Mad Lizard Mambo

by Rhys Ford

  “What? What is going on?”

  Ryder was… flustered when he woke, a wide-eyed, blinking tousle of confusion and sputtering. Hardly the picture of a sidhe High Lord, but even arrogant, pushy assholes put their pants on one leg at a time. I’d gotten accustomed to giving him a few minutes to get his brain in gear after waking him up, but I needed him to get his feet under him quickly.

  “Okay, I am… awake. What?”

  “Grab the shotgun.” I pointed at the sawed-off, over-under Yildiz holstered behind his seat, a string of shells looped around its barrel. “Load it up.”

  I’d spent an uncomfortable couple of days getting Ryder familiar with a shotgun, an hour or two before we left in the morning and again when we set up lodgings. Showing him how to get an accurate bead meant getting up behind him and holding the gun steady while he shot at water-filled milk jugs, moving the barrel up and down until he got a good feel of how to aim. On our Pendle run, he’d done more damage to my still-healing Mustang than to the black dogs chasing us, probably because he really didn’t want to kill anything.

  We would need another gun if things got tight, and since Malone was next to useless, Ryder’d promised to work past his reluctance and help out in a pinch.

  I’d promised to hold him to it, and the wave of dark shapes barreling toward us looked like a hell of a pinch.

  The rear cabin’s pop-up was smaller than our original drover’s, not big enough to sleep in and meant to be a watchtower for when we locked down for the night. It also made a hell of a gun turret, with jalousies wide enough to shove an assault rifle’s barrel through and do some fairly accurate shooting. We’d tested it out at Dutch’s before we left, but that’d been while the truck was parked. It was going to be another thing entirely for Cari to pick off anything while we were moving.

  But I sure as hell wasn’t going to stop.

  “What is that?” Malone piped up from behind me. “Coming towards us.”

  “Could be anything. Moving that fast and that wide? Nothing good.” I kept one eye on the massive dark wave moving toward us. “Cari? How’re you doing back there?”

  “Almost got it.” The small tower’s crank gave a few more whines, and then it locked down into place with a loud clunk. “We’re good!”

  Keeping the transport as steady as I could, I glanced in the rearview mirror, watching Cari pull down the folded ladder built into the tower’s walls, wedging its rubber feet against the floor. She nearly lost her balance when she put her foot on the first rung, but a fast grab of her leg by Malone kept her steady. Wedging herself into the space, Cari took the rifle from Malone and anchored the barrel.

  “Scope show anything?” I kept my eyes on the road, looking for a steep mesa. If I needed to park the truck, I wanted it someplace against a ridge and high enough it could be defensible. The angle of the road shifted, putting the growing darkness on my rear quarter panel, not the best place for me to discern what we were running from. “Bison?”

  “Malone, be ready to hand me more ammo if I need it. Yeah, I think they’re bison. Maybe beefalo,” Cari confirmed. “But they’re running hard. Like something’s chasing them.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I figured.” The transport was already pushing as hard as it could go. Made for durability, not speed, it would probably take the impact of a bison herd jostling, but I didn’t want to risk it. A few good hard shoves from a two-thousand-plus pound animal and the truck would be worse for wear. “We’ll be able to outrun them—”

  Something hit the undercarriage of the transport, and the whole truck lurched to one side. My back tightened as I fought the steering, the scars across my shoulder blades twisting with spasms when I wrenched the wheel back. We skidded off the road, the rear tires spinning over the edge of a strip of tar-patched asphalt.

  “Can you keep the truck on the road, Kai?” Ryder smirked at me. “I might have to load a shotgun soon.”

  “Yeah, funny,” I shot back. The road jogged again, zigzagging around small hillocks. “Watch behind us and let me know if they get close. And put your damned seat belt on, Ryder.”

  “What is chasing them? Can you see?” Ryder twisted in his chair and latched the belt, his expression troubled. “How are there bison here? Aren’t they a midcontinent animal?”

  “Were. Operative word there, Your Lordship. Now they’re everywhere there’s a flat plain and grasslands. Problem is, they stampede, and they’re huge. Once they get going, it’s like a tidal wave of meat, hooves, and pain, and they don’t stop. So hold on,” I ordered them. “Road’s going to get bumpy, but if we can hit a straightaway, we can outrun them.”

