The Iron Hunt (8 page)

Badelt’s
office was on the second floor of the narrow brick strip. Front door locked. I
saw postal boxes through the glass pane and glanced down at Aaz. He flashed me
a grin and faded into the shadows. A moment later, the front door opened from
the inside. I walked in, Dek and Mal still humming “Is This Love” in my ears.

I did
not encounter anyone on the stairs, and except for the sounds of the restaurant
next door, heard faintly through the walls, the building seemed quiet, empty. I
passed a small law office on the first floor, and on the second found two doors
advertising a MR. CHEN, ACCOUNTANT and a MABEL LEE, HERBAL MEDICINE. At the end
of the hall, farthest from the stairs, was a battered wooden door and a placard
that read, BRIAN BADELT, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR.

I
hesitated, still listening, and checked the corners of the dimly lit hall and
ceiling for cameras. Seemed safe enough. The largest shadow was the one my own
body cast, and the boys used it as a conduit to pour free into the hall,
gathering around me like wolves. Only Aaz was missing—until Badelt’s door
opened, and Aaz peered out with a sharp grin.

The
office was small. One room, one window. No space for a secretary. The air smelled
like cigarettes. No plants, no pictures on the walls. Just one filing cabinet,
a desk, three chairs—two in front of the desk, one behind—and a phone and fax
machine. Simple. Man of action, not frivolity. Maybe no money for frills,
though I remembered his picture—thought
hard-ass
—and decided this was
just his personality.

“Coppers
been here,” Zee said, sniffing the floor. “Been all over.”

I
figured as much. Man dies from gunshot wounds, you check his work and home. That,
and Badelt’s desk looked messy, paperwork scattered. He seemed like the neat
type, too fussy to tolerate disorder. I walked around the desk and sat in his
chair, listening to the boys prowl. Tried to imagine myself as Badelt, sitting
here, gazing over my domain. Looking at my name.

“Zee,”
I said. “Check out the filing cabinet.”

He
snapped his claws at Raw, and the two of them started pulling drawers. I slid
on my gloves, leaned forward, and checked the desk. In the first drawer, I
found an unlocked metal box. I opened it and looked down at a box of bullets.
No gun.

The
drawer beneath held a framed picture of Badelt. He stood beside a small
middle-aged Chinese woman who had her arm draped around his waist and a smile
on her face that was so big and happy it could have melted stone. She was
strikingly beautiful, unusually so. Most women who looked like her lived only
in the movies, or on magazine pages. Badelt seemed just as happy. No big smile,
but his eyes were crinkled with warmth. A good look on him. Better than death,
that was for sure. I wondered if the woman had been his wife, but if she was,
his keeping their picture in the drawer of his desk was probably not a good
sign.

I
heard the boys muttering at each other from the filing cabinet, and placed the
couple’s picture back in the drawer. Nothing else was in there. I started
pushing papers around the top of his desk. Toward the bottom, something caught
my eye. A newspaper, date from yesterday. I hesitated, then unfolded the paper,
scanning the pages. Outside, the wind picked up, rattling against the window at
my back. Dek and Mal stopped singing.

I
turned, looked out, but saw nothing unordinary. Zee and the others were still
messing with the filing cabinet. I focused on the newspaper.

It
was, as Suwanai had said, a local Chinatown rag. I saw them all the time,
especially when Grant and I came to the area for lunch or dinner. There was an
edition published exclusively in Chinese, but this was the English version, a
slim paper that dealt with local news, politics, and announcements, most of it
related to the Asian community.

Made
sense that Badelt would have found it an interesting read. His office was in
Chinatown. Stood to reason most of his work might be community-based, as well.

I
almost missed it. I was flipping fast, a sense of wasted time creeping up on
me, and my eyes skimmed over a photograph at the bottom of page four. I started
to turn past, then froze.

