Earthbound

  On the nights of the full moon I ran with the hunt, ran with the Moon Mother as she led the legion of animal spirits and the dead who followed her. I wondered if that would differ over here. Would I still run with the Hunt?

  The head of the Coterie of the Moon Mother had promised me that I would, that the Moon Mother would still watch over me while I was here. But a part of me feared that I would be cut off from her, exiled from her blessings.

  As I reached up, a stream of moonlight hit my hand and I felt her wash over me, racing into my blood on the wings of the moonbeam, filling me full with a gentle whisper that everything would be all right. You are following your destiny, Camille, and you have no idea of where that will lead. But trust in me.

  I let out a deep breath and for the first time since we had arrived, I relaxed.

  Delilah and Menolly were waiting. They were watching me, but they didn’t ask what I was doing. They knew that my magic was a private affair. We each had our secrets, each had our private little worlds that we couldn’t share with the others. But our bond was unbreakable. Even death hadn’t been able to shake it when Dredge had turned Menolly. No matter what, we stuck together.

  Shaking away my thoughts, I pointed off to the side. “I think there’s a path over that way that leads down to the pond. I saw it the other day when I was out hunting for a good spot in which to plan my herb garden.”

  “I see it,” Delilah said. She pointed and sure enough, we saw an opening in the bushes.

  The path was well-maintained, and even though there were roots that protruded from the ground, and rocks and pebbles in the way, it was fairly easy to follow. The moon peeked through the lacework arch created by the branches of trees on either side, illuminating the living tunnel through which we walked. Her silver beams dappled the forest floor.

  We walked in silence, not needing to talk. Ever since our mother had died it had been like this—the three of us against the world. Our father had withdrawn when Mother died, leaving us to our own devices, and me to watch over my sisters. Oh, he disciplined us and made sure we ate and were healthy, but love? He couldn’t show it. He was a soldier, and he had trained himself to divorce his feelings from his actions. He hadn’t been like that when Maria was still alive—the sun rose and set on her smile for him. When she died, the soldier returned full-force, and the husband and father seemed to vanish.

  “I miss Lethe. She was such a good housekeeper and cook, and I didn’t realize how much she helped me until now, but she was always there when I needed her.”

  My sisters had become my responsibility and Lethe had helped me shoulder it. She had stood between me and my father more than once, taking the blame for something I had missed or messed up. I begged her not to risk her place, but she insisted that I was too young to shoulder all the responsibility. She had made my childhood bearable, and as I grew into an adult, she had become more comforter than protector.

  “I wonder where this job will take us,” Menolly said. “We’re stationed at the end of the universe, or might as well be. Do you think there’s some bigger reason we were sent here?”

  “I thought you don’t believe in fate,” I said.

  “I don’t, but…”

  “All I know is that I’m looking forward to a vacation.” Delilah shook her head. “You know that’s what this is going to be.” She paused, holding up her hand and we stopped. She cocked her head and then pointed to the right often the bushes. “There’s something over there.”

  I closed my eyes and reached out. Sure enough, I could sense something…some energy that didn’t feel like it belonged here. In fact, when I really focused, I realized that whatever it was, it felt nasty and vicious.

  I caught my breath, backing up a few steps. “There is something there, and I don’t like it.”

  “Should we go back to the house?” Delilah looked around nervously.

  Menolly shook her head. Her voice soft, she whispered, “We don’t want to turn our backs on something potentially dangerous. We’re upwind of it, so it probably has our scent by now.”

  A flutter rippled through my stomach. We were no strangers when it came to fighting, but over here, all the rules were different. We didn’t know what enemies we might be facing, for one thing. For all we knew, this could be some animal, angry we were in its territory. Or, it could be something worse. And we came out unarmed. There had been no reason to bring weapons.

  “What should we do?” Delilah asked

  “I’ll circle around through the woods, giving it a wide arc, to see what I can find. I can move silently.” Menolly softly sidled over to the edge of the tree line, then backtracked a ways up the trail.

