Johnny Bass vs. the Kung-Fu Dragon Cult:
A Love Story
By Christian Klaver
Back to Chapters Six - Ten
Chapter Eleven
After that, Leslie's lessons continued the same as always, but she was never sure who they would be with. Usually it was Map and McCobbe, and less frequently Map and Madam Tyranny.
She made a discovery about herself the week that Map started her on the bow. He handed her an enormous oddly shaped bow at the beginning of the session, and they started shooting in unison at a hay target bale set up in the huge open arena that was their dojo.
“Patience,” McCobbe would say, as she followed Map’s precise movements. They would draw an arrow from the standing quiver with a careful motion, and nock it. The handle of the bow was placed so that most of the bow was held high, with the arrow shot from the lowest third. Up until now, Leslie had proved an apt study, but after nearly an hour of shooting, just as Map did, she still missed the target more often than she hit it. Pick up the arrow, nock the arrow, severe inhalation, draw the bow with meditative slowness, wait, aim, aim, aim, then relax and feel, release…and miss. Again and again she tried, often under Map’s close scrutiny. He seemed moderately satisfied with her process, happy with the release, but frowned after every shot went wrong. She was sure that Map would start hitting her at any moment, and sweat started to make her palms more slippery and blur her vision from trickling down into her eyes.
“Leslie,” McCobbe broke in, and Leslie jumped. “Look at me.”
She lowered the bow and prepared for the worst before she did as he asked.
He held up his hand. “How many fingers am I holding up, Leslie.”
She squinted. It was fairly dark inside, and McCobbe wasn’t in the best lit part of the room. And his hand was dark, and blurry.
“Three?” she said, guessing.
He chuckled and Map gave a grunt of surprise behind her.
“Well,” McCobbe said. “That does explain things, doesn’t it?”
The next day, McCobbe came to her at school. She could always feel a transition within her when he approached. Like a dip in her blood temperature, a cold shift inside her as the Dragon's child came to the forefront and Leslie's normal personality receded. He took her to a bizarrely normal appointment at an optomistrist.
The next day. She woke in the morning with a pair of glasses on the bed stand next to her. Apparently a present from McCobbe, though the idea of him being in her room while she slept gave her unpleasant chills.
Still…the glasses looked nice. Stylish wire oval frames with a slight pink tint. She unfolded them and put them on.
The world around her snapped into focus, sharper than ever before. She shot with deadly accuracy that day and always wore her glasses after that.
But the strangest, stranger even than the Madam, was the Horse Doctor. Leslie didn't know at first why Mr. McCobbe called him that, but it was easy to guess after a closer look. His face was gruesomely long, very much like a horse's. Except the large brown eyes lacked that wholesomeness that Leslie had always associated with horses. Those eyes leered and rolled wildly in an awful combination of human and animal.
Once when her step-family had gone out to the farm, her step-dad had helped move a dead horse and Leslie had peeked through the slats of the barn when no one thought she was looking. She heard them talk some, so she knew how the horse had died. Allergic to penicillin, so a routine precautionary shot after gelding had killed it. It happened, her step uncle had said with a sad voice. Leslie could see its horrid face, eyes bulging, laying in a great heap of dishwater colored foam that had run out of its nose. A horrid smell came from it, like meat rotting in manure.
The Horse Doctor reminded Leslie violently of that day, and she felt her stomach lurch.
Set up all around, on tripods and temporary shelves, were incandescent spot lights, rolling cameras and TV screens. Bundles of cabling and cords covered the dusty concrete floor with serpentine shapes of black and orange and stretched back into the darkness. Leslie couldn't imagine where they led to, certainly she'd never seen any sign of working electricity in this building, but she'd never explored around either. She hadn't gone any further than this room. A table sat in the middle with a motionless human shape on top, though so much camera equipment was in the way that Leslie couldn't be sure.
"Go on," McCobbe said, giving her a gentle push. He grimaced at the light and stepped back.
The Doctor took her hand and led her into the lights, like a guide to his own wonder world. They were reflected a dozen times over in the TV screens as they walked. It might have been expensive equipment once, but it had the look of garbage pickings now. Dusty black plastic or the chipped and dirty glass off an exposed tube and wiring all glinted dully, despite the large amount of light. She could see parts that were taped and one of the screens went dark as she went by, so the Doctor stopped and thumped it on the top patiently until it flickered back to life.
A small table of glass beakers and tubes sat next to the larger table, and a few burners bubbled the contents wildly. The Doctor fished something long and pale out of a jar not far from the corpses head, and to Leslie's horror, stuck it in his horse-like mouth and munched industriously. Celery.
When he turned back, his huge brown eyes were a perfect reflection of the lights and screens, so that they danced like the electric snow that meant you had no TV reception. Leslie saw her own reflection, as well, but it made her shudder and turn away.
Then the Horse Doctor drew Leslie to the table set up in the center. The one with the body. There wasn't any sheet, and the woman spread out on it looked unreal. No, not a woman, Leslie realized, but a girl. A teen, not much older than she was. Her skin was grayish, like old salmon. A waft of chemical smell, and the sickly sweet smell of dead flesh roiled underneath her watering eyes.
Leslie tried to get out of the light before she threw up, but she didn't make it. She could see her image reflected in the TV screens and the Horse Doctor's eyes as she fell to her knees and wretched out her Froot Loops.
The Doctor made another noise in his throat. He waited for Leslie to finish heaving, and lifted a beaker of blackish fluid from the smaller table and approached her with it.
"No…," she said hoarsely. "I'm not drinking that."
"Burrrum," the Doctor said. "I should hope not. It's clean up." He poured it onto the puddle of vomit and a sweet cloud puffed into the air. "I can't be expected to work with such nastiness getting into my nose, can I? I'm quite sensitive to such things."
Leslie stared at him with her mouth open, not quite knowing what to say.
"Well," he said, clearing his throat. "I am told to show you things, yes no? And so much to see, my child." He had a deep baritone that made Leslie think of the deepest voice in a barbershop quartet. So far, it was the only thing pleasant about him. Leslie thought about closing her eyes. Maybe she could listen, if only she didn't have to see. Or smell.
"Is it…?"
"Dead? Burrrum, oh yes. And glad of it, I should think." He tapped his forehead with a stubby finger. "Laceration near the spine. Very painful. A blessing by then. Death. Yes." He pulled the dead girl’s back up, and Leslie could see a horrible gash running nearly the length of her back, from neck to the belt line. She didn’t want to think about what kind of weapon made a mark like that.
Leslie looked back for McCobbe, but couldn't see him in the darkness. Did she have to be here? She sighed. She knew the answer to that one. She tried not to get sick when the Doctor turned her back to the body. She'd expected the smell to be overpowering, but her nose was already starting to get used to it. The Doctor was another matter. The death and bathroom smell was even stronger now. Next to the Doctor himself, the dead body was minor.
"Come, child. We will start with the simplest. Eyes, throat, knees. Important to know about, yes no? What kind of adversary can fight if they can't see, breath or walk?"
Then he led Leslie over to the body and picked up a scalpel. He started cutting into the knees, pulling back the skin and ligaments so that he could show Leslie the bone structure underneath.
"See, think about what lies under, my girl. We are all made of the pieces, yes no? Now see how a blow to the knee affects these things." He reached under the table and unlatched something. Then he pushed down on the bottom so that the table pivoted. Now the body was in a roughly standing position. Leslie hadn't paid much attention to it before, but now she noticed that leather straps on the hips and joints kept the body in place.
He unbuckled the straps at the dead girl's ankles so that he could bend the knee.
"See here...," he said. "You are being taught to break elbows, strike to the throat and such, yes no?"
Leslie nodded. It was true. Besides, she wasn't sure what the question was. Nodding seemed safer.
"And yet you have never done? Am I right? Of course I am. And how should this feel, what amount of pressure is too much, enough? Hard to know, yes. So...come. You shall practice now. And no one.." he shrugged at the captive body. "Shall be hurt."
"You want me to hit that? A body? That's disgusting."
