Eater of Lives(SPECTR #4) (6 page)

“Was this before or after you turned
vegetarian?” Sean asked.

Caleb shot him a dark look. “Does it matter?
Look, the point is, the demon reminds me of it. Frozen blood and
torn flesh. Frost on dead skin. That sour smell people get when
they’re on one of those high-protein diets that are supposed to
mimic starvation. Ketones, I think?”

Sean seemed about to say something else, but
John reached out and grabbed his friend’s wrist. “Sean. Think for a
minute.” And please Goddess, come up with some other answer than
what popped into his mind. “What variety of NHE does the
description remind you of?”

Sean’s complexion went the color of old
cheese. “Aw fuck. Wendigo?”

John hadn’t wanted to say it aloud. Hadn’t
wanted to even
think
it. “We might be off base. There might
not be a correlation at all.”

“Yeah. You want to risk that?”

Caleb looked back and forth between them,
dark eyes wide. “So…a wendigo is bad?”

“They’re cannibals,” John said, amazed his
voice didn’t tremble. “They exist only to eat human flesh. But the
more they eat, the more they starve. Before the forty days are up,
the possessed person inevitably starts to murder and eat people.
Once possession is complete and the full wendigo emerges, they grow
larger and more powerful with every life consumed. Let’s just say
they’re very hard to put down.”

“Yeah.” Sean shivered. “Shit. We need to put
out an all-agency alert and get the media in on it. Ask for anyone
who’s seen anything suspicious to call in.”

It would mean a mountain of work, chasing
down false leads and Goddess only knew what else, but right now
they didn’t have any other options. Most wendigo attacks occurred
in more northerly climes, but every graduate of the Academy learned
about the 1961 New York subway incident. A whole train left with
nothing but mangled, half-eaten corpses. Thirty dead, at least,
although the homeless population swore the wendigo took out a large
swath of their fellows before tearing its way through the roof of
the speeding subway.

“I’ll call Kaniyar and get things in motion,”
John offered.

“Thanks,” Sean said. “I’ll head back to my
office and start on the media release, so it can go out as soon as
possible. And let’s hope like hell this gets us somewhere, before
we end up with a massacre on our hands.”

* * *

That night, Caleb took out his paints for the
first time since he’d come to Charleston.

Local TV stations had run SPECTR’s request
for any tips during the evening news, and Charleston PD, Homeland
Security, and every other agency in the low country were on alert.
Having done everything they could, John suggested they make an
early night of it, so he could read through one of Brimm’s books
which might hold the clue to exorcising Gray.

He sat downstairs squinting at the scanned
pages on his tablet and making notes on pad of scratch paper
covered with esoteric symbols and scribbled translations of
medieval Latin. Will left to get drinks with Sean and some other
friends from his Charleston days, much to Caleb’s relief. Not to
suggest he thought John really wanted to get back with Will.

He’d heaped most of his things in their
bedroom the night before. Grabbing his paints and a blank canvas,
he pondered for a moment where he should set up. The guest room had
the best lighting during the day, but that didn’t exactly matter
since night fell a few hours ago. The living room had pretty good
lighting, but he didn’t want to distract John.

Their bedroom would have to do. The lighting
wasn’t great…but fuck, he could see in the dark now. Besides,
tonight wasn’t about making great art. It was about getting back
into things, doing something normal amidst all the chaos and
horror.

Gray stirred restlessly.
“We should be
out, searching for the demon.”

Charleston is a big city. We could exhaust
ourselves looking for the damn thing and still come up with
nothing. Let John do this his way.

Gray didn’t like it. The need to hunt
thrummed along their nerves. He had caught scent of the prey, and
knowing it still lurked out there irritated him constantly, like a
pebble in a shoe.

Sand in swim trunks.

“
That sounds…unpleasant.”

Gray constantly tried to feed him memories,
so Caleb gleefully dredged up the time he’d hooked up with a guy at
Myrtle Beach, and they’d had sex in the middle of the night, under
a boardwalk. Or tried to have sex, given the painful places the
sand ended up…

“
Can you please remember something
else?”

