“This isn’t how I would have done things,” Rose said.
“The time for being careful is done,” I said. “We tried doing what you’ve done in the past. Lashing out, trying to scare them off. It’s not working. I’ve gotta tell you, there weren’t many times where it came up, but I’ve been here. Dealing with some freak who wanted to rob me, when I was on the street, dealing with the family. There’s a point where you have a chance to act, and it’s a choice between fight or flight. Experience has taught me that the only real way out is to absolutely destroy the other motherfucker.”
Rose didn’t have a response to that.
My hand hurt where the locket’s chain was rubbing against the skin, as I made the repetitive loops and tears in the tape.
I finished, and then grabbed a can of spray paint I’d liberated from the cabinet in the library. I sprayed the bottle, top to bottom, and then stripped away the tape.
“There you go, Leonard,” I said. I moved the hatchet next to the bottle, and pulled my shirt and jacket back on. “Leonard, June. June, meet Leonard. You two should know we’re going to war.”
“War,” Rose said. “Absolutely destroying our opponent?”
“Best we can,” I said. “And we start by making the proverbial deals with devils.”
“We promised we wouldn’t.”
“Proverbial, Rose,” I said. “Proverbial deals with devils.”
“I don’t follow.”
I pulled the chain tight around my hand, securing the locket in place. Was the hair just a fraction of an inch longer than it had been when I’d cut it from around the chain? I pulled my glove on over it. Uncomfortable. Perfect.
Bottle in one had, hatchet in the other, I opened the door, stepping outside.
The last logs I’d thrown onto the fires had burned down into coals. I’d neglected to pay attention to them. Nothing too serious. I kicked snow over the smouldering logs until they were fully quenched.
I picked up the chain, gingerly avoiding the bits that had been in the fire, as I gathered it into a loop.
“Blake? Please don’t tell me you’re going to call out a name you shouldn’t call out. Because I can’t think of a good reason for you to be outside, after saying what you did.”
“I am going to say a name I probably shouldn’t,” I said, “But not like you think.”
“Does this run against the oath you just made to me?”
“No,” I said. “Not so much. But I think maybe, just a little, you can hold to your oath, by trusting me here.”
“Do you trust yourself?” she asked.
“Eighty percent, maybe?” I asked.
“Then I’ll strive to match you with eighty percent trust,” she said. Her tone was deadly serious.
I stretched my arms out to the sides, then shouted at the top of my lungs, “Briar Girl!”
My voice rang through the area.
“Briar Girl!” I screamed, again. I could feel the connection, now.
The Others at the periphery of the area reacted. Some retreating, some drawing closer. Messengers and warriors. Plant and animal spirits, elementals, and dark, gnarled animal things with an overabundance of teeth and claws. I couldn’t help but think of the poem Jabberwocky or the hunting one. Bandersnatches and whatevers. I only knew about it through acquaintances. No doubt I’d run into references in my grandmother’s books.
“Briar-”
A bird landed in front of me, a storm of wings and feathers.
Black and white, instead of a beak, it had a very human face on a tall head, pale, with features reminiscent of one of the statues on Easter Island. Exaggerated, stern, any eyes hidden beneath the shadows of a heavy brow.
“Thank you for answering,” I said.
“What are you doing, calling me?” the thing asked, speaking in her voice.
“I want to deal,” I said. “I know what you want, you know what I want. We’re going to talk sooner or later, so let’s talk.”
“Follow the homunculus,” she replied. The bird-thing turned to prepare to fly away.
“I’d like a promise of protection,” I called out.
“Too bad,” the thing replied.
“Blake, this doesn’t strike me as the wisest course of action.”
I set off after the homunculus-bird. “You want to play this safe, to be cautious, to deliberate and pick the best course of action.”
“Ideally.”
“Then we’re in complete and total agreement.”
The Others around us parted to let us through. I didn’t miss the fact that they were closing ranks behind me.
“You’re not making sense, and you’ve got me genuinely worried.”
“We’re in agreement. I would love to be logical and rational about all of this. But so long as we’re playing this safe and making steady, deliberate, smart moves, we’re never going to catch up. We’ve established this.”
“Yes.”
“And even in controlled attempts to change things up, put Laird in a bad spot, we’re still in a disadvantageous situation.”
“I know. Yes, I agree. I don’t understand this, though.”
“Let’s say you’re playing chess against someone who’s got more pieces on the board and decades more experience than we do. How do you win?”
“You don’t,” Rose said. “Unless you cheat.”
“We already tried cheating,” I said. “Getting him in trouble, risking his job. He’s apparently planning a response tonight.”
“Change the game, then,” Rose said.
“Again, we tried that. There’s no winning. Not really. So what I’m proposing is pretty simple.”
“Do tell,” Rose said. “Also, you do know that we’re being followed?”
“We’re surrounded,” I said. “But she wants to deal badly enough that she’ll hear us out before she murders us. Nevermind that. Our analogy here. I’m proposing the pigeon strategy. Knock over all of the pieces, shit on the board, and then strut around like we’re the victors.”
A brief period passed. I could hear something growling nearby, fighting another member of its kind. Already fighting over who would get first dibs, no doubt.
“Can I ask you a genuine question, Blake?”
“Of course.”
“Have you lost your mind? I don’t mean that in a funny way. I mean it in the sense that being really truly crazy is really truly sad. Have you, I don’t even know how to phrase it…”
“Am I lost?” I asked.
“Lost… maybe. Like being six and getting separated from mom and dad in a crowded place, experiencing that stark horror of not knowing where you are or that you might not be able to ever go home?”
“Yeah. I get what you mean. Aren’t we both lost, in that sense? Hasn’t it been that way for a little while?”
“I guess it has,” Rose said.
“We can’t rise to their level, not like this,” I said. “We have to bring them down to ours.”
I trudged through the snow, while the homunculus-bird circled back to keep me in sight, allowing me to follow. The cold was so brutal it went straight through my boots, and made my skin physically ache where it was exposed. My hands were getting cooler, too, where I had them out of my pockets, holding bottle and hatchet.