The crater that held the three enemies lay straight to our left now. Ernie ran down Romulus’ big body and disappeared into the brush. Roberta was nowhere to be seen. I slowed down to a crawl, lifted myself up to my full height, and pulled the wide-brimmed straw hat down low over my face. Changing my gait to a staggering shuffle, I pulled my left hand up into my shirt sleeve as if it’d been blown off. In my other hand Morphageus lengthened into a pick for digging. Romulus caught on. His walk took on an I-just-rose-from-the dead quality, too. He hunched over and lolled his head like his neck had been broken. Both of us dropped back into the pack of gory escorts and tried to blend in. None of them knew what to do. We weren’t fighting or fleeing, so no hand lifted to interfere with us. Our whole icky mob just kept on shuffling past the ambush.
No Pluto’s Bane lanced out of the darkness. Every instant I expected to get melted into that dark and bloody ground, but it didn’t happen. Our would-be killers must’ve had ordinary night vision. They couldn’t tell us from the undead monstrosities. Another great actin’ job. This one’s for you, Eddie. Ahead I could see a rightward bend in the path, where the Reb cavalry had gone. If we made it that far we could hustle along when we got out of sight and hide behind one of the boulders. They’d have to come out of cover to hunt us. Then the advantage would be ours.
But the three assassins had other ideas. Just when I thought we’d pulled it off, a violet bolt shot out from the left. It hit the lead soldier in our group. Since he wasn’t a living human, the terrifying energy absorbed into him like it’d done when hitting trees and rocks at Lee’s headquarters. Instead of melting away, he just kept walking. Another Bane blast struck the rear corpse, with the same effect. They’re workin’ their way along us all. When somebody screams and bubbles away, they’ll know they got the right one. Smart.
Since we were in the middle of the pack, it’d take a few more probing fires before they were likely to find us. The bend lay about a hundred feet away. It would be awful close. Now all three ambushers were shooting, two at the front and one at the back, testing each figure in turn to see if it lived. The night seemed lit with lavender lightning. Don’t nobody on that hill see this? Are they all blind? Had the Merchantry, or whoever had sent these murderers, chosen this spot because they controlled everybody on it?
As if my mind had given orders, a bugle sounded a charge from around the bend. The ground shook as if a cattle stampede headed our way. Cows? Again? I had visions of the heifers at the Monument and how that had almost been the end of us. Morphageus changed shape, flowing across my arm until it became a shield again. I shifted it to my left arm, the one closest to the ambushers. Then I moved as close to one of the undead as I could stomach. If any Bane came my way I wanted it to hit something that wasn’t me. Taking a deep breath, I readied myself for the cattle, too.
Only it wasn’t cows. The small cavalry troop that we’d hidden from a few minutes earlier thundered into view, Stars and Bars flying. They all let out a Rebel yell that purt-near busted my eardrums. Half of them headed for us, smashing down bushes and tall grass. The others turned and made for the shell crater, Pluto’s Bane be damned. Tyrell led them, saber windmilling over his head. Tyrell? Here? Now?And why’s he attackin’ those guys? Purple bolts hummed from the ambushers with a vengeance, abandoning Romulus and me. Horse and riders shrieked and died, consumed by that agonizing lava. Pistols cracked, sending round after round at the source of the murderous fire. But there were too many cavalry, spread out in a wide-open formation, for the assassins to get them all. It seemed that their staves took almost as long to recharge as it did to reload a musket. Some of Tyrell’s men were going to reach the crater unharmed.
I had to stop watching the charge and take care of my own hide. The Rebs bore down on us like avenging angels, intent on sending all of the new-risen dead back where they’d come from. And they clearly thought Romulus and I were just two more undead soldiers. With a squeak I dove headlong into a prickly shrub to avoid a sword stroke aimed at the top of my head. I felt the wind of it as it passed my ear. Landing in the thorns made all the rest of the day’s hurts seem like hangnails. I yawped my barbaric outrage to the heavens. Romulus didn’t follow my example. When a trooper slashed at him the giant Marshal pirouetted like a bullfighter, pulled the man out of his saddle, relieved him of his saber, and parried the cut of the rider behind him. Much as I wanted to appreciate that smooth move, I had other worries. I couldn’t get out of the sticker bush. The more I struggled the more it grabbed on. Finally I got so frustrated I cut myself out of the thing with Morphageus. As I stood there holding the magick sword in all its fiery-rune glory another Rebel yell pulled my attention back to the crater.
