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by Kaje Harper

  Pip stared across the water. After a moment, a pebble lifted off the far beach, skimmed the waves, and dropped at Pip’s feet. “Trying again,” the dog muttered.

  Darien wanted to help, to lend Pip strength and power. Except I’m too ignorant to know how. Intent and will. He pushed as much confidence and desire to help as he could down his hand, hoping it would seep into Pip’s little body. On the far shore, Silas’s body twitched, then lay still. Twitched again, then stilled.

  “It’s too far and he’s too heavy,” Pip said eventually. His ears and tail drooped.

  Grim went to him and head-bumped him, knocking the dog off balance. “You tried, pup.”

  Pip said, “I could swim out in the river and get closer. Except then Fetch would put him in the river. And it doesn’t feel like a good place to be.”

  Jasper said diffidently, “I’d offer to try to build a plank. Like in my demonstration. Except I’ve never made one nearly big enough to reach that shore, or held it long enough for someone to cross that span.”

  “What if we work together?” Darien asked. On that distant rocky shore, Silas lay still as death. “You build, I power it. I’m told I have a hell of a battery.”

  “You’d have to trust me.” Jasper stepped in front of him to meet his eyes. “We don’t have time to do it cooperatively. You’d have to give me your power to use.”

  “So?” Darien gritted his teeth. “Time’s wasting.” If Silas dies, I don’t care what you do. “Tell me.”

  “It’s unprecedented. It would have to be three hundred feet long.” Jasper eyed that far shore. “Maybe four hundred.”

  “We have to try.”

  “There’s no place to draw the runes, nothing to draw with.” Jasper looked up and down the shore. “I should’ve brought chalk.”

  Darien eyed the dusty, pebbled flatness of the beach they stood on. Blood? He’d gladly cut himself open, but he wasn’t sure he could lose three hundred feet worth of blood and have strength left to power it. Spit? Threads? I could pull my clothes apart. The river sparkled on its merry way, like it hadn’t a care in the world. Darien was really starting to hate that water. Water?

  He picked up a shoe and knelt by the water’s edge. Its song increased as he bent over it, but distant warm sunshine couldn’t match the chill of Silas, still on that far shore. Darien dipped up a shoe full of water and tried pouring it out, forming the rune for fire. It ended up a bit lopsided, but not bad. He stared down at the glistening lines on the pebbles, then shoved power into it. Burn! A quick flash of flame ran the circuit of the rune, flared briefly, and went out.

  Darien dipped his shoe again and held it out to Jasper. “Start drawing.”

  Jasper’s smile was a decade younger than his face. “Ingenious.” He took the shoe and crouched. “Better control down here. So…” He began a careful pour, his silver lines cleaner than Darien’s had been. “It’s going to take a lot.”

  “There’s plenty of River.” Darien picked up his other shoe, dipped it, and held it ready.

  Slowly the runework took shape. Jasper drew the long narrow shape down the beach beside the water, and Darien shuttled back and forth, shoe after shoe of silver River, stubbing his toes on the rocks and not caring. He flicked the occasional glance at the two familiars who sat inches from the water, staring across at Silas. Whether Grim could send Silas strength, or only watch over him, Darien didn’t know and wouldn’t ask. Whatever the cat was doing, it was a small, welcome comfort in this fucked-up situation.

  Eventually, Jasper straightened. “That’s done. But it’s big. If we can power it, it’ll take a lot to swing it across the River and hold it. And then someone has to go get Silas. If we lose it, they’ll be dropped into the River.”

  “I’ll go.” Darien was so ready his muscles quivered with wanting it.

  Grim said, “Let’s try waking Silas first. Pup, you ready?”

  Pip bounced once. “Ready.”

  “What are you planning?” Darien asked.

  “Just a little bop.” Grim stood, eyes narrowed to slits as he stared across the bright water. “Okay, dog, now be careful. He doesn’t need a concussion on top of everything.”

  “Not the head.” Pip barked sharply, and a stone lifted off the beach behind Silas and whacked his shoulder, on its way to land at their feet.

  Darien yelled, “Hey! Silas! Wake up!”

  Neither stone nor words made the dark huddled form stir.

  “It didn’t work.” Pip’s ears drooped.

