Wanderers 4: A Tough Act to Follow (The Wanderers)

by Richard Bamberg

  “If Alex is injured, we should go get him.”

  I nodded, but then reconsidered. “If he was conscious, then he’d have used that healing spell we taught him. He’s not in any danger.”

  “Maybe not, but you didn’t leave me in the hospital until I recovered. I want to make sure he’s safe,” Tess argued.

  I shrugged. “All right, that’s fair. We’ll check the motel and see if they’ve heard from him. If they haven’t then we’ll fly down to Cancun.”

  “Is it far?” Tess asked.

  Nodding, I said, “A damn sight farther than we’ve already flown tonight. I don’t remember the flying distance, but I went through there back in the nineties. It was about three days by road from the border. I wasn’t in a hurry then and I could have been sightseeing as much as traveling.”

  “Then we can’t make it there tonight.”

  I looked to the south. “No, not tonight. We’ll check out Alex’s motel and then get some rest before heading out.”

  “We’re staying at the motel?”

  I winced and Tess noticed. “We can go somewhere else. We don’t have to stay there.”

  “Yes, it’s probably best that we don’t stay where people know us,” I acknowledged.

  We pulled back out onto the pavement, heading south again. It was only a couple more miles to the motel. It was a bright spot of light along the otherwise dark road. The restaurant and bar had closed for the night. A fair number of vehicles occupied the parking lot, most of them in front of various rooms.

  I was uncomfortable returning to the place where I’d been so happy with Laura. It brought back memories of her death and of my sword entering her flesh. The memory had troubled my sleep for weeks. In all of my years, she was the only death by my own hands that I regretted. If only I’d thought of using the magic in Walt’s sword sooner.

  Stopping outside the office, I shut off Beast’s engine and dismounted. When Tess swung a leg off Maia’s to follow me, I held up a hand. “You haven’t learned to do a glamour, yet. Wait here until I find out whether they’ve heard from him.”

  “Why? You’ve been able to keep both of us glamoured before,” she protested.

  “I know, but we were here recently and it’s a lot harder to maintain a glamour that alters your appearance than it is my own. Besides, your voice is distinctive enough for someone to recognize it.”

  “I can change the pitch of my voice. You just don’t want me coming inside.”

  I rolled my eyes and sighed wearily. “Okay, Tess, have it your way. Come on.”

  She trotted over to me, a damn grin on her beautiful face.

  “Don’t think I didn’t see you rolling your eyes, Rafe.”

  “That’s a mentor’s prerogative,” I said.

  Her fingers wove into my hair and she pulled my lips down to hers for a quick peck. Pulling back a second later, she said, “Admit it, you can’t bear to be away from me.”

  I rolled my eyes again, but then put an equally quick peck on her lips. “You can’t prove anything.”

  She giggled and looped her left arm through my right.

  Sheesh.

  We entered the motel’s office together.

  The night man wasn’t behind the desk so I rang the bell. After a minute, I rang it again.

  The door behind the desk opened slowly and a young woman, yawning mightily, emerged.

  “Good evening, can I help you?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “We’re looking for Alex. I wondered if he’d called to say when he’d be back from Cancun.”

  “Alex? Ah, no. I haven’t heard from him, but the manager might have. He’ll be back in at eight tomorrow morning. Would you like to leave him a message?”

  “Sure, tell him Raphael Semmes–”

  That was as far as I got before the front of the desk exploded.

  Chapter 13

  Raphael

  An inky, jet-black, cloud burst out of the motel office’s counter and splattered my front with a tarry substance before I could even trigger my shield. Where the goo struck my exposed flesh, it burned like acid. I belatedly got my shield up in time to protect me from the impact with the glass of the front door. Both the glass and the frame shattered as I was blown into the parking lot leaving a spherical hole in the front of the office about eight feet in diameter.

  The black goo was flowing over my skin as though it were alive and was already making a corrosive path down from my face beneath my clothing.

