by C. V. Larkin
"Get me the portal key to Union Square."
"What?"
"You heard me. Do as you're told."
Todd's tree roots shot out, searching the shelves with single minded drive, pulling out plastic cases and shaking them around, before slamming them back into the appropriate slots. A couple of the bulbs on the ceiling shattered with a loud crack, showering them with tiny shards of broken glass as if punctuating his command.
"Shit," Tian said.
"What's looking for you?" the dryad asked.
"Wizards."
Todd's shoulders slumped and he shook his head. "The hot ones are always trouble."
The vines found what they were looking for with a lot of excited flailing. Todd presented Sio a DVD case with a shaking rooty tendril. Another bulb burst above them. "I would have gotten it for you anyway. But damn, good times."
Sio looked down at the DVD case as he accepted it. "The Birds?"
"Have you seen Union Square," the dryad asked. "Motherfucking pigeons are everywhere."
"Good point."
Todd Cheshire catted at the response. "I have a lot of those."
"Queens tits, stop already, we don't have time for this," Tian said. She grabbed Sio's jacket and tugged him toward her. A small bulb popped in the corner, raining microscopic shards down onto the counter.
"You see that?" she asked. "Electronics and wizards don't mix. If we don't get out of here, eventually they're going to notice they've got a blind spot and we're going to be ass deep in Guardians."
"I can think of worse ways to entertain myself," Todd said.
Tian leaned around Sio to shoot the guy a skeptical look. "Really?" she asked.
Todd thought about it a minute before shaking his head. "Not so much."
Sio opened the DVD case and stared inside. There was a disk in it. Tian grinned at his expression and popped the thing out. She held it up and spun it up on her middle finger like it was a basketball until the disk pulsed with a familiar white light.
She tossed it at the far wall and turned to Todd. "Ceyla's at the house, call her if you have any problems, then call me because we're coming back through."
"Uh, you do realize that I'm only, like, a couple thousand years older than you, right?"
"Great. You can call her if you fall and break a hip too," Sio told him.
Tian chuckled and Todd turned to stare at her. "Since when do you laugh?" he asked.
"It's a recent development."
"You seem different, you know."
"So I've heard," she said, backing toward the portal.
Todd nodded and winked at Sio. "Miss you."
"I'll bet."
Sio aimed for the portal. He was practically on top of Tian when the world around them dissolved. Just in case, Sio looped a finger through the back belt loop of her jeans as she turned into him. The side of his thumb inadvertently grazed the delicate skin of her waist under the top she was wearing and the minimal contact was all it took to kick off another endorphin overload like an inhuman metallic maelstrom. It rocketed through his system, dragging along a whole mess of conflicting emotion in its wake. Tian looked up at him from inches away and focused on his mouth.
"When you meet Baba, don't stare or she'll eat your face," she told him.
Sio wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, but that hadn't been it. He narrowed his eyes and watched her through the lashes.
"So we're clear, I'm not going to let you avoid what happened in the hallway forever."
"You will for now though."
"Yeah."
She leaned in and brushed silken lips lightly against his own. Maybe she'd intended it as a chaste kiss, but it didn't stay that way. She leaned into to him as he pulled her closer, her mouth soul-stealing hot on his own. His pulse cranked so high he barely noticed when they slid out of the portal, slamming into a concrete wall. He was breathing hard as she disengaged. They were in the back corner of a parking garage.
Tian shook her head. "I used to have better self-control than this."
An expression that looked a lot like affection slid across her features a split second before she turned away and started walking. Sio didn't trust himself to say anything. Hell, he didn't even know if he could say anything. He watched Tian walk away, wanting to drag her over to the nearest vehicle and fuck her over the hood. Eventually he followed her. When he got his voice back he said, "Tell me about Baba Yaga."
Chapter 25
Little Earthquakes
Get a room.
It was the first coherent thought she'd managed since they'd slid out of the portal. Sadly, it was hard to tell whether the idea had sprung from a statement grumbled by a passing third party or if she'd come up with that motherfucking gem all on her own.
