teaser tuesday leaves a rose for the dead

Second last scene in IRONBANE. Anjen has now picked up a new title: Kingkiller.

*

It rained during the funeral. Black carriages rattled through Summerholt under a sky the colour of iron. Crowds threw leaves and flowers under the wheels and braved spatters of mud.

Anjen watched from the crowd, jostled by elbows, the rain wet on her cheeks. The dead man’s kin rode up front in the place of honour. She ought to be up there; she was his true family, his right hand, the only one who would never have betrayed him. But she had to trudge through the mud and the rain to get even a glimpse of the man she’d loved.

It took her a glare and some sharp elbow work to squeeze into the back of the cathedral. There wasn’t room to breathe; she forced down the memory of fingers digging into her throat. She could barely hear the church father above the crowd. He spoke at length about the evil Kingkiller and her crimes, assured everyone that the Summer King had died a hero, and wrapped up by painting a picture of the dead man Anjen couldn’t recognise. The real picture was beyond a crowd of mourners to appreciate. They hadn’t fought with him. They couldn’t know him.

Afterward Anjen queued for hours to see the grave. It was nothing, just a patch of freshly-turned earth, guarded by grim-faced Summerholt troops. She could have told them not to bother. If even a spark of him had survived he would never have lain so still; he would have clawed his way out fighting before now.

The white rose in her hands seemed such a small thing. She’d given him a kingdom; she would have given him the world. She crushed the stupid rose in a sudden savage gesture and flung the petals away. They scattered across the bare earth like snow.

A hundred times she’d killed for him. What she’d failed to do was die for him. Once again, the only thing she could do for him was butcher people.

She was going to have to kill the Winter Queen. Again. And then destroy the body so that nobody else could ever resurrect her again.

A better person wouldn’t have a clue how to do that. But she was the master of doing horrifying things nobody else would even consider, and she had a plan.

The last white petals fell through her fingers and tumbled to the earth.

*

Other teasers: Dystophil, firedrake, Amna ...

teaser tuesday is a bad guy

Today’s Teaser Tuesday is a scene from IRONBANE, in which Anjen demonstrates her amazing ability to turn everyone around her into bad guys.

(Context: Anjen is leading a train of refugees out of the marches one step ahead of the Winterfolk. In every village Anjen recruits whoever she can, seizes all the supplies and abandons anyone who won't come with her to die. Not everyone is enthralled with her tactics.)

*
Anjen needed a quiet place to plan, so she headed to a deserted fire on the outskirts of camp, a red gleam of embers. The warmth soaked into her bones; she could have cried for joy. She sketched a map in the dirt with the tip of her stick. Here lay the village, here the high ground, this slope was so thickly wooded as to be impassable ...

Footsteps crunched in the snow behind her. She’d thought she was alone here. She started to turn.

A branch smashed across her skull. Lights burst inside her head. She collapsed like a puppet whose strings had been cut. Her fingers twitched in the dirt. Embers glowed brilliant red in front of her; the pain in her head was so huge she couldn’t seem to focus on anything else.

Someone dragged her up by the back of her coat. Her knee locked when she tried to stand, she yelped and fell back. The stranger picked up her stick. Anjen clutched at a log but the frosted bark slid slippery under her fingers and she couldn’t haul herself upright.

The stick cracked down. Her fingers broke. Pain jolted through her; she strangled off a scream. She snatched her hand back, fingers throbbing, and the slightest move made the broken bones grind. Fuck.

The tip of the stick lifted her chin. She shrank, kicked herself for shrinking, made herself look up the length of the stick. For an instant she knew, heart-skittering breath-stopping certainty, that it was --

Kellen towered over her, red hair wild, face white and gaunt. “Remember me?”

Having her bones broken encouraged her to think back. Night. Snow. Panic. A sword point bursting out of a man’s belly, a woman who screamed when she saw Summer’s disfigured face, trinkets shattering on the frozen ground.

“You robbed us and left us to die. You remember that, right? Taking all our weapons, our iron and salt, abandoning us?” Kellen slashed down. The stick caught her upflung arm instead of her skull; something cracked, numbness shot up the bone. “You led the Winterfolk to us,” Kellen spat, and hit her again. Stupidly, Anjen tried to defend herself with the same arm. The stick hurt worse the second time: she gritted her teeth and couldn’t quite lock the cry in her throat, tears stinging her eyes, pain red and shocking. “You led the Winterfolk straight to us. They were looking for you. They killed everyone, they killed my -- I could have saved her, I could have defended her, if you hadn’t robbed us and left us to die.”

