Chapter 6: The Man in the Hat, Part 1

Valerie had slept on a lot of uncomfortable surfaces in her life, especially the last few months. But so far, the cold, cast iron metal floor of a dented and battered cage probably took the cake. She stretched as best she could, trying to loosen herself up, but there wasn't much space, especially since she wasn't alone.

List was already awake. Most of the left side of her face was still covered by the shredded remains of the sleeves of Valerie's shirt, which were now thoroughly stained with dried blood. She sat in the corner opposite Valerie, avoiding the huntress’s eyes. 

A dozen moments from the night before flashed in Valerie’s mind. List, screaming like a barbarian as she carved a werewolf to shreds with a whip. The smile on her face, that had slowly faded from wild exhilaration, to a quiet, anxious uncertainty when she’d finally noticed the dumbstruck look on Valerie’s face. The very panicked and angry mob of townspeople who had come to find an outsider they didn’t trust, a girl they thought was a monster, and a corpse caught somewhere in transition between their sheriff and a wolf. 

It was a miracle no one else had died when the mob came for them. An even bigger one that all the townspeople had done so far was throw them in a cage. 

“Morning,” Valerie greeted.

List said nothing in response, continuing to sit, arms folded, tail loosely wrapped around herself, idly flicking back and forth at the tip. 

“Did you ever go to sleep?”

“Not for long.”

“Did I miss anything?”

“Not really.” List rolled her uncovered eye. “They’re too scared to come in here. Especially with the sheriff gone.”

Valerie glanced over to the gouges in the jail's wall, where the sheriff's claws had nearly gutted her. And she was sharing a cell with the girl who had killed that monster. She got a better look now, up close, and with much of the dirt that had once caked her appearance washed away by the rain. What she’d initially taken for purely black hair actually had a few streaks of bright red running through it. And then there were the tattoos running the length of List's right arm, all the way to the base of her neck.

At first glance, the black ink resembled a long, undulating body of a dragon, with its tails curling around the back of List's hand and its head peering out from her neck. But on closer inspection, the shape of the dragon was actually comprised out of dozens on dozens of names. They were small, crammed together, and often slanted or curved to conform to the dragon's shape, but they were still unmistakably names. She could only guess at the meaning of the tattoo, and there were so many names she couldn’t even have begun to read them all, but it did at least make the hellborn's name make a lot more sense. 

“Yeah. Gone.”

List glowered. “What?”

“What?”

“You’ve been staring at me like that all night," List said. "You want to say something, so just say it.”

Valerie still knew almost nothing about List, even after having spent a night in a cell with her. Between dealing with the townspeople, tending to their wounds, and arguing over whether they should have just fought their way out instead of getting locked up, there hadn't been much time for asking questions. And she still remembered how guarded List had been when they first met.

But if she was inviting questions . . .

“Okay, so about last night—“

“Never a good start to a sentence.”

“What was that? How do you know how to use a whip like that? How did you make it . . . do that?”

List scoffed. “How do you know how to shoot a miniature crossbow strapped to your wrist?”

“Years of training.”

“Well, sounds like there’s your answer.”

“But who trained you? How did you end up on your own?”

“Has anyone ever told you that you ask a lot of questions?”

“A few people did yesterday, actually.”

“Maybe you should take the hint.”

Valerie thought that was a bit rude, given that List was the one who'd just told her to ask her questions, but she relented. An awkward silence passed between them, until List's face twitched, and her hand reflexively reached up to the makeshift bandage over her left eye.

“How’s the eye?” Valerie asked.

“Still hurts."

"Let me take a look."

Before List could protest, Valerie joined her in her corner of their cell. List flinched when Valerie reached for her bandage, and the huntress paused, waiting for permission. After a bit of hesitation, List nodded, and Valerie very carefully began removing the bandage from List's face. She had to stop several times as List winced in pain, but eventually, she pulled the blood soaked sleeve away.

It could have been worse.

"Well, it doesn't look infected," Valerie said.

"That's not encouraging."

"You're probably going to keep the eye," Valerie said. "Is that encouraging?"

"It's better."

Valerie rolled her eyes. "Still. You could use a clean bandage."

Without missing a beat, Valerie began tugging on her remaining shirt sleeve. It took some doing—her shirt was actually exceptionally well made—but eventually, the seam joining the sleeve to the main body gave out, and the fabric came loose.

List hissed in pain as Valerie pressed the cloth to her face and secured it in place, but aside from some light trembling and a few jerks of her tail, she stayed still.

“There."

“Thanks.” List muttered. A beat of silence passed. “What about your arm?”

“Oh, it’s fine.”

“What do you mean it’s fine? You stuck it down a werewolf’s throat.”

“I mean—here, look.”