  Jasper said, “You’re sure he’s not dead?” When Darien glared at him, he raised his hands. “Just asking.”

  Darien didn’t even listen to Grim’s reassurance. It changed nothing, meant nothing. He would go get Silas and bring him back, dead or not. Jesus, don’t be dead, you bastard. He turned to Jasper. “How do we do this? How can I give you the power.”

  “Standard transfer should work.” Jasper drew a rune in the air.

  Darien gritted his teeth. “I haven’t learned that one yet.”

  “Oh. Damn. I could teach you but… it takes practice. Tiny amounts first, learning to accept, safely, before learning to transfer.”

  “Fuck safety.”

  Jasper flinched, and looked at his rune structure. “Wait. Have you learned to power a complex rune?”

  “I… a bit.” Silas had taught him to draw and pour power into the wards around the house. Silas had been all about him learning defenses.

  “If you’re going to do an unskilled power boost, I’d rather you did it to the runes. No offense. Let me just… I need a drop of your blood, and I can write you into the structure. Make it yours. Then maybe you can power it up.”

  “Blood?” What if he’s the one who called the ghoul and he’s calling it back? Sending it after me? Darien realized he didn’t care. This was Silas’s one chance. “Sure.” He fumbled for his pocketknife, not finding it in his pocket.

  Grim came over and stared down at the silver lines on the beach, turned to look at Silas, then said to Jasper, “One drop. Where?”

  “Wait.” Jasper scooped more water, and drew another rune sequence at the head of his beam. He pointed. “Right there.”

  Grim nodded slowly. “Hold your finger over it, young Darien.”

  “My knife—”

  Grim spread his claws. “You don’t need a knife.”

  “Oh.” Darien knelt and held his hand out where Jasper indicated.

  “When the blood hits, you should feel the rune. Try to grasp its structure.” Jasper didn’t seem aware he was wringing his hands. “If you can, if it makes sense to you, power it up slowly. Slowly!”

  “Go.” Darien didn’t flinch at the jab of Grim’s claw in his fingertip. The bead of blood welled, hung looking almost black in the silver light, and dropped.

  The blood hit the lines and thinned, racing along them. It shouldn’t have been enough to go far, but Darien could feel the shape of the working, the heft and density of it, the runes for strength and size and shape and solidity that formed it. His perception raced the length of a football field down the pebbled beach, pivoted quickly, and returned. The circuit closed with a snap he felt ring in his bones. “I have it.” He couldn’t have drawn it, but he could see the whole of it, waiting.

  Carefully, drop by drop, he pushed power into it, the way he had into the fire rune. This was much bigger, thirsty, soaking up power like a sponge. He spared an instant to wonder if he was going to end up leaking life force into the working, turn old before his time, but it didn’t matter. He’d give whatever it needed to animate it, make it solid, bind molecules of air as if they were steel.

  It was similar to strong shield construction, he realized. The brittle kind he’d abandoned for the flexibility he preferred. Brittle was good here, though. We need a plank, not a cooked noodle. Slowly he ramped up the power, until the beam took shape, glowing with golden light.

  “I’ll be damned,” Jasper muttered. “You have it all!”

  “Now what?” He thoug
ht he was handling it well, but he could already hear a strain in his voice.

  “Let me try to lift and swing it, while you hold the basic runes.” Jasper knelt and set a hand on the edge of the beam. Darien felt the touch, like a ripple in the structure, one that it recognized and bowed to.

  “All right. Far end across?”

  “Yes.” Jasper set his other hand beside the first and cranked his head around to look over his shoulder. Slowly the far end of the beam began to lift and pivot out over the water.

  Grim murmured, “Keep it high. It’s made of waterlight. I don’t know what would happen if it touches the waves.”

  “Good thought.” Jasper grunted, and the far end rose a foot higher above the River.

  Slowly, slowly, the long beam of light swung across the shimmering waves. Darien hung onto his part, pushing a steady stream of light into it. Solid, long, rigid, strong, intent and will. His chest felt tight.

  “Is it long enough?” Pip asked. “Is it there yet?”

  Grim bopped the dog with a heavy paw. “Hush, now.”

  Jasper huffed a few breaths like a weightlifter getting ready for a big lift. “I think we’re there. Lowering the end. Keep it steady.” He scrunched his eyes shut.

