Chloe was pulled toward the shaman, her hands going for his neck. “Don’t you ever try to silence KieraFreya, Goddess of Retribution, again!”
Chloe fought the bracers, but there was no need. Caught off-guard, she fell toward the shaman, but before she could make contact, he vanished in a puff of smoke, reappearing on a tree branch way up high.
The shaman winked as KieraFreya shook with rage.
The others logged back in a little after darkness fell. Chloe had been in silent contemplation for a long while, staring at the beauty of the large full moon and stars as they painted themselves across the indigo canopy.
The farm was bathed in silver light, and after his evening chores, a small man disappeared into the farmhouse as Chloe kept watch.
They packed up their items, reconfirmed their plan, and set off over the darkened landscape. In the distance, some wolf-like creature howled. Insects strummed their legs and chirped in hidden hollows. The four adventurers were nothing more than shadowy shapes in the night, the wisp choosing to extinguish its light and fade from their sight.
When they reached the perimeter of the farm, they divided into two groups. Chloe and Gideon took one path, and Ben and Tag took the other. Their plan was to skirt the perimeter and sniff out any danger before converging on the horses on the other side of the farmhouse.
The farm was even bigger from up close. A constant drone came from the great tiered cones that housed the bees’ honeycombed homes, the sound increasing and then fading in pulses that could easily drive a person mad. Chloe wondered just how many of them there were, and how they would compare to the bees she had encountered in her world.
“You think they’re poisonous?” Gideon whispered as the farmhouse loomed closer.
Chloe shrugged. “I hope not.”
When they reached the farmhouse, all was eerily still. Aside from the bees’ droning, there was little sound. The house was dark inside, and there was not a single person in sight.
Chloe, unable to curb her curiosity, climbed the stairs and moved to the window to get a closer look.
“What are you doing?” Gideon hissed.
Chloe put a finger over her lips and peered inside.
The house was impressive. More impressive than anything she had seen in Obsidian so far. Compared to the houses in Hobblesville and Oakston, this was a bona fide mansion.
She peeked into a living room, the walls lined with shelves that housed books, vials, and containers of, what she could only assume were alcohol. On the walls were drawings and paintings in frames of a man with an impressive handlebar mustache standing next to two little girls in coveralls as they each placed a hand on one of the giant beehives. The sight of the three of them gave her the creeps.
What a cute little family, she thought sarcastically, moving to a kitchen area before stepping back down.
“Come on,” Gideon urged in a whisper.
Chloe looked around for Gideon, locating him on the other side of the house. She caught up with him at the fence.
“Just a little farther,” Chloe said, pointing toward the horses. She could see five of them, three stocky and two weedy specimens that looked like they might keel over at any point.
“Where?” Gideon asked.
“There.”
“I can’t see them.”
Chloe cocked an eyebrow, then remembered that her Dark Vision skill likely gave her an edge over Gideon’s vision.
“Come on, I’ll show you.” She smiled.
When they reached the horses, there was no sign of Tag and Ben. They waited a few minutes, listening to that irritating hum from the bees before Chloe suggested going ahead without them.
“What if they’re in trouble?” Gideon asked.
“They’re big boys. They can handle themselves,” Chloe replied. “Besides, Derren is asleep, and the horses are right there. We could just jump over the fence, grab them, and be on our way. Easy as pie.
Gideon looked unsure, but he nodded at Chloe.
The fence was low, a two-bar affair painted white. Chloe cocked a leg over, straddled the beam, and hopped down comfortably on the other side. Gideon followed suit, grunting as the wood found his private bits.
They each took one step before Chloe’s ears pricked up, noticing the unsettling silence as the bees stopped humming.
It didn’t stay that way for long. They each placed a hand on one of the giant beehives.
Chapter Forty
“I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all,” Gideon said, his voice shaking.
Chloe squinted to see over the farm, but nothing moved besides the horses, and even they had fallen relatively still.
“Relax,” Chloe said. “Whatever it is, I’m sure we can…”
“There!” Gideon shouted, pointing ahead to where a great black mass was writhing and pulsing toward them.
Chloe couldn’t understand it. The thing approached at an alarming speed, looking like a large black cloud, moving and shaping itself with the wind. Chloe saw the black bodies of thousands upon thousands of bees, each around the size of her fist. The insects were larger than any she had ever seen in her life.
They bulleted toward the pair, angry little things driven by fevered determination. Chloe and Gideon turned on their heels and dashed back toward the fence, hopping it in one clean leap.
Which was when a strange thing happened.
The minute their feet cleared the yard, the bees stopped their mad dash, spinning lazily in the air and floating back toward where they had come from.
“Huh?” Chloe exclaimed, moving back toward the fence, leaning through the bars, and touching a finger on the grass.
The minute her finger made contact with the ground, the bees about-faced and began dashing back toward them, angry guards of their precious land defending the place from intruders.
Chloe removed her finger and they floated lazily away.
She touched a finger down and they spun once more.
She lifted it. They started flying back to their hives.
She touched the grass again. They reared up to attack.
“Stop that,” Gideon snapped, pulling Chloe’s finger away.
