The Dark-Hunters (131 page)

Luckily it started on the first try. Hallelujah! Maybe his luck was turning after all. No one had toasted him while he slept and he actually had enough gas to make it into Fairbanks where he could get some hot food and thaw out for a few minutes.

Grateful for small favors, he headed across his land and turned south for the long, bumpy trip that would take him into civilization.

Not that he minded. He was just too damned grateful there actually was civilization now to head into.

Zarek arrived in town shortly after six.

He parked his snowmachine at Sharon Parker’s house, which was walking distance from the town’s center. He’d met the ex-waitress about ten years ago when he’d found her inside her broken-down car late at night on the side of a seldom-traveled back road in North Pole.

It’d been close to sixty below and she had been crying, huddled under blankets, afraid that she and her baby would die before help arrived. Her seven-month-old daughter had been sick with asthma and Sharon had been trying to get her to the hospital for a breathing treatment, but they had refused her admittance since she didn’t have any insurance and no money to pay.

She had been given directions to a charity clinic and had gotten lost while trying to find it.

Zarek had taken them back to the hospital and paid for the baby’s care. While they waited, he’d found out Sharon was being evicted from her apartment and couldn’t make ends meet.

So he had offered Sharon a bargain. In exchange for a house, car, and money, she provided him with someone friendly to speak to whenever he came into Fairbanks, and a few home-cooked leftovers or meals—whatever she had lying around.

Best of all, in the summertime when he was completely locked inside his cabin during the twenty-three and a half hours of daylight, she would swing by the post office or store and bring him books and supplies and leave them outside his door.

It had been the best deal he’d ever made.

She’d never asked him anything personal, not even why he didn’t leave his cabin in the summer months. No doubt she was just too grateful to have his financial support to care about his eccentric ways.

In return, Zarek had never taken any of her blood or asked her anything personal. They were just employer and employee.

“Zarek?”

He looked up from plugging in his block warmer on the snowmachine to see her sticking her head out of the front door of her ranch-style house. Her dark brown hair was shorter than it had been a month ago when he’d last seen her—she had a blunt cut that swung around her shoulders.

Tall, thin, and extremely attractive, she was dressed in a black sweater and jeans. Most any other guy would have probably made a move on her by now, and one night about four years ago, she had insinuated that if he ever wanted something more intimate from her she would gladly give it, but Zarek had refused.

He didn’t like people getting too close to him, and women had a nasty tendency of viewing sex as meaningful.

He didn’t. Sex was sex. It was basic and animalistic. Something the body needed like it needed food. But a guy didn’t have to promise a steak he was going to date it before he ate it.

So why did women need a testament of affection before they opened their legs?

He didn’t get it.

And he would never become involved with Sharon. Sex with her was one complication he didn’t need.

“Zarek, is that you?”

He lowered the scarf over his face and shouted back. “Yeah, it’s me.”

“Are you coming in?”

“I’ll be back in a minute. I have to go buy a few things.”

She nodded, then went back inside and shut the door.

Zarek made his way to the store down the street from her house. Frank’s General Store had some of everything in it. Best of all, it had a wide variety of electronics and generators. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be able to use the shop much longer. He’d been a fairly regular customer for about fifteen years now, and though Frank was a bit dense, he had started noticing the fact that Zarek hadn’t aged in all that time.

Sooner or later, Sharon would notice it too and he would have to give up his only contact in the mortal world.

That was the big drawback of immortality. He didn’t dare hang around anyone for long or they’d find out who and what he was. And unlike the other Dark-Hunters, every time he had requested a Squire to serve him and protect his identity, the Council had denied it.

It seemed his reputation was such that no one wanted the duty of helping him.

Fine. He’d never needed anyone anyway.

Zarek entered the store and took a minute to pull his goggles and gloves off and unbutton his coat. He heard Frank in the back talking to one of his clerks.

“Now listen up, kid. He’s kind of a strange man, but you better be nice to him, you hear me? He spends a ton of money in this store and I don’t care how scary he looks, you be nice.”

