Swallowing hard and ignoring my growling stomach, I watched Boone, who ate slowly, but he was eating a bit of everything. I wanted to see what type of reactions he was having to the food, though I may as well have been reading a blank slate.
Cautiously, I poked the blue substance with a wooden utensil that looked like a cross between a shallow spoon and a spatula. Then I tried it. It was tart. Very, very tart. Without noticing, I ate an air bubble. When it popped in my mouth, the hot steam released, leaving a sweet taste in its wake.
I tried bits of other things. The meat was more like chicken than I had expected, but there were little white pieces embedded in each bite. Gristle, maybe? When I chewed, it seemed like gristle. The stuffing was bark. There was no way around it. It was bark, with maybe a few roots or something. I tried a little of the brown substance on top, but the flavor didn't improve, turning more bitter than I was prepared for.
Nevertheless, it was food. When I saw the gremlins take seconds, I added more of the blue stuff and meat to my plate, but passed on the rest.
"You might not want to eat too much," Boone said, keeping his voice low.
"I don't think there's much fear of that."
He grinned, but went on. "My digestive system is used to different types of foods. If yours isn't, you may want to wait a while before you eat anything else."
I hadn't thought of that. At the same time, I was starving. I ate a little more of the blue stuff and meat, but stopped there.
A commotion at one end of the clearing caused heads to turn. I heard the clatter of wooden place settings being dropped. Then I saw the gremlins and Wyna move their chairs back from the tables.
Then we were overrun with gremlins, the old gremlins, the ones I was used to. They jumped on the tables, the chairs, and even on top of the young ones. The younger gremlins tried to ignore them as best they could, like a rude, uninvited guest, but one they didn't want to offend. It took dedication to ignore a gremlin bouncing up and down on your lap.
One crawled up on me and tugged on my shirt, then clattered up onto the table and ate some of the blue stuff. I had expected the gremlin to eat with their hands or put their faces into bowls. Instead, they snatched up the spatulas and fed themselves.
Some of the younger people were having trouble staying in their chairs as the older ones pulled on their clothing. It then struck me, I wondered if the old ones were their parents. Their parents wanting them to come away from the table to play.
I had to cover my mouth to stifle the giggle. Not a laugh, but a giggle, and I didn't care. It was cute. Another gremlin ended up in my lap and it started to nibble on my arm playfully.
This might work with other gremlins, with their tough looking skin. But the old gremlin’s pointed teeth sank straight into my skin. I yelped and slapped a hand over the holes that were starting to bleed. It stung like mad.
The table went quiet. I looked around, worried I had broken some sort of etiquette. Not that it would bother me too much if I did. They had put me on trial and sentenced me to something, after all.
The little gremlin in my lap patted my arm gently.
"You okay?" Boone asked.
"Yeah, I don't think it knew our skin isn't quite as tough as theirs."
"You didn't, did you?" I asked, forcing a smile and looking down at the old one.
Noise broke out again, as though it hadn't stopped. The gremlin jumped off my lap, and before long, the old ones had their fill and started finding spots to lie down.
Hearing things falling and breaking in a nearby house, I guessed not all of them had decided to sleep under the stars.
"Time to go for night," Wyna said.
"What do we do?" Boone asked.
"Go to central house. Room for you there."
"Where's that?" I asked, still holding the stinging bite on my arm.
Wyna spoke to a gremlin before addressing us again. "Aghrah will lead. I will come in morning."
Aghrah stood, and without waiting for a response from us, he walked away. We had to hurry around the table to keep up. He led us to a house, slightly larger than some of the others, and opened a room for us.
"Thank you," I said uncertainly.
Boone ducked and entered the room and I followed, shutting the door behind me. He opened the bag and rummaged around. I went straight for one of the beds. There were four in the room along with one table and two benches.
"I wonder if they have showers or a bath," I said.
"Not that I've seen," Boone said. He tossed the first-aid kit to me. "Clean your arm, though."
"It's okay, it just stings a bit."
"Clean it and wrap it well," Boone said. "If it gets infected in this world there's not much we can do."
My nose curled up at the idea. "I hadn't thought about that."
Once the arm was cleaned up and covered, I stowed the first-aid kit and fell into bed.
"Tomorrow we go back to the portal," I said, staring up at the ceiling.
"We'll need to figure out what we're doing after that."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
Boone shrugged. "How long do we wait? We'll need to decide."
My heart sunk. He didn't think we were going to get back.
It was always a possibility, but one I was prepared to ignore. "We don't have to decide yet."
He didn't say anything, but I heard him get into another bed.
***
Light streamed through the windows, but I wasn't in a hurry to get up. We'd be going back to camp, and while I knew we needed to be there, I also knew I'd miss having other people around. Even if I didn't know the language, it was enough that they were there.
When I heard Boone moving, I finally relented and got up.
"Think they'd let us drag a bed back with us?" I asked.
"They're a lot heavier than they look," Boone said. "They left us breakfast."
