Thinning the Herd (17 page)

“To the trees,” Galahad called. Nick nodded, eyes glowing in the darkness.

THHHWUMP!! The ground spasmed. Twisted. Cracked open. Galahad stumbled, slipped to one knee, then glanced over his shoulder. And froze.

A burning slit opened in the glowering sky and a thing stepped through on massive tree-trunk legs—a thing outlined in glowing embers, yet gnarled like ancient wood, it towered above the trembling trees, its fire-pit eyes blazing with hellish green fire. Multiple tentacles uncoiled from its body and undulated above the trees and into the dying day.

A thing not even remotely human or shifter.

Fear spiked Galahad's heart. What the hell had Selene awakened? This was no Old One of the forest. This was something else entirely. He stood and backed up slowly, his fingers locked around Desdemona's warm hand.

“Great, just great,” Nick muttered. “What the hell
is
that? Huh? Cthulhu?”

“Not sticking around to find out.” Whirling, Galahad ran for the trees, Desdemona right beside him. He weaved in and around the trunks, panic sucking at his breath, squeezing his heart.

THHHWUMP!

A scream—Eddie or Selene.

Ducking under low-hanging branches, Galahad pulled Desdemona deeper into the woods, following the beacon of Louis's death-paled skin. Pain prickled. Red-hot. All over. Panting, he dropped to his knees, and released Desdemona's hand.

“What is it?” she asked, crouching beside him.

THHWUMP!

“Change,” Galahad gritted through clenched teeth. His body tingled. Sweat trickled into his eyes. His muscles kinked. Spasmed. Needles skewered him from the inside out. Fire incinerated all thought. He curled into a ball on the grass and gave himself over to the Shift.

“WhhOOOOOoooooOOOOOooOoooo!” Nick howled.

THWUMP!

The tingling faded. Galahad shook off his pants and jumped to his paws.

“I think it's moving away,” Desdemona whispered.

Galahad swiveled an ear. Listened. Nick trotted up, tongue lolling.

Thwump!

“Mew,” he agreed. Nick nudged Desdemona with his muzzle.

“Where's Louis?” she asked, picking up Galahad and cradling him against her chest.

Nick darted off into the woods, dodging branches and leaping over bushes. He glanced back several times to see if Desdemona and Galahad still followed. Held against Desdemona's fragrant and bouncy flesh, Galahad purred, then thought of riding the Rupert Express. His purr died in his throat.

When he reached Louis's body, Nick stopped and nosed his pale, blue-tinged face. Desdemona's breath caught in her throat. She dropped to her knees and opened her arms. Galahad hopped onto the ground, settling himself among still sun-warm ferns. He smelled dark soil and pine. Smelled death. But not decay.

Desdemona touched Louis's face with trembling fingers. Smoothed his eyelids closed. She wrapped her fingers around his hand.

“Rowrr.” Selene padded out from the trees, reeking of blood and smoke and musk, golden eyes shadowed. Haunted.

Desdemona lunged at her, screaming, “You killed him! And for what? FOR WHAT?” But Selene scampered easily out of reach.

“Rowrr.”
I don't know what went wrong
.

Galahad tilted his head, considered. Maybe Selene had spilled too much of Louis's blood. Maybe she'd unleashed too much magic. For, knowing so little about Louis, she'd had no qualms in slicing a knife across his throat. Maybe that blood needed to
remain
in his veins for the magic to work.

Or maybe Louis, being a black cat and all, was just plain bad luck.

Galahad caught a whiff of musky straw and glanced over his shoulder. The scarecrow stood beneath an elm, scythe held against its chest. “So you're saying that nightmare is a boo-boo?” the scarecrow questioned, dry voice clicking like insect wings.

Selene glanced away, tail twitching.

