Round Trip Fare

by Barb Taub

  “I saw what that freak brother of yours can do. So you’re going to be my little insurance policy. Now the rest of you are going to stay put while we walk out of here.”

  “Or…” The voice behind her was calm, quiet. She’d know it anywhere. “You could just die.”

  The hand holding the gun to her head tensed, but she was already twisting away as her assailant fell. She didn’t think he was still breathing when he hit the ground.

  “Hey, Carey.” Connor’s face was ashen, wet with sweat. But he smiled. “What took you?”

  She leaped forward to put her arms around him, staggering as his weight went limp against her. Then Yosh was there, helping to lower Connor to the ground. She put her fingers to his neck, finding a pulse. When the tears came, she made no effort to stop the choking gasps as she kneeled at her brother’s side, holding his hand.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  July 2011: St. Helens Ranch, Whitman, Washington

  They were all still breathing—at least on her side. The other side…not so much. So why do I feel so damn guilty? Zach was awake, but nauseous and disoriented from an obvious concussion. Connor was still unconscious. There was no sign of Bygul, but Claire seemed unconcerned about that so Carey decided not to mention it.

  Two of the imps had been hurt in the battle. Sid’s arm was slashed and possibly broken, but Anton had already cleaned, splinted, and bandaged it. Far more serious was the knife wound to Ben’s leg. To nobody’s particular surprise, Leigh Ann muttered about “first-aid class” and proceeded to stick him with a leftover drop of Claire’s spelled water before competently closing the wound with a line of stitches. Carey caught Claire giving her that thoughtful look again, but she nobly resisted the urge to wonder aloud what first-aid class taught how to stitch knife wounds.

  To Carey’s frustration, although several of the Outsiders survived the battle, none survived the poison. There was no obvious way to hide their bodies, and with only her small shovel, there didn’t seem to be a way to bury them either.

  Iax met her eyes after he and Peter finished dragging the last of the dead to the center of the clearing. “I think we took out their A-team last night. Someone had these guys in good position, but we would never have been able to take all of them at once if they had serious training.”

  Anton stood up from his exam and pat down of each body after paying special attention to their hands. He nodded. “Trained, but not professional. Probably local recruits.”

  Claire tucked her jacket around the sleeping Ben and straightened. “Since Joe, and possibly others, came from Whitman, it’s likely at some point an alarm will be raised about people missing, and a full-scale search will be mounted. That will take time, but we need to not be here when it happens.”

  It was Marley who said it. “We’re not that far from the St. Helens.”

  Carey stiffened, but finally nodded. “We’ve leased out the fields and had caretakers looking after the place, but nobody lives there right now. Peter and Claire can head there on the bike and come back with some of the ranch vehicles for our wounded. If I’m remembering correctly, there’s a fire road just beyond those trees so you can at least get that close. Meanwhile, we’ll load the bodies onto the horses and take them to the old quarry on the backside of the shale ridge. The lake there is deep so if we weigh them down, they’ll probably never be found.”

  It would take at least three of them to manage the bodies. If Iax came with them, that would leave Marley with Leigh Ann and the two uninjured imps to look after Ben, Zach, Sid, and Connor until Claire and Peter returned with transport. What if Outsiders returned? Gritting her teeth, she amended the plan. “Iax, you better stay and help the imps guard everyone.” When his jaw tightened, she held up a hand. “And before you start in on the growly thing, Yosh, you can just remember that I’m the only one who knows the back way to the quarry and the ranch. I have to go with them.”

  “Back to Yosh, are we?” Claire ducked Carey’s elbow with practiced ease. Yosh’s eyes crinkled slightly, but he said nothing.

  “Anton…” Carey hesitated. “Are any of them from your family?”

  He shook his head. “The only one I’ve seen before is the man from the stables.”

  There were still just as many dead, but somehow that made it easier. “Leigh Ann…”

  “Not even for all the Community Service credits in the entire world.” The younger girl’s reply was flat and blunt. Claire noticed that she’d backed as far away from the dead as possible, but still looked pale. “I’m a Leannán Sí. We take our energy from creativity and change. I can’t be with death.”