  I moved closer to Delilah. She was stronger than I, but I did have my magic though I hadn’t attempted any spells since we came over Earthside. I had been reluctant—too many backfires had made me leery, as well as too many disappointing fizzles.

  I closed my eyes and reached up to the sky, drawing on the power of the Moon Mother as I called down her strength. The sky was partially overcast, and I reached out to the clouds as well, which were still heavy with rain, siphoning energy from the potential storm as I called in the lightning.

  As I summoned the Moon Mother’s cold fire, I could feel her whispering. She was with me still, the same as she was in Otherworld, and she answered my need. My fingers tingled as her energy raced through me like quicksilver, gathering in my hands.

  Delilah glanced around. She stepped to one side, and picked up a large stick, holding it like a club as we waited. I tensed, preparing myself to send a jolt of the Moon Mother’s energy toward anything that came barreling out of the woods.

  Another pause, as Delilah and I watched, waiting. I strained, trying to hear Menolly but true to her nature, she was silent as the grave, silent as a statue. What was she doing? Why was she taking her so long? Had she been ambushed?

  And then, just as I was about to go plunging into the woods to look for her, the bushes parted and a creature came racing out. Its appearance was so sudden and it snarled so loud that I almost fell over backward. It was dark and squat, like a furry, stocky little man-creature. Beady yellow eyes gleamed over a pig-like snout, and its mouth was large and wide, with needle-like teeth ringing the inside of its blood-soaked maw.

  Delilah screamed as she dropped her club, then recovering, she snatched it up again. Menolly dove out of the bushes behind the creature, landing on its back. She was trying to take it down, but the creature wouldn’t fall—and that fact scared me. That a vampire couldn’t take it down meant the thing must be incredibly strong.

  I aimed my hands at its abdomen and loosed the spell. The bolt of energy hit dead center, and for a moment I was ready to cheer, but the next moment, it opened its mouth and turned toward me, eyes wide as it belched out what appeared to be the same jolt I had sent it. Damn, the creature had absorbed my attack and was sending it right back at me.

  I yelped, diving to one side. Oh, lovely. I landed in a sticker bush. The thorns pierced through my hands, my knees, and my skirts to impale themselves on the backs of my thighs and my butt.

  “Damn it!” I tried to roll away, but the briars came with me, digging deeper.

  Unfortunately, the creature remained focused on me, and I found myself staring up at the gargantuan monster. Well, maybe not gargantuan, but when you’re stranded in a strange world, sitting in a patch full of thorns that are digging into your butt, it’s rather difficult to be objective.

  Delilah raced toward the creature and me, club held high over her head. Menolly launched herself toward it from the side. Unfortunately, their timing was off. Menolly collided with Delilah, knocking them both to the ground. She hit Delilah so hard that they landed on the other side of the trail. The creature let out a grunt and, once again, returned its attention to me.

  As the gaping mouthful of teeth moved closer, I tried to scramble back but only managed to impale myself even more on the thorns.

  “Okay, e
nough.” Frustration setting in, I gritted my teeth against the barbs which were stabbing into me, and forced my way to my feet. The brambles came with me and I let out a squeak. The creature’s teeth were beginning to look good next to the damned thorns.

  At that moment, Menolly rushed in and grabbed hold of the creature, yanking it around to face her. She hissed, her fangs gleaming in the moonlight, and our opponent let out a welp. The next moment, it vanished as if it had never been there.

  We stared at the spot.

  “What the hell was that?” Delilah dropped the club she had retrieved.

  “I have no idea, but please, get me the hell out of these bushes.” I struggled against the briars. I was dripping oozing blood from my arms, my legs, and even my face where a bramble had thwacked me across the forehead. In the glow of the moonlight, I saw Menolly’s nostrils flare. I motioned to her. “Back away. I don’t need you drooling at me.” I usually wasn’t so grumpy, but I had at least three dozen thorns in me, and I wasn’t feeling particularly charitable.

