Distracted, I lost my mojo. The feeling in my chest dissipated. An aura swarmed the tip of Urszula’s scepter and tore loose, the blast grazing the spiker’s back and carving a groove into the dirt behind it.
The damned thing altered course, coming straight after her with vengeance in its beady eyes.
“Urszula! Watch out!”
She stood strong, holding her scepter steady, determined to get off another blast, but I was already diving at her knees, tackling her to the ground just as the spiker leapt. It flew right over us, claws scrabbling and flailing. It spun about in mid-air and landed ready to spring again.
A shadow enveloped us. Wing beats raised the dust all around us. Mr. O squinted down from his mantid as a percussive blast spread from the tip of his scepter straight down onto the alpha spiker. The shock wave immobilized it, pressing it flat against the dirt. It shuddered and collapsed into a pile of mush, every plate and bone in its body shattered.
“Owe you one, Mr. O!” I shouted up as he banked away from the wall to evade a flurry of projectiles.
What was left of the main wave of spikers barreled into our formation. A silver-haired Old One beside me fell as the tusk of a spiker drilled into his sternum. He passed with a whimper.
I swung my sword at his attacker only to skewer another spiker that was leaping at me unseen. Urszula was back on her feet, sending pulse after measured pulse, mopping up the stragglers that careened through our ranks.
The spiker I had impaled writhed at the end of my sword, snarling and screeching, struggling to free itself to come at me again, vicious even in its final throes. I stabbed the blade in deeper and twisted, releasing a flood of fatty, yellow froth.
With one spiker left standing, a convergence of pulses dissolved it into a cloud of pink mist and a pile of quivering limbs.
Urszula came over and glared at me. “Never do that again.”
“Do what?”
“Do not attempt to protect me. I can take care of myself. Save yourself first or you can save no one.”
“You’re welcome,” I said, with a shrug, extracting my blade from the spiker’s carcass and wiping it on a bush.
“Come! We must move quickly now.”
Trisk and Mr. O on their hovering mantids provided cover, blasting unseen threats on the other side of the wall. We rounded the back of the city, reaching the manicured lane that led up to the glaciers.
The rear portal of Frelsi’s outer wall was only blocked by a single cart. The Old Ones quickly demolished it with their pulses and sent a ragtag band of Hemis fleeing to the Inner Sanctuary.
“Keep close,” said Urszula.
We slipped into the breach. The gap between the inner and outer walls here was much narrower than down below. There were no habitations, only open ground. I could have easily thrown a stone and spanned the distance between the walls.
The fleeing Hemis frantically cranked closed the gate of the Sanctuary as we approached. Our Old Ones arrayed themselves in an arc and went after it with spell after spell without much success. It seemed to absorb and deflect their pulses as if protected by its own potent spell craft.
I don’t what made me think I could do what several dozen wizened and practiced souls had failed to accomplish, but I added my sword to the effort. After that successful tussle with the spikers, I was feeling uppity, I guess.
I pointed my sword, looked at that gate and thought of the rakes and brooms that always seemed to jam our old garage door open. The gears and cogs of this mechanism were nothing like the motor and chain of a Sears Craftsman automatic opener. I didn’t even feel anything leave the sword, but the gate seized up tight, halfway closed, its hinges fused into a solid mass.
The Hemis panicked and scattered. The Sanctuary was open for plunder.
The Old Ones, gathering strength and speed by the minute, plunged through breach. Their scepters belched and splatted into everything and everyone who stood in their way.
Pulses rained down from the towers, unbinding everything they struck into their elemental parts. Some of the Old Ones managed to exude umbrella-like shields from the tips of scepters, not perfectly protective, but sufficient to absorb or deflect most of the force of a spell.
The base of a tower burst apart and the tower collapsed, scraping the platforms off neighboring structures, crushing a row of puffball huts.
I wasn’t adding much to the effort. My spells didn’t seem to flow as freely as theirs. I felt almost constipated. Mostly, I just got in the way.
