Within the Flames (2 page)
Authors: Marjorie M. Liu
“It would draw the wrong kind of attention. More than what is already focused on the child.” Long Nu glanced at Roland. “She is being hunted.”
Hunted. A girl, hunted. Eddie felt a cold, visceral disgust when he heard that. It made him think of his sister.
“No one told me,” he said.
“We were not sure. Now we are.”
“Who’s after her?”
Long Nu hesitated, and that was enough to convey to Eddie just how bad it was.
“They are called the
Cruor Venator,
” she said, in a cold, heavy voice. “Blood Hunters. Witches who steal power from blood.”
Serena sucked in her breath, a startling sound because it was filled with fear, dismay: two emotions Eddie had never, once, associated with her.
Eddie shared a quick look with Roland. “Witches?”
“Not just any witches,” Serena said sharply, continuing to stare at Long Nu. “Killers. Vicious, ruthless. They live for death. It’s their first, and only, pleasure.” She moved even closer to the dragon woman, as though stalking her, hands flexing at her sides. “But it’s impossible. That magic hasn’t been seen in a hundred years.”
Long Nu shook her head. “I know what such a death looks like. A shifter in Florida was lost to a group of them only two weeks ago. The same shifter who contacted Dirk & Steele about the girl.”
A hard knot of unease hit Eddie’s gut. “I didn’t know he was dead.”
Roland rubbed a hand through his hair and closed his eyes. “I only just found out. Long Nu discovered Estefan’s murder through different channels. When he stopped e-mailing me, I thought maybe he’d changed his mind about asking for our help in finding the girl.”
“I suspect he reached out to you because he had an idea of what threatened her. Except the
Cruor Venator
got him first,” said Long Nu in a cold, blunt voice—looking directly at Eddie as she spoke. “Estefan was ripped apart. Drained of blood. Part of his heart eaten. Skinned. It was a very bad death.”
Eddie did not blink or flinch. Long Nu, still watching him, added, “His wife is human, and was away when he was murdered. She explained that just before her husband died, Estefan told her that three women had been asking locals about a girl with golden eyes. It concerned him a great deal . . . especially when he learned that they were using her real name.”
“You think those women are witches,” he said, “and that they found the shifter, and murdered him, because they were looking for the girl.”
“I know it,” Long Nu replied, with chilling certainty. “And even if I am wrong, the mere possibility makes it urgent that we find her as quickly as possible.”
Serena’s eyes narrowed. “Did he know that she was headed to New York?”
“Yes. And everything he knew, the
Cruor Venator
now knows.”
Deep, dangerous, waters,
thought Eddie, feeling that old familiar shift inside his skin, as though he were a shape-shifter himself, transforming into a different person.
That transformation had begun as soon as Long Nu said the girl was being hunted. After all these years, it was natural as breathing. Part of him was always quiet, always waiting, beneath the fire. A mind-set, where nothing could be depended on, where violence was expected, promised, and always lethal. He had the scars to remind himself if he ever forgot. But he never had.
His heart donned a cold armor, where he would feel nothing. Nothing, until the job was done.
Because it was obvious the job was going to require doing things he was going to regret.
“Just find the girl,” Roland said heavily, clearly reading his thoughts. “Serena, talk to youm" talk tr contacts. I’ll do the same here.”
Eddie didn’t need to hear more. He didn’t want to.
He turned and walked away, descending the stairs to the kitchen. He did not look at the cage. He strode down a long hall, then took another flight of stairs to the seventh floor.
He had an apartment half a mile away, but a spare room had been given to him several years ago, after he had contracted an artificially constructed virus: the prototype of a bioweapon. The infection had almost killed him, with one additional side effect.
Eddie had lost all control over his powers. All those hard-earned years of focus, sacrifice, and isolation—gone, meaningless. Literally, up in flames.
The way he lived his life until then had revolved around his ability to protect people from himself. Suddenly, in an instant, that was no longer possible. For almost a year he had needed to live in that glass cage, where he would be safe from others.
Confidence, shattered. Heartbreakingly alone.
