Comet Fall (Wine of the Gods)

by Pam Uphoff

Lightning, showing her usual sense, turned and ran out the side door.

  As the boy turned in her direction, raising his hand, Rustle grabbed his shoulder and spun him around.

  "That was not your property to take or destroy at your whim."

  "Whatever serves the cause of Peace." The young man looked her up and down and pulled power in through her grasp on her shoulder.

  A cramp crabbed her hand, and it was with an effort that she opened it and broke the connection. His eyes narrowed.

  "Rustle! Don't be rude." Thunder hustled up beside her, eyes wide and fixed on the young man.

  The corner of his lip curled knowingly.

  He studied Rustle, and pointedly ignoring Thunder. "You don't look like the usual Temple Whore."

  "I'm not," Rustle sat firmly on her anger. "I'm a scholar, studying the Gods. And you?"

  "I am a God." He crossed his arms and waited arrogantly for her reply, or perhaps worship.

  "Oh, excellent!" Rustle pulled her pad of notes from the pouch. "Tell me. Do you remember who they were?"

  He frowned. "What?"

  "They. The other gods can't remember who did things to them."

  "The other gods? How many do you know?"

  "And some of the gods have memories of 'labs'. Do you know what 'labs' are?" That triggered something.

  The youth was standing slack jawed and eyes vacant with memory when the Six Virgins erupted into the room.

  They variously yelped in dismay, broke into tears or tried to scoop up the black sand of the former statue.

  "Labs. Animal labs and, and . . . labs. Trans world travel?" The youth ignored the barely clad women behind him. "The machines, they . . . " his hands went to his head. "They made us a part of their machines."

  He paced around in circles. Glared at her as she wrote.

  "You make my head hurt. Are you one of Them?"

  "Don't, don't you hurt Rustle." Thunder had tears in her eyes

  The Virgins pulled themselves together and approached. "Who are you?"

  "I am the Golden Boy. I am the God of Peace. I am here to speak to the Emperor of Verona." He pulled himself up straight. "I was distracted by your violent and obscene statue. Do not make any images of violence again, or risk my wrath!" He turned then, and walked out of the Temple.

  Rustle sat down and wrote a note. Just met the God of Peace in the Temple in Cadent. He says he's here to talk to the Emperor of Verona. She tore out the page, charmed it with the Auld Wulf's name and shoved it into the pouch. Then she wrote down every word of their very brief conversation. The Virgins were still carrying on.

  "Rain, don't be silly. It was just a statue, not the Goat of Love himself." Rustle told her.

  The head Virgin sniffed woefully. "What do you know of the Goat of Love?"

  "Well, for starters he's my father, and secondly he's just arrived."

  With company. Armed to the teeth.

  "Pax walked out a few minutes ago." Rustle stood up.

  Her father hugged her. Damn it, where's my hug from the Wolf?

  The Auld Wulf, Romeau, and the Sheep Man were all looking out the doors. Dydit joined them, and Rustle followed, the Virgins trailing.

  "He's out of sight. Damn it, can we talk our way into the Palace faster than he can?" The Auld Wulf scowled out at the Plaza.

  Her father swapped looks with the Sheep Man. "We may be able to get in easily, if anyone still recognizes us."

  Romeau snickered. "The Goat can probably get in." He shot a look over his shoulder to where the Virgins were rapturously, and perhaps a bit confusedly, looking from Dydit to Romeau.

  Rustle snickered. "The God of Love has many aspects. Two at once is a bit of a stretch for the Ladies, though."

  "Nonsense," Romeau rallied. "You just need a bit more experience."

  "Use a light warp, and nobody will see you at all," she suggested.

  "Makes it tough to talk to the Emperor, but we could hear what that damned Peace has to say . . . " Nil muttered.

  The four men headed out without any further conversation.

  Rustle chewed her knuckles for a second, then she followed. She stationed herself where she could watch the main gates of the Palace, and concentrated on being unnoticeable. Until the Auld Wulf faded out of nothing next to her. "Come along to the Temple."

  Rustle blinked at the sudden dimness of the Temple. "Trouble at the Palace?"

