Брайан Макклеллан - Blood Tally

I chuckled to myself and adjusted in my seat to get comfortable, reaching down to slide the bench backward a little bit. What I touched instead of the adjustment lever was silky soft. For a split second I thought that I’d grabbed a T-shirt, but when I closed my fingers and gave it a tug, a muffled “Ow!” came from beneath my seat. I felt my heart lurch into my throat and I suddenly felt wildly vulnerable, like someone out for a swim that feels something touch their leg in the murky depths. “Maggie there’s something under my seat.”

I don’t sense anything, I …

I heard something slide around underneath me, the sound raising all of the hair on the back of my neck. Without warning, a little figure popped out from between my legs, hopped onto one knee, and deposited itself on the passenger seat. It happened faster than I could react, and I found myself eye-to-eye with the sphinx from Boris’s house.

“Please don’t tug my tail,” he said, sounding distinctly put out.

“I, uh … please don’t hide under my seat?”

“Deal.” He began aggressively grooming his shoulder.

I pushed myself against the door, thinking about sphinxes eating unwary travelers. “What are you doing in my truck?” I asked him.

“I needed transportation after I escaped from Boris.”

“You mean after I let you out?”

The sphinx stopped grooming long enough to shoot me a withering look, as if I had insulted him with the very idea that he might need help.

I continued, “You have wings.”

“And flying cats attract attention in North America.”

“Okay, that’s fair. Have you been here the whole time?”

“I have.”

Can he still hear me? Maggie whispered.

“Yes, I can hear you.” The sphinx stopped grooming himself and looked at me with what came across as deep disapproval. “I suppose you’ll do. The two of you seem interesting, and I gather that you work a lot, which is ideal.”

“I’ll do for what?” I asked.

“For my new home. I need a place to bed down. If you live in an apartment, I’ll need a litterbox – changed daily, of course – but if you’re in the country you can just leave a window cracked for me to get in and out.”

“Wait, what?”

He continued over me. “I’ll need four cans of tuna daily. Albacore in water, not that garbage they put on sale every other weekend.”

I held up a finger. “Whoa, whoa. You are not coming to live with me. I don’t even know who the hell you are.”

He drew himself up, his tail wrapping around his feet and his wings fluttering slightly. “I am the last Prince of the Nile, the Herald of Sekhmet! You will address me with the respect I am due, as well as offerings of albacore tuna.”

Sekhmet has been dead since before I was born, Maggie said skeptically.

That seemed to deflate the sphinx a little. “Yes, well. Being the Herald Prince of a dead god isn’t as illustrious as it sounds. Why do you think I’m in Ohio rather than Egypt?”

Weirdly, that made me feel a little sad. Almost by instinct, I reached out and scratched the sphinx behind the ears. He stiffened momentarily, then leaned against my hand. “That is an acceptable offering.”

I could feel myself melting on the inside. I like animals, but I hadn’t had a pet for over a decade. I just couldn’t justify it with how much time I spent on the road. “What’s your name?”

“I don’t believe I have one. Boris spent a lot of time calling me his four-legged investment.”

“That’s not a name. How about King Tut?”

“My ancestors knew Tutankhamun, and I think that’s wildly disrespectful,” he sniffed. “Don’t stop scratching!”

We could call him Oedipus, Maggie suggested.

“Oedipus is a Greek legend. He also had sex with his mother, which doesn’t reflect well on me. You, nice genie lady, need to remember that I can hear you.”

Sorry. Maggie sounded a little sheepish.

“How about Eddie? It’s like Oedipus, but … not.”

The sphinx purred loudly, leaning harder into my scratching. “That’s acceptable,” he muttered, suddenly collapsing on the bench next to me and cuddling up against my leg. “Now take me to my new temple.”

“You mean my home?”

“Yes.”

“Can’t go home yet,” I told him. “Still have lots of work to do.”

“Then keep scratching.”

I hate to interrupt all those scratchings, but I have something, Alek.

Eddie’s sudden appearance almost made me forget we were on a stakeout. I turned my attention back to the task at hand. “What am I looking for?”

Hold on. A good minute passed, then another, then another. I was just about to ask Maggie what I was holding on for when she finally said, See that lady right there?

A middle-aged woman with an ask-to-see-the-manager haircut and dye job entered my field of vision, walking across the parking lot and getting into her Prius parked underneath a tree on the far end of the strip mall. “I see her.”

That woman just came out of the clinic. Her nametag says S. Montgomery. That bag she’s carrying has two pints of blood in it. I’m pretty sure it’s against protocol to take those home at the end of the day.

I took my hand away from its scratching duties, eliciting a soft meow from Eddie, and snapped a couple of photos of the lady and her car with my camera phone. “Well, that’s definitely not Michael. But it could be an accomplice.” I looked down, struck with a thought. “Hey, Eddie, what do you know about Michael Pavlovich. Eddie?”

Soft snores answered me. I poked him gently. He didn’t budge.

“Real helpful,” I muttered. I checked the clock – it was just after seven in the evening – and wiped the sweat from my brow as S. Montgomery pulled out of her parking spot and headed toward the road. I waited a few moments, letting her get into traffic, before following at a distance.

I really don’t like that I can’t sense Eddie, Maggie whispered. Or that he can hear me.

I glanced down at him. I could hear his snoring above the sound of the truck. I whispered back mentally, I guess we have a cat now.

Careful with that. Like he said before, he’s not a pet. He’s a sphinx. Very intelligent.

Very catlike, I shot back.

Don’t let that trick you. I’ve only ever seen sphinxes at a distance, but I’ve read that they can be terrifying.

He seems a bit … small to be terrifying? Does he have magical powers or something?

They were the heralds of Sekhmet for a reason. But hell if I know what he’s actually capable of.

Plowing through four cans of tuna a day, apparently. I can’t afford that shit. I don’t even spend that much money on my own food when I’m not using the company credit card. I glanced down at Eddie once more, sighed, and turned my attention back to our quarry.

S. Montgomery had plenty of errands to run. We went to the grocery store, pharmacy, Chick-fil-A, and then finally to a little subdivision in Westlake. I watched her pull into the driveway of a little house with a neatly mown lawn and nice flower bed, then parked myself somewhat down the road from it. She unloaded her groceries, carrying them inside.

“What now?” I asked aloud.

Nothing exciting about her, Maggie reported. As far as I can tell, she’s a complete civilian. No connection with the Other.

Which meant that we might have misread the entire thing. “Well, that’s a day wasted.” I wrote down the address in my notebook just in case.

Maybe not, Maggie said. She’s coming back out. And the blood is still in her car.