Needle Rain (29 page)

“My gods,” she said, eyes opening. She found herself cradled in Thom’s arms. “There’re so many of them.”

“So many what?”

It was hard to concentrate with all of them giggling and running about. “The ghosts – they’re inside me. The children,” she said in awe. “They’ve got Vassbinder cornered.”

“They have?” His face loomed above her. “Where?”

“In me.”

“Really?” His words were half-terrified, half confused.

With her fingers shaking, while filtering everything through what she felt of Vassbinder, she began to remove the needles he’d placed. They hurt just as much coming out as going in.

The doors, the doors, the doors
, the children whispered to her.

Doom was coming.

The doors burst open letting in a conflagration of daylight and the first of the Sungese.

She watched, slack jawed and paralyzed, as Samos batted the first five of them aside. Then she knew what must be done. The only way they could survive.

“Bring him to me,” she rasped out. “Samos.”

“Samos? Oh, Heloise.” He kissed her forehead and lowered her to the floor. “I must go help him.”

“No! Bring him to me. To be made into an Immolator! A full Immolator!”

He stared, flummoxed for a moment, then spun and sprinted to Samos, screaming her message as he went.

Oh, Thom, she thought, now you’ve gone and told the enemy and they will not cease until they’ve torn us all from this world and cast us into oblivion.

What? What did I say? Into oblivion?
Those words were not hers. Vassbinder’s words, and overdramatic at that.

“Hurry, Samos!” she screamed, and found her legs were partly returned to her control. She forced herself upright and went about on her knees, collecting the required needles from the skeletons, from one to the other. Through the holes in her leggings she felt the scrape and prick of the bones.

Samos slid to a halt before her, his heels leaving smoky trails of dust. His face contorting, he glared at her, silently. Thom had told him.

Behind him she heard and saw the soft
bloop
and
hiss
as Bull fired a shot into the doorway. Two men fell, flailing, lit up by a thousand jets flaring blue from their pores.

“I know,” she softly replied. This was almost a death sentence. Almost. “Give me your body if you want this. Or say, no. Your choice.”

Samos sucked in air through teeth then nodded and held out his arms and spread his legs.

One drawn-in breath, one flash-quick siphoning of Vassbinder’s memories brought to her by the giggling minions, and she began. Second-hand instinct. His, not hers. The needles, golden and fine, gathered in the left hand. The right hand wielding them like darts and sliding them into Samos slicker than a seamstress with an oft-sewn dress pattern. To her half-Vassbinder eyes, he lit up with lightning.

And all the while she felt Vassbinder inside her, wrestling under the triumphant horde of the child ghosts. For this once, the ghost was the glove, and she the puppeteer. Her skin acquired a strange, black halo, her sense of self expanding outward, not much, a half inch perhaps. She felt before she touched.

The fight at the doorway became frantic. Bull fired two more shots that felled another two men. The blue balls made odd fluttering buzzing sounds as they spun across the room. Fear of such an agonizing death was holding them back. She could make it. Six more needles.

“Spin,” she hissed at Samos. She started on his back, plunging the needles through cloth. Ignoring his flinches. For an Immolator, he was tender skinned.

Another
bloop
and
hiss
, but this time the projectile came from without, and Bull cleared the desk, rolling backward over it as he strove to avoid being hit. The round splattered and spun across the back wall, turning books into blue sputtering avalanches that tumbled from the shelves.

“Tatiana!” Samos warned.

“Don’t move!”
Two more needles.

The doorway boiled with men. One was Teo. No one else could move like that. Another Samos, but on the wrong side. Outclassed and totally outnumbered, Thom had fallen back toward her. His stance and movements told her he knew Sung-tai, but what use was that skill against so many with swords? Frantic, she looked away. Concentrate!

One needle.

The tip of the last needle touched Samos’s thigh. She slid it, rotated it, measured its length as she had the others, her tongue caught between her teeth. “There! Go!”

Samos bounded away. Her Sung knife in his fist, he flung it. One man dropped.

Already, a couplet of blades thrown by Teo arrowed toward Bull and nailed him backward into the bookshelves. The Toad flipped from his hand and across the slick floor.

A woman stood in the doorway among the men, her red hair a bright symbol in the midst of battle, a gheist weapon in her arms, its nose pointing menacingly toward Heloise. This was Tatiana Ironheart.

Thom moved across her vision, yards behind Samos, who was casually flinging men aside and striking them down one after the other in some obscene dance of war. This onslaught forged an arrow straight at Teo.