Half a dozen troopers, Tyrell among them, had made it to the three masked figures. One staff, not yet ready to send out more Bane, got smashed to kindling by the hooves of a rearing horse. The weapon flashed into orange sparks and vanished. Its owner leaped back faster and farther than anyone I’d ever seen. A curved sword glistened in his hand before he landed. Next to him another dark fighter aimed his staff at Tyrell. One of the Rebs leaped from his horse in full gallop and tackled him, the shot zinging wild into the sky. The pair rolled and wrestled for a moment, before the gray soldier got pushed away. A few feet away, Tyrell fenced with the remaining staff. While he took the man’s attention with his saber, Alcibiades spun his mighty hindquarters around and bumped him so hard he flew ten yards. Nevertheless, he rolled light to his feet, a short sword in each hand. Men in green and in gray struggled over the two staffs that had been knocked free. The whole crater area became too confused to follow. I had no chance to sort it all out, because I found myself attacked again.
All three fugitive ravens smacked into me from behind, drawn by my foolish wielding of the fiery Morphageus. I crashed to my knees, seeing stars. The sword might’ve flown from my grip if Jasper hadn’t gripped my palm in a mighty handshake. His cheery battle voice echoed in my head as he whooped and made unheard threats to the birds. I swung the sword blind, hitting only the night breeze. My foes had learned that closer to me worked better than arm’s length. They dug their claws in and pecked savagely at my neck. But they weren’t trying to fill me full of holes, like before. They snapped rather than stabbed. What the heck?
I spun like a top, reaching with my free hand to try to pluck the birds off me. “Romulus! Help! Ravens!”
The Marshal roared in and swatted the birds off me with a single swipe of his paw. Blood poured from my gouged neck. Before they could return I sent a thought to Jasper. Helmet! Just like you did to me in the chamber. Quick!
Nothing. No helmet. No Jasper. Just silence. I felt my neck. No Stone, neither. No Stone!
“They took the Stone!” I screamed, frantic. “They cut the cord!”
Romulus snatched at the trailing bird, but he only got a tail feather. I swung the sword at another raven, with even worse result. Frowning, I looked at my hand. All it held was a rusty tin cup.
Oh, we’re in big trouble now.
The huge black birds rose into the sky. Now they were laughing at me, a harsh taunting sound that made me feel two inches tall. I’d lost the Legacy Stone already. So much for saving the world. Desperate, I scanned the sky, hoping to see Roberta and Ernie swooping to my rescue again. I saw nothing but morbid black. My senses had become mortal again.
Things got even worse. Tyrell’s men had destroyed all of the Bane staffs, but not their owners. All three of the assassins held the Rebs at bay with their swords. Two troopers and three horses lay lifeless in the grass already. The rest probed for weaknesses and found none. Even pistols were no help. Every time a shot was fired, its intended victim would snap out of the way just in time. Huh? Impossible? Nobody’s that quick. As it turned out, I almost had to be that fast myself. A bayonet from one of the undead Confederates came within a whisker of skewering my belly. My reflexes were nowhere near as catlike as before, but the animated corpse moved like he crawled underwater. Skipping away from him, I careened
into Romulus, who’d scooped up a musket and aimed it into the air. He planned to shoot down the ravens and recover the Stone. I wished him luck with that but held out no hope.
Somebody else didn’t want him to have any chance to succeed with his desperate shot. All of the risen dead moved toward us, weapons ready. I grabbed the nearest object, a shovel, and knocked two of them away. Romulus ignored them, his long Enfield’s barrel tracking something above and ahead. My shovel bashed in another foe’s head and disarmed one who pointed a clumsy Colt pistol at us. Gaining a breathing space, I told Romulus to shoot.
