CHAPTER TWO
For the better part of an hour we swooped, dived, barrel-rolled and generally capered across the sky, something we hadn't had time for when we'd first met on Halloween, but reality finally intruded and we dropped back down to Market, leveling out just over the Quarter, and finally landing in one of the huge fields that patchworked it. There were a good dozen or so members of Pegasus' Clan here, either being groomed, worked, or just plain showboating their way around the area.
“Are those grooms human, or did you break down and hire some of the Fae?” I asked.
“Some of both. None of Manannan's or Brigid's Clans, but there are a few of the Tree and Stone Clans that passed muster. The humans were easier and a lot less trouble.” As we passed, each of the horses raised their wings and dropped their heads in respect to the father of their species.
“I've been wondering about how you avoid the problems of inbreeding,” Sparky asked, and delicately, for him.
“A percentage of foals are born without wings, and they're genetically completely unrelated to me, with a little effort. Clean breeding stock and careful management do most of the work for us these days, but it was a real bitch to get set up. Bending time in the High Airs didn't hurt either.”
“So how big is the Clan these days? And do you include Riders in that number?”
“603 equine members, and yes, I include Riders in the Clan, of which there are 84, not counting you.”
“Seems a little small. Is that part of why you threw in on this shindig?”
“Not needing to get involved in inter-Clan diplomacy just to get a few things for the Clan was a serious consideration, yes,” he said, leaning his head over a paddock wall to rub his chin along the neck of a pretty little bay-colored foal. “The other was to find more Riders. You're right, there are too few of us, and without more biped representation, we're at a disadvantage, particularly since we can't manufacture goods or provide services other than transport, and that way lies servitude and slavery, again.” His tone left no doubt as to his refusal to see his offspring enslaved to the Fae again.
I could sense the vimana's presence within a few hundred yards, so I pointed in the relevant direction and Pegasus walked us over that way. I could have kicked him, but that seems a little rude for a talking horse that I like better than some of my family.
Near a stable that was almost as fancifully carved as his prison on the Isle of Apples we found Avani and her charges, half of whom were waking up and staring at the pegasi while the other half were still asleep or being shaken awake by the energetic Sharon. Her pigtails were shaking like pendulums she was putting so much back into it, but the last one she was trying to rouse was having none of it. I dismounted when we got close, just as the kid gave up and got Avani to give it a shot.
“Get up, Leo, we're here.” She shook his shoulder, but he still didn't respond, and she yelled out his name again, then mine, so I ran over.
“I'm a healer, let me take a look,” I said, opening the Sight. The first thing I noticed was the gray-blue glow of a spell; it seemed to be concentrated around the head and neck, but it encompassed Leo's whole body, in fact reaching tendrils into his body, intertwining deeply with every system in it with the exception of his brain, which was the least affected part. “Dammit, he's been spelled, did he eat or take anything?” Avani shook her head and tried to keep the other kids under control, some of them crying and others trying come over and wake Leo up.
“We went through a funny smell on the way here, mister Rhymer,” the self-possessed Sharon said, sniffling back tears and snot. “It made me feel funny, but Leo had a funny look on his face before he fell asleep.” She stared at Avani like she was afraid she was in trouble.
“I'm not mad, Sharon, but you need to tell me what you smelled, it could help Leo,” she soothed, hitching one of the kids to her hip and gathering the rest.
“It's a Fae spell, obviously. Similar to elf-shot, but designed to affect the dreaming mind instead of the body,” Prometheus advised. “and I've got no clue as to the point.”
“It's the signature of the Court of Dreams, Ry.” I turned my head towards the familiar voice and I laid eyes on Ranson, Senior Archivist and head of Fae Research Section. He looks like an old African shaman, all wrinkles, white hair, dark skin, and he'd changed out his usual stained robe for a clean tunic and pants.
“What in the Hells is a Court of Dreams, and why would they do it to one of my kids?” Avani said, cocking a hand in what I recognized as a blast-spell gesture. He held up his hand and showed his brand, resonating it in the proprietary pattern of Archivist training, so I was sure it was him. I returned the favor, introduced them to each other, and her hand relaxed.
“I've never heard of the Court of Dreams either, so like the lady said, who are they and what would they want with kids?”
He approached me and the boy and his hands flicked through a couple of minor diagnostic spells. “The Court uses humans to generate Power, and kids are their preferred target.” He dragged his fingers through the boy's hair, looking at the random bits of fluff and hair that came out. “The Reeves,” he looked at Avani before continuing, “are supposed to have hunted down and killed the last of them about 20 years ago, part of the terms of the Compact.”
“Okay, either somebody escaped, or they left something behind..” I started, before Avani interrupted.
“Look, before we go boggle-hunting any chance we can just stick him with a piece of iron or something to break the spell?”
