Game Of Cages (2010) (33 page)

"What's that?" I led her toward the kitchen. Beside the sink was a heavy tarp wrapped around something big. I peeled it back, expecting to find another body. It was just an oven.

Someone had bent the seal on the metal door so it would close over a thick black electrical cable. Light shone out through the dirty window on the oven door. An electric hum made the floorboards vibrate.

"What the hell have they done here?" Annalise asked. With one hand, she shifted the fridge to the side. It was unplugged; the heavy black cable had been plugged into that socket. Someone had put a powerful light--or several powerful lights--into the oven. I peered through the oven window, trying to see inside. It was no use. Then I remembered the halogen-lamp packages out in the car.

"The cage the sapphire dog was kept in for all those years was ringed with lights," I said.

She knelt and peered at the gaps in the door. She didn't have to ask the next question: Was the sapphire dog in there right now? She set her scrap lumber on the stovetop. The sigil on it twisted and writhed like an orgy of snakes. Whatever was inside, it was magic.

"Take the handle," Annalise said. "Don't open it until I say go."

I stepped around her and stood by the stove but kept my hands at my sides. She reached under her jacket and took out two more green ribbons. She closed her eyes.

I wondered if Catherine had told her everything about the sapphire dog, and whether I had told Catherine everything. Did she know it could pass through solid objects? Did she know about its tongue?

Annalise opened her eyes and nodded to me. I laid my hand on the handle. It was warm to the touch, but--

"Go!"

I yanked the door open and jumped back. The electric hum immediately stopped. The connection had been broken, but the light from inside didn't shut off. There were no halogen lights, but the oven seemed to be full of light anyway. At the bottom, I saw the blackened silhouette of a tiny rib cage and a human skull.

This wasn't the sapphire dog at all.

The churning light floated toward me just as Annalise threw her three green ribbons. The ribbons burst into flame--the same weird green hissing fire that I had seen her use to burn people down to their bones. I was already backing away.

The floating storm emerged from the wall of green fire, gases trailing behind it. Annalise said something, a curse, I think, and began throwing more ribbons.

Another billow of green flame struck the predator, then a brown ribbon flashed and the white-hot churning core of gasses I thought of as its face suddenly pointed the other way, moving toward the kitchen. Beams of blue light burst from a handful of thrown ribbons, some of them impaling the creature, all linking together to form a lattice. But the floating storm moved right through them, turning back to us.

Annalise's face was grim as she reached under her vest for another ribbon. The predator was closing in on her.

The stairs were right behind me. I could have sprinted down to the back door and been out on the road in three minutes. I knew the predator couldn't catch me out on the asphalt. But I couldn't leave Annalise. I was her wooden man, and this predator needed to be destroyed.

The pipes leading through the roof down to the sink told me where the water tank was. But I'd missed my chance. The predator was already too far away from it to replay the water-sprinkler trick.

An old set of skis and poles stood in the corner. The poles were pitted and crooked, but they were made of aluminum. I grabbed one and ran across the room.

Annalise had stopped throwing spells at the creature. She grabbed a mattress off the floor and heaved it. The fabric was already burning when it struck the floating storm, but it had no more effect than it would on a column of smoke. Pieces of mattress fell into the corner and set fire to the wall.

I threw the aluminum pole like a spear. It flew crookedly, striking the predator at an angle. That weird red lightning played along the pole's length as it passed through. Arcs jumped to other objects nearby, including the metal nails in the couch. The couch started burning.

The ski pole hit the floor, still sparking. The floating storm turned toward me. I backpedaled, drawing it away from Annalise as I went for the other ski pole.

Annalise picked up the burning couch and threw it. I think she was trying to kill the predator by breaking up the swirl of gases at its center, but all she managed to do was fan them out, set a new fire, and delay the thing for the few seconds it needed to pull itself back together.

I grabbed the other ski pole off the floor and, with two cuts from my ghost knife, shaved the end to a sharp point.

