Pulse

Chapter 17

Cian

"Watch your step," I said, offering Lucie my hand to help her clamber over a throng of boating supplies: an oil tank, an old and rusted propeller, a couple moist and mildewy life jackets. Inside the ill-lit boathouse, it smelled like gasoline and saltwater, the paint peeling on both the interior and exterior. I sighed; the first dock had no evidence of a body, so I traced my way past the flotation devices to go the second, but got the same result.

Lucie leaped from the second platform, landing roughly on the third. She began to teeter on her toes, and I inhaled, only letting myself breathe when she didn't fall. Her voice, however, did sound wary when she called to me: "Cian, you might want to see this."

I came to her side and peered down into the water, where a boat should have been. Instead, a man floated facedown on the surface, the water turned grayish black by the lack of sunlight. His skin was blanched and lifeless, hair gray and stringy. He had obviously been there a while, as the scent of rotting, moldy flesh wafted up into my face.

Next to me, Lucie coughed and covered her nose. Other than that, however, she showed no sign of severe disgust; she didn't turn and run back out, like I'd expected her to. It brought a begrudging smile to my face. "Do we touch him?" she asked me.

I shook my head. "No. Don't touch him. Diseases and stuff."

"Right. Diseases and stuff," she repeated. She turned in a slow circle, scrutinizing the boathouse. She stopped abruptly and tugged at my sleeve. "This looks familiar, doesn't it?"

Lucie faced the only boat in the structure we stood in, a vintage sailboat docked at the second platform with cracking white paint and a rusted wheel. Someone had painted The Sea Daisy in faded blue on the side, but that wasn't what had caught Lucie's eye, and it wasn't what caught mine. It was that same line I'd seen in Richard Hall's kitchen, and painted using the same substance: blood. Tis starving that makes it fat. "So you were right," I said to Lucie, glancing back at the body. "Whoever it is isn't just killing for sport. They're planning these murders."

"Murder," said a vacant voice that sent chills down my spine. I looked up, and my eyes met the dead man's, bland and cold, as if they'd been drained of color. He was stocky and broad-shouldered, still wearing the fishing shirt and cargo pants he'd died in. Damp gray hair fell across his eyebrows, stubble moving around his mouth as he spoke. "That's what happened to me. The shadow followed me, then it killed me."

I froze up a little. "The...the shadow?"

"You wouldn't mind elaborating, would you, Mr. Fisherman?" Lucie offered a sweet smile, and I just shook my head at her. There was something strangely enjoyable about having her there, standing at my side, assisting in any way she could. In fact, I realized, I felt empty without her beside me. Even if she only reached my shoulder.

Mr. Fisherman shook his head once, a curt gesture. "I don't know," he said, then his eyes lifted to me, wide and crazed. "It followed me and it killed me. It followed me and it killed me. It followed me and it killed me!"

I raised my eyebrows. I'd never came across a soul who was so lost. By now, the pungent scent death brought along with it was relentless in my nostrils, like decaying matter. I licked the scar at my lips, reaching to grab Lucie's wrist. "This guy's gone bonkers. Stand back."

"What are you going to do?"

A smile blossomed on my face, pulled up further at one side than the other. My shoulder blades had succumbed to their usual tingling, my wings humming underneath the skin. It grew louder and louder, and I let Lucie's wrist go, pointing at The Sea Daisy. "My job. Boat. Now."