Ride the Storm

by Karen Chance

  Yet that didn’t seem to matter so much. In fact, to me, it just made it all the more impressive. Not Hollywood pretty and unbelievably clean, like the only Camelots I’d ever seen, but like people had lived and fought and loved and died here.

  Maybe because they had.

  According to Rosier, the cracks in the plaster weren’t artistic license but mended bones, the rivers of rust below the old gutters tears of blood, the broken cobblestones fractured teeth. Rome might have built this place, but it hadn’t defended it. It had up and left one day, with almost no warning. Leaving the local people, many of whom thought of themselves as Roman, too, after centuries of its rule, high and dry.

  And prey to every invader with a boat and a sword, and every hill tribe looking for plunder.

  Until Uther, with his uncouth swagger and keen mind, and a grandfather who’d served in the Roman cavalry. And a son, born in the city his father had bled for, and dedicated to the same goal: holding civilization together. And, for a while, they’d actually pulled it off.

  Just like in the stories, the old fortress had become the base for cavalry units trained in the Roman style. And while not quite the knights in shining armor of the fables, they were devastatingly effective against the disorderly foot soldiers of the local chieftains. The revolts that followed Roman withdrawal were put down, the Saxons repulsed, and for one brief, shining moment, peace had reigned. An era that must have seemed truly magical to a people rent by war both before and after.

  An era the world would remember as Camelot.

  “Girl! Are you deaf? I said get out of the way!”

  It took me a second to realize that the guard was talking to me. He was one of a group of soldiers who’d run up to help the beleaguered sailors. While I was just standing there, dripping, in the rough woolen dress and cloak Augustine had whipped up for me, to approximate female attire of the period.

  But not female attire of the wealthy, I guessed, because I got a cuff to my ear when I took too long.

  I got out of the way.

  And scrambled up the hill to the shade of an oak tree, where a Medusa snarl of eels was lying in the dirt. They were waiting to have their skins stripped off by a curly-haired boy who did not appear enthusiastic about the work. But not because of the bloody eel carcasses, which he handled with the indifference of long experience.

  But because he was missing what looked like the greatest medieval faire ever.

  And so I stared some more. I’d heard the sound of a crowd from the pier—music playing, hawkers calling, people talking—but had thought it was coming from the city. And maybe some of it was. But the teeming mass in front of me was plenty big enough to account for it all on its own.

  The walled city on the one side, and the port town on the other, had a grassy gap in between them. And that, plus the open land along the river, was clogged with people. I’d hoped to catch up with Rosier and help him locate Pritkin before Billy got back, but how was I supposed to find him in this?

  How was I supposed to find anyone?

  Everywhere I looked there were tents and performers and overly excited dogs. There were drunk adults and laughing kids and gap-toothed old women selling mead. Over by the city walls, an archery contest was going on, with regular roars of approval from the crowd. Closer in, a swarthy type with a hooknose and a wand was painting stories in the air with fire: battling knights and fierce dragons and a princess in a tower. And a little way off, a couple of enterprising guys had rigged up a clay oven on a cart, so they could sell fresh-baked pies to the crowd.

  The pies smelled heavenly, to the point that my mouth started watering, but I had no money. So I pulled out a pouch I’d slung around my neck, because I couldn’t afford to be hungry right now. Although cranberry nut bars seriously lost out compared with fresh-baked meat and bread.

  Only somebody else didn’t seem to think so.

  I looked down to see Eel Boy staring longingly at my snack. For a kid who worked at a food stall, he wasn’t exactly overfed. The arms and legs under the rough tunic were thin, and the cheeks, while not sunken, lacked the expected layer of baby fat. I glanced at the burly guy on the other side of the tree, stirring a pot of stew, who looked like he ate all the leftovers, and who wasn’t paying us any attention.

  Then I crouched beside the boy. “Want one?”

  He looked from the peeled bar to me and back again. And licked his lips. But he didn’t take it.

  “It’s yours,” I said, and took out another, after putting his on the edge of my dress.

  I got my wrapper off and started eating, and the next time I looked down, he had a mouth full of PowerBar and was chewing furiously. I grinned. I’d still rather have had a pie.

  I ate my bar while scanning the crowd some more, but instead of Rosier I kept finding fey. Maybe because they were everywhere, making up at least a third of the revelers. And while I didn’t know a lot about the Light Fey, I knew enough to find it creepy that members from the three major houses were standing around the same pie wagon, and not trying to kill each other.

  Well, the Blue and Green were standing around the wagon, debating the virtues of venison versus lamb. The Svarestri, in their black-and-silver finery, were just nearby, watching everything with flat gray eyes, their expressions making even the drunker members of the crowd give them a wide berth.

  The pie guys kept looking at them narrowly, like they were driving off business, and eventually picked up their mobile kitchen and moved a dozen yards away, over by some sausage sellers.

  The Svarestri didn’t even seem to notice. They stayed where they were, arms crossed, eyes fixed on the docks. Where people trying to bring up baskets of slippery fish were being dive-bombed by seagulls and blocked by the crowd that had stopped to gawk at the still-smoking ships.

  Or at the new one just coming into view.