Those first few times venturing beyond its glass walls—terrifying. After that, months where Eddie did nothing but stay indoors or sit on the roof of the building, staring at downtown San Francisco. Watching people. Watching the world.
It had taken another six months for his confidence to return . . . but only because he’d had no choice. A friend needed help. That had been motivation enough for him to test the limits of his new control, and after that . . . it had gotten easier.
Taking back his old life had felt like a miracle.
Now he wondered if he needed to return to the cage again.
The spare room that Roland had given him was nearly a thousand square feet in size and full of windows, overlooking the city. His bed was a mattress on the floor, and his clothes were stored in plastic bins. Stacks of travel books, language study guides, and science magazines surrounded his bed, along with a small lamp and a box full of bottled water.
Eddie found a backpack and began stuffing it with underwear, a pair of jeans, and some T-shirts.
He found a small leather wallet, covered in stains and worn so thin with age it almost broke when he handled it. No money inside. Just photos. He hesitated but placed it in one of the bins, carefully. He had enough distractions.
lang="e height="0em" width="1em" align="justify">
Free.
He’s free.
Good behavior.
They let him out because he was a model prisoner.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God, baby.
He’s free.
Eddie closed his eyes, and focused on his breathing. With a great deal of effort, he pushed away the memory of his mother’s stunned, grief-filled voice.
But there was another voice inside his head. His own.
Don’t go to New York City. Go after Malcolm Swint, instead
.
Kill him.
For Daphne.
It would be so easy. All it would take was a thought.
Just one, little, thought.
Eddie shook his head in disgust. No. This was the
perfect
time to leave San Francisco.
He kept the lamp off. Old habit. He preferred working in the dark, unseen. The city lights were more than enough for going through the motions. He had packed this bag so many times, he could do it in his sleep. It gave his brain time to sort through everything he had been told.
Find the girl.
Air moved across his neck. Eddie turned. Long Nu stood behind him, silent as a ghost. He was too surprised to speak—and then he was too busy keeping himself calm as heat flooded his bones and muscles, rising through his skin. The air warmed around them.
“One more thing,” she said.
Eddie never saw the old woman move. Suddenly he was falling, falling and falling until he hit the mattress so hard he bounced. Golden light flashed, and he heard a rough, rubbing sound, like the belly of an alligator dragging over the floor.
A huge clawed foot settled on the mattress beside /i>ress behis head. Heat washed over his body, but it was not from him.
“Look at me,” Long Nu whispered, her voice deeper now, almost a growl.
Eddie turned his head. It was too dark for details, but he glimpsed scales rippling over the muscles of a long, serpentine throat . . . the hard line of a jaw, the shine of a sharp white tooth. Golden eyes shone like fire.
“The
Cruor Venator
don’t just take the blood of shape-shifters,” she said, each word softly hissed. “Any blood will do. But yours . . . your
fire . . .”
A deep rumble filled the air, caged thunder, born in her throat. “Fire is elemental. Only dragons have fire in their blood. You will stir their hunger.”
“I’m no dragon,” Eddie whispered. “I’m human.”
Long Nu leaned away from him, a slow retreat, revealing a massive body that in the darkness resembled a sinuous coil of muscle and claws, and draped leather. Eddie did not look too closely. He began breathing again. His heart pounded so hard he was dizzy—and that was dangerous.
Staying calm kept him cool. Staying calm was the key.
“You’re wrong,” said Long Nu. “What you bury only grows stronger, in time. This is true of what sleeps in blood.”
Eddie swallowed. “Stay out of my head.”
“I can’t,” she said simply. “You hide so much of your heart, even from yourself. Hide too long, and you will forget it’s there.”
He sat up, but had to shield his eyes as golden light flared bright as the sun, blinding him.
When he could see again, he found Long Nu on her knees, human and mostly naked. Her clothes were torn, hanging off her in rags. Eddie averted his eyes and dragged the blanket off his bed. He handed it to her.
“Ma’am,” he said quietly.
Long Nu’s hand touched his fingers as she took the blanket. Her skin was hot—just as hot as his. Even hotter, when she grabbed his wrist with her other hand and held him tight. Smoke rose between them. Eddie set his jaw and met her golden gaze.
