<What’s going on, Atticus?> Oberon asked.
I don’t know, buddy. I don’t speak their language.
<Those things out there don’t smell like cats anymore. They’re human but tainted with something else. Kind of like burnt rubber.>
“Sophie. I need to know what they’re saying.” I got no reply. “Come on, somebody help me out here. I can handle it.”
The man who’d prevented Sophie from going out to save Darren — and getting herself killed in the process — finally took a step toward me and offered his hand. I shook it and nodded once to him gratefully.
“Ben Keonie,” he said.
“Um … Reilly,” I said.
“I think Sophie wants to finish the sing,” he explained, as she and the rest of the crew continued to chime in at the appropriate places. “But I can tell you what those things out there are saying if you like.”
“Yes, I’d appreciate that.”
“They’re saying, ‘Feed us the white man.’ ”
Chapter 8
Fucking Hel.
Oberon leapt in front of me and began to growl at Ben, teeth bared and hackles raised. <If anyone tries to feed you to the skinwalkers, they’re going to get fed to the wolfhound.>
Whoa, calm down, Oberon. Stop growling. You can see he’s not even considering it.
<That’s because he’s considering my teeth.>
Okay, I’m sure he gets the idea. “Stop growling,” I said aloud. Oberon quieted and wagged his tail contentedly, looking up at me.
<What’s the meat I get for impressive displays of loyalty? Is it lamb? Because I think I earned a rack or at least a leg right there, drizzled with an ancho-chile sauce and a dollop of mint jelly.>
That’s it. I’m using parental controls and blocking the Food Network.
“Sorry about that,” I said to Ben. He shook his head and gave a tight little smile. It was no big deal.
“Who are you, man? How do those skinwalkers even know you’re here?”
“Well, that’s … um …” I didn’t want to explain to him that I was on several gods’ Most Hated list and that one of them had recently turned me into a bobcat Fancy Feast. Because then I’d join Sophie in shouldering blame for Darren’s death, plus I’d feel guilty about endangering the lives of everyone there, even though they had intended to lure the skinwalkers out in the first place. “We should probably wait and talk to Frank about that. He knows why, and he can explain it best, I think.”
“At — I mean, Reilly?” Granuaile said. “If they’re in human form now, what’s stopping them from opening the door?”
That was an excellent question. Aside from the hinges, plenty of wire bound it shut, but I thought they would have at least tried it by now.
“I don’t know,” I murmured. “Let’s go see.” I flipped my faerie specs back on, so as I got closer I could see the door silhouetted by the white glow of magic. The glow wasn’t at the very top, but it was on either side and definitely at the bottom. “It’s the ward laid down by the Blessing Way,” I marveled. “It starts at ground level and then moves up, starting with the door. Hogan doors always face east, so it would be simple to structure the spell that way. Clever. If they reach for the door now, they’ll be burned.”
Granuaile nodded but had no further questions. I switched back to normal vision and waited for the song to end, as the skinwalkers continued their creepy loop of demanding extra-rare Druid.
I tried to squat out of the way on the north side. It kept the skinwalkers lurking over there, since Hel’s damned knife had somehow turned me into ambulatory ambrosia. Oberon and Granuaile came over to squat beside me.
“Now what, sensei?” Granuaile asked, sotto voce.
“Now we have a long, sleepless night ahead of us. And if they start thrashing the hogan again, I repair it. Just keep it up until sunrise, when we hope they’ll go away.”
“What if they don’t?”
“Then I try to figure out a way to mess with them magically without doing any direct harm. But I think they’ll go. The thing that makes their eyes glow doesn’t like light.”
With a flourish of Frank’s hand and a final shout in unison, the first song ended. Frank sank down, exhausted. Before he could say anything, the skinwalkers’ litany changed, and this started a series of murmurs among the Navajos.
Frank shook his head though as they came to the end and began to loop once more. “That’s all bullshit,” he said, his voice rasping a bit more than it had before. He looked around at Ben, Sophie, and the others. “Even if we could be sure they’re not lying, which we can’t, they’d never be honest with the deal.”
<What deal?> Oberon asked. <If they’re making a deal with your life, I’m going to have something to say about it.>
Let’s wait and see.
Sophie said, “But what if he’s alive, Frank? If there’s a chance we could save him, shouldn’t we at least try to figure something out?”
Frank’s voice was full of sympathy. “He’s not alive, Sophie.”
“But how do you know?” she said, her tone desperate.
“I’ll tell them to prove he’s alive right now. You’ll see.” Frank set aside his sand for the moment and carefully rose to his feet, coming over to stand next to Granuaile on the north wall. He faced the wall and shouted something in Navajo.
I get it now. The skinwalkers want to trade Darren for me. Frank thinks they’re bluffing and Darren is already dead. He’s asking them to prove Darren is still alive.
<And if he is?>
We’ll have to do more than sit here and wait for dawn. We’ll have to try to save him.
<But not if it means giving you up, right?> When I didn’t answer, Oberon pressed for an answer. <Right, Atticus?>
The skinwalkers hissed, apparently upset that Frank wasn’t interested unless Darren was breathing. They spat out something else, and, whatever it was, it set Sophie to crying anew. Frank shot her a look that said, “I told you so,” but then the lines on his face rearranged themselves into the topography of regret. He gingerly knelt down next to his jish and announced he would begin to sing again.
Darren’s dead, I told Oberon. You don’t need to worry about me.
<Oh. Well, I’m sorry to hear about Darren. He smelled like a very nice guy.>
I was sorry too. But I wasn’t going to be allowed to mourn him now, nor was Frank going to get started on that new song.
A sound like steel tearing erupted from the throats of the skinwalkers and they attacked the wall again, this time with spirit-juiced human fists. They weren’t as effective as the bobcat forms, and I had no difficulty rebinding any damage they did.
The futility of it sank in after a few minutes and they subsided, but while everyone else was comforted by this, it worried me. I’ve met more than my fair share of demons and monsters, and usually they’re so full of juvenile rage that they’re incapable of dialing down the aggression until they’ve killed something. You can’t ever talk your way out of a fight with creatures like that, but you can predict their behavior reliably and use it against them. Up to now they’d attacked us using the “Hulk smash!” school of martial arts. Silence and peace just meant they were going to try something else. But what? The ground was covered. The door was safe. The walls were getting there. That left … the roof.