"Tut," he said letting the leg drop. He took a pair of eyeglasses out of a pocket in his doctor's smock and squinted through them. After a moment's examination, he tried wiping them clean on the smock, but it didn't help much. He didn't have a nose but more of a long snout, so when he put them on, the deformity of his face caused them to hang so far beneath his eyes as to give him a cartoonish appearance.
"Burrumm," he said, then nodded at the body. "That's what she thought." Then his mouth split open in a skeletal grin that ballooned the end of his long mouth and reminded Leslie of cow skulls baking in the Arizona desert.
"But, of course," he continued. "It's your choice. You can be where you are, or you can be the girl on the slab. Think of it this way, we don't have to rush into it. For now, we'll start small. See how difficult a leg is to break when bent? But if the joint is locked...notice." He struck a sharp blow to the knee and Leslie could hear a crunch as the joint snapped. She cringed.
"Think of it this way child,” the Doctor said kindly. “We have several sessions to work up to the eyes."
Leslie went to work.
"He gives me the creeps," Leslie complained the next day as she rummaged through her locker.
"Don't say that," Bradley said. Leslie dropped her books into the bottom of the locker, amazed. He was such a continual but silent presence in her life that she was surprised that he replied. She was used to speaking to herself. Usually it was the same thing as talking to him.
"Why not?" she said. She couldn’t believe Bradley would defend him.
"Don't ever say that, the Doctor is a great man. He can unlock parts of us that can do great and terrible things." He said the phrase fast and all together, like he'd practiced it. His face was suddenly intense. He didn’t look mad, but fervent, impassioned.
A groaning of metal made Leslie look up where his hand gripped the top of the locker. He had bent the locker completely out of place. She also saw the part of Bradley's arm where the sleeve fell back. Needle marks covered his arm.
"Jesus, Bradley, what are they doing to you?"
"He's not doing anything to me, it's what we’re doing. Amazing things! Together!"
"The Horse Doctor does this to you? Do you guys fill his arms with holes, too?"
She wanted to look closer at his arm, but had to step back when he wrenched the locker door completely off its hinges. For an instant, he looked like he was going to throw it at her, then he dropped it with a clang. Bradley's face flushed and he turned and fled down the hall.
Leslie watched him go, and then examined the metal imprints that Bradley's huge hand had left in the metal. Easily several inches deep. She couldn't imagine what kind of strength it took to do that.
We have a place for everyone, here, McCobbe had said. At the time, she thought he had meant the center. But now she knew better. The cult didn't throw anyone away. And apparently, what Map couldn't use, the Doctor got. She thought that it might be bad if her inquiry got back to the Horse Doctor himself. She shuddered.
Maybe she'd be better off not asking Bradley any more questions.
Chapter Twelve
A few days later, Bradley was waiting for her when she emerged from the tunnels. Leslie frowned and looked around. McCobbe usually sent a car. When McCobbe didn’t drive her himself, he sent an older black man named Falcon. He was gentle, and very sad, and nice to Leslie. But this time there wasn’t any car.
“There’s been an accident,” Bradley said. “The Doctor told me. It’ll be a few hours before they can send another car.”
“Where’s Falcon?” she said.
Bradley made a face, and then drew his finger across his neck. “On some kind of assignment, and isn’t coming back. That’s what the Doctor said.”
“Oh.” Leslie didn’t know what else to say.
"Come on," he said. "I want to show you something." He walked past her back into the tunnels. Leslie hesitated. She'd never gone in except when she had a lesson with Map. No one had ever told her not to, but the thought had never occurred to her. It was the kind of place you went to only when summoned. Still, she followed. It seemed like forever since she'd indulged in anything like curiosity.
Apparently, Bradley enjoyed a greater freedom than she did, because he was obviously more familiar with the tunnels than she was. In just a few minutes, Bradley led her to parts of the tunnels that she'd never seen before, narrow warrens that barely allowed Bradley to squeeze through.
"Where are we going?" she said, but Bradley just shook his head and kept going. Leslie felt awkward around him since the locker incident, but Bradley rarely opened up to her, so her curiosity got the better of her. After a few more tunnels, they started climbing and eventually ran into a flight of stairs. Leslie thought they were probably back at ground level again.
After squeezing through a narrow fissure, the area changed. The fissure behind them was part of a long dusty wall, though only part of it showed. Walls of rubble loomed on either side. The narrow corridor where they stood was ten feet of flat concrete, with scattered rubble. Chipped yellow letters spelled out a faded “Stand back” on the concrete just before a short ledge. Leslie went forward and looked over the edge. There was a short drop and railroad tracks, congested with rubble to her left and right. The walls of rubble blocked the entire train tunnel. Nothing short of a nuclear bomb was going through there.
"Pretty cool," Leslie said. She wasn't too impressed, but didn't want to be rude.
"It gets better," Bradley said, though she wasn't sure what that meant. "Here," he handed her a paper bag and started brushing some of the rubble to one side so they could have a clear place to sit. Inside the bag, Leslie found two Dr. Peppers, a huge Italian sub and a baggie of Oreo cookies. They each took a pop, and Bradley split the sandwich between them.
At first, Leslie hadn't been impressed, but now, she had to admit that sitting here in seclusion was a wonderful feeling. She popped an Oreo into her mouth.
She felt like she ought to say something. Something nice about the Doctor, or some kind of apology, but she couldn’t think of anything. He finished his pop and started picking at the can, the way some people idly picked at a label to peel it off. The metal peeled away easily and he carefully tore it down one side, picked off the circular tops, and flattened the rest until it was like a square sheet of paper. He went on, getting lost in his creation as he worked. He folded the metal easily into tiny, impossible details, folding it in on itself until it began to take an entirely different shape. When he was done, he held it out to Leslie.
“Here,” he said, and dropped it.
Leslie gave a start. It was folded into the shape of a delicate bird, like the Japanese folding her mom had once done. Origami. The purple of the Dr. Pepper logo flashed on the wings, while the body was largely the silver color from the inside of the can.
“Thank you,” she said, but felt awkward. The bird was also a little sticky. He hadn’t washed the pop off, of course. It was sweet, but she wasn’t sure she wanted a gift from him. Would it give him the wrong idea?
“Should be about any time now,” he said, and got up. When he stepped out onto the tracks, she followed him, out of curiosity.
The sensation started low at first, barely detectable. Then she could feel it rumbling in the concrete underneath her, just before her ears picked it up.
"What is that?"
Bradley smiled and jumped up, grabbing the rest of the sandwich. "The train," he said. "Come on."
He led her back to the stairway while the rumbling increased.
"Bradley, how in the world is a train supposed to get…" but she stopped, because a luminous engine, then passenger cars had slid into view, drifting out of the rocks as if they weren't there. Or maybe it was the train that wasn't there, she thought, since the rubble still looked very substantial, while the train didn't. While she was thinking this, spectral people appeared around her as ghostly passengers and started getting in and out of the train. A lot of the them looked older, like from a black and white movie, and a lot of them were men in American military uniform. One soldier was hugging a beautiful blonde woman who cried and kissed him fervently. Other than the train itself, nothing else made any sound. All the people moved in silence.
"Is it real?" she asked in a whisper, though it didn't seem like the people were paying any attention to them. Maybe didn't even see them.
Bradley shrugged. "I don't know. I found it a few weeks back. Sometimes I have time to wander around during visits with the Doctor." He got a funny look but went on. "Anyway, it's always the same. I think it has something to do with the Dragon, because it's so old."
Leslie shot him a sharp glance. She didn't think he'd known anything about the Dragon. Bradley obviously knew more than she gave him credit for. He also had more time unsupervised then she'd ever dreamed of. She was suddenly mad at him for that, but it was just a fleeting thing. The Horse Doctor frightened her horribly. She wouldn't trade places with Bradley for anything.
"How long does it last?"
"Just a few minutes," he said. "Then it goes away. It's different people, but the train's always the same. I haven't seen it too many times, but I think it only comes once a day. You know, regular. On schedule."
She still had the sticky bird in her hand, and before Bradley could stop her, threw it at the train.
"Hey!" he said, but still watched, entranced as it passed right through one of the boarding soldiers, but thumped off the train floor. She'd done it just in time, too, because the doors closed and the train rattled off.
