And cats came out of the woods nearby, yowling like banshees as they attacked. I saw Cato in the lead, along with Snow, Smoke -- and even Mrs. Miniver.
The birds followed. Even Gaylord suddenly squirmed out of my jacket and launched himself over Adrian's shoulder and at an oncoming horse and rider.
My breath caught.
And then I turned away again.
I could open a door with little trouble, but I needed something ready to draw attention and give Timber, my father and everyone else a reason to come running to help us. I had to be flashy and loud --
"The dragon's not real!" Aletta yelled, and I could hear her anger and frustration. "Get your bastard soldiers back here and stop her!"
I wasn't ready, but I grabbed at the magic -- remembering Aletta's touch and how much better she had been. Even so, I opened a wide door to the lovely green rolling hills of home. No city stood there this time since it had already come through, sitting like a malevolent ghost over the real town. However, I could feel a huge magic wall close by, which had obviously sheltered the fae side of The Edge from notice, so no one realized the odd things goings on.
I shoved a hole through the second wall, too -- though not a very big one. Then I shaped words by magic. I made them strong. We need help, we need help, we need help!
I started to send those words through, filed with so much magic they danced with light and flashed with all the panic I felt.
Adrian yelled something and I turned in surprise as Aletta launched herself from the horse and straight at me. Adrian couldn't stop her -- he had three soldiers he fought already, and he'd taken a bad cut in the side. I could see him about to go to his knees, and the sword of one of the riders swinging to kill him.
Aletta stopped the words with a wave of her fingers and a flash of magic as she reached for me. I could have tried to stop her.
Instead, I used magic to catch hold of Adrian and threw him into the opening and into Fae. I saw him reach towards me, bleeding, panicked, lost -- but alive.
I could see Mrs. Miniver trying to pull Cato away, blood covering his side while Shakespeare and Gaylord swirled and fought and frightened horses away from them. Birds and cats lay everywhere.
I couldn't save the world -- but I could save them.
I shoved Aletta aside with my hands and not magic. I think she would have been ready for a spell, but brute force worked for me this time. She slipped on a puddle of melted snow and ice lining The Edge. I used the last of my hoarded magic to grab all of my little allies, and I swept them up in a whirlwind and shoved them through the opening to where Adrian still tried to get to his feet, bleeding and yelling things I couldn't hear about the other sounds. I stepped towards him --
Aletta grabbed me, a gleeful smile on her face.
So I closed the door.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Aletta's enraged blow sent me to my knees, my head spinning. Rain, ice and snow fell around us as the storm raged yet again. I feared the storms had always portended the end of the world, and I had been too blind to see until now.
"Open the door again," Tamerlane commanded, slipping from the horse and limping toward us.
Aletta scowled his way. There was a match made in hell, I thought. "I can't yet." I could tell from the look on her face that Aletta hated to say so to this man. "I need to regain magic --"
He slapped her.
She fell to the ground beside me, and glared at him with her eyes blazing. I watched in mild interest, knowing this unlikely drama spared my life a little longer. Let them play out their games.
"Don't ever strike me again." Magic crackled in The Edge as she stood, her rage made manifest. Tamerlane had the wisdom not to slap her for ordering him. A man does not conquer all he had without learning to recognize problems.
"If you cannot open the door, why should I not ride off with my men? What difference does this make to me? Do you think I'm stupid?" He came close and stared into her face. "The door will bring you power. The door is for your kind. I would like to share the power, too. But if Allah does not deem it so, I am not going to stay in this winter land any longer. What I want lies close by to the east. Once I have the power, what else will matter?"
"What you want?" Aletta asked, confused.
"The treasures of the Golden Horde," I answered and won a startled look from Timur. "So he can touch them again, things the historical Tamerlane held. Once he does, he will be real in this world."
He gave me an almost regal nod. "Oh yes. You are far wiser than this one. She has never seen past her pride and her personal wants. A shame I had not allied with you, instead."
