Game of Cages

That last bit was a little cold. I don’t rescue people. I kill predators. But I did my best not to react. People have to cope the best they can.

She continued. “But … maybe it’s just that I know more now. Maybe I just know more about the danger and the … the suddenness. It can be so quick. One minute everything is just fine, and the next you’ve lost all power and control. They only had me for about twenty minutes, okay? That’s how long it took me to get away, but … When they have you, they can do anything to you. Kill you, rape you, torture you …” She paused while she ran through the possibilities in her mind.

I couldn’t ask what Yin had done. I didn’t have any real need to know except self-indulgent curiosity. What I needed to do was make her feel better. “Want to go kill them?” I asked.

“Yes!” she answered, but she didn’t jump up and rush for the door. “But I’m not the type. And it wouldn’t get me anything. I’m going to have nightmares about this, I think. I’m going to have nightmares for a long time about this. Christ, I’m collecting them like scars.” After a moment, she added: “Do you really think we should kill Mr. Yin?”

I spread my hands. “Catherine, I bought him off with a fake spell. Someone is going to have to kill him.”

We had a little discussion about that, where I explained what I did and how I did it. Catherine didn’t like the idea on general principle but couldn’t think of a specific reason to object. She even admitted that the society publishes fake spell books to discourage wannabes. Then she explained that Steve Cardinal had told her where to find me. It seemed that most of the town was looking for us, with instructions to call him if we were spotted.

“He seems to know more than he should,” she said. She watched my response carefully, as if trying to decide whether I was sharing information I should have kept to myself.

“He saw the sapphire dog,” I said. “In fact, it nearly fed on him. So yeah, he knows more than he should.” I told her about the predator, how it looked and what it could do. She was motionless while I spoke, staring at me intently.

Then I told her about my visit with Pratt. She seemed to recognize the name.

“Did he give you his number?” she asked.

“He wasn’t that into me. Actually, he was a complete asshole. He told me to go home, and he wouldn’t help deal with Yin.”

Wouldn’t help rescue you was what I should have said. Catherine seemed to understand anyway.

She rubbed her face. “Well, we can’t leave,” she said. “It wouldn’t make sense to leave Washaway now.”

My head felt foggy and sore for a moment, probably from the effects of sleep. “Right, that doesn’t make sense.”

After that, she set up the police scanner. Steve was out, so I went into his kitchen. I couldn’t find any coffee. We had to settle for black tea and sugar. His fridge contained nothing but condiments, Wonder bread, white cheese, and hamburger buns, and his freezer was packed with microwavable meat patties. I felt a little awkward raiding the man’s kitchen, and the dismal selection made it easy to leave it all untouched. Maybe we should order out.

We listened to the scanner for the better part of an hour. It was extremely dull, but Catherine had an amazing capacity to focus on something that might become useful at any moment. I got up and moved around the room, swinging my arms and trying to keep loose. My face felt stiff, and when I checked a mirror I saw that my eye was not swollen anymore but was an ugly dark color. The spot where Bushy Bill had hit me was slightly red but not too bad. No wonder the women in Washaway weren’t tearing their clothes off when I walked into the room.

There was squawking on the scanner when I came back. It barely sounded like human speech. “Do you understand any of that?”

“Fire at the motel is out,” she said. “The whole thing is a loss. The neighborhood watch is supposed to find locals who can put the firefighters up for the night.”

I wasn’t sure why they weren’t going home, but that didn’t seem important. What was important was Steve’s house; I didn’t want to be there when he got home. I didn’t like that clean, quiet, depressing little place.

“I want to get out of here,” I said. “Do you want to stay and man the scanner?”

“No,” she said quickly. “I’ll come along.”

That surprised me. “Are you sure?” I didn’t say This is a safe place or We might run into bad guys. I didn’t have to.

“They know about me, so there really isn’t a safe place anymore. And I’m not the stay-at-home type.”

She took the keys to the Neon and carried the scanner into the garage. While she fiddled with the wires under the dash, I went into the kitchen, boiled water, and poured it into a thermos. Then I added a tea bag and the last of Steve’s sugar.

Back in the garage, I found Catherine sitting behind the wheel, the engine running and the scanner hissing. I opened the garage door and she pulled out. I closed the door and climbed inside.

The scanner sat on the floor mat beside my feet. I didn’t dare move for fear of pulling out a wire. “I’m the one who rented this car, you know.”

“Maybe, but I’m a better driver.”

Fair enough. We drove back and forth through town, waiting for something to happen. At one point, a black Yukon passed us going the other way. The bidders had the same idea. After almost an hour, a thin fog billowed in, but nothing else came up. Finally, Catherine said what I’d been afraid to say. “Could it already be gone? Things wouldn’t be this quiet if it was still in town, right?”

“Maybe,” I said. “Except that the Breakleys were only discovered because we burned down their barn. Maybe it’s holed up somewhere, feeding and biding its time.”

“I don’t know about that,” she said. “The cage was surrounded by lights, remember? What if it only wanted a ride because it needed to avoid daylight? What if it set out cross-country once night fell?”