Winterfall

by John Conroe

  He looked at his vest, taking inventory even as the monster wobbled in place, shimmers of heat coming off its black diamond skin.

  “Thermite. We started carrying them when we watched the footage of the warlock kid in Maine,” he said.

  “Chris, step back,” Erika said. I glanced at her, seeing her partner, Tami, focusing on my monster. Gramps didn’t raise no fool. I got the hell outta the way just as the thing burst into white hot flame. Instantly Erika fired up her tornado trick and the resulting blast furnace sent burning ash twenty feet into the sky.

  “I like thermite,” Tami said casually. The security guy nodded, wide-eyed.

  My ribs grated as bone shifted and realigned itself, snapping back into place. I was instantly ravenous, digging through my BDU pockets for pemmican and power bars.

  The monster zombie burned down to black tar and Ryanne pulled her magic tuning fork from her combat vest pocket. She thwacked it on the heel of her boot and swung it in an arc through the space in front of her. The tone warbled in and out of tune, changing six times across the arc. We all froze, me with half a pemmican bar shoved in my mouth.

  “Ah Chris, I don’t think we’re done yet,” she said.

  Chapter 25

  Winter Realm, Fairie

  “Oh, hey there, Morrigan. Didn’t hear you arrive. Those trolls must be handy that way—stepping through gaps they find in space and time,” Declan said, tone light but a slight note of tension creeping through.

  “Queen Morrigan, perhaps we could discuss why you arranged for my people to be gated here,” Ashley said, giving Declan a warning glare.

  Stacia hooked her fallen clothing with a massive claw as she approached the rest of her party, her form shimmering and shifting as she turned back to a naked woman. Perhaps for the first time in history, Mack thought, no one was gawking at her, as all eyes were on the queen, the Speaker, and the mouthy witch.

  “You are on my land, Speaker. Here I ask the questions. And you—you insolent infant. You will cease all use of power and kneel before me,” Morrigan said, glaring at Declan.

  The heavy raft of gate timbers swiveled over to hover above the two Guardian elves, the Demyne lord, his son and men.

  “Cease you say, your royalness?” Declan asked. “Okay,” he said and waved a hand.

  The elves and men bolted almost as soon as the logs moved their way, so when the entire thing crashed to the ground, shaking the earth like an overloaded tractor-trailer, none of them were caught. Horses whinnied and men yelled in fear as they shot out in all directions, all semblance of military order gone.

  Mack glanced back at the queen, the hair on his neck raising as he noticed the glitter of frost on the trees and bushes around her. Her glare was murderous and completely focused on Declan.

  “Think you are precocious, witchling?” she said, and a line of frost shot across the brown earth, straight toward Declan.

  The giant raft of logs shot back up into the air, arcing overhead to slam points down, three feet into the earth, blocking the advancing frost. Ice started to climb the barrier but Declan narrowed his eyes and focused hard on the wall of wood. The middle logs burst into flame, the fire spreading across the others with supernatural swiftness.

  Mack couldn’t see the queen, but he heard her screech of outrage. The temperature in the clearing dropped fast and the flames started to sputter as more ice and frost overtook the bark of the logs. Something came around the side of the barrier, moving almost too fast for Mack to see, but he recognized the black of Neeve’s uniform and the even deeper black of her two Frost blades. The double roar of Stacia’s shotgun came almost next to his ear, deafening him as steel shot exploded bark off the left-most log and a cry of mixed pain and anger announced a hit. Neeve swerved to their left, one of her blades morphing into a ten-foot spear that lanced toward Mack’s roommate. A single steel orb snapped down to knock the black needle point into the dirt, smoke rising from the brief contact with iron-bearing metal.

  Mack swung his own rifle toward Neeve, sensing his sister doing the same, but his sights could never quite line up with her. She was just too fast. Then the nasty little DP-12 shotgun fired again, two shots almost on top of each other, and Mack saw the black-clad killer get knocked slightly off balance as Stacia scored another glancing hit on the preternaturally fast elven princess.

  Neeve broke off her direct assault and raced back to the protection of Declan’s log barrier. That’s right, Coldilocks. We’ve got our own supernatural badass, and her reflexes are at least as good as yours, he thought. Two orbs shot around the wall of logs, each from a different side. Mack couldn’t see what happened but he heard a sharp word, probably Elvish, almost certainly a curse. Then the orbs came back out their opposite sides, circling back to station above Declan.

  “Why did you abduct my people?” Ashley yelled in the direction of the queen.

  “Why do you think, child?” Morrigan’s melodious voice sounded amused. She was now somewhere back in the trees, just out of sight. “To gain advantage. To exert leverage, my dear.”

  “Then why did you send them here?” Ashley asked.

  “I didn’t, you ignorant ape,” the queen yelled back, amusement replaced by anger.

  “So either you messed up or someone messed things up for you,” Ashley yelled.

  A thrum sounded in the trees and a cloud lifted out of the vegetation. A cloud of toothy pucks. Hundreds of them.

