Blood & Dust (32 page)

'You threw fire bombs.'

'We have to cover our tracks; you know that.'

'You burnt the servo to the ground. With us in it.'

'We didn't know! The Hunters had Tai, and then Tai got away, so we gave them jackals something to
worry about so they couldn't chase us. Honestly, if I could take it back, I would.'

He sat, staring, trying to reposition yet again his understanding of how his new world worked.
For all he knew, Kala could've shot his father. She could've shot him.

'Bite me if it helps,' she said, offering her arm. 'Take a walk in my lifestream. See if the
answer comes to you. See if we can still be friends.'

He'd seen it before, he realised, in her blood. Bits of it. Guns. Bikes. The Monaro parked way
back, ready to swoop down with its boot open. The Sandman, peppered with bullets, already limping
back to the Crawfords' place with a cargo of vampires forced from the hunt by the sun. Red-eyes
versus red-eyes, and the Night Riders caught out in the open not knowing if Jasmine was sending
help, if VS had their eye in the sky.

He'd tasted her doubt, the relief of having Taipan in the car, quickly replaced by the fear of
pursuit jostling with the glee at having won. The Molotovs - she'd been driving, not shooting, not
lighting the petrol-soaked fuses
- had been thrown as much in elation and panic as in anger.

He knew all this and had been afraid to look any further, to risk losing the one person he felt
he could - needed
- to trust.

The bullet that had hit him had come through the wall or the window; it might have been aimed,
more likely it was a random burst and he'd copped it unlucky.

As for his dad, well, someone's finger had been on the trigger - Taipan's or Hunter's. He was
starting to wonder if it mattered which. It hadn't been Taipan's decision to go there, it hadn't
been Hunter's to be sent to collect Taipan. The blame trail went back decades, at the very least, if
anyone cared to pick at it, and Kevin didn't. It was too vast, too irrelevant. That massive depth of
history, that cycle of wrongs and revenges that had somehow caught him up in its undertow
- it was unfathomable. What mattered, what was keeping him afloat, was the simple fact that someone
was threatening to hurt his family to force him to do something. His choice was simple: stop them.

'Kevin, are you going to ride my lifestream or not? Are we friends?'

'Friends. Definitely. I don't need a bloody tour to see that.'

'Good. I'm glad.'

Her hand came out of her jacket, and she gripped his in both of hers. Only now did he see the
bulky outline in her pocket.

'Were you going to shoot me?'

'Only if I had to.'

'I'm glad we're friends, then.'

'Believe me, Kevvie. I'm on your side.'

She kissed him, and didn't stop till he kissed her back; he clung to her with all the desperation
of a drowning man grasping a life ring.

'Show you the windmill?' she asked.

He started the car. 'If you're my Girl Guide, shouldn't I get a cookie?'

'You've had your cookies for tonight, mister.'

Kevin nosed the Commodore through the gateway, taking it slow as they wobbled across a grid. He
kept his headlights off, relying on moonlight to illuminate the dirt track winding across the
paddock. The nervous silence was broken by the rumble of the motor, the crunch of pebbles under the
tyres, the occasional ding of a stone against the chassis or the guard. He waited for the trap to
spring, for the spotlights to come on and the soldiers to jump out. He remembered all too well the
troops attacking the Crawfords' farmhouse, the pain of his bullet wound, the men on both sides who
fell and didn't rise.

They crept along, and finally Kala gestured to a less-worn track branching off to one side. It
wound around tree stumps and ant mounds onto a creek flat and finally reached a windmill, the daisy
of its vanes unmoving in the still night air. A concrete water tank and trough sat at its base, the
area churned bare by hoofs.

Turning off the engine, getting out of the car - his back itched, waiting for the nasty surprise.
There was a rise on the other side of the gully in front of them with a light source glowing below
the crest. He could imagine all too easily a line of soldiers up there taking aim. Could imagine a
squad hunkered down behind the lip of the gully, like Anzacs in a trench waiting for the whistle to
blow. They walked, and his senses roamed with the keenness of a blade, but all he smelled was earth
and mud and wattle; all he heard was plover and curlew.

'I can't see the homestead,' he said to Kala, his voice sounding unnaturally loud.

