Elfhome

by Wen Spencer

  Tinker turned to glare with suspicion at their great-grandfather. “What do you want—besides the obvious? You can’t have Oilcan.”

  Unstoppable force met unmovable object. If Oilcan wasn’t sandwiched between the two, it would be entertaining.

  Forge stared back at Tinker, seemingly fascinated by her. “You were as human as your cousin? Before Wolf Who Rules spell-worked you?”

  “Yes.” Tinker growled. “Most people thought we were brother and sister, not cousins. I won’t let you take him away. This is his home—not some huge sprawling palace with a bunch of strangers.”

  Forge nodded slowly. “Forgiveness. Of course. I—I didn’t think…” He faltered to a halt and then sudden hope dawned on his face. “Are there more of you? They say humans are more prolific…”

  “No,” Oilcan said, and then to soften it added, “Grandfather. Most of Unbounded’s descendants had only one child to carry on the bloodline. Tinker and I are the only ones left.”

  “I see. Oh well.” He smiled sadly. “It is two more than I had ever hoped for. My son disappeared so suddenly, without a word to anyone, taking no one with him and seemingly without any of his things. He left behind his brushes and paints and lute. What was missing were things a thief would take. We were afraid he’d been killed and his body buried in some shallow grave. The not knowing what had happened to him: that was the worst.”

  Oilcan understood all too well. When the oni kidnapped Tinker a few weeks earlier, they made it seem as if she had crashed into the river. For weeks, he hadn’t known if she was dead or alive. He had the prophecy, though, that Tinker would be the one to stop the oni from invading. Oilcan had clung to that hope despite all the evidence. He could not imagine three hundred years of nothing. He could imagine how overwhelming the grief would be. Just the glimmer of hope would keep fresh the wounds and every day would be a cycle of sorrow.

  “Amaranth had every foot of soil within a day’s walk overturned. We dragged all the nearby lakes. She endlessly questioned everyone that might have seen him those last days. In the end, she couldn’t take not knowing what had happened to our son. She killed herself.”

  To lose first your child and then your wife. Gods have pity on the male.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” Oilcan said.

  “We came at all haste once we heard the news about his orphan being in the war zone. We only have our sekasha with us; we left behind the rest of our households. We’ll have to send my gossamer back to fetch them.”

  “You’re staying?” Tinker’s voice was full of suspicion.

  “Of course we’re staying. We can’t leave you two here defenseless. We have cots and blankets on the gossamer, and while we’re here, we can build your defenses for this enclave.”

  Oilcan realized that when Forge said “staying” he meant at Sacred Heart.

  #

  The children were ecstatic at the news. They saw it as a dry run toward opening an enclave. As Forge went off to collect gear from the gossamer and send it back for his household, the kids argued over what to do to prepare.

  “We should paint the dining hall!” Cattail doggedly rolled as fast as she could.

  “That’s pointless. We only have one table and six chairs.” Rustle waved his paintbrush at Oilcan’s small dinette table and mismatching collection of chairs.

  “They can eat in shifts.” Barley had stopped edging and was cleaning his paintbrush. “But I need to start dinner now. We need food for what—nineteen people? How many Hands did they bring? A couple days of this and we’ll end up with nothing but keva beans.”

  Baby Duck was trotting in tight circles, clutching her roller. “Where will they sleep? None of the guest rooms have been painted. Shouldn’t we be working on those instead?”

  That brought them all to complete halt and they turned to Oilcan with pleading eyes.

  “For now, we’ll put them in the finished rooms on the third floor.” Oilcan hated the whole plan. He wasn’t sure if he could trust Forge, but they needed funds if they were to stay neutral and the domana did have sekasha to keep the children safe. “Only for a day or two until we can paint the rooms on the second floor.”

  “And put up window dresses and artwork.” Cattail added quietly.

