Gathering Storm: An Alastair Stone Urban Fantasy Novel (Alastair Stone Chronicles Book 17)

by R. L. King

  Clyde stared at the window Ski had just sailed through, then settled his terrified gaze on Stone. “You’re—you’re—”

  “Yes, I am. And you’ve got a much better chance with me than you would with this lot. So what’s it going to be?”

  Clyde swallowed, swiped his arm across his streaming nose, and looked at the door. “Okay. Yeah. Let’s go.”

  “We’re not going that way. Come on.” He dragged the protesting man over to the window. “Now, this will be a bit tricky, so I need you to stay still and be quiet. Do you understand?”

  “What are you gonna do? They’re shootin’ in through that window, man!”

  Stone slammed him into the wall with telekinetic power. “Last chance, Clyde: do you want to live, or do you want to stay here and let them blow your miserable head off?”

  Clyde was nearly blubbering now. “Yeah. Yeah, man. I want to live. I don’t wanna die. I’ll be good. Just—get us the hell outta here!”

  “Good.” Stone checked the door to make sure nobody else was coming in, then paused to concentrate. He wasn’t lying to Clyde: this would be tricky. He’d have to maintain three spells at once: invisibility, levitation, and the shield, and he’d have to do it long enough to get them to one of the vehicles. If Clyde panicked and broke free of his hold, he wasn’t sure he could get the man back before the Sixes or the Hammers blew him to bits.

  That, and with all this gunfire, the police couldn’t be far behind. Whatever he did, he’d have to do it fast. “Right, then—hold on to me, and no matter what happens, don’t let go. If you let go, I can’t protect you. Can you do that?”

  “Y-yeah. Yeah.” Clyde flung his arms around Stone and clamped his hands together in a death grip, sending up a plume of stench that was nearly visible to the naked eye. “I don’t know what you’re gonna do, but fuckin’ do it, man!”

  Stone didn’t wait for him to have second thoughts. He concentrated a moment longer, then pulled up the spells one at a time: shield first as the highest priority, then levitation, and finally invisibility. He lifted the two of them and zipped out through the window just as more gunfire sounded from inside the house. Either Hammer’s guys had made it inside, or more of the Sixes had come back upstairs to secure their prisoner.

  “Oh shit oh shit oh shit…” Clyde mumbled, but to his credit he kept it quiet and didn’t start screaming in terror as they flew out past the edge of the house, passing over Ski’s bloody, bullet-riddled body in the front yard. From here, Stone could see two dark-colored sedans prowling back and forth along the front side of the house. Their lights were off, but the intermittent flashes and staccato cracks from their interiors, along with the whooping shrieks of their passengers, gave away their locations every bit as well as the auras of the gunmen hanging out the windows.

  Stone dropped them down behind a large tree across the road from the house. “Stay put,” he ordered Clyde. “And stay down.”

  Apparently, Clyde was done arguing. He dropped down to his knees and pressed himself against the side of the tree as if it were his best friend in the world, huffing like an overworked train.

  Stone took a moment to catch his breath—the invisibility spell was still tiring even at his upgraded power level—then re-cast it and poked his head out from behind the tree. He waited until the two cars had crossed and reached maximum distance from each other, then focused in on the closer car’s tire. A second later, brakes screeched and the gunfire stopped as the car’s left front tire exploded with a bang every bit as loud. The sedan fishtailed and came to a stop facing the house.

  “What the—?” Clyde demanded, gripping the tree.

  Stone ignored him and concentrated on the other car, which had spun around and was now coming back toward the first one. “Be ready to move,” he told Clyde.

  “What’re you gonna do?”

  More gunfire came from inside the house, dropping one of the Hammers from the stricken car as he exited to assess the damage. The other car pulled between it and the house, laying down covering fire as the remaining two Hammers in the first car scrambled out and climbed in. It had to be a tight fit now, especially if the second car had been full to start with. As soon as they were in, the second car sped off around the side of the house.

  Stone grabbed Clyde’s arm and pointed at the Sixes’ van, which was parked along the opposite side of the house. “Come on! Head for the van and stay close!”

  Clyde didn’t ask questions. His skinny legs pumped and his breath wheezed as he ran alongside Stone. They reached the van just as the Hammers’ remaining functional car came flying around the corner, tires throwing up plumes of gravel and guns blazing.