  Everywhere it touched me; I burned.

  My eyes were the worst. I hadn’t had time to close them and it felt like acid was dissolving my corneas.

  I screamed in pain.

  More of the goo flowed up my nostrils and into my mouth, burning everything it touched.

  My healing tat flared to life, but it wasn’t stopping the burning of my flesh. I clawed at my face, trying to pull the goo off me, but my gloved hands couldn’t grip it. My shield winked out, as I could no longer concentrate enough to keep the tat active. Falling to the pavement, I writhed and tore at my clothing, trying to get to the black goo that was spreading down my chest and back.

  I screamed again, which came out as a gargle as the goo flowed down my windpipe and shut off my breathing.

  The goo had already reached my belly, my elbows, and my knees. I tried to concentrate enough to come up with a way to stop its progression, but logical thought was impossible.

  Finally, I focused on my lightning tattoo, summoning down the power to burn the goo off me.

  There was the crack of tremendous current as a bolt sundered the sky and struck me where I lay spasming in agony.

  I blacked out from the pain and lack of oxygen.

  Chapter 14

  Therese

  The explosion was a total surprise. One second I was standing near Rafe, smiling at the night clerk and the next I was out the front windows and flying across the parking lot. I triggered my shield before I hit anything more solid than glass. I bounced once off the pavement and then rolled to a stop against the side of a pickup truck. Its alarm began to scream.

  No, it wasn’t a car alarm. It was Rafe. He was screaming.

  Bruno’s tail had tightened around my neck, nearly choking me. I put a couple of fingers between his tail and my throat and loosened his grip. Getting my feet under me, I shifted my shield into a dome over me. Both Maia and Beast had been blown onto their sides by the force of the explosion and they were now shifting forms and roaring in their different voices their anger and their fear.

  I shook my head trying to clear it. My ears rang from the blast, but Rafe’s screaming drowned out all other sounds. Running toward him, I saw he was covered in some kind of black substance. It looked too much like one of the night magic spells he wouldn’t let me try.

  Rafe was tearing at his face and then at his clothes. All the while, he screamed, until the scream turned into a gargling, which rapidly choked off.

  I wondered what I could do to help, but then his left hand formed into a fist, and he raised his arm toward the sky.

  “Shit!” I cried and flinched back as a bolt of lightning crashed to the earth and struck him where he lay.

  The energy behind the bolt was great enough to throw me farther back from him and my shield popped back into a sphere as I went airborne again.

  Bruno was chittering in my ear, but I didn’t speak wyvern.

  Falling back to the pavement, I moved my shield back into a dome and hurried back toward Rafe. His body practically glowed beneath the power of the discharge. The pavement around him was beginning to bubble and smoke.

  Before I reached him, the bolt died away and I could see him lying unconscious on the smoldering asphalt.

  Without thinking about anything but getting him away from the boiling asphalt, I stopped beside him. Within a second, I could feel the heat, but my leathers were spelled to protect against fire, impact, and magic. I grabbed Rafe’s wrists and dragged him clear of the circle of molten material.

 
As soon as he was clear, I dropped his wrists and knelt beside him. Black material–or was it skin?–covered his face and neck. I brushed at it with my gloves and it flaked away revealing raw, red skin beneath it.

  I lowered my ear to his mouth. Holding still, I waited for some sign that he was breathing. None came.

  “Damnit, Rafe,” I cursed. I cast my healing spell on him and then started CPR. As soon as I compressed his chest the first time, a cloud of black dust popped out of his mouth and he coughed.

  Beast and Maia moved close, standing to either side of us, but looking outward for any additional threat.

  “What was that?” Beast growled.

  As Rafe was breathing again, I brushed more of the black powder from his visible skin while he coughed and hacked for breath. His skin was the red of an intense sunburn, but I could feel the power of the healing spell working to restore him.

