The bells over the door jingled, and we piled in through a sheet of cascading redgold, energy flushing deep purple as it sealed us inside. With the Weres crowding behind we couldn’t slow down, and I was halfway across the small occult shop before skidding to a stop, guns flicking out.
The ride here had been spine-tingling but uneventful—if by uneventful you mean “almost got into six different traffic accidents, lost a cop in the industrial district, and bailed out of the truck with the tires still smoking.” Now I knew how other people felt when I drove.
It occurred to me to ask why the cops didn’t recognize her ride, but with the radio going supersonic and her lips moving as she cursed steadily, it didn’t seem like a good time.
Shelves of books and candles stood against the walls like good little soldiers, and there was a large rack holding crystals and stones in small bins. Another wooden rack held amulet-making materials—leather, bits of bone, beads, feathers, and less-nice things. Glass cases slumbered under falls of dusty golden sunlight, and the air quivered a little as the walls ran with purple light. My smart eye watered, trying to pierce the curtains of etheric force.
But that wasn’t what was bothering me right now. Anya let out a short sharp yell, and the Weres behind me suddenly let loose with twin growls, shelves of books and candles and other assorted trivia—including the glass cases and the racks—vibrating as the Sanctuary’s walls resounded like the curves of a gigantic bell.
Galina spread her arms, green eyes alight and her dark marcel waves slightly disarranged. She was in full robes, smoky gray silk glowing with pigeonthroat sheen, the medallion of the Order—a quartered circle inside a snake’s supple curve, cast in some light silvery metal—running with white radiance against her chest.
But that wasn’t why I had my guns out. You’d have to be crazy to draw on a Sanc inside her own walls. They settle, drive in their roots deep, and are near godlike inside their hallowed homes. Outside, they’re a tasty, almost-defenseless snack. But hunters, Weres, and even most ’breed or Traders will smack you down hard if you attack your local Sanc. Neutral supply of necessities is the least they provide.
No, I had both guns out and braced because of the hell-breed near the sleek black cash register, his eyes glowing sterile blue and his pale hair ruffling as he saw me—and grinned.
“Jill!” Galina yelled, and the walls tolled their deep bell note of restrained power again. Each hair on my body stood straight up, my skin shrinking with reaction, and I found myself suddenly hoping she wasn’t going to lose her temper.
It can get awful uncomfortable inside when a Sanc loses their temper.
“Darling.” Perry’s lip lifted, his pearly teeth bluntly human but too, too white. The silent snarl turned into a bright, bland, sunny smile, the kind a real-estate broker will use right before moving in for the kill. “So good of you to come.”
Galina’s open palm, flung out toward him, twitched. “Don’t make me, Perry.” Flat and loaded with terrible power, the single sentence turned the air inside the shop to frost. “Jill. Jesus Christ. Pax, hunter. Put the guns down.”
My breath turned to a white cloud. Every muscle in my body protested. Anya Devi drifted away to the right, and I was suddenly certain she was getting a better angle on Perry. An angle that would leave Galina out of the line of fire.
My stomach cramped, my arms aching and tingling. If I needed to know how Anya felt about me, it was all in that subtle movement. We were hunters. If I was going to throw down, even inside a Sanc’s hallowed walls, she was ready to back me.
“Stay where you are, Anya.” Galina was having none of this. “Jill, put your guns down.”
Perry took a single step forward. Galina’s hand twitched and he halted, a ripple running under his pale skin. Like tiny mice, begging to escape. The pale linen of his suit was dotted with black ichor, hems and cuffs sending up little threads of steam, but he looked pristine under it.
Like he could just step out from under the spatter stains and they would fall to the ground with tiny little plashing sounds.
Splashback. He’s been killing other hellbreed. Because we got away? Maybe. I took in the spatter patterns as I lowered the guns, slowly. So slowly, my arms straining, every muscle locking and fighting me.
I walked right into the Monde with nothing but plain lead in my gun. Jesus. My skin chilled again reflexively, and I tasted copper. What would have happened if I’d eaten something there?
There was no deciding which was worse: being helpless and mostly unconscious of the danger, or looking back and seeing how badly things could have gone.
Perry’s grin widened, the further down the barrels went. He shook his head slightly, white-blond hair sliding back from his face like raw silk. He changed hairstyles like some women change shoes, but very subtly. You had to look to see what he’d done each time.
And I did not like that I knew that, or how closely it meant I watched him.
