“Disrupt them,” said Dionne. We were reaching the edge of the wooded path now. It was dark, a gaping mouth in the tree line leading to the cursed grass. “Magic wants focus. So we take their focus. Use them water pistols, and then run if you gotta.”
Once we entered the path, we slowed. It was too dark to do more than creep along. I supposed that was the smarter thing to do anyway. It was cooler here, and the trees were full of tiny night sounds that jangled my nerves. What the hell were we going to find at the end of this path? I’d had a few self-defense classes back in the day, but I wasn’t a fighter. I’d put money on Cherry or Dionne being capable of some ass-kicking, but even they struck me as street scrappers at best.
We’d set up the wards so that they shut the hungry grass out. It made for an irregular circle, but we’d been thinking that maybe the nain rouge or any of his allies would be hiding in the woods beyond it and would get stuck outside the wards that way. Besides, Cherry and I were barely able to set up the structure where we did without passing out from the sick feelings and general oogie-ness of being that close to the grass with Tamar’s salt circle repelling us.
Having the wards active now helped with that; it put a wall of protection between us and the grass, dampening that sick-itchy feeling and the desire to run. But the grass still put us on edge, and I twitched at every sound, every stray hair that the breeze blew against my neck. As we got closer, I sensed more than saw other presences.
I reached over to take Vivi’s hand and squeeze it, knowing that whatever I was feeling, she had to be feeling way worse. She gripped mine back with such rigor that I glanced at her to see what was wrong.
Someone else stared back at me through Vivi’s eyes. They glinted coldly in a faint shaft of moonlight breaking through the tree branches. Shadows fell deep on the hollows of her face, contorting her features, shaping another face where hers should be. She was pulling on my hand, drawing me close. Those eyes were a predator’s, closing in.
I jerked my hand free and tripped over my own foot, crashing into Cherry, who caught me before I lost my balance. I stumbled, steadied myself, and whipped my head around for another look.
“Mari! Are you okay?” whispered Vivi, catching my elbow. Her face was nearly hidden in the darkness again, but it was hers. I could only nod as breath flooded back into my lungs. No one else seemed to have seen what I had seen.
Tamar stopped and held up a finger to her lips. Just ahead of us, I could make out a huddled mass of bodies crowded around one spot. There was a feeling of intensity, of focus and energy concentrated. If they’d heard us coming, they didn’t show it.
We moved in unplanned harmony, fanning out in a semicircle around them. I could see a hint of a deep red glow at the center of their knot. They were all sounding tones that ran together in an discordant chorus and they were all touching each other.
“Now!” shouted Joe, and without a plan or any idea what we were doing, we fell upon them.
I didn’t know what the others thought, but I wasn’t eager to start trying to cause pain when we were so outnumbered. I just barged in, shoving and yelling, grabbing at bodies and trying to pull them apart, forcing my way into their cluster and waving my arms and making a commotion that was impossible to ignore. Around me, my friends shouted and ducked.
I saw the nain rouge at the center. His blade glowed hot and he hacked at the net woven by the wards; I could see the red shimmer of thick strands of energy in front of him, in the spots where he had frayed them. Joe jumped him from behind, grabbing his knife arm in a half nelson and hanging on for all he was worth. Dionne slid to her knees in front of the ward structure like a runner taking a base and started doing something with it.
Beyond the energy wall, I could see him. Murmur. He stood on the other side, glaring through the red glowing net at us, and he was flanked by others. Many others. All of them standing silent, staring at us, waiting.
A flailing hand whapped me hard upside the head. I stumbled and bounced off of someone else. Everything was a blur around me, just shifting masses and moving limbs, noise and deep shadows and chaos. I flung my arms up, pushing anything that touched me, my feet sliding in the dirt and leaves.
Panic tingled in my chest and tightened my throat as I realized I had no idea what came next. We couldn’t run; all they had to do was let us go and get back to dismantling the wards. There was no way we could beat them all down--and I suddenly knew I was scared to kill them, scared to take the life of another physical, sentient being, if I even had the chance. And if we stayed here and kept fighting, they’d either kill us or subdue us, and break the wards, and leave no defense at all between the bogeys and the innocent people at Morph. My limbs felt weak; I felt like I was drowning as I batted back at everything that shoved and elbowed me.
