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Authors: James R Tuck

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BOOK: Spider's Lullaby
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Ronnie looked over both of us, brown eyes glittering in a mask of smeared mascara. “Thank you both for rescuing me.”
Tiff shook her head. “It's what we do for family.” The two girls shared a look and a nod.
“Help me up and we can get the hell out of here.” Both of them put hands under my arms, trying to lift me.
That's when we heard the egg sac full of murderous, supernatural spider babies rip open.
14
The spiders fell in a rain of hunger. Hundreds of them poured out of the hanging egg sac, spilling onto the body of the Kensai. Each spider was the size of a quarter. Tiny bulbous bodies with long spindly legs. They were translucent white. You could see through their skin, their insides visible as if through a fogged window. They skittered and swarmed over the body under them and began to feed.
I could feel them through my power. They were a mass of hunger. Their venom burned my skin, acidic and poisonous. Tiny legs plucked along my power as they ran back and forth, devouring flesh. Murder pulsed off them.
Pushing to my feet, I grabbed Tiff. “Go get Charlotte. Without her these things will kill everything they can.” She nodded, turned, and ran down the corridor of crates. As I watched, the flesh began to disappear from the Kensai. Ghost spiders crawled up, devouring, leaving behind only bone.
My mind raced. Guns were not going to work on these things. I could stomp them, but they would swarm over me, taking me down quickly. I started looking around for something to crush the spiders with. Ronnie was watching the spiders eat, horrified.
My hand clamped on her arm. “Run. Go. I'll take care of them, but get the hell out of here!” She turned to me, eyes wide. White showed around her entire iris. She made no move to run.
Dammit.
My fingers scrabbled at the Velcro straps holding the bulletproof vest on. They pulled away with the sound of tearing fabric. I jerked the vest off and folded the two sides together. Slapping at the Velcro, I tried to make a flat pad I could use to squash as many spiders as possible. My chest locked tight with the effort and pain, vision blurring as my fingers fumbled. The skittering along my power was reaching a fever pitch.
The last strap slapped into place as the spiders finished their meal. They turned as one mass toward me, perched along the cleaned bones of the Kensai. Each ghost spider stared at me with eight unblinking blood-drop orbs. They began to crawl toward me.
I stood ready, swaying on my feet, vest held out ready to swat.
Ronnie kicked my knee from behind.
The blow took me by surprise, knocking me to the floor. I went down
hard.
My elbow and hip slammed into the hard floor. Ronnie jumped over my legs, bare feet slapping the concrete as she charged the spiders. They stopped moving.
Pushing off the floor, I scrambled to my feet. Her name ripped out of my throat as I moved to stop her. She was too far ahead. As I watched, she dropped to her knees. Spiders boiled away as she shoved her arm into their mass. They skittered over her, crawling across bare skin, swarming up her arms and chest.
The spiders all froze.
Slowly, Ronnie pulled her hand from the crowd of spiders blanketing the Kensai's bones. Crimson light broke free, bathing her as she raised the sorcerous ruby over her head.
My power flared, spilling out. The gemstone pulsed with scarlet light like a beating heart. Ronnie stood up, legs wobbling and shaky. Tiny pale spider bodies, lit like red Christmas lights, tumbled off her.
“... stop, stop, stop ...” The words tripped over each other trying to get out of her mouth. My power hit just as her mind split open.
The first tiny filament whipped out, lashing across her mind. The end of the silk thread was barbed. It sank into the flesh of her mind and took root. It was followed by hundreds more. They fell like a metaphysical rain, weaving a network of connections between her mind and each tiny, venomous arachnid—a web of hair-thin connections binding Ronnie to the spiders. My power could feel them build like a mass of tangled hair, knotted and Gordian.
There was no way to extricate Ronnie's mind from the spiders now. Her eyes rolled back into her skull, lips jam-mering as she began to babble. I could feel her mind crack, fracturing at each connection point. It began to break into tiny pieces. I pushed with everything I had in me, throwing my power over her, trying to hold her mind together. Pieces of her kept slipping through, too small, too broken to hold together.
Charlotte stepped into my line of sight.
I hadn't heard her and Tiff come up. Swaying, she walked to Ronnie. Slender fingers with too many joints cupped the tiny dancer's face. Ronnie twitched, muscles dancing under her skin. I felt Charlotte's lycanthropy spark a split second before the change washed away her humanity.
“It will be all right, little one. Do not fight. It is a gift.” Charlotte smoothed back Ronnie's hair.