Couldn’t get up, her knee was shot. Couldn’t fight back. On the edge of camp, with all her men making as merry as they could, nobody would hear. Kellen was just going to break every bone in her body. Nothing she could do but take it. “Screw you,” Anjen croaked.

Kellen braced the stick across her throat and leaned.

The words strangled off in her throat. Anjen panicked. She choked and struggled and Kellen leaned harder, watching her face and enjoying this. She scrabbled in the dirt, clawed herself halfway up with her good fingers digging into a tree, fell back. Her foot kicked a scatter of fiery embers everywhere. “My daughter was seven,” Kellen murmured, methodically choking her. “Just seven. They killed her. Because of you.”

Everything was a red blur.

Distantly she heard the sounds of footsteps and voices. She tried to warn them, tell them to run, but it just came out a broken sound in her throat.

It was Summer, saying “Absolutely, I’m easy,” in that lazy, warm voice he used to talk to girls. The girl laughed. She sounded happy. “Whatever you want. I’m not -- ah, fuck.”

The pressure ripped away. Anjen choked and found she could breathe, drew in a rush of sweet air through her burning throat. Her fingers hurt, her wrist hurt, her ribs felt dented from being knelt on. She coughed and sputtered and just lay there panting for a while letting the world slide back into focus.

Kellen lay in the dirt, mouth bleeding, sword point at her throat. Summer pinned her with one foot. “Anjen,” Summer said through his teeth, never taking his eyes off his captive. “Anjen, say something, tell me you’re --“

Kellen spat out blood. “Hope I’ve killed her.”

His jaw clenched and his hands tightened on the hilt. Surely he of all people wouldn’t hurt an unarmed woman, a prisoner, not Summer with his ridiculous urge to be as good as his heroic father. “M’ fine,” Anjen croaked, trying to soothe him. Her throat was on fire. She swallowed, and regretted it.

“I know hurting prisoners isn’t very heroic.” Summer spoke in a low even voice that was not at all reassuring. He leaned on the sword. The point bit in. Kellen froze; blood leaked into the hollow of her throat. “And I don’t care any more. Understand? I’d throw all that away. If you so much as look at her, I will rip out your spine.”

Kellen swallowed against the tip of the blade, eyes wide, and didn’t look at her.

*

Other teasers: Dystophil, Kristin Briana, houndrat, ChristaCarol, sunna, inkwench, Leigh, jy'lenn, firedrake, Kathleen42, Gretchen, Horserider, Ugawa, Kyrie ...

teaser tuesday rises from the dead

This week’s teaser is another early scene from IRONBANE. Last week Anjen rescued a child, who survived long enough for new friend and fan of thematic naming Summer to dub her Winter, then died and resurrected as a zombie.

(Here be violence against children, zombie and human.)

*
They faced the dead child across a canvas of snow spattered with footsteps. Anjen clutched Summer’s arm, heart hammering against her ribs, fear and horror rising in her throat. He drew God’s threefold sign in a reflexive ward against evil.

“If you panic I will strangle you.” Frankly she could have done some panicking herself.

Summer said “Is this,” cleared his throat and had a second go at casualness. “Is rising from the dead a marcher tradition?”

“Must have forgotten to mention it.”

The child shambled toward them, tiny and intent. Please God, not this again. Anjen lifted a shaking hand and -- of course her throat was bare, he’d stolen the damn talisman. And she’d given her iron knife to him. And she’d run out of salt fighting the White Hunt. “Iron.” It was a croak. She swallowed. “The knife.”

“What?”

“Cut it up. So we can burn it.”

“You want me to kill her?”

“It’s already dead!”

The child stumbled and fell. Snow hissed beneath it; steam curled up from under the edges of its body. It twitched and curled in the snow, like a puppet whose strings had tangled.

“Bollocks to your marcher customs,” Summer growled, took two quick steps toward it and bent to pick it up.

A hand shot out. Blackened fingers dug into the snow like a five-legged spider.

Anjen started: “What in God’s sweet name are you --“

It erupted out of the snow.

