This Savage Song (19 page)

He rubbed his hand over the tallies on his wrist.

Four hundred and twenty-one days.

But it wasn't the marks he was afraid of losing.

There had to be another way. He retreated into the center of the room, scanned the walls, the floor, the ceiling. Smooth. Smooth.
Tiled
. Standing on the stool, he was just tall enough to reach the insulated squares overhead; they were heavy, but when he pressed against one hard enough, it lifted, and he was able to slide it up, and over.

August sniffed, recoiling faintly at the stale air, then retrieved his violin and hoisted himself up into the grimy dark.

The fingers were icy steel around Kate's throat, and before she could twist free, she was being thrown down against the sidewalk. She hit hard, the wind knocked out of her lungs and her palms burning where they scraped against concrete. She scrambled to her hands and knees, but the Malchai were too fast, and one of them was on her, forcing her down onto her back.

Her shoulder flared with white-hot pain as the monster pinned her to the sidewalk.

“Feisty thing,” he murmured as the other Malchai
freed the spike from his leg with a wet sound and tossed it aside. The monster on top of her had those same deep scratches running down his cheek, ruining the
H
and cutting all the way to bone. The marks looked fresh.

“She killed Olivier,” said the other, shaking the burn of iron from his bony fingers.

“Indeed she did,” whispered the first, bringing his lips to her cheek. She wrenched her head away and felt cold breath on her face as he whispered something in her bad ear, too low for her to hear. She drove her knee into his groin, but the monster only chuckled. So much for SING.

They were strong, but it was still light out, and if she could just get to her feet, put her back to the wall—

“I can hear your blood pulsing,” said the Malchai on top of her as her fingers scrambled for the second spike shoved in her sock. “I bet you taste sweet.” The monster's mouth yawned wide, flashing jagged, silvery fangs.

“No teeth,” warned the second, and the Malchai pinning her frowned but closed his mouth with a click. The other one produced a small, handheld torch, snapped it to life. The flame hissed, and Kate thrashed beneath the monster's grip, until his nails dug into her skin, drawing blood.

“I'm going . . . to kill you,” she snarled.

“Humans, humans, full of lies,”
sang the one on top of
her, red eyes dancing with delight. “Should we kill her first, like the others?”

The Malchai with the torch seemed to consider. “No. There's no one to hear. We should take our time, like he would.”

This was wrong.

This was wrong, wrong, wrong.

Her hand clawed at the grass, trying to reach the second spike. The monster on top of her smiled, and the one with the torch turned the dial, focusing the heat into a white-hot knife.

“She has her father's eyes,” he said, and Kate shuddered, remembering the teacher on the ground, his sockets scorched black. “Hold her still.”

August dropped out of a ventilation duct and into the hallway, his uniform smudged with dust and cobwebs. His shoes hit the polished Colton floor, and as he straightened, his relief at being free quickly reverted to fear. This hadn't been some random prank. Someone had wanted to keep him in that room. But who? And
why
?

Right now, that didn't matter as much as getting out. He headed for the nearest exit, pulling the phone from his pocket, but staggered to a stop when he saw the girl's body. She was young, a freshman, her head twisted at an awkward angle, but it was her face that made him gasp.
She had no eyes. They'd been burned out.

He dialed Henry as he hit the emergency door override and burst out of the building.

“Come on,” he muttered as the phone began to ring. He let it ring three times, four, then hung up, and was about to dial Leo when he heard the strangled scream.

It wasn't a high-pitched cry, more a muffled shout. August rounded the corner and slammed to a stop. Two creatures huddled over a girl, their lines too long and lean, their skin too pale and bones too dark. He'd never seen a Malchai before. Not face-to-face. They cast no shadows, but the air around their bodies shivered in his vision, their teeth jagged silver points.

They looked . . . monstrous.

And the girl beneath them—the one who'd cried out—was Kate.

For an instant, the world went still, and time slowed, the way it did between chords, the moment drawn out like a note.

He had to help her.

He shouldn't help her.

If he did, she would know what he was.

If he didn't, she would die.

They were killing her.

They were framing him.

She was an innocent.

She was a Harker.

And then, too fast, the moment collapsed, and he dropped to his knees and opened the violin case.

The torch burned the air above Kate's face.

The Malchai's nails were digging into her jaw, and a sound like a whimper escaped her throat. The noise, so foreign, so pitiful, was enough to shock her back to her senses.

