Monsters (Ashes Trilogy 3)

“What more do you want to talk about?” But he knew. The red winged thing was shifting, needle claws pricking, digging in. Getting ready for . . . well, whatever round this was. “I told you about Penny and Simon—”

“Ah.” Finn lifted a finger like a medical receptionist on an important call. “But not the girl.”

“I don’t know her,” Peter said, wondering why he was working so hard at this. Perhaps this was something to hold on to, a little like dignity. But he also had a deeper reason. Finn was pissed he hadn’t captured her. Peter liked that someone had actually beaten the ass**le at his own game. Or, perhaps, never played to begin with. “Why do you care who she was?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Finn snapped Davey another hunk of meat in a backhanded Frisbee throw. “Whoever she is, she is not a Chucky. I saw that girl speak. She called to Penny, she was talking to Simon, and then she tore out of there, killed one of my best shooters . . . no, no, Davey.” Finn held the plate out of reach as the boy made a grab. “Wait now, that’s a good boy.”

“Even if I knew who she was, which I don’t, why is a name so important?”

“And you call yourself a good Christian? In the beginning was the Name, Peter.” Finn’s eyes were as colorless as a dead snake’s. “What did Adam do soon as he opened those baby blues? He named everything. Put the world under his thumb. Then he got lonely, God made woman; Adam got to name her, assert his dominion, and everything was downhill from there. To name is to recognize. It is to gain access and control. Things are much scarier in the dark, where they are formless, than in broad daylight. I just want to bring her into the light, that’s all.”

Access? It was like Finn was talking about hacking a computer’s hard drive. Not such a stretch, maybe. Say carrot, and the image, the taste, maybe the smell, popped into your head. So did memories. So a name would be like . . . a password? Into the brain?

This was begging for a brain bomb, but he couldn’t resist. “You scared of her, Finn?”

“I’m interested.”

Yeah, I’ll bet you are. The way dogs reacted to her always bothered him. Now Peter wondered if she had been Changing into something very odd all along. Perhaps Chris made the same choice Peter and the Council had for all the other kids: chased her out before she could be killed. Or she might’ve only run. But what finally helped him understand just how unique she was came when he saw what Finn had: she talked . . . and Simon had listened. At some level, Simon understood; Peter saw it in his posture. Then, Simon touched her face—and she let it happen. She gave Simon that moment. So there was something there, all right. They were working together, helping each other. There was a bond, and what the hell was that about? Because, God, did this mean that Simon might come back? Or was Simon what Finn said he was: very different, a one-in-a-million fluke, a Changed with a foot in both worlds?

And she hid, somehow. There was no way she could’ve killed the hunter and still run fast enough to get away. She was nearby and Finn still couldn’t get his fingernails under her. Davey couldn’t track her. So how did she do it?

“Sorry,” he said, although his throat was balky. “Can’t help you. Don’t know her.”

“Mmm-hmm. Thought you might say that.” Placing the dish of meat on the camp table, Finn reached into a breast pocket. “I keep forgetting that you are a much more effective weapon against yourself than I or anyone could ever be,” Finn said, carefully cleaning blood from each finger with a linen kerchief. “Remember: I can give and take, Peter.” Folding the kerchief into thirds, Finn tucked the cloth back into his pocket. “Give”—Finn’s eyes slid from Peter—“and . . .”

“No!” Peter flailed, struggling against the collar. “No, Finn, leave him alone, don’t—”

But Simon was already screaming.

89

Fading back from wherever she’d been, with her mind dark and eyes closed and body as motionless as a pillar of salt, and into the silence of those woods and bluing shadows was like reentering the world after a long, dreamless sleep. The wolfdog was still by her side. The only smells drifting through the woods were charred timber, scorched stone, crisped bone. Broiled wolf, and melted nylon. But no Changed, no Finn. No Wolf or Penny. No men.

Her bare feet were white and so cold tears sprang when she tried worming her toes into socks and then her boots before tottering to a stand. Using the hunter’s .30-06 Springfield as a crutch, she’d picked her way from the screen of brambles, hobbling like an old woman.

The hunter’s body lay where it had fallen. Only his radio was gone. Interesting. The body could be Finn’s way of saying just how deeply he didn’t care. Perhaps Finn would return to see if other Changed took the bait, but that felt wrong.

Which left a third possibility. The man in black had set out the equivalent of kibbles for a hungry stray: Here, kitty, kitty. Don’t be afraid. If true, that would suggest he thought she was Changed. So, had Finn been bluffing with all his talk, just tossing out lines? Maybe.

All Finn could know for sure: Changed or not, she was the one that got away. * * * Picking over the hunter’s body wasn’t her favorite activity, but this guy was loaded for bear. Besides the ammo in his fancy camo, the hunter had a brick of 165-grain super shock tip bullets in his cargo pants and a small headlamp, as well as a flint and striker, an Altoids tin of char, an emergency blanket, a small wad of jute, and a plastic bag of Vaseline-smeared cotton balls. A seven-inch sheathed Buck knife was looped through his belt. She crammed everything into her medic’s pack. Feeling more like a grave robber than ever, she unwound his scarf and peeled his watch cap. They smelled like old dead guy, but she needed the clothes.

The house was a smoldering ruin in a crater of rubble and melted snow already on its way to refreezing. Of the wolf totems, only the one hanging beside the stuff sack remained. The fire had burned hot and long enough to barbecue the corpse and partially melt the stuff sack. The body parts it once contained—a rack of ribs, an entire pelvis from waist to just above the thighs, one leg—were now in a heap on the snow. The charred wolf smelled like old cooked tires. The people parts smelled of overdone pork tenderloin. All the bodies, Changed and not, were crumbling, crisped stick figures with impossibly white teeth bared in the lipless grins of blackened skulls.

Skirting the crater, she went around to the porch side. No Wolf or Penny, but plenty of prints. No blood. They didn’t hurt Wolf; they took him alive. The blast of relief made her knees wobble. That she was relieved . . . she didn’t want to look at that just yet.