Ink and Shadows (2 page)

Its reptilian face was screwed up into a pout, eyes running down an elongated face as it howled soundlessly at them. White and pasty, it pressed hard against the glass, wanting some sort of recognition from the men living just beyond its reach. A flash of opal, and the Veil thickened, shoving the specter away from the immortals. It plunged it back into the shadows where other creatures lurked, then circled back around, a wisp of pale gray against the sky.

“What the fuck?” Ari straightened, sliding his hand around Death’s waist, ready to pull the other Horseman off the counter and into safety. “What the hell is that doing up here?”

“It’s been hitting at the windows for the past half an hour.” Death shrugged. “I thought I’d worry
about it if it breaks the glass and gets in.”

The creature circled around the upper floor of the building, drawing in close to Mal’s windows.

Ari grinned at the youngest’s startled shout, dangerously excited by the wraith popping in and out of the darkness outside. He laughed into Death’s shoulder, a wicked grin on his face. “Guess it surprised Cooties.”

Inside his room, Mal struggled to turn down the volume of his stereo, leveling out the bass before it broke the glass of his bookshelves with a resonant thump. Guided by the flickering green of the remote’s display, he fumbled for the right knob, his vision fuzzy. Barking his knees on the coffee table, the youngest Horseman yelped, biting the tip of his tongue.

Searching about on the tabletop, he found his spectacles mostly by sound, his wire-rimmed
glasses rattling when his fingers hit the earpiece. Putting them on, the world came into
view, his messy study littered with open books and more than a few empty tumblers. Mal shoved his pale
hair off his face, stray chunks falling forward into his eyes.

“Did you see that?” Mal poked his head out of his bedroom door, gesturing wildly behind him, then realized neither man could see through the solid wall to where he was pointing. “That was a wraith. Up here!”

“Got to hand it to the boy, he’s sometimes got at least half a brain cell working.” Ari leaned his hip against the counter. “Wraiths aren’t that bold. That thing shouldn’t have been able to come this close.”

“It’s rather daring. Maybe it feels safe behind the glass? But then why would it try to get in?”
Death agreed as he worked off another piece of orange. He’d been troubled ever since he’d first gotten the message that the Four were needed for a task. “I think something near us is thinning the Veil. I’ve
gotten some rumors about things happening, and well, then….”

“How thin?” Ari frowned.

“I’ve heard about things leaking out.” Death watched Mal as he bounded into the living room, the young immortal following the wraith’s progress as it looped around their penthouse. “You can go into my rooms if it’s heading there. If it starts to look like it’s coming through, let us know. We’ll take care of it.”

“Thanks.” Mal strode past Ari, ignoring the other Horsemen. “I thought it broke one of my windows, but the pane held.”

“Just don’t open a window and let it in,” Ari shouted at Mal’s back as the young man headed to Death’s rooms, looking for the phantasm. “Hell, it might eat him, and we can get a new Pestilence. One that knows how to hold a sword or something.”

“Leave him alone, Ari,” Death replied. “We have other things to fret about. Wraiths outside of our windows are the least of our worries. I tried asking around a bit, but mostly it seems to be just talk. I can’t get anything solid.”

“Crazy people talking to themselves is normal.” Ari reached for the mangled bits of fruit in Death’s hands, his thoughts as tangled as Death’s fingers around the orange. “Now you’re the one killing that.”

“I’m Death. What else were you expecting?” Death gave Ari a bruised look, making the blond laugh, a burst of booming warmth.

“For you to eat it. You don’t eat enough.”

Ari’s belly clenched when he held out a slice and Death leaned forward to bite into the offering, his teeth barely grazing Ari’s fingertips. When the other man pulled back, chewing on the orange slice, Ari sucked his fingers clean, hoping to find some taste of Death left in the wetness.

The world paused for Ari, holding its breath before turning again as Death chewed. After swallowing to bring moisture back into his mouth, Ari spoke. “What kind of stuff are you talking about? Or is it the normal
God help us, someone is probing the cows
? And who’s telling us this, those idiots beyond?”

“Those idiots, as you call them, are helpful. I got a message yesterday afternoon. I needed some time to think about it,” Death remarked. Dealing with directives from beyond was a major reason Ari wanted nothing to do with guiding the Horsemen. “They want us to hunt down something.”

