The Time Corps Chronicles (Complete Series)

by Heather Blackwood

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it. It was kind of garbled actually, so you’re lucky I could make that much sense of it.”

  Yukiko looked out over the ocean, but the water looked as it always had.

  “Aren’t you going to thank me?” Coyote said.

  “Thanks.”

  She was still shaken from the slaugh attacking her. She touched her neck and looked at her fingers. No blood. The whole area felt tender though. It would probably bruise.

  “Sorry I didn’t get him in time,” said Santiago.

  “Goes with the territory,” she said.

  “We make a good team, Kit.”

  “No. We really don’t.”

  Chapter 19

  “Just concentrate,” said Red Fawn.

  “I’m trying,” said Astrid. She stood in front of the same mirror in the mirror house through which she and Elliot had seen the horde of angry slaugh. She tried to make the Door open again, imagining the mirror as water smoothing out, as a sliding door, as a window, but nothing happened.

  “Concentrate harder,” Red Fawn said.

  “What does that even mean? What am I supposed to be concentrating on?”

  “I don’t know. I never opened a Door.”

  “So why did you say it?” said Astrid.

  “I was trying to be helpful.”

  Astrid sighed, pushed her hair behind her ears and tried again. Elliot stood to one side, waiting. They had tried to recreate the conditions under which Astrid had accidentally opened the Door, but it hadn’t worked. It seemed that she had opened the Door entirely accidentally, and was unable to repeat it.

  “You called me?” Yukiko said, tone as icy as she could manage. She held the magnet-covered metal box and felt the slaugh slide along the bottom as she shifted the box from one arm to the other. Mr. Augustus sipped his coffee, which must be six hours old by now. The radio played a soft piano concerto.

  “We know about the slaugh,” he said.

  “I gathered, seeing as you asked me to come in and bring it.”

  “You weren’t supposed to bring a slaugh through,” he said.

  “It’s not my fault you and the Seelie had a bad plan,” Yukiko said. “I did my part as instructed. No more, no less.”

  “And yet, we have a slaugh.”

  “It’s not really my problem, is it? The illusion of the lost child was there, I bent reality a little. It’s not my fault that the girl is what she is. And besides, you should be thanking me. I helped catch the evil little thing before it could kill someone and bankrupt your park.”

  She set the box on the desk a little too hard, infuriating the slaugh within. It cursed and scrabbled inside its prison. Mr. Augustus pulled away from the box.

  “How are you going to send it home?” asked Yukiko. “Are you going to call the Unseelie to come pick it up?”

  “I have called Iolanthe. She’ll handle it.”

  “Yeah,” she sighed. “I suppose it’s best to let the sidhe manage the sidhe.”

  “Can’t argue with you there, sister.”

  She wasn’t his sister, not in any way. Except both of them were under the command of the Seelie. And both of them were helpless regarding their own destiny.

  “Don’t release the knots on the chain,” she said.

  “I’m not stupid.”

  “So will I be freed? I did as I was asked.”

  “Unlikely.”

  “How long will they keep me?”

  He shrugged. “They’ll keep you as long as they keep you. It’s not like you’re a djinn and they only get three favors.”

  “They could keep me forever then.”

  “Until you die, yeah. Why don’t you sit down?”

  Yukiko paused, considering, and then took the seat. Mr. Augustus took another sip of cold coffee.

  “Look, I’m sorry I poisoned you,” he said. “I didn’t have any choice in it, just as you don’t.”

  “How are they holding you? Can’t you get free?”

  He shook his head and glanced at the clock. “I can’t get free any more than you can.”

  “Maybe I could help you. And you could help me? My word is good. I honor my agreements.”

  “So I’ve heard. But there’s nothing you can do for me. The Seelie have many in thrall to them, many slaves. They don’t get free.”

  “Well, Mr. Augustus, I am not them. I am a Myobu, an ancient and noble race. And we do not take kindly to being enslaved.”

  “Maybe not a few centuries ago. But now, you’re all freelance, from what I understand. No family, no god, no nothing. So who will stop them?”

  He was correct, of course. There was no one to stop them. She was completely on her own to help herself. But she had spent most of her life on her own, so it was not a new feeling. Later today, she would dance again in Red Fawn’s show and gain more power.

  And then she would see about getting her spirit ball back.

  Chapter 20

  “You should go home, sweetheart. There’s really nothing for you to see.” Red Fawn gave Astrid a grandmotherly pat on the shoulder.

  “No way. I saw those horrible things, and I want to see the thing that can stop them.”

  “He isn’t their master and he doesn’t fight them.”

  “But he can take them away from here and send them back to hell where they belong,” Astrid said.

  “Oh, the slaugh don’t come from hell.”

  “It’s almost sunset. I’m going, and you can come or not.”

  Astrid didn’t give Red Fawn time to answer, but hurried down a cement staircase, the bottom of which was buried in the sand of the beach. She pulled off her sneakers and stuffed her socks inside. There was no way she was going to miss seeing the slaugh taken away. She had opened the Door, and she wanted to see the being who could undo her deed. Red Fawn had said that the slaugh would be fetched by someone called the Piper, but she wouldn’t give any more information other than to say that he was strange, fearful, and the sight of him drove men mad.