They were left with a room full of rubble and the distant tremor of the passing train until, finally, that too faded away.
“Weird, huh?” Bradley said, but Leslie was already past him and onto the tracks. She was looking for the metal bird, but it wasn't there
“Sorry about the bird,” she said. “But I had to know. I guess that means it’s real, huh? If it was just an image or hologram or something, the bird would still be here, right?”
"Yeah,” he said uncertainly. “I guess that makes it real. Of course, it shakes the room and stuff."
There weren't too many times that she could sneak away, but over the next few months she'd come back a few times. She only came once at the right time, though. She didn’t find the bird, and when McCobbe made mention once of her absence, she stopped going.
Chapter Thirteen
She wasn't so busy with her activities that she didn't notice what was going on with many of the other children. She knew it was something. Other curricula besides Map's or the Horse Doctor's. Dana and some of the other girls seemed to be involved in something together, but no one talked about what it was. Kids often went missing for days, but she had learned not to ask.
She didn’t ask any of the adults, either. McCobbe didn't take kindly to questions. She'd formed a loose friendship with Bradley, but mostly her own time was too taken up to form many lasting friendships. She thought the other kids might know more about what went on, but she wasn’t close to any of the other children. The conflicting schedules didn't lend themselves to socializing, and she was sure that was by design.
She found out more about Dana's task one week, by accident.
Maurice, one of McCobbe's aides, came to her with an envelope, late in the evening. He knocked quietly and didn't come in until she answered. Maurice was a huge black man, very quiet, but always seemed to have something smart to say when he finally spoke. He was also very gentle. Even though he worked for McCobbe, Leslie liked him.
She was reading in her bed. Sun Tzu's Art of War. Map had given it to her, but without instructions as to why it was important. She was finding the book immensely boring and welcomed the distraction.
Maurice sat at the end of her bed, at a deferential distance. "We have a problem down at Madam Tyranny's place," he said.
Leslie blinked at him in surprise. It was unlike any of the staff to refer to people and places in such a direct manner.
"Normally, Mr. McCobbe would take care of something like this, but he's not around and I don't know when he'll be back. So she called me. I need you to take this envelope down there. She'll know what to do. The address is written on the outside. A car is outside to take you. Can you do it?"
She had a ton of questions. What was in the envelope? Money? It looked like money, a lot of it. Why her? Wasn't there anyone else? Where was McCobbe? Why didn't Maurice go? What decided her was that Maurice had actually asked. Like a question. Something she could say no to. So she didn't. Besides, if McCobbe came back and found out later, she would certainly get punished then. She couldn't really say no. But it was nice of Maurice to pretend that she could.
As soon as Maurice left the room to let her get dressed, she held the envelope up to her lamp. Sure looked like money. She threw on some jeans and a t-shirt, then grabbed a warm coat. She picked up the envelope and held it up to the light. Yep, money all right. She tucked it into her inside coat pocket.
When she got into the waiting car, she didn't know the driver. A small piggy looking pale man with wild red hair. She read him the address: 212 Starks. He must've known where it was, for he started off immediately.
He brought her to a sprawling mansion near the middle of Detroit, near one of the casinos. The paint was peeling off the front and the grass was overgrown. But the walkway in the front was clear, and the gate opened easily enough when Leslie pushed.
When she knocked a young woman opened the door immediately. She had a pale green kimono on, and dark hair set in a vaguely oriental coif, with extremely pale skin. She looked at Leslie with a completely empty expression. The room behind her was richly furnished, with an array of thick colors, mostly golds and browns.
Leslie didn't know what to say, and the woman didn’t speak.
She waited, and still the woman said nothing. The material of the woman's clothes wafted gently, even though the breeze was very slight. It was the only thing that moved. Her expression remained unchanged, as if she had all the time in the world.
Leslie blurted out: "McCobbe sent me." The woman tilted her head and backed up, drawing the door open.
Inside, the foyer was sumptuously decorated, with thick dark tapestries bundled on the floor and hanging from the walls. Incense hung in the air like delicate curtains drifting across the expansive room.
"I need to see Madam Tyranny," Leslie said. The woman nodded.
She led Leslie through the foyer and into a much larger open room, equally sumptuous. The woman indicated one of the many couches in the room, this one gold lamé. Then she disappeared through a door to the side of the room.
The total silence she left behind was profound. Leslie took a few more steps into the room, but her steps made no sound at all on the plush layers of carpeting.
The room was huge, with ornate open steps on either side that led to a sweeping balcony the nearly circled the entire room. Voices drifted from the balcony, and Leslie could see the tops of many open doorways that led away from the balcony, further into the house.
"Look," a dream voice came to her. The voice sounded like notes on a harp, wafting with the clouds on a beautiful moonlit night until the noise was just as much moon and air as it was sound. Leslie turned, entranced, and gasped out loud.
The balcony above her was crowded with floating lights. It took her a second look to discern that the lights were actually people. Or some kind of people. Nearly thirty or more.
They rushed down to where Leslie sat. They weren't really floating, but their graceful steps as they ran down the stairs and across the thick carpet made it look as if they floated. Leslie noticed that the carpet didn't mark their passing, even though her own footsteps left big, soft impressions. She couldn't look straight at them. It was too much like looking directly at the sun. Beautiful, but it hurt. So she peered at them slyly, fixing her gaze on the whorls and paisley of the carpet, regarding them out of the corner of her eye.
Their forms were beautiful, but somehow indistinct, as if her eyes could not quite grasp them. Their colors seemed richer than the world around them. The woman-like beautiful thing on her right had a spray of hair darker than black, darker than a shadow at midnight. The woman to her left had eyes so blue, and at the same time so green that the ocean seemed a pale reflection. A dazzle of brightness here, a slanted eye or delicately pointed ear or fawn-like naked leg. She could only grasp pieces. Leslie felt grey, and the rooms decorations, once warm and sumptuous, now looked lifeless, like a movie suddenly going black and white. She couldn't turn away. She was caught, like a moth to flame. She fluttered in their incandescent shadow, waiting to burn. She felt that a death from overwhelming beauty would be quite fine. Her chest felt tight, as if she couldn't contain the vision, and her breath came in short, tortured gasps.
The warm light that suffused them seemed to leak from their long fingers with each delicate movement, so that it left little pools and swirls of phosphorescence drifting around them. Leslie was sure she herself would glow when she left, and wondered if she would now register on a Geiger counter. If she concentrated very, very hard, she could make out a slight luminescence coming from her skin. She wondered how long it would last.
They tilted their heads, fixing her with hungry and curious gazes.
"A human child," One trilled, a sound like a speaking harp, beautiful and lilting. "Oh, how wonderful! Sisters, come look." Leslie closed her eyes briefly, to concentrate on the voices, then they snapped open of their own accord. She couldn't stand not looking. It seemed like a long time ago when she had last breathed, and the pain in her chest got worse. Tears were welling up in her eyes, so that she wanted to knuckle them clear, but couldn't make her hands move. She was too busy looking, drinking in the sight of them.
"Back," a voice came suddenly. Harsh and guttural after the beautiful melodies before, and an ungainly form lumbered its way through the forest of beautiful shapes.
"Back, I tell you," the voice snapped again, and pain flared across Leslie's cheek.
With a trill of laughter, the beautiful women scattered, like birds, rushing back up the stairs. Leslie suddenly remembered how to breathe again.
"There, there, my pet," the voice came again, and Leslie's eyes cleared enough for her to recognize Madam Tyranny. Leslie's hand went to her cheek. It stung. The Madam had slapped her.
"Nearly lost another one, didn't we, my dove," Madam Tyranny said fondly. "But, no harm done this time. One of them is like a love song, but the whole flock at once, when you’re not used to them, well, that’s another thing all together. We lost a few people before we figured that out. It gets easier after awhile. Like a drug. Just like a drug, actually, which is why they are such a draw. One taste isn’t enough. One night, one week, month, year. It doesn’t matter. The men always need more. And women.”
She left Leslie in a crimson couch the size of Nevada. Leslie was stunned, but could still hear the clink of china dishes. Then Madam Tyranny returned with a cup of something hot and pressed it into Leslie’s hands.
