Trickster's Girl (The Raven Duet)

by Hilari Bell

  "Not till morning. I think it's been parked back there because they're finished for the day."

  "I'm not letting you turn me into a thief," said Kelsa. "Not more than you already have. The people who own that buggy need it. And it's pretty old. They probably can't afford a new one."

  "But it will be returned to them," Raven said persuasively. "Possibly by the end of the day. We can leave them some money as a rental fee. More than it's worth if you like."

  "Assuming they spend it before it vanishes," Kelsa muttered. He didn't have to explain why they couldn't try to rent it openly. Anyone who did something that unusual would certainly be examined closely—and the owner would demand to see their IDs. Her feet were throbbing, and the rest of her body ached with weariness. And he was right; even if the money vanished the ATV would be returned.

  "The key's in the ignition," he murmured in her ear.

  On Kelsa's insistence, Raven left most of the money they had tucked into the bin of cleaning supplies she'd unstrapped so quickly and quietly.

  The ATV might be old, but the engine hummed to life with well-maintained quiet. It was only in Kelsa's guilty imaginings that shouts rang out behind them and someone called the police.

  In reality, Raven settled onto the long seat behind her, and they rode up the drive and out onto the road with no trouble at all.

  "Don't look so grim," he told her. ATVs weren't designed for speed, so they could talk over the wind. The enforced slowness was probably a good thing, since they had neither reinforced clothing nor helmets.

  "I'll bet they won't even notice it's missing till morning," he went on. "By the time it's reported we'll be long gone."

  "You don't care about them at all, do you? How angry they'll be. How worried and upset. They live in a place where people are so trustworthy they can leave the keys in the ignition, and we're breaking that trust."

  Even at thirty miles an hour she couldn't turn to look at him, but she saw his puzzled frown in the rearview mirror. He didn't understand. Either that, or he didn't care.

  But the "you don't value humans" fight had cost them too much already. Kelsa sighed and turned her attention ahead. She had to admit, driving was better than walking.

  Eventually they left the lake behind, and soon after that the road curved away from the valley between two green-clad hills, wending up to a narrower valley. The asphalt surface, hitherto smooth, began to roll in a series of low waves.

  "It's like driving over a giant curling ribbon." Kelsa had heard of frost heaves, but she'd never seen them. Not like this.

  The valley eventually widened to more open ground, dotted with long shallow marshes and rocky slopes above. It was past ten, and the sun was finally settling into the northwestern horizon, when Kelsa saw a huge tawny lump in the grass at the roadside and brought the ATV to a stop.

  "That's a grizzly bear!"

  There could be no doubt about it. Its thick fur was pale gold, the same color as the dry grass on the hillsides above, and its shoulders rose in the characteristic hump.

  It was twice the size of a black bear, and Kelsa was very glad that after one incurious glare it ignored her.

  "It's not a shapeshifter, either," Raven said. "Why are we stopping? Don't tell me you have to piss again."

  "No, but ... It's right beside the road." And on the open, slow-moving ATV she had no desire to get closer.

  "There's something in the grass that it likes," Raven said impatiently. "Go by on the other side. If it wanted to eat you, it would be paying more attention."

  The great bear had been keeping an eye on Kelsa between bites, but not with the fixed gaze of a predator. And this was the only road to the border, so she hadn't much choice.

  Kelsa set the ATV in motion, swerving over as far as she could without going into the ditch.

  The bear's tawny head lifted as she approached. If it charged, Kelsa decided, she would use the lights and horn as her first two weapons, and then the ATV itself. Her heart hammered against her ribs.

  But the bear only watched her roll past. Kelsa twisted on the seat to keep an eye on it until they were far down the road and the bear had returned to its meal.

  Adrenaline sang through her body. There was a fine tremor in her fingers as she turned back to the road, and her senses seemed sharper than usual.

  "Oh, my God. That was a grizzly!"

  "I'm surprised we haven't seen one before," Raven said calmly. "They're pretty common in the north."