  She had to see him. Red Fawn pulled off her sandals. There was a shady place under the pier, the perfect place to see and not be seen. According to Red Fawn, the Piper would come to this place because it was the borderland between sea and earth, and he would come at sunset, as it was between day and night. It was poetic, Astrid thought, if a bit literal. But these things had rules, she had learned.

  “Is he scarier than the slaugh?” Astrid asked.

  “Scary? Oh, not really. He’s … himself. And that’s enough to scare the britches off most people.”

  “So why are you afraid of him if he’s not evil?”

  “Don’t be a fool, child. My friend Rattlesnake isn’t evil, but he’ll coil and strike if he’s surprised or threatened.”

  “But we’re not threatening.”

  Red Fawn gave a snort. “I’m not.”

  The sun touched the horizon and a woman walked down the beach, holding the metal box. It still had the colorful magnets attached and looked like a tacky souvenir. But she held it like it was a treasure.

  “Who’s that?” Astrid asked.

  “Iolanthe.”

  The woman’s movements were graceful and slow, as if there was nothing worth hurrying for in all the world. She wore a filmy gown that blew around her legs and exposed her bare feet. The ocean wind swept a tendril of her blonde hair across her face, but she did not push it away. She kept both hands on the box.

  Then, her face changed. It was the serene human face, and it was also the face of a ram.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Red Fawn. Astrid realized she must have gasped.

  “She has a ram’s head.”

  Red Fawn didn’t seem surprised. The ram woman stood stock still,
waiting. No human ever waited with such composure and serenity. She looked out over the water, and Astrid looked too. The waves rose, broke and hissed on the sand, the gulls wheeled overhead and the people on the pier above passed without noticing a thing.

  Astrid understood that things happened in the world that were just outside of regular people’s senses. It wasn’t that they weren’t paying attention. It was that they were incapable of seeing most of it. Red Fawn had told her as much, but she had not believed it completely. It was difficult to believe that she could see what other people could not.

  The waves were a few feet high, not big enough for surfers, so the water was empty on this side of the pier. That in itself was odd, but she figured some weird creature or person probably put the whammy on it to make it unappealing to visitors. The waves came in and out, soothing and rhythmic. The next wave was high, rising in a giant swell of foam and brownish water, and when it broke, emerging from the crash of the water came the Piper.

  He was tall, at least eight or ten feet high, with a face that looked mostly human. The eyes were too far apart, too slanted, too black, and his nose was too flat. His mouth was wide and sensual, and though he was monstrous, he was also appealing at some level. Like Iolanthe, he had horns, but his were not ram horns, but the curving horns of a bull, black, shining and sharp. His torso was bare and covered in a light covering of curly brown hair. His body seemed to be partly made of water, not just covered in it. It was brown, green, full of life. The water poured from his curly brown hair, his beard, his shoulders.

  And then, he moved forward through the surf and Astrid saw the lower half of his body. It was hairy, with thick, powerful legs that bent backwards at the knees. He was half goat. Then, his cloven hooves touched the sand, and he changed. He still had the same appearance, but now he was solid, harder, of the earth and the things below the earth.

  “Is that the devil?” Astrid whispered. There was no way anything could hear her above the sound of the waves, the people and the rides, but she didn’t want to take any chances.

  “Of course not. Like he’d make an appearance.” Red Fawn was keeping her voice low as well.

  “Then what is he?”

  “Like I said, he’s the Piper. Master of None. A bit of a celebrity, really.”

  The Piper took the box from Iolanthe, and said something to her for a few moments. Then he turned and moved back into the water, the surf swirling around his ankles. Astrid watched as he went from being of the earth to a being of water as he passed from the sand to the sea.

  He paused, and Astrid stopped breathing. He turned his head toward them, slowly, deliberately, as if giving her the chance to run or look away. She did not. Red Fawn gripped her arm hard. It hurt, but she did not move. The Piper’s gaze met hers, and she felt the scurrying wild things of the forest, the movement of leaves, the music, pulsing and tearing into her heart, elevating it and breaking it at the same time. She felt the hunger, the desire, the pulsing need, and just beyond that, the madness. In his being was the brink and the place beyond the brink, where thought did not matter and where reason was useless. She could not look away.

  Then, the feeling pulled back, and she felt him assessing her. He wondered about her, and there it was. It was gone as soon as she thought she had seen it. The flicker of fear.

  The Piper turned away and kept moving, and his hips, chest and shoulders vanished under the water. A wave crashed down, and his head was gone as well.

  She looked out over the water, and far off, on a slick rock that barely broke the water’s surface, she saw a woman, dark-skinned and still. She must have been sitting on an inner tube, as a dark, thick coil hid her hips and legs. A wave washed over the rock, and the woman was gone.

  Chapter 21

  Astrid didn’t even try to sleep. There were too many thoughts and too much anxiety for her to allow herself to relax. She read by flashlight, knowing that if she turned on her bedroom light, her mother might see the glow from under her door and come in. The sound of the television through the wall was reassuring, a familiar irritation.