And then the thought hit me, the one slim chance, and I went with it before I could talk myself out of it. “Wait!” I shouted to the nain rouge. “Truce! Truce! I have something you want!”
Joe didn’t look daggers at me so much as anime-sized broadswords. “No! No deals, remember?”
Ironically, Joe was what made the nain rouge give me a second look. “You came to fight us, and now you want peace?” His voice growled like a rusty engine, with an alien accent.
The cogs of my brain were giving off smoke. I scrambled back, trying to push my way to the edge of the mass where I could break free and run back the way we came. “We don’t care about you,” I babbled, grasping handfuls of bullshit out of thin air. “Your fight isn’t ours. We had to stop you from breaking the wards before they got through. There’s another way but you have to come now.”
“Mari, no!” Cherry pushed toward me.
“I’m listening,” said the nain rouge. “Make it good.”
I backed off further, pulling free of hands that tried to grab my arms. “I made a fairy circle.” That was sort of true. “I made it. I know where it is. There’s nothing but a few country bumpkins out beyond it, but you knew there wouldn’t be many of them, didn’t you? It’s closing. It’ll be gone before dawn.” That was a lie, but close enough to true. “Leave the wards, let my friends guard them. I could lead you out there. You don’t have to wait for those other fae guys to open a door and come through, you can just walk right in with no one to stop you. But we have to go now.”
“Mari!” Sara looked horrified and betrayed. Good. Right now, I needed that.
“We have a deal!” thundered Murmur, snarling and throwing himself against the ward, clawing at it, as it sent off horrid red sparks like an electric fence.
I pointed at him. “He’ll turn on you! When you die, he’ll take your soul the same as anyone else’s. Do you want to take that chance? I guarantee I can’t hurt you like he can. And what will it matter? You’ll be in Faerie, sealed up and safe from him. We’ll be the ones who have to deal with him if we can’t beat him.”
The wild fae, I noticed with a sick feeling, were starting to overpower my friends, pinning them to the ground, forcing them to their knees. My friends still had fight in them, but they needed to not spend it all on these jackwagons with the whole night still ahead of us.
“If you’re lying, it will go badly for us,” mused the nain rouge, with an edge.
I summoned up every last bit of chutzpah I had in me. “So what?” I made it as bold as I could. “Look at him. The damage is done. You listened to me. You considered it for even a moment. So he knows what his deal is really worth to you, and believe me, he won’t let that go unanswered when he busts in here. Seems to me we’re your best chance now. My friends keep them out and you and your crew come with me. Just me. I’ll get you there before the wards fall. You don’t get what you want? Just fucking kill me, then.”
Murmur’s voice was in my head. You’re gambling your friends’ lives. You will lose.
Not if we hold out long enough.
I will give you one chance to save them. On
ly one. Send the girl through to me. Hand her over, and this ends here. Do what you will with the fae creatures.
You have to be kidding me.
You have my word that I will not kill her. Just give her to me.
I turned to stare at him through the infernal red glow that ignited the silver spheres. The missing piece clicked into place. “I know what it is.” I said it half to myself. Then I balled my hands on my hips. “No.”
The demon screamed in rage. My friends were shouting at me.
The nain rouge stepped closer. His gaze flicked sidelong toward the wards, and I saw the tiniest hint of doubt, maybe even fear, as he registered the now-infuriated demon army on the other side of the wards. “Who says I won’t kill you anyway?”
“You do.” I could barely keeping my voice from shaking. “Because you need me to close the door after you.” I threw a meaningful glance at Murmur, then looked back at him and lifted my wrist as if I could see a damn thing out here. “Time’s a-wasting, asshole.”
He considered it. Murmur beat at the wards, buzzing mixing with his furious howls.
I met Tamar’s eyes, tipped my chin in a tiny nod. She tilted her head, narrowed her eyes. I looked back at the nain rouge. “I only want one thing from you. Take this woman when you go.” I pointed at Vivi.
