by Sara King
“I don’t,” Kaashifah screamed, bringing the sword back around for another swing, “want,” she panted, swinging again, driving her sister further away from the soldiers, “to fight!” She swung again as her sister fell flat on the ridgeline of the roof, stopping the too-big sword at her neck. “You’re the first Fury I’ve seen in almost two thousand years!” Kaashifah cried. “I don’t care what crimes you committed. You had your reasons. Please. We can fix this.”
Zenaida snorted and glanced sideways, obviously trying to calculate whether or not she could get up before Kaashifah could gut her.
“Don’t force my hand, sister,” Kaashifah warned. “You will not like what you find.”
Zenaida, realizing that Kaashifah wasn’t going to finish the job, chuckled and started getting to her feet. “You’re just a coward.”
“I’m the Blade of Morning!” Kaashifah screamed back at her. “There is a reason for that, you stupid fool!” She’d lost her patience with her sister, and the destruction around them made it look as if the center of Wasilla had been hit by a bombing run. Dozens of men in combat gear were dead or dying from where they had been unable to dodge Zenaida’s missiles in time, and Kaashifa could hear the crying of lost children and the sobbing of women, saw the forlorn, ambling masses as they searching through the rubble for loved ones, shocked into silence, and it reminded her of countless battlefields of the past.
“I’m only going to say this once more,” Kaashifah said, the scene bringing tears to her eyes. “Put down your sword, sister, and let’s talk. If you decline, I am going to kill you, and our Lord’s Hounds will come to reap your soul.”
Zenaida laughed at her. “A myth,” she screamed. “The Lord of War does not exist! There’s no afterlife, there’s nothing. Innocents are killed—murdered—every day, and they just disappear! They never come back. They never live again! And they sure as fuck don’t go strolling through the pearly fucking gates.” As she spoke, she flared her wings and thrust her sword heavenward, spittle flying from her lips in a froth of madness.
“Sister,” Kaashifah said softly. “Don’t do this.”
Zenaida’s lip twitched in a sneer. “You’re wounded and are still struggling to remember how to wield a sword. Don’t try to pretend you’re sparing me, sister. I’ve been toying with you.”
Kaashifah felt a pang of sadness at the hatred in her sister’s voice. It was in that moment, with an entire city of devastation around them, the moans of hundreds of grieving souls echoing from the ruins, that she realized that there was no saving her sister.
I have to kill her, she realized, horrified. I have to end this. A second later, Zenaida lunged at her, and Kaashifah instinctively raised her sword, finding that cold calculation that she had been avoiding smoothly sliding into place, readying her for the kill…
Suddenly, the building exploded under them, with more white trails of smoke leading in from three other directions before other missiles hit, utterly devastating the warehouse, throwing them both into the air. While Zenaida spread her wings and caught herself in a long, easy soar, brightening the buildings and roadways beneath her as she passed, Kaashifah flipped head over heels about two hundred feet, landing on her stomach in the parking lot, still in her human form. She pried herself from the concrete, wincing.
Above her, her sister was scowling at the fighter jets, which had launched their missiles well out of sight. “That,” her sister growled, “is not honorable.” She followed the little dots with her eyes as the jets swung around the horizon. “Did you see that? They must be at least seven miles off, and the assholes tried to shoot us in the backs.”
“Leave them alone,” Kaashifah muttered, climbing onto the cab of a pickup truck. “They’re just doing their jobs.”
But her sister was gaining altitude, turning away from her, towards Anchorage.
“Zenaida!” Kaashifah snapped.
Her sister twisted back to look at her and called, “I’m off to destroy the bees’ nest, sister. Perhaps the good little soldiers will stop pestering us if they have no queen to give them orders.”
“No, dammit!” Kaashifah yelled back at her. “Leave them out of it, you qybah!”
But her sister was already heading for the inlet.
Damn it, Kaashifah thought, watching her sister’s brilliant wings soar towards Anchorage. One city was bad enough. Did her sister plan to wreck another one, too? What was her game?
