• • •
Evening was creeping over the city as I walked into Hoover Park. The lights of the tall towers downtown had mostly come on, so I was surrounded by bright windows that hung in the sky like square stars. I made my way to a bench on the southern side of the park, which I’d picked because the Amazons could walk there from our apartment house without too much trouble.
Ten minutes later I saw them, carrying duffel bags and looking pretty much like any number of other semi-homeless young people. I waved them over.
“Let’s take a walk,” I said.
We made our way to a more isolated part of the park, out by one of the children’s play structures. At this time of the day the only people in sight were a young mother with a couple of cranky, runny-nosed kids, but they were already packing up to head home. As I watched them walk off down the path I asked Halyna, “Now tell me again what you two want. Exactly. And why you helped me.”
She looked a little surprised by the question. She looked even more surprised when I pulled out my pistol. “What is going on?”
“It’s nothing. The technical term is ‘due diligence.’ Oxana, you sit down too.”
Their eyes were wide, but to their credit neither of them looked anywhere near close to panic. I wondered how many bad situations they’d already seen in their short twenty or so years on Earth. “Why is this?” Oxana asked, pointing at the gun.
“Because I need answers, and this time I need real, truthful ones. First your people, you Scythian Amazon whatevers, wanted the feather, and now you’re trying to keep the horn away from the Black Sun. How do you even know the Black Sun? How do you know any of this and why do you care?”
“We know because the bitch Anahita has been our enemy for hundreds of years,” Halyna said. “She made her Persian servants steal our sisters and put them in slavery.”
“When?”
“When? When all the Persians obeyed her. Worshipped her.”
“You do realize you’re talking about more than two thousand years ago.”
“We not forget,” said Oxana.
“We were raised for not forgetting,” added Halyna.
“And how do you know about the Black Sun and their hairy pets?”
Halyna nodded. “Because after the feather and the auction, Black Sun got interested in you. But we know them already because they are in Russia too, and Russian Black Sun hate us Scythians. They call us race-traitors and whores.” She smiled. “Oh, and lesbians of course, but some of us are not so bothered by that. They try to get into our camp, we kill one of them. After that, it is war between us.”
“So they don’t work with Anaita?”
“No. I don’t know why they care about the horn, except that it is a powerful thing.” Halyna shrugged. “We don’t care about horn, except to hurt Anaita.”
“So you’re out to overthrow a goddess. An angel. You do realize that’s not going to happen, right?”
Oxana was still looking worriedly at the gun, but Halyna seemed to have forgotten it. I made sure both of them had their hands in view, and that neither of them could reach me easily. I have pretty fast reflexes, especially compared to a normal human, but I had seen the sharp things these ladies practiced with, and there were two of them. Also, I was reasonably sure neither of them had drunk between seven and many alcoholic beverages the night before.
“We fight a long fight,” Halyna said, a curl of red hair lying across her forehead like a bloody weal. “We keep her from winning. That is our victory. Our leaders tell us that because we don’t have the feather, we cannot hurt her, but if we get the horn we will hurt her in a different way. She will lose power.”
Well, Anaita would lose power over Eligor, that was certain. And if Eligor went down, he’d try to take Anaita with him—the grand duke was thoughtful that way. I hoped he had the clout to at least raise some very serious questions among her angelic comrades in Heaven if it came to that.
“So it was nothing to do with me? Why were you living in my building?”
“To watch you,” Oxana said. “Not hurt you.”
“Because lots of people know you are the man with the feather,” explained her comrade. “Now they hear you may have the horn. Very big news with some people, especially some bad people. We think Black Sun may come, so we watch for them. They must not get the horn.” Halyna shrugged. “That is all. We do our job. We work for our people.”
“And all your people want is the horn—but here’s the problem. I can’t let you have it. Do you understand? I need it more than anyone else does. But I can promise you this, if I do get it, your Anahita won’t like what happens. And we can all agree that we don’t want those goose-stepping Black Sun bastards to get it either.”
Halyna turned to Oxana and they had a quick conversation in Ukrainian. I kept the gun up, but I didn’t point it straight at their faces anymore. Sometimes courtesy is as important as actual trust.
“Okay,” said Halyna at last. “Is okay. You promise, we believe. Not give the horn to Anaita, everything okay. We can work together.”
“Not just work together,” I said. “Go to war. Are you ready for that?”
Oxana nodded eagerly. “We have been in war all our lives. This war. Same war. Against the Persian bitch.”
“Okay,” I said. “One last thing.” I turned my gun around and handed it butt-first to Halyna, who took it with a look of surprise.
“Why?” she said, eyebrow lifting. “Not loaded?”
“Oh, definitely loaded. Go on, look.” I waited while she examined it and saw that it was jammed with shells. “Silver, too. I’ve had to give up lead almost completely.”
Halyna handled it for a moment, then pointed it at me. She looked quite capable of pulling the trigger if she chose. “Why do you give this gun to me?”
“Because I’m tired of not trusting people. Honestly, from here on in I don’t think I’m going to have time to do a lot of background checks. So if it’s really me you want, just shoot me now. I’m too tired for all the usual skullduggery.”
Halyna looked at the gun, then at me. “What is . . . ‘skullduggery’?”
“Never mind—let me rephrase it. I’m too tired for the same old shit. Are we on the same side? If we’re not, then just put two in my skull, and I’ll see what comes next.”
Halyna stared at me for a few seconds, looked briefly to Oxana, who also seemed quite prepared for anything, then handed me back the gun. “Same side, Bobby Dollar.”
“Good. Bring your stuff. We’re going to take a ride.”
• • •
See, Caz’s message-via-demon-crudlump hadn’t just reminded me about Caz and how I felt about her, because to be honest I never really stopped thinking about that part. It had also reminded me that she and I had both flirted with disaster even before we met—the Countess more than me, considering she had stolen Eligor’s most prized possession. So why hadn’t the grand duke just grabbed her and taken her back? Because for part of the time he didn’t know where she was. That was the important part.
I drove the long way around, making sure no one was tailing my new/old Datsun. We drove through the harsh neon glare of Whisky Gulch and into a neighborhood tucked behind the stately homes along University Avenue. The Amazons were puzzled when I pulled into the driveway of an undistinguished apartment building, but they were positively astonished when I slid into one of the parking spaces and got out to punch a code into a panel disguised as a utility meter, and then the entire back of the garage opened up so we could get into Caz’s secret apartment hideaway.
Being back there was definitely a mixed blessing for me. It was a great place to hide, because as far as I know nobody on either side knew about it. I’d told Eligor everything he wanted to know (because I was being tortured, kids) but as far as I remembered, he’d never asked about Caz’s hideout. Believe me, I’d have happily spilled that information to keep myself out of the burning flames for an extra minute, but it just didn’t come up. Those who have not spent days feeling the skin singed off their body, regrown, and then singed off again are not allowed to comment on my lack of silent courage. No, seriously, shut the fuck up. You don’t know anything.