they tend to blur together.”

“You're really having fun, aren't you?”

“The time of my life. You know, in Tartarus I was adrift. Truly going mad. All I wanted was some sense of control. And now I have it and it feels great.”

He draws a card.

“Now that I think about it, yes, I did kill Blackburn. I'm sure of it. Still, you might want to ask Tuatha about the clogged kitchen plumbing. Terrible timing too. While she's planning her husband's funeral and all.”

“All these lies. They're obvious and boring.”

“Is our biblical flood boring?”

“You're not claiming credit for the rain, are you?”

“No. That's the Angra. Just their approach brings calamity. Can you imagine what it will be like when they arrive?”

“It's like you've got Tourette's. All the shit that comes out of your mouth.”

“I take your fear and give you the king of spades.”

“I take your never seeing daylight again and give you a deuce of clubs.”

“Tell the lovely Ms. Fortune to count her nightgowns. I bet she'll find one missing. Covered in blood and down the drain with her hubby's guts. Your turn.”

I don't want to believe him, but he seems to be telling the truth. Maybe he meant what he said. Tartarus made him even crazier than when I put him in. He talks like a suicidal Hellion. Does he want me to kill him or does he want to kill himself? I'll tell Wells to put more guards on him.

“You think you're coming on like the Devil, but you sound more like a bawling brat.”

“That's something else you took from me,” Mason says. “My chance to become Lucifer and move my legions against Heaven.”

“Heaven would have destroyed you. I saved your life.”

“Thanks oodles. I take your humanity and give you a four of spades.”

I keep trying to make sense of it all, the game and Mason. What does he really want? My brain vapor locks. I can't think of what to bet.

“You're not doing very well today,” he says.

“You said there weren't any rules in this infinite crap.”

“Like life, there are always rules. They are just not necessarily logical. But you're even less logical than usual.”

“I think you just made up this game as payback for last night.”

“Does that mean you forfeit?”

The cell door opens and the Shonin shuffles in. If a skeleton can look more skeletal, that's how he looks. Blackened skin flakes off his face. His hands tremble and he has trouble walking in a straight line. He stops and leans against the wall. I go over to him.

“What are you doing here?”

“You need to stop this foolishness. Your personal feelings for the girl and your past with Mason are making you unfit for work. You should go. Let me play him.”

“Even if you're right, he won't play you. This whole thing is to show me up.”

“I'll play him,” says Mason.

The fucker always did have good hearing.

“I mean, if you're incapacitated. Besides, the game is almost over. There's just a few more hands.”

“Let me finish,” says the Shonin.

He takes a step toward the table and his legs give out. I grab him by the shoulders and lift him up. He's just bones and robes. He weighs nothing. By the time I have him up, the cell door is open and guards are coming in, their guns drawn.

The Shonin punches me in the shoulder. It's so feeble I wouldn't have known it happened if I hadn't seen it.

“Put me down.”

I set him on his feet.

“I'll finish with the book,” he says. “I'm learning great things. But you must play the game. I can't do both.”

“Go and lie down, old man. Let me handle this.”

The guards help the Shonin out, locking the door behind him.

“That was dramatic,” says Mason. “He's even more pathetic than you and Muninn. Always running to help the older gents. Those daddy issues run deep.”

“You know if you call the Angra, they'll kill you too.”

“All those L.A. good vibes you've picked up have made you afraid of death. But death is what you and I do.”

There's only one thing I haven't tried.

“Forget it. I quit. You win.”

Mason cocks his head like he's waiting for me to say something else. He sighs and pushes his cards away.

“I admit. That's the last thing I expected from you.”

“Then I did win after all.”

He smiles.

“No, but you fooled me. And you played horribly, even for you,” he says. “I tell you what. I'll give you something anyway.”

“You'll give me something even though I lost? Why?”

“Because I want you to come back and play some more.”

“Okay. What will you give me?”

Mason thinks for a minute.

