Falling Light (Game of Shadows #2)(6)

Heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, crack, LSD, ecstasy, PCP. Marijuana did nothing for him. Smoking it made him hungry and even more paranoid than usual. He just didn’t see the point, although he was rather fond of opium.

It was so easy to enjoy drugs when he had no lifelong commitment to any one body. Nicotine? He loved it. There was nothing quite like that first cigarette right after he took over a new body. Taking a drag of smoke into virgin lungs was better than sex.

When he experimented, he was always careful not to overdose. After all, for him, the point of using drugs was recreation, not a desire to escape his life. He didn’t want to accidentally die and have to start life all over again as a real baby, not knowing his own true identity. That would leave him too vulnerable to his enemies.

But none of the drugs, not even his favorite, coke, could hold a candle to the experience of taking human lives. He drank them down like they were the finest of liqueurs. If gold had a taste, he imagined that was what a soul tasted like.

Pure life force. It was the most valuable commodity in the universe. It was also the easiest resource to harvest, and the best goddamn high there ever was.

He wished he could drink down the life force of his old enemies the way that he had discovered he could do with humans. Imagine what kind of high that would be—revenge and sustenance all at once. He’d tried once or twice, the rare times he had been able to capture one of them. But he had never discovered the knack for it. Either their spirits were too strong or they were too like his, and his desire remained nothing more than a frustrated fantasy.

He was aware that he was rambling a bit and not with very much relevance or clarity. Making an effort to rein in his wandering thoughts, he ran through the list of what he had accomplished since he had fled from the cabin.

By now, the Michigan state patrol would have discovered the massacre at the Northside Restaurant. His drone at Quantico would have initiated contact with the state police to insure that the FBI would take over the homicide case. With his drone in position to target the search, by this evening, one of the most intensive manhunts in the history of the United States would be under way for Michael and Mary.

While the knowledge was very sweet indeed, he couldn’t afford to relax and wait to let the authorities bring in his prey. For a survivalist like Michael, there were a lot of places to hide in the countryside, and Michigan had so much freshwater coastline, it was going to be a nightmare to try to patrol the borders.

Also, he knew very well that Michael and Mary were working hard to join Astra in whatever hole that bitch was using as her current lair. They were stronger together than when they were apart. Even though there were now only three of his enemies left, as long as Astra joined anyone that came against him, he knew that even a small group could be enough to bring him down.

He had to try to stop the three from reuniting if he possibly could, otherwise he might spend the next several decades—the rest of this generation—on the run. If that happened, he knew from experience that the balance would only begin to swing in his favor again when Michael’s and Mary’s current human bodies grew old and frail.

Old age was not a friend to his enemies. Their spirits became trapped by the limitations of their failing meat. That was the drive behind his original search to find a way to leap from human host to host, so that he could stay forever youthful, forever strong.

Deep in thought, he drove to his latest temporary headquarters in a motel room in Grand Rapids. He had just unlocked the door and was entering his room when his cell phone rang.

He glanced at the number. It was his drone at Quantico. He kicked the door shut and answered it.

“Oversight for the case has moved to DC,” his drone said. “I’ve insisted that I want to remain involved, so headquarters complied by assigning me to head the task force.”

He twitched a shoulder impatiently. Sometimes working with drones was an exercise in irritation. They might be under his total control, but that control came at a cost. Drones lost a certain initiative or essential drive that independent people with souls retained.

But contracting jobs out to independent humans, or even partnering with them, meant that he could never be absolutely sure of their loyalty. It was always a judgment call which way to jump with a project.

“Martin, what did I tell you about bothering me with unimportant details?” he said. “You remained in charge of the case. That’s all that matters.”

“Well, yes and no,” Martin said, sounding apologetic. “My point is, I’ll be working with outsiders from DC. Some of them will be joining me in the field, so there will be witnesses to anything I do. It’s a complication and might slow things down. It’ll be harder for me to plant evidence and direct the search.”

“Well then, you’ll just have to introduce me to your coworkers,” he said. “You know how I love to meet people.”

One good handshake was all it took. If he met a human in person, he could turn him or her into one of his drones. The procedure took energy and depleted him for a while, but needs must be met. This mission was too important to allow any interference from outsiders. For this, he had to retain total control.

“Understood,” Martin said. “In the meantime, we’ve been discussing initial steps. Michigan is a logistical nightmare for a manhunt. Even if we enlist help from the National Guard, there is no way we can cover all of the state’s borders, especially the coastline.”