Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy (44 page)

And was this Jess now, this sigh that might be wind or spirit:
That’s
right, Chris. Let go of the hammer.
“I’m so sorry, Ellie,” he said.
“I know.” She looked back at her horse. “Love you, girl,” she said
to Bella, and pulled the trigger.

“Oh, boy-o, it’s not that tough,” Finn said, as if he really didn’t care,
like they were two buddies hanging out in the old man’s tent, having
a couple of cold brews after a hard day. Wielding his parang, Finn
carefully shaved skin from a raw rump roast, squared on a cutting
board, that might have been beef with excellent marbling. In a saner
world, that is. Because that smudge of blue ink? Odds were high it
didn’t say USDA Select
.
“Just tell me: who’s the girl?”

“I . . . I d-don’t . . .
uhhh
.” Pete’s neck rocked as another sudden
spasm bolted through his head. His jaws locked to corral a hiss.
“Don’t . . .
know
.”

“Now why don’t I believe that?” Finn sliced a thick, two-inch
steak, probably against the grain. “I may not be a mind reader, but I
saw your face. Why won’t you give me a name?”

“Because I . . .” Another shuddering brain bomb. They’d been at
this brutal game for the last five hours, ever since leaving the smoldering ruin of the lake house. Peter had read stories about people with
brain aneurysms. The very few who survived said it was having nails
pounded through their skulls. This was like that: intense pain, a pulse
in the center of Peter’s head and right behind his eyes, like the winged
thing was scooping out more real estate with its claws. Not as awful
as the brain storm that seized him that day on the snow with Davey,
though. So why not?
Think, Peter; this is important
.

And yet . . . he didn’t want Finn’s fingers completely out of his
head. As much as the brain bomb hurt, Peter craved that electric red
swoon more. When Finn sent Davey and his altered Changed after
Simon and Penny, the rush had been so intense, so
good
, the moan
of pleasure escaped before Peter could trap it. Every muscle ached
to join in the hunt. The
blood.
Finn knew it, too:
Like that, don’t you,
boy-o? I can give and take, you know. Give . . . and take.

Finn was working himself and the Changed up to something, like
predators ascending the food chain. First, Changed out for “training.”
Now, larger teams, like today. Peter sensed there was one more prize
Finn wanted, one more test to run, and then they would head for
Rule.

