Dark Goddess

Fleeing didn’t come naturally to a former Magistrate like himself. He was a tall man, as lean and sinewy as a timber wolf, and his pale eyes were the color of dawn light touching a blue-steel knife blade. A three-inch hairline scar cut whitely across his clean-shaved left cheek.

Kane had considered growing a beard for the op, so he could infiltrate Porpoise’s crew, but he couldn’t stand to go without shaving for more than a few days. His years as a Cobaltville Magistrate had instilled in him a loathing of whiskers longer than an eighth of an inch.

He heard a dog bark and he clenched his fists. It was bad enough he had been discovered while trying to climb the wall around Porpoise’s compound, but now he felt the hot breath of death on the back of his neck.

When Kane heard the men’s voices again, their words drowned out by the baying of the hounds, his lips peeled back from his teeth in a silent snarl. They were much closer, and he knew he had to start running again.

The brief rest had done him little good, but his anger added renewed vigor to his muscles. The men and the dogs probably viewed him as little more than a weary fox, fleeing before the hounds, but he felt more like the timber wolf. A wolf was a wise animal that had learned all the tricks of staying alive, spinning out the odds with a gambler’s skill to continually outwit death.

Kane sprinted full-out, achieving a long-legged, ground-eating stride, running on the balls of his feet. He swatted at the mosquitoes that made strafing dives at his eyes. Straight ahead, past a row of gnarled cypress roots, lay a stretch of mudflats that led directly into the ville of Coral Cove. There he would find alleys and doorways in which to hide until he could make his rendezvous.

The soles of his high-laced jump boots sank into the muck, releasing the sulfurous stench of marsh gas. Behind him rose the frenzied yelping of the dogs. Kane lurched into a shadowed area just inside the half-completed log wall surrounding Coral Cove and risked a glance backward.

Three bearded men held a trio of long leather leashes in their right hands, and rifles were slung over their shoulders. At the ends of the leashes strained and slavered six of the biggest mastiffs Kane had ever seen. The black-and-tan dogs yipped and bayed, eyes rolling, tongues lolling, froth dripping from their fang-filled jaws.

Kane wasn’t sure if the men had seen him, but they released the leashes. The mastiffs bounded forward, a line of red maws and yellow teeth pounding right through the mudflats at blinding speed.

Blinking back the sweat from his eyes, Kane whirled and sprinted into the ville, the snarls and yelps of the dogs loud in his ears. Coral Cove’s buildings were old, many of them close together, arranged around a makeshift town square, the centerpiece of which was an old, immense and deep-rooted live oak. He glimpsed a slatternly woman dumping a pail of slops out of an upstairs window of a big frame house. When she caught sight of him running across the square, she retreated quickly, snatching a curtain closed.

The settlement wasn’t very large, but according to the Cerberus database, Coral Cove had been a small fishing village turned vacation resort. Of course, that been a very long time ago, before the skydark.

Kane’s eyes darted back and forth, looking for cover. He didn’t care for the idea of digging in and standing fast, since the dogs could surround him and tear him to pieces. He had not gone armed on the recon mission, taking the precaution that if he were apprehended, he wouldn’t provide more weapons to the enemy’s arsenal.

But Kane was never completely helpless. He dug his hand beneath his shirt to the waterproof utility pouch at his waistband and carefully pulled out a metal-walled sphere about the size of a plover’s egg. The pressure-fused CS powder grenade, usually employed as a diversion in a limited area, would cause extreme discomfort in a small room. To have flung the grenade back at the dog pack would have been useless—there was not enough concentrated spread in the vapor.

Kane sprinted to the trunk of the oak tree and leaped high. He caught hold of a thick, leafy branch and managed to swing up and balance himself precariously upon it. The limb swayed like a hammock under his weight.

Looking across the town square, he saw the first of the mastiffs bounding into view, tongue lolling, savage eyes glinting. The other dogs raced behind it, their smooth dark coats clotted with mud. Their teeth gleamed like ivory daggers.

The dogs milled around uncertainly, sniffing the ground and whining quizzically. Far back across the mudflats there were shouts, the thump of running feet. Kane held the grenade tightly in his left hand as he watched the mastiffs casting about in confusion.

The first dog to have entered the ville growled and slowly advanced on the tree with a twitching muzzle, nose still to the ground.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” Kane breathed. “Nose to the dirt. Don’t look up.”

The limb upon which he crouched suddenly creaked. Kane grabbed a branch overhead as the limb sagged half a foot. Wishing he were fifty pounds lighter, Kane kept absolutely motionless. The dogs would know he was nearby through scent alone, but if their attention wasn’t drawn upward—

The limb suddenly bent and the splintering crack of wood filled Kane’s ears for an instant.

