The Art of Stealing Time t-2

by Katie MacAlister

  “Think we could do that with Astrid?”

  He glanced upward as red and gray clouds gathered overhead, and flexed his fingers. Lightning streaked in a brilliant arc across the roiling sky. “We could try, although she’s not mortal as they were.”

  “This ends now!”

  “Oooh.” We both watched as Holly, with a firm grip on Diego, hauled Ethan over to us. “Someone has a mad.”

  “I’ll deal with you later,” she snapped, piercing me with a look that had me gripping the hilt of my sword tighter. She turned back to Aaron. “You have violated the terms of our agreement. Either hand Anwyn over to Ethan, or prepare for battle. This war will end today, one way or another!”

  Aaron stood silent for a moment, his expression grave, but not overly concerned. I figured he’d just tell Holly to get stuffed, or banish her, or whatever a king did when someone lipped off to him, but he did none of those things.

  “Very well.” He wiped his hands on a filthy oil rag. “Since you have called for a challenge of the body, you shall have it.”

  “Wait!” Ethan almost shrieked, jerking Diego away from Holly in order to clutch his arm tight to his body. “I’m a lover, not a fighter. Well, I was a fighter, but that was centuries ago, before Diego took over. I refuse to fight.”

  “You do not,” Holly snapped. “You’ll fight and like it! Because if you don’t, I’ll see to it that you will never be able to be called a lover again.”

  We all raised our respective eyebrows at her tone. Ethan had evidently had enough of her bossing him around, not to mention obviously threatening him with gelding, because he straightened up and looked down his nose when he said, “You go too far, woman.”

  “Strewth, your sheila’s mad as a cut snake,” De Ath said, strolling over to us. “Stop her earbashing, and let’s go have a butcher.”

  “Oooh. Australian accents are just so . . .” I stopped when I felt Gregory glare at me. “... not nearly as sexy as slightly middle-European ones.”

  “Nice save,” he murmured in my ear. “But you will pay for that later.”

  “Promises, promises.”

  “I know my rights,” Ethan continued, scowling at Holly. “And they say that I am entitled to elect two champions to fight on my behalf. I shall do so. De Ath?”

  “Happy to oblige, mate.”

  “Champions, eh?” Aaron’s gaze wandered along the semicircle of warriors who suddenly stood at attention. Doug, who had been on the far side of the Velociphant, moved forward into a flanking position. “As you like. I name the thief and the lady with the sword.”

  I turned what I feared were bulging eyes on him. “Gregory and me?” I squeaked just as Doug came forward and said, “My lord, I fear that would be unwise. Lady Gwen has little battle experience, and the thief has none that I’m aware of.”

  “No takebacks!” Ethan said quickly. His alien arm reached out and visibly pinched Holly on the ass. She jumped and slapped it until Ethan, murmuring softly to his arm, regained control over it.

  “I shall be Ethan’s second champion,” she said through gritted teeth, sharing an angry look with all of us before spinning around on her heels and marching over to a laden squire.

  I looked at Gregory. “How do you feel about running away while screaming at the top of our lungs?”

  “It sounds like an excellent plan, but unfortunately I don’t think we can do it.”

  “Why? Doug would happily take our places, and he could probably whup Holly’s butt.”

  Gregory leaned over to Aaron. “If we do this, you will banish the reclaimer.”

  “Not unless you bring back my bird.”

  Gregory looked at him silently for a moment, then to my horror, nodded his head. “Very well. But you will owe us a further boon.”

  “What sort of boon?” I asked.

  Aaron gave a half shrug. “If you return my bird to me, you shall have anything you want.”

  Ten minutes later, the six of us stood on the mounded battleground, the clouds overhead thundering with ominous warning. Ethan stood on one side behind Holly and De Ath, who had been given a sword and was busily flirting with a woman in the crowd. Gregory had likewise been offered a sword, but had opted, upon seeing Holly with her daggers, to go with a wicked-looking shiv. Around us, in a circle, were the inhabitants of both camps. I saw several familiar faces—Master Hamo, Seith, Buttercup, Antoinette, the apothecary—they were all there. All except my mothers. I had mixed feelings about that; part of me wanted them to see me in my pretty armor, wielding my impressive sword, but the other part, the part that knew just how little skill I had with both, was happy they wouldn’t see me wiped into the red dirt.