Eddie stepped out of the shadows. Well, Eddie if his skin hung in folds, not stretched quite tight enough across the frame wearing it. And the source of the scream Galahad had heard earlier—it looked like the Boogeyman had seized both opportunity
and
Eddie. Oh. And on his feet? Galahad's Cool Cat Skechers.

“Well, that didn't go according to plan, did it?” the Boogeyman said, pulling Eddie's lips into a big old grin. “Maybe you should've spilled all of the virgin's blood instead.”

“Mrawr,” Selene grumbled.

True, that thing
did
need to be stopped. But how, exactly, were they to stop it? And what was to prevent other things like it from stepping through that rip in the sky? Galahad extended a leg and groomed while he pondered.

Desdemona gasped. “Look! Look!”

Galahad lifted his head. Desdemona trailed her finger across Louis's throat. The slash had healed. Not vanished, no. But healed into a thin white scar. Not the way it usually worked with a nine-lifer. Whenever Galahad had died, his body had renewed itself. No scars. No limps.

“What does it mean?” Desdemona whispered, hope trembling, fragile, in her voice.

“Mew.”
He's no longer dead. Maybe your devotion guided him back—like last time.

Desdemona bent over Louis, touched her lips to his. “Breathe,” she whispered. “Breathe, Louis.”

Selene paced back and forth. Her tail lashed. “Yowr.”
We need a champion to fight for Oregon. For the world.

The scarecrow folded his arms over his chest and looked away. The Boogeyman pursed its Eddie lips and whistled.

Selene stopped pacing and glared at her remaining companions with amber-eyed disgust. “Mrawr.”
Neither one of you?

“To be honest,” the Boogeyman said, “it's
your
problem, isn't it?
You
fucked up. And why get all chickenshit now? Conquer that thing and rule this land.”

Louis sucked in a deep breath of air and Desdemona pillowed her head on his gently rising chest, a smile on her lips. She closed her eyes. Tears glistened on her black lashes. Nick curled up beside her, ears tilted toward the conversation.

“Yowwr.”
We need a hero.

Galahad stopped grooming and rose to his feet. Stretched. Yawned. Met Selene's gaze.

“Mew.”
I know just the guy.

22

UNAVENGED

Della steers the Mustang in a tight U-ey, then peels away in the opposite direction from the Valley River Center. The ear-splitting screech of brakes swings Hal's head around. A swerving semi heads straight for the Mustang, the driver staring, mouth open, at the looming horror striding through the mall
.

The Mustang shoots off the overpass, spiraling for a heartbeat, maybe two, in the night air, then drops, disappearing from view
.

“Della,” Hal whispers. “Lawrence.”
Both
doomed for helping him?

The semi plows into cars angled to stops across the highway, birthing a catastrophic chain collision. Hal hears crunching, shrieking metal, smells the pungent odor of gasoline. A dragging muffler struck sparks across the highway as the semi bulldozes the twisted and smoking mass of cars along the road.

WHOOMPFFF!

The gasoline bursts into flames. Lights the night and the god striding the highw
ay.

And both—god and screeching, burning collision—head straight for Hal
.

Hal ran toward the stomping god and away from the inferno of twisted metal bearing down on him. Intense heat licked at his skin. Tasted him a little. And liked what it tasted: hero flambé.

His heart drummed fast and steady, pounding out the rhythm of survival.
Haul ass! Move! Move! Move!
The spine-chilling sound of screeching metal vibrated into his skull. Sweat trickled into his eyes, stinging, and he blinked it away. A hubcap rolled past, shining and pristine, a silent competitor in the survival race.

A burning-coal-rimmed hoof cratered into the highway as the god stepped onto the overpass. The road trembled and Hal staggered. He caught his balance with his catch pole and kept running, sucking down air stinking of burning rubber, antifreeze, and frying flesh. Heat scorched the back of his T-shirt and jeans like an iron set on
HIGH COTTON
. His clothes began to smolder. Lunging for the god's lifting hoof, Hal managed to grab hold of a protruding knot-knob-wart thing and hauled his ass past the glowing orange embers ringing the hoof. He was grateful to discover that the flesh above the hoof was relatively cool, if a bit sticky—a disconcerting fact that he had no intention of analyzing.

