Flight by Numbers

by Kimberly A Rogers

  My gaze shifted to the people flowing around us. This was the worst possible place to have a fight. Especially between high numbers. My breaths came faster as I returned my attention to the two men who were still staring at each other. The 7 flickered, almost becoming an 8, before it settled back into a steady 7. The man nodded to Mathias and then he spun on his heel, striding away from us.

  My good leg almost gave out as I stared after his retreating form, before the crowds swallowed him once more until even the 7 was obscured by the other numbers. I turned back to Mathias and hissed, “What just happened?”

  Mathias didn’t answer right away. Instead, he picked up our bags. “Come on. The train will leave soon.”

  “Leave? For where?”

  I thought we were stopping in Inverness and switching to a different method of travel. Perhaps I’d misunderstood his comment from last night. I followed him to a different platform. Fewer people were here than on the other side of the station. Mathias went over to a bench and dropped our bags on one end, then motioned for me to sit as well. I did so and then shivered as Mathias sat next to me. He handed me the bag of food he had brought, murmuring, “Best eat it now.”

  I chewed mechanically, hardly paying attention to the food, as I kept a wary eye on the people slowly making their way to join us. I swallowed a bite and then asked softly, “Who was he?”

  “One of Weard’s foremost hunters.”

  A cold sensation ran down my spine at the words. I darted Mathias a questioning glance. He still looked detached and definitely not at all worried. “Why did he let us go?”

  Mathias shook his head. “Just focus on eating. The train will be boarding soon.”

  I considered pressing him further, but I already knew it wouldn’t work. Glancing around the platform, I noted more 5s and a few 6s. A few wings marked the short-statured Sprites. Perhaps the others were more Fae. I turned my face so I was practically nose to shoulder with Mathias. His arm around my shoulders tightened slightly, but he didn’t say another word.

  Finally, we were allowed to board the train. We sat tucked in the back of the last car. No one else was in the car with us, which was almost too good to be true. I stayed tense until we pulled out of the station. “Where are we going? Wick?”

  Mathias glanced down at me. “The train goes to Wick.”

  Implying that we were not. I pursed my lips and changed the subject. “What happened back there? Why did a hunter stop?”

  Mathias’ gaze shifted to staring straight ahead. After several moments of heavy silence, I had nearly given up on getting any answers out of the frustrating man. I turned to look out the window when Mathias suddenly spoke. “Royal and I used to be what most would consider friends. He was one of the few employees left at Weard that I trusted.” He paused, the corners of his mouth turning down, and then his voice frosted over as he added, “He knows what would happen if he attempted to take you from my protection.”

  “Doesn’t that mean he is still your friend?”

  “No.”

  There was a finality to the single word, and no doubt Mathias wanted the conversation to be over. But I couldn’t let it go. Not yet.

  I hesitated and then reached over to grab his hand. We were still wearing gloves, but the contact seemed to surprise him. I looked into his icy blue eyes and said softly, “If he let us go, he is choosing friendship over Weard. He is still your friend.”

  Mathias smiled but it was cold as he shook his head. “I said I trusted him. Once. Friendship is a dangerous thing to have in Weard. It marks you as weak.”

  “Mathias . . .”

  “Royal is many things, Lauren. But, he has never been a complete fool. That is the only reason he decided to let us go. No doubt, he will report us in Inverness. Hunters will converge, but our trail will be cold by that time.” Mathias paused only a moment before he slipped his hand out from mine and added, “As I told you in Olympia, I have neither friends nor family.”

  It was on the tip of my tongue to mention traveling all this time as his pretend wife. But, I choked on the thought. Even a pretense of marriage could be considered binding by some paranormal species . . . if you drew attention to the marriage when there wasn’t a need. And, the thought of being married to Mathias made me feel . . .

  I refused to let myself finish that thought. Instead, I sighed. “And, I told you then that you have a friend now or is friendship with a rogue Spotter forbidden as well?”