  Darien threw everything he had into long and solid as the far end lowered, dipped, and then stopped.

  “Long enough!” Pip bounced up and down. “Look, it landed!”

  Holding his breath, holding rigid and solid, Darien squinted across the water. The beam spanned the river just inches above the waves, golden light reflected in the shimmering surface. The far end touched the shore several feet beyond where Silas’s body— where Silas— lay huddled. Relief and pride mixed with the bit of him that wanted to panic.

  There was a bridge, held by his will. A crazy magic bridge that didn’t sag, as anything made by man would— and thinking about how not-real it was didn’t do good things. He pushed his power and trust into the runes. And realized, “I don’t think I can cross it. Not and hold it solid.”

  “I can’t either,” Jasper said. “I’m keeping the end where it is, but I think the shore doesn’t want it. It keeps trying to slip free.”

  “Damn it.” Darien screamed, “Silas, you son-of-a-bitch. Wake up! We’re waiting.”

  “We’ll go.” Grim jumped onto the beam. “Come along, pup.”

  Pip leaped up behind him, skidded, and almost went off the other side. “Slippery.”

  “Sorry.” Darien didn’t dare tweak so much as a fraction of that runework. “I can’t change it.”

  “He’ll manage,” Grim said.

  Darien couldn’t do anything but stand and watch, and let his power run free, as the big cat and little dog paced down the beam of light across the River. At the far end, Grim crouched, looking at Silas. A fast whip of his head had his jaw clamped on Pip’s scruff. “Don’ jum’ down, P’p.” He shook the pup and let go. “That’s not life, where you’d land.”

  “Then what do we do?”

  “Fetch him.” Darien couldn’t see Grim’s eyes, but he’d bet they were burning green. “Fetch like your life depends on it.”

  Darien saw Silas’s body shift and roll slightly.

  “He’s heavy,” Pip muttered, audible in the still air.

  Grim said, “Well, cats have nine lives. Death doesn’t mean as much to us.” And jumped off the beam.

  Darien flinched, and bit back a shout. All he could do was keep that beam solid under Pip’s small feet. Grim landed, collapsed, and pulled himself back up. Without a word, he bent and grabbed Silas’s jacket in his teeth. Across the water, Darien could make out how every muscle in that twenty-pound feline body strained and pulled.

  Pip barked, “Fetch.”

  Silas’s body slid a foot closer to the beam.

  Grim let go to command, “Again!”

  The next slide pulled Silas in against the beam of light. Darien fought the urge to expand the beam. That was his power out there, his strength. He should be able to give it to Silas. But it was trapped in the rune structure and if that broke— He pressed his lips tight to stop their trembling and breathed through his nose. Strong, rigid, long, hard. He tried to make it a joke. I’m long and hard for you, Silas. Wake the hell up and appreciate it.

  Grim hopped up on the beam and shook like he’d been soaked in water. Then he bent and grabbed Silas’s sleeve, lifting one limp arm across the beam. “Leg next. Fetch, you useless mongrel.” Between them, the familiars wrestled Silas’s leg up onto the light.

  Darien saw the moment when Silas lifted his head. “Grim? Darien?” Silas’s shoulders shifted.

  “Stay put!” he shouted, loud as he could. “Don’t you fall off the damned beam.”

  “Beam?”

  Grim said, “This is a rescue. With a limited time, so move your wizardly ass. Get yourself up on here.”

  Darien squinted, making out Silas’s slow crawl up and centered until he lay along the beam, his arms and legs clutching it.

  “It’s warm.” Silas’s voice carried, wonder in it. “I thought I’d never be warm again.”

  Darien’s relief was so deep his heart stuttered, and the beam shivered. Shit. “You need to get back here, like now! Don’t know how long we can hold it.”

  Silas lifted his head. “I don’t think I can walk.”

  “Then crawl. Scoot on your ass. Just move!”

  Pip trotted back a few feet, out over the water and said, “Fetch!”

  Silas slid to him with a yelp of surprise, clutching at the beam.

  “Good idea, pup,” Grim said. He bent and lowered his head to Silas’s ass. “The things I do for my necromancers. You pull, pup. I’ll push. And Silas, if you fall in the water, none of us will forgive you.”