“There are so few left of my kind,” whispered Long Nu. “Find the girl.”
“I will,” Eddie promised, and found himself adding, “Whatever it takes.”
Long Nu gave him a mirthless smile, and the smoke between them suddenly became fire. It did not burn him, but the flames flickered up both their arms, like tiny deadly fingers.
“If the
Cruor Venator
is hu
nting her,” she said softly, “it might just take everything you have.”
W
hen Jimmy screamed, Lyssa was holding a warm teacup in her gloved right hand and shading watercolors with her left: ungloved, her skin pale and oh-so-human. A mild headache had been brewing all morning. Not enough sleep. Too little sunlight and fresh air. Bad premonitions.
Lyssa jumped when she heard the boy’s voice, jumped right to the edge of her battered folding chair, knocking her knees on the plastic table. Everything slid sideways. Tea sloshed over her wrist, onto the painting—and the brush tumbled from her hand, hitting the concrete floor. Cold sweat broke against her back, followed by a wave of heat that made all the burning candles flare with a massive, crackling hiss.
They found me,
thought Lyssa, and all her careful planning went out the window. She sat, paralyzed, even when the boy cried out again. Her body just wouldn’t move.
Until, suddenly, it did.
And she ran.
It was black as a cave outside her nest, which was at the farthest end of the unfinished subway tunnel, at the spot where construction had stopped, many years ago. Nothing there but the old worker’s station she’d moved into, built inside a massive concrete wall. Outside—scattered, shoveled up against the damp walls—was loose rock, unused iron rails, and old electric cables that draped in snakelike piles. In some spots, garbage still remained from the previous resident: plastic cups and rotting clothes, a hollowed-out mattress that was home to rats.
Desolation, in the dark. Her apocalyptic garden.
The cool air was heavy with the scent of rust and cement, and stagnant water; and the ground was uneven beneath Lyssa’s boots: dirt and gravel, and the old train tracks that hadn’t ever been used. She raced over them with sure footing. No flashlight, no lamp burning in her hand. Her eyes were good in the dark.
Lyssa tried tereo stay calm—to
think—
but when Jimmy cried out again, his young voice echoing against the cavernous walls, power poured into her muscles, and her entire body prickled with heat. Sight faded into a golden haze. Her teeth sharpened. Lyssa slapped her gloved hand over her mouth, breathing hard through her nose.
No,
she told herself, running faster.
Not now.
Lyssa rounded a curve in the tunnel, passing tents and lean-tos: small makeshift rooms with no roofs, and walls made from standing sheets of cardboard and plywood; surrounded with folding chairs and other boxes; piles of nameless, unidentifiable
stuff
that had probably served some purpose, once upon a time. Clothes, toys, magazines, broken Styrofoam, metal scrap: rotting in the dark, filthy, smelling vaguely like shit and piss. Or maybe that was the fact that there was shit and piss everywhere, at the edges of the tunnel. Years of it.
She hated the place.
Ahead of her, light glinted: cookfires burning in old stainless-steel pots and deep pits dug in the ground. Lyssa smelled onions, hot dogs, and whiskey; and the air sizzled, smoke rising around the face of a familiar man: Albert, who crouched over the food with a pair of chopsticks held in his trembling grip.
His watery gaze was focused on the boy. On the man holding the boy.
Jimmy. Twelve years old, so skinny he was practically swimming in loose jeans and a zip-up sweatshirt. His hair was brown and floppy, his cheeks ruddy. His brown-eyed gaze, usually so cocky, was lost behind an expression of real fear. He was trying to free himself from the old man standing rigid in front of him.
It was Mack. Which was good and bad.
Bad, because he was nuts. Good, because he was only human.
He held the boy’s skinny arm with his right hand—the other raised high, gripping an empty can of SPAM.
“You little
fuck
!
”
he roared, shaking Jimmy so hard, the boy lost his footing. “Where’s your fucking dog, you worthless piece of shit?”
Stay calm,
Lyssa told herself, jaw clamped tight.