It crashed into him. He staggered. It locked one tiny arm around his neck, unhinged its jaw and bit into his throat; his yelp strangled off. Summer dug his fingers under its face and clawed it away. The child clung to him, spattering blood, the rune hissing in the ruin of its stomach. Summer tried to peel it off him, cursing and shaking, feet sliding in the snow, the child a squirming, bloody demon in his hands.

Anjen slapped her pockets, remembered she had no weapons and snarled “Iron, you fool!” He pried Winter off him and threw it away. It hit the ground and skidded, bones cracking. Frost feathered outward from the point of impact. “Iron,” Anjen shouted again. The child peeled itself off the ground in a sinuous slither.

“I don’t kill children,” Summer said through his teeth.

“It’s just wearing her skin!”

“I don’t care why, I’m not doing it!”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Anjen snarled, stalked the two steps to her house and kicked the door open. She leaned in and reached above the door. Cold metal met her fingertips. She curled one hand round the hilt and drew the iron sword, the marcher’s friend, the last defence against evil.

It felt heavy in her unskilled hand. Sunlight glanced off its never-used shine. She remembered covering bloody hands with hers as together they drove a sword through -- No. She was never going back there.

The child fell back from the iron blade. Anjen levelled the point on its face. She’d killed more things of winter than she could even remember, she could add one more.

Summer yelped “What are you doing?” and stepped between them. Winter peeped around him, twinkling frostily.

“My job.” Cold stung her hot face. She could do this. This was what she was for.

The ironwar child had been born too early, a tiny thing Anjen could hold in her cupped hands. It had cried and cried, and she’d cradled it against the warmth of her body, taken up her knife and --

“Are you insane?” Summer demanded. “Do you have a secret thing for killing children? Because I’d like to suggest that we not butcher her in the street!”

“You idiot.” Her voice shook -- even the point of her sword shook, which was stupid. She tightened her grip. “It’ll kill and keep killing, and everyone who dies will rise again, unless we cut it down with iron. Get out of my way.”

Summer crossed his arms, colour high in his cheekbones. “Let me think. No.”

“Move,” Anjen snarled, and he took the tip of her sword delicately between two fingers and pushed it down. For some stupid reason it completely undid her: she couldn’t seem to think past his serious face.

She didn’t want to do this, God, she didn’t. Maybe he was right, maybe there was another way.

Summer held her eyes. “We’ll find some way to save her, I promise. We can --“

Winter pulled the iron knife from his belt.

Its fingers melted to the hilt. It shrieked. Steam hissed. When that knife flashed out in a searing arc Summer caught its arm, hooked its legs out from under it and dumped it in the snow with a crunch. It snarled at him, the rune hissing and spitting, ice melting and God it could have killed him.

Nobody else would do it. It always happened this way.

Anjen drove the iron sword through the child’s heart.

Sword point hit frozen ground in an impact that jarred her to the elbow. Winter thrashed and screamed and spattered blood that burned, and finally went still.

Anjen took a steadying breath and for a second the air tasted of smoke and blood, of the failed rune in the choking confines of her house. Her hands were shaking. Summer looked at her as if she were the inhuman thing, the one in need of killing. Maybe she was.

She wrenched the sword free and wiped the blade with a handful of snow. She’d nicked it. If this kept up it’d be as battered as she was.

“Congratulations,” Summer said bitterly behind her. “Good work. Still time to kill more children before lunch.”

She was going to punch him in the face.

*

Other teasers: Dystophil, firedrake, Mad Hatter, pixydust ...

teaser tuesday is doomed

For today's Teaser Tuesday I wanted to post a fondly-remembered scene from THE INFERNAL FAMILY, only to realise upon rereading it that it was not good at all. Happily, one of my novels always comes through for me. So here's a scene from the first chapter of my epic fantasy IRONBANE. It's the first teaser to feature my favourite character Summer -- in the other teasers Anjen is carrying the sword she gave him as a memento of him.

NB: Iron and salt and symbols of God are the traditional weapons against supernatural evil.

*

Something flitted through the woods. Anjen looked around wildly, caught it, lost it. The child burrowed into her coat; her arms were burning, she shifted her burden. Summer wiped his bloody hand on his coat and took a less slippery grip on the iron knife. Ahead she glimpsed daylight and open space.

“Hear that?” Summer brightened. “Horses! People! That’s good, right?”

She stopped in her tracks. Then she caught it too: hoofbeats like distant thunder.

Pale shades slipped through the woods. Moving toward them. Fast. She felt their advance in a wash of bitter cold.

