Dragon's Egg (Dark Streets Book 2)

by BR Kingsolver

  I poured some of the potion in the bowl and began to chant. When I finished the incantation, I dropped the strands of Valinir’s hair into the liquid and sketched a rune over it. Next, I chanted another spell and added the lapis. Finally, I sketched a rune over the bowl and spoke a Word. The liquid foamed, then settled into a clear liquid again, and the rock sucked it up.

  Putting the potion bottle and the bowl back in my bag, I took the stone into my hand and stood. Walking out from the shelter of the rocks, I walked clockwise around the top of the hill—a full circle and then another fifty degrees.

  “Here,” I said as I stopped and pointed northeast. “He left in that direction.”

  There was a faint path, like a game trail, leading down into the forest. I sketched a rune to create a shield but didn’t activate it as we started off. The trail ran fairly straight except for minor detours around trees, logs, and large rocks. I became convinced that it was a game trail that animals used to reach water. As far as I could tell, at least a dozen people had traveled down it lately. I assumed those to be Vampires, as Elves would leave little trace of their passage.

  “Either they were captured, or chased, or they were doing the chasing,” I told Cassiel and pointed to the tracks. “Those tracks are from Vampires, I assume, judging by the size of the feet and the heaviness of their tread.”

  He peered at the ground, then shook his head. “My night vision came from my father,” he said, “rather than from my mother. I can’t see what you’re talking about.”

  That was a problem. The Vampires could see just fine at night. I started looking for a place we could hold up until daybreak. Stumbling into an ambush with a partner who couldn’t see who he was fighting didn’t enthrall me. Besides, I realized I was tired, and some sleep wouldn’t hurt either of us.

  After a few hundred yards, the trail circled around another group of boulders. I checked them out and found a level spot out of sight of the trail.

  “Let’s spend the night here,” I said. “We can eat something and get some sleep. That way we’ll be fresh in the morning. Maybe you can see something from the air then.”

  “I didn’t think to bring any food.”

  Reaching into my bag, I brought out my cloak and a blanket. “Here,” I said, handing him the blanket. I also pulled out a water bottle and a package of journey bread. Seating myself on my cloak, I opened the package.

  “I hope you have good teeth. This is nourishing and keeps forever, but it’s not exactly gourmet dining.”

  We gnawed on the journey bread, washing the hard, dry stuff down with the water.

  “Doesn’t taste too bad,” Cassiel said.

  I laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment. You can live on it for weeks, but no one eats it by choice.”

  After I finished eating, I set wards around our small campsite. The temperature was dropping, so I rolled myself into my cloak and snuggled up against a fallen log.

  “Should we share our body heat?” he asked as he drew the blanket around him.

  “That would probably be wise,” I said, trying to ignore the heat his suggestion caused to flare through certain parts of my body. He scooted up beside me.

  “Roll over the other way,” he said. I did as he suggested, and he spooned me, his chest against my back. Our clothes, my cloak, and his blanket lay between us, but it still brought a smile to my face as I fell asleep.

  “Dawn is upon us,” the voice of my dreams whispered in my ear. Cassiel had one arm wrapped around me, holding me tight against him. I didn’t want to wake up, let alone move, but the hard ground under me reminded me of our situation. I rolled over and looked into his face. It was all I could do to stop myself from kissing him.

  “All right,” I managed. “Do you think you could fly today? Maybe we can see something instead of just blundering blindly ahead.”

  “That sounds like a good idea,” he said. “Do you have any more of that bread?”

  I nodded.

  He smiled. “Then let’s eat and scout out the surrounding area.”

  I dug more journey bread from my bag and shared it with him.

  “What exactly is this stuff?” he said, after washing down a bite with water from my flask.

  “Grains mixed with fruit and turkey. You could use almost any kind of meat. I bake it, then compress and dry it. A spell keeps it from molding. The recipe is thousands of years old.”

  “What does it taste like when it’s fresh?”

  I grinned. “Not a whole lot different, but it’s easier to chew and swallow.”

  “And you just carry it around with you, even in the city?”

  “You never know when you might end up stuck somewhere with nothing to eat. Five years of walking the realms taught me that. I grew up on a farm, so I’m spoiled. I don’t like being hungry.”

  I conducted a quick search through the surrounding area, but didn’t find any Vampires or Elves, and no sign of them other than the tracks on the trail. I did see animals—squirrels, rabbits, and birds that would provide a meal if necessary.

  When I finished my circuit, I found my way back to the ring of rocks where Cassiel awaited me. The day was warm, and he had removed his shirt. His chest and shoulders were much broader than an Elf’s or a Human’s, and he was muscled like a weight lifter. I wanted to tell him to put the shirt back on, but instead told myself to act my age and stop gaping and drooling. He probably found clothing constricting when he was flying.

  “The area is clear,” I said. “Do you want to go up and see if you can spot anything?”

  “I think it would be better to take you with me. I don’t want to get separated,” he said and handed me the harness I had worn the previous day. I took a deep breath and wished even more that he would put his shirt on.

  He strapped us together and leaped into the air. We rose above the treetops, and he kept climbing. Inky-black clouds covered the sky, and a faint red ball in the east cast the landscape below us in dark shadows. Cassiel leveled off and spoke into my ear.