  Kelsa's elation drained away. "You said taking over an animal's mind is hard, because they rely so much on their instincts. A grizzly bear is one of the few animals that will stalk and prey on humans. How hard would it be for your enemies to convince a passing grizzly that human would make a good meal tonight?"

  Raven was quiet for longer than she liked. "I don't think Bear would let them overshadow the mind of one of his. Unless he's finally made up his mind which side he's on."

  "How very reassuring," Kelsa said. "Your allies ... Who are your allies, anyway? They couldn't prevent that?"

  "Probably not," Raven admitted. "We tend to make up our own minds. And we don't change them easily."

  "So your enemies aren't going to change their minds, no matter how many leys I heal? And who are your enemies? I need to know that!"

  "Why? It's not like Bear, for instance, couldn't shift into a hawk if he wanted to. Abandoning the form this ley prefers would cost him more energy, but he could do it. And it's the neutrals, like Bear, who I'm trying to convince."

  So no matter which shapeshifter she encountered, she had no way to tell friend from foe without Raven?

  "Wonderful."

  "But keeping control of an animal, even if it might be willing to do what you want, is harder than influencing humans," Raven said consolingly. "I don't think they'd try that. At least, not yet."

  ***

  Another two hours down the road, in the rich gray arctic dusk, Kelsa saw a sign and slowed to read it: PICKHANDLE LAKE. CABINS. FISHING. CANOEING.

  "We're getting a cabin," she said. "There are too many bears around here to sleep outside."

  "You spent all our money on the ATV," Raven complained. "And I really don't think they'd offend Bear by—"

  "I'm not going to risk becoming grizzly jerky because you think they might not want to offend Bear."

  Kelsa turned down the driveway and parked the ATV in front of the office. Through the lit-up window she could see the night clerk, a girl not much older than she was, with a book reader propped on the counter in front of her. "I'll go in and find out how much it is while you make us some money."

  She was a little worried that the clerk might recognize her from the newscasts, despite the change in her hair. But Elizabeth Stayner's PID passed inspection, and Raven came in with a roll of twenty-dollar bills as Kelsa was signing them in.

  The cabins were on the shore, farther down the drive. The dark lake was small and shallow, compared with some that Kelsa had seen recently. But as it came into sight, Raven stiffened.

  "Chetthel Chi. I didn't realize we'd come this far."

  Kelsa parked in front of cabin eighteen and looked back at him, startled by the unease in his voice. "What's wrong with Chettie ... Pickhandle Lake? Is it off the ley, or an antinexus or something?"

  Raven snorted. "There's no such thing as an antinexus. And we are off the ley's main current, but that doesn't matter. This lake, though, it's at the confluence of three rivers. It's been a human rendezvous for thousands of years. That kind of energy ... It wants people to gather here."

  "I want people to gather here," Kelsa said. "The more humans, the fewer bears!"

  Raven shrugged, but his eyes still searched the dark woods that surrounded the shimmering water.

  "I'm not camping with the grizzlies," Kelsa told him. "I got practically no sleep yesterday, and we're both exhausted. Come in and go to bed."

  The cabin held four narrow bunks, so there was no negotiation for who slept where. But it was chilly, and Kelsa
was so tired she simply kicked off her shoes and curled up under the blanket with her clothes on.

  Even as she slid into sleep, she was aware that Raven lay with his eyes open, listening.

  ***

  When Raven's hand gripped her shoulder Kelsa came awake all at once, like a soldier in a combat zone. If it wasn't an emergency she would kill him, but for now...

  "What?" She whispered the word, as if someone in the cabin might overhear.

  His voice was almost as soft when he replied, "Come here. Tell me what you make of this."

  He led the way to the front window, which looked back up the road toward the office.

  Through the relatively thin forest, Kelsa saw half a dozen shafts of light burning in the dark gray twilight of the northern night. At different angles. Bike headlights.

  "The biker gang." It could have been an innocent group of travelers, but Kelsa knew in every atom of her terror-chilled flesh that it was them. "How could they catch up with us so quickly?"