  That was going to be easier said than done, because one second I was staring at road, and then the next it was all darkening skies and dust.

  I hit something in the road. A large something, but I couldn’t see what. We were airborne in a second; then the truck bounced. My teeth rattled as the broken pavement rocked the truck’s frame. Then the hill dropped out from under us and the truck flew from the road.

  We landed again, harder this time, and the hit slammed us forward in our seats. Ryder held on tight to the shotgun, but his shoulder struck the dash, the seat belt he’d just latched in breaking or separating on impact. I grabbed at his waistband with one hand while keeping the other on the wheel, giving up some control of the truck to get him back in his seat. Malone was shouting something I couldn’t make out, and the transport shuddered once. Then its right-side tires began to lift off the road.

  “Sona ba bi tsi.” Landing at a recess in the road, the truck should have been fine. We should have been moving forward, heading away from the herd barreling toward us and not sliding down a moving hill. Gunning the engine did nothing, and I could see jack from the driver’s seat. “Ryder! I need some eyes on what’s going on. Hole?”

  “Um… no,” Ryder yelled back at me as the ground exploded up around us. “Wyrm!”

  I put little faith in divine intervention. Sure, I called out gods’ names like I was ordering Chinese from a street cart surrounded by drunk sailors, but when it was all said and done, I didn’t actually believe any entity existing in the ether of the universe was going to swoop down and save me.

  So in my mind, when the several-ton truck I’m driving slides off the back of a massive desert wyrm, praying to a dragon spirit was definitely not on my list of things to do. Apparently Ryder did not share this cynicism, because the sidhe pouring out of his mouth was less cursing and more praying.

  For the wyrm.

  Not for the truck.

  Some people’s children.

  “Hold on. It’s going to roll!” I shouted behind me, and the wyrm began to scream, letting loose a sonic wave of rage and pain.

  There wasn’t time to do much more than wedge myself in. I didn’t care about the shotgun bouncing around in the wheel well by my feet, and I could only hope Cari was strapped down into a rig. I was panicking because Ryder was loose, his arms flailing about, and his legs were dangerously close to the windshield. His body shifted toward the middle of the cab, and I turned in my seat, grabbed any part of him I could reach, and held on.

  I felt his heart beating against my arm, his back crushed into my chest. I’d given up trying to maneuver the truck. The wyrm was going to fling us off like we were a flea, and there was nothing more to do than hold on tight to the blond, irritating sidhe lord that got me into yet another one of his messes.

  Ryder shifted, grabbing at my legs, and I buried my face in his hair, inhaling the sidhe on him. His scent stung my lungs, setting fire to my blood, and my longing for him chased my fear. The world was tumbling around us, and I was smelling his goddamned hair and pressing my hand against his chest to hold his heart.

  The open windows and jalousies filled with plumes of gritty sand, a rasping scour across my exposed face and arms. Ryder turned his head, protecting himself as much as he could, but there was no escaping the tiny sirocco unleashed upon us. For a long, agonizing second, the sky sat under the horizo
n, mountaintops digging down into its storm-promised clouds, and my stomach lurched with the roll.

  I heard a yelp and crashing sounds behind me, then a spit of angry Mexican, fouling the already thick air. Another shift and the transport slammed tires down into the road. Then the wyrm shook itself loose.

  Desert wyrms were dragons. No one argued that. Unlike the fiery, angry lizards battling their lives out in Pendle, wyrms were solitary creatures, preferring to scurry down into sand dunes and bake in the sun, rarely emerging, then returning to their slothful nest. Frilled and lacy, they were a more delicate fern of a lizard than their more sturdy, reptilian counterparts, but they did one thing very well once they were awakened—and that was eat.

  Its wheaten scales were soft, pliable over its long body, but its short, squat legs were powerful, and a wyrm ate by raising its entire length up, then crashing down upon its prey, knocking it senseless or simply squashing it into a pulpy mass. With a flat-snouted sea horse head, a desert wyrm looked as if it would sip its food. The snout was a lie. In truth, it was a nictitating membrane held in tight by an unlocking maw, and when a young desert wyrm opened its mouth, it could suck down a cow without even blinking.

