Free Hunter's Prayer by Lilith Saintcrow Page A

fine.” I spat blood, he’d socked me a good one in the mouth. Thank God my teeth don’t come out easily. Sorcery is occasionally useful. “Hold him.” Where’s the mark, got to find the mark, got to find it; what’s a Sorrow doing in here?
    The boy’s spine crackled as his eyes rolled into his head. He mumbled, and I wondered what he was cooking up next. Goddammit, and he’s gagged. Christ. I tore the front of his shirt, ran my hand over his narrow hairless chest. No tingle. Where was the mark?
    “Jillian?” Father Guillermo, by the door. He sounded choked.
    “You witch, that’s one of our kids! ” Rourke was still having trouble with this one.
    I snapped a glance back over my shoulder, checking. “Transferred from out of state? Your kid’s in a ditch somewhere, Father. This is a Sorrow. Probably just a little baby viper instead of a full-grown one, though.” Or he’d have tried to crush my larynx instead of socking me in the gut. I got his pants off with one swift jerk, breaking the button and jamming the zipper. “I suggest you wait outside in case he chews through the gag.” Blood dripped into my right eye, I blinked it away, irritably. “The question is why the Sorrows are so interested in this seminary. And when I find the mark we’ll find out.”
    I got lucky. It was on his right thigh, the three interlocked circles in blue with the sigil of the Black Flame where they overlapped. He was a young soldier, not a man-drone only fit for sacrifice or a pleasure-slave. Of all the ranks a male could hold in a House, the soldiers had maybe the shortest life—but at least they weren’t tied down and slaughtered to feed the Eldest Ones. “Bingo,” I muttered, and held out my hand. The bone handle of Saul’s Bowie landed solidly in my palm.
    The Sorrow hissed and gurgled behind the gag. Saul reached down, cupped his chin, and yanked back, exposing the boy’s throat and making sure he couldn’t thrash his shoulders around.
    I laid the flat of the knife against the mark and the kid screamed, audible even behind the gag. Steel against Chaldean sorcery, one of the oldest enmities known to magic.
    The Elder Gods would have us all back in the Bronze Age if they could. They would have us killing each other to feed their hungry mouths as well. Still, there are some Elders the Sorrows don’t invoke, because their very natures are inimical to the worship of darkness. Belief is a double-edged blade, and a hunter can use it as well as any other weapon.
    “Thou shalt be released,” I murmured in Old Chaldean. “Thou unclean, thou whom the gods have turned their face from, thou shalt be released, in the name of Vul the Magnificent, the lighter of fires—”
    He screamed again. I paused. Next came sliding the knife up and flaying the skin to get the mark off. I could add it to my collection. Each little bit of skin, drying and stretching and marked with their hellish brand, was another brick in the wall between me and the guilt of my teacher’s death. Each time I killed a Sorrow, I felt good.
    Cleansed.
    I am not a very nice person.
    “Last chance,” I said. “Before you go to your Hell.” And believe me when I say that’s one place you don’t want to visit even for a moment.
    The kid went limp.
    There, that’s more like it. I looked up at Saul, whose eyes still glowed. No, he was not in the least bit happy. But he nodded, a quick dip of his chin, and released the pressure on the gag just a little.
    The rat-faced kid’s eyes met mine. A spark flared in their tainted depths, swirling now he had revealed himself. His skin began to look gray too, the Chaldean twisting his tongue and staining his body.
    Wait a second. He isn’t even an Acolyte. What’s he doing out of a House? “Ungag him.”
    Saul hesitated.
    “Christ, Saul, ungag him.”
    The boy jerked. Leather slipped free. But Saul was tense, and I saw his right hand relax from a fist into a loose claw, nails sliding free and lengthening, turning