  “I don’t know. We were talking to the night attendant when there was an explosion. There was no warning; at least my ward didn’t detect any. Rafe must not have had a warning either or he’d have gotten his shield up.”

  As I mentioned the woman, she appeared in the opening of the motel’s shattered door. “Oh my God! Those are the things from Colorado Springs.”

  I ignored her. I think everyone would recognize Maia and Beast, even if they didn’t really know what they were, and that explosion was loud enough to wake everyone at the motel.

  “Rafe, can you hear me?” I shouted and shook him by the shoulders.

  He nodded and tried to sit up. I gripped his shoulders, focused energy on my muscles, and helped him to his feet.

  “Jesus, that hurt,” he said.

  As soon as he was standing, he bent over and retched a mass of black something onto the pavement.

  “Are you alright?”

  Rafe shook his head and braced his palms against his knees as he retched again. This time it was dry heaves. “I don’t think so. I don’t feel right inside.”

  He straightened and blinked rapidly. He wiped at his eyes and then raised his face toward me. “How bad is my face?”

  “It’s burned, but healing. I cast healing on you.”

  “I can’t see.” He stopped to cough and a cloud of black dust billowed out in a cloud. When he got his breath back, he added, “The gunk burned my eyes.”

  “Jesus, but the healing spell will fix anything, right?”

  “It had better. I’ve never seen it fail, but eyes are tricky.”

  “Then you should be able to see in a couple hours at most,” I said with some relief.

  “I hope. I’m not willing to contemplate not being able to see.”

  “Rafe, what was that explosion?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen anything like it. It must be a night magic spell, but my ward should have detected it and triggered.”

  A small crowd of people had come out of their motel rooms. Most were not coming any closer, but one or two brave souls were cautiously approaching us.

  Beast let out a low growl that would have made a grizzly back off and they stopped moving forward. A second later, they began to back away.

  “Rafe, we should get out of here before the authorities show up. Someone is bound to have called nine-one-one by now.”

  “Yes, of course, I don’t feel well enough to handle questions. Mount up.”

  He put out a hand and Beast stepped beside him. Rafe grabbed a fistful of mane and then froze. “What the hell?”

  “What’s wrong?” I asked as I hurried to him. I grabbed his shoulders thinking he was weak.

  “My levitation tat. It’s not working,” he hissed.

  “What?”

  “It’s like it’s not there. I can’t feel it.” Suddenly, Rafe began to pat his chest, belly, and then upper arms. “Gone. They’re all gone.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, not understanding.

  He turned to me with that vacant stare that was so disconcerting and for the first time since I’d known him, he looked afraid. “My tattoos are gone.”

  Chapter 15

  alexander

  “Rowle? As in the rogue Wanderer who’s been trying to jumpstart Ragnarök?” I asked when I was able to breathe again.

  “The one and only,” Rowle said with a smile.

  I took a cautious step backwards toward the door.

  “I–I thought you died in Colorado Springs last November.”

  Rowle waved a hand in a dismissive gesture. “As a great man once said, ‘the report of my death was an exaggeration.’ As you can see, I am very much alive.”

  “Really? Well, heh, heh, that must be irritating, but what do you want with me?” I asked as I took another backward step.

  “We can’t very well discuss your future if you try to run away without hearing me out,” Rowle said. “Have a seat, I won’t bite.”

  I tried to swallow the lump in my throat. “Ah, I–I’m comfortable standing.”

  “I don’t repeat myself, Apprentice.”

  Knowing the power this lunatic controlled, I understood that my only hope of survival lay in not pissing him off. I’d have to humor the bastard until I could find a way to get the hell out of his reach. I crossed the small room and took a seat in the only other chair.

  Once I was seated, Rowle smiled. “That’s better Alexander, or do you prefer Alex?”

  I swallowed hard and tried to grin. “Alex is good.”

  “Excellent,” Rowle said with a feeling of good humor in his tone. “Now, I’m sure you have countless questions and I’ll answer them all in time.”

