Fatal Circle

by Linda Robertson

  I twisted back to him. “Damn it, don’t make me cry right now. I have to be able to see when the fairies arrive!”

  Menessos’s arms—and his conviction—enveloped me and I let my tears fall, unashamed. There weren’t many, but I didn’t hold them in. That heat within me flared to life. Warmth and reassurance spread through me. He held me in silence, both of us staring out over the water as the night abated.

  As the sun rose, the mist became shadowed, as if the fairies neared the edge of it. For an instant the haze glittered silver and gold, then the prows of a line of ten boats appeared, elongated keels rising up like swan necks fore and aft. They were palest ivory and the golden hues of oak. Sails billowed with unearthly winds, banners snapping atop their masts. At first they seemed ghostly, unreal—but as they cleared the veil of mist, another row appeared like the first. And another. Solid and frightening.

  A larger vessel followed. At first I thought it was black and red, but as it became clearer, it was seemingly made of coals flickering with inner heat. Instead of rails, a line of flames framed it bow to stern. And Fax Torris stood on the bow. Her skin was crimson. Her hair, rising stiffly from her scalp in odd peaks, was also shades of scarlet. A wreath of yellow and orange flowers helped create the illusion of a blaze atop her head. She was clothed in shreds of her fiery colors, stirred by the winds into a flickering semblance of flames.

  Just to her port side sailed a ship of timber with branches woven to create an intricate railing with yellow and brown leaves flapping. Lucrum stood at the bow of this ship. His face was the green of new leaves, his brown hair tousled thick with brambles. He wore a surcoat of wheat-field tan, a vest and breeches of mud brown. The large jeweled brooch heavy on his lacey cravat was familiar; he’d worn it when they kidnapped Beverley.

  At the stern of these two ships came three rows of something like canoes, but fatter on the bottom. Each of these smaller boats carried one or two fairies, and they were dressed for a show, not for battle. That, however, didn’t mean much with the fey.

  Behind the last three rows was a pair of tugboats, pulling something large, flat, and threatening. What it carried, though, the mist effectively secreted.

  The smaller boats and canoes began fanning out.

  “On this humble world,” Fax Torris shouted, “on this great day, witness as we are liberated from our bonds! Long have we been shackled by this great insult. But no more!” Her voice seethed through the air. “Before us stands the source of our abuse. We answered his call, we aided him in his plight, and with cruelty he reacted. With malice he laid a trap. With malevolence, he sprung it. But this day we will be freed.”

  While listening, I studied the distant craft, holding my breath and waiting to see it revealed, only to realize they had no intention of showing it—unless needed. It was the surprise threat meant to ensure our submission.

  I scanned the smaller boats again. “Are they taking up viewing points, or are those war formations?” I whispered. Mark would know. Does Menessos?

  “That’s precisely what I was pondering. Perhaps I should not delay any longer.”

  Menessos sank to his knees, in the circle he’d drawn in the sand. It was my cue to get behind him a few feet, but still within the circle. It appeared he was offering himself without resistance. But he whispered the chant, calling the two remaining royal fairies. A call neither could resist. A call that would tear them from their ships and thrust them through space/time to materialize within the circle.

  Lucrum, the earth fairy, should appear before Menessos, to the north. Fax Torris would appear behind the vampire, in the southern position allotted to fire. Kirk would take Lucrum. I had a short iron dagger taped up the left sleeve of my blazer. I was ready to rip it free and stab her in the back. There will be no scene of Johnny lying at her feet.

  Menessos completed the first line of the chant in seconds. I felt the stirring and studied the fire fairy closely. I wanted to know when she felt it, too.

  In a flash of flames, Fax Torris leaped from her ship toward Lucrum’s. Wings of fire sprouted from her back. I glimpsed her raised arm, saw the glint of a blade. Lucrum saw it coming. His cry of horror carried across the water to the shore, vibrating like the dull thudding impact of boulders in a landslide. Fax Torris had murdered him.

  Menessos doubled over and fell to the sand in pain, unable to finish the call.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  I fell to my knees beside Menessos. “Finish the call!”