  I hadn’t noticed it before, because it was almost impossible to see at any distance. Or even closer up, because it looked like the whole thing was coated in the cloaks the fey wore, the kind that reflected whatever was around them. The result was a ship that looked like it was made out of the waves themselves, translucent and watery bright, with sails that caught and reflected the rays pouring through a gap in the clouds.

  It was beautiful.

  And suddenly, that traffic problem got a whole lot worse. A trumpet pealed, a distant, pure note that had heads turning and conversations falling silent. And the next thing I knew, I was being squashed against the tree, me and Eel Boy, who had grabbed his basket protectively when what looked like the whole damn city descended on us.

  After the second elbow to the ribs, I climbed up the tree after the boy, who was scaling it like it was horizontal.

  Of course, some of it was, the burls and knots on the old trunk making convenient hand- and footholds, allowing us to get above the crowd. We found a perch on a more or less level limb, where he plopped his basket down and continued shucking eels as the throng surged below. And as the ship came closer, gliding silently up the river while more soldiers joined the fray, shouting orders at each other to hold back the crowd.

  “Clear a path! Clear a path!”

  The locals had obviously dealt with the soldiers’ short tempers before. Because there was a sudden surge away from the docks. Except for a couple of sailors, who were shoved unceremoniously aside, arguing loudly because their boat was still burning.

  Nobody cared.

  “Clear a path! Clear a path, damn you!” The dock was clear now, but the soldiers weren’t satisfied, forging a wedge into the crowd, cutting a route from the pier to the grassy open area between the two towns. They’d just finished when the ship glided to a stop.

  “Who is it?” I asked the boy, whose disbelieving dark eyes rolled up at me.

  “Seriously?”

  I blinked at him. Had that been sass?

  He smirked.

 
; That had definitely been sass.

  “Who else would have a ship made out of water?” he asked.

  “It’s not actually made out of water,” I said. “It just looks like it is.”

  “Oh, right.” He didn’t bother to hide a smile.

  I looked back at the dock. And was just in time to see the hull, sails, and even the delicate rigging, which had all been gleaming translucent pale in the sunlight a second ago, suddenly disintegrate. And plunge back into the river, a fantastic mass of water all falling at once, with a splash big enough to drench the crowd almost as far as our tree.

  But not the small knot of people who had appeared on the dock.

  Most of them I didn’t know, but that wasn’t true of the two dark-haired women in the center. Nimue walked out of the tsunami as dry as if the water didn’t dare touch her. She was wearing a sea green dress with layers of silk so fine they foamed up around her like the tide. And might as well have been made of it, when compared to the rough wool of most of the crowd.

  They’d fallen largely silent, just staring. But not at the dress, or at the jewels scattered through her long, dark hair that could have been captured seawater, or at the dark-haired warriors surrounding her, tall and chiseled, with armor and shields that lacked the dull glint of metal in favor of the shifting, mercurial nature of her element. In fact, as amazing as it seemed, they weren’t looking at her at all.

  They were looking at her companion.

  The princess was dressed more simply, her rich brown hair in a simple plait, her dark green dress devoid of adornment, maybe because of her status as prisoner. And there was no doubt that that was what she was. The guards weren’t there to protect Nimue, who was basically an army all on her own. They were hedging her granddaughter, who must have been recaptured after the fight.

  And who wasn’t looking so good. The strong, vibrant woman I’d seen last time was gone. She looked pale, defeated, and more than a little ill. And that was before she suddenly collapsed.

  The crowd reacted before the fey did, with a rumble of surprised distress and an unconscious surge forward. One that had the soldiers shouting again and pushing back. And people falling and getting trampled, and chaos threatening to break out.

  Until another blast of trumpets shivered through the air, and a mass of horses and riders burst out of the walled town.

  The soldiers on crowd control were dressed in rough woolen tunics, crude leather belts and leggings—in short, like everyone else, except for iron helmets. But the men galloping toward us wore finely wrought bronze armor that looked like fish scales and gleamed ruddily in the late-afternoon sun. And blazingly white tunics and crimson capes, embellished with a bright red dragon.

  My companion suddenly surged to his feet, excited in a way he hadn’t been over magic ships or fey queens. He stood on the branch to get a better view, his eyes gleaming. “The king!” he shouted. “It’s the king!”

  The cry was taken up by the crowd, loud enough to shake the leaves around us. And a second later, I saw him, too, the blond-haired king from the mirror at the head of the riders. Ones he didn’t need, because the crowd parted before him like the tide.

  He paused next to Nimue, but only to pull the unconscious woman—his half sister, I realized—onto his horse. Other horses had been brought for the queen and her entourage, but Arthur didn’t wait for them to mount. As soon as the princess was secure, he turned and spurred back the way he’d come, the crowd surging and cheering, the soldiers shoving and fighting, and me just sitting there, silently.

  Because, for once, fate had done me a favor.

  I didn’t know where to find Johanna, and if she continued to phase instead of using the Pythian power, that wasn’t likely to change. But it didn’t need to. Because I might not know where she was, but I knew what she wanted.

  And the last time I’d seen it, it had been in the princess’ hand.

