“More bedtime stories, Hank?”
I mimed for Jane, Althyof, and Krowkr to line up, ready to charge into the proo. I pointed at the puppies and pointed at Jane, and she knelt and whispered in their ears, first Keri, then Fretyi. I pointed at the proo and mimicked picking something up and carrying it somewhere, then pointed at the screen that showed Luka. Althyof nodded and drew his daggers, mouthing the triblinkr that started their cadmium red auras and their jittery stretch-shrink cartoon dance. Krowkr’s eyes opened so wide I thought they might fall out of his head.
“No stories, Luka. I will take you to Iktrasitl. I will show you the tapestry. I will point out the runes that spell out Hel’s uhrluhk.” Holding up my hand, I started counting down from five with my fingers.
Luka scoffed and shook his head.
“Look, Luka, this is silly.” I had three fingers extended. “Let Sig go, and I will deal with you straight. You have my word.”
“Your word? Is that supposed to mean something?”
Two fingers still stood. I faked a chuckle, grimacing at how it sounded. “Do you not know me by now, Luka? Do you not know I always keep my word?”
He bristled at hearing his own words parroted back, and as he did, I folded my thumb over the others and pumped my fist once. I moved my proo behind and to the left of him, picking a terminus that was most in his blind spot given how he stood and the way he held Sig. I was already moving by the time the proo snapped into place, both guns drawn, and Jane close on my heels, a puppy under each arm. Althyof spun in our wake, already whispering his battle trowba, and Krowkr followed behind him. I reached the proo and slapped it with the back of my hand.
Something must have given us away—the reflection of the new proo in Mothi’s eyes, or the sound of the proo coming to rest, but when I materialized, the space where I expected Luka was empty.
“Nice try,” he hissed at me.
I snapped my head around. Luka stood next to his proo, an arm around Sig’s chest, fingers of his other hand digging into Sig’s throat.
“I should kill him for this.”
“No! No, Luka. Take me instead. I’m offering you an exchange—me for my son.”
“Dad, no!” shouted Sig.
Jane popped in behind me and gasped, while both puppies growled and snarled.
“Say goodbye to your son, Hank,” said Luka and uncoiled the arm he had wrapped across Sig’s chest. And as Sig spun away with the force of it, I held up my hands in supplication. I thought the blood would come at any moment, and my son would dead, but Luka released Sig’s throat and shoved him into the silver disc of Luka’s proo. Sig squawked and flung his hands up to ward away the proo without thinking, and in an instant, he was gone.
“No!” I shouted, eyes glued to the proo. I lunged toward it, Luka momentarily forgotten, shoving my pistols into their holsters without thinking.
“Lokathu proonum,” said Luka, and the moment he finished the phrase, the proo closed with a slight pop and a gust of wind.
Behind me, Jane shrieked and bolted forward, arms out, sweeping through the empty space.
“And now, you have every reason to return Hel to me,” said Luka in a matter-of-fact tone. “But I’d hurry, if I were you. That klith is nasty enough for an experienced Isir, let alone a mere boy.”
Something inside me snapped, and rage overcame my rational mind. My pistols were back in my hand and I had both trained on Luka’s face. Luka’s gloating face.
“Go ahead, Hank,” he said. “See what happens.”
“You bastard!” I yelled.
“Hank!” screamed Jane.
It was a close thing, I must admit. I came to my senses with the trigger of each pistol a hair’s breadth from their breaks. With shaking hands, I eased off the trigger pull. “Where did you send him?” I croaked.
“You first. Where is the queen?”
“I already told you that! Owraythu has her.”
Luka shrugged. “So prove it!”
“How? What will you accept as proof?”
“Hank, never mind this bastard! Where is our son?” Jane wailed.
I glanced down at the floor. I picked out Sig’s slowth, and I could tell by looking that he was alive. Two other slowthar converged on his at the point where the proo had been. I breathed a sigh of relief. “I don’t know where he is, Jane, but he’s okay. What’s more, he’s got company.”
“Company? What do you…” Realization dawned in her eyes.
“No one crossed with him!” snapped Luka. “He’s alone and no doubt afraid! Do you care nothing for your own son?”