  “Oh God,” Jetta said.

  “Faith, O youngest Sutton,” Declan said, rummaging in his bag of tricks. He pulled out a heavy plastic bottle about the size of a hiker’s water jug. He tossed it into the air and the plastic just exploded. A new, copper-colored cloud spread out around and above them. “That’s six thousand steel BBs from the wondrous and magical land of Walmart. Sic 'em, fellas,” the young warlock said, waving a hand.

  Mack eyed his roommate even as the cloud of steel shot at the flock of tiny killers. If Mack didn’t know him better, he’d swear that Declan was a little drunk.

  Declan jumped around and waved his hands like he was conducting an orchestra, the massive cloud of metal dancing across the sky in time to his motions. Like some kind of sky broom, the BBs swept through the weaving, dodging pucks, dropping them by tens and twenties, even the briefest contact with the metal enough to doom the little killers.

  Some got through and Mack was forced to wave his rifle barrel in a crazy, unsafe manner as two of the steel-jawed fliers came at him. A hand snapped out in front of his face, pale skin with black spots snagging one of the pucks and crushing its body in a convulsive jerk. He nodded his thanks to Ari and took three more swipes before his steel rifle barrel knocked the second one out of the air. A stomp of his boot finished the horrid thing.

  Fast, sharp cracks coming one on top of each other, staccato fashion, told him his sister was using her .22 Magnum. He glanced her way and found her shooting pucks from the sky, hitting one with almost every shot.

  Suddenly the cloud of BBs swarmed through, around, and among them, sweeping the flying jaws away but not touching a single member of the party. Mack looked at Declan. His friend was still acting a bit weird, but his control of the deadly cloud of BBs was absolutely complete as he brushed the pucks from the air around them.

  “ENOUGH!” Morrigan’s voice cried out. It was an ugly screech, nothing queenly about it. Yet it made Mack sad and ashamed. She was so very disappointed and so angry, and Mack couldn’t help but feel it was his fault. He felt intense guilt that he was letting her down.

  “Aww no ya don’t,” Declan said, but Mack wasn’t sure if it was to him or to someone else. His friend grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him closer and it was as if a fog seemed to burn away from his mind. The downer feelings were gone and it took Mack a few seconds to realize those had never been his feelings at all.

  Stacia was pushing members of their little party toward her witch boyfriend, and Mack could see their faces clear one by one as they each got closer to the young warlock.r />
  “Her main power is command. She imposes her will on yours,” Ian said, rubbing his face briskly with both hands, his submachine gun hanging across his chest.

  “Which is gonna suck for us in, like, a few seconds or so,” Declan said, weaving a bit on his feet. “Plus I’m running low, even here. Those rips in reality take a lot out of a witch,” he said. Stacia snorted and Mack couldn’t tell exactly why, but if he had to guess, it was because her boyfriend was doing things that whole circles of witches would struggle with back home.

  “It’s worse than that,” Ashley said, pointing. On the far side of the clearing, away from any of the combatants, heavy, squat figures were emerging from the forest.

  “The ogres are back,” Jetta said.

  “The people of Forpost are coming out,” Aylin said, her words translated by no less than six smartphones at the same time.

  Mack looked behind them, and sure enough, the remaining guards were joined by the women and children of Forpost, all moving slowly out of the broken gateway.

  “We’re in her Realm. Her power is greatest here,” Ian said.

  “Okay, time to go. You guys gotta keep them off me for a few minutes while I set this up,” Declan said, rummaging in his bag of tricks. “I’ll help with the steel shot and my orbs, but most of my attention will need to be here,” he said, pulling out a wooden stick that looked a bit like Harry Potter’s wand. Mack knew it was Rowan wood from the tree on Declan’s home property and his friend only used it when he really, really needed all the help he could get. He kneeled and started to draw shapes and runes in the dirt on the ground.

  “Okay, let’s circle up, backs to Declan. Mack, Jetta, you have the ogre side; your rifles have the most power. Ashley, you and I have the horsemen. Ah, Stacia can you…” Ian started to ask, his words falling off. Mack realized that Ashley’s dad had never seen the werewolf woman in action before and it appeared he was still thrown for a loop.

  “Right. These ladies and I will keep the fort people at bay,” the beautiful blonde said, stuffing new rounds into her high-capacity double pump shotgun.

  “They’re mostly women and kids,” Jetta said.

  “That’s why I’m loading up these few rounds of rubber buckshot. Had them in my bandoleer forever. They had to come in handy sometime. After that, I’ll use the little bit of birdshot I’ve got. But Jetta,” Stacia said, “if it comes down to it, I’ll have to take them out.”

  “Understood,” Jetta said, topping the magazine of her rifle before putting it back into the gun.

  “HEAR ME, MY PEOPLE!” Morrigan yelled. “THESE ALIENS HAVE ATTACKED ME AND YOU. THEY MUST DIE!”

