Bloodstone

Page 25

I remembered Daniel’s question about calling to the Morfran to find the Reaper. “Is there some way we can make the Morfran come to us? Flush the Reaper out?”
Mab pursed her lips, considering. “Not that I’m aware of. Myrddin is using his demon side to control the Morfran—and with the Morfran, the Reaper. I can’t break that connection unless the possessed human is in front of me. There’s a ritual to exorcise the Morfran, but I can’t do it at a distance.”
Pity. We sat in silence for a minute. Then Kane jumped down from his chair and ran over next to Mab. He put his front paws on the table and nosed at the laptop.
I voiced his question. “You were talking about the video. Is there anything in it that could help Kane?”
“Perhaps.” She sniffed again and cleared her throat. “As I watched the video, I paid careful attention to Pryce. He’s not yet resuscitated. He cried out when my energy blast hit his table, yes, but it was merely a reflex, I believe. After that single cry, he sank back into his stupor.”
“Myrddin said it would take the life forces of five people to bring Pryce back.”
“Yes, I heard that on the video. And I was to be the fifth.” She smiled grimly.
“I’ve been thinking about that. Myrddin and the Reaper appear to be working on a timetable—one victim every two days. Last night, I was supposed to be victim number three, but Myrddin failed to steal my life force. So maybe we screwed things up for him.” I looked at her hopefully.
“We might have, child. Unfortunately, we did not.”
She picked up a folded newspaper and showed me its screaming headline: Reaper Strikes Again. “It happened on Stanhope Street. The body was found three hours after we left. The police have discovered the underground facility where you were held captive. It was, of course, abandoned.”
I grabbed the paper and scanned the article. The police weren’t saying much, but the story claimed that the victim had suffered the same mutilations as the previous two. The reporter noted, somewhat hysterically, that the Reaper had moved beyond the South End. Now, no one in Boston was safe.
Mab took the paper and folded it again. “We know that two more victims are required before Pryce can be revived. That means Pryce is vulnerable. And the son’s vulnerability makes the father vulnerable to us.”
I saw where she was going. “If we can grab Pryce, we can force Myrddin to change Kane back.” We could use Pryce as leverage, like the Old Ones were doing.
Mab nodded.
“And then what?”
Mab pursed her lips as though surprised I’d asked such a silly question. “Why, then we destroy them both.”
AFTER BREAKFAST, WE CHECKED OUT OF THE MOTEL. MAB gave me some clothes—an oversized Red Sox sweatshirt and matching sweatpants—that she’d bought at a convenience store down the street. The best she could do for shoes was a pair of pink flip-flops. My toes would be chilly, but it didn’t matter. I was happy to leave the bloodstained hospital gown in the trash.
We were barely out the door when Kane took my sleeve in his teeth and pulled me toward his car. He led me around to the driver’s side, then sat and stared.
“You want me to drive?”
The wolf nodded. He looked back at Mab and shuddered. Mab handed me the keys. “As I said, one does what one must. I learned a great deal about driving last night, but I can’t say I’m eager to repeat the experience, especially on your Boston streets.”
If a wolf can heave a sigh of relief, that’s what Kane did. I unlocked the doors and opened mine. Kane jumped into the back, and I slid into the driver’s seat. The engine roared to life, then settled to a steady purr. Nice. I love my Jag, but she’s an antique requiring frequent repairs. Kane’s BMW was a dream machine.
I hit the gas. The car fishtailed a little as we sped out of the parking lot. Kane let out a short, sharp yip as Mab put a hand on her chest and exclaimed, “Oh, my.” We headed back to town.
IF THE ANCIENT GREEK GODS HAD REALLY WANTED TO PUNISH Sisyphus, they wouldn’t have bothered with that rollinga-stone-up-a-hill thing. They would have made him spend eternity trying to find a parking space on a downtown Boston street during business hours on a Monday.
I couldn’t drive into Deadtown; we’d never get through the checkpoints. Myrddin and the Old Ones had taken my ID card, Mab had no identification at all, and Kane—well, Kane was a wolf. The Goon Squad would be all over us before I could back up and turn around. We’d have to sneak in. And that meant I had to find a place to park.
I was on Cambridge Street, circling City Hall Plaza, when Kane started yipping. I glanced at him in the rearview mirror. He stared down a side street. “You want me to take that right?”
His wolf’s head nodded.
I turned right. A couple of blocks later, Kane yipped again, his eyes fixed on the entrance to a parking garage. I knew Kane had a parking space downtown somewhere. This must be the place.