'We have to go up,' she said, reaching for the frame of the windmill.

He climbed after her. The touch of the steel triggered a swarm of memories; he clung like a
beetle, trying to maintain not just his grip on the tower but on reality.

Taipan had come this way, coasting his bike to a stop here before walking it out of sight into
the gully and approaching the homestead on foot.

Kala had followed his trail, and perched up high, right there, watching the Hunters leave and
signalling to her fellow Night Riders, vampires braving the encroaching dawn, red-eyes fearful of
having to finish the job without them, of having to protect the night crawlers and themselves as
well.

There had been only the one vehicle, the unsuspecting Hunters driving into the ambush, but their
four-wheel-drive had proven tough and the men tougher, and they'd pushed through, had reached the
highway, but the Night Riders had had it blocked and the Hunters had pulled a hard U-turn and ended
up at the roadhouse, leaking water and blood and running out of time. This was where the events that
had killed Kevin's father and changed Kevin's life - his very being - had begun. Now here he was,
reliving those moments, the anxiety and the fear and the desire, the present and two versions of the
past overlying uncomfortably through all his senses. He clutched the steel, fighting to focus his
mind as Danica had taught him, to push through to the present.

Kala waited patiently like a kid hanging on a fence, arms and legs pushed through the structure
right near the top where the faded Southern Cross wind vane stuck out from the centre of the iron
flower.

'Slow poke,' she chided as he finally clambered to her side.

'Just checking out your arse.'

'Lucky I'm not wearing a skirt then, eh?'

From their perch, they could see over the gully and the intervening hill to Jasmine's base. Kevin
felt, again, that strange overlap of Taipan's and Kala's experiences, the strangeness magnified by
the sight of a commonplace farm given a deadly, uncommon air.

The single-storey timber house looked unremarkable with its tin roof and wrap-around verandah. It
faced them from the northern side of the compound, surrounded by haphazard outbuildings. A
split-rail fence divided the house from the various sheds and stockyards. The lawn was a drab dark
olive; outside, the paddock was dirt and stubble.

A high fence, similar to the emu fence at Danica's nest, surrounded all the buildings. Spotlights
made pools of light around each post - at least they weren't animal skulls. A long, tall machinery
shed filled the south-west corner of the compound, big enough to hold the largest of farm tractors,
but its doors faced the house across the wide expanse of yard and Kevin could see only the back wall
from his vantage point. There was only one gate, a double panel of mesh in the southeast section of
fence. Two men with guns slung over their shoulders guarded it, standing close together as though
chatting.

'I'm open to suggestions,' Kevin said. 'Those stockyards give a little cover.' He thought that
was where Taipan had gone across, but the fence hadn't been lit that night. They'd ramped up their
security since that incursion. Then came the chilling thought: they'd turned the lights on for him.

'Maybe there's a better angle on the other side. Somewhere dark we can cut through the fence.'

- Wish I could get my hands on that chopper -

Four lights illuminated the corners of a concrete square he assumed was the landing pad for
Jasmine's fly in-fly out celebrity operation, about midway between the machinery shed and the house.

'Fly by night,' he mumbled.

'Say what?'

'Takes on a whole new meaning, doesn't it? I wonder where that chopper is.'

Reece and Felicity waited by the door of the helicopter as the pilot went through
his flight check.

'So how are you getting on out here in the sticks?' he asked her. They'd been working opposite
shifts, she travelling between the homestead and Barlow's Siding to handle the public relations, him
acting as punching bag for Mira night and day.

She shrugged.

'Bloody hot, isn't it? A real dry heat.'

'Let's get one thing straight, Hunter Reece.' She leaned toward him, looking up with mock
coyness. 'Just because you've seen me naked, doesn't make us mates.'

'You're not my first
ménage a blood
, you know, sweetheart.'

She moved away, looking toward the homestead.

Reece lit a cigarette and was rewarded with a nose wrinkle, a shuffle. 'Just out of curiosity,
how old are you?'

'What's it to you? Want to brag to your mates in the locker room?'

'I just like to know whose blood I've been sharing. Professional interest.'

'Six on twenty,' she said with a smirk.