  “Stop it. You’re not going to fail,” a soft voice said in my ear.

  I stared at Gregory. “Are you reading minds now?”

  He laughed. “I didn’t have to. Your expression made your thoughts quite clear.”

  I took a deep breath. “I think the odds are pretty good that we aren’t going to be asking Aaron for that boon anytime soon. I’ve only had a couple of battle lessons, and I doubt if you’ve ever been in a knife fight in your life.”

  “You also bear what is more or less a magic sword, and I have something very valuable at stake—our future happiness. Have faith, my sweet. I am confident we will prevail.”

  “But I have to fight Death, Gregory. Death!”

  “Who has no power here because he has been banished, and stripped of his abilities in Anwyn.”

  “There is that, at least. You’re sure you’re OK with fighting a woman?” I asked, nodding at Holly, who was running a whetstone over her daggers.

  He pulled me to him in a kiss that had me sweating under my armor. “Yes,” he said a minute later when he allowed me to catch my breath. “I’m quite sure.”

  I slid a glance down at his chest. “No porraimos lightning?”

  He just smiled and released me.

  “This battle shall commence along these terms,” Aaron said, speaking in a voice that resonated with grandeur. He was so down-to-earth that it was easy to forget he actually ruled this realm. “The two champions shall fight until only one remains standing. The losers will unequivocally yield to the winner, with no objections to any ransom sought. Are the terms agreeable?”

  “They are,” Ethan said. Two women were in the process of helping him into his arm harness. “Let the battle commence.”

  “I say that!” Aaron said with a frown. He took a deep breath, eyed Gregory and me, and then said in a peeved tone, “Let the battle commence!”

  Holly was on Gregory before he could so much as blink, the two of them rolling down the mound in a cloud of red dust, but I couldn’t do anything to help him because De Ath bowed to me and said, “I believe the technical term here is en garde.”

  I lifted my sword in an answering salute, and tried frantically to remember everything that Master Hamo had showed me earlier in the afternoon.

  The Nightingale sang as I swung the sword to parry, my armor feeling heavy and clunky despite fitting me perfectly before. I stumbled backward, just barely blocking the attacking thrusts that De Ath made with apparent ease. He wore armor on his chest, but no helm, which meant his faint smile that never seemed to waver was right there, mocking my belief that I could survive this experience.

  “You’re not very good at this, are you?” he asked, swinging his sword in a move that would have decapitated me had I not managed to heft the Nightingale just in time.

  “No, but I don’t have to be. I just have to give Gregory time to disable that annoying Holly,” I ground out through my teeth.

  His smile grew broader, and the crowd gasped as he suddenly jumped forward, forcing me back several steps, the Nightingale singing furiously as, miraculously, it managed to parry a flurry of strikes that moved so fast they were a blur. The Nightingale kept up with it, although how, I had no idea. It had to be the magic inherent in the sword, because I certainly didn’t have the skill to do it myself. I tried to make o
ne attack, but he easily spun away, sending me stumbling forward onto my knees. I was up on my feet before he could attack again, but unfortunately I fell backward onto my ass when I tripped over a large rock, the impact knocking the Nightingale out of my hand.

  A cry of horror went up from Aaron’s people. De Ath strolled toward me as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Behind him, I heard Gregory snarl. He emerged from the cloud of red dust, one of his arms hanging limply, dripping blood into the ground as he staggered forward. Holly screamed and leaped onto his back, her dagger dark with blood as she tried to sever his jugular.

  The crowd roared when I jumped to my feet and snatched up the Nightingale, but instead of attacking a surprised De Ath, I lunged at Holly, smashing the hilt down on her head just as her knife blade pierced Gregory’s throat. She clung on, although her knife tip dropped.

  De Ath yelled something. Time seemed to slow down at that moment, seconds crawling by like minutes. I felt the rush of air behind me heralding the oncoming blow from a massive sword. At the same moment, Gregory turned his head in slow motion, his pupils dilating as they focused beyond me, his expression changing from one of mingled anger and pain to one of fear.

