Lili St Crow - Strange Angels

The house was three stories of massive overdoneness, a pile of pseudo-adobe. Why anyone would build a hacienda up here among the Eskimos was beyond me.

The truck obediently turned, following the unrolling driveway. I eased it to a stop and let out a sigh. “Okay. Let’s—”

“Holy shit.” Graves was staring past my nose, out the driver’s-side window. “Um, Dru?”

My neck protested when I turned my head. All of a sudden every bone and muscle I owned was tired, and I had to pee like nobody’s business. Driving in a snowstorm is like pulling a sled; you work muscles you never knew you had.

The big black gate had shaken itself free and was closing, little driblets of snow falling off like flaking skin. Ice crackled, and the sky overhead was a sheet of painted aluminum. The gate latched itself with a muffled clang, and a fresh wave of cold wind rattled it, moaning through the metal gingerbread.

That’s either very good or very bad. I peered up at the slice of the house I could see. Warm electric lights through every window, no shadow of movement, no sense of someone home.

It couldn’t be empty.

“Dru?” Graves sounded very young. It occurred to me that as much as I wanted someone older and more experienced, he must want it twice as much. And I was all he had.

The weight settled on me, heavier than ever. “I guess we go in.” If this is Christophe’s extraction point. It kind of makes sense, close to the edge of town and everything, but still . . .

It felt hinky. Super extra hinky with a side of bad sauce.

The engine kept running along. I could probably take out the gate with this piece of heavy metal. But if I killed the truck, we’d be out in the snow with no way to escape .

This is where Christophe said. So why are you stalling? I put the car in park, eyed the front of the house again. The front door was a huge thing of wet black wood. They certainly like everything super-sized out here. All hail Middle America.

I made up my mind and reached for the field box. “Stay in here. I’m going to check it out.”

“No way. Are you crazy ?” Graves shook his head like he was dislodging a bad thought. “Don’t leave me out here !”

“Look, if I don’t come out, you drive the truck through those gates and get the hell out of here. I’ll go inside and make sure it’s safe. No reason for us both—” To get killed, I was about to say, because it was what Dad often said. “—to go in,” I amended hastily, “because someone needs to stay out here and keep the truck running in case we need to leave in a hurry. I’m trained for this.” At least, I’m better trained than you are. “I’ll do it.”

“Jesus.” Graves stared at me. His eyes were very, very green. “You’ve got a death wish.”

Right now I have a bathroom-and-sleep-somewhere-safe wish, kid. “No, I don’t. I want to get out of this alive and I want to get you out of this alive. Look, just stay here and keep the motor running. You know how to drive?”

“Are you kidding?” The look he gave me qualified as shocked. “I ride the bus .”

Oh yeah, this just keeps getting better. “Don’t worry. It’s a piece of cake.” I opened the field box, checked the gun. The clicks of the clip sliding out and back in, the safety checked, were very loud in the snowy silence, the wind suddenly hushing to a damp not-sound.

“Oh yeah? What if the door’s locked, Dru?”

I actually smiled. At least, the corners of my mouth pulled up. “Places like this are never locked,” I said quietly, and unlocked my door.

As soon as I slammed the door shut the wind came back, random curls flying into my eyes, driving snow against my cheeks, white flakes sticking to them. I went around the front, not looking through the windshield—if I did, I would only see Graves looking pale and scared, and I didn’t need that.

I was scared enough for both of us.

There were only three steps leading up to the door. Big concrete urns that might have held plants were now only mounded with snow.

There’s nothing growing in here. It’s all concrete. I shivered—it wasn’t as cold as you’d think, but snow tickled me with little wet fingers, clinging to my eyelashes and soaking through my sneakers.

I touched the door, closed my hand around the knob. It turned easily, and I heard a soft, passionless sound—an owl’s throaty who? who?

I looked back over my shoulder. No sign of Gran’s owl, but the call came again, muffled like feathered wings. The truck kept running, smooth as silk. The door opened silently, snow blowing in past me.

Through the door, then, into a foyer floored with little pieces of varnished wood all smushed together and waxed to a high gloss. I stood shivering and looking at a flight of stairs going up, a chandelier dripping warm waxen light. The gun was a heavy weight pointed at the floor. I snicked the safety lever off and wished miserably that Dad was here.

How do you know he wasn’t? a little voice said in the very back of my head, and a cool bath of dread began at the base of my skull, sliding down my back with soft wet flabby fingers.

I know, I told that horrible little voice. I saw where he died, I think. He left the truck right outside, and he went down a hall in an abandoned warehouse. And someone was waiting for him.

The lights were on, but it was cold in here. Cold as a crypt. I took another two steps into the foyer, saw a hallway, and the light changed imperceptibly.

I whirled. The door slid closed, the slight sound of its catch just like the sound of the safety clicking off. The taste of rust ran over my tongue in a river, followed by the wet rotten smell of oranges gone bad, fuzzy and leaking in a blind wet corner. The ringing got worse, filling my head with cotton wool.

Something glinted on the floor, past a little square of rounded darkness that my eyes refused to see properly for a moment.

Oh shit. My sneakers made small wet sounds. Little tracers of steam lifted off my skin, it was so cold. My breath made a cloud, vanishing as soon as I inhaled. I moved as if in a dream, or as if it was last night, something pulling my unresisting body forward. It hurt to bend myself over to pick up the familiar black leather billfold.

It was thick with cash, and I flipped it open, saw Dad’s ID, him staring into the camera like he dared it to take a bad shot of him. The picture of Mom was gone, but the mark where my thumb rubbed the plastic every time was still there, like an old friend. I straightened, automatically stuffing the billfold in my pocket, and was compelled to step forward, looking at the other little thing, glittering patiently on the waxed floor.

It was silver, and as I bent my aching knees to take a look at it my body knew, chilling all over, gooseflesh prickling across my back and down my arms.

It was a heavy locket, almost as long as my thumb. Scrollwork on its front I knew better than my own name, even, and a silver chain, now broken, that I’d seen all my life. The scrollwork made a heart with a cross inside it, and on the back there would be little foreign symbols sketched, where they could rest against the skin.

I touched it with my index finger, letting out a clouded breath that ended on a short sound as if I’d been punched and lost all my air. My fist closed over it and I pushed myself up, dry-eyed.

And all of a sudden I knew something else. I wasn’t alone in here.

Someone spoke from the hall beyond the foyer. It was a boy’s voice, more tenor-sweet than Graves’s and harsher than Christophe’s, with the same queer space between words and sounds as the djamphir ’s.