Frank Tuttle - Hold The Dark

I looked down at the list. “They’re dead.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“By whose hand?”

He shook his head. “I do not know.”

“Why four days? What happens then?”

The muscles around his jaw began to move beneath his cold pale skin. “I cannot say,” he said.

“What can you say?”

“I can tell you about the other names. Prostitutes, all. From houses less prestigious than the Velvet. One has vanished each month, for the last eleven months.”

“How-”

“I cannot say,” he said. “No one looked, when they vanished. They had no family. Few had close friends.”

“Then how do you know so much?”

“The House has many interests,” he said. “We’ve been following this one for some time. With, I fear, little success.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“We both want the same thing.” He sounded tired. “If anything I tell you helps you find Martha Hoobin, you’re welcome to it. Maybe you’ll remember that we did try to help.”

I wrestled with the concept of helpful vampires for a moment. Then I pulled open a drawer, found Martha’s silver comb, held it up.

“Ever seen this before?”

He lowered his shaded glasses, inspected the comb and handed it back to me. Then he reached back inside his coat-and withdrew an identical silver swan-comb.

He put it down on my desk, beside the one I’d found. They were twins, down to the carving of the feathers and the color of the bristles.

“I have three more. All found among the belongings of…” He pulled the list around, pointed to three names. “Her, and her, and her.”

“Notice anything strange about yours?”

He frowned. “No. Why?”

I hesitated. But he’d told me things, and I decided if I wanted him to keep talking I might have to open up myself.

“A friend of mine tried to do her witch-touch act to it. Dropped it like a hot brick. Said she couldn’t feel that it had ever belonged to anyone. She said that wasn’t right, that she thought someone had put some kind of black mojo on it.”

“We tried the same thing,” said the halfdead. “No one saw anything of significance through any of these-but they didn’t notice a lack of sight either.” He nudged my comb with a forefinger. “Odd. When did your friend try witch sight on it?”

“Yesterday.”

He nodded.

“Ours were not nearly so fresh,” he said. “Hmm. Perhaps if the spell were cast to fade away…”

“My friend said that was more than just street mojo. She said it was black hex. Sorcery.”

“That would be significant, if true,” said Evis. He looked up suddenly at me. “I don’t suppose you’d allow me to take this away for further study?”

“I don’t suppose you’d give me a receipt?”

He beamed. “Gladly.” And I swear he reached back into that coat, pulled out a small leather-bound notebook and a gold writing pen.

“Tell me something,” I said, as he scribbled away. “Were you maybe a lawyer, before?”

He looked up, lifted an eyebrow. “Before I died and became a blood-thirsty halfdead fiend?”

“I wasn’t going to say ‘fiend’.”

He laughed. “I was a lawyer, yes. Before the War. Nevertheless, I wound up in the infantry. I took a Troll arrow at Potter’s Hill.”

I sat upright. “Potter’s Hill? Summer of seventy-four? I was there.”

The halfdead finished writing, signed the page with a flourish, tore the paper out of the book and slid it across the desk toward me. “There was a halfdead in our regiment. We’d spoken, become friends, of a sort. He saw I was dying, asked me if I wanted to-to take a chance.” He shrugged. “I do not recall my reply. But I woke up dead two nights later. Funny old thing, life.”

I took the receipt. It was all there, neat and legal, one silver comb, on temporary loan for sorcerous inspection, blah blah blah.

Potter’s Hill. Hell, he’d died right under my nose.

“All right,” I said, tapping his comb. “One veteran to another. Mind if I keep this one to show around?”

“With my compliments.” He slipped his notebook back in his pocket, and his golden pen. “One more thing, Mr. Markhat.”

“And what is that?”

“We are aware of you and your efforts. Others may be aware of these things too. Persons not as well disposed toward you as I and my House.”

“I get that a lot,” I said. “Don’t worry. I’ll put two strings on my screen-door tonight.”

He shook his head.

“You need not waste time at the Velvet. We’ve done that already. Martha’s abductors were never on the grounds, nor were they in association with anyone employed there.” He raised a gloved hand when I started to speak. “Please, Mr. Markhat, accept this as truth. It cost us-dearly-and I am convinced it is accurate.”

“So forget the Velvet,” I said. “That doesn’t leave me with much. Because the only other thing in her life was her home, and her brothers-and you can accept this as truth-they had nothing to do with this. Nothing at all.”

He nodded. “We reached the same surmise.”

I shook my head. “I still don’t understand any of this.” I sensed our conversation was nearly over. “But thanks, all the same.”

He made a little dip with his head. “And thank you.” He rose, stopped, looked up at me like he’d just thought of something. “I have an idea.”

“Do tell.”

“I am forbidden to divulge the details of certain delicate matters to you. I am bound, by honor and oath, to obey this stricture.”

“I wouldn’t dream of asking you to do otherwise.”

He grinned, put his hand quickly over his lips. “Still. I have several errands to run this evening, finder. I am hardly to be blamed if you follow me and perhaps draw your own conclusions as to the nature of my actions.”

I rose too. “Forgive me, but trotting along behind you strikes me as a good way to wind up on the dead wagon in the morning. What if one of your friends mistook me for a common thief or a light snack?” I shook my head. “No, thanks.”

“That is a problem. But happily, I have a coach. My driver is discrete. If you have a dark coat, you could come along, and I assure you no one would be the wiser.”

“What about your oath?”

He shrugged. “The House, as I said, values initiative. If I’m asked if I was followed, I can honestly say I was not. And if they ask if I invited you to ride along with me, well, I should have to confess, but I doubt that I’ll be asked that particular question.”

I lifted an eyebrow.

“Miss Hoobin has, at best, four days. My efforts to locate her have proved fruitless, as have yours. You lack the time to learn what I have learned. I lack your ability to move about unnoticed, and move about in the daylight. I give you my word you will not be harmed. I give you my word you will be returned here safely well before sunrise.”

He took off his glasses, looked me eye-to-eye. “I am halfdead, Mr. Markhat. That may well deny me a place among the saints, but does it truly guarantee me a throne beside the devil?”

I looked him in the eye. No saint ever had such a face, or such a stare.

“I’ll get my coat. And call me Markhat. Mister is for old folks.”

Evis smiled a pointy smile behind his hand. “Call me Evis. Shall we go?”

We went, the devil and I, out into the night.

Curfew, quoth the Regent, is Rannit’s greatest achievement since the War.

That statement is usually followed by a lot of prattle about peaceful co-existence with our halfdead brethren and statistics twisted to prove that the only groups preyed upon by said brethren are burglars and street gangs. Honest folk, we are assured, folk tired from a day’s honest work, folk at home and in their beds, these folk have nothing to fear from the halfdead.