“Every time you get one of those, I’m reminded how happy I am that you’re our leader.” Ari spit out a sliver of seed caught on his tongue. “I hate those things. Everything is cryptic, and they remind me we’re just puppets. They make my skin crawl.”

“I’m used to them, I suppose.” Death shrugged, picking the threads from the fruit. “It’s better than it used to be. I’d rather have my dieffenbachia catching fire and speaking in tongues than my horse starting to paw out runes in the dirt. Somehow that’s more disturbing.”

“Your plant okay?”

“It’s fine. They possessed the television this time.” Death gave Ari a grin.

“What did the flaming television want this time?”

“Something’s unbalancing the Veil. Things are bleeding through. Things from our side.” Death leaned back on his hands, slick with citrus juice. “They didn’t give me much in the message. You know it’s hard for them to see into the mortal world.”

“Omnipotent but blind. Interesting combination. It’s funny how they always cop the
we’re blind to
things in the mortal world
whenever they give us squat to go on.” Ari rarely kept his own opinions about
the unseen puppet masters to himself. “What exactly are we looking for?”

“I don’t know. I know it’s tearing the Veil wide open. Maybe something big got loose. Might even have been something let loose by someone playing with things they didn’t understand.”

“Someone being a seer or magus? They’re always pains in the asses.” Ari mulled over the possibility of the world returning to an older time when humans were accustomed to the Veiled walking among them. “Be a bitch if we have to spend all of our time chasing down shadows.”

“Those we could handle. I was told that things are crawling out of the Veil, and humans are able to see them and touch them.” Swallowing another bite of orange, Death wrinkled his nose. “San Diego seems to be hit the hardest, from what I can tell.”

“So it’s probably starting here in the city.” Ari helped himself to another slice of Death’s fruit, sucking the pulp free.

“It could be,” Death said. “Whatever this is, it’s even making the Fae nervous. Last thing they want is to be spilled out into the mortal world. It’s been a long time since they’ve been exposed to humans. I don’t think they would be able to handle it now. People these days would hunt them rather than worship them.”

“Do you think there’s something in the water doing it?” Ari asked, playing with the folds of his wrapped towel. “You remember that one time in Montana when there was a wheat fungus that made entire towns see the things that go bump? We were there for days until Pestilence… Batu… figured that out.”

“I don’t know what it is. I wish we had more help in this, but the Others aren’t willing. I’ve asked.” Death shook his head to stop Ari’s railing about the other immortals. “The television flared on again this morning, but it wasn’t any clearer.”

“Maybe it won’t be anything, but hell, it’ll be nice to get out and do something else, huh?”
Stretching his arms up, Ari felt the kink pop out of his neck. “Good time to be hunting. Night’s cool, and
the moon’s a bit thin. Good time to break legs and suck the marrow clean from the bone.”

“I was trying to get a feel for what is going on, but I didn’t have much luck,” Death replied, leaving off picking through the orange. “The humans that can see us tend to avoid me.”

“Mortals.” Ari leaned over and picked at a scab on Death’s consciousness. “Don’t feel bad about not liking to talk to them or them not talking to you. One doesn’t make a pet out of the pig that’s going to be the Christmas ham. Besides, it’s better if you’re all mysterious and aloof.”

Death snorted. “We are what we are.”

“True, but you skulk. People like that. All spooky and shadows. That makes you more legend-like. I blunder, stomp, and whore my way through it. Not much mystery there.” Ari grinned, flashing a bright smile at his oldest friend. “And I happen to like blundering and stomping.”

“And whoring,” Death pointed out.

“True, whoring’s a good bit of fun,” Ari agreed. “Let me get dressed, and we can go hunting for rabbits.”

“I can’t.”

The pain in Death’s eyes stopped Ari in his tracks. The cinnamon shade held in them burned from a fire inside of the immortal.

“I’ve got a calling to attend to in Asia.”

“You’ve got souls to look to?” Canting his head, Ari drew back to his friend’s side. He knew what was coming, what was out there waiting for Death, but his mind denied wanting to look any further, trapped by conflicting emotions. “Bad time for it if you want to go out hunting for this mess.”

