Harvest of Holidays (3 page)

* * * * *

“Disaster planning is exhausting, isn’t it?” Oscar commented as they walked slowly down the path toward the Chevy sitting by the sidewalk. A little girl dressed up as Snow White skipped past them while her mother stood at the gate, watching. There were more young children walking along the street with their treat buckets. Later, after dark, the older kids would systematically scour the neighborhood for their sugar fix.

Tally sighed. “It’s not something we’ve ever had to think about before. Some of the questions you have to answer are…stressful.”

“Donna and I went through it just after Casey was born. For people like you, wills and insurance just doesn’t cut it, not when there’s the possibility of…well,” he paused as they walked past the mother at the gate, then added softly; “The possibility of some pissed-off demon or spirit coming back to wreak vengeance upon your heirs and bloodline.”

“That doesn’t happen a lot,” Tally said quickly, speaking just as softly. “I hope Donna didn’t let you think it was a natural hazard.”

“No, but I spent years as a contract lawyer. Thinking about the worst that could happen has been trained into me.” He smiled to take the sting out of it and leaned against the long dark green hood. “Do you mind if I ask a direct question?”

“I think you’ve earned a direct question or two, today,” Tally told him.

He considered her closely. “Demon hunters are a pretty tight bunch. Close.”

Tally shrugged. “I suppose. It’s unusual for us to work in groups like we’re doing now – but we’re working that way because of the gargoyles. It’s the only way to find them and fight them – use bigger numbers than they’ve got. I suppose we’re close because of that.”

Oscar’s scrutiny didn’t fade. “When you get close like that, when you’re risking your life every time you go out…you get to depend on each other. Lean on each other.”

Caution rippled through her. Tally tried to smile naturally. “What’s on your mind, Oscar?”

He drew in a breath. Then another. “Is Donna…and Jimmy…?”

Tally instantly rejected a dozen different answers, while her mind buzzed with thoughts and cautions and warnings. Finally, she settled for a type of the truth. “I can’t answer that, Oscar.”

He swallowed. “If she wasn’t, you’d just say no.” His voice was strained.

Tally shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. It
is
rough out there. You do have to depend upon each other. It builds up…extraordinary stresses. And knowing you have a short life expectancy…well, everyone deals with that in different ways. Carson parties. Hard.”

“Not anymore,” Oscar said quickly. “I haven’t seen him drunk since you got pregnant.”

Neither had Tally. She tried for another example. “Jimmy likes his booze. Miguel likes his drugs. Connie and Joy…well, they have their own private rituals. But that’s the point, Oscar. Everyone is different, but it’s part of the life.”

“And that’s where it stays, right? Inside your little world.” He sounded very bitter.

“I honestly don’t know what Donna does on her down time,” Tally said truthfully. It was more than she should have said and she shifted uncomfortably on her feet. “Why don’t you ask her directly?”

Oscar shook his head. “I can’t. You don’t understand what it’s like, being married to one of you when you’re not one yourself. I knew, going in, what she was. Donna was frank about it. I think she wanted to scare me off, but it just made me more determined.” He smiled. It was a weak smile, but it was there. “I still think it’s one of the coolest things in the world, this realm of yours. Demons are real. Vampires are real. Ghosts aren’t just stories. It’s…exhilarating.”

Tally grinned. “You sound like Carson does, sometimes.”

Oscar’s smile faded. “But that’s just it. You’re both hunters. You’re both a part of your world, so neither of you has to stand to one side and let the other just…do what they’re good at. And Donna’s good. I know that. I wouldn’t take it away from her, and she does the very best she can with the girls and for me…but because I accepted her for what she was, I have to accept
all
of it. I can’t start crying uncle now, just because there’s a part of her life that I don’t like.”

Tally touched his arm. “You’re a very decent man, Oscar. I think you do marvelously well as a straight human married to a hunter. It must make life a strain.” She pressed her lips together. “I didn’t want to end up with a normal human, even a normal human hunter. I thought, if I was to settle into any long term relationship it would be…I don’t know.”

