If anything, they were seen as evil and something the natives needed to exterminate.
Which proved inconvenient. Despite the cockatrice having powers and being able to shift into cockatrice form, the simple humans were wily and fierce hunters who didn’t seem to care if they were slaughtered if it meant taking a few cockatrice with them. Sheer numbers threatened to overwhelm them.
They did manage to thin the native numbers somewhat with curses and other spells. Unfortunately, after coming into the next spring with their numbers down by nearly half, it was increasingly looking like they might not be able to achieve their goal.
As solstice approached and the construction was completed, they knew they needed a worthy sacrifice, one they could use to call forth the Dark One to their realm. With his help, surely they would succeed?
Unfortunately, the maiden they’d picked was the daughter of a chief who didn’t take kindly to her abduction.
When the slaughter ended, the chief embraced his daughter before going and spitting on the body of the leader of the demons. Then he picked up the knife and strange bundle the man had been carrying and took them as the spoils of war.
* * * *
Not everyone had gone to the rock pile that day. When the rest of their group didn’t return by dark, the two mothers who’d been left behind with newborns of their own and caring for the infants and babies of others made a decision.
The one with another child, Ellwyne, left her newborn and young one behind set out in search of their group. Her mate was out there, with them.
She had to know.
The mate of the other woman had already been killed by the natives two months earlier.
It was late when Ellwyne finally discovered their bodies, not even scalped, strewn around the rock pile. Left out for the vultures and animals to pick through. Searching, she found her mate and struggled not to scream, to cry for him.
I will not allow myself to grieve.
Ellwyne would, however, seek vengeance. Their group been caught by surprise, their shifters not even having time to shift out of human form, those who were able to shift.
Many of them had been younglings, not quite old enough for a full shift yet.
The bodies had been picked clean of weapons, and their Grimoire Lilitu and the ceremonial knife—which had been passed down from children of the Dark One—were gone.
Ellwyne had a small dirk that she’d brought over with her from the Old Country. Tracking the progress of the filthy humans had been easy for her while shifted into her cockatrice form. She stalked them back to their camp, where they were celebrating their victory.
It was too easy for her to pick off the sentinels. They’d grown complacent, certain they’d killed off the remainder of their group. She went tent by tent and silently wiped out their numbers, sparing no one, not even children.
She saved the chief for last. In his tent was where she found him, the selected sacrifice for the Dark One, and their knife and book. Killing the chief had been easy. When the girl screamed, Ellwyne shifted back into human form and attacked, punching the girl until she fell unconscious. Then she gathered up their people’s things, and the book and knife, into a cloth bundle so she could carry them.
After binding the girl’s arms and wrists, Ellwyne shifted and carried the girl back to the altar they’d lovingly built to their race’s sire, dragged her to the top, and then shifted back.
Using the book, she found the spell, one they all knew, and began the summoning as she slowly flayed the native girl alive, her blood soaking into the rocks, christening it, consecrating it to the Dark One.
Before her, a shimmering light appeared, a small opening.
The veil!
Ellwyne stood and turned, staring in awe at the Dark One.
“Who are you?” he asked.
She stumbled over her answer. “Ellwyne, Dark One.”
“Where are the others?”
She shook her head. “Murdered by these primitives.” Now she allowed her tears to flow. “My mate, everyone. Only the children and Ghaldrer and I survived. The others were ambushed.”
“No men survive?”
“No.”
He held out his hand. “Approach, child.”
She did, stepping through the veil.
* * * *
It was late in the afternoon when Ellwyne stumbled out of the portal back to their altar. The body was still there, blood dried, but Ellwyne barely noticed.
She pressed her hands to her belly, wondering, amazed.
The Dark One had picked her!
She was to bring Ghaldrer and send her across. To protect and raise their young, to hide and stay safe from the natives. Pretend to be humans. And when their children were of age, to summon him there at the altar and send the girls through.
To save their race.
They were truly the chosen ones!
After rolling the native girl’s body off the top of the altar, Ellwyne clutched the book and knife to her as she stumbled back to their camp. Ghaldrer stood, her eyes wide.
“What happened? You have been gone three days!”
“Three?”
“Yes!”
She would have sworn it was only overnight, but maybe her grief had muddied her mind.
After telling Ghaldrer what had happened, and allowing herself to grieve for her mate, Ellwyne grabbed her friend’s hand and pressed it to her belly. “Feel the fire within me! We are chosen!”
It was the only thing that could possibly slake her grief. That the Dark One himself wanted them to help save their race.
To birth a newer, better one, one that could save them and rule the world.
“When do I go?” Ghaldrer asked.
“Now.”
“What about my baby?”
“I will nurse her.”
“How will we survive? Just two of us and children?”
“He is going to send someone to help us. A midwife. One who can cross through the veil undetected. They will help guide and protect us.”
The women embraced. “And then?”
“He will let us know. But we are to protect the book at all costs. It is the only one in the New World.”
