by Tim Lebbon
Don’t die, she was saying. Don’t get yourself killed and leave me in this strange new world.
“Do my best,” he said.
“Come on,” Lilou said, but not harshly.
The two groups parted company. Lilou, Angela, Tah, and Ahara headed uphill. Vince, Baylor, Jay, and the unconscious Meloy headed east, intending to turn upward around the next ridge.
“Fucked-up day,” Jay said.
“Right,” Vince said. He feared it was going to get even more fucked up.
* * *
“What else can we expect?” Vince asked a few minutes later. Angela and the others were out of sight, as if the wild landscape had swallowed them up.
“Huh?” Jay seemed distracted.
“Mallian had a pixie with him, called Thorn. Vicious bastard. I’ve seen him in action before, back in London. But there was something else, a woman who kept sort of flickering back and forth, sometimes a woman, sometimes something like… an otter? A fox?”
“Huh.” Jay carried on walking, resting her rifle in the crook of her left arm and looking ahead.
“What does that mean?” Vince asked.
“Means you better hope we don’t meet her. Sounds like a kooshdakhaa. Never seen one myself, heard about them though. Baylor?”
“Not pleasant,” the centaur said.
Vince followed Jay in silence, suddenly realizing how isolated he was, at the mercy of this woman who Meloy had brought in to help them. She was someone he’d never met, didn’t know, and now Meloy was on the verge of death. Vince could be in as much danger from her and Baylor as from Mallian and his crew.
As Jay had said, Fucked-up day.
The morning sun was warming the air and lifting a haze of mist from the forests, making the atmosphere heavy with moisture. With each minute that went by it grew more and more humid, and he became soaked with perspiration. Jay soon altered their route and took them straight up the hillside toward the mountain’s hidden peak. That didn’t help.
“The others are well,” Baylor said. Jay grunted. Vince didn’t ask any questions, but took comfort from the centaur’s pronouncement.
* * *
Angela had never seen Ahara so solid, so there. She led the way, heading into the mouth of a steep gorge and seeming never to tire. Lilou followed silently. Whether or not she trusted the wisp, she seemed content to follow her higher into these mountains.
Angela was close behind Lilou, and behind her came Tah. The cyclops fascinated Angela. A mummified cyclops head had been her first ever sight of a Kin relic, back in Vince’s secret flat in London when life was simpler and she’d merely suspected Vince of having an affair. Tah was dressed in loose jeans and a checked shirt, and she’d produced a baseball cap from somewhere. From behind she might have looked like any normal woman. Bigger in the shoulders perhaps, stockier than most, with a strength that would immediately set her apart.
But the single, big eye was animalistic, more like a bird’s than a human’s, lidded with a fine skin layer that flipped down and back regularly to clean her vision and lubricate the large eyeball’s surface.
“The others have started uphill,” Tah said.
The silent communication between Kin was a mystery, but Angela didn’t want to know. All she wanted was for Sammi to be safe. Then, only then, she might consider her future with the Kin. Whatever she decided, she was sure they would now always be in her life. It was too dangerous for them to let her go.
If Mallian got what he wanted, everyone would know about them, soon enough. The implications of this—his intentions, the methods he might use, their effects—had never really been discussed, but she feared that she knew what it meant.
Humanity wasn’t ready for the Kin. Creatures like these would threaten the foundation of every belief system, and throw every human being off balance, whether or not they were people of faith. Like anything they feared or didn’t understand, people would greet the Kin with suspicion and violence. With Grace on his side, Mallian would return that violence in kind.
Magic against guns. Myth against military might. The slaughter on both sides didn’t bear thinking about.
“Close,” Ahara said from up ahead. The gorge had widened into a deep valley, a sheer cliff to their left leading up to a curving ridge line, a wider bowl-shaped formation to their right, clogged with trees and tumbled boulders. Ahead, the slope rose even more steeply toward an escarpment high above. It was a wild, rough landscape, beautiful and brutal.