Tian disengaged with every cell screaming in protest. It was a wonder the bastards weren't audible. She felt like she'd sprinted flat out for about fifty miles. Her pulse was slamming itself around her jaw, her lips, and about a dozen other places she'd love to pretend didn't exist. The more she touched him, the harder it was becoming to remember why that kind of kamikaze move was a bad idea.
"I used to have better self-control than this," she said.
Sio leaned against the wall of the garage, bedroom pout working its way around some seriously ragged breaths. Even so, he might have pulled off smug if he weren't spilling more steam than a sauna. For a dangerous heartbeat of time it was impossible not to love him. To admit it. Tian turned away and started walking so he wouldn't see the look of undisguised horror that had come barreling in on the heels of the reaction.
I'm yours... I've been yours.
Numb, please, fuck, just be numb.
Love meant chained naked in a fetid dungeon, broken and trapped in a puddle of your own blood and piss. The recollection made Tian long for hollow. Emptiness had a comforting quality to it, like slipping on a favorite robe at the end of a long day. It was getting harder and harder to compartmentalize the mess in her head. Little bits of electric static kept interrupting the painstakingly cultivated balm of soulless emotional vacancy.
"Tell me about Baba Yaga." Sio said, catching up in a couple of ground eating long legged strides. She still wanted to touch him...taste him.
"Baba Yaga is part Crone, part Duegar, and it's a bad idea to go to her for help."
"And yet here we are about to do it anyway..."
"Cause we're out of options," Tian cut him off with the irritated realization that she'd finished his sentence.
The rain had slackened from torrential downpour to drizzling nuisance by the time they emerged out in front of Macy's. Pedestrians hunched under the flimsy canopies of their umbrellas fighting the bitter cold and scampering with purpose from shop front to shop front.
"Tian, you should be thrilled that I knew what a dryad was. What the hell is a duegar?" Sio asked with an annoying level of good humor.
"Dwarves that get off on tricking people into dying, not real big fans of the human race."
"Pleasant," he said. "I get the feeling that most of the Fae aren't avid supporters."
"They deal."
"What do crones do?"
"Whatever they want." Tian sighed. "They're seers mostly. Look, Baba is older than human civilization and the old ones have serious hang ups about etiquette. Be polite, hell, go for formal if you have to speak with her at all. And don't stare." Sio frowned and shook his head, but Tian held up her hand. "Trust me you're going to want to."
"At least you have an idea of what we're getting ourselves into," Sio muttered as he followed her up the terraced grass steps that led up to the square. Tian stopped and turned around.
"I have no clue what we're getting ourselves into, Sio. I've seen Baba once and it was when she came to visit Eamon. The best I can do is relay the lecture I got. Believe me, you have no idea how much I hate that."
She turned around and started walking again before she did something regrettable. As they hit th
e flat stone expanse of Union Square she started talking again. It wasn't as if they had a whole lot of time left.
"Never ask her about the fact that her servants are invisible, it's dangerous, and for fucks sake don't say thank you."
"The phrase 'Thank you' counts as basic politeness."
She glanced back. The steady drizzle had weighed down his hair and the sodden strands flung droplets onto the contours of his face and the beginnings of his five o'clock shadow. The intensity of him meant that staring too long felt like slipping consciousness.
"You don't say thank you to the Fae," she said. "Ever. It's an admission of debt and owing debts in Faerie is one of the fastest ways to get yourself killed. It's like baring your throat."
To his credit Sio only nodded his assent, even though she could see that he was digesting this new bit of information, chewing over the fact that she'd said it to him. Tian began to back away, but he reached out and grabbed her arm. She could feel the chill of his skin through the soaked shell of her jacket.
"No gratitude," Sio said. "Anything else?"
Tian leaned forward. "Promise me something." His eyebrows shot up as if she'd surprised him.
"What?"
"Swear to me, no matter what happens, you won't make any deals with her on your own."
