Splinter (Whisper Walker Series) (19 page)

He turned suddenly, towards the door. Then he moved quickly across the room and disappeared through the doorway. I crouched back down and crept on around the house, heading for the next window, hoping I could see more clearly.

The next window was even smaller. However, it didn’t have a curtain pulled across it. I stood on my toes and glanced inside. It was a vacant kitchen. A complete mess though, I noticed. It looked like it had been very nice at one point, but now was a disaster zone.

Double-checking that no one was there, I gave up and went to the rest of the windows and checked, with similar luck. No one. I didn’t even see the Briln Magistrate again. I couldn’t find Kelsie, either. I figured she might have just circled the house to find me and we were chasing each other. I turned back, hoping to catch her, when I noticed the frigid empty feeling the Briln Magistrate had given me was fading away.

I made it all the way around to the front of the house again with no sign of Kelsie.

Cursing under my breath, I was left with no other option than to try and figure out where she went. Maybe she had seen the Magistrate leave and followed him. Still, I would’ve thought she would tell me instead of just wandering off. On the other hand, it was her father. Maybe seeing him had been too much and her sanity left her.

How was I going to find her? “Dammit, where’d she go?” I whispered aloud to myself, hoping hearing my own voice would help quell the worry I was feeling.

“I saw the possessed guy drag her off down the street,” a girl’s voice answered behind me.

This time I didn’t jump. Maybe I was getting used to her popping up when I didn’t expect it.

“Hello, Samantha. So, you saw her getting dragged down the street? Did you see where to?” I asked, glancing at the ghost who seemed to have changed into jeans and a tight T-shirt. “Wait, you can change clothes?” I asked incredulously.

“Yes, it’s all about how strong one is.” She flipped her hair egotistically. “It’s a bitch to get clothes, though. All I saw was the man dragging her down the street.”

I stared off down the street in the direction she was pointing. It was better than nothing, but not much to go on. “Well, at least I have a direction to start in, providing they don’t kill her first. If only I had a quicker way to search.” I finished, raising a hopeful eyebrow at the ghost.

She looked mildly offended. “You expect
me
to go house to house with you looking for your girlfriend? No, that would be beneath me. I’m already stooping to help you out.”

“How are you helping me?” I asked, getting irritated. We were losing precious time here.

“I’m going to tell you how to find them. Did you feel the Dybbuk earlier?”

“That cold, empty feeling? Yes.”

She nodded. “Yes. Well, follow that. It will lead you to them.”

Then she was gone.

Why did I feel like I had just gotten a “follow your heart” speech?

I took off down the street, going cover to cover. The feeling in my chest grew until it was as noticeable as it had been when I saw the Magistrate at the house. Then suddenly it seemed to triple. I felt like I could barely breathe, it was so strong.

Just as suddenly, it slacked off. There was my indicator. It must be in one of the houses I had just passed. There was one on each side. I picked one and started looking through windows. I saw a man and a young boy, but no Kelsie.

I slipped over to the other house, feeling my heart beating out of my chest the closer I got. Yes, this was definitely the one.

I went window to window until I found them. I was at a window in the back of the house. The curtains were pulled closed, but there was a small gap between them in the middle. I could see the Sven Magistrate, the Briln Magistrate, and some random very mean-looking man. Directly in front of him was Kelsie. Tied to a chair. The man was pointing a wicked, curved knife at her aggressively. But he was talking and didn’t seem to be in any hurry to kill her. He also didn’t seem to suspect my presence, or he might’ve been out looking for me.

I noticed the man that was supposed to be her father had glassy eyes, like he wasn’t “home” at all. He just sat on his chair like a statue. The Sven Magistrate wasn’t much better, but at least he appeared semi-coherent.

“You know what you have to do, don’t you?”

“Samantha! Stop popping up like that!” I whispered frantically.

“Well, don’t you?”

This time she was right next to me. I could feel my arm against her, and it was making my skin tingle, somewhat enjoyably now that I knew what caused it. “Not really. I mean, I need to get Kelsie back. Why? Specific plan in mind?”

