I had to close my eyes, shutting my lids over the wet heat of tears before they could escape down my cheeks. I swallowed with difficulty and tried to reply without my voice wavering and cracking, “Is it crazy to feel . . . bereft over a vampire?”
“There’s nothing crazy about mourning the passing of a friend. Monster, mage, murderer—those things are what, not who he was.”
“How do you know?”
Quinton glanced away, nervous. “We talked a few times lately.”
“About me.”
“Every time. Some of the things he revealed weren’t pleasant; some of them were hard—” He returned his gaze to mine. “He told me off plenty and didn’t let me off any hooks in that regard. But what he said about you . . . I was not his biggest fan, I admit, but he never hurt you. And he could have at any time. You said you respected him, that it was mutual, but he went you one better—he admired you. I think, in some weird, twisted, Carlos way, he almost loved you, and that made it harder for me. I wanted to keep on despising him, but I couldn’t. Well . . . except for the Nelia thing, which still creeps me out. But he supported you when you needed help and made you work things out for yourself when you didn’t. He cared what happened to you, even though he didn’t have to, and he told you things you didn’t want to hear when you needed to hear them. Sounds like a friend to me. And you were a friend to him, which I think was very rare.”
“But for friendship . . . He wouldn’t have died like that if I hadn’t given him blood at Carmo. It changed him and that change killed him.”
“No. An angry, jealous man killed him. You saved him—at least twice. You’re not guilty of what another person did in destroying your gift. And . . .” He closed his eyes and shook his head as if throwing something aside. He looked back to me, his gaze clear and certain. “And I am not guilty of what my father does just because I didn’t ruin our lives by taking his. I know that what he’s doing is wrong and since no one else believes me, the task of doing the right thing in stopping him and his magical thugs falls upon me. And upon you if you choose to come with me.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“It’s not your fight. You didn’t let this happen and the Guardian Beast hasn’t been around pushing you to fix this, so . . . I guess it’s not the apocalypse I fear it is and it’s not your responsibility in that particular sphere.”
I found myself shaking my head, convinced he was wrong. My uncertainty and tears dried up like water in the Alentejo sun. “No. That’s not why the Guardian hasn’t been around. I’ve seen it nearby—it’s concerned in this. But, I think . . . I think it’s decided I’m not a child anymore who needs to be taught her responsibilities. It expects me to make my own evaluations. It didn’t push me into the possession case last year, though I heard it at a distance and it helped me when I really needed it, but it didn’t interfere. It was watching, but it wasn’t directing. It’s up to me, now. It’s my road to walk and screw up or not, just like Marsden and every other Greywalker. Hands of the Guardian, not a pawn.”
Quinton smiled and glanced down at my big hands. “Maybe Paws of the Guardian in your case.”
I laughed, surprising myself. “Well, it is a guardian beast, after all. And even if this weren’t my job, on that account, it’s still my job on your account.”
Quinton’s eyebrows rose. “Mine?”
“Because I love you. And I won’t leave your side. Ever.”
He closed his eyes and breathed a sigh, all the energy around him going a soft blue, like clean water. I knew he was still thinking about the question he’d asked and I should have given him my answer again—the last time seemed to have gotten lost in the chaos of Amélia—but part of me didn’t want to promise something death might negate if we didn’t meet our goals tonight.
THIRTY-FIVE
Lying in wait. That was the only phrase I could think of for what we were doing. Quinton called it “camping.” The fields around the dolmen rolled slowly up from the river, into gentle hills covered in cork oaks and grazing cattle and down shallow valleys until it climbed all the way to the castle walls of Monforte, which I could spy even at this distance. There was very little cover down near the standing stones, so we’d crossed the river and climbed the nearest hill until we came to a stand of trees on a bit of high ground with a mostly clear view back down. We lay in the last of the summer grass with Quinton’s small automatic pistol between us to watch what Rui and Quinton’s father would get up to. We’d have to work our way down with care once they arrived, since the low slope and the trees made it difficult to watch the dolmen from any greater distance than about a quarter mile.
For hours there’d been no activity at all. Then a handful of trucks arrived and set up around the bridge as if they were road maintenance. There was a farmhouse about a mile to the west up the rising road, but the sloping, rolling terrain hid the little hollow by the river and only a car approaching from the east would see anything going on at the standing stones.
The trucks were useful cover. They parked one at the far end of the bridge and another farther up the road to the west, just before the road dipped down. With lookouts in each, there would be plenty of time to warn the group working at the dolmen of any visitors coming from the road. They plainly weren’t worried about anyone crossing the road in between the trucks since that stretch was visible between the two vehicles. The only blind spots would be on our side of the river, but it appeared they were counting on the water itself to hold off intruders. The mages were conspicuous in their black robes as they headed to the dolmen. Papa Purlis’s guys spread out to create a perimeter near the trucks and patrol the field near the standing stones. I counted fourteen of them, all armed with compact weapons of some kind—shotguns or rifles, I wasn’t sure—and there would be a few more in the trucks.
“It looks like they’ve heard about Carlos and are writing us off,” Quinton said. “They aren’t putting out many sentries I can see. Anything magical?”
