Poisoned Pearls (7 page)

The place was small as a shoebox, too. The kitchen and
bedroom were all one room. I had this tiny stove that barely held a pizza that
I’m sure the hipsters would consider “retro” but I knew was just old and a fire
hazard.

I had a proper bedframe that I’d found in an alley, made of black
wrought iron (all the better to tie you to, my dear). The mattress was cheap
but new—hadn’t trusted the ones I’d found used that I could afford. It
was hard and uncomfortable but better than sleeping on concrete. I kept the bed
pushed under the windows. Sure, I boiled in the summertime and froze in the
winter, but I could look up and at least pretend to see the stars at night.

The top of my dresser was still shockingly empty since
Natasha had removed all her jewelry and scarves and nail polish and everything
else.

I knew Sam would never leave her things in a dump like mine.

I shook my head. Couldn’t think about Sam, not that way. Not
ever.

Had it only been a few hours ago that we’d been flirting?
Since I’d smelled her lemongrass perfume?

I stripped out of my jacket and two shirts and leggings and
underwear and went straight to the bathroom.

That was one thing this place had going for it—really
hot water at all times, and as much as I wanted.

One steaming hot shower later and I was feeling mostly human.
I made myself some tea, one of my real indulgences, not that Lip-torn shit but
real loose-leaf tea that came from that yuppie place on Nicolette Mall. I piled
up my pillows on my bed and was about to settle myself down for one nice, last
cigarette before I went to sleep when someone knocked on the door.

It better not be the cops. I couldn’t handle any more drama
that night. Or morning, really, I needed sleep, damn it.

“Who is it?” I called as I pulled myself out of my bed and
walked cautiously toward the door.

“It’s
Csaba
, bitch. And you owe me
an explanation.”

Shit. Now I had a local drug dealer pissed at me.

This day just couldn’t get any better, could it?

“Look,
Csaba
,” I said as I opened
the door. “I don’t know—”

I didn’t have a chance to say anything else before Dusty and
two of
Csaba’s
other buddies came barreling into my
place.

“Why don’t you make yourself at home?” I asked as they
started looking around my place.

Looking for that extra room that I didn’t have.

“You live here?”
Csaba
finally
asked as he stepped over the threshold.

“Yeah. Beats the concrete,” I told him.

He just grunted in reply as he tried to invade my space as
well.

It was kind of comical watching four big guys make their way
through the maze of my mess, trying to space themselves out so they weren’t all
standing on top of each other.

It wasn’t like I threw a lot of parties there.

Maybe I should have been scared, but I felt like they were
just being ridiculous. “Is there something I can help you gentlemen with?” I finally
asked. I’d stayed near the door, not so I could run away or anything but
because there wasn’t more room in my tiny space.

Csaba
finally ordered the other
two thugs to wait outside in the hallway while we chatted. I stepped to the
side to let them pass, then closed the door.

Really—I wasn’t a threat to
Csaba
.
Or Dusty.

“You brought the cops with you, to my place,”
Csaba
accused me.

I couldn’t help but snort with laughter. “You’re kidding,
right? Like they wouldn’t have made a run at you because of Kyle anyway.”

“That one cop, Ferguson, said he was looking for you. That
you’d run away from him. Seems like he got a hard-on for you or something,”
Csaba
said as he finally settled, collapsing down on my
bed.

I was glad the frame held his weight and didn’t break.

“Yeah. Their stupid post-cog keeps saying I’m involved in
Kyle’s murder, somehow,” I explained. “But I’m not. I wasn’t there. She’s got
her lines crossed.”

“Ferguson said you ran away with Hunter,” Dusty said
casually.

Were these two working for the cops or something? Wouldn’t
have surprised me, actually. The lines between good guys and bad guys always
seemed to blur on the TV shows when murder was involved.

“More like kidnapped by Hunter,” I told them honestly. “He
just picked me up under one arm and started running.” It was close enough to
the truth.

Dusty looked me up and down, obviously not believing me. It
wasn’t as if I was a petite girl or something. But Hunter was freaky strong.
And fast.

“Why’d he do that?”
Csaba
asked,
seeming genuinely curious.

“He’s had some vision with me in it,” I told him. I rolled
my eyes. “Doubt it was real. Probably just ghost tripping.”

