Shadows Past: A Rune Alexander short. Book 5.5 of the Rune Alexander series. (2 page)

“Raze,” Rune yelled, as she ran through the gates.

“Over here,” Z said. He jogged past her, then took a sharp right at a tall tombstone.

She was seconds behind him and when she reached him, he was already standing with his blade to an Other’s throat.

The Other was backed up against a tree, his eyes wide, his hands in the air.

“Dammit, Z, that’s the ghoul. Gunnar. He’s harmless.” Gunnar the ghoul was always lurking somewhere in Wormwood, sneaking around, doing God knew what.

Z backed away slowly, taking his shiv with him. “Sorry, ghoul. You ran, and that made me want to chase you.” He looked at Rune.

But Gunnar didn’t appear to have heard him. His hollow stare was planted firmly on the candy bar peeking out of Z’s shirt pocket.

“Dude,” Rune said. “We were told a human was in here causing trouble. Do you know where he is?”

“And who was screaming?” Z added.

Gunnar’s gaze went back to the candy bar. “No.”

Rune narrowed her eyes and fished her own Baby Ruth candy bar from her pocket. Gunnar’s stare immediately swung to her.

Rune peeled the wrapper from the chocolate, then took a gigantic bite. “Oh, that’s good. Mmmm. So good.” She couldn’t believe the ghoul actually wanted to eat the stuff—after all, ghouls ate the flesh of the dead, didn’t they?—but he wanted it for
some
reason.

He put his long, skinny fingers to his chest, and there was no mistaking the longing in his eyes. The craving.

Rune softened. A fucking candy bar-eating ghoul. She grinned. “Gunnar, I’ll trade you the candy for some information.”

He nodded and tried to snatch the bar from her, but she was too quick for him. “No, no, dude. You’ll answer my questions first.
Then
you’ll get the candy.”

He appeared to gather his self-respect as he straightened his spine and stared down his nose at her. Wisps of long, black hair floated around his head, though there was no wind. Snow settled into his locks, adding to his slightly demented, otherworldly look.

At last, he curled his lip, just slightly, and bowed from his waist. “Of course, Your Highness.”

Z gave a quick laugh but cut it off when she turned to glare at him. He cleared his throat. “Sorry,” he muttered. But the grin was still there.

“Where’s the human we’re after, Gunnar?” Rune asked, turning back to the ghoul.

When the ghoul hesitated, she waved the candy under his nose.

He pointed. “That way. The last time I saw him he was shooting at a pike. I do not think he meant to kill her.”

“Why is he here, Gunnar?” Z asked.

Gunnar turned his nose up and continued to stare at Rune.

Rune sighed. “Do you know why he’s here? What does he want?”

“He seeks someone. The master told him the one he hunted was here and that the Others were hiding him. The master lied.”

“Llodra sent him here?”

Gunnar pursed his lips. “That question was already answered.”

She frowned. Smart ass ghoul. “Do you know the human’s name?”

“I do not.”

Then he leaned forward slightly and sniffed. “You smell of him. It is a fresh scent.”

“The master?”

“The human.”

She’d touched dozens of men that night. Some she’d fought, some she’d dragged to jail, and some she’d rescued from Others. There was no way to know exactly which human Gunnar had scented on her. She held the candy out to Gunnar. “Bon appétit, ghoul.”

Again, he bowed. “You are welcome, Your Discourteousness.”

“Freak,” she murmured, and left the ghoul with what was maybe his first candy bar as she went to find the human.

No other screams sounded, and there were still no signs of Raze. Cell phones wouldn’t work inside Wormwood, so she couldn’t call him.

“Why would Llodra send a human into Wormwood?” Z asked, running beside her.

“Because he’s fucking Llodra.” But she knew there was more to it than the master being an asshole. “I don’t know.”

Nicolas Llodra always had an agenda.