  When the TV turned off, she glanced at the clock. It was almost three in the morning. She heard her mother walk down the hall and the bedroom door closed. That was a good sign. When her mother stayed up all night or fell asleep in front of the television, it meant she was upset about something, usually unpaid bills.

  Cinderella had left the kitten box before midnight and had not returned. The kittens liked to eat regularly and now and then, one of them would squirm and make tiny mewling noises. Astrid stroked them with the back of her fingers. Soon, they would be old enough to walk around, and then she would have to find homes for them. Looking at them all together, the size difference between Runt and the other two was significant. He was a good deal smaller and his fur was not as thick. She should name the other two, but if she named them, it would be even harder to get rid of them.

  There was a hard lump under the old towel that covered the bottom of the box. Astrid pulled it back and found her metal owl bell. It must have fallen into the box from her nightstand. She was lucky it hadn’t hit the kittens. It was old-fashioned looking, like an antique from the ancient world, and its expression was stern and watchful. She set it back in its place on her nightstand.

  She waited for the sound of Cinderella returning, the jingle of the collar, the sound of the cat door. It didn’t come. She thumbed through the fairy tale book, half reading, half pondering what she had seen. The slaugh in the mirror were horrible, worse than the creatures she had imagined under the bed or in the closet when she was young. And unlike the monsters of her imagination, these creatures were completely real. And then there was the Piper. She had sensed the instant of fear in him. What exactly was happening to her? The ability to open Doors to other worlds was terrifying. Red Fawn had not seemed to think that the slaugh was the worst thing that could come through. So what else was there, waiting, and how could she keep from letting it through?

  Maybe she could learn how to summon the Piper. If he could clean up any stray creatures, then he could help her. She felt warm at the thought of him. He was masculine in the extreme, almost to the point of a caricature. But goat legs. He had goat legs. There were satyrs in Greek mythology, goat men who seduced nymphs. Now she understood that part of the stories at least. Then there was Santiago. She was inexperienced with men, but she knew he was bad news.

  The cat flap opened and closed, and Astrid opened her bedroom door to let Cinderella in. The kittens squirmed in the box and Astrid waited. Cinderella didn’t come down the hall. She must be in the kitchen, maybe eating her kibble.

  No. She knew differently. Something was off. Whatever senses she was developing, they were setting off alarm bells now. Or maybe it was plain old intuition.

  She went to the kitchen and sighed in relief. Cinderella was in the center of the floor, chewing on whatever she had killed outside. It was going to be a mess to clean up, but at least it was nothing serious.

  Then the cat looked up. The thing in front of her was no bird or lizard. It was a small fetal thing, a homunculus, gray and humanoid. Its head was too large for its body and it had long, spindly arms with three fingers on each hand that ended in bulbous tips. The feet were similar, but with short toes. Its rounded stomach and large head gave it an almost infantile appearance. Huge, black eyes without pupils, like the aliens she had seen on television, watched her.

  Thank God it was dead. For a moment, she feared that it might still be alive, but it was covered in black blood and it did not move. Part of its hip and thigh were gone. Cinderella had been eating it. Oh God, that was disgusting.

  The way Cinderella was looking at her now was almost as horrifying. There was intelligence in her eyes, though her face, being covered in fur, was not readable. She was expectant, and also looked like she wanted to tell Astrid something. Astrid wished the cat could talk, and would te
ll her where the hell this monstrosity had come from. But she thought she already knew. Red Fawn had said that she could open Doors unintentionally, even in sleep. She had not slept that night, but she had slept every other night.

  Cinderella puffed up and shot toward the cat door, stopping a few feet short of it. Then, Astrid heard it too. Something scrabbled outside at the door.

  The cat growled a warning, high and loud, and the scrabbling stopped, only to begin again. Then Astrid understood. That’s why this vile little monster looked like an infant. It was a baby. And it had a mother.

  She yanked open the drawer, looking for the slide-in panel that had come with the cat door. It had to be in here somewhere. She yanked out another drawer, but it was nowhere to be found. She opened a cabinet, pulled out a cookie sheet and held it against the cat door. The thing stopped its sniffing outside and she felt it push experimentally against the cookie sheet. Then it banged on it hard.

  “The chair,” Astrid whispered to herself. She held the cookie sheet with her foot and pulled over a kitchen chair, laying it on its side so it held the cookie sheet against the cat door.

  Cinderella stayed a few feet away, every hair on end and every muscle tense. Her eyes were so dilated that her irises were just a thin strip of yellowish green around her giant pupils.

  “Another slaugh,” Astrid whispered. “You killed a slaugh baby.”

  The baby was still on the floor, oozing a slow flow of black blood. The smell coming from the thing was awful, the same death and sulfur smell that had come from the burned circle in the grass.

  “What are you doing?”

  Her mother was behind her, blinking in the light of the overhead kitchen light. She was in her pajamas.

  “Um, there’s a raccoon,” Astrid said, but stopped. The dead slaugh lay in the middle of the kitchen floor. “No, it’s not a raccoon. It’s something else, trying to come in. It’s the mother of that.” She jerked her chin toward the corpse, keeping pressure on the chair, and thus the cookie sheet.