Daniel Abraham - Unclean Spirits

“I think this is going to need stitches,” he said.

I looked down at the ruined flesh where the rider’s claws had cut me. When I got dizzy, I looked away.

“Yeah,” I said. “I think you’re right.”

The dog yipped once and rose to its feet. I heard the front door swing open then closed, and Ex came in, his pale eyes wide. Aubrey raised a hand in greeting, and Ex mirrored the gesture with an autonomic air.

“Turned out it was a little hairier than we thought,” I said. “Who knew?”

“The guy out front has a rider,” Aubrey said. “Probably jaette or haugtrold. The original soul’s in the dog. The house belongs to Candace Dorn. The horse is her fiance, Aaron. He’s a cop. Since there isn’t a SWAT team outside right now, I’m guessing the rider did something to keep the law away while he killed us.”

“And I need to go to a hospital, get stitched up,” I said. I thought I sounded very calm.

“Right,” Ex said, then a moment later, “Okay. I’m on it.”

And that, more or less, was that. Aubrey got me a loose blouse from Candace’s closet to preserve my modesty on the drive. I pressed a towel to my side and tried not to bleed on his minivan. On the way to the emergency room, we concocted a story that we’d been out on a date and got jumped by three muggers. Since it was Boulder, I suggested making them a band of roving neocons, and Aubrey laughed. By the time we staggered into the ER and plopped down to tell our story to the intake nurse, I almost felt human again. Parts of my body ached that I hadn’t known existed, the doctor who looked me over called for about eight different X-rays to see how many of my bones were broken, and the blouse we took from Candace wound up balled into the biohazard can.

When they asked about my health insurance, I took the money out of my pocket. Nine thousand nine hundred and change after pizza and beer. It was enough to cover treatment and a night’s observation. Barely. Even though he was falling down exhausted, Aubrey took point talking to the cops while I drifted in and out of consciousness. The hard, narrow hospital bed was the most comfortable place I’d ever been. Monitors strapped to my chest and arm let out low pongs and chimes.

When I let my eyes close, my watch said it was one in the morning. When I opened them a minute later, the morning sun was pouring in the windows, heating up the walls. Chogyi Jake was curled in the chair at the foot of my bed, a paper coffee cup forgotten in his dozing hand. My body ached badly, just lying there. But I was all right. I’d lived through it.

The sun tracked its slow way up the sky, and I let my mind wander. It was Sunday. Somewhere out there, far to the east, my mother and father were going to church in their starched clothes, ready to watch their preacher sweat and exclaim and witness to the power of a god I didn’t believe in. West, in Arizona, a new semester would have started at ASU. The dorms and apartments would be filled with men and women sleeping off Saturday night, just the way I had done this time last year.

Closer by, Randolph Coin-or the thing inside him-had already started leading its seven-year swarm into a dance that would take more bodies away from people like Aaron the German shepherd and Candace Dorn and give them over to these unclean spirits. At Eric’s house, Midian was probably frying up steak and eggs, with Aubrey and Ex either at his side drinking coffee or sleeping off the night’s exhaustion. Chogyi Jake murmured something and shifted his weight without spilling his coffee. I smiled at the man’s sleep-peaceful face and let myself sink back down into my amazingly expensive, thin, uncomfortable pillow. I had expected to greet this particular morning with a sense of despair and isolation, and instead I felt at home in my life for the first time I could remember.

It was Sunday, the fifth of August, and it was my birthday. I was twenty-three.

The doctors in Boulder released me that afternoon with precautions about not doing anything to pop my stitches or aggravate my knee. Chogyi Jake took me home in his van, but I was already fading. I fell asleep almost as soon as I got back home, and when I woke up Monday morning, the house was silent.

I slipped out of bed, careful of my various wounds, pulled on a thick wool robe that was a little too large for me, and padded out into the hallway. The door of the guest bedroom was ajar, and Aubrey was in the bed, his eyes closed and his mouth hanging open. I watched him sleep, watched his chest rise and fall and rise again. Part of me wanted to step in, slip into the bed, and curl up beside him. Before I could act on the impulse, I heard the front door open and familiar voices fill the space. Ex and Chogyi Jake. And then Midian, welcoming them.

“The one thing we know for absolute certain is that it didn’t work,” Ex said.

Midian coughed once and shrugged his shoulders. He nodded to me as I walked through the doorway.

“Hey. The resident skeptic rises,” he said, and I shuddered at the sound of his voice. Every morning, it seemed a little worse than I’d remembered it. “I figured you for sleeping in through noon.”

“Got hungry,” I said.

“Can we stay on point here?” Ex snapped. “We can’t hold to Eric’s plan. It already failed.”

“It was discovered,” Chogyi Jake said. “But the core of it was never tried, so we can’t really say it wouldn’t have worked.”

“Coin’s a smug little cocksucker,” Midian said. “Even after we took out his little ninja squad, I don’t know that he’d be on high alert. He knows we got away, but he has to assume that he broke the plan’s back. Plus which, little old herself here does have some superpowers. You want a donut? The guys brought back a dozen, and the coffee’ll be ready in a minute.”

“I’d take a jelly. And I don’t have any superpowers,” I said, but it didn’t have the force of conviction anymore.

“Your priest buddy, Ex, has been doing some research,” Midian said, ignoring my protest. “Looks like there’s protective mojo on you that makes you hard to see, magically speaking, which might be why you got in past the alarms. Could also have something to do with how you kicked all the ass back at the apartment and then with that nasty up in Boulder. Did Eric ever give you anything that had writing on it you couldn’t actually read? Like a ring or something? Or take you to a hot spring? Natural hot springs are good too.”

Before I could say no, he hadn’t, Ex broke in.

“But we don’t know the details yet, and the point still stands that Eric got killed.”

“I’m not saying it isn’t a risk,” Midian replied calmly as he handed me a jelly donut. The powdered sugar was white as snow, a splash of red at the side. “I’m just saying it’s a calculated one.”

Ex’s face went pale, his jaw hard. For an instant, I was sure he was going to hit Midian. Instead, he muttered something obscene, turned, and stormed out the front door, slamming it behind him. Chogyi Jake sighed and picked a cake donut out of the box on the counter.

“No offense, Jake,” Midian said, sitting at the table. “Your friend there? He’s a prick.”

“He’s angry with himself,” Chogyi Jake said. “He deals with it poorly. Give him time to work it through. He’ll be back.”

“What’s he pissed off about?” I asked around a mouthful of sugar.

“He failed to protect Aubrey and you from the haugtrold,” Chogyi Jake said. “You could have been killed. Both of you. He didn’t insulate you from that danger.”

“It wasn’t his job,” I said.

“He feels otherwise,” Chogyi Jake said.

“Since we’re talking about stupid, though,” Midian croaked as he poured three cups of coffee, “walking in on an unknown situation like that haugtrold when this whole thing with Coin is still hanging fire? That was dumb.”