Her fingers brushed the edge of the spike. And then she heard it.

Music.

A single note that rang out across the grounds and filled the air, a note that seemed to take up more space than it should. And then another, and another, weaving together into a song. The music was strange and haunting and beautiful, and it took all of Kate's focus to cover her good ear, but somehow, she could still hear it, crystal clear. The Malchai dropped the torch and staggered as if hit, and the one on top of her froze, and clutched his skull in pain as something began to blossom like a bruise across his skin.

Her fingers finally found the spike in her boot, and she drove the iron up into the Malchai's chest, past the blackish substance breaking out on his skin like sweat, and under the bone plate, and into his heart. The
monster screamed, clawing at himself, but it was too late. The spike was buried all the way to the blunted grip, her fingers slick as black blood spilled from his lips and he slumped onto her. Kate shoved him off and staggered to her feet, swaying from pain, her thoughts clouded by the threads of music.

And then, abruptly, it faltered, and she heard Freddie scream, “Watch out!”

She turned too slowly, and found herself face-to-face with the second Malchai. The monster caught her wrist despite the oily darkness oozing from its skin, and before she could tear free, his knife-like fangs sank into her shoulder.

Pain shot through her. And then, an instant later, the monster's fangs were gone, and he was being hauled backward. Freddie's arms were wrapped around the Malchai's shoulders, one of his hands pressed flat against the pale skin at the monster's throat; and Kate stood there, dazed, thinking about how young he looked—how small—before she remembered that he was a monster, too. Freddie's eyes were shut, his teeth clenched as he pinned the Malchai back against him, the darkness soaking from the monster's skin into his own like a stain.

Kate's senses finally snapped back, and she broke into motion, taking up the discarded spike and driving it up
into the Malchai's heart. He didn't fight. He was already slumping against Freddie's chest, the red light flickering out of his eyes by the time the iron struck home.

Freddie let go, and the monster collapsed between them, little more than teeth and bones, and for a second they just stared at each other, covered in blood and gore and gasping for air.

Neither moved.

Freddie's gaze rolled unsteadily over her, and the corpses, before drifting to his violin, discarded in the grass. Kate's fingers tightened on the spike in her hand.

Run
, said a voice in Kate's head.

She didn't.

Freddie's eyes found hers, and he swayed a little on his feet.

“What the—” Kate started, but then he doubled over and began to retch.

What came up was black, glistening like oil. He tried to straighten, but stumbled forward, collapsing to his hands and knees and heaving inky liquid onto the pale concrete of the Colton sidewalk.

Get back
, said the voice, but she was already sinking to her knees in front of him. “What's wrong?”

He opened his mouth, as if trying to speak, but choked as more darkness heaved out onto the concrete. When he looked up, his eyes were no longer gray, but
black. Black, and full of pain. Veins stood out on his hands and wound like black cords over his skin, climbing his throat.

What had Sloan said?

We cannot feed on them. They cannot feed on us.

Then why? Why had he done that? She wanted to ask him, but Freddie's eyes were sliding out of focus, his body shaking. He reached weakly for his violin, but it was too far away, and moments later he crumpled to the pavement. He wasn't moving. Was he dead? Did she want him to be dead? A small part of her thought, so
that's
how to kill a Sunai, but no, his chest was still lurching up and down with shallow, staccato breaths.

Her cell phone rang. It was still sitting on the sidewalk where it had been knocked from her hands, and she rushed forward and answered.

“Hello?” she asked, breathlessly. But it wasn't her father. Or Marcus. It was the cab company. The car was waiting in front of the school. The meter was running.

Kate looked around at the wreckage of the fight: the two Malchai corpses, the torch scorching a black line into the sidewalk, the unconscious Sunai at her feet. She was covered in drying blood and streaks of blackish gore. She swallowed.

“Stay there,” she told the cab. “I'm on my way.”

When August woke up, everything hurt. Pain had always been a fleeting thing, something that skimmed along the surface of his senses, but this was deep, knotting around every muscle and bone. The last time he'd gone dark, it had hurt to the core, burned through him like a fever, but even that was different. Now he felt hollowed out. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to
be
. And for the first time in his life he wanted to crawl back into the darkness of his dreams.

Instead, August dragged his mind to the surface where his body waited and opened his eyes.

