Warstalker's Track

by Tom Deitz

  “You know the most,” LaWanda said, glaring at Myra. “You do it.”

  Myra did.

  “So you need to move Tir-Nan-Og?” Deffon mused when she had finished.

  “Or the Lands of Men,” Aife countered. “But Tir-Nan-Og, being smaller, would be the simpler task.”

  “Maybe not,” Deffon gave back. “It may be smaller, but there is far more Power there than in the Mortal World. Such Power may be needed.”

  Aife shook her head. “Much of that Power maintains the land and feeds those who dwell there. And without the rightful king, such a working has no chance of success. Besides, anyone seeking to prepare for such a thing there would surely attract the attention of the Sons of Ailill, who would do all they could to forestall it.”

  “Even though it would aid their cause, should Tir-Nan-Og be moved?”

  “Even so—now.”

  More silence Aikin got a strong sense, however, that the gryphon was weighing options. Finally, the creature spoke. “The secret of the Silver Tracks is indeed to be found within that volume, though I do not know where and believe that information to have been coded. I know this,” he added, “because I watched in secret. I learned much, though Father did not suspect it. But there is one thing I must tell you now, for the longer you ponder it, the less likely you will be to act in error.”

  Aife eyed him warily. “And what might that be?”

  Deffon rose and marched solemnly toward them, then sat back on his haunches, looking very heraldic. “The Silver Tracks require blood to manipulate. If mortals choose to attempt this, it will require a great deal indeed.”

  Aife’s eyes narrowed. “Blood…or Power?”

  “The Power in the blood. No more can I say, for more than this I do not know.”

  Aife studied the rest of her companions. “It occurs to me that now we have Colin’s grimoire, our business here is finished. I can study it as easily in your World as this, and Nuada may also want to examine it. Perhaps he can make suggestions.”

  “Wish we knew what was going on back there,” Alec grumbled, kicking at a clump of half-burned wood.

  The gryphon perked up at that. “You do?”

  Alec glared at him. “Wouldn’t you?”

  “Colin once owned a scrying stone with which he would sometimes study other Worlds, though he did so infrequently lest he be detected.”

  Alec raised a brow. “You know where this stone is?” Deffon extending a gleaming talon toward where Piper sat. “In that chair.”

  Piper looked startled. “Here?”

  “Not where thieves would look first,” the gryphon chuckled, “yet easily accessible. You might want to check beneath.”

  Piper blanched, but put down his pipes. For a moment, he fumbled around under the chair. When he withdrew his hand, he held something fist-sized and milky-clear that flashed glassily in the eerie light. Aikin squinted at it, then got the shock of his life when he noticed that the object was bifurcated by a septum of ruby-red.

  Alec noticed it too.

  “Oh, my God!” they cried in unison, “that’s an ulunsuti!”

  “What—?” LaWanda began, but Myra drew her aside to explain, while Alec and Aikin rushed forward.

  “What the fuck is one of those doing here?” Alec burst out.

  Aikin snickered. “Thought you were well rid of that thing, McLean.”

  Alec rolled his eyes, though he consciously slowed his approach. “Sometimes you change your mind.”

  “You have to feed it—” Deffon began helpfully.

  “I know, I know. The blood of a large animal, or it’ll go insane. Wonder how long since this one’s been fed,” Alec added, peering meaningfully at the gryphon.

  Piper looked as though he held either a skunk or a flaming coal, and was all too eager to relinquish the object.

  “Think we should?” Myra asked the company in general. “Won’t hurt,” LaWanda acknowledged.

  “What I want to know,” Alec announced, having claimed the object, “is what one is doing here.”

  Deffon shrugged. “Obviously Father either brought it here or had it brought here by the Tracks.”

  Aikin’s mouth popped open. “They can reach that far?”

  “No reason not to,” Deffon answered amiably. “And I believe that he acquired it in his youth. He traveled much before coming here.”

  “Never mind that,” LaWanda snorted. “What can it show us?”

  “Whatever you want,” Alec retorted, a little protectively. “You have to prime it with blood—just a little will do—and then— Actually, the best thing is to just sort of worry at it.” He eyed Aikin speculatively. “Probably ought to use my blood, though.”

