Briar: Through the Mirrorworld

by C. T. Aaron

  Ezzy flings the Counterpart to the ground. The guy is moving, but holding his torso like the man on the second level had done.

  Good. It’ll do.

  I bring Ezzy back at a slow trot, trying to preserve his strength and energy and not make his wounds any worse. I spin toward Mae and Spark, and see Aison getting to his feet. Maebry is under one of his arms, as if her small frame will be enough to support the gargoyle.

  “Can he fly?” I say desperately as the men in the stands start making their way toward the field. Things are happening too fast for me to be sure, but I think some of them have weapons.

  Mae looks at Aison. The gargoyle is grim-faced and silent as always, but he looks down at her in turn. He brings his free hand, thick and boxy, under her delicate chin and lifts it. It seems for just a moment that he smiles.

  Mae faces me with a determined expression. “Yeah. He can.”

  I rush to his side as Aison slowly spreads his wings. I wrap my arms around one leg. Maebry does the same, and Spark slides in next to me, hanging on to Aison’s bicep.

  “Ezzy!” I say to my Fam as he reaches us.

  Ezzy looks awful. He’s actually panting, something I don’t remember seeing him do before. His eyelids are drooping.

  He tips his head back, snout pointed at the sky. I guess immediately what he means.

  “No! I can’t send you away once I lose sight of you!”

  He barks once, and turns away from me, lower his head and prepared to leap.

  A thousand things could go wrong, but we’re out of time. Maebry tells Aison to go. The powerful creature bats his wings once to get off the ground. It feels a bit like being in an elevator at first, but then Aison flaps again, and again, and with each beat of his wings, we go higher, faster.

  Below, dozens of men are now on the field, yelling, shaking fists, brandishing pistols. No longer under my control, Ezzy barks his worst, snapping and growling, keeping as many of them as he can from getting off clean shots.

  We clear the edge of the roof and fly into the crimson sky, three human beings clinging helplessly to the great stony muscles of a gargoyle in a world that dimly mirrors Earth.

  I actually have time to think that entire thought in all its grand absurdity before popping Ezzy out of the arena. I figure we should be free and clear now; Ezzy is so hurt, he has to recover. Hopefully I won’t have to call him to bail me out again any time soon.

  Then: bam!

  Aison shudders and dips in the air, losing altitude. Spark screams and nearly lets go of the gargoyle’s arm. Mae and I have a better time of it, because our feet are planted on top of Aison’s, like a little platform of stability with our arms wrapped around his legs. Aison doesn’t go horizontal like Superman when he flies; it’s more of an upright crouch.

  “What—?” Maebry cries.

  Bam! Another hit, like Aison’s being smashed by cannonballs.

  Then the baritone thrum of the hummingbird mutant finally pounds into me and I remember that it was up here waiting for us to make just such an escape.

  “Hold on!” I shout, somewhat pointlessly to Maebry and Spark.

  This bird, whether it’s being controlled by a Counterpart or not, is pissed. And it wants us out of its airspace.

  A third crash of its body into Aison’s suggests that it may very well get what it wants.

  “Aison, fly!” I scream. “Get out us out of range!”

  I have no idea if Aison can understand me or even cares to. My hope is if we can get far enough away, then if the hummer is being controlled by a Counterpart, eventually the person controlling it will lose that control when he can’t see his Familiar anymore.

  But the whole idea that a Counterpart can control a Fam is new to me, who knows how it really works?

  The hummer darts in for another attack and Aison swings a fist backward to try and knock it aside, but the hummer is too fast and agile. At least Aison’s swing prevented it from hitting us again.

  Aison pumps his wings and we move forward some more as the hummer cruises effortlessly backwards in the air. It looks like a graceful ballet dancer compared to Aison, who lumbers through the sky like a pallet of bricks dangling from a construction crane.

  I don’t know how the hell we’re getting out of this.

  Aison isn’t as fast as the hummer, which floats alongside us just outside his reach. The hum of its wings bruises my already battered brain, making my ongoing headache spread into my neck and shoulders as I cling hard to Aison’s leg. The hummer keeps tilting its head this way and that, as if looking for a weak spot.

