Darkest Night - Smoke and Shadows Part 28

"Don't change the subject. You fed off Tina."

"There was no shadow." He held out his hand for the keys.

"So very much not the point," Tony told him, dropping them on his palm.

"It was, in one way, for her own protection."

"Against what? High blood pressure?"

"Against the shadow."

Tony waited for the rest of the explanation as Henry started the car and put it in gear.

"You were able to disgorge the shadow when I called on the link we share," Henry continued calmly, pulling into traffic. "While I can't protect the whole city, it is possible that should it come to it, Tina will be able to do the same."

"Disgorge the shadow?"

"Yes.""After one quick snack? Don't you think highly of yourself."

"Tony ..."

He slouched as far as the seat belt allowed, picking at one of the scabs on his palm.

"And she's old enough to be my mother!"

Although not a good judge of human aging-it went by too fast as far as he was concerned-Henry guessed the script supervisor was in her mid to late fifties. "I'm significantly older than that."

"Yeah, but you don't look it. You and Tina, well, there's this whole creepy Harold and Maude thing going on."

"Who?"

"Harold and Maude. A Hal Ashby movie from 1971. Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon; it was brilliant, a cult cla.s.sic, and you need to watch more movies without subt.i.tles but again, not the point." Tony ran his less scabby hand back through his hair and sighed. "You don't just do that whole crunch, munch, thanks a bunch thing with people like Tina."

"She won't remember it."

"Good."

Henry turned onto Hastings and sped up to make the next light. "You were about to make an observation; back before we spotted the van?"

"Was I? Well, it's totally gone now."

"Let's hope it wasn't important."

"Yeah, let's."

There were half a dozen cars in the studio parking lot when Henry turned off Boundary Road; Arra's hatchback conspicuously not among them.

Henry parked where he had the night before, hoping that pa.s.sing security would consider it to be his spot and not question his presence. He'd long ago learned that life was simpler if it was arranged in his favor rather than adjusted after the fact. "Do you know who these cars belong to?"

"No." Tony popped his seat belt and opened the car door. "I think the old Impala belongs to one of the writers."

"I used to have a car just like that," Henry noted as they started for the back of the building.

"Well, you know what they say, there's a dark green Chevy Impala in everyone's past."

"Who says that?"

"Them."

"And who are they?"

Tony snorted softly as he stopped in front of the keypad. "The same guys who say you don't put the bite on women old enough to be my mother.""You don't think that att.i.tude's a little ageist?" Henry asked, leaning against the wall.

"No." The lock released and Tony carefully pulled the door open. "I think . . ."He stiffened as Henry raised a quieting hand and decided not to get p.i.s.sed off about it when he saw the vampire's eyes were fixed on the line of black that was the soundstage. Henry'd put on his hunting face. There was something in there. Someone . . .

One of the shadow-held or one of the crew?

The lights were off.

It could be one of the crew sleeping it off before heading home after a few too many drinks at the bar down the road.

Or it could be security patrolling on the other side of the soundstage, flashlight beam blocked by the permanent sets. Okay, probably not that. According to one of the writers, if CB wasn't in the building, the rent-a-cop spent most of his time in the office kitchen working on his screenplay.

It could be one of the shadow-held. Lee had turned on the lights, but Mouse hadn't. If it wanted the body it wore to remain unseen, then darkness was better-better for hiding even if it meant it lost the ability to use its cast shadow as a weapon. It wouldn't need a weapon if it wasn't seen.

Maybe it had other weapons. Maybe it had a gun. Maybe I've been watching too much American television.

Hang on: it could be all of the remaining shadow-held. Unless there were rules he didn't know, nothing said they had to show up one at a time.

A quick glance down at his watch. 10:43.

Half an hour early for the gate.

He stepped back as Henry stepped forward. No point in speculating, when all he had to do was ask. "How many?" he whispered.

"I hear a single heartbeat."

"Arra?"

"I don't know."

"Shadow-held."

A flash of teeth. "I'll let you know. Give me thirty seconds."

"And then?"

"Make your way to the gate and start setting up the big light."

"In the dark?"

"Use the flashlight. Remember that the darkness handicaps them. They can't use the shadows the body casts in the dark."

"Duh, Henry. My intel, remember?"

Henry's brow creased in annoyance. "Then why did you ask?" he demanded and slipped into the soundstage.The darkness in the soundstage was not absolute, but then in this day and age, darkness seldom was. Exit lights and LEDs on equipment left running gave Henry illumination enough to see by. Not clearly, but sufficiently.

The taint of the otherworld seeping through twice a day prevented him from scenting and identifying the life he could hear, and the reek of fresh paint permeating the soundstage like a mist didn't help. No matter. The heart rate told him his quarry was awake and humans seldom sat awake in darkness. Shadow-held, then. Waiting for the gate.

He slipped around a false wall and paused, close enough now to scent his quarry as female. The wizard? Still too many other, stronger scents masking subtleties.

It was standing just under the gate, wrapped in the ubiquitous plastic raincoat.

". . . twenty-eight Raymond Dark, twenty-nine Raymond Dark, thirty." Tony dried damp palms against his thighs and squared his shoulders. "Ready or not, here I come." He hoped a thirty-second lead was enough time for Henry to take care of things-not that it mattered if it wasn't. The big lamp had to be in place and ready to go when the gate opened.