He was sitting on a concrete floor, propped up against an unfinished wall, a tangle of metal girding and wooden beams against his back. His vision swam, then focused, then swam again; he tried to move, but his wrists were bound to the metal framework on either side with zip ties.

Kate Harker was sitting in the middle of the concrete floor, arms around her knees, watching him. She was wearing his Colton blazer over her blood-streaked polo. A bruise was coming out along her jaw, and she held one arm in front of her at a protective angle, her polo torn where the Malchai's teeth had sunk in. She looked shaken, but when she saw him staring, she stiffened, her face unreadable.

“Welcome to my new office,” she said. Her voice was cold, distant. Maybe it was shock. He'd seen FTFs go through that, after a brush with death. “I was starting to wonder if you'd ever wake up.”

August tore his eyes away and looked around the room. They weren't alone. A man was slumped in the corner, unconscious, hands bound, and mouth covered in duct tape. A label on his shirt read “V-City Cab.”

She followed his gaze. “You're heavier than you look,” she explained. “I needed his help getting you up here. And then . . . well . . . I didn't think I should let him go. But I paid him pretty well before . . . well.”

August tried to swallow. His throat felt like it was coated in sand. “My violin.”

Kate rapped her nails on the case beside her. He sagged with relief, and she gave him a look he couldn't parse. Her attention drifted to the windows, empty frames covered in plastic sheeting. Even through the
plastic, he could tell it was getting dark. He should have been home by now. Where was his phone? He couldn't feel it in his pocket. Had he dropped it?

“Where are we?” he asked.

“My father has safe houses set up around the city.”

A wave of panic hit him like nausea. “And you
took
us to one? After his Malc—”

Kate shot him a withering look. “They weren't my father's anymore,” she said icily. “But I'm not stupid. We're in a renovation project around the corner from the safe house. I have a lot of questions, Freddie.”

He swallowed again. “August,” he said tiredly. “My name's August.”

“August,”
she said, as if testing it out. “That does suit you better. August Flynn.”

So she did know.

“How long?” he asked, and she must have understood the question because she said, “Yesterday.” August nodded. He'd been right. He'd probably feel vindicated, if he weren't in so much pain.

“I thought your kind were supposed to be invincible.” She said
kind
like it was a dirty word.

He cringed. “Nothing is invincible.”

A dry smile flickered across her face. “That's what I thought.”

“Kate—”

“No,” she cut in, “you don't get to talk yet.”

He fell silent. The blood pounded in his head.

Kate scraped black gore from her metallic nails. “Why did you help me?” The question came out fast and sharp, like this was the one she'd been waiting to ask.

He closed his eyes. “It was a trap. Those Malchai weren't just trying to kill you. They were trying to make it look like a Sunai execution. They would have pinned the death on me—on my family—and used it to break the truce.” He dragged his eyes open again. The illness was finally, mercifully, receding. “I meant what I said in the woods. About wanting peace.”

“I'm supposed to believe the monster's a pacifist?”

“I never lied to you.”

“But you didn't tell the
truth
.”

“How could I?” he asked. “Would you?”

Kate didn't answer. She was staring at the floor, her face taut with pain.

“Are you all right?” he asked softly.

Her head snapped up. “Are you fucking with me?”

August shrank back, confused. “I was just ask—”

“Stop talking.” She got to her feet, revealing the iron spike she'd tucked beneath her knee. “I know what your kind can do. I've seen the footage, seen the way you toy with your victims, playing some sick game of cat and mouse. . . .”
Footage?
thought August. “I am not a
mouse, August Flynn, do you understand? I know what you are.”

She was coming toward him. The metal girding she'd bound him to ran vertically up the wall, and he dragged himself to his feet, wrists sliding up the bars until he was at full height.

“I saved your life,” he said.

In response, Kate brought the tip of the iron spike to his throat. It was still stained with Malchai blood, and the scent turned August's stomach. Kate's eyes were feverish, but her hand was steady.

“A thank-you would suffice,” he said.

“Why were you at Colton?” she demanded.

“My father sent me.”

“You mean
Flynn
.”

“Yes.”

“Did he want you to kill me?”

“No. He wanted me close to you in case the truce broke. There aren't many things in this world Callum Harker cares about, and Leo thought you might prove valuable as leverage in the fight.” August leaned forward against the metal tip. “And for the record, it's going to take more than this to hurt me.” As if rising to the challenge, Kate pressed down, but the point didn't break the skin.