The Old Ones seemed to ignore the Hemis for the most part, focusing their rage on the Freesouls, pursuing any brightly clothed individual with almost predatory abandon.
One man, cornered in the wreckage of a tower, tried to flee up a line of cracks in the inner wall. A scepter blast shattered the polished stone cladding it. He slid to the ground in a heap of rubble where a convergence of spells converted his flesh to mist.
The orgy of demolition commenced, barely opposed until a band of Freesouls wielding staffs appeared on our right flank and engaged us in a running skirmish. They harassed us with their erratic shots but did little to impede our progress. We drove them deep into the Sanctuary until they too, lost heart and fled.
A cacophony of bleating preceded a stampede of juvenile Reapers, released in desperation from the breeding pits. They came careening through the forest of towers like a flash flood of blubber.
They were far less deadly than the spikers and far more easily discouraged. The Old Ones dispatched them with disdainful ease, like gardeners picking slugs from their arugula. The confused survivors fled back to their trenches to lick their wounds.
Out of nowhere, a creature came swooping down on me from the top of a puffball, swiping at me with the claws protruding from the leading edge of its bat wings. I dodged aside and slashed at it with my sword as it went by. It screamed and whipped around to have another go at me.
With a whoosh, a scepter pulse beamed down from overhead, carving out a concavity into the creature’s hide that made it curl and writhe like a caterpillar under the focused rays of a magnifying glass. A flap of wings swirled clear air into the dust cloud, revealing Mr. O, again my guardian angel.
I had lost track of Urszula in the ruckus and tagged after a group of Old Ones who had splintered off and were heading behind the arena, among the Reaper breeding trenches and pens holding Defectives.
The trenches were empty, save for a few juvenile Reapers huddled in a corner, braying at us. Every mature Reaper, it seems, had been mobilized for the attack on Neueden.
A Freesoul popped out of an alley between the pens and leveled his staff at a group of Old Ones whose backs were turned. My sword flew up instantly. Without having to think, something swirled out of my chest and out the blade tip. A rope of yellow energy enveloped him in a sizzling sheath that slammed him down, jerking and quivering until he became still.
I stood there, shocked. I had never killed a man before. I looked up to find a cage full of Defectives staring at me numbly. One man started clapping.
I went over to the latch and hacked away at it with my sword.
Urszula came around the corner. “Leave them be. They’re safer confined.”
“Safer? They’re Goddang Reaper food if they stay put. How is that safer?”
“I don’t want them getting in our way.”
“But … they can help us fight.”
Urszula turned to the gaggle of eager eyes huddled behind the mesh. “Can they?”
“Bet your ass,” said a man with frazzled hair and a crazed expression in his eyes. “Huh boys? These fucking Freesouls, we’ll turn them into fodder.”
“Hell yeah!” said another.
Urszula touched her scepter to the latch and held it there until the metal cracked and crumbled away. “Don’t stay here. Make your way across the plateau, to the ruins.”
“Understood,” said the frazzled man, as he and his fellow Defectives spilled out of the pen.
I rushed over to the n
ext pen, eager for Urszula to do the same for them. A hand shot through the mesh and seized me.
I wrenched my arm away in revulsion, but looked up to find a friendly but dirty face beaming at me.
Bern looked bruised and disheveled, but otherwise intact. He couldn’t stop grinning.
“You know him?” said Urszula, her expression dour and distracted.
“Of course! Don’t you remember Bern?”
“Oh yes. Isn’t he the one who wanted me terminated?”
“Never,” said Bern. “I just wanted him to leave you to your own devices.”
“I see.” With a touch of reluctance, Urszula held the tip of her scepter against the latch, until it too crumbled away.
“How’s Lille?”
“How should I know? They took her away. I can only hope she’s somewhere safe.”
Trisk came swooping down on his mantid, landing with a thud between two Reaper pens.
“The Frelsians have broken off their attack,” he said. “They’re falling back. Returning to defend Frelsi.”
