Drynn

by Steve Vera

  Once on the ground on his belly, he came to the disheartening realization that there was no way he was going to be able to play commando with these stitches. Already, the once-muted pain throbbed through his shirt. In fact, he might actually be stuck in this position.

  “What an unusual place to be at such an hour,” came a voice from behind him.

  He froze. Surely no one had snuck up from behind on the great Skipster.

  “Lying still next to that old stump does not change the fact that you have been discovered, friend.” The voice was light and airy and spoke in a way that suggested the speaker wasn’t entirely comfortable with English.

  Skip sucked his teeth.

  “Do not be too hard on yourself,” came the voice again. It was followed by a lithe, slender, young woman who came silently strolling out of the trees. “There are few things that can hide from my eyes.”

  She was a tiny little thing, maybe five-two or three, with a pert, slightly upturned nose and a ponytail that bounced as she walked. Though she could have been eighteen, Skip pegged her for late twenties; the skin of her face was taut around her features, lacking the roundness of adolescence. She stopped five feet behind him and waited, shoulders back, hands clasped behind her hips.

  “Identify yourself,” he said, rising with a groan from his position, smacking snow off his knees as he stood. He was sure of it—a couple stitches had popped.

  “My name is Noah,” she said, sticking out her small, half-gloved hand to him. Her nails were short and unpolished, though femininely tapered at the ends.

  Slowly, he reached out and took her outstretched fingers within his own large mitt, surprised that her strength mirrored his own. “Nice to meet you, Noah. You’re trespassing.”

  She regarded the mud that had passed from his hand to hers with mild distaste and then wiped it off on her jeans. In reflex, he reached into a coat pocket to fish out his badge, which was resting fifty feet away beside a cottonwood.

  “I know quite well enough who you are, Chief Walkins.”

  “Good. Then you’ll tell me who you are and exactly what you are doing out here.”

  “I’m doing the same thing you are.”

  “And that is?”

  Their eyes locked, her gray to his blue.

  “Looking for clues.”

  Skip wouldn’t have called her comely, but she definitely was attractive. Her bone structure had a cultured, pedigree quality that conjured images of Victorian aristocracy masquerading as a…cheerleader. “Who do you work for?” Skip asked.

  “I don’t work for anybody.” She seemed to find the question funny.

  “So you’re just wandering around a crime scene, contaminating evidence—I should arrest you right now.”

  “But you won’t,” she said with a small, knowing smile and a tilt of her head.

  “You seem awful sure of yourself.”

  “Quite. I’m far more useful to you out of jail.”

  Skip had been listening closely but for the life of him could not place her accent, and that was rare. “Okay, prove it. What do you got for me?”

  “I wish to propose a trade.”

  “What for what?”

  “Information for information.”

  It was Skip’s turn to smile. “You see, if you have information pertaining to this case and you withhold it, that’s called obstruction of justice.”

  Her eyes changed to metal. “Obstruction of justice is the very least of our worries right now, Chief Walkins.” A breeze blew between them, rattling leaves and summoning a patter of cold fingertips right up his spine. “But I will share some of my knowledge with you in exchange for the answers I desire.”

  “You will share all of your knowledge.”

  Noah shook her head. “No. That would take weeks and be counter—” She cut herself off and looked across the graveyard, past the doorless entrance to where the gray-stone path began.

  Skip heard it too. Muffled crunching spaced at about four seconds apart. Somebody was trying to creep up the path.

  “The other agent makes his appearance,” Noah said.

  “What other agent?” This was news to Skip.

  “One by the road and one in the trees.”

  “Where?” he asked, looking around.

  “Mmm, I think I shall take my leave,” Noah said. “And you needn’t worry about the other one. He is…elsewhere.”

  “What do you mean, elsewhere?”

  “Oh, don’t worry your handsome little face. He’s quite safe, just a bit lost.”

  “Look—”

  “You look, Chief Walkins.” Now he really knew she was no teenager. There was something hard in her eyes, the same look returning vets get when they come back Stateside. “The things you and I must discuss are too important to be spied upon. I shall visit you at your home at nine o’clock precisely.”

  “Wait just a second—”

  “Make sure you are there.” She bowed her head in a farewell salutation and walked back into the trees where she’d emerged. She was lucky he was in too much pain for a good chase or he might have decked her. Besides, he wanted her all to himself; he didn’t want to share with whatever oaf was trying to creep up on him.

  “Don’t be late,” he called out in a murmur and then turned his attention back toward the sound of skulking footsteps. Agent Onionbreath was trying to sneak up on him. The man had stopped behind a tree just before the clearing. Oh, you’re good, dingle berry; you’re a regular ninja assassin. What was the criteria for being a fed these days anyway?

  Skip turned back to see how far Noah had gone but unsurprisingly, she was gone. Figured.

