Chapter Twenty-Two
Precious Things
Oliver awoke to the sound of a door slamming. At least, he was fairly sure that was what woke him. He had been having a stress-dream about the butcher being out of meat for Felipe and having to exhaust the Paranormal Society’s cheese supply with more ridiculous lies, and the woman who ran the kitchen slammed the door in his face right when he woke up. Oliver groaned and shoved his face into the pillow. Most of his stress-dreams were about forgetting corpses in the preservation drawers until they were skeletons floating in organ soup, but somehow, this one was worse. Turning onto his side to reach for Felipe’s comforting warmth, he found the bed empty and the coverlet thrown back. Oliver shot up. The door to their bedroom was open, but he didn’t think that had been the sound that woke him. Where was Felipe? A wave of guilt washed over him at the way he handled Felipe’s concerns the previous night. They should have talked it out more. Something was bothering him, and now, he was gone. Oliver scrambled out of bed, stuffing his feet into his shoes and throwing his bathrobe over his pajamas. The ring hanging from his neck thudded against his chest as he took the stairs two at a time to the darkened foyer.
“Felipe?” he called louder than he intended.
The floor creaked overhead in Gwen’s bedroom a moment before her bonneted head appeared in the hall haloed in lamplight. “What is with the yelling and banging? Do you know what time it is?”
“I’m looking for Felipe. I woke up, and he wasn’t in bed. I told him not to go outside without me at night, but…” Oliver let out a frustrated huff as Gwen came down and followed him through the dining room. “I can’t sleep not knowing where he is.”
“You know he’s probably outside using the facilities or sneaking a snack.”
“I hope so, but I’m worried, Gwen. He was upset with me before bed, and I know something is going on with him, only he won’t tell me what it is. I—”
The words died on his lips as they reached the kitchen. The back door stood open, banging against the kitchen wall in time with each leaf-laden gust. That had been the noise. Oliver ran outside. It was so dark he could scarcely see, but something felt wrong. Felipe didn’t just leave doors open. Oliver’s mind jumped to Sheriff Ridder breaking into the Stills’s home. He hadn’t heard anything inside, but— A flash of light near the trees caught his eye, disappearing as quickly as it came.
“There he is!” Gwen cried, pointing as the glint appeared a second time.
Oliver could just make out a Felipe-shaped shadow crossing the yard, but he was nowhere near the outhouse this time. Anger rose in Oliver’s breast at the realization that Felipe had gone off without him again and that the previous time probably hadn’t been an innocent trip to the bathroom either. They were going to have a long discussion about this.
Pressing the oil lamp into his hand, Gwen nudged him back into motion. “Go get him. I don’t have shoes on.”
Oliver stomped through the grass toward his partner, vacillating wildly between anger and relief. He didn’t want to yell and wake up Mr. Allen, so he called to Felipe in a stage whisper. But Felipe kept moving. He bobbed and weaved as if dancing to an unseen tune. It wasn’t until Oliver was nearly on top of him that he realized he held a very large knife in his hand. Running ahead of him, Oliver called his name again, but Felipe didn’t seem to hear it. Every motion was exaggerated and slow, as if he moved underwater. The way he held his knife wasn’t quite right and neither was his stance, but what scared Oliver most was the way his face twisted with anguish with each slash and parry. Whatever he saw, it wasn’t Oliver.
“Felipe!” Oliver yelled as he leapt out of range of the next strike. “Felipe, wake up!”
“Is everything all right?” Gwen called.
“No, but stay where you are. He’s sleepwalking, and he has a weapon.”
Felipe jerked like he had been struck and murmured something under his breath in pained Spanish. For a brief moment, his movements slowed, and his hand hovered in the air. Now, was his chance. Setting the lamp on the ground, Oliver slipped behind Felipe and grabbed his arm. He had taught Oliver how to disarm someone, and while Awake-Felipe never would have let go, Oliver had surprise and agility on his side for once in his life.
“Drop it!” Oliver gritted as Felipe bucked wildly against him.
He pried his fingers off the hilt one-by-one, and when the knife hit the ground, Oliver quickly put his foot over the blade without letting go of his partner’s arm. Felipe thrashed and tried to wrench from his grip, but with each attempt, the words streaming from his lips slipped further into the incoherent, breathy babble of the wounded. His body locked and stiffened beneath Oliver’s hands. Turning Felipe toward him, Oliver watched in horror as Felipe’s eyes went wide with terror and his mouth parted in a silent scream.