  I looked around one more time for Rosier, but there was virtually no chance to locate him in all this. I’d gotten him here; I was going to have to trust that his knowledge of the city would be enough to help him find his son. I had to talk to the princess, which meant that I had to get in that castle.

  I started looking for a way to get down from the tree.

  And then somebody grabbed me.

  Chapter Forty-eight

  I jerked my head around, hoping to see blond hair and green eyes—and I did. Just not the right ones. I found myself staring at a stunningly beautiful face: perfect masculine features, flashing emerald eyes, hair like captured sunlight. And sculpted lips that curved in a vicious little smile.

  A fey, I thought in confusion.

  A Blarestri fey, judging from the blue velvet jerkin.

  A Blarestri fey king who wanted his staff back, and oh, shit.

  The green eyes abruptly darkened, from emerald to jade, and the fingers on my arm dug into the flesh. “I know what you are,” he hissed. “I know what you did.”

  Well, that makes one of us, I thought, a little hysterically. Because the way I remembered it, he’d won our last encounter. He’d shoved me through a roof, into a group of Pythias, who had promptly sent me back home. Leaving him with the staff, which he’d decided to lend to Pritkin, and why was that on me?

  But I didn’t say that. I didn’t say anything. Because a knife had just flashed into his hand, between one blink and the next, and the words died in my throat.

  Which meant that my mouth was closed when a bucket of eel guts was dumped on his head.

  “Go!” the boy told me, and jumped into the furious crowd, many of whom had just gotten splattered, too.

  Good idea, I thought, and hit the ground on the other side of the limb, scrabbling away on hands and knees.

  Thankfully, Nimue’s group had just departed, spurring their horses toward the castle, and thus ending the crowd’s interest in the docks. So everybody was swarming back this way. And I do mean everybody. I was almost trampled a dozen times, along with being knocked about, pushed, and yelled at, none of which mattered because I was back on my feet, I was darting through the crowd, I was—

  Getting jerked back against the torso of an incredibly powerful, incredibly bloody, incredibly pissed-off ancient being.

  And then someone tried to burn us to death.

  The king let go, the crowd scattered, people yelled. And I stared up at a mass of fluttering flames, dancing overhead. Flames that resolved themselves into birds, small ones with fiery wings, molten eyes, and bodies that flung a cascade of sparks—

  Mostly behind me, I realized, as they swarmed through the air in a vicious arc that never once touched me. But which threw the equivalent of a wall of fire between me and the king. I spun in time to see Caedmon enveloped by flapping flame, and looking like he hadn’t expected that, either.

  And then someone grabbed my hand.

  It was the swarthy, hooked-nosed performer, who had been entertaining the crowd a second ago, and was now pulling on me. “Hurry! It won’t hold him!”

  “Who—” I began, just as the face morphed into another green-eyed blond, this one with stubbled cheeks, hair like a cow’s breakfast, and a nose that wasn’t much better than the glamouried version. But which was a lot more familiar. “Myrddin! What are you doing here?”

  “Rescuing you!”

  “No! You can’t—don’t get involved in this!”

  “I’m already involved,” he said, jerking me into the crowd.

  “What? Why?”

  He stared at me in amazement. “I lost the staff.”

  And then we were pelting ahead, down the riverbank and through an open-air market, with vendors and stalls and a tavern-in-a-tent, its benches spilling out into the middle of the road, and filled with fey.

  Blarestri fey.

  “Shit,” Pritkin said fervently, although the fey barely seemed to notice us.

 
Until a furious command rang through the air: “Stop them!”

  And suddenly, benches were being knocked over, a dozen blue-clad giants were on their feet, and twelve swords were glinting in the sun.

  “Shit!” Pritkin said, on a slightly higher note, and split.

  Literally.

  I’d seen him do something like it before, but I’d been a little distracted at the time. So it was a shock to see his body replicate itself in a long string, like an accordion of Pritkins, spilling out of his skin. And out of mine, I realized, as a couple dozen Cassies jumped away from my body, scattering in all directions.

  Not that it helped. Unlike the Svarestri we’d fought last time, these fey weren’t fooled. Maybe because they hadn’t taken their eyes off us the whole time.

  Until half the river suddenly slammed into them—and the tavern, and us—in a wave the size of a house.

  I came up gasping, and swimming on what had been low but dry land a second ago, and was now a new inlet.

  But I didn’t think Pritkin had done it, because he’d just pulled a major spell out of his ass, and you didn’t get two of those back-to-back. And because some Green Fey, two men and a woman, were sitting along a tree limb, mugs in hands, grinning down at the chaos. And especially at their floundering blue counterparts, who didn’t seem to appreciate the dunking.

  “I thought the Green were mad at us,” I said, staring up at them, because the fey made no damn sense at all.

  “Slightly . . . annoyed,” Pritkin corrected breathlessly.

  “They tried to kill us!”

  “Those were the queen’s personal guard, and they were under orders. These aren’t. And I am Green Fey—partly.”

  “And this means?”

  “That,” he said as several furious Blue Fey staggered back to their waterlogged feet and headed our way.

  And were bitch-slapped by another wave for their trouble.