  “Gloves are off now,” Stacia said.

  “Okay. So are mine,” Declan said, adding symbols around the edge of the three-foot circle he’d scribed. Mack didn’t recognize the shapes Declan was drawing and he realized they must be some Elvish glyphs that his friend had learned.

  “Here they come,” Jetta said. Mack looked back up to see all three groups converging on their position. His sister was sighting through her rifle and she suddenly fired. A hundred yards away, an ogre fell backward as the top of its head exploded. Taking his cue, Mack sighted on another of its fellows as the whole horde of monsters started to run their way. He fired, moved his crosshairs to the left, and fired again. Jetta’s rifle went off, then Ian’s HK started to bark fast, single shots, and the crack of Ashley’s 9mm came almost as fast.

  Stacia’s shotgun fired, and again, then came the sound of her pump followed by two more shots. “Last two rounds of rubber buck,” she muttered as they all kept firing.

  “Mack, throw this when they get close,” Jetta said, using her left hand to put something into his right. It was the M67 grenade that she’d rescued from his gear several days ago.

  “Dec?” he asked, tossing it to his friend. The witch looked up and the grenade froze in mid-air. Then Declan grinned and gestured at the little round bomb floating in space. The safety pin plucked itself out and dropped to the ground, then the grenade shot across the seventy-five yards to the onrushing front line of ogres, the safety lever flicking off halfway there.

  The little bomb hit an ogre in the front row so hard it punched right through its neck and out the other side. It exploded two seconds later and the results were beyond spectacular.

  It killed like six in its immediate vicinity, and the steel shrapnel of the grenade’s casing had a horrific effect on ogres for twenty feet in every direction. Gray skin burnt like it was being sprayed by the molecular acid from the xenophobes in the Aliens movies.

  Ogres lost their minds at the pain, attacking themselves and each other.

  “Wow, okay. Mack, help Ashley and her dad. I got this,” Jetta said, starting to pick off survivors one by one.

  Mack turned his gun on the horsemen of Demyne, the two-point-five power scope bringing them into sharp focus. He wasted no time, sighting the leader, Lord Norton, and squeezing off a round. The big man pitched backward off his horse and Mack switched to the son. Junior’s horse reared back at the moment of Mack’s shot and his round hit the animal in the neck, missing the son altogether. The animal fell over, kicking, and the young lord was lost from view. Mack had an instant to regret the shot, never wanting to harm a horse, but the mass of attackers charging their way wiped the emotion from his mind, refilling it with fear. He started to shoot rapid fire, aiming as best he could, Ian’s and Ashley’s guns firing just as fast. The massed rapid fire knocked down riders like targets at a summer fair shooting gallery. Horses reared and swerved, scared by the explosions in front of them.

  “Let’s go!” Declan yelled behind him. Almost as soon as he yelled it, Ashley disappeared, a slender, tanned hand, clad in yellow-green dragon skin, grabbing her vest from behind and literally yanking her off her feet. Mack emptied his rifle and turned to see Stacia toss the younger girl through a new tear in reality like a sack of flour. Ari and Aylin were missing, presumably already through Declan’s new portal. Ian tried to wave the blonde girl off when she came for him but she picked him up bodily from behind and tossed him after his daughter. Jetta yelled and dove through. Mack turned, pulling his Glock, letting his empty rifle fall on its sling, backing toward the portal as he fired off delaying shots in almost every direction around them. He fell backward through the portal, still watching as Stacia grabbed her witch and pulled him through with her. That’s how he saw the needle of glossy black slice out from the side and stab through Declan’s left arm. He also saw one of the orbs smash into the Black Frost spear.

  His fall was broken by someone else, then he oooofed as Stacia and Declan slammed into him. The four orbs came zinging through with them and then the rip in space and time zipped shut with a sizzling sound.

  “Get off me, you oaf,” his sister said. Her demand was unneeded, as he was already scrambling toward Declan and Stacia, his hand plucking at the Arcane first aid kit in his vest.

  Declan’s arm was pouring blood out on the white marble floor of the Speaker’s guest quarters in Idiria.

  “There’s still a piece of that damned Black Frost blade inside him,” Stacia said, holding both her hands over the wound.

  “I can feel it wriggling around inside my arm,” Declan said, a grimace of pain twisting his features.

  “The living weapon of the Queen’s Guardians will continue to try to wound you,” Aylin said. The young girl was standing in the little herb garden in the central atrium of Ashley’s digs, looking frantically through the plants lined up in neat, orderly rows.

  “Do we cut it out?” Mack asked, watching the blood well up around Stacia’s fingers.

  “It will form barbs and resist. You would have to cut the arm off,” Aylin said, her own voice blending with the multiple translations echoing from their phones. “If I can find… ah-ha. Here it is,” she said, grabbing a bushy green plant and stripping off a handful of little black specks. “The seeds, leaves, and stem of this plant are all deadly to the organism that makes up the Guardian’s
weapons.”