  I knew, I just knew that we were both about to be killed. Holly’s hand was even then moving back to Gregory’s throat, but there wasn’t enough time for me to hit her again before De Ath’s blow would strike me. I wanted to tell Gregory just how deeply I loved him, but the words were stuck in my mouth. It was the end, and we both knew it.

  Blue light flashed in front of my eyes, a brilliant white-blue that sizzled along my skin and exploded outward in a booming flash that seemed to consume the world and leave it silent and empty.

  “Gwen?”

  I opened one eye. My vision was blurry, but the voice was as familiar as my own. “Are we dead?”

  “Not quite. Although we are in Anwyn.”

  I opened the other eye and concentrated on focusing my vision until the vision of multiple Gregories merged into one. “You are the best Traveller ever,” I told him.

  He smiled, kissed me gently, then touched a tender spot on my forehead. “You hit your head on your own sword.”

  “It was worth it to see an enraged Traveller do what he does best.” I let him help me up to my feet. It looked like a bomb had been dropped around us; the ground was scorched black, while the several hundred warriors and attendants had been felled just as though they were trees in the middle of a nuclear explosion. I was relieved to see that they weren’t dead, since they were slowly moving and sitting up. Ethan was on his knees, shaking his head. Aaron staggered as I watched, said something about his beloved Piranha, and stumbled off toward the giant machine. Holly lay still in a sort of a crater. De Ath was sitting with his hands dangling between his knees, his face black and his hair smoking.

  “Crikey,” he said in a rusty-sounding voice, then promptly fell over.

  “We won,” I told Gregory, and flung myself on him. He flinched, and I suddenly remembered his arm. “Goddess! She cut you!”

  “It’s nothing that won’t heal, although I believe she managed to dislocate my shoulder,” he said, a patient look on his face when I ripped off his sleeve to examine the damage. His arm was sliced in several spots, but the flow of blood was already beginning to thicken.

  “My moms can probably fix the dislocation,” I said.

  A look of embarrassment crossed his face. “Would you hold it against me if I said I would prefer to have a proper healer look at it? It’s not that I don’t like and respect your mothers, but they do have a tendency to . . . to . . .”

  “Mess things up?” I bound up the worst of the slashes, then cuddled into his good side, kissing the edges of his lips. “I wouldn’t mind in the least. Gregory—”

  “No thanks to the thief’s light show, the Piranha is unharmed,” Aaron announced, coming back to where we stood. He surveyed the people who were in various stages of recovering and getting back to their feet. “Although I regret that Constance left before she could be blasted. I would have paid good money to see that.”

  “I take back any objection I had to the thief,” Doug said from behind us. Aaron went to help him onto his feet.

  “I’m just glad my moms aren’t here—oh, hell, there they are. They must have heard the lightning explosion. They’re going to want to fix you, Gregory. I’ll go tell them to go back to Ethan’s camp until Aaron’s healer can see to you.”

  Gregory grabbed the back of my mail shirt as I started off, pulling me back. “You don’t want to do that, Gwen.”

  “Why don’t I?”

  “Because they have something we badly need.”

  “They really aren’t that great at healing, although they do try their best—”

  “No,” he interrupted. “Not that. See?”

  I looked at where he nodded. My mothers were picking their way through the half-sensible people, the slight form of Mrs. Vanilla in their grasp. “See what? All I see are my moms and Mrs. Vanilla.”

  “Yes.” He looked expectantly at me.

  I shook my head. “What is it that you see that I don’t?”

  “It’s not see so much as hear. What’s the name of the bird that Aaron is looking for?”

  “Vanellus.”

  “Right. And what does that sound like?”

  “Vanessa?”

  He looked at me.

  I pointed to my forehead. “I have a head injury. Stop giving me the look that says I’m missing something . . . Oh. Vanilla.” Enlightenment dawned with a prickle of electricity along my arms and legs. I turned to look back at my mothers. Gregory very gently placed a finger beneath my chin and pushed it upward until my mouth stopped hanging open in surprise. “You are kidding me!”

