by Wen Spencer
“Where’s that coming from?” He didn’t bother fumbling for his discarded clothes. He pulled fresh out of his dresser.
“Ginger Wine’s,” Thorne Scratch growled.
There was a sudden draconic roar and the flare of crimson-tainted brilliance. Thorne had her vest armor on; the light gleamed off the slick black of the scales.
“Thank gods,” Thorne Scratch breathed out.
“What was that?”
“Fire Clan esva.” She tugged on her pants. “I need to go. Take the children to the safe room and lock yourself in.”
He stepped into his tennis shoes without bothering with socks.
Thorne Scratch was pulling on boots as he went out his door. The kids were spilling into the hallway, all in nightgowns, whimpering in distress. There was another roar. Through the hallway window, he saw a crest of flame rise up out of buildings down the street, temporarily lighting the night to day. The kids cried out and ran to him. He was suddenly trapped by a dozen arms clinging tightly to him.
“It’s okay! It’s okay! Prince True Flame and the Wyverns are fighting the oni. We’ll be fine.”
“Get to the safe room!” Thorne snapped from his bedroom. “Go!”
He started them moving, shuffling forward like a giant amoeba of fear. It wasn’t until Thorne swept past them like a dark shadow that the kids let go of him enough to cling to each other in more manageable groups.
Thorne Scratch unlocked the front door and then stood waiting for him to catch up to her.
“Go to the safe room.” He pushed the kids toward the hallway.
Thorne caught him by the front of his T-shirt and kissed him hard. “I hate leaving you here with nothing to protect you,” she whispered.
“You’re the one running toward the fight,” he said. “I’ll be tucked behind several feet of stone.”
Thorne Scratch gave him one last long stare as if it was going to be the last time she’d see him alive. “Lock this behind me. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
And then she was gone.
Locking the door was the hardest thing he ever had to do.
He hurried back to the small windowless safe room. He did a head count—five kids looking scared to hell—before shutting the heavy door and sliding the bars into place. Even through the thick walls, he could hear the muffled gunfire. And then there was a loud explosion of such force that he could feel the earth underneath him shift. An explosion like that would kill a sekasha regardless of their protective shield—and Thorne Scratch didn’t have a domana protecting her.
Oh, Thorne, he thought. Be safe.
* * *
Hours passed. The night had gone silent.
Windwolf and Prince True Flame had most likely won, but he didn’t know how to find out short of leaving the kids alone or waiting for Thorne.
And Thorne still hadn’t returned.
He hadn’t felt so helpless since hiding in the pantry, watching his father keen over his mother’s body.
23: SCISSOR PAPER STONE
Two spells were woefully inadequate.
Or at least, two spells that Tinker didn’t know all the parameters for. The lack of control was driving her nuts. There was no time to even guess how to increase the size of the Stone esva shield since the gunfire required her to keep it up nearly constantly. The flame strike dealt out a satisfyingly massive blow of damage, but she was in the process of burning down Ginger Wine’s entire enclave. She felt like she should be shouting “Sorry!” every time she blasted another tight knot of oni.
The enclave was a pure chaos of bodies. The oni were taking advantage of the enclave’s defenses, fortifying themselves behind stout doors and stone walls. The Stone Clan forces—alarmingly only laedin-caste—seemed unsure if they should be escorting their unarmed clansmen to safety or be attacking the oni. They careened around the enclave, randomly chasing or fleeing the oni.
“Where the hell are the Stone Clan sekasha?” Tinker carefully picked her way over smoldering rubble. There should be sliced and diced oni someplace as the sekasha kicked collective butt.
“The oni must have taken them by surprise,” Pony said. “It is the only reason the oni would still be alive.”
“They’re all dead?”
“Those you saw die, those were probably not the first to die, but the last.”
She shifted sideways hurriedly to protect a knot of Ginger Wine’s staff from machine-gun fire. “Go! Get to Poppymeadow’s.” She was too late to save the sekasha, but she could make sure everyone else got out safely.
