California Bones by Greg van Eekhout Page B

but he knew it was one of the most corrosive substances in existence. The Hierarch used it to destroy an entire armored tank division in the Death Valley Standoff. Sometimes archeomancers uncovered a bit of it, but seps venom hardly ever left European shores. Finding it in Los Angeles wouldn’t be easy.
    Daniel turned to Otis, who’d been watching the meeting from the back of the room. “Got any seps in stock?”
    “Afraid not.”
    “Surprised. You’ve been handing over bone like it’s Victory Day.” Otis was coy about how he’d come into grootslang and gorgon blood. Even for him, this stuff was hard to get. But he’d clearly tapped into some good treasure, and he wasn’t afraid to spend it.
    “I don’t have seps,” he said, uncrossing his arms. “But I know who does.”
    *   *   *
    Five days later, Daniel had his crew prepped to go get it. This would be a good test. If they couldn’t handle a residential burglary, then no way could they pull off the Ossuary job. Better to find that out now.
    He still couldn’t believe he was going to break into the house of a Los Angeles god. Not that anyone else on the crew considered Wilson Bryant a god, but his father would go on for hours about the mystical brilliance of the music he made as leader of The Woodies, especially on their breakthrough album, Animal Talk . To which Daniel’s only ever response was, “The cow goes moo.”
    Bryant lived in a two-story Malibu beach house elevated above the surf on pylons. A lot of celebrities insisted on living in this pretty part of town, and every few years their houses were swallowed by the sea or consumed by fires in the canyons, or swept down the hills in mudslides. They would come on television, looking stylishly disheveled, and proclaim how they weren’t going to let misfortune break their spirits, and how they were going to rebuild, and Daniel would throw a shoe at the TV.
    But Daniel liked the location. Bobbing offshore in a rigid inflatable boat with his crew, he scoped out the house through binoculars. All visible windows were barred. There was a swiveling security camera on the roof, another on a second-floor balustrade, and a stationary camera over the door. Several alarm company placards were displayed like hexes. A glow in one of the upstairs windows suggested someone was home.
    Daniel maneuvered the boat to avoid the pools of light cast by flood lamps on the roof. He killed the outboard motor, and rode the surf up to the iron mesh skirting the barnacle-encrusted pylons. Cassandra and Jo made quick work of the mesh with bolt cutters, and Moth paddled the boat under the house. Daniel tied off on one of the pylons and took a good sniff. Brine and sphinx-lock and a tinge of cannabis.
    There was just enough space overhead for Daniel to stand. He played his flashlight over the web of support struts and spars, hoping to find an easy entrance—a rubbish chute or something. But no such luck. They’d have to cut through the floor.
    Cassandra lifted an eighteen-inch, four-horsepower chainsaw. Hefting it in one hand, she smiled like a murderer.
    This was going to be noisy. Daniel hated noise. He held up a finger before Cassandra touched the pull cord. With a rubber bladder, he squeezed out a few puffs of fine yellow sand. Ancient Egyptians had constructed myths around the snake personified by the cobra-goddess Meretseger. Her name meant “she who loves silence,” and it made sense to Daniel that pyramid builders revered her, since any moment of silence amid the clang and crack of hammers and chisels must have been a huge relief.
    Daniel gave Cassandra the nod. She yanked the cord of the chainsaw. Muffled by the meretseger dust, the blade cut through wood, no louder than an electric razor. Less than eighty seconds later, Cassandra had sawed a gap in the floor big enough for everyone but Moth to climb through. They donned ski masks, and Daniel and Cassandra and Jo went up.
    They found themselves in a dark hallway