“Felipe! Felipe! Look at me. It’s Oliver. Wake up,” he yelled into his ear, giving Felipe’s shoulders a less than gentle shake. “You’re having a nightmare. ”
Fear coiled around Oliver’s heart as Felipe’s eyes rolled back in his head. He hoped to god this was just a nightmare and not some form of compulsion. He needed to snap him out of it. He didn’t want to slap him or douse him with water, but he would if he had to. Grabbing the soft flesh on the back of Felipe’s arm, Oliver pinched it as hard as he could. Felipe hissed with pain, but when he opened his eyes this time, the bubble of delusion seemed to burst. Oliver let out a sigh of relief as Felipe’s body relaxed beneath his palms and he looked around the yard in confusion.
“Where is it?” Felipe asked, his voice rough as if he had been yelling or crying.
“Where’s what?”
“The demon.”
“Darling, there isn’t one. You’re safe. Whatever you saw was a nightmare,” Oliver said calmly, though that explained the knife.
“Is Felipe all right?” Gwen called from the back door.
“Yeah, I think so.”
Holding Felipe steady, Oliver wrapped an arm tightly around his shoulders. Fear, confusion, and something akin to shame flooded the tether as he tried to ground him and reassure him it was only a dream. After a minute of continuously sweeping the yard for danger, his eyes seemed to clear, though it did little to slow his pounding pulse. When Oliver was sure he wouldn’t fall over or go on the attack, he picked the oil lamp off the ground. In its soft glow, he could see the deep bruises forming beneath his partner’s eyes. He needed to do something about this. Two nights of broken sleep and several days of mismatched meals were taking their toll. As the fog of emotions across the tether cleared, Oliver kissed Felipe’s temple.
“Are you all right now?”
“Yeah, sorry about that. I’m fine,” Felipe replied quickly, running a tired hand over his face.
“You were sleepwalking.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
Oliver held his arms. “Yes, you were. We saw you! You had better be disoriented and not trying to lie to me, Felipe.”
“I—” The words died on Felipe’s lips as he looked toward Gwen and then the outhouse on the far side of the yard. When he turned back to Oliver, his features tightened, and a murky sluice of guilt wound beneath his heart.
Oh … Well, that explained some things. “Let me guess, when I found you out here last night, you were sleepwalking too, weren’t you?”
Without meeting his eyes, Felipe nodded.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want to worry you with everything going on. It only happened once, and I didn’t think—”
Anger rose in Oliver’s breast like a dirigible at the thought of all the things that could have gone wrong. “You’re right. You didn’t think. Did you know that you grabbed a knife this time?” Oliver said, pointing to the blade still pinned beneath his foot. “You could have hurt yourself or someone else. For god sakes, you could have walked into the Dysterwood, Felipe! What then? I could have lost you.”
Oliver was furious and relieved and hurt and so many emotions at once that tears burned the backs of his eyes from the sheer weight of it all as he stared into Felipe’s features. He didn’t know if he wanted to scream or cling to Felipe and sob. It didn’t seem to matter as long as Felipe was safe and never ever did that again. The thoughts must have been obvious on Oliver’s face because the other man looked far guiltier than Oliver had ever seen him. Felipe reached out to touch Oliver but hesitated until his partner stepped closer.
Taking his hand in his, Felipe shut his eyes and sighed. “I’m sorry. I am. This has never happened before, and I didn’t mean to—”
Felipe went quiet as his brows furrowed, and for a horrifying second, Oliver feared he had slipped into a nightmare again until he put his hand up for quiet. At first, there was only oppressive silence, but then, Oliver heard it too: the crunch of grass and leaves beneath heavy footfalls. Whatever it was, was behind them near the overgrown pasture at the edge of the Dysterwood.
“A deer?” Oliver whispered .
“I don’t think so.” Felipe paused to listen again. “There’s more than one. Give me the knife and tell Gwen to go inside until I know what we’re dealing with.”
“Until we know.” When Felipe looked like he wanted to protest, Oliver quickly added, “After what just happened, I’m not letting you out of my sight. I’ll give you the knife, but you need to wait for me.”