I peered into the Grey, but aside from a growing network of lines over the dolmen, there was nothing new. “No. They’re probably shorthanded without Griffin, but if, as you said, they’ve written us off, they won’t be too worried about redundancy.”
“Or spares.” Quinton returned to staring at the standing stones through the binoculars. “It’s frustrating that the graveled part is on the opposite side of the stones. It appears Rui’s decided the Devil’s Pool is the place to do the job, but I can’t see what’s going on there with the stones blocking a big part of the view.”
“It’s more important to know where they are than what they’re doing until nightfall. Carlos thought they’d have to wait until after dark to raise the dragon—which looks likely—so I think we can make our way closer once the sun goes down without a lot of risk, so long as we know where all of your father’s guards are.”
“We’ve got a few more hours. Do you want to sleep for a while and I’ll keep watch? We can swap in an hour or two—you’ll be a better observer than I once the sun starts heading down.”
We agreed to the schedule and I curled up to nap, sleeping poorly with more dreams of blood and death. Quinton woke me as the sky turned orange and I took over, peering through the Grey to keep track of the living bodies down below. I was grateful that none of the bone mages were undead, since their smaller, darker auras would have been harder to spot in the growing darkness.
I could see a spinning circle of silvery fog around the dolmen and thought Rui had probably created an alarm system, in effect, by posting the ghosts from any remaining Lenoir boxes to watch. They would be a problem only in bringing our presence to Purlis and Rui’s attention, but by then we’d be so close, the element of surprise wouldn’t be much anyway. I looked at the other sentries and lookouts, trying to map a path down to the stones without alerting anyone. Without Carlos, I’d have to be right at the edge of the casting circle to have any effect on the spell. I studie
d the landscape of my preferred route, looking for potential problems like tree stumps or sudden hollows in the ground.
As it grew darker and the sky was turning purple, the stars beginning to shine while they waited for the moon, I switched my attention to the dolmen, watching the slow building of the casting circle and the assembly of the bones within it. Since they were parts of the spell that would become the Hell Dragon’s skeleton, the bones gleamed through the Grey, leaving soft threads of ivory with streaks of blood red and ink black hanging in the silvery mist world. They were beautiful in spite of their dire purpose as was the strange chanting of the Kostní Mágové. I recalled Rui’s bone flute that I was carrying in my pocket, the bone, smooth and pale, carved with red runes that molded the tones that would come from it. I wondered whether I was going to have to use it since we didn’t have Carlos with us and whether it would be better to take that risk and use it soon, rather than gambling on getting close without Carlos to back us up. Just how close would I have to get to make it work . . . ?
I sank a little deeper into the Grey, holding the bone flute in my hand. The world seemed to leap and tremble in shades of silver and gunmetal as if the planes of the normal and the paranormal fluttered here like sheets of cellophane in unearthly breezes, with almost no Grey fringe in between. The longer I stared, the more obvious it became: The Grey really was only the thinnest curtain here. And on the other side of it lay the true, deep paranormal—the realm of things that should never escape into the world of mortals, things I had only glimpsed and with which I wanted no closer association. Whatever Rui’s mages were doing with their lines and their chanting, it was thinning the Grey. If they could tear the barriers between the worlds open, I didn’t know what manner of horror would pour into the normal plane.
“Oh shit,” I whispered, rolling over to wake Quinton. “It’s not a nexus—it’s a portal.”
Quinton woke instantly. “What?”
“We missed it, Carlos and I. That’s not just a nexus. It’s a door. The Grey is thin here—there’s barely space between this world and the next. Whatever they’re doing right now, it’s pushing the Grey aside and tearing a hole in the barriers. If that nexus actually lies in the paranormal, it’s not as weak as we thought and once they’ve made their hole, it’s not just power that will come through. Carlos thought something was waiting there—he almost told me something just before he . . .” I had to shut my eyes for a moment to banish the choking memory. “Just before he died. He started to turn back, said he had a better plan. . . . I can’t possibly exert enough control from here if that opens up. We need to risk using this,” I said, holding up the flute, “before they’re done preparing, or we’ll have to move a lot closer—and I mean breathing close.”
He blinked at me for a second or two. “Well . . . I guess we needed to get closer anyway. When’s the best time to go get captured?”
“Captured?”
“Yeah, whatever I can do to create maximum disruption, at this point, is what I need to do. You need to get as close as you can if you’re going to use that thing, so I need to pull them away and buy you the chance. How many of the people down there are bone mages? Or mages of any kind?”
“Six—one is Rui and one’s the dreamspinner. We know the kid is weak, so there’re only four to worry about aside from the Big Bad.”
Quinton nodded. “All right. Can you pinpoint my father? Assuming he’s here at all.”
“Yes. I know his aura. He’s down by the Devil’s Pool. I’d guess he plans to test his control of the drache as soon as possible.”
“Probably wants a good look at what he’s paid for, first. It’s so convenient of them to gather close together. This is one time I wish I had a rifle.”
“Are you any good with one?” I’d seen him handle rifles before, but I’d only seen him fire my automatic and a shotgun and that had been in close quarters. This was more like four hundred yards.
