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stitches complained where I d pulled at the wound sometime during my flight from the warehouse. My shoulder
hurt too.
Hey. You ve got a call.
It was the fourth time my phone had rung since I d pulled into the ambulance-only zone and screamed until
a couple of paramedics helped me pull Aubrey out. As far as I knew, the minivan was still parked out there.
Illegally. I tried to care.
Hey, Eric said. You ve got a call.
I pulled the cell phone out and answered more to keep from hearing his voice again than because I wanted to
talk to anyone.
Hello?
Where are you? Ex said.
Hospital. Aubrey s in a coma or something. I don t know. He s& I don t know.
You have to get back to the house. You have to get someplace warded.
Okay, I said. They took him off to get a CAT scan or an MRI or something, and as soon as
Jayné! he shouted. You have to come here right now. You re in danger.
Yeah, I said. All right.
I dropped the call and made my way back to the emergency room. It turned out someone had moved the
minivan to a parking space not far away, left it unlocked, and put the keys in the visor. I didn t know who d done
it, but I figured this wasn t the first time someone had blocked up the entrance. I was vaguely grateful that they
hadn t just towed it away.
I pulled out, found my way onto Speer heading northeast, and tuned the radio to a country station before I
realized that I had forgotten my coffee at the cafeteria and also that I didn t know how to get home from here. I
just tried to keep my mind on driving until I reached Colfax, turned left, and passed the University of Colorado on
my right. Then I knew more or less where I was. I did a U-turn at Eighth Street and headed home.
It was a little past noon now, the temperature rising up into the nineties. The air smelled like gasoline and
tar. The traffic was thick but not slow, and it seemed to take all my attention just to keep up with it. My body
seemed to know better than I did what needed to be done. I let reflex take over, and I was a little surprised under
half an hour later to find myself pulling up to the brick house. Eric s house. My house. The windowless van was
on the street, the black sports car in the carport. The lawn looked thirsty. I wondered when I was supposed to have
watered it.
I walked in the front door and dropped my keys on the side table. Ex came out from the kitchen, a shotgun
held at half ready, like he didn t know whether to expect a friend or an assault team. Which was probably
reasonable. We stared at each other for a long moment. He seemed tired. His white-blond hair was pulled back
into a ponytail tied with a strip of leather. His black shirt was torn at the cuffs. He looked angry, but not with me.
He looked haunted.
It happened on his watch, I thought to myself. He did his best, and this is what came of it. Poor little tomato.
I took his hand without realizing I was going to. He looked surprised for a second, then squeezed my hand
gently. He started to say something, stopped, and looked down.
It s all right, I wanted to say. Except that it wasn t.
How is he? Ex asked.
Stable, I said. Just not in there.
It s the fucking Voice of the Abyss, Midian rasped from behind Ex. If he hadn t done that bullshit with
the dog, he d have held it together. You know. Maybe.
Midian sat at the table. His shirt was off, and a bandage wrapped his wasted belly. Blood dark as India ink
was soaking through.
I thought Coin was supposed to be vulnerable, I said.
He was, Midian said with a grimace. Fucker was barely able to ignore everything we threw at him and
cripple us before he went back inside.
Is that supposed to be funny? I asked.
What do you want to hear, kid? Midian said. The gravel and whiskey voice seemed almost compassionate.
We took our shot. It didn t work out.
Where s Chogyi Jake? I asked, a sudden stab of panic hitting me.
Meditating, Ex said. He s okay. I think he s okay.
So what the fuck happened?
We made some assumptions, Ex said.
And?
And it turned out Coin was a little more paranoid than we thought. He was protected. Personally protected,
not just by the wards they had on-site, Ex said. From what we can tell, he was ready for exactly the forms we
were using. He suckered us.
Meaning someone ratted us out, Midian said. My guess? Eric may have spilled a couple of beans on his
way down.
And now their initiation rite s done, so they aren t tied up with that anymore. Coin has a couple hundred of
his people free to act against us. And he s not locked to any particular location, so we don t know where he is, Ex
said. He sounded tired. We knew it was a risk.
My shock was starting to wear thin, numbness giving way to something less gentle.
Actually, I said, I m pretty sure Oh, and we might all die wasn t part of the discussion when I was in
the room. I thought you guys knew what you were doing.
Well, Midian said, his voice sharp and grating, maybe you should have spent a little more time planning
and a little less playing at the mall and getting your ashes hauled.
Stop it, Ex snapped, but it was too late by then. Midian was rising to his feet, one bone-thin hand pointing
toward me. His lips drew back from the blackened teeth, and his voice buzzed with anger and physical pain.
Look, kid, I don t care if you want to candy-ass your way through life. You ve got the cash. Do what you
want. You want to take over Eric s plans and then let everyone else do the work because they re older than you are
and they ve got cocks? Fine with me. No trouble. But I ve got a half a liter of crap leaking out of me right now
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