  Mathias didn’t respond. I glanced up at him. He had tugged his hat down and closed his eyes. Pursing my lips, I gave serious consideration to forcing him to continue the conversation. I lifted my hand to shake his arm, but habit made me balk before I could actually touch him. Mathias was being cold, and I simply couldn’t force myself to make him talk to me. Especially not when we were still fairly exposed.

  Resigning myself to more unanswered questions, I turned to look out the window at the rapidly passing buildings as we headed out of Inverness and tried to ignore the far too taciturn man beside me. So far, the only thing that wasn’t different about Mathias was the 10 still glowing bright and golden in the air directly above his head. A sigh escaped me as I continued watching the buildings. This was going to be a long train ride.

  * * *

  Chapter Six

  Lauren

  “Lauren.”

  The faint whisper barely disturbed me. “Mmmhmm.” Maybe whoever it was would go away and let me sleep now. I snuggled deeper against the pillow, which was warmer than usual . . . harder too. Still, I wasn’t ready to get up.

  My pillow slid beneath my cheek, and I reached up to hold it in place. My fingers snagged on fabric, but it wasn’t smooth linen like a pillow should have been. It was fuzzy and of much heavier weight than a pillow. Not to mention warm. Smelled nice too.

  A throat cleared and then Mathias sounded . . . strained and really close as something warmed my ear. “Lauren . . . you need to let go.”

  Let go . . . I pried one eye open just a little. I could see my hand clutching dark grey wool. Then my gaze drifted up. A faint smile curled my lips as I met Mathias’ blue-green gaze. He looked . . . uncomfortable. The reason dawned on me. I was practically sprawled against his shoulder and his chest. I could feel the blood draining from my face as I remembered snuggling against the pillow, no, Mathias. Both eyes opened as I jerked back and I stammered, “S-sorry.”

  Unable to even face him, I quickly turned to face the window. My cheeks were burning now and I plucked at my shawl, which had slid down off my hair at some point. As I arranged and rearranged the green fabric so it covered my hair once more and framed my face, I noticed the train had stopped. There didn’t look to be much out there though.

  Mathias murmured, “Come on, we need to get off here.”

  I wasn’t even certain where here was, but I was currently too embarrassed to ask him for anything. At this point, I was ready to be anywhere other than on the train. Mathias was already moving away with our bags by the time I gathered my crutches and got out of the seat. A quick glance around proved the car was still empty except for us. At least that meant there weren’t any witnesses to my embarrassing actions.

  My cheeks still felt warm as I followed Mathias to the door. I could only hope that between my complexion, my shawl, and the relative dimness of the light outside that he wouldn’t notice. The conductor helped me maneuver down the steps until Mathias could reach up to get me the rest of the way down onto the platform. His touch sent shivers of awareness, chased by embarrassment, running through me as his hands closed around my waist and he lifted me off the steps and down to the platform. I could hardly look at him. He kept one hand on my arm as he reached up for the conductor to pass my crutches down, and I was far too aware of that point of contact.

  When Mathias handed me the crutches, he removed his hand as soon as he was certain I was steady. I felt the loss of his touch a little too keenly. Then, I shivered for an entirely different reason as a cold wind cut through my wool coat. I wa
s beginning to understand why January was not considered prime tourist season in Scotland, especially in the Highlands. Desperate to get my mind off of Mathias and how easily he could make me feel . . . everything, I looked around the narrow platform as the train moved but it didn’t proceed forward, it reversed. Latching on to the scant distraction, I nodded toward the train as I asked, “Why are they doing that?”

  “They are going to Thurso before they come back here to go to Wick.” Mathias glanced down at me, but didn’t seem to notice I was still blushing. He gestured toward a stone house. “Come on. I need to find a lorry and you need to get out of the wind.”

  It was difficult for me to focus on much other than the wind cutting through my coat and gloves as I maneuvered over the snowy ground trying to avoid both drifts and patches of ice. Fortunately, it didn’t take too long to get inside the stone building serving the station, which was a good thing because I didn’t see many other houses around. A Brownie was manning the ticket counter. I quickly moved to the far side of the room acting as though I was only interested in warming up by the fireplace. The last thing I needed was for a Brownie’s ingrained sense of hospitality to lead him to come over and attempt to help me.