Then, with a horrible pang, Kaashifah realized that Zenaida had no game. Her thousands of years of carefully-collected potions and charms were gone, swept away into the Void. She no longer cared who saw, no longer cared about the Pact. She had gone completely rogue.
Kaashifah summoned her Fury and pushed her wings outward, into her half-form. Immediately, her broken surroundings lit up with a radiant glow, cast off from her feathers’ heavenly luminescence. She gave her wounded wing an experimental flap. It was weak and slow, and it was readily apparent it would be impossible to fly, let alone catch up with her sister.
Damn! She watched Zenaida disappear over the line of gnarled cottonwood trees on the horizon, then tried to figure out how she was going to get to the two military bases outside Anchorage before her sister could destroy them. She considered walking the Void, but without ever having been inside Anchorage, she had no bearings, no way to know she wouldn’t pick the wrong string and end up in the ocean, or thousands of miles away…or three hours after the fact.
From the ground, a machinegun opened fire, tearing holes through the metal cab beneath her feet, popping out the safety glass in a tinkle of tiny crystalline cubes. Kaashifah caught sight of the soldier hunkered in the dirty snow beside a green dumpster, peering at her over the barrel of his gun. His companions had all either fled or died, leaving him the only one still firing.
Kaashifah launched herself from the truck to awkwardly glide down to him. Alighting clumsily on the packed snow of the driveway, she moved closer, ignoring the hail of bullets that spattered across her shield as the man got up and stumbled away from her, awe and terror on his face.
“Listen!” Kaashifah said, yanking her energy back out of the claymore as the soldier paused to reload. “I’m not going to hurt you, damn it. My sister is about to destroy your base. I need you to radio those who are in command. Tell them an angel of War wishes to speak with them.”
The man’s eyes went wide and he shook his head back and forth, holding the gun between them like a shield as he slapped at the magazines packed into the deep leg pockets of his cargo pants.
“Now!” Kaashifah shouted, flaring her wings. “Tell them to look at Wasilla and know that the same is about to be wrought upon their Elmendorf and Fort Rich if they do not help me.”
“I’m just a grunt,” the wide-eyed young man managed. He looked like he’d wet himself. Then he turned and pointed at the side of a collapsed building, where a guy was hunched over a little black box, speaking into a receiver. “That’s the guy you want to talk to.”
A courier of some sort. A messenger. Good. Kaashifah walked up to the man and dropped to her knees beside him. The luminescence of her wings made his head turn and his eyes widened as he stared up at her.
“Listen to me very carefully,” Kaashifah said. “I’m all that is standing between you and the end of your world, do you understand?”
His mouth dropped open and the receiver fell from his hand.
“Good,” Kaashifah said. “Deliver a message your base. Tell them to send their jets…”
Chapter 23: A Dance with Fate
‘Aqrab watched the dunes fly by beneath him in silence, having never been so angry in his life. As of yet, he had not seen another living soul in the Fourth Lands, despite having been aloft for several hours. Strange, but there were certainly vast areas of his homeworld that were uninhabited. After all, even in the Fourth Realm, civilization tended to congregate around water and the sustenance that it could provide to lesser forms of life.
“I’m really sorry,” the drago
n repeated, for the hundredth time. Savaxian had offered himself as a steed earlier that afternoon—probably out of self-preservation, knowing the serpent was now on ‘Aqrab’s home territory—but ‘Aqrab was still not talking to him. Thunderbird, ripped from his homeland, without his powers of rain and lightning, had nonetheless spent two of those hours screaming and fighting in blind panic as ‘Aqrab held him in place on the dragon’s back, until ‘Aqrab simply punched him hard enough to make him devolve into a whimpering huddle around the dragon’s neck.
“You will right this,” ‘Aqrab growled back. Then, gently touching Thunderbird’s shoulder, he said, “Are we close?”
Thunderbird nodded, whining, his eyes squeezed shut around tears.
“He’s going to kill us when we go home, isn’t he?” the dragon asked, wincing back at the sobbing demigod.
“Well,” ‘Aqrab said, “I suppose you’re about to find out.” Even as the dragon was stiffening beneath him, ‘Aqrab twisted them back to the First Realm.