“Here, drink this.”
Leslie sipped at the hot drink and nearly choked. It was harsh and sharp, but sweet at the same time. It burned the back of her throat.
“Tut, tut, child,” Tyranny said. “Drink it all. It’s good for you.”
Leslie took another reluctant sip. “What is it?”
“Sake. Dulls the senses. And what in the world was Daniel thinking when he gave you those clothes? A good dress should cling like a bad date, Darling.”
Leslie’s jeans and t-shirt looked pretty drab compared to Tyranny’s form fitting scarlet sleeve, but Leslie felt more comfortable. She didn’t say anything, just finished the small cup with a sour face and gave Tyranny back the cup. Her face felt flushed and her head felt fuzzy.
Madam Tyranny gave Leslie a few minutes to get her senses back, then helped Leslie to her feet. “I'm glad you're here, duckling. It’s time you saw something of my establishment."
Leslie tried to see more of the creatures on the balcony, but the Madam pulled her stumbling out of the room. Madam Tyranny led her through a hallway, and up another flight of stairs and down a long heavily carpeted hallway. It seemed the whole house was decorated with wall to ceiling to wall carpet, as if you might want to frolic and roll around the whole place. It also made a barrier of sound. You could set off a bomb in here, and the carpets would suck every bit of noise so that nothing could escape. Leslie wondered if there might be a critical density of carpet that would swallow people up, too. The long hallway was filled with doors, dozens of them on both sides. They were all ornately carved wood, oak or ash or others Leslie didn’t know. Each one was carved with beautiful pictures: unicorns, fanciful birds in flight, thistle, ivy, mushrooms and farie webs. Each one was unique. Leslie thought this was a good thing, and probably deliberate. It would be very hard otherwise to find the room you were looking for.
"I want you to see this, Leslie," the Madam said, as she slid open one of the doors. This one was carved with a beautiful rainbow.
The room inside was tiny, practically a hallway, filled with three overstuffed leather chairs. To their left, the wall was made entirely of glass. It looked into a much larger room.
She blanched in shock at what she saw.
Two women were attending to a man that hung from the ceiling. He was naked, facing away from the glass. One of the women was kneeling before him with her face pressed to his lap, but thankfully, his body blocked the view. Watching the other woman was worse though, because she was taking a staple gun and snapping staples into the man's bare back. His wrists were bound above him, and his hands twitched in their restraints as the women worked him over. Leslie looked in horror at the huge amount of blood everywhere. On the floor, covering the staple gun and dripping from the kneeling girl's golden hair.
The kneeling woman leaned back to say something, so that Leslie could see her face. Dana. From the center. Dana laughed, though Leslie couldn't hear it through the glass. She said something with a smirk, and the other woman passed her the staple gun. Dana starting stapling the man’s stomach, then moved lower. It seemed the cult had uses for everyone. Dana's natural cruelty must have been a good asset to the Madam. The glass must've been one way. Neither of the girls had reacted to Leslie and the Madam's entrance.
"We spoke largely about tension, last time, Leslie. How much you can stretch a man before he breaks. They talk of breaking people, but of course what you really want is to stretch them, and keep stretching them, eternally stretching them. You have to learn every man's limit. For most, an amputation would just make them pass out. The staple gun is perfect in this case. Great shock value, but it doesn't hurt as much as you'd think. And there is no escape, no passing out, no rest. Just more and more and more. The break is the escape. Do you understand?" The Madam grabbed a handful of Leslie's hair in a savage terrier's grip and twisted so that she could peer down into Leslie's upturned face. She shoved her face close enough to almost kiss her and Leslie could smell the Madam’s sweet breath.
"Do you understand?"
Leslie tried to shake her head no, but the Madam's grip was too fierce. She tried to whisper "no," because she didn't, but nothing came out.
The Madam understood anyway and let Leslie go as she went on. "If they work him too hard, he'll pass out, or get some other form of release. Either way, he'll get relief. But we want to keep him caught in our little web, without pause or reprieve. When he dies, or passes out, or goes numb, or has a happy ending, either way he's done. Until then, he's our plaything, and we can get what we want."
"What do we want?" Leslie whispered.
"It varies, of course. This man was selling drugs in our territory, and refuses to tell us who he's working for without proper coercion. We need the information, and we need to teach him a lesson." The madam pursed her lips. "Or he's a paying client. I forget. It might be that other one that needs to be taught the lesson. No matter."
“You’ve experience only a small amount of this. You’ll adminster more, of course. While others will specialize in this more than you have time for, it’s always good to have skills, my dear.”
Leslie didn't know what to say to that. Then she remembered why she was here.
"This is for you," Leslie said, pulling the bulky envelope out of her coat pocket. "Maurice said I was to give this to you."
She tried to give it to Madam Tyranny, but the older woman just waved it away with a gesture of her hand.
"Oh. That business. No need anymore. I paid them off with the drug courier's money. You keep it. I do hope you can let yourself out. I have business I must get back to. A common friend we both have." She smiled lewdly and gave Leslie an exaggerated sly wink and smacked her lips.
She wafted out with a grand gesture, humming to herself and leaving the door open behind her. Leslie took one last look. Dana had abandoned the staple gun and was violating the naked man with the hilt of an Egyptian looking dagger. Then she pulled it out and started using the blade.
Leslie shuddered and ran from the room.
Madam Tyranny was already far down the hall, opening a door all the way down. When she did, multiple sounds flooded out, country music and a man sobbing. She recognized the music first. Patsy Cline. Tyranny hummed along as she let herself in, and Leslie could tell it was Map’s voice. Then the door shut and Tyranny, Patsy and Map were all gone.
Leslie closed the door of the spy room behind her and sat on the floor of the hallway. It was all so overwhelming.
She was still huddled on the floor when she heard beautiful music floating through the hallway. She got to her feet and turned around, trying to figure out where it was coming from. It sounded like fresh wind blowing on the surface of a still pond. It was coming from the door right next to her. Which made sense. Sound didn’t travel far here. This door was carved like a grand tree. Only the tree parts stuck out farther than the door, like the artists had seen a tree in the wood, and carved away the rest.
When Leslie opened it, she found a bedroom inside, covered in delicate pastels and snowy lace. A small girl, about Leslie’s age, sat on the pure white frilly bedspread, playing a wooden flute.
The girl played for a few more seconds before she let the melody drift away and turned to face Leslie. She was luminescent, like the creatures from the other room, but less so. She looked more human. A hauntingly beautiful girl.
Then she stopped playing abrubtly, and the light faded away, and she looked just like any other girl, although still very pretty.
“You’re not…” the girl started, and then stopped. She bit her lip and kept on looking at Leslie, waiting.
“I’m sorry,” Leslie said. This looked very much like a private bedroom. “I didn’t mean to just barge in here. I just heard the music…and…”
“Oh,” the girl said. “I thought you were a little young to be a customer. That’s a relief. Here. C’mere. Hurry!”
Leslie walked over, perplexed.
“Quick, under here!” She pointed underneath the huge bed.
Leslie wasn’t sure why, but she let the girl push her underneath the bed. The girl was obviously anxious. It was a large wood frame, with a fair amount of space underneath. Leslie was even more surprised when the girl joined her. She let the snowy white bed ruffle fall, shrouding the both of them underneath. It wasn’t quite dark, and in the half light of the candles showing through the bedruffle, Leslie could see the other girl hold a finger to her lips just as Leslie heard the door open.
Someone entered, and Leslie closed her eyes and was surprised to discover she could tell a lot about the man, just by his footprints. Map’s lessons had worked better than she thought. He was a large man, almost certainly an adult and not atheletic. The quick tread sounded agitated. Nervous or excited. And he’d never been in this room before.
Leslie lifted the ruffle a barest fingertip, and the girl next to her made the slightest of gasps. Leslie could see dark, polished dress shoes and a pair of tan pants legs. About a size 11. They paced back and forth a couple of times, and one of the shoes tapped in irritation. Then a soft “fuck” came from above, and the shoes walked off. Leslie could hear the door open and close, and the man go out.