The night, dark even beneath the evenly spaced pole lights, was alive with moving shadows, darting figures, and odd sounds. Thumps, whirrs, growls…

And finally, she spotted a body so huge it could only have been Raze. “There,” she said, relieved.

She swerved off the path, Z beside her, and ran toward her fighter, a blade in each hand.

Raze had the human backed up against a gnarled, short tree. As Rune and Z arrived, he twisted the human’s gun from his grip and stuck it into his belt. “Just caught him,” he told her. “He’s not a professional.”

Rune put her blades away. “What the fuck are you doing here, dude? We could have been home drinking coffee instead of trying to protect an idiot who thinks he’s safe in Wormwood with a fucking
gun.
” She crossed her arms.

“Five more minutes he’d have been dead,” Raze growled. ”Wolves were already closing in when I found him.”

“I didn’t need protection,” the man said, finally. He clenched his fists but made no move toward them. Obviously he wasn’t quite
that
stupid.

He was well dressed for the cold night, wearing a heavy coat, a scarf, and a hat. His hands were bare. He was unremarkable in looks—medium everything. Medium height, hair length, weight. He looked like he belonged behind a desk, not in an Other graveyard waving a gun around.

“Cuff him, Z. He can talk as we walk him the hell out of here.”

The man pushed himself back into the tree and raised his hands. “Leave me to my work. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

Raze grabbed him by his jacket, flipped him around, and shoved him against the tree so Z could cuff him. The man sagged against the bark, trying to regain the breath Raze had knocked from him.

Seconds later, they were pushing him through Wormwood toward the gates. “I’m going to ask you once more,” Rune told him. “Tell me your story or I’ll arrest you and you can spend a couple nights in jail.”

“On what charge?” he cried.

She shrugged. “We’ll think of something.”

“Bastards,” he spat.

“Fine. Raze, toss him in my trunk. I’ll haul him to jail.”

“Wait,” the man said, as Rune opened her trunk. “I’ll tell you.”

“Good.” She opened the back door and nodded at Raze, who pushed the guy inside.

“Talk,” she said.

The man stared straight ahead, glaring at nothing. “I’m looking for evil. When I find it, I mean to kill it.” Then he turned to look up at Rune, and the weak moonlight glinted off the desperate misery in his eyes. “I have to kill him.”

“Who?”

He swallowed, and once again, he looked away. “My son,” he whispered. “I have to kill my son.”

“My son,” he continued, his voice soft, “was born evil.”

“What do you mean?” Rune’s voice hitched, and Z moved a step closer to her.
Born evil…

“No one could do what he does and not be filled with evil,” he replied. “His touch is wicked. He touches…”

“Dude,” Rune said, starting to relax. “Your son had sex with someone and you think that’s wrong? Is that what you’re telling us?”

But he speared her with a stare as intense and serious as it was intelligent. He wasn’t some judgmental bible thumper looking to shoot the sin out of someone.

“
No,
that’s not what I’m telling you. My son is a murderer. He does something a lot more harmful than sex. He kills. He’s full of power and he has to be
stopped.
”

Rune felt trapped by the horror in his stare. “Who did he kill?”

“And how?” Z asked.

“When he was three years old he got out of his restraints and touched a cat. In my world, touch means kill.” He attempted a smile.

“Restraints,” Rune said. “You tied down a fucking baby?”

“I didn’t tie him down.” But the anger in his voice had fled, leaving only exhaustion. “I covered his hands with gloves and cuffed them behind his back. I should have cut them off,” he mumbled.

“He accidentally killed a cat when he was a baby and you want to kill him for that now?” Raze leaned forward slightly, his eyes narrow.

“That was the first time he killed. His…power didn’t really manifest until he was seven months old. There were differences to him, of course. When he was born, he burned my wife as she delivered him. She had no idea she was pregnant and delivered him herself. Alone. I was at work,” he said sharply, as though they’d accused him of neglect.