"It never would have happened -- because I am far wiser than Aletta."
He gave a little nod of agreement. Aletta, almost hissing with anger, lifted her hands again --
And he slapped her once more. She fell against the wall, started to surge forward -- and two of the soldiers caught hold of her. Tamerlane brought up a knife and held the blade before her.
"Open the door, or else I have no use for you at all -- because you are not pretty enough to even throw into the seraglio with my other conquests."
Her face whitened and she started to speak, but the knife cut a little path along the side of her neck, almost against the artery. I don't think anyone had ever told her she's wasn't beautiful before. I think that struck her harder than the viciousness of her ally.
If I could have helped her just then, I might have. If she had thought of anything but herself, she would have reached me by magic and we could have formed a bond to work against him.
But not Aletta. No. She turned her rage on me and on The Edge. She shoved me against the magical wall, and I felt her starting to tear a door open in the magic around me, using brute force and anger. The Edge reacted in kind. Magic flicked out, burning and bright. A soldier caught in the power glowed, screamed, and disappeared. Others began to back away, but Tamerlane remained with the knife steady in his hand.
I fought her. She snarled in rage and pushed harder, and I knew she would win against me. I pushed everything I could into the power to stop her, and she chiseled away at my feeble magic, inch by inch --
I felt power surge through the wall. Aletta looked frightened and lost her own spell. A little ways along The Edge an opening suddenly erupted -- huge and wide and filed with noise and light and movement. Horses and riders began to push through into the human world. They were not Tamerlane's people this time. They wore clan clothing and colors, and they shouted as they moved immediately to the attack.
Aletta yelled in fear. Tamerlane's soldiers released her at his shouted order, and he turned his weapon away from us and to the new enemy. More warriors from the fae world kept coming through --
Aletta almost stopped them. The power of her rage must have been much akin to the power I often got from fear. She started to throw the fae back, and I thought she might trap a few in the wall, winning a bigger opening than I would have made.
I thought I heard big wings nearby. No time. Aletta shouted her spell, but I grabbed her leg and she sprawled into the muck and mud. She still grabbed at The Edge and tried to force control through her will. I Cago and another of my cousins, caught in the magic, panicked and trying to get free -- but other magic had begun to work as well, helping Aletta at this crux moment.
No!
I shoved my cousins free of the hold. Aletta howled and slashed out at me with magic and physical power. I barely rolled away, almost landing beneath hooves of a horse. I couldn't breathe now, or lift my arms to do more magic.
So much happening! I didn't realize Adrian had arrived until he slipped from behind a fae rider and pulled me into his arms. I held to him, gasping for breath, for power, for anything so I could live long enough to see what happened. I watched as though through a narrow dark corridor which finally shifted to nothing beyond Adrian's face. I couldn't hear above the roaring in my ears. But I had stopped them; surely I had stopped Aletta in the last battle!
Another set
of hands rested on my shoulders. I shuddered at the touch and then felt magic -- healing, warm, welcome. Father.
When I had the strength to turn he took me from Adrian's hold and into his own for a moment -- and then, oddly, he gave me back. I didn't think he would approve of a human --
"You came," I whispered, grateful. "I couldn't get through. I couldn't reach you --"
"Your human is very loud," father said with a smile. "And finding a sudden influx of wounded birds and cats . . . I knew then this trouble came from you and had to be serious. We had other problems, but this . . . this was far worse than what we faced elsewhere. Aletta just kept it well hidden."
"She had allies." I glanced down and smiled as Cato rubbed against my legs. Gaylord and Shakespeare arrived as well, and some of the others came through behind the horses and the fae. I laughed to see them all. The day brightened.
"You did well." My father patted me on the arm, as though nothing remained to do.
We still had more work. Tamerlane's soldiers were scattering, while my father's men, on the faster fae bred mounts, followed and overtook them. I saw them battling, grabbing at wrists, tearing off strings -- and the soldiers disappeared, one after another.