It was nearly on me. "Take this!" I shouted, and threw the pole through the predator. It sparked just like the other one did, shrinking the floating storm slightly. But not enough to kill it.

I backed toward the steps, the predator moving closer to me. Swirls of orange, yellow, and red curled around one another in sudden spirals and breaking wave fronts. It was like watching a half dozen small hurricanes collide in slow motion. In its own way, this thing was beautiful, too.

It passed over the burning couch, and now there was nothing between it and me. I backed down the stairs, well aware of what would happen if it got above me.

I hoped Annalise understood what I was doing.

Just as the predator moved into the stairwell, the ski pole shot through it and wedged into the wood paneling.

The floating storm froze in place. Red lightning flashed off it, draining into the wall studs. The paneling caught fire.

I bounded down the steps. The wall beside me groaned and the glass in the back door shattered. I turned away from the door and ran to the main part of the store.

There was a sudden, deafening blast from above. Hot air struck me from behind, followed a bare instant later by pieces of broken wood. I sprawled forward onto the trembling floor, feeling something huge and heavy land on my back. For a moment, I thought the terrible pressure of it wouldn't stop until my back was broken.

For once, I wasn't afraid. I pulled my knees under me and struggled to my feet, gratified that I still could. Firelight shone from behind me. I staggered toward the door but tripped over one of Yin's men.

My balance was shot and my ears were ringing. I stood anyway and looked back at the office. A section of the wall was missing, and everything was on fire. I could see fire upstairs through holes in the floor. I stripped off my jacket, but it wasn't burning.

The floating storm did not come through the doorway after me. I breathed a heavy sigh and leaned against a rack of winter coats. I needed to get out of this building, but for the moment, I didn't trust myself to cross the room without help. My head was still swimming and my skin felt scalded. I tried moving my arms and back--my ribs hurt, but I didn't think anything had been broken. Lucky.

Another explosion shattered the windows. This one sounded different from the one in the stairwell, but my ears were still ringing. I saw a sudden flare of light and stumbled toward the office.

I couldn't enter, but I could see into the backyard through a gap in the wall. Annalise was out there, and she was on fire. Another explosion struck the ground at her feet, and she was thrown back into the bushes. The cabin rattled with the blast.

The floating storm didn't attack like that. I ran to a side window.

Issler stood in the falling snowflakes. He held something that looked like a massive, two-handed revolver. As I reached for my ghost knife I heard him shoot it--foof!--and another blast of firelight erupted from the back of the house. He was smiling.

He didn't see me as he started toward the backyard. I threw my ghost knife at him.

The spell didn't go where I wanted it to go. It had never missed before, but it turned away from him just as I had turned away from the stairs in the office.

At the last moment, I willed it toward his weapon instead.

The ghost knife cut through the top of the barrel just before he squeezed the trigger. The gun burst apart in his hands, fire flashing over his face and neck. He screamed.

I turned and staggered toward the front door. Firelight shone down at me from the ceiling. The cabin groaned as if it was about to collapse. I yanked the door inward, feeling it scrape against the floor, and sprinted into the yard. The men inside would be getting a Viking funeral soon.

I reached for my ghost knife again. It was almost too far, but it came.

I held it ready to throw as I came around the barbecue pit, but it wasn't necessary. About fifteen feet away, Issler was kneeling in the dirt, squealing and grunting from the pain. With one hand he smeared mud into his left eye, and with his other he dug inside his mouth. I could hear meat sizzling.

I wondered if the ghost knife could hit him if I held it in my hand rather than throwing it. There was only one way to find out. I started toward him.

Suddenly, the shadows around us slid across the ground. The floating storm came over the top of the cabin and moved down toward Issler. It was small--no larger than a cantaloupe--but if it fed, it would get bigger.

I still had the gun in my pocket, but it was useless. I pressed my ghost knife to my lips. I didn't know what would happen to me if it was destroyed inside the floating storm, but I might have to chance it.

