Immortal Killers Page 16

  “Looks like we’re both going to die tonight,” he said. The dog licked the tip of his nose.

  “Still alive?” The Cardinal’s deep whisper double-voice carried from the balcony.

  Nathan had to turn his head far to the side in order to see with his good eye. He watched in both fascination and resignation as the Cardinal leaped over the balcony. It may have only been Nathan’s brain functions slowing down, but he swore the Cardinal floated to the ground. He appeared to descend like a feather.

  The dog whimpered, let out a deep breath, and expired. The idea that struck Nathan came on fast. As the dog’s eyes sparked with its soul, Nathan pressed his face as close as he could manage. He held his one eye open and concentrated on the dog’s soul.

  “Don’t worry,” he said, though he couldn’t tell if his mouth produced any sound. “You won’t be there for long.”

  When the dog had finished its journey into him, Nathan gazed up at the night sky and sighed with relief. Except the usual feeling of satisfaction and wholeness never came. He knew he had an extra soul within him but it didn’t provide the contentment or the fullness of a human soul.

  With the Cardinal walking toward him, Nathan had no time for contemplation. He would have to consider these things another day. Provided he survived, of course.

  As far as he could tell, he had the use of his left arm. When he raised it toward the sky and made a fist, he felt shards of glass scrape inside his shoulder. Groaning, he closed his eyes. He couldn’t watch. Not this.

  The Cardinal’s footsteps crunched the bones of the corpses in his way. If this failed, the Darkness would win — Nathan would never be able to cheat it again. It would claim him, and his soul would no longer be amongst the living.

  Wincing in anticipation of the agony, he brought his fist down with what little strength remained and struck his broken chest. The sharp bones inside him speared his lungs and heart. His mouth formed a wide O as everything within him finally shut down.

  The dog’s soul lifted out through Nathan’s eyes, and at once, his body began to heal. He heard a loud braying noise like a mule being slaughtered. Then he understood — the noise came from his own mouth as bone after bone reset, puncture after puncture resealed, and wound after wound reformed.

  Nathan inhaled sharply, and for two seconds, the agonized screams ceased. Then his spine snapped into place and he bellowed again.

  The Cardinal continued his approach, his wide grin widening more. Nathan’s arms strengthened enough that he could prop up on one elbow. The Cardinal stood over him, with his hands on his hips and his feet wide apart. “You cause yourself such pain. Why do so when you know I will enjoy tearing you into pieces again?”

  As the bones in his pelvis reformed, the constant crackling made Nathan’s body sound like a campfire. He clamped his mouth tight and glowered at the Cardinal. At the same time, he slipped his right hand behind him and wrapped his fingers around Maggie. He just needed a chance.

  His right leg bounced when the knee popped back into its proper position. The Cardinal shook his head but held off from attacking. Nathan saw the malice — he wanted to wait until Nathan was completely healed before breaking all those bones again.

  Off to the right, a car door slammed. The Cardinal’s focus jumped toward the sound. It lasted only a second, but it gave Nathan an eternity to act.

  He whipped Maggie around and ejected her spent magazine in one motion. As he brought her in line for a shot, he slapped a full magazine in, let out a breath, and opened fire. The power of that massive handgun jolted his arms and thrust him onto his back, but he kept firing. Holes opened up the Cardinal’s chest. Blood splashed out with explosive force. The Cardinal never stopped smiling. Then one bullet pierced the middle of his forehead.

  A soul seeped out of his eyes like tar oozing from the ground. As it lifted into the air, Nathan put another bullet into the Cardinal’s healing body. This one knocked the Cardinal back a few steps. Another soul, this one a thin, gray mist, drifted out of his eyes. But he did not die. He started to heal again as he walked toward Nathan.

  Nathan blasted the rest of the magazine into the Cardinal — each shot a kill shot. Every time he hit, another soul left. As the last one took to the air, the Cardinal reached up and plucked it back. He cupped the soul over his eyes and reabsorbed it.

