"Shit," Pony echoed.
"That aside, what did you figure out?" Stormsong asked.
"I made a huge mistake in the variable for time on the gate equations. And if I did it—I bet the oni did too. These plans, as they stand—all the spaceships would have arrived at the same moment. That's why they collided."
"When did they go to?" Pony asked.
"I think . . . that they were held in time until the gate was destroyed. They finished their journey—all five ships—three days ago."
"Your mother found herself in great danger and you're her only link to home," Stormsong murmured.
"Yeah, at which point, she started to hound me with nightmares." Tinker tugged at her hair. "But what the hell am I supposed to do? I mean, the good news is that obviously she's alive—for now. The gods only know where she is. She could be on the other side of the galaxy. And which galaxy? This one? Earth's? Onihida? We're talking a mind-boggling large haystack to lose a needle in. Even if she was in space over Elfhome, what am I to do? What could I possibly do?"
"Forget the egotistical she-snake," Stormsong said. "You have pressing duties here. Her problems are not your concern."
"But why then, do things keep turning up? Like the pearl necklace, the black willow, and Reinholds? The dreams relate to me and my world, somehow. Don't they?"
Tinker saw a troubled look spread across Stormsong's face before the sekasha turned away, hiding her unease.
"Oh, don't do that!" Tinker picked up the morning's newspaper, still tightly folded in its bag, and aimed a smack at Stormsong's back.
Stormsong caught the newspaper before it connected and gave her a hard look.
"I need help here." Tinker jerked the newspaper free. "This is part of the whole working together. I need to know what you know about dreaming."
Stormsong sighed. "That is a wound I don't like to dig into. Everyone assumed that my mother had some great vision when she conceived me—and no one invested more in that myth than I did. But I did not have the talent or the patience for it. I was too much my father. I like solving problems with a sword. And I don't like feeling like I'm failing you."
Tinker fussed with getting the newspaper out of its bag so she didn't have to face Stormsong's pain. "You're not failing me."
Speaking of failing someone, the newspaper's headline was "Policeman Slain."
Nathan's body was draped with a white cloth in the island of light on the black river of night highway. Nathan Czernowski, age 28, found beheaded on Ohio River Boulevard. She stood there clutching the newspaper as faintness swept through her. How could seeing it in print make it more real than seeing his body lying in front of her?
Stormsong continued, "As you're finding out the hard way, dreamers can join for a gestalt effect, but unless they share nuenae, the resulting dream is conflicted."
Tinker pulled her attention away from the newspaper. "What?"
"Dreams are maps for the future." Stormsong held out her right hand. "If the dreamers share nuenae—" Stormsong pressed her hands, matching up the fingers. "Then the two maps overlaid remain easy to understand. But if the dreamers don't share nuenae—" Stormsong shifted her hands so her fingers crosshatched. "There is a conflict. It becomes difficult, if not impossible, to tell which element belongs to which nuenae. The pearl necklace was from your nuenae. The Wizard of Oz, is from your mother's."
"Nuenae being . . .?"
Stormsong pursed her lips. "Nuenae reflects goals and desires. Among elves, it is one's clan and household. I'm not sure humans can share nuenae like elves can. Humans are more—self-centered."
The newspaper screamed at how self-centered Tinker had been.
"So, Esme, Black, and I are operating at cross-purposes." Tinker folded the accusing headline away and went to stuff it in the recycling bin. "And my dreams may or may not have anything to do with helping with the mess we're in."
"Yes, there is no telling. At least, I can't, not with my abilities. Wolf has sent for help from my mother's people. They might be able to determine something since they share our foci in regards to the oni."
"Whereas my mother could care less."
"Exactly."
As Tinker dropped the paper into the recycling bin, the top newspaper caught her eye. The headline read: "Viceroy's Guard Kill Three Snipers, Gossamer Slain." She lifted out the paper.
When did this happen?
The paper was dated Tuesday. Tuesday? Wasn't she awake on Tuesday? Yes, she was—she had spent Tuesday at Reinholds—why hadn't anyone told her? The paper also reported that the EIA had declared martial law, that the treaty had been temporarily extended until Sunday, and the elves had plans to screen everyone living in Chinatown. How had she missed all this? She dug through the pile of papers, uncovering growing chaos that she had been oblivious to. Wednesday's paper had stories on the lockdown of the city by the royal elfin troops, a wave of arrests of suspected human sympathizers, the execution of more disguised oni, and the start of a rationing system as fears of the Pittsburgh dollar collapsing triggered massive stockpiling. Above the headline was an extra banner proclaiming, "Four Days to Treaty End."
Four days? Was that today?
The other unread paper was dated Friday. She had lost at least a day to drugged sleep. The top banner read, "Two Days to Treaty End." The Pittsburgh police had called a "blue flu" strike when the EIA closed Nathan's murder case.
Oh, gods, what a mess.
"What day is this?" she asked Stormsong. "Did I sleep through Saturday too?"