But I could see Tamerlane and Aletta on a single horse, riding fast before the others.
"Katlyn?" my father asked softly.
"We need to stop them." I stood, though I wouldn't have stayed to my feet without Adrian's help. I waved a trembling arm toward Tamerlane and Aletta. "We need to get them quickly."
"We'll get to them soon enough. The trouble here -- this is very unstable."
"Now," I said. He turned to me, startled. "Now. There are dragons, father. They want us to deal with Tamerlane or they will. We don't have much time."
"Dragons? Gods! My horse! We need horses!"
I bent down and grabbed Cato as Adrian picked up his backpack again. I could see someone had healed his wounds though the red of blood still showed on his clothing. I could still feel the cut in Cato's side, a scar beneath the fur, but someone had healed him as well, and he felt whole and good. He purred as I held him close.
"Are we going to ride?" Cato asked, watching the horse one of the men brought forward.
"Unless you want to grow wings and fly," I replied and held him close.
"A cat flying. Ha!" Gaylord said and came down to my shoulder.
"Watch what you say, you little feather-brained --" Cato stopped. He looked up, dismayed. "Oh no. I understand him."
"And I understand you, too, you big fur ball. So watch what you say." Gaylord snapped his beak at him a few times, and then settled smugly against the collar of my jacket.
Cato looked so stricken I barely managed not to laugh . . . well, not too much anyway. Shakespeare settled on Adrian's shoulder as soon as he got on the horse. My father helped me up in front of Adrian, Cato in front of me and Gaylord still holding tight.
Shakespeare leaned forward and tapped me on the shoulder until I turned around.
"You are the most thick-headed person I've ever met," the bird said in quite clear parrot. "Why, in the name of all the feathered gods, did you never look up one of my quotes? And can we please change my name now? Shakespeare? Come on. At least get the gender right!"
"Oh. Oh." I didn't know what to say.
But we turned to ride anyway, so I didn't need to answer her just yet.
My father and his men fell in around us. I couldn't see any of Tamerlane's army left, but I could see him and Aletta, riding full out ahead of us, two shapes nearly lost in the snow storm.
And then a shadow drifted over head as two dragons sailed beneath the clouds.
We rode with the wind.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Midnight arrived amid a heavy fall of snow -- no surprise there. We rode along Highway 34, past buildings that were hotels again with only a whisper of the other city still holding in this last moment of magic. The ghost city would disappear before daybreak and the humans would awake to find their world normal -- at least if we won this final battle. The fae were already doing their best to counteract the spells, and to set things right. The encircling domes went down, and the expanding desert vanished to some other place, though I could sometimes see sand in corners, barely covered by the new fall of snow.
We had to find Tamerlane and Aletta. I suspected where they would be, and led the group straight there.
The Stanley Hotel still looked like an oriental palace, though faded a little along the edges. The grounds still held more sand than snow. The few soldiers left quickly fell to the fae and we advanced without a problem. I saw the horse, abandoned on the driveway by the Stanley Hotel vans, and caught a glimpse of Aletta and Tamerlane heading inside.
"He's going to be hard to get out of there," my father admitted as we came to a stop. He lifted a hand. "This is damned strong magic, and the power is going to try to warp everything we do. He's made this his world."
"But we're going in," Adrian said.
"You need not go. You're human. This isn't your battle to fight."
"I stay with Kat. And last I looked, this was still my world."
My father started to say something. He stopped and nodded instead.
We headed for the door and I could feel the world alter as we pressed forward. Faces stared from the building's gilded windows, and I heard the shouts of people. Oh yes, this place seemed quite real enough, though still magic held it here.
Some of the other fae went ahead, and I could hear a battle within. Cago held the door, battling back one fierce warrior and then another -- but they were no match for the fae who knew the secret of the strings.
"Clear!" Cago said.
We went in.