  “Allow me,” the gryphon rasped, and before anyone could stop him, the beast lashed out with one of those claws and laid open the side of Alec’s hand in the most delicately finessed maneuver Aikin had ever seen, to have been executed so fast.

  Alec blinked, then blanched as his blood oozed out along a thin, sharp line. Fortunately, he rallied and raised the hand above the ulunsuti, which he held in his lap, so that the blood could drip upon it. “Best you not touch it with the wound itself,” he cautioned. “These things’ll suck you dry if you’re not careful.”

  “So would the well Colin used to empower the Tracks,” Deffon observed absently. “Alas, it exists no longer.”

  Alec glared at him, then at the rest of his companions. “Well, folks,” he muttered, “since this guy’s been activated, I reckon we oughta do something with it. So unless somebody’s got a better idea, let’s join hands and close our eyes and…hang on. Just think about what’s going on back home. And hope. I mean, if that makes sense to you, Aife,” he appended apologetically.

  The Faery woman shrugged distantly as she joined their circle, but was careful, Aikin noted, to sit next to Alec. Myra claimed his other side, and Aikin took her hand, offering the other to LaWanda, who grasped Piper, to bind themselves into the traditional boy-girl circle that seemed to work so well. A deep breath, and Aikin closed his eyes.

  For a moment it was impossible to think, or rather, he was thinking so hard about thinking that his thoughts had gone to war. Too, there was the small matter of what had happened the last time he’d used one of these things. It had shown him the way to the Track in Athens, sure, but that had opened another kettle of fish he’d still not consumed to the bottom. When you got down to it, though, that one foray into Faerie, born of jealousy as it had been, had been more trouble than it was worth. Did he want to risk that again? Or would maybe, finally—as Dave had long desired, and he was starting to agree—this whole mess of inter-World politics finally end?

  But how?

  How, indeed?

  A deep breath, and he opened his eyes, and stared at the ulunsuti’s blood-red septum.

  Stared at first; but all at once it was as though the stone stared back, then reached out some strange unfocused consciousness and grabbed him. For an instant, he was floating, but then vision clarified, and he was high in the air, as though in bird shape, and gazing down at the ocean.

  It was a strange ocean, too, for its waters were oddly dark, as was the sky; as though those waves leaped and frothed in a place of perpetual twilight. Certain there was no visible sun, and now he looked at it, that ocean seemed to go thin in spots, as if it were a film of gauze stretched over a more solid reality he could almost but not quite see. In other places golden strips overlaid it, like ribbons of tenuous light. Straight Tracks—and Pillars of Fire.

  There were also places were the ocean simply wasn’t, which must be the Holes everyone was so concerned about: places where their World had not only burned through Faerie but through other Worlds besides.

  And finally, so small he didn’t note them at first, there were ships.

  He wished a closer look, and got one. And stared, from no more than thirty yards up, upon at least a hundred vessels, very like Fionchadd’s or those that had pursued them earlier, each with a black sail bearing a cri
mson eagle. And each crammed to the gunwales with Faery warriors.

  A gasp, a blink, and more ships! Another fleet as large as the first, but with a different device upon its golden sails, this one more complex than the others he had seen. He squinted. Had it! A scarlet anvil surrounded by a ring of white skulls.

  A third gasp—not his own this time—and whatever Power had commanded him let go, and he looked once more on red and milky-clear. Tears stung his eyes, and when he could see clearly again, Aife’s face was grim as death.

  “I pray that we look on now,” she whispered, “and not on the past, for I dare not hope for the future.”

  “What…?” Alec asked, peering at her anxiously. Aikin hoped they’d all had the same vision. Otherwise—well, if they’d all seen different things, they might be in even deeper trouble than they were already.

  “Two fleets,” Aife said tersely. “Two fleets,” she repeated. “One bore the arms of Finvarra of Erenn. The other the sigil of Arawn of Annwyn. Both smell an empty throne. Both, I am certain, sail this way.”