He motioned toward the rank pin on her collar, the blade centred through the stylised GS logo. He
wore his, too, to help avoid accidents with all the bored, gun-toting grunts hanging around. 'And
you've made Dagger already. Impressive.'

'I'm a quick study. You?'

'Plus four,' he said.

'Specifically?'

'Forty on thirty-six.'

'Getting past your prime, old man. She offered you the bite?'

'Age and experience,' he said with a shake of his head. 'I got a few miles left in me yet.'

Mira appeared on the veranda.

'How old's the boss do you reckon?' Felicity asked.

'Twenty, twenty-two, going on about 600.'

'About what I figured.' There was a touch of awe in her voice; awe and desire.

He made a point of checking her throat, the same place where his own bore the four dots arranged
in a square showing he was claimed by a single vampire. Her skin was unmarked; not even a mild case
of wolfbite. 'So you've got your dagger after only six years, but you haven't got your shield?'

'Not yet,' she said with a sly smile.

Mira arrived. 'No smoking near the bird, you know that, Reece.' She stepped up into the chopper
and took one of the front seats.

Reece toed out the cigarette.

'She wasn't talking about the chopper,' Felicity jibed as she scrambled after Mira and took the
seat next to her.

Bitch
, he thought.
Just when we were getting on so good.

The rotor started to turn and Reece slammed the door after him, prepared for an uneventful twenty
minutes of flying and Felicity's latest no-news. Turner had refused to allow Felicity to stay at the
homestead while Mira had been at the coast, and the girl had turned it to her advantage, forging a
"close working relationship" with the copper, Smith, who Reece couldn't help but feel a
little sorry for. The poor kid had no idea what he was letting himself in for; if he was lucky, only
his heart would get broken.

Reece ached for another smoke. He hoped young Matheson wouldn't show his face. That he had the
good sense to just run; to cut his losses and run. They'd taken out at least seven Night Riders in
the Rockhampton raid, including two fangers; he doubted what was left of the gang would achieve much
against three squads of VS muscle, a handful of narky vampires just itching to blow off some steam
and - last, but not least
- this very fine gunship.

Mira ignored the lack of news, her attention focused out the window, though her eyes were shut as
much as they were open, as though fending off a migraine. The purple glimmer that indicated she was
tapping the power of her blood showed through her lashes.

Felicity gave up in the face of Mira's silence, eventually whispering to Reece, 'Is something
up?'

Reece shrugged.

'Too loud.' Mira shook her head, as though to dislodge a buzzing insect in her ear. 'But she's
close, I think; awake, guarded, but the fear, the fear - blood calls to blood. Reece, we need to be
on our guard. I think this could be it.'

'Another circuit?' he asked, heart rate rising.

Felicity turned to the window, scanning the murky landscape below.

'Home,' Mira said, rubbing her blood bracelets. 'I need peace and quiet to try to connect to
Matheson's squeeze. Hard, when she's awake and guarded, but the fear - I'd recognise that anywhere.
She can't hide it from me.'

They were on their return approach, coming in from the south, when the pilot asked, 'You got
someone out by the windmill?'

'Have we?' Mira asked. 'A little night maintenance? They'd better not scare off the grease
monkey. Unless-'

Felicity's hand went to her pistol. 'Nothing I know about.'

Reece said the same. He abandoned all thoughts of snatching a smoke when they landed. Damn it,
why hadn't the kid run?

'I definitely saw a vehicle there,' the pilot said. 'You want me to come around for another
look?'

'No.' Mira grabbed Felicity's wrist so tightly the girl gave a little cry. 'It's them. I can feel
it. I can feel
her
. Get us down - now! Then hang back till I send the word to close in. No
shooting. I need them alive and in one piece.' She turned to Reece. 'I want you, with me, in full
kit, as soon as you can. Felicity, you rouse the troops, but quietly, and stay by the radio. Hunter
Reece and I are going on a little foray.'

'Are you sure you should go, Strigoi? Just the two of you? It could be another ambush.'

'Which is why I want this bird in the air with its talons out, and you on the ground with every
gun ready. But yes, I'm going. We've set them up, now it's time to knock them down.'