by C. Gockel
Swinging his branch at another deadly cretaceous turkey, Lionel says, “Up ahead is a spot of dry land. If we get there, I can use magic.”
A third head peers out of the vegetation. Somewhere beyond it, Tara hears another coo. Hissing and spitting, one of the raptors tries to flank them. Tara jabs it with her stick and the smell of burning feathers makes her grimace. The creature backs up, and one of its legs plunges into the black water. With a terrified-sounding shriek, it leaps back into the foliage just as another lunges. Swinging at it, Lionel cries, “It’s working!”
He sounds way too optimistic, and Tara cries, “Don’t jinx it!”
At her words, a raptor goes flying over their heads, flapping its rudimentary wings and shedding feathers. She hears a thud, and whispers, “What happened?”
“I jinxed it,” says Lionel. “Fascinating that both our languages have the concept of ‘jinx.’”
“Lionel, focus!” Tara shouts, sidestepping a lunge at her calf.
Lionel replies, “Just a few dozen more paces!”
“Dozens?” Tara squeaks. The raptors have edged them closer to the water. It gives them only three sides to cover instead of four, but the raptors are afraid of the water, and Tara's pretty sure she should be too.
“It could be worse,” he mutters.
“Don’t say that!” Tara protests. That is exactly the moment a raindrop lands on her nose. “You so jinxed it,” she grinds out.
“What?” Lionel pants.
Thunder rumbles. More drops thwack against the grasses, and Tara’s smoldering branch steams and hisses.
“I jinxed it,” Lionel admits.
Tara looks at the black surface of the water, riddled with raindrops. “Can you swim?” she asks.
“Yes.”
She eyes a mound of earth a few yards across the black expanse of water. It’s high ground. He should be able to use his magic there. “We’ve got to swim.”
“Whatever is keeping them out of the water is going to eat us!” Lionel says.
“The raptors are going to eat us!” Tara retorts. She never thought she’d ever give up her Jimmy Choo boots, but she kicks them off in a flash and takes off her coat. “And I don’t think they can swim.” They’re just overgrown turkeys, or nasty ostriches … neither of those can swim, right?
A raptor shrieks, far too close, and there is a thud and a crack. “We’ll swim,” Lionel mutters. “A lady in the lake or selkies can be bargained with. On two,” says Lionel.
“One,” says Lionel.
A raptor opens its mouth and makes a shrill scream. “Now!” shouts Tara. She shoves the dead end of the torch into a raptor’s maw, throws her coat on another, and dives. She hears Lionel splash beside her.
The water is cold, and she still has too many clothes on, but Tara’s a good swimmer.
“They aren’t following!” she hears Lionel say, a few feet behind.
“Don’t … Look … Back!” Tara cries between strokes.
She hears a splash.
“I jinxed us again,” Lionel gasps. In the corner of her eye, she sees him catch up to her with a decent freestyle. She doesn’t look back to see what he means, but all of a sudden, she feels something snake around her waist. She tries to swim faster, but the snake-thing tightens. Tara gasps for breath and struggles against it. Looking down, she screams. “Is this a tongue?”
“Maybe a tentacle,” Lionel says, struggling beside her.
Tara tries to kick at the tentacle-tongue, and gets dragged beneath the water. In the blackness, she thinks she makes out a set of glowing blue-green eyes, each as large as her head. Beside her, she sees bubbles, and realizes Lionel is being dragged down, too. She struggles against the creature, but feels herself weakening. Her lungs feel like they will explode. Her muscles start to go slack … and suddenly she is above the water, gasping for breath, Lionel beside her. Before she can thank her luck, she catches sight of four velociraptors swimming directly toward them.
“Damn,” she mutters, and wonders if death by bog monster would be quicker.
One of the first velociraptors goes underwater, and then the next.
“What?” says Lionel.
“Is it diving?” Tara says, searching the water for sight of the creature.
“I don’t know,” says Lionel.
The third and fourth velociraptors disappear. Tara holds her breath, waiting for the bite of teeth underwater. They don’t come.