Urszula looked mortified.
“But the raid … it worked!” I said.
“We need to get out of here. Now!” said Urszula. She slammed the base of her scepter on the ground. A concussive thud reverberated from its shaft like a contrabass church bell. Every Old One in the vicinity looked to her.
She shouted to her fellow warriors in their ancient lingo. The Old Ones barely reacted to the news, but started making their way back towards the gate, clambering over the wreckage, gathering in the open ground beyond. Some, badly injured, were being carried by their comrades.
Another tower collapsed, crushing a row of huts, sending up a thick cloud of dust that wafted over us.
I offered my arm to Bern out of habit, but despite his cane, he didn’t need my help. His leg had been fully mended by the Frelsians.
“I’m ready to go back to the tunnels, my boy,” he said. “I think I’ve had my fill of this madness.”
“I don’t blame you one bit” I said.
A winged pod came gliding down from one of the towers, smashing against the wall and bursting open with a hollow ‘plonk!,’ scattering its contents across the empty lot—knots of wiry worms that untangled themselves into little, woody corkscrews.
One of the worms tensed its coils and sprang at an Old One who had strayed too close, latching onto her leg. It slithered up and drilled into the small of her back. She dropped her scepter and screamed, clawing at the writhing creature as it dug into her spine, its tail end whipping about as it burrowed deep.
I ran over and tried yanking at it with my free hand. It had latched on firmly and refused to yield. I held the tip of my sword to it, sorting through my mind for a potent and appropriate vision. It came as a memory of the leeches that had covered my leg when I went swimming in the pond behind the house of a fellow homeschooler. Dad had taken his lighter and calmly burned them off one by one.
While I stared, the woody worm slowed its burrowing and began to withdraw. I kept my focus steady, and allowed the feelings within me to loosen and channel through the blade until the worm shriveled and disintegrated into flakes that wafted down onto the dirt, leaving behind a deep and bloody puncture that went down to the bone.
Urszula rushed over and slathered a handful of her sticky healing goo on her wound. “To the gate. Now!”
I helped the Old One to her feet, but her legs had gone limp. Urszula and I carried her in a sort of fireman’s sling. Detouring wide around the field of Fellstraw, we rejoined the remnants of our assault force, many of them walking wounded.
Cheers erupted from the high platforms as we ran.
Urszula sneered. “Let them have their victory. We got exactly what we wanted.”
The gate was just ahead, still ajar. Like a vision from a dream, a slender figure appeared in the opening. She carried no weapon. She was naked.
“Holy Christ!” said Bern. “Will you look who’s here?”
Urszula dropped the Old One she was carrying and raised her scepter at the startled girl.
“Put it down,” I said, slapping down her arm. “That’s my Karla.”
Chapter 44: The Loch
It took all three girls to keep James upright and muscle him out of the church and along the pavements. It helped that he retained some autonomous muscle control and could manage a sort of sleepwalk, thrusting a leg forward now and then to aid their cause.
Renfrew had mobility issues of his own to deal with. Broken straps made his prosthesis wobble with each step, and sometimes it came loose entirely. Lacking crutches, he was forced to employ a stolen umbrella as a cane.
Luckily, the authorities were distracted by the commotion up the street. Two of Sturgie’s musical friends were in the process of being arrested. He and Alfie skulked low among the parked cars, trying to make their way back to their van unnoticed.
They piled into the little blue Ford, Karla and Isobel sliding James between them, his head flopping from shoulder to shoulder as he was jostled. His lids lifted slightly to reveal the whites of his eyes rolled back, his body surrendered to the fugue state that meant his soul was absent from this world.
Karla reached over his lap and got him buckled. His clothes smelled like the inside of a decommissioned phone box, but she didn’t mind. She nestled her cheek against his chest as a slow but steady drip of tears found their way down her cheek in rivulets.
Renfrew took the wheel while Jessica held his detached prosthesis in her lap.
“You’re missing a prong in the buckle,” she said.
“I realize that.”