“No. What you have to do is kill the one with the knife. He’s hosting the Dybbuk. It looks like you’re going to have to kill the glassy-eyed one on the far side. He’s a goner. The other one there, the fat one on the left, he might make it.”

“Are you serious?” I demanded, dropping down with my back to the wall of the house.

“Yes, you must kill them. You brought your athame?” she asked, her face completely serious.

I nodded. “You can’t actually expect me to kill her father?” I hoped for some other option. I didn’t know if Kelsie would ever forgive me for that.

“Drake. You must hurry. Before he kills your friend. If you don’t kill him, he will do terrible things. He’s already done many. Now go. Remember, you must use the silver athame or he won’t die.”

There were a million things I would rather be doing right now. I was trying to wrap my head around this. I’d killed before, but never like this. Always mutants or in self-defense. This felt like murder.

The back door was unlocked. As I silently pushed it open, I reached into my belt and pulled out the silver athame. I snuck down the dark hall, sticking to the edge of the floor closest to the walls, the place least likely to creak.

Five steps later, a doorway. From the flickering light coming through it, this was where everyone was. At first I didn’t hear anything. I paused to listen. I heard the Sven Magistrate’s voice.

“…the force guarding the Gates into Sven have been cut in half. If they’re cut back any more, the Captain of the Guard will say something and raise suspicion. I have many of them sent deep into the Wild Territory where they are looking for something that doesn’t exist. They should be killed. The time to move is now. The time is now to conquer the Sven…”

He droned on for a few moments. I slunk back and took a deep breath, holding it to slow my heartbeat. I’d become acutely aware that right now my actions didn’t only affect me, but they also very much affected Kelsie. This wasn’t some mission where I was stealing something from a Guild when the only thing to lose was me. No, this was much bigger than that, and I stood to lose the one thing I really cared about if I failed.

Blood was pounding in my ears, making it hard to focus. I was prepared to throw myself around the corner when the Sven Magistrate stepped through the doorway and turned to go down the hall opposite me. He never saw me lurking in the shadow. I let him go; Samantha said he might be salvageable.

I listened again, creeping back to the edge of the doorway.

The Dybbuk was talking now. “…and what are we going to do with you, girl? Kill your friend and make you watch? Maybe make you watch as I kill your father later? Hmmm…so many options.”

That was all I needed to hear. I lunged around the corner. The Dybbuk’s back was to me, but the Briln Magistrate was in a chair near the door. I came up behind him and clamped one hand over his mouth, with the other I reached around his neck, slicing it with the sharp athame. I momentarily thought I might throw-up from the odd sensation of the knife drawing through his throat. It slid through effortlessly, like it was made for it – my hand only getting a minimal amount of warm, sticky blood on it. As I released my hold on his mouth, his head lolled to the side, and he fell off the chair with a thump and a gurgle.

The Dybbuk started to turn. I was still a good three meters away and threw myself at him, not knowing if I would make it. My aim was going to take me directly into the swing of the knife he had pulled away from Kelsie’s throat to swipe at me. I did everything I could to throw myself to the side. Even though I seemed to be in the air forever, it wasn’t long enough for me to shift away. I watched my chest heading for the knife like it was slow motion. Then the knife jerked to the side enough that I barely missed it.

Kelsie, though tied hand and foot, had knocked her chair over into his leg, throwing him off balance. He growled and kicked her hard in the face. She let out a pained squeak, and blood splattered from a broken nose.

I landed almost on top of her, painfully slamming my ribs into the corner of the chair. I only had a moment to grimace as the Dybbuk came at me with the knife again.

I rolled and kicked out, trying to knock his legs out from under him. It worked about as well as trying that on a muscled mutant – not very well. I succeeded in getting him to his knees, though. I hopped to my feet, ignoring the throbbing in my ribs.

I tried to move the action away from Kelsie, since she was still tied up. I lunged to the side. With the way the chair had fallen and the Dybbuk in front of me, I had only one option to get past him and that would put me within his strike zone.

His eyes burned a fiery reddish hue as he lunged at me, his face contorting into something inhuman. He tackled me into the wall. His knife landed as we slammed down with him on top. His blade sliced through my side directly below my armpit.

