Out of This World (11 page)

She gives me a withering
as if
look that would do my
grandma proud and changes the subject. “You were asking about
los tíos
,” she says, “and I thought I should warn you about them.”

My eyebrows go up.

“Please remember that this is only based on hearsay,” she goes on. “But you are a young animal spirit and will be unaware of the stories that are told about them. You know they fight an ongoing war with evil spirits?”

I nod. “Along with some really big and bad thing that's at the center of the world or something.”

Which is why they want Josh on their side, but I don't add that.

She nods. “They welcome allies—especially animal people— but they are more concerned with winning their battles than keeping their allies alive. Be careful in your dealings with them.”

“Thanks,” I tell her, “but I don't need the warning. I don't trust anybody.”

She pats my arm. “How sad for you,” she says.

Then she leaves me beside my bike and returns to where the other women are standing.

I don't waste time wondering why she's sorry for me. Instead, I start the Harley. I need to find Cory or Auntie Min to help me get to the otherworld. I'd prefer Cory, but he can be hard to track down. I know where Auntie Min should be, so I head for the underpass where she has her camp.

I get maybe a block from the park when I feel the first
ping
. I start looking around, but it takes a few more
pings
for me to spot them: a handful of rangy barrio dogs the colour of dirty sand, tracking my progress by running full tilt through the dirt yards on either side of the street. At least that's what they'd look like to someone who doesn't have Wildling radar in his head.

I make a few turns just to be sure they're really on my ass, then I pull over to the side of the street.

I take out my phone and punch in J-Dog's number.

He answers on the first ring. “Yo, little bro. Where you at?”

“You in the mood to shoot something?” I ask.

“Always. Is this a
me
thing or a
you
thing?”

He means, does it involve the gang, or Wildlings.

“Bit of both,” I tell him. “I've got a pack of dogs on my ass and I thought I'd lead them back to the junkyard behind my crib. I think they've got a connection to the guy who killed Lenny.”

J-Dog was seriously pissed off when he found out that Josh had killed Vincenzo. He'd wanted that pleasure.

“Oh yeah?” he says. “Then they've got to die a little slow.”

“One of them needs to not die at all.”

“You telling me my business?” he says.

“I need to be able to question one of them.”

“Well,” he drawls. “Maybe we can make that happen.”

“Come on, Tío Goyo,” I say into the thin air.

There's no response. I'm all alone here, wherever here is. Except then I hear the sound of voices. I stand up and turn to see a couple of figures approaching from under the big fir trees.

Obviously Tío Goyo didn't want to be seen by them, which is why he did the quick fade. But what about me? Am I supposed to hide, too?

Too late. The figures are closer and now they've seen me.

They don't look particularly threatening, so when they stop, I walk toward them. Of course, when it comes to animal people, well, cousins don't have to look tough to be tough, and vice versa. I mean, Chaingang has a mouse under his skin and I have a mountain lion. How weird is that?

These two are slight, about my height with darker skin and straighter hair. A man and a woman, dressed in unbleached cotton trousers and tunics. The man has a sack hanging from one shoulder. He and the woman are holding hands.

I stare at them intently, trying to figure out what made Tío Goyo take off. The only thing I know is that they give me an old-cousin
ping
, and then I realize that I can actually see their
animal shapes just outside of their skin, hovering around them like an aura. What I'm seeing is a pair of rabbits.

The mountain lion inside me rumbles with interest. The woman moves closer to her companion.

“Hey, skater boy,” somebody says from behind me.

I'm in the hall, heading to my next class. Turning, I find Ampora.

“I need to know where my stupid sister is,” she says.

“Really, dude? That's how you ask for a favour—by dissing my friends?”

“Look, I kicked her out of the house last night and now Chaingang's all on my ass about it. I need to know where she is.”

“You kicked her out?”

“Are you deaf? I just said that.”

“Dude, Chaingang's going to be the least of your worries if anything happened to her.”

“What? Now you're threatening me, too?”

“I don't need to. Josh is going to tear a strip from you.”

She rolls her eyes and waves a hand like that's nothing.

“Seriously?” I say. “You're not afraid of the guy who shut down the Riverside Kings?”

Not to mention ripping apart a badass cousin that even Chaingang couldn't take on. But I don't say that aloud. I don't have to.

Her expression gets uncertain and her face goes pale.

“I need to find her,” she says. “Help me out.”

I'd have more sympathy for her, except I figure she's only interested in saving her own ass. Knowing her, she'd probably be glad if something bad happened to Marina. That's not cool.

“Okay,” I say. “I'll look for her.”

But only because I'm worried myself.

“Where do you think we should start?” Ampora asks.

I shake my head. “There's no ‘we' here, dude. You've already done enough damage.”

“You can't just cut me out—”

I hold up a hand. “The places I'm going, nobody's going to want to see you. Nobody's going to talk to you.”

“What is
with
you people? Ever since Josh became a Wildling, you're being high and mighty, acting all mysterious. You, Marina …” Her voice trails off and she studies me for a moment before she adds, “You're one, too, aren't you?”

