by C. E. Murphy
Unasked for, a bunch of pieces fell into place. We'd pretty well knocked the Master around the block, in Ireland. We'd slain his dragon, wiped out his banshees, killed the banshee queen, destroyed the Morrigan, and then punched a bunch of holes in him and sent him scurrying back to his realm to lick his wounds. And when I said "we" I mostly meant my mother, Gary and Meabh, the warrior queen of Connacht, because during a lot of that activity I'd been busy taking it in the teeth. Perhaps I could consider myself the sacrificial lamb, hanging out to get everybody's attention while my allies did the heavy lifting, but really I just thought they'd saved my bacon a lot.
But put it all together, and we had dealt the Master some serious blows. He'd used the banshees for blood rituals and power collection, and we'd cut that source off. He'd barely been fed in the past thirty years, and had to be going mad with hunger. The wights were power siphons, not such a far cry from the banshees, only without hundreds of years of practice behind them. I still didn't think it was coincidence it had come home to North Carolina, but it seemed likely he was scrambling to rebuild his power base. Anything we did to draw the line here meant he would be weaker yet, and for me, planning to face him down, that was a good thing.
So I did not fight back. Not for a lot of reasons, the primary one being I had no wish to risk Aidan any further. But also because any active magic I used could be sucked down and used to power up the wights, whereas if I could keep them pouring out the strength they'd taken from Aidan, they might just burn themselves out. It was a dangerous gamble with Aidan's life, but I was confident of being able to keep that, at least, together. I did, quietly, say, "C'mon, kid. Let me in." I was three steps away. If he would invite me into his garden, we could stamp out the stain building in him.
The stain, though, was very dark and strong by now, though it had only been growing a few seconds. I could See glimpses of his spirit animals, torn with agitation as they fought with, and gradually for, the darkness overtaking him. Two of them were familiar: a raven and a walking stick. I said, "Screw this," considerably more loudly, and then, "Raven?" in a normal tone.
He erupted from my shoulders like flights of angels. In the magic-rich environment, he was less a concept and more of a bird, weight to his wings instead of just the beautiful tendrils of light that he often manifested as. "Go talk to him," I said, and he chortled and darted toward Aidan.
The wall of magic leapt over me, compressing around Aidan. I snapped back into my body. Raven dove, quick and desperate, and I saw a flash of Aidan's walking stick leaping like it was trying to connect with my spirit bird.
Instead, it hit the shrinking wall of magic, and time flexed.
Everything turned rubbery, including my legs. The air rippled, starting with Aidan and rushing out at great speed. It felt nothing like my train wreck through time in Ireland, but I was convinced something similar was happening. Maybe the difference was I had Renee along to smooth out the bumps.
Or maybe the difference was that the twelve-year-old epicenter of the quake had his spirit walking stick along, and it had a much clearer idea of how to surf time than I did. Aidan's eyes were entirely black and his expression was one of unholy delight. I shrieked for Renee and dug my heels in, throwing everything I had at the idea of staying put in time.
The world ripped apart, shock waves redoubling around us, then expanding out in a pulse faster than the eye could see. Almost faster than I could See, for that matter: a leading edge of discoloration showed me where it was headed, and gave the impression that it was picking up speed and intent as it rolled. Whatever the time wave wanted, I did not want it leaving the valley. There was enough sorrow and pain for the wights to feed on in this protected haven. The idea of what they, hooked into Aidan's magic, might be able to do with the world outside the valley didn't bear thinking about.
I forgot about rescuing Aidan and threw everything I had at the mountainous borders of the valley. It was too far, just like Aidan had been too far, but I was desperate. Shields flickered in the distance, gunmetal faint against the blue sky. They were weak. Feeble, because raw cosmic power or no, a valley was a lot of territory to cover, and I lacked confidence in being able to do it. I saw the power surge roll toward them like a tsunami, and braced myself.