“He does not want us to return to our old lands, then?”
“No. He says we will rule here.” She smiled. “We will be queens.”
* * * *
Nearly four days had passed when Ghaldrer finally returned, stumbling into camp and collapsing, her belly already swelling.
Ellwyne smiled down at her. “Did I not tell you?”
Ghaldrer laid her hands on her belly, staring at the swell in wonderment. “But…it is so soon!”
“Feel the fire within you,” Ellwyne said. “That is true, powerful magick.” She grinned. “And we have no wolves or dragons to worry about in these lands.”
“He told me we need to be careful. Our midwife will be here within a couple of moons.”
“Excellent. We’ll need her.”
“He said time is different there. That it moves faster here on our world. When our females are old enough to be caught with child, that we should bring them back here and summon him. But that once our midwife arrives, we need to move. Pretend we are human women.”
“What about the altar?”
“He said it is safe. But he wants us away from the natives here. We cannot intermarry with the humans, though. If we end up bred and caught by a human, we are to kill the baby. Sacrifice it on the altar for more power. That we’re only to allow pure babies to survive.”
Ellwyne nodded. “That makes sense. Did he say where to go?”
“He said that the midwife will take us south and west. That there is a great river which will one day be important. He wants us to live there and raise our nest there.”
Ellwyne clasped Ghaldrer’s hands. “Do you know what this means?”
“It means a long journey.”
Ellwyne’s eyes looked lit from within. “It means exactly what we sought!”
“Nothing good comes at small cost.”
* * * *
The midwife had led them to their new home. Plenty of land, plenty of game, plenty of fish.
Not many natives in their area. They were very careful not to piss the natives off, forcing themselves to trade with them, make peace with them.
To never mention what had happened at the rock pile.
Knowing that if they did, it would mean their deaths. The deaths of their children.
The midwife would disappear for weeks at a time before returning, but their children had all survived, and both women’s bellies were swelling with the lives growing within them.
As it came time for Ellwyne, then Ghaldrer to birth, the midwife returned. “Stay here. Settle here. Both of you. I’ll return when it’s time to take them back.”
But…she didn’t return. And as the children grew, the youngest was nearly eighteen years old when a large earthquake destroyed their home, trapping and killing their mothers inside.
The children weren’t sure what to do with the knife and book they had. They’d been taught some of the legends by their mothers, how they must keep their nature secret, where they’d come from.
And that everything would be revealed to them when they were of age.
So they all moved from the site, together, after burying their mothers, rebuilding not far away. Eventually marrying with natives and white settlers alike, the book staying with the oldest boy, who became a man who was too busy trying to survive and raise a family to focus on chasing old myths, even though he did keep and protect the book and pass it down to his eldest son after telling him of their lineage…
* * * *
The Tanuki couldn’t find them. She knew she wasn’t far off from the timeline, that the oldest offspring, maybe even the youngest, should be ready to take back to Boorman for breeding. But when she found the old ruins of their homestead she realized she’d fucked up.
And the asshole wasn’t exactly a forgiving kind of guy.
Shit.
She returned to Tavares, an off-Earth plane through which she’d made her journeys to Earth so it wouldn’t catch the watchful eyes of the damned archdemons.
She couldn’t have been that far off in her calculations, could she?
Then again, she’d been awfully busy herself and maybe she had lost track of time and misjudged things. Her own concerns had distracted her. Caught up in a very torrid—and hopefully productive—affair with Eros, she had plans of her own to keep track of.
She patted her tummy over the special package she carried there. Hopefully one that would help her end up in The Firm.
Where she deserved to be.
Boorman and his fucking cockatrice were more like the cock-up-trice. They couldn’t get their shit together, and whatever personal grudge it was that Boorman had with Hades’ son was going to get Boorman killed. She didn’t care about her history with that stupid race, or that Boorman had helped her extract revenge on the Cailleach.
She needed to focus on greener pastures.
Like popping out this bundle and worming her way into The Firm once and for all.
* * * *
In January of 1942, a man went into the local bank in New Madrid, Missouri, and rented a safe deposit box. In it, he deposited a canvas-wrapped book and a very old knife.
He couldn’t read the book. To his knowledge there wasn’t anyone left who could read the thing. But he knew the power he sensed within it was something that, one day, one of his kind would need to use.
It’d been passed down from generation to generation, along with the myths. He didn’t dare approach anyone about it. If he did, and it was as important as he’d been told it was, it would paint a target on his family’s head.
Cockatrice were not ones to mess around. That much he knew.
But he had a family to take care of. One he was about to leave defenseless.
And he was about to be shipped out to the Pacific theatre to help fight the Japanese.
He couldn’t afford not to. With his mate dead, they were barely hanging on, their farm struggling. None of them could shift, and he doubted their children would be able to, either. He’d enlisted in the military and ordered his two sons, who were only twelve and fourteen, to stay behind with his two older, adult daughters to run the farm. To not do so would be stupid on a number of levels.
