Chapter Fifteen

I spotted a familiar dark-green bag, mine. It was on the ground at the feet of a hat seller who had a small stall at a corner. The hat seller, a handsome, middle-aged woman, sported a tattoo on her forearm. From this distance it looked familiar. With no other clue, I had to approach her. I waited until no one else was near before I said, "Señora, I am looking for the man who left this bag with you. Did he tell you I would come?" She looked me up and down, and I couldn't tell how she felt about what she saw. "So what did he look like, this man?" she asked. "He is tall and has a flat face, with long hair. And many tattoos, including one that looks much like yours." "The magician did tell me a young woman would be coming for the bag, but I did not think it would be one such as you." I had no idea what that meant. "I'm sorry to disappoint you," I said, wondering if she'd be more agreeable if I drew out my knife. "But I need to find him, real quick. And I need to take this bag with me." "It is a heavy thing for a woman to carry," the hat seller commented in a snooty way. Again I didn't know what that meant, exactly. Time to be direct. I got money out of my skirt pocket and handed it to her. "Thanks for keeping the bag," I said. "Where did he go?" "He started off in that direction," she said, pointing to the southwest. "He went in the little alley there." I nodded, picked up the bag, and strode off. The bag did feel heavier than usual. Maybe it was just the weight of her disapproval. I took a few steps before I thought,If anything's unusual, I'd better have a look. Grigoris. It wasn't easy finding a spot I could be private enough to have a rummage, but I arrived at a stretch of empty alley. I squatted and unzipped the bag. Resting on top of my guns was a piece of pottery, part of a broken jar. I was sure it was the one Eli had had in his hand when he was sitting in the courtyard. I was blank when I looked at it. Then I smelled the magic. Eli had laid a spell on the piece. I could only figure that Señora Snooty would have gotten an unpleasant surprise if she'd opened the bag and tried to touch the contents. And that made me smile, for the first time in a long, long stretch. I touched the pottery, and a pleasant warmth met my fingers. It knew me. I looked up and met the eyes of a man who'd unzipped, about to take a whizz against the wall a yard away. He grinned in a very nasty way. He jerked with his fingers, telling me to hand him the bag. I shook my head. My hand closed around the knife in my pocket. I hesitated because he might yell, and I didn't want to bring down the barrio folks before I'd even found my missing employer. Mr. Whizzer's fingers jerked again, and when I didn't move, he caressed his dick with them. What a choice: give up my worldly goods or get raped. I threw the piece of pottery at him without a single thought, and he let go of his dick long enough to catch it. He had quick reflexes; worse luck for him. His head jerked back on his neck in a very odd way, and his knees crumpled, and then he was facedown on the filthy surface of the alley, his whole body all twisted, and he was dead. No blood. No noise. "Thanks, Eli," I said. I retrieved the cursed object from the dead man's hand and held it in my hand, not certain whether to keep it or not. Could it be used twice? Or was it spent, like a bomb that had already gone off? But I couldn't crouch there thinking, I needed to haul ass. Being found next to a dead man would not be a good thing. I remembered the gallows in Ciudad Azul, and I moved quicker than I'd thought I could. As I walked, I felt the pottery grow warm in my hand. Maybe if it recognized me, it would recognize Eli, too. I had no idea how to make that happen, but it was as good an idea as any other. Take me to him, I told the broken thing, by way of encouragement. You can do it. And I started walking. I wondered if it would help to close my eyes, but I figured I'd just walk into a wall. I started to turn left, just to see what would happen . . . feel what would happen. Wrongness happened. Like when I'd been driving the car after the kidnappers. Okay, straight ahead, then. Soon I was deep in the maze of alleys. My mother had shown me a picture of a labyrinth once, and this was the closest I'd ever come to seeing one. None of these passages were straight for very long, and huts did not sit square to the line of walking surface, which was packed dirt and garbage. Every so often I'd happen upon a larger open place, a sort of square, where there'd be a water pump or a burn barrel. Even though these people surely lived close to the bone and used everything until it gave out, a lot of people meant a lot of trash. The cleaner areas were those around the burn barrels. The barrels stunk, but not as bad as the litter in the pathways. I was real glad I had boots on. The hem of the skirt was getting dusty, and worse. I could feel my lips pull back in a snarl. I like to be clean. But I realized I had more serious troubles than my creeping, crawling feeling of filthiness. I