“With a vampire, perhaps?” Oscar asked gently.

“Perhaps, in the far corners of my subconscious, yes,” Tally admitted frankly. “Vampires seemed more normal to me than humans, but I fell in love with a human that had been in the business only a few years. It has taken every day of the six years we’ve been married to figure it out, Oscar. It has taken arguments and compromises and exhausting discussions like this one this afternoon. But we do it because we want it to work.”

Oscar blew out his breath. “I gotta go,” he said, digging keys out of his jeans pocket. He stood up. “Thanks.”

Tally tried another smile, and this one came more easily. “Talk to her,” she encouraged him.

“Maybe. I’ll think it through.”

She watched him walk around the car and get behind the wheel, and waved as he drove off, moving at turtle speed in deference to the little kids hopped up on candy that were spilling out onto the road and racing to the next house without a care about their surroundings.

Feeling a baffled sort of sadness, Tally walked slowly back into the house.

* * * * *

Carson was standing by the phone on the wall when she entered, talking into it. He glanced at Tally as she shut the door. “I don’t think Oscar is still here, Donna.”

Tally shook her head.

“No, he just left,” Carson added and frowned as Donna said something that sounded high and fast, even from across the room. “Where?” he said sharply. “We’ll be there in…forty minutes.” He hung up, leaving the white coil swinging against the wallpaper.

Damian and Nick were already getting to their feet.

“Explain for the one human in the room without supersonic hearing,” Tally said.

“Donna and the rest. They didn’t find the revenant, but they did find three bear carcasses. They had been torn into like Kentucky Fried Chicken.”

Gargoyles. They were the only creatures big enough and strong enough to think of wild bears as mobile snacks. Tally went to the front closet and handed out everyone’s coats and jackets, then pulled her long working coat off the hanger and shrugged into it carefully.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Carson demanded, pausing half-way through buttoning up his pea coat.

“I’m coming with you.”

“Like hell!”

“I’ll stay out of the way. But if the clan has moved into our neighborhood, then you need every single person who can wield a blade out there.”

“I’ll watch her,” Damian added.

“You’re fucking pregnant!” Carson cried, the tendons in his neck standing out in sharp relief.

“I’ll be careful,” Tally said softly. “But I’m coming with you. The Stonebrood Clan has been my one focus for six years now and in six years, we’ve taken down one of them.
One.
Now they’ve come to us. There will be a nest out there, Carson. If we find a nest, we stand a real chance of taking them all down in one hit. Don’t make me sit on the sidelines for this. Just…don’t.”

Carson was silent, but she could see his chest rising and falling as he battled his instincts.

Nick cleared his throat. “Not that I want to get in the middle of a husband and wife fight, but I have to point out that since Tally turned sixteen I haven’t once succeeded in coaxing her to change her mind.”

Carson looked at him, and Tally had the oddest sensation that they were communing just like Nick and Damian often did. There was a look that passed between them, and she knew it was about her.

Then Carson ruffled his long hair with one hand, scrubbing hard. “Okay,” he said heavily and pointed at Damian. “If she gets so much as a hangnail over this….”

Damian grinned. “You’ll…what?”

“I’ll figure out something,” Carson said darkly.

Damian shook his head. “She’s safe with me.”

* * * * *

The river valley was a mile-wide strip of lush woodland that was, after two decades of careful preservation, returning to something like it would have been before the British tramped their way through the state, making everything another little England. The nature preserve ran along the river for nearly ten miles, stretching out to two miles across in some places, and narrowing down to nature trails in others.

“We should think about walkie talkies if we’re going to keep hunting in packs like this,” Carson said, his breath billowing out in dense mist. Now that it was dark, the warmth had left the day.

“This is the trail Donna spoke of,” Damian murmured more softly. “Although I question her estimate of five hundred yards.”

Tally kept quiet. She was having trouble keeping up with everyone, although nothing in the world would make her say that aloud after arguing so hard to come along. There was a peculiar stitch in her side that seemed to press in on her lungs, making her breath come short. It didn’t help that there was fifteen pounds worth of weapons tucked away inside her coat, weighing her down even more. Her feet were throbbing.