  He gazed down at Nathan. “You see now how little any of you know about our world. All you tiny-minded fools, scurrying about, worried over one soul here or there. There’s no need for worry. We can do so much more than you ever bother to try. That’s why it is not a waste to kill you. Any of you. For you already waste the gifts you have.”

  He lifted his hand and stepped forward. Nathan’s mind read the arc of attack and knew that hand would cut straight into his sternum. He also knew he could not evade the blow. The Cardinal simply moved too fast.

  But as he plunged down his hand, two bright lights grew at his side. He looked up, shocked at the sight of a van barreling across the lawn. The vehicle made no attempt to swerve out of the way. Instead, it slammed into the Cardinal. The impact sent him flailing back through the air. His head hit a tree and pin-wheeled his body until he hit the dirt and tumbled a few feet further.

  The driver opened the door — Crystal. “Can you walk?” she asked.

  “With some help.”

  She jumped out and hoisted him to his feet. With his arm over her shoulder, they maneuvered around the van. By the time they reached the passenger’s seat, he could support his own weight, though he limped with every step. Once he sat in the van, Crystal dashed around the front, jumped in, and stomped on the gas.

  The tires spit up dirt as she wheeled around and headed down the long road off the estate. Nathan checked the side-mirror for any sign of the Cardinal’s pursuit.

  “Don’t worry,” Crystal said. “He won’t follow us. Not right now.”

  “Why not?”

  Crystal pulled the van off the road and cut the engine. “Because of them,” she said nodding at the red and blue lights flickering through the trees. “Duck.” Nathan lowered in the seat, and seconds later, the police raced up the road, passing the parked van without a thought.

  As he waited, Nathan noticed the blood pooling on the floor mat and the hole in the van door that was rimmed with blood. He remembered the soldier who had been slammed through that door. Crystal must have yanked the man out. He looked at her. She had defied Russo’s control, too. Nathan hoped he would never have to fight her. She was tougher than she let on.

  Once the last police car had gone by, Crystal started up the van and drove away.

  Nathan let his head fall back against the seat. “We made it.”

  “We did,” she said.

  He frowned. “We should have warned the police. They’re running right up into their own slaughter.”

  “The Cardinal won’t kill them. He can’t. It would only draw in more police and create an enormous manhunt. He may act like he is above us all, and he is in many ways, but like the rest of us, he fears getting discovered. Maybe more than the rest of us because he’s so unique.”

  “Then what? Will he hide from them?”

  “Chances are he’s already gone.”

  “And us?”

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”

  Food sounded like a good idea.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  They drove south for another hour before pulling into a truck stop. Settling into a booth, Nathan mouthed the word coffee to the waitress.

  “This isn’t over, is it?” he said as Crystal picked up a stained and battered menu.

  “Never. Larkin and Russo won’t stop.”

  “Why can’t they let us go? We’re not going to endanger them, reveal who they are or anything like that.”

  Crystal set the menu down in order to look straight into Nathan’s eyes. “You need to learn fast or you won’t survive. These two have been locked in a civil war since the 1800s. In a war, you need soldiers for
your army. But in this war, soldiers are hard to come by. They’re not disposable fodder. Each one is a unique agent for the cause. So, when Larkin lost one — me — that was a serious blow. To lose you and me both is unacceptable.”

  The waitress poured coffee into two chipped mugs and took their order — a burger for Nathan, steak and eggs for Crystal. When she left, Nathan picked up the coffee and scalded his tongue on his first gulp.

  “Okay, I get all that. So, we need a plan going forward. We’ve both ditched the tracking devices they implanted on us, but that only makes it harder on them, not impossible. How do we fully disappear?”

  “There is no we in any of this. You look like Jake, but you’re not him.”

  “I wasn’t suggesting —”

  “You think I want to spend the coming decades looking at you, thinking of him, being reminded every day through eternity that the man I loved is gone forever but his body remains?”

