by Terry Madden
“Come.”
She scanned the timber walk that ran along the top of the stockade, and saw no one.
Keeping to the fence, she led them forward. It had all the markings of a trap. “Archers take the wall walk. Talan and Dylan, come with me.”
The barnyard was silent. The bodies of a woman and two children lay where they fell, while chickens pecked for grain between their fingers.
The door of the house stood wide open.
“Stay behind me,” she told Dylan and Talan.
“What if they’re in there?” Talan’s breath was rapid and shallow.
“Watch the door.” He didn’t argue this time.
She touched Dylan’s arm and he followed. She drew her dirk and Dylan a shortsword.
The dying embers of a fire barely glowed in the hearth, and Lyleth’s eyes struggled in the dim light. Crumpled beside the fire lay a man wearing the cloak of a druada. Planting her foot on his shoulder, she pushed him over.
His hand went to her ankle and Dylan’s sword went to his throat.
“Ava’s solás,” she whispered. Jeven was his name.
He let go of her ankle, his arm losing strength for he bled from a wound to the belly. He convulsed and clutched at her cloak. Who would have done this? Fiach’s men? That made no sense.
Ava would not be far from Jeven, and Irjan, not far from Ava. “Where is she?” Lyleth whispered.
She followed his gaze to the timber ceiling and the ladder on the far wall.
Lyleth placed her fingers on Jeven’s temples to draw out the pain, but he seized her wrist, his eyes wide and frantic. He tried to speak, but failed. Then his will let go of him, and so did Lyleth, freeing him of his flesh. She whispered the words of passing and closed his eyes.
Dylan’s eyes were on the ceiling, where tiny streams of dust came through the floorboards. She touched his arm and motioned for him to wait here.
She dropped her cloak and led with her dirk.
The ladder was narrow and bound to creak, so she became a mouse and placed her feet where the rungs met timber braces.
Slowly, she climbed until her eyes were level with the loft floor. Spears of daylight shone through seams of a shuttered window and fell on the unmoving body of Ava. But for her boots, she lay naked among fleece bundles and racks of dried fish. She was bound in the manner of Alamit seers, a primitive method used to prevent the soul from wandering too far. The bindings served to shock the body into dragging the spirit back, but one always had another keep watch in case of strangulation. Where was Irjan?
“The queen.” Dylan’s head poked up beside her. He repeatedly made the sign against evil.
“Watch the ladder,” Lyleth told him.
A stoppered horn vial lay beside Ava. Lyleth uncorked it and smelled the black liquid. Poppy and henbane, and probably nightshade. Ingested, the contents would kill, but used sparingly in the eyes or nostrils, it would allow one to fly, and in Ava’s case, share the body of her conjured red crow. Irjan had abandoned Ava, it seemed. When Lyleth shot the red crow, Ava’s soul had crashed back into this wasted shell of flesh.
Ava lay flat on her stomach, the tether so tight she wheezed. Lyleth pushed a stray strand of hair from Ava’s face, and lifted an eyelid. Her pupils were wide and black, and a stream of spittle trickled from the corner of her mouth. Lyleth rolled Ava to her back against a fleece bale, and laying a palm on her chest, detected a shallow breath and a sluggish heartbeat.
“Ava.” Her head lolled, and her eyes moved rapidly behind the lids.
She was a frail shadow of the girl who’d sailed from Sandkalder as the wife of a king. Lyleth had stood beside her on the deck and watched Ava’s face as the frozen shores of her homeland grew small on the horizon. “Gone,” she’d said, testing her new language. “I am gone from here.” She laughed into the wind and salt spray, “I am gone!”
Ava’s skin felt icy and goosefleshed.
Lyleth patted her cheeks. “Where is Irjan?”
Ava’s eyes tried to open, but it seemed even the dim light was blinding.
Dylan’s voice came from the top of the ladder, “Found me that greenman’s killer.”
“Irjan?”
“Nay, just a lad round ‘bout Elowen’s age,” Dylan said. “Hid himself in the kitchen cupboard with a meat knife, he did. The druí must have spooked him, and he give him a good stick in the belly.”