“Fine, but if it is something dangerous, promise me you’ll go in.”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Oliver replied as he handed Felipe the heavy, horn-hilted knife.
A stricken look passed across Felipe’s features, but it disappeared beneath the hunter’s sharp-eyed gaze as whatever was in the field walked closer. Oliver jogged back to Gwen with the oil lamp, casting glances over his shoulder to make sure Felipe was still waiting at the corner of the house. Behind her glasses, Gwen’s eyes were wide.
“Where’s Felipe?” she asked, glancing around his shoulders.
“He’s at the back of the house. Something came out of the Dysterwood and is walking through the field. We’re going to see what it is, but Felipe wants you to go in the house until we’re sure it’s safe.”
Gwen looked like she wanted to protest until her eyes narrowed in thought. “I’ll see what I can do about making your job easier. Just don’t forget you aren’t a fighter, Ol. Know when to get out before you get hurt.”
At that, she slipped back inside and shut the door behind her. As Oliver crept back to Felipe’s hiding spot at the corner of the building, the lights in the house came on one-by-one and the curtains were dragged apart to let the light spill out. Gwen. Individually, the lamps didn’t do much, but the collective glow from the house illuminated the half of the old horse pasture closest to the inn and made Felipe’s eyes flash orange. Oliver stood at his partner’s shoulder and followed his gaze to where the intruders moved just outside the halo of light. Against the trees, he could make out two shadows lumbering through the brush. The figures looked like people, but they moved wrong. Their movements were all at once too stiff and too loose as if their bodies weren’t held together correctly .
“What are they?” Oliver whispered.
“I don’t know.”
At the sharp crack of Argus’s bark, the creatures swung their heads toward the house, and Oliver gasped. The creatures were human, or had been at one point, but the skin on their faces was marred by black veins while their flesh was mottled purple with lividity. They opened their eyes wider than people ever should as they craned their necks and swept their gazes across the yard toward their hiding place. The taller one had a beard laced with moss while a large beetle scuttled across the shorter man’s face unnoticed. Everything about them felt wrong, but the way they moved made Oliver sick. He expected them to give up the charade of humanity at any moment and drop to all fours and crawl. With each step, their limbs jerked and their heads swayed like puppets on strings as they ambled closer to the edge of the light, drawn by the dog’s barking. As they drew closer, Oliver could make out their tattered brown suits and standard issue traveling coats. Felipe tensed against Oliver’s side as the stink of stagnant pond water and rot carried on the wind.
“The missing investigators,” Oliver whispered. “Something’s wrong with them. The other dead weren’t like this.”
Felipe nodded without taking his eyes off the two men. “Oliver, I don’t think you should be out here.”
“Neither should you. Maybe they’ll keep walking. The dead only attacked those who murdered them, and we didn’t do that.”
The dead investigators were heading straight for the house. A few yards from their hiding place, they stopped, and the taller one threw its head back and sniffed the air. Oliver and Felipe exchanged wide-eyed looks and soundlessly took half a dozen steps back.
“Do you really want to test that theory right now? I don’t know if they’re looking for us or Mr. Allen, but we can’t let them into the house.”
“Tell me what to do.”
“Get my gun and my other knives. I’m going to meet them.”
Oliver’s pulse pounded in his ears as his hand tightened around Felipe’s arm. He didn’t want to let him go. He didn’t want him anywhere near those things. Felipe kissed him hard enough that Oliver instinctively shut his eyes, but it was still too short.
“I promise, I’ll be fine, Oliver. Just get my things for me and stay out of danger.”
At Oliver’s begrudging nod, Felipe readjusted his grip on the knife and slipped around the corner of the house. Oliver froze as Felipe called for the creatures to identify themselves. For a long moment, there was only eerie calm on the other end of the tether and silence. Adrenaline hurtled through Oliver’s veins in time with a wet slap and a grunt of effort. Forcing himself to move, Oliver ran back to the kitchen door. He was about to throw it open when he spotted Gwen straining to see from her bedroom window.
“What are those things? Why are they moving like that?” she called, her voice high with alarm as Felipe lured the men into the light streaming behind the house.
“The missing investigators. I think they’re possessed by the Dysterwood. Gwen, I need you to give me Felipe’s gun, his throwing knives, and whatever else you can find. They should all be in the bedside table closest to the window in their holsters.”