Leslie slid easily out, and was to her feet before the sound of the closing door had completely faded away. But there wasn’t any reason for haste. They were alone.
“Help me,” the other girl said, extending a hand, and Leslie helped her out from underneath the bed.
“Well,” the girl said breathlessly. “That was grand! And now, proper introductions. I’m Marisette.” The girl did a small and graceful curtsy.
“Uh…I’m Leslie,” Leslie said awkwardly. She tried to imitate the curtsy but didn’t do a very good job.
Marisette pulled her over to a small tray next to the bed. It was filled with elegant little morsels of cakes, pastries and deserts. Another tray held a collection of bottles and ornate glasses. “Oh this is much better. Another girl. Much nicer than men or any of the other Fey. What a bore they are! You can actually hear the weight of ages of tradition in every boring syllable, if you can imagine what that is like! Try some of these little chocolate looking things, they’re magnificent, and the wine, if you like, but you won’t. It’s awful. But the coffee from your people, I think. I like that with sugar and cream, please, very much, thank you. And then you must tell me all about the outside! This one here is good. We call it Fallallinasonell, made from the honeybees that only work underneath the birch at moonlight. But this one is better. Something called an Ohree-Oh. Delicious. Do you smoke? No? Good. Me either, but I’m supposed to offer any guests some, if they like. But, of course, you’re not a normal guest, thank the stars! Still…it’s nice to have things to offer.”
“Now,” Marisette continued without hardly drawing breath. “Tell me about the outside. I want to hear everything!”
“Um…ok,” Leslie said, somewhat flustered by the girls constant stream of patter. Still, she couldn’t help but catch the girls enthusiasm. As if turned out, everything was new and exciting to Marisette, who listened avidly while Leslie talked about television, school, shopping malls, movies, rock music and Hope Center.
She learned about Marisette, too. Marisette had never left the mansion here and spent most of her time with her sisters. Leslie found out that Marisette’s mother was one of the creatures of light, and her father a long ago forgotten customer. Leslie couldn’t imagine how that could have happened, but apparently, it happened several times, because there were 13 such children here. All of Marisette’s siblings were girls. Apparently, it always worked that way with halfbreeds. Fey mothers that lay with human men had girls. Always. With Fey men, it was always the reverse, but Leslie had never seen any of the men.
They talked for hours, but stayed away from the topic of their jobs for the cult. Marisette was an “entertainer” and Leslie an “operative”, but they didn’t talk about sex or death. They both knew the cult, they didn’t need any more explanation, and neither wanted to discuss those things so much.
Marisette seemed most fascinated by human music, she said. And Leslie was at a loss trying to explain the difference between county, rap, rock, jazz and blues, to say the least.
“Besides,” Leslie said. “None of it’s as pretty as what you were playing.”
“You liked it? Here.” She pushed the wooden flute into Leslie hands. “You try.”
“Oh, not me,” Leslie said, refusing to take it. “I can’t play anything.”
“Pfft. Everyone can. Only most of the time you won’t let yourselves remember. Humans forget everything. But you’ll remember with this. Just touch it. The wood is pure. That’s the difference. Closer to the source. Here, just hold it.”
Leslie let Marisette push the flute into her hands, and fingered the slender flute wonderingly. It was a pale yellow color, bark and all, and delicate. But as she touched it carefully, she realized Marisette was right, she could hear music already.
When she lifted it to her lips, it was more like tuning into a radio station than creating something. She put the flute to her lips and the music poured out of its own accord.
The music was profoundly beautiful, lively, and it lifted and danced. Then she found the lower register notes, and a new dirge-like melody cut across the first one, until she was playing two entertwined melodies for a short time. But the lively one came in shorter and shorter bursts, like dying gasps until it was gone, and only the sonorous tune remained, and then it was quiet and there was only silence.
“Wow…” Marisette said. “That was gorgeous. And sad. I’ve never heard anything like that before.”
“It’s like…what it sounds like when…” Leslie stammered. “When someone dies.” And suddenly she burst into tears. Marisette held her, cooing soft sounds and stroking her hair while Leslie sobbed.
When she felt better, Marisette helped Leslie freshen up with a soft damp cloth to her face.
“Wow,” Leslie said. “I don’t know where that came from.”
“Yes you do,” Marisette said.
Leslie nodded. They both knew.
“You should get going soon, before they catch us here,” Marisette said. “But please promise you’ll come again. Soon? You’re the first person I’ve enjoyed talking to in a long, long time.”
“I’d like that. Oh. Here.” She tried to give the flute back.
“Oh, no. That’s yours now. No creation of the Fey reaches its true calling until it’s given away. I’d like you to have it.”
Marisette gave Leslie a big hug at the door as she let her out. “Remember to look for the tree,” she said, pointing at the carving on the outside of the door. “The door moves, but my room is always behind the tree.”
Leslie clutched the flute to her chest and went down the hall. She had to get back before she was missed.
Chapter Fourteen
Leslie's routine was basic after that, some public schooling, which she didn't take very seriously, and lessons after school, which were deadly serious. When she could steal a few hours away to visit with Marisette, or less frequently with Bradley, it was a rare and wonderful thing. Sometimes she would just crawl onto the roof in the middle of the night and watch the stars, just for some time when no one was telling her what to do.
When Leslie was seventeen, McCobbe told her it was time for graduation. She still had a year to go in school, but she knew what he meant.
This time, when he dropped her off to train with Map, McCobbe just dropped her off at the pipe entrance. That was routine by now. How she got in was part of her training. Sometimes, Map would wait patiently in the center and Leslie would have to try to get into the room before he could hear her. Sometimes he would lie in wait, and she would try and find him before he hit her. An adult game of hide and seek.
She actually looked forward to these sessions now, despite the number of times she got hurt during them. And it was something she was good at. And getting better all the time and getting hurt less and less. She used to feel that Map was holding back during sparring, but lately she'd been catching him more and more. And she knew he wasn't letting her.
But McCobbe said this was different. He said that everything that happened from here was a part of it.
She took one look at the tunnels and decided not to use that way of getting inside. Too close quarters. She opted to come directly to the large training room from the outside, climbing the walls of the building and slipping into the window. She moved like a shadow and despite her alertness, didn't see anyone until she got to the main courtyard.
No games of that kind. Map stood waiting for her in the open. A target was sitting in the opposite corner, a crude outline of a person pinned to a pile of burlap sacks. Map had an unfamiliar enormous bow in his hands. He was carefully drawing and without hurry or hesitation planting arrow after arrow in the midsection of the drawing.
McCobbe was lounging in his usual corner. She never beat him in, and as much as she'd tried, she'd never been able to figure out how he always got in first. As far as she knew, she was the taking the most direct route. The tunnels would take a lot longer.
Leslie entered silently, out of habit, but Map's eyes tracked her when she slipped into the room. She slid closer to one of the pillars, afraid that arrow dodging might be his idea of her next training phase, but Map only tucked the bow under his arm, like a normal man carrying a newspaper. He went over to one of the pillars, and Leslie saw that a large man was bound to the pillar. Map was shooting at his target in such a way that the arrows whizzed by the bound man's face on their way, which had the man in a huge sweat. Even tied up, Leslie thought they had a new student. Then she wasn't so sure.
The man was Asian, but perhaps living here in America, for he had a softness to him that spoke of hamburgers and Twinkies. Still, he looked big. Wide shoulders, stocky hips, perhaps 180 pounds, and about 5'6". Fat yes, but also strong looking. He watched her with panicky eyes, and Leslie moved around to see the thongs that kept his wrists pulled tightly behind his back.
Map grabbed a fist full of the man's hair in his hand, forcing him to rise upwards. The man was mostly silent, but Map's twisting grip forced an occasional hiss out of him.
"We have a gift for you," McCobbe called out from the corner. Map nodded and Leslie followed his gaze. A bundle of black cloth sat in the corner and she went over to it. It felt like canvas on the outside, soft silk on the inside when she folded the flap back. She unrolled it further, and found an array of beautiful weapons. When she unrolled it all the way, it spread to the size of a tablecloth, with the weapons tied to the wrap with black cord. A Japanese Katana and Wu-Shu sword dominated the center. Barbed shuriken, several knives of various lengths, and several other weapons she didn't recognize covered the rest of the fabric, all of them carefully tied into place.