  "That idiot walked straight in and started giving commands," Romeau grinned. "Would have worked like a charm, if only we hadn't been blocking his compulsions."

  "That old man was tough minded." Dydit said. "Bet he could have resisted."

  "Until his formerly loyal Courtiers killed him." Romeau wrinkled his nose in distaste.

  "And we didn't have to show our faces, which is very lucky, for some people." The Sheep Man glanced at Dydit.

  "Now the Emperor is pissed at Auralia, and we've set spell blocks all over the place," Dydit said. "They didn't see us, so we can slide out of here without the Kingdom of the West being blamed for anything. Would you like a quick trip home?"

  "Can't leave the horses and Xen, Dad," Rustle grinned. "Besides, I'm having way too much fun rummaging in Romeau's attic."

  Dad split a glower between Romeau and the Auld Wulf. "No fooling around with gods!"

  "Don't worry, Dad, I won't do anything you wouldn't." She hugged him and stepped back. Three of them flickered out and were gone. She met the Auld Wulf's eyes.

  "When you get tired of Cadent, there are some ruins across the Cific you might like to explore. And some temples of Gods that we haven't figured out how to open. Call me, when you're ready to come home, or go to Asia." Then he scooped her off the floor and kissed her. Thoroughly. Hungrily.

  He set her down with an exhaled breath somewhere between ecstasy and guilt and disappeared.

  Thunder sighed. "Why doesn't anyone kiss me like that?"

  Lightening sighed. "Can you invite him back for the Annual Orgy?"

  Rustle sighed. "He's the God of War. It just wouldn't be right."

  Chapter Fourteen

  1373 Late Winter

  Ash, traveling

  Tromp looked in the mirror, and liked what she saw.

  Clear high rounded forehead, dark wings of brows and lush dark eyelashes surrounded deep green eyes. Her cheek bones were breath-taking and her delicately pointed chin was the perfect complement for her pouty lips. She'd do a bit more work there after she'd left the village. Along with changing her hair color. A bit. She'd decided that just a few streaks of brown, for contrast, would be better than solid brunette.

  She even had a proper escape plan.

  In an hour she'd be on her way to Wallenton, with the spring wool clip and the winter projects everyone had finished. She'd had a good winter, herself. The Witches had shown her Triad how to find gems under ground, and how to bring them to the surface. An incredibly valuable skill.

  But children . . . Not that she regretted Azure and Beige, mind you, childbirth had been better than sex, and nursing had been good until her nipples toughened up. After that it had just been tedious, and the girls were taking more of her time and attention every day. It was time for her to be free of them.

  Except they spent almost all of their time focused on her. She was the most important and marvelous thing on the World to them. She was going to miss them horribly.

  She was sure Zenith and Cost would take good care of them when she mysteriously disappeared in Wallenton. She had retrieved her backpack with all the money hidden in the secret pockets. She'd tossed the notebooks to make room for her clothes and her own packet of garnets and diamonds. Now she carried it out to the wagons in front of the tavern, trying to make it look lighter than it was.

  With a quick glance to see that no one was watching, she muscled it up on the second wagon and tucked it in under the seat. Weg, who was driving this trip raised an eyebrow.

  "I won't need it until we're in town, so I figured I'd get it out of the way," she smiled at him
, reducing him to the usual gawp-and-nod reaction. She was starting to get bored with it. She needed a big forceful man who'd get a bit rough. She hopped down from the wagon and went to fetch the babies' gear, and of course, the babies themselves. Babies? They were nearly two years old, how could it possibly have been so long?

  She met up with Zenith and Cost on the way back, and they chattered happily as the wagons rolled out. The way Zenith was making eyes at Weg made Tromp wonder if she hadn't picked the young man out to father her second daughter.

  There really wasn't any rush. The older witches had lost their collective minds and over-produced for a while, and now her generation was being treated like excess baggage. Bah! She was the leader of the Triad of the Half Moon and she was still changing diapers. They should have kept some of those power-less witch girls as servants. But they hadn't, so really, the young witches needed to slow down their birthing, so they, and their daughters, would be more valued.