As he pulled the trigger something invisible slammed into both of us. The musket fired but hit nothing. Landing in another thorn bush, I let out some unladylike phrases. What now? Is the whole darn world against us? Looking in the direction the giant shove had come from, I saw something that even my ordinary human eyes couldn’t miss.
A line of Bullies in gray robes stood on the hill, holding hands. Their awful glowing eyes were easy to see, even two hundred yards away. They’d sent one of their communal magickal force blasts at us and were readying another. That’s why nobody on the hill paid us any mind.
“Let’s go!” I hollered, tugging at Romulus’ hand to get him up. We sprinted down the path, toward the bend and the safety of the boulders. As we ran we zigzagged, to make a tougher target for the walking dead who had begun shooting at us. Luckily their aim proved to be what you’d expect from lifeless hands. The wheeling line of Reb troopers coming back through and lopping off their heads sure was helpful, too.
For once, something went our way. Just as the second Bully blast thrummed down the hill we dove headlong into a cluster of big rocks. The force wave made our ears pop, but didn’t knock us about. I had a chance to peer toward the crater and see how things were going against the freakish swordsmen. Not well. All but one of the cavalrymen and most of their horses were down. Our masked enemies had proven too tough, even without Pluto’s Bane. They moved like ricocheting bullets made of quicksilver, almost untouchable. Tyrell, the only Reb still on his feet, saluted the trio with his saber and hopped back onto Alcibiades. Horse and rider raced back toward us, a couple of the other mounts following, their owners dead on the field. To our front, back on the path we’d just raced down, came eight more troopers at full gallop. They’d finished spreading carnage among the undead men and headed straight at us. The remaining ten corpses all held muskets, which they cocked and aimed in our direction. With so many targets they had to hit something. Up on the hill, to our left, the line of Bullies made its way down, hands still linked. In front of them a yellow-green wall of energy circled like a small hurricane, building up to shoot something that could only be really, really horrible. The masked killers started running our way. A whole lot of stuff had decided to converge on little me. I tensed all of my aching muscles and got ready for the worst.
I expected a whole host of wicked terrible things: trampling, beheading, bullets, torture, being vaporized by black magick, getting turned into a snail. What I wasn’t ready for was seeing the cavalry horses jump into the air at once…and stay there.
They flew. On wings. Like Pegasus.
Lovely white feathery wings blossomed out of each mount’s shoulders when they jumped. In the time it took for a quick breath the wings had appeared, gripped the air, and taken the horses aloft. They swooped right over our heads while we stood there, gawking, mouths hanging open. That made us easy to grab, and a good thing, too. Strong hands snatched at our wrists and plucked us out of the rocks. No sooner had we been taken up then the combined horror of undead musket balls and Bully energy shattered the space where we’d been.
While I tried to catch my breath the rider who held me pulled me up onto the saddle in front of him. His chestnut horse seemed to smile at me as I settled in just on top of his beating wings. To my right Romulus, towed by two troopers, threw himself up behind one who guided a dappled gray. I dug my shaking fingers into my mount’s dark mane and tried to grasp that we were hundreds of feet above the Virginia countryside. We were flying. Flying! On horses! Ma and Eddie’ll never believe this.
Tyrell glided in next to me. Alcibiades may have magically turned into a golden winged horse, but he gave me the same miserable look as always.
“I promise,” I told him with a grin, “as soon as we land you’ll get your apple.”
Tyrell smiled back. “And I promise, as soon as we land, you’ll get your pretty necklace.” He held up the Stone. “Al just bit a raven in half to get it.”
That’s when I noticed that all my angels wore spurs. Thanks, Dream Lady.
29/ To the Coast
“I learned to fly on a winged stallion,” I said.
Jasper took on a wistful tone. “And after that, can puberty be far behind?”
Quiet. Blessed quiet. After close to a week of suffering through every sound imaginable, all magnified by the Stone, hearing nothing felt like heaven. No artillery deafening me, no shouts or musketry or even wagon wheels pounding in my ears. I felt like I’d been in the middle of a horrible brawl, thugs pummeling me non-stop. In an instant they’d all become pacifists. This is bliss.