“No can do, this spell was designed for use on humans, and we have enough iron in our blood to disrupt any spell that doesn't take it into account.”
“Okay then, is there anywhere I can stash these guys where they'll be safe, before we go skin these pricks alive?” For vengeful minders, you can't do much better than a Reeve.
“I can handle that,” Pegasus said. He whinnied, I felt a pulse of Wind blow past, and a couple of breaths later the entire field was shielded behind a shimmering dome of magic. “Only one of the Clan can cross the dome. I'll get another thumbbearer to keep watch.”
“That your cute name for humans, now?”
“Better than naked monkeys, right?” One of the horse trainers hustled over and introduced himself to the kids and Avani, so I released the vimana to her control so they could get the kids indoors.
“You showed up at an awful convenient moment, Ranson,” I offered him my hand, just so our brands would confirm each other.
“I'm a Senior Archivist, Ry. Your attempt to ping my brand got my attention, so I tracked you down. Your landing approach wasn't exactly subtle, and your link to the Windhorse Clan isn't a secret. Add them together with a map, and here we are.”
“Okay, fine, so how do we find these bastards?” The Sharp was filling my head with ideas about what to do when we found the pricks and I was inclined to run with it, everything from flaying them alive with pressure spells to causing specific aneurysms with blood pressure fluctuations. Child predators are one of the few things that I don't mind cutting loose on.
“This spell's like a mining operation, there's a track leading to the processing plant. Unfortunately, the track runs through the Dreamtime, and I don't know any trustworthy Somnomancers.”
“Don't recognize the term.”
“Dream-mages. Spooky folks. Option two, we find an Alchemist with some DreamSmoke, should be easy enough in a marketplace.”
“And what should I expect to pay for that? The color of my eyes? My firstborn?”
“Cash should do, but gold definitely will.” We both shut up as the Reeve rejoined us; she'd changed into battle-gear, a bulletproof vest enhanced with durability runes, greaves and gauntlets of silver metal that glowed with Power, all over a micro-chainmail bodysleeve. Over her eyes was a visor of some transparent material that probably shifted her vision into the UV and IR spectra. No helmet, but the rest of the gear probably extended a forcefield or something, helmets are just too limiting to vision and hearing. “Nic
e outfit. Not sure you're going to need it, though.”
“Better to be safe than sorry,” she said, sliding a bandolier of metal stakes over a shoulder and fastening it down. We filled her in on the likely suspects and the plan of action, which made her nod. “I had the kids down in the Alchemist's district yesterday, so I know it pretty well. You just planning on going door to door?”
“DreamSmoke's a cheap and easy concoction, it can be banged out in about ten minutes. We just need one with good ingredients,” Ranson said with a fang filled smile, and just to show how seriously he was taking this, he shapeshifted enough for his three extra sets of eyes to show. “Think I can get a discount like this?” Avani's hand had gone to her belt when his other eyes appeared, but she made a visible effort to relax. “Sorry, I should have mentioned the Anansikin thing.”
“Not a problem, I just... have a problem with spiders,” she said, markedly not looking at either of us, and we did the smart thing and paid no attention. “Although, if we're pulling out all the stops,” she said theatrically while lifting her arms up, “you should probably know about these.” The sides of her chestplate bulged out in two places on each side, morphing and stretching into two more sets of arms. She looked like a modern-day Hindu God prepared for war, and amazingly sensual at the same time.
“Those Hindu Goddesses don't just have those extras for holding all their armaments, they're unbelievable in the budoir,” Prometheus commented with an invisible leer. “The unexpurgated version of the Kama Sutra would have been a popup book, if better paper had existed back then. Just going into one of their Temples could have aroused a stick.”
“Thanks for the complete nonsequitur.”
“Would you rather I just let you try to top what you did to Marshallac Firelord? Especially since we figured out the Defender gave you a raging case of heroism?”
“Point taken.” Not my proudest moment, but not one I was ashamed of.
“Well, now that everyone's prepared for war, should we get moving?” Marge asked. We nodded, and at some signal from their Lord, two of the herd cantered over and presented themselves to Ranson and the Reeve. “You both comfortable riding bareback?” I almost started laughing at the double entendre, but I turned it into a long nasal snort. They both agreed and mounted up, as I did. The horses took off at a dead run, and halfway across the field we took to the air.
Riding a flying horse isn't like you'd think, their wings are mostly for manipulating Wind-magic and there's not a lot of wind resistance or turbulence unless the Pegasi is either going for supersonic speeds or intentionally letting the turbulence through, so it's a really smooth flight. Avani took the lead, and we arced over the Market for about fifteen minutes before we landed right in the street, not even disturbing the flags and signs hanging outside the shops and stalls, a precise display of Wind control, which I said to Pegasus.
