The Neon Graveyard by Vicki Pettersson Page A

told Buttersnap, sighing as she sidled up to me, looking for more to eat. Her body was a giant ember. Her mere presence fended off the room’s chill. I leaned against her, and companionably she leaned back. “There would be something wrong if I just went soft.”
    Because there was a man waiting for me, suffering and enslaved, in another world, and I’d face a thousand tulpas for him alone.
    “And the real irony is,” I told Buttersnap, “Hunter has made me softer than ever.”

4
     
    T he weekend desert raves had become our best way of entering and exiting city boundaries without notice. Scattered among a group of apathetic teens, all bundled against the desert night in fleece hoodies and cargos, we looked like a writhing sea of military escapees, talking and laughing, dancing and drinking, the desert thumping underfoot.
    Not that the outings were without peril. This was how a good half-dozen rogues had found us, and if they could reach us, so could the troops. So we always used unlit dirt roads, zero signage, and cryptic word of mouth for directions. We also set the impromptu destinations as close to the boundaries dividing the city from the cell as possible. The invisible border restricted the Shadow and Light within it like a cowboy lassoing a calf, and I always watched from outside that intangible loop as a stream of headlights wound over the high desert like a glowing snake, dozens of teens bursting from its belly.
    Tonight I was struck by a surprising pang of jealousy as I watched the other mortals lose themselves in the big bass throb that sent cacti and jackrabbits into shock. Plastic horns and whistles and glow sticks whipped through the night, and voices arched like war cries over the craggy bedrock while the scent of burning wood and yucca stood up in the air. There’s nothing quite like a desert rave. Something about disappearing into the arid flats is akin to being locked in a slick embrace. Or maybe I just remembered it that way from a youth when raves were a way to escape my parents, the city, and everything else that so sharply defined me.
    At two in the morning, the other grays broke away from the main group, joining me on the “free” side of the line. We stood out over there, clearly separate from the other partiers. If a mortal drifted close, they were offered a drink and unobtrusively escorted back to the mass of flailing limbs. If, on the other hand, a rogue agent appeared, they’d also be given a drink, then dropped into a seat of honor next to a small blazing fire and interviewed.
    Tonight had yet to see any potential allies, so we had to make do with small talk until— if— one made himself known.
    “Why’d you do that thing to the Tulpa?” Gareth said suddenly, tilting his head. “With his nose?”
    A half a dozen curious gazes turned my way, and I shrugged. I guess tonight wasn’t going to be a night for small talk.
    “He wants people to think his ability to morph into any shape or form is a strength,” I answered.
    “Isn’t it?” Foxx asked, his voice wry.
    “Can be,” I conceded, offering up a grim smile. “But real people can’t just rework their facial features according to whim. And I just wanted him to know that I know it for weakness. Besides, it’s one thing to tell all of you that the Tulpa isn’t all-powerful. That there’s a way he can be beat—”
    “But by showing us a weakness—” provided Fletcher.
    “You begin to believe.” I nodded. “And if a mere mortal, using nothing more than her mind, can impose her will upon him—”
    “Then we can too,” he said, crossing his arms. Backlit by the bonfire, he looked like a Gulf War soldier. “And what about Harrison? You could have used one of the old conduits to kill him.”
    “Sometimes the antiques malfunction.” I shrugged. “I didn’t want to take a chance in such a high-pressure situation.”
    Milo, next to Fletcher, scoffed quietly. “Yes. You’re the epitome of caution.”
    “You’re