“That’s some protection,” Chloe mused, her eyes fixed on the bees until they were once more out of sight. She sat on her ass, half-pondering what to do to get past the bees, half-wondering where Ben and Tag had gotten themselves to. She peered into the darkness but could see neither.
Gideon shook his head, still in disbelief. “They’re so big. I’ve seen sparrows smaller than those things.”
Chloe nodded, remembering the picture of Derren and his kids. An idea sprang to mind.
“Come on,” she said, rising. “I’ve got an idea.”
Gideon followed Chloe reluctantly to the house. She waved him up the stairs, and they both peeked once more into the living room, where beekeeping outfits hung on the wall.
Chloe tried the door. It was locked.
“You got anything in that book of yours that’ll help us break into houses?” Chloe asked.
Gideon pulled out the tome of spells from his inventory, an action that Chloe didn’t think she’d ever get used to. One minute Gideon had a tiny bag, the next he was withdrawing a beast of a book that seemed impossible to fit inside.
He flicked through the pages, shaking his head. “Nothing, unless you want to blow the door right off its hinges.”
“We’ll call that Plan B.”
They skirted the house once more, eventually finding another door leading into the kitchen. This one was also locked, but there was a large dog flap on the lower half that Chloe knelt beside. She measured herself against the flap while Gideon stifled a laugh, his laughter quickly dying when Chloe realized she was too large and began to study Gideon’s frame.
“Don’t even think about it,” Gideon warned.
“Too late. Thought about. Come on, skinny stuff, it’s for the good of the team.” She cast her best smile his way, and Gideon rolled his eyes.
/> “Fine,” he said, getting down on all fours. “But you owe me one.”
She watched through the window as Gideon made his way inside. He gingerly rose to his feet, gave her a swift thumbs-up, and tiptoed to the living room, his knees as high as his chest with each step, reminding Chloe of animated cartoons she had watched when she was younger.
She waited patiently by the kitchen door, suddenly growing alert as Gideon sprinted into the kitchen holding a bundle of coveralls in his hands. He threw himself to his knees, skidded along the floor, shoved the items of clothing through the dog flap, and scrambled through.
“What is it?” Chloe asked, grabbing his hands and pulling him through.
“There’s a reason that there’s a dog flap,” Gideon told her. “Run!”
Several barks exploded the night silence. Chloe’s heart turned to ice as she saw several candles lit in the upstairs room. A second later, a voice said, “What is it, Fido? Rex? Daisy? Go get ‘em.”
They heard heavy movement on the stairs and fled back to where the horses were waiting, scrambling to get the coveralls on as they did so and wondering what kind of protection they might give against dog bites.
Chloe sealed herself in and, without hesitation, launched over the fence. Gideon hovered, struggling with fumbling fingers to close the suit, fighting the dilemma of dogs or bees.
“Come on,” Chloe urged.
“Are you sure they won’t hurt?” He asked. “Won’t they sting through the suit?”
Chloe shrugged, anticipating the bee attack as the drones fell mute but the dogs kept barking. “I don’t know, but it’s bite or sting. Your choice.”
Gideon sighed, managing to finish sealing the suit. He hopped over the fence and pointed behind Chloe.
She turned to face the great swarm of bees, closing her eyes in anticipation of what could be the worst pain she’d ever experience in her life. Once more, she hated the fact that the others had had their pain receptors muted. She cursed Mia, shaking a fist and hoping she was watching Chloe right now, feeling guilty as all heck that the patch wasn’t yet accessible to players in full immersion.
The bees came on ferociously and swarmed around Chloe. She had one last image of two of the fiercest dogs she had ever seen making it to the fence before her vision became a fuzzy black and white haze that reminded Chloe of when storms hit at home and affected the television signal.
The bees’ bodies were large, occasionally bumping into her suit and pushing her in all directions. She waited for the stings, but nothing came. She was masked in a great cloud of bees. She couldn’t see Gideon, but she could hear him as he complained and uttered strange noises, clearly going through the same sensations that she was.
Chloe groped around, raising her arms closer to her visor, and she saw the great creatures resting placidly on her arms. They had poufy fur covering their bodies, with thick bands of white and black. Their antennae were almost double the length of their bodies, and their stingers were hooked and razor-sharp.
Imagine getting stung by one of those bad boys, Chloe thought.
I imagine you probably will know what that’s like soon enough, KieraFreya teased.
“Gid?” Chloe called. “You still there?”
“Yeah!” he called back from somewhere up ahead.
Chloe reached out, trying to find anything that could be Gideon. She stumbled blindly, the dogs going mad and barking and barking, but clearly terrified to enter into the paddock due to the bees.
At last, Chloe found Gideon. Her hands found his shoulders, and she breathed a sigh of relief inside her suit. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“What’s that? Gideon’s voice came from a distance, and she couldn’t quite understand it.
Confused, Chloe turned Gideon around so his visor was facing hers. Behind the veil of mesh, she saw someone who definitely wasn’t Gideon. The handlebar mustache far too big to fit on Gideon’s face.
“Well, you found me,” Derren said as Chloe gasped.
