Death Blows: The Bloodhound Files-2 (38 page)

No gun, but I still have my scythes. I pull them, snap out the blades, and put myself between him and the sword. I know exactly what he’s going to do, so I’ve got my eyes tightly closed when he triggers the sunburst, the world going bright scarlet behind my eyelids. My scythes are basically
eskrima
batons with knives sticking out of them, and I don’t need my vision to turn the area immediately in front of me into a very dangerous place to be.

Unfortunately, da Vinci’s a better fighter than I expected. He drops to the ground, staying below the pattern of strikes I’m weaving, and kicks my legs out from under me. I go down hard on one shoulder and lose one of the scythes.

Which is the opportunity the Quicksilver Kid’s been waiting for. With me out of the way, he’s got a clear shot. He pitches his one knife straight at da Vinci’s heart.

Too bad Dr. Pete picks that moment to lunge. The knife punches into his back, missing his heart and spine but embedding itself in his shoulder blade. He ignores it and swipes at da Vinci’s eyes, snarling like a chain saw.

Three on one, and all he’s got is the armor. That, and the home-field advantage . . .

Another flare of light, but this one is much more contained; Da Vinci blasts Dr. Pete in the chest with a beam of focused light, one that throws him backward across the room. He slams into the Kid, who’s bending down to grab another knife from the floor, and momentum carries both of them into the far wall.

I spring to my feet, but Da Vinci’s faster than me. He leaps, grabs the sword, and has its point against my throat before I can counter with the scythe. Time seems to stop.

“Nobody move,” da Vinci says. “Bloodhound, drop your weapon.” He seems quite calm, not even angry. From the corner of my eye I can see Dr. Pete and the Kid, both crouched in the corner. The Doc looks like he’s signing something to the Kid, but the angle’s all wrong and I can’t read it. Neither can da Vinci—I’m in the way. The flames are starting to spread and the air is getting smoky.

I drop the scythe. “If you’re going to skewer me,” I say, “Do it now. I’d prefer to go out on my feet.”

“No,” he says coldly. “I’ve changed my mind, Bloodhound. You’ve cost me the shield and caused me a great deal of trouble. I think the best solution to this problem is that you never came to this reality in the first place.”

“What?”

He smiles without humor. “The Midnight Sword can cause temporal effects, but with the Balancer gem adding to its power it can do much more. I’m sure you’ve heard the term
retconning
in your research into comic books? It means ‘retroactive continuity’; it refers to changing a character’s past, unmaking their history so that a new, more interesting one can replace it. I’m going to sever the cusp that brought you here. You’ll wind up back where you belong, with a head full of mixed-up memories of a place you’ve never been, of relationships you’ve never had. It’ll probably drive you insane . . . but maybe not. You’re better equipped than I to judge.”

I wonder if he’s right, or just crazy himself. I wonder if I can stop him . . . and if I even want to.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen, myself,” a voice says. It’s coming from the top of the stairs, and it’s a voice I recognize.

The voice is Dr. Pete’s. The thrope standing there isn’t him.

His hair is longer, shaggier, and black instead of brown. There’s a gray streak down the middle that I recognize. He’s dressed in black jeans, a black leather jacket over a bare chest, and combat boots. He looks like Dr. Pete’s twin brother.

“Hey,” Tair says. “Am I interrupting something?”

“Who are you?” da Vinci demands.

“Me? I’m an innocent bystander. Okay, the innocent part is definitely open to interpretation—”

“Explain, or I’ll kill her.”

“Short and to the point. Okay, let’s see: Somebody stole my life. I was doing just fine, business was good, and suddenly everything changed. People didn’t know me. The ones that did know me had some crazy ideas about who I was and what I was about. I did some checking around, and guess what? It was
him
.” Tair points at Dr. Pete, crouched in the corner and growling. “I don’t know how or why, but he’s not only stolen my life, he’s
twisted
it.
And I want it back
.”

He starts to come down the steps, very slowly and deliberately. “I thought maybe I could just scare him into leaving, but that didn’t work. Then I thought I’d just kill him—but for some reason, I
can’t
. Some kind of magic stops me from even trying, though some friends of mine did make a pretty good effort. And then, tonight, he comes tearing out of the hospital his bosses have him stashed in, and heads out to an industrial plant that’s on fire. I follow him, and after sniffing around the fire for a while he comes here.”