Just then, a cell phone buzzed on the concrete floor
beside the violin case. Kate turned toward it, and horror washed over August. “You left it
on
?”

“I took out the GPS,” she said, crouching to retrieve the cell. She frowned at the screen.

“Kate,” he said, tugging against the zip ties. He swore. They were threaded with metal. “Who is it?”

She straightened. “Home.”

“Don't answer,” he said, wishing for the first time he could change a person's mind instead of just loosening their thoughts. Her thumb hovered over the screen. “Kate,
someone
sent those Malchai to kill you.”

Kate stared down at the cell. It stopped buzzing. And then started again. “They broke their oaths,” she said. “Just like Olivier.”

“Who's Olivier?”

“They're hungry and restless,” she went on, voice half lost beneath the phone's ringing. “And sick of following orders.”

August twisted against the ties. “That wasn't some random attack back there. It was calculated. Someone went to a lot of trouble to make sure you died and I was there to take the fall.”

Kate hissed a single word under her breath. The phone was still going but instead of answering, she turned it over, and slid the battery out. The buzzing died. She said the word again, and August realized it was a name.

“Sloan.”

He'd heard that name before. Leo spoke of him the way he spoke of most monsters, only worse.

My father keeps a Malchai as a pet
.

“Would this
Sloan
start a war?”

Kate shot him a look. “Death and violence, isn't that what all monsters want?” August didn't rise to the bait. “Look, I don't know,” she said, pacing, “but I'm pretty sure he wants me gone, and if he could frame Flynn in the process—I don't know anyone else who'd think that many steps ahead. Most of the Malchai are single-minded killers. Sloan's . . . different.”

“Do they listen to him, the other Malchai?”

“I've been home for nine days, August. I haven't really noticed. So far his favorite hobby seems to be tormenting
me
.”

“If he's involved, then you can't go home. You . . .”

He trailed off as he heard the sound of cars coming to a stop, an engine cutting off. The sounds were low, muted, and Kate hadn't heard them yet. She was still pacing.

“Kate.”

Car doors opened and closed.

“Kate.”

Footsteps.

“Kate.”

She turned toward him.
“What?”

“You have to untie me,” he said, trying to get his hands free. The zip ties were too tight, and even though the metal didn't
hurt
, it made the bonds hard to break.

“Why would I do that?”

“Because someone's coming.”

A door slid open somewhere below, the sound loud enough, finally, for her to hear.

“They must have tracked you here.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I took the GPS out of the phone.”

In the corner, the cab driver stirred. A cell jutted out of his pocket.

“Shit.”

Footsteps echoed on stairs. Kate hurried to the window, shouldering her backpack. She drew a lighter from her pocket, a small silver knife snicking open from one end, and sliced through the plastic sheeting with the small but vicious blade, revealing a bruised sky beyond. For a second he thought she was going to leave him there, pinned to the wall for Harker's men to find, but then she came back.

“I was going to turn you in to my father,” she said. “When you got in the car this morning.” She slid the knife between the zip tie and his skin. “It would have been so easy.”

“So why didn't you?”

She looked up. Swallowed. “You didn't look like a monster.”

August held her gaze. He wanted to say
I'm not
, but the words got stuck. “And now?”

Kate only shook her head and gave the knife a swift pull.

But the zip tie didn't break.

She frowned and tried again. Nothing.

August paled. “Please tell me you have a way of getting these off.”

“I didn't plan on getting them off,” she snapped. August began to fidget with panic, but Kate simply raised her shoe and slammed it into one of the metal bars. The noise was loud—too loud—but the bar buckled and gave, and August managed to weave his zip-tied wrists free. Kate kicked the second bar, but it was stronger, or the angle was wrong. It bent but didn't break. The footsteps were getting louder. August wrapped his hands around the bar and so did Kate, and together they pulled with all their weight until it finally came free, and the two went crashing to the concrete floor.

Kate landed on her injured side and gasped in pain, but when August went to help her up, she pulled back as if his touch were poison, and managed on her own. August caught up the violin case as she was reaching
the torn plastic on the window, and he climbed through after her, expecting a fire escape of some sort and finding only a six-inch lip before a three-story fall.

The air caught in his throat.

“Don't tell me you're afraid of heights,” she said, shimmying along the edge.

“Not heights,” he murmured. “Just falling.”

He looked around, trying to figure out how they were supposed to get down, when Kate took a breath and
jumped
.