Calm.
But she wasn’t feeling calm when she grabbed Mack’s left wrist with her strong right hand. She held on so tight her claws almost punctured her glove. Her sweater sleeve slid down. Reptilian scales glimmered into view. Just a hint of them, covering her arm.
It was dark. No one was close enough to notice that her skin wasn’t human.
But it made Lyssa panic, all the same—and she forgot her strength.
She yanked down too hard on Mack’s arm. The old man screamed, and dropped the can of SPAM. He also let go of Jimmy, who scrambled backward, eyes huge.
Mack fell to his knees, groaning. Lyssa released him, ashamed and afraid. Her skin burned, and she lowered her head, long braids and oversized knit hat falling around her face. If her eyes were glowing . . .
Lyssa shut them. “Mack. What the hell?”
She heard him shifting on the gravel, hissing through his teeth. “Bitch. You broke me.”
She wanted to be sick but made her voice strong, hard. “No. You’ll bruise, but that’s all. Jimmy, you okay?”
“Fine,” he said, somewhere in front of her.
Lyssa took a deep breath, then another. “What happened?”
Mack’s voice quavered with a sob. “His fucking dog stole my lunch. Left the can out for just two fucking seconds.”
She finally opened her eyes and looked at the old man. In the three years she had lived in this tunnel, she had never seen him without his gray knit cap, punched with holes and bits of debris. His beard was the same dull color, and so was his skin: ashen, the shadows so deep under his sunken eyes that it was hard to know where one began and the other ended. A skinny, sinewy, cadaverous man—burdened with profound mood swings.
Seconds ago he had been enraged. Now he just looked miserable, and hungry, and very old. Too old to be living down here, too old to be touched so roughly. Too old to be dealing with someone like her. Even if he was an asshole.
“Jimmy,” she said heavily, without looking away from Mack.
The boy climbed to his feet, but remained half-crouched, wary. “I’m sorry.
Really
sorry.”
He didn’t sound sorry. Lyssa gave him a warning glance. “Mack, I’ve got some food you can have.”
“Keep it. You got mean hands.” The old man shot Jimmy a hateful look. “I’ll kill that fucking dog if I see it again. You hear me?”
“Go to hell,” said Jimmy, with all the squeak and snarl of a puppy.
Lyssa rolled her eyes, marched over to him, and grabbed his arm. She didn’t have to say anything. The boy looked at her and grimaced.
Albert, who had finally risen from his cookfire, shuffled forward to help Mack stand. Albert was middle-aged, black, with a bad knee that got stiff on rainy days. According to him, it rained every day.
“That kinda talk’s no good,” said Albert gently, also giving Jimmy a warning look. “Come on, Mack Daddy. I got some dinner you can have.”
“Fuck you,” Mack said, and this time there was definitely a sob in his voice. “Not hungry. Just surprised I still got my arm.”
You’re lucky I didn’t rip it off your body,
thought Lyssa, uneasy. At full strength, she could have. She had done it before, to other men.
Fewer than ten people resided in the tunnel, but it was midday up top, so only a handful of the usual residents were around. Most had jobs—part-time at McDonald’s, or working as janitors at Grand Central. Some temped at local businesses that needed muscle for a day. Two panhandled. A veteran who had come back from Iraq only a year before had just landed a job at a construction site—but like Lyssa, had issues with living around people. Nevertheless, she didn’t expect him to stay in the tunnel for much longer.
The rest, like Albert and Mack, were alcoholics or too mentally disturbed to function up top. Lyssa didn’t care about their problems, so long as they stayed harmless. This was a good tunnel, filled with folk who were desperate but hopeful. Old Mack losing his cool with a kid was a bad sign. Almost as bad as the police sniffing around, which hadn’t happened yet.
Lyssa figured it was only a matter of time. Most tunnels were watched by authorities—locked, or rigged with cameras and alarms. No one wanted terrorists slinking underground and setting bombs.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said to Jimmy, walking him down the tunnel to her nest. “Forget the fact it’s a school day. It’s not safe. Your mom got you out of here for a better life. Not more of this.”
