“Listen, bitch. You try to pull any of that shit and you’re dead meat.”
Judy put her bike up on its kickstand, and got off. Tossing her helmet onto the ground, she walked right up to Weasel.
“Come on,” she said, a feral look in her eyes. “Let’s you and me get it on, Weasel.”
She stood in front of him, relaxed, ready. Her face told him she didn’t give a shit. He thought about the things he’d heard about her and hesitated. Even if something got started, there were still too many of them for the Dragons to come out ahead.
“You and me, Weasel. Let’s go.”
“Just what the fuck do you want?”
“The girl.”
“She’s not here. Chance just took off with her.”
“Then how’s about this,” Judy said. “You stay out of it and we stay out of it. We leave it between Chance and Blue. Whatever happens, happens, and we all go on the way we were going—business as usual.”
Weasel glanced at Beard and the big man shrugged. “Chance’s pretty full of himself,” Beard said. “Always saying he can handle anything.”
Weasel nodded. They’d come up here to party, not to get fucked over like this. And seeing how Chance wouldn’t even share that little piece of ass he’d snatched—well, fuck him.
“You’ve got a deal,” Beard told Judy.
“You come after any one of us and that deal’s off,” she said.
“I’m saying you got a deal,” Beard said, his voice lowering. “Don’t push your luck.”
Judy nodded. “Okay.” Whatever else Beard was, he was a man who kept his word. “You seen Blue around?” she tried.
“What do you think?”
“Right.” Judy went back to her bike. Picking up her helmet, she took the machine off its kickstand. The large man who sat on the Norton beside her leaned close.
“What now?” Hacker asked softly.
“Well, we didn’t see them coming in, so I guess we’ll just see where the road takes us going the other way.”
“Can we trust them?”
Judy looked at Beard. “I think so.” Kicking her bike into life, she gave the Dragons a wave, then led the way out of the farmyard.
“Are we letting them get away with this?” Weasel asked Beard.
The big man looked at him. “Chance that big a friend of yours?” he asked.
“He rides with us.”
Beard nodded. “Yeah. He wears his colors a lot—under that sports jacket he’s got on half the time. Besides, I gave them my word.”
“Turk isn’t going to like this. Chance’s been bringing in a lot of bread.”
Turk was the president of the Ottawa chapter of the Dragon.
“It’s the bread Turk likes, not so much Chance,” Beard said. “Chance did his bit to set things up, but now that the business end of things is running smoothly, well, the guy’s too fucking ambitious—you know? We only got room for one main man, Weasel. What goes down today, it could solve a lot of future problems.” He laughed at Weasel’s frown. “Come on, man. Lighten the fuck up, would you?”
Weasel nodded.
“Who’s for more brew?” Beard called to the other Dragons.
One by one they made their way back to the farmhouse.
5
Blue didn’t have time to think. By the time he realized that Joey was turning, the big man was already roaring down the road toward them. Blue hit the brakes, swerving into the ditch as Joey came at him. The Harley skidded in the dirt. Before the bike could trap him under it, Blue jumped free. Bushes broke his fall, but he still hit hard.
Farther down the road, Joey played chicken with Emma’s car, running her into the ditch as well. The car came to a dead stop. Emma slumped in the seat and the car stalled. Oh, Christ, Blue thought. If she’s hurt... He started for the car at a run, pain lancing in his side. Might’ve cracked a rib.
By the time he reached Emma’s car, Joey had turned around and was coming back. Blue reached in across Emma’s limp form and came up with the shotgun. As Joey came up broadside, Blue turned and fired, aiming low. The blast caught out the front wheel and the bike spun out of control, skidding sideways down the road until it spilled over in the ditch. Joey went flying.
Blue ran up to where Joey lay and thrust the barrels of the shotgun into his face. “Where’s he taking her?” he demanded.
“Fuck—fuck you.”
Joey was in bad shape. One leg was twisted under him, broken for sure. Some ribs were probably broken, too.
“You can still come out of this alive,” Blue told him.
