Staked
Page 19
CHAPTER 16
For the record, Shango is a really super-charming thunder god. I know only the barest sketches of his pantheon, and after he spends a couple of hours telling stories about them and the beliefs of his people, I’m simultaneously enthralled and ashamed. Enthralled for obvious reasons but ashamed that I didn’t know more about the Orishas already. It’s an unfortunate truth that in the Western education system—well, in the Western countries, period—we are sadly deprived of the rich variety of African traditions. So much so that many make the mistake of thinking of the entire continent of Africa as a monoculture rather than the vast collection of disparate cultures that it is. Shango’s people primarily hail from Yorubaland, which spans the southwestern portion of modern-day Nigeria into a couple of neighboring countries, Benin and Togo, though he also has worshippers scattered throughout the world as a legacy of the slave trade. A consequence of that legacy is that he and the other Orishas get out of their homeland quite a bit to keep track of their people and do the odd favor here and there. And I suspect he might be more powerful than Perun, because he continues to enjoy healthy worship from around the world.
Perun, I think, begins to feel outclassed halfway across Poland, because his English is not nearly so good. He shuts up for a while, and what little expression I can see underneath his beard looks sour. I speak to him in Russian, which I am fairly certain Shango does not speak.
“Are you feeling left out, Perun?”
He lifts an eyebrow at me first, throwing some shade, perhaps, but then he dissolves into a sheepish grin. He replies in the same language, in which he has no fluency issues.
“I suppose I am. Silly of me, I know. But we gods of older, smaller pantheons have our insecurities too. My problems with English are persistent, and I have not devoted enough time to eradicate them. So it is my own fault if I am feeling inadequate. Please forgive my mood.”
“Done. But do join in whenever you feel like it. I enjoy hearing from you too.”
When we get to Bydgoszcz, we have to choose whether to follow the southern or northern bank of the Wisła River to get to Warsaw. I choose the south because there are a couple of large forested swaths on the way, according to the elemental, which will allow us to make good time and not have to worry about roads and people staring at the strange group of people running as fast as a horse and hound. And, besides, once in Warsaw, the Wisła River bends south, and we’ll wind up on the side where I met Malina’s coven before.
Apart from my aching innards, I’m starting to think it might simply be a pleasant run for us as we trek through Kampinos National Park, which is only twenty kilometers or so to the northwest of Warsaw. It’s the especially dead time of night, around three in the morning, and nothing stirs to give us the feeling of an imminent attack—the attack just happens. Out of the mist clinging to the Wisła River, three grayish figures rise and float toward us with glowing white bulbous eyes. Their arms and fingers are long and sticklike, straight white hair streams back from their scalps, and I can’t see much in the way of legs, but that might be because they’re flying, so their legs are stretched out behind them.
“Uh, Perun, what are those?” I say.
The Slavic thunder god turns and gasps. “They are nocnice!”
It’s an unfamiliar word and I’m not even sure what language it comes from, so I sputter, “Yeah, but what are they?”
He doesn’t get time to explain, but in short order I figure out that they’re unfriendly, because one of them floats right through my defensive swipe with Scáthmhaide and locks a cold collection of bones around my throat, bearing me to the ground with surprising strength for something so insubstantial. The same happens to Perun and Shango, and then we all try to fight back. The trouble is, my staff and fist just whiff through the thing, though it is undeniably exerting tangible force upon me. I pull out a knife and stab into it and watch my hand simply float through it. A hoarse, halting whisper that might be a laugh huffs out of its toothy mouth, and my windpipe closes as its hands constrict. I can’t breathe and I can’t bring any force to bear on this thing. I look to the gods for tips, but they’re having the same difficulty. They’re being choked to death and can’t lay a finger on the nocnice in return. One or both of them summons winds to try to blow them away—not a bad idea considering their ephemeral nature—but all that does is kick up leaves and toss my hair around. I see a fireball in the sky above and understand what’s happening: This is Loki’s doing. The fireball doesn’t descend; it just hovers, watching. He’s arranged a second ambush for me where he lets some other creature do his fighting for him. And, as before, it’s a carefully chosen creature against which I have little or no defense. I can’t even begin to figure out how I would bind this intangible thing if I had breath to speak the words.