My power was still connected. In my mind's eye I saw Charlotte's lycanthropy sweep through Ronnie's mind, sealing all the fractures, mending the erosion of her sanity. Her spider wove furiously, knitting the web of connections between Ronnie and the spiders from a tangle into an intricate lace.
Ronnie's lips stopped moving as Charlotte held her face. The Were-spider made soft shushing noises, telling her it would be okay.
Mascara-smeared eyelids closed, fluttering. My power was pushed away as Charlotte's lycanthropy sealed the connections between Ronnie and the spiders. As the last fracture closed my connection with them shattered like an icicle under a sledgehammer. Ronnie's eyes snapped open.
Charlotte melted back into human. “Are you with us, child?”
Ronnie nodded slowly. She opened her mouth, then closed it with a frown. Charlotte smoothed a hand across her brow.
“It's okay, little one. It will take a bit for you to think like a human again. Your words will come.” She looked over at me and Tiff. Her long, thin arm slid over Ronnie's shoulders and the dancer huddled into the embrace. “She'll be fine. It will take some time, but she will be okay.”
At Ronnie's feet, hundreds of ghost spiders puddled. Each of them looked up at her, their eight blood-drop eyes only for her.
Would she be all right? I had a feeling all right was an extremely relative term now.
15
My hand clamped down on the frat boy's sweaty wrist. Pulling hard, I gave it a good twist that jerked him back down into his chair. His clean-shaven face turned up at me in surprise, mouth open to say something. He took one look at me looming over him and swallowed it down.
I leaned in, breathing hard in his face, talking loud enough to be heard over Hank Williams Jr. blasting over the speakers. “That would be a bad idea, man. Worst one you ever had.” I shoved his hand back toward him. “Do. Not. Touch. The. Girls.”
Frat boys travel in packs. He looked at his buddies, all slightly different versions of him, for help. They all looked straight ahead, drinking their drinks. Without backup, he was a grade-A coward. He turned back to watch the girl onstage.
I looked up at Ronnie as she swung around the brass pole. She smiled at me. I pointed up over her head. Nodding, she closed her eyes as she swung upside down, thighs clamped around the pole. Hanging upside down, she waved away at the five ghost spiders that hung on silken thread above the frat boy's head. They were bigger now, the size of half dollars. On her signal they yo-yoed up to the ceiling to join their brothers and sisters.
I turned away and began weaving through the crowd of tables, moving toward the bar.
Charlotte had been right. Ronnie
was
okay. Relatively. It had taken a few weeks for her to come all the way back from the imprinting of the spiders, but she had. According to Charlotte, it was like having your mind broken up and spread around while still fully aware. Each spider was now connected to Ronnie psychically. They were attuned to each other. They were always around. She could feel each one and they acted like tiny, deadly extensions of her will. She didn't control them as much as they wanted what she wanted. They were always bringing her stuff: her keys, the TV remote, money.
They were also overprotective little bastards.
Which is why we had to be extra vigilant about the hands-off policy here at Polecats.
But Ronnie had already had her fair share of weird in her life. She was actually taking this in stride, all things considered.
Charlotte was fine. Once her offspring imprinted on Ronnie, all connection to her was severed. She cared about them because they were spiders, but she explained that with natural spider babies, you lose so many of them so quickly that there is no care and nurture involved. That's why spider egg sacs are filled with hundreds. Most will die quickly. The numbers are how Mother Nature ensures survival.
I reached the bar and picked up my cup of coffee. Well, it was more bourbon than coffee, but that's beside the point.
Tiff sidled up to me. She didn't dance but liked to dress like she did. Tonight she was wearing a slinky policewoman outfit complete with handcuffs. She leaned back against the bar showing me just how well her uniform shirt fit. She had one helluva tailor.
Her chin tilted toward the frat boys by the main stage. “Everything okay, boss?”
“Yep, under control.” I took a sip of coffee. The bourbon rolled down my throat with a nice soothing burn. Sitting the mug on the bar, I ran my fingers under my new shoulder holster.
Slender fingers reached out and caressed the unbroken leather. The nails were painted dark magenta to match her hair. “Still uncomfortable?”
“It's getting better.”
The new shoulder rig was still tight, slowly breaking in from wearing it. I had gotten it because now I had two barely-used-to-kill-me, nickel-plated, Colt 1911 .45's. They hung under each arm, heavy and comforting.
