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  "Fuck you." He said it a little louder than he'd intended to, as we passed a bustling nurse in the hall. The heavyset woman gave him a glance of disapproval, her graying hair cut short in a cap of curls. I smelled disinfectant, pain, and the smell of filth that always lurks under the bald edge of sanitation in a hospital. "I never get used to that," he muttered. "How do you stand it?"

  "A finely developed sense of the bizarre. Plus a good bottle of booze every now and again." The human mind is amazingly adaptable, Monty. You'd be surprised at what you can live with once you see it often enough.

  "Christ, it's that easy?" Monty pointed, and we went through the glass doors to the ICU.

  Immediately the air turned thick with tension, and I felt Dustcircle draw a little closer to me. It was, dare I say it, almost comforting. "It's not that easy. But the booze and random sex help a lot." I heard my own tone, hard and falsely bright. "What's our lucky boy's name?" I should have asked before now, but Monty didn't even shoot me a disapproving glance.

  "Cheung. Jimmy Cheung." Montaigne had gone pasty-pale. He pointed again, with a nicotine-stained finger. He'd smoked cigars for years before his wife made him give it up, but old habits and addictions die hard and he still chomped a Cuban or two when the going got really rough. "He knows you're coming. Down there, in room 4."

  No shit, Monty. The only room with a couple of uniforms guarding it. "He's coherent?"

  Monty's shrug was a marvel of ambiguity. "In spates, I guess. He's pretty well sedated. The doc says not to agitate him, but…"

  "But we need whatever I can get out of him. I'll be gentle." A regular angel of mercy, that's Jill Kismet. "He's one of mine, Monty. I'll be very gentle."

  "Good." Monty folded his arms. "I'll be down in the caff if you want me. Gonna get some fucking coffee." His eyes flicked past me, the question implicit.

  "He'll come with me. Backup." I watched Monty's eyes widen and the blood drain from his face again. He really did go alarmingly pale sometimes, for such a big tough slouching bear of a man. "I don't expect any trouble. But better to be safe, right?"

  "You got it. Just don't shoot up the fucking hospital, I don't need the paperwork." He turned on his heel and left me there, and Dustcircle moved a little closer.

  Right into my personal space, as a matter of fact.

  I took a deep breath, controlling my twitch. Weres don't have the same concept of space humans do, and most every hunter gets itchy when someone else gets too close. When a Were moves in like that, it means they're offering support. Cat and canine Weres are very touchy-feely, and bird Weres have a whole elaborate protocol for brush and flutter. Snake Weres like to get right up into your aura and breathe in your face, all but rubbing noses like Eskimos.

  And let's not even talk about Werespiders. I shivered, the hair on my nape rising briefly. Decided to let him know I didn't feel too chummy, despite his offer of comfort. "Any reason why you're in my personal space, Dustcircle?"

  "Just being friendly." He didn't retreat, setting off down the hall with me, matching me step for step. "He's a friend of yours?"

  "Monty? Yeah, he's a good guy." We were approaching the uniformed officers, standing to attention at either side of room 4's door, which was slightly ajar. I could almost feel Dustcircle breathing on my hair. Even for a Were, this is too close. Get him away.

  I didn't have time. I nodded to the uniforms—Tom Scarper, a good cop, and his partner Ramon, both guys I remembered from their rookie class with me—and accepted their quiet murmurs of welcome. Even foul-mouthed Fuckitall-Ramon looked serious, his dark eyebrows drawn together.

  Then I was through the door, the Were right behind me, and in a hospital room full of tubes, soft sterile light, and the sound of machines beeping softly, monitoring-heartbeat and respiration, standing their ceaseless watch.

  "Jesus," I whispered. The thing on the bed looked vaguely human, but it was bandaged to within an inch of its life.

  Get it? Within an inch of his life? Ha ha, Jill. Very funny. I swallowed with an effort, moved up to the side of the bed. Half of Jimmy Cheung's skull had been shaved, and a wet glaring line of unbandaged stitches showed where his scalp had been opened up. I calculated the angle of the scar and felt my heart thump sickly inside my chest.

  Not Were claws. Those are likely hellbreed marks, if I spread my fingers just so and had curved claws the marks would look similar. So it was probably our girl Cenci who opened up the car like a tin can and reached in for this kid.