Still crippled, her legs weak, and deprived of her only weapon, Heloise watched. Her pulse thumped, her mouth was dry as ashes. She could make it to Bull. His eyes seemed closed and he sprawled on his side, leaking blood. Child ghosts flitted here and there, weaving around the combatants, black birds disturbed from their nesting place.

From the corner of her vision, Heloise saw a flash of blue light and focused on the origin. Tatiana stood, legs wide-based, smiling at her.

Heloise gaped. Heading for her was a churning blue ball. She screamed but the sound had no time to leave her lungs.

Thom stepped into its path and the blue disintegrated in a burst that limned him with violet.

As one the child ghosts inside her quailed. The air twisted.

Her scream burst from her. Heloise scrambled, lurching to her feet then toward him, barely registering the grimace on Tatiana’s face as she pulled the trigger again and again on an empty gun, or the two men battling like goliaths in a circle cleared of others. She reached Thom’s feet.

The soles of his shoes pointed her way, and that contained more horror than any ghost, for worms of ectoplasm squirted from the shoes, to convulse on the floor and disappear. Yet none of those worms had been on Thom. Something had stopped them piercing him?

A fine black cloud speckled her vision before it faded. She whispered a prayer and fell to her knees with a painful thump. Hesitantly she laid a hand on his cheek.

He lay unmoving, the black braid of hair across his face, then his hands twitched, and he breathed.

The blows and cries of the other men fighting seemed as distant as the moon.

Slowly she lowered her head to rest her forehead on his.
Gods, yes.
He breathed.

“What happened?” he asked hoarsely.

“You saved me,” she said quietly. “And, I think...” She listened again to the ghosts within and to the others, so few of them now, who inhabited the room. They reinforced her notion. Some of their number had put themselves between Thom and the incoming ectoplasm.

“The child ghosts saved you. Stay there. I have to go to Bull.”

****

Samos fought with precision, each move calculated. Each hit. Each kick. There were so many variables but he counted them all. How many were against him. Most kept their distance. Calculate, enumerate, weigh the odds. The need to protect those behind him, even Thom Drager. The thrown knives and the odd spear. The speed and skills of Teo. But most of all, what slowed him was his awareness of Tatiana. He could resist her, but the closer she came, the more she slowed him down. Fractions of a second. Enough to make a difference against Teo. She was so sure he would not kill her.

Every so often, between the blocks and missed killing blows, he let his fingers brush the pendant on his palm. Still there, thank the gods. The fight swirled across the room and back, each of them struggling for supremacy. They bounced off walls and sometimes off men who strayed too close. And all the time, Tatiana circled them as if linked by a chain.

A kick from Teo carved a sliver of skin from his shoulder, his return blow with the Sung knife sliced only air, but Teo again connected. The tip of Teo’s knife cut through the strap of the pendant. Samos caught it as it slipped and saw the hint of a smile touch Tatiana’s lips.

He heard the click, as she made little gleeful bites with teeth against teeth, anticipating his defeat.

He made a decision.

The risk was there, but worth it. He whipped his hand across and flung the pendant. The air cracked, marking its swift passage.

Teo somersaulted and nearly caught it. The green stone gleamed as it shot past his fingers, sped on its way and went straight into Tatiana’s mouth. Teeth fragments flew.

Tatianna choked out a scream and fell, clutching her throat.

“Ahh,” Samos sighed.

That fraction of a second was now his. Teo was landing from the leap when Samos struck his first blow. Wishing he didn’t have to kill, but knowing he did, Samos smashed a blurred flurry of blows into Teo’s neck, skull, stomach, and spun him to crush the spine in three places. The man slid unconscious across the floor, leaving a red trail – finished and dead in seconds.

Then he was over Tatiana. She lay on her side, coughing. Her hand covered her mouth and blood seeped between her fingers. She blinked up at him.

He should kill her too. “Where is it?” He held out his hand, waiting for her to return the pendant. But she only pointed at her throat, her eyes wide. The red wig sat askew.

She’d swallowed it.

And all he could think for a turgid second or two was of what else she’d swallowed and where those lips had been on his body.

She hacked out another cough, took her hand away and spat gobbets of blood and saliva on the floor.

Glancing up, he saw her men running away. Some tripped as they tried to keep him in their sight, their faces distorted into gargoyle shapes by horror. Shock gripped them along with fear. Beyond, past the smashed-open doors, the bright blue sky and fluffy white clouds showed through holes in the broken wall. He didn’t bother to try to stop her men as they swarmed up the ropes.

