by Karen Chance
You’d think something like this would make the history books, I thought, as we creaked onto a narrow road, terrifyingly steep and rocky. I grabbed the bars, bracing along with everyone else, and tried not to notice the sheer drop-off on the other side. Or the pebbles rolling under our wheels, which were plain wood and didn’t have any kind of traction. Or the fact that this wasn’t the most well balanced of vehicles.
All of which was still okay, more or less, until the merchant abruptly whipped up the horses.
Suddenly, instead of slowing down—which would have been freaking sensible—we were all but flying down the mountain, wheels rattling, cage swaying, women screaming—and falling and tumbling because the crappy wheels were only in contact with the road about half the time.
“What’s happening?” I yelled at Rosier, who had wrapped himself around a cage bar, like a frightened monkey. “What’s he doing?”
“Trying to avoid that,” he said, looking over my shoulder, his eyes huge. I turned in time to see a blast of spell-fire tearing through the air and then through the cage, shearing off the top right corner and sending us swaying dangerously from side to side.
“What the hell?” I screamed as the horses whinnied and bucked, the merchant shouted and swore, and we almost fell into the abyss.
As it was, I got thrown to the other side of the cage, where for a second I was left staring down at a sea of nothingness, just a blue-gray void of mist and vague lumps that might be trees, and another cliff face rising across the gulf, distant but near enough that I could see shapes darting among the rocks.
And flinging spells, because three more were already headed our way.
They streaked across the sky, red and orange and purple, strangely beautiful as they parted the mist, sending it rolling up on either side. Like vertical fireworks or colorful torpedoes tearing through the sea. Which would have been a lot more impressive if we weren’t on the ship they were about to sink.
“Get low!” I told the panicked women. “Now, now, now!”
I pushed them down, the ones I could reach, but had to break it off a moment later and dive for the floor myself. But it looked like the idea had been conveyed. We ended up clinging to the grimy planks, as flat as we could get, but thanks to the open bars of the cage, that still gave us a perfect view—
Of the rain.
Out of nowhere, the storm that had started slacking off turned violent, and in the clear night sky ahead clouds blew up. I watched as the mist in the valley congealed into boiling, purplish gray masses and rain began to fall, above us, below us, everywhere all at once. Drenching sheets that tore into the spells, shearing off their power, causing them to sputter and crackle and spit—
And die.
My heart hammered as I watched one dissipate right before it reached the bars. Another made it but had been blown off course, exploding in the air just above us, raining a cascade of bright red sparks down on all sides. But a third was still coming, lashed at by rain and storm, buffeted by wind, but somehow still on course. Like some magic heat-seeking missile that adjusted its path as we did, as we all but flew with no springs and no brakes, our eyes glued to the steadily approaching power ball that was getting smaller and smaller but was still coming—
And then it hit, like a massive hammerblow, sending us slamming into the horses, which screamed and grew wings, or so it seemed. Or maybe that was because the different parts of the storm had just become one massive torrent, the main core of its power driving down on us—and the road. Which went from dangerous, overgrown goat trail to something a whole lot worse.
I looked down at the flowing river of mud, at the trodden-down, slick-as-glass weeds, at a set of wheels no longer turning, because they were no longer in contact with the road, and thought, Oh.
And then we were over.
The next few seconds were a heart-stopping mass of confused images: the cage sliding and dipping and falling, and then flipping when we hit open air. All of us strangely silent as we tumbled around, because our hearts were in our throats. The rain, almost a solid sheet outside the bars. One of the horses, its mane streaming, its eyes wide and white-rimmed as it fell alongside us, pawing the air as it continued trying to run.
And the ground, speeding toward us like a green bullet, trees spearing up like daggers, huge boulders everywhere, death in a hundred forms waiting with open arms—
And continuing to wait as we froze midair, a huge rush of my power halting our fall midtumble.
Leaving me to yo-yo to a stop between the hard oak boards of the ceiling and floor, panting and shaking and screaming as I hadn’t been able to before, the ones trapped behind my teeth by utter terror breaking loose with a vengeance.
“Ahh! Ahhh! Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!”
And then something hit me in the face.
It took me a second to realize that it was Rosier, who I’d knocked loose from his death grip on the bar, sliming the side of my head before I managed to throw him off. And to scream some more. And to beat the ceiling of the cage, which was now the floor, not for any reason I could name, just because the massive surge of adrenaline had to come out somehow.
I collapsed back against the old boards, gasping and exhausted. Scatterings of rain sparkled in the moonlight above my face; women’s shifts flowed out everywhere, like angels’ wings; the slaver stayed suspended, caught halfway through a fall on the opposite side of the wagon from his horses, his eyes wide, his mouth gaping. Like the terrified faces that stared down into mine, all of them mirroring the way I felt, because I hadn’t saved us yet.
I’d frozen us too soon.
There was no doubt about it. I lay there, staring past the merchant’s motionless body, at what looked like the view from my penthouse in Vegas. Actually, the overgrown, windswept ground was the exact opposite of it, but the angle was similar. Because we were still dozens of stories high.