No, wait—I project to her, but Orlaith has already pounced on top of the nocnica. I expect her to simply fall through it on top of me, but instead she lands palpably on its back, her teeth tear into its substance, and the whispery laugh becomes a hoarse cry of surprise and slides into a scream. Orlaith pulls it off me, teeth embedded deeply, and shakes her head back and forth like she would with a chew toy, the instinctive attempt to snap the neck. I don’t think the nocnica has a spine in the traditional sense, but Orlaith’s move shakes the creature apart into clumps of dirty vapor, and the scratchy wail fades and the bulbous eyes wink out.
Good hound! Thank you! Can you do that again, to the ones on Shango and Perun?
Orlaith hacks once and says,
As she bounds over to help the gods, I check the position of the fireball, which hasn’t moved, and then look around for Miłosz. He’s perhaps forty yards distant, pacing and snorting in nervous agitation. I wonder again why Loki doesn’t use the special weapons he’s acquired from me—where are Vayu’s arrows or the whirling blade, Fuilteach? Perhaps neither would survive the journey in flame and he’s saving them for a special target—Odin would be my guess, and perhaps Freyja.
Orlaith dispatches the two other nocnice, thus becoming the first wolfhound to rescue a couple of thunder gods, and as they get to their feet I say, “Eyes to the sky, guys. It’s Loki.”
They look up, spy the fireball, and snarl. In tandem they raise their weapons to the sky, and the weather takes a decided turn for the worse. Loki can survive their lightning strikes, I think—he had no difficulty with Perun the first time we met him, in a field near Flagstaff. But the Asgardian decides against escalating and moves off to the north. The thunder gods don’t pursue, since they’re supposed to protect the horse instead of chase Loki down, but they mutter about him being a coward. I privately disagree: He’s bold enough when it suits him. He simply plays the odds. Were any of us alone, he’d probably dive right in, but facing two thunder gods plus a Druid who can wink out of sight and clock him upside the head is not an ideal scenario. Maybe it’s because he’s still healing from the tomahawk I put in his back: I sure hope so. After he’s out of sight I promise Orlaith a deer hunt soon and go to soothe Miłosz, while Shango asks Perun what the hell those things were. I listen in because I want to know as well.
“Nocnice are nightmares,” he says in English. “Damned souls who choke peoples as they sleep, leave no trace. Not usual to attack like this.”
“Why couldn’t we touch them?” Shango asks.
Perun shrugs. “Is way of nightmares, yes? They get you in clutches and you cannot fight back. Only wake. Except we already awake, so no escape for us.”
“Then why could Orlaith take them out?” I say.
“Any dog, even small ones, can do this to nocnice. They guardian against many spirits. They bark at night sometimes and you think, what you barking for? Stop that. Sometimes dogs hearing and seeing things we do not, and they scare them away, protect us.
Roosters do this too, but nobody like roosters except hens. Good thing you like dogs.”
Orlaith, is this true? Do you bark at spirits sometimes?
Well, thank you.
“That was not the kind of fight I hoped for,” Shango says.
“Loki rarely gives you that,” I reply. “You have to find a way to surprise him.”
We continue from there, much more paranoid than before, but nothing else attacks on the way into Warsaw. I lead Miłosz and our escorts to the same bound poplar tree in Pole Mokotowskie, where I assume I’ll find the coven, but it’s only Malina herself.
“An hour before dawn is a hell of a time to return victorious, Granuaile,” she says, shivering in the cold. “I couldn’t believe the divination when I saw it. But since it is victory, I’ll forgive you.” She grins in wonder at Miłosz. “Wow. The white horse of Świętowit. Did you have any trouble? Oh!” Her eyes drop to my bloodstained shirt. “I see that you did.”