The only thing nearby was the barbecue pit and the stainless steel gas grill. I cut through the gas hose and dragged the tank out of the bottom. I couldn't tell if it was full or empty, and at the moment I didn't care. It was metal and it was handy.

But I was too slow. The floating storm was already directly above Issler and moving downward.

The tank snagged on something. I tugged and twisted it, trying to tear it free. It wouldn't come.

The floating storm was close enough to Issler that he could have reached up and touched it.

Red lightning never struck. The predator floated above him, swaying back and forth as though trying to find a way in. Maybe it was having the same trouble my ghost knife had had.

I shook the tank, making a horrendously loud noise but finally freeing it. The predator floated toward me.

I swung the tank once in a wide-armed circle and heaved it. It struck the floating storm dead center. I wished the propane had blown up like a bomb, but that didn't happen. I had to be satisfied with a couple of sparks and a slight delay in the chase.

Damn. Annalise was nowhere in sight, and I had no one to help me. For all I knew, she was dead in the bushes back there.

But that didn't mean I was out of ideas. Getting inside one of the cars out front would protect me from real lightning, and now seemed like a good time to try it against magic. I didn't know what I'd do after that, but maybe I'd have a chance for my head to stop spinning.

I ran to the front of the building. The firelight was bright and the heat was raw against the side of my face. Wood cracked and crashed somewhere nearby, followed by a roar of flame. The front wall of the cabin trembled and leaned toward me.

"Ray!"

That was Annalise's voice. I stopped and looked for her, letting the predator get uncomfortably close. I saw her silhouette waving at me from the far side of the cabin.

I angled back toward her and the heat. The little floating storm followed at about shoulder height. I could have sworn that it was having trouble staying in the air.

The wind changed, choking me with a gust of black smoke. I gave a wide berth to the porch, even though the fire hadn't reached there. The flames were flickering along the outside of the wall, slowly spreading downward.

I rounded the corner with tears streaming down my face and nearly ran headlong into Annalise. I dodged to the side as she stepped forward, and I could only catch a glimpse of the thing she was holding over her head as she tipped it over and slammed it onto the ground.

It was the water tank from the roof. She'd dumped it over the floating storm.

Scalding hot mud shot out from under the lip of the tank. It scalded me through my pants, and I dropped to my knees in the freezing mud to leach away the heat.

"Where did Issler go?" Annalise asked. Her clothes were in tatters, exposing pale skin from her chin to her ankles. She was completely covered with protective tattoos, as I had always suspected, but what I hadn't expected was how she looked. She always wore clothes that were large and loose, but I never expected to see all her ribs, her bony hips sticking out through her skin ... I wasn't prepared for how starved she looked.

Then I saw that the sides and top of her head were burned nearly black. There was a section of undamaged skin on her face about the size of both her hands, but the flesh around it was actually smoking.

"Jesus Christ, boss," I said, with more fear in my voice than I'd intended. I jumped up and slipped out of my jacket. She let me wrap it around her shoulders. Her usual expression of stony anger turned a little sour, but she didn't shake it off. It looked as big as a quilt on her. The smell of her burns made my stomach twist into knots. "Is there something I can ... Does that hurt?"

She pulled the jacket closed. "I hate it when they burn my clothes."

"Issler is on the other side of the building. He was still alive when I left him."

"I can fix that," she said, and started walking in that direction. "Get away from the building."

I sprinted for the line of cars and crouched behind the trunk of one of the BMWs. A few moments later, Annalise walked around the pit with Issler dragging behind her. His head hung at an awkward angle. Dead.

She lifted Issler's corpse in front of her like a shield and kicked the front door of the cabin open. Flames roared out. She threw him inside, then trotted toward me. My jacket was smoking, too.

"Well," she said when she reached me, "that was annoying."

As we walked down the switchback trail, Annalise stayed a few paces behind me. I didn't know whether she was sparing me the sight of her burned flesh, using me as a lookout so that no one would question her injuries, or using me as her wooden man again. It didn't matter. We walked in silence, and when I glanced back to see if she was about to go into shock or something, she glared at me.