  “See there? That’s the trail we were following.”

  In spite of my Elven eyesight, I could barely tell where the trail was. His night vision might not be as good as mine, but it seemed his distance sight was far better.

  We flew along, and after a while, I relaxed and found myself reveling in the wonder of flying over the world below us. His wings beat very rarely as he traveled from one thermal to another, soaring with his wings spread. The sense of freedom was exquisite, and I wished I had wings. What a wonderful feeling of freedom he must experience.

  Our speed of travel was far faster than we had managed on the ground, and after an hour, I spied what looked like a town. It sat at the edge of the forest and mountains, with the plains stretching out before us. Herds of the cattle-like animals grazed as far as I could see, and a couple of roads and railroad tracks cut through the plain. Some sort of vehicle traveled on one of the roads toward the town. In the distance behind it, I could only see the horizon.

  “Should we try that town?” Cassiel asked.

  “Yes, can you set us down a mile or two away in the forest?”

  He found a small clearing and landed, then unclipped me from him. It was a relief, but also brought with it a feeling of disappointment. I told myself to get a grip.

  We worked our way to a promontory overlooking the town. From what I could see, it was an outpost, housing families who tended the herds. A central area appeared to have shops and some larger buildings that might have been offices or served governmental functions. I had no idea how Vampire society or government operated in their own realm. Surrounding the center were several hundred houses. Interspersed were larger buildings that I guessed might have been schools. At the plains side of the town were barn-like structures and corrals filled with cattle. I assumed that was where the bleeding took place. For the first time, I wondered if Vampires ever got tired of always eating the same thing.

  “Do you understand what all this is?” Cassiel asked, wavi
ng his hand toward the town.

  “You see the herds of cattle out on the plains?”

  Cassiel nodded.

  “They bleed them. There’s a distribution network for the blood, which they need to feed their people in the cities. The upper classes breed Humans the same way. But the population pressures are constant because they outbreed their food supply. Since Transvyl and Earth are only a single veil apart, when they do find a rift, they cross over. My understanding is they also ship animals, including Humans, back to their own realm to serve as food.”

  “Only Humans?”

  “Oh, if they could get their hands on Elves or Angels, they would breed them, too,” I said. “But Humans without magic are the easiest, and since Earth is the closest realm, it’s mainly Humans.”

  I checked the scrying stone I had created the previous evening and found it was warm.

  “Valinir is somewhere near here,” I told Cassiel, holding out the stone so he could see it. “I’ll have to move around and see where it gets warmer or cooler to figure out what direction we need to go.”

  “Let’s do it,” he said, pulling his shirt out of his pack and putting it on. Once again, I had a feeling of relief mixed with disappointment. He was confusing the hell out of me. I couldn’t figure out if I wanted to see him naked, or not.

  We circled the town, staying in the forest and maintaining our distance. The stone stayed the same temperature, which told me Valinir was probably in the town. Not what I had hoped for. I told Cassiel about my findings.

  “If he’s down there,” Cassiel said, “we have to assume he’s a prisoner.”

  I shook my head. “I can’t imagine how they could have captured a battle mage.”

  “One mage can capture another,” he said. “Your friend could be wounded or unconscious. Whatever is going on, it isn’t good.”

  “So, how do we get in there to find out? Do you have any kind of magic that will make us invisible? I don’t think Vampires have the same myths about Angels as Humans on Earth do.”

  “I think we’ll have to rely on your glamour,” he said. “I can go aloft and watch. If something happens that you need me, I can fly in to pull you out.”

  I bit my lip, wondering how much information I could trust him with, then decided to hell with it. If I couldn’t trust him, I never should have put myself in that position.

  “I can don a glamour,” I said, “but I don’t speak their language, and know nothing of how to act in this realm. What I can do is hide myself completely. Like this.”

  I shrunk down to my other size. All Elves have another size, about a foot tall. My teachers said it was our original size, before we evolved beyond the other Fae.

  The look of astonishment on Cassiel’s face almost made me laugh. Then I donned a glamour that mimicked one of the squirrels in the forest.

  “Think this will work?” I asked.

  He burst out laughing. “A talking squirrel! I love it!”

  With a thought, I grew back to my normal size. “I’ll use that when I get close,” I said. “Walking down there at my normal size is an easy jaunt, but in my smaller size, that is a very long hike.” I spoke a Word and a magelight appeared in my palm. Twisting the spell slightly caused it to cycle from white to yellow, orange, and then red. “Do you think you can see this from up there?” I asked, motioning toward the sky.

  “Yes, I’ll be able to see it. If you find the mages, how do you plan to get them out of wherever they’re being held? I can carry a full-grown Elf, but not five of you.”

  “I don’t know. If I can free them, they can pass through the veil back to Earth. We are well away from the battle in that realm. But I’ll signal you with the magelight.”