“Both?” she asked.
I nodded, glancing down at Yowtgayrr’s and Skowvithr’s slowthar.
“They’d die before letting any harm come to him,” said Mothi.
“What are you all blathering on about? No one went with him. You all saw it. I flung him into the proo and closed it the second he crossed. He is alone!”
Jane shook her head but did not look at Luka. “Where did you send him?”
“Where did you send Queen Hel?” Luka snapped.
I sighed and shook my head. “I told you, Luka. We had nothing to do with it. She disappeared with the Plowir Medn in that last battle.”
Luka scoffed. “She wouldn’t have left without me.”
“From the look of it, she didn’t have a choice. I don’t know where they took her, but I’ve seen her since, in Owraythu’s realm. She’s being tortured by the sound of it.”
Luka came up onto the balls of his feet, a mask of rage sweeping over his features, and he hissed like a maddened feline. “Tell me where she is!”
“I just did. Tell me where my son is, and I’ll go get him. Afterward—and only afterward—I’ll take you to Iktrasitl, to one who can take you to Owraythu’s realm.”
Luka rolled his eyes. “What, you can’t take me yourself?”
Shaking my head, I said, “No. I’ve been there, but it was in a dream state. I’ve never been there in person and I have no idea how to spin a proo there.”
“Your son will die a terrifying and lonely death.”
Jane lunged forward, her spear and shield snapping up, but I caught her by the shoulder, shaking my head. “I’ve already told you what I know and given you my word, Luka. Besides, I can find him without you. Your help only makes the process faster.”
“Hah!” snapped Luka, but unease colored his expression.
“I found you, didn’t I?” Luka’s gaze found mine, and I could see how confused, how unsure of himself, he was. I nodded. “Yes, I tracked you here.”
“Impossible! The preer leave no trails.”
“True enough,” I said. “But I can see your slowth—your trail—through time. I tapped into it to see where you were. I can do the same with the three slowthar that traveled across your proo.”
“Why do you insist on this nonsense? No one traveled with your son. I was right there, and…” His eyes darted around the room. “Where’s the Alf?”
Mothi’s laughter boomed through the room. “You’re getting old, Uncle.”
“I’ll teach you respect, boy. You can count on that.”
“Here I am, old man. Why put off til tomorrow things you can do today?”
“Both of you cut it out!” I snapped.
“Haymtatlr,” said Jane in a sweet voice.
“Hello again, Jane.”
“Hello, friend,” she said.
“I forbid you to speak to her, Haymtatlr,” said Luka.
“I don’t think I care,” said Haymtatlr. “How have you been, Jane?”
“Fine, but I need to know where Luka has sent my son.”
“Tell her and I swear to Isi that I’ll pull you apart, one blue box at a time.”
“As if you could,” snapped Jane. “Haymtatlr?”
“You are my friend, Jane, but Luka has been…a…a companion of sorts for a long, long time. Vowli was a better friend than Luka, but—”
“Do either of them treat you the way I do?” Ja
ne asked.
“It’s… I… It’s not… Hel commanded… I… I…”
I shook my head. “It’s okay, Haymtatlr, I can find him myself.” I stared at his slowth and imagined wrapping my arms around it, picking it up like a cable that measured one-foot in diameter, and tucking it under my arm. I slid forward along its length, feeling the reassuring beat of my son’s energy or life-force or whatever it was that flowed through the tube-like slowth. At the point where the proo had been, there was a jolt—as if I fell through space for a moment—and I—
“Hank! Look out!” Jane screamed.
“Luka!” yelled Mothi.
He smashed into me like a linebacker making a sack. My feet left the ground for a moment, and I flew a few feet, Luka’s shoulder embedded in my side.
“Oolfur,” he grunted as we slammed into the metal floor, and his prayteenk began.
I chanted the Kuthbyuhrn triblinkr under my breath and felt my own prayteenk course through my body. Shucking my pistol belt and shrugging out of the cape that kept part of my pain at bay, I swept the floppy hat off my head, momentarily disoriented by the change from full vision and depth-of-field to one-eyed, flat vision. I tore the mail shirt off with no time to spare.