He’s halfway down the stairs now. “Thing is, I know this place. Never been here before, but it feels real familiar. And the closer I got, the more I felt some kind of pull, like I’m supposed to be here. Anyone care to explain that?”

I realize I was wrong about Tair looking like Dr. Pete’s twin. He’s younger than the Doc, his body language more aggressive.

“Stop where you are or I’ll open her throat,” da Vinci says.

Tair stops, and his gaze flickers to me. “Yeah? Why should I care—”

And then things happen very quickly.

The Quicksilver Kid bolts to his feet. He’s got his hands clasped, with one of Dr. Pete’s feet braced in the middle. I’ve seen lems throw a lot of things, but this is the first time I’ve seen one toss a thrope. Dr. Pete hurtles through the air like a furry javelin, obviously trying to grab me and get me out of harm’s way.

Da Vinci swings the point of the sword away from my throat.

And through Dr. Pete’s chest.

TWENTY-ONE

The force of the impact drives it all the way through and out the other side. He hangs there for a second as the sword and his entire body lights up with crackling, scarlet lightning—and then, he vanishes.

The look on Tair’s face isn’t what I expect. Fear, triumph, even contempt were all options I would have thought possible—but what shows up is realization. Comprehension.

“Well, well, well,” Tair says, a smile starting to spread on his face. “Happy birthday to me . . .”

Da Vinci hasn’t just murdered Dr. Pete. He’s murdered his history, just like he was planning to murder mine.

There’s only one thing I can think of to do. I grab the wrist of da Vinci’s sword arm and throw my body against his chest. He’s a lot stronger than I am, but I have leverage; as long as I can keep his arm extended he can’t get all stabby on me.

Which doesn’t mean he can’t flash-fry me, of course. Agony screams through both my already burned hands as he heats up, and my jacket starts to smolder where it’s in contact with the armor.

The Kid has another knife in his hand, but I’m in the way again. “Throw, damn it, throw!” I yell.

Tair is abruptly in front of me. “Hey, bright boy,” he says. “You forgot to wear your visor.” He jabs da Vinci in the face, his hand a blur.

Da Vinci howls and drops the sword. I let go of his arm and dive to the ground, covering the sword with my body and giving the Kid a clear shot. That must have been one helluva punch.

I hear a meaty
thunk
above me—and then the clatter of armor as da Vinci’s body collapses on top of mine, the armor’s light and heat turning off like a switch’s been thrown instead of a knife. A knife now embedded in da Vinci’s forehead.

Tair shoves the body aside, but doesn’t help me up. Instead, he reaches down and picks up the sword as I scramble to my feet.

“Nice toy,” he says. “I think I’ll keep it.”

That’s when I notice the hand he’s holding it with is in were form. One clawed forefinger drips with gore up to the knuckle. I glance at da Vinci and see the ugly wound where his right eye used to be. No wonder he dropped his weapon; whatever magic protected his face from the armor’s sunlight obviously didn’t extend to enchanted knives or thrope fingernails.

“Ahem,” the Quicksilver Kid says. He’s got another knife in his hand, and he’s staring at Tair pointedly. “This dance over, or are we gonna have another go-round?”

Tair grins at him, then at me. “I’m good. Got me a shiny new toy, a shiny new life . . . hell, maybe even a shiny new girlfriend.”

“What?” I manage.

“Oh, come on,” he says. “Maybe I don’t know you, but I know myself. And no matter what kind of goody-goody I turned into, I doubt my taste in women changed. And no
way
would I risk my skin for a woman I wasn’t already involved with.”

He holds his hands wide in invitation. Blood runs down the hilt of the blade and drips to the floor.

“Well, you lucked out, didn’t you? Traded in the old model for the new. Fewer miles, better acceleration . . . and I handle
real
well on the curves.”

I glare at him. This . . . imposter isn’t Dr. Pete. He’s the person Dr. Pete could have been, if he hadn’t straightened his life out. He’s a collection of bad choices and attitude—but under all his bravado and ruthlessness, he still has the potential to
become
the man I knew.

The man that’s now dead.

“We were friends,” I say. “Nothing else.”

He holds my gaze for a second, and I look away first. He laughs. “Like that, huh? Okay. I like a challenge. Hell, it’s what I live for.”

And then he leaps for the stairs, wolfing out in midair and making it out the door in two more bounds.