Caleb grinned as he set up the canvas on its
stand and prepared his brushes. “Just be glad I’m circumcised.
Fewer places to get sand stuck, at least.” Then he realized he’d
spoken out loud to the voice in his head, and shut his mouth before
John came up to see what was going on.

He spread some of the acrylic paints on a
palette. The colors seemed almost to glow in his enhanced
sight.

“
Yes.”

I swear you’re getting off on this.

Hesitation, uncharacteristic of Gray.
“There is such beauty…I did not understand before.”
A jumble
of images followed, like something cut from an old black-and-white
TV reel, without weight or context. “Beauty” wasn’t part of it: all
was equal.

The memories shifted: John’s eyes, brilliant,
burning blue, the first color Gray really ever saw. Shocking.
Beautiful. As was the red of fresh blood, the colored glass
glittering in the alley beside the garbage bin, the setting sun,
and the startling green of some weed pushing up between the gnawed
ribs of the dead man in the swamp.

Maybe they ought to buy some edible body
paint and slick down John…

No. Shit, things would go back to normal
soon. Gray would be gone in a few days, so no use planning what
kinky paintings they could do on the canvas of John’s warm
skin.

Caleb selected a brush and paused above the
palette. This was just a warm-up painting, something to keep his
skills from rusting into total disuse. But of what? Or should he
just start with splotches of color and see what took shape?

His gaze traveled the familiar confines of
their bedroom. The bed, neatly made by John every morning. The
hamper, the scent of their mingled sweat rising from it to his
amped-up senses. The little altar in the corner, with candles and a
bowl and the image of a lion-headed goddess. Not Bast…Sekhmet?

Gray offered another memory, this one clear
and cool: something he had seen himself, not a fragment salvaged
from dead neurons. Sand shifted and slid in the night wind, and the
full moon rendered the shadows sharp edged. Huge sandstone columns
stretched away to either side, the linen “roof,” which would
provide shade during the day, snapping in the breeze. Statues
strode between columns, colossal.

The memory contained no color, of course, but
the thousand variations of gray on the intricately-carved stones
hinted at paint. God, what would it look like in color, beneath the
sun? The temple must have been a blaze of hues against the dull
sand, an explosion of brightness in this lifeless place.

This is Egypt, isn’t it?

“
Perhaps. No one called it thus.
Sedgeland, Northland, Land of the River Bank, the Black Land and
the Red Land.”

A shiver went over Caleb’s skin, either of
awe, or fear, or maybe just inspiration. Thrusting the brush
aggressively into a blob of red paint, he made the first mark
across the canvas.

* * *

“Babe?” John said from the doorway. “Are
you…holy shit.”

Caleb blinked. He’d lost track of time; his
hand cramped around the handle of the brush. Paint flecked his
forearms, and the canvas in front of him wore a thick coat of
acrylic, although he only half-recalled painting it.

Which made sense, because no way had he done
more than half the work. The technique, sure, and the initial idea,
but…fuck.

The canvas blazed with saturated color, the
gold of sunset fading into deep purple shadows, with every shade in
between. The painting showed a desert, with cliffs in the distance,
and a temple near at hand, although not a replica of the one from
Gray’s memory, but something more fantastic.

Something stood half-hidden in the shadows
near the foreground, looking back. Maybe a woman, and maybe a lion,
its eyes the focal point of the painting as it—she—simply watched
the viewer in return.

“Whoa,” he breathed.

John’s hand settled in the small of his back,
warm through the thin material of his t-shirt. “It’s amazing.
Really gorgeous.”

“Thanks.” Caleb swallowed and gestured
vaguely to the altar. “We—I mean, I thought you might like it.”

“I can’t believe you did it so fast.” The
strokes were rough, but the image contained a surprising amount of
detail for a few hours’ work. “I love it.”

Warmth flooded Caleb’s veins, and he felt
Gray’s pleasure.
“It is good?”

Yes. Yes, it is.

Caleb pressed a kiss against John’s lips.
“I’m glad. Guess I lost track of time while I worked. Is it
bedtime?”

“Past,” John said, with a rueful grin.

“Did you find anything in Brimm’s book?”