Pure hate blazed in Joey’s eyes. “We... we got magic on our side,” he said. “The fags’ll make me better.”
Blue didn’t know what he was talking about. He sat back on his heels, laying the shotgun across his knees. He didn’t think he could use it on Joey, but Jesus, he had to get after Chance.
“Guess I’ll just sit here and watch you die,” he said, making out like he thought Joey’s wounds were worse than they were. “Anybody comes along to help you, and I’ll blow a hole in them.”
“Chance... Chance’ll get ’em to fix me up. He’ll...”
His words trailed off as he looked past Blue’s shoulder. Blue turned fast, bringing up the shotgun, then saw it was only Emma.
“You,” Joey said. “You’re...” His face clouded with confusion as he looked at her. “You’re supposed to be at the lake with... with Chance.”
Blue grinned. “Thanks, Joey,” he said as he stood up. He took Emma by the arm. “Let’s go—we’re losing time.”
“What... ?”
“Are you all right?”
“Shook up, but—what happened?”
Blue got her into the passenger’s side of the car and took the wheel himself. The ditch wasn’t deep and he didn’t think he’d have a problem just backing the car out. “Joey thought you were Button and it screwed him up. Good thing, too. He might be stupid, but he’s stubborn as hell. He’d never have told us anything.”
“I didn’t hear him tell you anything.”
“He said Chance was taking her to the lake—closest one to here is La Pêche. That’s got to be it. Come on,” he added to the car when it wouldn’t start.
“Are we just going to leave him... lying there?” Emma asked.
The engine finally turned over, coughed and started. “What do you think?” Blue asked. It took some rocking back and forth before he could back the car out. “You want to bring him along?”
“Well, no. But—”
“Hang on,” Blue said. He booted the gas, power-shifting until they were barreling along the road in fourth gear.
6
Judy brought the long cavalcade to a halt when they reached the wrecked bikes. She shut off her engine and the others followed suit. In the ensuing quiet, she walked over to where Joey lay, blinking up at her like a hurt animal.
“Blue’s bike’s over here,” Hacker called.
Judy bent over Joey. “What happened?” she asked, but the big man wouldn’t answer.
“He’s in bad shape,” Hacker said as he joined her.
Judy nodded. “Let’s clean up after Blue and call it a day,” she said. “We’ll load the bikes in a couple of the pickups and drop Joey here off with the Dragons.”
“What about Blue?” one of the other riders asked.
“I think this evens the odds,” Judy replied. She turned to them all. “Hey, thanks for backing me up.”
They hauled the bikes onto the beds of the pickups. Joey protested, but they put him in the back of the third truck.
“You coming?” Hacker asked.
Judy was looking on down the road. “This goes on to Lac la Pêche, doesn’t it?” she said.
Hacker nodded.
“I think maybe I’ll check out how things end.”
“You want some company?”
Judy smiled. “Not a crowd—but you’d be welcome.”
They waited until the rest of the group was ready to go. When the
long line of bikes took off, followed by the three pickups, they stayed behind, watching them go.
“You think Blue’s okay?” Hacker asked.
Judy nodded. “I just figure he might be wanting a ride home.”
Starting up their own machines, they headed off down the road.
Five
1
Twilight was thickening in Rathbabh when Glamorgana’s gnashers bound Button to a squat granite outcrop. Smoor stood nearby, staff in hand, glaring at Chance, who was watching the proceedings with a smirk. Soft music came from Taran’s harp where he sat in the deepening shadow of an old maple tree. The bard’s eyes were expressionless as he watched Glamorgana approach. The woodwife carried a naked knife in one hand. Its blade was long and finely honed, with two blood grooves running close to its false edge.
The gnashers stepped away from the stone at an abrupt motion of Smoor’s staff. Using the edge of the knife, Glamorgana cut open Button’s sweatshirt, baring her upper torso.
“Is the metal so cold?” the woodwife asked pleasantly at Button’s shiver.
Taran withdrew his hands from the strings of his harp and a deep quiet settled over the glade.