Ari ached to touch Death’s face, to feel the strength of bone in the cradle of his palm. Ari loved his role in the Horsemen, but Death dreaded his, seducing souls to pass. Most went without Death’s attendance, carried on to unknown places. No one living behind the Veil, a shadowy existence just beyond the Mortal world, knew what lay beyond. Where an immortal went after their service, no one knew, not even Death.

“Do you really need to go?” Ari knew the answer to that question before the words fell from his mouth. Death answered with a silence steeped in duty. “I mean, do you have to go right now?”

Of course Death would go, Ari scolded himself. If he didn’t, who knew what the world would become. Souls torn from their bodies, usually from tragedies or conflicts, roamed the area and threatened the Veil’s ability to hold back the other things that fed on mankind. Single specters were not much of a problem, but a large concentration often proved troublesome. If not persuaded to sever the ties to the mortal world, a resonance would linger… sometimes drawing others to stay behind or try to reach out to the people around it, not understanding that its body turned it out.

Drawing out his breath, Ari asked, “How soon?”

“Soon.” Death found his voice and picked at a piece of rind on the counter, smashing the skin between his pinched fingers. “A fire in the slums of lower Hong Kong. I don’t know how many yet, but I’ll want to be there.”

“You don’t need to be there when it starts. There’s hours after their passing until they’re stuck here.” Ari gritted his teeth, chewing on a point of argument ages old. “Go after. Spare yourself that pain.”

“Someone needs to be there when they die. No one should pass unseen, untouched,” Death said. Ari’s anger was thoughtless most of the time, but now Ari held it rigidly in, something Death appreciated. “If not me, then who? It’s what I’m here for. So they don’t wander, alone and forgotten.”

Ari placed his palms flat on the cold counter, his hands resting by the sides of his friend’s hips. “Yeah, we’re the Horsemen… the Four. But there’s no one here telling you that you have to drink from that cup every time it’s poured hot. Let it cool first.”

“We’ve talked about this, Ari.” Death’s voice was a whisper, husky from Ari’s closeness. “I have to. It is who I am, what I am. I need you to take a look around tonight. Something in my gut says that it can’t wait.”

“You’re the brains. I’m just the muscle,” Ari said, pushing free from the counter, tucking the ends of the unraveling towel around his waist. Ari was reluctant to give up this fight, to let Death loose into the slums where he would wander for hours, reaching into each soul to see if they wanted or needed assistance in shedding the mortal world. “But I’m definitely sexier.”

“Take Mal.” Death held up a hand, fending off Ari’s yet unspoken protests. “He’s one of us. He needs to know what we do, and not just from stories told around the dining table.”

“Oh, you’ve got to be shitting me.” Ari hissed with frustration. “Look at him. He’s chasing a wraith around the apartment like he’s a goldfish looking for flakes.”

“He needs to feel like he’s a part of us.” Death’s dark eyes were distant, running along another train of thought. “Mal doesn’t feel like he’s one of us. I know losing Batu was hard on you. It was hard on all of us. He was a good friend.”

“Batu was a damned good friend,” Ari grumbled, crossing his arms over his bare chest. “And a damned good Pestilence. Mal’s…. Death, the kid’s useless compared to Batu.”

Mal stopped before entering the living room. He’d heard Batu’s name whispered about when the others thought he wasn’t listening. Ari’s words hurt, deep in his chest, and the young Horseman gritted his teeth to keep from biting Ari’s head off.

“That isn’t Mal’s fault. New ones feel excluded for a long time,” Death reminded him. “And that’s not something that I can have between us.”

“He feels outside of us. Min, she fit right in. Not a problem. She’s a good Famine, skinny little twit but vicious. I like that in a Famine,” Ari bit back as Death’s gaze slid over him, and he felt the reproach there. “He’s different than us. Too different.”

“We needed different.” Death leaned forward, their bodies close and his eyes still on Ari’s
tanned face. “So they gave us Mal. You and I, we’ve been here forever, but the others need changing
sometimes. You know that. Even if we want them to stay, they have to move on. Mal’s here because we
need a Mal. And maybe he needs us. We don’t know.”

“Batu just worked. No fuss. No massaging little-boy egos and hurts. He just slid in and did what Pestilences need to do.” Ari’s mouth twisted sourly at the thought of spending hours with the youngest Horseman. “Mal’s like a sheath that’s too tight for the sword it was made for.”