The velociraptors on the shore squawk and shriek at them. Before Tara knows what is happening, she and Lionel are lifted by the tongue-tentacles into the air and thrust toward the shore. The tentacles do not release, and the force of reaching the end of the thrust rattles Tara’s teeth. The raptors leap toward them, and before she can blink, she’s yanked backward with more jaw-rattling force. The velociraptors splash into the water and then disappear into the depths.
“Is it fishing with us?” Tara cries.
She sees a few more velociraptors peek from the grasses. Before she can count how many, she and Lionel are thrust forward and back again. One more beast jumps, and it disappears into the black water. The others vanish into the grass.
The tentacles pull Tara and Lionel back to the center of the water where they’d first been caught, but don’t let them go.
Catching her breath, Tara says, “Thank you for not eating us, mister …” She almost says “monster” but decides that might be rude. “Amazing water creature who must be like an octopus of my home world. They’re very smart and also cute.”
The tentacles slide away, leaving Tara and Lionel sputtering and treading water.
“And thank you for that,” Tara says.
“Tara!” says Lionel. “Don’t talk to it, swim!” And then his eyes get very wide and he looks at a point beyond Tara’s shoulder.
Instead of swimming, she looks.
Two enormous blue-green eyes with the depth and luminosity of opals are staring at her. Between them stretches a skin that’s mostly black but swirls with blues and purples. Tara is dumbfounded. It’s possible that she is maybe about to die, but why would it let her go if it was going to eat her? She can’t out swim it; its tentacles are everywhere.
“Hi,” Tara whispers. “You have beautiful eyes.” And wonders if she is about to become a candidate for a Darwin award again.
She hears splashing behind her and before she knows it, Lionel has wrapped an arm around her waist and is pulling her toward the shore. The eyes rise out of the water on a head that looks very octopus-like, but it opens a mouth that has as many teeth as a shark.
Lionel curses. The head expands with a whooshing noise. And then the head lowers, and bubbles course toward them, pushing them to the shore.
Tara laughs, and Lionel says, “You’re lucky we don’t taste good.”
“It’s a real alien!” Tara cries. She is living in Star Trek!
Her feet hit the bottom of the pool, and Lionel lets her waist go, but grabs her arm and drags her onto dry land. The wind must have picked up because she hears branches clacking together. He’s walking so fast. It may be the narrow escape from death, but she finds herself babbling. “It understood me, I know it did. Inky, I’ll be your bait for velociraptors anytime!”
A jet-black tentacle pops above the water and sways. “Inky is waving at us!” Tara exclaims. Lionel doesn’t even pause to look back.
“What’s the rush?” Tara asks. “I’m tired and hungry. We can rest here. If any more meanies show up, Inky will eat them.” And maybe they could snuggle again. Tara feels warmer just remembering her night in Lionel’s arms.
Lionel finally stops. The rain has stopped as suddenly as it began, but his hair is still plastered to his head, and his ears are pointing between the strands. “Tara, you can’t play bait for the kraken. Much longer in the water and we’d catch hypothermia.”
“No, I’m not cold—” At that moment, she realizes that what she took to be tree branches snapping in the wind is her teeth chattering. “Oh.”
Tara follows him along the “ridge.” Instead of grasses, it’s got trees, and the ground beneath their feet is more solid, but she’s only wearing socks, and she keeps stepping on things that poke and prickle. Lionel’s feet have been bare since they left the circle, and he hasn’t complained. She finds herself wishing he’d complain so she could complain, too.
Lionel turns to her. “I can’t believe you named a kraken Inky.”
Tara scowls. “You’re the one who was doing a cross-cultural linguistic study in the middle of a fight with velociraptors.”
He stops in his tracks. “And so I did.” Meeting her gaze, a smile spreads across his face. It’s kind of cheeky, definitely unashamed, and it takes her breath away. As much as his face has changed, he still has that dimple. Her heart stops, and her lips part.
From the air, she hears rawking. “Over here! Over here!”
Lionel looks to the sound. “Huginn and Muninn!”
The two birds swoop overhead. “Follow, quick! Quick!”
From behind them comes a familiar cooing, and then a shriek.
Tara clutches his arm. “Velociraptors!”