  I’ll be waiting for you.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Gavin sat by himself in his car and stared out the windshield. The goodbye had gone much worse than he’d thought, and he hadn’t had very high aspirations to begin with. It was like filling hundreds of sandbags to brace for a storm surge, boarding up windows, tying things down, only to watch one single wave batter all efforts away. His head felt numb and hazy, and there was a constant ringing at the fringes of silence.

  As bright as this fresh coat of grief was on his spirit, it wasn’t what was making him feel as if he’d swallowed a handful of sushified squids. That honor belonged to another even more sinister emotion…dread. Awful and inescapable.

  With a sigh and a shake of his head he looked down at his tan, scarred hands and rubbed his knuckles. Each nick had its own tale, each gash a testament from another life. Battles he’d fought in, near death misses, training accidents, things people on this world couldn’t even fathom. He turned his hands over and studied his palms for the ten thousandth time, eyebrows furrowed, jaw tight. Ever so faintly he could see the symbols burned into his flesh, could see them glimmer if he turned his hands just right. Only a select, chosen few had ever brandished such markings. With slow deliberation he closed them into fists. No passage of time or vacuum of magic could change what he was and would forever be—a Knight of the Shard.

  Even if he was on the other side of reality.

  He fixated on a single, tadpole raindrop snaking its way down his windshield, navigating a steady barrage of drizzle and a minefield of amoeba water globs, only to be sucked into the vent of his hood.

  Yeah, that’s about right.

  It felt different this time, this loving and loss. In the first war, they’d had the immortality of youth on their side—what had they been, sixteen when the first reports of the Drynn came? In fact, had the war started just two weeks earlier they still would have still been Apprentices.

&nbs
p; For better or worse, the war had waited for them to pass the Test of Ordination, where if they succeeded, they finally got their cloaks and became Shardyn, or if they failed…they perished.

  All seven of them had passed. They were the first class—or branch, as they were called at the temple—in more than half a century to have a hundred percent rate of passage. Their master and mentor, the Seneschal, had been pleased. For once.

  With Lucian on one side and Alyssandra on the other, Gavin had been invincible.

  He slammed both palms on the steering wheel. It wasn’t supposed to be this way! The two people who had meant more to Gavin than anything else in the world had died terrible, painful and bloody deaths. At least Amanda was still alive. He would make sure she stayed that way.

  He took a sudden, sharp breath, flared his nostrils and pushed a steel rod through his spine. A Shardyn Knight was always ready…should the need ever arise. That was their mission statement, that’s what they stood for and that was the oath he’d taken—they’d all taken.

  There was need.

  Gavin opened the door.

  Cold mist and rain droplets greeted him. He noted the drab, iron-gray sky and kicked through a soggy leaf pile that had been scattered by neighborhood traffic. His driveway was filled with four vehicles—an Escalade, an old GMC Suburban, Jack’s silver-and-chrome BMW HP2 motorcycle that looked like it could go back in time, as well as Gavin’s other vehicle, a covered 1968 Camaro.

  Twenty feet from his front door Gavin could hear the distorted growl of an electric guitar vibrating outward; Jack must have commandeered his Strat.

  “Well, look who decided to join us,” Jack said as Gavin walked silently down the basement stairs. No surprise, his childhood friend was fully plugged into his Celestion guitar speakers. His fingers blurred and ripped off the pentatonic scale through Gavin’s much-prized Fender Stratocaster but Jack stopped in mid-riff. “What’s wrong with your face?” He looked closer.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Holy shit, you got a neon red handprint right across your grill,” he said, laughing. “Lucky for you she used an open hand. Should I call you an ambulance?”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Gavin said quietly and hung up his jacket behind the door.

  Tarsidion watched from the floor as he sat Indian style, his expressionless stare giving away nothing as he pushed rounds into a gun that looked as if it could bring down a Brontosaurus.

  “Did you tell her the truth?” Cirena asked, sitting cross-legged on one of his sofas, the edge of her boot heel resting against his coffee table.

  “Of course not.”

  “See that, Tarsy? Stav got sha-blammed.”

  “What did you tell her?” Cirena asked, ignoring their younger brethren.

  “Does it matter? What matters is that we are ready.”

  “Well, we are,” Tarsidion grumbled. “No thanks to you.”

  “He’s just mad because I won’t let him play,” Jack said. “I swear, these two are absolute sourpusses. You’d think the end of the world was coming or something.”

  “You told her goodbye, then?” Cirena continued, ignoring Jack.

  “I did.” Gavin walked deeper into the diminished chaos of his basement; they had indeed been busy bees. All that was left was the money and their arsenal lining the back wall. On the glass coffee table between Cirena and Jack was an olive-green duffel bag, brimming with gold and silver. Gavin stuck his hand in it, felt the cold metal of the coins spill through his fingers. He took one out and studied the Viking ship engraved on the back.

  “Platinum,” Jack said with a wink. “British Noble. Very nice.”

  Deeper within the duffel bag was a purple and yellow Crown Royal Whiskey pouch (very Jack-like) filled with red gold, white gold and silver rings, platinum-studded bracelets, jewelry and dozens of assorted styles and cuts of gemstones, including freestanding diamonds, rubies and sapphires.