  “Got it.” Silas’s voice sounded thin.

  Foot by foot, they worked Silas across the river. The slipperiness of the beam worked in their favor now. Sweat ran down Darien’s back, as he threw his all into solid and rigid. Beside him Jasper’s mouth worked silently, and he pressed clenched fists to his chest.

  About halfway along, Silas said, “I can help.” He began inching along, using his arms and legs to slide forward. Pip tried walking backward ahead of him and a hind leg slipped off the edge. Pip yelped. Silas grabbed the flailing little foot in his hand. Darien held his breath as they got themselves back to stability.

  Grim snarled, “Don’t walk backward, idiot. You’re not built for it.” Darien bet even Pip could hear the relief in the cat’s voice. “Walk a few feet, look back, Fetch. Got it?”

  “Yes, sir.” Pip turned carefully, trotted a few steps, and looked over his shoulder. “Fetch.”

  Silas grabbed, Grim pushed, and Silas slid three feet forward.

  “Better,” Grim said. “Again.”

  Darien felt shivers beginning to run out from his core. His chest tightened. “Hurry.” He had to whisper it. His breath came short.

  Thirty feet. Twenty. Ten. Pip made a leap to shore, landing with a stagger on the pebbles. Silas said, “Jump, Grim.”

  “Not till you’re on the dirt, O heavy one. Again!”

  With a last heave, Silas dragged himself past the brink. One foot hit the water as he rolled off to the shore, splashing droplets onto the beam. Grim sailed over his body.

  Like a note of music hitting a crystal, the entire rune structure chimed with the water’s impact and exploded. Darien staggered and fell, hands over his ears, as the beam fractured into a million components. The power in it snapped back to him, flooding him with dense resonance, a thousand scraps of his magic trying to fit back into his core. Head, shoulder, elbow hit the pebbled ground. His vision whited out, full of gold flashes, and he gasped for breath like he’d been kicked in the chest.

  When he could hear anything again, a strange, wet cloth was being dragged across his forehead and a high, anxious voice was saying, “Darien? Wake up? Are you alive? Are you all right?”

  Not cloth, tongue. He held up a hand to fend off Pip’s next lick, and open
ed sticky eyes. “I’m okay. I’m awake.” He rolled to his side, bracing up on one elbow.

  Six feet away, Silas’s eyes met his. Silas looked like crap, his cheeks hollow, deep circles under his eyes, but his lips curved in a wonderful smile. “Darien. There you are. Thank all the gods.”

  “We’re both here.” Relief punched him so hard tears welled up, hot and blinding. “You and me. And Jasper?” he realized. “Grim?” He forced himself to sit, grabbing his ringing head in his hands, and looked around. Jasper sat on the rocks in the same position, head pressed between his palms. Beside him Grim sat licking his fur with methodical determination.

  Pip bounced between them, tail a blur. “I Fetched. I helped.”

  “You sure did.” He grabbed up the dog and hugged him so hard Pip squeaked. Darien didn’t feel up to going to Silas yet, but the dog was solid and warm and alive in his arms, and Silas was smiling at him.

  Suddenly Grim leaped to his feet, back arched, head up.

  Silas pushed himself up off the ground. “What, Grim?”

  “There.”

  A figure strode toward them out of the fog. A thin orange light surrounded it and an orange whip of power flexed and coiled in one hand. Darien jumped up and stumbled, trying to get his shields raised, but he felt like a car-starter on a burned-out battery, fizzing uselessly. The figure resolved into a thin man in a dark suit, elderly, ordinary-looking if you ignored the lash of power coiling at his side.

  Silas said, “Pasternak. What are you doing here?”

  The local necromancer. Darien wanted to laugh and say, “You’re too late to join the fun,” but the man’s expression was far from humorous.

  “Where is she?” Pasternak demanded.

  Jasper dropped his hands from his face. “Who?”

  “My wife.” Pasternak stopped in front of them and pivoted, scanning the beach. “She should be here. I followed her here.”

  “Did she die?” Jasper said. “I’m sorry. We haven’t seen her shade.”

  “She can’t die. I won’t have it.” His searching gaze became more frantic. “What happened?”

  Jasper pushed to his feet, not looking much better than Silas. “There was a creature, a ghoul.”