  One liquid brown eye was open. He was awake. His breath hissed in, hissed out without the aid of a ventilator, at least he was breathing on his own. An oxygen tube lay under the bandages that covered his ruined nose.

  I found my voice. "Officer Cheung." My tone was soft, respectful, and Dustcircle bumped into me from behind. I shoved back, subtly, pushing him away with my hip. "It's Jill. Jill Kismet."

  The eye widened. Blinked. His other eye was lost under a sheeting of gauze. I wondered if I wanted to see the damage, decided I didn't. The rhythm of his breathing didn't change, and his heartbeat didn't waver. It was uncanny, seeing the EKG spikes match the pulse my preternaturally sensitive hearing was picking up.

  The Were moved closer, bumped me again. I suffered it, my eyes on the bandaged face resting against the pillow's whiteness. The blankets were pulled up on his chest, and I smelled the sharpness of urine. He had to have a catheter; no way he could make the bathroom in this condition.

  God. Tangle with the nightside and this is what you get. Even if you're innocent. Do your job, Jill.

  "I'm going to take down whoever did this to you," I promised the slack face on the pillow. "But I need you to tell me anything you can about the attack. If you can't, just shake your head. Or blink, or something." I kept my tone very soft, conciliatory. "But if you can, it would help me. A lot."

  When he spoke, I was surprised. His voice was strong but reedy, and his lips weren't bandaged. They were bloodless, and a thin crust hung at their corners, the effluvia of sickness. "It was a woman." He exhaled, took a gasping breath, and I smelled the peculiar sick burning scent of the human body struggling to cope with damage.

  "They radioed, said they'd seen something by the side of the road—a dog, or something. Coyote. But wrong. By the time we got there…" A slight cough, and I eyed his IVs. He was on morphine, which explained the dreamy tone and his lack of affect. "She came right through the windshield. Tore… the top of the car open. So quick. And quiet, nothing but the metal screaming…"

  "What did she look like?" I pitched my voice low, respectful.

  "Blonde. Pretty. Red eyes." His own eye closed briefly. Opened wide. "She was going to kill me, but it scrambled over the hood. She went after it."

  My breath caught. "It?" Coyote? Dog? A canine Were, stuck between human and animal form? Likely, but don't make assumptions, Jill. This is tenuous enough.

  But there was no more. His eye drifted closed again, and the rhythm of beeping from the machines smoothed out.

  Gone into the dark depths, just like a submarine sinking.

  Blonde. Pretty. Red eyes. The glow of a maddened hellbreed? It meant she wasn't a Trader, their eyes didn't change, just acquired the flat dusty shine.

  Besides, no Trader could have fought off both me and Harp. It wasn't possible. Still, I felt a thin thread of unease, and was glad I'd received at least one hard piece of information to hang that assumption on.

  I reached down. Mikhail's ring glinted on my left hand. My middle two fingers touched the rough gauze over his hand, then the very edge of one knuckle showing through the swathed white and the bumps of the IV. His skin was cold, inert.

  "I promise," I whispered. "I'm on the job. Rest easy."

  There was no reply. I took my hand back, straightening, and bumped into Dustcircle again, acutely aware of how much taller than me he was. Dammit. What's he doing? I half-turned, pushing past him and heading for the door; I had to damn near ooze around him, he stood so still. My heart lodged in my throat as he tur
ned to follow me, each move as graceful as a dance.

  Outside, the Were left the door ajar again, fluorescent light glowing in his dark hair. I nodded at Ramon, the obstruction in my throat turning dry and massive.

  Scarper's cheeks flushed under his stubble. "Hell of a thing," he said, the words falling dead in the corridor.

  "Yeah. Hell of a thing." My voice didn't seem to want to work quite properly either.

  "Gonna fuckin' get 'em, Jill?" This from Ramon, whose dark eyes were bright with unspecified emotion.

  I met his gaze, and for once someone didn't flinch when I looked at them. "Of course I am. Nobody fucks with cops in my town and gets away with it, gentlemen." I turned on my heel and stalked away, almost tripping as Dustcircle moved in close again.

  I waited until we reached the end of the hall to bring it up. "What the hell are you doing?"

  "Just being friendly," he repeated, his steps matching mine. "You take this seriously, don't you."