She tried to step back, but he had already tied a length of rope around her body, pinning her arms to her side. “Come with me if you want to live, little piggy.”
“What about Gideon?” Chloe said.
“Your little friend can wait with the bees until you tell me who the hell you are and what in the name of the gods you’re doing on my property.”
Chloe was led back toward a small gate in the fence. The bees crowded them both until they made their way through, then, as if an invisible forcefield had been crossed, the bees abandoned them both and headed back toward the other invader.
Chloe felt sorry for Gideon, imagining him circling blindly around the paddock, the number of bees on him doubling as Chloe’s found a new target to keep them entertained.
Derren led Chloe into the house, one of the dogs on their heels. The other stayed outside to guard Gideon. Derren made Chloe take a seat on one of the chairs in the living room, helping her out of her visor so that she could finally see him clearly.
He took the chair opposite, twiddling his mustache for some time.
“Explain yourself,” he said at last.
“Explain yourself. Who in their right mind has a handlebar mustache these days? They’re very last season, and quite unflattering on a man.”
The corners of Derren’s mouth turned up in a grin. “You’ve got some big balls, girl.”
“Makes up for the lack of yours, then, doesn’t it?”
Chloe thought she saw a hint of rage behind those dark eyes, then Derren rose, fiddled with a bottle filled with amber liquid, and poured some into a glass. He returned to his seat, sipping from the drink and wincing as the liquid burned his throat.
“The finest honeyed whiskey this side of the Gregarian Mountains.” He offered some to Chloe.
She declined with a shake of her head.
“You know how much this stuff fetches? A dozen silver pieces a bottle. That’s top-shelf produce right there. I have people flooding to me from all over with the wagons, carts, and trailers, seeking even the smallest quantities of this stuff.” Derren leaned back in his chair, pointing to a picture on the wall that showed him standing in front of a crowd of thirty or so people.
“It’s because the stuff’s hard to make. There’s only a handful of people in the whole of Obsidian who have mastered the art of humblebee farming. Sure, people have tried to make the same product with ordinary bees, but the stuff pales in comparison. Nothing is quite like humblebee pollen to give the liquor the sweet kick it deserves. It’s really a complicated process to produce this.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” Chloe asked. “Why not bring my friend with me and just end us here and now?”
Derren grinned, the smile not sitting quite straight on his face.
“All of this, I suppose, is to say that I am remarkably wealthy. If I wanted to, I could pull favors from a great many sources and have you destroyed in a second. I wouldn’t even need to get my own hands dirty to do so. I’ve got money pouring out of every orifice, so just know that, although you think you can steal from my land, you can’t touch me.” He spread his arms wide. “I’m invincible here.”
“If you’re so wealthy, why the hell did you feel the need to steal a stableboy’s horses?” Chloe asked. “What’s in it for you? Surely you could buy thousands of horses with this,” she tried to do air quotes, but remembered that she was tied up, “ridiculous pile of wealth, without needing to resort to stealing from those less fortunate than you.”
Derren nodded, draining his glass and rising to his feet. He laced his fingers behind his back and strolled around the room, looking at the pictures. “That may be true,” he said, a far off look in his eyes. “But you know what money can’t buy?”
“Love?” Chloe joked, the Beatles song instantly popping into her head.
“Precisely,” Derren said, giving Chloe an impressed half-glance. “Money cannot buy the affections of the woman you love. Not real love, anyway. Sure, it’s easy to bed a girl wi
th coin, but where’s the challenge? Where’s the affection? Where’s the romance?”
Chloe felt her stomach turn, imagining this disgusting specimen of a human rolling around in a bed with a woman.
Derren reached the picture Chloe had seen through the window of him standing with two small girls. “What’s wrong with this image??
“There’s a twat in the middle with a handlebar mustache?” Chloe quipped.
“There’s no woman. No lady of the house. No one to inspire me. No one to hold me. No one to love me.” He turned his attention back to Chloe. “That’s why the horses are here, y’see? The stableboy is an idiot with a narrow view of the world. He’ll think I’m stealing the horses because I can.
“But the truth is that his sister is one of the loveliest specimens I have ever encountered. Rosaline, a true testament to the female form. I might not be able to buy her affection with coin—and believe me, I’ve tried—but by perhaps in holding an object of theirs to ransom, I can, in some way, begin to forge a matrimonial bond that will one day unite us both.”
Chloe stared at Derren, perplexed. “You stole horses...to win a girl?”
“Precisely,” Derren replied with no hint of irony.
Chloe let this stew for a moment. “Well, that was a great plan!”
Derren’s face lit up. “You really think so?”
“NO, you idiot. What girl is going to love a man for stealing her brother’s horses? Are you crazy? The way to a woman’s heart is consensus. Wooing her. Sweeping her off her feet.”
“Consensus? What do you mean?”
Chloe sighed. She knew the formula well. No matter how many men approached her and her friends in bars, the man would have no chance unless there was a group consensus that he was a worthy candidate. If several women in the group didn’t like the look of the sleazeball who had approached them, he’d be sent to the doghouse with his tail between his legs.
Collecting The Goddess (Chronicles Of KieraFreya Book 1) Page 29