by Lee Roland
“Iameth,” she cried into the night. “Brothers, Sisters, I invoke the Oath of Elder. Peace and life among us.”
The hounds stopped, frozen and silent. Then the lead hound shook his head like flies buzzed around his ears. Maeve could hear his ragged breath. He raised his head and stared at her. A moan tore out of his throat, a piteous sound filled with agony; it rose in pitch until it became a vicious howl. A compulsion spell. Left to themselves, the hounds might have heeded the Oath, but a malicious magic drove them on.
Maeve braced herself as the lead hound climbed closer. It opened its mouth and lunged. She jammed the rod in its eye. The hound howled and jerked away.
The second one leaped over the first and received the same wound. In their pain and fury, the two attacked each other, tearing and shredding flesh and bone, thereby insuring the others behind them couldn’t pass.
A horn blasted the night, once, twice, calling off the hounds. Why not? They had her cornered. The uninjured pack members obeyed, but the two ripping each other to shreds at Maeve’s feet were beyond the calling.
At least a dozen men emerged from the alley behind the hounds.
“Go now, Harriet,” Maeve said.
“Nope.” Harriet raised her wings as if she were an eagle.
“Harriet, please.”
“Gonna stay for show.”
“What?”
The sound came first, a graveyard moan, then a whisper…from where? Maeve gazed up into the midnight sky. Filled with magic, witch-sight opened her eyes and senses.
A maelstrom, a whirlpool of power, circled above the buildings like a funnel to a starless, alien universe. Had her spell created that? Not likely. She’d never seen so much enchanted energy in one place, except perhaps at Immal’s adobe. Her body quivered as the tempest sucked away the magic she planned to use for her final blow, leaving her empty and helpless.
The hounds fell silent. Several men, the more intelligent, broke away and raced back through the alley. Maeve didn’t blame them. If they could see the hounds, they could see the doom hanging above; proximity to that much power could only be disastrous.
The empty lot, the junction of four alleys, the ramshackle shed, and Maeve’s broken fire escape crouched under the thumb of liquid doom.
Harriet bit Maeve’s ear. “Go!”
Maeve didn’t hesitate. She leaped over the dying Slough Hounds and ran.
“No, no,” Harriet yelled. “Meant go up, stupid!”
Too late. Like God flushing a toilet in heaven—Maeve asked for it, didn’t she? A tidal wave poured from the sky.
Maeve made it to an abandoned car, leapt on the hood, then to the roof. She jumped up and grabbed a rusted sign jutting from a building. Throwing her legs up, she wrapped herself around the metal sign support.
The water slammed into her like a giant fist.
The flood must have reached twenty feet on the alley walls. If she’d run to the top of the fire escape, as Harriet wanted her to, she’d be above it. Water tore at Maeve’s body with freezing fingers. Desperate, she tried to keep her face against her arms so the flood wouldn’t force water up her nose. Wait. Salt water? From the ocean? How had that happened? Objects rushed by her, possibly men or hounds. Once, a large object gently bumped her before moving on.
How long could it last? How long could she hold her breath? The sign jerked, giving way to the relentless drag of her body in the flood. Another jerk, and the water caught her, tore her and the sign loose, then rolled her over and plunged her down. Time ran out, and like consciousness, memory faded away in the dark.
****
Maeve opened her eyes. Harriet squatted on her chest, staring at her. They’d made it. But how? Cloth rustled, and Flor knelt beside her.
“How are you?” Flor asked.
“Other than being crushed by a bird, I’m fine. How’d I get here?”
“I have no idea and Harriet won’t talk. We broke in here to wait like you said and—”
“Raymond!” Maeve struggled to sit up. Flor caught her arm while Harriet lifted off.
“He’s fine. I found some blankets and a heater that worked.”
The large room was warm. A seemingly empty glass jar glowed and gave a yellow tinge to the high ceiling and concrete floor. “What’s that?” Maeve pointed to the jar.
“A potion I mixed up so you could see,” Flor told her.
