Thinning the Herd (7 page)

Hal pulled the pole halves from his belt. Twirled them around in his hands, getting a feel for the shorter length while he waited for Nick and Galahad to put their now unknotted shirts back on.

Galahad's slim hands worked the black button-down's buttons with grace and speed. After Nick shrugged his suit jacket on, Galahad brushed dirt from the shoulders and back and from Nick's dark hair. Groomed him with quick movements of those graceful hands, his gaze focused on his task.
Content
with his task.

Grooming—a social, caring thing among canines
and
felines.

“Which way do we go?” Desdemona asked. “To find Louis.” She stooped beside the unconscious ganja farmer and picked up his pitchfork. Standing, she tested its heft.

“Ever used one of those before?” Hal asked.

Desdemona shrugged. “What's to know? Point and poke. Simple.”

Hal laughed, delighted. “Point and poke. Words to live by. I love you, woman.”

Desdemona rolled her eyes.

Galahad crouched beside the fallen wolf-man. Poked it with a finger. His brow furrowed. He pursed his lips. “What
is
it? Two shapes at once . . . ruled by moon
and
sun? Or neither?” He glanced up at Hal. “This is unnatural,” he said, his voice low, tight. “Something's very wrong. It shouldn't exist.”

“Global warming.”

11

ASS WHUPPING TO GO

Hal twisted around to look at Nick. The
y
ō
kai
shrugged. “Global warming is destroying the world, messing with evolution, mutating some species, and killing others.”

“You're serious?” Hal asked. “About global warming producing
this
?” He nudged the wolf-man's corpse with the toe of his boot. “Like, overnight?”

Nick nodded, yellow eyes solemn.

“I'm sorry, buddy,” Hal said. “But I don't think it works like that.”

“I'm just saying—”

Blue-white light winked on. Hal shaded his eye with the edge of his palm. Several sets of fluorescent grow lights suspended on wires from the stone ceiling bathed the green-leafed fields below in pseudo-daylight. Most likely on a timer.

Desdemona pointed across the illuminated field of manure-fed ganja. “A corridor.”

Hal nodded. “Good enough.” Using one pole half as a machete, he led the way through the fragrant green field. Gally stopped and picked something shiny up from the dirt. Slid it into his pocket.

Hal grinned. It
had
saved their asses after all.

The marijuana plants rustled as they passed through them, a soothing whisper, and the heady aroma cleared the dead-body stink from Hal's nostrils. Galahad's voiced concern about the wolf-man plucked at him with tiny squirrel hands—plucked and clawed.

No denying that the wolf-man
had
been unnatural—like nothing Hal'd ever seen before, at least not outside of a schlocky horror movie. A mutation? Or a creation? Either prospect was unnerving. If a creation, by who and why? And if a mutation . . . Hal's jaw tightened. Then he'd have to learn some new ass-kicking techniques.

As he slashed through the swaying field of pot plants, he heard a gasp from behind. Hal spun around. Desdemona stood still, her gaze on the ground.

Nick bent, disappearing beneath the tall plants. When he straightened again, he held a card. A tarot card. Unmunched. Bloodstain-free. The Two of Wands. Nick flipped it over. Angel and oak tree.

“Louis's,” Desdemona said, her voice a near whisper.

Nick handed her the card. She looked at it for a moment before tucking it inside her boot. Determination sharpened her lovely features. “Let's go,” she said. Her fingers locked around the pitchfork.

Hal watched her for a moment.
His
Desdemona. Squaring his shoulders back, he turned around and resumed the trek through the ganja.

The corridor opened into darkness. Standing beside Hal, Desdemona flicked her flashlight right, then left. Tunnels stretched east–west and north–south.

“Dammit,” Desdemona said, frustration edging her voice. “Now which way?”

“Louis is
your
friend,” Hal said, looking at her. “I think you should choose the direction. If anyone can home in on him, it's you. Which way? You tell us.”

Desdemona studied Hal for a long moment, as if seeing him for the first time, then turned her attention to the choices stretching in opposite directions in front of them. She bit her lower lip, considering, then said, with a decisive nod of her head, “West.”