"It is Friday," Stormsong said.
"Domi," Pony said from the door. "It is the lone one."
Lone one?
The sekasha escorted in Tooloo, who must have walked up the hill from her store. Tinker stared at her with new eyes. Not that the female had changed; Tooloo was as she had always been Tinker's entire life. There were no new creases in the face full of wrinkles. Her silver hair still reached her ankles. Tinker even recognized her faded, purple silk gown and battered high-top tennis shoes—Tooloo had been wearing them when Tinker and Pony helped her milk her cows two months ago.
Only now Tinker realized how odd it was for an elf in a world of elves to live alone. What clan and caste had she been born into? Why wasn't she part of a household? Was it because she was a half-elf? If she was half human, born and raised on Earth, how could she be so fluent in High Elvish, and know all things arcane? If she was a full-blooded elf, trapped on Earth when the pathways were dismantled, why hadn't she gone back to her people? Three centuries was a short time for elves.
Tinker doubted if Tooloo would tell her if she asked. Tooloo had always refused to be known. She went by an obvious nickname, neither human nor elfin in origin. Not once, in the eighteen years that Tinker had known her, had she ever mentioned her parents. She would not commit to an age, the length of time she had lived on Earth, or even a favorite color.
Tooloo squirmed in Cloudwalker's hold. "Oh, you murderous little thing! You had to satisfy that little monkey brain of yours. I told you, starve the beast called curiosity—but nooo, you had to play with Czernowski and now you've killed him."
Tinker felt sad as she realized she'd lost yet another part of her life. "I didn't mean for Nathan to get killed."
"Oh, you didn't mean to! Do you think those threadbare words will heal his family, grieving over his headless body?"
"I'm sorry it happened." Tinker swallowed down on the pain that the words caused her. "I—I wasn't paying attention when I should have been—and I'm so sorry—but there's nothing I can do. I was wrong. I should have listened to you from the very start—but I didn't see where all this was going to lead."
"Pawgh, this is all Windwolf's fault—killing my bright wee human and making a dirty Skin Clan scumbag in her image." Tooloo spat.
"This has nothing to do with Windwolf making me an elf."
"Does it? My wee one never had such superciliousness of power."
"Supercil-whatis?"
Tooloo glanced at Pony stand
ing behind Tinker. "Giving you sekasha is like giving an elephant rollerskates—stupid, ridiculous, and dangerous."
Tooloo could say what she wanted about her, but now she was going too far to include the sekasha too.
"Yes, I killed Nathan," Tinker said, "but I'm not the only one to blame. I'm a stupid clueless little girl, but you've lived with humans for over two hundred years—you knew exactly how Nathan would react if—" And then it dawned on Tinker and she gasped with horror. "Oh sweet gods, you wanted him to think I was a whore! You deliberately misled him! You evil she-goat!"
Tooloo slapped her hard across the face, enough to make stars dance in her vision.
Tinker heard the sekasha draw their blades and threw out her hands to keep Nathan's death from repeating. "No! No! Don't you dare hurt her!" Once she was sure that she was obeyed, she turned back to the stranger who raised her. "Why? Why did you do that to Nathan? You had to see it coming!"
"Because nothing else would have slapped you out of wallowing in your own piss. The city is about to run with blood unless you do something. Czernowski was the sacrificial lamb to save this city."
"I was trying to! I don't know how!"
"Use that little monkey brain of yours! The elves are about to march all over this city with jackboots. I've lived with humans for hundreds of years. They are good, compassionate people. I lived through the America's Revolutionary War, its Civil War, the fight for women's suffrage, and the struggle for civil rights—and all those advancements for equality among humans are about to be flushed down the crapper. It's already started—they're searching through Chinatown, dragging people out of their homes, and testing them and killing them where they stand."
Tinker glanced to Stormsong since the rant had been in English. Stormsong nodded in confirmation. "Why didn't anyone tell me?"
"You've been too fragile."
She couldn't trust Tooloo's version of this; the "lone one" kept whatever truths she had to herself. Nor, as much as she loved them, could she count on the elves in her life to understand what it was to be human. Tinker gathered up the newspapers; she needed their human-biased facts. And Maynard—she needed to talk to Maynard.
Red was becoming a predominant color in Pittsburgh, like an early autumn. They encountered four roadblocks on the way to the EIA offices, all manned by laedin caste Fire Clan soldiers.
"If True Flame has this many warriors, why do we need the Stone Clan?" Tinker had let Pony drive, but she hung over the front seat to talk to him and Stormsong. The backseat was crowded with the other three sekasha.
"Stone Clan magic can find individuals in a wilderness and things hidden in the ground," Pony told her.
"It's like calling in bloodhounds," Stormsong said in English.
Tinker remembered the sonarlike spell that Jewel Tear had used. Yes, that should make finding the oni hidden in the forest easier. She wondered how the Stone Clan would fare, though, in the steel-riddled city.