I reached over and pulled Rosier back into real time, and watched him flail around for a minute, screaming bloody murder.
And then clutching the ceiling-turned-floorboards, webbed hands spread wide. “I . . . I think I wet myself,” he whispered.
I didn’t answer. I slowly got to my knees, wincing when I put weight on my sore one, and pushed a floating girl out of the way. And crawled over to the bars, squashing my face against the rusting metal until I grabbed hold of the merchant’s tunic. And jerked him over.
I found the key for the lock on his belt, and got it open after a minute of frustrated swearing. And swung the cage door wide, allowing me to look down. And then just stayed there, as still as everyone else.
Except for Rosier, who crawled up alongside. “What is it? Are we too high up for . . . for it to be survivable?”
“Yep.”
“Then . . . can you do it again?” He swallowed. “Can you let us fall for another few seconds, and catch us when we’re about to . . . hit down?”
“No.”
“No?” He looked at me, a little of the new, scared-shitless Rosier giving way to the old full-of-it variety. “Don’t you think we need a little more than ‘no’ in this instance?”
“No.”
“And why not?”
I pointed down. “That’s why.”
Rosier finally, very carefully, peered over the edge and into the void. And saw what I just had—namely, a glittering golden web, like from the butt of the world’s biggest spider, billowing out below us. Or no, I guessed, not exactly a web.
“Is that . . . is that . . . is that a net?” he demanded.
“Looks like it.”
“Why is it there?” He turned to me, looking almost indignant. And then he scowled some more, because yeah. The old Rosier was definitely back in charge now. “What are you doing?”
“Biting my nails.”
“Why?”
“I don’t have a clipper.”
“You—” H
e stopped, and the scowl became a glare. “Stop. It.”
“Why?”
“Because we have to get out of here, that’s why!” Only it was more like “Becausewehavetogetoutofherethat’swhy,” and now he was shaking me.
“Why?”
“Stop saying that!”
I sighed and left my hangnail alone. Mainly because I needed the finger to make a point. “One: a time stoppage doesn’t last long. In a few minutes, we’re going to finish that plunge anyway. Two: the only way for me to hurry that up is to use more power, which I don’t have because I just did a time stoppage. Three: The only way for me to override that would be to take more potion, and do I have to explain why I don’t want to take more potion?”
He sat there for a moment, vibrating, then leaned back over for another look.
It didn’t appear to improve his mood.
“How much do you have left?” he asked abruptly.
“Two-thirds of a bottle.”
“I don’t suppose you could . . . just a sip?”
“A time stoppage is a major spell,” I told him. “I’m usually wiped for as much as a day after. And that’s assuming I start from somewhere good, not already bottomed out. Getting me back to the point that I could do anything would probably take as much extra stamina as shifting us here.”
“Meaning we’d have only a third left.”
“And considering how wildly successful we’ve been so far—”
“We’ll trust the net,” Rosier said sourly.
We just sat there after that, staring at the rain, waiting. I didn’t know what Rosier was thinking, but I wasn’t contemplating the view. I didn’t know what threshold of power use Gertie needed to home in on us, but it didn’t really matter. Whatever it was, I’d just blown the hell out of it.
She was going to be on top of us in—well, probably seconds after we landed. Maybe a minute or two if I was lucky. Which meant I needed a plan—and a good one—already in place before that happened.
But how was I supposed to get one here, suspended in the air, like a damn bird in a cage? I needed information. I needed the lay of the land. I needed alternatives—
And suddenly, I had them, a cascade of five—no, six—different options falling in front of my eyes, like a spliced-together video on fast forward.
“Slow down!” I said, because I was a little freaked out, and because I could barely see anything.
“What?” Rosier asked.
“Nothing.” Because they’d listened. Or my power had, because this looked like the series of images I’d seen in my head the first time I tried to shift. But instead of a fall of centuries, I was looking at one made of minutes that had now slowed to a crawl.
And which, with a little concentration, I managed to rewind back to the beginning.
The first sequence showed a group of women sneaking through tall grass. Staying low, staying in the shadow of a cliff, staying almost invisible. Until they were forced out into the open in order to approach our web-encased cart, which did appear to have survived the fall. It was still intact, anyway, and framed by two screaming horses and a white-faced slaver, who was floundering around in the web and screaming, too.
Something that only increased when he spied the women. He began babbling almost incoherently, and then pleading, and then screaming again. All of which was abruptly cut off by an arrow through his throat.
The man fell back, caught by the web, until the women did something that made it dissolve. The wagon fell another story or so, a final jolt that had screams coming from inside again. While the web became a heavy fog that billowed up on all sides, spreading out over the valley, helping to hide us.
But not well enough.
The women ran forward, some killing the horses, to shut them up, I assumed. Others grabbing the merchant, checking him for a key he didn’t have. Several others jerked on the door, found it open, pushed their way inside. And began to reassure the traumatized slaves.
Which might have worked better if not for the deluge of arrows suddenly coming our way.
