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Hunt beast.
I prowled the streets, scanning my surroundings up, down, and sideways, sniffing the air, listening intently, while tallying my priorities for the day.
Rainey had texted while I was sleeping, letting me know she’d found a home, not only for Sara Brady and her siblings but two other orphaned families. No children were placed until I inspected their new homes myself. I won’t save innocents only to lose them to another’s corruption.
In my teens, I’d have also prepped a Dani Daily about recent events, but Dublin had a paper again and, these days, I merely jotted notes, snapped photos, and left the info outside their offices down by the O’Connell Post Office. They’d proven reliable about printing the things I considered important so I stuck to my gracious noncompete. I didn’t get a byline but at least the news got out there.
Also on my list was book shopping. Since my bookstore of choice, with its kickass motto—You want it, we’ve got it, and if we don’t, we’ll find it—was MIA, I was going to have to patronize Bane’s Bibliotech & Bagels (seriously—copy much? Get your own original thought) with its concrete floors, stark fluorescent lights, dog-eared, smelly, secondhand, over-priced books, and even more overpriced café.
The euro still ruled, second to brute-force and black-market racketeering. Dublin had quickly relapsed into that elaborate conspiracy of pretending meaningless pieces of paper were worth something, which worked for me. I’d pilfered a pile of currency I found stashed in a storage room deep in Chester’s. One of ten storage rooms, crammed with currency from too many countries to count, much of it intriguingly ancient.
Though cell towers functioned reliably for the most part, the Internet was in sad shape, vast chunks of it missing. With so much of the human race gone, enormous areas of the planet lacked both the power and manpower to run things. Compounded by magic making things unpredictable, books once again commanded a premium.
I needed information about Ireland’s gods and goddesses. I’d never given them much of a thought. I preferred superheroes and had spent far more time poring over comics and graphic novels. Who was AOZ and what was his modus operandi for tripping people up with their own wishes?
While uncovering their legends perhaps I’d stumble across a story about a god that had long ago been wont to abduct adults, leaving their children behind. Discover the why of it, a name. A way to defeat him. Granted, a contemporary book wouldn’t yield nearly the detailed information of the abbey’s private libraries, but it was as good a place to start as any.
Beast first.
I decided, even though BB&B was gone, to head straight there. Not only was it closer, but the wards were decidedly Barrons-esque. Perhaps both owner and establishment had miraculously reappeared; one could always hope. Besides, when I’d discovered it missing the other day, I’d not scouted the lots with my customary attention to detail, aggravated by its disappearance and on the trail of prey. If BB&B yielded nothing, I’d head straight for Chester’s.
As I moved briskly across Ha’Penny Bridge and entered the south side of Dublin, I encountered my second anomaly of the day.
It was Saturday, but this morning at seven-thirty the streets teemed with people in suits and dresses who looked suspiciously as if they were going to work. As a pedestrian plowed down the sidewalk toward me—a woman in her late twenties or early thirties who was peering intently down at her cellphone—I said politely, “Pardon, what day is it?”
She raised her head, absorbed me, noting the hilt of my sword poking over my shoulder, the many bulges in my pockets, perhaps she just didn’t like my face. Her eyes narrowed, she clutched her purse more tightly and darted around me, sprinting off in high heels.
I glared at her retreating back, “Right, because monsters don’t exist and you don’t need people like me in the world,” I muttered as I reached for my phone. When I’d read my text messages earlier, I hadn’t paid any attention to the date. There’d been no reason to. I sleep a few hours at most and can go days without it. But yesterday was a bit more eventful and I’d slept closer to four hours.
I gaped down at the screen.
It was Tuesday.
I shook it. Hard. It still said Tuesday.
That was impossible. I narrowed my eyes as the tatters of a dream I’d had last night—or rather days ago—surfaced in my mind. Ryodan. Tracing symbols on me. Murmuring.
That prick. I’d awakened feeling so unusually fine because he’d spelled me into sleeping from Friday night until Tuesday morning!
Bristling, I pivoted sharply and stormed in the opposite direction, crossing Barrons off my suspect list. Ryodan had used his powers of “relaxation” on me in the past. This was a Machiavellian move, taking me out of the game so he could leave Dublin on his own timetable.
If Ryodan wasn’t at Chester’s, I was wrecking the place. Trashing. Maybe torching. No, I wasn’t done searching it. But definitely wrecking.
Nobody knocks me out for days. Especially not after being gone for two years. Especially not after I saved his ass.
As I stalked toward 939 Rêvemal Street, my brain processed a third anomaly: an inordinate number of blue-collar workers, laborers from the looks of them, were marching in the same direction, belts swaying, heavy with tools. They were bright-eyed, ruddy-cheeked, talking loudly with excitement.
I moved in behind the fast-moving throng to eavesdrop.
“I heard there’s a year’s work, maybe more,” one of the men exclaimed.
“I heard two. Christ, that’d be something.”
“Ballocks, it’s good to be working again! The construction business has been deader than a bloody doornail. Too many buildings, not enough people to fill a tenth of ’em.”
“Nice to see someone willing to put the money into new construction.”
“Right, that. With folks worrying about what tomorrow might bring.”