  Stone wrenched open the door of the van—fortunately, the Sixes hadn’t locked it—and used magic to fling Clyde inside. “Stay down!” he ordered, dropping into the driver’s seat.

  The Hammers’ headlights fell on him, illuminating him in a bright glow, and only then did he realize he’d dropped the invisibility spell too soon to conserve his energy. The muzzle-flashes resumed, and this time rounds plinked off the side of the van instead of the house. One shattered the windshield and slammed into the empty passenger seat.

  “Oh God oh God oh God…” Clyde moaned from the floor.

  “Enough of this,” Stone growled. He couldn’t see the car’s tires well enough to blow them at this distance with the headlights’ glow dazzling his eyes, but he had to do something fast. Let’s give this new power a real test, then.

  As the car continued its slow, inexorable approach, Stone gathered the Calanarian energy, shaped it, and took hold of the sedan’s front end. He had no idea if he could do this, but now was as good a time as any to try. With a wrench, he lifted the car’s front left side and flung it sideways, waiting for his head to light up with pain.

  It didn’t. The dark sedan tilted and continued tilting until it lay on its side. It hung there for a moment in perfect balance, then did a graceful flop onto its roof, tires still spinning uselessly in the night air.

  “Yes!” Stone yelled. He was definitely going to have to do some more tests to discover his new limits. Not now, though. Now, they had to get the hell out of here before the Hammers regrouped or the Sixes discovered their ride was leaving without them.

  But they still had a problem he’d forgotten about. “Oh, bloody hell, I don’t have the keys!”

  “Look under the sunflap,” Clyde’s shaky voice called from the floor. “Don’tcha ever watch any movies?”

  Stone bit back a sarcastic reply and checked the sun visor. To his surprise and delight, a set of keys with a skull keyring dropped into his hand.

  “I didn’t think anyone was stupid enough to do that in real life,” he muttered, jamming the key into the ignition. A moment later, he had the van turned around and was heading as fast as he dared away from the house. In the opposite direction, he spotted faint red and blue lights and heard the far-off sirens of approaching police cars. It was only when they’d made it a mile away that he let himself relax, just a little.

  “What…the hell…are you?” Clyde poked his head up from the floor and settled himself into one of the van’s rear seats. “What is going on?”

  “That’s what I’m planning to ask you,” Stone said, without taking his eyes off the road. “But first we need to get rid of this van and find a safe place to lie low for a while.”

  “No way, man. Thanks for the rescue, but I’m outta here. Just let me off somewhere—gas station or whatever—and I’ll be outta your hair, pronto.”

  “It doesn’t work that way, Clyde.” This time, Stone did turn a little to meet the skinny, twitchy man’s gaze. “I’ve come a long way looking for you, and you’re not going anywhere until we have our little chat.”

  “You can’t make me,” he said sullenly.

  “Oh, but I can. Believe me, you do not want to try my patience right now. You saw what I did to that car, right? And besides, I saved your miserable hide. You owe me something for that.”

  “I ca
n’t do it anymore.” His voice still sounded sullen, and now a whine had crept into it. “I’m tellin’ ya, it’s gone. I was sure they was gonna kill me when they found out. So if ya got any ideas o’ pickin’ up where those guys left off, I can’t help ya.”

  “So you’re saying you can’t heal anymore?”

  “No, man. It’s gone. I don’t know what fixed your leg, but I promise, it wasn’t me.”

  “Don’t worry about my leg. It was just a ruse to get me in to see you.”

  “I’m hungry. Can we stop to get somethin’ to eat?”

  “Not until we get away from here, and get a different vehicle. So you could heal before? That wasn’t a lie?”

  Clyde sighed. “No lie. It was freaky as fuck, but I could. Just a couple days ago, I fixed up a guy who got stabbed in the gut. It was pretty disgusting. Nearly lost my lunch lookin’ at it. Part of his, y’know, intestines were stickin’ out.”

  “Do you have any idea why it doesn’t work anymore? Do you feel any different?”

  “What the hell is going on with you, man?” Clyde gripped the passenger seat and poked his greasy head forward into the gap. “Why all the questions? How did you even know about me? What do you want?”