Flor had placed a folded blanket under Maeve’s head, and Raymond lay across the room wrapped in others. His eyes were open, and he smiled at her.
Maeve relaxed. “No water came in here?”
“Water?” Flor frowned.
“The flood came…how far are we from the shed?”
“A block and a half. Raymond couldn’t go any farther. It was quiet until Harriet started screeching at the door. When I opened it, there you were. Unconscious.”
“Oh.” Maeve didn’t know what else to say. Had she dreamed it? No matter—and no time. They had to go. “Is it daylight yet?”
“Maeve, what’s the matter with you? We’ve only been here an hour. It’s not even midnight.”
Maeve ran her fingers through her short curls—her short dry curls. Her jeans and jacket? Dry too. “Inaras, help us,” she whispered. But it wasn’t Inaras who’d brought the flood down on the Slough Hounds and their handlers. Another power had answered her call and rescued her. She lifted the small sack of Immal from her pocket. It rolled in her fingers like a plastic bag full of soft pudding.
“I think I should take that back.” Flor bit her lip and held out her hand. “We might need it later.”
Maeve stood and dusted off her jeans. “Harriet?”
Harriet perched on a broken chair across the room. Barely visible, her eyes caught the jar’s light and reflected like gold coins.
She resisted the urge to sigh. It wouldn’t do any good. “You’re not going to answer any questions, are you, bird?”
The harpy grumbled.
“Okay, I won’t ask. But I have to tell you, when we get to Elder…” Threats were useless. Maeve had tried them before. Threats, guilt, coercion, and manipulation simply didn’t work on harpies—or dragons. “I’ll try to get the van. Come on, Harriet. You can fly lookout.”
Maeve slipped out into a clear cool night. Slick streets, dirty puddles, and drains blocked with debris told of recent rain, but nothing of a flood. A block and a half, Flor had said. Should she go back to the alley and look? No. Enough for one night—she was alive.
The van sat parked where she left it, and the other vehicles were gone. A faint scrape and gurgle behind her made her turn.
A dying Slough Hound dragged itself along the sidewalk toward her. One malevolent eye gleamed from its torn, bleeding head. With a great sigh, it relaxed.
Maeve went to it. She moved as close as she dared and dropped to her knees. The hounds were, by their nature, disposed to serve evil, but they were a small evil in the world of magic. And a greater wickedness controlled them now. Magic enough to take them from their home and compel them to attack. Looking into the single eye, Maeve whispered the prayer for a fallen soldier.
“Great Master, thy servant beseeches thee, send thy daughter Inaras to take this warrior home.”
The hound groaned. Its agony seized Maeve’s sense of honor, justice, and compassion, and twisted it into blind hatred. The crime, using the Iameth of Elder as common animals could not go unpunished. Maeve again gathered as much magic she could and held tight.
“Inaras, thy daughter beseeches thee;
Curse him who sent this pawn to die;
May food be foul in his mouth;
May his body fail and mind weaken;
May he find no respite except in death.”
Maeve placed her hand on the hound’s shoulder, and as the beast died, she released the curse to fly back to its master. A pinprick, no more, against the power that controlled the hounds, but a hit nevertheless.
Harriet’s toenails clicked on the sidewalk beside her.
&nbs
p; “Yeah, Harriet, I know. Curses are black magic, Tana would be ashamed of me and—”
The Slough Hound’s single eye popped open, and it growled.
Harriet squawked, flapped, and threw herself in the air.
Maeve had her hand on the dying animal’s shoulder when the curse delivered the message. The unknown being she damned had followed that curse back across the web of magic to her. She jerked her hand away and broke the connection.
The hound’s body stilled.
Harriet landed on Maeve’s shoulder. “Bad, bad, bad. Told you! Bad—”
“Shut up!”
Harriet flew away.
****
Alex remembered exactly what happened in the alley. His memory took him back to where he followed the Commander, hating it, hating being there. They’d headed into the alley, having received word that the girl had been trapped at last. There was no way out this time. The Commander abruptly stopped. Alex saw the reason.