With a nod, Gwen ducked back inside. Oliver didn’t want to watch the fight, but he couldn’t look away. Felipe moved with a dancer’s grace as he lashed out with the heavy, curved blade. It would have been a ballet of death if the investigators had been living men. His knife sank efficiently into the men’s kidneys, yet it did little to stop them. They didn’t have weapons, but they didn’t need them. Felipe had barely finished landing the last blow when the corpses converged on him. They threw their sodden bodies at him as if they meant to smother him beneath their weight. Oliver swallowed a cry as Felipe cracked one in the face with his elbow and slashed the throat of the other, but the dead didn’t even notice. The shorter one held tight to Felipe’s arm as he eyed the taller one suspiciously. Its hands played over its form as if searching for something, and Felipe used that opening to slam his head back with a sickening crack while kicking off the taller one’s chest. Its ribs gave beneath his foot as it staggered back, and Felipe wrenched his arm free.
“Oliver, catch!” Gwen said as she levitated Felipe’s gun and knives into his arms. Freeing the revolver from its holster with shaking hands, Oliver looked up in time to see Felipe sink his knife deep into the ribs of the smaller man. The corpse reached for Felipe’s neck as he shoved the blade up into its heart, but it didn’t seem to notice. A barb of fear embedded in Oliver’s heart, a mirror to the look in Felipe’s eyes. He threw his weight, knocking the corpse to the ground and ripping out the knife in the same motion. Black ichor dripped from the wound as Felipe gave the creature a kick to the head that did little to stop it from getting up.
The dog was barking its head off, but Oliver could barely hear it over his heart thundering in his ears. Where was the other one? Hidden in the shadows of the house, the taller investigator rummaged through its coat. A snarled smile curled its lips as something metal appeared in its hand. Water poured out of the revolver’s barrel as the man drunkenly pointed it at Felipe.
“Gun!” Oliver screamed.
Felipe swung the smaller corpse in front of him and dove out of the way as the flash went off. The bang rang through Oliver’s ears as the smaller corpse jerked back with the blow. The taller investigator’s fingers scrabbled over the hammer as it was slippery. Oliver stared blankly at Felipe as he motioned for him to do something. Before he could react, Gwen ripped the revolver from his hands with her powers and flung it into Felipe’s waiting palm. Without missing a beat, he fired into the taller corpse’s heart.
“Shit!” Felipe cried as it staggered back a step but didn’t collapse.
Oliver’s blood ran cold. It should have worked. It had worked on the man from the mill. Why didn’t it work on them? Lucien had bashed in Ridder’s skull, but Felipe didn’t have a golf club. Decapitation supposedly worked on the undead, but Felipe didn’t have a sword or the creatures’ cooperation to saw through their spines with his knife. His movements were already slowing, and his chest heaved with exertion as he swung his knife into the walking corpses. Felipe couldn’t hold out until dawn.
“What do I do. What do I do. What do I do,” Oliver repeated under his breath, clasping the throwing knives to his chest.
“They’re reanimated, right?” Gwen yelled from the window, her voice strained with effort. “Can you un-reanimate them?”
Oliver wasn’t sure. He closed his eyes and let his powers expand out, but they couldn’t reach. He left the knives at his feet for Gwen and made for the shadows. “Cover me.”
Inching along the wall, Oliver watched as Felipe sliced across the back of the shorter man’s knee as the taller investigator swung the butt of his gun at Felipe’s head. The blow hit his shoulder with a crack, but Felipe didn’t stop. The shorter corpse turned to Oliver as its leg buckled, and for a heart stopping moment, Oliver thought it would throw itself at him. Its eyes locked on his as it let out a hiss and staggered back to Felipe. He didn’t want to think too hard about that; not now anyway. Drawing in a steadying breath, Oliver closed his eyes. His powers flowed through his body and into the aether. He passed through Felipe’s warmth and the familiar sturdiness of the tether, but he had to keep moving. Oliver shuddered as his magic touched the dead investigators. He could taste pine tar and the metallic sweetness of rot on his tongue. All he had to do was reach for it.