It hit, wobbled, and passed through. A huge amount of magic rolled back at me, caught by the shields, but some of it kept going. I had no idea what that meant in terms of the world outside this valley. Within it, the trees bent until they snapped, splinters erupting into the air. Birds and animals shrieked. So did I, for that matter, ducking and flinging my arms over my head. Branches and falling trees bounced off my shields, pummeling me. When the destruction finally stopped, I lifted my head, eyes wide.
Aidan was gone. The wights were gone. A village stood around me instead, men and women frozen in their activities and staring at me. Cherokee men and women, wearing traditional leather clothing: pants, tunics. A few women wore woven shirts from some fiber I didn't recognize. They were all barefoot in the spring weather. I felt overdressed.
And for some reason, that thought reminded me of Morrison.
Chapter Fourteen
My first impulse was to run like hell back to the other end of the valley, where I'd left the love of my life just before hauling a chunk of real estate somewhere else in time. My second and third impulses were pretty much the same, but by that time the locals had worked through their first, second and third impulses, too.
Some of them threw down what they were carrying and ran shrieking. Others fell down and pressed their faces to the earth. One decided the only smart thing to do was shoot me.
Despite being on the wrong end of the arrow, I kinda liked him for it. The arrow spanged off my shields, which made several more people fall down. I decided discretion was the better part of valor and started backing away. There was a creek around here somewhere. No doubt if I fell in it I could get myself far enough downstream to not threaten these people, which made me wonder if my vaccinations were recent enough for it to be safe for me to even be breathing near them. I wondered if Aidan's were, since he probably had at least one more set of them due before adulthood arrived. I would not, God damn it, permit myself, Aidan or Morrison, whose vaccinations I was confident were up-to-date, be the carriers for every disease that smeared across the Americas post-European-contact. Even if I had to single-handedly heal every living soul on the continent, I would not let that happen.
For one crazy heart-lurching moment I wondered if that was even possible. Probably not without killing myself, but it was one of those closed time loops anyway: the Native American population had largely not survived European contact, therefore I had not gone through healing millions of people. I still had another heart-fluttery moment where I held on to the idea, imagining how the world might look on my end of time if I'd managed to somehow effectively vaccinate a continent's worth of people against the diseases that were coming to wipe them out.
The timeline was not that flexible, and I knew it. If I managed something like that I would end up returning to a future that was nothing like the one I'd come from. Alternate worlds. I knew the potential for them existed: I'd seen too many of the paths I hadn't taken roll out before me to doubt it. And much as I'd like to see a world where American natives rose up as a major power, I didn't want to lose the life I had, either. The timeline would have to remain as it was.
I fell into the creek about then, and despaired for my white leather coat.
The creek turned out to be more of a river, in this day and age. It snatched me up and tossed me downstream. Another arrow or two came flying my way, but they had a sense of "Yeah! And stay away!" about them, rather than real threat. I got knocked and buffeted around, shields keeping me from any dangerous injuries, and after a while hit a shallow enough stretch that I was able to fling myself out of the water. Dripping and battered, I scrambled out of my coat and held it up to see how badly damaged it was.
It wasn't torn, scraped, stretched, bruised or marked
up. In fact, although I was soaked to the skin and had water pouring from my hair into my eyes, it wasn't even wet. The only water on it was where my hands clutched its shoulders, and there, it beaded and rolled away. I boggled at it, then turned the Sight on, searching for an explanation.
Apparently the coat was taking on the properties of superhero outfits, which never seemed to get shredded when heroes ran off at supersonic speeds or got shot up by the moron of the week. It had some shielding of its own, a faint shimmer of gunmetal. My subconscious evidently did not intend to let another Morrigan shred the coat's sleeves again, or indeed to allow my clumsiness to soak and ruin the leather. I was deeply, deeply grateful for my subconscious, and also very slightly resentful that it didn't think the rest of me was worth keeping dry. Especially since I couldn't think of a way to use the magic to dry myself after the fact. At least I wasn't coated in glitter anymore. Muttering, I put the coat back on and looked around, trying to get my bearings.