“I’ve had time to worry at this riddle of the hidden talisman,” Glamorgana continued, “but it took my bard’s words to give me the answer. Spill her red blood on a gray stone, he told me, and then I knew. The talisman is your heart, sweet thing.” Cutting through Button’s bra, Glamorgana laid her hand on Button’s bared breast. “That pulsing organ that beats so wildly under my hand.”
Taran frowned and laid aside his harp, remembering the words spoken that couldn’t be recalled. He’d spoken rashly, letting his bardic spirit unravel the riddle through him, but he wasn’t pleased. He had no stomach for more blood-spilling. Not like Glamorgana’s human agent. He watched under hooded eyes as Chance took a few steps closer to the stone. The biker slicked back his hair with a quick motion of his hand, a look of anticipation on his face.
“And it needed to be your heart, sweet thing,” Glamorgana said. “The wild heart—the heart that knows no logic, only emotion. I think I knew it all along, or why let your other half go?”
She played the tip of the knife across Button’s belly as she spoke, smiling as the stomach muscles contracted at the contact.
“I can feel the moment growing,” Glamorgana said. “The time is ripe to free the talisman from its pretty sheath.” She bent over, her face close to Button’s. “Surely you feel it too?”
Button’s eyes were huge with raw panic. She strained against her bonds, the ropes burning at her wrists and ankles. Glamorgana kissed her lightly on the brow, then straightened, the blade held ready in her hand. Then the gnashers raised nostrils to the air.
“Don’t even try it,” a voice said, dark with anger.
Glamorgana turned slowly from the stone to see Blue standing at the edge of the trees, the shotgun in his hands, bore trained on her. Behind him was a twin to the woman her gnashers had bound to the rock—the wild heart’s logical half.
“What’s this?” Glamorgana said lightly. “A rescue?” But she laid the knife down on the stone beside Button.
Taran stood up under the maple. Glamorgana mocked the man in his grease-stained jeans and leather jacket, but the bard in Taran saw beyond the man’s simple anger and plain garb. This was a hero, stepped straight from the old tales. An old heart beat in that young breast.
“Take care,” he said, so softly that the words carried no farther than his own ears. And he didn’t know if he spoke to the man or to his mistress.
2
They had spotted Chance’s bike as soon as they pulled in by Lac la Pêche. Blue parked the car beside it and killed the engine. Stepping out of the car, he looked all around them for some clue as to where the biker had taken Button.
“Listen,” Emma said.
That was when Blue heard the harping that led them to the glade where Button was bound to an old gray stone. The music made Blue think of Taliesin, and for one moment he thought he saw Sara’s bard standing there under the maple, the small harp at his feet. But then he aimed the shotgun at the woman with the knife, a raw red fire burning up through his nerves. He almost pulled the trigger when the woman mocked him.
“Step away,” he said, making a small motion with his weapon.
But the tall woodwife merely regarded him, one hand straying to a bag at her side. “So forceful,” she said. “And he sees into Faerie, too. Can he see my gnashers as well?”
She made a small motion with her hand, but Blue had been ready for it. He’d spied the gnashers straight off. As they moved forward at her signal, he turned slightly, fired at them, then pumped a new shell into the breech. The bore swung back to cover Glamorgana, Chance and the bard before they had a chance to make a play.
But Blue wasn’t prepared for the effect of his shot on the gnashers. He’d just wanted to scare them off. They were standing far enough back so that they’d get stung by the little steel pellets, but not badly. Instead, they were howling as if he’d shot them from close up. It was the iron in the steel pellets. And Faerie can’t abide iron—not Faerie such as these, unused to the haunts of men.
A humorless smile tugged at Blue’s lips as he saw the woman’s dismay. He turned slightly toward the gnashers, saw them thrashing about, clawing at where the pellets had struck them, but still approaching him. He fired a second time, smoothly pumping up a new shell again. This time they backed away.
“I’ll only ask you one more time,” he said. “Step away from the stone.”
“Oh, I think not,” Glamorgana said.