  It finds one.

  The hummer either flies backward or slows down so Aison can get ahead of it—I can’t tell which—and ends up behind us. It zooms forward and upward, flexing its wicked tail, and snaps the tip into and through Aison’s wide right wing.

  Aison groans and dips a little in the air again as the hummer rips its tail from Aison’s wing, leaving a jagged hole.

  Maebry screams, “No!”

  While it’s not physically possible given its long, needle-like beak . . . I swear the hummer grins.

  It charges ahead again, tearing another hole in Aison’s wing. The gargoyle dips a little further. We’re not falling from the sky, not quite yet, but the ground is a hell of a lot closer now, maybe two stories.

  Aison tips to one side as his aerodynamics change. The hummer adjusts and bolts in for another strike.

  This time Aison’s ready for it. He folds the punctured wing close, enveloping Maebry momentarily in the thick membrane, and the hummer’s tail swishes harmlessly past him. Aison reaches out with his right hand and snatches the scorpion-like tail, yanking hard.

  The hummer wasn’t expecting that; it flips backward like a person slipping on a floor covered in marbles. Aison flexes his arm, swinging the hummer in front of him like the Fam is a tennis racket. I assume he’s going to fling the animal in front of us, maybe punch it or crash into it while it tries to regain its bearings.

  I couldn’t be more wrong. As the hummer swings away, Aison jerks his arm backward again, bringing the hummer in close. Its blurred wings thump into us, forcing me to close my eyes and hold on even tighter. Above even the nauseating vibration of the hummer’s wings, I hear a damp crunch that reminds me of pencils breaking.

  Suddenly the thrumming stops. I crack my eyes open and watch the hummer falling gracelessly to the ground. I hear it thump into the dirt as we fly over and past it. Aison bats his wings and gains a little altitude and continues our flight east. From my position on his leg, I see the hummer flitter its wings a couple times . . . and also see an enormous bloody gash in its chest.

  I crane my neck to study Aison’s powerful gray body. Streaks of dark liquid stream from his wide mouth, which is closed and grim as usual.

  He’s bitten the creature. And inflicted a terrible wound.

  “Oh my God,” I whisper, and turn to Maebry. She’s still across from me, close enough almost to touch, hanging on tightly to his leg. “Mae?”

  But she won’t look at me. Her eyes are open, I can see that. She’s just staring blankly behind us. Not at the wounded Fam, but rather at nothing at all.

  “Maebry?”

  No response. I look at Spark, whose face is mostly set in an expression of determination as he holds on to Aison’s arm. He does meet my eyes, though, for just a second, before looking away.

  That’s when I realize what’s happened.

  Aison didn’t bite the hummingbird on his own. Mae controlled him.

  And if it dies then so will . . .

  We keep flying.

  But not for long.

  EIGHTEEN

  “We need to set down,” I say, mostly to Maebry, who still looks utterly zoned out and not in a good way. “Mae? Can you hear me? We need to get on the ground.”

  Aison’s wing beats are slowing. I don’t think it’s just from the bloodless but garish wounds in his wing, either. I can practically feel the exhaustion in his limbs.

&nbs
p; “Mae!”

  At last she blinks and looks at me, eyes bleary. “Yes. Yeah, okay.” She tilts her head back. “Aison. Take us down. It’s okay, you need to rest.”

  Aison stretches out his wings and dips, doing one wide circle as if to burn off altitude before coming to rest on the ground. We tumble around a bit, like an airplane hitting turbulence, but the three of us climb off the giant gargoyle without too much damage. Aison gets his feet situated under him before clasping his wings shut around his body and sitting stoic and motionless.

  “Thank you, buddy,” Spark says, rubbing Aison’s good wing with one hand. “I have never, ever seen anything like that before.” To Mae he says, “You got one hell of a Fam here.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mae snakes her arms across her belly.