“See to the boy, Dylan.”
Lyleth turned back to Ava, her eyelids fluttering, her words an incoherent wheeze.
“Your men die for you,” Lyleth said, “while you fly on borrowed wings. What was it like to fall from the sky?”
She pinched Ava’s cheeks and trapped the lolling, bloodshot eyes with her own.
Ava just smiled weakly, and laughed, rolling to her side on the pile of fleece until the cord around her neck tightened. She croaked past the noose, “Did my husband please you?” She went into a fit of choking laughter. “What’s it like to rut with a dead man?”
Lyleth shook her. “Irjan left you here to die. Where is she?”
Ava looked into her for a long moment. “Feed me death, druí.” Her eyes went to the vial of poison. “Do what you’ve come to do.”
Ava was close enough to death already. Lyleth took her dirk and cut the cord around Ava’s throat and hands.
Sitting up, Ava rubbed at her wrists.
“Your death is Nechtan’s decision,” Lyleth said, “not mine.”
Ava pulled her knees to her chest, and in one motion, drew a blade from her boot. She stabbed wildly, but before she connected, Lyleth caught her wrist and squeezed. The knife dropped to the floor.
Lyleth picked it up and pressed it to Ava’s throat, a blade of green lightning glass, a soothblade of the Old Blood. How did Ava get such a weapon?
“You’re a coward,” Ava said. “Do it.”
“Your life is Nechtan’s.” It took the sum of Lyleth’s will to stay her hand and slip the ancient blade into her belt. She bound Ava’s hands with the cast-off cord.
Rolling into a pile of vomit-soaked fleece, Ava keened. Lyleth had never felt such sorrow spill from another. Death was a gift she would not give Ava. It would come soon enough. She draped her cloak around the shivering, wasted woman and stuffed the hem in her mouth to quiet her. Who knew Ava was here? And how long would it be before they came for her?
A low whistle came from the archers on the wall walk.
Lyleth opened the shutter and looked east.
A bright lick of flame curled from the towers of Maiden Pass and Caer Cedewain itself burned.
Lyleth squatted beside Ava and looked into those lost eyes. “Your father comes for you, lass.” She stroked Ava’s hair. “He’s been coming since your wedding day.”
Chapter 36
From behind the hedge, Connor watched the last of the golden fog dissipate until Ned stood there on the pool deck, naked. Moments before, he’d been a giant eel, and now here he was, examining the runes Connor had drawn around the hot tub with Iris’ lipstick.
Iris was tugging on Connor’s arm. “Run!” she cried. “Go on.”
“Are you crazy?” She was halfway to the fence already.
Ned didn’t even glance at Iris; his eyes were trained on Connor, hiding in the shrubs in his boxers. Ned strode toward him like Bigfoot, until he stood on the other side of the hedge, his hands on his hips. His eyes bored a path through the leaves to meet Connor’s.
“Hey ya, Ned,” Connor said weakly.
“Come out, you pussy.”
Connor crept from behind the bush, his eyes scanning the deck for the used-up lipstick, the evidence. The blood drained from his brain.
“I—I just thought I’d try one more time to get through, because I really need to see Dish, just once more, and I didn’t know I would be, uh, interrupting.” The next words just barfed out. “You’re a water horse.”
Ned gave him an offended scowl. “A water horse? You on crack?”
Ned found a towel, wr
apped it around his waist, and plopped into a chair. He examined the runes on the flagstones, then measured Connor from under heavy brows.
“I won’t tell a soul, honest to god,” Connor said. “I know it was you who took me through the well the first time and I know you can take me again if you want to. It’s really important, or I would never ask, but I suppose you already know that.”
Ned’s mouth was hanging open.
“First of all, Connor Connor, I’m no stinking water horse. Second of all, I’m the one who’s gonna be making the demands around here, not your sorry ass. And third, it wasn’t me who took you over the first time. Why the hell would I do that?”
Stories of trading your soul to the devil came to mind.
“Then how did I get through?”
“Fuck if I know. But I do know I should’ve left you there.”
“So, you did pull me out?”
