Hunter's Prayer (29 page)

I stuffed the scrap of leather in my pocket. “I’m going on vacation, Perry. When I come back, I’m not visiting. When I need you, I’ll call. And if you ‘arrange’ for anything to happen to Saul, I’ll put a bullet through my own fucking head and spoil all your pretty plans for me. So you’d better take
real
good care where you drop your quiet words.”

His face froze. I could almost feel the air pressure shift. “Sooner or later you will come to me.” He said it quietly, as I groped behind me for the doorknob with my sweating, suddenly clumsy left hand.

I felt the smile sink into my face, my lips pulling back from my teeth. “Hold your breath until I call, hellbreed.” My fingers closed around its slick roundness. My right hand quivered, but I managed to ease the hammer down with my thumb. The big muscles on the front of my thighs were shaking too.

“You can’t escape it.” His voice rose as I backed out, my foot seeking behind me for the first step, finding it. Lowering me down. I backed up another two steps, swung the door closed. “Come back and kill me or walk away now, it’s all the same.” His shout rattled the door as I pushed it closed. The click of the latch catching seemed very loud. “
I will have you, hunter! I will have you!
”

“Not today,” I muttered, and made it down the stairs without having to stop. It helped to be going down.

I pushed the iron door open, stepped out. Slammed it behind me. Leaned against it for a moment, studying the room.

Riverson stared at me. The hellbreed, all frozen, stared at me. One of the night bouncers, leaning against the bar for a quick drink before going on duty, stared at me.

All eyes on you, Jilly.

I walked across the Monde Nuit with my head high, the heels of my third-best steel-toed boots clicking against the floor. The boots would need hard use before they were as soft and comfy as my favorite pair. I was going to have to figure out a better way to get blood out of boot leather.

“Kiss.
Kismet.
” It was Riverson, out from behind the bar. Nobody made a move to help him as he stumbled for me, his hands out. As if he was truly blind, and not more capable of finding his way around—at least in here—than anyone else.

I didn’t stop, didn’t slow down. But he reached me anyway, and grabbed my coat sleeve. “Kismet.”

“Fuck off.” I didn’t have breath or energy to waste on him. I had to get out of here.

He grabbed my hand, shoved something into it. A box, a small cardboard box like they have for jewelry. “Goddamn you.” His fingers bit into my sleeve. “Take it and go, you fucking bitch. Take it and go if you know what’s good for you. Don’t ever fucking come back here.”

Oh, God, I can kill you now if you push me. Don’t push me.
“Fuck
off,
Riverson.”

“These are yours,” he insisted. “Fucking take them, or he’ll destroy them. And for the love of God,
don’t come back.
”

He let go of my sleeve, and I made myself keep walking. My fingers crumpled the edges of the box, I felt the harshness of some kind of ribbon. What kind of present would Riverson give
me
?

These are yours. Take them or he’ll destroy them.

That was a laugh. How much more could Perry take or destroy?

Nothing but what you let him, Jill. It’s that goddamn simple.

I was past the bar and four steps away from the door when I heard shattering glass and a screech of inhuman rage from above. The air turned hot and tight, but I didn’t pause, and nobody moved on me.

Outside, I stepped past the day bouncer. The parking lot was filling up, and the sun was sinking. The sky was fantastic, crimson and gold, indigo moving in from the east. Night’s dawning, ready to spread over the vault of heaven.

I stopped, looked down at the box. It was wrapped with a piece of silvery ribbon that slid off because I had crushed it. But I felt a familiar tingle in my fingers, and tore the top of the box off.

There, sitting on a cushion of white padding, was a silver glimmer. Mikhail’s ring. And tangled around it, the supple silver necklace and the chunk of carved ruby, glowing and pulsing with its own inner light.

The gem that Mikhail had held as he pulled me out of Hell, and the ring he had given me when he accepted me as an apprentice. Both shining with their own inner light here, at the edge of the brackish pond of hellbreed energy.

My eyes filled with tears. I fitted the ring on my left third finger, clutched the necklace, and dropped the box. Looked up.

My orange Impala was parked in the fire lane, like the good girl she was. The engine was running, and Saul had lit a Charvil. I made it to the passenger’s side on unsteady legs and dropped into my seat with a sigh. Slammed the door. Locked it.

Saul said nothing.

