Hunter's Oath

by Glynn Stewart

  Gunfire…was right out. Magic was even more so. Chernenkov cleared out of the greenspace next to Deerfoot Trail and into the community within a minute, dodging around pedestrians as I went after her.

  I was pretty sure I saw at least one woman pull out a phone after she knocked them aside. I suppressed the urge to knock the phone from her hand as I passed—the police were getting called. We just needed to get out of sight before they arrived.

  There was a gap as we cleared the strip mall where there were no humans around, and I tried to close with her, rapidly stepping in and out of Between.

  She slipped into the shadows, dodging me as we crossed a quite stretch of road and then returning to normal space as we charged past a gas station.

  This was not going as planned. Neither of us was running much faster than most humans, though few humans could have kept it up for as long as we did. We passed through several neighborhoods, another strip mall, and then we found ourselves charging into a familiar industrial district.

  She was headed for the Unseelie Court.

  Night was starting to fall around us, and the industrial district was deserted now. I risked a bolt of flame, a distraction as I closed the distance.

  Chernenkov, however, had come to the same conclusion I had. I stepped out of Between into a dark alley, maybe a block from the warehouse that served as Unseelie Court, and directly into a clawed fist.

  That hurt, sending me reeling backward as she snarled at me.

  “Fine,” she hissed. “You want to play, despite it all? Gráinne should have let me eat your heart!”

  “She might agree with you now,” I told her. “Except Gráinne’s dead. The Covenants prescribe the Cold Death for her crimes, so I guess you can call that mercy.”

  She snarled, long sharp teeth appearing in a mouth that wasn’t really designed for them.

  “Damn you. You lie. You’re nothing. A changeling. How?”

  “I am a Hunter’s changeling and a Vassal of the Queen of the Fae,” I told her quietly as I drew the whip stock from its holster. “Maria Chernenkov, you are charged with murder and working with the enemies of the High Court, with treason of the first order.

  “Surrender, and Her Majesty may show clemency. Fight me, and I will have no choice but to execute the penalties laid out by the High Court for your crimes.”

  We had an audience. I wasn’t sure where they had come from, but that was perhaps inevitable given that we were now very much in Unseelie territory. A dozen fae now lined the end of the alley, which was probably part of why Chernenkov had finally turned at bay.

  “Fuck your High Court and fuck your Queen,” she hissed. “If I rip your throat out, that ends this.”

  “Not really,” I told her. “You attacked a Fae Court, tried to start a war. There will be consequences no matter what happens now.”

  Flickering shadows surrounded her now, dark flames highlighting her limbs as she partially transformed, claws and teeth and spikes forming on her flesh. Shadow lashed out at me, darkness lunging toward me like an arrow.

  Fear rippled off her as well as she tried to pin me in place for her attack. I’d felt the trick too many times before, though, and I shrugged it away this time as I dodged her arrow and responded in kind.

  Fire and shadow flashed through the alleyway as we clashed, and then I flicked my whip out toward her. I almost managed to wrap the fiery tendril around her, but she flashed to shadow and flipped out of the strike, closing with me at a terrifying speed.

  I didn’t even think. The first of the cold iron spikes was in my left hand and went flashing out as the Pouka closed.

  I missed her shadow but slammed a six-inch-long cold iron spike into her stomach. She hissed loudly, stumbling backward while a stream of curses spewed forth.

  “You’ll pay for that. I will tear your heart out and eat it.”

  She ripped the spike from her flesh, tossing it aside as her skin steamed against our kind’s bane.

  “I know how to kill you this time, Maria,” I told her. “Surrender. There can still be mercy.”

  “What, if I betray everything?” she laughed. “I know Seelie mercy. Seelie generosity. I will die standing, not kneeling and whinging like a starving animal!”

  That was the second time someone had said they’d die standing to me today, and I was starting to get sick of it.

  “I’d really prefer it if no one died at all,” I said conversationally. “Not least since my Queen really wants to talk to you. If you insist, however, I don’t have to bring you in in one piece.”