“Of course I pulled your ass out,” he snuffed. “You got no business over there. And you got no business here now—”
“If you’re not a water horse, what are you?”
“I’m not a what, kid. I’m a who.”
How could Connor have failed to see it before? Suddenly, so many things became clear. And Connor wasn’t about to let Ned get away with it.
“You’re a well guardian! That pool on the beach. You lured Dish there, you tattooed him! Then the crash, and poof, Dish’s insides are gone because you took him.” Connor was talking so fast he couldn’t stop. “You moved the well and I just happened to find your little hiding place here. But why did you take Dish?”
For once Ned seemed at a loss for words, his face all scrunched up. “‘Lure’ isn’t exactly the right word—”
“But you did. Just tell me why.”
“I don’t owe you an explanation, Judge Judy, but you owe me a few.” He nodded at the runes.
“You purposely took Dish over to—to wherever it is,” Connor said, “and you told me he ‘needed a chance.’ A chance to do what? What do you need Dish for?”
Ned found some cigarettes behind a dead potted plant, shook one out of the pack, and lit it. He took a long drag, and exhaled a plume of smoke in Connor’s face that most definitely took the shape of a water horse.
“Sit down,” he demanded.
Connor coughed, and sat.
“You need to take a deep breath, kid.” Ned put on his friendly face and leaned close to Connor, but all Connor could see was that lidless yellow eye swiveling in its socket. Ned always did smell a bit like fish.
“Your Dish had a task that needed doing.” Ned was clearly struggling to keep his temper. “He would have gone himself if he’d found a way over. Now, where’d you get these runes?”
“Had a task? You mean he’s done it already?”
“Let’s suppose he has. Where did you get this?” Ned tapped cigarette ash on the runes.
“So, if Dish has done what you took him to do… you don’t need him anymore.” The pieces fit together now. Dish had fulfilled his role, and Bronwyn was going to pull the plug. What would happen to him when the kite string was cut?
Connor looked at the runes circling the pool. “It says something terrible, doesn’t it?”
“Where did you get them?” Ned’s friendly face was gone now.
These runes must be more important than Connor thought. Had the words summoned Ned? No, it couldn’t be. Ned had been here from the first day. But the only place the runes existed before Connor drew them was in the photograph. He jumped out of his plastic chair and started scuffing at the lipstick marks with the heel of his bare foot.
“I got this. It’ll be clean in no time. A little bleach—”
“Cut the bullcrap.”
Connor turned to face Ned and the beer gut rolling over the knot in his towel. Well guardians were supposed to be beautiful women. Connor felt cheated.
“It’s some kind of magic spell, isn’t it?” Connor asked. “Like druid magic?”
Ned’s voice was frayed. “There is no ‘magic.’” He made little quotes marks in the air. “Not on this side.”
“What are you talking about? I just saw you—you swimming around as an eel. If that’s not magic—”
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist. Think of this world as the left side of your brain, the other world as the right. Here, you got virtual reality and spy planes, there, we got shapeshifters and shit. When you die, you go back and forth, back and forth.” He waved his cigarette side to side. “You build your resume till you can use both sides of your brain.”
“Back and forth?” That was exactly what Merryn had told him. “Till you reach enlightenment?”
Ned’s mouth was hanging open. “Sure, whatever.”
“This well is the way through, it’s the third well.” Connor said it with conviction.
“This is a well.” Ned exhaled wild shapes of smoke from his nostrils. “Not that well. So, now…” Ned stood up, and got in Connor’s face. “I’m pretty sure these symbols didn’t just come to you, unless you got one hell of a right brain. Now, unless you want to get hurt all over, I’d start talking, dickweed.”
Connor scanned the deck for the photocopy, but he distinctly remembered Iris stuffing the paper in her hippy bag.
“It was a photo.” His voice cracked into a falsetto.
“What photo?”
Connor wiped his sweaty palms on his boxers. “I know you took Dish over to fight some kind of battle, but they’re going to cut off his life support. Let him die. And I know if he dies here, he’ll die there, too. So, tell me the truth, and I’ll tell you about the picture.”