  Stone looked around. They were entering a town now, though he had no idea which one. He spotted a small motel near the outskirts, pulled the van around the back into a poorly-lit parking lot, and motioned Clyde out. “I’m going to get us a room here so we can talk. Say nothing until we’re inside. Do you understand?”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it. If you talk, you’ll regret it.” Stone hated to threaten the man since he was obviously already terrified, but he didn’t have a lot of choice. He couldn’t leave Clyde in the van until he’d secured a room, since the odds he’d do a runner as soon as he was alone approached certainty.

  “Fine. But I want somethin’ to eat, man. And a beer.”

  “Don’t worry. Just stay quiet.”

  Stone was glad he’d decided to wear gloves, since it would be difficult to explain to the cops what his fingerprints were doing in a van outside Pittsburgh when he was supposed to be in Palo Alto. He still had the illusionary amulet going to make him look like a middle-aged businessman, so he quickly wove a second illusion to make Clyde appear as a skinny, pimply teenage boy (not much of a stretch, except for the age). He gripped the other man’s arm and strode toward the office.

  Fortunately for him, he’d hung on to the thousand dollars he’d pretended to give the Sixes back in Pittsburgh, and even more fortunately, a little cash went a long way to buying the bored clerk’s disinterest in their specific circumstances. Clyde remained silent, unwittingly playing the part of a surly teenage boy, and fifteen minutes later they were safely closed inside a boring, utilitarian motel room with the door locked and the curtains drawn.

  Stone switched on the light and motioned for Clyde to sit down. He’d bought a selection of snack foods and soft drinks from the motel’s lobby, and he tossed them on the table. “Sorry it’s not much yet, but we’ll get you more later. Right now, I need you to talk.”

  Clyde ripped into a pack of Ding-Dongs with the voracity of a starving wolf. He shoved one into his mouth whole, chewed, swallowed, then stuffed in the other one and washed it down with a big swallow of Mountain Dew. “What do you want, man? I mean, I’m glad as fuck you got me out of there, don’t get me wrong. Those guys were hardcore. I wish you’d taken ’em all out. They killed Louie and Pete!”

  “Yes, I’m sorry about that, I truly am.” He took a seat across the table, moving his chair so it was between Clyde and the door in case the man decided to make a break for it. “Clyde—tell me about what happened.”

  “What do you mean, what happened?”

  “You didn’t have these healing abilities all your life, did you?”

  “I—” Clyde’s gaze skated away, and his aura flared. “I dunno, man. I dunno.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Clyde. I’m on your side, but I’ve got very little patience right now and I’d like very much to deal with this as quickly as possible and go home. So how long have you had these abilities?”

  He bowed his head and opened an energy bar with more care. Even if it hadn’t been obvious from his posture that the last of the fight had gone out of him, his aura clearly displayed it. “Aw, fuck, man, I dunno what the hell happened. But I do know when it happened.”

  “When?”

  “Two-three weeks ago. Me an’ Pete an’ Louie went out huntin’ like we always do this time o’ year. We tried a different spot this time—friend o’ Louie’s had him a cabin out in the woods out near Litton, and let him use it for the weekend. So we headed up there. Took a cooler fulla beer, a buncha sandwiches and some cold fried chicken, and headed out. I took my dog Rocky with me. He’s a good dog.”

  “So what happened?” Stone asked, unwilling to sit and listen to Clyde’s hunting stories. “Get to the point.”

  “Okay, okay.” He took another slug of Mountain Dew and scratched his belly. “Sure wish this was beer, though.”

  “Later.”

  “Yeah. So we was out there lookin’ for some woodchucks, coyotes, that kinda thing. Thought maybe we’d try to get us a deer if we could, even though it ain’t deer season. It was early on Saturday morning. Rocky took off, and the next thing I hear, he’s yelpin’ like somethin’ got him.

  “So we all run over there and find Rocky tanglin’ with a fuckin’ bear! He musta got too close to its cub or somethin’, ’cuz it was tearin’ shit outta him. We shot off a couple rounds and scared it off, but I thought ol’ Rocky was done for. Figured I’d have to shoot him to put him out of his misery, y’know?”

  “But that didn’t happen?”

  “No, man. That’s when things got fuckin’ batshit. I ran over toward where he was, and suddenly I felt weird.”

  “Weird?”