  “And make them nice.” Oilcan promised. He wasn’t sure where they’d get fabric for the curtains but artwork he could handle. “Beans will be fine; they know this is a war zone. I can see if they can have supplies from Easternlands brought across. I’ll chase down another table and some more chairs.” He caught Baby Duck by the shoulders and pointed her at the nearest unfinished wall. “Go ahead and finish this coat. You’re almost done and then you’ll have to wait for it to dry anyhow. Merry, why don’t you take over edging for Barley?”

  Tinker was watching him marshal his troops with amusement. “Grandpa would be proud.”

  “He’d be happier if they weren’t elves.” Oilcan murmured in English to spare the kids feelings. He pulled out a tablet and started a new to-do list. If he wanted Forge’s gossamer to bring back food supplies, he’d better talk to Forge immediately. “Grandpa never really trusted elves.”

  “Lately, I’ve been empathizing with him.” Tinker grumbled low but back in Elvish. She kept pace with Oilcan as he headed toward the distant gossamer. Apparently she intended to keep an eye on Oilcan while the gossamer was still close enough to whisk him away. “If you read between the lines in his codex, Dufae was hiding on Earth. He never comes out and says it, but I think he found out that someone in the Stone Clan was cooperating with the Skin Clan. It might seem like a long time ago for us, but most likely, all the parties except Dufae are still alive.”

  Dufae and his mother who’d been desperately trying to figure out what had happened to her son—searching to find what had made him disappear. He wondered how Amaranth died. Had Amaranth actually killed herself?

  If she hadn’t, then two households worth of possible killers were about to arrive.

  Would the kids be safe? Someone in the Stone Clan had already betrayed them once. “I found something out,” Oilcan said. “All the kids are naelinsanota—a caste that the Skin Clan was developing. The weird thing was that it’s a bit of a stigma—families weren’t advertising the fact that they were naelinsanota.”

  Tinker cursed loudly, looking like she wanted to hit someone hard. Frustrated, she settled for kicking at a clump of grass. “I bet the dead children were hiding the fact that they were naelinsanota too. Lain says all the kids, the ones that lived and the ones that were killed, were related. It means they’re all the same caste; even Baby Duck even though she can’t remember or not. All seven! This wasn’t a random call for sponsorship. Earth Son, or whoever was using his name, had to have all but hand deliver his offer to specific families.”

  “To specific children.” Oilcan said. “It can’t be a coincidence that all of them are still doubles.”

  “Only doubles are free to change households without shame.” Pony’s voice echoed Tinker’s anger. “The only caste that waits until their hundredth year to chose their Beholding are sekasha. But to find seven doubles of any one caste—that is not coincidence.”

  “Do you think Forge has anything to do with this?” Tinker eyed Oilcan. He could almost see the little cogs and wheels in her brain spinning quickly, planning ways to kidnap him herself.

  “No.” Oilcan said firmly. “Thorne asked me for our lineage. The news traveled to Forge and he came to find us. Me.” Forge’s emotions felt too genuine to be faked. “He loved Amaranth beyond reason. There’s no way he could have killed her and stayed sane.”

  “So maybe he’s crazy.” Tinker said.

  “I—I doubt it.” Pony shook himself like a wet dog at the idea. “His Hand would know if he’s unstable enough for that and if they suspected he was monster enough to kill his domi, then—no—he can’t be insane.”

  It was comforting to know—assuming that the sekasha were as all-knowing as Pony thought. Certainly Pony had been the fi
rst to realize Tinker was slipping over the edge when Esme was invading her dreams. But what if Tinker had been twisted before Pony met her? Would Pony see past a mask of sanity? Thorne Scratch hadn’t.

  #

  There was chaos on the faire ground by the massive anchors. Apparently Earth Son and Jewel Tear’s orphaned households had heard of the arrival of a Stone Clan airship. They were gathered around Forge, carrying travel bags. Some stoically quiet. Some in tears. Some pleading and weeping loudly.

  “Anyone that wants to go back to Easternlands can.” Forge must have cast an amplification spell because his voice carried as if he was using a bullhorn. “Anyone seeking to join my household will need to stay here in Pittsburgh and wait until I can decide to accept anyone.”