  “I’m not trying to replace him.”

  “Yes, you are. You don’t even know it, though.”

  Nathan held his tongue. He even held back an exasperated huff. She could see his cross look, but she did not back down. With what he hoped sounded like patience, he said, “You’re right. I don’t understand that I’m trying to replace him. Explain it to me.”

  She played with the sugar packets on the side of the table. But she also talked. “Just because I fell in love with Jake doesn’t mean he was worthy of it. He was not a good person. No, that’s not fair. He was still in that early stage of accepting his immortality. Makes some people act immature. They think because they can live forever that they can get away with whatever they want. Somehow you seem to have bypassed that whole thing.”

  “When in all of this have I gotten anything I wanted?”

  She chuckled. “Right. Well, for some, the whole thing really goes to their heads. It did with Jake. He liked all the power and he used it to his advantage all the time. But he was a handsome man — well, I guess you are now — and he was always kind to me. I didn’t want to fall for him, I knew the kind of man he was and what that meant for me, but the heart doesn’t take orders from the head. My love meant nothing to him, of course. Emotions like love were only tools he used when it suited him. Besides, any concept of love he had, he reserved for Larkin.”

  “He was in love with Larkin?”

  “He craved Larkin’s praise. Larkin was a father figure to him. The rest of us were disposable.”

  “And you think I’m like that?”

  “I think, whether you know it or not, you want to use me. I have knowledge of Larkin and Russo. I know all the players and their roles. I’ve been immortal far longer than you. I’m a great resource for you. Plus, you lost your mortal life only recently. That wound is still fresh. Part of you wants to latch onto me as something stable or, at least, comprehensible. Except I won’t do it. I’m done being used by anybody.”

  A woman walked by and stopped at the table. Nathan glanced up to find Octavia’s stoic face looking back at him. “I’ll be needing you to return those bodies.”

  He scoped the diner — three truckers at the counter and one couple in a booth on the far end, one waitress, and a cook in the back. Too many innocent people around. A fight with Octavia would certainly result in collateral damage.

  Nathan slid deeper into the booth and gestured to the open space. Octavia remained standing. “I’ve got to ask — how did you find us?”

  Octavia tossed a surprised look his way. “You really think Larkin’s the only one who bothers to track people?”

  “You put a tracking device on me, too?”

  “No, idiot. Russo.”

  Crystal’s fingers dug into her menu. “That’s not true. I scanned myself several times. He never put a tracker on me.”

  “Relax, you’re clean. That van, however, is one giant tracking magnet.”

  Nathan glanced out the window at the dented van parked alone near a trashcan. Then the full impact of Octavia’s words hit him. “If you followed us with Russo’s tracking, then you must have caught him and won.”

  “I caught up to him, but I didn’t win. I didn’t lose either. When I arrived, I found him hunched over his laptop. He took one look at me and ran off. I chased him for a while, but in the end, I couldn’t keep up. He has a surprising depth of stamina.”

  “You admire him? Isn’t he the enemy?”

  “There are too few of us to hold onto the idea of enemies for long. Russo is an obstacle, certainly, but if tomorrow he were to want to join Mr. Larkin, it would be done at once. All animosity would be gone.”

  “Nice, but I doubt it.”

  “That’s because you’re an infant immortal. Once you’ve lived long enough, you’ll understand.”

  “Really? Because I think you underestimate Larkin’s hatred.”

  “Think what you wish. You can discuss it with him on the island. Are you ready to go, or do you wish to stall longer? I can save you some effort, though — you won’t find an escape.”

  Damn. He thought he had been subtle, but once again, his teacher was several steps ahead of him. “I can’t go back. He’ll kill me.”

  “Not if you agree to more training. He knows that you were pushed too fast. Now, he’ll let you stay on the island under my tutelage, and in about five years, we’ll have completed your training. By then, you’ll see things much clearer.”

  “And her?” Nathan asked, gesturing to Crystal.

