Butcher Bird

"Bye, Rubi," whispered Lulu as Spyder hustled her out of the building.

"Hold on to me," he told her as they got on the bike. Lulu wrapper her arms around his waist and leaned heavily on his back. Spyder kicked the Dead Man's Ducati into gear and took back streets across town to a twenty-four-hour diner he knew down by the waterfront.

For all her scars and drugged despair, Lulu seemed better after a second cup of coffee. She took a long breath and even smiled the now familiar raw flesh smile.

"Aren't we a pair? A couple of real desperadoes. Like those kids in Badlands. Kit and:who was his girlfriend?"

"Holly."

"Yeah, that chick from Carrie. She was really something." After a moment, Lulu said, "I never saw you punch anybody like that before."

"Sure you have."

"Not a girl."

"Yeah," said Spyder. "That was new."

"I love her."

"I know you do. She going to be all right."

"You sure?"

"I promise."

Lulu looked out the window, apparently satisfied for the moment. They drank coffee, ate pie and french fries, and Spyder watched the clock over the counter creep ever so slowly toward dawn.

"So, what happens next to a couple of outlaws like us, hopped up on caffeine and sugar, and on the lam?"

"I figure it's a lot like Badlands," said Spyder. "We leave here, get a ride and go straight to Hell."

Twenty-One

Jubilee

At the far end of Fisherman's Wharf, past the eager early morning tourists and their blear-eyed children, a jeweled airship hung in the air.

The balloon portion resembled an enormous, ruby-colored seahorse. Below this was a comfortable-looking gondola of a dark, lacquered wood with gold filigree. Spyder saw the seahorse blocks away, but wasn't worried. By now he knew that no one else could see the thing or would remember it for more than a few seconds if they did.

Spyder parked the Dead Man's Ducati by a clam-chowder stand in front of Fisherman's Wharf and left the keys in the ignition. Taking Lulu by the hand, he led her down the long wooden walkway connected to the piers. Long before Fisherman's Wharf had been transformed into a video game and fried fish tourist trap, the place had been a working pier for fishing boats coming in from beyond the Golden Gate. Even weekend sailors avoided the place now, however. It wasn't just the tourists. The few places left to tie up boats had been staked out by hundreds of growling and extremely territorial sea lions. Mostly, the animals used the piers to sun themselves, so in the cool morning air there weren't more than a dozen or so sacked out on the deck. Spyder walked Lulu carefully around the sea lions to the airship.

Primo waved to them from the end of the pier. Shrike was sitting on one of the pilings, her face to the sun. Her pale skin was outlined in the orange and pinks of dawn light. Spyder stood behind her. She got to her feet, put a hand on his chest and smiled at him. "I never doubted you for a moment, even if you doubted yourself," Shrike said, and pecked him on the cheek. She went to the balloon and Primo helped her into the gondola, then Lulu. Spyder followed them inside as Primo cast off the rope that tethered them to the wharf. For a second, it seemed as if nothing was happening. Then, they rose straight into the chill morning sky. Spyder's stomach dropped with the nauseous sensation of riding in a freight elevator.

Shrike was passing around cups and a thermos full of hot coffee.

"Hey, I'm Lulu," Lulu said to Shrike. "A friend of Spyder's. I was at the bar with him the night you two met."

Shrike nodded. "Have some coffee," she said, then turned and went below deck.

Spyder poured coffee for Lulu and himself and watched Primo at the front of the gondola operating a spider web of lines and pulleys, positioning the airship to catch the bay winds. Spyder took his cup and approached the little man.

"Want some coffee?" Spyder asked.

"I don't drink stimulants, sir."

"Need any help with the ropes?"

Primo grinned. "Oh, no thank you. I'm fine." He pulled enthusiastically on one line and let another slide through his hand as they turned away from the coast and drifted toward the Golden Gate Bridge, steadily gaining altitude as they went.

"You look like the cat who ate the canary, after fucking it," said Spyder.

The little man nodded. "I'm doing what I love," he said. "I serve Madame Cinders because that is my duty. She gave my clan sanctuary centuries ago and we always honor our debts. But living sedentary in her palace isn't the happiest life for me."

"A ramblin', gamblin' man."

Primo laughed. "We Gytrash are travelers both by profession and by disposition. I grew up on horseback, in trading ships clad in gold and on endless overland treks through all three Spheres.