"I don't know how to use most of these," she said wonderingly. All he'd ever given her before were broken broom handles.
"Yes you do," McCobbe said, suddenly behind her. "All the movements stem from actions you already know. You'll see. Come. It's time for your gift." Leslie twisted, unsure of how he could sneak across the room so silently and quickly. Jesus...she hadn't even heard him get up.
Leslie turned and watched as Map took out his smoking sword and carefully slid the blade along the man's bonds. The rope parted easily.
"He's my gift?" Leslie said. A shadow of an idea slunk into her mind.
"Not exactly," McCobbe said. "He's a rapist. He likes little children especially. He killed two last month. He claims that he's raped and killed over twenty little boys and girls. He says it doesn't matter which. He's too careful to be caught by the police. If he leaves here, he'll do it again. His name is Hayama."
The man looked tense, but didn't answer. He stood up and chafed at his sore wrists, watching carefully to see what would happen next.
"What are you going to do with him?"
"We're not going to do anything with him. If fact, we're going to let him go, if he does us a small favor."
Hayama spoke for the first time, in a deep and gravelly voice. "What kind of favor?" His eyes looked nervous, but his voice was steady and strong.
In answer, Map walked over to Leslie and the bundle of weapons. He pulled out the two swords and handed the shorter one, the Wushu sword, to Leslie. The longer Katana he slid out of its sheath. It had an ornate wrap around the handle, and the blade had a subtle, graceful curve to it. He set the sheath back on the wrap.
"This girl," McCobbe said to him, "weighs about 108 pounds, and just turned seventeen. You have an eight inch reach on her. Kill her, and you can go." Map flipped him the sword and Hayama caught it by the handle, though just barely. Map pulled the bow out and knocked an arrow.
"If you run," McCobbe said. "You die. I assure you, Map enjoys shooting people far more than immobile targets."
Leslie gawked at both McCobbe and Map as they left the center of the room.
McCobbe nodded his head to her as he got out of the way. "I'd hold the end up, if I were you," He backed away from the two of them.
Hayama looked pissed now, and not at all scared anymore. "If you want her dead, why don't you do it?"
"He doesn't," Leslie said and Hayama's attention snapped back to her. She lifted the sword in the air and drew the point into line with his throat. "But if I can't kill a fat rapist dickhead like you, then he feels I deserve to die."
She didn't have to see Map or McCobbe's nod to know she was right.
Hayama's face went red and he clenched his jaw. Leslie could almost hear the teeth grinding.
"Your funeral, little girl," he spat and lunged at her. He swung his sword fast and quick at her waist, all-out like a lumber jack. Leslie might have tried to scoop it up, or duck back, but she didn't.
She leapt inside his arc, keeping her arm up to ward off his blow. His sword slashed the air behind her, though he nearly knocked her over with the beefy meat of his arm. She stuck her fist straight out as she leapt forward and punched the pommel of her sword into his nose. It made a satisfying crunch and his head snapped back. Blood splattered into her face and he cried out and stumbled back. She drew the point of her sword back into line as he flailed around helplessly, trying to wipe the blood from his eyes.
She aimed...and hesitated.
She knew she had him dead to rights. One flick of her weapon, to the throat, back of the knee, eyes. Almost anywhere would do it. And she couldn't. It was bigger than right or wrong. It was too enormous a decision for her. To kill another person...it was monstrous.
Hayama knuckled the last of the blood from his eyes and lashed out with a huge swipe of his weapon. Leslie only barely got her sword up in time and didn't have the right angle, so she took the jarring impact full force. The shock ran through her, numbing wrist, arm and shoulder. She dropped her sword a second after the blow and Hayama reared up like a huge grizzled bear and swung again.
Fear and confusion washed over her, and it nearly killed her. All Leslie's technique, the infinite repetitions of drills momentarily lost to the blur of violence. She flopped backwards to escape the shot to her head, hitting the concrete hard with her shoulders.
He grabbed his sword in both hands and chopped down.
Leslie jerked her head to one side and the sword rang off the cement. She lashed a foot into his knee and he grunted and fell to a crouch. She kicked again, this time to his chin, and he fell backwards.
He staggered back to his feet, but it gave her time to somersault away, picking up her sword as she rolled over it.
He looked pissed off, but not seriously hurt. She took a step back. It shouldn't have lasted this long. If she didn't finish it quickly, he would. She'd been lucky so far. He feinted low then high, but she refused to be baited. He was confident, and starting to enjoy himself.
And then something inside of her, something very, very cold, began to uncoil within her.
"Go on, Leslie," McCobbe said. He spoke quietly, but it still carried across the room. His words echoed out of the darkness as if from miles away. "You have the techniques. All you need is the fury. The hate. It's inside of you. I know. I helped put it there."
When Hayama swung again, she met his blade and pressed in, clinching like in the movies. She couldn't hold it long, he was a lot bigger. It was only his surprise that kept him enough off balance to allow her to get away with it. He leaned in, and she jumped back, sliding her sword out of the guard with a little half step back, slicing at the top of his hand. He pulled back his hand with a grunt and she used the opening to jab him in the throat with her left hand. She was in too close for her blade, so she punched with the pommel. Short push kick to the crotch, finger jab to the eyes, another kick to the knee, punch, punch, punch: throat, chin, nose. This was a routine that Map had drilled her through a thousand times. Hayama's head rocked back with each shot. His eyes were bleeding. So was his nose. He clutched his throat and staggered back. This gave Leslie enough room to swing and she whipped her sword back around. Hayama twisted, so that she only hit him with the flat of her weapon. Still the blow across his temple laid him flat on the ground.
"Kill him, Leslie!" McCobbe urged. Somehow he was right beside her now.
The cold fury raged through her, but still it was her hand that held the sword. Her vision clouded over in a blood colored fog, and her legs were shaking. Her mouth was dry and she thought she might collapse any second.
"Is he really a rapist?" she asked McCobbe in a husky voice.
"What?"
"Did he really hurt children?" She had to know. She thought it might make this easier.
"He is a man that was ready to kill you to save himself, and it comes down to you or him. That's all it ever is. You. Or him. That's all it'll ever be. The rest is just window dressing. The rest isn't important."
She was crying now. And a small part of her that strangled in the cold, serpentine fury that raged inside of her cried with her. "It is important," she said. She was sobbing now.
McCobbe's tone was mild. "Is it? One of you is going to die here. I'd like it to be him, but, of course, the choice is yours." He turned away from her slightly, nodding to Map.
Leslie screamed as her leg exploded in fire. For the longest of sickening moments, she stared in shock down at the blood slicked arrow that stuck right through her thigh.
My leg, she thought. It's my leg that's shot. Oh God, maybe I'll never walk again. Oh God. Then she collapsed. She could see a bit of flesh, her flesh, stuck on the barbed head of Map's arrow. Blood had splattered in a arc across the floor.
McCobbe knelt down beside her.
"You or him, Leslie?"
"You can't make me do this..."
McCobbe smiled. "Technically speaking, you're right. But we can be awfully persuasive. You or him, Leslie?"
"No..." she said, holding out her arm in supplication. McCobbe's face was only inches away for hers. Everything was supernaturally clear as he nodded again. She could hear the creak of Map's bow, and the displaced whoosh of air when he shot. The barest of instants later, the next arrow appeared as if by magic through her forearm as she watched. The fine spray of red flecked both McCobbe's cheeks and her own.
She tried to scream again, but it only came out as a wet and hacking cough.
While McCobbe watched her roll around in the growing slick of her own blood, she gripped the shaft of the arrow sticking out of her arm. This time, she found it easier to let the black fury take her. The Dragon's seed grew, and that made the pain recede. Made things easier. She snapped the point off the arrow in her arm and crawled with her one good arm over to Hayama's unconscious form.
Only he wasn't unconscious. He was just starting to come around. Which made it easier and harder. Easier in the sense that when Hayama rolled in her direction and sat part way up, it brought her target that much closer. Harder in the sense that she couldn't ignore the stricken look in his eyes when she forced the broken arrow into the soft part of his throat.