“It’s better to face them than to run,” Lionel says, putting himself between her and the raptor cries. “And I have my magic.”
Peering around him, Tara sees the shapes of the raptors emerging from the trees. Lionel raises a hand toward them, and then looks down at it. “I don’t have my magic,” he whispers. “It’s the water from the lagoon … it’s in my hair and my clothes.”
The velociraptors charge from behind the trees, leaping into air above their heads, and a strange whistling fills the air. The last thing Tara sees are talons as Lionel spins and tackles her to the ground.
Stranger in a Strange Land
Lionel has tackled Tara to the ground before he’s even really thought to himself what he’s doing. There’s the scream from a raptor above them, and he feels the beat of wings. The beast lands just beyond them. Flapping, claws scraping in the sod, it turns around, and then its shadow is above them. It lurches, and then its weight is crushing down on Lionel and Tara below him. Hot liquid spills over Lionel’s neck and back. It takes a moment to realize that it’s not his blood. Pushing the beast off, he sees arrows protruding from its body and the bodies of other members of its flock.
Tara sits up, her eyes are only on him. “Thanks for saving me.”
He finds himself flushing in irritation. “Don’t say ‘thank you’ to an elf. You’ll put yourself in my debt.”
She looks at him with doe-like innocent eyes. “Can’t we just stop keeping score?”
He sighs. He hears footsteps in the distance, but he’s not sure if they are friend or foe. “No, we’re about to be surrounded by elves, and you must keep score.” Not quite believing what he is about to do, he inclines his head and says, “Thank you for coming back to rescue me in prison.”
She blinks. “Oh, so we’re even?”
“Yes,” says Lionel.
Rolling her eyes, she shakes her head. He puts his hand on her shoulder, and her eyes go to his fingers. It is as though her gaze has physical weight. He finds himself licking his lips, but recovers his wits. “Listen, Tara, you must not give your full name to whoever is approaching.”
“Why?” she asks, meeting his gaze, and again her eyes are so wide and innocent.
“Because it gives us power to know your name. We can use it for compulsion,” he says, and the thought of anyone else using it on her makes him burn.
“You know my full name,” she exclaims. Her voice gets accusatory. “And you used it on me in the cell.”
“So you’d go home!” Lionel protests. “And be safe.”
Narrowing her eyes, she says, “Don’t worry, I won’t thank you for that.”
“Good,” he says, flustered more than he should be. He’d protected her, or tried to. She has no sense whatsoever, probably because she’s human and a baby by elf standards. She probably isn’t even fifty years old … he catches himself, remembering how little sense he’d had when it came to climbing the tree and using his eyes to scan for the Golden Road, or how he hadn’t thought of using fire to frighten away predators.
She huffs.
He looks into the surrounding trees and directly into the eyes of an elf he recognizes. The elf has an arrow leveled at his head.
“Rolleim,” Lionel whispers. “It’s me, Lionel.”
“Stand slowly,” Rolleim says, not lowering his bow. “And raise your hands.”
Lionel rises and his heart falls, seeing no glimmer of recognition in his once friend’s eyes. Rolleim follows Lionel’s movement, raising the bow to keep it aimed at Lionel’s heart. About two decades older than Lionel, Rolleim had always been the taller one. Now Lionel is taller by a full two hands. He’s dimly aware of Tara rising beside him. He hears familiar whispers in the trees. “A human … but the other one …”
His mother’s voice rises from the forest. “Lionel!”
Before he knows it, his mother has rushed past Rolleim directly into what would be the path of his arrow, her arms outstretched. Catching her, Lionel enfolds her in his arms and pulls her tight, feeling a rush of gratitude and relief so great he thinks his legs might give out from under him. She feels so tiny in his arms. His mother had been smaller than him before, but now she seems impossibly so.
Someone coughs. He hears the sound of shifting feet, and the patter of rain on leaves above them. He lets his mother go at last, but she keeps an arm around his waist. When he looks down at her, he sees she is crying.