The two of them came out from the back. Frank stopped dead in his tracks to stare at him.

Zarek stared back. Frank was used to seeing him with a goatee or beard, his sword-and-crossbones earring, and the silver claws he wore on his left hand. Three things Acheron had ordered him to abandon in New Orleans.

He knew what he looked like beardless and he hated it. But at least he didn’t have to look at himself in a mirror. Dark-Hunters could only cast a reflection when they wanted to.

Zarek had never wanted to.

The elderly man smiled a smile that was more habitual than friendly and ambled toward him. Even though the people of Fairbanks were exceedingly friendly, most of them still tended to cut a wide berth around Zarek.

He had that effect on people.

“What can I get for you today?” Frank asked.

Zarek glanced at the teenager, who was watching him curiously. “I need a new generator.”

Frank sucked in his breath between his teeth and Zarek waited for what he knew was coming. “There might be a bit of a problem there.”

Frank always said that. No matter what Zarek needed, it was going to be a problem to get it, hence he would have to pay top dollar for it.

Frank scratched the gray whiskers on his bearded face. “I’ve only got the one left and it’s supposed to be delivered to the Wallabys tomorrow.”

Yeah, right.

Zarek was too tired to play Frank’s haggling game tonight. At this point, he was willing to pay anything to get the electricity back on in his house. “If you’ll let me have it, there’s an extra six grand in it for you.”

Frank scowled and continued to scratch his beard. “Well now, there’s another problem. Wallaby be wanting it real bad.”

“Ten grand, Frank, and another two if you can get it over to Sharon’s house within the hour.”

Frank beamed. “Tony, you heard the man, get his generator loaded up.” The old man’s eyes were light and almost friendly. “You be needing anything else?”

Zarek shook his head and left.

He made his way back toward Sharon’s and did his best to ignore the biting winds.

He knocked on her door before he shouldered it open and entered. Oddly enough, the living room was empty. This time of night, Sharon’s daughter Trixie was usually running around, playing and screaming like a demon or doing homework under extreme protest. He didn’t even hear her in the back rooms.

For a second, he thought maybe the Squires had found him, but that was ridiculous. No one knew about Sharon. Zarek wasn’t exactly on speaking terms with the Squires’ Council or other Dark-Hunters.

“Hey, Sharon?” he called. “Everything okay?”

She walked slowly down the hall from the direction of the kitchen. “You’re back.”

A bad feeling settled over him. Something wasn’t right. He could sense it. She seemed nervous.

“Yeah. Is something up? I didn’t crash a date or anything, did I?”

And then he heard it. It was the sound of a man breathing, of heavy footsteps leaving the kitchen.

The man came down the hall with a slow, methodical walk—like a predator taking its time getting the lay of the landscape while it patiently watched its prey.

Zarek frowned as the man stopped in the hallway behind Sharon. Standing only about an inch shorter than Zarek, he had long dark brown hair pulled back into a ponytail and he wore a Western-style outback duster. There was a deadly quick aura around the man and as soon as their eyes met, Zarek knew he’d been betrayed.

This was another Dark-Hunter.

And there was only one out of the thousands of Dark-Hunters who knew about Sharon and him …

Zarek cursed his own stupidity.

The Dark-Hunter inclined his head toward him. “Z,” he drawled in a thick Southern accent Zarek knew only too well. “Me and you need to talk.”

Zarek couldn’t breathe as he stared at Sharon and Sundown together. Sundown was the only person he had ever opened himself up to in his entire two thousand plus years of living.

And he knew why Sundown was here.

Sundown alone knew Zarek. Knew his haunts, his habits.

Who better to hunt him down and kill him than his own best friend?

“Talk about what?” he asked gruffly, narrowing his eyes.

Sundown moved to stand in front of Sharon as if to protect her. That he would think for even an instant that Zarek would threaten her hurt most of all. “I think you know why I’m here, Z.”

Yeah, he knew all right. He knew exactly what Sundown wanted with him. A nice, quick death so that Sundown could report back to Artemis and Acheron that everything was right again in the world, and then the cowboy would return home to Reno.