  Too bad for us this wasn’t a young wyrm, because by the size of its head and the snapping streamers whipping about its opening jowls, we—and the truck—were goners.

  A rushing waterfall of sound battled with the wyrm’s leathery screams, and I caught a glimpse of an orange goat eye in the windshield. Then all I saw were scales and rivulets of coursing sand. The ground shook, rattling the truck’s glass, and everything turned dark as the wyrm lifted itself up to strike.

  “Stay there and get that damned belt on. I’ve got some yelling to do at you later.” I brushed my lips against Ryder’s cheek, then dumped him into the passenger’s seat. The truck was stalled, but the fuel cells could have held, and I pumped the ignition, looking for a charge on the gauges. “Cari! You alive?”

  The response I got was far beyond my lingual comprehension, but it was enough to reassure me she was fine.

  “I’m fine!” Malone shouted. “Got the gun!”

  “Nice, Robbie.” Wiping the sand from my eyes, I blinked and stared at the wyrm’s elongating belly. It wove back and forth, posturing and asserting dominance. “Cari, can you get a shot? It’s going to stop dancing soon.”

  “You bet your ass I can,” she reassured me. “Just drive.”

  “Trying!” I gritted my teeth. “Come on, baby. Let’s get us out of here.”

  While the gauges showed the lines were intact, the cells could have cracked or, worse, fallen out of sync. The display rolled up green, and I hit the starter, gunning the engine to life. Its raspy roar was lost, however, by the arrival of the bison.

  If the wyrm kicked up the sand, then the bison brought with it a storm. The road was gone, smashed beneath the dragon’s churning body. Its mouth was fully extended, blocking out what little sun we had left. Horns and furry backs swarmed around the transport, slamming into its high sides.

  “Holy shit,” Cari yelled from the turret. “There’s nightmares. The bison are running from nightmares!”

  I threw the transport into drive and accelerated. The truck jerked forward, carried on the wave of bison. A slide to the right and the wheels found traction. Holding my breath, I forced the transport to full throttle, rolling through the herd as the dragon struck the road.

  The ground cracked beneath its weight, and the wyrm came back up, its cheeks filling with panicked bison. Blood splattered across the truck’s side and through the open window, hitting me in the face. I choked on the hot fluid, my eyes stinging. I couldn’t see well, blinking through bits of fur and bone, but Malone’s shouting filled me in.

  “It’s right on our ass!” Robbie’s voice cracked. “Oh God, we’re going to die.”

  “Only I get to say that.” I glanced at Ryder. “Right? Only I get to complain about dying.”

  “Complain later. Drive now.” He went pale when the herd shifted. “Watch out for its tail.”

  I ducked and hit the brakes at the same time. Stupid, but I ducked. The dragon’s feathery tail swished over us, and my heart skipped, right before the fronds struck the truck’s rear cab. Driving was like trying to shove my way out of rush hour traffic on the upper streets and I had the world’s biggest, angriest cop on my ass. As well as a raging mob of crazed thugs, because the nightmares weren’t that far behind.

  Pressing the accelerator down, I shot the truck forward and found a hole in the herd, leaving the desert wyrm to the unholy beasts surging across the plains. I wasn’t going to stop until I knew we were safe. There wasn’t any need to look over my shoulder at the monsters coming at us. Their hooves were a thundering echo on the ground as the wyrm writhed and sang.

  “God, it’s… oh God, they’re taking down the bison,” Malone gasped. “Oh, Odin and his crows.”

  “Yeah, well, better them than us,” I muttered. Then I heard Ryder’s tumble of sidhe and sighs. “We’re clear. Nightmares, bison, and dragon are all too busy chewing on each other to give a crap about what happens to us. You don’t have to pray for us anymore, Ryder.”

  “I’m not praying for us, Kai.” He turned in his chair to face me, grief staining his green eyes. “I’m praying for the dragon. That could have been us back there, dying under those monsters’ teeth. Instead, the wyrm is fighting our battles while we escape with our lives.”

  He was serious. It was in his voice, a somber, rich roll of respect and pain. I could understand that. Ryder watched me, hooded eyes on my face. Giving him a small smile, I kept my eyes on the road, distancing us from the carnage behind us.