“She knew he was…odd right from the very beginning. She wanted that baby more than she’d ever wanted anything. She became obsessive. She begged me to let her keep him out of the public. We never reported his birth. Never took him to a doctor. Never put him in school. We moved to an isolated place in the country and things were okay. My wife homeschooled him. It was
okay.

“But then…she got pregnant again. When he was seven.” His smile was grim. “She’d been told she’d never have a child, and now she would have two.”

Rune pushed her hand against her abdomen, trying to loosen the knots.
Shit. He killed the baby.

The crew never made a sound. They stayed quiet and just let him talk.

“He was so angry when the baby was born. I saw it in his eyes when he looked at her. I wanted to destroy him then,” he said. “But his mother, she loved the boy. I loved him too. But…” Again, he shook his head.

“His sister was everything he was not. There was nothing sinister in her eyes. She was sweet, innocent, and normal. And I loved her.” He moaned, once. “She was
my
baby.”

“He killed her?” Rune asked, unable not to.

At last, he nodded. “He said it was an accident. I’d moved out. My job was in the city and it was too long a commute. I sent them money.” He wouldn’t look at any of them.

“You left your wife there alone to deal with a dangerous son and a helpless daughter?” Z asked.

“Yes,” he cried, suddenly. “Yes, I did. This is my fault. My daughter’s death is my fault. I wanted to teach my wife a lesson. I wanted her to let me…”

“You’re a fucked up asshole,” Rune said. “You withdrew from your family because your wife refused to let you murder her son.” She wanted to hurt him then, wanted to hit him until he bled.

Raze took her arm and pulled her back, away from the stranger.

“You don’t understand,” the man said, quietly. “You can’t understand.”

“I understand your son needs help,” she said. “And you need to be put away.”

He went on as though he didn’t even hear her. “My wife heard a thump and she said she just knew, she somehow knew what had happened. She threw open the door to his bedroom and my little girl was on the floor, dead. When I arrived I went in there and picked her up. Pieces of her broke off like charcoal. Some parts of her were just ash.”

He looked up at them then, at the horrified circle of faces, and giggled. He was losing his grip on sanity and losing it fast. “He had to work hard to get her that burned. It was not an accident. He got free—somehow he got out of those fucking cuffs—and he went after her. Dragged her into his room. Jealous, maybe, at her freedom, the wife said. He was born evil. I can see it in his eyes.”

Rune closed her eyes. “Fuck me,” she whispered.

“We didn’t have the internet,” he continued, “because we were afraid he’d contact someone. He was allowed magazines, newspapers, books, TV. He’s very smart. Very smart boy. He learned of groups who take in people like him. Special people. He wanted to join them and had begged his mother to allow it. She refused. I refused. He is too dangerous for the world. I should have cut off his hands.”

“You think he’s making his way to one of those groups?”

“Maybe. But I don’t think he’ll get to where he’s going. He’s never been on the outside, not really. And soon, if he’s not stopped, you’ll begin hearing of charred bodies being found. He’ll likely die out here on his own, but not soon enough.”

“God,” Rune said, suddenly, her voice little more than a whisper. “We know where he is.”

Z looked at her and nodded. “What’s your son’s name?” he asked the man.

“Ben,” the man answered. “His name is Ben. And he’s the devil.”

Rune’s hand shook when she pulled her cell from her pocket. She punched in Jack’s number and waited, unable to breathe, for him to answer.

“Rune?” he asked. “Everything good?”

“God, Jack,” she murmured.

“Hurry home, Rune.” Ellie’s voice was small in the background. “I’m cooking.”

“Jack,” Rune said, again.

“What’s going on?” Jack asked, his voice suddenly sharp.

“We found Ben’s father. I need you to be very careful, and make sure Ben keeps on that fucking glove. Don’t let him touch you. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes. And send Ellie the fuck home. Now.”

“Shit, Rune,” Jack murmured. “The phone is on speak—”

The last thing she heard before his phone went dead was Ellis screaming.