  Menolly just shrugged it off. “We should get back to the house. We don’t know if that thing…whatever it is…is coming back. We can call…who the hell do we call? Chase?”

  “I suppose so. At home, we’d gather a posse to go find it, but here…” I drifted off.

  We had no precedent to go on. We didn’t know what the creature was or whether it would be back. We didn’t know who to turn to. The OIA had stranded us, and we couldn’t even contact them until Trenyth had the Whispering Mirror installed. Essentially, we were on our own. Fend for ourselves, gather the wagons, that sort of thing.

  “Come on, let’s get you home and cleaned up.” Delilah wrapped her arm around my shoulders as we headed back to the house, keeping a close eye on the forest around us. We didn’t want any more surprise attacks. But we made it home without incident, although several stirrings in the brush left us jumpy.

  Once inside, I leaned against the counter while Delilah tended to my cuts and Menolly tried to ignore the oozing blood. In fact, she grabbed another bottle out of the fridge and gulped it down. The scent and sight of fresh blood set her on edge. While she had managed to control the impulses, we never took chances, especially when it came to friends and family.

  “Okay, any ideas at all what we were facing?” I asked, wincing as Delilah motioned for me to hike up my skirts. I rested my elbows on the counter, holding my dress up so she could see the thorns and cuts.

  “A demon?” Delilah found a pair of tweezers—one of the delights of being Earthside—and began to yank out the thorns. “Quit jumping. You’ll make it hurt worse.”

  “I can’t help—Youch! Damn it! Watch it.” I frowned, wishing I had a drink. A stiff shot of brandy would go a long ways right now. “I’ve seen a lot of strange things but never something like that.”

  “No, I don’t think it was demon. A nasty temper, yes, but the creature didn’t seem…evil, if you know what I mean.” Menolly frowned. “I still say we should call Chase.”

  “Go ahead. His number is on the pad next to the phone.”

  She grinned. “He’s scared of me. I could have so much fun with him.”

  Delilah cleared her throat. “If you won’t let me chase the geese, then you can’t goose Chase. While we’re at it, I want a cell phone.”

  “Yeah, we all should have them, I guess.” I frowned. “Before you’ll know it, we’ll be so used to technology that we won’t want to go home.”

  “That will never happen.” Delilah winked at me. “But you know how much I love gadgets.”

  “Gadgets and animals. That reminds me, you will have no menagerie here. We don’t need a dozen bunnies, a herd of sheep, and a bunch of rodents in the back yard.” I glanced around at the empty room. “Though a pet would make the place feel less empty. I wonder if we’ll ever get used to having so much space all to ourselves?”

  “We’ll fill the house up with furniture soon enough and it won’t seem so lonely. We should talk about hiring someone to clean house, while we’re at it.” Delilah motioned to the counter. “Okay, up on your stomach. I need to get the thorns out of the backs of your legs and your butt.”

  I groaned, but did as she bade.

  “Oh gods…you are pockmarked with them. This is going to take a while.” Delilah started in, one by one cautiously extracting the jagged barbs from my backside. I let out a curse and restrained the urge to kick her when she yanked out the first one.

  Menolly replaced the receiver on the cradle. “He’s on his way over. He said he’ll bring a few men and they’ll check out the yard. I didn’t have the heart to tell him we have five acres.”

  “Get this done before he shows up.” I glanced over my shoulder at Delilah, but she said nothing as she focused on denuding me of thorns.

  Menolly wandered out to the back porch and stared over railing, keeping watch.

  Fifteen minutes later we were almost done—Delilah was slathering my ass and the backs of my thighs with salve—when the front door opened. I tried to roll off the counter, but I wasn’t fast enough as Chase came rushing into the room. He skidded to a halt as I lie there, my butt wide open to the air, slathered in salve and bloody marks.

  Chapter 6

  “Well, I haven’t had a greeting like this in a while,” he said, laughter bubbling just below the surface.

  “Not another word, Johnson. Not another word.” I cautiously eased off the counter, stiff from the pain and sores. I wanted to sit down, but one look at the hard seats and I changed my mind.