The
photograph was old, but clear. Based on the caption, it had been taken in 1957.
Front and center stood a young white man who looked big and strong, ruggedly
attractive, with a sunny, healthy virility not often seen in the modern male
species. He was dressed in simple clothes, and looked cheerfully dirty. Behind
his right shoulder I saw a giant stone Buddha set in a craggy hill, and at its
base, white tents. His hip leaned against a table set amongst rocks and sand,
its surface covered in small artifacts: pottery shards, small pieces of metal.

JACK
MEDDLE, read the caption. ARCHAEOLOGIST.

But
it was the woman on his left I could not stop staring at. She was slender,
dressed in a simple blouse, long pants, and tall boots. She wore gloves, and a
kerchief knotted loosely around her neck. Fine, delicate features, high
cheekbones, full mouth, flawless skin. Hair pulled back. She had striking eyes,
filled with a defiant raw strength that seemed to reach out of the
photograph—daring, haunting. The eyes of a fighter. A Hunter.

My
grandmother.

My
lungs ached. I forced myself to breathe. Felt little bodies crowding close and
leaned back as Zee and the others took a look.

“Oh,”
Zee said, very quietly.

Took
me a moment to speak. “What is this?”

“Silk
Road,” he said, as the others all shared a long look. “After the big boom.”

Big
boom. The bomb. My grandmother had been in Hiroshima during World War II. Never
learned why, only that she was lucky: The bomb fell at 9:15 in the morning. Sun
in the sky. Tattoos secure. The boys kept her alive. Covered her face and
breathed for her until she could travel to safety. Anything, everything, to
survive.

I
looked at the caption again. Her name was listed only as Miss Chambers, an
alias I was unfamiliar with. Miss Chambers. Adventurer. That was her title.
Appropriate, I supposed.

I
scanned the article, which discussed how Dr. Jack Meddle had, while on a Silk
Road expedition, stumbled upon an ancient temple buried in the sands almost one
hundred miles north of Xi’an. A place of diverse worship, for Christians, Muslims,
and Buddhists.

Now
some of the artifacts unearthed from that temple were being displayed at the
Seattle Art Museum, as part of a traveling exhibition of ancient Asian
antiquities. The grand opening, according to the newspaper, was tonight. Part
of a gala celebration timed to coincide with the Chinese New Year, fast
approaching.

Jack
Meddle was going to be there.

I sat
back in Badelt’s chair and closed my eyes. I did not believe in coincidence.
Meddle had known my grandmother, and here I was, looking at a photo of them
together, found in the office of a private investigator who had written down my
real name.

I
looked at my grandmother. Studied her gaze, so much like my own, and felt, too,
that I was staring at my mother. An eerie sensation.

I
also saw something else that was curious.

My
grandmother was standing very close to Meddle. So close, in fact, she might
have been holding his hand. Or his waist. Maybe his ass. Hard to say. I could
not see their hands, which were hidden behind their backs. Shoulders pressed
together like glue, bodies turned in, just slightly. The two of them looked
comfortable, like they were used to being close. Working together.

I
checked the date again—1957. No specific month.

A
chill swept through me. My mother had been born in 1958.

“No,”
I said out loud, and looked at the boys, who stared back like choirboys: far
too innocent, little devils. Zee shuffled his feet. Dek and Mal lay curled,
very still, on my shoulders.

No.
It was impossible.

But
it also made sense. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. The women in my family
never talked about fathers. Or grandfathers. No record of them in the journals.
One would imagine storks got involved for all my mother had ever spoken about
sex and men and babies. It was a sore subject.

I
checked my watch. A little after eight, and the gala ended at eleven. I still
had time. I took another long look at the photo, then carefully folded the
newspaper and stuck it into the back of my jeans. Helped the boys return the
files. They were quiet, subdued. So was I.

I
knew my grandmother only through photographs and her journal: just one, her
writing and language spare, to the point. I thought of all the other women who
had come before, countless women who had fought the demons, a chain unbroken
from mother to daughter for more millennia than I cared to contemplate. I knew
even less about them.

I
wondered if Zee and the others would miss me when I was gone.

When
Badelt’s office was back in order, I looked at the boys, reached up to pat Dek
and Mal, and said, “Is that man in the picture my grandfather?”