Not much to hear anyhow, high above the Virginia landscape this late at night. Just the soft rush of air past my face and the fwoop of wings. We’d been moving for over an hour. The sickening battlefields were far behind us. Fires below and to our right gave away Federal camps, part of the long supply line that led back to McClellan’s base on the Pamunkey River. Ahead lay darkness beneath and lovely stars high up. You’d never know that a couple hundred thousand men are diligently slaughterin’ one another around here. I felt so drained after all of the running and fighting that I wanted to take a nap right where I sat. But that would’ve been sort of risky, being as how I’d been moved to one of the dead troopers’ horses. The mid-air switch had been hair-raising. Now I had nobody to grab hold of me if I snoozed and fell off. Romulus had slid onto his own mount, too. He looked like some great dark night from a fairy tale, which I guess you could say he truly was.
Tyrell still flew to my left, close enough for easy conversation. We stayed quiet, though. The captain had told me that a rifled musket could plunk us even at this height, and so could a lot of other scary weapons he’d only hinted at. Who might be shooting at us wasn’t mentioned. I knew from seeing the Bullies that the Merchantry seemed to have changed its mind about waiting for me in London. That is, unless those corrupted mages on the hill were working with one of the rebel groups instead of the home office. Who employed those frightening three masked men was anybody’s guess. Not to mention those persistent ravens. From the way Romulus talked the Merchantry had its own civil war going on, except there were a lot more than just two sides. The first chance I got I wanted to pin him down on specifics. Knowing who chased after me and just what they wanted would be an advantage.
And what about Tyrell? The Stone had gone cold twice when he’d been around. Coincidence? The Pluto’s Bane fellows had been there, too, both times. At Boatswain Swamp those Bullies would’ve frozen it. What did it say now that we were alone up here? The brief look I’d had of it when Tyrell’d showed it to me hadn’t helped. Too far away and too dark. But he rescued you back there, sure enough. And he says he’s gonna return the Stone. Does that make him an enemy? And the Stone didn’t raise the alarm all those earlier days he traveled with us. What’s it all mean, then?
I gave up thinking about it for a while and tried to enjoy the peace and quiet. Soon, though, I got to thinking that it seemed a bit too silent. No Jasper chattering away in my head. Just my own sorry thoughts. Would he still be there if and when I got the Stone back? Did the ravens or their master undo the magick somehow? That’d be the end of us if they had. I decided that if I got him back I’d give him any favor he asked to get some questions answered. Well, any reasonable favor. I wasn’t too sure about his singing minstrel songs for three hours again. That’d been one long afternoon on the road, believe me.
My angels and I kept on
our way southeast. The great winged horses showed no signs of needing a rest or sleep or food. I needed to eat, having been too busy running for my life to get dinner. Munching on crackers and an apple, I felt loads better. Things were looking up after six dreadful days. Tyrell said we’d get to the coast before dawn. Assuming we found the Penelope’s Kiss without too much trouble, and assuming nobody ambushed us again, and assuming I didn’t just fall over dead from the shock of success, we might be on our way to London in a few hours.
We. That reminded me that there looked to be less ‘we’ than before. Where were Roberta and Ernie? Hadn’t seen hide or hair of them since before the ambush. Did the Bullies get them? Were they just lost? Did they know that Romulus and I had taken to the air? I’m gettin’ into a bad habit of losin’ folks lately. Ma, Eddie, Jasper, Roberta, Ernie. Careless, careless, careless. We needed to come up with a plan for situations like this. Either a way to communicate or a way to meet up when we got separated. That ought to be easy enough, with all this magick about. Our enemies sure enough seemed to have figured it out. They always stayed a step ahead of us. I’d started to get real tired of that.
Nothing for it but to keep going and hope for the best. I lost track of the time as we raced through the summer sky. It felt blessed cool after days of sweltering June heat and humidity. Even Wednesday’s rain hadn’t cut the warmth, just made it more sultry. This is nice. Maybe I can get me one of these fancy horsies.Feed him apples and whatever it is that makes their angel wings grow. Some candy? Divinity, maybe.
Brimstone and Lily (Legacy Stone Adventures) Page 29