  Octavia sneered. “I doubt Mr. Larkin will be so lenient with her.”

  Crystal slipped her hands underneath the table. “Doesn’t matter what he wants to do to me. I’m not going. You’ll have to kill me, if you want to take this body back.”

  “I expected as much.”

  “That’s okay,” Nathan said. “We expected you, too.” He leaned back slightly so that Octavia could see Maggie pointed at her kneecap. “You’re fast, but you can’t beat a bullet.”

  On her face, he could see the calculations. Lose a kneecap for a little while, it was an acceptable loss if she could still capture and return these two, but could she do that with one knee and how long will it take to find a suitable soul to fix her body with, and —

  But she never got to debate the idea any further. All of the lights in the diner cut out. Nathan first thought there had been a power outage. Until he heard Octavia.

  “Shit,” she said.

  The word itself could have been a response to many things, but the tone in her voice — soft, caring, yet regretting what must come — twisted his stomach with fear. When the lights flickered back to life, the Cardinal stood at the cash register near the entranceway. All the mortals were dead. The truckers, the couple near the back, the waitress, the cook — all of them had been slashed open. Blood streamed onto the floor while a hamburger burned on the grill.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  The Cardinal held a blade no larger than a scalpel. He made a quick wrist motion and the blade vanished inside his robes. He angled his head towards Nathan, his wide-brimmed hat covering his face with menacing shadows.

  “You shot me,” he said. “You shot me, and she hit me with the van. I did not like that.”

  Nathan could not find the air to respond. Half of his mind was in shock at the slaughter before him. The other half watched the Cardinal, flinching each time that ancient beast moved.

  “Leave us alone!” Crystal threw her glass of water at him. She screeched and her voice cracked, but she went on anyway. “You don’t give a crap about Russo or Larkin. They’re the ones that want us. Stop coming after us.”

  The Cardinal did not answer. At least, not verbally. Nathan caught a slight shift in the Cardinal’s head — his attention on Octavia.

  “He’s not here supporting Larkin or Russo,” Nathan said. He nodded at Octavia. “He’s doing all of this for you. Isn’t he?”

  Octavia looked about the diner. Her eyes welled as she gazed back at the Cardinal. “Thank you,” she said. “I know you want to help me.”r />
  The Cardinal lowered his head in a minuscule bow. “Now, you need not worry about the patrons getting in the way.”

  She put her back to him and wiped at her eyes. Doing her best to keep the tremble out of her voice, she said, “I don’t need any more help, now. I need you to go back to the island.”

  “Back?”

  “I can handle these two myself. They’re not going to run.” She glared at Nathan. “Isn’t that right?”

  “Sure,” he said. “We’re obviously not getting away.”

  “See? They’re cooperating now. So, you go home. I’ll visit you when I get back, and if you care, I can make sure Mr. Larkin knows how instrumental you were in capturing these two.”

  “I do not care what Larkin thinks.”

  The door opened and a young man entered. His face had deep lines etched in from a long, unhealthy abuse of alcohol. “Can I get a table?” he said before his brain caught up with his eyes. “What the hell happened here?” He saw the Cardinal, and his lips wrinkled together as if he had become an elderly man. It was the last thing he saw before a thin blade slashed open his neck.

  “Stop it!” Octavia said.

  Nathan could see the Cardinal’s madness radiating outward. His bloodlust had taken over. Octavia must have seen it, too, because she rushed towards the Cardinal with one hand stretched out for him. The other hand, however, gripped her weapon.

  The Cardinal whipped around from the dead drunk, his blade leading the way. Octavia blocked the attack and kicked him in the stomach. The Cardinal grabbed her by the ankle and lifted high enough to knock her off balance. When he let go, her back hit the floor.

  “It’s me. Octavia. You came here for me.”

  “No. Yes?” He rubbed the side of his head with the blade’s handle. “I did. I think.”

  “You did. You came to help me, but you’ve gotten a bit excited. You remember the last time that happened?”