“Where?” Lilou asked.
Ahara grew still, tilting her head as if listening, looking left and right.
“Closer.”
“Closer where?” Angela asked. “What are we looking for?”
“And… here,” Ahara said.
Undergrowth rustled. Birds took flight from trees around and above them, singing out in alarm.
“Is this it?” Angela asked, wondering what the Fold would be, how it would manifest, and whether they’d even realize they were there.
But this wasn’t the Fold.
She smelled Mallian before she saw him emerging from the shadows beneath the trees. That such a large creature could conceal himself until he was so close to them shouldn’t have surprised her. Nothing about him should surprise her.
He appeared to be alone, and that didn’t surprise her either. The Kin allied with him would be out there in the wild, tasked with stopping Vince and the others.
“Lilou,” Mallian said, as if no one else existed.
Ahara had faded back, becoming hazy now that her betrayal was complete.
“This is so wrong,” Lilou said. “I can’t let you—”
“‘Let’?” Mallian said, and he chuckled. Angela wasn’t sure she had ever heard him laugh before.
An explosion of movement erupted behind her, then past her, as Tah went for the Nephilim. Angela opened her mouth to shout a warning, but felt herself winded with shock at what was happening, and what she was about to see.
She wished she could close her eyes. She wanted so much to turn away, to not witness something that would stay with her forever. But her mind was already scarred by violence, and the same shock that stole her voice froze her to the spot.
Tah seemed to flow across the twenty feet between the small group and Mallian, dodging a couple of small saplings, her passing barely touching the undergrowth. A couple of leaves shimmered, and a cloud of flies parted and then closed again behind her. It was almost too fast for Angela to take in.
She reached Mallian and leapt.
Mallian flitted to one side and brought his fisted right hand around and down onto Tah’s back. He struck her between the shoulder blades and drove her into the ground. All her grace, speed, and suppleness was shattered by the impact, replaced with a heavy grunt and a crunch as she struck.
“Mallian—” Lilou began, but the big Nephilim seemed suddenly aflame with movement and rage. Before Tah had a chance to move or catch her breath he grabbed her up in both hands, one clasping the back of her neck, the other clenched around a big thigh. He lifted her high and brought her down with all his might.
Bones broke. Blood splashed. He did it again, and again, then threw her limp body into the air. He caught her lower leg while she was still above him, and used his body weight to swing her around and down, slamming her head into a heavy tree. The sound of splintering was more than wood.
Angela managed to close her eyes at last, but she still heard. Tah was probably dead already, but over the space of the next few seconds Mallian made sure.
“Mallian, no,” Lilou said, and in her words Angela heard a hopelessness she too felt.
“Where are the others?” he demanded. His voice was deep and angry, but he didn’t sound the least bit out of breath.
“Dead,” Ahara said.
Angela’s eyes snapped open. Lilou lowered her head to look at the ground, and as realization of the double deception bit in, Angela felt tears blur her vision.
“All of them?” Mallian asked. He was gazin
g at Angela now, knowing where to look for the greatest reaction.
She stared back at him, defiant behind the tears. Her jaw trembled. She made herself glance down at the bloody, broken remains of Tah, steaming in the morning sunlight where parts of her that should never be seen were splashed and slopped out to view. The horror of the sight fed into her shock and grief.
“It doesn’t matter,” the Nephilim said.
“It all matters,” Angela said. “Vince mattered to me more than anything. It’s called love. You don’t understand it, and that’s why you’ll lose.”
“Lose?” Mallian said, tilting his head. “I never looked at this as a competition.”
“You’ve gone so wrong,” Angela said. “It’s so sad. Even with the fairy, you’ll never gain whatever you see in your dreams. You know that, don’t you?”
“I know I have to try,” he said. He wiped his hands across his body, leaving smears of blood and gore. “You’re all coming with me.”
“I thought you’d just kill us,” Angela said. “That’s what you’re good at.”