  But Zenith's flirting gave her an opportunity. She minded babies all the way to town. Cost's little Yoderite too, and didn't Cost just flirt with everyone.

  By the fifth day—their second in town, they owed her, and she casually sauntered off to see the town. She circled around and grabbed her back pack from where she'd concealed it under hay and a spell, and lugged it down the stream behind the inn until she was far enough away, then she took to the streets under a small spell that shed attention and headed for the wharf. She needed to go down stream, but just two little villages down, to pick up the Old Road where it crossed the Karitha River. She would buy a horse and supplies there, and then follow the road across the mountains . . .

  "Have a problem, miss? Anything I can help you with?" The man's lust was so obvious a dullard could feel it. Might be useful, and he was at least clean, if an otherwise ordinary looking fellow.

  "Oh, I'm trying to find passage on a barge that will stop in Bridgeton. Do you know of any?"

  "Well, as you've found out, the barges mostly go all the way to the city without stopping, but for a pretty girl like you, I could persuade the captain to swing in at the old bridge," he winked to be sure she understood she'd be buying her extra stop with her body.

  She fluttered her eyelashes and smiled, "Oh, could you?"

  The barge was perhaps smaller than average, but very well kept, and with enclosed cabins in the stern. She paid one of the crew and received a key. Her new friend showed her which one.

  "Call me Jed. Leave your bags here, I'll give you a tour," he winked.

  As she'd expected, there wasn't much to see, as the barge cast off and headed downstream. The highlight of the tour was his own cabin, where she was quite happy to show him some new tricks. On the water she couldn't pull in more power, but she had plenty stored to push it around. She made sure that he had the sexual stamina and physical energy to please her. He was glassy eyed and staggered, when he gallantly escorted her back to her cabin.

  Three men had the contents of her backpack strewn all over the room.

  No, not strewn. Carefully stacked, laid out and organized.

  "Where's Usse?" the oldest one stood up. And up.

  "What?" she dived for the stacks of gold wafers. "How dare you search my bag!"

  "Usse's bag," the tall one said. "Did you kill him? I can't really believe that. He wasn't interested in women."

  "It's mine. I'm afraid you've made an error," she straightened and looked down her nose at them.

  "Really?" the tall man pulled out the little leather case. "Do you usually travel around with the Great Seal of The One hidden in your luggage?"

  "The One?" she said weakly.

  "Where is Usse? Did you kill him? Where? How? Where are his notes?"

  Rotting in the forest, where I pitched them seemed like a good way to get herself killed. She drained power from her escort, who still had a grip on her elbow.

  The tall man's eyes widened, and he pounced as the younger man crumpled.

  Her last coherent memory was of his fist.

  When she came to, she reached for the Earth, but to her horror, realized that they were afloat, without even any tenuous contact through the dock. A man approached, and she tried to gather power, but her reserves were already low, and she realized that she was in the hands of men who knew how to drain a witch and keep her that way.

  She forced herself to lay limp, to pretend unconsciousness, as she was raped, and the power dropped until she wasn't faking it.

  She awoke to a card game, with a big redhead talking about the relationship between aces in a hand and raping her. Unfortunately a lot of aces were showing up. Some time later there was something about taking her to Fascia, and then she was being taken out of a coffin-like box. She was glad she'd been unconscious when they'd closed her in it.

  "This is like fucking a dead body."

  The tiny, odd shaped room they were in had three hammocks slung across it. She vaguely wondered how anyone could get into either of the top ones. Her coffin was probably in the place of a fourth, and took up a significant share of the floor space. Everything heaved around her, the walls creaked a bit . . . was she on an oceangoing ship now?

  She was fuzzy for awhile, the whole World seemed to be swaying around. Then a slammed door heralded the tall man's return from somewhere.

  "The damned Captain has gotten new orders. We're in for a long voyage. He says Ygti ordered him to follow some damned Royal navy ship to try and find their 'new, secret harbor.' "

  Tromp stifled a whimper.

