Forged in Fire

by J. A. Pitts

  She watched me with that oddly birdlike flutter of her head.

  “Sleep, mother,” Qindra said, striding forward. She began to sing a lullaby. Jai Li gasped, recognizing the song.

  “Shh,” I said, holding her to my chest. She snuggled against me, mewling.

  Qindra had her hands in the air, weaving back and forth, like a snake charmer. Nidhogg followed, her great head swinging from side to side.

  The song echoed from the mountainside, filling me with a sadness and longing beyond my defenses to contain. I sobbed once, gasping for air, my throat aching and my eyes burning. A second sob burst from me, and I started crying.

  Jai Li patted my arm as I wept, head bowed over her.

  The sky above us began to brighten, allowing me to see more clearly.

  Sirens echoed off the mountains, and I walked to the edge of the plateau. One of those huge tour buses pulled up to the burning wreckage below, followed by three ambulances. Folks in armor poured from the bus, fanning out across the battlefield. Others left the ambulances, pulling out rolling stretchers, looking for someone to save. The cavalry had arrived. Better late than never.

  I walked to the path. I had to get Jai Li down to them. She needed more help than I could give her.

  I looked back one last time.

  Nidhogg lay down, her wings spread behind her and her long neck atop her forelegs. Qindra closed the final distance, placing a hand against the glowing white scales. Again, it was Gram that caused the glow, but with the fresh light of morning licking against the tops of the mountain, I no longer needed the assist.

  “She’ll sleep now,” I said to Jai Li and began to descend the trail.

  Maybe Jimmy had found Katie. If not, I’d begin looking for her as soon as Jai Li was seen to. I needed Katie to be alive most of all—the skald of my hearth and home. Tears leaked from my eyes, but they were beyond my control.

  Eighty-two

  When I got to the ambulances, Melanie was there with Jim and Katie. He’d found her, facedown in the snow, her guitar smashed beneath her. She was unconscious. Melanie got to her quickly, sending her and the deputy back in the same ambulance. They headed to Wenatchee. It had the closest hospital.

  She hooked an IV into Jai Li and got her stabilized enough to ride to the hospital. I didn’t leave her side. Part of me screamed to go with Katie, but this little girl needed me as well.

  The ambulance ride was one of the longest times in my life. I ached—hollowed and hurting with dread. If Katie died, I didn’t know what I would do.

  I looked down at Jai Li, stroking her hair. She was so small, so weak. How could anything that beautiful and fragile survive in the world we lived in?

  Deidre had been there, coordinating the search for survivors. Since we hadn’t had a big contingency, it wasn’t a long search.

  A handful of our folks had stayed back at Black Briar. Skella texted me from Deidre’s phone, all the way to Wenatchee. She explained that her grandmother had feared she would get killed mixing up with our kind. She was probably right to be concerned. Skella promised to give me all the details later, but as long as she was on our side, I didn’t care too much. The fact that there were elves with Justin, however, that had to be addressed. Later, though. I was too damn tired to deal with it.

  Katie came around in the emergency room. They gave her fluids and kept her overnight. Best they could figure was she had passed out from exhaustion and lack of food and water, as there were no wounds. She’d obviously had a nosebleed at one point but didn’t need a transfusion or anything. They had her on an IV to get her fluid levels back up and put her in a private room.

  Jai Li was in the pediatric ward, where they gave her a pint of blood. They bandaged her neck, but the biggest worry was infection. She’d be staying a couple of days.

  Gunther had been stabbed, and Anezka stayed with him until the ambulance could arrive. He had to have surgery but had no permanent damage. He’d have a wicked new scar to add to his collection, though. Anezka had really stepped up, clobbering the cultist who stabbed him and fighting the others off.

  I didn’t sleep that first day, going back and forth between Katie and Jai Li. When Deidre and Jimmy got to the hospital with the Black Briar survivors, I let her spell me while I went to use the hospital locker room to shower. I changed into scrubs and fell asleep at Katie’s bedside. Jai Li was asleep, and Deidre would be there when she woke. I needed Katie to wake up, to say my name.

