The night felt colder outside, but the snow started to lessen and I could see Aletta running, stumble --
Shakespeare came and settled on my shoulder, watching.
Tamerlane caught Aletta, white smoke sliding into her body. She nearly lost her balance, stumbled, and ran again -- limping now.
"Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt in the tangles of Love's very hair." Shakespeare said, shaking her head.
I knew what ran ahead of us wasn't Aletta in one sense. I didn't know if I cared.
A dragon glided over the top of the hotel, golden scaled, the sinewy body flowing as though moving through water rather than air. Aletta -- Tamerlane -- turned as the creature came at him and yelled --
The dragon caught her by the shoulder, flapped his wings, lifting upward, upward, gone into the clouds before I could even shout.
The other dragon circled around us once, landed and changed into the jade-eyed woman. The fae backed away in haste. Adrian and I did not.
"Have we done well?" I asked softly.
"Oh yes, my little fae friend. Oh yes. We have him now. Be safe. Be well."
Then she changed, took to the air and sailed to her companion.
Light flashed and I felt a door open, magic rolling over us for a moment -- a door to somewhere, though not to the land of the fae. They sailed through, taking Tamerlane with them.
And the door closed.
The snow finally stopped falling.
"Done." Adrian said, sighing with relief.
"Almost." I reached into his pocket and pulled out the chain and gem, handing the necklace to my father. "Aletta had very powerful help."
He held the gem, opened the magic, and traced a line -- straight to another man whom I almost didn't recognized since I so seldom saw him: Kalin, Aletta's father. He still in the big cape he wore when he visited his daughter at the condo.
"That's him! That's him!" Gaylord snapped his beak at the man several times as the others took him away.
"Go rest," my father ordered. His hand on my shoulder gave me a little more magic. "We'll see what we can settle tonight, before the humans awake, and clear the signs of the magic and the war both here and in the park."
"Peripix everywhere," I warned. "Some of the cats got a few, but they're nesting in places they shouldn't. The cats can show you where. The Edge though --"
"Already retreating to where it belongs." His hand rose, measuring the magic. "They must have worked for decades on this plan, and waited for a time of flux. Damned dangerous stuff, forcing The Edge to move. And, from what I could tell from the army we destroyed, Kalin and Aletta imbued each of the soldiers with a little door magic, so they could pass back and forth at will -- at least for a while."
"The city?" I asked, looking around as the last shadows of Samarkand faded.
"Apparently they used small pieces of The Edge taken from all over the world and built the mythical city around them. That's why it could pass through The Edge. It took them years -- probably decades, if not a century -- to set this up and put it in motion. If I had considered another fae might be helping, I wouldn't have abandoned you to this." He put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my eyes. "You did a good job, Kat. We can do the rest. You need to recover. I would hate to lose you now."
Adrian took my hand, worry in his face. I let him lead me away and headed towards home. I didn't mind the walk -- I could still gain magic from the snow. Cato rested on his shoulders and Gaylord and Shakespeare flew ahead of us. When I glanced back, I could see my father send people out to fix whatever little problems might remain.
We won. The world didn't end.
"Done," I finally said.
Adrian wrapped an arm around my shoulder.
Done and safe.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Three days passed before the road crews could get the highways cleared, even with the snow melting in the warm spring days. By then we had power, the phones working and people had begun to drive out of Estes Park, happy to leave the long adventure behind.
Others had headed to the mountains to ski. Some humans are just crazy.
Adrian and I had breakfast at The Bear Camp the morning he planned to leave. Lily and Jim shared coffee with us, as they prepared to go hunt down the creature they'd sought before the snows.
"With luck, the thing has disappeared," Jim said. "I hope so. We have the park open again, and even the pass will be cleared within the week."
I nodded, knowing the gargoyle was gone, and gave Adrian a little smile.
He'd already talked to the magazine publisher, confessed everything, and sent scans of some preliminary pictures we'd taken the day before. The publisher forgave him everything once he saw the work. He even said the pictures of the animals seemed magical.
He was right.
"I'll be back in a few weeks," Adrian said as we walked out of the café. He took my hand and held the fingers tightly in his own. "I'm somehow going to wrangle a way to get me settled here, at least for a good amount of time. I want to know -- I want to understand everything: Magic, you, the two worlds. What I saw on the other side of The Edge -- I want to understand, Katlyn. I want you to teach me."
I nodded, not trusting my voice at that moment. I didn't want him to go, even for a little while. I turned and tested The Edge, as I did so often these days, while I fought to gain control of my emotions. It had returned to the Terra Tomah area and fallen silent and nearly still. We had calm again, though I had trouble accepting the peace.
We still had a few peripix. Even my father and his men couldn't find them all. The cats continued to do their best, and the clan planned to return to try and clear them out as soon as they settled things on the other side.
Aletta and her father had set a number of magics in motion there, and created considerable chaos to cover what they did at this insignificant little corner of the human world. They had kept everyone else running in circles, but they had never expected me to stop them.
I had expected Tiber to replace me. Instead, he had come over and thanked me and Adrian both. He had never come to the human world before. I'm not certain Adrian really understood the full implications. But it meant a lot to me.
Now I looked at Adrian and gave a little sigh. He had to go, to deal with things in the human world -- in his place. I couldn't keep him here with me, without changing him. When we reached his car I leaned forward and kissed him. We drew whistles and cat calls -- one from a passing cat -- before he drew back.
"I can take you home first --" he said softly.
"I would rather walk," I said. "Go and hurry back, Adrian. I'll miss you."
Maybe I hadn't really said those words to him before. His eyes brightened and his smile grew wide. He opened the car door and slid in. The window rolled down but stuck half way. I reigned in my magic and it worked. I leaned forward and kissed him once again. We said nothing more.
He pulled away, the car turning in the parking lot, heading out into the street. Disappearing . . . my heart pounded and tears threatened to blur my vision, but I knew he would return. His promise gave me something wonderful to look forward to.
I took a slow walk home, stopping to talk to the pigeons and gathering three peripix I found nesting in the barn. All was well. A couple cats thanked me for the tuna treats they got every time they dropped a peripix into the holding tank. I'd have to send the new batch over to fae before the cell got to full. My real fear, however, was the possibility of peripix dens somewhere in the mountains. I suspected we were going to be dealing with this problem for a long, long time.
I stopped and talked to Mrs. Miniver, too, while Mrs. Hale bustled around in her kit out back.
"We did all right, we did," she said, all bright-eyed and looking half her age. I wondered if the change came from her short sojourn into the fae lands. "Cato, he showed himself a brave lad, he did."
"You were all brave," I said.
"That we were." She stared into my face. "All of us, Kat."
I
smiled, bade a proper farewell, and walked the rest of the way to the house. Trouble, Snow, Smoke and the little black cat I had started to call Shadow lounged under the trees. I'd bring them out some food in a few minutes.
As I stepped to the front door I heard Cato and the two birds inside, all three of them laughing.
And you know . . . that just can't be good.
The End
###
About the Author:
Lazette Gifford has publications in both electronic and print format, including material from Double Dragon Publishing, Yard Dog Press, Eggplant Literary Productions, Ideomancer, Fables, Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine and more. She owns Forward Motion for Writers and is the editor/publisher for Vision: A Resource for Writers.
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Web Site: http://lazette.net
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Kat Among The Pigeons Page 29