I rubbed at the top of my right wrist. There was a paler patch of flesh where the cuff had protected and softened the skin, a bracelet of weakness. The marks from the Sorrows’ chains had healed over.

The ruby glowed up at me. My fingers fumbled with the clasp of the necklace, the ruby settled right in the hollow of my throat. Home again, home again, Jill Kismet.

Pulled out of Hell.

Who was holding the line this time?

Jesus. Jesus Christ.

If Perry had planned to give them to me, why did Riverson have them? Had he filched them from his master? I always stopped at the bar first; did Perry think it would soften my mood to have the blind man present me with my own jewelry?

Take them or he’ll destroy them.

Saul’s profile was even, serene. He watched the door of the Monde, the Charvil dangling from his left-hand fingers, his other hand on the wheel.

I found my voice. The ruby warmed against my skin, settling into its familiar tingling readiness. “Ready to go, baby?”

He tossed the cigarette, touched the wheel with both hands, his fingertips gentle as if he was stroking my back. “Born ready, kitten. You?”

“Get us the fuck out of town, catkin.” I swallowed roughly, closed my eyes. Felt Saul shift into first. “Let’s not stop for a few hundred miles.”

“You got it.” The Impala slid forward, he cut the wheel, and as we pulled out of the Monde’s wide broad lot, he slammed on the gas and left a respectable streak of smoking rubber. I slumped in the passenger seat, and didn’t open my eyes until we hit the freeway.

Glossary

Arkeus:
A roaming corruptor escaped from Hell.

Banefire:
A cleansing sorcerous flame.

Black Mist:
A roaming psychic contagion; a symbiotic parasite inhabiting the host’s nervous system and bloodstream.

Chutsharak:
Chaldean obscenity, loosely translated as “oh,
fuck
.”

Demon:
Term loosely used to designate any nonhuman predator with sorcerous ability or a connection to Hell.

Exorcism:
Tearing loose a psychic parasite from its host.

Hellbreed:
Blanket term for a wide array of demons, half-demons, or other species escaped or sent from Hell.

Hellfire:
The spectrum of sorcerous flame employed by hellbreed for a variety of uses.

Hunter:
A trained human who keeps the balance between the nightside and regular humans; extrahuman law enforcement.

Imdarak:
Shadowy former race who drove the Elder Gods from the physical plane, also called the Lords of the Trees.

Martindale Squad:
The FBI division responsible for tracking nightside crime across state lines and at the federal level, mostly staffed with hunters and Weres.

Middle Way:
Worshippers of Chaos, Middle Way adepts are usually sociopathic and sorcerous loners. Occasionally covens of Middle Way adepts will come together to control a territory or for a specific purpose.

Neophym:
A Sorrow between an Acolyte and a Terephym/Mother in rank. Females go on from Neophym to become Mothers and Grand Mothers; males never reach higher than Terephym (soldier-drone) rank.

OtherSight/Sight:
Second sight, the ability to see sorcerous energy. Can also mean precognition.

Possessor:
An insubstantial, low-class demon specializing in occupying and controlling humans; the prime reason for exorcists.

Scurf:
Also called
nosferatim,
a semi-psychic viral infection responsible for legends of blood-hungry corpses, vampires, or nosferatu. Also, someone infected by the scurf virus.

Sorrow:
A worshipper of the Chaldean Elder Gods.

Sorrows House:
A House inhabited by Sorrows, with a vault for invocation or evocation of Elder Gods.

Sorrows Mother:
A high-ranking female of a Sorrows House.

Talyn:
A hellbreed, higher in rank than an
arkeus
or Possessor, usually insubstantial due to the nature of the physical world.

Trader:
A human who makes a “deal” with a hellbreed, usually for worldly gain or power.

Utt’huruk:
A bird-headed demon.

Were:
Blanket term for several species who shapeshift into animal (for example, cougar, wolf, or spider) or half-animal (wererat or
khentauri
) form.

extras

meet the author

L
ILITH
S
AINTCROW
was born in New Mexico, bounced around the world as an Air Force brat, and fell in love with writing when she was ten years old
.
She currently lives in Vancouver, Washington with three children and a houseful of cats. Find her on the Internet at
http://www.lilithsaintcrow.com
.