The boy didn’t answer her. His silence was tense, heavy.
“Jimmy,” she said, worried. “Why are you here?”
He ducked his head, almost like a flinch, and pulled a flashlight from his backpack. He switched it on. It hurt Lyssa’s vision, but she didn’t tell him to turn it off. He swung the beam around, and somewhere on their right, she heard a muffled sniffing sound, followed by toenails clicking on stone.
A dog slunk close. A mutt, one of the ugliest animals Lyssa had ever seen. Part Chihuahua, maybe, but there could have been dachshund in it, or some kind of Jack Russell. Lyssa had seen rats that were bigger.
The dog whimpered. The boy scooped him up. Lyssa said, “Mack was serious. He’ll kill him.”
“I’ll kill
him,
” muttered Jimmy, hugging the dog even closer to his chest. Lyssa gripped his bony shoulder with her human left hand.
“Don’t say things like that,” she said quietly.
Jimmy tensed and gave her a sullen look. “I was joking.”
“I don’t care. You have to think about repercussions.”
The boy stared at her, then glanced away. “Did you ever kill someone?”
Lyssa felt cold. “That’s some question.”
“My mom was wondering why you’re still down here. You’re not like the others. Which means you’re like
us.
” Jimmy looked at her again, and the glow from his flashlight cast shadows that made his face look hollow, ghastly. “You’re hiding.”
It was Lyssa’s turn not to answer him.
The tunnel curved. Most of the walls were unfinished, nothing but excavated dirt. The support columns were made of concrete, covered in graffiti. Trains rumbled, sounding so much like thunder it made Lyssa homesick and heartsore. She missed a good rainstorm.
“I’ll take you to school,” she said. “We’ll drop Icky off at your place first.”
“They hate me at school,” he mumbled.
“Good. Having people hate you builds character.”
Jimmy gave her a dirty look. “You’re mean.”
Lyssa ruffled his hair. “Don’t come back here. Not unless someone is with you.”
“I had to.” Jimmy pulled away from her. “Mandy is missing. Flo, too.”
Lyssa missed a step. “What?”
“They’re gone. That’s what their friends said when Mom stopped by their bench at Grand Central. She had sandwiches from work that she was going to give them.”
“They’re heroine addicts. Anything could have happened.”
“You haven’t heard the rumors?”
“No.”
“People are disappearing,” said Jimmy. “I’m afraid you’ll be next.”
H
e had newspapers, articles that he had torn out.
It was an old habit. The boy was a punk, but he was good with words, and his mom didn’t read English as well as she spoke it. She depended on Jimmy to keep her updated on what was going on in the city, and elsewhere. Newspapers were cheap. Listening improved her English. And it made Ms. Sutabuhr feel good that her son might be learning something every time he read to her.
Lyssa gave Jimmy a bottle of water from the cooler. He knelt on the threadbare rug, and dribbled some into his cupped palm. The dog, Icky, wagged his tail and lapped at the water. She watched for a moment, amused and uneasy.
You’ve been alone too long,
she told herself. Solitude was easier to accept without reminders of what she was missing.
Lyssa smoothed out the newspaper articles Jimmy had given her. He watched, wiping his wet palm on his jeans. No emotion on his face.
He focused instead on the watercolor she had been working on. The canvas was part of a thick drawing block: a heavy sheet of paper with a prominent tooth, its rough texture creating a grainy surface that captured pools of flame-colored water. Flames, everywhere, twisted in knots and claws, and wings made of sheer, delicate fire—all surrounding an empty white space to the right of center.
A white space that made her heart ache when she looked at it. A white space that stared at her from the page with its own peculiar, haunting, life. Even when she did not look at it, she felt its presence.
Like now. Heavy, at the corner of her eye.
Lyssa swallowed hard. “You’ve brought me articles on six different women. Disappearances dating back three months. Only three of them are from New York state. None are homeless, either.”
Jimmy shrugged, and bent to pick up Icky, who pawed at his ankle. The tiny mutt got lost in the oversized folds of his sweatshirt. “Those have to do with something else.”