“Ahara, no, because she led you to me. Lilou, no, because I love her and she’s my oldest living friend, however misguided she’s become. But you, Angela? A human who has no love of the Kin?”
Angela stared at the Nephilim. Her heart hammered, and every instinct strove to tear her gaze away. But she denied those instincts. Few humans had ever seen anything like this majestic, horrific creature and lived.
“Come on then, you bastard,” she said. “I’ll gouge your fucking eyes out.”
Mallian blinked, then smiled.
“You come with me,” he said.
“Why?”
“To bear witness,” he replied. “It’s a great day.” He looked down at the ruined Kin at his feet. “A great day! Surely you can feel that, Lilou?”
Lilou said nothing.
“You will,” he said. “You all will.” He pointed up the slope toward the escarpment. “We’re close. She’s close. Walk.”
They all started to move. With Mallian bringing up the rear they headed uphill. Angela could already see something strange up on the escarpment. Part of the forest seemed less solid than the rest, more uncertain. Like heat haze, only more fluid, slower.
Part of the world was not their world anymore.
35
Sammi went downhill. It was an instant decision, one informed by the strange area she’d spied up on the ridge line ahead. It was hidden behind trees now, but the few glimpses she’d caught were troubling. They played on her mind.
It’s somewhere else, she kept thinking, and running away from it made her feel better.
She tripped over a hidden root and went sprawling, sliding through undergrowth and feeling brambles and thorns prickle across her neck and shoulder. She pulled herself upright, wincing against the pain but not letting it slow her. A few scratches and cuts wouldn’t matter. She’d been struck by lightning twice, and survived.
Gregor would do so much worse if he caught her.
Scrambling over a fallen tree, she scanned ahead to pick the best route. There were no paths or trails here, and she had to make her way between trees, following the contours of the land to avoid slipping into a ditch or a hollow. The idea of being trapped somewhere deep while Gregor appeared above her was terrifying.
She had to believe that he was still pursuing her, although she could no longer hear him. She might have lost him on the flatter ground, sprinting ahead and disappearing while he still struggled up the steep slope. She couldn’t rely on that. Moving as quietly and rapidly as she could, Sammi felt his breath on her back with every step.
After running for what might have been fifteen minutes, still cautious, still quiet, Sammi heard a strange sound from up ahead. She skidded to a halt, kicking up fallen leaves and twigs as she bumped down a slope and came to rest against the trunk of a big tree.
The sound came again. A long, slow moan, like something in pain.
Edging around the tree, peering downhill at an open area of forest below, she saw Vince and some of the creatures he’d been with before.
Her heart stuttered. Aunt Angela! she thought, but there was no sign of her. Only Vince, and a strange man-horse with another man splayed across its back, and a woman carrying a gun. They were tending to the man on the man’s… horse’s… thing’s back, and he was the source of the long, low moaning.
Sammi felt freedom and help closing in. She barely knew Vince, had only met him a couple of times, but he had been with her aunt, and now she knew that he was here to help.
She certainly couldn’t sit here for too long, trying to debate what to do.
“Vince!” she whispered, and they all turned to look at her.
Vince, with wide-eyed disbelief and a smile breaking across his face.
The horse-man with a look nothing like a real man’s.
The woman with the gun pointing at her face.
“Sammi!” Vince said. “Are you—”
His gaze shifted behind her at the same time as she heard the sound. She knew it was Gregor, so instead of pausing to turn and look she launched herself from the side of the tree and curled into a ball, hitting the slope hard and rolling several times before coming to a halt. Scrambling on hands and knees, scratched and cut in a hundred places, she scrabbled toward Vince.
He was there for her, grabbing her under the arm and pulling her upright. Beside him, the older woman was standing in a shooting stance.
Sammi twisted to look behind her.