“Passable, but I’d settle right now for any mess I could cause from a distance. This small-caliber pistol won’t do much from here but make noise,” he added, patting the gun that lay on the ground nearby.
“Sort of the same problem with the flute.”
At the center of the Devil’s Pool, someone lit a fire. The flames jumped up initially and cast shadows into the falling night, then died back down to something more like a moderate campfire.
“Looks like gasoline,” Quinton said. “Flares up quick, but burns fast, too. I wonder how much of it they’ve got. . . .”
“Does it matter?”
“It could. I’d feel bad for the farmer, but I could do a lot of damage and wreak a lot of havoc with a couple of cans of gas, especially around these dry grasses and trees. Even more if I also had some rags and some matches. Gasoline makes a pretty impressive explosion if you know how to make it go ‘boom’ in the first place, and then there’re little fires all over the place afterward.”
“They’ve lit a fire of their own, so my guess is that they’re going to start this show soon,” I said. “The sun’s already down. They’re probably just waiting for the last of twilight to burn away. It has to be a pretty complex spell with so many parts, so it’s not going to advance quickly. At my guess, we’ve got maybe an hour. If they already know we’re here or if we draw too much attention too soon, they’ll try to grab us.”
“A pair of megalomaniacs like them? Yeah, they’ll want to make us watch the whole show. I’d better get to causing trouble so you can get into position. Where are you thinking of stopping?”
“Near the short end of the standing stones—I need to see what’s happening on the gravel, but I can always retreat to the river if I have to.”
“I don’t want them to hurt you. . . .”
“This is not going to be a damage-free fight. So long as we’re alive and they’re dead at the end, I’m willing to risk some hurt.”
Quinton looked grim at my reply, but he didn’t argue. He nodded. “All right. You start down to the stones by an indirect route. I’ll start moving toward the truck on the bridge to play pyromaniac.”
Once again, Quinton and I were moving in opposite directions; I digging the bone flute from my pocket and he slinking through the long shadows of the freshly fallen night like a snake in the grass.
Getting down the hill wasn’t simple. I wanted to keep one eye on the Grey and one on the ground, looking for a location that would be close enough to try the flute, but far enough out to give me room to run when Purlis’s guys started after me. I also didn’t want to step in anything that might slow me down—like a hole or a cow patty. Pastoral hillsides look benign and lovely in photos, but they’re full of potential pitfalls. I made my way to the top of one of the paths I’d been mapping earlier, crouching and moving with care while keeping to the shadows as much as possible.
At the top of my path to the stones, I stopped and, remaining crouched, slid a little farther into the Grey to look around. I could see Quinton’s energetic form moving down the hill closer to the bridge and no one seemed to be paying him any mind. I could see the fluttering of the planes and the growing white shape of the casting circle with its enclosed bones, sending ripples through the Grey like something rising from deep water. I thought that once I was within the radius of the ripples, I should be able to disrupt the spell with the flute. I had no idea what noise I was supposed to make with it, but I’d have to hope I could fake it—it only had four holes, so the tone combinations were limited and when Rui had used it, he hadn’t been playing a song so much as progressions of notes and listening for a matching resonance. If I could get it to make a noise at all, I’d try to do the same thing, except I’d be watching the glow of the bones to see if one stirred.
I checked for anyone moving nearby and estimated my distance to the first ripple. Then I backed toward the normal and started down the hill. I was going to be closer than I liked, but I didn’t think I stood any kind of
chance at a greater distance.
Going downhill in a crouch was more difficult than crossing the face of the hill. I started to lose my balance once and bit back a yelp as I put my injured hand out to catch myself. I may have been healing faster than normal, but the flash of pain was sharp and left my hand throbbing for a minute. I would need both hands to play the flute and couldn’t risk doing myself more damage at this stage. Maybe later . . .
I could feel the ripple in the Grey when I snuck into it. The world seemed to roll like the deck of a storm-beset ship. With the contradictory evidence of my eyes saying nothing was moving and the remaining discomfort in my hand, I felt a bit queasy. It was nothing compared to my initial nausea in the Grey years ago, but it wasn’t easy to ignore—it reminded me too much of vampires and of one in particular. . . .
I squatted in the churning cold and unwound from the flute the black thread that Carlos had made. I shuddered at the thought of putting my mouth on the nasty little instrument, but I forced myself to do it and started to play, the random notes warbling out into the night like disturbed birds, screaming in distress. I played as terribly as I sing, being tone-deaf. The initial notes from the bone flute caused a flurry of sparks to rise from the bones assembled in the center of the casting circle and, for a moment, the spell burned phosphor-white. I didn’t see any of the bones move, but I did observe the black and white energy around Rui eclipse in a storm of red as he heard me. The chanting of the Kostní Mágové faltered and the spell dimmed, wavering as Rui moved, shouting first at the mages and then at Purlis. The chanting resumed and the spell gleamed not quite as brightly as it had and the red spires of Rui’s anger fell back only part of the way. Apparently I was irritating him and that was adversely affecting the spell. It was not the effect I wanted, but it was still a good one.
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