  Something in Leigh Ann’s words touched a chord in Carey’s memory, but she didn’t have time to pursue it. “Okay then. Marley and Anton, do you think you could help me with the bodies? Then we’ll all meet back at the St. Helens.”

  Most of the horses must have been used on hunting trips because they didn’t mind the bodies or the smell of the blood. But the smaller ponies the imps had been riding shied nervously, eyes rolling. Mounted on the edgy ponies, Carey and Anton each led two horses carrying a pair of bodies. Marley brought up the rear, leading the last pony.

  As they rode, Carey thought about the time when she was fourteen and took a fall as she was attempting some stupid horseback maneuver. It took hours for her to get onto her horse and ride back to the St. Helens, sick and dizzy with a broken clavicle. But this slow, silent ride, she thought, was far worse. Who were the dead? Did they have lovers who would never know what happened to them? Families waiting for a return that never would occur?

  »»•««

  The sun was a red sliver blushing the clouds over the hills behind them when they finally topped the shale ridge and led the now-riderless horses down to the St. Helens Ranch. Carey wanted to leap off and race into the house. And she wanted to kick her horse into a gallop and never look back. Bain had been awaiting her arrival, and pelted over from the porch. She groaned as she swung down from her pinto and bent to flip the Aussie’s ears. “Some days saving the world just sucks, Wigglebutts.” Straightening, she led the others and the now riderless horses to the barn.

  Mercifully, the rebuilt barn was a utilitarian structure bearing little resemblance to the one that had burned, and moreover it was located on the opposite side of the road. Inside there were empty stalls but no feed. Yosh joined her as they removed saddles and brushed the horses before turning them into the paddock where the old barn had been. He ran water into the trough, while she checked to make sure there was plenty of grass.

  She was exhausted, sickened by the battle and its aftermath, and worried about her brother. But as she looked at the ranch house, she still thought that the hardest part of her day was ahead.

  Yosh put an arm around her. “We can stay in the barn if you’d prefer. Your brother hasn’t woken up, but he seems okay.”

  She leaned against the paddock fence, shivering slightly in the cooler evening temperatures. Stepping behind her, he wrapped his jacket around her shoulders and pulled her into his arms. She felt his lips on her hair before he asked softly, “Why did you keep the ranch all these years?”

  “I had to.” Bain squeezed between them, and she reached a hand down to his ears. “If Connor was looking for me, I thought he might come here. There was a message for him inside. One only he would understand.”

  With another sigh, she straightened and moved toward the house. But she left his jacket around her shoulders, and her hand gripped his.

  Everyone except Connor and the injured Ben gathered in the huge kitchen. It was so familiar, as if she’d just walked out that morning. Carey half expected Harry to walk in, complaining about something she’d done to one of the Leftfeet, or grinning and sweeping her off to spar in her latest attempt to win his silver knife. She didn’t want to remember that only hours ago that same knife had sent one of the Outsiders plummeting from his tree perch.

  It felt strange to go into her brother’s room. Everything was just the same. His sch
oolbooks were in neat piles, as if he was about to study for the finals they never took. The man now sleeping in his bed had smiled at her out of Connor’s face, but she wondered who lived behind those dark eyes. His arm rested outside of the blanket, and she measured her hand against his much larger one. Unlike her own scarred and calloused palm, his was smooth and cool.

  One of the imps—she was pretty sure it was Moe—came in and silently took a seat on the old sofa across from Connor’s bed. Carey pulled the blanket up over Connor’s arms and tucked it around his shoulders. Standing, she nodded to Moe and left the room.

  Mechanically, she helped Peter sort out a meal from the contents of the huge freezer. She mediated a dispute between Leigh Ann and Zach, apologized to the imps for the instant coffee, ignored Marley and Claire talking wedding showers, and helped Anton tether her laptop to the satphone. All the while, she felt Yosh’s dark eyes watching her.

  To her own surprise, she felt a shadow of her wicked grin return as she crossed to whisper in his ear. “I think we need a shower.”