“What the fuck are you doing?” yelled Joe, fighting his captors.
Two of the wild fae grabbed Vivi and dragged her forward as she shrieked in protest and my other friends fought back with fresh vigor. “Why?” said the nain rouge.
“Because she’s poison.” I was sure they could hear my heart hammering. “We’ve done all we can for her, but that thing inside her is taking over and we can’t stop it. Better we get her out of this world before she starts destroying it. You made this mess, you take it with you.”
He took her chin, looked her face over. To my surprise, he nodded. “He will be useful as we advance. Bring her,” he directed the ones who held her.
I was right. That was the missing piece. That was why Vivi mattered so much to Murmur. That was why her death was the one we had to stop, the reason we’d been called to fight Murmur.
The One Who Hungers.
“No! Please! Mari, why are you doing this?” Vivi’s eyes were desperate as the fae hauled her between them.
Tamar was shouting with the others, but when I glanced at her, I saw recognition in her eyes. Okay. Good.
I started backing down the path. “Are you coming or you want to get stuck here for another few hundred years?”
The nain rouge’s eyes flashed like fanned embers and he pointed out a dozen or so of the wild fae. “You, you, you--keep them here.”
I didn’t spare a backward glance as I jogged down the path, the wild fae coming up behind me with Vivi in tow. “That’s cold,” I said. “Leaving them here to die.”
“Not if your friends succeed,” said the nain rouge. “After that, they can take care of themselves. It’s more than I can say for you, handing over your friend.”
I shrugged. “Just met her. Being a good Samaritan isn’t worth letting a horde of monsters loose on a camp full of innocent people.”
He snorted. “Perhaps I’m taking the wrong one with me.”
“Don’t get flirty, bucko.” I admit, I was warming to my role, although I thought my heart might explode out of my chest like an alien baby. “You’re just a problem I can make someone else’s.”
He chuckled. We neared the edge of the clearing. I had a moment of shaky relief; I hadn’t drawn them all off, but I’d pulled enough of them away and they’d let my friends keep the wards safe a while longer.
Now I just needed my Hail Mary to pay off. It was a long way across camp to the fairy circle, even without stalling. Come on, guys, be ready, I willed in the direction of the land fae, because I wasn’t sure what I was going to do if they weren’t.
Things in camp seemed to be normal--or at least Morph-normal--on the surface, though I felt an undercurrent of energy that sizzled and sang. The people we passed seemed either blissed out and ecstatic, or extra loud and frenetic, or burning with intensity. People danced everywhere, whether they were close to music or not, swaying and grinding and spinning. People walked drunkenly, or made art, or made out. I prayed the wards would hold. Whatever was going on here, it’d be a feeding frenzy for the bogeys if they got loose in camp.
When they got loose. Not to be a killjoy, but unless Dionne and Tamar came up with something brilliant quick, it could be just a matter of time before the wards weakened enough for Murmur’s legion to push through.
This was not the time to be worrying about that. I was about to have a much bigger problem on my hands if a little help didn’t materialize in about thirty seconds.
I tried to slow down without being too obvious about it. Tried to buy some time, tried to spot any scouts along the way. Tried not to meet Vivi’s eyes as she sobbed and called out for help and no one seemed to hear it or even see her. Tried not to think about how outnumbered I was by the wild fae who trailed alongside and behind me.
We crossed the entire camp. I could see the ominous darkness where the trees and brush began, and soon I’d have to lead them into it. There was a chance that I’d get good and lost before we could get close to the fairy circle, which wouldn’t turn out well for me, but was better than having my bluff called. If we got as far as the circle, the best I could hope for was that the number of fae fighters waiting on the other side of the circle was enough.
My throat was as tight as if a hand was wrapped around it, and it was making the veins in my forehead throb. I was so far out of the reach of any help from my friends. I shivered.
“That is far enough.” It came from a short distance in front of us. I was pretty sure it was Boden and I clamped my mouth over my shuddery exhale. Thank all the gods.