  I could hear Mathias’ low voice as he spoke to the Brownie. His accent provided a delicious counterpoint to the Brownie’s pronounced Scottish burr, and I caught myself relaxing at the sound. I blew out a breath as I tried to pull myself together. This was the worst possible time for my attraction to Mathias to rear its inconvenient head.

  Then, there was a warm presence behind me but I didn’t dare turn around. Mathias leaned in closer and murmured, “He knows you just want to warm up at the fire while I get us a lorry. Georgemas Junction is fairly isolated, and he lives here not in the village of Halkirk. Norms don’t even realize he mans this place. Don’t act scared.”

  There was a brush against my arm that seemed to sink through the wool to my arm. Maybe I should have gotten a heavier coat. I heard Mathias’ steps retreating and then the sound of the door opening and closing. I stayed in front of the fire feeling as though the Brownie was watching me, but never daring to turn around. Worried he would come over to check on me, I made a show of warming my gloved hands while balancing on my crutches. Fortunately for my fraying nerves, it didn’t take long for Mathias to find us a ride. As soon as he came back in, I was more than happy to see him even when I followed him back out into the cold to a battered old truck.

  I still felt . . . aware, electrifyingly aware, of his touch as he helped me into the passenger seat. My hands fumbled with the crutches when he handed them to me, and he helped settle them between me and the driver’s side of the bench seat. He shut the door and tossed our bags in the back, protecting them from the elements with a tarp. I took a deep breath trying to distract myself from his touch. Closing my eyes, I once again questioned why I had to feel such a strong attraction to a 10. Especially a 10 who wasn’t even sharing information, except in bits and pieces. The cab was still cold despite the heater being cranked to high. Perhaps it would numb my ankle.

  Mathias climbed in on the other side and then drove out of the junction, heading south. The scant buildings immediately surrounding the junction faded to fields and woods. Other than the railroad tracks, all signs of human habitation vanished in the gloom. Forgetting my earlier embarrassment, I frowned over at Mathias as I asked, “Why are you going this way?”

  “We need to reach Altnabreac.”

  Which meant absolutely nothing to me. The tendrils of attraction curtailed in the face of fresh exasperation. It was difficult to keep my tone calm and gentle as I pushed for more information. “Where is that?”

  “The village is about an hour’s drive from here.”

  I pushed my shawl down so it fell around my shoulders. “Why are we going this way? We had tickets to Wick. Didn’t we?”

  Mathias didn’t trouble himself with answering. I let out a slow breath. If my foot wasn’t hurting, I would be more worried about his erratic behavior. Now, I was merely annoyed. Still arguing with a 10 was something I instinctively balked at doing. Picking arguments with high numbers was not how a Spotter stayed alive, especially when I had worked so hard to keep my talent hidden. So I stayed quiet. When I wasn’t distracted by the pain and when Mathias seemed in a better mood, I would push for an explanation. Until then, I preferred to watch and wait.

  Well, actually I would have preferred to run. It was what habit and instinct had taught me to do when placed in close contact with high numbers behaving erratically. Now . . . Now, I continued to ignore my own sense of self-preservation for a man I wasn’t certain I could trust was thinking or acting rationally anymore. Perhaps it was a foolish thing to do. And yet . . . I didn’t want to give up on him. Not when he had done nothing, except work to protect me. If that ever changed, even for a moment, I would find a way to get away from him. But until that occurred, I didn’t want to give up on him.

  Reaching up, I pulled out the pins keeping my hair in a knot. As it fell in loose waves to brush my shoulders, I thought I saw Mathias looking over at me. However, when I stole a glance he was staring straight ahead. Scolding myself for my foolishness, I combed my fingers through my hair and then twisted it back up and pinned it into place once more.