  My whip lashed out and our deadly dance of Fire and shadow resumed. She dodged around the flame and struck with her claws, closing with me inside the curve of the whip. Claws and teeth and shadow lunged for me…and then I wasn’t there.

  I stepped Between, emerging behind her, and this time, I did catch her with the whip. I yanked her back toward me and a second spike was in my hand. She broke free of the flame tendril…and for one necessary moment, she was still.

  And so was her shadow.

  The cold iron spike hammered through her shadow into the concrete, shattering the ground under my blow. I released the spike and it moved away, shifting with her shadow as it pinned her.

  She wasn’t pinned to any particular spot. Just to…reality, I guessed.

  It apparently hurt. She’d been angry at me when I’d stabbed her flesh with an iron spike, but when I stabbed her shadow, she screamed.

  No human could have made that noise. A bloodcurdling shriek echoed through the warehouse district, and Chernenkov recoiled from me.

  She was slower now. The spike in her shadow was clearly impeding her somehow. I didn’t pretend to understand how it worked. I only knew that she was vulnerable, and I pressed my attack.

  Fire flickered down the alleyway as I tried to pin her in place, trapping her between the whip of green-white flame and bolts of Fire on the other side as I drew a third cold iron spike.

  She hesitated and I charged. Fire slammed her into place, holding her shadow still for a precious moment and I swung the cold iron spike for the blow that would truly cripple her…

  And a blast of force caught me in mid-strike, tossing the spike and me aside alike. Chernenkov skittered away and I controlled my descent with Force to land on my feet, facing Lord Andrell.

  Fury marked his beautiful face. Power flickered around his hands and he snarled at his Court.

  “Will you all just stand by and watch him murder one of ours?” he bellowed. “Fight, you mewling fools!”

  32

  There were over a dozen Unseelie around me now. No redcaps, which suggested this was the official Unseelie Court, but several Gentry. A hag. A nightmare. A couple of Svartálfar, black dwarves related to gnomes like Eric. One of the Nobles who’d arrived at the airport with Andrell.

  There were others too, but the math ran through my head in moments as they hesitated. They might not want to fight me—they all knew who I represented—but they had sworn Fealty.

  Their oaths bound them as much as mine bound me.

  “Lord Andrell,” I challenged him quietly. “You know my orders. You know what this Pouka has done. You swore to assist me in hunting her down. Why?”

  “You cannot simply execute Unseelie in the streets!” he barked.

  “The High Court disagrees, though I was actually tasked with capturing her,” I told him. “To bring her before our Powers to face justice for her crimes. As we once spoke about the redcaps we now know served her, do you claim her, then? Is she of your Court, bound by Fealty, that you are responsible for her actions? For her crimes?”

  “For her to feed and live is no crime except in the eyes of the Seelie,” he snarled. “You have tried to break us, to turn us into dogs that beg at your heel for the scraps you allow us. I will not permit you to punish her for what she is!”

  “That is not my command,” I told him. “My command was to capture the mastermind behind the attack on the Seelie Court in this city, to interroga
te her to learn of her ties to the Masked Lords, and to bring safety to this city.

  “I swore an oath, Lord Andrell. So did you. To uphold Court and Covenant. You even promised me to bring this one to justice.”

  Chernenkov was out of the gap between us now, trying to blend into the background of Unseelie watching the standoff. At Andrell’s word, they would all attack. So would she.

  “So, I ask again, Lord Andrell. Do you claim her? Is she of your Court and bound by Fealty?”

  “She is my wife,” he snarled, the words echoing in a sudden still silence. “I am hers and she is mine, by whatever oaths or terms you demand. I refuse to allow you to judge her, destroy her. Let the High Court be damned.”

  “Ah,” I said. “I’m guessing there’s an iron mask floating around here somewhere, isn’t there, Lord Andrell? Or was Gráinne your contact and your own treason merely by association?”

  “We should never have bowed to the High Court,” he told me. He was calmer now, which was somehow even more terrifying. With a now-familiar gesture, he snapped his hand out and the same cold iron mask Gráinne had worn flashed into existence.