  The gryphon, who’d taken no part in their impromptu séance, rose and padded over to join them. “War indeed,” he mused in a low, thoughtful voice full of regret. “I did not share your visioning, yet I could not help gazing at the stone. I saw many endings and some beginnings. More to the point, I saw important things. Things worth saving and things worth changing. Therefore, if you have need of me, sound the horn you will find in that cupboard there, and I will come.”

  All eyes swiveled toward the single cupboard that yet retained its doors, but Aikin was first to leap to his feet. “No,” he warned when Alec made to follow. “Everyone else has done something worthwhile here; I’ve been like tits on a bull. This is mine. Not my horn,” he added, “my responsibility.”

  “Go to it,” Alec sighed, likewise rising. “I’ve gotta find something to store this in.” He flourished the ulunsuti. “Ceramic jars are nice,” he added hopefully.

  Aikin left him to it, made his way to the cupboard in question, twisted the latch (in the shape of a leering demon’s head), and opened it. The horn was the first thing he saw: as long as his arm and gently curved, like a hunting horn. He started to reach for it, then hesitated, squinting at it uncertainly. What was it made of, anyway? Ivory, maybe. Or bone. Except that it was red, and he didn’t think it was dyed, stained, or painted. It was carved, too: four separate bands of marching gryphons, interspersed with delicate interlace. And there were ties attached to it: cords of crimson silk ending in matching tassels.

  Steeling himself, for he recalled Deffon’s reference to protections, he reached out gingerly and touched it. Nothing happened. Another breath, and he took it in his hand. “Hail to you, Aikin Daniels,” Deffon said quietly, at his side, though he hadn’t heard the beast approach. “Hail to you, Mighty Hunter: for this time and place, and the times that come after, the Lord of the Gryphons.”

  It took a moment for those words to register. Then: “What? Me?”

  The gryphon nodded sagely. “Colin used that to summon us so he could then enslave us. Yet a threat to your World is a threat to ours, and in this World, at least, we are free. Only a mortal or one of Faery kind can wield that horn, but by your kind alone may it be destroyed. Think of that when such seems good to you.”

  “Thanks,” Aikin replied solemnly, gazing into the beast’s vast sad eyes. “I will.”

  “Hey, Aik!” Alec called. “Get your butt over here. Women folk say it’s time to travel.”

  “Thanks,” Aikin whispered again, then turned to retrieve his shotgun. Aife had a firm hand on Colin’s grimoire. Piper was already tuning up his pipes.

  “Until—” the gryphon whispered in turn, and in three swift bounds had vanished down the stair.

  “Until…” Aikin murmured back, one hand on his sawed-off shotgun, the other on a Faery-wrought hunting horn.

  Interlude V: Time and Tide

  I

  (Sullivan Cove, Georgia—Sunday, June 29—early evening)

  Scott Gresham, who alone of the shaky fellowship bent on saving Sullivan Cove had actually remained there, kicked a discarded beer can and wished it were Ralph Mims’s head. Not that total decapitation of Mims and his cronies would do much good now, nor dismemberment and displaying the quarters at the mountain passes by which the tourists the assholes hoped to attract found their way here. That wouldn’t help at all, not with the on-site office all but installed, the backhoe primed to start excavating, and bulldozers on the way. Mystic had a foreman now; there’d be a dozen men on-site tomorrow, a dozen more two days later. Too many to stop single-handed, too many prying eyes. Never mind the matched set of rent-a-cops that’d be staking out the place from here on.

  Only magic could save the Cove now—or divine intervention. He hoped David and his clan would forgive him for failing to stall these guys. For that matter, he hoped he’d forgive himself. Maybe it was time to take the considerable stash of ill-gotten gains he’d already accumulated and hit the high road for Alaska. Presuming there were no Faeries there. Or other troublesome realms.

  Sighing, he kicked the can again and tried to go through the motions of being busy, which meant marching smartly, measuring, and looking intense while jotting down random figures in a notebook.

  God, what a waste this was! To despoil such a lovely place! He felt like a goddam rapist.

  “Yo, Scott!” someone called amiably from the huddle of men crowded around the front of the office. “Get your ass over here, boy!”