"And if you cannot solve the problem with the Ghostlands," Cloudwalker added. "They should be able to. They closed the natural pathways after the first invasion."
Stormsong made a rude noise. "There is a difference between collapsing caves and dealing with whatever is wrong with the Ghostlands."
"The Ghostlands should collapse on their own." Tinker was growing less sure of that—she would have expected the rate of decay to be faster. This morning marked the fourth day since she had reduced Turtle Creek to chaos. Now there was something not everyone could claim: I reduced a square mile of land into pure chaos. It made her sound like a small atomic warhead—"someone dropped a Tinker on us!"
The EIA offices directed her back across the Allegheny River to Chinatown. There she found Maynard overseeing the testing of the Chinese population. A mix of laedin caste soldiers and Wyverns were systematically emptying a house, putting the occupants into a line to be tested by the EIA. As she approached, it became clear that the process was hampered by the fact that most of the elves and many of the Chinese didn't speak English. East Ohio Street was a cacophony of shouted instructions, crying, and pleading. The coroner van—identified by bold letters—stood at the far end of the street. Blood scented the hot summer air. And for one dizzy moment, she was back on Ohio River Boulevard, splattered with Nathan's blood.
"Domi, are you all right?" Pony murmured into her ear as he supported her by the arm. He'd activated his shields at some point and they now spilled down over her.
She nodded and pulled out of his hold.
"It is clear!" One of the Wyverns came out of a nearby building shouting in High Elvish.
There was a pulse of magic, and she felt the house, from the pipes underneath it to the tip of the chimneys. There wasn't anyone inside. Apparently that was the point. On some unheard command, the Wyverns moved down to the next building. Annoyingly, because of her height, Tinker couldn't see through the crowd to spot the Stone Clan domana directing the search.
"Is Jewel Tear here?" she asked Stormsong, who could see over the heads of most of the humans.
Stormsong shook her head. "It is the mad one, Forest Moss."
"Oh, joy," Tinker muttered. "Where is Maynard?"
"This way." Stormsong started forward.
Tinker thought they would have to push their way through the crowd, but as they approached the humans and elves, the crowd parted as if shoved by an invisible wedge. In the human faces there was a mix of fear and hope. They wanted her to be one of them but were afraid she was wholly an elf.
The crowd was avoiding a section of sidewalk. As Tinker drew even with it, she saw that it was covered with congealing blood, thick with black flies. As the sekasha brushed past, some of the flies rose in fat, heavy buzzing. The rest continued to feed.
"I want this to stop," Tinker whispered to Stormsong, dreading her answer.
"This is by order of the crown," Stormsong said. "There is nothing you can do to stop it."
Maynard saw Stormsong first and then scanned downward to find Tinker. "What are you doing here?"
"I want to talk to you about this stuff." Tinker waved the newspaper at Maynard.
"I'm busy at the moment. Why don't you get your husband to explain it to you?"
"Because you're here. I have the power to pin you down and make you explain it to me. And you'll use words I can understand."
Maynard glanced at the paper. "What don't you understand? That article is fairly clear."
"What can I do?"
He gave her a long unreadable look before saying, "I'm not sure. Windwolf bought us some time, but without proof that the gate is in orbit and possibly repairable, that time runs out Sunday."
Figures, after everything she had gone through to destroy the gate, she now had to save it.
"So," Tinker said, "if I can prove the damn thing is still up there, would that help?"
Maynard's eyes widened in surprise. "You think you can do that?"
It was tempting to say yes, but she had to be honest. "I don't know. I can try. It's a fucking discontinuity in Turtle Creek, across at least two or three universes. If Earth is one of those universes, there might be a way to use the Ghostlands to communicate."
"The elves are keeping everyone away from the Ghostlands," Maynard said. "The scientists at the commune are ready to storm the place for a chance to study it."
"Keep them away from it," Tinker said. "At least until we can make sure the Fire Clan and the Stone Clan don't kill them on sight."
Maynard looked away, as if to hide what he thought. When he turned back, his face was back to its carefully neutral—nearly elfin—facade.
"What do you fucking want from me?" Tinker cried. "I was raised in a junkyard!"
"You're the only one in a position to understand fully what it is to be human," Maynard said, "and still be able to do anything about this situation."
"But I don't know what to do."
"I know you don't," Maynard said but didn't add anything more—which would have been a big help.
There wa
s a pulse from Forest Moss and this time the building wasn't empty. She—and Forest Moss—picked up two people still inside on the second floor. A shout went up. Tinker turned to see the Wyverns swarm in through the door of a tiny secondhand shop. Like flashbulbs going off, she felt spells flaring the small rooms into brilliance, one after another. The Wyverns quickly worked their way to the room with the hidden couple.
"Oh, no." Tinker started for the store.
Stormsong pulled her short. "They are only killing oni."
Was that supposed to make it better? Much as she hated the kitsune, she didn't want to see Chiyo beheaded. She didn't want Riki dead any more than she wanted Nathan hurt.