Gregor was at the bottom of the slope. Sweating, panting, curved knife grasped in his right hand, he was also grinning a mad, toothy grin. There was blood on his face from where a branch or thorn had slashed him across the bridge of his nose. Blood smeared his teeth red.
“Give her to me,” he said, and the woman tensed.
“You want me to kill him?” she asked.
“Yes,” Vince said.
“No!” Sammi shouted. “Not because of me.”
The woman breathed hard, grumbling in her throat.
“It’s not only for you, Sammi,” Vince said. “Shoot him.”
Sammi actually heard the metallic strain of the trigger tightening when another sound broke the air. A heavy, unbelievably loud crack. Not for an instant did she believe it was a gunshot, because she’d heard that sound before.
Not again, Sammi thought, and the fading marks across her shoulder, chest, and arm tingled with static. Oh no, not again.
* * *
As Grace makes her way toward one of the remaining open routes into and out of her Fold, she stretches out her senses and probes beyond. It is unpleasant—sensing out into the human world is distasteful, like putting herself into the mind of a madman. With these bridges still connecting the Fold to the world, however, she can do it with relative ease.
Where she has recently felt one Kin approaching, now there are more. Confusion takes hold for an instant, then she gathers herself. Quickly she moves down the sweeping valley side toward the floor, leaping several tumbling streams, cooling herself in the mist from a waterfall, reaching the river and following its course downstream. Soon this river will come from and flow to nowhere, and she has begun thinking about how she will stock it with fish and keep the waters fresh. Her magic will make it happen.
The powers inside her, dormant for so long, are relishing this new explosive use. This is a wonderful sensation.
As she follows the river she hears something calling out in the distance. It is a vibrant, exultant sound, and it gives her a frisson of delight. One of the deniers she has brought here has found itself again, reassumed its real form, shed whatever pretense allowed it to exist openly within the world of humans. With every day that passes, her Fold is becoming a true place of the Kin.
She feels no need to walk to the open portal at the end of the valley. Instead, after assessing the orientation of the Fold and the location she needs to reach, she reaches out with her magic to make a rent in the Fold’s skin. Her mag
ic comes as easily as breathing, thinking, being, and with a sharp crack the temporary tear opens up.
She peers through into the human world and sees the final Kin she seeks.
She doesn’t even have to move. She reaches out, grabs the denier, and pulls her through.
Then with a blink she closes the rip and drops the girl to the ground.
* * *
“No,” Vince breathed.
“No!” Gregor shouted.
Jay fired, but he had leapt toward the place where Sammi had been standing. The bullet slammed into the hillside.
Gregor tripped and landed on his face, clawing at the ground, hauling himself closer to the place where the impossible had happened.
I saw, Vince thought. He reached out and pushed the rifle down before Jay could shoot again. “We might need him.” He didn’t know how, or why, he thought that, but he was acting without thinking, some strange instinct moving him while his thoughts…
… his thoughts wallowed in shock.
I saw the fairy, I saw into the Fold, another world, her world, and now Sammi is in there, too.
Grace had reached through and grabbed Sammi’s hand. Time moved differently—out here manic, panicked, the witnesses watching in stunned disbelief. In that strange other place, slow and considered, almost calm. Sammi had stood and walked through, guided by the fairy who had glanced past her at the others.
Her eyes had met Vince’s. Less than a heartbeat, less than a blink, but in his memory that gaze felt like forever, as if he had been born staring into her eyes, and still did now. They held him pinned to the world.
“I saw…” he said, but he couldn’t say what he had seen. It made so little sense that words couldn’t describe. In his memory it was already a dream, so solid and sure moments ago, now faded and hazy. He tried to remember, to hold onto what they’d just witnessed. He closed his eyes.
“What happened?” Jay asked.
“I saw,” another voice said, and Vince turned to Baylor. The centaur was motionless, eyes wide and staring past Vince. But it was Meloy who had spoken. Splayed across the beast’s back, his head was raised. He locked eyes with Vince. “She took Sammi?”
