Dark Currents (27 page)

Thirty-eight

T
ime crawled.

My head ached; my chin stung. My shoulders and arms were beginning to burn from having my hands tied behind my back. If the Locksley residence had air-conditioning, it was turned off in their absence.

Sweat trickled down my temples.

Daughter . . .

I hunched my shoulders toward my ears, trying to block out a sound no one else could hear. I thought about what the Norn had told me: The key lay hidden in something a vampire had said to me yesterday, and whatever it was, it lay within me.

For the life of me, I couldn’t think what it might be.

In the wide world outside, the sun reached its apex, baking in the sky. I made an effort to breathe low and slow.

“So how did you find this place?” I asked Ray D in a conversational tone. “It’s really nice.”

He looked pleased to be addressed. “Oh, I do a little handyman work from time to time. A guy I met at the bar hooked me up with this gig.”

“Mr. Cassopolis?”

He beamed. “You know him?”

I rotated my aching shoulders. “Yeah, I do.”

“My Raymond’s a very good handyman,” Mary Sudbury said helpfully, reaching up to stroke his jaw. “Very skilled.”

Ray bent his head toward her, and they smiled at each other, a pair of blissful ghouls in love. I might have felt sorry for them if the continued existence of their relationship didn’t necessitate generating incredible amounts of anguish and misery, which I was apparently next in line to provide.

Somewhere out there, Stefan was zeroing in on my location. Maybe, just maybe, Cody had tracked down a lead from Mr. Cassopolis after realizing the address I’d phoned in was bogus. Unfortunately, both would lead them straight into an ambush.

Okay, so it was past time to start using my wits. I just wished they didn’t feel so scrambled. But whatever cards I held, it was time to play them.

“You two seem really happy together,” I said to Ray and Mary. “It’s too bad Hel’s issued a death sentence for you.”

They stared at me. Mary’s pupils dilated fiercely. “You shouldn’t say such things! Liars make the baby Jesus cry! Liars get their mouths washed out with soap, little lady!”

I’d be willing to bet somebody was channeling an evangelical Mommie Dearest. “I’m not lying,” I said steadily. “Read my emotions and see. I’m Hel’s fucking liaison, and I’m here telling you that Hel has decreed you’re both to be dispatched for your sins.”

“For what?” Ray seemed genuinely bewildered.

I nodded at the mermaid’s tank. “What do you think? For
that
.”

“But we needed her!” he protested.

“No.” I shook my head. “You
wanted
her. You wanted this—this whole sick Sid and Nancy scenario. And you were willing to overturn Hel’s order to have it.”

“We didn’t do anything!” Mary said indignantly, pointing at Dunham. “He’s the one who did everything. We just took care of her.”

An incredulous laugh escaped me. “Took
care
of her? Is that really what you’re going to call it?”

Mary might just be crazy enough to believe it, but I saw a slow awareness dawn on Ray’s face. He was stupid, but he wasn’t that stupid. “Them boys didn’t really hurt her none,” he mumbled. “She’s a tough old gal.”

I didn’t bother to dignify it with a response, glancing at Johnny instead. “Hel’s prepared to banish Stefan if he can’t administer her justice to his own people. If you take over, these two become your problem.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Dunham advised him.

“Why not?” Johnny cradled his shotgun. “She’s telling the truth. I reckon I’ll deal with it when the time comes.”

“What’s
that
s’posed to mean?” Ray asked suspiciously.

“It means I’ll deal with it.” A note of impatience crept into Johnny’s tone. “Don’t worry about it, man.”

“It means he’ll get rid of you when this is over,” I informed Ray. “You and Mary. Lock you in solitary confinement for months on end until you starve and devour your own essence. Isn’t that how it works? Maybe it won’t take as long with both of you trying to feed on each other. Or maybe he’ll separate you to make it last longer. Do you plan on separating them?” I asked Johnny.

He strolled over, leaned down, and slapped me across the face, wrenching my head sideways. “All right, now, you shut your mouth, ma’am.”

I tasted blood.

Daughter . . .

A spiral of anger rose in me. The pump attached to the mermaid’s tank made an alarming sound, hoses bulging. “Or maybe he’ll have Dunham use
dauda-dagr
,” I said. “Make it quick and clean. Is that the plan?”

