But she exploded from the wall and her lances were through them before any of us could even react. Their bodies are still moving but I think its just the final twitches a body makes when it gets traumatized so abruptly and completely.
I hear a weird clicking sound that affects me the same way the ZEWs chittering does, terrifies me on a primitive level. Is she coming for me now? I grab my sword and whirl. It takes me a second to spot her. I follow the trail of blood.
Up.
The Crimson Hag is perched on the roof of the building behind BB&B, with ropes of entrails dangling over the side in long glistening strands, dripping on the sidewalk. The bony needles she used to flay Barrons and Ryodan are actually her legs, which bend weirdly, sort of like a praying mantiss front legs, and have curved hooks on the ends.
With insectlike appendages, shes knitting their guts into the hem of her dress. As her bony legs click and clack together, the guts sway over the edge, shortening, inch by inch, smearing blood up the brick.
Its so disturbing that my stomach heaves and my body tries to burst into tears and puke at the same time. I swallow it all and choke.
I hear a guttural sound followed by a weak sigh and look back at the bodies.
Im going to kill the kid, Barrons says faintly.
Ryodan makes a burbling sound like a bloody laugh. I dont think he even has the parts left to laugh with. Get in line.
They both deflate and go still.
I stare dumbly.
They die like superheroes: cracking a joke. Like theyre just going to get up tomorrow and fight another day. No fear. Balls to the wall until the bloody end.
I feel like somebody ripped my guts out, too. I cant stand to look at them anymore so I drop my head, and squinch my eyes up tight. My heads a muddle. How did I get here? How did deciding to go to the Unseelie Kings library end up with Ryodan and Barrons dead? I cant make sense of it. I mean, I can, because duh, I can follow the chain of events, but who the feck could have foreseen such a bizarre and preposterous outcome? How am I supposed to make small decisions when they can have such large, unforeseeable results?
Well, that was fortuitous. Christian skirts their bodies and moves toward me, laughing. Two down, seven to go. I wonder if we can just point the bitch at the rest of them. Mac, too.
My head whips up. Hes laughing. They died and hes laughing. I start to shake. Stay. Away. From. Me.
What did I do, lass?
You took me in there, thats what you did! You didnt warn me enough. Im only fourteen! I dont know everything! I cant know everything! Youre older! Youre supposed to warn me about stuff! And now you act like its good that theyre dead!
I thoughtyou wanted Ryodan out of the picture.
I just wanted him to leave me alone! And I never wanted Barrons to die! Aw, crap, Mac! I wail. I look at the back of the bookstore, now even more miserable than before. Macs in there. How long before she comes out and finds Barrons in the alley, bled out in the snow? How long before she discovers my complicity in this, too? I can see her, finding him, flinging herself over his body, weeping. One more tragic loss in her life.
Because I opened a fecking bottle.
Because I was curious.
The night Alina died, I felt like I wasnt really there. I never been able to shake the feeling there was something wrong with me. I searched Ros journals from beginning to end but she never wrote a single fecking word about me. Never. Makes me think maybe she had other journals I aint found yet.
But tonight Im all here.
I suffer that unpleasant shift I felt once before, the night I got Jo stuck working in the club. The one where I move sideways into a different way of being me, see myself different, and I dont like it. Its the shift where Im a boat and there are all kinds of people capsized in my wake. No, not a boat. What did Ryodan say I was? A tsunami. Thats it. Crashing into things and leveling them. When he said that, he had no idea hed be one of those things I leveled. Or that he wouldnt live to see the one hell of a woman Im going to become.
Above my head bony needles clack away. I hear the wet slap of intestines against the wall as theyre drawn up the side. I should be terrified. I should be running for my life so she doesnt do to me what she did to them. Should I hide their bodies so Mac wont find them and figure out what I did?
Come, lass. We have to get out of here while shes busy. The Hag gets obsessed with her knitting but shell be done soon, Christian says.
My legs are made of cement and I have concrete blocks for feet. I just keep looking from Barrons and Ryodan to the bookstore and back. First Alina. Now Barrons. There isnt going to be any place on the face of this planet Mac wont hunt me down when she finds out what happened here tonight.
I look at Ryodan. How can he be dead? Whos going to run Chesters? Whos going to keep the loser Fae and humans in line? With both Barrons and Ryodan gone, is there any safe place in Dublin? Will BB&B and Chesters get abandoned?
A hand closes on my shoulder and I just about jump out of my skin.
Weve got to get out of here, Dani. Shes finishing up.
I shake him off violently. Dont you ever touch me again, Christian MacKeltar!