“Yes, plenty. But I’ll be all right eventually.” Getting slammed to the ground by the nocnica had not done my injuries any favors. I would be an utter wreck without Gaia’s continuing aid.
“And these gentlemen are?” Malina asks, looking at Shango and Perun. I’m not sure that I should introduce them as such.
“Hired muscle,” I say, and hope the lie isn’t utterly obvious on my face. I suppose it might be technically true in Shango’s case. He’d said something about Odin wanting him to help me give Loki the finger on this one, and maybe he paid in the currency of his favor. Not that Shango would give a damn about favors from Odin. Regardless, they’re keeping their distance, signaling that they feel no need to be introduced, and I respect that. “They don’t talk much, and they’ll leave once the horse is safe.”
“Right. We should get going, then. We’ll take him to my place. The house and all the land surrounding it is warded.”
“Warded how, if I may ask? I mean, against what?”
“Well, fire, of course. Loki will not be burning everything around him like he did in that onion field.”
“What about demons and spirits?”
Malina smirks. “No problem. If they get past our wards, we have hellwhips for those. You can relax. We channel the powers of the Zoryas and they are protective goddesses. We know how to protect our homes.”
I figure that must be true. If Odin is fine with Miłosz staying with the sisters, it must be as safe as any place he could find in Asgard.
Malina had seen we’d be arriving on foot, of course, so she rode her bike to the park. “We have to cross the river, so it will be a few more kilometers. I suppose your early arrival is good for something—we’ll have the streets practically to ourselves.”
She leads the way, blond hair resting on a red coat, and we follow through a city getting its last few minutes of sleep. It’s slower going, since so much of it is paved and I have to run without any juice from the earth. The sun isn’t above the horizon, but the eastern sky has lightened from pitch to merely gloomy by the time we cross the Wisła River. There’s a genuine ray of sunshine announcing the dawn when we turn onto Ulice Lipkowksa in the Radość neighborhood of Warsaw. It’s quite nearly bucolic—fenced properties on an acre or two, mixed in with wooded areas. Pines grow there, since the soil is somewhat sandy on that side of the river and the pines send their roots deep enough to hold on. Once in the canopy of the neighborhood, the urban hum fades and you don’t think that you’re only five minutes away from a city of two million people getting ready for Christmas or assorted pagan good times.
Perun and Shango take their leave at the gate to Malina’s property. They summon winds and lift up into the skies, and once they’re clear of trees, Shango flies south and Perun heads north. It blows their cover pretty spectacularly.
“Hired muscle, eh?” Malina says, her tone drier than a week-old bagel.
“Yeah! But also thunder gods. Forgot to mention it, sorry. I thought you would know already.”
“I only divined your arrival with the horse,” she says, opening the padlock on the gate. It looks like a perfectly normal lock, but a quick flip to the magical spectrum confirms that there is a whole bunch of hoodoo surrounding it. There are also layers of protections ringing the entire fence and arcing over the property in various shades of purple, from lavender to deep violet. I’m sure that while I lived in the same building as the sisters in Tempe, their floor of the tower looked like this, pulsing with warning.
Malina Sokołowska’s funky white house sits behind a brown slatted wood fence that encloses the whole acre and a half, and the architecture is old school—I can tell by the popped-out windows with triangular tiled hats on the second story, and the giant casements for the first-floor windows are a giveaway too. I’m guessing it was built in the 1930s. There’s moss growing on the wide stone steps leading up to the main house, and a smaller set leads to the door of what must be either attached servants’ or guest quarters. Most of the coven is outside waiting for us on the steps, bundled up in coats and purple scarves, sipping thermos cups of tea or coffee held in their gloved hands. Their smiles are wide and genuine when they see Orlaith and me. Berta bounces up and gives me a hug and then asks if I would like some cake. “I knew you were coming,” she says, “so I baked you one.”