Teeth gritted, mind blanking out the memories of pleasure, he gripped the back of Tatiana’s neck and dragged her over to where Heloise sat tending to Bull.

She’d pulled a knife from one arm and was binding the wound. A second knife, sunk to the hilt, pinned his other arm to a shelf. The man was more lucid and bleeding less than he should be. Then Samos took in the pattern of needles down his chest. Healing ones, of course. Courtesy of Heloise.

“Take care of her, Heloise. Please tie her hands and feet and keep her away from us all.” He ran a hand up into his fringe, feeling the grime of oil and sweat. “She has...special effects on men. Though right now they’re somewhat dulled. Please...” He swayed a little. “Don’t ask for details. I’ll take care of Bull.”

To her credit she only blinked and nodded.

He prayed he’d never have to tell about what had happened on Tatiana’s ship.

“Uh, this might hurt.” White-faced, Bull nodded. Samos extracted the knife then staunched the flow of blood by encircling Bull’s arm higher up. Quickly he picked up a torn cloth Heloise had left, wrapped it about the wound, tied it snug, and released the tourniquet. “That’ll do till we can get that stitched.”

Thom knelt beside him. His pallor almost matched Bull’s. “Omi can stitch wounds, Samos, and Heloise says she can remove those needles of yours. Go to her. She’s not sure how long that will be possible.”

“Okay.” His heart thumped an irregular tattoo. “By needles, did he mean them all? Or just the new ones?”

He raised his eyes and met Heloise’s gaze, watching as she finished tying Tatiana’s hands behind her, giving the last knot a hearty wrench and gaining a glare from Tatiana.

Already the woman recovered. Mouth bloody and teeth shattered. Gods, she was a tigress.

“Don’t look so worried, Samos,” Heloise said. “I know what I’m doing. Come here.”

“Okay.” He was repeating himself. He had to get this done. Every heartbeat drained days from his life.

The needles came out so smoothly. He watched every single one go, except the ones at his back where he couldn’t see. But it was only the needles she’d placed. He lowered his head, hiding his dismay. “You can’t do the others, can you?”

“Oh, Samos.” She put a hand to his forearm. “You doubt me? I have Vassbinder to draw on but they’re buried deep. I need pliers or some sort of instrument to grab the broken ones. If you can find some at the orphanage, I will do it. I promise. Be quick though.”

They were all exhausted but only she, Thom, and Samos were not wounded. Yet the only way back was up the ropes left by the Sungese and neither Bull nor Tatiana could be trusted to climb by themselves. It fell to Samos to first climb up to check the security of each rope, then return. Then he took Bull up the rope, slung over his shoulder. After that he took Tatiana, hogtied hand and foot to forestall any escape attempt.

The sight of Bull being carried as lightly as though he were a child had left Heloise awestruck.

Going up the rope on the outside of the sea-mansion cleared her mind.

The wind buffeted her.

The deaths of the children, and the more recent ones of the Sungese warriors and Teo, still etched a bloody place in her memories. They were erased temporarily by the ocean frothing over the rocks below and the raucous cries of seagulls and terns drifting on the winds.

She paused halfway up the rope and simply breathed. In...out. In...out.

After a while, the child ghosts inside her stirred and poked, unsure as to what she did. “I’m going! I’m going!” she muttered to herself. It was like living in an apartment with fifty others. Still, at least they were keeping Vassbinder in the basement.

Their journey through the interior of the mansion was dangerous. Most of the upper structure had collapsed, forming a small mountain of fractured bricks and torn vegetation. Picking her way slowly across some loose rock, Heloise watched Samos sprint away with Bull again draped over his shoulder. Three strong bounds and they were gone from sight. She gave the rope that led to Tatiana’s neck another tug. “Faster. Unless you’d rather we leave you here for the child ghosts?”

Hard-eyed, the woman considered the words, then resumed walking at the same pace, her backside swaying. From the look on Thom’s face, her special effects were simply female allure. Ample breasts, curvaceous body, and the luck of a demon – for her lips were uninjured.

Heloise shifted the rope to her left hand. In those large gray eyes of Tatiana’s, intelligence lurked, and more...

Though Tatiana had tried to kill her, there was a certain something about her that appealed. She could see why men liked her. See why they wanted to take her to bed. She studied her for a second and was surprised to see Tatiana smile knowingly. Sexual allure there, definitely.

Inside her, Vassbinder laughed.