Ned sighed. “His show’s over.”
“Show? Is that all Dish’s life is to you? Some kind of show?”
Ned’s eyes ignited. He slammed his bare, wet chest against Connor’s, like a batter arguing with an umpire. “Give. Me. This. Photo.”
Terror settled like shorted wires in the pit of Connor’s belly. Iris would be halfway back to school by now. Connor’s eyes must have flashed toward the trail, because Ned said, “Your girlie has it?”
“I—I uh, well, yeah.”
In a millisecond, Ned’s hands closed around Connor’s throat.
“I swear—she has it!” The words croaked past Ned’s tightening hands.
“You’ll bring me every copy, because you know I’ll know if you hold out on me, you little turd.”
Ned’s face turned red and the world started to recede from Connor’s view like a time warp tunnel. Ned let go, and Connor collapsed and sucked air while Ned pulled at his goatee with a trembling hand.
Connor forced himself to his knees, coughing, then stood. This time, it was Connor’s turn to get in Ned’s face.
“You want the picture,” Connor said, “and I need to go through that well because there’s no way in hell I’m going to just let Dish die, here or there.”
When Connor realized what he was doing, his heart stopped. Shit. Ned was grinning at him.
“Are you trying to make a fucking deal with me?”
Connor thought for a long minute whether the answer should be yes or no.
“Yeah. Here’s the deal.” Connor swallowed hard. “Let me see Dish one more time. Let me warn him.”
“Bring me the pictures. All of them.”
Connor stood at the edge of the well, naked. Ned was in there somewhere, all scale and fangs. “Jump,” was all he’d said before disappearing underwater.
Connor had gone back for the book and gotten as far as Ziegler’s mansion, then called his roommate. Aaron said the cops had already been there for the missing persons report. Connor asked him to give Iris a message: she was to meet him at Ziegler’s, and bring the book and all photocopies.
“Photocopies of what, dude?”
“Just tell her.”
Ten minutes later, Iris was there, pleading with Connor not to do it.
“What if Ned’s a demon?” she demanded. “What if he’s going to use this for evil? Open a portal to hell?”
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“Just give me the pictures,” he told her.
She fished around in her hippy bag and produced two crumpled photocopies and Clyde’s book, still Ziplocked.
“See ya, Iris.”
He was a few steps away when she ran to him and gave him a long hug. It actually felt good, and he held her for longer than he thought he would.
“Stop crying,” he said, and headed for the trail.
When Connor got back, Ned was sitting beside the well eating Chinese food from a carton.
“Here.”
Connor held out the pictures and the book. Ned took them with a strange reverence, tracing the runes with his fingers just like Aunt Merryn had. Finally, he glanced up at Connor, like a dog protecting his bone. Whatever this stone was, it was a big deal to a well guardian.
“Now it’s your turn,” Connor said. “Take me across.”
Connor stood with his bare toes gripping the edge of the hot tub. There was no bottom now. The plaster was gone and a deep current sent a subtle curl over the surface. He thought his heart would leap out of his throat. Ned had promised to take him to the other side, but he never said anything about bringing him back. In the old stories, these trips were usually one way.
With both feet, Connor jumped in.
Connor lets the cold take him, forces his muscles to cease fighting, his arms streaming above him like vines seeking sun. His lungs beg for air until he gives in, and inhales, and a concerto of crystal bells fills his head. Every nerve in his body is fully awake, tingling wildly with the touch of effervescence.
He is a black goldfish, and he’s swimming right out of his aquarium into another sky.
The heavy burden of his body dissipates slowly and carries him on like a balloon.
Through streamers of bubble-jewels, shafts of distant light dance in clear water. Roiling in and out of the light, a great beast moves. Ned. His scales are hammered silver and the light from another sun sparks his armor with iridescent flashes. But his yellow eye never leaves Connor. He circles, faster and faster, until a breaking wave carries Connor toward the surface.
In slow motion, a sword tumbles past him, end over end. A man follows the sword, his open, empty eyes staring at death, the weight of his armor dragging him past Connor into the darkness below.