She and her Hand pushed forward, driving the oni back and freeing the elves that had been trapped behind them. Since she was dropping her shield to cast the flame strike, her Hand scattered evenly around her so their shields would protect her from stray gunfire. It made her nervous, so she blasted away without mercy or regard to the property damage she was causing.
They reached the far corner of the enclave and discovered that the handful of oni they’d been chasing had backed into a dead end. The sekasha leapt forward, a whirlwind of blades, and moments later she was surrounded by dismembered bodies.
“They weren’t the main force,” Pony growled. “They were just a distraction. They took Jewel Tear out another way.”
* * *
Tinker felt like she was nine years old when Prince True Flame and Windwolf appeared. There she was, surrounded by the burning rubble of Ginger Wine’s enclave, with no rescued Jewel Tear to show for all the destruction.
“Beloved,” Windwolf ignored the ruin to focus on her. “Are you hurt?”
And that’s one of the reasons she loved him so much. He understood the important part of this mess. “No.” She dropped her shield, suddenly feeling bone weary, and let him wrap his arms around her. It felt wonderful to lean on his strength, knowing he would make everything right.
Obviously the prince wasn’t going to ignore the fact that she had just leveled an enclave. He was staring down at her with an odd expression. “She was maintaining a Stone Clan shield.”
As Stormsong had pointed out with her limited edition T-shirt, things wear out. Usually not so spectacularly. . . .
“My right hand is broken,” Tinker offered as an excuse.
Windwolf tightened his hold on her. “The Wind esva doesn’t have shields cast by the left hand.”
“It was Stone Clan esva.” True Flame’s tone demanded an answer.
Oh gods, all this burning rubble and dead bodies, and they were going to argue about that? “One of my ancestors was an elf. Apparently he was a Stone Clan domana.”
The prince glared at Windwolf. “You changed the domana of another clan?”
If Tinker hadn’t been pressed against him, she would have missed Windwolf’s anger. He stood quietly, only the tension of his body betraying him. Finally he calmly said, “Her grandfather died of old age before he was out of his doubles. If I hadn’t changed her, she would have had the lifespan of a human.”
“She was a child of another clan.” True Flame stressed the word “child.”
“She was an adult by human counting,” Wolf snapped. “Her family made no attempt to contact the Stone Clan. The ties were severed.”
“She called their Spell Stones,” True Flame said.
“You told me to protect my Hand!” Tinker cried. “Protect the ones that serve! They would have all died if I’d let them come here alone. I did what I had to do to protect them.”
Judging by the annoyance on True Flame’s face and his silence, she’d found the argument that he couldn’t reply to. It was the fundamental basis of the entire elf culture: that obedience demanded protection. Tinker would have felt triumphant over the win if she hadn’t just snapped out the first thing that came to her. How could she feel so tired after sleeping all day? Almost in answer, pain flared through her right arm. Oh, yes, the damn healing spells.
Someone started to scream nearby. The fact that the screamer was male made the sound more horrific.
“That’s
Forest Moss,” True Flame said.
They found the one-eyed domana crouched in the blood of one of Jewel Tear’s sekasha. Forest Moss was holding out his bloody hands and screaming. The female sekasha had been shot in the face at close range. In Tinker’s dream, she had been Stormsong. Tiger Eye was in his bed just beyond the female’s body, his spine cut. Judging by the blood splatter, he’d been paralyzed by the blow, helpless as his lifeblood pumped out.
Tinker completely understood the need to scream. She turned to hug Pony close. “In my dream, it was you and Stormsong.”
“You are hurt and tired,” Pony murmured only loud enough for her to hear. “Let me take you back home.”
It didn’t seem right to leave the mess for Windwolf to clean up, but she could feel the healing spell taking its toll. In a matter of minutes, she’d be asleep, regardless of her standing upright or lying down. Besides, what was the point of her staying? She’d already leveled the place and failed to stop the oni.
24: SCAPEGOAT
The Wyvern washed into the warren like a flood of blood.