  Eventually Mathias drove down an isolated unpaved road, leaving behind one little village in favor of . . . desolation. My doubts about this rather less than defined plan grew louder when we finally arrived in an isolated village whose sign declared it Altnabreac. There was hardly anything here to even be called a village. There was a cluster of three buildings near the rails and one was definitely a train station. When we drove past it, I gave Mathias a hard look. “If this is our destination, why not simply take the train?”

  “It is a requested stop only. That would draw too much attention.”

  “And our arrival does not?”

  Mathias drove further away from the station before stopping the truck in front of a rundown stone cottage off an even tinier dirt road. I wondered if this was considered the edge of the village. There was a gas lamp a few paces away casting a small circle of light, but for the most part the area was completely dark. I tugged my shawl back up as a partial cover against the cold and sleet while Mathias pulled our bags out of the back. He carried them inside before he came back to open my door. I hurried to get my crutches on the ground and hop out before he had a chance to touch me. I did not want any distractions right now. As soon as my foot touched the ground, however, I realized something was different.

  Another look around confirmed there were more stone cottages, but they were spaced further out and back toward the rail station. A paranormal community partially hidden by a glamour. That sent a spike of worry though me. All thoughts of protesting this stop vanished as my focus switched to getting inside and out of sight. We entered the cottage, but Mathias didn’t act as though he was there to stay. He crouched in front of the fireplace and quickly started a fire. I looked around nervously. There were only a few pieces of furniture in the front room, a scarred and battered looking table with two mismatched chairs. The one-room cottage was definitely missing a few creature comforts. I was distracted from my observations as soon as Mathias stood up. He didn’t say a word to me while he strode toward the door with a determined look on his face.

  “Mathias!” When he stopped with one hand on the door and looked back at me, I could only shake my head in disbelief. “Where are you going? You don’t mean to leave me here.”

  “I will return.”

  “What if someone realizes I’m in here? How am I supposed to explain things?” I gestured vaguely in the direction the glamour covered cottages were in as I added in a low hiss, “You can’t think everyone here will be unaware of the fact I’ve become the most wanted Spotter in the history of Spotters.”

  He somehow remained completely unperturbed by my words. His voice was cool, calm, and collected as he replied, “No one will notice us because we won’t be here long enough
to be noticed.” Mathias paused, studying my face, then added, “And if anyone does, they will assume we’re lost or tourists on holiday. Or both. Most of these cottages are empty for the winter. Stay inside. I have rations in my bag if you get hungry before I return.”

  “Wait a minute, Mathias, you haven’t explained,” I started to say, but he was already out the door before I finished rather lamely, “what we’re doing here.”

  I heard the truck rumble back to life and hobbled over to the door in time to see taillights vanishing into the gloomy night. Well, this was working out great, wasn’t it? I shut the door and hobbled to one of the two chairs, the one that looked to be the sturdiest of the pair. I set one crutch against the table and then dragged the chair over to block the door. At least, if someone came after me, I would have some type of warning.

  This was ridiculous. I was stranded in a little village in the highlands of Scotland because Mathias wasn’t being rational. Or if he was, he was not sharing his plans with me. I prayed he had a plan because a 10 losing his mind was the kind of thing that usually served as the prelude to a Spotter horror story. It was bad enough when a 10 had ambition and plans but once they went mad, it took an act of God to bring them down. Of course, it usually took an act of God to stop ambitious 10s if I remembered the stories correctly.

  I sat in the second chair, feeding the fire, for most of the night. A few times I dozed for an hour or two, but every noise from outside startled me awake. Half the time I nearly jumped out of my skin imagining paranormals bursting into the cottage ready to drag me to the nearest holding facility. Eventually I grew hungry enough to hunt through Mathias’ bag for the rations. I pulled the sealed rations out, and then stopped when my fingers brushed against leather. Extracting an older-looking worn leather book, I opened it to the cover page. A compendium of paranormal species. I had heard of these books, but never had the chance to read one myself.