BANG. Oliver flinched as a bullet collided with the stable wall two feet above his head. He screwed his eyes tighter and tried again as he sank into a crouch. As soon as it touched the web of magic, he gagged. The creature was too busy fighting Felipe to pounce at him this time, but it still felt like his soul walked into a spiderweb full of dead flies. Oliver forced himself to relax and let his powers brush against the threads of magic. They had burrowed deep into every part of the dead man’s body. Oliver ripped a piece away, but the creature didn’t so much as falter as the magic pulsed through the rest of the web. Where was it pulsing from? There had to be a brain or nucleus governing it. Oliver forced his eyes open, and for half a second, he saw the central nodule glowing like a negative against the night.
** *
The creature’s arm tightened around Felipe’s neck as it held him in an iron grip. Both of the dead men looked familiar, but he didn’t want to think about that right now. Above him, Gwen grunted with effort as she leaned out the window and wrenched the taller man’s arm away from Felipe’s head with her mind. The gun swung wildly between Felipe and the house as spots danced in front of his eyes. Somehow, someway, he needed to end this. He just needed to figure out how. Felipe drove his knife into its thigh, but it felt nothing and didn’t loosen its hold even a fraction. He cursed under his breath and thrashed. It still didn’t let go even as wet, rotting flesh slid under the man’s sleeve.
“Felipe, aim for the shorter one’s left eye!” Oliver yelled as he stumbled in front of him. His partner’s eyes squeezed closed in pain as he held his head with gritted teeth. “Sorry, my left!”
Forcing his arm up slowly, Felipe tried to blindly aim the gun. The cartilage of his throat creaked as he squeezed the trigger. The blast singed the side of his face as gun powder and the saw dusty smell of burnt bone filled his nose. His left ear screamed like a tea kettle, but the corpse finally collapsed. Felipe’s knees nearly buckled under its sudden dead weight as he shrugged the man off like a sodden coat. Where was Oliver? He winced at the throbbing pain in his ear. He wasn’t used to his eardrum not immediately healing, and the shrill keening made it hard to think. As he turned, he caught Oliver yelling something, but it was garbled in his ears.
Too late he felt the searing heat of a bullet punch into his arm. Three . The dagger dropped as his left hand hung uselessly at his side. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Oliver rushed to him, reaching for the bloodied arm, but Felipe shoved him back toward the house. You didn’t put precious things in harm’s way. One of his knives whizzed past and lodged in the taller man’s eye. Felipe paused, hoping it was over, but the dead man didn’t slow. He raised the gun again, and Felipe threw himself on top of Oliver. The wood of the old stable shattered above their heads in a hail of splinters. Two . He could barely hear himself as he ordered Oliver back to the house, but Oliver didn’t move.
His grey eyes widened, and he said something Felipe didn’t catch before pulling him flat to his chest. Another knife sailed through the air and lodged in the corpse’s wrist. The dead investigator paused and stared at its hand as if trying to get its fingers to work, but the heavy gun tipped forward, dragging its useless hand with it. Scrambling away from Oliver, Felipe kicked and sent the gun flying into the grass. Felipe staggered back as a wave of dizziness sent the yard off kilter, but he pushed it back and pulled on the secondhand adrenaline rolling off Oliver. Soon, he could collapse in a heap and replay every mistake. He just needed to stay on his feet long enough to kill this monster.
The creature stared at its empty hand, but as Felipe tried to swing his revolver into position, the dead man yanked the knife from its socket and charged. Time slowed to a crawl as Oliver dove between Felipe and the dead man and yelled something up at Gwen. The taller investigator reared back like a startled horse, but Felipe was already shoving Oliver out of the way. The keening in his ears died to a muffled pressure as the knife sank into his flesh. White hot pain bloomed in his side as the dead man ripped out the blade and raised his arm for a second strike. Something grabbed Felipe by the shoulders and hauled him out of the way before he could convince his body to move. Cupping his hands over the wound, Felipe bit down a cry at the sudden surge of pain. Blood leaked through his pajamas, but something horribly soft and familiar protruded through the wound. Not now. He couldn’t— He still needed to—
Two shots blasted through the man’s left thigh in an explosion of shattered flesh and bone. The dead man’s eyes widened as the uncanny light left them, and it slumped in a heap atop its splintered leg. Leaning back against Oliver, Felipe traced the bullets’ path to the upper window where Mr. Allen still stared down the smoking barrel of the Henry repeater. A relieved laugh slipped from Felipe’s lips, but when he looked up at Oliver, his eyes were filled with tears.
Fuck .