With a startled growl, the mastiff circling below looked up, caught sight of him and barked ferociously. The other dogs clustered around the base of the tree, yipping and yelping. They slammed into one another as they all tried to squeeze around the trunk.

Kane wasted no time. He dropped the grenade straight down into the mass of milling dogs. One of the mastiffs snapped at it and the casing burst open, the small explosive charge within it detonating with a low, smacking explosion. A heavy cloud of white CS powder erupted, spraying in all directions, like a miniature blizzard.

Instantly, the baying of the dogs turned to high-pitched whines, whimpers and squeals. Pawing frantically at their eyes, the mastiffs reeled away, staggering, snorting and sneezing. Kane jumped down from the limb, landed on the far side of the tree and ran toward the nearest house, a rambling two-story structure built in the old antebellum style. The windows were boarded up, so he decided the door was mostly likely secured and began to angle away.

A black mass shifted in the shadows cast by a balcony overhang. “Kane!”

The urgent whisper cut through the cacophony of the distressed dogs, and Kane darted into the murk. The black shape was a small figure huddled within a mass of rags and tatters, decorated with gray streamers of Spanish moss. Under green stripes of camouflage paint he saw streaks of milk-white flesh.

“Inside! Be quick!” The figure scurried sideways and a door opened and closed.

Panting, Kane groped over the door, searching for a knob. His fingers touched nothing but damp, slightly warped wood. He pressed a shoulder against it, then the door swung inward and he stumbled into an unlit foyer. A small hand clutched at his right wrist with surprising strength and hauled him forward.

“In here, idiot!”

Kane caught a whiff of mildew and urine. The door closed, and he heard the faint snick of a locking bolt being drawn. Fingering his nose, Kane whispered, “And I thought I was the only stinkard here, Domi.”

“Shut up.”

Kane stiffened at the angry intensity of the girl’s voice, but he fell silent, listening to the yowling of the hounds. He heard men’s voice raised in breathless curses, the cracking of whips and the piteous yelps of the dogs.

“Where’d the son of a bitch go?”

“Guess for your own self, Lucas! Got my own problems with this goddamn hound—”

“Billy-boy ain’t gonna like it if we lose ’im.”

“Shit, tell me something new…but he’s gonna have to live with it.”

Ear pressed against the door panel, Kane listened to more whining, whimpering and cursing as the men got the dogs releashed. They didn’t intend to continue the pursuit. Although the citizenry of Coral Cove put up with a great deal from Billy-boy Porpoise and his gang, they wouldn’t tolerate a midnight door-to-door search. After a few minutes, the sound of the dogs and their masters faded away.

A flashlight suddenly glowed, startling Kane so much that he jumped and cursed.

“Relax,” Domi said softly. “Windows boarded over—nobody can see.”

Kane squinted toward her as she flung back the hood that shrouded her close-cropped, bone-white hair. An albino by birth, Domi was a small white wraith of a girl, every inch of five feet tall. Eyes like red rubies stared up at him through the mask of combat cosmetics she had daubed over her cream-white complexion.

“Had you goin’ there, huh?” Laughter was in her high-planed face, and the faint mockery added piquancy to her features.

“Yeah,” Kane said dryly. “You’re a gifted comedian. What would you have done if the dogs had caught me?”

Domi’s small right hand eased out from beneath the ragged cloak. Nestled within it lay her Detonics Combat Master .45. The stainless-steel autopistol weighed only a pound and a half and was perfectly suited for a girl of her size.

“Shoot ’em,” she replied frankly. “Then kill the men who made them killers.”

Kane nodded. “Figures. Where’s Grant?”

Domi shrugged out of the tattered cloak, letting it drop to the floor. “Upstairs. He was keepin’ an eye on you, too.”

Stepping around the heap of rancid rags, Kane pinched his nostrils shut. “Why does it stink so bad?”

Domi shrugged. “Cover up my own scent, in case the dogs got after me. Old Outland trick.”

Kane regarded her gravely. “You peed on it, didn’t you?”

“Among other things.” Domi turned toward a stairwell, casting the beam of the flashlight ahead of her. She wore a black tank top and tight-fitting denim shorts that only accentuated her compact body, with its pert breasts and flaring hips.

Kane followed her up the stairs, reflecting that after five-plus years of working with her, he shouldn’t be surprised by anything Domi did, even wearing a cloak soaked in her own urine.