Kim Harrison - Hollows 1 - Dead Witch Walking

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DEAD WITCH WALKING

Kim Harrison

"Your death is going to be a pleasure for both of us, Rachel Mariana Morgan.

Such a twisted way to die

—

in pleasure

The air blurred before me, and I staggered as I realized the thing had

changed again, now into a tall, sophisticated young man dressed in a formal frock

and coat. Was it a vamp? A really old vampire?

"Perhaps you're afraid of pain?" the vision of an elegant man said, its accent

now proper enough for even Professor Henry Higgins. Grinning, it picked me up

and threw me across the room.

My back hit the cabinet with enough force to knock the air from me. The

clatter of my knife on the floor was loud as my fingers lost their grip. Struggling

to breathe, I slid down the broken cabinet and was helpless as the thing lifted

me by my dress front.

"What are you?" I rasped.

It smiled. "Whatever scares you."

"A fun-fair ride through a fascinating version of our world."

Charlaine Harris

"It isn't easy to write a protagonist who blends qualities of Anita Blake and

Stephanie Plum, but Kim Harrison carries it off with style."

Jim Butcher

KIM

HARRISON

DEAD

WITCH

WALKING

HarperTorch

An Imprint of

HarperCollins

Publishers

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are

products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be

construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or

persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

HarperTorch

An Imprint ofHarperCollinsPublishers

10 East 53rd Street

New York, New York 10022-5299

First HarperTorch paperback printing: May 2004

First HarperTorch special printing: December 2003

Printed in the United States of America

Visit HarperTorch on the World Wide Web at www.harpercollins.com

To the man who said he liked my hat.

Acknowledgments

I'd like to thank the people who suffered through me during the rewrites.

You know who you are, and I salute you. But I'd especially like to thank my

editor, Diana Gill, for her wonderful suggestions that opened up delightful

avenues of thought, and my agent, Richard Curtis.

Dead Witch Walking

Kim Harrison

One

I stood in the shadows of a deserted shop front across from The Blood and

Brew Pub, trying not to be obvious as I tugged my black leather pants back up

where they belonged.

This is pathetic

, I thought, eyeing the rain-emptied

street. I was way too good for this.

Apprehending unlicensed and black-art witches was my usual line of work, as

it takes a witch to catch a witch. But the streets were quieter than usual this

week. Everyone who could make it was at the West Coast for our yearly

convention, leaving me with this gem of a run. A simple snag and drag. It was just

the luck of the Turn that had put me here in the dark and rain.

"Who am I kidding?" I whispered, pulling the strap of my bag farther up my

shoulder. I hadn't been sent to tag a witch in a month: unlicensed, white, dark,

or otherwise. Bringing the mayor's son in for Wereing outside of a full moon

probably hadn't been the best idea.

A sleek car turned the corner, looking black in the buzz of the mercury

street lamp. This was its third time around the block. A grimace tightened my

face as it approached, slowing. "Damn it," I whispered. "I need a darker door

front."

"He thinks you're a hooker, Rachel," my backup snickered into my ear. "I

told you the red halter was slutty."

"Anyone ever tell you that you smell like a drunk bat, Jenks?" I muttered,

my lips barely moving. Backup was unsettlingly close tonight, having perched

himself on my earring. Big dangling thing—the earring, not the pixy. I'd found

Jenks to be a pretentious snot with a bad attitude and a temper to match. But

he knew what side of the garden his nectar came from. And apparently pixies

were the best they'd let me take out since the frog incident. I would have sworn

fairies were too big to fit into a frog's mouth.

I eased forward to the curb as the car squished to a wet-asphalt halt.

There was the whine of an automatic window as the tinted glass dropped. I

leaned down, smiling my prettiest as I flashed my work ID. Mr. One Eyebrow's

leer vanished and his face went ashen. The car lurched into motion with a tiny

squeak of tires. "Day-tripper," I said in disdain.

, I thought in a flash of

chastisement. He was a norm, a human. Even if they were accurate, the terms

day-tripper, domestic, squish, off-the-rack, and my personal favorite, snack,

were politically frowned upon. But if he was picking strays up off the sidewalk in

the Hollows, one might call him dead.

The car never slowed as it went through a red light, and I turned at the

catcalls from the hookers I had displaced about sunset. They weren't happy,

standing brazenly on the corner across from me. I gave them a little wave, and

the tallest flipped me off before spinning to show me her tiny, spell-enhanced

rear. The hooker and her distinctly husky-looking "friend" talked loudly as they

tried to hide the cigarette they were passing between each other. It didn't

smell like your usual tobacco.