“West, it is, then.” Gravel crunched beneath Hal's boots as he stepped into the tunnel, leaving the warmth and illumination of the grow lights behind.

The tunnel ended fifteen minutes later in a round open space piled high with big, colorful pillows. Desdemona's and Galahad's flashlights revealed several shimmering brass hookahs standing on the smooth dirt floor. The sweet smell of ganja and rose water perfumed the air. A haze of smoke hung above the hookahs.

Hal's gaze skipped from the emptied bags and cans of Cool Ranch Doritos, M&M's and Campbell's cream of celery soup littering the floor to the round-petaled flowers and peace symbols painted in Night-Glo colors on the walls. A small round table held an assortment of pipes and lighters.

“Dammit, this can't be right,” Desdemona said. “I was so sure . . .”

“Must be one of the fabled pot dens,” Hal said.

“Wow. You
never
fail to amaze me,” Galahad murmured. “Such a stunning grasp of the obvious.”

“Speaking of the obvious,” Hal said, gaze never wavering from the cozy room in front of him. “You want your ass whupping here or to go?”

“Let me think. Hmmm. Truly tempting, but no.”

“No's not an option,” Hal reminded him.

“In that case, still no.”

“Would it hurt to eat a snack or two?” Nick asked. “Since we're here?”

As Hal opened his mouth to answer, a raw, bestial roar ricocheted down the lightless tunnel. The hair pricked up in the back of his neck. His muscles knotted.

“Aw, crap,” Nick sighed.

Hal shoved Desdemona into the den of pillows and hookahs, then whirled, swinging up both halves of the hook pole. “Light, Gally, if you please,” he said, voice as taut as his body.

Gally's flashlight cut through the darkness revealing a furred freight train bulleting toward them, red eyes sparking in the light, wide-open muzzle full of pointy teeth.

“Aw, crap,” Nick sighed again.

Hal stepped forward and swung the pole halves up to either side like a matador, up on his toes. Then the wolf-man was on him. Hot, stinking breath blew in his face. He stabbed down with the pole halves, spinning away to the side as the beast passed. But not fast enough. A massive clawed paw lashed out and slapped him across the head hard enough to send him into orbit.

Then dropped him a million miles back to Earth. Headfirst.

Light exploded in a shower of yellow and blue sparks across Hal's vision. His teeth sliced into his tongue. Blood filled his mouth. He slid to the floor, unable to stop himself, hitting with a bone-jarring thud.

As Hal's vision tunneled down, he heard an Amazonian shriek and saw Desdemona rush the wolf-man, purple hair flying, skirt clinging to her slender thighs. She plunged the pitchfork into the beast's oddly ponderous belly. Then, throat corded, she ripped the pitchfork up. Eviscerated the creature.

Ropy guts and dark blood splattered onto the floor, and as Hal's vision winked out, he thought he saw Louis Dark curled up in the steaming gore.

TV off. Click.

12

THE WORLD FELL APART

The world fell apart.

Moon and sun battled for the sky, and a permanent twilight shadowed the land. Monstrous creatures, neither human nor animal, stalked from within thick autumn-leafed forests and, howling beneath the forever eclipse, hunted human beings and shifters. Tore them apart and tossed them aside.

The world fell apart.

Oceans rose and continents sank. Shifters hid from humans and humans slayed shifters, severing head from body and burning both. Gods walked the forests. Hungry gods. Heartless gods. Empty gods. Devouring the screaming sacrifices chained to the mist-shrouded trees.

Bloodstained branches. Oak trunks scarred by shifter claws.

The world fell apart.

Again and again and again. In fire. With blood. Sacrifice and betrayal. Over and over and over again.

The world fell apart, its heart a brooding tribal drum pounding in the night.

A heart silenced.

A heart reawakened.

So it was. So it would be again.

*  *   *

Hal opened his eyes and stared into red-laced darkness. He blinked. The darkness remained. His aching head felt as though a herd of rhinos had used his skull for tap-dancing practice and the old penny taste of blood lay heavy on his tongue.