Valerie held her arm out for List to see. Where the werewolf’s teeth had bit through her clothes and torn her skin, there was now only fresh but fully healed scars.

“That’s…interesting.”

“I heal fast,” Valerie said.

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“I can see that.”

“It’s nothing too crazy. It’s not like I heal good as new in the middle of a fight or anything. But stuff like that, flesh wounds, I can usually just sleep off in a day or two. This one was pretty bad, actually. They don't usually scar.”

“Of course. Nothing too crazy.”

Valerie nodded once before suddenly frowning. “That was sarcasm, wasn’t it?”

For the first time since Valerie had met her, List laughed. There was a bitterness to it, but it was unmistakably real, and without a doubt the most relaxed List had ever sounded. 

A small, quisitive smile traced across the hellborn’s lips. “You know, you’re a lot…stranger than I took you for.”

“Why? Because of the healing?”

List shook her head in mild disbelief. “Because you say shit like that, or walk around calling yourself a monster hunter, and yet you somehow don’t expect people to think you’re crazy.”

Valerie opened her mouth to protest, but quickly found she didn’t actually have a rebuttal to that. 

“I guess you’re right.”

“I’m always right.”

“That, I don’t think I believe.”

“That’s just because you don’t know me very well.”

“No, I don’t,” Valerie agreed. 

Another brief silence.

“So, are the tattoos magic?”

“Oh my gods, you’re relentless.”

Before Valerie could decide whether or not to take that as a compliment, an angry din from outside caught her attention. List’s own pointed ears flicked up at the sound, and her tail began to agitatedly whip back and forth. Without thinking, the girls closed ranks with each other

“What’s going on?” Valerie asked.

“Nothing good,” List said.

The din grew steadily louder, eventually taking the texture of a few dozen angry, manic voices shouting to be heard over each other. Experience helped List recognize the sound of an angry mob a second before Valerie did, but she figured it out once the door burst open to reveal a crowd of people wielding logging axes and garden implements.

Given that they were cornered, outnumbered, and List was still hurt, they put up a good fight. But it was a losing battle, and it was only a matter of time before the townspeople found their opening.

"No more waiting!"

"To the tree with them!"

"Get the rope!"

After being dragged and cajoled outside, four people working in concert managed to tie Valerie's hands behind her back and get a noose around her neck. Another eight did the same for List, and the both of them were half hauled, half prodded away from the jail and toward a tree in the center of the town.

Panic seized Valerie's chest as realized what was happening. A mix of insults, accusations, and calls for their deaths blanketed the both of them, so loud she found it hard to think. 

"Outsiders!"

"They brought the monsters! They're working with them!"

"They killed the sheriff!"

"Make them pay!"

"String them up!"

Her head swam, incredulous. This wasn't right. She and List had saved this town. And now they were going to hang for it.

"Wait!" Valerie grunted. "Stop!"

She tried to shout out a defense. Either no one heard her, or no one cared. She tried begging for mercy and got the same result. She struggled against her ropes to no avail. She kicked. She screamed. 

The tree got closer.

List thrashed like a wild animal. Any part of her body she could use to resist, she did. She dug her heels into the dirt. She snapped at anything that got close to her with her teeth. Her tail swung like a whip. But for all her fight, she didn't do much more than make more people pitch in to keep her moving.

Valerie made one last, desperate plea to the people as their ropes were thrown over the lowest tree branch.  List let out the longest string of curses anyone present had ever heard. Then Valerie's throat constricted, and her feet left the ground.

Her pleas and List's curses both became choking sputters as they were lifted by the neck, hands tied, feet desperately seeking purchase and finding only empty air. A hundred furious eyes bore down on them as the surrounding crowd watched them, continuing to hurl insults and accusations. 

Valerie started to see spots.

Then there was a flash of light, and a snap, and suddenly sweet air rushed into Valerie's lungs as she dropped to the ground like a rock. She landed face first, hands still tied behind her back, but she didn't care. She could breathe. She was alive.

List coughed and grunted nearby, also fallen from the tree with her noose dangling from her neck, frayed and smoking at the end.

The girls struggled to sit up with their hands still tied behind their backs, but eventually they managed. It was only after Valerie finally began to catch her breath that she realized that the crowd around them had gone silent.

The gathered lynch mob had parted almost perfectly down the middle, creating an aisle from the hanging tree all the way to the far side, where stood a single man in a long, dark coat, and a tall, wide brimmed black hat. He carried himself with perfect posture, both hands resting on the head of a simple black cane.

A hundred hushed townspeople stared at him in shock, but he never took his gaze off the two girls gasping for breath at the base of the tree that had almost been their gallows.

"Valerie Waymire," he greeted, voice both singsong and humorless. "What have you gotten yourself into now?"

Valerie coughed once, her face a mixture of relief and embarrassment. "Dr. Siren. You're here."

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