Introducing

If you enjoyed HUNTER’S PRAYER,

look out for

REDEMPTION ALLEY

Book 3 of the Jill Kismet series

by Lilith Saintcrow

R
ight before dawn a hush falls over Santa Luz. The things that live and prey in the dark are either searching for a burrow to spend the day in, or for one last little snack.
The closer to dawn, the harder the fight, hunters say
. Predators get desperate as the sun, that great enemy of all darkness, walks closer to the rim of dawn.

Which explains why I was flat on my back, again, with hellbreed-strong fingers cutting off my air and my head ringing like someone had set off dynamite inside it. Sparks spat from silver charms tied in my hair, blessed moon’s metal reacting to something inimical. The Trader hissed as he squeezed, fingers sinking into my throat and the flat shine of the dusted lying over his eyes as they narrowed, forked tongue flickering past the broken yellowed stubs of his teeth.

Apparently dental work wasn’t part of the contract he’d made with whatever hellbreed had given him supernatural strength and the ability to set shit on fire at a thousand paces.

I brought my knee up, hard.

The hellbreed this particular Trader had bargained with hadn’t given him an athletic cup, either. The bony part of my knee sank into his crotch, meeting precious little resistance, so hard something popped.

It didn’t sound like much fun.

The Trader’s eyes rolled up and he immediately let go of my trachea. I promptly added injury to insult by clocking him on the side of the head with a knifehilt. I didn’t slip the knife between his ribs because I wanted to bring him in alive.

What can I say? Maybe I was in a good mood.

Besides, I had other worries. For one, the burning warehouse.

Smoke roiled thick in the choking air, and the rushing crackle of flames almost drowned out the screams coming from the girl handcuffed to a support pole. She was wasting both good energy and usable air by screaming, almost out of her mind with fear. Bits of burning building plummeted to the concrete floor. I gained my feet with a convulsive lurch, eyes streaming, and clapped the silver-plated cuffs on the Trader’s skinny wrists. He was on the scrawny end of junkie-thin, moaning and writhing as I wrenched his hands away from his genitals and behind his back.

I would have told him he was under arrest, but I didn’t have the breath. I scooped up the handle of the bullwhip and vaulted a stack of wooden boxes, their sides beginning to steam and smoke with the heat. My steel-reinforced bootheels clattered and I skidded to a stop, giving her a once-over while my fingers stowed the whip.

Mousy brown hair, check. Big blue eyes, check. Mole high up on her right cheek, check.

“Regan Smith.” I coughed, getting a good lungful of smoke. My back burned with pain and something flaming hit the floor less than a yard away. “Your mom sent me to find you.”

She didn’t hear me. She was too busy screaming.

I grabbed at the handcuffs as she tried to scramble away, fetching up hard against the support pole. She even tried to kick me.
Good girl. Bet you gave that asshole a run for his money.
I curled my fingers around the cuffs on either side and gave a quick short yank.

The scar on my right wrist ran with prickling heat, pumping strength into my fingers. The cuffs burst, and the girl immediately tried to bolt. She was hysterical with fear and wiry-strong, choking, screaming whenever she could get enough air. The roar of the fire drowned out any reassurance I might have given her, and my long leather trenchcoat was beginning to smoke. I was carrying enough ammo to make things interesting in here if it got hot enough.

Not to mention the fact that the girl was only human. She would roast alive before I got
really
uncomfortable. I’d promised her mother I’d bring her back, if it was at all possible.

Promises like that are hell on hunters.

I snapped a quick glance over my shoulder at the Trader lying cuffed on the floor. He appeared to be passed out, but they’re tricky fuckers. You don’t negotiate a successful bargain with a hellbreed without being slippery.

The roof was falling in. More burning crap fell down, splashing on the concrete and scattering. A lick of flame ran along a runnel in the floor, and the girl made things interesting by almost twisting free.

Dammit. I’m trying to help you!
But she was almost insane with fear.

It probably messes your world up when you see a short woman in a long black leather coat beat the shit out of a Trader with a bullwhip, three clips of ammo, and the inhuman speed of the damned. The silver charms tied in my long dark hair spat and crackled with blue sparks, and I’m sure I was wearing my mad face.

I hefted the girl over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes and spent a few precious seconds glancing again at the motionless Trader. Burning bits of wood landed on him, his clothes smoking, but I thought I saw a glimmer of eyes.

