Free Bloodlands by Christine Cody

mind to hear the cries of what he thought to be loved ones.
    He saw blood on a woman who might’ve been her mom . . . then her brother . . .
    Then there was a tearing wipe into a second, even more painfully vivid memory, blood . . .
    The red of it clutched at him, and he dropped the connection. A tremor lined his veins, and he hungered. Yearned.
    That was why he couldn’t afford to look into people—because they might jigger his worst instincts with careless thoughts. That was why he should’ve been able to stop himself this time, too.
    Chaplin winced, as if feeling his anguish, and Gabriel silently commanded the dog to keep this secret between them.
    The dog quivered, as if the effort of separating secrets were too much.
    Control. Gabriel needed to find it, to access it. Control was key to a monster’s survival. It was almost all they had.
    He took the reins of the conversation, leading it to where he thought it’d be safer.
    “Ask me anything,” he said to Mariah. “And I’ll tell you so I can ease your wonderings.”
    He’d lie. He’d dodge. He’d hide.
    “Okay then,” she said. “The crucifix. Your reaction to it . . .”
    “Coincidence.” There—simple enough. “You know I hadn’t eaten properly after I was injured, and I overtaxed myself while working.” Gaining strength by the moment, he stood away from the wall, his tone lightening. “Besides, I’m an atheist. Always did have an aversion to crosses and the like.”
    Another lie—he’d had religion in his day, and the symbols of his own church burned at him every time he witnessed one. In a cross or crucifix, all he saw was hopelessness.
    “Healing,” she said, taking a step toward him. “You got rid of those injuries as if all you had to do was wish them away.”
    “The unguent I had you put on my wounds,” he said. In truth, it was meaningless, slightly-tampered-with lard that he carried and used as part of his masquerade. “An old woman—an herbalist—made some for me before I struck out of the Southblock sanctuary.”
    Mariah still didn’t seem won over. Steel, this one was.
    “Your flask. What’s in it? Blood?”
    He laughed, as if that were ludicrous, but he knew he’d have to bury the object outside before she could check it. Chaplin had vaguely revealed to Gabriel that Mariah didn’t leave the shelter unless necessary, and even then she didn’t stray far, so the odds of her discovering it out there were slim.
    “A concoction,” he said, adding lie upon lie, “made from a nutrient powder and what water I manage to find. The old woman gave it to me, as well.”
    “Sleeping all day . . .”
    “It’s relatively cooler out here at night. Everyone knows that. Better to sleep when the weather is unkind.”
    As Mariah stood there, he could see that she was stuck between wanting to believe this stranger who’d proven so helpful today and disbelieving him out of wise necessity.
    She glanced around the room, her gaze resting on a crate with some sticks poking out of a metal cup, as if she or her dad used to char the ends to write on paper.
    Walking over, she grabbed two of them, and Gabriel knew exactly what she was about to do: construct a makeshift cross to flash at him.
    But Chaplin also must’ve sensed her intentions, because he sprang up on the crate, knocking it over, spilling the sticks to the ground, barking and making those strange yet patterned canine sounds at her.
    He’d said something to her while blocking Gabriel, and he wondered what it was. Before he could mind-ask his familiar, the dog opened his thoughts.
    Don’t worry—I won’t let her kick you out, Gabriel.
    Mariah had already backed off, seemingly bothered by her companion’s defense of Gabriel.
    Chaplin yipped and yapped, stringing together a sentence, and Gabriel could hear what the dog was saying to Mariah now, because Chaplin was allowing him to.
    He chased off Stamp’s no-gooder. He can help. Monsters are serious business. Take it