Csaba
and Dusty looked at each
other when I said that. They knew something more, something about Hunter, that
they weren’t telling me.

And I honestly didn’t care too much, either.

“So if that’s all you’re here for, I’d like to call it a
night. Get my beauty sleep before my next shift,” I told them.

“Well, I was going to insist that you pay for the product I
lost tonight,”
Csaba
said, looking around my
oh-so-tiny kingdom. “But after seeing this place, it’d take you three lifetimes
to do it.”

Csaba
stood suddenly, and started
walking toward me slowly. “But I don’t ever want to see your face again. Not
anywhere near anything that’s mine. Got it?” His voice sounded low and mean,
like some kind of rough gangster.

“You practice that in front of a mirror? That was good,” I
told him. “Threatening. Yeah.”

At least he didn’t hit me in the face. Instead, he punched
my stomach, hard, leaving me coiled over, my breath coming short. “Nice
chatting with you!” I called after him as he left.

Dusty gave me a second punch, taking the air right out of me
and leaving my legs without the power to hold me up. I lay curled up on my side
on the floor, barely able to breathe through the pain.

I knew me and my mouth were going to get me killed someday.
But they’d come into
my
house,
my
space, looking to tear into
my
life.

Of course I was going to give them what hell I could.

After I’d staggered back up and closed the door, I collapsed
on my bed, setting two alarms on my phone so I’d be sure to wake up and go to
my shift at Chinaman Joe’s that afternoon.

Needed to keep to my schedule so the cops would be sure to
find me. So I could get the rest of my daily allowance of abuse.

Thick, brown shag rug scratched Loki’s bare shins and didn’t
provide any cushion for his bare ass as he sat naked and cross-legged in the
living room of the apartment he’d “borrowed.” However, it was much better than
being outside, which was where he normally performed any ceremony.

Not that the cold that bothered the humans so much would
have affected Loki. However, in this crowded human city, he needed privacy more
than heat or comfort, and while there were many parks, there were also many
humans.

The apartment was “garden level”—who would have
thought that meant it was underground! When the artist—the original
owner—had told Loki about it, Loki had envisioned a place with wide doors
that opened out onto a garden. Not a set of dark, dank rooms with windows that
he had to stand in order to see the constant traffic just outside.

Across the tiny living room hulked an overly large couch in
the shape of an “L.” They must have had to assemble it in the room—it was
too big to fit through any of the doors. It was a lighter brown than the rug,
and just as scratchy and uncomfortable. Two smaller chairs faced it, both of
them in dark red corduroy.

It all felt closed in and tight. How did the humans even
breathe in here?

However, it didn’t matter. Not really. Loki just needed a
place on earth from which to work. Much easier to have a physical location than
always working from between the worlds.

The apartment belonged to an artist, a sculptor. He had a
series of muscular torsos hanging in a line, about eye height, on the two walls
that didn’t have windows. They were all the same shape, each cast from the same
mold, just painted and decorated differently. They were reminiscent of those
stupid Greek and Roman statues that had the arms broken off. More than one wore
armor, leather or tin or tiny plastic rings supposed to look like chainmail.

In front of Loki, spread out on the carpet before him, lay
his magical implements, what he needed for his next creation. A tiny, green
plastic sword that he’d acquired from a nearby bar, its end holding a single
drop of his blood. The purple and white horse he’d stolen from a child playing
in the park, distracting the annoying brat with a spider the size of his hand.
Two large oak leaves glued together and roughly shaped into a cloak.

Loki took a deep breath and tasted the night around him, the
bitter cold snow and harsh starlight. Idiotic humans thought that their clocks
imposed some sort of order on the natural world, that just because the hour
stroked midnight that had some relevance to creatures natural and unnatural.

That somehow, their
time
mattered or made things magical.

No, the hours that mattered were set by the moon and the
stars and the night winds. When the worlds slid into alignment, not when the
humans said it was right.

With a sense of irony, Loki started his spell exactly at
1:13 a.m.

Spirits of the night
      
Slayers of
rock and tree

Come across the whale road
      
Along the
paths of stone and steel

Gather around the too-clever one
      
Scarred-faced and sweet-tongued

Dance to my lip streams
      
Play in my
blood light

Find form and purpose
      
Find
spear-din eternal

Raise up bone beak and shield
     
Raise up the
feeders of eagles

All for the glory of the draught of giants
     
All for the
uncut thread

Red light poured from Loki, overtaking the harsh overhead
lamp. The torsos on the walls started to writhe. Wisps of white smoke streaked
into the room, swirling past Loki, the ugly couches, the skinny windows.