My stomach wasn't feeling its best after dinner last night, but food was food at this point. We ate in virtual silence until someone opened the door and poked their head in, making what might have been polite inquiries as to our whereabouts. It could just as easily been a crude joke at our expense, but it sounded all the same to me, so I'd pretend it was polite.
I grabbed our bag and we left the house. Outside, there were gremlins lined up, and we walked between two rows facing one another to Wyna, who stood waiting for us.
Wyna beamed and it looked almost sincere, but there was a hint of darkness beneath the look that still made me not trust the woman.
"So," I said, "we're free to go?"
"Yes," Wyna said. "And they are giving you this." She took a cloth-wrapped package from the gremlin next to her and gave it to Boone. "Food," she added when Boone pulled back a corner and inspected the contents. "And these." She passed over two short spears, each one with a sharp tip that appeared to have been baked out of clay.
"Um, thanks," I said.
"You have water," Wyna said. "And this for you." She handed me a little bottle. "They are sorry about the injury and want you to drink tonight."
"Um, okay," I said.
"It will stimulate healing, but takes several days," Wyna said.
"Well, um, thanks. Tell them thank you," I said. I turned the sturdy little bottle of red glass around in my hand. It was the first time I had seen glass here.
"Now, you face the beast," Wyna said.
"We're going back to our camp, and then going home, I hope," I said.
"Yes," Wyna said. "That is where you will face the creature."
"What?" I tried to keep the accusation out of my voice.
"That is your sentence. To be fair, they are luring the creature to you," Wyna said.
"That's not—"
Boone interrupted me before I had a chance to get a good grip on my anger. "Maybe it's not as bad as we think it is. What is it they want us to do?"
Wyna grinned and looked straight at Boone while speaking to the gremlins. Two ran off. "Fair question. They created a sample
of the creature."
While awkwardly holding the spear they had given me, I crossed my arms. "You're asking us to kill something."
"Kill the killer, yes," Wyna said.
"This isn't our world," Boone said. "We don't go to other worlds and kill things."
Wyna cocked her head. "This is not a creature of this world. Like me, like you, it is not from here."
"We only have your word that this thing is causing trouble," I said. "For all we know, you’re causing the trouble." It was the wrong thing to say.
Wyna's eyes hardened, but before she could say anything, the two gremlins returned carrying a small statue.
"This is the beast," Wyna said.
I looked at the figure and blinked, not believing what I saw. Large wings spread out from the smaller body. The metal gleamed, but I knew in real life that the creature would be inky black with leathery wings. It had a long beak, even though I knew it could speak in some semblance of our language.
"It looks like a pterodactyl," Boone said.
Chapter 14
My heart nearly seized when Boone's words cemented my understanding. "How did it get here?" I demanded.
"We do not know," Wyna said.
"You didn't call it here?" I asked, not wanting my dread to take hold.
"No one I know would bring this here," Wyna said with a cruel glint in her eyes.
"Where did it come into this world?"
"We do not know. We know where the killing began," Wyna said.
"What have you done to stop it? What have you tried?"
Wyna shook her head. "Nothing that worked."
"Is it at least injured?" I asked, barely waiting for her whole answer.
"No one has been able to damage the beast," Wyna said.
My heart pounded and I breathed heavily, but I couldn't take in enough air.
"Do you know what this is?" Boone asked.
"You people lured it to our camp?" I asked, hoping I had misunderstood something along the way.
"For you, yes. For easy access," Wyna said. Her grin was back, and this time she showed teeth.
I looked around at all the gremlins, then back to Wyna. "You let it get this close to a village?"
Wyna shrugged. "That is why we are sending you. If you are unable to deal with the creature it will not matter how far away they live."
She was right about that. A creature like this could devastate this world.
"Cassie," Boone said a little louder. "Do you know what this thing is?"
I glanced at him before turning back to Wyna. "How far away is this thing now? Is it going to be there when we get back?"
"Depends on speed it travels. You have more information than we."
I rubbed my forehead and tried to think fast. There had to be a way out of this.
"Agent Heidrich," Boone snapped. "Answer the question."
"Yes!" I yelled. "Okay, yes, I know what it is."
"Is it a dinosaur?" Boone asked.
"No, it looks like a dinosaur, a sordis, I think, but it isn’t one." I tried to wrack my brain for everything that Logan, Rider, and I had discussed when we had last faced the monster. "And it's a demon."
"A demon." Boone looked at me blankly, not getting the magnitude of the issue.
"Yes, and if you haven't run across one, count yourself lucky." It couldn't be the same one, could it?
"I've heard of things called demons," Boone said, "but I haven't heard that from anyone in the agency."
"They're not allowed in our world," I said.
"They are not allowed here, but it could not be prevented,” Wyna said.
"Have you see one before?" I asked.
She shook her head. "No, in your world, many things are called demon. Including humans."
I nodded and looked blankly at the gremlins. They remained standing in their rigid lines. Turning my attention to the short spear they had given me, I couldn't see how it would be any help in a fight with this thing.
"You need to get the gremlins farther away," I said. "There was mention of a city. Maybe it will avoid something larger."