  With Yosh following, she stepped into her old room. He wasn’t quite quick enough to hide the tiny snort of laughter as he took in the clashing wall colors, the shelves full of weapons and books on warfare and strategy, and— Carey gasped at the sight of the monkeys dancing across the purple quilt folded at the foot of the bed. The rest of the room was painfully neat. A quick check of the dresser drawers showed that the clothes once strewn across the floor were gone, while the two frames that had held the Halloween picture and Harry’s drawing of Gaby now had pictures of the ship and crew from Firefly. How…? The pair of tiny throw pillows anchoring the bedding held her answer. Marley.

  Even though the other woman knew Carey would never willingly return to the St. Helens, she’d somehow found a copy of her old quilt and made sure Carey’s room was waiting. Family, she realized. They may have your back, but they still throw in a couple of stupid little pillows to annoy you. Just because they can.

  Straightening her shoulders, she crossed the room to her old bathroom. Turning in the doorway, she raised an eyebrow to him. Her smile was, she thought, getting better. “Last one in’s a…mwfff!” His mouth slanted over hers in an affirmation of life after the horrors of the day. Then their hands were everywhere, pulling off their own and each other’s clothes as he walked her back into the shower, fumbling at the wall behind him for the controls.

  “Yosh, wait! The water takes a while to get…” Too late, as freezing water had them gasping. But he just wrapped arms around her and proceeded to heat them both before the hot water ever kicked in.

  It was the middle of the night when she slipped out of bed and pulled the purple quilt up over his chest and shoulders. She bent over him for a moment, watching the moonlight gild his sleeping face, then turned to the connecting door to Connor’s room. One of the other imps—Mike this time, she thought—stirred from the couch, nodded at her, and left the room. She pulled the blanket from the back of the couch, wrapped it around herself, and leaned back to watch her brother’s face.

  »»•««

  That floor was weird. Squares of… Carey peered closer. Marble? White, slightly shimmering stone alternated with ebony so dark it swallowed all light beneath her black leather boots. She tried to lift one of the boots to check that her knives were sheathed, but couldn’t move her feet.

  “I can’t move mine either, Midget.”

  She smiled to hear that frustrated tone in Connor’s voice. He looked wonderful. Like her, he was dressed completely in black and carried a shield and a spear.

  “Oh, come on, Parker.” Claire’s voice behind her was disgusted. “I get the t-shirt with that Ø symbol for Null City. But what’s with Bishop’s hat and the spear?”

  “Could be worse.” Peter laughed from the square next to Claire. “At least you’re not stuck with a helmet that has a damn horse tail down the back.”

  Twisting to look behind her—she heard Claire snicker as Carey’s boots wouldn’t move, and gave her a middle-finger salute—she saw the squares at her back were occupied by two people wearing crowns. One was Poppy, whose crown looked like the City skyline. The other was a man who looked like a statue she’d seen of the God Zeus, only he was wearing black jeans and had a pair of dark sunglasses hooked against his crown. His black T-shirt had a train logo. Metro? They were both staring at their hands, each clasping huge swords whose points rested on the ground between their feet.

  Next to Poppy, she saw Claire in her bishop’s hat. Amidst the general headgear-related bitching, Leigh Ann trotted off, flipping her long ponytail. Her black shirt seemed to be flickering. Carey blinked as Leigh Ann reached the group clad in white robes facing them from the opposite side of the checkered squares, her long white robe now a match for those around her. Down from her, Marley was also wearing white, but it was a T-shirt and jeans that changed to black as she strolled to the empty square next to Metro and pulled on a bishop’s hat like Claire’s. Iax was next to Marley, and Peter next to Claire, both looking uncomfortable in Centurion’s helmets with long horsehair plumes The empty squares next to Iax and Peter held what looked like Harry’s silver knife and a badly wrinkled tie.

  “Are we really here?” Carey didn’t know why she was whispering. “The chess pieces on my connections game board?”

  “I’m still unconscious.” Connor sounded sheepish. “It was the only way I could talk to you. But…” He shook his head in disgust, raising his voice so those around could hear. “The hats are all her doing. And the spears.”

  “You think we don’t know that?” Claire’s voice was, as always, serene. “I’m the one who had to wake up every day at the Academy to walls plastered with illustrations from the Annotated Encyclopedia of Weapons and Warfare.”