  “What about this one?” Gavin asked, poking a zipped black bag resting right beside the green duffel bag.

  “The kind of gift that keeps on giving. I figure if the Chinese and Arabs could make fortunes with them, so can we.” Jack unzipped the bag partway so Gavin could see inside.

  Packets of saffron, cotton and jalapeño seeds peeked out among hundreds of others. They were clearly planning on returning home.

  “Do you have coffee in there?” Gavin asked.

  “What am I, an idiot? Of course there’s coffee—Costa Rican, Columbian. I got it covered.”

  “I don’t think I would have thought to bring seeds,” Gavin said.

  “That’s why I’m me and you’re you.”

  Tarsidion slammed in the magazine of the Brontosaurus killer and unfolded the legs to the bipod beneath it.

  “Any problems?” Gavin asked.

  Cirena unhappily eyed the gun.

  “Nothing we couldn’t handle,” the big plainsman said, peering through the scope. “I’m pleased you allowed me talk you into getting this. It would have been nearly impossible in England.” That’s where Tarsidion spent most of his time, training in England and Wellington, Florida when he wasn’t competing around the world. Never had there been a sport more suitable to a man as polo was to Tarsidion.

  “I had hoped we’d never need them,” Gavin said.

  “Well, we need them.”

  “They are the weapons of cowards,” Cirena said from the couch.

  “Not at all,” Tarsidion said, giving her a sideways glance. “They simply require a different sort of mastery that I excel in as well. To be able to kill from such a distance without aid of magic would indeed have served us in the war.”

  “They must not be allowed to return with us,” Cirena said in a voice that dismissed argument.

  “And they won’t,” Gavin assured her. “We’ve all agreed already that Theia is dangerous enough without them.” Gavin watched Tarsidion’s reaction carefully. Just whatever he could carry, the big man had originally argued. His brethren had sized him up and unanimously agreed—whatever Tarsidion could carry would be way more firepower than Theia had any business possessing. He just went on peering through the scope. “Agreed?” Gavin repeated.

  Tarsidion looked up. “Of course.” He went back to the scope.

  Mmmm.

  Leaning against the wall beneath his guitars were six pistols, three submachine guns, two assault rifles and a crossbow with a laser sight, the corresponding ammunition in front of each. Gavin picked up a big, black Mark 23 pistol.

  “Anybody hear from Noah?” he asked, sliding back the action.

  Nobody answered.

  He looked up from the gun. Three pairs of eyes stared at him, each broadcasting a different emotion and judgment.

  So be it. “Come on,” he said to the three. “We need to settle something.”

  Gavin walked toward the closed shōji doors leading to his dojo. He wiped off his shoes on a mat with thick bristles (Gavin hated being barefoot) and slid the paper walls open. He stepped onto the bamboo floor and approached the far wall, where his three Osafune Mitsutada swords—the katana, the wakizashi and the tanto—waited majestically upon their perches. Unlike his Quaranai, his Earthen swords did not possess a soul, but somewhere within their tempered folds of rippled steel the spirits of forger and wielder remained. He felt it every time he used them.

  He turned hard left, took three steps and then lowered himself to one knee. The others looked on from the entryway.

  Gavin pushed on the third wooden panel of the wall and was rewarded with a muted click as the panel separated from the rest. He took off
the panel, grasped the crescent-shaped lever beneath then turned it clockwise.

  A whole section in the middle of the floor slid away soundlessly. Stairs were revealed.

  “Would you look at that,” Jack said, stepping inside the dojo.

  Cirena and Tarsidion followed, their heels clicking on the bamboo. Gavin walked down the seven stairs, conscious of the subtle hum of energy emanating within, and stopped in front of the wooden trunk resting at the end.

  It had been a long time since he’d been down here.

  He grasped the bronze handles of the trunk and pulled it toward the stairs, heaved it onto his shoulder with a groan before climbing. The trunk was warm.

  Tarsidion grabbed the trunk from him as he neared the top and set it down carefully in the middle of the floor. Gavin climbed out and walked up to his three swords. He grasped the short-bladed tanto on the bottom and depressed a hidden button in the hilt. A half-dollar-sized circle at the bottom swung open and a single key fell out.

  “In two days,” Gavin began while walking back toward the trunk, “we will either be dead or we will be home.” He inserted the key, clicked open the lock and slowly opened the chest.

  Inside, resting diagonally in a blue foam setting, was his twin brother’s Quaranai. The weapon was no longer silver but instead a dull matte black. Its soul was gone. This Quaranai would never breathe again or seep blue light or cut through the sinew of evil.

  It was dead. Just like his brother.

  According to ceremonial protocol, Gavin should have been using his own Quaranai, but that was not possible. His own weapon was…indisposed.

  “What are you doing, Stav?” Jack asked.

  Solemnly he grasped the hilt of Lucian’s Quaranai, drew it out and held it in front of him.