  "You lost two days with Otter Woman, and breaking me out of jail." Raven's voice was grim but calm, and Kelsa took heart from that. "If they were guided ... Well, clearly they could catch up with us because they have. What now?"

  "The police!"

  Kelsa was moving to the cabin's com board when Raven said, "The same police who want to question you about a jailbreak? Who under these circumstances will run the DNA attached to that identity and discover that you're not Elizabeth Stayner?"

  "I'll lie." Kelsa pushed the power button. "Say they're trying to break into..." The com board remained dark, even when she pushed the button again.

  Every horror vid Kelsa had ever seen flashed through her mind. Her knees felt as if they were turning to jelly. "Have they cut the power?"

  She was reaching for a light switch when Raven's warm hand closed over her cold one.

  "If they haven't, the light will bring them straight here. Get your shoes on. We've got to get out. They're coming."

  The long shafts of light were swinging down the road to the cabins now, turning together like a hunting pack.

  Despite Kelsa's tug on his arm, Raven stopped to close the cabin's back door behind them, and then hurried her into the shadowy trees. Fortunately, the ground around the cabins was relatively clear.

  "It will take them a few minutes to find the right cabin," he said, steering her toward the water, "and a few more minutes to break in, search the place, and realize we aren't there. Then they've got to figure out where we've gone. Though they'll probably have some help with that."

  His voice was grim, but being out of the confining walls and moving had broken Kelsa's paralyzing fear. She was still terrified, but her mind was working again.

  "We should go into one of the other cabins. Wake someone. They could call the police on their com pod."

  Raven shook his head. "Everyone around here has been pushed into sleep. That was what alerted me. You won't be able to wake them. We're better off running."

  They were moving steadily away from the ATV, which couldn't outrace a drug gang's bikes anyway. "Run how?" Kelsa demanded. "On foot in the woods?"

  The grizzlies were looking better to her now.

  "No." They emerged from the trees as he spoke, only a handful of yards from the cabins' dock. Half a dozen sleek dark shapes were lined up on the sand. "We're taking the old road out."

  Kelsa's father had been a botanist. She'd gone canoeing only once in her life, at the age of seven or eight, but Raven claimed he was an expert. Remembering his smooth leap onto the back of that horse, maybe he was.

  Kelsa dragged one of the canoes into the lake, indifferent to the cold water that filled her shoes. One of the few things she remembered about canoeing was that the person in front steered, so she climbed awkwardly in and settled herself on the back bench. Raven picked up a big wedge-shaped rock and proceeded to crack open all the other canoes with the methodical calm of a cook breaking eggs. Only a lot louder.

  "They're coming," Kelsa said. "They don't know what they heard, but they're following the sound."

  "Just one more." Raven turned the final canoe over, lifted the rock over his head, and smashed it down on the keel. Fiberglass cracked once more, and several bikers shouted. The headlights were turning toward the dock.

  Raven splashed out and climbed into the canoe, setting it rocking. He snatched a paddle, and with several deep strokes pulled them farther from the shore.

  "Do you know how to handle these things at all?"

  "No," said Kelsa. "But I think I can paddle if you tell me which side."

  She could almost hear her father's voice shouting, "Paddle on the right. Paddle on the left."

  "Good," said Raven. "First, let me turn us around."

  He did so with a smooth speed that made it look easy, though Kelsa was pretty sure it wasn't.

  The moon chose that moment to rise over the trees. It was only half full, turning the small waves to rippling silver on the far edge of the lake. Soon it would light up the water like a stage.

  Raven muttered something in a liquid tongue Kelsa didn't recognize, but she had no doubt of its general meaning. She wanted to swear too. She gripped her paddle, trying to remember. One hand over the top, and the other went...?

  "On the left," Raven ordered, digging his own paddle into the dark surface.

  After a dozen or so strokes it began to come back to her, the smooth rhythm of sinking the paddle's edge straight down, pulling it toward her, and circling around for the next stroke.