Tommy shouted, “Don’t fight! Don’t fight!” A moment later, he was on the floor, in too much pain to focus his mind and heart hammering with fear for his family. Had the elves decided to fuck it all and kill them anyhow?
His family was all so used to having the snot beat of them that even the smallest just lay silent where they were pinned to the floor. The only reason he knew they weren’t dead was their fearful breathing and that there was no smell of blood in the air—yet.
The scrape of boots announced that the true powers had entered the warren.
Prince True Flame was a schoolgirl’s wet dream of an elf, from golden hair to skin that looked carved from white marble. He was dressed in spotless white.
Prince True Flame came to tower over Tommy. “Where is she?”
“Where is who?” Had Tinker disappeared again? God forbid, since the world turned upside down every time she did.
“The Stone Clan domi Jewel Tear on Stone. Where is she?”
“I don’t know!” Tommy shouted.
“True Flame.” Windwolf blocked the prince’s kick to Tommy’s head. “We have no proof that they had anything to do with it.”
“He has his father’s powers.” True Flame glared down at Tommy.
“I told you, his powers are limited.” Windwolf stayed between Tommy and the prince. “Look around you. This is a household, not a camp of warriors fresh from battle.”
“They are oni spawn with no one trustworthy standing responsible for their actions. They refuse your protection, so they are not part of us.”
“They do not trust us, and if this is how we treat them with no proof to support an attack, then they have full right to mistrust us.”
They searched for proof. They were thorough but strangely neat about it. The oni would have broken everything as they searched, but when the elves were done, nothing seemed disturbed.
“What’s going on?” Tommy growled into the battered floor.
“Ginger Wine’s enclave was attacked. Jewel Tear was taken,” Windwolf said.
“And you suspect us?”
“The oni clouded the minds of the sekasha and took them unawares.”
And Tommy was one of the few people in Pittsburgh that had the ability, but he wasn’t the only one. “The oni had a kitsune. She’s better at the mind tricks than I am.”
“Yes, so my domi tells me.”
Windwolf trusted Tommy, but obviously he wasn’t top dog in Pittsburgh anymore. Prince True Flame was now the one that said who lived and died. The half-oni had fallen into an “all or nothing” category. If the elves decided Tommy was guilty of helping the oni, then all his cousins would be ruled guilty, too. It would be a quick slaughter.
He needed to get the elves away from his warren so his family could disappear. “Let me help find her.”
Windwolf’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “You want to help?”
“No one knows Pittsburgh better than me. I need to go to Ginger Wine’s, though, where it all started.”
“It’s a Wind Clan enclave. I can grant you access to it.” Windwolf motioned to the soldiers pinning Tommy down.
Tommy carefully freed his eight-year-old cousin, Spot, and tucked the small boy under his arm. “Spot has a better nose than me. He might be able to smell something out.”
From across the room, Bingo gave him puzzled look and murmured, “What are you doing?”
They’d found out long ago that if they whispered without moving their mouths, their extra-sharp ears would pick it up without them being overheard.
“Move the warren,” Tommy whispered back.
“What about you?” Bingo asked.
“I’ll get them away from here so you can disappear.”
“Tommy . . .”
“Do it.” Tommy hissed.
Bingo hung his head and looked away.
* * *
All three TV channels had their news trucks outside of Ginger Wine’s smoldering enclave. Under bright mobile spotlights, the reporters were recording the human take on the night’s activities. They were making a big fuss over the fact that the dead oni were being stacked like cordwood on the curb. Didn’t they know that the oni fed their dead to their dogs?
Tommy used the brilliance and shadows to stay hidden from the reporters as he slipped through Ginger Wine’s front gate. A full battle had been pitched inside the enclave. Half the buildings were leveled, the ruins still smoldering. Empty bullet casings brightly littered the ground, and blood was sprayed across the walls. It was going to be hard to find anything useful in the rubble.
