By the time the number of people had trickled down to the last few guests any sense of excitement had long ago wound down. Even Marty falling asleep on the floor, carried off by Gevaudan to sleep in her room for the time, with only Tara, Andrew, and Anna particularly sticking around. The first two not even particularly dedicated to staying much longer, so much as Tara was shaking Percy down for his cornbread recipe while I smoked on the balcony.
Sat back in the metal fold out chair, one foot laid up on the ledge, letting my eye trace over the scars on that showed from under the edge of the skirt riding up my long leg. The vines and flowers and blades, carved into the flesh what felt like a lifetime again, almost a natural part of me.
The idea of imagining myself without my tattoos almost impossible to even consider, and the idea I was the person who actually bore them even harder. Purist tattoos, the mark of someone who’d hunted half-ones and laughed with their blood on her face, who killed more people than she could properly count and never thought too deeply about it.
And I was considering that again.
Let whoever hired the mercenaries have their fun, blow up one building and call it a day, and everything would be better, right? If I was lucky, The Lady would die and maybe a few other people I didn’t care all that much about; she stops hurting innocent people and manipulating the half-ones. Sure, it’d become a shit show pretty fast: power vacuum, no one organized enough to stop humans finding out about the supernatural, no one with the contacts to keep getting everyone their Ids and paperwork…
Who knew how many innocent people getting crushed in the rubble just on the off chance a bomb would kill a vampire that old that easily.
How many people did it take to host an event like that? Chefs, servers, security, what else? A dozen people? Thirty? Fifty? I wasn’t even exactly sure how big the building was, would the only people there be people working for The Lady? Even assuming there were a few dozen supernaturals there, at least a few workers for each one…
I’d killed around ninety humans, was I really considering the idea of at least doubling that number?
A crooked laugh escaped me, and I nearly jumped off the balcony when someone asked, “something funny?”
My body burning in pain, the laugh that escaped me only making the ache in my ribs worse, and I shook my head as I leaned on the railing in front of me and told Andrew, “fuck you scared me. I was just… thinking?”
Andrew nodded, stood halfway out in the open door of the balcony while he shifted on his heels like he was unsure if to leave me to my thoughts or comfort me, “well…I just wanted to thank you. Meant a lot getting to see Marty and all of that, I usually don’t do anything around Christmas just with… well, you get it.”
“I remember,” I admitted, knowing how tough it probably was on him, “I just… I wanted to have some people over. You know? I don’t really do that and-”
“Mary,” Andrew interrupted laughing, a hand clasped on my shoulder, “I know for a fact that’s not the only reason, but honestly? Scar aside and whatever happened with Red you seem like you’re doing good, and I’m glad I could help.”
I took a second to try and figure out if that was a good sign or bad one, blinking a moment before I admitted, “fair enough.”
Tara interrupted us with a call for Andrew, the woman triumphantly walking up waving a piece of paper in the air declaring, “got it! Mind if we swing by the store on the way home? I wanna pick up some ingredients”
Andrew sighed into a chuckling laugh, shaking his head as he turned back around and kissed his girlfriend on the forehead answering, “fine, but we’ll need to make it quick; we still need to figure out how to re-season Knive’s cast iron before they get home or we’re dead.”
The mere mention of the cast iron apparently enough to summon Percy, the man moving from his position at the dishes to near the door in a few seconds as he started, “well, I can give you some advice there, but if Basil knows his BBQ he probably knows how too. I mean, how bad could it be?”
Andrew and Tara both looking at each other before the latter admitted, “I used some steel wool to scrape out some eggs that got stuck and-”
Tara cut off by a hand gently resting on her shoulder from Percy, the man looking like he was holding in an immediate reaction before asking, “when does Knives get back?”
“Planned for the day after Christmas,” I answered for them, Percy shaking his head a moment as I told them, “you’re probably dead.”
“You better get started on that pan tonight, and… next time? Little bit of water in the pan, get it to boil, gently scrape with a spatula, works every time,” Percy explained, shaking his head as he asked me, “you doing alright? You want I can make some coffee or whatever. Anna might still have a little in her flask if you want to see if she’ll share.”
I nodded, the words stuck in my throat before I admitted, “I’m fine, just… lot on my mind. Think we can talk?… no offense, guys, just-”
“We’re already gone,” Andrew agreed with raised hands, the two stepping back and closing the balcony behind them.
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Percy and I left stood alone, neither of us talking until I eventually asked, “my dad, he… I heard he apparently goes to some party The Lady hosts, scheduled for tomorrow night. Do you know if he’s…”
Percy shook his head, brow furrowed a moment before admitting, “I think he’d asked for someone else to take his place, though I ain’t too sure. Why you asking?”
“The mercenaries are attacking there,” I said, the man barely seeming to react to the announcement, “I… The Lady’s going to be there, and-”
“You’re considering letting it happen,” Percy didn’t need much prompting to realize, the man furrowing his brow as he said more to himself than me, “good chance to at least wound The Lady, maybe not kill her, but it’d throw her off for a while. I mean…” he stopped, his lips growing thin before he realized, “people.”
