Storm in a Teacup (27 page)

I feel oddly winded now. I wipe a hand across my forehead, and my stomach cramps.

"Are you okay?" Mason takes a step toward me, his voice pitched low.

I look around at the woods. We're only about two hours north of Nashville. I shouldn't be feeling this way. I made it to Cincinnati before with no trouble, and it wasn't until Columbus that I started getting the stomach twists. Must be something I ate.

"I'm fine," I tell him loudly. Too loudly.
 

Mason raises his hand to his lips.
 

Okay, I can take a hint. I zip it and follow him into the underbrush.
 

He moves silently through the wealth of flora, feet barely churning the loamy earth. The forest smells dirty, but in that nature way you expect when sniffing the underside of a mossy log. The venue's changed from the downtown shades, and I don't know what to expect. The air makes the fuzziness in my head begin to clear, and I wonder if I was imagining it before.

I keep within grabbing distance of Mason, eyes stuck with his backside in periphery as I try to keep my feet from crunching twigs.
 

It's not a bad backside.

Oh, who am I kidding? He's got a nice ass to put all nice-assed underwear models to shame.

Then the ass stops moving and I almost run into it.

There's no clearing ahead, only a mass of live oaks and sycamores that indicate we're probably near water. But Mason stops and holds his hand up to me.
 

"Stay here. Do not move."

That's encouraging.

He vanishes into the trees, and I follow the flickering paleness of his skin as it weaves between the trunks. A glimmer of starlight in neat pinpricks shows through the dense canopy above me.
 

For creatures that can climb to seventh story balconies as easily as Mason can, I shouldn't underestimate their abilities when it comes to trees. These trees are heavily branched, easy climbing even for those of us without squirrel DNA.
 

The branches don't move, and every moment of anxiety from Mason's absence is tempered by the lack of rustling above my head.
 

With my eyes turned upward, I only see Mason returning when he's fifteen feet away. Maybe looking up wasn't the best idea. I can tell it's him because he's not making any effort to be sneaky, even though his face is hidden behind a tree trunk. If he gets poison ivy, I'm not going to be the one rubbing calamine lotion all over his itchy anything.

"They are gone," he says, his voice puzzled. "They were here a short time ago. Let's go farther."

We walk for another half hour. A cramp seizes my stomach, and I double over.

"Ayala?" Mason turns, making no noise in the underbrush.

I stumble toward a tree. "Which direction are we walking?"

"North," he says, puzzled. "Why –"

"I can't go any farther."

"What?"

I feel it now, the churning of my stomach acid. My forehead seems to burst tiny beads of sweat from every pore. "I'm hitting the edge of my territory. I have to go back, or I'll pass out."

The words don't compute in my head, even though I'm the one chattering. "They're not even out here. Let's go back to the car. Maybe you scared them."

"I shouldn't have."

I don't know what he means by that.

He's looking at me sideways. "You're not okay."

No, I'm not, but I ignore him and focus on putting one foot in front of the other without landing on my face in between.

We pick our way back to the vehicle in relative silence, only the whisper of our feet on leaves to announce our presence.

Mason's arm clotheslines me onto my back.
 

"Mason, what are you doing?" I've landed on the flamethrower. Not the best feeling on the spine. The nausea hasn't improved as much as it ought to. I should have remembered that it takes more than going back home to cure this.

He responds with a hiss and a snarl directed in the area of my feet.
 

I lift my head up, fighting the bile that rises in my throat. Two shades are crouched not a yard off from me.

Only Mason stands between us. I tug the flamethrower tube from my sleeve and work it into my hand.

"No, Ayala." Mason doesn't turn, but he points straight at my right hand holding the tube.

One of the shades takes a lunge forward. Mason snarls again. The shade skitters back, baring his teeth.
 

They're smart. Cunning. They knew Mason was coming and circled back to meet us on our return. If they want me dead, dead I will become.

But I'm not getting dead. I'm just getting a cramp in my neck from holding my head up to watch them while laying flat on my back. I can't tell if they're communicating. Something flickers through the air. Fear? Pride? Unease?

It could be one or all three, and I don't know where it's coming from. Maybe me. I feel uneasy, and it's not only the clammy sweat on my brow and neck.

"You already know you don't have to hurt her."

The sound of Mason's voice breaks my resolve to stay put, and I scootch backward into a low crouch, pulling my feet beneath me. At least this way I can leap or roll instead of waiting for a shade to grab hold of my foot and tug.

They don't respond to my movement. Their eyes, black in the weighted darkness of the woods, stay trained on Mason's face.

"She's my friend."

I am?

"She helped me. She is helping me. She wants to help you."

Yep. That's me. Ayala Storme, hellkin hunter and shade tamer. I need a flute and a jaunty hat.

"She kills us." One of the shades speaks for the first time, his gaze lighting on me.

"Only out of defense of her life. She thought we were demons." Mason's deep rumbling drawl is even, calm.

"Do we look like demons?" This question is addressed to me.

I take a breath and relax my stance, releasing my hold on the flamethrower tube. Mason's not the only one who can talk. That's good. If any of this can be described as anything other than surreal.

"I first saw one of you in the center of a circle of demons, ripping apart a human woman. How would you have judged it? Not to mention I'd tracked other births, and each was accompanied by serious splattage. I made the best decisions I could with the information I had. It would have helped if I hadn't seen more of you dismembering Nashville's finest and relieving businessmen of their arms." This seems to be a blind spot with shades. Are they all really ignorant of the fact that norms tend to take dismemberment pretty hard? My speech has affected my upchuck reflex. I swallow hard and taste acid.