Cool and sticky, it is
.

Catch pole in hand, Hal climbed the knots like Tom Cruise scaling the cliff in the first
Mission Impossible
, although he had
no
intention of dangling by one hand just for the sake of added tension. Definite overkill.

The Ancient strode over the burning wreckage on the road and Hal glimpsed the fire raging white-hot at its compacted core. Glimpsed broken and charred bodies. His jaw clenched. People ran down Delta Highway, some screaming, some blazing like torches. The god coiled a tentacle around a collision survivor, and hoisted him, shrieking, into the smoke-thick air.

Hal pulled himself up the god's tree-gnarled limb, making good use of the sticky ichor gumming its flesh, ichor that smelled of blood, dirt, and—oddly—sandalwood. He rolled his shoulders back. Time for Ancient, Empty, and Hungry to learn a few manners.

As the tentacle lifted its tasty, noisy treat to the god's maw, Hal anchored his feet on a pair of knots and smacked his catch pole across the glistening appendage. THWACK!!!

The tentacle paused, although the treat continued to scream, then resumed lifting. Swiveling on the knots with heart-stopping precision, Hal hit the tentacle with lightning-swift double taps of the catch pole. WHAP-WHAP!

The tentacle paused again and the treat stared at Hal with huge Gollum eyes.

Hal thought he saw a flicker of recognition in those cave-dweller eyes. He touched his index finger to his lips. “Pretend you don't know me. I'll have you down and running again in no time.”

Mouth still open, scream ready, the treat slowly nodded.

The greenish light spilling from the Ancient's fire-pit eye sockets shifted down in Hal's direction. Lingered.

“Name's Rupert. Hal Rupert. And I'm putting you on a permanent diet.” Hal felt a hard, tight smile tug at the corners of his mouth. His fingers locked around his catch pole. “And if you don't like it, I got your ass-whupping waiting right here.”

Tentacles erupted from the knots beneath Hal's feet.
So that's what they're for
.
Go figure.
Smaller and thinner than the one snaked around Gollum Eyes, the tentacle-ettes writhed toward Hal's ankles. The god was
not
pleased with the diet. Was challenging authority. Hal nodded. Okay, then. He skip-stepped out of the pointy-tipped reach of the tentacle-ettes. Jumped from knot to knot.

Time slowed, drew back in upon itself like smoke sucked into a fan, and Hal inhaled the moment, breathing it in like his Desdemona's smoky incense scent. His heart pulsed strong and steady, mirroring the pulse of the green land beneath the Ancient's burning hoofs.

Rain fell, a cool drizzle misting the smoke-smudged sky.

Hal jammed his catch pole into the Ancient's gummy flesh and pole-vaulted through the air, somersaulting with uncanny accuracy onto the sticky surface of the treat-wielding tentacle. A moment of perfect action.

Time exhaled.

The tentacle whipped up and down and side to side. The treat, still held within its coiled grasp, shrieked. Balancing like a lumberjack logrolling on the Willamette, Hal worked his way down the tentacle, smacking it with one end of his catch pole, then the other—TAP-TAP! TAP-TAP!

The Ancient opened its maw. And roared. A hot wind reeking of rotten eggs blasted Hal, blew through his hair, and dried the rain from his face. He thumped his catch pole against the tentacle.

“Yeah, you like it? You want more? I've got it right here,” Hal smacked a hand against his chest. “Come get some.”

The Ancient roared again. Stomped. Tremors vibrated the tentacle and Hal swung his catch pole in front for balance.

“Quit pissing it off, you lunatic!” shrilled the treat.

Hal winked. “Good job! Keep it up.” Man deserved an Academy Award.