“Lots of innocent humans in there,” I agreed, settling back into my chair with a groan of pain, “I’m… The Lady’s killed a lot of humans, you know that, I know that, everyone has, but at the same time just…”
“Not a lot of hunters would complain about someone doing it, even if there’d be Hell to pay,” Percy said with all the neutrality such a statement could hold, “it’d kill humans, it’d fuck everything up around here, we’d probably lose some of our own in the bomb or whatever comes after, but… well, no one likes The Lady, they like she lets them hunt monsters she wants dead. Hell, I mean, some the stricter hunters had it their way we’d just-”
Percy stopped himself quick enough that the sound of his teeth clenching rang in the evening air. His lips thin, eyes staring a hole into the floor as he refused to say exactly what I knew he had wanted to.
They’d kill every supernatural they could.
Not just a werewolf causing problems for the city’s peace, not just a vampire leaving dead bodies laying around or a fey waging war with their courts. A good chunk of hunters were pleased with the idea of putting a silver bullet through my heart just for existing, and it didn’t matter I’d actually deserve it. Hell, very least I could say they’d have included a lot of good people in that list; Andrew, Basil, Knives, Tara, people who didn’t deserve it.
Would those sort of hunters even hold back anymore if The Lady wasn’t around to force them in check when they did cross a line?
Why was I still considering this? I was already a monster, I fucking…
“I killed Greg,” I said before I realized the words had crossed my lips, looking over to Percy while he stared me down, “the first hunter that went missing, The Lady claimed credit for, it wasn’t part of the mercenaries. I killed-”
“I know,” the man interrupted me, his expression almost sad even as he continued, “heard Leila saying she saw you at the bar, and even if I hadn’t I… well, I kinda suspected it when The Lady claimed credit. Someone said they thought Greg was talking up a girl the night he went missing, they stayed until last call, and… well, if The Lady wanted to kill someone, you seemed like you’d get asked.”
I couldn’t speak for a moment, my mouth half held open, lip trembling as I admitted, “she… she didn’t ask me to, I-”
“Had a good reason,” Percy interrupted once more, the man taking a crouch beside me as a sad smile cross his lips, “Mary, I… I know you had a good reason, no matter how it happened.”
“Why?”
“You think we’ve been friends this long, just for me to assume the worst of you?” Percy letting the words sit on the air while I couldn’t bring myself to say a response. Only as I thought I was about to start crying he rose once more and let me know, “only regret I have is if you owe The Lady for helping hide the body.” Whatever look I had on my face enough for him to tell me, “next time you you kill someone, you can call me. No questions asked, I promise.”
I had to laugh, a dull hollow noise as I shook my head and asked again, “why are you trusting me that much? I was… Percy, why?”
The man stopping at the door, one hand on it before he admitted, “If I can’t trust you I’m not really sure who I can. I’d rather not imagine that world.”
His words feeling like an unintended slap to the face even as he went back inside none the wiser. The idea he could trust someone like me feeling like it should have been funny even as it felt impossible to laugh at.
Percy didn’t even know how long I’d been in the Purists, did he know how many humans I’d killed?
Would he still act like I was worth helping if he did?
The thought twirling around in my head until the door opened once more and I looked over to Anna stood there arms crossed. Barbie behind her, though I knew no one else was seeing the ghost even as I peeled my eye away from her.
Anna the more pressing issue at least, the woman’s eyes boring down into me until she finally announced, “I’m heading home, Mary.”
I nodded, not sure what else I was supposed to say as I told her, “have fun.”
The woman not moving until she finished her point, “we still have a lot to talk about,” before turning and leaving me. Anna near slamming the glass door shut behind her and leaving me alone to try and figure out whether that was good or bad even as Barbie walked languidly towards me.
My spectral companion sitting across my lap, her icy touch burning to the touch even as I asked without thinking, “you and Red have fun?”
Barbie raised an eyebrow at that, her smirk almost mischievous as she asked me, “doing what?”
She had me, and I sucked my teeth a moment before brushing it off, “doesn’t matter, you’re allowed to do what you want.”
The laugh she let out was almost mocking, a freezing head resting against my shoulder as she purred, “are you jealous?”
I let my eye loosely focus on the ghost fires of Richmond, barely visible in the evening light as I answered, “tried the marriage and one person thing, I’m happy to try going poly. Never really got to do much dating or finding out my type anyway, might as well.”
“Oh good… we had sex,” Barbie admitted, and I felt a small noise rise in my throat while my arms tightened around her. The woman laughing as she comforted me, “we just talked some things out, she wanted to ask a few questions and then she introduced me to Leverage. She’s not really my type anyway. You sure you wanna go poly, you seem to have a little bit of a jealous streak in you?”
I let out a grumbling response, only as I caught a glimpse of her smile admitting, “I used to get… okay, yeah, jealous, of Hunter. I killed a few women who hit on him. I… I don’t like the idea of being jealous again, and I think I’d rather get over it.”
I felt her head nod against me, that same laugh escaping her as she confirmed, “just talk it out before anything happens?”
“I kinda need to explain the ghost girlfriend again anyway, I think new partners would want to hear about that first,” I admitted, gently pushing her freezing form off my lap and rising to my feet with a groan of pain. The ghost looking at me confused even as I pulled my coat tight around me and swung by my bedroom in the apartment.
My purse and keys joining me as even Percy noticed my preparations and said, “I thought you ain’t got nothing you can do tonight?”
“I don’t,” I admitted, not stopping my pace as I checked I had everything on me and brushed my hair out with my fingers, “doesn’t mean I don’t want to talk to someone. You think you can help me pack some of that chili and cornbread to go?”