  In the front, Raven switched sides. Kelsa twitched, but when no further commands came she went on paddling on the left side of the canoe. Paddling was easier than steering, and Raven's claim that he knew what he was doing must have been true, for the canoe drew swiftly away from the shore.

  Focused on their progress, Kelsa didn't look back till the snarling shout rang out behind them.

  "You can't run from us forever, bitch! And when we catch you, you're gonna regret like hell you even tried."

  The bikers had reached the shore, their rides gleaming in the moonlight. Two of them had dismounted to check the broken canoes, but most were still perched on their seats. A chill ran down Kelsa's spine. There were nine of them. The original four must have sent for reinforcements.

  "If you come back here," the leader yelled, "maybe we'll leave you and your pretty boy alive when we've finished with you. But if you don't come back..."

  Kelsa thrust the paddle in once more. "That encourage you?" She wanted to sound dry and ironic, but her voice cracked on the words.

  "Not in the least. Any chance you can keep them talking?"

  "What good will that do?" Did Raven have some clever plan?

  "Probably not much. But if they're talking to you, they're not trying anything else. On the right now."

  Kelsa switched hands to paddle on the other side. It wasn't much of a plan, but...

  "I called the police on my com pod," she shouted back. "They should be here any minute. You're all going to jail!"

  Several more of the bikers had dismounted, milling at the water's edge, but it didn't look like they'd found a way to follow her. Kelsa's heart began to rise.

  "Your face is on every newscast in western Canada," the biker shouted. "Accomplice in a jailbreak. You don't dare call the cops."

  So much for that bluff. But as they made their way farther and farther out, it looked like Raven's basic plan was working. If he could get them a few miles down the river that drained this lake, they'd be safe in the forest.

  Grizzly bears seemed almost irrelevant now. The fact that her back and arms were tiring meant nothing at all. Paddling with a will, Kelsa was beginning to feel almost hopeful—until an icy wind eddied around them.

  Raven stopped paddling and looked around. "What was that?"

  "Just a cold wind?" But even in the cool night it had felt like the breath of a glacier. Then it vanished, in a way no natural drop in temperature ever did.

  A biker's astonished cry drew he
r attention back to the shore. It was several hundred yards away now, but the moonlight gleamed on the rim of white spreading out from the muddy banks.

  "Tarnation!" Kelsa had never heard that word spoken with so much force. "They're freezing the lake!"

  "That's ice? But how...? Who...?" Both answers were obvious. "It's the beginning of June! How could they freeze a whole lake?"

  The white was spreading.

  "They don't have to freeze the whole lake." Raven dug his paddle into the water once more. "Just enough to close the mouth of the river and trap us. Some help here, please. Left!"

  Kelsa fixed her gaze on the dark opening at the far end of the lake, paddling with deep hard strokes as he went on. "And they only have to freeze the surface hard enough for those thugs to reach us. It may not be a clear violation of the physics of this world, but they're drawing a lot of power out of the ley. Maybe enough to tip some of the neutrals in our direction. They're gambling a lot here."

  "But that's a good thing, isn't it? If more neutrals go over to your side you'll have more allies, right?"

  "Only if I survive long enough to recruit them." Raven's voice was grim. "That's what they're gambling on. If they can kill me—"

  "Then the fact that they bent the rules hardly matters."

  The first biker stepped tentatively onto the ice, and Kelsa felt as if the ice was spreading into her heart as well. The white rim that encircled the lake was slowly closing the gap that opened into the river. She couldn't see the ice sheet grow, but if she looked down for a few moments and then back, she could see a difference.

  "How long do we have?"

  "Not long enough." Raven was watching the closing river too. "I'm going to try to slow this down. You're on your own for a while."

  He set down his paddle, then bent forward and thrust both hands into the water.

  Kelsa looked back at the bikers. They were too distant to shout at her now, but all nine of them were mincing carefully across the ice.

  Kelsa swore under her breath and turned her attention to paddling. When she paddled on the left side the canoe swerved right. When she paddled on the right it went left. She could control it fairly well, except when the shifting breeze shoved it sideways or set it spinning.