An image of Desdemona strobed through his mind: his Goth warrior queen stabbing a pitchfork two-handed into the belly of the beast and spilling out—

“Louis,” Hal whispered, sitting up. An action he immediately regretted. Pain slammed through his skull. He groaned.

He blinked several times, trying to get his eyes to focus, but in the darkness he couldn't tell if they'd focused, crossed, or popped out of his head.

“Nick? Gally?” he whispered. “Desdemona?”

Silence. He felt nothing—not Galahad's energy nor Nick's strength. And not one spark of Desdemona's fire.

Trailing his fingers across the dirt-covered floor, he found the tunnel's stone wall. Standing, he leaned against it, trying to catch his breath. The stink of death snaked through the air. Hal gagged. His heart pounded hard, unevenly, in his chest. Sweat beaded his forehead.

He needed light. But what would he see? His friends, dead? Desdemona curled in guts and ichor alongside her kitty, her tarot-reading Louis Dark?

Hal sucked in another breath. Maybe he didn't want a flashlight, after all. Maybe it'd be better not to see. He rested his head against the wall and closed his eyes. His body quivered with each hard pulse of his heart.

He heard Desdemona's voice saying:
All I want is Louis back.

Remembered his answer:
And that's what you'll get. I promise.

Hal had a horrible feeling his promise had been fulfilled. His throat tightened and his hands clenched into fists as he remembered Galahad's smooth voice saying:
Bad guys often overlook sidekicks.

“That's where you're wrong, Gally,” Hal whispered, voice breaking. “Sidekicks are usually tortured and left for dead. To inspire the hero.”

Hal's eyes opened. His friends. His companions.
Not
his sidekicks. His
people
each and every person in Eugene and Springfield.
Mine.
Shifters and humans both. He protected them all. And he'd fight for them with every breath in his body, with every beat of his heart.

This bad boy didn't need a tortured sidekick for inspiration.

As Hal slid a bracing hand across the tunnel wall, his fingers bumped into a protruding object. Traced it. He frowned. Felt like a . . . . light switch.
No freakin' way.
He flicked it up. Light flooded the tunnel, shafting pain into his head. He winced and lifted a hand to shield his eyes. Squinting, he made out the bulk of the second dead wolf-man sprawled in a thickening pool of its own blood and insides. But it was alone.

Pushing away from the wall, Hal walked unsteadily to the creature. No Louis. No Desdemona. No Nick or Galahad. Hope surged through him. Had they escaped? He scanned the dirt floor for answers. There! Just under the creature—Desdemona's pitchfork. And, jutting out on either side of the wolf-man's neck, both halves of his pole. Stepping forward, Hal jerked the pole halves free. Wiped the wood clean on the creature's fur. Slid the halves through his belt.

Hal stepped back and something crunched beneath his boot soles. He lifted his foot. Bending, he plucked Desdemona's black-moth choker out of the gore; the cameo was fractured and blood-smeared. He wiped it clean with the hem of his shirt.

She'd been taken. Like Louis. And, he'd bet anything, like Nick and Galahad too. But why? And why had he been left behind? Left for dead? Or for some other purpose?

To inspire a hero?

Hal's fingers clenched around the choker. Someone had just inspired a major ass-kicking. And that someone would soon have a lot to regret—a whole
plethora
of things to wail and bemoan—like ever being born.

Pain throbbed in his temples, drummed at the back of his skull.
Drummed.
A thought, an image, he couldn't quite grasp snaked through his mind. A dream, maybe?

Hal glanced up the tunnel in the direction from which the last wolf-man had launched its attack. Metal doors—
elevator doors
?—gleamed at the end. Why the hell not?

Hal walked around the creature's body, looking for any trace of Nick or Galahad. Squatting, he shoehorned a pole half under the furry body like a knife around the rim of a cake pan.
Loosening up a doorway to hell,
a not-so-quiet voice suggested.

“Bring it, then,” Hal whispered.

Nothing. No trace of either
y
ō
kai
. He stood.