The swirling winds picked up the light, the red bleeding
into the white until their color had changed. The torsos continued their
writhing, some now bucking, as if trying to escape. Faint screams followed the
winds, some in pain, others in triumph. The scent of campfires and fresh-cooked
boar filled the room.

Loki repeated his chant. His magical implements took on the
same red cast. Their forms changed. The sword turned to steel, the horse lost
its cartoon nature and became real, the cloak gained weight and form and flowed
like silk.

Spirits embodied the torsos on the walls. Shield maidens for
Loki’s army. The prostitutes and whores and junkies whose souls Loki had taken.
They broke free from where they hung and picked up their swords, their cloaks
streaming down their backs, their horses snorting and waiting for them.

The edges of the room expanded out beyond the world, into
the gray mists of between, rolling forever in all directions.

Then the shield maidens began to raise the others. The
gamblers and the braggarts. The discontented. The suicides. The weekend
warriors who really wanted a war. The camp followers that believed heart and
soul that end days were here. The generals who couldn’t follow orders. The ones
the street had frozen that night.

And still the winds came. The ranks around Loki swelled.
They shouted their anger. They growled their challenges. They flowed into one
another and broke free.

But above all, they grew full of hunger.

The only thing that would satisfy each and every one of them
was battle. War.

And to win.

That was the only way to free themselves from this world and
all others.

Loki felt himself harden as the ranks of his army grew, his
cock standing stiff and proud. He would win with these warriors. Odin’s fallen
lived for the glory.

Loki’s troop needed to
win
.

As Loki finished his chant the third time, his army cheered
him on. They needed his blessing. They
had
to have it, to complete their transformation, to become one with his will, for the
spell to finish.

Loki grabbed his cock. With only a few strokes (and less
satisfying than that last whore who really did know some tricks), Loki came,
spurting come all over the floor, the physical manifestations of his spell
smoking and dissolving under the hot liquid. Loki groaned his release, his
chant easing, the maidens and his army slipping into the nether worlds, between
this space and that.

When Loki opened his eyes, the room remained much the same.
Melted toys lay on the scratchy, brown shag carpet, along with his cooling
spunk. He took a deep breath, trying to calm his heart. The torsos on the walls
had all disappeared. Smoke and blood flowed around where the shapes had been,
showcasing the negative space.

Maybe the artist would appreciate the new look. If he came
back.

Loki groaned as he stood up, his knees protesting. He knew
without looking in a mirror that the scars were back on his face, his energy
drained.

But he had an army now.

Odin would never know what hit him.

***

Hunter stayed where he was when he saw
Csaba
and his “lieutenants” go into Cassie’s apartment building.

As if they knew anything about war.

No one could see Hunter, of course. He hid with the ghosts
in the alley across the street. The brick held in the shadows and the cold.

The sun had come out, brightly white. High thin clouds
streaked across the thinly blue sky. Hunter hadn’t realized until he’d gone to
the desert that only moderate temperatures gave the sky richness, a blue so
thick he could swim in it.

The cold kept down the stench of the hulking dumpsters at
Hunter’s back. Not that Hunter minded too much. He’d had more than one meal
served à la can.

But Josh had bought him breakfast that morning.

Now that Hunter thought about it, Josh had bought him more
than one meal, never asking Hunter to chip in.

Whatever agency Josh worked for, at least he had an expense
account.

Josh also bought the drugs sometimes. Not from
Csaba
, though he claimed that’s where they’d come from. But
the packaging was always better than the cheap stuff
Csaba
had. More professional.

And the highs had always been higher grade as well.

A warm flash touched Hunter’s back. When he turned around,
he saw more ghosts had come. A group of homeless dudes, scavenging the
dumpsters. The faint bump the rubber cover made when it slapped against the
brick wall told Hunter they were pretty far away, possibly in time, or in terms
of worlds.

They didn’t look as if they wanted to fight. Not yet. That
didn’t mean they wouldn’t cross the streams and come after Hunter if they
thought he had something they needed.