  Being as cautious as I could, I reached the outskirts of the town, then shrunk and donned my glamour. Trees and shrubs grew throughout the town, and there were plenty of real squirrels running about. Although it was only a few hundred yards, it took me until noon to reach the center. From there, I didn’t have a plan. I abandoned the squirrel glamour and simply kept to the shadows and any cover I could find, and checked out every building, one by one. A few times, someone caught me in the open, but I held still and used a glamour to mimic whatever the background was.

  I spent part of that night inside one of the large buildings, eating some journey bread. I hoped that my Nephilim companion had the skills to feed himself in the forest, since I had forgotten to leave him anything to eat. For an Elf, there was plenty to eat out there, whether by shooting a squirrel or a rabbit with my bow or gathering the berries and roots I recognized as being similar to familiar plants.

  By the following morning, I knew Valinir and his companions weren’t in the town’s center, but the scrying stone was hot enough to let me know I was headed in the right direction.

  One of the buildings had cattle in a corral on one side with a large door to the inside. I guessed the building had to do with blood production. Outside, I saw a Dralf talking to another man, who looked Human. I could feel both of their magics, and the Dralf was a powerful battle mage and a realm walker. When he turned toward me, I saw that it was Mondranar. He was definitely the man who had tortured Tomas Novotny. A strong ward was set up around the building, and my scrying stone was hot enough in my hand to be uncomfortable.

  There wasn’t a way in all the realms I would survive a confrontation with a battle mage. My magic wasn’t the kind that could take down the wards, either. I could try to kill Mondranar with my bow, but I would get only one shot. If I missed, I’d be dead shortly thereafter.

  I racked my brain trying to figure out what to do. I could leave the town, rendezvous with Cassiel, cross the veil back to Earth, contact Selinger and get reinforcements to come back. Although I had seen armed Vampires throughout the town, there wasn’t near the firepower Mondranar had deployed on Earth.

  Deciding that would be my backup plan, I circled the building to a place where no one was around. No other buildings were close, and those that were in the area didn’t have any windows. Vampires weren’t very good with plants, and whoever planted the trees in the town hadn’t planned on the trees’ growth. They had planted a line of five trees that were far too close to the rear of the building.

  I leaned with my back against a tree and drew energy from it. Then I directed my magic at the trees on either side of me. Throwing fireballs and lightning weren’t on my skills list, but I was damned good with plants. After an hour, the trees were double their original size, and the root systems had more than doubled in size.

  People always marveled at the four massive oaks at the corners of my nursery in Washington. By far the largest trees in the entire metro area, they appeared to be hundreds of years old. But I had planted the saplings only fifty years before.

  A lot of mages die while learning their trade. Either they get careless, aren’t tutored properly, or just lose control. Magic is very exacting, and you have to make sure you account for every minute element of the environment. When I was learning wards and shields, my tutor stressed that you had to protect not only what you could see, but also what you couldn’t.

  If I had set the wards around the building, I would have used the living energy of the trees to anchor and strengthen them. The trees’ roots would have carried the ward magic deep into the earth, and under the foundation. Elves are plant magicians. Dralf, who live underground and deal more with mining and metals, are not.

  The mage who set those wards, whether Mondranar or another, had set them using the building’s walls. As the trees grew, their roots began to stress the building’s foundation. After two hours, the walls began to crumble in places, and the building began to shudder. I wondered how long it would take for someone to notice.

  Once set in motion, the trees’ growth continued at its unnatural pace. So tired that I had to force myself into motion, I snuck around to the building next door and climbed to its roof. I pulled my bow and quiver from my bag and sat back to watch as I ate some more of the journey bread.


  A very large bird circled high above me, and I waved to it. In answer, it turned its circling pattern into figure eights.

  By nightfall, the trees, which had originally been shorter than the three-story tall building, towered over the structure. The building began noticeably to deform in the rear, and several large cracks appeared. Vampires and mages emerged and inspected the trees. A lot of running around and hand waving ensued. I saw Mondranar and some other men get in a truck and drive away.

  A couple of hours before daybreak someone decided to evacuate the building. When they brought out a cage with three men and a woman inside, I spelled a magelight and shifted the color to yellow, orange, and red, then back to white again. After three cycles, I snuffed the light and picked up my bow.

  Two mages supervised a crew of Vampires as they loaded the cage onto the back of a flatbed truck. All four people inside appeared to be unconscious, and one of them was Valinir. I pulled two arrows out of my quiver and nocked one. As soon as the cage was loaded, I shot the mages. The first one hadn’t fallen yet when my arrow found its home in the second one’s chest. A thump behind me caused me to spin around, sword in hand.

  “Don’t kill me, I’m here to help,” Cassiel said. I could see his grin even in the dark.

  “Let’s get rid of those Vampires and see if we can figure out how to drive that truck,” I said.

  I began firing arrows at the Vampires and took down three before a flash of lightning took out the rest of them. Cassiel grabbed me under my arms, and then we were airborne, swooping down toward the truck with me shrieking in alarm. I damned near wet my pants.

  We landed by the truck, and Cassiel let go of me. He was chuckling. Lucky for him, I was holding my bow instead of my sword.

  “The cage is spelled,” Cassiel said. He grabbed my arm and one of the cage’s bars. Reality rippled, and when I managed to catch my breath, the air I breathed was that of Earth.

  Chapter 13