A reservoir of roiling, sparkling water hovered right above the buildings. A churning mass of doom poised to obliterate everything. He could smell it. The ocean, low tide. Impossible.
The Commander whirled and ran. Alex was on his heels.
The colossal tidal wave crashed down.
Three of them, the last three to enter the alley, made it out. Alex, the Commander—and Taggert.
But the giant wave rolled Alex along the pavement. He covered his head with his arms, trying to protect it at least. The flood slammed him into the double tires of a big truck. He’d made it far enough out of the alley the water spread out and dissipated in mere seconds.
Coughing, blowing salty water from his mouth and nose, he struggled to his feet. The Commander, on his knees, was doing the same.
Taggert had recovered first. His face contorted into a snarl worthy of a rabid dog. He ran up and smashed the Commander’s head with the butt of the rifle he’d somehow managed to hang onto. It made a sickening crack on his skull. The Commander collapsed. Taggert directed the rifle barrel toward his leader.
Alex raced to them. Taggert heard him and lifted the gun—too late. Alex’s fist smashed square into his face. The impact of the blow sent a shock up Alex’s arm. Taggert went sprawling on his back. Without hesitation, Alex lifted his boot and stomped down. He crushed the man’s throat. Taggert choked and gasped in a desperate and futile attempt to breathe. His struggle didn’t last long.
Alex grabbed his barely conscious Commander under the arms and dragged him to safety. His mind raced. He’d killed a man. Would that weigh heavily on him in the good and evil of his life? The doubt that filled him was not for Taggert. Taggert was a killer. But what was the man whose life he had saved? The one who had left two bodies buried in shallow graves in the desert. Taggert would have killed in a burning rage. The Commander killed with detached, brutal efficiency. How would that balance the scales?
Alex knelt, lifted the Commander’s head, and cushioned it as he revived. As he waited, Alex licked his lips. Salt water? How could that be? He gazed down, and cold blue eyes stared up at him. Alex knew he was being assessed in a new light.
The Commander struggled to his feet. He staggered and Alex steadied him, but it didn’t take long for the man to recover. Neither of them spoke while they worked a cover up of the event—the disaster. He dragged what bodies he could find into a pile in the shadows.
The Commander, fully recovered, helped by tossing the dead with one hand, much as he had tossed the man in the desert. Hounds they called the vile creatures. They were not dogs. They had lain in their cages, huffing and drooling until released, then they followed an unseen master when they entered the alley. Were they here for the dragon? They probably couldn’t kill it, but they could distract the beast. Their bodies went on the pile with the others. Impact from the flood, slammed against buildings and pavement, appeared to be their primary killer.
The Commander made phone calls, and then they waited in silence until a truck arrived to collect the evidence. With all the resources he’d had at his disposal, his plan to capture one woman, one remarkable woman, had once again ended in utter failure.
Alex and his Commander went to one of the Jeep’s parked far enough away to be safe and drove to a hotel. The Commander didn’t speak until they were in a room.
His thoughts came back to the present when the Commander’s phone rang. Once, twice, three times. The Commander punched a button and put it to his ear. He didn’t say hello, just sat on a bed and listened. “I’ll be there,” he said. He tossed the phone aside.
The man whose powerful presence dominated Alex’s life for weeks, sat staring at the floor. The Commander had failed. Even with powerful resources at his command, he had failed. He’d been set against and bested by incredible and unknown forces. Whomever she was, this girl had more going for her than an injured dragon.
The Commander raised his eyes and stared at Alex, and Alex could almost feel the weight of that gaze. The look on his face was bitter for a second, and then it faded to show a total lack of emotion.
“You want to leave, Hania? You can. You should. There’s money in a bag in the back of the Jeep. Take it.”
Alex shook his head. “I don’t have anywhere to go. Anywhere I want to go.”
The Commander laughed. It sounded not humorous, but full of bitterness and irony. “I’ll probably get you killed before this is over.”
Alex’s sense of survival had told him he should leave. Take the offer and go. A deeper, wilder part of him wanted to heed the call to a life different from any he imagined. The storm he had called across a dry landscape, the creatures he’d seen, memories drifting in, stronger each day—that was what he wanted. He wanted to be with the man, the one man who could offer him everything—including the possibility of a violent death.