  “Give us a sec,” I say to Spark, and put an arm around Maebry. I lead her away to a withered acacia tree for a little privacy and turn her to face me, my hands on her shoulders.

  “Hey. I know what you did. It’s okay. You had to. That thing was trying to kill us.”

  Mae meets my eyes. Hers gleam with anger and turmoil both. “I might have killed someone, Briar. Killed them.”

  “The wings were moving, I saw it.”

  “Who the fuck cares?” Mae pulls backward out of my grasp. “Didn’t you hear me? I might have killed someone!”

  My arms drop to my sides. My headache, which gives no indication of stopping any time soon, nevertheless dims in response to my heart breaking for Maebry. Because the truth is, she’s right. She might have—could have—killed a Counterpart. A human being. I don’t personally think so, based on the amount of damage Aison and Ezzy have taken today and still survived, and that the hummer was moving after it fell.

  Still. It was an awful wound. I’ll live with the sound of its bones crunching as long as I live—whether that’s five minutes or a hundred years. If the Fam and its Counterpart do survive, it hardly matters now: Mae didn’t have any way of knowing if they would when she took control of Aison. It’s not like she chose between a taser and a pistol, assuming that one would be less lethal. She just did what she had to do to stop the hummer from attacking us again.

  “Maisy-Mae,” I say, trying to keep my voice gentle—which is not a skill I’ve really cultivated—“if you hadn’t done it, we’d all be dead. That thing wasn’t playing around. You saved us.”

  Maebry’s eyes fill with tears as she cinches her arms even more tightly around her body. “I know that too. And I’d do it again to protect you, B. I would. But now that we’re safe, I have to live with this. Okay?”

  I start to reply but Spark steps into view. “Um, sorry to interrupt, and I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but we’re not exactly safe yet. You hear it?”

  Mae and I turn west. Spark’s right, there’s a sound building from that direction. At first I think it’s the hummer, but no—it has a different pitch. Low, but not the same deep baritone as the hummer’s wings.

  “What is it?”

  Spark licks his lips. “I’m thinking motorcycles. A whole lot of ’em.”

  As soon as he says it, the sound clicks into place. Yep. A shit-ton of pissed-off guys on motorcycles headed right for us. Or at least our general direction. I can’t see them yet, but the reality is Aison didn’t fly all that far from the arena. A couple miles, maybe? Less?

  “Dammit, now what? Can we get Aison back up?”

  “B, I don’t think he can do much more flying.” Mae wipes tears from her face with her fingers.

  “And Ezzy’s pretty jacked up,” I say.

  “And if those guys bring their Fams to bear . . .” Spark says, then snaps his mouth shut.

  I nod quickly. It sure would make for one action-packed movie sequence, a bunch of Familiars fighting tooth and claw, but unlike a summer blockbuster, this fight would get all three of us smeared into bloody scraps on the ground.

  The monotonous drone of the motorcycle engines grows. Maebry and Spark look at me, like I’m supposed to have an answer.

  I check our surroundings. We’ve passed the clearing around the arena anyway, so there’s cover in any number of buildings, all of them dusty and disused like the others I’ve seen in this world. Most are one story, but there are a few taller buildings around, too. Taking stock of our limitations, I’m not sure running is the best idea. We can’t outrun motorcycles. On the other hand, if we hide and they find us, I don’t think we can fight them off.

  I face Mae. “Can he fly without us? Even if it’s just for a minute or two?”

  Mae is silent for a moment, then nods. “I think so. But not much longer than that.”

  I take her hand. “Come on, follow me!”

  The three of us Counterparts run for a white stucco building that looks like it’s a car repair shop in our world. Aison lumbers alongside us, head down, eyes narrow, reminding me of a determined marathon runner. He must be in so much pain right now.

  The building is two stories. We race to one of the wide entrances, the kind you’d drive a car through, and stop. I spot a staircase leading to the next floor.

  “Send Aison flying that way.” I point to what I think is north. “Let them see him go. We’ll go to the roof, and when he’s just about out of sight, pop him away. Can you do that?”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Not bad, worth a shot,” Spark mutters.

