Tulip flicked her ears.
The jingling came again, insistent. Jingle. Jingle. Scrape of metal on metal, sharp enough to make you cringe.
Interesting. I brought Tulip to a halt. Let’s see what happens.
Two men stepped out into the road from behind the ruins of Regions Bank. The one on the left, six feet tall, with a beefy build and a gold chain around his tan neck, looked like a typical street tough guy, the kind who made his money collecting debts and carried brass knuckles in his pocket. He wore jeans, a tank top, and a custom pair of tennis shoes, handmade. A rifle hung off his shoulder. He was a large man, but next to the other guy, he looked like a child.
The second man towered over the first by a good foot and a half. Huge shoulders, barrel chest, weirdly long arms bulging with muscle. He wore stained camo pants tucked into giant yellow boots and a brown tank top that left his shoulders bare. A three-and-a-half-foot wooden club hung from his belt. Every inch of his visible skin was covered with dense red body hair, matching the greasy mane hanging from his head. His brutish face sported a permanent sunburn, except for the spots covered by his beard.
The two men strode to the middle of the street and stopped, blocking my way. The goon on the left wouldn’t be a problem. His swagger told me he was strong and likely relied on brute force and his mass rather than speed and training. The giant next to him was another story. He moved like a man half his size, with a kind of animalistic smoothness. Like a bear, seemingly lumbering but big and fast, and hard to stop once he charged. Not good. With a club, his reach was longer than mine by half a foot. With magic up, he wouldn’t have been a problem. But magic was down, and he outweighed me by at least a hundred and seventy-five pounds.
Jingle, jingle. Getting closer.
The smaller man unslung his rifle and pointed it at me. “Don’t move.”
I’d picked this road to avoid traffic. Buckhead used to be an edge city, an uptown anchored by a cluster of high-rise hotels, offices, condominiums, and restaurants, none of which had fared well since the Shift. It also spawned some nasty magic hazmat during magic waves. Like downtown and midtown, the area was a treasure trove for the reclamation crews, but downtown was safer, and so far, the city mostly left Buckhead to its own devices.
These two weren’t run of the mill bandits. This road wasn’t well used, and the persistent jingling told me they were a good way from home. Were they waiting for me? Why?
I could shoot them now with my bow, but there was a good chance I’d kill them, and any answers would die with them.
A huge dog trotted into view from behind the Regions building, thirty-five inches at the shoulder and slabbed with monstrous muscle. His chest was so deep and broad that his hindquarters looked like an afterthought. He gripped the ground with paws the size of melons. A single hit would crush a human skull. His head with wide oversized jaws sat on a neck thicker than my thigh. Long metal spikes thrust from his skull, running all the way down his spine to the long tail. His fur was a forest of blueish metal needles.
An iron hound. There was only one place in Atlanta it could have come from.
The beast saw me. His turquoise eyes focused on my face. He opened his cavernous mouth, flashing four-inch fangs, and snarled. The spikes snapped erect with a metallic screech. The dog took a step toward me and halted, brought up short by a thick chain wrapped around his throat.
A moment later its handler waddled into view. He was the smaller man’s height, but the giant’s weight, and he carried most of it in a beer gut. White, hairy, wearing denim overalls with no shirt. A machete hung in a sheath on his hip. He held the dog’s chain in his left hand, and a second chain, stretching behind the building, in his right.
The handler anchored himself, pulling the hound short, and yanked the other chain. A small body flew into view and landed at the handler’s feet.
Dougie.
His face was a puffy bruise, his lips split, his right eye swollen shut. His hair was caked with blood. His jeans were shredded, and bloody flesh gaped through the holes. They had dragged him, scrapping his knees raw. The chain was wrapped around his narrow waist, and it had worn the skin way from his ribs and stomach. He hadn’t fallen the way a person would normally fall. He had collapsed like a rag doll, boneless and making no effort to catch himself.
The world turned red in a single furious second. They’d beaten a child. They’d broken his bones. They put him on a chain. They dragged him across the city. The rage burned in me like a firestorm.
The handler yanked the chain, lifting the child three feet off the ground. “This her?”
No answer.
The asshole shook the chain. The boy dangled like a broken doll.
I would kill him slowly.
“Is this her?”
Dougie opened one eye to a mere slit. His voice was little more than a whisper. “No.”
The handler dropped him and looked at the giant. “It’s her.”
If I showed the slightest interest or concern, they’d torture him to get me to behave. I had to shift their priorities.
“Wow, the hills really do have eyes,” I called out. “And greasy hair.”
The giant peered at me. “You look like a good breeder.”
“You look like your parents met at a family reunion.”
His sidekick with the rifle frowned.
“Keep thinking. It will come to you.”
The handler bared yellowed teeth at me. “Mouthy bitch.”
My middle name. “Did you finally get it? Don’t be ashamed. It’s hard to be the son of Sasquatch.”
Dougie crumpled, forgotten on the ground. That’s right, focus on me.
“Get off the horse and lie down on the ground,” the asshole with the gun ordered.
I needed to get them away from the boy. I raised my arm and pointed at the gunman.
“What’s that? You gonna shoot me with your finger, you dumb bitch? Get off the horse and lie down on the ground. I’m not gonna tell you again.”
I got off Tulip and tapped her with my hand. She trotted off to the side, out of the way. The three men watched me. Dougie lay still.
I whistled once, a short, harsh note, and dropped to the ground.
Turgan dropped from the sky like a stone, raking the gunman’s face with his talons. The man shrieked. A shot rang out. I jumped up, dashed left, behind the Regions building, and whistled again. The eagle streaked across the sky, soaring clear. The whole thing took less than two seconds.
I pulled Dakkan out and screwed the spear together. The building blocked the street. I couldn’t see them, but they couldn’t see me either.
The gunman was still screaming.
“Shut up,” the giant snarled, his voice cold and vicious.
“It took my fucking eye!”
A wet thud announced a punch landing. “Shut up or I’ll crush your head.”
The screams died. I moved east, circling the building, moving silently along the wall.
“Larry, loose the fucking dog on her.”
The chain clanked on the ground.
I waited.
The dog came around the corner, following my scent, his massive paws scraping the stone in a shower of sparks. Fangs flung spit into the air. The cavernous mouth opened wide…
I stabbed Dakkan into that gaping maw. The spear bit into the soft tissue inside the throat, slicing through muscle, cartilage, and bone into the brain. I jerked the spear free. The dog stumbled, his charge suddenly aborted. Blood gurgled, gushing from his mouth.