"I know the way to the throne room." I took the lead, Adrian standing as my guard, a sword in hand.
We ran the labyrinth of halls, my father's companions sometimes fighting away people who tried to stop us. We reached the room only moments after Tamerlane and Aletta. I thought I saw the ghost of the one Tamerlane dissolve into the reality of the new form. The scribe blinked, frowned and began to write again.
The tiger stood.
"Be still," I told her. "Be still, this is not your place or your time."
She backed away, tail lashing. Cato, standing at my feet, watched her carefully.
"I am Timur. I am the conqueror and I rule the world of men." He spoke the words and made them true in this place. "Bow before your betters, infidels! Bow down and accept."
His power melded with magic of this place.
A mistake to come here: My legs wanted to fold under me, trying to obey his command -- accepting his rule because this was his place and no longer the human world nor the fae one. He ruled here.
I could see the others felt the same. Adrian started to bow. I caught his arm and held him to his feet, and in holding him, I gained the strength to stand as well. The touch helped to clear my head. I realized, suddenly, that even here, Tamerlane shouldn't hold the depth of magical power I felt --
Aletta?
I searched until I found my cousin standing just behind Tamerlane, nearly lost in the shadows. Her magic mixed with the power of this myth they'd worked so hard to make real.
But no. She never had this kind of control. She couldn't have created this --
Another fae here.
"Bow! And accept my place!"
One fae went to his knees. Another followed. Tamerlane smiled, and I could feel his power grow as the fae accepted him as real.
"No," I said aloud. "No. Magic -- father. Strong -- someone else, helping them --"
My father turned to me, eyes narrowed, face pale. Fighting.
"You have not been given the right to speak, woman." Tamerlane crossed to me and caught hold of my hair, a hand raised --
And Adrian hit him. Hard.
He stumbled backwards. The tiger growled in wordless rage and yanked at her chain, but I couldn't decide if she meant to come for us or just leap to kill anything. I didn't think she was s
ane.
When Tamerlane stumbled, the power lessened for a few heartbeats. The scribe faded away. Some of the others looked less real. I glanced frantically around. "Magic somewhere. We have to get out."
"Stay!" Tamerlane shouted, the word reverberating through the walls.
I froze.
"Magic," Adrian whispered. He moved away from me, a slow steady step and closer to Tamerlane. Another. He pulled the backpack from his shoulders and reached inside.
Oh dear Gods.
He turned on the digital camera and threw it at Tamerlane and Aletta.
The world shattered, spun, splintered and howled. Winds and vacuum fought each other, the screams of rage and the silence of emptiness: Everything came upon us, the moment when nothing remained real, and the world teetered between the power of reality or myth, technology or magic.
I folded myself over Cato, holding him tight and grabbing hold of Adrian, dragging him to us-- my reality just then. All I wanted, I pulled together with my power and made this, for a brief moment, my place.
I pulled Gaylord and Shakespeare to us, and my father, and a few more fae, all drawn because my want of something became almost manifest.
Things calmed.
I slowly lifted my head. Shadows played along the walls as the intricate mosaics melted. Sand brushed against the floor and disappeared -- but this wasn't the same room. We stood in the lobby of the Stanley Hotel.
Tamerlane staggered to his feet, but his form, too magical and wounded by the technology, wavered, changed, grew misty -- unreal. He became a ghost rider once more, though without the horse.
"Catch him!" my father shouted, stumbling to his feet.
Fae swarmed toward him, ready to encircle the mist in magic. Aletta stood, shaken and frightened as some of the fae came for her. She started frantically for the door and ran --
The mist surged toward her. She saw the movement and screamed.
"No! Not me! Not me!"
She ran, shoving open the door and racing outside. If she had stayed, we probably could have helped her. The ghost followed her out into the cold snow and we rushed afterwards, most of us limping and cursing, though a few fae patted Adrian on the shoulder and thanked him.
Kat Among The Pigeons Page 28