“How about we just knot the ends together?”
“How about we worry about that later? One leg’s plenty to drive an automatic.”
A squeal of tires and a cloud of blue smoke told them that Sturgie and Alfie were fulfilling their promise to create a further diversion. Renfrew waited until a police car went wailing past them after the white van, before pulling out from the curb
He drove as if he were heading to the grocer’s on a Sunday morning to pick up a carton of milk.
“You could stand to go a little faster, Ren,” said Jessica, anxiously. “We’re practically crawling.”
“Don’t want to draw undue attention.”
“Fifteen clicks in a forty zone will draw it quicker than anything.”
“Alright. I’ll speed up a bit.” He glanced up into the rear view. “How’s the boy?”
“He’s alright,” said Karla. “Breathing a little ragged, maybe.”
Jessica peered over the back of her seat. “He don’t look so good.”
“How about we go straight to the hospital, have him checked out?” said Renfrew.
“Not here,” said Karla. “Not in Inverness.”
“But if the poor boy’s suffering….”
“We can’t, Ren. Not here.”
“We could just drop him off.”
“No! Papa knows people at the hospital. Some of the nurses attend our church.”
“What would they do? Poison him?”
“I wouldn’t put it past them. I’m all for taking him to a clinic, but we need to get him out of Inverness first.”
“Bugger,” said Renfrew.
Isobel, all smiles, leaned over and took her sister’s hand. Karla forced a smile in return, but the tension in her face turned it into a scowl.
How could Izzie be so cheery at a time like this? Linval was dead. James was hurting, perhaps gravely.
The ungrateful manner in which James had reacted to his rescue still puzzled her. Why had he been in such a hurry to return to the Liminality? Was he delirious? What business could be more pressing than a reunion with the one he loved?
Her head swirled with possibilities. Was he spiteful for her taking him for granted all those months apart?
Or maybe those Dusters had done something to his head. Maybe there was something going on with that little demon bitch.
She pressed her ear over hi
s chest and listened to his heartbeat. Initially robust and reassuring, a flurry of skips and stutters alarmed her, before it settled back into a steady rhythm.
She leaned back and studied his face. His cheeks had a rosy glow, which she hoped was a good sign. At least his blood was pumping.
“Alright people,” said Renfrew. “Keep your fingers crossed. We’re about to leave the city limits.”
He turned onto Glenurquhart Road and the A82 up the northern shore of Loch Ness.
***
As they roared through Drumnadrochit, Jessica turned and stared out the rear window. “There’s a car following us. A black one.”
“That’s nice,” said Renfrew. “Half the cars in Scotland are black.”
“But this one looks just like the one that brought Karla’s dad to church.”
“Because it’s black?”
“And I’ve been watching it on the straightaways. It’s getting closer.”
“Will you settle down, Jess? No one’s following us. I assure you. I’m not driving that fast. They would have caught us by now if they had any intention—”
“Pull off the road next you can. We should let it pass.”
“Oh, for crying out loud!” Renfrew turned abruptly down a track that cut between tall hedges of yew and holly lining some paddocks. They descended steeply to a broad, uncut field swaying with alfalfa. He turned onto a cross-track and behind a hedge.
“Happy?” he said. “So what now?”
“Let’s give it a few minutes, and if all’s well, we can move on.”
“How’s the boy?”
“His pulse is a little bit jumpy,” said Karla. “But … otherwise, he is fine.”
“Jumpy?” said Renfrew. “What do you mean, jumpy?”
“It is just … a little bit erratic.”
“Oh, that doesn’t sound good.”
“Looks like … he’s shaking,” said Jessica.
Renfrew sighed deeply. “We should have taken him straight to the nearest hospital.”
“We’re almost halfway to Ft. William,” said Karla. “I’m pretty sure there’s a clinic there.”
“He could have already been admitted. You’re going to be the death of him with your dilly-dallying.”
“Please, Ren!” said Jessica. “There are things happening here beyond our ken.”