Johnny reversed the shotgun. “Do you want me to use this here stock to smash your pretty little face in?” He was breathing hard, his pupils wavering. “Or do you want me to turn every ghoul in this room loose on you?”

I held my tongue, anger dwindling back to fear. The pump stopped whining and the hoses stopped bulging.

“Ignore her.” Jerry Dunham sounded bored. “She’s just trying to turn us against each other. Don’t fall for it.”

“Easy for you to say,” I managed to whisper. “You’re mortal. You’re not subject to Hel’s authority.”

“She has a point,” one of the unknown ghouls muttered.

“It’s not too late for you to call this off,” I said to Johnny. “You haven’t done anything you can’t walk away from.”

He laughed mirthlessly. “Other than kidnap Hel’s liaison? No.” He shook his head. “Sorry, ma’am. There’s only one way that gets forgiven, and that’s to prove you’re a miserable failure at the job.”

Al the Walrus scratched his head. “Don’t that put it back on you once you’re in charge, Johnny? Hel’s justice and all?”

Johnny gestured impatiently with his shotgun. “I’m telling you, I will deal with it when the time comes!”

“You’d better not try it!” Mary Sudbury called out in an ominous singsong voice, swaying in Ray’s arms, her pupils as black as night. “I won’t let you hurt my Raymond. Never, never, never.” She shook her finger at Johnny. “Naughty little boys get eaten up by the bad monsters.”

As the sun inched across the horizon, the ghouls quarreled among themselves, which was a lot more unnerving than it sounds. On the surface it looked like any ordinary argument, but there were power plays I couldn’t entirely fathom going on in the hidden depths beneath the words, contests of will going back and forth, all of it fueled by an ever-rising hunger that was barely held in check, on the verge of ravening.

I’m pretty sure Rosie, or whatever the mermaid’s real name was, bore the brunt of their emotional ardor. Hour by hour, I could almost
see
her being drained. But I could feel it, too—feel the shifting tides of power, feel the avid hunger that crawled over my skin like the psychic equivalent of drool.

Ew. Just . . . ew.

I leaned my cheek against the warm glass of the aquarium. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I really, really wanted to rescue you.”

The mermaid flattened one webbed hand against the other side of the glass, sympathy in her anguished gaze.

“Daisy and Rosie,” Jerry Dunham said in his flat voice. “Ain’t that just too precious for words?”

I stared at him with pure hatred.

He chuckled. “You want to do it? Go on, do it. Call your daddy. Let the world burn.”

Daughter . . .

I closed my eyes, picturing my mother’s face. I clamped down on my emotions, wrapping my will around them like a garrote.

Darkness was beginning to fall when the sound of motorcycles rumbling into the driveway silenced the bickering. Stefan and his posse had arrived. Someone shut off the lights, and the ghouls hunkered down in anticipation of the battle to come. Only Rosie’s algae-covered tank glowed, green and murky in the dimness.

One by one, the engines outside cut out.

“It’s go time,” Johnny murmured, aiming the barrels of his shotgun at the front door. “Let bygones be bygones. Let’s do this.”

I drew a breath to shout a warning.

The muzzle of Dunham’s pistol pressed against my temple. “Scream and I’ll shoot you,” he said with calm assurance. “You first, and the fish second. Is that the way you want to die, blondie?”

“No,” I whispered.

The moment dragged on endlessly. I was acutely aware of the silence, of the breath moving in and out of my lungs, of the circle of Dunham’s pistol hard against my temple, of the mermaid undulating helplessly in her tank, her gills fluttering.

The knob of the front door of the Locksley family’s summer home rotated an inch . . . and went still.

“What the fuck?” someone said in frustration.

In the woods outside, a wolf howled, one, and then another and another.

Johnny turned slightly. “Shit—”

The front door burst inward with a great, splintering crash of wood and glass, lashed by the impossible force of vast, muscular, rainbow-hued serpentine coils moving at lightning speed.

Oh,
crap!

A jolt of pure panic gripped me. “Lurine,
no
! Get out of here!”

And then it was all chaos.

Lurine’s coils retracted as fast as they’d struck. Johnny’s shotgun boomed several times and Dunham’s pistol cracked. Heedless of the gunfire, ghouls poured through the shattered door and leaped through the windows, bursting the screens and smashing the glass panes. I caught sight of Stefan, an actual sword in his hand, his pupils wide and furious in his ice-blue eyes. If he wasn’t ravening, he was damn close to it.