The tentacle uncoiled, flinging the treat into the bushes below, and snapped back for Hal. Hal dodged. Ducked. Weaved.

Ain't going down. Not today.

He closed his eyes. Visualized his squirrel nemesis. Breathed in. Out. And jumped, limbs splayed, catch pole grasped in his right hand, for the Ancient's badlands of a belly.
Squirrel attack.
Sticking the landing, Hal danced, catch pole whistling through rain and smoke-laced air as it struck blow after blow into the Ancient's cragged and pitted body.

THOCK! THOCK! THOCK!

Hal spun blow after blow. Slapped away tentacles and tentacle-ettes. Slipped out of reach. Every movement a diamond-cut moment of perfect action. Each hit of the catch pole an unparalleled second of true reflex.

Again and again and again and again and again.

Hal twisted and dipped and lunged. Rain slicked his catch pole. Sweat and rain plastered his T-shirt to his torso and dripped, into his eyes. He no longer felt his fingers clenching the catch pole. His shoulders ached. His breath rasped in his throat. Burned in his lungs. His heart drummed against his ribs. Planting his catch pole into a knot, Hal wrapped both hands around it and rested for a moment, trying to catch his breath. Trying to ignore the cold lump of dread in his belly.

He had a feeling that the Ancient was merely playing with him.

The world falls apart
.

Oceans rise and continents sink. Shifters hide from humans and humans slay shifters, severing head from body and burning both. Gods walk the forests. Hungry gods. Heartless gods. Empty gods. Devouring the screaming sacrifices chained to the mist-shrouded trees
.

Bloodstained branches. Oak trunks scarred by shifter claws
.

The world falls apart
.

In fire. With blood. Sacrifice and betrayal. Over and over and over again
.

Hall shook off the memory of his dream and the fear icing his heart—that the god's presence meant that he was too late, that the lives of everyone he loved had already been sacrificed, their precious blood spilled.

With blood. Sacrifice and betrayal.

Hal's throat tightened. His eyes burned. No. They had to be alive.
Had
to.

He couldn't stop.
Wouldn't
stop. If it was too late to save Desdemona and Galahad and Nick—even Louis, then it wasn't too late to avenge them. Or Della and Lawrence.

Rage burned pure and hot within Hal, flared phosphorescent in his heart.

Punished for guiding a hero? Punished for doing the right thing?

Hal straightened. This bad boy could deal out punishment too.

More tentacle-ettes writhed out of knots and Hal jumped and skipped out of reach, muscles fueled with adrenaline and fury. Fuel he was using up fast as he bitch-slapped tentacle-ettes with deft twists of his catch pole. Leaping. Slapping. Skipping. Over and over and over again.

Then Hal stumbled. Slipped. His hand shot out and seized a knot. A tentacle-ette slithered around his catch pole and, yanking it from his numbed grasp.

Hal's heart hammered hard and fast against his ribs. The catch pole pinwheeled through the night. It hit the ground a few moments later, bouncing against the pavement.

TUNKTUNKTUNK.

The sound knifed Hal, a switchblade straight to the gut. Breathing hard, muscles straining, he pulled himself back up onto the Ancient's gummy torso. Something sticky and reeking of sandalwood bulldozed into his temple. Blue light strobed behind his eyes. Reeling, he tried to dodge as the tentacle-ette whipped back for another blow. And ducked right into a second tentacle-ette.

The slender appendages worked his face like a speed bag. A Technicolor replay of last year's Fourth of July fireworks show at Autzen Stadium flashed through Hal's mind. He tasted blood.

“Hal!”

Sounded like Della. Ah, so he must be near death. At least, he hoped so.

“Get your skinny white ass down here, boy!”

Very
near.

But . . . die and leave his Desdemona unavenged? His friends?

Time-out. He needed a minute in his corner with his cut man. Needed to rethink his strategy and find his catch pole.

Closing his eyes, Hal let go of the knot. And fell.