“Maybe I should have put a blade in him,” the Quicksilver Kid says.

“No,” I say. “No, I’m—it’s all right that you didn’t. He doesn’t deserve that.”

“Wasn’t talking about killing him. Could have put it in his leg. Slowed him down some.” The Kid walks around the room, collecting his knives. When he’s got them all, he kneels by da Vinci’s body and strips it of the bandolier. I notice for the first time that he’s leaking little beads of mercury from where the bolts penetrated his arms and legs.

“You, uh, need those holes looked at?”

He slides each of the knives into its sheath and buckles the bandolier on. “Nah. Got a patch kit in the car, take care of it myself. And I best be going.”

“Where?”

“Hunt down that thrope. Figure the bounty should be considerable to get that sword and the fancy jewel back.”

He stumps up the stairs without a backward glance. Behind me, I hear someone whine, and whirl around—but it’s only Eisfanger, finally waking up.

He slowly transforms back to human. “Whuz,” he says thickly. “Whuz happened?”

I stare down at da Vinci’s body. “I guess someone didn’t make their deadline.”

And that’s it, pretty much.

I call an NSA cleanup crew, but not until I’ve stripped da Vinci’s body of the armor and stashed it in an upstairs closet; Cassius will appreciate getting it back. Then I drive Eisfanger and myself to the hospital, where I get my wounds properly bandaged and look in on Charlie.

He’s in the lem ward, which looks a lot more like a garage than a medical facility. He’s on a raised platform, lying on a hard rubber pad, the only bedding a cylindershaped cushion under his head. He’s also naked.

“Jeez, Charlie,” I say, looking to the side. “You couldn’t use a sheet or something?”

“For what?” he says. “As the man once said, there ain’t no
there
there. Hard to be embarrassed by what you ain’t got.”

I know he’s right, but somehow his complete lack of genitalia makes it worse. “It’s not so much embarrassing as disturbing.” I spot his fedora hanging on a coatrack and hand it to him without looking. “Put this somewhere strategic, okay?”

I give him a quick summary of the events at the da Vinci house.

“Sheldon Vincent, huh? And of course, you couldn’t wait for me.”

“You were out of play, and I didn’t know for how long. Da Vinci would have killed someone else—if I hadn’t come along, somebody would still have wound up in that pentagram.”

“Well, I was banged up pretty bad,” he admits grudgingly. “Guy that patched me said I’d lost a dangerous amount of my insides. Said the only thing that saved me was that someone had the presence of mind to insert a big chunk of animist-charged metal into my chest.”

“How about that. Those paramedics sure are prepared.”

“Thing is, the metal was real hot. Melted the plastic a little going in, but the sand absorbed the heat after that.”

He glances down at my bandaged hands. “Looks like you got banged up a little, too.”

“This? Nah. Burned myself making toast.”

“Uh-huh. Careless of you.”

“Guess so.”

We look at each other for a moment. “I think I’m gonna get dressed now,” he says.

“Yeah. Good idea—Ahh!”

“What?”

“Did you have to start with the hat?”

“It was in my hand.”

“And now it’s on your head. Which would be fine, except you’re
still
not wearing any
pants
.”

“I could take it off again.”

“No, no, it’s fine. Just trouser up, will you?”

I find Cassius standing beside Gretchen’s bed, staring down at her sleeping. He looks up when I come in. “Jace. How are you?”

“Second-degree burns on my hands. Wrenched shoulder. Mild concussion. Knife wound to my right wrist, right beside the two punctures already there. How about you?”

“I’m fine. Wish I hadn’t been unconscious for the last few hours, but I’ve been brought up to speed. Feeling somewhat stupid, honestly.”

“About Sheldon Vincent—or should I say, Shelley da Vinci?” I shake my head, then wince as a bolt of pain goes through it. “Don’t be. He kept himself at a distance from events, using Stone as his proxy. There was no way to connect the two, not in any rational manner.”

“But you did.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes rationality is a one-trick pony. I think I heard that in a cartoon once.”

He hesitates, then says, “I understand that certain items are still missing.”

“The Midnight Sword and the Balancer gem are. The Quicksilver Kid’s on their trail, though—I have the feeling they won’t be missing for long.”

“And the armor?”

“Safe. You can pick it up later.”

He nods, then looks back at Gretchen. “Her child is fine. I think the African Queen just bought herself a great deal of political support.”