Zee
said nothing. Raw and Aaz stared at the floor, little claws digging into the
wood, spikes flat against their scaled skin. No way to tell if that was a yes
or a no, but it was obviously another subject not meant for discussion. Too
many of those tonight.

I
gave them a hard look. Walked to the door. Opened it.

And
found a demon waiting on the other side.

EXPECT
the unexpected,
my mother once said.
Because
the unexpected most certainly will be expecting you.

The
demon was taller than the doorframe, so tall my neck hurt to look at him. He
was wrapped in a cloak that billowed and heaved in the still air of the hall,
the cloth—if it was cloth—whipping about his body with such violence he could
have been standing in a hurricane. I saw shadows in the winks of those folds,
bottomless, endless—like oubliettes for souls.

Little
of the demon’s face was visible; a wide-brimmed black hat swept low over his
eyes, revealing only white flesh, a pointed chin, the long masculine line of a
hard mouth. Black hair curled past his jaw, the very tips twining and writhing
like snakes.

I saw
no hands. And though his eyes were hidden beneath the brim of his hat, I felt
him looking at me. His stare, like a brand upon my face, the heat of his gaze
pushing through me with unfathomable strength.

I
lost my mind. It had been a long time. Most demons I encountered tended to be
of the spirit variety, wearing human bodies. Substantial as a breath of bad
air. The ones made of flesh and bone were rare. Harder for them to pass through
the veil. Took an opening. But more than that, it required another level of
escape, through the rings, the ascending prison dimensions. Power was needed to
achieve freedom. Determination. Which meant the ones who did break free, as my
mother would say, were bad motherfuckers.

The
boys and I had fought our share. Some had been on earth for centuries, merely
hiding until our paths crossed. I had no way of knowing just how many escapees
there were. It was a big world. Only one Hunter.

I
stepped back and slammed the door. As if that would save me. I stood, staring,
expecting the demon to burst through. I also expected the boys to close ranks,
but they watched the door, as well. Unmoving. Eyes huge.

“
Zee
,”
I hissed.

“Maxine,”
he said, expression inscrutable, ears flattened against his bristled skull. Raw
and Aaz dug their claws into the floor, the spikes in their spines fanning out
with a clacking sound, violently trembling. Dek and Mal also quivered, their
breath rattling hot in my ears.

None
of them looked ready to fight. And that was wrong, had never happened. It could
not. My blood was their blood. My death, the same as their suicide. The boys
lived only because I did. It was supposed to be an incentive. Beyond
friendship. Or loyalty.

“Zee,”
I said again.

“Open
the door,” he whispered.

“You’re
going to get us killed.”

“Never,
Maxine.”

“You’re
wrong.”

“Never,”
he snapped, and there was heat in his voice, anger. Not directed at me. I could
feel that much. I could taste the truth. The boys had never steered me wrong.

My
heart hammered. I opened the door.

The
demon was gone.

I did
not waste time. I ran down the hall and jumped the stairs, three at a time,
feet pounding. The boys followed, loping through the shadows, disappearing
entirely as I burst onto the sidewalk and skidded into a crowd just leaving the
noodle restaurant. I ignored their yells. My skin prickled. My stomach hurt.
Bile in my throat. Big fat target.

GoMaxineGoGoGo.

I
ran, fled, tripped over my own feet racing down the street to the Jeep. I had a
vague plan. Lead the demon away. Find some high ground. Isolated. Away from
people. Hope like hell the boys helped.

Just
before I reached the Jeep, Dek and Mal hissed in my ears. I faltered. Felt air
move against my hair, and turned just in time to see a dark blur slam into the
sidewalk behind me. Concrete cracked. Like a thousand spines breaking, and I
looked down and saw feet shaped like knives; literally, blades; or claws that
might have been blades, long and straight, shining quicksilver. The demon stood
on those feet like a dancer,
en pointe
, and took a step. His toes
clicked as they cut the sidewalk. His head remained bowed, cloak shimmering
like dark water.