  “I’m sorry, but why do you need an apprentice? I thought you’d shunned the service of Fate.”

  Rowle nodded. “A valid question. I did stop answering Verðandi’s summonings two centuries ago, but the recent events have left me with the idea that while I may still have several centuries in me, I am mortal and thus I feel the need to leave something behind when I’m gone. I’ve decided that you will be my legacy.”

  Oh, hell and damnation. What could I say to that? From everything Tess had told me, this guy was bad, really bad. According to her, he’d killed all of the Wanderers except for Rafe. I wondered how long it would take Rafe and Tess to find me. Surely, they were looking by now.

  I noticed that Rowle was waiting for a response. I cleared my throat and tried not to squeak. “Ah, I don’t want to appear disrespectful. In fact, I have tremendous respect for your power, but aren’t you the bad guy?”

  Rowle laughed softly, but there was little humor in his laugh.

  “Alex, being the bad guy is a matter of perspective. All of the Wanderers have done things that would lead others to consider them bad guys. In our own minds, we are the good guys. I’m not as bad as some, but granted I’m also not as good as some others.”

  I pursed my lips and gave a small tilt of my head. I had to be delicate. I certainly didn’t want to have him mad at me, but damn.

  “Starting Ragnarök, that’s not a typical thing I think of a good guy doing.”

  “It’s not necessarily an evil thing either. Sure, the gods get carried away when they start fighting each other, but they’ve been doing it since the beginning of time. My goal was to get these gods fighting each other until they were too weak to do any more damage to humans. You see, Alex, the gods have been banished from staying on Earth for anything more than a brief period. Because of that, they are seriously restricted while they’re here. By opening the portals to their worlds, they’ll be able, finally, to sort out which of them are the most powerful. Then mankind would have been safe from their constant interference in our affairs.”

  “They interfere in man’s affairs?” I asked, not understanding how Rowle was justifying his actions.

  “Certainly, granted not as much as when they had free access to Earth, but they still interfere. Look at the Wanderers; we have always served Verðandi, one of the Norse Norn sisters. Everything the Wanderers do is interference in man’s affairs. And don’t think the Wa
nderers are the only ones meddling in human affairs. Although most of the Wanderers don’t realize it, the other gods have their own lackeys on Earth.”

  “But Tess told me that you were responsible for the deaths of the other Wanderers,” I said, more to keep him talking than because I needed verification of what I’d been told.

  “Tsk, tsk,” Rowle said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Wanderers are grownups. They can fight their own battles and do so quite often. Sometimes we don’t see eye to eye on some matters and occasionally it comes to a fight. Unfortunately, when Wanderers fight, only one survives. I didn’t want to kill those other Wanderers, but once a fight starts, either I win it or I die. Would you, yourself, not go down fighting? Of course, you would. You wouldn’t have been reaped as a warrior fit to serve Fate if you were any less of a man.”

  “But did you have to kill them all?”

  Rowle gave a sad wag of his head. “Alex, my actions may have been a little extreme, but I assure you that they left me no choice. As I mentioned, none of the Wanderers are as pure as the driven snow. We aren’t evil, but sometimes we have to do things that the average man would consider the work of a bad person.”

  “Even Rafe?”

  Rowle’s face darkened and I thought he was going to shake his head again, but then he hesitated and his eyebrows wrinkled in thought. He lowered his face and for a few moments, he was silent.

  When he met my gaze, he looked sad. “Alex, there are some truths that are hard to learn. I had hoped to avoid telling you everything until you were surer of yourself, but I can see you believe too much in Raphael.”

  Well, D’uh. Of course, I believed in Raphael. Besides saving my life, he’d stopped an invasion of Earth at the Garden of the Gods. Who wouldn’t respect that? “What do you mean?” I asked. “What truths?”

  “Alex, my son, you are my direct descendant.”

  I blinked in confusion. “What? How is that possible?”