“Thanks, the foals are still getting the hang of coordinating multiple disturbance vectors while being ridden, so the practice is good for them.”
We dismounted, and we all made faces at the various smells permeating the area, as you would expect with dozens of alchemical operations all going on at once. It's the bizarre combinations that do you in, burning plastic and fresh ground cinnamon don't go together well at all. I've smelled worse, but it still knocks you back on your heels
“Okay, let's do this systematically, everybody takes a shop. If either of you find it, let me know, and the Reeves service will reimburse the cost,” Avani said, turning to her left and going through a beaded curtain belching out clouds of cherry-smelling blue smoke. Ranson took the shop to the left, and I went right into a building covered in classical alchemy glyphs, the choice of advertising for a Practitioner who wants to project gravitas and a stern personality. The guy behind the counter looked like a woodprint from the Middle Ages, long dark robe, shapeless crushed velvet hat, and a clunky gold chain with a black stone medallion around his neck.
“Hi, don't wanna be rude, but I'm in a rush, and I need DreamSmoke, enough for three people. Can you help me out?”
“No, I don't do psychogenics, just metallurgy. Outside turn left, three doors down on the other side of the street.” He turned around and ducked through a darkened doorway, not even bothering to make sure I didn't steal anything, but in Faerie, theft's as dangerous a proposition as juggling sweating dynamite. I followed instructions and crossed through a doorway shaped like Stonehenge trilithons 10 feet high and just wide enough for a shopping cart to get through.
Inside, I walked into an OCD chemist's dream, all gleaming white counters, shining steel cabinets, and every container, flask, bottle, and box I could see was tagged with a computer printed label. The space was even laid out for ease of browsing, it looked like all the compounds were grouped into similar functions, curative potions here, alteration powders there, and so on.
“This is what happens when you stream too many seasons of Breaking Bad.”
“No kidding. Imagine what the living room looks like.”
“More of the same, or the polar opposite.”
“Five on more of the same, I've seen Pam get like this when she's between commissions.”
I stepped up to the counter and tapped the bronze gong which didn't make a sound out front, but I bet it rang right in the ear of the proprietor, who obliged by appearing in the completely dark interior door. I couldn't tell the gender or anything else about the Alchemist, since he/she was wearing an industrial cleansuit and gasmask.
“Welcome, and how can I help you today?” Even the voice was muffled beyond distinction, and it wasn't a Glamour or an illusion, just careful choices in apparel, which was a pretty neat trick by my standards.
“I'm looking for DreamSmoke, or alternately someone that can brew it up in a hurry.”
“Try the third row from the right wall, on the countertop, dark wood box with bronze spiral inlay.”
I followed the directions and found the goods. “Okay, how much for the lot? I need enough for three adults.” We settled on four pounds of gold and two of the six carat diamonds I'd borrowed off of the Windhorses; I'd have bargained harder, but I didn't want to waste time with a missing kid and the supposedly extinct Court of Dreams to deal with. I didn't even bother getting a bag, I just carried it outside. Avani was waiting, empty handed, so I waved the box at her in what I hoped was a significant way. We ended up waiting a few minutes for Ranson, who came out of a store halfway down the block carrying a bottle big enough for a fifth of whiskey. I showed him my haul, and all eight of his eyes went wide.
“Shades of Hades, I haven't seen Smoke in that form for over a century. Where'd you get it?” I pointed out the shop, and he muttered something about having to come back and compare notes before indicating we could go. We mounted up, and the steeds pulled out all the stops and got us back to the paddock and through the defenses in less than five minutes. After thanking them, the foals trotted off to graze, and Pegasus checked with the human Clansmen to make sure all was well.
“Great, that's all set. What do we do now?” I asked.
“We find a good place to jump and a small brazier. You really lucked out, Rhymer, with this concentrated form of DreamSmoke we can physically Transit where we need to go, not just astral travel or see it clairvoyantly. Guess you didn't get all dressed up for nothing,” he said to Avani, hoping to lighten the mood, I think.
“Nothing worse than having a cold iron stake suffering from a lack of Fae meat,” she said, caressing the ones on her bandolier in a way that would be sensual if it wasn't a sharp weapon. “How're we supposed to get back?”
“That's the drawback, we're only at the destination as long as it keeps burning.”
“And lucky you, Wind magic can keep that stuff smoldering for an hour,” Pegasus chimed in. “Between that and maintaining the wards, I can't go with you, though.”
“We can manage, plus it probably isn't smart for you to leave your entire Clan here without a Head with all the Fae around,” I reassure
d him. And I wasn't going to mention it, but he's still got a completely justified grudge against the Fae for those centuries of captivity, and giving him a valid target like the Court was asking for more trouble than I could handle, especially if I was trying to control my own temper, too. He gave in gracefully, only putting up one pro forma protest, and sent yet another Clansman in search of a brazier. The runner came back in short order, a small clayware dish in tow, so we did a final check on gear. I borrowed a couple of knives from the Reeve (all of mine were in a bus locker in Topeka) and topped off my reserves in the Ocean of Watermagic and Ranson just flicked his talons a couple of times and took all the gear out of his pockets.