  You have got to be kidding. "Is there any other way to take it? I'm a hunter, this is my town. Aren't Werecougars territorial?" And what the fuck do you care anyway, country boy?

  "About some things." He was still too close, his warmth brushing my coat.

  I rubbed at my right wrist, delicately avoiding the scar's pucker. It throbbed uneasily, reacting to the spill of pain and grief in the air. Give him something a Were would understand. "They're my people. Nobody messes with them and gets away with it."

  He eased off a bit, giving me a few inches of space that felt damn wide by then. "What's next?"

  My lungs filled, a deep breath like a sigh mixing his smell and my own, plus the comforting, ever-present aroma of leather from my coat. "Next I drop by the warehouse and our local Sanctuary to pick some things up, and as soon as dusk hits I go out to torch a few holes."

  "Sounds like fun." Was that amusement in his voice?

  It felt like he was getting really personal, but it just could have been some Rez Were custom I didn't know about.

  "Lots of blood and screaming, severed limbs—the usual." I sighed, and moved away as he homed in on my personal space again. It took a half-skipping motion that looked awkward, my coat swirling, but he quit trying to plaster himself to me. "Lucky you. You get to wait in the car. Now quit rubbing on me."

  Chapter Fifteen

  Galina held up a handful of thin silver bracelets, her soft green cat-tilted eyes troubled under her dark bangs. She looked like a thirties film star, between her paleness and the marcel waves in her sleek hair. "You want to try these, Jill?"

  I swept four hinged copper cuffs off the counter and into my largest pocket, laying down a fifty-dollar bill. Eyed the chiming bracelets speculatively. They were blessed, I could see the clean blue glow running just under the surface of the silver, spilling out into the ether. "You think they might hold up better? The copper's taking a chunk out of both of us."

  Westering sunlight fell through the high windows of the small shop. Galina lived up on the second floor, and very rarely left these four walls. Sanctuaries are tied to their particular houses; it's the bargain they make. They finish their training, settle, and drive roots in deep; a Sanctuary's house is well-nigh invulnerable. If they're caught out in the open, several nightside species consider them a tasty snack.

  For all that, the local Sanctuary is where hunters, Weres, and other nightsiders go for supplies—silver, icons, bullets, other things—and gossip. Name it, and your local Sane can get it for you. If your credit's good, that is—

  and if you haven't been too irritating lately. And lots of Weres or hunters will smack you down hard if you're caught messing with a Sane.

  Sancs have a lot of discretion once the Order finishes training them, and if you start trouble inside one of their houses you'll be on your ass in seconds flat. The sorcery they use is weak out in the world, but inside the confines of their own Houses, Sanctuary's will is law.

  Sancs most often die old in bed after a few hundred years. Hunters don't.

  Galina shrugged, her smile flashing for a moment as the sun picked out highlights in her hair. Saul had busied himself in the corner, playing with the Were toys—drums, claw-shaped knives, feathers and other bits for making amulets and fetishes.

  "If it'll help you with that thing, I'll import it until the cows come home. But I get these—" The silver chimed in her hand, responding as the walls of her house creaked a little, fluxing in answer to her smile. "—from Mexico; they're cheap and readily available. I can even make them, if I have to. They might corrode less easily, too."

  The glassed-in counter between us was full of little trinkets: Saint medals—Anthony, Jude, and Andrew, as well as George and Catherine—all specially blessed by Father Guillermo over at Sacred Grace, who had a dispensation from the Vatican to use some of the… ah, older blessings. Small stuffed alligators yawned, and a collection of rock-crystal scrying orbs glittered under the golden light.

  Galina is slim and even smaller than me, her short stature belied by the shifting cloak of red-gold energy that is a Sanctuary's trademark. She wore the traditional gray, a tunic-top and a pair of bleached jeans, but was as usual barefoot. A silver pendant with the mark of the Order—a quartered circle inside a serpent's curve—winked at her throat.

  I took one of the thin hinged bracelets. If I wear more than one to cover the scar, it'll make a hell of a lot of noise when they tap together. But if it works, I might have her make me a cuff. "Well, let's see." I snapped it shut over my wrist, held my hand out, and shook it a little to make the bracelet fall against the scar's ridged pucker.

  An amazing jolt of pain leveled me to my knees, Galina's short blurt of surprise echoing uneasily against the walls.

