Rob Thurman - Deathwish

To say I had mixed emotions on that was an understatement. Pride and automatic refusal. But I could refuse all that I wanted. Promise would do what she wished.

Cherish would run. Oshossi would suddenly seem not quite so bad. He could kill her, but the Auphe would kill her. As for Goodfellow . . . a knock on the door, a scant moment of metal scraping the lock, and he was there. “So,” he said impatiently, “are we going after Oshossi or not? I had to perform with someone far, far below my standards to get this information. I would hate for it to go to waste.” His annoyance faded as he took us in. My stony face, Promise’s determined one, and Cal limply unconscious and worn to his last reserves.

“ Arhidia , what’s happened now?” The apprehension was easily read in his tense frame.

I filled him in. Halfway through, he was on one of the chairs with his head in his hands. When I reached the part about us plummeting over the edge, he was muttering over and over under his breath, “Gamiseme. Gamiseme. Gamiseme.”

I spoke enough Greek to agree with him. I repeated the same thing to him that I had to Promise. “You should go. When the three of us are gone, they’ll have no reason to come after you. And as long as you’ve lived, no one could be better at hiding than you, assuming they could even pick you out from the other pucks. None of us expect you to die with us.”

His shoulders braced and he straightened to lean back against the chair. “And miss all the fun?” The careless smile disappeared. “I’ve run from battles all my life, counted my own life as far more important than anyone else’s. You, on the other hand, have faced death with me. For me. No one in all my years has ever done that. I stand with you now.” He turned a little green with the words, but he was resolute all the same.

It wasn’t what Cal would’ve wanted. It wasn’t what I wanted, but bravery and loyalty could be unshakable. In this case, I knew it was. We would, if nothing else, give the Auphe something to think about.

“Tell us what you learned of Oshossi,” I said, changing the subject. There was nothing more to say about it. Nothing more to do but to go down fighting.

Cal had mentioned the brownstone Robin had told him about on the phone. And as far as the puck could tell, Oshossi had no backup locations. “It’s that or the park with his zoo. If he kicks our asses, well, that was that. But if we come out ahead on this one and he makes a run for it, then we’ll only have eight-hundred-some acres to search for him. What could be easier?”

“Soon. Coming soon.” We turned as Cal mumbled in his sleep, and it wasn’t Oshossi he was dreaming of. That I knew. His hand clasped open and shut. It was the serrated-edged combat knife he always slept with that he was missing. I picked it up from the coffee table and slipped the handle into his hand. His disturbed breathing smoothed out and he dropped into a heavier sleep.

“One last time,” I said to Cherish who had appeared at the hallway entrance. “We’ll try one last time for you and then, unfortunately, I believe you’ll be on your own.”

“It’s more than I could ask,” she said gravely.

It was much more, but Promise was willing to die with us. I owed her daughter at least one more effort. Although I was beginning to wonder—all this over a necklace? Oshossi might have his pride on no prey escaping him, but this seemed excessive over a handful of rocks and metal that held no other purpose. There is pride and then there is obsession. And to walk away when he might have easily killed us, it gave one pause. But I’d given Promise my word and I would live up to it this one last time.

Cal slept nine hours, knuckles white from his grip on the knife’s handle every minute of those hours. I ignored the ache in my head and watched him. There had been a time when he had slept that way every night, except he had done it under a bed curled in a ball. The first time the Auphe had taken him, when he’d come back he’d spent months that way.

During that time I’d slept little as I watched for the Auphe. Cal hadn’t talked much then; some days not at all. We’d been hiding in Charleston, South Carolina, at that time. I’d studied martial arts since I was twelve. Whatever city Sophia had dragged us to, I’d find a dojo. I’d collect cans or, when I could fool someone about my age, work any job I could find to pay for those lessons. I’d never forgotten that face at our kitchen window when I was seven. Or the others I’d seen since. And at eighteen, almost nineteen with a barely responsive brother, I went every day for as many hours as I could, taking him with me. I hadn’t known the Auphe for what they were then. I thought I would have a chance.

I became a warrior, a killer, but all I had managed was to put off the inevitable.

Eighteen Auphe. It may as well have been a hundred.

I detected the change in Cal’s breathing and looked up from the blade lying across my lap. “We’ve had a helluva run,” he said. “At least those bitches will remember that.”

We had. The steel that suddenly ran through me was as solid and real as the one that rested on my legs. “We have and we will. We are not giving up.” I couldn’t. I’d spent my life refusing to give up. I wasn’t going to start now. “The Auphe closed your gate. Do you think you could do that to one of theirs?”

He sat up and thought about it. He had a crease across his face from the couch cushion, and what I suspected was a slight hangover from the drugs. “Yeah, I think I could. I felt how they took it. How they tore it apart. I’m pretty sure I could do it. But what good would that do? The last thing we want is to keep them hanging around. If they want to take off, I think letting them leave the party is our best bet.”

“I don’t know if we can use it in our favor or not, but it never hurts to have information.” It was a piece of an impossible puzzle, but there were times amazing things could be done with one piece. “We’re going after Oshossi tonight,” I said, moving on. “Are you up to it?”

He looked at his watch to check how many hours he’d slept and scowled. “You mean after you drugged me?”

“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean,” I said without remorse.

“Bastard,” he said affectionately, before yawning. He then shook his head, getting rid of the last of the drowsiness. “Yeah, I’m up for it. Hell, compared to this morning it’ll be like a vacation.” He tapped the black blade of his knife against the mala bracelet around his wrist. Putting down the knife, he pulled the beads off and handed them to me. “Thanks, Nik, but I think being Auphe now might be the best thing when the time comes. If Midol deosn’t work, I’ll give them a little taste of their own medicine.” He gave a darkly feral flash of teeth. “Next time they call me family, they’ll have reason to.”

I fingered the beads, then slipped them back on. It was his decision, whether I agreed with it or not. And I wholly did not. His grin faded and twisted. “Sorry I didn’t get us out of this like I said I would. I thought being like them would be enough.” It wasn’t, because he wasn’t. But he couldn’t see that.

“It’s not over yet,” I said.

Neither of us would let it be.

As Cal had not been in the mood for the revenant outside the Ninth Circle days ago, I was not in the mood for Oshossi. I was also not in the mood for Cherish having brought Xolo along. At best he’d be a distraction for her; at worst he’d be killed. It was not my problem or my responsibility, but it was an annoyance.

“You will not be at top form if you’re watching out for him,” I told her. And watch out for him she would. He seemed to have the defensive capabilities of a sloth.