Morrison and I had come into the valley close to its southern end. The village site had been closer to the northern end. I was somewhere in the middle now, and Aidan was nowhere to be seen. Neither were the wights, which was something, at least. Not a good something, but something. I wished I knew what year it was, then straightened up. Renee?
It is before the time of tears.
Before the time of tears. The Trail of Tears. The Cherokee had been forcibly relocated in 1838, but they were the last of the Five Civilized Nations to be moved. The first had gone in 1831. But the people I'd seen didn't look like they'd had any European contact. They were isolated, so it was possible they'd just been overlooked, but I asked how long before the time of tears?
She sighed. I supposed eternal bugs were not deeply concerned with the piddling details of human history. After some consideration, she said, The sickness has only begun to come, which I thought might narrow it down to somewhere in the late 1600s, but could be as early as 1493, for all I knew. I still said, "Thanks," out loud, then sighed as deeply as Renee had. "I don't suppose you know where Aidan went."
My sister is distant. The path between us is dark. She is ill. Perhaps dying.
My heart went into triple time. "Does that mean Aidan's dying? Raven?" He was the expert on life and death, after all. He klok-klok'd a couple of times and gave a shiver of wings, leaving the impression that no, it didn't necessarily mean Aidan was dying, but it meant Aidan was certainly not well. I restrained myself from saying I could've figured that out without help. I tried to calm my heartbeat, and put the question of Aidan aside for a moment.
"What about Morrison? Renee, did he... Did we... Did everything in this valley slide come loose from time?" It had sure felt like it. I wasn't at all certain things beyond the valley hadn't also come loose, but that was more than I could deal with right now. Renee nodded complacently and I let go a shuddering breath. Morrison was here somewhere. He was not dead, lost, eaten or any of the other potential bad things that could have happened in a time slip. I just had no way to contact him.
I couldn't help taking my phone from my pocket and checking for a signal, just in case. There wasn't one, of course, nor was there any other sign of life from the damned thing, because it, like me, had gotten soaked in the river. I wished for a cup of rice, then realized I had salt in my backpack. Wet salt, which would do me no good.
My stomach clenched with sudden hope. I also had the shotgun and a small pack of live ammo. I slithered the holster off, checked the gun over, then unloaded the packed salt ammo and replaced it with shotgun cartridges. I didn't want to go hunting. I just wanted to make a really big, very modern noise in a quiet preindustrial valley. If Morrison was out there, he could respond in kind. And then if he had any sense he'd stay put. Actually, if I had any sense, I'd stay put, because Morrison clearly had a lot more woods know-how than I did, but it was pretty much a given that I had no sense. I raised the shotgun, sighted, and blew a hole the size of my fist in a hickory tree about twenty feet away.
The report sounded roughly like the fall of Jericho. It would have been loud even in the modern day, with the distant but discernible drone of airplanes and car engines as part of the background noise. Here, now, with nothing but the wind and birds, it was terrifying, and that was speaking as the person who'd caused it. I staggered a bit with the gun's kick, lowered it, and rubbed my shoulder.
An answering pistol shot cracked the air. I howled triumph, thrusting the shotgun at the sky like a rebel leader, and did a dance of relief. Then I packed everything up, slung the coat and pack on, and headed south along the riverbank. Maybe Morrison would think to come down to the water. It was the easiest meeting point for two people who had no way to communicate.
I'd gotten almost no distance at all when another sound ricocheted through the valley. It wasn't nearly as loud as the gunshots, but much steadier and quite sharp, like rocks being knocked together. I stopped, ears perked, and listened.
Dat dat dat dat. Brief pause. Dat. Longer pause. Dat. Another longer pause. Dat. Another longer pause. Dat, brief pause, dat, long pause. Dat, long pause, dat dat. Considerably longer pause. Dat, long pause, dat dat. It went on like that while I stared helplessly up the mountains.