Panic dug its icy claws into her. She cleared her throat; her voice was abnormally calm. “It’s the White Hunt. The Winterfolk.”

“Is that bad?” said Summer, blissfully oblivious.

God she was an idiot. She should have snatched the child and run the instant she recognised the white arrow. “You’re faster. Take the child and run. If you cross all seven chains of stones you’ll be safe. Go to the church father, he’ll --“

“No.”

“What?”

“I said no, and please stop making plans, they’re terrible. I have a better idea.” He turned her firmly by the shoulders. “Run.”

The shove got her moving. She hitched up her skirts one-handed and ran. Branches clawed at her with bony fingers, ice and snow skidded underfoot. Thunder rose all around them as the pale horses charged them down, sweeping a killing frost ahead of them, and the riders’ laughter hissed in the air.

They broke into open air. Frosted grass crunched underfoot like glass. Her arms were on fire, the little girl squirming. Ahead icy roofs glittered under the sun.

A lone hunter swept in from the left to cut them off.

Both of them skidded to a halt. Anjen went for the salt with her free hand.

The pale horse picked a leisurely path through the snow, placing each hoof with care. Sunlight danced on its icy coat. The rider shone translucent. She felt the murderous cold contract like a fist; pain and thunder and ice sang in her bones.

She put her back against Summer’s. He was shivering even harder than she was. Should have stayed in his summerlands.

“I always thought a valiant last stand sounded fun.” Summer’s voice was sharp with strain.

Her laugh broke down into coughing, lungs burning, air frozen. “Didn’t you say you were too pretty to die?”

“I’m prepared to make a heroic sacrifice. There could be songs. Possibly even legends.”

The hunter leaned down from its horse, blinding bright in the sun, and reached out -- delicate frost feathered its fingers.

Anjen stayed frozen. The little one yelped and grabbed a tiny handful of Anjen’s coat.

“This is definitely the worst plan you have ever --”

“Get ready,” Anjen said through her teeth.

Pale fingers brushed the child’s pale skin.

Anjen threw salt in the hunter’s face. It jerked back with a hiss and its face started to melt. Water ran down its armour in glittering lines. She shoved the child at Summer -- he caught her, a reflex movement -- “Now run, idiot!” -- and advanced on the hunter, snarling, throwing salt after salt.

Its hiss rose to a shriek as she drove it back. The ice horse reared above her; the sun set every edge on fire, it burned as if lit from within. She snatched up an arm. One hoof carved a line of white fire across her forearm -- an instant earlier it would have been her face. Numbing cold leapt up her arm. The horse hit her with its shoulder, her foot slipped and she crashed to the snow. Impact slammed the breath from her lungs. Thunder reverberated through the iron-hard ground. She rolled over, gasping and clawing in the snow, fingers frozen, and threw another shower of salt upward at the horse. Most of it fell back on her. Both horse and rider were melting fast. She spat snow and salt and scrabbled for something, anything to --

Its hoof smashed down an inch from her skull and the melted leg snapped like an icicle. It lurched. Its other leg snapped. The ice horse fell on its face.

Anjen levered herself upright, clutching her bag of salt, hand wrapped round the talisman at her throat. The ring burned; she felt its heat even through her glove.

The hunter slid down from horseback and drew its sword, a long sliver of ice. It staggered toward her dragging a melted leg. Its half a face turned to follow her.

Anjen tried to douse it with salt. The last crystals rattled sadly in the bottom of the bag.

Shit.

*

Other teasers: ChristaCarol, Karla, LynKay, Firedrake, Dystophil, JustLaurie, sunna, KBridges, WritingDemons, Kristin Briana, M Austin, Bryn Greenwood, paranormalchick, Mad Hatter ... and more as I read.

revenge of teaser tuesday

Today I've taken off my jade-coloured glasses and turned the volume on the you-suck soundtrack down far enough to find at least one teaser-quality scene.

This week's teaser is from my YA urban fantasy DREAD MACHINE, opening line: "Every time I started at a new school I made myself a new person." It stars my favourite pathological liar, who will eventually be called Fox. This novel is my first attempt at first person and my first attempt at YA, so please feel free to critique.

Secondary character Daniel is (a) nice, (b) cute and (c) normal, which makes him both attractive and forbidden, like a stolen cookie. Om nom nom. :D

*

When I saw the smiley face painted on our red door I knew someone was going to get hurt.