The change I called for was far more of a complete body change than Luka’s shifting, so he gained his wolf-form while I was still in the throes of my change.
He grunted as Jane barged into his side with her shield, and he snarled his anger in my face. He wrapped his long, lupine arms around me and crushed me to his chest. His mouth opened wide.
With twin snarls, Keri and Fretyi leapt on him, each burying their fangs into a different part of his anatomy and shaking their heads violently. Luka’s growls joined theirs, and he snapped at Keri.
It was all the distraction I needed. My prayteenk finished, and I roared with pent up anger and fear for my son. I shrugged Luka off and whirled up to the pads of my four paws. I shook my head side-to-side, as my instinct seemed to demand, and lunged at him, my own fangs snapping.
With a yelp, Luka threw the varkr pups off and rose into a wrestler’s crouch, taloned hands held out in front of him. It had been easy to forget how big he was in this form—fifteen feet tall if he was an inch—but if anything, he looked even thinner, even sicklier as a wolf than he did as a man.
My change, on the other hand, added the bulk of a giant cave bear to my frame and the strength that came with it. I advanced, head still swinging side-to-side, growling and grunting. He backed away, circling to the left, his eyes darting from place to place—looking for a place that offered him an advantage, no doubt.
Keri and Fretyi advanced with me, one on each side, and mimicked my swinging head, their growls and snarls added to the cacophony. Behind me, arms and armor rattled as the others prepared to support me. Jane’s wings flapped into being and she hovered above me, her spear pointing at the oolfur.
Luka feinted toward me, snapping his jaws and grunting something unintelligible, and then hurled a ball of fire at Jane. She ducked behind her shield and the fire splashed aside. A monstrous ping filled the air, and a jagged black beam slammed into Luka’s chest, flinging him away like garbage in the wind.
I charged, roaring as my bear instincts demanded. Keri and Fretyi came with me, darting forward with silent grace compared to my lumbering run. Luka shook his head, and his eyes widened comically as he saw us coming. He had just enough time to get to his knees before I plowed into him like a bulldozer hitting a pile of loose paper.
I flung him over on his back and pinned him under my front paws. I hunched my weight forward, grinding my claws into his trapezius muscles. Hoping he’d pull his head back and expose his throat, I snapped at his face, but he was far too experienced for that—he tucked his chin, instead. Keri and Fretyi had his hands, worrying them as if they were chew toys. His feet scrabbled against the slick metal floor, fighting for purchase, writhing to the side.
I squatted, putting my chest against his and bearing down with my mass. He snapped at my face, and I darted my head forward, catching his lunge on the top of my snout. I bucked my head up, exposing his throat, and felt his fangs slide into the skin above my ursine eyes. I pressed forward, using my mass to drive my jaws closer to his throat. My fangs sank into his flesh and I pressed my jaws together. He panicked, and his gaze darted from side-to-side—no doubt thinking of Vowli’s grisly end—and he thrashed like a demon, but my weight was too great to dislodge, and my jaws were too strong for him to cast me off. He whimpered and thrashed as panic robbed him of his capacity for thought.
I pitied him in that moment.
Maybe Meuhlnir is right about him.
The thought flashed through my mind, and it was akin to a lightning strike to the forehead. This was the bastard who’d done so much evil in my life—the murders on Mithgarthr, including Ben Carson and my partner, Jax, kidnapping Sig and Jane, killing Urlikr…all of it—but I realized abruptly that I no longer wanted his death. He was broken, evil—of that there was no question—but the memories I’d shared, how he felt about the murder of his brothers, had changed how I felt about him.
I no longer want to kill him, I thought, surprise washing through me. But he will never change, he will never even want to change. He’s as evil as evil can get. Was it the way Kuhntul said? Did this man deserve compassion and understanding?
Still, that memory of how he felt when he thought of his dead brothers…of his role in the murder of his brothers…that was only one of his memories, and maybe it had been a melancholy moment. At any rate, that had been hundreds of years ago in Luka’s timeflow—might be he’d put those thoughts away.