  “I think, unless we are very mistaken, that we are about to make Aaron extremely happy.”

  “Goodness!” Mom said as she and Mom Two lifted Mrs. Vanilla over the moaning, recumbent form of De Ath. “What did we miss?”

  “Nothing other than Gregory being awesome and stopping Death and Holly in one lightning-bedazzling blow.” Gregory smiled at the pride that I couldn’t keep out of my voice.

  “Death?” My moms stopped and looked worried.

  “He’s a new guy, evidently.” I waved toward De Ath, who once again was sitting up. “Not the same one you had the run-in with.”

  “G’day,” he said, lifting a shaky hand to my moms.

  “Oh, thank the goddess for that. Gwenny, dear, I believe Mrs. Vanilla is needed here.”

  “I do believe she is.” I watched as my moms stopped in front of me, gently setting Mrs. Vanilla onto the ground. She was just as crumpled as ever, a wrinkled old woman with hair that stood up in the back, and weathered skin that hinted at more years than most mortals saw.

  But she wasn’t mortal. At least, I didn’t think she was.

  “Do you want to do the honors?” Gregory asked me.

  “No. You figured it out. You can be the one to tell him.”

  “I love you, Gwenhwyfar Byron Owens.”

  “Almost as much as I love you, Gregory . . . er . . . what’s your middle name?”

  “I was born Rehor Ilie Nicolae Faa, which is Anglicized to Gregory Elijah Nicolas Faa.”

  “Rehor? Really?”

  “Really.”

  I licked the corner of his mouth. “Almost as much as I love you, Gregory Elijah Nicolas Faa.”

  “Do that again, and I won’t wait for a healer before I take you to bed,” he growled.

  I smiled, enjoying the way my heart sang when he turned and called for Aaron.

  “What is it? I’m busy right n—” Aaron, who was assisting the warriors nearest him, froze in mid-word, his expression blank as he stared past us.

  “I have goose bumps,” I whispered as Mrs. Vanilla, who had been making her usual unintelligible squeaks, stopped. She took one tottering step forward out of my mothers’ grips.

  Gregory said nothing, just held me with his good arm, his breath ruffling
my hair in a way that was both sensual and comforting. We were meant to be together, meant to be at that place at that time, watching as a frail old lady moved past us, every step she took transforming her. Her back straightened, her skin smoothed, her hair darkened and lengthened until it flowed down her back in ebony waves. Her bathrobe lengthened as well, becoming a long dark green velvet gown that hugged blossoming curves.

  “Vanellus,” Aaron breathed, his voice filled with awe at the vision of young womanhood that stopped before him.

  “Aaron,” she responded, her voice as light and high as . . . well, as a bird’s.

  I sniffled happily as they stared at each other for another minute, and then she was in his arms and the air was full of birdsong.

  “OK, that’s seriously romantic,” I said, blinking back a few happy tears.

  “It truly is,” Mom said, handing me a tissue before using another to dab at her own eyes. “And aren’t you glad that your mother and I liberated her when we did? Just look at how happy they are.”

  I turned to look up at Gregory and basked in the love evident in his beautiful eyes. “They can’t possibly be happier than we are.”

  “Not in a hundred lifetimes,” Gregory agreed, and took my breath away with a kiss that sent lightning shimmering about us both.

  EPILOGUE

  “Right, so I get the bit about that Death guy not having powers in Anwyn and calling off Astrid after you beat him, and I understand that Aaron was so grateful that you found his bird that he is letting you guys have visitation privileges as well as allowing Gwen’s moms to stay there where they won’t get into any trouble, and I even understand that Ethan’s tree dudes refused to go back to being plants once he was defeated, and they were assimilated into Aaron’s folk, but I do not get the whole thing about Mrs. Vanilla. Why did everyone call her a bird if she was really a woman? And why didn’t she do something to find Aaron when she was back in Anwyn?”

  Gregory greatly enjoyed the warmth of Gwen, pressed close to him, seated on a couch in the sunny Paris apartment that belonged to his cousin Peter.

  The cousin in question, sitting across from them, patted his wife’s leg. “I think, my love, you need to let Gregory and Gwen finish explaining what happened.”