The shade who questioned me takes a step closer to me, and every muscle in Mason's back tenses. The shade raises his hands.
 

"I don't intend to hurt her...Mason."
 

How does he know Mason's name?
 

"Maybe not, but she doesn't know what I do."

No, probably not. The final shade has only been watching the whole exchange. He makes no move to come closer, only sits back on his heels to observe.
 

Something passes between Mason and the shades, and with it a sense of resolve. They're communicating. And somehow I'm getting the backwash.

The two shades turn and leap into the nearest tree, leaving Mason and me alone in the woods.

I straighten, adjusting my skewed back holster after its encounter with the ground. "What was that about?"

"They're going to help us."

"Well, that was anticlimactic."

"Did you expect to fight?"

"A little."

"These two were on their own because they want to be. They are like me. They don't want to hurt anybody."

"So we started easy." Here I got all battle-royale for a couple of shades that were already standing down. I guess in a way I'm thankful; I wasn't really looking to meet up with creepy sadisto-shade and the Hannibal deluxe crew, but now have a weird stuffy feeling that has nothing to do with my slowly fading nausea. My leather pants creak when I take a step.

That's what it is.

All dressed up and no one to fight.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

I'm going to have to kill something tonight. Mediators are supposed to report all demon kills to the Summit, and I usually bag two or so a night. If I'm out on patrol and come back without having to clean my sword, Gregor's going to ask questions.

I'd rather go home, drink some tea, and concentrate on not barfing. That's not going to happen. I almost lost it up there in Kentucky. Maybe our range tightens up once we press the boundaries. I hope I'm wrong.

Regardless, tonight I have to bag some hellkin.

I bring it up to Mason when we get back to the car.
 

He looks at me from the passenger seat, thankfully keeping his knees together. "Do you know somewhere we could find demons?"

"We?"

"I brought you out here. I can help."

I start to tell him that I work alone, but right as the words are about to leave my lips, I realize how stupid that sounds. I'm working with Mason. What does it say about my philosophy when I didn't even notice I'd broken it?

North of Nashville there aren't many places known for being demon hot spots, but there is a newish hot spring over by the ruins of the Grande Ole Opry where the occasional snorbit can be found.
 

Snorbits. For a name as stupid as that, they're not fun to mess with. They like sulphur — surprise, surprise — and the hot spring is one of their favorite hangouts in the Nashville area. It's why I don't hunt them very often. I know where to find them, and they're almost always there. Textbook easy.

A snorbit demon has about a foot on Mason and forearms like Popeye if his spinach took steroids. When I pull into the deserted parking lot of the Opry, I already see one lurking on the opposite end between us and the old hotel.

They tried to keep the hotel running after the Opry went up in flames, but then the hot springs started bubbling up all around it. The type of folks to stay at the Opryland aren't the type to think rotten eggs aroma worth the price of a room with a view.

We're not the only things moving around out here. I don't bother to shut off the headlights of my car. Snorbits don't see light well and find their way mostly by smell. They should find us well enough anyway — we're upwind of them.

At least with the lights, Mason and I should see them coming.

The first attack comes in the form of two snorbits. "Ever fight one of these before?" I ask Mason. Maybe I ought to have asked him that earlier.

"No." He blurs forward before I can respond.

The first snorbit's arm sails through the air and lands with a whump next to a crushed concrete pylon.

Now that's just...not fair.

I brighten when I remember the flamethrower. Yes, I can drive with it strapped to my back. You learn to put up with all manner of discomfort when you're a Mediator.

The second snorbit is coming right at me. They're lumbery, leathery things. Sort of like an elephant with about five percent of the cuteness. I wait until it gets close and light the thrower with a snick of flint.

It stops and sniffs the air.

I pull the trigger.
 

Fire erupts from the tube in my hand, engulfing the snorbit in flame. Its distended arms flail. I can't tell if it's in pain or if it finds the smell of its own burning flesh enjoyable.

It's down in moments, and Mason's already made short work of its buddy.

A second pair of headlights glints toward us.

I'm not the only Mediator who knows this as a snorbit spa. "Mason!"
 

His head jerks up. His body's spattered in black blood that stinks like brimstone.
 

"Get out of here. Get to my apartment and clean up. Someone's coming."

So far the beams of the headlights don't touch us. If they've seen a shade, I'm done. Kaput.
 

Mason's already gone. That little horse's ass can move fast.

The headlights come to a stop, and I find I've got a second problem. No one will believe I dismembered a snorbit. I don't have time to hack at the wounds.
 

So I torch them.
 

The heat from the flamethrower draws my skin tight on my face, and the parking lot begins to smell like the inside of a volcano.

Mixed with the rotten egg smell of the hot springs, this is something to say pew at.

I look over my shoulder as the last limb of Mason's snorbit fizzles and spits with the dying flame. Of all the Mediators to show up. It's Ben.

"You're ruining my barbecue," I tell him. If he saw Mason, I'll be tied up with slummoth entrails and left to boil in the hot pool yonder.

"Looks like you're about finished. Taking a pass on tonight's patrol?"

Ben knows me well enough to know how rare it is to see me here. At least I can play the concussion card.

"It's been a weird week."

"You're telling me." He looks at the bodies littering the pockmarked — and now newly-charred — pavement. "Two of them, eh?"

"Glad I brought Lucy here." I waggle the flamethrower at him.