  Chase wiggled his eyebrows at me, but then the smile vanished and concern took over. “Are you okay? I don’t mean to comment on your ass but damn, you have a lot of nasty bruises and cuts back there. What happened?”

  I bit my tongue, trying to stem my irritation. I knew it was partially caused by the pain. Chase was actually trying to be nice and he did seem concerned. “We’re not sure. We got attacked out on our land by some creature, and I fell in a pile of bramble bushes. Apparently the briars liked me and wanted me to stay and sit with them awhile.”

  “What sort of creature? I have a group of my men waiting on the front porch. They’re ready to go hunting, but first we need a description of what we’re looking for.”

  “We don’t know what it was, but we can tell you what it looked like.” Menolly had moved in a blur, so silently that Chase let out a shout and jumped as she appeared by his side. She started to laugh. “What’s the matter, detective? See a ghost? Or maybe…a vampire?”

  “What the hell? Don’t do that!” Chase edged away from her. I could smell the fear coming off of him, along with a spicy, meaty smell. Whatever he had eaten for dinner was sticking with him, oozing out of his pores.

  “Don’t tease the detective. It’s not nice.” Part of me wanted to scold Menolly and part of me wanted to cheer her on. But the diplomatic side won.

  She rolled her eyes, but muttered an apology. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “Uh huh, right. So what did it look like?”

  “Short, about so tall.” She measured from the floor with her hand. “And it was covered in fur. It had a gnarled face, and the mouth—we definitely saw a ring of teeth.”

  “It absorbed the magic I sent out it. Absorbed it, then threw it right back at me. So we know that it can feed off magical energy. Although I doubt it would object to a dinner of body parts, either.” I strained remember anything else that might help. “We don’t think it was demonic. It felt nasty, but not deliberately evil. Honestly, it reminded me of an animal.”

  “A hungry one,” Delilah said.

  I nodded. “Yes, true. I think it was hungry. Why else would it continue to attack us when it saw there were three of us?”

  “Because we weren’t very effective against it? Because it thought it could win? But you’re right, it did remind me of a hungry animal. Only smarter.” Menolly slowly floated up toward the ceiling. She had taken to hanging out up there when D
elilah and I ate, or when she wanted to think. Vampires were good at levitating, and while Menolly was still a little shaky at it, practice made perfect.

  Chase stared up at her, looking unnerved. I offered him a chair and he slid into it, tapping his fingers on the table. “I can’t think of anything I’ve ever seen that would fit your description. Definitely nothing found Earthside — at least nothing that I know of, but that’s not saying a lot. So many things have come out of the woodwork since you guys opened the portals that it’s hard to say. But it sounds like something from your side of the fence. From Otherworld. Not that I’ve ever been there.” A wistful note echoed in his voice.

  “Do you ever want to visit there?”

  He shrugged. “I think so. If I had a good guide. I wouldn’t want to do anything against local customs and get myself in trouble. And frankly, I can see that happening.” He let out a long sigh and cautiously leaned on the table as he stood. “You girls need furniture. I see you’ve gotten a start on the place, but this is a big house and it’s going to take some time for you to fill it up.”

  Delilah let out a snort. “Trust me, I think we’re going to have the time. I don’t foresee as being recalled soon. If you want your men to spread out and check the yard, that’s great, but given how strong this creature is, you might want to take Menolly and me with you.”

  “Right,” Menolly said. “And nobody goes out alone. Don’t take this the wrong way, but if we couldn’t handle it, then it doesn’t bode well for your men going out there on their own. We’re a lot stronger than most FBHs. And we don’t want to see a body count from this.”

  Chase looked relieved. “I appreciate the thought. And I’m sure my men will, too. Ever since the portals opened, we’ve been facing a lot of situations in which we’re not sure what to do.”

  “It’s a learning curve for all sides.” I grimaced as I realized how stiff my legs and back were. “Sheesh, those cuts put a damper on me.”