  The defenses on the building sprang into humming alertness, but I could have cared less, my arm was on fire, as if I'd just stuck it in an oven and the flesh was crisping all the way down to the bone. I fell over, scrabbling at the silver with my other hand, but the hinge had locked, silver ground against the scar and I let out a sharp cry as the pain spilled down my chest, reaching for my heart with clumsy clawed fingers.

  Abruptly the pain receded, hot thick tears squirting out of my eyes. I exhaled, blinked, and found myself flat on the floor, Saul Dustcircle crouching next to me. His fingers locked around my wrist, the silver bracelet—

  curled like paper in a hot fire—was busted open in his other hand.

  "Jesus," I whispered.

  His eyes were very dark, and they held mine for a moment. He didn't ask a single question, just turned my wrist up and looked at the scar, his eyebrows drawing together.

  Shame boiled up inside me, hot and vicious. Galina arrived, having vaulted the counter; she slid her arm under my shoulders and helped me sit up. "Christ, Jill, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, my God, are you all right?" The defenses settled back into their humming, and I was grateful for that. Triggering a Sanctuary defense would make the pain from my arm seem like a cakewalk.

  "F-fine." I tried to yank my wrist out of Saul's hand. His fingers bit down, a Were reflex, but I tore free, dispelling the urge to examine my arm and make sure I wasn't burned. My nerves twitched and screamed. "That was interesting." The words rode a breathy scree of air.

  "Are you okay? Do you need to sit down, a glass of water, anything?" Galina was close to tears, her eyes glimmering and pale now. "I didn't think it would do that. Honest, I didn't."

  Jesus, Galina, I know. "No worries." I sounded shaky even to myself, took a deep breath. "At least now we know silver won't work to cover it up. What'd you do to that batch?"

  "I blessed it using a Greek invocation to Persephone. An old one I dug up out of some of Hutch's books." She was even paler than usual, helping to haul me to my feet and trying ineffectually to dust me off. "Are you really all right?"

  Saul rose gracefully, holding the bracelet. It had twisted into a tight little corkscrew and sang a thin little note of stress before it stopped quivering. I didn't blame it, I felt the same way.

  G
oddamn. Well, let's call that an experiment and chalk it up to experience. All hail Jill Kismet the scientist.

  I shook my hands out. The pain had vanished, leaving me weak-kneed and a little sweaty. "Fine. It was just a jolt, that's all." And I hope nobody finds out about this, because having someone do that to me for torture would be unpleasant at best. "I'll stick with the copper for now. We'll think of something."

  "I'm sorry." She really was contrite. Galina was a gentle soul, when all was said and done. It was why she was a Sanctuary. The Order is concerned with preservation and peace; it's a pity so few pass the entrance tests. Human nature, I guess.

  "Don't worry." A sudden idea struck me. "Can you bless all the silver for my bullets like that? It's heap powerful mojo."

  Her sleek hair brushed forward over her shoulders as she nodded. "I can do that. How much do you need?" She didn't mention what any fool could see: I was wearing my ammo belt and bandolier, preparing for serious trouble tonight.

  If she'd seen the trunk of my Impala, she might have been even more worried. I thought about it for a second.

  Took a shaky breath in, my heartbeat finally smoothing out. "Enough to refill my ammo belt. I'll stop by tomorrow if I have time." Translation: if I'm not getting shot at, or dealing with another crisis. I gauged the fall of sunlight.

  Near dusk. In another forty-five minutes it would be night.

  The thin taste of copper laid itself over my palate again, my body reacting both to the pain and to trouble coming. I was going to throw myself into something dangerous and potentially deadly tonight, and my animal instinct was having a difficult time with the thought. Dumb idiot body, getting all worked up before the fun started.

  Going out to torch hellbreed holes is just asking for trouble. But sometimes asking for trouble heads off even deeper trouble up the road.

  "All right." Her eyes moved past me, to Saul. "Anything you need, sir?" Her tone was polite, and I thought I caught a twinkle in her eyes. Theron and some of the others from the barrio were regular visitors; the Order and the Weres are old friends. Back when the churches both Catholic and Protestant used to hunt the furkind—not to mention the feathered and scaled—the Order was doing its best to protect them. European Weres had caught the worst of it, but those in the New World have suffered enough to remember in different ways.