My Desert Eagle had been crushed under the forklift. I could buy another one, but once I had picked up the matched pair of 1911's I knew there would be no going back. They were nice. Instantly they felt like I had been shooting them for years. I ran the serial numbers by Detective Longyard, the homicide detective who has been my unofficial contact with the police since I started this war on monsters. They came back ice cold. It didn't surprise me. Professional hit men treat guns as disposable tools. Use once and discard.
So I had new guns. I didn't use the silencers, but they were put away in case I ever needed them.
I also had the katana.
When I picked up the blade from what was left of the Kensai, I could feel the Oni trapped inside it. It began talking to me. Whispering. Holding it, all I wanted to do was kill, slicing everybody in the world in two just so the accursed black blade could drink its fill of blood. It was locked away now in a secure vault here in Polecats, behind several crucifixes and a ring of blessed salt. I couldn't destroy it, that would set the Oni free and I'd just have to kill it again.
Besides, in my line of work, you never know when you might need a sword that can make you an unstoppable killing machine.
Yep, I love my freakin' job.
He hasn't met a monster yet that could give him a scare. With ice in his veins, silver hollow points in his chambers, and an innate ability to rise from the dead, what's to fear? The answer may be something he doesn't want to face....
 
Deacon Chalk normally has no trouble telling innocent victims from real monsters. So protecting an abused pregnant Were-dog is a no-brainer ... until a vicious lycanthrope leader and his brotherhood target Deacon, other shape-shifters, and any humans in their way. Suddenly, Deacon is outnumbered, outgunned, and unsure who—or what—to trust. The only edge he has left is a weapon hungry for his soul
and
his most savage impulses. And using it will exact a price even this hell-raising hunter fears to pay... .
 
 
Please turn the page for an exciting sneak peek of
James R. Tuck's newest Deacon Chalk,
Occult Bounty Hunter novel
 
BLOOD AND SILVER
 
coming in August 2012!
1
Good days don't last. Not for me they don't. Not for the last five years. Since the deaths of my family good days are like pet rattlesnakes. I may not know when they will bite, but I damn sure ought to know that they will. Suddenly and sharply. With great venom and without mercy.
I was having a good day. Scratch that, I was having a
great
day. My friend Tiff had dragged me downtown to a little carnival that had set up in a parking lot. It took some persuasion on her part; after all I am a big badass Occult Bounty hunter. We had ridden rides and filled our bellies with greasy carnival food. Laughing in the sunshine and making fools of ourselves. We were surrounded by normal humans, families enjoying themselves. There were no monsters. No bloodshed.
So far the only thing that had threatened my life was a rickety Tilt-A-Whirl and some sketchy looking hot dogs. And I'd had a good time. Leaving the carnival, I was happy to simply walk down the street, the warm sun on my back, and a good-looking woman at my side.
I was at peace with God, Nature, and my fellow man. And I should have known some asshole was going to come along and screw it up.
“Are you working tonight?”
My eyes cut over to the small brunette walking beside me. Well, I say brunette, her hair was dyed black and had bubblegum pink cut through it in streaks. Tiff matched me stride for stride, even though at 5'2” she was more than a foot shorter than me. The quick pace flipped her short skirt back and forth, flashing a nice length of leg from hem to calf-high boots.
“Nothing's on the books, but you know that doesn't mean anything.” I stepped close to her as we walked. “Don't you have to work the club tonight?”
“Nope. I got Kat to cover so that I'm free.” She moved close and her arm slid around my waist. Fingernails painted to match her hair lightly scratched through my T-shirt. A pleasant shiver chased up my spine. Her arm rested above the snubnose .44 revolver she knew was at the small of my back. I had a lightweight button up shirt over it and the big .45 semiautomatic that hung under my arm.
“Maybe we could do Indian food tonight then.”
Her free hand rubbed her stomach. “I don't know how you can think of food right now. I am completely stuffed.”
“I always think about food when I'm not working.” I was comfortable walking beside Tiff. Spring was in the air. Warm, but not oppressive like the South gets in the middle months of the year.
Things had been quiet for a bit, which is why there was time to do things like go to the carnival. Normally I am eyebrow deep in monsters. Work had been pretty tame since last year when I had gone up against Appollonia, an insane hellbitch of a vampire who had gotten hold of the Spear of Destiny. Of course, that job had nearly killed me but I was still standing at the end of it. I had survived and managed to kill off a good part of the vampire population in the southeast. All in all, not a bad day at the office.
That was also the time I had first met Tiff. The break in action had given me a chance to get to know her better. We had grown pretty close.
