Lilith Saintcrow - Hunter's Prayer

Lifted the gun. Sighted. Right between those fucking black eyes, just below where the colorless gem glittered at her hairline.

You slaughtered them like pigs, bebe. You heard the screams for mercy and you disregarded them. You were judge, jury, and executioner, you took your God’s place.

Her soft, merciless voice chattered inside my head. So close to being outplayed. I wondered who had tracked me here, Saul or Perry, and I wondered just how deep into debt with Perry I’d gotten.

The thought of paying off that debt made me shiver.

Maybe she mistook it for weakness, or indecision. Her eyes lit up, sparks dancing in their infinite black depths, and her mouth curved up despite the distortion of the cruel gag. The Weres learned a long time ago not to take chances with a Sorrow.

So did I. I should have killed Belisa on sight. But I hadn’t.

“Judge, jury, executioner,” I said, harshly. The rest of the world fell away, leaving us enclosed in a bubble of silence. “Just like you, you fucking Sorrows bitch.”

Her eyes widened.

“There’s just one difference, Inez.” My mouth was dry, I wanted another swallow of that brandy. I wanted to start screaming.

Most of all, though, I wanted to stay in that clear cold place where nothing mattered but the job at hand, the killing that had to be done. Everything there was so fucking simple. It was mercy that fucked things up; it was kindness and compassion that tangled everything together.

The smile spread razor-cold over my face, and watched as her struggles to free her hands intensified. She began to move on the floor, velvet whispering and a thin choked sound bubbling up from behind the gag.

I took a deep breath, air so cold it burned going down. “I’m a hunter. I am the fucking law in this town, bitch. Sentence pronounced.”

I squeezed.

The muzzle flashed and her body jerked. Her head exploded—Saul had loaded with the hollowpoints, and as tough as Sorrows become, they are still human at the bottom. Not like Perry.

Did that make them bigger monsters, or smaller?

I lowered the gun slightly. Squeezed the trigger again. Again.

He must have had a full clip. I kept squeezing, firing into her body again and again and again as it twisted and jerked. Then there were only dry clicks, two, three, four, five of them before Saul twisted the gun out of my weakening hand, took me in his arms, and dragged me out of there. I wanted to stay, to find Melisande and kill her with my bare hands, I raged in my cracked and unlovely voice that I was going to do just that. I did, until the shakes got so bad my teeth chattered and cut the words into bits.

Then I screamed, again and again, in Saul’s arms until he carried me outside, where the reek of the garbage piled around was overwhelming but at least there was sunlight, thin and sad through high clouds. But it was Perry who clapped a hand over my mouth, finally, and hissed a word in my ear. It was Helletöng, a long sliding subvocal whisper, and it sent me into a sleep that was, again, like death.

And I went gratefully.

I ’d been wrong. It had been Perry who had tracked me, through the scar, disregarding the wound in his head. It had been Perry who suggested spreading the word among the Weres about the trouble I was in. They had stopped by Micky’s and made Theron their first contact.

The Weres had come because I was a hunter, and because I was Saul’s lover—but, more important, because they respected me. It was nice, I supposed, to know I was regarded so highly among them. They’re notoriously hard to impress.

I spent the first two days in a deathly daze, dealing with one thing after another in between passing out and having Saul threaten to tie me down in bed if I didn’t stop and take some time to heal. Belisa had escaped, her trail led out of the House underground in the very heart of the Santa Luz garbage dump and then… vanished.

There were no surviving sacrificial victims. They recovered eight bodies, Belisa had stopped long enough on her way out to slit a few throats herself. They were all vanished prostitutes, not a one over twenty, and they were folded into the murder statistics for the year. Five of them had family, but I wasn’t able to attend any of the funerals. I wanted to, but I just… I had my hands full with other fallout.

Demolition boys from the Santa Luz bomb squad brought out some type of explosive, wired the underground complex while the Weres guarded them, and blew it. There was a rumbling sound, a crater, and the slight depression in the ground was buried under tons of refuse.

Montaigne finished another economy-sized tub of Tums. Juan Rujillo filled in the requisite forms to report a Major Paranormal Incident as well as requisition hazard pay for me from the FBI’s backstairs funding since the mercenaries had come from out of state, sent it off in its courier pouch, and told me to get some fucking rest. Montaigne seconded that emotion, and thanked me with profanity-laced gruffness for sending him two carloads of naked sobbing women who understood very well they were not supposed to talk to the press about their ordeal. The women had been turned over to counselors and social services; in a few years they might be okay. Maybe.

Two of them had already committed suicide. But not Hope; I asked specifically after her. “Tough cookie,” Montaigne had sighed. “Keeps asking difficult questions about you.”

“She’ll get over it,” I said, rubbing the new leather cuff Saul had made to go over the scar.

Montaigne paused, leaning back in his chair. Saul was just outside the door, and the sound of phones ringing and people moving was so comforting I almost closed my eyes right there. Swayed on my feet.

Monty cleared his throat. “About those pimps.”

I braced myself. I won’t apologize, Monty. What are you going to do? Fire me? Bring me up on murder charges?

His mouth twisted up on one side. It was a facsimile of a smile, more like a grimace of pain. “Turf wars. Wish they’d kill each other more often.” Monty dropped his eyes to his paper-strewn desk.

Bile rose in my throat. Judge, jury, executioner. You took God’s place.

It was true. But like most truths, it had an edge that would cut—and an edge that didn’t cut me. I found out, with relief, which one was pointed at me. “Monty—”

“Shut the fuck up, Jill.”

“I was only going to say thank you.”

Monty told me to get the hell out of his office, and I complied meekly.

I missed Carp and Rosie’s visit, being sound asleep for once. They came, Rosie left a bouquet of flowers, Carp left a bottle of Jack Daniels. Nice of them.

Father Gui called, offered to come by and pray with me. Saul told him in no uncertain terms where to stick it and hung up. I guess he was still upset. At least it saved me the trouble of hanging up on the priest. I wasn’t ready to forgive him yet.

And I was still weighing whether or not it would be worth it to go down and tear apart that fucking church to find what else he had hidden from me.

The Weres, of course, said nothing. Except Theron, who came by the warehouse and squatted down by the couch, which was the only place I could stand to sleep. I kept staring at the chair Belisa had sat in. My eyes would close as I heard Saul moving around the warehouse, cleaning up, cooking exquisite little meals I tried to force myself to eat.

I usually woke up screaming. Nightmares are usual after something like this; better a nightmare than waking up to the real fucking thing. You go long enough with post-traumatic stress from nightside fun and games and you learn that very quickly.

Theron examined me for a long time, his dark eyes moving over my face. He was here on business, not socially, so he didn’t try any of his usual little games with Saul. Instead, he simply looked at me. Saul had tucked a wool blanket around me, pulled it up to my chin, and spent some time braiding more charms into my hair. My throat felt naked without the ruby, and Mikhail’s ring was probably gone.