“That would be great,” I tell her, “but I’d like to make sure that Świętowit’s horse is happy first.” To the wider group, I announce, “His name is Miłosz.”
A couple more witches emerge from the house and then the entire coven steps forward, grins on their faces, for introductions to the horse. He shies a tiny bit at the crowding, but I send soothing thoughts to him and explain that these women will be taking care of him now and protecting him from the god who branded him. There will be apples and oats and he’ll be able to take walks in the woods and enjoy the sky from now on.
He already knows Malina, and introductions to the other four witches I know proceed quickly. I point out Roksana, Berta, Klaudia, and Kazimiera, and they say hello to Miłosz. Malina darts inside the house to get me a fresh shirt and light jacket for the chill.
I have to slow down and take my time after that, switching my head into recording mode. Formally meeting the rest of the coven will be news for Atticus when I catch up with him. He signed a nonaggression treaty with the original five shortly after he took me on as an apprentice, and these new coven members are not technically bound by it; he’ll want to know who the free agents are. And I have to remind myself that I am not bound by that agreement either—and neither are any of the sisters when it comes to me. When they are smiling and welcoming like this, it’s difficult to remember that we aren’t really friends. Maybe they would like to be, though. I think Malina is a very different leader than the old one, Radomiła. Her new witches all appear to be in their twenties, but that doesn’t mean anything; I’m thirty-four now but still look like I’m in my twenties.
Martyna is a brunette with bangs and has the rest of her hair tied back in a ponytail. She has piercing blue eyes rimmed in thick mascara and sharp, thin lips she’s painted blood red. “If you’d rather not have that heavy cake,” she confides to me, “I made some delightful cookies.” Her eyes dart to Berta and her lips turn up on one side. Berta’s eyes are narrowed, and it’s evident that there’s a friendly competition going on to see who can first foist her baked goods on the Druid.
“Hiiiiii,” the next witch says, bobbing her head once and smiling at me. “I’m Ewelina.” Her bubbly greeting is a stark contrast to the Swedish death-metal T-shirt I see peeking out underneath her jacket. She has hot-pink streaks in her black hair, multiple piercings in her eyebrows, a ring in her nose, and a stainless-steel stud underneath her bottom lip. Unlike the others, she has no purple scarf, but she wears dark-purple eye shadow instead. She throws up some horns with her fingers as if she’s at a Dio concert and nods
once. “Rock on.” I think that might be all the English she knows, and that’s fine—her smile goes a long way, and her few words of English are more than I know in Polish.
Agnieszka looks somewhat colder and more nervous than everyone else. Her violet scarf is wrapped around her to such heights that her mouth is completely hidden. I see only her prominent nose and eyes above it, like an old Kilroy graffiti from World War II. She has purple mittens on her hands, which I notice when she extends one to shake mine. “I’m not very good at baking—or anything normal, really,” she says, apologies in her tone, “but I’m quite good at wards if you need anything like that.”
“That’s very kind. Thank you.”
Next, a blond witch who’s spent a lot of time in the sun introduces herself as Dominika. She’s shaven the right side of her head down to her ear but let the top and left side grow straight and long, in a sort of homage to New Wave styles of the 1980s. Her exposed, perfectly shaped right ear has eight different piercings with beautiful rings and studs, and when I begin to stare at it I realize that it’s what she uses to charm people. Wow, an ear witch. I blink furiously and look at her eyes, which are shining with excitement.
“I love horses,” she says. “Will you tell Miłosz I’m so glad he’s come to stay with us? He is magnificent!”
I relay these sentiments to Miłosz, and he nickers in response to the flattery. Dominika pulls an apple out of her coat pocket and asks, “May I give this to him?”
“Of course.” She moves it under his nose, presenting it on top of her palm, and he nabs it with his lips and then crunches down with evident satisfaction.