  Chapter Fifteen

  1373 Spring Equinox

  Asia

  Tromp slept and woke, ate, took care of personal business and was raped back into drained unconsciousness again and again. For days. She had no idea how many.

  But this time she woke because she hit the floor and rolled. Men cursed around her, tripped over her, ran out of the room and back in. She could hear distant splintery noises, sharp cracks. The ship jerked oddly, crunching parody of its usual roll.

  "They can't get her off the rocks . . . We're not sinking right now, so they're waiting for some light before lowering the boats." That was the tall man.

  "Damn superstitious fools, they're probably blaming our dead body." Black's voice, quite near.

  "I told the Captain we had a live woman, and he figured that was even worse luck." The tall man again.

  There was more talk, questions, and then, "I've got Egfi listening, he'll keep track of what's happening."

  Good, the tall man had it all under control she could sleep a bit longer. But as she slipped beneath consciousness, she became aware of power. A trickle coming from the rocks that pierced the ship, a slow ooze through the ship's timbers that filled her long drained and abused reservoirs. She slept very well indeed, and laid limp and unresponsive when she was slung over a shoulder and carried up ladders and down into a boat, with foreign curses all around her.

  She looked as helpless as possible, peeked out of slitted eyes as the small boat fought surf and finally grounded on a beach of coarse stones. The boat cast off. She was alone with her captors, on the rocks.

  "Don't let her touch the ground." The tall man's voice, always giving orders.

  She let them carry her up a steep slope to where they could see the ruined foundations of a good sized town. From what she heard, there were a lot more ruins, a huge city, and some intact structures.

  "Did you see the glow of those buildings? There's some magical potential there, we need to find out what it is."

  "We need to pacify the boat's crew so we can get out of here." A rare word of dissention from the black haired man.

  "We have plenty of time, they think they can get her off the rocks at high tide tonight, and get her down to that sandy beach before she sinks. If they can careen her there for repairs, we'll rejoin them. If she sinks, well, we'll have to steal a boat from the Westerners. In any case, I don't believe the Westerners have seen that building to the south. Let's walk down there, then we'll rig something for our little friend
here."

  One of the brown haired ones groaned a protest, and someone grabbed her and she was flung over yet another shoulder. They walked—scrambled over broken angular stone, more often, until they reached their goal. The man carrying her leaning on a boulder to rest, and she reached to lay a hand on the bare rock. Power. She peeked around to see where they all were.

  Tromp gasped and stared.

  The whole building glowed, to her inner sight.

  "Damn, she's woken up! Quick . . . "

  She sucked the power from the man holding her and twisted away as he collapsed. Panicked, she ripped the rock out from under their feet, threw it back at them . . . and realized that she had them. She concentrated on the surface layer as they struggled out from under the debris. The rock flowed, clamped down around legs, ankles and hardened. That quickly they were all trapped.

  She felt them raising power, and raised her own shields. One physical, one mental. She strolled around them with a smile. "My turn, now." She spotted her backpack and dragged it up the first few stairs of the glowing building. The entry was ridiculously ornate, curlicues everywhere, twin water fountains to either side of the door. Dry . . . but she could feel something . . . at a mental touch, water squirted from the pitcher toted by the voluptuous statue of a young man.

  She loved it. The huge carved door was closed, magically locked, the whole building sealed. She took a deep breath and nearly choked. She was filthy. She wasn't sure of the date, had she been captive for a month? Surely not that long.

  She rummaged in her pack. The men had repacked her things, clothing, makeup, ah, soap. Her mother's excellent herbal soap. She shed the stained shift and stepped into the fountain. It was cool, but a touch of power warmed it. She soaked, and scrubbed, and floated and got all pruney. It was heavenly. She still hurt here and there, especially down there. She reached into the pack and pulled out the wine bottle. Oh yes.

  She wiggled the cork out, and took a sip, felt that marvelous zing all over again, and stretched. Not a twinge, anywhere. Rapid footfalls. She threw up a shield, and the tall man crashed into it, and then to the ground. He was bare foot, his ankles bled, as if he'd chipped rocks away . . .