He landed directly on top of the athame, his momentum driving it deep into his gut. He grunted, and blood poured out of his mouth and the hole in his stomach. I used all of my strength to force the athame to slice up his middle a few centimeters. The skin parted like a filleted fish. I never even felt his ribs, the blade sliced through them like they weren’t even there.

I flipped him off of me and withdrew my athame. Then for good measure I slashed his throat – couldn’t have his supernatural-ass surviving this. As the knife finished the job, the handle burned hot in my hand, and I almost dropped it. All of the air seemed to be sucked out of the room, and the body disappeared. Gone with it was the empty feeling that had grown to epic proportions during the fight. I glanced at the massive amount of blood on the floor and wall and noticed the odd paintings and objects in the room. Evil-looking ornaments.

I turned, remembering Kelsie. I stepped over to her, cutting her bindings, and helped her up. I checked if she was all right enough to run like hell. She wasn’t, so I picked her up in my arms and carried her outside the door, telling her to sit there for a second.

I didn’t want her to see what I was about to do. It was bad enough that she had seen me kill her dad. I stepped over to his body and dragged it to the big splotch on the wall. Then I slit open his gut, fighting to keep my stomach contents inside me the whole time. Blood and entrails went everywhere, helping to blend in with the blood on the floor. I hoped the guards were dumb enough to buy this. Right now, I just needed to distract them long enough for us to get out of town.

I stepped back into the hallway and picked Kelsie up. I walked to the back door and checked that there wasn’t anyone around. Then I sprinted as best I could carrying her.

“Where is the opening in the wall that you came through?” I asked, my voice coming out in uneven jumbles as I landed each step.

“Let me down, I think I can make it. I have to show you. Hard to find.” Her voice came out in the same broken rhythm as mine as she gurgled a bit with blood from her nose.

I got to the deep shadow thrown by a shed and set her down. I helped steady her as she regained feeling in her legs. After a second, she took off at a stumbling walk, clutching her side, while her other shoulder hung at an unusual angle. I followed her. A couple of minutes later we made it to a secluded area behind a large building.

She paused for a second in the shadow of a house. “My shoulder’s dislocated. I need to fix it.”

Before I could instruct her on it, she slammed it into the side of the building. I heard the pop and saw her face screw up in agony as it found its position. I was a bit surprised.

“How did you know…?” I started, fading off with the expression on her face.

“Shut up. Later. Let’s go. We’re almost there.”

She led on a few more meters and started prying at the edges of a couple blocks in the wall. Once she got a hole, she twisted blocks in the wall, revealing the hole. It was still far too small for me to fit through.

“Dammit. Hey, can you help me break this block free?” I asked, not waiting for an answer. I gripped one side of it and pushed with everything my adrenaline-filled body could muster. I ignored all the burning protests from my abdominal muscles as I pushed. My vision started filling with small black dots from the pain.

The block in the wall moved a little, almost enough to let me through. Kelsie shuffled over and placed her hands next to mine. We struggled. I could see Kelsie’s teeth shining in the dark as she ground her jaw with the strain. There, I might fit through that. I motioned her to go first. She crawled out.

I followed, scraping my shoulders and back as I forced my way through. Compared to my other injuries, it was nothing, so I barely noticed.

Once through, I turned to slide the blocks back into place.

“Hold it!” a voice called out behind me.

“Damn,” I muttered. “So close.”

I hoped there was only one. I considered my possibilities, biding my time. He hadn’t asked me to turn around yet. I hadn’t heard any other noise to indicate there were more.

“Kelsie, is he the only one?” I asked as quietly as I could so only she would hear it.

“Uh-huh,” she muttered.

I knew if he was too far away, this wouldn’t work. Worth a shot. I grinned to myself at the pun.

“Turn around,” the guard said.

I’m gonna turn around all right.

I dropped to a knee and spun around while reaching behind me and jerking the athame out of my belt. I brought it around and let it fly as my eyes registered where he was. The old knife flew straight and true, surprising with the weight of the handle. It buried itself to the hilt in the guard’s throat. He didn’t even have a chance to get a shot off. He crumpled, dead, to the ground with no other noise than a momentary choking sound and a thud. I hurriedly looked around for others.