  “I cannot!” His voice was ragged.

  I wrapped my arms around him protectively. He’s mine and he’s hurting. Hurting because of her.

  “Treachery!” Fax Torris cried. “That monster has forced my actions! Forced me to slay my own brother! His control over me must be ended! Kill him,” she sobbed. “Kill him!”

  It didn’t surprise me that she would twist it and blame Menessos for her own murderous actions.

  Beneath me, Menessos groaned and shivered. A spasm rocked him. He whispered, “Call Mountain!”

  I turned to the tall line of switchgrass far behind. Waerewolves and Beholders were already racing forward from their hiding spots. “Mountain!”

  The big man cleared the tall grass at a jog.

  That was when the first shot was fired.

  I twisted toward the shore again. The fairies from the small boats were taking to the air, wings speeding them ashore or fleeing into the sky. Of those ready to fight, colorful balls of energy flashed from their palms, magic meant to do harm. A multitude of shots followed in quick succession and their magic died in the iron-filled air. Booming gunshots echoed under the screams of fairies. The caustic odor of gunpowder surrounded me. People are dialing phones right now, reporting gunfire. Police will be here in force in ten minutes … They will have to stop. It’ll end before anything can happen to Johnny.

  Mountain dropped heavily beside us. “I’m here, Boss.” He offered his wrist to Menessos. Instantly, the vampire lurched upward and took Mountain at the throat, sucking and slurping like a desert wanderer finding the oasis pool. It was beastly and grotesque. It wasn’t anything like the tenderness he showed me. Horrified, I scrambled back.

  The scene across the water was macabre. So many fairy bodies dropping on the lake, their frilly costumes rippling on the waves for an instant before body and all disintegrated into slime. Fax was raging, screaming with her scalding voice, demanding Menessos’s head. Injured fairies fluttered ashore.

  The buckshot was apparently gone, but it had done its job. If not mortally struck, with iron embedded in their skin, the fey could not work magic. Additionally, blisters were rising, limbs swelling in allergic reaction even as I watched. They could not summon their magical weapons, but clearly a few had summoned theirs before being injured. The waerewolves—I saw the Mr. Clean wannabe and Hector among them—and Beholders clashed with this pitiful fey force, swinging shotguns like baseball bats. It was all carnage.

  “Stop,” I whispered.

  Menessos lifted his face away from Mountain, but I wasn’t talking to him. I didn’t want to see this anymore. We were winning. We didn’t have to keep killing.

  Menessos left Mountain and the big man collapsed to the sand, one hand applying pressure to his neck. Menessos crawled toward me. “Fax isn’t dead, Persephone. They cannot stop until she is dead!”

  I stared at the blood smeared across his face. My horror must have been clear. He wiped at his face with his sleeve.

  The fire fairy’s voice bellowed, “Elementals!”

  The vapors concealing what was behind the tugboats began to dissipate. From the flat surface, dozens of creatures rose up and swarmed toward the shore.

  “She brought the elementals!” Menessos whispered.

  Unicorns became warhorses, galloping atop the water and racing toward the beach, slashing their horns like swords. Dragons, with broad fan-gilled heads and fanged jaws wide, roared as their eellike bodies slithered into the water behind the unicorns. Griffons sprang to the ai
r crying like hawks and flashing talons, ready to rend flesh. Phoenixes joined them, sparks falling from their feathers like glittering firework trails.

  “They all have collars,” I said. Links of chain dangled from each.

  “It was bad enough the fey stole them from us,” Menessos growled, “but so much worse for such enchanted creatures to be enslaved.”

  Fax Torris fell onto the back of a phoenix, her flaming wings making the bird even more regal. With a flick of her hand, the collar twisted—the bird reacted with a cry of pain and its long wings stuttered in their motion. The chain slapped into Fax Torris’s palm, and the bird flew around the others, as if coming to the front of the horde.

  “She’s controlling them with those collars.” My eyes searched the beach for Johnny.

  That was when I saw the witches.

  Brooms rocketing in from the west, maybe twenty-five in all.

  “Do you know if Xerxadrea’s body has been identified yet?”

  “What?” Menessos asked sharply.