  “My sword, Vestri,” he commanded. The Svartálfar he was speaking to hesitated. “You are bound by Fealty,” he snapped. “My sword.”

  The black dwarf gestured, drawing a blade out of the shadow around us. I knew what it was before I even looked at it. Like Talus, Andrell had a gnomish warblade. In his case, probably forged by one of the Svartálfar around him.

  A silver-hilted cold iron blade, with orichalcum runes along its length.

  “You have broken oath and Fealty and Covenant, Lord Andrell,” I said quietly. I couldn’t fight a Fae Lord. But I also couldn’t fight his entire Court…so I’d choose the fight against my actual enemy. “In the name of Our Queen, I challenge you. For the honor of our people and the will of the High Court, I demand that you face me.”

  He slammed the mask onto his face, its magic sweeping over him as the glamor concealed his form. It was a pointless gesture today, when everyone around him knew who he was and what was happening, but with his defiance in the air, I supposed there was no reason not to.

  “So be it,” he said harshly. “Are you prepared to die, Hunter’s changeling?”

  “I am a Vassal of the Queen of the Fae,” I told him. “Whether I am prepared is irrelevant. I swore an oath.”

  Damn, he was fast.

  One moment, he’d been snarking at me about his wife and my willingness to die. The next, he’d crossed five meters of distance and was striking for my face.

  I wasn’t there. I stepped Between to buy myself breathing room, reappearing back into reality behind Lord Andrell with the whip in my hand. Green-white fire flicked toward his back, but he was turning almost before I emerged from Between.

  The cold iron blade flashed through the tendril of flame, severing the spell and collapsing my whip out of existence. A dozen flashing swords of glamor snapped into existence around me, diving toward me at blistering speed.

  Inga’s training served me well. I leapt backward, driving my movement with telekinesis even as I threw shields of force in front of the path of the glamor-blades. Illusory—but all too deadly—swords shattered on my shields.

  Instinct screamed and I dropped to the ground, landing on one knee as a series of blistering-hot bolts of Fire tore through where I’d been floating.

  Andrell advanced behind his attack, the warblade held loosely in his hands as he approached me. Bolts of Fire, ice and glamored Force flickered down the alleyway, clearing a gap behind me as his Court got out of the way.

  I met it all with a single shield of Force. Inga had taught me to use angles and skill to deflect attacks, and the barrier I flung up was an invisible mountain range of shifting planes that caught attack after attack and flung them to the sky or the ground.

  For a moment, Andrell’s attack hammered against my shield and I held.

  Then the wave of strikes flickered out and I met the Unseelie Lord’s gaze across the darkened alleyway. Part of me wanted to mock him, to demand if that was the best he had.

  The problem was that I knew it wasn’t.

  “Impressive,” he murmured quietly. “What are you? No changeling, no quarter-human, should be able to stand against a Fae Lord, even for a moment.”

  He shrugged. There was no lapse between his words, his shrug and his attack. Even as he was speaking, an inferno of Fire and ice erupted from thin air, hammering toward me with the fury of a Fae Lord.

  I wasn’t there. Cold flickered over my skin as I stepped Between and emerged behind his attack—and less than a meter from Andrell himself. The Wizard’s gift flared with power as I struck, channeling every ounce of magic and strength I had into a blow that would have gutted a building.

  Pure-white flame lashed out from the whip stock, heat that seared even me as it flashed out and wrapped around Andrell.

  He caught the flame. His free hand flashed out and he parried the whip of heat and Force with his forearm, wrapping the tendril of white-hot flame around his flesh and using it to pull me to him.

  I let him, gathering force in my other hand and punching him in the face with it.

  I didn’t actually expect that to work. His head snapped back as I hit with the force of a speeding truck and he went flying backward, my whip of flame tearing off flesh as he collapsed against a wall.

  The smell of burnt pork filled the alleyway, and I could see ash and blood on the ground as he stumbled.