“You already controlled the Qomrama when you used it to remove the demon from one of my bodies. But you don't know how you did it?”

“No.”

“The Qomrama likes you. It wants to please you. But remember that it's transdimensional. Your desires for it must also be transdimensional.”

“What does that mean?”

He leans back in his chair.

“It means if you can't play the game, you can't control the Qomrama.”

“If you know how to use it why haven't you?”

“Because you have it.”

I sit back down at the table.

“I took it so the 8 Ball is mine. Possession is the key to controlling it, isn't it?”

He nods.

“That's why Aelita had it hidden in the palace.”

“All I have to do is play with it long enough and I'll figure it out without you.”

“The world is falling apart, Jimbo, and it's going to get worse. By the time you get the keys in the ignition, there might not be much left to save.”

I look back at the cell door. I know Wells is on the other side shitting fried green tomatoes, waiting for me to get more information, but I'm lucky Mason gave me this much.

“Thanks for the freebie.”

Mason nods.

“Of course, I'm still going to hurt you.”

I put my Kissi hand on the table and take off the glove.

“I owe you a finger. Take it.”

He looks at it like a chef would look at rat shit in a Dumpster.

“I don't think I want it anymore. I'll have to hurt you some other way.”

“I'm ready.”

He shakes his head.

“Later. We're done for now. Come back around dinnertime for tomorrow's game. I have some preparations to make.”

I put the glove back on, happy my hand was too ugly for even Mason to want it.

“Tomorrow then?” he says.

I think for a minute.

“Forget the Infinite Game. I'll play you Russian roulette again. This time by your rules.”

He looks right through me.

“I'll watch, but that's your game. I want to play mine.”

He gathers up the cards from the table.

“Send in the guards on the way out. I want to get started on the new game right away.”

After checking on the Shonin and translating as much as I can remember of the conversation in Mason's cell into English, I head home. Vidocq calls about an hour later.

“I thought you'd want to know. They burned the clinic.”

“Allegra's? Who did it?”

“Men have been hanging around for the last few days. They park across the street or up the block. Nothing has happened until tonight.”

“Did you call the cops?”

There's a pause.

“A few came. They say harboring Lurkers is now a crime in Los Angeles. They arrested poor Fairuza.”

I know what this is. I should have let him take my finger. Instead I gave Mason the perfect opening to hurt me through someone else. I practically handed Mason Allegra and Fairuza on a platter.

I go to Vidocq and Allegra's apartment. Not through a shadow. I ride the Hellion hog so I can feel the rain for a while. Vidocq stays with Allegra as she cries in the bedroom. I spend the night, listening for sounds at the door. I have a lot of guns with me.

D
URING THE NIGHT,
I go out through a shadow to see the clinic. The whole mall is gone. Just burned timbers, broken glass, and collapsed roofs. I don't mention it to either one of them.

There are bottles and packages scattered over Vidocq's worktable. It's too haphazard to be his stuff. I pick up a small bundle of yellow herbs and give it a sniff. They stink of smoke. These few things are what Allegra managed to grab from the clinic before she had to run. Bottles of rare potions and plants. A ­couple of old handwritten books. Probably Doc Kinski's personal medical notes. A chunk of blue amber. Some red mercury. Carefully wrapped in silk are the two pieces of divine light glass that heal most injuries. There are a ­couple of small vials on the end that I don't recognize.

“They're potions for Candy. Allegra made them fresh herself, so there's no chance of them being poisoned,” says Vidocq.

I didn't hear him come in.

“How's Allegra doing?”

He shrugs.

“Badly. But it could be worse. Thank you for coming over.”

“Anytime. What else can I do?”

He drops down onto the old couch. Rubs his eyes.

“Nothing. She's asleep now. I think when she wakes she'd like to be alone for a while to collect her thoughts.”

“Sure. I'll take off.”

“I don't mean to throw you out.”

“Don't worry about it. But there's one thing,” I say.