"Tian...I..."
He frowned, considering the ramifications. Sio didn't look happy. He was going to be downright pissed about the fine print when it came up.
"Please."
"I won't make any deals with her on my own today, and not until I have a good idea what I'm dealing with. Will that work?" He took to negotiation like a fish to water.
"I guess it'll have to," she said, tossing out a rueful grin.
"Good, then you have my word."
"Good."
Sio was honorable. He'd remain true to the letter of his promise. All other bets were off. Tian beat feet towards the Dewey Monument. The stone pillar towered in the center of Union Square with the goddess of victory perched atop, lording over the bustling consumers. The monument was the less than modest entrance to Baba Yaga's domaine.
Tian glanced up with resignation and settled herself against the far side. The "don't look here" glamor was so strong at this section of the base no one noticed them.
"Turn your back to the forest," she said, reaching out and beckoning Sio closer. He moved in, eyes burning with enough self-assured heat to make her jittery. He slid both arms around her waist, pressing her against the rock hard contours of his body.
"Turn your front to me," she finished, choking around the last flighty stragglers of breath that had yet to evacuate her chest.
Sio leaned down. His lips were millimeters away from her skin when they slipped through the membrane between worlds. Stone became permeable grating for a sand storm second against their skin. When the scouring was over they were trapped inside a claustrophobic windowless box that could have doubled as a studio apartment in the Tenderloin.
Sio's hands were spanning her lower back. She dug fingers into his obliques as if the death grip would lend enough friction to avoid blatantly groping him. A loud grating preceded a series of clicks. The corroded metal plate gave way beneath them. It was a short drop, five feet, maybe seven. Tian hit the metal surface below and stood. She glanced at Sio who looked startled, but was otherwise no worse for the wear.
They were standing on a ledge leveled by precious metals that had been melted down and reformed into a glittering cap. It was one of many. The asymmetrical chunks of rock spread out in front of them forming a trail, separated from one another by a series of deep fissures. The glittering path led to the warped remains of an elegant stone building that must have been 'relocated' during the 1906 quake. What exterior elements of the structure that had remained intact were illuminated by the electric blue phosphorescence of the glow worm shit covering the walls of the cavern around them.
Beautiful? Sure.
Romantic? Not exactly.
"Was this loose change?" Sio asked, inspecting the floor.
Tian glanced down and shrugged. "Works great for traction."
The markings showed through, registering as coins in multi-hued patterns on the encrusted flat surfaces. Each chunk of stone boasted similar frosting and the metal twinkled merrily in the nightshade lighting. Tian wondered if her heartbeat would ever return to a normal rhythm as she threw herself at the nearest flagstone. It was a pathetic and wholly transparent attempt to avoid that dangerous moment between conscious thought and emotion. Thank the fucking Queen of Night that it worked. She was across in a couple of long strides, then came the jump followed by a hard landing on another unforgiving metal surface.
Rinse. Repeat.
Tian hurled herself forward, focusing on the effort of the movement. Sio was keeping up as if he were unaware that the pace wasn't humanly possible. Rinse. Repeat. The binding should have prevented that, but she was past worrying about it. Their problems were big enough already.
Rinse. Repeat. Don't think.
"We're lucky it's not charmed," she said, still sprinting.
"How's that?"
"Charmed metallurgy was a dwarf thing." She clenched her jaw with an audible pop, irritated by her own nervous chatter.
"And then they, what, changed their minds?"
Tian shook her head.
"We're not what we once were," Sio answered for her.
It was exactly what she'd been thinking, but hearing it from him was eerie as hell. "Don't let any of the old ones hear you say that."
Their progress toward Baba Yaga's residence was slower now, more cautious. As they got closer it was hard to miss the signs of dilapidation wearing heavy in the aging structure. The building had been beautiful once. It still had a melancholy appeal, though beautiful would hardly be the word that came to mind. The flames in the entryway guttered, threatening to go out as she and Sio approached. A cold sweat spurned by the uninvited skeletal fingers of unease trickled down her spine. Tian gritted her teeth, resisting the sickening tendrils of a self-destructive impulse that called for blood and battle and death. No doubt that last part would be coming along soon enough.