I have to laugh. “I wish, dude. But yeah, we've got secrets and they're none of your business.”

The warning bell rings. The halls are empty except for a few stragglers. We're all supposed to be in class now.

“Go,” I tell her. Then I throw her a bone. “I'll let you know if I find out anything.”

“But—”

“Seriously.”

Before she can argue anymore, I duck into the boys' washroom. I half expect her to follow me in, but maybe she thinks I actually have to use it. I wait a few moments, the weight of Donalita's pebble heavy in my pocket. When I think the halls must be empty, I slip out and head for a side door.

For once, my luck actually holds. Nobody stops me to ask to see the hall pass I don't have. There's no one around at all. I smile when I heave the door open and step out into the hot sun. Free. I mean, it's not great why I'm skipping classes, but I can't help but feel a lift in my heart all the same. My only worry is Marina. I hope she's just out catching waves.

I check around to make sure no one's watching before I take the pebble out of my pocket. It would be hard to believe that Donalita's inside this thing, except my double vision still sees her curled up in a ball at the same time as I see the pebble.

“Okay,” I say. “So, um, here goes …”

I tap the pebble against the side of the school. For a long moment nothing happens. I'm about to tap it again when the pebble goes weirdly soft in my fingers. I wasn't expecting that and it drops out of my hand. I start to grab for it at the same time as Donalita shifts into her normal shape and suddenly I've got an armful of girl. I stagger back against the wall under the unexpected weight. She drapes her arms around my neck, bringing her face inches from mine.

“Hi, dude,” she says and kisses the tip of my nose. “But shouldn't we be doing this somewhere else?”

I have to laugh as I set her on her feet.

“This is serious,” I say. “I need your help.”

But before I get the chance to explain, the door beside us opens and there's Mr. Goss glaring at us. He's so hard line when it comes to rules that everybody calls him Mr. Boss. This is, like, the last thing I need right now.

“To the office, Wilson,” he says in a sharp voice. “Right now. And you, young lady—”

I don't get to hear what he was going to add. Donalita scoops me up in her arms and takes off at Wildling speed. We're a block away between one breath and the next.

“Dude,” I say as she puts me down.

“That was okay, right?” she asks. “We didn't want to be there, did we?”

I can't believe this little girl just carried me like a baby—talk about crushing my studly rep—but I can't stop grinning, either. What a rush. My blood is pumping. I felt like we were the Road Runner just going at batshit crazy speed and leaving Coyote in our dust.

“That was
awesome
,” I tell her. “I would've killed to have seen Goss's face when you took off like that, even though I'm going to pay for it later.” I laugh. “Let's just pray that no one else in school was looking out a classroom window. I'll never live it down, dude.”

Donalita's laughing too, but this time she's the one to bring us down to earth.

“Why do you need my help?” she asks.

“It's Marina,” I say. “If even her bitch sister from hell is starting to worry about her, then it's serious. We need to find her.”

“Where would she go?”

“I don't know, dude. Can't you use some witchy Wildling power to track her down?”

“No,” she says. “But Auntie Min probably could. She could get every lizard and bird in town out looking for her.”

“Then we need to go see Auntie Min. Donalita?” I add when she doesn't respond.

She nods, but she's looking down the street, her body
language stiff. When I follow her gaze, all I see is a rangy barrio mutt sniffing at the base of a palm.

“What is it?” I ask.

“That dog's a cousin,” she says.

“Yeah, so?”

“There's something off about her.”

I take another look, but I can't see whatever it is that Donalita does, except the dog's maybe taller than most that roam loose in the barrio.

“Off how?” I ask.

She shrugs, then swivels to look the other way down the street. There's another dog sitting at the far end of the block. This one's not pretending to do anything but look at us.

“Okay,” I say. “This isn't good, is it?”

Her only response is to hook her fingers together and offer them to me as a step, though a step up to what, I don't know. We're standing on the sidewalk under a tall palm. There's nothing else around.

I look up—way up—to where the broad fronds stick out like the tree's got bad bed hair.

“Dude,” I say. “What are you thinking?”

She gives her hands an impatient shake. “Step in—and be ready to grab yourself a perch.”

“Dude, you can't be serious.”

“Now!”

The word jumps out with such an authoritarian crack that I'm putting my foot in her hands before I even realize what I'm doing.

“Keep your body straight,” she says.

“Seriously, I don't think this is such a good—”

I don't get to finish. She snaps me up like a kid playing with an action figure. And I mean
up
. Like fifteen, twenty feet. I think I'm going to shoot right over the top of the palm, but I manage to grab hold of a spray of fronds and haul myself to relative safety in the branches, with only a few cuts on my hands from the sharp edges of the leaves. I hardly get there before a coatimundi pushes through the crest of big fronds to join me.

“Are you out of your freaking mind?” I yell at her. “You almost sent me to the moon!”

The coati shifts into Donalita's familiar features.