Immediately, the skies above them darkened with swirling black thunderstorms, pulled unnaturally from all directions.
“Put me down!” Thunderbird screamed, as the air around them began to sizzle with electricity. “Now! Or I swear I will strike you both until not even your bones survive!”
“Peace!” ‘Aqrab cried, knowing that the demigod meant just that. “The dragon’s taking us down.”
“Now!” Thunderbird shrieked. His eyes were still closed, his hands fisted against the dragon’s neck and the sky was roiling in a twisting black mass above them.
“We’re going down,” ‘Aqrab assured him, as the dragon flared and landed them on a winding mountain road. “There,” he said, as soon as Savaxian’s taloned feet had touched the asphalt. “We’re down. Now before you do anything in haste—”
Thunderbird rolled off of the dragon’s back and fell to the ground hard, panting, hyperventilating, rage in his face. The skies began to crackle with electricity above, and the hairs on ‘Aqrab’s arms began to stand on end. “You struck me!” he snarled at ‘Aqrab.
Goddess preserve me, he’s going to kill us both, ‘Aqrab thought, realizing that the Thunderbird was beyond all reason. “Dragon!” he cried, as the expectant tension in the air began to tingle at his arms, “Remember what I said about never giving you another chance? I lied! I grant you a wish. Use it now!”
“I wish Thunderbird was no longer afraid of heights!” Savaxian babbled immediately, obviously having that same thought.
Immediately, the Law rushed into him with the question of, How would you fulfill this wish?
Remove the fear of heights placed upon Thunderbird by the dragon’s last wish, ‘Aqrab thought hastily.
Immediately, the magic rushed through him and ‘Aqrab surrendered to the ecstasy of the full power of the Fourth Realm.
He was still breathing hard, curled on his side in the middle of the road, having slid from the dragon’s back in his bliss, when ‘Arab looked up to see the Thunderbird staring at the dragon in shock.
“Not once,” Thunderbird whispered, his voice low and awed, “but twice you surprise me this day, dragon.” Straightening, his voice taking on a pitch of formality, he said, “You are a much nobler creature than I had once thought. My deepest apologies for my prior slights to you. They came from a vain and selfish fool, and it will not happen again.”
The dragon’s mouth fell open, and again ‘Aqrab had the urge to inform Thunderbird that, in truth, the dragon was just righting a previous wrong, but then he realized that if he did so, the dragon would not survive the next three minutes.
“Uh, I…” The dragon seemed to understand that, too, because he squeaked, “Thank you.”
“No,” Thunderbird said slowly, shaking his head. “Thank you. You are a true friend, and of noble soul.”
“Uh, I just saw you were in need,” Savaxian babbled, “and I, uh, couldn’t let you suffer like that.”
The demigod bowed again. “You are welcome to hunt on my lands, whenever you see fit.”
Unable to stand the dragon’s hypocrisy any longer, ‘Aqrab narrowed his eyes and said, “We really need to free whatever’s alive in the compound.”
Immediately, Thunderbird’s electric eyes widened and he turned to the road. Ahead of them, a family of sight-seers had stopped their Subaru on the icy hill and through the windshield, ‘Aqrab could see four open mouths staring back at them. ‘Aqrab saw the blue flash of a camera from the passenger side, lighting up the rain.
“This way,” Thunderbird said, starting up the road. As he jogged past the vehicle, the man driving the Subaru followed his progress, jaw still hanging wide. Grunting, the dragon tucked his wings and padded after him, assumedly so that the Thunderbird couldn’t claim anything interesting in the basement before he got a chance at it, leaving ‘Aqrab standing in the empty road in front of the Subaru, giving those inside a nervous grin. He backed off to the side of the road and motioned for the man to pass.
The man obligingly drove forwards a few feet, then stopped to stare at him through the window. Behind him, the backseat window rolled down and, after a quiet moment, a childlike voice called from the darkened interior, “Are you Bigfoot?”
“Ah, well, little one,” ‘Aqrab started to reply, but the man stepped on the gas, spinning the Subaru’s wheels as it started down the slope. Before it was out of range, ‘Aqrab heard a childlike squeal of, “Bigfoot rides a dragon, mama!”