  “I can’t explain it. Like…energized, y’know? I dunno how else to say it. Like I drank about nine o’ them Red Bulls in a row. But anyway, I dropped down on my knees next to Rocky, and I don’t mind admittin’ I was bawlin’ like a baby. I love that dog, man. Raised him from a pup. But anyways, I took him in my arms, prayin’ to God to help him, and suddenly I just started feelin’ this…warmth around me. Almost like somebody turned up the heat, even though it hadda be nearly freezin’ out there. And my vision got all...like yellow. I thought maybe I might be havin’ a stroke or somethin’.”

  He picked up a Slim Jim, but let it drop back to the table and met Stone’s gaze head-on for the first time. “And that’s when it happened.”

  “What happened?”

  Clyde swallowed. “One second I was lookin’ down into Rocky’s eyes, apologizin’ to him for what I was gonna have to do, thinkin’ about how much I loved him and wished it all hadn’t never happened, and then…” He swallowed again, and his voice shook. “And then…He had this big slash on his side. I could see his ribs, it was that bad, and there was so much blood…but I swear to God, as I watched, that slash just…sealed up. Went away. And so did all the other cuts and stuff he had. His eyes got brighter, he licked my hand, and then got up and started jumpin’ around like nothin’ had even happened.”

  Stone stared at him in astonishment. Those kinds of magical manifestations under stress or pressure weren’t impossible among latent talents, but he’d never heard of one showing up quite that fully formed before. “And…you’ve never felt anything like that before?”

  “Nah, man. Well, like I said, one time I drank a six-pack o’ those five-hour energy things on a dare—thought my heart was gonna pop right outta my chest—but I didn’t go ’round healin’ up no dogs after.” He eyed the door. “Hey, man, can we get a pizza or somethin’?”

  Clearly they weren’t going to get anywhere until Clyde had been fed something more substantial than junk food. “Fine.” Still keeping an eye on the skinny man, he used the room’s phone to call the pizza delivery joint on the flyer next to it.

  “Get meat,”
Clyde called. “Lotsa meat. An’ mushrooms. An’ extra cheese.”

  When the pizza had been ordered, Stone dropped back into his chair. “There. Now tell me what happened next.”

  Clyde shrugged. “It was Louie who figured it out. After Rocky got fixed up, he said there was some kinda glow around us. He cut his finger and told me to try fixin’ it up.”

  “And did you?”

  “Yeah, man. It was trippy as hell. All I had to do was think about how I wanted to fix the problem. I even fixed Pete’s cold, so it didn’t just work for injuries.”

  “So that’s when you decided to go into Pittsburgh and set up shop as some kind of mystical healer.”

  “Yeah. Wouldn’t you? Louie figured if I had this fuckin’ weird new superpower, at least we should make money on it. But I guess we put out the word to the wrong people, because it weren’t a day before the Sixes showed up. One of ’em pretended to be hurt, and soon as I fixed ’im up, all the sudden there was guns everywhere. They told me I worked for them now. They threw a bag over my head and next thing I knew, I was at that house. They kept me in the basement when I wasn’t workin’, and kept bringin’ guys through with knife wounds, gunshot wounds—even some normal-lookin’ people like you. I guess they were advertisin’ for clients or somethin’, chargin’ a big pile o’ money for me to do it. I didn’t even get none o’ the money!” He looked indignant, then bowed his head. “And I know they iced Louie and Pete. They didn’t say nothin’ about it, but I didn’t see ’em no more after I got out here. Them guys told me they let ’em go, but I heard ’em talkin’ when they thought I was sleepin’, and I heard somebody diggin’ out in the backyard a couple days later.”

  He popped open another Mountain Dew with obvious dejection. “They was good guys, Louie and Pete. We been together since we was kids. They was family. I wish none o’ this shit had ever happened to me, even if it did mean losin’ Rocky. I’m glad whatever it is, it’s gone now.”

  “Are you sure it’s gone?”

  “Yeah, man. When I woke up this morning, I didn’t feel that energized feelin’ no more. I cut my finger a little and tried to fix it while I was alone, but it didn’t work no more. I was scared shitless what they’d do to me if they brought me somebody and I couldn’t fix ’em no more. I knew they’d either beat the shit out of me or kill me and bury me out back with Pete an’ Louie. Or maybe both.”