Me or him, she thought, then the arm that was holding her up buckled and she fell again.
Hayama gurgled blood, a look of surprise on his face, tried to say something, failed, and fell flat onto his face. A large red stain crept across the dirty floor to mingle with Leslie’s.
She thought idly about the old television shows she saw as a kid, with Indians that cut their palms and mixed them, becoming blood brothers. Did it count with a dead body? Was there a bond? She noticed that her blood seemed to be darker than his, stained, corrupted. Maybe it wasn't very good to be her blood brother.
The floor was cold, and she couldn't feel her leg anymore.
"Well then," McCobbe said as he walked over. He might have been playing golf, so mild was his expression. "That wasn't so hard, was it?"
"The fuck it wasn't," she gasped, and started to cry. "Maybe you can get shot next time."
McCobbe laughed. “Well, our little serpent in training has come a long way, hasn’t she? The rest of the children are still children to me, but you’re different. A viper, Leslie. A viper we made.”
Map came over too, and he toed the body onto its back. He picked the sword up, cleaned it, and passed it over to Leslie. She took it gravely, but didn't stop crying.
Maybe she never would.
Chapter Fifteen
She had the next six months after that off. A graduation present. She spent most of it on her back, watching television or reading while she healed.
Then McCobbe left a message for Leslie with the school and she knew her vacation was over. The message didn’t have Leslie’s name on it, but she knew it was for her. The envelope had beautiful black letters on it, addressing the message to “The Viper”. McCobbe hadn’t been kidding. The note inside was short: an address and time. A hotel in Southfield, on Telegraph, eight o’clock. When she got back to the center from school, there was a black car waiting for her. It was always a black car. The cult had a pure sense of identity. The Viper wouldn’t travel in anything less, it seemed.
She went lightly armed and overly dressed. It was guesswork. Just as likely, he’d have her crawling through air ducts and over rooftops and she’d have to throw out her clothes when she was done. She didn’t have any idea what McCobbe wanted her for, but thought she’d be going inside and wanted to look presentable. McCobbe liked to give a show, and took a more than casual interest in the tidiness of his pupils.
She wore a black skirt and red top gilt with painted Chinese birds that McCobbe had given her a few weeks ago. Black stockings and some shoes that looked ok, but still let her move around. She wore another shirt for warmth underneath in case she ended up outside after all. She had a long knife tucked in the back of her skirt, and another in her purse.
The driver showed up at school, and she let him take her home. She didn’t know the driver, and he didn’t ask any questions. He’d wait for the next three weeks parked outside the center while she got ready, if he had to. He didn’t know anything about where they were going. He just followed orders. Presumably someone told him to pick her up, and he took his directions from her thereafter. She gave him the address, but made him pull over a few blocks before they got there. He complied without expression or comment. She didn’t know what he might want there. She never did. Maybe she should look around for a bit.
The area was typical of Telegraph: hotels, restaurants, fast food places and random businesses. She walked the perimeter of the building and found nothing unusual. The area behind the hotel was wooded, though. More than Leslie expected.
When she saw movement in the woods, she decided she’d better have a look. She didn’t want to meet McCobbe with trashed clothes, but her suspicious mind wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything there to worry about first.
She compromised by skirting the front of the wooded area, closest to Telegraph. Easy enough to look like a pedestrian here rather than tramping through the woods.
She was slightly surprised to find a metal bridge that ran along Telegraph, but was so overgrown as to be barely visible from the road. To the right was the road, but a small path angled into the wooded area to a flat brown expanse of water. She decided to check out the bridge, which looked out over an amazingly large river that flowed right under the road. It was nearly twelve feet down to the pavement underneath, a small sidewalk under the bridge. All the rest was river and woods. It was hard to see most of it, even through the grate she walked on, since the leafy treetops that overgrew the bridge blocked a lot of the view. Even so, she could see people on it. Six men.
Six men with guns.
They were clean cut, with casual jogging clothes, but each of them held an automatic pistol out in the open. That told Leslie they weren’t cult. She didn’t know anyone in the cult that used a gun. They looked a little like cops, but Leslie wasn’t sure. They waited in an area on one side of the river, underneath the bridge, directly underneath her. They might have been talking, but the constant sound of the traffic right behind her obscured it.
When she saw the guns, a tremble of fear ran through her, and was immediately sluiced away when Dragon’s chill washed over her. As always, it was a quick angry wash from inside her, where the Dragon’s seed festered. It was always there, lying under the surface, waiting.
Leslie didn’t get a chance to wonder why, because that was when McCobbe showed up. A rumbling shook the bridge she was on, and metal screeching sounded from below the bridge. She could feel the vibration shake the metal grate she was standing on, but she didn’t know what from. She was looking right at one of the slender trees when McCobbe stepped out from behind it like a cartoon character stepping out from behind a lamppost. There was no way that he could have been hiding there, in open daylight, behind a 2 inch diameter tree, but there he was. The disembodied noises faded away.
The men with the guns were even more surprised. One of them shouted and they all started shooting their guns. Leslie jumped, crashing through the screen of leaves and snapping branches to fall down among them. She pulled her knife out and opened one man’s forearm as she came down.
Things happened very fast after that. McCobbe had summoned his ghost stick from his sleeve and disarmed the two men nearest to him. Leslie snapped a short kick into the nearest man’s knee and he crumpled. Leslie stooped and buried her knife in the small of his back. She could feel the knife punch through bone. The spinal cord. She tried to yank it back out, but it was stuck. She was trying to pull the knife out when another man stepped in front of her, pointing his gun. Then he screamed and clapped his hands to his eyes, blood running down his cheek.
One shot went off, sending up a small cloud of dirt near Leslie’s right foot, but it was the only shot that got off before all the men were down. Leslie finally wrenched her knife free, and spun around, the Dragon’s fury roaring through her, looking for more opponents. The muddy river slid silently by, and the only noise was the constant whoosh-whoosh of the traffic from above and the slight rustle of the trees in the wind. None of the bodies moved.
McCobbe was unfazed by the attack. He brushed at the sleeves of his midnight black suit, even though they still looked immaculate. Leslie looked down at her own clothes. They were smeared with dirt and green stains from where she’d crashed through the trees. At least she didn’t rip anything. “Well,” McCobbe said, smiling. “I am glad I invited the two of you.”
“Two?” she said, and looked back up to the bridge. It took her a second to recognize the black girl standing there.
Digsy. They lived in the same building, but it was like seeing someone from her past. It’d been a long time since Leslie had seen her. Digsy had on a pair of cargo pants and a leather jacket, still with her irrepressible topknot. She carried a short tube of black plastic.
“Wait here,” McCobbe said, and walked up the path to talk to Digsy about thirty feet away. His voice was low so that Leslie couldn’t hear what they were saying. What McCobbe was saying, actually. Digsy didn’t speak, but just kept nodding. McCobbe was giving instructions of some kind.
The tube made her wonder, and Leslie knelt down to examine one of the men. She pulled a dart out of his eye. It was made of a two inch nail with a paper cone tail, now crumpled. Surprising that it was that accurate.
Then she stopped. Something else metallic lay in the grass. It looked like trash, but now that she had a closer look, she could see it was a precisely folded Dr. Pepper can, shaped like a swan. She could only imagine Bradley doing it. Was it a habit with him? She used her body to screen her action as she pocketed it. She’d have to think on it later.
When she stood back up, Digsy touched the tube to her temple, by way of salute. If she had come by the bridge, the likeliest possibility was that she’d followed Leslie here, without her knowing. Something else for thought. Apparently, she’d been getting her own brand of training. Leslie wondered who was giving it to her.
“Come, Leslie,” McCobbe said. “We have an engagement, the two of us.”
Leslie looked back at the bodies, and McCobbe chuckled. “Don’t worry. I’ll send someone to clean this up. Four minutes from now, there won’t be anything here to cause concern.”
He helped her brush some leaves from her dress to make her more presentable, and led her back to the hotel with an idle air. Leslie’s head swam. Too many questions. Digsy. The metal bird. The train? What did those men want? How much of what just happened had McCobbe expected? Where were they going that he needed a bodyguard, and that his bodyguard might need one too? Was Digsy still following them? Leslie tried to look around without letting McCobbe catch her.