  Did I say that ambulance ride was long? The night waiting for Katie to wake up was longer. Now I had an inkling of what she’d been through after I killed Jean-Paul. And those chairs were not comfortable at all.

  Around dinner the next day I was contemplating the fact that I hadn’t had any food since the olives, cheese, and salami we’d had in our apartment the night before. The thought of it and the memory of making love to her warred inside me. I needed fuel. Knew I needed it, but if she died, if she did not open her eyes soon, I don’t think I cared if I ever ate again.

  And I couldn’t bear the thought that she’d wake up and I’d not be there.

  Skella solved it. I was nodding, trying to stay awake, realizing that, too, would take me down eventually.

  “Here,” Skella said, swinging into the room with two boxes and a case of Diet Coke.

  She pulled a hospital table around and placed a box on top of it, flipping open the lid. It was a BBQ-chicken pizza. My mouth watered and my stomach clenched.

  “Thanks,” I said, but she was already at the door.

  “Got to deliver this other one,” she said with a wave and was gone.

  I closed the lid on the box and slid the table aside. I did take a drink, though, and cracked it open. The first few gulps tasted like heaven going down.

  “I’d kill for a slice of that pizza,” Katie said.

  I dropped the soda, lurched up out of the chair, and practically threw myself onto the bed. I was laughing and crying at the same time.

  “About time,” I said, wiping my face. “You scared the hell out of me.”

  She smiled, taking my hand, squeezing it. “You look hot in those scrubs.”

  That’s when I knew she was going to be okay.

  Eighty-three

  We had twenty-four people in Chumstick counting the hostages. Of the four on duty when the cultists arrived on the scene, Lonnie and Abrielle were killed, while Steve and Jayden survived.

  Stuart and Jimmy brought twelve people with them. Paul Aaronson, Marla Stewart, Kyle George, Jillian Brachman, Jimmy, and Stuart survived. We lost Eddie Boyce, Bobby Denton, Daniel Kincaid, Byron Fischer, Aiswara and Victor Tiwary (brothers), Andrew Ohng, Cindy Nguyen, Tila Morgan, Kesha Mahnke, Lorelei Sturgis, and Brook Lefevre.

  The bad guys had shown up with some of our folks in tow. They all survived, miraculously. Trisha, Frick, Frack, and Jai Li. As well as Mr. Philips, the manservant of Frederick Sawyer.

  Qindra was already there, trapped in the house. She got out alive.

  Frederick Sawyer and Nidhogg both arrived after the battle had begun, and both survived. Although a change had happened. Nidhogg had not been out of her house in a hundred and fifty years. The world had progressed a lot in that time. Big changes were on the horizon.

  On the bad-guy side, they counted the bodies of eighty-four cultists. Didn’t make any sense why they hadn’t totally kicked our ass. Sometimes you just had to shake your head and wonder. I know our fighters had trained and used weaponry and terrain to our advantage, but seriously.

  About a dozen of Justin’s folks were seen beating feet for the hills.

  On the plateau, Qindra counted forty-seven murdered civilians. She had a crew come out, but there was no way to cover up that many dead.

  The newspapers had a field day.

  The sheriff was among the murdered, but the deputy survived, thanks to our folks. He told the story of how we’d broken up a cult, like that Heaven’s Gate crowd. They killed a lot of people, burned down a few buildings. We were all heroes. Like
I needed more time in the papers.

  The elves and, in two cases, trolls, who had been part of the cultists, were handled by a private funeral home that had connections to Nidhogg. Need a body disappeared? No problem. A dragon owning a crematorium. Seemed redundant.

  And the seven we’d captured. They disappeared. Qindra wouldn’t say anything more about them. I guess I didn’t want to know.

  Eighty-four

  Everyone was free to go home on the twenty-fourth—Christmas Eve. Jai Li would need to check in with a doctor, but her wound was remarkably light. Qindra had done something to her, I was sure. The scar would be much reduced as well. Her wand had been with Katie when Jim found her. The look on Qindra’s face when he handed it to her was amazing. A détente had been born. That was the final handshake in my mind. I’m not sure how we’d all move forward, but Qindra was no longer “them.” She was part of “us.”