Seeing it burned my throat like a gulp of tequila. I stopped so fast Daniel bumped into me.

The face on the door winked at me in a scrawl of cheerful yellow. The Smiling Woman was here. In my house. With my mother.

Terraced houses towered on either side. A street market coiled round us, a big colourful dragon covering movement and drowning sound. People shoved past me; any of them could be hers. Some old man picked up his cat and scuttled back into his house. My heart banged against my ribs and for a crazy moment I wanted to bolt too -- under a stall or something, anywhere tight enough to hide.

But the red door smiled at me. Mum was inside.

I stamped on a rising bubble of panic, tore my eyes off the smiley face and turned into a random stall, hitching my bag higher to hide my face. Racks of dolls stared back at me. My sleeve caught on an amulet of thorns hanging from the roof; when I tried to pull free I dragged a chain of them sideways, jangling chimes and tangling feathers. I fumbled with them one-handed.

“Here.” Daniel reached past me to untangle me, fingers warm and gentle. Poor stupid Daniel still thought everything was fine, I was some normal girl he could be sweet to, like anything good ever came of talking to me. Shouldn’t have let him hang around.

A stallkeeper glowered at us from behind a wall of blank doll faces. Obviously we were thieves, what else would school kids be doing around here. Screw him.

I shoved Daniel into the nearest wall. “Hey,” Daniel yelped, and then cut off when I leaned right into him -- so close our eyelashes tangled, his heart a skitter beneath my palm, breath hitching in his throat.

“Daniel,” I said in his ear. “Do something for me.”

“Er,” Daniel squeaked. “Okay. Sure?”

“Go home. Back to school. Wherever. You’ve walked me home, so -- we’re done here. Right?” I smoothed his shirt front and adjusted his tie, which seemed to rivet his attention. “Catch you tomorrow.” If I survived breaking into my own house and trying to kill the Smiling Woman.

“Right,” Daniel murmured back, hypnotised.

Score one for being a girl.

*

Other teasers: Jy'lenn, WritingDemons, Firedrake

teaser tuesday strikes back

Another teaser from my epic fantasy IRONBANE. Anjen is masquerading as the back-from-the-dead Winter Queen; Robben is a smitten friend and follower.

*

Anjen was brooding on the walls when gentle hands drew her coat more tightly around her; Anjen nearly fell off the wall. Of course it was Robben, a warm presence at her elbow. “Mistress Anjen?”

The sword bumped against her leg every time she moved. She couldn’t understand how Summer put up with it, it was a huge clumsy thing. “Yes?”

“You’re not afraid.” He made it a question at first, then forced a smile. “Burned God, of course you’re not. What would ever scare you?”

She couldn’t understand him sometimes. Did she look like she had ice instead of blood, like she was some inhuman thing that felt no fear, like she was the bloody Winter Queen?

She reached into the warmth trapped inside her coat and pulled out her bottle. Robben made a disapproving face. She ignored him and drank deep; the liquid coursed hot and fierce down her throat, lighting a trail of fire down into her belly. There. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

Of course he wanted her to be the Winter Queen. That was what he needed from her: coldness in the face of danger. She couldn’t allow him to see her hands shaking on the bottle. Probably shouldn’t let him see her drinking at all.

She aimed the bottle at him. “You know why we could never, ever be together?”

Robben flinched. A dark part of her liked that.

“Because you’re weak.” Anjen spaced each word out deliberately. “You jump at every shadow, and you thin everyone must be scared like you.” She drank again. It gave her such a rush, like she could bring anyone down. “But you know who isn’t and has never been scared?” She leaned in until the sword hilt dug painfully into her hip, holding his eyes. “Me. I’m the goddamn Winter Queen. I kill everyone who crosses me, I invade countries, I come back from the dead. So don’t you think that you can taint me with your fear, that you can crack this mask, because it’s not a fucking mask. It’s real. I’m real. And I’m not afraid.”

Robben looked painfully small.

Success.

“I’m going to win this.” Anjen made it a promise. “It won’t be pretty. But I will. Not. Lose. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Robben said in a tiny voice. “Your Majesty.”

That had a sweet sound to it. Like she was something greater and more terrible than just a woman getting old. “Get back to your post.”