  Scott was tempted to ignore them. Mystic’s hired hands weren’t bad lads (the ones he’d met, anyway), nor was Mims intrinsically evil. But he wanted no part of them. He was just flat out tired of faking.

  “Scott! C’mon! You don’t want to miss this!”

  “I’m on it!” Scott yelled back, because he had no choice. But he took his own time ambling down the rise on which he’d pitched his tent back before Cal and LaWanda’s homemade deluge had flooded it, and into what remained of the broomsedged acre that marked both the terminus of the Sullivan Cove road and ground zero for Mystic Mountain Properties’ unstoppable resort.

  A pause to check the sky (it was getting on toward sunset, which meant Mystic was paying double weekend overtime for folks to be out this late), and Scott joined the rest of the crew. It was nearly an even split: half in khaki work togs, half in expensive suits; but every pair of shoes, wingtips and hobnails alike, was caked to the ankles with mud. Which made Scott grin.

  “’Bout time,” Mims snorted as Scott panted up beside him.

  “What’s the deal?” Scott inquired with calculated nonchalance.

  Mims pointed to a small folding table on which rested a shiny new iron spike marked with bright red paint. An equally pristine sledgehammer lay beside it. The man was all but glowing. “Well, Scott, my boy; I can’t tell you why, but I just had this hunch it’d be lucky if we drove the first spike on Sunday night. You know, so we can hit the ground running tomorrow.”

  “I…see,” Scott managed, feeling as though someone had kicked him in the gut.

  “Yep,” Mims went on enthusiastically. “Figured I’d drive that sucker in right at sundown.”

  “Right,” Scott said again, staring west, where the sun sat right atop the mountains. But the mountain he saw was much closer, and the sheer quartz cliffs atop it glowed red as burning blood.

  II

  (Clayton, Georgia—Sunday, June 29—near sunset)

  JoAnne Sullivan smoothed no-longer-so-Little Billy’s white-blond hair for the thousandth time that day and wondered for the ten-thousandth what in the world was going on with her husband, who’d been recovering just fine when she and Dale and the boy had arrived last night, but now seemed to be going steadily downhill.

  The waiting room at Rabun Regional was deserted save her clan. The rest—two old men, one old woman, and a teenage girl with a baby she looked too young to have—had departed just after seven, likely in quest of dinner. As for Bill—her husband had been whis
ked away half an hour ago for another round of tomfool tests.

  Tomfool because she knew what was wrong with him: something insidious that had entered his body with that stick of wood and now gnawed away at him, invisible to mortal detection. “Shit!” she spat abruptly, fumbling in her purse for a cigarette.

  Little Billy glared at her. “Wish you wouldn’t smoke.”

  She glared right back. “Gotta do something when things get like this. Can’t drink, don’t feel like eatin’, too wired to sleep.”

  Dale put down the outdated issue of Southern Living he’d allegedly been reading since noon and ambled over to join her. If he was tired, he didn’t look it. If he was worried (as was likely), he was keeping it to himself. If he had anything to say, he’d already said it: “Don’t worry.”

  “He’ll be okay.”

  “If they can’t fix ’im here, we’ll find somebody who can.”

  She didn’t know if she could stand to hear those things again.

  “Goin’ for a burger,” Dale muttered instead, looking at Little Billy. “Anybody wants to tag along can.”

  JoAnne almost accepted his invitation. “Better not,” she sighed. “No tellin’ when they’ll bring Bill back. I promised that Devlin man I’d call as soon as I knew anything, even if it was nothin’.” A pause, as her eyes misted and she almost broke down. “God, Dale,” she choked into her hand. “I wish David was here! I wish this hadn’t happened. I wish…I wish poor Bill was well!”

  “We all do,” Dale murmured, patting her arm, then giving her a fierce, hard hug. “Some things are bigger’n we are, though.”

  “Right,” Little Billy agreed. “I—” He broke off, cocked his head as if listening to something outside.

  “What?” JoAnne prompted. “What is it?”

  Little Billy shrugged and managed a very forced smile. “Nothin’—not really. I just thought I heard a woman cryin’.”