  I pointed to the fast-approaching women, wands at the ready. “Are they coming to our aid or to do more damage?”

  The waerewolves noticed the threat of magic zooming in on them. I knew by the uneasy voices calling for Johnny. That, at least, helped me locate him. He was running toward us from the east end of the beach.

  He stopped a dozen yards away, shouting, “Do they know waeres are down here?”

  “I don’t know,” I answered.

  “What about those creatures? They’re magic, too, aren’t they?”

  I nodded.

  Menessos called to him, “You know what you must do, Domn Lup.”

  Johnny and he locked eyes. They shared something. I tried to reach Johnny through the connection Menessos made. I had a sense of the memories they had shared. I heard a whisper, Xerxadrea’s voice. He was remembering what she had said to him in my kitchen: “Perhaps you would learn a few things if you would but try to see beyond your own conflict and see his.”

  Johnny nodded, turned, and ran.

  I reached for Menessos. “Can the Beholders get the collars off those elementals?”

  “Good thinking.”

  Johnny gathered the waeres to the east. He must have given them the option of leaving. Over half of them fled the beach. Menessos, for his part, must have given a mental order to the Beholders. They formed a phalanx on the beach before us, four rows deep, ten abreast, and a handful around the circle. All held iron weapons at the ready. Unfortunately, they had no shields. The animals charging them, unlike storybook depictions, were not dainty and frail.

  Long pikes would have been better weapons against them, not that I wanted to see unicorns die.

  The witches hovered beside us, in formation. Vilna-Daluca sat at their lead. The four members of the lucusi that I had already met were all with her, and nearly two dozen more. “It doesn’t appear the two of you are alone or that you intend to deliver the vampire as WEC commanded.”

  “We tried that,” I said. “Apparently there are plenty of sneaky people who thought that was a bad idea.”

  “Riiiight.” Vilna winked.

  “Your wands-at-the-ready scared off half the waerewolves,” Menessos added.

  “I think we can handle this.”

  “Where’s Xerxadrea?” he pressed.

  It was a good cover move. I hadn’t thought of it.

  Vilna’s features flickered with worry, but she covered instantly. “She’s too old for a fight like this. She sends her blessings.”

  The unicorns were nearly to the shore. Fax Torris and her phoenix were coming up fast on the outside. These beautiful creatures had served to guard our circles, in spirit form, for decades. Fighting them was so wrong.

  Vilna-Daluca nodded. “Witches!” she called. The hair on the nape of my neck rose as they called on the power of the ley and it answered. The crystal tips of their wands flared to life and settled into a subtle glow. Vilna raised her arm to signal.

  “Remove the collars,” I shouted to her.

  She paused, considering this, then nodded.

  Before she could complete the gesture that would send the witches against the elementals, however, I saw a black wolf race along the beach and leap at the phoenix carrying Fax Torris.

  The witches flew past our heads, but I didn’t care what they did now. I could not look away from the wolf.

  Fax Torris wrenched the phoenix’s chain and leaned back hard. Her wings fanned out as she stood and used her feet to press the phoenix’s body into an angle that put its talons slashing forward.

  While the avian’s claws were not as long and sharp as those of a griffon, they were dangerous nonetheless. They raked across the wolf’s chest. His teeth sank into the phoenix’s neck. The fairy’s wings beat furiously, dragging them farther out over the water. Then the wolf yanked the phoenix’s neck to the side, snapping it. All three fell into the water, disappearing beneath the surface.

  “Johnny!” Only Menessos’s grip on my arm kept me in the circle. “Let me go!” My hand clawed at his. I jerked free and headed out of the circle.

  Menessos shouted, “You must stay! You have to shut the gateway!”

  Damn it!

  I held my breath, shifting my weight, as the seconds ticked past. I scrutinized the water where they had plummeted. They’d been down too long without surfacing for air. Maybe they’d struggled away from where they went under and I didn’t see them come up.

  With the melee raging before and around me, there was too much to see. When I watched something to the left, I missed something happening on the right. My gaze constantly returned to the water, scanning the surface.