If they were dead, their bodies would be crumpled beside the wolf-man's. Nick and Galahad lived. As did Desdemona. He was certain of that. Felt it in his bones.

Slipping the choker into his jeans pocket and the pole halves through his belt, Hal strode toward the doors, the pain in his head pounding out a refrain of revenge. The rhythm kept him on his feet. Raged in his heart.

One black button protruded from the tunnel wall beside the elevator—hopefully it was for up only. Hal punched it.
Ding!
The doors slid apart and he stepped inside. The interior was clean and shiny, but smelled of smoke. Pot smoke. Of course.

As soon as the doors bumped shut again, the elevator lurched to a start, heading up. Hal frowned as tinny sounding Muzak poured from a ceiling speaker. It sounded like a string section performing a cheesy elevator version of the Grateful Dead's “Truckin'.”

He'd keep on trucking, all right. Oh, yes. Definitely.

Hal was like the Terminator now. He'd never stop. Not until he rescued his friends. Not until their kidnappers had been dealt whirling catch-pole justice. Hal Rupert was on his way.

The elevator jolted to a stop with a sharp
ding!
The doors eased open. Late-afternoon sunshine slanted into Hal's eyes. He stepped out of the elevator and into the Valley River Center. He turned around, trying to get his bearings. The elevator looked like a service door back by the restrooms near the food court.

Hal walked down the hall to the main floor of the mall. Couples strolled, teens swarmed, and others walked in friendly groups, shopping bags dangling from their hands, unaware of the battered but driven hero striding through their midst, unaware of the danger and madness lurking beneath their feet. Unaware of what the hero would do to keep them all safe, to bring back the ones he loved.

Better that way, Hal reflected. Safer. For them.

A few people paused as he passed, perhaps taking in his bloodstained, bedraggled state, perhaps recognizing the grim determination lining his face.

“Dude,” one guy said. “You hurt? Want me to call nine-one-one?”

Someone else whispered, “Is that blood?”

And someone else, “Do you suppose he's dangerous?”

Hal felt a hard smile curve his lips. Was he dangerous? Yes. Oh, yes. He walked through the mall and out through the doors to the bus stop. People hesitated when they looked at him, their mouths opening, then closing. Some slid their gazes away, following their own personal
Don't ask, don't tell
edict.

No one greeted him aboard the bus, safeguarding his identity, as always. The ride home was long and silent, his blood-spattered reflection hard company.

*  *   *

Hal didn't bother to turn his
OUT
sign around as he unlocked his office/apartment door. He pulled the pole halves from his belt and tossed them onto his desk. They clattered against the wood, one rolling off onto the floor.

At the kitchenette, Hal yanked the fridge door open and pulled out the milk jug. Poured himself a tall glass and pounded it down. Poured another. Pounded that one down too. Pouring a third, he carried it back to his desk. With a sigh, he sank into the chair, the fake leather creaking beneath him.

How had things gone so wrong? Hal pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. Color sparked and flared. His head throbbed. Pulsed with pain that even the milk couldn't ease.
Desdemona.
He'd failed her completely. He'd failed to protect her. Failed to rescue her friend. Failed to keep her or his friends safe.

He picked up the glass of milk, poured half down his throat, but nothing could wash the bitter taste of failure out of his mouth. Or wash its stain from his soul.

He wasn't worthy of the title
dogcatcher
. Hell, not even
animal control officer
. Galahad. Nick. He'd let his friends down. Maybe got them killed.

No, they're alive. I know it.
Feel
it.
Hal slammed back the rest of the milk, then rose to his feet. Pain spiked from his head down to his spine. The room whirled. Something shattered. He glanced at his hand. Empty. He'd dropped the glass. The room spun faster and faster. He grabbed hold of the desk to steady himself.

Someone knocked at the door. Hal released his hold on the desk and bent, fumbling for one of the pole halves. Someone knocked again. Called his name. The voice sounded familiar. He stumbled, dropped to one knee. Toppled. He hit the floor hard. And the damned room kept spinning.

“Hal? You in there, boy?”

The door creaked open. He hadn't locked it. Careless.

The world spun.

Fell apart.