61

I LEANED EDWARD up against the wall. He wanted me free to shoot if Olaf told me to. Olaf got to scout ahead and see what the problem was. He vanished around that corner, and I pressed myself to the wall and gave the briefest of looks ahead. The stairs ended just up ahead. The electric lights showed a cave, I think. The lights glistened on blood and bodies.

Olaf backed up, and came down to us again. "I can see the exit."

"What are the bodies?"

"Riker's men."

"What killed them?"

"I think it is our murderous beast. But there is no other way out. The other entrance has been blocked by an explosion. We must go out this way."

I figured if the murderous beast was up there waiting for us, Olaf would have been more excited. So I went back to Edward. His skin was the color of bad paste. His eyes were closed. They opened when I touched him, but they were brighter than they should have been. "We're almost out," I said.

He didn't say anything, just let me settle his arm over my shoulder. He was still holding on to me, but every step we took, my arm around his waist was taking more and more of his weight. "Hold on, Edward, just a little further."

His head jerked as if he'd just heard me, but his feet kept moving with me. We were going to make it, all of us. The blood got thicker the farther up we walked. Edward slipped in it, and I had to catch him and barely managed to keep us both standing. But it was a sudden movement, and he let out a small sound of pain. Shit.

"Watch your step, Peter," I said. "It's slippery."

Olaf was waiting for us at the bodies. There were only three of them. One was a man I didn't recognize, but I recognized the gun near his body. He was one of Simon's men. Simon was lying in a pool of blood and darker fluids. The entire lower chest, stomach, abdomen were open. His intestines trailed out onto the cave floor, but his eyes were still blinking upward, still alive.

The third body was Amanda, and she was still moving, too. But Olaf had her covered, so I kept my attention on Simon. He smiled up at us. "At least I killed the Undertaker."

"He's not nearly as dead as you are," I said.

"You're all dead, bitch."

"We know you invited company," I said.

His eyes looked uncertain. "Fuck you." His hand inched towards his gun that was still lying beside him. Gutted, dying, in more pain than I could imagine, and he tried to go for his gun. I stepped on his hand, pinning it to the earth. Harder to do than normal with Edward hanging on me, but I managed. "Peter, you and Becca go up with Bernardo to the front of the cave."

Peter didn't argue. He just carried Becca past us, Bernardo trailing behind.

I pointed the gun barrel at Simon's head. I couldn't leave him behind because I didn't trust him at my back. Even this wounded, I wasn't willing to take the chance.

"I hope the monster guts you, Bitch."

"That's Ms. Bitch to you," I said and pulled the trigger. A short burst, but more shots echoed mine. I whirled, gun up, and found Peter standing over Amanda's body. He emptied the Firestar into her body while I watched. Olaf was just watching him do it. I looked for Bernardo and found him holding Becca near the cave mouth.

Edward started to slide to his knees. I knelt with him, trying to keep him upright. He whispered, "The kids, out, get them ... out," and he fainted.

Olaf was there without me asking. He lifted Edward in his arms like a child. If the monster came now, we all had our hands full. Shit.

Peter had run out of bullets, but he was still squeezing the trigger, over and over and over. I went to him. "Peter, Peter, she's dead. You killed her. Ease down."

He didn't seem to hear me. I touched his hands, tried to lift the gun from him. He jerked away, violently, eyes wild. He kept dry firing into the woman's body. I shoved him back against the rock wall, hard, one arm across his throat, the other pinning his hands still wrapped around the Firestar. His eyes were wide and frightened, but he looked at me. "Peter, she's dead. You can't kill her any more dead than she already is."

His voice shook when he said, "I wanted her to hurt."

"She did hurt. Being torn apart is a bad way to die."

He shook his head. "It's not enough."

"No," I said, "it isn't enough, but you killed her, Peter. That's as good as revenge gets. Once you kill them, there isn't any more."

I took the Firestar out of his hands, and he let me. I tried to hug him, but he pushed me away, then walked away. The time for that kind of comfort was past, but there were other kinds of comfort. Some of them came from the barrel of a gun. There is some comfort in killing that which has hurt you, but it is cold comfort. It'll destroy things inside of you that the original pain wouldn't have harmed. Sometimes it's not a question of whether a piece of your soul is going to go missing, only which piece it's going to be.

Peter carried Becca. Olaf carried Edward. Bernardo and I took the lead. We searched the spring darkness with our guns, back and forth, back and forth. Nothing moved. There was just the sound of wind in the tall line of sage bushes that bordered the back of the cave. The air felt so good against my face, and I realized that I'd not really expected to get out, not alive. Pessimism, it wasn't like me.

Bernardo led the way back to circle the house. We'd try for Edward's car, but we wanted to make sure no one or no thing was waiting to eat us when we went for the car. Olaf went second, carrying a very still Edward. I was praying hard that he'd be okay, though strangely it felt odd to pray to God for Edward, as if I were praying in the wrong direction. Peter and Becca were just ahead of me. He stumbled as we headed into the thicker brush. He had to be tired, but I couldn't afford to carry Becca. I needed to have my hands free to fight.

I felt the prickling brush of magic. I called, "Guys, something's out here."

Everyone stopped and started searching the darkness. "What did you see?" Olaf asked.

"Nothing, but something out here is doing magic."

Olaf made a noise in his throat like he didn't believe me. Then the first wave of fear washed over us. So much fear that it closed the throat, sent the heart thundering, made the palms of your hand sweat. Becca started struggling violently in Peter's arms.

I took two steps to help Peter control her, but she struggled free, fell to the ground, and ran like a rabbit into the brush. Peter yelled, "Becca!" and went after her.

"Peter, Becca! Oh, shit!" I ran into the brush after them. What else could I do? I heard them just up ahead, crashing through the brush, Peter calling Becca's name. I had a sense of movement to my right, and I saw something. It was bigger than a man and even by moonlight you could see it was different colors. I fired into it as it opened a huge razored mouth, but the claw kept coming towards me, as if the bullets were nothing. The closed claw slammed into my head. It knocked me off my feet, and I hit the ground hard. Darkness swirled across my vision, and when I could see again, the thing was right above me. I kept my finger on the trigger, until it clicked empty. The monster never hesitated. It filled my vision with a face that was almost birdlike, and I had a moment to think it was pretty before it hit me again, and there was nothing but darkness.