Wincing, he hurried to catch up with the other two.
Thunderbird led them to a small, gravel road that wound out from behind a huge stand of cottonwood trees, behind which it was completely shrouded in a wall of alders. The demigod hesitated, peered at the side of the mailbox and its little green duck, then started down the drive.
“Get ready,” ‘Aqrab muttered, as they eased down the gravel road and the buildings beyond began coming into sight, hidden in a thick forest of birch, spruce, and alders.
Expecting a full-on assault the moment they stepped onto the compound, ‘Aqrab was somewhat surprised when they were able to walk right up to the front door without incident.
They’re all off looking for us, he thought, stunned. Either that, or out trying to pacify the Fury. Not wanting to think about that, ‘Aqrab let Thunderbird lead the way inside the compound. Like he stepped into mortals’ dwellings on a daily basis, Thunderbird scraped his moccasins on the rug, swung the door wide, and strode inside.
“We’re looking for a staircase,” Thunderbird said, as he led them down the hallway. “They’ll keep their prisoners underground. Less chance of—is that the Seahawks?” He hesitated as they passed an open door to what looked like a cafeteria. A huge television was hanging from one wall, a football game in full force. “They made the playoffs?!” Thunderbird came to a halt, his jaw falling open slightly, peering at the television.
“Hey!” ‘Aqrab cried, grabbing the demigod by an arm. “I’m not paying you songs to watch TV.”
“I’ve heard your songs already,” Thunderbird replied. “Oh wow. I think that’s a sixty-one-inch plasma screen.”
“First we find the dungeon, then you can steal their television,” ‘Aqrab said. “Come on. Where do you think that staircase is?”
But Thunderbird ignored him and stepped into the room, plucking a tidbit from the table of food-bins inside the door. Popping it into his mouth, he chewed the morsel for a moment before he made a sound of approval. “And they’ve got a good buffet. Barbecue ribs!” The demigod proceeded to pick up a plate and start filling it with items from the steaming trenches of food.
‘Aqrab felt something in his neck twitch. “Dragon?” he asked.
“Yes, I’m seeing it,” the dragon muttered. “He just filled a plate up with their food and sat down in front of their TV.”
‘Aqrab watched the scene for another moment, just to prove to himself that he was actually seeing it, then twisted and started back down the hall, with the dragon following closely behind, once more in his ta
ll, fully clothed, rakishly handsome human form—that was one inch taller than the rain god.
“Okay,” ‘Aqrab said, as they started wandering through the maze of linoleum-floored hallways, “there has to be someone in here who knows where it is.”
The halls, as it turned out, weren’t entirely deserted. A black-robed priest came around one corner, saw the two of them, and halted, frowning.
“Are you lost?” the man demanded in a very un-Fatherly tone.
“Yes,” the dragon said, turning to face him smoothly, “we were invited to conduct an interview in your basement by one of your comrades. Could you show us where it is?”
The priest looked ‘Aqrab up and down with obvious disapproval. “You’re reporters?”
‘Aqrab winced. “Ah, well, I do work with words for a living.”
The priest sniffed. “Are you aware it’s winter outside, my son?”
‘Aqrab glanced down at his bare feet, like jet against the white linoleum. “Ah, yes, I’ve been painfully aware of that fact for the last few months, actually.”
“We have an appointment in the basement,” the dragon reminded him.
“I’m sorry,” the man said, “this building has no basement, and I’ll have to ask you to leave. The cardinal isn’t here right now, and even if he were, you do not meet the dress code.” He gave ‘Aqrab’s naked chest a disdainful sniff.
“Oh, ah,” ‘Aqrab started, trying to decide how he was going to politely ask the man to lead them to the basement anyway, when the dragon walked up, grabbed the priest by the neck, and threw him against the wall. As the Father choked, he allowed some of his form to wax draconic.
His scaly silver lips stretching in a smile, Savaxian rumbled, “I don’t think you understand, Father. You will tell us what you know about this place, or you will become a bloody pile of entrails on the floor. Your choice.”