“You made it back,” she sniffs. She’s wearing farmer’s attire: a pale cream-colored tunic with a high collar and long sleeves beneath a dress of wool in goldenrod yellow with no unnecessary embellishments. The dress is tied up to her knees, revealing worn leather boots. A rust colored cape hangs from her shoulders, and also a leather knapsack. Her hair is in a braid that isn’t as severe as the palace norm. He smiles, holding back tears. It’s good to be home.
Lionel looks up and finds that nearly twelve members of his village seem to have come out for this adventure. He glances up and sees the ravens. Did Huginn and Muninn summon them? How would they have gotten here so fast?
Looking past Lionel, his mother says, “You have a human companion?”
“Oh, yes,” Lionel says, turning to find Tara has backed away a few steps. She is as wet as he is—but it looks better on her, he suspects. The shirt she wears clings to her, sharply demarcating her strong shoulders and dramatic curves. There seems to be some sort of undergarment that is beneath the shirt, either for decoration or support, that sadly hides her breasts. He notices the other men, and some of the women, eyeing her with more than curious interest and finds his jaw getting hard and his cheeks heating at embarrassment of his own jealousy for a woman he isn’t even romantically engaged with.
Forcing his features to neutral, he says, “Mother, this is Tara of Chicago. She was abducted from her home by the Dark Elves along with me.”
At the word “mother,” Lionel notices Tara relaxing slightly.
“How do you do, ma’am?” Tara says in Lionel’s tongue.
Jaben, one of the men from his village, a farmer even older than his mother, says, “She speaks Elvish!”
“It is good to meet you, Tara of Chicago,” his mother says, smiling ear to ear, her eyes sparkling with tears.
Tara looks between them, raises a finger to her cheek, and smiles at Lionel and his mother both. “I see the resemblance!”
There are some harsh whispers from the elves around them, and a huff that sounds like a bitter laugh. Lionel feels his shoulders fall. He doesn’t look like his mother … not anymore.
Smile fading, Tara’s gaze goes to the crowd.
“You must be frozen through!” says his mother, looking between the two of them, beginning to take off her knapsa
ck.
“Don’t cover them up, Tavende,” Jaben says to her. “They’ll need to let the Dark Waters wash off of them.” As he speaks, Lionel hears the rain beating on the leaves above them increase, and feels droplets on his head and shoulders.
“Come on,” says Jaben, with a wave of his hand. “We shouldn’t be tarrying here much longer. There are worse things than velociraptors.” His eyes go to Huginn and Muninn in the treetops. The two birds rawk and bob.
Rolleim takes up the lead, bow upraised. Lionel looks back, and sees Kalee, Jaben’s wife, sidling up to Tara.
Lionel hesitates, but Jaben says, “Come on, get a move on. Kalee won’t bite her.” Jaben sounds gruffer than Lionel has ever heard him, and he’s not meeting Lionel’s eyes. None of the elves are meeting his eyes.
“How did you find me?” he asks, falling into step with his mother.
“We were out hunting mushrooms when we heard Huginn and Muninn’s cries,” his mother says with a sunny smile.
The rain begins to fall more heavily. His mother doesn’t go to look for mushrooms in the Delta of Sorrows, although he’s heard of Jaben and Kalee doing so occasionally. He’s also heard other rumors about the couple; dangerous rumors that he’s never tried to substantiate because if he knew the truth, he might be forced to report them.
The rain increases in intensity, running down Lionel’s face, forcing him to wipe it from his eyes. High above them, the ravens rawk and take off, circling into the mists and out of view. Lionel’s eyes shift back to earth and catch on Lorelei, a woman not much older than he. She quickly looks away, and Lionel feels his heart beating too fast in his chest. He remembers a line from the book he’d drawn the Invocation of the Destroyer from. To summon the Destroyer is to end your life. Only use as a last resort. He’d thought that made no sense … now he’s beginning to realize that his old life may be gone.
Tara hears one of the elves say to Lionel, “We shouldn’t be tarrying here much longer. There are worse things than velociraptors.”
Wrapping her arms around herself, Tara prepares to follow the line of elves. She would really like some Gore-Tex hiking gear right now. She’s cold and wet, but she gets that there is something in the black water they’d taken a dip in that they want washed off by the rain.