was being followed. The knife was out of my pocket and back in my hand. I'd kept the bag of guns unzipped so I could dip into it if I needed, and it seemed that was a good precaution. Might be kids, intent on robbing me, or simply dogging the footsteps of a stranger who might be doing something interesting. Might be yet another man looking to take whatever he could get from me, like the one who'd died earlier. Might be someone who had ambushed Eli. Might be Eli. I turned a corner and took a few steps. Then I flattened myself against a windowless wall. I was surprised my shadow was a little girl, but I grabbed her anyway. She was silent, even with the knife to her throat, so she was no typical kid; though she sure smelled like the kids in this neighborhood. "Talk," I said in Spanish. She glared at me. "Where is the grigori?" I asked her. The girl did flinch when I said that. She knew what I was talking about. "Why did you take him?" I said, hoping to jar something loose from her tight little mouth. "Sergei has him," she said. "He will kill him if you harm me." "I will kill you if you don't take me to him." I didn't enjoy threatening a child. I didn't want to kill her. I gave her the fiercest glare I could summon, because if she believed I'd do it, we'd both get out of this unharmed. Lucky for both of us, she understood I was desperate. "I will take you," she said, all kinds of angry, and scared underneath it. "Witch!" I laughed. "Soy un pistolera profesional," I told her, right in her face. I am a professional shooter. This girl didn't quite believe in witches, but she'd seen someone get shot. She gave a short nod, to indicate she believed me. "Walk ahead. Don't scream, don't run, don't warn anyone." Since she was leery of shooting, I dropped the knife back into its sheaf in my pocket and reached into the bag to draw the other Colt. She flinched. "Go," I said. At first the girl kept glancing back over her shoulder. Scared I'd shoot her in the back, I guess. She got some ginger back in her after a few minutes of not dying. She tensed as if she was going to dart ahead. I couldn't have that. I was holding a gun and a piece of a jar, and carrying a heavy bag. I wouldn't catch her if she ran. I caught hold of the girl's shoulder, and I squeezed her little bones. I meant business. She whined, but she'd earned the pain. Though she called me a few names, she kept her voice low. Good enough. The girl tried to lead me astray, but I knew when she was turning in the wrong direction. Finally she gave up. The piece of pottery kept warm. In five minutes we came to the right place. It was a little better than the shanties around it; it had been made all from one material, and there were chickens in a pen. I noticed hex signs hanging all around the pickets. The owner wanted to make sure no one stole the chickens. The girl shoved open the door and practically leaped inside. She shrieked, "¡Otro extraño!" Another stranger! Then she spoke in a torrent of Spanish so quick I couldn't understand her meaning. But I was right behind her and found I was walking into a situation I also didn't understand. Eli was sitting in a wooden chair facing the door. His hands were held up in a way that could mean he feared getting shot, or that he was about to hit someone with some magic. To the right of the door, facing Eli, was the man who might be my uncle, Sergei Karkarov. When I'd tracked down my father and shot him, I'd been surprised at how fair he was. I'd even said, "Oleg Karkarov?" Just to be sure. I still remember the expression on Oleg's face when he turned and got a look at me. Because our faces were similar, the nose, the set of our eyes. I'd seen all that before I'd shot him dead. Sergei was another kettle of fish. He was shorter than his brother, and his hair was a rusty brown. He was a lot less good looking, too. He held a gun in his hand, an ancient revolver, and he spared me only one quick glance. Sergei saw Eli as a bigger threat. I thought of what had happened to the man in the alley. Maybe Sergei was right. "Who are you?" Sergei asked me in accented English. "I saw you shoot—" "I'm your niece," I said very quickly in Spanish. If Eli hadn't already figured it out, I might buy a little time. "No!" Sergei replied in Spanish, pretending to be shocked. "My brother had another bastard?" The word didn't shock me. I'd been called that by other children often enough. I took one large step and stood between Eli and him. "It's okay, Gunnie," Eli said from behind me, oozing calm. "You can stand behind me. This man and I are just talking." I felt a puff of disappointment at not getting to kill another Karkarov, but I did as he'd suggested. I was careful not to turn my back on Sergei. The hut had one room and basic furniture: a little table, two small beds, a camp stove. "What happened?" I asked Eli once I was behind him. "While you were gone, I picked up his scent," Eli said. "And you didn't wait for me," I said, trying to sound calm, like Eli. Now that I'd found him alive, I really wanted to hit him in the head. "I thought