“You left too soon, Kiss.” The sheer good humor, as if we were at a party and he was dropping banal gossip. A hot draft of desert wind, laden with the scent of spoiled honey, brushed every surface. “Always in such a hurry.”
Buzzing pressed itself inside my skull, tiny insect feet prickling over my hands and face. I even felt them inside, chitinous bodies and dragging stingers pressing behind my cheekbones, running lightly over the surface of my brain as the buzz became a roar. They were crawling and eating, and my fingers almost shook with the urge to rip at the skin of my face and peel them off—
“Back off, Perry!” Galina’s walls shivered again, the bell-gong sound rattling through my bones. “If I toss you out, you’re never coming back in. Settle down.”
“I just want to talk to her.” He sounded so reasonable. I blinked furiously, my left cheek twitching as if a seamstress had her needle in and was plucking at the flesh. “Just a little tête-à-tête with my darling one, surely it can do no harm?”
“Galina.” Devi, her tone slicing through his. “Get him the fuck out of here, or I won’t be responsible for what happens.”
All those threats. Blandishments. Pulling on me like dogs with a bone, except I was armed and ready the way a bone never is. The machine inside my head started calculating whether or not I could aim and squeeze both triggers before Galina twitched and made all of us mighty uncomfortable.
The machine returned a number I didn’t like, no matter how many times I ran it.
“Everyone just simmer down.” The air hardened, pressing against all of us, Galina’s temper fraying. “I can separate you all like toddlers at the lunch table if I have to. Perry, you’re done here. Leave.”
“I don’t have what I came for.” Soft, deadly, the sliding sound of another step. “Kiss. My dearest. I have all the answers you could ever want, and I ache to give them to you. All you have to do—”
I fought to keep the guns down. Because sooner or later I was going to chance it, no matter what the numbers in my head said.
It wasn’t surprising someone interrupted him. What was surprising was that it was Saul.
Weres don’t take on ’breed. Traders, yes, because Traders are still at bottom human. But there’s no corruption in Weres that can track and anticipate a ’breed.
The thrumming growl under his words said very clearly that Saul didn’t care. “Step any closer, hellspawn, and I will kill you.”
The world narrowed to a pinhole of light, darkness crawling around the edges. Galina’s shop trembled like oil on disturbed water, afternoon sunlight suddenly brittle and chill through the windows. Air-conditioning soughed, the humming in the walls oddly distorted, shimmers of energy cycling up. Galina’s arms tensed, and her green eyes flamed. Red-gold Sanctuary sorcery smoked in the walls.
“Little puss.” Amused, disdainful, Perry’s chin lifted. His face had changed, cheekbones turning to blades and severe handsomeness rising from under the blandness. Helletöng grumbled, its flabby fingers picking at the strings under the surface of the visible. “I will deal with you in my own time. Go back to lapping milk and clawing at walls. Kiss…” The sibilant turned into a hiss. “When you’re ready, come and find me.”
When you’re ready. Silver spat and crackled with blue sparks, bleeding free of the metal. My aura rippled, the gem vibrating against my wrist. The rattling hum rippled and crawled over my shoulders, sliding under my clothes. Leather rustled, my hair ruffling on a breeze that came from nowhere, Galina’s shop trembling around us both. The wooden floor groaned sharply, once.
Perry winked out. A pop of collapsing air, a draft of rotting, spoiled honey, an obscenely warm breeze caressing my face. My guns jerked up, but there was nothing for them to track, and the Sanctuary shielding made a low overstressed noise, rocks shredding under contradictory gravitational pulls. Galina chanted something, low and furious, and my fingers cramped.
I was sweating, great clear drops of water standing out on my skin. And shaking too, like a horse run too hard.
“What. The fuck.” Anya sounded puzzled. “Lina?”
The world righted itself. “Well, that was unexpected.” The Sanctuary blew out a frustrated sigh. “Jill?”
I thudded back into myself. My arms were straight, and even though I shook, the guns were absolutely steady. They were up.
Maybe I would have been fast enough, after all.
Training. Goes bone deep. “Jesus,” I whispered.
Galina skidded to a stop right next to me. I almost twitched. Hunters don’t like it when someone gets too close. But I lowered the guns, and my fingers eased off the triggers.
And Galina, wonder of wonders, threw her arms around me. She hugged me, her walls suddenly tolling a greeting instead of a threat. She was rounded at hip and breast the way I was not, and her hair smelled of incense and green growing things. The murder under my skin retreated from that softness.