Her hand lifted from her spellbag, cold witchfire flickering in her closed fist. But before she could throw it, before Blue could shoot, Taran sprang forward. One hand tore the spellbag from her shoulder so that it fell to the ground, the other closed about the fist that wielded the witchfire.
“You fool!” Glamorgana cried.
She spun out of his grip, but the witchfire ran down her arm. The flames charred Taran’s hand, but only the smallest spark had touched him. Glamorgana screamed, the witchfire enveloping her in a sheet of white flame. She stumbled against Chance and the two staggered in a macabre dance that lasted only moments before the witchfire consumed them. The flare of their dying blinded every one of them watching. When they could see again, it was to see a cloud of ash settling where they’d stood.
“Jesus Christ,” Blue said softly.
The gnashers howled. When Blue turned to them, shotgun raised, Smoor tossed down his staff and the creatures fled.
Emma clutched Blue’s arm. “Blue... ?”
He looked at her, seeing his own shock mirrored in her face; then he shook his head slowly. “Button,” he said softly.
He went to the stone and cut her free, enfolding her in his arms.
“I prayed you’d come,” she mumbled into his shoulder. “I didn’t believe you would, but God I prayed.”
Blue took off his jacket and wrapped it around her. “You think I’d let them just take you?” he asked. Button didn’t answer. She just hugged him tighter. “It’s going to be okay now,” he told her. “Can you hang in for a moment? I want to see to the guy that saved our asses.”
When she nodded, he left her leaning against the stone, his jacket wrapped tight around her, and moved to where the bard knelt, clutching his burnt hand. Laying down the shotgun, Blue went down on one knee so that their faces were level.
A twisted smile touched Taran’s lips. “I’ll be... I’ll be playing no songs of this night’s work,” he said.
“We owe you a big one, man,” Blue told him. “Let me see that hand.”
Taran held out the hand. It was shriveled and black—a bird’s talon now, not a human hand. It wouldn’t be fingering a harp’s strings anymore.
“Witchfire burns... clean,” the bard said. “But painful.”
“Jesus.”
While Blue talked to the bard, Emma slowly approached the stone. She stared at her twin’s
face. As Button’s gaze met her own, something fired between them. Gingerly, Emma reached out to touch her twin. Like a movement in a mirror, Button lifted her own arms. When their hands met, they each felt their gazes spin. A rushing sound filled Emma’s ears. Vertigo overcame her so that she fell to her knees, eyes shut fast. When she opened them again, Button was gone and she was clutching a dusty rose sweatshirt and a leather jacket.
“What the hell... ?” she heard Blue say.
She turned to him, tears in her eyes. She could feel again, though it wasn’t quite the same as before. There was a sense of sharing present inside her now. The memories she had for the past two days were doubled, strangely imposed on each other. She looked at Blue and saw him through Button’s eyes. Her eyes. Their eyes.
“She... she’s not gone, Blue,” she said softly. “But it’s not just Button anymore.”
She hugged the jacket and sweatshirt against her chest. She wanted him to say everything was okay again, but she wasn’t sure that it was. Button wanted him, but she didn’t even know him.
“I guess it’s got to be like... starting over again,” he said finally.
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She looked up at the darkening sky through the boughs of the holt’s trees and felt something else stir inside her as well. The wild heart. That power that Glamorgana had sought, that could never have been hers. A wind touched her cheek, blowing in from the west.
Be strong, my heart, she thought she heard it say in a voice low and husky, as she remembered Esmeralda’s to be. Guard that gift and use it well.
Use it? she thought. She could feel the stir of tree roots underfoot, could almost understand the words spoken above her, leaf to leaf. They told her what to do. She rose from where she knelt and went to the bard. When she touched his hand, that Autumn Gift drew the pain away. She couldn’t heal, but she could ease. Taran looked up, his eyes shining as his bardic nature recognized what moved through her. Then she turned to Blue.
Holding the jacket and sweatshirt close in the crook of one hand, she lifted a hand to touch his cheek and could feel the tension ease in him as well.
He closed his fingers around hers and squeezed them lightly before letting her hand go. “Look,” he said.