Page 57 of The Fire Went Wild
And I have listened. I’ve been on this planet for over fifty years, counting the time I spent in the ground, and I still look like I’m 30. I’ll keep looking 30 for decades, too. Just like Dad. Just like my grandparents. Just like every other Hunter in this world.
And in all my 50 years, anytime the gods speak to me, I listen. I don’t question it. If they show me a face, a life, I end it. Doesn’t matter who it is, or how difficult it’ll be to make happen. I spill the blood. I make the offerings. I carve the gods’ sigils into old meat and bleached bones and leave them out in the open air for humans to find, even if doing so makes it that much more likely for me to get caught. I listen to Ambrose bitch incessantlyabout how much more likely it means I’ll get caught, which is worse.
And right now, driving to Texas with the only living woman I’ve ever fucked in the passenger seat of my car, is the first time I’ve wanted to disobey.
Part of it is the quiet. She’s angry with me; I can feel that much. I handcuffed her to the seatbelt so she doesn’t get any ideas about jumping out while we’re on the highway. Now, if she really is a Hunter, then it won’tkillher. But despite what I said to Ambrose, I’m still not totally sure she is. Yeah, when I was letting her kill me, she felt like a Hunter. But right now? She still seems human. There’s still that veil between us, that chasm between predator and prey.
A binding, the gods said, and Ambrose acted like he had heard of something similar. And yet doubt still creeps around.
Maybe you should just trust the fucking gods.
It’s Dad’s voice in my head, because of course it is.
Charlotte sighs, something she’s been doing since we got on I-10. I glance over at her, but she’s staring out the window, the winter sun turning her cherry-red hair into flames.
“It’s another couple of hours,” I tell her. “We can stop at Whataburger once we’re over the border.”
I have no idea why I say that. I think I just can’t stand the silence. Or her anger. The truth is I want her to like me. I want to fuck her again, and make her come, and feel her hot living breath as she gasps out her pleasure. But I don’t want to have to sneak it. I want her to want it, too. Just like she did in the marsh.
“What the fuck is Whataburger?” She still doesn’t look at me.
“A fast food place.” I force myself to focus on the highway. “It’s good.”
“Are you always so—calm about this?” She turns toward me. I feel it, the way the air moves around her. The way her scent catches. A human scent, still. Not Hunter at all.
I tighten my fingers around the steering wheel. “Yes. I told you what I am. I’m not—”Like you. The words are right there. But that’s the whole point of this trip, isn’t it? To prove that, actually, she is like me.
“Right.” She shifts around, the handcuffs jangling against the seatbelt. “You’re—the boogeyman.”
“Yeah.” That’s what Ambrose always calls us, anyway. He’s doubtful about the gods, but that’s just because they don’t talk to him so directly. Sawyer’s the same way. They didn’t grow up like I did, communing with our gods before they killed. But both of them know, instinctively, there’s something otherworldly about our kind. Something that maybe isn’t supposed to be in this world at all.
“So who are you killing?” She says it like she’s trying to be casual, but I smell the whiff of fear.
“I don’t know his name.” The road unspools in front of us, a long black ribbon. A sign flashes by: Twenty-five miles to Lake Charles. Eighty-five miles to Beaumont. Houston just a little further away from that.
“Okay.” She sounds doubtful. “So you’ll just—know him when you see him?”
It feels weird, talking to a human about this. But she isn’t a human, I keep reminding myself. She’s a Hunter, there’s just something wrong with her. Something broken. It’s up to me to mend it.
Assuming I can trust the gods.
Of course you can trust the gods.
Fuck, I hope she’s not human and I’m not about to break this treasure that fell into my lap.
“I know where he is,” I say. “His house.” I glance sideways at her, and she’s watching me, those big dark eyes drawing me. I jerk my gaze back over to the road. “He’s an associate of the two attackers. They all work for the same man.”
“Oh yeah? And how do you know that?”
The gods are whispering, low and raspy. Arguing with each other again. The Unnamed wants me to tell her. My Guardian says I have to wait until she’s been Awoken.
“I just do,” I say sharply, and they go silent. “Don’t worry about it.” I keep staring at the road, and I’m not sure why I say this next part except that it feels right, saying it to her.
“I won’t let anything happen to you.”
The sun’sjust starting to set when we arrive in Houston. Cities always put me on edge—all that humanity crushing in around me turns my blood hot and vicious. The gods tend to retreat, too, leaving me on my own with all that prey.
And Houston’s worse than most. It’s so big and sprawling and the freeways feel like ropes pulling tighter and tighter around my chest. I take deep breaths, clenching the steering wheel as I pull into a glittering river of cars.