We were not dating. I wasn't ready for that. She understood. Hell, she had to. She knew about my family. About what had happened to them. How I had lost them five years ago at the hands of a Nephilim serial killer named Slaine. I hunted him down and found that monsters
are
real. I found that every nightmare you ever had, every story you ever heard that made you lie awake at night and sweat even though you were cold with fear, every damned thing in the dark that made your heart skip a beat ... it's all real. My thirst for revenge was so great I hunted Slaine anyways, monsters be damned. I chased him even after learning what a Nephilim is.
Nephilim are the offspring of Angels and humans. While tracking Slaine I came across an Angel. Yes, an honest-to-God Angel of the Lord. Slaine's people were raping her, trying to impregnate her and make more Nephilim, filming it to sell as Angelporn. I killed those sons of bitches and set her free.
After that I found the bastard who killed my family. Being just human I was outmatched. He killed me.
Dead.
When I died, the Angel showed up to return the rescue. She infused me with her blood, or whatever Angels have that passes for blood. It brought me back. Made me more than human. I am faster, stronger and tougher than normal. I heal fast, not like a superhero, but a lot faster than human. Although it all still hurts like a bitch until I do. I can see almost perfectly in the dark, and I can sense supernatural crap. I killed that evil son of a bitch and I have been killing every evil son of a bitch I can find ever since.
Oh yeah, I'm Deacon Chalk, Occult Bounty hunter.
I hunt monsters for a living.
To this day the deaths of my family sit like stones where my heart was. Sometimes the pain of their memory is crippling. It breaks my bones and grinds my soul. It crushes me. All I want to do is go be where they are. I can't buy that ticket myself, that's a mortal sin according to the Pope. Kill yourself and go straight to Hell. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars. So I move on and I keep hunting, waiting for the day I run up on something monster enough to take me out, to send me on my way to be with them. To give me the peace that was ripped away from me with their deaths.
The loss of my family is why I strap up and hunt. I carry the pain and rage of their loss
every day
. It's always there. Always waiting to crawl from the shadows. Always looking to explode and shatter into shards that cut and tear. I miss them every day.
Every.
Fucking.
Day.
And there hadn't been anyone since my wife had died. Until Tiff.
She had come along last year in the middle of that shitstorm with Appollonia and the crazy bitch's plan to enslave humanity. Once that was settled Tiff stayed and made a place in my messed up life. Somehow, she found a way to make her intentions clear, and yet not put any pressure on the situation at all. She knew about my family and what happened to them. Not the full story, because I still can't talk about it. It's too painful. Too sharp. Even without knowing, Tiff still understood. And that was enough for now.
So understand that I was happy when we walked toward the parking lot to leave. All was good and right in this shitty old world, better than it had been in years.
Until we turned the corner and came across a man beating a dog.
The man was large. Dark chocolate skin bulged, thick with muscle. Not quite as big as I am, but a big sonuvabitch nonetheless. Fat dreads hung around his head like dirty snakes. They shook as his arm rose and fell and rose again. One hand snarled around a heavy chain connected to a wide leather collar around the dog's neck. The rest of the chain flailed from his other hand, thudding against the dog's sides and haunches.
The dog was curled into a ball, trying to be as small as possible, hiding from the chain as much as it could. Pitiful whimpers mewled with each blow. Blood-slicked shaggy fur picked up dirt and debris from the gravel lot they were in, sticking in layers of brown and grey grit. It was so covered in blood and dirt I couldn't tell what kind of dog it was.
The man stopped beating the dog, still holding the chain. I could hear his breathing from across the lot, bellowing in and out, short from exertion.
Tiff drew to a stop beside me as I went still. She took a small step away, giving me room to move. Her arm was still behind me and I could feel her hand on the grip of the .44 at my lower back. She had her own in her bag, a CZ75 9mm, but mine was closer to her hand. She was following the training I had been giving her over the last few months.
Good girl.
The keys to my car were already in my hand since we were close to the parking lot. I handed them off to her. Tilting my head, I spoke from the side of my mouth without taking my eyes off the scene in front of me. “Get the car. Pull it back here and stay in it. Keep the motor running and be ready to go.”
I caught her nod from the corner of my eye as she took the keys and moved away. I looked around the lot before I moved. It was at the end of a building on the corner of two streets. The back of the building was a brick wall. Some artist had painted a mural of a girl with a butterfly on her outstretched palm. It was pretty well done. The street side of the lot had a chain link fence clogged with kudzu that was trying to take over, using the fence as a trellis. Kudzu will grow anywhere. It's like a disease here in the south. Give it a crack in the asphalt to plant itself and it will latch on, getting bigger as each day passed, growing and spreading in little increments like vegetable Ebola. A row of cars lined the fence, leaning on their wheels.