Not my problem, tonight

, I thought, moving back

into my shadow.

I leaned against the cold stone of the building, my gaze lingering on the red

taillights of the car as it braked. Brow furrowed, I glanced at myself. I was tall

for a woman— about five-eight—but not nearly as leggy as the hooker in the

next puddle of light over. I wasn't wearing as much makeup as she was, either.

Narrow hips and a chest that was almost flat didn't exactly make me

streetwalker material.

Before I found the leprechaun outlets, I had shopped in the "your first

bra" aisle. It's hard finding something without hearts and unicorns on it there.

My ancestors had immigrated to the good old U.S. of A. in the 1800s.

Somehow through the generations, the women all managed to retain the distinct

red hair and green eyes of our Irish homeland. My freckles, though, are hidden

under a spell my dad bought me for my thirteenth birthday. He had the tiny

amulet put into a pinky ring. I never leave home without it.

A sigh slipped from me as I tugged my bag back up onto my shoulder. The

leather pants, red ankle boots, and the spaghetti strap halter weren't too far

from what I usually wore on casual Fridays to tick off my boss, but put them on

a street corner at night… "Crap," I muttered to Jenks. "I look like a hooker."

His only response was a snort. I forced myself not to react as I turned back

to the bar. It was too rainy for the early crowd, and apart from my backup and

the "ladies" down the way, the street was empty. I'd been standing out here

nearly an hour with no sign of my mark. I might as well go in and wait. Besides, if

I were inside, I might look like a solicitee rather than a solicitor.

Taking a resolute breath, I pulled a few strands of my shoulder-length curls

from my topknot, took a moment to arrange it artfully to fall about my face, and

finally spit out my gum. The click of my boots made a snappy counterpoint to the

jangling of the handcuffs pinned to my hip as I strode across the wet street and

into the bar. The steel rings looked like a tawdry prop, but they were real and

very well-used. I winced. No wonder Mr. One Eyebrow had stopped. Used for

work

, thank you, and not the kind you're thinking of.

Still, I'd been sent to the Hollows in the rain to collar a leprechaun for tax

evasion. How much lower, I wondered, could I sink? It must have been from

tagging that Seeing Eye dog last week. How was I supposed to know it wasn't a

werewolf? It matched the description I'd been given.

As I stood in the narrow foyer shaking off the damp, I ran my gaze over the

typical Irish bar crap: long-stemmed pipes stuck to the walls, green-beer signs,

black vinyl seats, and a tiny stage where a wannabe-star was setting up his

dulcimers and bagpipes amid a tower of amps. There was a whiff of contraband

Brimstone. My predatory instincts stirred. It smelled three days old, not strong

enough to track. If I could nail the supplier, I'd be off my boss's hit list. He

might even give me something worth my talents.

"Hey," grunted a low voice. "You Tobby's replacement?"

Brimstone dismissed, I batted my eyes and turned, coming eye-to-chest

with a bright green T-shirt. My eyes traveled up a huge bear of a man. Bouncer

material. The name on the shirt said CLIFF. It fit. "Who?" I purred, blotting the

rain from what I generously call my cleavage with the hem of his shirt. He was

completely unaffected; it was depressing.

"Tobby. State-assigned hooker? She ever gonna show up again?"

From my earring came a tiny singsong voice. "I told you so."

My smile grew forced. "I don't know," I said through my teeth. "I'm not a

hooker."

He grunted again, eyeing my outfit. I pawed through my bag and handed him

my work ID. Anyone watching would assume he was carding me. With readily

available age-disguising spells, it was mandatory—as was the spell-check amulet

he had around his neck. It glowed a faint red in response to my pinky ring. He

wouldn't do a full check on me for that, which was why all the charms in my bag

were currently uninvoked. Not that I'd need them tonight.

"Inderland Security," I said as he took the card. "I'm on a run to find

someone, not harass your regular clientele. That's why the—uh—disguise."

"Rachel Morgan," he read aloud, his thick fingers almost enveloping the

laminated card. "Inderland Security runner. You're an I.S. runner?" He looked

from my card to me and back, his fat lips splitting in a grin. "What happened to

your hair? Run into a blowtorch?"

My lips pressed together. The picture was three years old. It hadn't been a

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DEADWITCHWALKINGByKimHarrison"Yourdeathisgoingtobeapleasureforbothofus,RachelMarianaMorgan.Suchatwistedwaytodie—inpleasure."Theairblurredbeforeme,andIstaggeredasIrealizedthethinghadchangedagain,nowintoatall,sophisticatedyoungmandressedinaformalfrockandcoat.Wasitavamp?Areallyoldvampire?"Perhapsyou're...

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