Charles De Lint - The Ivory and the Horn

Chris offers to put me up, but I don't want to get that close to him. I let him buy me meals, though. Left on my own, I forget to eat half the time. When I do remember, I'm usually scrounging something from one of the monsters' kitchens— now there's something that really helps your appetite. God.

The cramps start in September, and I begin to get these sudden spells of weakness so often that even Chris notices the change. I mean, he can't see much of me, all clothed in black and hiding in the shadows most of the time, but what he can see tells him I'm not well.

"Maybe we should ease off a bit," he says.

"I'm fine."

"You look like shit."

I know. I caught a reflection of myself in a window on my way to meet him tonight. All the meat was gone, leaving just corded animal muscles over the bones. The real emptiness is inside.

"I tell you I'm fine," I repeat, trying to convince myself as much as him. "What've you got for me tonight?"

"Nothing."

I don't even realize that the growl's rumbling in my chest until I smell the sudden sting of his fear. I force myself to calm down, but he still backs away from me.

"I'm sorry," I say and I mean it.

He nods slowly, but he keeps his distance.

"Okay," I tell him. "We'll take a break tonight. Just give me one name."

I don't know why I'm pressing him like this. I could do it on my own. Skulk around until I found a monster. I might get lucky, you never know. But I think later that I want his complicity in this. I want someone to know what I'm doing— not to feed my ego. Just to remember me when I'm gone.

"One name," he says.

"That's all."

Chris sighs. He tries to talk me out of it for a little while longer, but finally gives in. One name and address.

"This one's a little weird," he says as he hands it over. "It came in from the guidance counselor at Redding High. Something about it being a sensitive case, but I couldn't find anything in the file to say why."

"That's okay. I can handle it."

Mistake— but I don't blame him.

6

Grant Newman is awake, only I don't realize it. I pull myself in through his window, third story, nice part of town, and creep soundlessly across the hardwood floor to where he's lying. He's alone in his bed. I scouted around earlier and discovered that he and his wife have separate bedrooms. Makes it easier for when he wants to pay little Susan a night visit, I guess.

I slip up onto the bed and he grabs me. It happens so suddenly that I just freeze up in surprise. Then when I try to fight him, I can't find the strength to break free. It's not that the anima's gifts have worn off; it's that I'm worn out. I've left too many pieces of myself behind in too many monsters' lairs. The shock of my sudden helplessness makes me feel dizzy.

"What the hell've we got here?" Newman says as I struggle to break his grip.

My heightened sense of smell makes his bad breath seem worse than it must really be. I know that smell. It's the way my old man used to stink before he took the belt to me.

I try to get my legs up between us so that I can kick him, but he rolls me over and pins me to the bed with his knees.

"Some kind of little ninja fuck," he says. "So what's the deal? Yukio getting tired of paying me off?"

He reaches for my mask until his gaze locks onto my chest.

"Jesus," he says. "Your boss must be really getting hard up if he's running woman assassins now."

I'm gaunt these days, just muscle and bone and the muscles aren't working tonight. But the body suit still shows I'm a woman. For some men, that's excuse enough for anything. Maybe Newman thinks he's in his private place and anything goes. For all I know we are in his private place, and I've just lost control of the situation.

Newman forgets about the mask, and reaches for the zipper of my suit instead.

"I've never fucked a ninja before," he says. "This'll be something to—"

I'm the wolf with its leg in a trap, the bear that's been shot, the puma that's been harassed until it has its back to the wall. Panic whips my head forward and I close my teeth on his hand, biting through fingers, straight to the bone. I'll give him this: He doesn't scream. But the pain makes him loosen his grip.

I whip up a leg from behind him and manage to hook it around his neck. I pull him back, off of me, heaving myself up to help the momentum. He falls backward out of the bed and I'm out of there. I almost lose it in the window frame, but my adrenalin lets me catch my balance before I go tumbling three stories down to the pavement below. By the time Newman gets to the window, I'm two floors above his apartment, spidering my way up the wall and onto the roof.

I make the jump from his building to its neighbor, and then over one more before I collapse. The roof's covered with gravel, but I can barely feel it digging into my skin. Cramps pull me into a fetal position, and I've got the shakes so bad that my teeth start to rattle.

It's a long time before I calm down.

It's even longer before I'm scratching at Christ's window.

As I tell Chris about what happened, I start to remember things I saw in Newman's bedroom, things I hadn't noticed when I'd scouted the place out earlier.

"It's going to be okay," Chris tells me.

"But he's seen me."

By which I mean: Now the monsters know I exist.

"Don't worry," Chris says. "What's he going to do? All he saw was a masked woman. It's not like he can recognize you. It's not like there's any way he can find you. He's probably more scared of you than you are of him."

"I don't think so," I say.

On Newman's night table: The police-issue .38 in its well-worn holster. The billfold with the shape of a badge worn into the leather.

"Newman's a cop," I tell Chris.

I remember more: What he was saying about payoffs.

"A crooked cop," I add.

"Oh, shit."

We both know what can happen. Newman can have an APB put out on me. He can make up any old story he likes about why I'm wanted and they'll believe him. Christ, he can tell the truth and I'll still have every cop in the city out looking for me. The police don't take kindly to anyone assaulting one of their own.

I'm bone-tired, but I know what I have to do. Chris tries to stop me when I get up and head for the window, but I turn around and look at him.

"What else can I do?" I ask him.

"You're in no condition to—"

He's actually a really race guy, even though he acts a bit too much like a mother. I can see why kids, even abused kids, like him and trust him.

"I know," I say. "But I don't have any choice."

I'm out the window before he can stop me. I make my way back across town to the roof of the building across from Newman's. The September wind's cold, but I can't feel it through my bodysuit. Don't need it to be chilled anyway. I've got apiece of ice inside me and that's what's making me shiver.

I know I should wait until I'm stronger, but I'm not so sure I'm ever going to get any stronger. I get the feeling that I'm wasting away, as inexorably as the cancer that took Annie.

I wait, crouching there on the rooftop, until I see the light in Newman's bedroom go off. I'm like a ghost coming down the side of the building and crossing the street. I don't feel strong, at least not physically. But I'm determined, and I hope that'll count for something.

7

When I get outside Newman's window, I realize he's not asleep. I can sense him sitting in a chair in the corner of the room, gun in hand, watching the window. He knew I'd be back.

So I go in through a window on the other side of the apartment. My entire being is focused on what I'm doing. Keeping silent. Staying strong— at least long enough to tidy up the mess I've made of things. His wife never stirs as I slip by her bed and out into the hall. I pass his daughter's bedroom and that helps. She makes a little moan in her sleep. The plaintive sound brings everything into sharper focus— why I'm here, what I'm doing— and makes it easier for me to concentrate on getting it over with.