  Stuart had stayed with her while she’d taken control of the scene in Chumstick, acting as her personal guard and helper. I’m not sure what happened there, but something. I’d have to keep an eye on that.

  Nidhogg’s lawyer, Anne Rokhlin, showed up at the hospital as we were checking out. The drive over the pass had not made her any more pleasant.

  “You need to take her home,” she said, handing me a sheaf of papers. I glanced at them and dropped them on the table in the waiting room.

  “Say that again,” I demanded.

  “With Qindra home again, Nidhogg has formally requested that Jai Li return to her rightful place in her home.”

  I punched her. Okay, so maybe I didn’t have the beserker under control after all. Katie pulled me back. “Sarah, no!”

  The lawyer stumbled back against the nurses station, holding a hand to her mouth. “Really?” she asked, looking at the blood on her hand. “I’ll tell you this one time, Beauhall. You do not want me as an enemy. If you ever lay a hand on me again, I will bury you.” She took a deep breath, plucking several tissues from the box on the nurses station, and held them to her bleeding lip. “I’m just the messenger. Take the girl home and consider some fucking therapy.”

  She turned, snatching her briefcase off the floor, and stalked out of the ward.

  “Nice,” Katie said, holding my arm. “Can we not make things worse?”

  I took a deep breath. “Yeah, right. We just take her home?”

  Katie shrugged. “Let’s take her; I’ll go with you. We’ll talk to Nidhogg, see what happens.”

  “Fine,” I said, snatching up the sheaf of papers.

  When we got out into the parking lot, Qindra had already hired a car. It was raining and cold, but I had my bike. We rode in the limo. I’d get my bike later.

  We arrived at Nidhogg’s place three hours later. Traffic across Highway 2 was miserable as more snow was falling in the higher elevations. Once we cleared Gold Bar, I regretted not stopping there, heading into Black Briar. Not yet, I thought. Business first.

  Katie sat with me, and Qindra sat opposite. Jai Li sat next to Qindra, holding the woman’s arm like she was afraid she’d float away, but she kept looking over at Katie and me.

  “How you holding up, kiddo?” I asked.

  She smiled, giving me the thumbs-up. The bandage on her neck looked huge, but I knew she’d be okay. Well, depending on Nidhogg, I reckoned.

  Eighty-five

  We strode into Nidhogg’s house, the main foyer empty and echoing. Jai Li had Qindra’s hand in her left and mine in her right. When the big doors shut, she paused, looked from me to Qindra, then dropped my hand and pulled Qindra left into the entrance to her wing. The gate stood across the hall, and Jai Li pointed at it, then back to me.

  “It’s quite beautiful,” Qindra said, looking back at me. “And why is this here?”

  Jai Li lowered her face but cast me a glance.

  “Nidhogg was afraid the children would hurt themselves,” I said. “She asked me to build it, to keep certain urchins,” I brushed my hand across the top of Jai Li’s head, “from getting hurt among your possessions.”

  “Is that right?” Qindra squatted down, taking Jai Li’s face in her hands. “Weren’t you told to never enter my quarters?”

  Jai Li pulled her face away, not looking at Qindra.

  “Found her asleep in your bed more than once, apparently.”

  I pulled the key from around my neck, handing it to her, leather cord and all.

  She took it, nodding once.

  A sound brought me around. The household had begun to creep into the foyer, dozens of women and children, each coming toward us.

  I saw Zi Xiu standing near the back, her hands over her mouth, crying quietly. The children came first, walking forward to touch Qindra and Jai Li.

  Katie and I stepped back toward the front door, letting them welcome their missing home. It was bizarre and heartbreaking. The children especially. They had this desperate look on their faces, like Qindra was a ghost or something.

  She stepped into the mob of them, touching each of them, calling them by name. Those she touched fell behind her, hugging Jai Li, then turning back to follow Qindra. Some looked back at me, but most did not. This was not my home; I was not one of them.

  After the children, Qindra moved to the adults, saying a word, hugging, touching, making human contact with each and every one. The room swelled with the noise of it, the sheer relief and joy of it.