  Oilcan glanced to Thorne Scratch. He hadn’t even considered that she might leave completely. Certainly there was nothing he could offer to make her stay. He took comfort that she made no move to leave his side, collect her gear, and go back to the Easternlands on the great living airship. Did she plan to offer to Forge or Iron Mace? Surrounded by Tinker’s and Forge’s Hands, Thorne had her face set to warrior neutral so he could glean nothing of her intentions.

  Forge pushed through the throng to where Oilcan and Tinker stood. “Is something wrong?”

  Oilcan realized then that they hadn’t actually talked about how much he’ll charge Forge. Maybe the elf thought he was staying in exchange for the defensive spells he planned—but Tinker could probably do just as good a job. It was food that Oilcan couldn’t get easily elsewhere. “The city is under siege and running low on food. We’ll be happy to have you stay with us—but there’s no place we can buy enough food to feed everyone. I was hoping that part of your…”

  He wasn’t sure what elves called it.

  “Mau.” Pony murmured.

  “Mau would be in supplies from Easternland. Flour, salt, sugar, keva beans.”

  Forge nodded. “Of course, of course. If you need something, and if it is mine to give, you may have it.”

  It was nearly the same thing that Tinker had said just days before. It touched Oilcan deeply that this male that he just met was so willing to commit completely. It reminded him of his own instant affinity to Merry because she had reminded him of his lost mother.

  “Thank you, Grandfather.” He put his hand on the male’s shoulder, ignoring the slight scoff from Tinker.

  Forge swallowed him into a full hug. “Oh my child, I don’t know if I’ll be able to bear losing you so soon after finding you.”

  “You can stay as long as you want,” Oilcan said. Really, they needed all the domana they could get.

  Forge hugged him tighter. “I will stay to the end.”

  For a moment, Oilcan thought he meant until the end of the war. Only when he caught sight of Thorne giving him a look full of understanding sorrow that Oilcan realized that Forge meant until Oilcan died of old age.

  37: Days of Past Not Forgotten

  Oilcan spent the next few days finding tables and chairs, buying paint, tracking down yards and yards of fabric and a sewing machine, raiding his various stashes of paintings for artwork emotionally safe enough to hang, and making countless trips to Wollerton’s for the massive bathing room renovation. He also tracked down yet another cell phone for Tinker and programed it for her. All of this meant he spent a lot of time away from Sacred Heart. Since Thorne always came with him (and usually a rotating foursome of Forge’s sekasha in the name of learning the city), it left the children alone. With the oni doing raids all over the city, he was glad that Forge was at the enclave, overseeing construction of outer walls and defensive spells.

  When Oilcan found time to spare, he would check in on Forge. The male was more than willing to patiently explain how he was building the spells into the wall’s foundations to create the enclave’s powerful barrier protection. Again and again, Oilcan found echoes of his grandfather in the elf. From the way Forge handled his project management to the way he pulled at his hair in frustration, it was obvious that more than just genetics been handed down through the family.

  It delighted Forge to see the habits in Oilcan. “Amaranth always had paint on her hands and in her hair and on her face; usually right on the end of her nose. I think it was because she would do this.” Forge pressed the back of his hand to his nose to demonstrate.

  Oilcan laughed and checked. He had a swipe of soldering paste across his nose from welding the bathing room’s water pipes. “Yeah, that’s how it got there. Tinker is worse than me. Five minutes into anything and she’s got a smudged nose.”

  Forge was showing Oilcan how to vary the shield spell when a slight tension went through Forge’s Hand.

  Iron Mace drifted onto the worksite. “Ah, I wondered who was tapping the stones.”

  “I’m just teaching him how to protect himself.” Forge said.

  “You weren’t taught our esva as a child?” Iron Mace motioned with his hand as if conceding a point. “Well, more of a child.”

  Oilcan sighed. Insisting he was an adult made him feel like a four-year old shouting “I’m a big boy now!” Forge had studied architecture during the days of pharaohs and Iron Mace had been using four numbers to record his age when Amaranth had been born. It was no wonder that the two couldn’t see him as anything but hopelessly young. “My mother knew Elvish, both Low and High, and a handful of songs, but not much more.”