She beat at my back with her fists, but I hefted her and sprinted down the long central aisle of the warehouse, lit with garish flame. Fire twisted and roared, stealing air and replacing it with toxic smoke. Something exploded, a wall of hot air mouthing my back as I got a good head of speed going, aiming for a gap in the burning wall.

This might get a little tricky.

Rush of flame, a crackling liquid sound, covering up her breathless barking—she had nothing left in her to scream with, poor girl—and my own rising cry, a sound of female effort that flattened the streaming flames away. The scar ran with sick wet delight as I pulled force through it, my aura flaming into the visible, a star of spiky plasma light.

Feet slapping the floor, back burning, I’d wrenched something when I’d brought my knee up.
Probably feel better than he does. Hurry up, she can’t take much more of—

I hit the hole in the wall going almost-full speed, my cry ratcheting up into a breathless squeal because I’d run out of air too, darkness flowering over my vision and starved muscles crying out for oxygen. Smoke billowed and I hoped I’d applied enough kinetic energy to throw us both clear of the fire.

Physics is a bitch.

The application of force made the landing much harder. I don’t wear leather pants because they make my ass look cute. It’s because when I land hard, something snapping in my left leg and the rest of my left side taking the brunt of the blow, trying to shield the girl from impact, most of my skin would get erased if I wasn’t wearing dead animal.

As it was, I only broke a few bones.

Concrete. Cold. The hissing, roaring of the fire as it devoured all the oxygen it could reach. The girl was still feebly trying to struggle free.

It was a clear, cold night, the kind you only get out in the desert. The stars would be huge bonfires of brilliant ice if not for the glare of Santa Luz’s streetlamps and the other, lesser light of the burning warehouse. I lay for a few moments, coughing, eyes streaming, while my leg crunched with pain and the scar hummed with sick delight, a chill touching my spine as the bone set itself with swift jerks. My eyes rolled up in my head and I dimly heard the girl sobbing as she stopped trying to get
away
. She’d be lucky to get out of this needing a few years of therapy and some smoke-inhalation treatment.

Sirens pierced the night, far away but drawing closer.
Here comes the cavalry. Thank God.

Unfortunately, thanking God wouldn’t do much good. I was the responsible one here. If that Trader was still alive and the scene started swarming with vulnerable, only-human emergency personnel …

Get up, Jill. Get up now.

My weary body obeyed. I made it to my feet, wincing as my left tibia and my humerus both crackled, the bone swiftly restructuring itself and all the pain of healing compressed into a few seconds rather than weeks. My hand flicked, the bullwhip coiling itself neatly and stowed at my hip, and I had both guns unholstered and ready before the warehouse belched a torrent of red-hot air and the Trader barreled through the hole in the wall, flesh cracking-black and his eyes shining flatly, the sick-sweet smell of seared human pork adding to the perfume of hellbreed contamination.

Traders are scary-quick. I tracked him, bullets spattering the sidewalk as my right arm jolted under the strain of recoil going all the way up to my shoulders, broken bone pulling my aim off.

Mikhail insisted on me being able to shoot left-handed, too. I caught the Trader with four rounds in the chest and dropped the guns as he reached the top arc of his leap, his scream fueled with the rage of the damned.

I’m sure the fact that half his meat was cooked didn’t help.

My hands closed around knifehilts. Knife-fighting is my forte, it’s close and dirty, which isn’t fun when it comes to hellbreed or Traders. You don’t want to get too close. But I’ve always had an edge in pure speed, being female and little.

The scar helps too. The hard knot of corruption on the soft inside of my wrist ran with heavy prickling iron as I moved faster than a human being had any right to, meeting the Trader with a bone-snapping crunch.

The idiot wasn’t thinking. If he had been, he might have done something other than a stupid kamikaze stunt, throwing himself at a hunter who was armed and ready. As smart and slippery as Traders are, they never think they’re going to be held to account.

The knife went in with little resistance, silver laid along the flat part of the blade hissing as it parted flesh tainted by a hellbreed’s touch.

The Trader screamed, a high gurgling note of panic. My wrist turned, twisting the knifeblade as we landed, right leg threatening to buckle as momentum drove me back. I stamped my left heel, the transfer of force striking sparks between metal-reinforced bootheel and concrete.

My other hand came up full of knife, blurred forward like a striking snake as the blade buried itself in his chest, and I pushed him
down
, pinning him as the shine flared in his eyes and roasted stink-sweet filled my mouth and nose.

Hunting is a messy business.