  “I get it. I do,” I said. “Because without that wyrm, those nightmares would be eating elfin tartare right about now. So give it all the thanks you’ve got stored in there and some of mine too.”

  Sixteen

  “YOU CAN see forever from here.” Awe filled Ryder’s voice to the point of breaking. “Look at the sky. Such a big sky.”

  I glanced up. The stars were a milky spread of lights and colors pouring out of the black. A frosting of clouds lingered at the edges of the surrounding mountains, a hint of rain in the brisk air. The threat of a storm hung around us, whisperings of thin, piercing drops and light hail.

  “Yep. It is. Now come help me with this so we have a place to sleep, Your Lordship.” I rattled the tie-downs to the hard-side tent I was erecting on the transport’s long, flat roof. “The kids are going to take the cab tonight. We’ll switch tomorrow.”

  The turret was a bit dented from the truck’s tumble, but it still went down, sitting flush with the rear cab’s roof. There was enough room to set up the two-man tent near the end by the cab and still have a few feet to set up watch outside the cover. A cupped ridge near the foot of a steeply angled hill was a perfect resting spot for the night. We’d stopped a bit earlier than I’d have liked, but defensible camping places weren’t a dime a dozen, and with the truck backed into the clearing a few hundred yards off of the road, the tree line on either side shielded the site from most of the wind.

  “You need help up there?” Cari yelled from inside the truck. “If not, I’m going to do a rubdown shower then crash.”

  “Nah, go ahead. I’m going to get His Lordship to blow up the mattress.” I tightened the last tent rung to a loop on the truck’s edge, then yanked the panels into place, popping the structure up. “Ryder, if you want something to sleep on, you’d best get that mattress inflated.”

  Watching Ryder set up the mattress was hilarious. One tug of the suction ring and the blow-up bed expanded out, hitting him in the chin. Chuckling, I helped him wrestle it into the tent, then zipped up the screen flaps to keep the bugs out.

  Dinner was a few-hours-old memory, and my stomach growled, chewing on itself in complaint. I dug out a few packets of ramen and instant miso soup, threw everything but the saline broth packets into two heat packs with some water, then sealed it up. After handing one to Ryder, I
made myself comfortable on a folded bedroll, stretching my legs out in front of me.

  “What is this? What do you do with this?” Ryder settled down next to me, moving gingerly. “It looks… odd.”

  “Why don’t you settle down a bit and rest?” I asked. “The pain’s making you a bit nuts.”

  He and Malone took the brunt of the roll—Ryder because he hadn’t been strapped down properly, and the kid opened up a few of his dog bites. A slap of skin glue and the cuts were sealed, but there was no helping Ryder’s deepening bruises, other than a bit of aspirin and sympathy.

  “It’s noodles. Here. Press down on the outer pack, then shake it a bit,” I instructed, breaking the heat element with a crunch, then setting the bag down as it began to puff up. “Just don’t shake too hard. Give it a few minutes and we can eat.”

  “Suppose I break it?” Ryder poked at the heat square, then again, harder, when I sighed at him. “What did you put aside? What was that?”

  “That’s the shoyu packet. It’s powdered. Useless for soup but pretty good with rice. Like furikake.” Leaning over, I broke the pack for him, trying not to laugh when he huffed in a breath at the heat. “Didn’t they have camping in Underhill? Or was roughing it going out with your second best horse?”

  “We had transports,” Ryder grumbled back. “The current fuel cell engine is based on our designs. An elegant combination of elfin and human technologies. Before that you were running electricity and we were using steam and magic. Both very poorly, I might add.”

  “Hey, there were some kick-ass electric motors back in the day,” I refuted. “Sure they cost a hell of a lot and the cars weighed a shit ton, but they were powerful.”

  “Not for the average buyer, then,” Ryder scoffed back at me. “Ours were difficult to maintain at times. It’s funny how, even during a war between races, there are those who find a way to meet in the middle for the greater good.”

  “Funnier you said you were running when talking to me about human stuff.” The packets were done heating, so I carefully vented a corner, letting the excess steam out. Wedging them between our makeshift seats, I left them to cool.