The elves frightened Spot. When Tommy put him down, the boy clung to Tommy’s hand. Spot was silent as usual, but his solid amber eyes drank in every detail. The elves shied away from them, trying not to look at the boy’s short black fur, doglike muzzle and long, floppy ears. Spot had his mother’s sweetness; he didn’t deserve the frightened glances.
“We need to track the oni.” Tommy kept the anger out of his voice—it wasn’t the boy he was angry with. “You understand?”
Spot nodded wordlessly and crouched down to sniff at the gleaming wooden floors. Hands flat on the ground, he half ran in circles around Tommy, trying to make sense out of the confusion of scents. Windwolf, Ginger Wine, and the viceroy’s bodyguards stood back, silently watching the boy track.
Spot picked his way through the maze of the enclaves. The oni had avoided the great inner courtyard, instead working their way through almost all of the back passages that the staff used to access the guest rooms. All but one of the dead elves had been killed unaware, not that it lessened the carnage done to their bodies. Oni were like sharks when it came to blood; once they smelled it, they went a little mad. Unarmed members of Ginger Wine’s staff and several of her laedin-caste guards had been hacked apart in hallways and public rooms. Eight of the sekasha been killed in their bedrooms. Obviously the oni had moved unseen and unheard through the enclave. No wonder the elves suspected him.
The boy suddenly veered off to a little back room stacked with baskets, rakes, and snow shovels. Tucked in the very back, hidden from a casual search of the room, was a bed complete with goose-down pillows, silk sheets, and rich wool blankets. Apples, keva beans, and smoked river shark had been squirreled in easy reach of the luxurious bed. Even Tommy’s weak nose could identify the musky scent of a kitsune.
“Chiyo was living here.” Tommy nudged two baskets that were lined with towels. “Looks like she planned to have her litter here. She’s got another week or two before she’s due.”
Ginger Wine gasped and dropped to her knees. “I didn’t know, domou. Please. I didn’t know.”
“You came to me with your concerns weeks ago,” Windwolf said. “I should have investigated. This is not your fault.”
Tommy locked down on a bitter laugh. The elves got completely forgiven for housing an oni—not even yelled at—but his entire family was blamed for something they had not
hing to do with.
* * *
The moon was rising as Spot followed the track to the side gate that gave cars and horses access to a barnlike outbuilding. The boy lost the scent there.
“They probably had a truck waiting.” Tommy patted the boy on the head and gave him an apple stolen from the courtyard. “At sixty miles per hour, they could be anywhere in Pittsburgh by now.”
Prince True Flame huffed. “I think they will take her west. There are no Spell Stones there. She will be helpless, as will we.”
“I’m not leaving the city,” Windwolf said quietly. “They almost killed my beloved yesterday. Her arm is broken, and she is—nearly—helpless. The healing spells will keep her weak for days.”
“Your domi will be safe in the enclave.”
Windwolf stood firm. “I have given up three hundred thousand sen of virgin forest to the Stone Clan, and what have they managed to do? Earth Son forced his Hand against him. Forest Moss has gone mad.” As if summoned by his name, the domana started to scream. “And now this idiocy. A single ground scry would have picked up the kitsune. Three Stone Clan domana, and not one checked the buildings they slept in? This is a war zone!”
“That is not how the Stone Clan will see this. They will see it as a failure on the Wind Clan’s part. You should have made sure that the enclave was safe.”
“You know that the wind scry couldn’t have found the kitsune. That was the whole point of requesting Stone Clan to send help.”
Prince True Flame glanced toward Tommy. “I will send word to my sister. She will have to deal with the Stone Clan somehow. We need more domana or we will fall here. The Stone Clan will want a scapegoat for this if we cannot recover Jewel Tear. They will want you, cousin, but I will offer them the oni spawn.”
* * *
They let him go. At first he was surprised, but then he realized that they wanted the Stone Clan to waste time trying to find him. So far the elves couldn’t find their ass with both hands. An elfin carpenter, however, was more thorough than a human one, because the elf had forever to hammer down nails. The Stone Clan would find Tommy eventually.