I watched as if from a distance as the women outside the cage were skewered, dead before they fell, while the ones inside cursed and started slinging spells. The fog dissipated to show an advancing party of fey, dozens strong, emerging from behind what looked like every damn tree. And then—
I looked away, switching abruptly to the next scenario, trying to ignore the blood-soaked carnage that flipped quickly past my gaze.
But the next one wasn’t any better. I saw myself, Rosier in my arms, running for the tree line as soon as we stopped bouncing in the net. Saw me get maybe a quarter of a mile before being nabbed by a large party of men. Saw me back at their camp, tied up beside a fire, while a circle of them gambled with some dice. Saw one win, heard him shout, felt him grab me—
And then I was fast-forwarding again, past scenes of my shift being ripped in two, of my naked body splashed with firelight, of me being forced to my hands and knees while the victor came up behind me—
I looked away, only to come back to a different group, this one with a pack of dogs, chasing me through the trees.
And then another, grabbing me as I splashed across a river, in the last direction possible from this starting point.
And, finally, of me staying put while the battle raged outside the cage, while blood dripped off the roofline in front of my eyes, while a fey ducked inside, eyes cold and assessing, and while a woman beside me with a bone sticking out of her leg was put down like a dog. I screamed, and someone grabbed me, holding me down as I twisted and fought. And broke away, panting and sniveling, my nose running, my eyes wild—
And finally managed to focus on Rosier, his own eyes huge and worried, watching me from across the still-suspended cage.
“Are . . . are you all right?”
I swallowed, staring around. At the glittering curtains of rain. At the floating bodies of the women, still caught in free fall. And at the path I’d just carved through them, scrambling to get away from things that hadn’t happened yet.
I let out a very shaky, very relieved breath.
“I—I don’t think—” I began, only to be cut off by several loud thumps from overhead, and the sensation of the cage suddenly dipping.
Rosier’s head jerked up. “What was that?”
I didn’t answer. I just sat there, remembering that there had been six possible futures, not five. But I’d freaked out before I made it to the last one. Not that it mattered, I thought, looking up. I’d even thought that she’d be right on top of us.
I just hadn’t meant it literally.
“What is happening?” Rosier yelled, as the solid wood overhead crumbled away in a large patch, hundreds of years of decay taking place in seconds. It was on his side, near the door, probably because Gertie didn’t want to risk aging one of the women, and was big enough for a head and shoulders to fit through. Maybe a whole body if she didn’t try it herself.
And she didn’t, although why she didn’t, I wasn’t sure.
It wasn’t like I had any options left.
Well, except for one.
“Tell your demon to stand down,” she told me. “Or I will kill it.”
Rosier looked upward, his face bewildered, and then at me. Stand down? he mouthed.
“And if I do, what then?” I called up, fumbling with my bracelet.
“Then the both of you live to answer for your crimes. Although considering the punishment, you might prefer not to.”
“Unheard?” I asked, jerking a small vial off the dagger-filled chain, which I’d put there like a weird sort of charm, because it was the safest place I knew. “You would kill me without a trial?”
“Your actions have been your trial! How many chances have you been given? How many times have I had to bring you in? If you wanted to talk, you should have done it before—”
<
br /> “I don’t recall being given a chance,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady as I shuddered through a taste like every vile thing on earth condensed.
“I don’t recall you staying put long enough to use one!”
“If I do this time, will you listen?”
“If you do?” She barked out a laugh. “As if you have a choice!”
“Wrong answer,” I said, and shifted.
Chapter Twenty
A moment later, I was in the same crouch, but no longer in the same place. For a second, I stayed put, disoriented from a shift I wasn’t supposed to be able to make, and from the view. Which looked like I’d just stepped into the heavens.
The waterfall off the wagon had blocked much of the outlook from inside, but there was no such problem here. I could see the vast valley spread out below, the moon riding a wall of purple-black storm clouds above, and the huge arcs of lightning flashing between the two, because the storm still raged beyond the bubble of my spell. And us caught in the middle, rain beating violently against the small time stoppage as if it knew we shouldn’t be here, as if it resented the tiny well of peace in the midst of its fury.
For a split second, despite everything, I just stared.
Like the girl on my left was doing. Her long, dark hair was undisturbed by the gale-force winds that couldn’t touch her, yet her face was shock-pale, her blue eyes staring outward with the same awe that was probably in mine. Because she was young, so very, very young, that this just might be her first time at the rodeo.
It wouldn’t be her last.
Agnes, I thought, my stomach clenching as I looked from her to Gertie, who was bent over, her ample rear in the air as she reached down into the hole on my opposite side.
Leaving me stuck between a Pythia and her heir, with no way to freeze them both.
Especially not when some movement of mine caught Agnes’ attention, and she looked down—
And was tackled by a frantic blonde, coming up from the roof in a fluid motion entirely unlike my usual awkwardness, because desperation does wonders for hand-eye coordination. Or hand-knee, because I got a leg around one of Agnes’, at the same time that my left hand grabbed her left arm and my right arm went around her throat, leaving her plastered against the front of me as she cried out, as Gertie spun, as Rosier screamed, because he was somehow dangling from the hand of a snarling Pythia.