She spun and glowered at the woman. “Stop it! Besides, I’m not that way inclined.”

Tatiana tilted her head and shrugged. “I can’t control it.” Her voice was deep with sultry promise and there was a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. “Perhaps you don’t know yourself as well as you think?”

Blushing in front of this woman did not help her mood. She jerked roughly on the rope and smiled at her gasp. “Walk, lady. I don’t need the smart comments.”

Thom said nothing, but then he was probably too busy studying her rear end. If this was Tatiana with her power dulled, how would anyone ever control her? No matter. Soon, it would be another’s problem.

It was late afternoon, the trek out of the mansion was mostly over, and they’d left the collapsed section behind them when Samos reappeared with Omi in his arms.

He lowered Omi to the ground. “I will be glad when I’m done with carrying people! Even I am getting tired.”

“Nice in here,” Omi said perkily, looking around at the green inner forest of the sea-mansion. He pulled his robe meticulously straight then brushed off some grass. “Bull’s wounds are freshly bandaged and he is resting with many children running about tending to his needs. Later, I will stitch them. Now, to business.” He shut his eyes, opened them. “Heloise, can you achieve what I have been waiting for?”

“I can. I’m sure of it.” But she ran through the procedure in her mind again, just to be certain. Vassbinder was held tight by the child ghosts. It was crowded inside and at times she felt as if she’d burst. Soon, she told them, and herself, it will be over. “Who is first? You, or Samos?”

“Let us rest here a moment. A hundred years I have waited. No need to rush is there? I gather you think this borrowed ability will last some hours yet?”

She nodded. Cleared her throat. “Twelve hours, normally, though Vassbinder isn’t quite normal. A night’s worth, or until the ghost’s need is met.” Tatiana watched them with avid interest. Memorizing things, no doubt. “First let me tether our guest a little farther away.”

Once roped to a sturdy sapling, Tatiana made herself comfortable against it and smiled.

“Stay there.” Heloise pointed a finger at her. It did her soul good to order that woman about. She jogged back to the others and sat next to Thom.

“We watch her in turns,” she said. All their eyes swiveled to take in Tatiana. “Ah! Not that much watching!”

“She is intriguing isn’t she?” Omi said. “Hmph. Now. Heloise, most importantly, are you the only one able to do this? Thom? Have you regained...”

Thom slowly shook his head. “No. Nothing at all.” There was sorrow in his voice.

“That is curious. I had assumed Amora’s prediction meant Thom, but it seems she meant you, Heloise.”

“Or perhaps she didn’t know?” All this talk of gods made her uneasy. Humans were bad enough. Gods were as erratic as they were powerful.

“I must ask something else that may be painful to you. Can you remove your own needles? Because if you can’t, I cannot see how you are ever going to get this done.” He shifted about as if to get a better position then studied her from under his brow.

Ah, he’d found the sore point. She made herself return his gaze. “I can’t, Omi. I’ve tried to think of a way. If I could pass this knowledge on, I would. But we don’t have a memory worm and that’s the only way I can think that it would be possible.”

“No? Thom are you sure you cannot? Perhaps with more time? Nobody can predict the future.”

“Right now, I’m sure. I would give anything, you know that.”

It was time to begin. If she left them arguing too long, perhaps those capricious gods would grow tired of the delays and take away Vassbinder. Without him, she could do nothing. “Who is first?” she asked quietly.

Samos pointed at Omi. “Him. He’s had priority for some years from what I’ve been told.”

“No! You must go first, Samos. You know this.” Omi shook his head in disgust and disbelief. “Every moment counts against you. Go first.” From his robe he withdrew a pair of fine pliers. “Our jewelry classes use these. Strong. Fine ends to them. Are they adequate?” He handed them across to Heloise.

She hefted them, opened and closed them. The points were barely a quarter inch across. “Yes. Come here and stand before me.” Heloise beckoned to Samos. “This is going to be bloody.”

“I can take it.”

She rattled through the removal of the first to last needles again in her head. Vassbinder had done this hundreds of times, but it was a century ago and he’d never pulled out broken ones. She let out a long, calming breath.

“Stay absolutely still. Now. I begin.” The point of the pliers went into Samos’s flesh easily. When she felt the scrape of the needle, she knew this would work. One after the other, the needles slid out. The pliers and Heloise’s fingers grew bloodier, but she made herself ignore that. One at a time, ignore the blood, she said to herself, over and over.

Finally. “That’s it. Samos, I’m done. They’re all out.”