  I stroke Aison’s good wing. “Thank you. You saved us. You’re amazing.”

  It would be unfair to say Aison smiled, but I swear something in his expression changed.

  “Now go. Let everyone who’s chasing us see you fly off, okay?”

  The gargoyle trundles backward, away from the building. Maebry, too, rubs his strong wing and whispers something I can’t hear.

  Aison unfurls his wings, and we dart into the building. With one mighty flap, he goes into the air, letting out a low rumble of pain as he puts his wounded wing to work.

  Maebry stands in the wide doorway, watching him go. I touch her arm. “Come on. We have to get to the roof so you can see him better.”

  Mae nods, and the three of us run for the stairs.

  My head swims as we reach the second floor, a room empty of anything but concrete pillars supporting the roof. When is the last time I ate? Or slept? Or am I not supposed to sleep, that’s the right thing to do with a concussion, right? Stay awake? If time really does pass the same here, it’s got to be at least two o’clock in the morning, maybe later, which means I’ve been going full-tilt since around nine p.m. and haven’t slept in almost 24 hours.

  All these thoughts coalesce in my stomach, making it churn. Good lord, the last thing I need is to start puking all over everything . . .

  “You okay?” Spark says as we rush for a ladder bolted to one wall. Above it is a trap door to the roof.

  “Of course,” I say, grabbing on to the ladder for stability. The floor seems to be resting on ocean waves beneath me. That’s probably bad.

  “We got to get you some help,” Spark says.

  “Yeah, you look terrible,” Maebry says.

  “Shut up!” I bark. “Just get up to the roof and take care of Aison!”

  Neither of them are impressed by that, but Spark does start climbing the ladder. He throws open the trap door and gets onto the roof.

  Maebry rests a hand against my cheek. “You’re pale. He’s right, we have to get you home.”

  I pull her hand away as the floor lurches under me again. “Fine. But we can’t do it now. Get up there. Please.”

  Mae frowns, but hikes up to the roof. I try to watch her go, except tilting my head backward brings those ocean waves back to my feet, and I have to re-center my head. Once I hear her on the roof, I climb up.

  Aison flies in the distance, the direction I’d pointed. He’s about the size of a fingernail, making good time. We crouch behind a the lip of the roof, and can now see the men on their motorcycles. They’re not far, a few football fields, maybe.

  “Look,” Spark whispers. “Way to go, I think it’s
working.”

  About half the men veer north, pursuing Aison. The rest keep coming roughly our direction, but it occurs to me that unless they’ve got some kind of tracking we don’t know about, they can’t possibly know where we are.

  I sit with my back against the lip and glance at the sky. Maybe they’ve got other flying Familiars who are circling and reporting back to a Counterpart. But I don’t see anything. Maybe there’s some kind of giant eagle or something up there, too high to see, but there’s nothing as far as I can tell.

  Spark and Mae also slide down, so the short wall is taller than our heads. “I’m going to take a look over here,” Spark says, and crabwalks to the opposite corner of the building.

  By this time, I’m so tired I’m starting not to care if they find us or not. I shut my eyes for just a second, but that makes it worse. I open them again.

  “I’m sorry I did this to you,” Mae whispers as the growl of motorcycle engines gets nearer.

  “You didn’t do anything.” I drape a hand over her left knee.

  “No, you were right. I shouldn’t have come here at all. It’s my fault that—”

  “Mae,” I say, “I’m gonna stop you right there. I feel like shit, so I’m only saying this once. You’re here because that asshole back home attacked us. You’re here because there was a place where people like him don’t exist, or aren’t supposed to anyway, so of course you went. Would you let me say that it’s my fault I let you come here?”

  “No.”

  “Right. No. When bad people do bad things, that’s on them. Every time. Okay?”

  Maebry presses her lips together and nods. She puts her hand on top of mine, searching my face with her sparkling brown eyes. “You came looking for me.”

  “And I always will.”

  She takes my face in her hands and kisses me several times, soft and light. “We’re getting out of here.”

  “I know.”