the track would get too faint," he said. "I knew you'd follow me." "I saw my gun bag." Completely by chance. "I asked the señora to keep it visible." Or maybe not. "What are we doing here, Eli?" "This man is Sergei Karkarov. He has told me he is the half brother of Oleg, and son of Grigori Rasputin by a different mother. I'm trying to determine if the girl is his niece or his daughter, and if Oleg had any other children. The firstborn has the strongest blood. Other blood is useful but not quite as effective." The girl's eyes were going back and forth. I had no idea if she could speak any English or not. I thought it was real strange that the bastards of the same man, but with separate moms, would find each other and live together. If Oleg and Sergei had had the same mother, the whole situation made more sense. But nothing about this was exactly up my alley. "Did you ask her?" "Until now, I hadn't seen her." "Yet she'd seen you. She was following me." "Interesting." Eli sounded cold and confident. Good. "¿Cuál es su nombre?" I asked my uncle. What is her name? "Su nombre es Felicia," he said. "¿Es la hija de Oleg?" Is she Oleg's daughter? And I was glad that, since I was behind Eli, my grigori couldn't see my expression when Sergei said in Spanish, "Why? Are you going to shoot her like you shot him?" "This gentleman wants to talk to Felicia, if she is truly Oleg's daughter." I spoke in English because I wanted Eli to understand what I was saying now. Sergei looked at me hard, trying to figure out the right answer. He was still holding the revolver at the ready. And Eli's hands had not wavered. I didn't know how much he'd understood of the conversation, since there had been a lot of Spanish and a lot of tension, but he realized that the child's parentage was in question. "I need to talk about this girl's future," Eli said, to prod Sergei into an answer. This weird standoff had to end. I was trying to weigh the problem a gunshot would cause us against the itch to kill Sergei. Or I could throw the rock at him . . . if only I knew what the consequences would be. Would it blow him up? Would we get caught in the boom? Felicia was just inside the door, her back to it, looking from one of us to another with a lot of fear. The door behind Felicia opened, and I had a sliver of time to think, A neighbor's come to check. But it was Paulina. "Felicia, move," I said urgently, and she understood my alarm if not my words. She jumped to her left, glanced behind her, and screamed. I just about did the same. The thing that had been Paulina was stained with blood and dust, her gummy eyes staring out of a parched face, her fingers ripped and torn. My gun was up and ready. Sergei's revolver was trained on her, too, but I don't think he knew he'd pointed it at her. He was stumbling backward to get farther away, as much as he could in the small room. Eli said uncertainly, "Paulina?" He didn't know if he'd buried her under the rocks while she was alive, or if this was a revenant. But I knew. My gun was out instantly. I shot her straightaway. I shot her five times. It was hard to aim because of the girl and Sergei, but I got her each time. She fell to the floor. Eli yelled, "No!" I don't know if he was telling me not to shoot (too late on that one), or if he was protesting Paulina's ghastly appearance. The thing that used to be Paulina kept struggling to roll over so she could crawl to Eli. I didn't know if she wanted to hug him or kill him. I was betting she was aiming to kill him, since that seemed to be the theme of this trip. Eli seemed stuck to his chair, so I circled it as I reached under my skirt to draw out another pistol with a full clip. I stood between him and the thing. Since it was still twitching, I fired into its head. It quit moving. I'd settled it. I took a deep breath in, expelled it. Felt calmer. The child, Felicia, was backed against a wall, her hands balled up and pushed against her mouth. Sergei was wide eyed and speechless, his mouth hanging open from shock. Eli's eyes were wide open. Tears were rolling down his cheeks. He didn't seem aware of anything around him. I was disappointed, because Eli had been showing some grit. I reminded myself he'd seen what he thought was his dead brother a couple of days ago, and he'd seen his dead partner rise from the dead just now. I should make him an allowance for that. A man's voice called from outside, "Sergei! What's going on in there?" I pointed at Sergei, who understood he had to pull himself together. He made a big effort. He cleared his throat a couple of times. "Nothing urgent," he called back. "We had an intruder. The problem is solved." It was the kind of neighborhood where no one called the police after they'd heard that. To my relief, I could hear the voices grow fainter as the people scattered. They'd decided it was none of their business. They were right. It was hard to figure out what to do next. Sergei and Felicia seemed pretty much fixed in position and quiet, so I knelt beside Eli's chair. "Look at me, grigori," I said, and I didn't sound