Through barks and head gestures, Kane guided me to his parking space. I pulled in and turned off the car. I let my head fall back against the leather headrest.
“Good driving, child,” Mab said. Kane howled his agreement.
“Driving was the easy part,” I said, opening my door. “We’ve still got to sneak into Deadtown.” And we had to do it in broad daylight with a wolf in tow.
There are several unofficial “back doors” that can get you into or out of Deadtown without having to pass through a checkpoint. Dead spots, for example, in the electrified fence that surrounds the area. I knew of one on Deadtown’s north side, but it would be impossible to get there from here on a busy weekday without attracting attention.
Well, we’d have to try. Maybe passersby would think Kane was a very large dog. He jumped from the car and shook himself, then stood, head lifted, sniffing the air. The wolf was large, standing as high as my waist, his back broad, his muscles taut with strength. He exuded a barely restrained power, something primeval, that evoked deep forest and other wild landscapes. There was no way anyone would mistake this fierce, majestic creature for a domesticated puppy.
Yet what choice did we have? I made sure the car was locked up tight and started toward the garage exit.
Something tugged on the back of my shirt. I turned around to see Kane with his jaws clamped on the hem.
“You have a better idea?”
He let go of my sweatshirt and went deeper into the garage. Mab and I exchanged a look, then followed. We descended several levels. When a car drove by, Kane would duck between parked cars. Mab and I just stepped aside and waited for the car to pass.
At the bottom level, near the elevator, Kane stopped and sat beside a metal door, maintenance access for the elevator. He looked at me and yipped. I tried the door. Locked. He yipped again.
In the bottom of the door was a ventilation panel, with horizontal, louvered slats. Kane stood and pressed his nose against it. He looked at me, then touched the panel once more.
I hooked my fingers around some slats and shook. The panel gave a little. I pulled, and it came away in my hand. Kane licked my cheek and jumped through the hole. A moment later, he stuck his head out, staring at us like he wondered what was taking us so long.
I peered past him. I couldn’t see much, just enough to know that Kane’s route into Deadtown was dark and dusty and festooned with spiderwebs. Lovely. I nudged Kane aside and climbed in. The closet-sized room was deeper than I expected. Kane moved inside to make room for Mab, who crawled in a moment later. Together, she and I fitted the panel back into place.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” I said to Kane.
He licked my cheek again and went farther back. In the stripes of light that came through the panel, I could see a low opening in the back wall, maybe a yard square. Kane disappeared into the tunnel.
A pitch-black, narrow, dirty tunnel. Several weeks ago I’d learned, in an abandoned Welsh slate mine, that I didn’t do so great in dark underground spaces. And this tunnel looked too tight to even be called a “space.” I calculated. On the surface, it took a brisk ten-minute walk to get from Government Center to Deadtown. Crawling the same distance through this tunnel would take approximately . . . forever.
An impatient bark echoed from the tunnel. I took a deep breath and crawled inside. Mab followed.
There was no light, but the tunnel felt cleaner than I expected. There was little grit under my palms, as if the floor had been swept. No cobwebs brushed my face. No horrible little creatures with too many legs dropped onto my neck. I let out a startled yelp when I bumped into something—it was Kane, who’d paused to wait for us. After that, I stayed close behind him. No more than a couple of minutes had passed before light flooded the tunnel as Kane nosed aside a curtain and leapt out.
I followed, trying to decide whether I felt more relieved to see or to stand up straight. We were in a cellar, with concrete floors and walls. It looked like some kind of storeroom, with cardboard boxes lined up on shelves and stacked on the floor.
“You must pay the toll to pass,” croaked an ancient-sounding voice.
I turned around. Beside the tunnel we’d exited sat an old man in a folding metal chair. His leathery face was as lined as a road map, and he had a full head of white hair. A shock of that hair fell across his forehead as he sat hunched forward, holding a sharp-looking knife in one hand and a stick in the other. He smoothed the knife along the stick, whittling. A thin curl of wood joined others on the floor.
“We have no money,” I began. “I was abducted and—”
“We’ll pay,” Mab interrupted. “What’s the toll?”
The old man sized us up, his dark eyes glittering. “Ten dollars apiece. Double for the wolf.”
“That’s outrageous,” I sputtered. I was ready to crawl back through the tunnel and take our chances going overland.
The man shrugged, then shaved off another curl of wood. “The authorities don’t take kindly to wolves running around on city streets,” he said in a bored voice. “Especially if a concerned citizen calls in a report.” His eyes peered at me shrewdly from under his white hair.