“Shit,” I said, because the nain rouge was glaring at me. “They found the circle.”
“Get out of the way,” he retorted in the direction of the voice.
Boden, still in his human seeming, stepped out of the shadows. He was carrying some kind of farm tool. “Unmake the hungry grass and retreat, and we will let you go unharmed.”
They took each other’s measure. Around me, the other wild fae murmured and fidgeted, thrumming with tense energy, spoiling for a fight.
“Move aside.” The nain rouge puffed up. He looked Boden over again and smiled. “Or you could throw in with us, commoner.”
“Final chance,” said Boden. All this time, he hadn’t spared me a glance, and I wasn’t sure what to make of that. “Get out.”
“What do we say to that, fair friends?” The nain rouge glanced at the others, smirking. He made a gesture and together they all shouted a word I could neither understand nor pronounce. And they surged forward, blood in their eyes.
Boden stood his ground. Fae poured out of the dark woods behind him and rushed forward to clash with their wild kin.
Vivi’s captors had abandoned her in their zeal to fight, and I rushed toward her. We had to get out of here. I wanted to jump in and help our allies somehow, just to show them I was still on their side, but this fight was no joke and I wasn’t prepared to get killed just to prove a point.
Suddenly Boden was in front of me, grabbing me by the ponytail and forcing me to my knees. He was much stronger than I’d expected and I panicked at the pain. “The demons,” he rasped. “Where are they?”
“Outside the wards,” I whispered back. “My friends are defending the barrier.”
He nodded, a brief harsh jerk. “Good,” he said. “Go, run. Tell them we have enough here to fight the wild kin. Keep the barrier strong as long as you can and we may be able to help you when it falls.” He shoved me as he released me, for good measure. I toppled over into the grass, and he turned back to the fight.
I scuttled backwards, crab-style, and then flipped over an
d pushed myself into a clumsy run, slipping and falling back to my knees once or twice before I managed to get my feet under me. I was terrified that one of the wild fae would see me running and try to chase me down, and adrenaline gave my feet wings.
There were footfalls behind me. I spared a glance over my shoulder and regretted it as I saw that one of the wild fae had indeed seen me go and was running me down. Turning my head disoriented me and I tripped, landing hard on all fours and skidding onto my side. I rolled over and pushed up again, taking another couple of awkward long strides to right myself, but it was enough to let the fae close the gap between us. I felt a hand catch in my shirt.
I whirled, pulling myself free and coming nose to nose with a face somewhere between a Kabuki mask and a Pictish warlord, with yellow eyes set too far apart. He was brandishing a huge, heavy machete like the one the nain rouge had carried. Before the fae could swing it down, I struck out and punched him in the face.
I had never straight-up nailed someone in the kisser, so let me say this--for as satisfying as it is, it freakin’ hurts. Pain scalded my knuckles and wracked my whole hand up to my forearm. We both staggered backwards, the fae doubled over clutching his face and me hugging my throbbing arm to my chest.
Some deep-buried instinct born out of a phys ed self-defense lesson kicked in, and I went for his feet, stomping down hard with my own. I tried to complete the trifecta with a sidelong kick at his knees and missed. The fae was unsteady, but recovering and ready to fight. He whirled the machete blade with terrifying grace and sliced down at my head.
That I threw myself out of the way in time is nothing short of a miracle. I heard the blade hum through the air beside me and thunk into the hard-packed earth.
I was on the ground again. I pulled in one leg and thrust it out in a kick at the fae’s legs, but there wasn’t enough power or speed behind it, and the wild kin jumped back a step out of my reach. My hands scoured the ground around me as I scooted back on my butt. I was afraid to take my eyes off my attacker even long enough to get up. With remarkable ineffectiveness, I threw a handful of pebbles and dirt at him. My other hand closed over a small rock--a very small rock--and I flung it as hard as I could, which I could feel in my arm was not remotely hard enough. The wild kin cocked his head and contemplated the rock as it bounced off his chest.
MetamorphosUS: Book 1 of the Mythfit Witch Mysteries Page 35