He exhales sharp and sudden like I punched him in the gut. You dont mean that.
I hear a weird clicking sound that affects me the same way the ZEWs chittering does, terrifies me on a primitive level. Is she coming for me now? I grab my sword and whirl. It takes me a second to spot her. I follow the trail of blood.
Up.
The Crimson Hag is perched on the roof of the building behind BB&B, with ropes of entrails dangling over the side in long glistening strands, dripping on the sidewalk. The bony needles she used to flay Barrons and Ryodan are actually her legs, which bend weirdly, sort of like a praying mantiss front legs, and have curved hooks on the ends.
With insectlike appendages, shes knitting their guts into the hem of her dress. As her bony legs click and clack together, the guts sway over the edge, shortening, inch by inch, smearing blood up the brick.
Its so disturbing that my stomach heaves and my body tries to burst into tears and puke at the same time. I swallow it all and choke.
I hear a guttural sound followed by a weak sigh and look back at the bodies.
Im going to kill the kid, Barrons says faintly.
Ryodan makes a burbling sound like a bloody laugh. I dont think he even has the parts left to laugh with. Get in line.
They both deflate and go still.
I stare dumbly.
They die like superheroes: cracking a joke. Like theyre just going to get up tomorrow and fight another day. No fear. Balls to the wall until the bloody end.
I feel like somebody ripped my guts out, too. I cant stand to look at them anymore so I drop my head, and squinch my eyes up tight. My heads a muddle. How did I get here? How did deciding to go to the Unseelie Kings library end up with Ryodan and Barrons dead? I cant make sense of it. I mean, I can, because duh, I can follow the chain of events, but who the feck could have foreseen such a bizarre and preposterous outcome? How am I supposed to make small decisions when they can have such large, unforeseeable results?
Well, that was fortuitous. Christian skirts their bodies and moves toward me, laughing. Two down, seven to go. I wonder if we can just point the bitch at the rest of them. Mac, too.
My head whips up. Hes laughing. They died and hes laughing. I start to shake. Stay. Away. From. Me.
What did I do, lass?
You took me in there, thats what you did! You didnt warn me enough. Im only fourteen! I dont know everything! I cant know everything! Youre older! Youre supposed to warn me about stuff! And now you act like its good that theyre dead!
I thoughtyou wanted Ryodan out of the picture.
I just wanted him to leave me alone! And I never wanted Barrons to die! Aw, crap, Mac! I wail. I look at the back of the bookstore, now even more miserable than before. Macs in there. How long before she comes out and finds Barrons in the alley, bled out in the snow? How long before she discovers my complicity in this, too? I can see her, finding him, flinging herself over his body, weeping. One more tragic loss in her life.
Because I opened a fecking bottle.
Because I was curious.
The night Alina died, I felt like I wasnt really there. I never been able to shake the feeling there was something wrong with me. I searched Ros journals from beginning to end but she never wrote a single fecking word about me. Never. Makes me think maybe she had other journals I aint found yet.
But tonight Im all here.
I suffer that unpleasant shift I felt once before, the night I got Jo stuck working in the club. The one where I move sideways into a different way of being me, see myself different, and I dont like it. Its the shift where Im a boat and there are all kinds of people capsized in my wake. No, not a boat. What did Ryodan say I was? A tsunami. Thats it. Crashing into things and leveling them. When he said that, he had no idea hed be one of those things I leveled. Or that he wouldnt live to see the one hell of a woman Im going to become.
Above my head bony needles clack away. I hear the wet slap of intestines against the wall as theyre drawn up the side. I should be terrified. I should be running for my life so she doesnt do to me what she did to them. Should I hide their bodies so Mac wont find them and figure out what I did?
Come, lass. We have to get out of here while shes busy. The Hag gets obsessed with her knitting but shell be done soon, Christian says.
My legs are made of cement and I have concrete blocks for feet. I just keep looking from Barrons and Ryodan to the bookstore and back. First Alina. Now Barrons. There isnt going to be any place on the face of this planet Mac wont hunt me down when she finds out what happened here tonight.
I look at Ryodan. How can he be dead? Whos going to run Chesters? Whos going to keep the loser Fae and humans in line? With both Barrons and Ryodan gone, is there any safe place in Dublin? Will BB&B and Chesters get abandoned?
A hand closes on my shoulder and I just about jump out of my skin.
Weve got to get out of here, Dani. Shes finishing up.
I shake him off violently. Dont you ever touch me again, Christian MacKeltar!
He exhales sharp and sudden like I punched him in the gut. You dont mean that.