like I cared that he was crying. He did look. "I'm real serious," I told him. Eli nodded. "That wasn't Paulina. That was the same kind of magic that made you believe you saw your brother, you know that's true. I thought Paulina was dead. You thought Paulina was dead. Because she was. We know what dead looks like. Even if we'd both been wrong and we'd left her alive in the desert, she could not have walked from her burial place to this house without help in the time since then. And who'd give her a ride, looking like that? You hearing me?" "You saying that's a dead woman?" Felicia said in Spanish. She had a shrill little voice, and I didn't want to hear it right now, no matter what language she used. "That's what I'm saying. Shut up." I had always heard sisters were annoying. At least Eli was not crying anymore. But he was not speaking, either. I hoped he understood me, and I hoped he got back inside himself right now. Every bone in my body told me we needed to get the hell out of Juárez. "You're the daughter," Eli said, as shocked as if the ceiling had fallen on his head. Or as if his dead partner had just walked into the room. Evidently, Eli spoke more Spanish than I'd given him credit for. "Yes," I said. "You shot your father." "He raped my mother." "You shot Oleg Karkarov. The man we've been looking for on this whole trip. And you never told us." "Yes. Can we talk about this later? Someone's trying to kill us now." Eli narrowed his eyes at me. "Yeah, I know, that's always." I took Eli's hands and pulled. I got him standing upright. He took a few deep breaths. Sergei exploded. He'd been so quiet. I'd hoped he'd stay that way. "You little bitch, bringing all this to my house! What do you really want with Felicia?" Jesus, I wanted to shoot him. I just couldn't take any more. Eli said over my head, "I ask you again, whose daughter is Felicia?" "Depends on why you want to know." I aimed my gun at him. "No, it doesn't. Talk." I wasn't negotiating anymore. I was going to start shooting again. "She's mine," Sergei said. I glanced at the girl as he spoke, and she looked surprised. Well, hell. "Is he telling the truth?" I asked Felicia. By that time, I wasn't sure what language I was speaking. "Depends on why you want to know," she said. I was so willing to suspend my no-killing-kids rule. Eli said, "If you are the child of Oleg, you can return with me to the Holy Russian Empire, and you will serve a greater purpose. You will have a good life in decent surroundings. But if you come with me, and I find out you are lying about your parentage, you will serve no purpose at all and you will be discarded." That was almost as bad as shooting her, going by her reaction. Eli's tact had flown out the window. He was at the end of his rope, too. "What does 'discarded' mean?" she asked Sergei in Spanish. "Tossed aside," he replied in the same language. Felicia chewed on her lip, while I pulled on Eli, trying to get him to the door. Go, go, go, my brain was chanting. Eli was still knocked down with the shock of Paulina's appearance. (Or maybe with knowing I'd been lying to him from the beginning. Though why he would expect anything else, I couldn't figure. But I felt guilty.) "Give my friend a drink," I said to Sergei, and he turned to get a bottle off a shelf. I could see when he considered hitting me with it, I could see him weighing the gun in my hand against his longer reach and his speed, and I could see him decide against attacking me. He opened the bottle and passed it over to Eli, who took a big swallow, then another. After a moment Eli's legs worked. He was able to move with me pulling and supporting him. He was so heavy, so tall. I groaned but tried to keep it quiet. "Go with us, or stay?" Eli asked Felicia. "You can choose. I will not force you. I should not have frightened you." Felicia gave Sergei a glance that was all one big question. "Whatever you wish," he said, a cruel burden to lay on someone so young. "I will stay here," she said, making up her mind. She glared at us, all bravado. "Go to hell, you two gringos." "Felicia," I said. "If you change your mind, meet us tomorrow at the train station. I think we'll try to catch a train out of here." After a moment Felicia's head moved in a jerky nod. I realized the girl, my cousin or my sister, was terrified of the choices in front of her, no matter how angry she tried to seem. We began to move awkwardly toward the door. I felt like a building was leaning against my shoulder. "It would sure help if you could walk on your own," I said, trying not to sound desperate. "But we'll figure out a way to get it done." Eli stood free of me and took up his suitcase. He left Paulina's bag. I didn't know why he'd brought it this far, except maybe out of sheer cussedness. Not wanting Señora Espinoza to have Paulina's things. My little personal bag went over his shoulder. We were set to go. Then he staggered. "Shit," I said. While he leaned against a wall, I reloaded both Colts. I gathered up my gun bag and put the long strap of it over my left shoulder so it'd hang