He led her into the motel lobby, elegant and enormous with a monumental marble desk perched on one side of a swath of thick red carpeting. The next room was just as elegant, with the nicest bar Leslie had ever seen, a huge dark wood structure, with the liquor shelves behind it and a wall covered in mirrors.
A neatly dressed man was waiting for them at the bar. The man shook her hand with a business man's two-handed double pump handshake and turned to the bartender. Leslie used the mirrors to check out the room behind her. A posh setting with subdued lighting. The few patrons were minding their own business. Her own face reflected in the glass looked different to Leslie. Pale eyes under blond hair, like before, but a leaner face. She looked sleek and dangerous, at least to her own eyes. Like the feral beast, small but fierce, sharp eyed and wary with dark circles underneath that spoke of hours of sleeplessness. It would be four years before she was old enough to sit at this bar, but no one asked for her I.D. She looked too serious to be merely seventeen. Or maybe they just didn't want to have to talk to her.
"Leslie," McCobbe said. "This is Frank Donofrio."
"Gin and tonic," the man said to the bartender. The boy behind the bar stood to attention immediately, a young earnest black boy in a crisp white shirt. He looked nervous. Donofrio looked like the kind of man that was used to making people nervous.
His suit was a conservative and expensive looking black. He wore a canary yellow button down shirt underneath, with a matching black tie with yellow stripes. His shoes gleamed enough to make the clean floor look bad. He leaned on the bar, peering through his expensive looking glasses at a watch that was probably a Rolex, gold. He wore a thick gold wedding ring. The whole outfit probably cost as much as the motel's marble front desk.
Donofrio was on the plus side of thirty, but he made it look good. His hair was swept back in an immaculate widow's peak, with enough salt in it be distinguished. He had a boxer's neck and a nose that showed an Italian heritage. He straightened his cuffs and perused Leslie directly. Not leering, but gauging her carefully in some other manner.
"Excuse us for a moment," McCobbe said, and led Donofrio away.
McCobbe and Donofrio talked for awhile. They were at one end of the motel counter, an impossibly long jade-flecked expanse that stretched like an interstate highway.
When they came back, Donofrio was holding a bright scarlet envelope. He caught her eye as he slid the envelope across the bar top to her.
"Mr. Donofrio has some extra room at his place, and is looking for some help. You'll be graduating from high school in nine months, and need a place to stay, Leslie. The center can't keep you after graduation."
McCobbe's look told her it was expected, so she nodded. She would like to get out of the center. She wondered what kind of house Donofrio had, what her room would look like. Whatever else she might expect, Donofrio's house would be just as much cult territory as the center was. She knew that much.
Donofrio pushed the red envelope at her again. When Leslie touched it, something deep in her stomach twisted, like her lunch coming back up. She pulled her hand away, surprised it wasn't covered with black blood. She slowly put her hand back and pulled the envelope closer.
"You don't mind doing me a little favor, do you Leslie?" he asked. He kept his tone casual, but they all knew it wasn't Donofrio's request. This request came from higher up, or rather, lower. The Dragon was ready to put her to work.
"Of course not, Mr. Donofrio," Leslie said quietly. McCobbe beamed down at her, the child prodigy.
Her first assignment. She picked up the envelope. It had her name on it. Her other name. The Viper. The paper was stiff and cool in her hands.
Councilman Powers came briskly out of the downtown house, whistling to himself. He waved goodbye to the inside, and someone closed the door behind him as he nearly skipped down the stairs.
"Damn tasty little tramp," he murmured to himself happily.
Something fast and dark bumped his foot, and he tumbled down the last few stairs, flopping ungracefully onto the sidewalk in front of the house. He got groggily up onto his knees, his hands and face sticky with blood from scraping the cement. What the hell? Something small, maybe a cat. He hadn't seen. There was dirt and blood on his suit, too. He groaned. One of his hands wasn't working right. He thought it might be broken.
He couldn't be found here. Not this place. He got ungainly to his feet and wobbled to the Lexus parked in the back. He'd clean up later. Not here.
There was no movement on the stairs as he stumbled out of the light. A few minutes later, a car engine started, and his black car jerked onto the road and quickly out of sight, heading for the freeway.
A piece of darkness detached itself from underneath the stairs and slipped up the steps, nearly invisible. The door opened and the shadow slipped inside.
Leslie quietly closed the door behind her. No one from the brothel knew she was here yet. Often they never did. She'd gotten very good at moving around unseen. She grinned a little at the councilman's 'misfortune'. She knew who he came to see, and she didn't like to hear her friends called names.
She listened as she moved through the house, avoiding everyone, especially the Fey. She knew how casually dangerous they were, and took proper caution.
She listened at Marisette's door out of habit, but knew Marisette would be alone. She was.
Leslie slipped in and Marisette looked up brightly. Leslie was the only friend she had, really, and it wasn't much different for Leslie.
"You might not see Councilman Powers for awhile," she said with a smirk. "He had an accident on the stairs on the way out."
"Oh, I hate to think of anyone getting hurt, but with that man, maybe it's ok. I think he just about pulled my hair out this time."
Leslie sat on the bed
"Here," she said, tossing a sheaf of newspapers and magazines on the bed for Marisette. Mari never had any interest in leaving the brothel. She said it was far too chaotic and dangerous out there for her kind. Leslie thought it was just as scary in the brothel, but didn't argue. Mari constantly yearned for news and things from the outside, though, and so Leslie brought her these when she could.
Mari leafed through the papers while Leslie helped herself to the leftover coffee and snacks that Marisette always had when company came.
"Ugh," Mari said, wrinkling her nose, then avidly taking a closer look at the magazine in her hand. "The clothing you all wear on the outside always looks so vulgar and exciting. Look at that, would you wear that?"
Leslie thought that was funny talk from a half-Fey in fishnets and a kimono, but she looked at the glossy add and then rolled her eyes. "No, but only because it's dorky. It's a raincoat, Mari." She had another cookie and poured more coffee.
"Still…" Mari shuffled through things and suddenly stopped.
Leslie thought it might be another fashion victim, but it was more sobering. The front page of the Detroit News. A family had been butchered in their suburban homes, and it had hit all the papers.
"How horrible…" Mari said, then tried to hide the paper and wouldn't meet Leslie's eye for a second.
It was unusual for Mari to be self conscious. It caught Leslie's attention.
"What?" Leslie said.
Mari looked awkward. "Well, the paper here says it was a killing of some sort, and I was afraid…you know…it might be a client of yours. I didn't want to say anything."
"Oh," Leslie said. "No." Leslie had been getting and completing assignments for a few months now.
"I mean," Mari said, “it wouldn't be your fault, you know…"
"It's ok, Mari, it wasn't me. I've never done a family. Just single men. I don't know if it's the cult way of ramping me up, or just coincidence. It doesn't matter. We're all worm food anyway."
"Maybe," Mari said gently. "But the ‘how’ matters."
"Fuck you."
"Oh Leslie, I don't mean it like that," Mari said warmly. "You can't chose your profession any more than I can. I know that. I don't mean that it’s important what kills you, I mean it's important how you die. How you face it is what matters. Just as much as how you lived. When you're dead and gone, how you lived and acted, how people remember you, is all that's left."
"Oh." She’d never thought about it exactly that way.
"And such a young one, too," Mari said. “Too young to die.” She lifted the paper to show Leslie the picture of a young boy.
Leslie's blood ran cold and she dropped the coffee halfway to her mouth. It was Billy. She read to caption: Entire Family Butched. Her old foster family. All of them. Butchered in their home.
She knew without a doubt who had done the butchering. Map. And partly because of her. It was the Dragon covering her past, covering the cult’s tracks. Leslie could see it all as clearly as if she'd been there. Map appearing suddenly out of the darkness, sword flashing as people died.
She threw up all over Marisette's snow white bedspread, and Mari held her reeking head in her lap until Leslie had finished.
They both knew it was a part of being with the cult. Some days were just like that.
Continue to Chapters Sixteen - Twenty