  Witches thrust bursts of ley energy from their wands—bolts like glowing bullets of white and magenta. As the bursts struck the unicorns, shrill neighs pierced the air. Two bolts in quick succession struck the collar of the unicorn centermost in the charging front line. The collar fell away. The beast immediately shifted its path to our right, pushing the animals down the line veering that way as well. The second row followed them.

  The other half of the front line, however, stayed true to their course.

  The Beholders held their ground.

  Even as the witches tried desperately to make double strikes on the magic collars, not all of their bolts hit their marks. When they succeeded, the unicorns fell out of attack mode. Those that missed, though, seemed only to enrage the animals and they charged onward more furiously. Beholders were run through, lifted, and tossed to the air. Spiraled horns once flecked with gold came free smeared with blood. Hooves pounded … until an iron weapon rammed through a chest and white fur was stained red with blood.

  Someone shouted, “Just touch the collars with iron! They fall free!”

  In seconds, a handful of the freed unicorns had formed a line before us, rearing and neighing, flailing their hooves as if to ward off the other elementals. Huge dragons slithered ashore roaring and snapping, obliterating Beholders and unicorns—collared and uncollared alike. Griffons and phoenixes engaged the witches in aerial acrobatics. Wands flashed; scintillating specks of flame fell and caught broom thatch.

  And over all the noise, I heard a crackling laugh.

  Fax Torris stood at water’s edge. She dragged Johnny’s naked body behind her. With a jerk, she hauled him farther onto the beach. She dropped his arm like a filthy rag, and kicked him so hard he was lifted into the air, rolling, and landed hard. He didn’t move. I couldn’t tell if he was breathing or not.

  My heart froze, hard and heavy, a block of ice in my chest. I jerked the dagger from my sleeve. I turned to Menessos. “Call her!”

  He shook his head. “Lucrum’s death, the Beholders’ deaths. I haven’t the strength.”

  Trembling with rage, I took his chin roughly in my free hand. “Say the fucking words!” I shouted even as I shoved energy at him.

  He recoiled from me before I could transfer it, throwing himself backward to the sand. “You must not!”

  “Fax
must die!”

  “You have to shut the gateway! You need your energy to do that!”

  “I’ll use the ley. But she has to die first!”

  “You can’t use the ley to shut the door.”

  That stopped me. “Why not?” I felt deflated, lost and scared. So angry. Failed.

  “We didn’t know about ley power when we opened it. You have to shut it as we opened it. All we had was our own power. Our desperation. Our hope and resolve. Our pain and our loss.” He moved onto his knees, so weak. Jerking up his pant leg, he released something concealed there.

  I’m not the only one hiding backup plans on their person.

  The willow wand.

  He offered it to me. “There’s another way.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Fax Torris’s fire wings had carried her and her scalding laughter out over the lake. She was gathering some of the collared phoenixes to her, a new formation for a new attack.

  Unicorns with broken legs or bleeding stab wounds sprawled around me. Their pitiful noises told me they’d have to be put down. Griffons struggled in the surf, trying to come ashore. They didn’t seem able to swim and twisted at odd angles. One, already ashore, had lost an eye and the talon tips from the claws of one foreleg; it hobbled around stretching its beak down to other griffons that lay unmoving on the sand. A smaller dragon was curled protectively around the head of another dragon that was coughing blood on the sand. The small one whimpered.

  Those that still wore collars continued fighting the handful of Beholders who remained.

  The witches had regrouped and were attempting some sort of airborne offensive against the griffons. My attention strayed to Johnny. Was he dead or alive? Mountain was crawling toward him, trying not to gain the attention of any collared elementals.

  The air prickled with another calling of the ley. As I felt it crawling over my skin, I knew Fax was drawing heavily on the line. The fire fairy pushed her hands down before her, wrists together, and opened herself like a conduit. Her wings flared like flamethrowers, engulfing nearby phoenixes like burned offerings. She was creating an energy reservoir within herself. The accumulation of ley line magnitude caused the air underneath her to shimmer. The swell of her power triggered something in Beau’s charm. It answered with a glow that thawed my frozen indecision, emboldened me and warned me.