"You wish them leave their homes?" Wyna asked.
"I want them to survive," I snapped. "This thing will make short work of this place."
"I speak with the leaders, but make no guarantees," Wyna said.
"Try," I pressed.
Wyna nodded, though she looked reluctant. She started screeching at the gremlins, and they broke their formation and moved to the village square.
"Now," Boone said, "it's time you fill me in. If you've fought something like this before, we might have some sort of advantage."
Needing to get a grip on myself, I took a few meditative breaths. "I can't see any sort of advantage, but you know more about fighting than I do. Wyna's right, there are lots of things called demons, even by the agency. This is only one of them, but it's one I've run into before."
"How did you beat it?" Boone asked.
"With Logan, Rider, and I working together, we brought it down, but we... we weren't able to keep hold of it."
"I need to know everything you know," Boone said.
He wasn't wrong, so I told him. The entire story of our previous director and the deal he had made. How we had tracked it, lured it out, and brought it back to the agency. Then, how it had opened a portal directly in the office and made its escape. Everything I could remember, I told Boone.
"Your advantage," I said, wrapping things up, "it will want to kill me above all else."
"They made it sound like an animal," Boone said.
"It's one of the Lost," I said. "It's smart, careful, and calculating."
"And you're saying it can use the Path?" Boone asked.
"It uses energy. The Path in our world doesn't much like the creature, but it steals energy from it." Sadly, I had learned many tricks from the demon, including how to make the Path solid, but Boone didn't need to know that.
"But you can take it down?" Boone asked.
"What? No! Last time it took me, an elf, and a werewolf, and we were still badly injured. And it got away."
"You know more about it now, though. And our goal will be different this time."
"How so?" I asked.
"You were trying to capture it. I don't think we have that option here."
"You want to kill one of the Lost?" I asked.
"Do I want to? No. But they've lured it to the portal and we need that site."
Feeling miserable, I shook my head. "Maybe I can lure it farther away." There was no real hope for that. It was a temporary solution, if anything.
"No. Our only hope at this is going to be to stick together and fight together."
There was no hope for that, but I kept that thought to myself. We couldn’t go into a fight with this thing with a defeatist attitude. Well, at least we both couldn’t.
"Do you have something in mind?" I asked.
Boone hesitated. "Not yet, but I will. If this is going to work, though, we're going to have to plan and execute as a team."
"You mean we have to trust each other," I said.
"Yes." He didn't look abashed at the question.
I shrugged. "You're the soldier here. I'll trust your judgment. The problem is that I'll see things you won't. Can you trust me if something changes?"
There was another hesitation. "You've had my back so far."
He didn't sound convinced of his own words.
"You know as well as I do, this is different," I said, not pretending I believed him. "As far as the fight goes, I'll follow your lead."
A hint of a grin appeared. "Even if I give an order?"
"In a fight, absolutely," I said. "If you try to make me peel potatoes or whatever, we'll have a problem. But you're not going to have all the facts when you're giving the order. If you say flank left and I see a barrier invisible to you, what are you going to do when I don't go left?"
Boone rolled his shoulders. "Do you know what it means to flank left?"
He was playing
for time, so I went with it. "Is it your left or mine? Or someone else's? I never asked."
He grinned again. This time it reached his eyes. "Let's go with your left."
"Your call," I said. "In all seriousness, though, if you use hand signals, I'm going to have to make things up as I go along."
He laughed. "Maybe I can teach you a few."
The laughter helped me catch control of my frantically pounding heart and get a grip on myself. "Outside of agency training, that's the first time someone has offered to teach me the hand signals. How is it everyone automatically knows them?"
"It must be a guy thing," Boone said.
That made me crack a smile. "I think it's more of a 'not Cassie,' thing. While you're at it, you can tell me what you do when you keep watch, especially when there's not a tree to lean against."
"Sure thing," Boone said with a grin. Although he still looked in decent spirits, he turned serious. "We both need to get familiar with each other's strengths and weaknesses in a fight. And we'll need to learn fast."
"Let's get started, then," I said.
Boone nodded at something behind me. "We may need to wait till we're outside of town."
Wyna walked over with a small group of gremlins, each one carrying a spear and wearing wooden slats on their forearms.
"There was some success," Wyna said. She appeared to be in a better mood than she had been earlier. "A few will leave."
"And the others?" Boone asked.
"Some will stay and some will travel with you," Wyna said.
"What? Why?" I asked.
"To understand," Wyna said.
"If they're coming with us they might not get the chance to understand anything." I looked around at the gremlins. The largest was a half foot shorter than I was.
"Not the right words," Wyna said, appearing to think. "If you fail, they will know more."
"They're going to stay out of the way?" Boone asked.
Wyna shrugged. "They will fight if they know they will win. They will not take orders from you."
"That sounds familiar," Boone said, again with a hint of a grin. "Ask them to stay back during the fight until the creature is down."
"I will ask them, but they will do what they do," Wyna said.
AIR Series Box Set Page 110