*

Other teasers: vroth, Jamie, Liz, ChristaCarol, Rosey, JennW, firedrake, Véro, Bee, sunna, inkwench, Kathy, becki, dudette, Stella Thomas, Snoink, dystophil ...

teaser tuesday

Still pretty burned about the novel from hell, so I'd like to post a teaser from a story that still excites me. This is part of the climax of my epic fantasy IRONBANE. Protagonist Anjen, better known as Ironbane, is a forty-something war criminal with a walking stick and a master plan.

(Here be violence and swearing.)

*

The Winter King stumbled toward her, still melting. It towered over her. "Sss." Snow steamed beneath its feet. Its white cloak smouldered, and curled up and blackened at the edges, and finally caught fire; the fire rose around it like a halo.

Anjen licked her lips. Her jaw ached from gritting her teeth, her bruised mouth stung, but she dragged out words. "You forgot something."

"Sss!" the Winter King hissed, burning, and drew its sword of black ice. Around it the Court of Winter smouldered and burned and died.

"Go ahead," Anjen croaked, smiling more and more through the pain. "Kill me. If you can."

She found she didn't care all that much. She'd done her duty: she'd faced the Winter King and beaten it and kept her pride, for all that it tried to scare her and shame her into submission. Dying didn’t matter any more.

The Winter King took two lurching steps.

Anjen reached for something the Winterknight had discarded in its death throes. It was a stupid clumsy thing she normally had no need for, and yet when she curled her fingers round the hilt the iron weight of Valiant in her hands reassured her. Pain pulsed through her in time with her heartbeat. She stiffened her spine and forced herself to her feet, ignoring the creaking of her beaten body.

She braced her feet squarely in the snow. It would be over one way or another in a single exchange. If she moved, she'd fall. If she ran, she’d die. She had to stand and face it.

"What you forgot," Anjen told it, lifting Valiant's point, the distant starlight dancing pale on the iron blade, "is that I'm fucking Ironbane."

The Winter King staggered toward her on fire. Its burning cloak stuck to it and melted it. The flames curled around it brightly, making a second, hotter crown, and when it snarled the flames escaped from its open mouth and burst through its eye sockets.

It lifted the black sword high above its head.

Fuck that. Anjen jammed the point of Valiant up into its belly.

*

Other teasers: Karla, Lia, Raven, Lavender, Becca, Amna, Angie

teaser tuesday

Teaser from my urban fantasy, THE INFERNAL FAMILY. Protagonist Johann is back in the wreckage of his home to pick up the body of his murdered son.

(Here be bad language.)

*

By night the hall glittered with broken glass, smeared with blood gone black, the carpet stiff underfoot. It looked unreal enough that he could pretend not to recognise it. Must have been somebody else who’d let his son die here.

A trail of black footprints led upstairs.

“You put him to bed?” Nicholas said.

“I couldn’t leave him there.” His voice cracked for some stupid reason. “Not on the floor.” Like an unwanted thing, a toy Johann’d ditched when it broke.

He went upstairs. If he didn’t touch the footprints it wouldn’t be the same as before, as the weight of his son curled in his arms, fingers slipping from his shirt. So he could look into Marcus’ room and not see --

Johann stopped, feet stuck, couldn’t take another step. Nicholas said “What?” and looked over his shoulder, and went silent.

The body lay curled under the duvet, hair fair against the pillow. Johann couldn’t look at it, but it kept dragging his eyes back, displacing his memory of cradling his warm living son. Marcus couldn’t be a huddled thing under a duvet, dead long enough to stiffen, he’d been bright and brave and alive and this wasn’t real, Johann refused to let it be. He wanted Marcus back.

“When I first took Marcus in he, he wouldn’t sleep in the room I gave him.” The words spilled out, even though it was a stupid story and Nicholas hated personal stuff. “I’d find him curled up in a chair in the morning looking miserable. I thought maybe I was doing something wrong, maybe he was scared of me or something -- But later I found out his dad walked out on him. Just left one night and never came back. So he only wanted to sleep somewhere where I’d wake him if I left.”

God, Johann’d been so scared back then. Scared of hurting him. Scared of him leaving. Scared of this fierce need to protect him. It didn’t make any sense that Marcus would want to stay, and every time Marcus crept sleepily under his arm and tucked his fair head under his chin Johann thought it’d be the last.

“He never does that any more. Did. And I left him today. I left him while he was sleeping. What if he wasn’t really dead yet, what if he woke up and I was gone, and he thought I walked out on him, I didn’t want him any more --“

The words were running down into useless babble, so he stopped. It wasn’t right that he’d survived.