  She stopped in front of Zi Xiu and took the woman’s hands away from her face, holding them both in her hands, and said something to her I could not hear. Zi Xiu laughed through her tears, but reached forward and hugged Qindra.

  The children cheered. I’m fairly sure this home had not had that form of noise inside the walls, ever. It made my heart ache. Katie clung to me, holding my right hand in both of hers, leaning against my shoulder.

  This was a family, not unlike Black Briar. These people loved one another, needed one another. And they lived under the fear of Nidhogg and her erratic moods.

  Qindra raised her hands, and the cheering stopped. She was thin, thinner than I liked. By rights she should be in the hospital, but I knew that wasn’t going to happen. Her recovery would be here, among her people.

  And that was as it should be.

  Jai Li hung back, torn between the crowd ahead of her and looking back at me. I smiled at her. “Go on. This is your home.”

  The huge doors at the far end of the foyer opened, and the noise fell to a hush. Nidhogg stepped forward, dressed in an elegant black dress, her hair pinned back in a series of tight braids, a silver pin holding it all together.

  She stood there, leaning against her black and silver cane, surveying the scene before her. First one, then another of the servants fell to their knees, heads bowed. Soon, the rest of the crowd followed, including Qindra.

  Only Katie and I stood, on the opposite end of the hall, facing Nidhogg. She looked different, more powerful somehow. Getting out of the house, flying across her land, perhaps that had changed her. Or, maybe it was her daughter’s coming home. She walked forward, the cane a staccato beat on the marble floor. First, she went to Qindra, pulling the woman up to her feet, and hugged her.

  Those on their knees gasped in wonder. This was unprecedented. Many of them began to cry, whether from joy or fear, I couldn’t tell.

  When Nidhogg stepped back, Qindra wiped her eyes. “Welcome home, daughter,” Nidhogg said. “You have been sorely missed.”

  “Aye,” one of the young boys squeaked. No one else spoke, but Nidhogg laughed. Her voice was paper thin, but the laughter was one of joy. Soon the rest of the room was abuzz with whispers.

  Nidhogg turned from gazing at Qindra and raised one hand. The room fell silent. “Jai Li,” she said, her voice stern once again. “Come forth, child.”

  “Mother,” Qindra said, her voice quavering, but Nidhogg held up a hand to silence her.

  Jai Li strode forward, cutting through the crowd, which shuffled aside to let her pass. She was so tiny.

  She stopped in
front of Nidhogg and knelt down, her head bowed.

  “Do not kneel to me,” Nidhogg said, pulling the girl up.

  Those kneeling cast glances at one another, and the whispers began again.

  Nidhogg did not quiet them, but when she spoke again, they fell silent.

  “You disobeyed me,” she said, her voice stern. I took a step forward, but Katie held on to my arm.

  Jai Li nodded.

  “You, who have never once set foot from this house, took it upon yourself to leave here, to do what you thought best.”

  She nodded once again, keeping her head bowed.

  I looked at Qindra, who practically vibrated with frustration.

  Nidhogg looked around the room at the upturned faces, each writ with fear once again.

  “This is my house, my domain,” she said, her voice growing louder. “I rule here. You,” she swept the room with her hand, “serve me at my whim.”

  She dropped her hand onto the top of the cane and looked back at me.

  If she made a move toward the girl, tried to hurt her in any way, I was going to kill her with my bare hands.

  “You are no longer part of my household,” she said to Jai Li. “I cannot allow it.”

  “But, mother,” Qindra said again; the strain in her voice was enormous.

  “Silence,” Nidhogg said, slashing her hand toward Qindra. “I rule here.”

  Qindra bowed her head, only the shaking of her shoulders betraying her tears.

  “Jai Li,” Nidhogg said. “You are banished from this home. Go out into the world and make your way. You have forsaken my bond. You will be casteless, without a master within my lands. I have no claim on you, henceforth.”

  Others wept then, not caring who knew.

  “We’ll take her,” I said, stepping forward.

  Nidhogg stared at me for a long time. No one rose, but many risked glancing back. “She can live with me and Katie. We’ll take care of her.”