I looked back. No one was coming down the sidewalk. There were a lot of people at the carnival, but they were all far enough away that they looked tiny and indistinct. The coast was fairly clear as long as this stayed quiet.
I took a step, walking towards the man. Rolling my shoulders to loosen them, flexing my hands open and closed to warm them up. Adrenaline coursed through my arteries making my heart beat harder. Not faster, the rate stayed the same but each beat thudded inside my rib cage like a bat to a bell. Each beat slammed an echo inside me and anger rose pushing more blood through my veins.
People who abuse animals are cowards, especially ones who hurt dogs. Dogs are God's way of showing He still loves us. They only exist to be devoted to us. So when some jackass has to abuse a dog to make themselves feel better it really, really pisses me off.
I am not someone you want pissed off at you.
My whistle cut across the lot, making the guy jerk his head up. Deep amber eyes flashed out under a thick brow. The scowl he gave wrinkled a wide nose and curled his lips into a snarl. His voice rumbled from a deep chest. “Go away redneck. This is none of your concern.”
“When I go away, I will be taking that animal with me, asshole.” I stopped just a few feet from him, finger pointed towards his face. “Walk away now and save me the trouble of kicking the shit out of you before I do.”
The man dropped the chain on top of the dog with a run of clinks and a thud. It didn't move or run away, just lay shaking, as the chain slithered off its huddled form. Turning to face me fully the man flexed his fingers against each other. The knuckles popped loudly. A shudder ran through him. His chest and shoulder muscles compressed under his black T-shirt, tensing for a fight. He raised his face up to look at me.
The bones underneath his skin
shifted
.
It was subtle, but I saw it. The bones thickened and slipped just ever-so-slightly, squaring up his skull and widening his mandible. A warm power slid over my skin, rubbing like velvet against the grain. The hairs on my arms stood up. The spring breeze pushed from behind him. The moist smell of cat made my nose wrinkle.
Damn. A lycanthrope in broad daylight.
This changed everything.
My eyes cast around for a weapon to even the odds. Weres are fast as hell and stronger than a motherfucker. I had guns, I always have guns. I even had silver bullets in them, but we were in the middle of downtown on a spring day. There were people around, families just around the corner from where we stood. Hell, we were only three blocks from the local police precinct. Gunshots would bring lawmen a-runnin'. That wouldn't be good. Cops don't have silver bullets. Some of them know about the things I fight, but most are in the dark. I try to keep it that way.
The lot was flat and mostly empty, nothing but gravel under my boots. No weapons I could see. I squared my shoulders and started walking towards him again.
“
What
did you just say to me?” His voice was deeper, the edge of a growl rumbling out into the air.
“I said ...” and with that I closed the space between us, looping my right hand from behind and driving it into the side of his head. My fist slammed into his temple where the skull is its thinnest. It drove his head to the side and pushed him down into a crouch. Fingers closing on a handful of dreads, I jerked his face into my knee, smashing his cheek. Pain made him roar. The volume of it shook me, vibrating through my bones. Velvet power exploded from him, rushing along my body, stinging my skin.
Faster than I could put my foot down he threw his body back, shaking me off and flinging me backwards through the air. My stomach lurched as I sailed above the gravel. One second was all I had to see golden fur erupt from dark skin and his face pull into the shape of a snarling beast.
Lion
sprang to my mind. Then I was crashing into a row of trash cans, spilling garbage everywhere, thinking about nothing but pain.
Something hard rammed into my back just above my kidneys with a grinding crush. Air whooshed from my lungs as my diaphragm spasmed and jerked. I was blind, vision dark from lack of oxygen. The pile of garbage I was in didn't help as it spilled over me. Something wet and sticky smeared across my arm. Dust and debris flew in my face. Scrambling, I got my feet under me. Heaving lungfuls of air I shook my head to clear my sight.
A pile of old cinderblocks lay on the ground, scattered from where I had slammed into them. As my eyes cleared I saw the man who had thrown me was now a full-fledged man-beast. Half-man, half-lion he stood like a special effect in a big budget movie. Sand colored fur covered him and he had grown in size, more muscular than before, bigger than me. Thick black talons flexed in and out at the end of his fingertips. His body shook. Dreads colored like dirty honey bounced around his leonine face. They had grown out into a thick mat of a mane.
BOOK: Spider's Lullaby
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