  “They say to defeat God, all you have to do is show that he bleeds,” Andrell said quietly, his thick Irish accent still beautiful despite it all. “Having killed gods, I disagree with that assessment.”

  There was something new in his voice as he drew himself up straight to face me. He was favoring his left arm now, though any injury I’d managed to inflict on a Fae Lord wouldn’t last long.

  “I know you now, boy,” he hissed. “I should have known before we ever came. Of course, Mellie’s child would be His. What lies have been told and blood has been shed to keep you secret? What hell did that bitch of a Queen bury your mother in to shield you from us?”

  “Yield, Andrell,” I told him. “There can still be clemency here, even for you.”

  He laughed. With the full physical power of a Fae Lord, his laughter echoed like gunshots in the silence of the alleyway.

  “You don’t get it, do you, boy?” he demanded. “I am what you named me, yes. I am a Masked Lord. When the High Court grew too full of themselves and showed weakness, I rode against gods. You have drawn blood, which even your Queen failed at, but there is no mercy here. No peace.

  “Your Queen neutered the power and glory of the Sidhe! We will be reborn in fire and blood once again.”

  “You’ve already failed here,” I pointed out. “This city will never be a sanctuary for you.”

  “There are other cities. Other wars.” He laughed again. “Even being the only known Masked Lord has its advantages. Think of the traps we can lure fools like you into if you hunt me. You can’t win this; you know that.”

  “I’ve already won,” I told him softly. “You have no Court here, Andrell. No Fealty. No Covenants. You have betrayed all of them and are nothing.”

  He was silent, and I could tell that he was looking at the Unseelie who’d surrounded us in an ancient ritual that any back-alley scrapper would recognize the heart of.

  He knew I was telling the truth. His Court would not follow him out of there. He could kill me, but I’d already won. Calgary would never be a sanctuary for the Masked Lords. The watchers would carry the story, and it was unlikely even the Unseelie Court here would survive.

  Andrell could kill them all, I supposed, but he could no longer bind them with Fealty.

  Oaths flow both ways, and he had broken them.

  The long moment of silence was broken by his laughter again.

  “So be it,” he told me. “You are the first in a long time to draw blood on me, boy. I’ll give you that.
But we know how this ends.”

  New glamor wrapped around him and he grew, gaining height and bulk as he approached me. Fire and shadow wrapped around his newly giant form as he doubled in height.

  “Kneel, boy, and I will make it quick.”

  “Oh, go fuck yourself.”

  Fire flashed in the alleyway again, and a gnomish warblade met wizard-augmented Fire. His Power flared against mine.

  The Wizard’s gift let me stand against him. For several eternal seconds, I met the strength and fury of a Fae Lord and withstood him.

  It didn’t last. It couldn’t. The warblade exploded in Power, Fire and Force shattering my flame and throwing me away. I barely managed to slow my landing to something reasonable, but Andrell advanced on me with the fury of the lesser god he truly was.

  “I know you now, boy,” he repeated. “I killed your father. Now I’m going to kill you.”

  “The funniest part is that I have no fucking idea what you’re talking about,” I told him as I stepped Between to dodge a blast of fire. Giant or not, the Lord was terrifyingly fast, and despite a momentary feeling of power, I couldn’t face his magic.

  He laughed and lashed out at me in a single second. I barely deflected the Fire into a wall and danced backward.

  We were making one hell of a mess of this alley, but the Unseelie continued to circle around us. It wasn’t every day you saw a Fae Lord fight anyone. It was even rarer you saw anyone survive facing a Fae Lord for any extended period of time.

  I mostly managed it by not being where he struck. Between was my salvation as I dodged in and out of reality to avoid his blows, far too overwhelmed to try and strike back or actually fight him at this point.

  My day was starting to take a toll on me as well. I could tell that my reservoir of Power was fading fast. Even stepping Between was starting to drain me, to take longer…and Andrell could tell.

  I stepped wrong and he was waiting for it.

  A fraction of a second longer to enter Between was too long, and a man-sized icicle hammered into me. I managed to get enough Force in front of it to blunt the blow, but that was all.