But Zarek had gone quietly to his execution once before. This time, he intended to fight for his life, such as it was.

“Forget it, Jess,” he said, using Sundown’s real name.

He turned and ran for the door.

Zarek made it back into the yard before Sundown caught him and pulled him to a stop. He bared his fangs at him, but Jess didn’t seem to notice.

Zarek punched him hard in the stomach. It was a powerful strike that made Jess stagger back and it brought Zarek to his knees. Any time one Dark-Hunter attacked another one, the Dark-Hunter who attacked felt the blow ten times worse than the one who received it. There was only one way to avoid this—for Artemis to lift her ban. He just hoped she hadn’t lifted it from Jess.

Zarek struggled to breathe from the pain of it and forced himself to his feet. Unlike Jess, physical pain was something he was used to.

But before he could go far, he saw Mike and three other Squires in the shadows. They were walking toward them with determined strides that said they were armed for Dark-Hunter.

“Leave him to me,” Sundown ordered.

They ignored him and kept on coming.

Spinning about, Zarek headed for his snowmachine only to find its engine in pieces. Obviously they had been busy while he was at Frank’s.

Damn it. How could he have been so stupid?

They must have destroyed his generators to force him into town. They’d flushed him out of the woods like hunters with a wild animal.

Fine. If they wanted an animal to track, he would be one.

He slung his hand out and used his telekinesis to knock the Squires off their feet.

Unwilling to hurt himself again, Zarek dodged Jess and ran for town.

He didn’t make it far before more Squires fell in and opened fire on him.

Bullets tore through his body, shredding his skin. Zarek hissed and staggered from the pain of it.

Still, he kept running.

He had no choice.

If he stayed down, they would dismember him, and though his life seriously sucked, he had no intention of becoming a Shade. Nor would he give them the satisfaction of killing him.

Zarek rounded the side of a building.

Something hard hit his middle.

Agony exploded through him as he was flipped head over heels onto the ground. He came to rest on his back in the snow with the breath knocked completely out of him.

A shadow with cold, merciless eyes moved to stand over him.

At least six eight, the man held an unearthly masculine perfection. He had pale blond hair and dark brown eyes, and when he smiled, he revealed the same pair of fangs as Zarek.

“What are you?” Zarek asked, knowing the stranger wasn’t a Daimon or Apollite even though he looked like one.

“I am Thanatos, Dark-Hunter,” he said in Classic Greek, using the name that meant “death.” “And I’m here to kill you.”

He seized Zarek by his coat and threw him against the far building as if he were nothing more than a rag doll.

Zarek hit the wall hard and slid to the street. His body hurt so badly that his limbs shook as he tried to crawl away from the beast.

Zarek stopped. “I won’t die like this again,” he snarled. Not on his belly like some fearful animal waiting for slaughter.

Like a worthless slave being beaten.

His body fortified by his rage, he forced himself to his feet and swung around to face Thanatos.

The creature smiled. “Backbone. How I love it. But not as much as I love sucking the marrow from it.”

Zarek caught his arm as he reached for him. “You know what I love?” Zarek snapped the creature’s arm and seized him by his neck. “The sound of a Daimon breathing his last breath.”

Thanatos laughed. The sound was evil and cold. “You can’t kill me, Dark-Hunter. I’m even more immortal than you are.”

Zarek gaped as Thanatos’s arm healed instantly.

“What are you?” Zarek asked again.

“I told you. I am Death and no one defeats or escapes Death.”

Oh, shit. He was screwed now.

But he was far from defeated. Death might take him, but the bastard was going to have to work for it.

“You know,” Zarek said, falling into the surreal calmness that had allowed him as a whipping boy to suffer through untold beatings. “I’ll bet most people shit their pants in terror when you hand them that line. But you know what, Mr. I-want-to-be-scary-and-am-failing-miserably? I’m not a person. I’m a Dark-Hunter and in the grand scheme of things you don’t mean shit to me.”

He concentrated all of his powers into his hand, then delivered a powerful blow straight to Thanatos’s solar plexus. The creature stumbled back.