Hungry Ghosts (Eric Carter #3)(75)

“Some folks would say I’m worse.” His eyes took on a dusky, red hue and any thought that he and I were ever friends was gone. He’s not human and it showed. “Point is, it doesn’t change what’s going on one goddamn bit, does it?”

“I can’t kill them, can I?” I refused to agree with him. It was true, but I wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction. “So what do I do?”

“Oh, you can kill ’em. Just not the way you’re thinkin’. But sadly, this is where the narrative stops,” he said. “I can’t tell you what to do. I can nod my head or grunt a negative, but I can’t come out and say it. And no, this isn’t me trying to play you or anything. This is Mictlantecuhtli’s magic. It’s weaker than it was five hundred years ago, or I wouldn’t have been able to tell you this much, but a straight answer? Can’t do it, Chief.”

“Since when have you ever given me a straight answer to begin with?”

“Fair point,” he said. “So let me give you one now. You’re gonna have to guess. I can’t help that. Sorry. And then I’m gonna have to make you forget it. Because here and now I’ve got things blocked off for you. But if I don’t twist your memories a bit, the second you wake up they’ll know what I told you. They’ll know what you’ve guessed. They’re gonna suspect no matter what. But if they don’t know for sure they’ll keep playing the game, waiting to see if you really figured it out or not.”

“I don’t see how. I’ve got them blocked off.”

“Yeah, no you don’t. Those spells you got inked to hide you from them? That handcuff you got on your lady friend? They don’t work. Everything that chunk of Mictlantecuhtli in your head knows, he knows. They can see you, find you, talk to you. You can’t hide from them.”

“Oh, you are fucking kidding me. Those tats cost a fucking fortune.” This entire time I thought I was safe, but they were just letting me think that. A slow pounding started going through my skull at that point. How the hell do you get a migraine inside a dream? “Fine. Let’s get this over with. Is it bigger than a breadbox?”

“No,” he said.

It took me a little less than twenty questions to get my answers and I didn’t like them one bit.

___

I pull back, yanking my hand away from Mictlantecuhtli’s chest and almost tripping over my own feet. I only barely manage to hang onto the knife. Mictlantecuhtli grins at me.

“So you did figure it out,” he says.

Would I have, if Darius hadn’t clued me in? Maybe but probably not. I started to. Little things that didn’t add up, but I couldn’t get them to connect. Like why the king of Mictlan ran from his own people. Why they both wanted me so desperately to kill the other. Why they kept goading me on until I knew I was going to kill them both.

And why they were going to let me do it. I knew I was being played, but I had no idea how.

Mictlantecuhtli’s hands shoot out and grab mine. I can’t move them. I can’t even drop Quetzalcoatl’s lighter. He closes the lid with his thumb. “Let’s not do anything rash, shall we?” he says. He pulls the blade back to his chest, leans in until the point presses in. “I fall forward or you shove that knife in, either way, it counts.”

“Eric, what the hell is he talking about?” Tabitha says.

“Quiet,” Santa Muerte says. “It’ll be your turn next.”

“My turn for what?”

My mind is racing. I try to pull back but his grip is like iron. He squeezes so hard cracks are forming in the jade. I try calling on his power inside me, not caring that it will tip me over the edge. I just need a second.

But it doesn’t want to listen to me, anymore. I can’t think of any spell of my own that would do a thing to him. My own magic is useless.

I hear Tabitha and Santa Muerte arguing behind me but I’m not quite sure about what. There’s a rushing in my ears and my vision is starting to go dark around the edges.

Jade is slowly crawling up the last two fingers that are still flesh. I feel a tightening in my chest. So this is how it ends. My soul torn apart by an Aztec death god, or an eternity encased in jade. Goddammit.

All I need is one fucking second.

My raven tattoo gives it to me.

The birds tear free from their place on my chest, ripping through cloth, taking pieces of jade along with them. They’ve been feeling different for weeks and now that they’ve gotten loose I can see that they are different, and not just because they took the initiative and went out on their own.

It’s their coloring, their texture. When they’ve been released before they were inky black, but now they’ve taken on the qualities of the jade. Green, stone feathers, jeweled eyes.

But it’s also how they feel. Angrier. Bigger. Meaner. Much more dangerous. And they popped out all on their own.

Mictlantecuhtli figures this out the hard way. He shrieks as they tear into him, pecking out pieces of him with their beaks, gouging out chunks with their talons. They multiply in the air around him. Suddenly there are a dozen, two dozen. He swats at them, the ones he hits bursting into flame only to be replaced with five more.

He loosens his grip and I pull my hands free, falling onto my back. I don’t have much time. Seconds, maybe. I hesitate for a fraction of it, hoping what I learned from Darius is right.