John’s gaze skittered to the side. “Not
yet.”

Shit. “But you’ll keep trying, right?”

“Of course I will.” John’s arms slid around
him, warm and strong and sure. “Let’s go to bed.”

Valerie hunched over her keyboard, staring at
the computer screen. A long list of men scrolled past, all of whom
had answered her newest profile on yet another dating site.

She hadn’t left the apartment since coming
across the trail of the monster hunting her. A shiver ran through
her at the memory, and she plucked at the layers of blankets
wrapped around her shoulders.

Monster
. Like something out of a
horrible story: the wolf in the wood, waiting to gobble up the
three little pigs, or the witch fattening up Hansel and Gretel.

But they were stronger than any monster.

“
Yes. But you must pick another meal!
Hurry!”

Impatience etched her veins in acid, pushing
back against the soothing cold, letting the edge of hunger in. And
hunger meant weakness. The weakness of her stupid body, wanting
what it couldn’t have.

She forced it away and focused on the screen
in front of her. She’d had trouble concentrating lately, the cold
spreading to the edges of her thoughts. She paused at the picture
of a young man dressed in a baseball cap with a Confederate flag
emblazoned on it. Maybe him?

But his profile was maddeningly nondescript.
No bragging about all the “bitches” he’d fucked. No suggestion he
thought women existed as objects for his pleasure, and “rape” was
just an invention of femi-nazis.

Shit.

“
Take him.”

What? I…I can’t. Just the ones who deserve
it, remember? The ones who…

She swallowed, pushing memory down. Demanding
hands and bare skin and…and…

No. She was strong. Stronger than her
treacherous, weak body.

“
Yes, you are,”
crooned the cold thing
inside her.
“Strong enough to see he deserves to be
taken.”

But…how can I tell? Maybe he’s just a douche,
or a dumb ass. Not someone who deserves…it.

“
You know. Just look at him.”

She blinked blearily. Maybe his gaze had a
malevolent edge she didn’t notice before…?

“
He’s willing to meet right away. Any day
of the week. He must be up to no good.”

God, she was hungry.

She reached automatically for the plate at
her elbow. Bone crunched under her teeth, but these were just wrist
bones, without marrow. Without flesh.

Yes. The cold voice had yet to steer her
wrong. She just needed to trust her instincts. Trust her
strength.

Clicking the link, she began to compose an
invitation to meet the man in a new bar, far away from the one
haunted by the monster.

* * *

“We’ve got her!” Sean exclaimed as he burst
into John’s office.

John looked up from his computer. Excitement
flushed Sean’s face, and he wore a grin of anticipation and
relief.

“What?” he asked blankly, his mind still half
on his email.

“A call came in from the hotline—someone
claiming he’d seen one of his neighbors put a suspicious-looking
package in a communal freezer in their apartment complex. He opened
it up and saw part of a human foot. Charleston PD sent an officer
around, in case it turned out to be a pig’s leg, because who would
be stupid enough to stick evidence in a freezer where any of the
neighbors could find it? He says it’s genuine.”

John’s heart sped. Thank Sekhmet. “Does the
cop know to pull back?”

“Yep. He’s keeping an eye on the place to
make sure the suspect doesn’t slip out, but otherwise just sitting
tight for us. I’ve already let Kaniyar know.”

“I’ll meet you in the parking deck in five,”
John said, sliding his chair back and picking up his coat. “Just
let me grab Caleb.”

* * *

Less than half an hour later, four SUVs full
of SPECTR agents screeched to a halt in front of the apartments.
The building began life as one of the grand old houses of
Charleston, but a later owner had broken it up into apartments at
some point in the last eighty years. Time had passed the
neighborhood by; cracks riddled the sidewalk, the pavement needed
patching, and most of the houses barely had any paint left on their
weathered sides.

John threw the vehicle into park and climbed
out. Agents in body armor ran past, moving to encircle the house
and cut off any escape. Kaniyar stood by her SUV, barking orders
into a headset. When she saw John, she motioned sharply to him.
“Starkweather! Send Jansen in on point. You and McNamara back him
up. Ward, Gregg, Dunne, Brown, go with them.”