Killing Rites

himself off from me. For less than a second—less than a heartbeat—as I screamed and twisted and fought against Tamblen’s arms, I saw Ex, and the desolation in his eyes was unfamiliar and terrible. I thought, This is what a nightmare looks like, and the gun went off again.

Chogyi Jake lowered his doubled fists until the barrel was aimed unmistakably at Tamblen’s heart. His smile was the same one he always wore.

“I’m going to ask you to put her down now,” Chogyi Jake said. “Next time, I will not ask.”

I stopped struggling. Tamblen shifted my weight but kept me on his shoulder.

“You don’t understand,” the big man said.

“You won’t be the first man I’ve killed,” Chogyi Jake said.

He won’t? I thought, and Ex stepped between them, his hands held out. Where he stood, Tamblen couldn’t reach the door to the courtyard without pushing him aside, and Chogyi Jake couldn’t shoot Tamblen without the bullet passing through him.

“All right, we’re just going to calm down now,” Ex said. “No one’s getting shot. I mean Father Chapin is, but no one else.”

“I know you love these men,” Chogyi Jake said. The gun hadn’t shifted an inch. “But they are zealots, and —“

“Just don’t shoot them,” Ex said. “Just wait.”

Chapin coughed and swung his legs off the table. He tried to stand; he cried out in pain. Miguel put an arm around him.

“Chewy,” Miguel said. “Please. We don’t have much time. He’s losing blood.”

Ex swallowed, nodded to himself, and turned to face Father Chapin. My old friend looked about six years old, lost and determined and frightened to the bone. He licked his lips and I tried to turn so that Tamblen’s shoulder wasn’t digging into my liver.

“Father Chapin,” Ex said. “I know Jayné. I trust her, and after tonight, I think she deserves your trust too. She wasn’t wrong. She was the one who found the taint in our society, and she stopped it. She wants to be free of this thing. She only made common cause with it when we forced her to. Us. Ask her to renounce it. She’ll come back again just like before.”

Chapin’s eyes narrowed. He looked at Tamblen and nodded. The big man lowered me to my feet.

“Is this true?” the old priest asked. The blood on his cheek was dry and dark and flaking. “Do you renounce the Black Sun, and will you swear to me on peril of your soul that you will return here and complete the rites that you began?”

I took a breath. It was what I’d come here for. It was the reason I’d been running like hell since Chicago. One of the reasons, anyway. I thought of the hours I’d spent waiting for my body to move without my willing it, watching for evidence that I wasn’t in control of my own flesh. It had been terrible. All I had to do now was say that I still felt the way I had then.

But I didn’t. I’d made my truce with her, and she hadn’t betrayed me. There weren’t all that many people I could say that for.

“No,” I said. “No, I won’t renounce her.”

Ex’s cry of despair broke my heart a little. He sank to his knees, his eyes closed. I thought he might be crying. It was all spinning out of control now. All of the people he wanted to keep safe were destroying themselves and each other, and all his efforts to protect us were falling through his fingers like sand. I stepped forward and put my hand on his shoulder. He was shaking.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I really am.”

“Father Chapin? I think you’re making a mistake.”

Everyone turned toward Alexander. He was stroking his terrible little goatee thoughtfully.

“You think … what?” Chapin’s voice was a rasp. “A Princess of Hell stands before us in the flesh of this poor sinner who came to us for aid. Tomás’s corruption was terrible, and the price we will pay for it will beggar us, but there is this thing still before us that we can do right.”

Alexander pressed his fingertips to his lips, scowling.

“No,” he said. “If she wants our help, I’ll do whatever I can to help her because I think she has a good soul. But if she doesn’t want it, we can’t force it on her. She’s not even a Christian, Father.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning you shouldn’t have accepted her in the first place,” he said. “She’s only here because you and Xavier killed that girl years ago, and somehow she’s supposed to make up for it.”

“Well, there’s an uncomfortable perspective,” Carsey said. “So we should just open the door and usher her out into the world? With what she is?”

“We will not!” Chapin shouted. “We will not free the devil! What I have done wrong, I will answer for, but I will not sin again. I refuse to. I will die here if I must, but I will not leave while she is free!”

didn’t even turn to see what the commotion was about. I knew that some riders did more than lurk in the back of a mind. Some kicked the original owner out, taking the body whole. If the Akaname were like hermit crabs, taking over the bodies that other riders had already opened up, that meant Tomás had been ridden before, and maybe that first rider had killed his soul years before. Maybe he was only qliphoth now, an empty shell without self or rider. And even if there was something of the man left in the body, he was broken in ways that wouldn’t ever be made whole.

And then I knew what they reminded me of. They had been parasitized. Tomás had been the one with the actual beast in it, but they had all been used. Tamblen and Carsey, Miguel and Chapin. All these men dedicated their lives to freeing people from possession, and instead they’d become an engine for spreading riders. Tracking down the Akaname they had spread would be the work of years, if it could even be done. Right now in front of me, Chapin was doing anything he could to distract himself from the grief bearing down on him. And grief, I knew, made people crazy.

Chapin really was going to let himself die.

“Jayné,” Ex said. “I need a favor.”

“You want to lock me up,” I said.

“Just long enough to get him to the hospital. So that he can know you’re safe.”

“Is that what you call it?”

“Please,” Ex said. “I need to save him. At least let me try.”

I looked over at Chogyi Jake. The gun in his hand hadn’t moved. I had the distinct impression that if I’d said so, he’d have shot everyone in the room who tried to keep me from walking out. It wasn’t what I’d expected of him, but the fact that he was there—that the choice was there—made choosing possible.

Ex stepped closer, leaning in. His voice was low and fast, and his hands fluttered in front of him as he spoke, like little sparrows trying to take wing.

“If you don’t want the rite of exorcism, I’ll make sure you don’t have it. Just let me put you down there for now. I promise I’ll free you again later.”

“I’m sorry. It’s not my call,” I said. And then: “Hey. We’ve got a situation here. You want to chime in?”

Always before, the rider had come suddenly or not at all. My hand might move on its own, or I might say something I hadn’t known I was going to say. Or else she just took the wheel, and I was a passenger. This time, it felt like she was welling up around me, pulling herself up to control my body through an act of will. Like running things was hard for her. Like it was a chore.

Ex saw the change. His face went pale and he started to step back, then caught himself. Behind him, Carsey’s eyes went wide. I couldn’t see the others.

“You’ve got no reason to trust me,” Ex said.

My rider swallowed carefully, like my throat was sore.

“Will you help me?” Ex asked.

The pause lasted years.

“Yes, I will,” she said. “Take me to your prison.”

Ex sagged with relief. I heard Carsey and Miguel moving behind me. Tamblen put a hand on my shoulder and the rider shrugged it off.

“Don’t touch me,” she said, and then I was in control again. I turned to look up at Tamblen’s face. “Yeah, I can walk it.”