As they reached the edge of the entryway the fire of welcome went out and they were plunged into the underworld blue light of the glow worms. Sio moved up behind her until his back was pressed flush into her own as he surveyed the space they'd passed through. Tian didn't blame him, but found it difficult ignore the chill that he was bleeding through her jacket, through the nylon of the shoulder rig, into her skin as if all the rest didn't happen to exist. She was clenching her jaw so hard that if she weren't Fae she'd need a shit load of dental work when this was over.
The whispers came next, hundreds of them, disembodied voices echoing off the rock only to rebound and slide unpleasantly across her skin.
"State your business, killer."
The air felt tepid, stale, as if they'd cracked open a tomb. Tian gritted her teeth, as invisible fingers tugged the strands of her hair and caressed her face.
"I seek counsel. We're here to request audience with Baba Yaga."
A series of rapid whispers so low they were almost subliminal burst from nothing. "As you wish," one of the voices drawled next to her skull.
Tian shuddered and rubbed her ear, inwardly cursing the lost battle of composure. The desire to fight back was so strong, so instinctual she bit down on her tongue to curb the impulse. Seven loud popping sounds were followed by seven small fire balls that burst from the brasiers to the sides of the entrance. The flames burned in every impossible color except for the warm yellow of natural firelight.
"Follow then, little sparrows..."
"Follow deep into the darkness..."
"Deep into the night..."
"Stay on the path..."
"Stay close to the light..."
"We who lead you are but shadows..."
"And seven bearers of the bright."
The voices chanted, m
ore joined in, too many wraith-like whispers to keep track of.
"I know their names," Sio said. There was a note of emotion in his voice that Tian couldn't place. The servants roared in response, a deafening swarm of hornets.
"With the binding you shouldn't be able to hear them at all."
Tian turned to look at him. His features were accentuated by the shadows thrown off in the flickering witch lights.
"That's comforting," he said.
"I'll bet."
The divine sensation of ravens' wings and liquid sparklers fluttered in her chest and behind her eyes. The sharp moonlit metallic flavor of silver spread over her tongue. Tian's blood felt carbonated as it pulsed through her veins. She stood there squinting at Sio until he nodded to the lights behind her.
"They're moving."
"Then so are we," she said, spinning on her heel in a forced effort to look away from him.
The electric adrenaline of the Goddess presence didn't abate as she moved away to follow the bobbing balls of multihued fire. The haunting sounds of a concert piano wafted in delicate phrase from deep below them. The room they were standing in had the high ceilings of a bank or a cathedral, though it was difficult to say with any surety what the building had been. The witch lights reflected off of the wealth of precious metals in the walls, illuminating the room in their immediate vicinity, leaving the shadows to hang heavy in the space above. Stalactites dripped like icicles out of the darkness until they grazed the stalagmite formations on the floor, forming columns that had been carved by an expert hand and elegantly inlaid with an intricate brocade of gold and fire opals. The opulent pieces of furniture they passed were covered in thick plastic slip covers that reflected the lights and the indistinct forms of the bearers with all the yawning clarity of funhouse mirrors.
The witch lights circled, dancing in the shadows, moving forward toward a jagged staircase at the end of the hall. Even in darkness the thing looked more like an Escher print than any form of useable construction. Invisible hands prodded Tian forward with childlike impatience. She and Sio followed onto the landing of the staircase, and at the insistence of the invisible menagerie they began to climb. The music grew louder, swelling, stealing the air around them with its haunting beauty. Tian ascended, oddly touched, amid the hypnotic dance of the flames which were inexorably drawn forward on the strings of soul stirring melody. She had seen the pixies dancing in the moonlight once, but that had been a raucous, joyful, manic, sort of thing. This dance had a melancholy sense of loss that resonated.