“How many times do I have to say it?” Peter managed through
clenched teeth. “I don’t know who she is. Why is it so important?”
“Oh, boy-o. You disappoint me.” Sighing, Finn used the parang
to push stew-sized chunks onto an aluminum camp plate. The tent
was warm, the air rich with copper musk. “All right, let’s take a break.
Phew-wee
.” Finn flicked mock sweat from his broad brow. “I’ve worked
myself into a lather. How about we try something easier, all right?”
“Whatever.” Peter backhanded real sweat from his forehead. The
cuffs around his wrists clinked. A guard had cinched them so tight
there was blood where the steel had rubbed his skin raw. He swallowed, but with difficulty. The control collar not only chafed, but the
chain looped through the metal D-ring was secured so high on the
bars that Peter had no choice but to sit upright. Lucky for him, he
hadn’t needed sleep in weeks, or he’d strangle on his own weight.
Through the wire mesh dividing this stainless-steel transport
cage, he saw Penny cringing against Simon. At least they weren’t in
restraints, and Finn had gotten his camp doc to wrap Simon’s sprain,
so that was something.
“Tell you what,” Finn said, taking the filled plate and sidling close
to Penny and Simon’s half of the cage. “Let’s talk about little Penny .
. . well,
not
so little Penny.”
“What do you want to know?” Peter said, his tone flat. Simon’s
eyes narrowed at Finn’s approach. Suddenly rapt, however, Penny
straightened, nostrils flaring.
“I’m curious.” Finn moved the plate from side to side, smiling as
Penny tracked it like a spectator at a tennis match. “Yes, smells
good
,
doesn’t it, Penny? Want some?” Finn brought the plate to within arm’s
reach. “Go ahead, dear. You know you want it. Take it.”
Don’t do it, Penny.
A stupid thought. Illogical. Watching his sister’s
face rearrange itself—raw animal hunger replacing fear and suspicion—hurt so much Peter would’ve taken a brain bomb instead.
“Whoa, easy now,” Finn chuckled as Penny’s hand darted to grab
a meaty fistful. “Wouldn’t want you to choke, sweetheart. How many
months is she, Peter?”
“Seven, more or less.”
More, probably.
“Oh.” Finn’s bushy white eyebrows arched as he ticked off the
months on his fingers and then mugged fake astonishment. “Well,
we
did
wait until the last second, didn’t we?”
Penny had. He still remembered his shock when she told him:
I thought I was late.
He’d had to bite back the scream:
You thought
you were late for three
months
?
But she was only sixteen. Too late,
he discovered she’d already confided in a girlfriend and things had
mushroomed from there, the rumor spreading through town.
Which
is probably how Finn found out in the first place. Weller, maybe, or Lang.
Or
given the depth of Finn’s hatred for Rule, the old man might’ve had
a spy there all along.
“How did you get her to the lake house?” Finn asked, proffering
the plate again. Penny’s cheeks were round as a chipmunk’s, but she
still grabbed a double handful. “Must’ve been difficult.”
He tried to shake his head, but the collar brought him up short. “I
took her on Friday, the day before . . . you know.”
“Ah, the day before the world went away. You were going to come
back?”
“Sunday night.” The lake house was never meant as anything
other than a place for Penny to hang for a single weekend while he
scraped together the money and set up the appointment in Illinois.
Messing up Penny’s life more by forcing her to go through with the
pregnancy would do no one any good. Beg forgiveness later. “Didn’t
quite make that.”
“When
did
you go back?”
“Thursday night.” It had taken that long to track down Simon and
ride like hell.
“And she was still there? Poor girl must’ve been starving.”
“Not really.” When Finn leveled a look, he continued in a dead
monotone, “She was with a . . . friend. Of mine.” He paused. “From
college.”
“The father? That’s interesting. Does put a new spin on the female
praying mantis.” Finn gestured at Simon, who hadn’t made a move
for the food. “I’d have thought he—”
“Never in a million years. Not Simon. We’re family.”
“Why do you think she stayed at the house?”
“Beats me.” In part, he suspected that his having procured . . . well,
just call them
supplies
. . . helped. There were a lot of very fresh corpses
lying around in those early days. Really, he tried to think of it as taking
clothes from owners who were past caring. Yes, it was crazy. But she
was his sister. Whoever said that once you cross a line, it gets easier to
do it again and again . . . they had something there. It was lucky he’d
thought to bring food, too, because his college buddy was, literally, a
gnawed pile of bones by then. But he also had the notion that the idea
had been lodged in her brain from the very beginning. Safe because it
was remote, the lake house was also familiar territory, too.
“What about Simon?”
He explained about the tranquilizer dart. Carting Simon to Penny
was the only way Peter could think of to keep his friend alive and
also get the message across:
Take care of her.
Not so complicated.
Even dogs understood simple commands. From the looks of the
lake house and that stuff sack with its stockpile of goodies, that message had obviously stuck, although he knew Simon had wandered
far. In all the time since the world died, Peter had caught only a few
glimpses of Simon and his pack near Rule—always at a distance, and
well upwind—but never Penny.
That feeding ground was ghastly but fascinating with its array of
wolf carcasses and that skull pyramid. Peter couldn’t begin to guess
why Simon chose to wear a wolf skin either.
Peter
was interested in
wolves. They’d been going to Isle Royale when the accident happened. So, for Simon, did the wolves represent a link to
him
? Possible,
but Peter always sensed he was missing something.
“Well, you are the resourceful one, aren’t you, boy-o?” Finn leveled a look at Simon. “What about you? Aren’t you hungry, son?”
The only change in Simon was his eyes, which hardened to diamonds. This was something Peter never had seen in any Changed,
