Kelly Meding - As Lie the Dead

“We got separated,” I said.

“How?”

The words danced on the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed them back. Bad sodium pentothal. I was not about to slip on that little tidbit. The last thing I needed was a bounty on Phin’s head for attempted murder. But I had to give them something. “Leonard Call,” I said.

Kismet frowned. “Who’s that?”

“A new problem we wouldn’t have known about without my going off all rogue and not taking my orders directly from you.”

My sarcasm rolled right off her. “What does he have to do with any of this?” she asked.

I told her about my conversation with Isleen, leaving out the details of my Dumpster rescue. “If you were listening to the whole conversation I had with Wyatt, you know about Park Place,” I said.

“Yes, and we’ve had people watching it all night. Thanks for bothering to share that tidbit, by the way. If you were one of my Hunters—”

“I’m no one’s Hunter anymore. Why does nobody understand that? It killed me once. I don’t want that life anymore, but everything around me keeps sucking me back into it.”

“This isn’t a job you get to quit, Stone,” Tybalt said, coming shoulder to shoulder with his boss. Anger blazed in his cheeks. “We all signed up for life when we went to Boot Camp. Every single day, we work to keep the innocents safe and to honor everyone who died trying to become what we are. You can’t quit and shit on all that.”

“I’m not shitting on anyone.” I vaulted to my feet. The world tilted, and I didn’t have to fake leaning on the wall for support. When I looked up, both Hunters had drawn their respective weapons. Milo’s gun was pointed at my chest. Tybalt had produced his butterfly swords. It looked like a single weapon, the blade about the length of his forearm, until he split them into a pair. Tall as he was and with one sword in each hand, he almost looked scary.

I stood up straight and squared my shoulders and glared at Tybalt, fury rising. “You think I don’t remember the name and face of the trainee I killed to graduate Boot Camp? I honored her every time I went out and killed a Halfie or gutted a goblin, or spilled blood to defend this city, and I think I really fucking honored her and all the others who died when I was raped and tortured to death last week. How about you?”

No one spoke. Tybalt had been there the day they found my dying body in the old train station. He’d seen what the goblins had done to me, and he had the gall to question what I’d sacrificed? Asshole!

Tired, hungry, and sick of not knowing who to trust, I held my ground. I’d done my duty by living and dying a Hunter. So why was everyone else so keen on pretending nothing had changed?

“Tell me something,” I said, directing my question at Kismet. “When you look at me, do you still see Evy Stone? Or do you see someone new, who’s no longer part of your world, and who you perceive as a threat?”

Her cheek muscles twitched, unable to hide her thoughts. I’d struck damn close to home. I wasn’t the Hunter I’d been, irrevocably changed by my death and my habitation of Chalice Frost. I was something very new—a stranger with the memory and training of a seasoned Hunter and with two bizarre powers that gave her a distinct advantage over every other human she used to work with. Kismet couldn’t control me. Baylor, Willemy, Morgan—none of the other Handlers had even tried.

The brass could no longer control me. I was done being their bitch.

Kismet considered my words for several long minutes, her eyes the only part of her that moved. Up and down, across my face, searching. Reaching some sort of conclusion. A conclusion that came with an annoying amount of open pity. “We don’t blame you, Stone,” she said. “The changes aren’t your fault.”

I raised both hands in a “stop” gesture. “Don’t give me the whole ‘You’d have been better off staying dead’ line, because that ship has sailed.”

“No, I wasn’t going to say that.” She reached out her right hand, and, without being told, Milo handed her his gun. She held it loosely, felt its weight. I watched every movement, dread sinking in. Icy fingers clutched my heart and squeezed tight.

I swallowed. “Then what—?”

“You’re a threat, Stone. Without the brass, the system crumbles into chaos. We can’t protect the city if we’re arguing among ourselves. Fighting one another, chasing one another. I’d hoped to talk some sense into you.”

A tremor ripped down my spine. “So you’re going to kill me.”

She winced. “Are you going to give up this obsession with the brass and come back to work?”

“I can’t,” I said, shaking my head. I also tested for the Break and found its power easily. No spark of blue or sense of disruption. Good. “Not until I find out who Leonard Call is. Not until I know the other Clans are safe from whoever’s targeting them.” Something else struck me without warning, and a small cry escaped my lips.

Kismet tilted her head and frowned. “What?”

“You were listening.” Cold fury washed through me. Not at her but at my own damned self. For utterly failing to keep Phin’s most precious secret about the Clans. “You know.”

For a moment, she stared, head shaking lightly. Then understanding dawned. Her lips parted, but the gun never fell. “About the bi-shifters? I know what you told Wyatt, about their special status and abilities. But one coincidence does not a conspiracy make, Stone. You need more proof.”

“I can get proof.”

“Through proper channels, with the help of the Triads, and approval of the brass? Going by our book?”

“If I get the proof I think I will, then the brass will be out of a fucking job.”

“What could they possibly gain by murdering the Clans?”

“I probably could have asked them if you hadn’t smashed that flash drive.”

Another standoff ensued. She didn’t want to kill me; that much was evident in her hesitation. She also didn’t want to believe me. As a Handler, she was duty bound to the Triads and to protecting the city’s innocents. She had to weigh the potential truth in my words with what she believed to be best for everyone. She couldn’t believe me without proof. I couldn’t get the proof for her without breaking every rule of conduct and exposing the heart of the Triads to outside forces.

Even if I was convinced that heart was diseased.

“What’s the move, boss?” Tybalt asked.

Kismet flinched. I had my answer.

“Leonard Call,” I said. “He’s the key to Park Place. Don’t forget.”

“I won’t,” Kismet said, raising the gun.

Holy shit, she’s going to do it . I latched on to the Break, ready to slip into it with a thought. “Tell Wyatt something for me?”

She nodded sadly. “Anything.”

“Tell him I’ll see him soon.”

Confusion twisted her mouth. I focused on the main floor of the factory—what I recalled of it, at least—and let the Break tear me apart. I heard Kismet cry out, and then the roar of the gun. Didn’t feel a gunshot, only the scattered floating of teleportation.

The eye-watering stink of gremlin piss greeted me when I materialized on the factory floor, adding to the ache between my eyes. Evidence of its recently vacated residents littered the floor. Bits of nesting material were scattered around. Fumes wafted from the tops of the open vats, as potent as a bottle of one-hundred-fifty-proof Jack.

Four levels above me, a door opened and voices shouted. I ducked behind one of the vats, with no idea how to get out of there. Teleporting again was dangerous, and my headache wasn’t going away. A maze of broken-down conveyor belts fed into and out of the main room, past the vats to other rusty machines. Any one of those holes was a potential exit.