Every other ghoul in the place had gone over the edge. They were fighting hand-to-hand and will-to-will, grappling and pounding wildly. Some had weapons; some were using fists. Unable to reload in the mayhem, Johnny was using his shotgun as a cudgel. The Locksleys’ rec room was a seething maelstrom of raw emotion and naked hunger, and I could feel myself being sucked into it, my essence swirling into it like water down a drain. It filled me with a terror and helpless fury that served only to fuel the madness.

Except for Jerry Dunham, who was as cool as a proverbial cucumber, waiting for a clear shot.

Stefan was holding the others at bay with his sword, which he wielded with the efficiency of long, long practice, his half-mad gaze sweeping the room, searching for me.

“Stefan, get out!” I shouted at him. “It’s you they’re after!”

Of course he didn’t listen, homing in on the sound of my voice; and worse, I saw Cody was behind him.

“That’ll do just fine, blondie.” Dunham pistol-whipped me across the cheek, hard enough that I toppled sideways. “Now shut it.”

Blood filled my mouth. All I could do was watch, lying on the floor with my hands and feet tied, as Stefan came forward, his sword in both hands, looking like a cross between an assassin and an avenging angel.

Until Dunham lowered his pistol and shot out both his kneecaps with calm precision. “Ray, get the cop!”

Stefan went down, his face twisted with pain. Ray D charged Cody, who braced himself in a shooter’s stance. His service revolver fired, and a fine red mist exploded from Ray’s chest. He staggered backward and crumpled. Mary let out a shriek, flinging herself toward Cody.

And then time . . . stuttered. I don’t know how else to describe it. Time stuttered, and Ray D wasn’t dead and shot on the floor anymore. He was on his feet, still charging Cody, wrestling for his gun, aided by Mary.

“Hold him off!” Dunham shouted, putting another bullet in Stefan’s sword arm, turning his biceps into a gory mess. “I just need a minute!” He lunged for the bar, dropping his pistol and scrambling for
dauda-dagr
and the welding glove.

My chest heaved in an involuntary sob and I gagged, half choking on my own blood. Hell, I should have stayed at Twilight Manor and let Lady Eris bite me. It would have been better for everyone. I swallowed hard, the taste of blood filling my mouth.

My blood
.

I suspect that it must taste deliciously of brimstone and ichor, my dear. . . .

It was more than just a cliché.

Not just brimstone. Ichor, celestial ichor. After all, what was a demon but a fallen angel? That blood ran in my veins, too. The Norn had said the answer lay
within
me. And I was capable of feeling more than fear and anger, capable of feeling so much more.

I met the mermaid’s sorrowful gaze behind the glass, inches away from me. I gazed at her with compassion and held tight to that feeling, letting it swell until it filled me. My shoulder blades itched in the place where wings would have been, and my heart seemed to expand within my chest.

Compassion. Tenderness. Love.

Holding fast to all I held dear, from Mom’s unrelenting faith in me to Jen’s fierce loyalty to Lurine’s mantle of protection, I gathered it and let it spill forth. To the timeless sound of heartbroken women singing the blues and sunlight sparkling on the river. To all that engendered wonder, from the mighty scale of Yggdrasil II and Hel’s undeserved trust to the Oak King’s indescribable majesty. To the ephemeral beauty of naiads and fairies and Garm the hellhound’s slavering devotion to his eternal duty. To all that evoked tenderness, from the chief’s love of this town to Gus the ogre’s crush on my mother to the booger-eating kid who’d helped me gather acorn caps in the park.

Shuddering at the taint of ghoulish hunger devouring my innermost private feelings, I forced myself to offer them up as a sacrifice.

I fed my best and truest self into the maelstrom, and the sounds of fighting faded.

Feeling spent, I levered myself to an upright sitting position. All around the rec room, ghouls had gone still, pupils wide with awe, momentarily sated and blissful.

“What the fuck?” Unaffected by the outpouring of emotion, Jerry Dunham sounded disgruntled. He knelt beside Stefan’s bleeding figure,
dauda-dagr
raised in his gloved hand, poised for the killing strike. “Let’s finish this!”

Unfortunately for him, there was one other non-ghoul in this fight, and he wasn’t affected by what I’d done, either.

“You’ve got it.” Cody leveled his pistol and fired, and Dunham toppled sideways,
dauda-dagr
falling from his hand.