not even Davey. Hunger was one thing. But hate was
personal
. So this
was also interesting.
“Well,” Finn said again, although his tone carried a measure of
bemusement and . . . irritation? “You really
are
different. What I
wouldn’t give to get inside your head.”
“That wasn’t the deal. You promised not to hurt them,” Peter
said, thinking how empty that sounded. Look at
him
. Finn had carved
Lang into kebabs.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Finn said, his voice stony, the avuncular
grandpa gone. When Penny tried another snatch, Finn pulled the
plate out of reach. “That’s enough for now. You thirsty, Penny?” He
tugged a water bottle from his hip. “Want something to wash that
down?”
The drug.
Peter’s heart lurched. “Finn!” He tried a lunge, but the
collar noosed down. Choking, he strained, throwing his head from
side to side. “P-Penny . . . d-don’t drink . . .”
“Relax, boy-o.” Finn tossed the bottle through the bars. “You think
I want to risk this baby? Not on your life. I am
very
interested in that
little monster.”
“Why?” Peter’s throat felt as if he’d swallowed a blowtorch.
“For one thing, I’m curious to see if she eats her young. I’m
completely serious about that. For another, that fetus was exposed.
Interesting to see what pops out and what it becomes.” Folding his
arms, Finn nodded at the girl, who was guzzling water. “Look at that.
Do you realize that she hasn’t
once
offered anything to Simon? It’s
almost as if he’s not there.”
Peter
had
noticed. It was so strange, too, given how close they’d
all been before.
It’s like Penny’s been erased.
His eyes shifted to Simon,
and he was startled to find Simon’s eyes on him. No hatred there, but
Peter read plenty of hurt and confusion. Betrayal.
He saw Simon suddenly tense, then wedge himself between
Penny and the bars. A moment later, a tent flap rustled as Davey, in
his camo-whites, appeared with a guard who seemed to be mostly an
ornament.
“Davey.” Finn tossed a chunk. Snagging the meat with an expert,
one-handed grab, Davey crammed the food into his mouth. His alert
eyes never left Finn. “Good boy.” Finn patted his leg the way an owner
called an attentive puppy. “Let’s talk to Peter, all right?”
“What more do you want to talk about?” But he knew. The red
winged thing was shifting, needle claws pricking, digging in. Getting
ready for . . . well, whatever round this was. “I told you about Penny
and Simon—”
“Ah.” Finn lifted a finger like a medical receptionist on an important call. “But not the girl.”
“I don’t know her,” Peter said, wondering why he was working
so hard at this. Perhaps this was something to hold on to, a little like
dignity. But he also had a deeper reason. Finn was pissed he hadn’t
captured her. Peter liked that someone had actually beaten the
asshole at his own game. Or, perhaps, never played to begin with.
“Why do you care who she was?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Finn snapped Davey another hunk of meat in
a backhanded Frisbee throw. “Whoever she is, she is
not
a Chucky.
I saw that girl
speak.
She called to Penny, she was
talking
to Simon,
and then she tore out of there, killed one of my best shooters . . . no,
no, Davey.” Finn held the plate out of reach as the boy made a grab.
“Wait now, that’s a good boy.”
“Even if I knew who she was, which I don’t, why is a name so
important?”
“And you call yourself a good Christian? In the beginning was the
Name, Peter.” Finn’s eyes were as colorless as a dead snake’s. “What
did Adam do soon as he opened those baby blues? He
named
everything. Put the world under his thumb. Then he got lonely, God made
woman; Adam got to name
her
, assert his dominion, and everything
was downhill from there. To
name
is to recognize. It is to gain access
and
control
. Things are much scarier in the dark, where they are formless, than in broad daylight. I just want to bring her into the light,
that’s all.”
Access?
It was like Finn was talking about hacking a computer’s
hard drive. Not such a stretch, maybe. Say
carrot
, and the image, the
taste, maybe the smell, popped into your head. So did memories.
So
a name would be like . . . a password? Into the brain?
This was begging for a brain bomb, but he couldn’t resist. “You
scared of her, Finn?”
“I’m interested.”
Yeah, I’ll bet you are.
The way dogs reacted to her always bothered
him. Now Peter wondered if she
had
been Changing into something
very odd all along. Perhaps Chris made the same choice Peter and the
Council had for all the other kids: chased her out before she could be
killed. Or she might’ve only run. But what finally helped him understand just how unique she was came when he saw what Finn had: she
talked
. . . and Simon had
listened.
At some level, Simon
understood
;
Peter saw it in his posture. Then, Simon touched her face—and she
let it happen. She
gave
Simon that moment. So there was something
there, all right. They were working together, helping each other.
There was a bond, and what the hell was
that
about? Because, God,
did this mean that Simon might come back? Or was Simon what Finn
said he was:
very
different, a one-in-a-million fluke, a Changed with a
foot in both worlds?
And she hid, somehow.
There was no way she could’ve killed the
hunter and still run fast enough to get away.
She was nearby and Finn
still couldn’t get his fingernails under her. Davey couldn’t track her. So how
did she do it?
“Sorry,” he said, although his throat was balky. “Can’t help you.
Don’t know her.”
“Mmm-hmm. Thought you might say that.” Placing the dish of
meat on the camp table, Finn reached into a breast pocket. “I keep
forgetting that
you
are a much more effective weapon against yourself
than I or anyone could ever be,” Finn said, carefully cleaning blood
from each finger with a linen kerchief. “Remember: I can give and
take, Peter.” Folding the kerchief into thirds, Finn tucked the cloth
back into his pocket. “Give”—Finn’s eyes slid from Peter—“and . . .”
“No!” Peter flailed, struggling against the collar. “No, Finn, leave
him alone,
don’t
—”
But Simon was already screaming.