So he gave the key to his eldest daughter, Hylena, for safekeeping. He told her not to open the box, not to look at the book, unless he told her to. And above all, not to tell her other siblings about it. That he was entrusting to her the secrets of their kind, their nest.
Or, should he fail to return, if she somehow stumbled across someone who might be able to read it, then she could decide what to do but to never betray their nest. That to trust the wrong person with it would mean their deaths.
He died in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
* * * *
Hylena was good to her word and while she hadn’t been able to shift, her younger sister, Syrena, and one of her younger brothers could. They soldiered on as best they could with Hylena running the nest.
Time passed. The nest survived, with Hylena and Syrena both taking mates and having younglings, as did their brothers. They kept the farm and as opportunities allowed, they made money.
Perhaps not legally, but they were careful to stay off the radar of other shifters and other cockatrice nests.
Especially after a cousin from Europe tracked them down and told them of cockatrice hunters who were trying to wipe them all out. It was difficult enough for the two of them being single mothers, now that both their husbands had been killed in Viet Nam.
Then, in 1992, Hylena was mortally injured in a car wreck. She lived long enough in the hospital to pass the key over to her sister, Syrena, and told her of their father’s orders.
Syrena didn’t tell anyone else about the key.
Not even her son, Carl…
Chapter Three
A long time ago, there was a girl with a grudge. Even Immortals aren’t immune to the wrath of a jilted woman. Especially a jilted woman with friends from off-Earth places. Remember, kiddies—just because you can, doesn’t mean you should…
The Cailleach had walked amongst the people in her care far too many years for her to recall. Truth be told, it sometimes grew tiresome.
Even the men.
She hoped she would never grow completely tired of bedding the men. If she ever did, that would be the day she’d start to look for a way to escape this realm.
If her two sisters would ever allow her to do that.
Her latest conquest had been more than willing, a man she hadn’t needed to seduce, who’d been ready and eager to share his bed with her. Tall and stout, well muscled, a farmer who didn’t have a wife or betrothed.
She was horny, not greedy.
Although no man had ever captured her heart, and if she had it her way, no man ever would.
It wasn’t her fault men wanted to tup her when she would put out and the human women who’d caught the men’s eyes wouldn’t spread their legs before finalizing their silly sham construct they called “marriage.”
Perk of the rank. An unintended pregnancy wasn’t a worry she had due to her status. Neither were any of the ailments that plagued humans.
She had been coming to the farmer’s house for several nights now, and was wondering how much longer before she’d have to say good-bye to him. It wouldn’t do to let any of the men she bedded grow too fond of her. She refused to take a mate, to be tied down.
There was too much life yet to live, too much to see, history unfolding before her. Some of the visions she’d had showed her that.
It was those future times she truly looked forward to, when life would be complicated and people who had blessed luxuries would do stupid things like spend time in the wilderness in tents when they’d have perfectly wonderful homes to keep them safe and dry.
Humans are stupid.
She also needed to be in control. And physical feelings were brief, fleeting.
That was one thing she sort of missed. How long had it been since she’d…felt? The human experience of deeply caring for someone or something?
Sure, she had her responsibilities. She wasn’t even talking about that kind of “feeling.” A deep connection.
She missed that, in some ways. Because none of the men she bedded could ever be more than just a fleeting sensory experience, soon to be forgotten to the sands of time.
Once she’d made the mistake of searching for a past lover, just out of curiosity, to see how he’d fared through life. Being able to change her own appearance made it easy to pass undetected unless she chose to reveal her true nature to someone.
She’d found him on his deathbed, surrounded by family and loved ones. Things she didn’t have. Not really.
Never again.
She learned to never follow up. Once she moved on, she never looked back.
It wasn’t worth the melancholy tug on her senses. That wasn’t the kind of “feeling” she wanted.
The Cailleach met up with her current conquest, Barthyn, at the local tavern. “There you are.”
“Sorry I’m late. Slight diversion.”
“Nothing serious, I hope?”
“No. Silly nit who keeps flitting around me. I’ve told her repeatedly that I have no interest in her, yet she pursues me.” He wrinkled his nose. “Something about her and her people. I just don’t like it, and can’t put my finger on it.”
She began to walk home with him, her arm hooked through his. She’d told him she was a widow from out of town and traveling through to stay with relatives, to explain her prowess in bed without him thinking her a whore, and to elicit a little sympathy from him.
“She must care about you.”
“I barely know her. Odd people, hers, anyway. Showed up a few months back to work a farm that had gone to seed when the family died. Rarely seen in town. One of their women has apparently decided we should be together.” He leaned in and forked a ward against the Evil Eye ahead of them before spitting to the side. “Not people I think I wish to be involved with, anyway. That stretch of land they’ve taken up on has always brought bad fortune.”
The Fire Road Page 2