  Mace pressed, apparently not believing that Oilcan was untrained. “Unbounded Brilliance made no permanent record to school his children in their inheritance? He left them ignorant of his clan and his family and all the vast store of knowledge we had when humans were still squatting in caves?”

  If his ancestor had left anything, it was in the codex with a warning built into the spell-lock: trust no one. Still, Oilcan had to keep to the truth. “We didn’t know that Unbounded Brilliance was Stone Clan domana until a few days ago. If he’d told his son anything about the spell stones or the esva, it was lost long ago.” Certainly they hadn’t been aware that the spells of the codex were inscribed on stones and could be cast remotely. His mother had taught him the domana finger exercises between rounds of patty-cake and cat’s cradle.

  “How does your cousin know the esva then?” Mace asked.

  Oilcan wasn’t sure but he could guess. “She probably saw Jewel Tear and Forest Moss cast spells and copied them.”

  Forge laughed. “What did I say, Mace? We breed true—too clever for our own good.”

  Iron Mace scoffed.

  Forge glanced beyond Iron Mace and shook his head. “This is a war zone, Mace. You should keep your people closer.”

  Iron Mace scoffed. “I’m safe here.” He waved to the nearly completed wall. “You have the passive protections in place and you are here with two of your Hands. I see no point at wearing my people to the bone. They have to rest sometime.”

  “You would not have this problem if you took another Hand.”

  “And have five more mouths to feed.”

  “The clan would more than double your support.”

  “Things are not that simple. This is why you fail so badly at politics.” Mace gave a slight wave and strolled away.

  Forge frowned after him.

  “He cannot take what hasn’t been offered,” Dark Scythe, Forge’s First, said.

  #

  “If you change your mind,” the note read in messy English, followed by a phone number and then lots of x’s and o’s. Oilcan frowned at the scrap of paper tucked into his glove box. Who was this from? The phone number had an area code, so it wasn’t a Pittsburgh number.

  He rooted a little more until he came up with a fresh pad of paper and a pen and headed back into Sacred Heart, trying not to think about the note. Undoubtedly it was from a female post-doc that he’d met at one of Lain’s Startup Cookouts. It really didn’t matter which one—they all ended messy.

  Ryan MacDonald was the last woman he dated. She had been delightfully laid back. Toward the end of her thirty-day stay
on Elfhome, though, they slipped into the familiar pattern of all his relationships. The conversations that danced around the depth of his feelings. The tentative testing his commitment to Elfhome. Ryan at least didn’t push for him to move to Earth; instead she hinted that she could return to Elfhome for a permanent position.

  It ended like all the others. Her in tears and the familiar refrain “If you would only say that you loved me.”

  Any other Shutdown, he would have locked himself away at his barn and drunk himself into a stupor. On the off chance that Tinker would return from Aum Renau, though, he got permission to ride out Shutdown at the enclaves and thus was there to welcome her home.

  He flipped open the pad and tried to distract himself by scribbling down the start of a new to-do list. (Tinker teased him about using paper, but sometimes writing something down and then burning the paper was the only way to deal with things.) Roach had hauled away the last dumpster filled with rubble from the restroom demolition. He needed to take down the three-story chute, carefully, in case he needed it for a second story remodel of the bathrooms. The cement board was up and the seams sealed. All that was left was the tiling.

  His footsteps echoed in the front foyer, reminding him that he was alone for the first time since he found Merry. Not completely alone. Blue Sky was treating the kids to DVDs. Oilcan could hear the faint strains of music from somewhere upstairs and buttered popcorn perfumed the air. Iron Mace was working in his rooms. His Hand was using the gym as a training hall. Forge was consulting with Prince True Flame on defenses out by the faire grounds.

  But Thorne Scratch wasn’t quietly shadowing Oilcan for the first time in days. Iron Mace had called her aside while Roach was loading up the dumpster. She had left Sacred Heart to do Iron Mace’s bidding—making Oilcan wonder if they had quietly come to an arrangement already.