  “Well if you’d paid attention back then, you’d know that what I’m holding is a spear.” Carey pointed to the weapon in Claire’s hands. “You and Marley have javelins, and Peter and Iax have lances. Honestly, woman. How did you ever make it through the Academy?”

  Twisting again, Carey saw that the row of square tiles to her left each contained a member of her team—Zach, Anton, and Connor. To her right was… She sucked in a breath. Gaby! Smiling at her! Beyond her, holding Gaby’s hand, was a man she didn’t recognize. Then at the end, another unknown woman and man. The woman was holding her shirt out from her body, head twisted to look at the Ø. Grinning at Carey, she waved her spear.

  Carey turned back to her brother. “Connor!” For some reason, her voice was a whisper. She cleared her throat. “It’s Gaby! Do you see? Does that mean my connections are back?”

  “You can’t really lose something that’s in every part of you.” His smile was that same little lift of his lips that barely lit his eyes. “Most the Metro could do was borrow it for a while.”

  “But what does it all mean?”

  “It’s your dream. You tell me.” He shrugged. “I just stepped in to have a word with you. Good to know about Gaby, though.”

  And there it was. That full-on Connor laugh that made her want to hold her hands up to his warmth and joy. But even as she reached out for his hand, those on the surrounding squares began to fade away. Gaby was trying to say something, raising her hand to point at an enormous ring on her finger, but she was gone.

  Carey gripped Connor’s hand. “Wait! What did you want to tell me?”

  To her surprise, he remained solid, his smooth hand cool but steady in hers. “Our task. When I was following that group that tried to ambush you near the St. Helens, I heard them talking. Narcorial’s team in Seattle has just grabbed the Director of the Accords Academy. They want to trade him for some guy called Rian. That’s where we need to be.”

  “But you’re sick. Unconscious.”

  He hesitated. “I’m trying to wake up, but I can’t quite make it. You’ll have to take me to Seattle with you anyway, because we both have to be there. I might be the only one who can stop Narcorial, and that probably means your job is to save Rian.”
r />   “Okay.”

  “Did you just agree with me, Midget? Now I know I’m dreaming.” He flashed that grin, and she was alone.

  Except…warm arms folded around her, pulling her against a hard chest. She opened her eyes to see a purple quilt wrapping them both. “This is getting to be a habit with you.”

  Yosh grunted a soft affirmative, and leaned back against the sofa. She shifted in his lap until she could see the slight smile on Connor’s sleeping face, and closed her eyes.

  She woke in heaven. At least, that’s what it smelled like. “Pancakes?” She and Yosh stared at each other. “What if Zach gets there first?” After a glance to confirm that Connor still slept, both bolted for the door.

  In the kitchen, Peter had just put a mountain of pancakes on the table. Leigh Ann, Anton, Marley, and the imps each took a few. Zach simply pulled the rest of the platter in front of himself.

  “Hey!” Carey protested.

  “Not to worry,” Claire assured her. She whipped a towel off of another platter and bowed. “We’ve got you covered.”

  “Peter, if you weren’t marrying Claire,” Carey began.

  Claire and Yosh frowned. Peter smiled.

  “Well, then you wouldn’t be getting married.” Carey grabbed the platter and headed to the table. “Pass the syrup.”

  Over breakfast, she filled them in on her dream, or vision, or…whatever. “So,” she concluded. “Connor and I need to get to Seattle. But the rest of you…” Everyone looked at each other. Claire wiped her mouth with a napkin and stood up. “When do we leave?”

  Chapter Thirty

  July 2011: Seattle, Washington

  Carey’s phone buzzed as Yosh drove the huge club van across the King County line. From her position on the back of Peter’s bike, Claire had forwarded Jeffers' text. Accords. Your office.

  Just under an hour later, they were all in Claire’s office, having dragged extra chairs in from the lunch room. Even for a Sunday night, the building was too quiet. “Where is everybody?” Claire and Peter looked at each other. The Accords Agency had official hours posted on their door, but Carey had been there at every possible hour of the day or night, weekends, holidays, and one extremely memorable Christmas Eve. There were always people around.