A darker shadow blotted out the starlight just ahead, moving into the center of the path. All four of them halted at the same time. Everyone’s instincts were on high alert.

“It’s me. Donna,” came the call from the shadow. “This way. We think it might be cornered.”

“Cornered against what?” Nick asked.

“The river and the highway that crosses it, about half a mile north of here. We held position and waited for you. We need the numbers to close the net.”

Nick stepped forward. “Show us the way,” he said curtly, his English accent very distinct. The older accent tended to emerge when he was hunting, for he had been a hunter in England in the last century, when he had worked with other hunters to bring down this same Stonebrood clan. As much as this was Tally’s project, to avenge her father’s death in some small way, it was just as much Nick’s. They had been working together for the last six years to bring the clan down once more.

Donna waved them onward and stepped into the trees and they all followed. Damian fell back to keep pace with Tally, moving just ahead of her. She wondered if he had sensed her physical stress.

Inside the trees it was darker and warmer, for the air was still and thick with scents and sounds of the night. Even at this time of year, there were still crickets and the rustle of birds and small creatures in the undergrowth. The thick, sharp scent of pine wafted over them as they pushed through the firs. All of them moved almost silently. It was part of their training. But Tally kept tripping over her own feet. She gritted her jaw and slowed even more, picking her footing with more care. Damian fell back with her and this time, moved around behind her. “I can catch you if you fall, from back here,” he said softly enough that no one else except perhaps for Nick would hear him.

Tally sighed. She hadn’t hidden her weakness from Nick and Damian. She only hoped Carson didn’t notice. It would distract him.

For the first time she questioned the wisdom of coming along tonight. Yes, it was her project, to rid the world of the Stonebrood clan once more. But her stubbornness could bring more than herself into danger. Damian wasn’t going to be an effective member of the team because he had promised to watch out for her. Nick had probably heard she was slowing down and part of his attention would be pulled away from the quarry they were hunting as a result. Carson…well, he would worry anyway. Would the others waiting for them somewhere ahead also be distracted by her presence? It wasn’t something she had considered until now and now it was too late. If there was a gargoyle ahead, the thing would have picked up their scent.

Donna was slowing down, her silhouette shifting as she turned her head, looking for the others.

Nick tapped her shoulder and pointed. She nodded and headed where he had directed. It was at a sharp tangent to the direction they had been taking.

Carson slipped away, heading in the opposite direction from Donna.

Without a word, Nick moved directly ahead.

Damian caught Tally’s elbow. “We’ll stay here.” His voice was very low.

“Yes,” Tally agreed. It was a stadium seat, while the action was taking place ahead of them, but now she didn’t mind at all.

Because everyone was so good at moving quietly even among the trees, the silence gathered around the pair of them. High overhead, Tally could hear wind moving the treetops. It was a lonely whistling sound. Even further away, a dull murmur spoke of traffic. That would be the highway. There were no other sounds at all. Not even the scrabble of tiny creatures in the undergrowth. Everything knew there was a predator nearby and was curled up and hiding, waiting for the danger to pass.

“I’m sorry I’m holding you back,” Tally said.

Damian shrugged. “I’ve done this once already. I don’t mind skipping the re-run.”

“Was it very bad? In England?”

He didn’t answer straight away. “It was different, then. The Stonebrood clan was the very last. It was a mission for Nick, to rid the world of a creature that had no moral compass, no compassion and no natural enemies. They’re unnatural, anyway. The result of a curse gone wrong.” He shrugged. “At the end, when they knew they were doomed, they killed anyone they could reach, just because...”

“Because they were angry,” Tally concluded. She had heard the story about the final day when Lirgon, the leader of the clan, had finally been cornered and killed. It had been a brutal and bloody day. Many of the hunters who had joined Nick to hunt the gargoyles had died.

“They killed whoever they could reach, just because they could. It was defiance, not anger,” Damian said. Then he blew out his breath. “And with a wave of his hand, a demon brings them back to taunt us once more.”

“Not all of them,” Tally said.