He hoped they stayed in the future. He didn’t feel like
battling, and he had other things to do. So he kept only part of his attention
on them while he looked out again, listening and watching for Cassie.

Hunter’s area of knowing wasn’t too big that morning.
Fortunately, Cassie’s apartment was on the side of the street facing him, so he
could encompass her entire place. His timing wasn’t great, either—maybe
five minutes ahead.
 

Hunter saw the blows before they occurred, passing through
his own stomach, hollow and cold.

Of course Cassie didn’t call out. Didn’t ask for help.

No matter what she might say, she was his blood brother. The
vision was clear. She
saw
like he
did.

Or she would, soon enough.

Hunter didn’t bother to physically follow
Csaba
after the dealer and his goons piled into the large
van and left. A drug dealer could never be that difficult to find, not if he
wanted to stay in business. He did concentrate his
knowing
on
Csaba
for a few moments as
they pulled away.

The drug dealer was going to meet a police officer.
Interesting. So even he had his price.

When Hunter realized that Cassie would sleep now, he knew it
would be safe to leave, at least for a little while.

His blood brother could take care of herself, though she
also would need his help, whether she realized it or not.

Hunter turned and looked at the ghosts in the alley. There
were several more there now. Some were from a nearby future and world, wearing
the same heavy coats and boats that Hunter and anyone sane would, given the
cold.

A few were from farther away, a time when summer had already
come.

The ghosts didn’t see each other, though. They passed
through one another, like wind through a screen door.

Was there something going to happen in this alley? Is that
why there were so many ghosts here, now? Or was the last batch of the
Ghost Tripper
drugs really as powerful
as
Csaba
had claimed they were?

Hunter couldn’t tell.

After slipping his darkest shades back on, Hunter strode out
onto the street, turning the corner and walking back in towards the more
inhabited areas of downtown, where the fancy stores played Christmas music
nonstop, as if that was somehow supposed to bring cheer.

Following Josh was useless. His cover was good enough, deep
enough, that he’d already fooled Hunter once.

But there were other ways to skin a cat, Hunter knew.

Time to go get the official “services” involved.

***

Of course, the government wasn’t about to admit fault, or that
the drugs they’d fed their psychics during the war were purposefully addictive.
That so many of this country’s brave soldiers had ended up junkies was just the
nature of that particular war.

Their lies, as much as anything else, made Hunter want to retch.

However, he still took advantage of the government’s guilt.
He would take their blood money, or
wergild
.

At least once a month he made his way to the VA hospital,
put up with whatever tests they insisted on running, and got a check deposited
to his account as a result.

If he didn’t show up, the check didn’t come. Simple as that.

And Hunter hadn’t gone in, yet, for his December check.

He needed information about a liar.

Where better to go than to the source of all lies?

***

Odin watched in dismay as yet another rank of Loki’s army
rolled into being, then crushed his own brave warriors. The day reflected the
storms in Odin’s visage, with dark clouds broiling above the battlefield. The
winter hay had long since been cut, and the dead white stalks lay like bones,
already bleached, between the piles of bodies. Crows, ravens, and eagles
gathered at the edges, awaiting their rewards.

Campfires smoked darkly in the far corner, where Loki’s
warriors waited for their next attack. Odin didn’t need to ask where Loki had
found such men and women to battle this way—oath breakers, most of them.
Dying without valor or honor.

Loki’s “Valkyrie” had brought them there, to the field, that
day, on dark horses with steel swords that shone with green light and cloaks that
trailed down their backs like leaves.

The warriors, Odin had expected. He’d known the type of army
Loki would raise.

The shield maids, not so much. Not all of them were women,
even, though they were all made to appear that way.

Loki had refused to say where he’d found his Valkyrie, or
how he’d created them.

Odin suspected that he didn’t really want to know.

However, Odin also couldn’t complain about them. Loki’s
shield maidens weren’t against the rules of their contest. No, Loki had said
he’d raise an army worthy of Odin’s best.

And he had. They were beating his own men.

At least, for this skirmish, all that was on the line was
Sleipnir
. They weren’t fighting the final battle, weren’t
calling the twilight into being.

As the last of Odin’s troop fell, Loki came riding up. His
horse that day was colored like those silly children’s horses, purple with a
white mane.