No longer an Immolator, the man quivered in all his muscles then sat down gingerly, as if afraid of what might happen.

“Pardon me, but I’m going to rest for a while.” He lay down on the mossy dirt-covered tiles with a sod of grass and dirt for a pillow. Eyes closed he spoke, words slurring, “Thom, go north. They won’t chase you there. I’ll make sure the Imperator knows that you’ve forgotten the Immolator technique. You know what I mean. And watch Tatiana for me. Her, I need. Uhh, Heloise, before I forget, there’s something a bit nasty I have to tell you about her.”

“Eh?” She frowned. “What?”

“Later. It’s just to do with how she’s being, uh, controlled.” He yawned. “Later.”

That Tatiana could hear was obvious to Heloise. Her smile had widened to a malicious grin.

“Gods, that woman gets under my skin.” Neither Thom nor Omi said anything. They were both staring at Tatiana.

“Omi!”

“What?
Ahem.
Oh, yes. I am next. Shall I stand for you too? Such an intriguing woman. We must be wary of her until some soldiers come to take her away. I believe they should be here soon if my homing fly did its job. A few hours, though I should be able to distract them from Thom and where he might be, since we have her to give them also.

“Don’t worry about Samos either. I have contacts in Carstelan. I’ll see he is taken care of. You must, however, make sure Thom leaves before the soldiers arrive.” Then he stayed where he was, frowning. It was the only time Heloise had seen him look worried.

You.
He’d said you, as if it were her job to save Thom and not the other way around.

Perhaps that was true?

It was what she wanted to do. The man wasn’t the terrible person she’d once imagined him to be. He deserved a second chance at life. There was a certain satisfaction, a sense of restored balance, when she contemplated helping him. It made her feel as if she was a good person again...as she had been before Leonie.

Besides, she liked him...more than a little. She studied Thom when he shifted about to look at Tatiana.

“I’ll watch her,” he said, unaware of Heloise’s scrutiny. “I’ve seen enough of gouged flesh to last me a while.”

“Thank you. Omi. Here, please. Now.” She eyed the bloody pliers and didn’t blame him for being nervous. An Immolator could control pain far more than a normal man. “Have we water to clean these?”

“Here.” Thom threw her a half-full bottle.

It was enough to wash the worst of the blood off. It would do. She wasn’t going to waste more time sending back to the orphanage or going down the cliff to the sea.

Omi shuffled over. His face was pale and beads of sweat were already popping out on his forehead. “I shall try greatly not to move. And I will succeed. I will.”

And he did. As she dug for each needle his muscles flinched and twitched, but he did not move or do more than grunt in pain. The bleeding was far greater, but then the scarring was greater and this was not an Immolator. Which only made his fortitude all the more amazing.

“Done,” she said, her voice hoarse from the strain. Omi swayed and almost fell, and she sprang to support him. With Thom holding him from the other side, they lowered Omi to the ground to lie beside the sleeping Samos.

“I’ve done it,” she whispered. The blood was drying on her hands and making her skin tighten. There was more blood halfway to her elbows, under her fingernails and spotting the ground all about, as if there’d been a small battle. “Stay there, Thom.” She stumbled over to Tatiana and held up a single golden needle before her eyes.

“This is because I can’t trust you. It’s a simple enough needle and any Needle Master will be able to remove it. Tatiana cringed away. “If you move, it may go astray and that will hurt you far more. Be still!” She slid the needle into Tatiana’s neck and waited for her eyelids to close in sleep before she made her way back to Thom.

“There. I should have thought of that before.” The world was rocking from side to side, and her eyelids grew heavy.

“Heloise, you need to rest yourself.”

“Yes, but I have to get rid of Vassbinder. Too dangerous to leave him while I sleep.” She was mumbling but it seemed impossible to speak louder. She stumbled and went to her knees, then head bowed, she let her eyes close.

The child ghosts knew what she intended. They brought Vassbinder to the fore where she could reach him without strain. The detachment was simple with the children’s help, and soon there remained only one point still anchoring Vassbinder to her. Resigned to his fate, he hardly struggled at all. She heaved a sigh of relief as she felt him drift away, and then...he was gone.

She’d promised the children too. Each of them came to her and she gently released them to find their own peace in whatever afterlife waited for them. Instead of sadness, when she set free the last of them a gentle happiness settled over her. For them, this was not death; it was a beginning. She’d given them a gift, and after a day filled with so much blood and pain, their joy was a gift for her also.