I can see for myself, I thought. I can look into his memories and see for myself. It’ll be easy, all I need to do is dip into his slowth, and it’s right there beside me.
The others were coming. I heard Althyof’s trowba, I heard the jingle of mail, the clink of Mothi’s axes, the whoosh of Jane’s wings. When they reached us, they would try to kill Luka, I knew. If I’m going to try this, I’d better hurry. But what will happen if I go gallivanting through his memories? I can’t even tell them what I’m doing. But what other option is there? If I change back, Luka will continue the fight. If I do nothing, Luka will die, right here, right now.
I concentrated on his slowth, glaring at it from the corner of my eye. I dipped into it and his panic swept me away.
Thirty-one
Panic swept through Luka, carried on his pulse like flotsam on a breaking wave. Meuhlnir’s rebels were assaulting the North Gate, and he’d come to tell Suel, to bring her to the battlements to watch him give battle to his brother. She lay on the ground in front of her throne, drool spinning from the corner of her mouth like a spider web. “My Queen!” he called and rushed to her side.
Her eyes were open, staring at nothing, but her chest seemed too still to support breath. He rolled her to her back, hating the lifeless way her limbs flopped. One wrist cracked against the stone step of her dais loud enough that he thought it must have cracked one of the myriad bones there. Still, Suel didn’t respond.
“Come on, my Queen! My love!” He lay his ear to her chest and sighed with relief. Her heart still beat in her chest, though slowly, weakly. “To me!” he screamed, his voice booming down the hall. “Bring the queen’s healer!”
He rearranged her into a more comfortable position and wiped away the drool from her lips. He felt her breath on his knuckles as he did so, but in her eyes: nothing. “Suel, my love, come back,” he begged, hating how his voice shook. “Don’t leave me.”
But if she…if she…dies…all of this will have been for nothing! Paltr…Huthr…dead, gone. All for nothing if Suel dies. This stupid war…all for nothing.
“Suel, come back to me,” he whispered. “I can’t do this without you.” His heart ached at the thought of life without her. Where will I go? To whom will I turn for solace? Meuhlnir? Ha! Vowli? As if that one cared about anything but power. He had no family, not anymore. Suel was his family.
“To me! To me!”
Footsteps pounded in the hall, many feet coming on the run. He cradled Suel’s head in his lap and stroked her hair, trying to arrange it so she would appear regal, beautiful to the courtiers and guardsmen he’d called. She hated looking a mess…
Suel groaned, and her hands twitched.
“Yes, that’s it! Come back, my Queen!” He stared at the angry red welt on the left side of her neck.
The doors flew open, and people poured into the room. The queen’s new healer was in the middle of the pack, looking flustered, in the throes of panic herself—and rightly so, because if the queen died, he planned to send the healer on after her. “Poison?” he demanded.
The healer’s eyes flew wide, and without slowing, her hand dove into the bag at her side. She fished out an earthenware pot and flipped its cork stopper away. “A cure-all,” she said. “It will slow the advance of any poison. Who did this?”
“If I knew who did this, you’d be stumbling over his dead body!” Luka snapped. “See to her! Now!”
The healer slid to a stop and dropped to her knees. She sniffed the queen’s lips and shook her head.
“There’s a welt on the left side of her neck, idiot! Do you have eyes?” he raged.
Without looking at him, the healer turned the queen’s head and pinched the welt and sniffed it. She shoved the cure-all back in her bag. “No puncture wound, no scent of poison on her breath.” She bent back over the queen’s wrist and muttered a kaltrar in the Gamla Toonkumowl, swaying a little with the force of it.
Luka’s angry gaze swept through the crowd standing around watching. It came to rest on one of the new guardsmen. “Well?” he roared. “Close the palace, you fool!”
As if he’d tossed a viper in their midst, the crowd of courtiers and guards leapt into action, many bolting out of the room, others coming over to aid the healer.
“I will find out who did this,” he said. “And when I do…” There was no need to finish the thought. Those closest to him shuddered, and, as always, it shocked him a little that these people were so afraid of him. “Fools,” he muttered.
“Shall I take your place, Lord?” asked one of Suel’s ladies.
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