He thumbed on the flashlight, pointed it at the floor, and headed for the light board.

Not the wizard. A girl, Tony's age. She had the raincoat shoved back and her hands deep in the front pockets of a pair of bib overalls. As Henry stopped at the edge of the open set-she was standing where they needed her to be, he had no need to go any farther-she shifted her weight back and forth from one red high-top to the other.

Impatience, not antic.i.p.ation. She couldn't know he was . . .

When the lights came on, the last thing Henry saw before being flung to the floor was her smile.

Lights?

Tony blinked toward the spill of lights from the dining room set.

Why would Henry turn on the lights?

Answer: Henry wouldn't.

He started to run.

Henry struggled against the shadow that wrapped around him from wrist to cheekbones; his arms held to his sides, his mouth and nose covered. It bulged but held.

When the girl squatted beside him, the shadow squirmed off his ears.

"We left a guard on the gate," she said conversationally. "It wasn't here, so someone had to have destroyed it. If someone knew how to do that, then that same someone knew way, way too much and would likely be back. h.e.l.lo, someone. I was waiting for you. You should've checked for traps." Her smile broadened as she held up the remote switch she'd used to turn on the lights. "You'll be unconscious soon, and then you'll be dead."

Not soon. Definitely not before the gate opened. Although Henry needed to breathe, the air in his lungs would last him long enough. He could hear cables. .h.i.tting the floor, the lamp's wheeled platform moving. All he had to do was lie here, listen to the shadow-held gloat, and wait for the gate to open. The shadow would attempt to leave, Tony would hit it with the light, and he'd be released. A slightly less dignified scenario, granted, but it would get the job done. And a good thing, too, since the tensile strength of shadow meant he wouldn't be doing the superman-breaking-his-bonds thing any time soon.

Her smile slipped and her eyes narrowed. "You're different."

He fought to keep the Hunger from showing, but it was still too close to the surface. Tina had helped but not enough.

"Nightwalker." One finger flipped a strand of his hair back and forth. "This one doesn't believe in you, but I wouldn't be too upset about that since she doesn't believe in me either. It's all metaphors and symbolism in here." The plastic raincoat crinkled as she leaned forward, one hand going to the floor beside his head to keep from overbalancing.

"What's it like in there, I wonder? I imagine you've got a better grip on what's real. Shall we find out? Besides, it's always smartest to take over the strong. Makes it harder for the weak to stop you."

From the corner of one eye, Henry noticed a patch of darkness under the huge rectory table. Dark enough? Only one way to find out. Rolling seemed to be his only option.

"Oh, no, you ..."

He was under the table before she finished her protest. He felt the binding ease- apparently it was just dark enough- and he ripped his way free; aware he was snarling as he got to his feet but not really caring.

Her lip curled in answer. "A creature of darkness fighting for the light? That's not how it works where I come from."

"It's how it works here."

She flashed him a cheeky smile and turned to run; Chase me, chase me! so strongly implied she might as well have shouted it aloud. Henry held the hunter in check, dodged the cast shadow she was attempting to distract him from, and stood in front of her before she could turn again. "Apparently my kind move slower where you come from."

She stiffened in his grip, her eyes staring at nothing as the shadow within her began to rip free.

Vibration in blood and bone announced the opening of the gate.

"Henry! Close your eyes!"

Even through closed lids the world turned a brilliant white. Tears streaming down his cheeks, Henry threw the girl forward, dropped to his knees and buried his face in his arms.

After a long moment, the light turned off.

"It's okay. You can look up now." Figuring Henry could take care of himself, Tony ran across the set toward Kate Anderson's crumpled body. She was Mouse's focus puller and that was the only thing Tony knew about her. Muttering, "Not again!" over and over like a mantra against a worst-case scenario, he dropped to his knees, rolled her onto her back, and felt for a heartbeat. Lost it in the screaming pain still vibrating his skull.

Found it again."She's alive."

"Yeah." Tugging the raincoat back into place, he looked up at Henry. "Why did you throw her?"

"I hoped that being right under the gate would activate the shadow's primary function- to return home with information-and keep it from remembering that it was heading for me. Seems to have ..."

"Not real. Not real. Not real!" One hand clamped around Tony's arm, the other grabbed for the collar of his shirt. Kate's pupils had contracted down to black pinp.r.i.c.ks and her eyes were opened painfully wide. "Not real!"

"Sorry." Tony wasn't sure why he was apologizing; it just seemed the thing to do. Then he remembered. "Henry, we don't have any potion, the cops dumped it. We didn't even stop to buy vodka!" Dropping his a.s.s to the floor, he dragged her up onto his lap.

"You're going to have to vamp her!"

Kate's heels began to drum as Henry dropped down by her other side. "To what?"

"You know, touch the primal terror. Convince her you're real and that'll help her deal with the rest!"

His mouth slightly open, Henry stared at him, his expression caught halfway between astonishment and amazement. "And if she can't deal with me?" he asked after a long moment.

"Jesus, Henry, she's twenty-three years old and you're . . . you. Just crank up the s.e.x appeal!"

Shaking his head, Henry took hold of the girl's jaw. "Do you have any idea of what you're talking about?"

"h.e.l.l, no! I'm making it up as I go along. Do you have a better idea?" he asked as Henry stared down into Kate's face. "Or any other idea?"

"No."