“Stark,” Nicholas said awkwardly behind him. Johann reached out and took hold of his arm without looking, grip too tight but not caring about hurting him, and just -- focused on what was real. What mattered. Not this thing that wasn’t his son.

“Let’s just get this over with,” Johann said.

Something moved downstairs.

Both of them froze. Streetlights poured between the open curtains, a tide of orange creeping across the bedcovers, Johann felt trapped in amber.

The silence resounded. Maybe he’d imagined the sound. He was already losing his mind, it wouldn’t be a big leap from there to hearing things --

A door shut.

Hunters. In his home. Where they’d murdered his son.

Everything else slipped through his fingers. Fury fired up, hot and savage, settling in the pounding of his blood and the curling of his hands into fists.

When he went for the stairs Nicholas barred his way, knife already drawn, light jumping along the edge. “Could be anyone. Neighbour. Police. Drunk idiots who --“

Johann slammed him aside and took the stairs three at a time. Empty of people, the skeleton of the house passed by in a blur, the walls its bones, doorways gaping like sockets. A shadow moved in the kitchen -- Johann burst into the kitchen feeling alive and full of fire, smashed aside the hunter’s pathetic attempts to defend himself and threw him into a kitchen cabinet.

Wood splintered. Glass rattled in its frames. The hunter fell onto the counter in a cascade of cabinet wreckage, rolled off the counter clutching his ribs, slid to the floor. Johann flexed his hands and the fresh cuts on his knuckles stung; he liked that, proof that he could still hurt people.

The kitchen was a mystery now, shadowed and streetlit, no longer home. “Marcus and I used to cook here,” Johann told the hunter conversationally, hauling him off the floor. “I was never any good at it, but Marcus enjoyed it. Flour everywhere.” Marcus used to sit at the kitchen table and reread the recipe with furrowed brow, ticking off with mathematical precision things he’d already added. For a moment Johann pictured him there, real enough to reach out and touch.

Johann slammed the hunter onto that table so hard something broke, wood or bone, he didn’t care. The hunter choked and couldn’t scrabble out of his grip. “Doesn’t happen any more. Since you killed him.” He flung the pathetic human down with a snarl. “My boy was smart. Aced all his exams, he liked studying, he wanted to go to university. He could’ve done, I would’ve figured something out, I -- He used to sit right here.” Johann broke that chair with his hands, sudden bunch of muscles, satisfying smash. Another memory broken.

The hunter gripped the counter and pulled himself off the floor. His other hand skittered out for a kitchen knife.

Johann didn’t care. “Go ahead. You should have killed me instead, I would’ve let you, why would I care, he was just a kid, he was my son --“

The hunter smashed a jar in his face. It spilled white, the stuff got in his eyes and burned. Salt. Then the hunter slashed him across the ribs -- shocking cold at first, then the cut burned, warmth seeping through his shirt.

Johann hit the bastard in the face and rocked him back against the counter. The bloody knife Johann ripped out of his hand; he wanted to stab and stab but that would be too quick, Marcus had suffered before he died. Johann slashed him instead, going for his face but catching his upflung arm, cutting and cutting, red lines running down and blood smearing everywhere, the taste of salt in his mouth and stinging his eyes --

“Stark, what the fuck are you doing?”

He spun and Nicholas stood in the doorway, cold and stern and out of reach, and for a second Johann choked on the red urge to hurt him.

“What is wrong with you?” Nicholas demanded, his accent sliding into a vicious extreme. “You can hear him screaming from outside the house. So can all the neighbours you just woke up, and so will all the police they just called, who will find us in a ruined house with a corpse!”

His heart hammered, the knife slash stinging, hands slippery with blood. Nicholas always talked too much, stupid words that meant nothing. “Scared?” Johann threw back at him.

Nicholas narrowed his eyes. “Give me that knife.”

The hunter slipped as he tried to get up. Johann stamped him down, fury hot and blind, wanting to smash him into a red pulp he could squeeze through his fingers. “No.”

“Then I’m taking it off you.”

“This is what you do to things that scare you, isn’t it.” Johann lifted the knife, liking his sudden tenseness, not quite a flinch. “You get in their faces and dare them to hurt you. Like you did to the angel.”

“Go ahead.” Nicholas stepped right in, startlingly close. “Dare you.”