to the right. "Open the door," I told Felicia, and she leaped to do it. Finally she was willing to cooperate. Putting my left shoulder under Eli's right armpit, my arm around his waist, we lurched forward, turning sideways in the doorframe to fit through. The alleys were narrow and my burdens were heavy. I was as tired as I had ever been in my life. I wasn't happy about anything or with anyone. At least I hadn't had to clean up the remains of whatever had looked like Paulina. Maybe it had been Paulina, reanimated. Or maybe it had been a likeness. "Fuck it," I said, and Eli laughed like a coyote. "You're feisty," he said. "I'm a gunnie. I have to be feisty." "Where are we going?" Eli asked after a few more yards of lurching. I was staggering a little myself. "I don't know," I said, and that, too, was funny to my companion. I was glad someone was laughing. I wondered what he'd drunk. "What did your drink taste like?" I said. "Like fire." "Do you drink much alcohol?" "I never have. We're not allowed." He laughed. Things just got better and better, didn't they? "Eli," I said, having just enough spare wind to speak, "if we see any other grigoris, you have to kill them." It was late afternoon, so we had hours of daylight left. The only way we were going to hide was to find a house or hotel we could shut ourselves into. Eli was shocked, drunk, or a combination of the two. "All right," Eli said, giving the top of my head a kiss. Jeez. "I will." And he did. They came around the next corner, looking for us. They were as surprised as we were. I shot the woman on the right—she was stout and old—and she went down with a gurgle of surprise, though it was a gutshot, so she was still alive. Eli withdrew the blood of the middle guy, a man with skin so black it was like coal. I shot the man on the left in the head, and whatever spell he'd had prepared went wide. It was over in less than five seconds. I ended the woman as we stepped over the bodies. What was one more shot now? I could hear people moving around, and voices calling out, but the inhabitants of this corner of Juárez had retreated inside whatever door was nearest when they'd heard the first shot. They weren't coming out until they were sure the shooting was over. We ran. It was awkward as hell, but we had to move fast. We were the most suspicious spectacle possible, we didn't belong here, and it would be amazing if we didn't have blood spattered on us. I didn't have time to check. We kept moving in the direction of broader streets and shops, the major thoroughfares. Until I wondered why. We couldn't stop now, but we had to talk about that as we moved forward. "Eli," I said in as low a voice as I could manage. We slowed to a shambling walk. "We have to decide if we're going to try to find a hotel, or if we're just trying to find a park or something to spend the night outside." "A hotel," he said instantly. "Okay, great." That solved one problem, though I thought it was odd he was so firm. "Got any idea if we'll see more of your grigori buddies?" "Maybe they're all dead. That was the biggest team I've ever seen for any job." He didn't sound too certain, and I wasn't counting on us finally having some luck. "All right, then, we'll keep moving," I said. We set off, sighting on the streetlights of the best part of town. Eli wasn't leaning on me as hard, but he wasn't letting go, either. It would be great if he could carry the bag of guns, too, but I wasn't going to ask him. He was doing so well. "I don't know how come there's no crowd." Even if this was the kind of place where people hid from trouble, it was weird how empty the alleys were. "I'm sending a stay-away message," he said. "But I'm getting weaker." No wonder he was having such a hard time walking. Doing magic; being shocked several times over by attacks, deaths, deception; alcohol; and no sleep . . . "Keep up the good work," I said. We were steering in a straight line, more or less. Surely a hotel had to be close. Maybe I could get a room without anyone seeing Eli. We could sleep and get clean and eat, all three things I wanted so badly. But then we ran into the chief of the grigori hunting party. He was a stocky, bearded man in a dark suit, and his face was covered with ink. He was waiting for his crew to return triumphant, I guessed. Eli and I were the last two people he expected to see. It was also lucky that he looked at me first, so he didn't recognize Eli for one important second. In that second I stabbed him. But as he was falling, he opened his hand, and something terrible happened to me. I felt a huge blow. I saw the ground getting closer. I didn't pass out completely, which was a pleasant surprise. Lately, I'd been unconscious way too often. But it would have been nice to be out of it for the next half hour or so. I was aware that a man in a grubby shirt was looking at me with the leer of someone who thought I was about to be taken advantage of, and I felt stairs under my feet, and I felt the huge relief of seeing a bed, being able to fall on it, having a soft surface under my back.