Of course Morrison knew Morse code. Of course he did. Of course he would try to communicate with me that way. Except I knew the same two letters in Morse code that everybody else in the world did, S and O, dot dot dot and dash dash dash, and that was the sum total of my knowledge. He banged out an O, but one letter out of several was not enough to illuminate his meaning. Feeling helpless, frustrated and remarkably uninformed, I started down the river again. Morrison kept banging away for a while, including a pause long enough to suggest he was wiping the slate clean and starting over, and then did the whole thing a second, then a third, time. Then he went silent, either waiting for my response or assuming I'd understood and was doing as he'd instructed.
Or possibly murdered horribly by natives led to his location by his activities, but I was fairly certain murdered horribly would be accompanied by at least some gunshots, so I stuck with my previous assumptions and made my way south as fast as I could. At least I might be able to get some sense of where we'd been, and head up the mountain from there, hopefully to locate him. I'd pick up some rocks of my own when I thought I was far enough south, and start playing Marco Polo.
As far as I could tell, no one from the settlement had chosen to follow me. That was a relief. We had enough to worry about without adding potentially, and understandably, hostile natives to the mix. Renee, can you get us back home?
I can guide you. The power is yours alone.
I'd gotten used to Raven's playfulness and Rattler's snarky tongue. I was not prepared for a pedantic spirit animal. I shifted my eyebrows upward in a sort of snooty ooh-la-la response, and had the distinct impression a bug glared at me from the inside of my own head. Well, as long as between the two of us we could get home, I wasn't going to worry about that aspect too much. Finding Morrison and Aidan could take top priority. I stopped a few times to drink from the river, wondering vaguely what kinds of interesting bugs were in it, and whether healing magic would flush them out or if I should be boiling this stuff. I guessed I'd find out.
I heard it before I saw it, a soft crashing through the woods. There were still deer and the occasional report of mountain lions in the Appalachians in my time, so I slipped behind a tree and stood as quietly as I could, waiting to see what would burst out of the trees. I was hoping for a puma, since I'd never seen one, when Morrison stepped out of the branches. He had a wary hand near his gun, and an intent expression on his face. I squeaked and whispered, "Morrison!"
His shoulders visibly relaxed and he moved his hand away from his gun. I scooted around the tree and hugged him as he said, "Walker. Thank God you understood me. I didn't know if you knew Morse," into my shoulder.
"I don't. What did you tell me to do?"
"Head downriver." He set me back, hands on my shoulders and his eyes as disturbed as I'd ev
er seen them. "Where the hell did you go?"
"Oh. I was doing that anyway. I hoped you might think of it, too." I frowned. "Where did I go? Downriver, just like you sa--"
"You disappeared, Walker. You turned north, your face went blank, and a few seconds later you...I don't know what happened." The strain in his face came out in his voice. "The air rippled. Not as badly as it did later, but it rippled and the sun jumped in the sky. I don't know how much time I lost. But from the moment the air changed, you were gone. I saw your magic for a few seconds. I don't know what it was doing, but it looked wrong. Dangerous. Like you stretched and snapped away. What the hell happened?"
Watching him try to maintain composure put stepping out of time on my short list of things to never do again, certainly not in front of a witness. I hadn't thought about what it would look like, or what might happen to people moving through normal time while I took a shortcut. I suspected losing a few minutes was the least awful potential side effect, and that much, much worse ones could be in store. I'd cut maybe a couple of hours of travel time by doing the leapfrog. If I'd skipped a century, the ripple might have turned Morrison to dust.
It is likely, Renee said, and I pressed my fists to my mouth, feeling sick.
"I was in a hurry," I whispered behind my hands. "Aidan was fighting the wights. I had to get to him. I'm sorry." I was not about to explain how badly I could have screwed him up, but I would never, ever do it again. "I'm sorry."
Morrison, bless him, accepted the apology with a nod and cut to the important business: "Did you save him?"