The Commander remained focused on Alex. He smiled, evil, dark. “Oh, I see. You’ll stay for the dragon.”
Alex let logic and reason go, and spoke the truth that had been building in him. “I’ll stay for the magic, yes. The dragon. And I’ll stay for you.”
The Commander stood and gripped Alex’s shoulder, his fingers squeezed tight. Only for a moment, but long enough for Alex to know he’d been accepted.
Alex had risked his life; he had killed for this lethal man. And tomorrow? What would he see? Learn? Something fabulous? Something deadly? He was sure of that.
Chapter Nine
“You’re so skinny,” Ryder said. “What’s happened?”
Maeve stretched like a cat as he ran his hand down her body. Yes, she’d lost weight. “Hard times,” she told him. She’d last seen Ryder in California. They had spent a week by the beach once, sleeping all day and making love all night.
She’d found Ryder yesterday when they stopped for gas south of Columbus, Ohio. The convoluted path cost Maeve time, but she hoped for the best, and along came her favorite truck driver.
Willing to make a show of leaving the truck stop alone and meet them after dark, Ryder watched without comment as Maeve sank the mini-van in a deep lake Harriet found. Raymond’s hair and eyes seemed to intrigue him, but he asked no questions. He brought them to his mountain home in West Virginia, only a hundred and fifty miles from Elder.
His fingers brushed across her lips. “You in trouble again?”
“Sort of.”
“Stay here with me. I’ll take care of you.” A big man, he dragged her on top of him like a blanket. Maeve laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat. Ryder would try to take care of her. She feared that most. He couldn’t match the power following them, and he’d die trying.
Outside, thunder growled then rumbled away, leaving only gentle rain on a tin roof of the comfortable log house. Powerful magic shivered in the air around Maeve. In a bedroom down the hall, Flor and Raymond cast their own spell of love and desire. Harriet insisted on staying outside on the porch. Maeve sometimes forgot the harpy was a bird, too. Maeve moved up a little and kissed Ryder.
“When I get Raymond
and Flor to Elder, I’ll come back—for a while.”
Like Joe Don and Charlie, Ryder Lawson loved her. Unlike them, she once thought of staying with him. His house in the mountains could be home when they weren’t on the road. But magic needs magic and, like Raymond and Harriet, it would find her eventually. If she stayed long enough, he would begin to see things he wouldn’t understand. She didn’t know if her mountain man-trucker could deal with a different world.
“Maeve,” he said, “you know how I feel.”
“I know. Ryder, I—”
“It doesn’t matter. Listen, when you don’t have anywhere else to go, you always come to me.” Outside, the rain faded to a whisper.
The next morning, Ryder led them downstairs to a garage beneath the house. “No more hitching rides. No more stolen cars. And yes, I know that van had to be stolen. I want you to take my pickup. You can bring it back when you’re finished. Then you and me can talk.”
“Are you sure?” Maeve hugged him. “I’ve been kind of hard on vehicles the last few weeks.”
“I noticed. Give me a ride to the bottom of the hill so I can get the rig, then it’s all yours.”
Chapter Ten
“Is it April or May?” Maeve asked Flor.
“May.”
“Oh. Guess that’s why everything’s so green. Sort of lost track of time somehow.”
They’d stopped at a grocery store, then found an empty roadside park. A little off the road, lay a meadow. A mass of green, saffron, and white that stretched like a floral bedspread to the woods. The sweet scent of wildflowers filled the air. Blessed Spring had arrived in full measure.
Harriet caught a couple of mice before coming back to scratch through popcorn Maeve spread out on another table. Raymond had left them to walk in the woods.
A coal-black bird on a limb above them caught Maeve’s eye. “Wow. That’s a big crow.”
“Not exactly a crow. It’s a raven,” Flor told her. “A western raven. I’ve met him before. He’s a long, long way from home. I wonder if Immal sent him?”