“Does it strike you as odd that for a librarian-cum-reporter known for diplomacy and manners, you're about ready to fall on these Fae like a ton of bricks?”
“You helped Tiamat create the Dragons and you're surprised about the territorial and protective impulses?”
“No, but you resist so many of yours, it's a little surprising when you give in, not to mention it tends to leave body parts strewn about and holes blown through solid rock walls.”
“Are you always going to act like one part commentator, one part conscience?”
“I don't get cable, the Internet, or Shadeweb, so that makes you my one source of entertainment. I'd hate for you to get a mid-season cancellation because you got the heroism virus without the martial skills to back it up.”
“Okay, okay, you might have a point, but isn't having the principle of Forethought in my head, a multi-armed and heavily weaponed Reeve, and a venomous trickster werespider Fae expert for backup almost as good as being a walking angel of death?”
“Just keep it in mind.”
“Ready?” Avani asked, I nodded and so did Ranson, who set the lump of DreamSmoke in the brazier and pulled out a lighter. The stuff looked like tobacco soaked in motor oil and compressed into a small block that smelled like fresh cotton candy, and it caught fire with a 'whump' of green fire that shifted to an orange smolder as Marge's magic enveloped it. In the smoke, I saw a shimmering and just when I was about to move, Ranson told me to stop.
“I have to get the trace first,” he said with a smile, and my cheeks reddened in embarassment. He laid a hand on the boy's head and used the other to flick something through the smoke-shimmer, which flashed bright blue. “Okay, it's locked, go!”
Avani jumped through first and I followed, but instead of the blink-and-you're-there of a Gate or Transit, this was more of a fall through a gray tunnel accompanied by the gutchurning nausea I get with all teleport travel. Just when I was about to blow chunks the trip ended, and I was able to hang on to my last meal. It looked like we were in the middle of a storm cloud, all grey wisps and flashes of light in the distance, even down to what was roiling under our feet, which is a little unnerving when you're afraid of heights.
“This is the Unmanifest.” Sparky's voice was half wonder and half fear, a combination I've never heard from him before.
“Problem?”
“Potentially, a large one. Everything I know about the Void is secondhand at best.”
“Well, that sucks.” That was putting it mildly. Scratch the tactical advantage of a creative genius, then. “I thought you Titans were connected to the Void, how can you know nothing about it and yet recognize it?”
“Only Gaia, Tiamat, Oranos, and apparently the Court of Dreams, know anything more than 'Voidstuff makes reality', and the fact the only Power I can sense is what you and the Wonder Twins are carrying says we're outside the bounds of anything I can recognize as real says 'Welcome to the Void'”.
“Great, we're taking on a group of jerks that don't just steal kids, they've set up shop in the Void and survived. That's fantastic, maybe next week I'll get to go to Olympus and punch out Zeus right after I call Ares a wussy,” I complained.
“Quit whining, if you were going to dissolve you'd already be gone. And since Ranson and Avani are still here too, I guess Voidstuff isn't as corrosive as I always thought.”
“Nice to know you can still learn something new at your age, but do you have any ideas how I can explain how the hell I know this is the Unmanifest without dropping the dime on you?”
“Just run with it, you don't have to tell everything you know.”
“Good point.”
Ranson and the Reeve were exploring the area cautiously, trying to find our target. Finally, Avani gave up with cautious handwaving and light Power-probes, pulled out an iron stake and started tapping the mists closest to her.
“Good idea,” Ranson complimented her. “We should have ended up either right at the ritual center anchoring the leech, or just outside any wards they set, neither of which respond well to iron.”
“Either of you ever seen or heard of any Otherrealm like this? Only place I've heard of is the entrance to Annwn, and I think Arawn might have some harsh words to say if we're poking at his domain with Fae-bane,” I lied with the straightest face I could manage.
“Hells if I know,” Ranson admitted, his fingers flicking and twitching in edginess.
“Don't know, don't care, I just want to plant a boot in someone's ass, free the kid, and go home. I've had about as much of babysitting as I can take.” She swiped the air again, this time she hit paydirt, the stake rebounding with a clang. “Finally. Now we just have to find a way in.”
“Wait a sec, got an idea,” I said, releasing Power from my reserves and shaping it into vapor, producing a dense localized fog. I moved it around the surface Avani was stabbing and we started walking to the left. Finally, my cloud showed a depressed area of the surface, and we stopped moving. I opened the Sight and I assumed my compatriots were doing the same until Ranson pointed out the obvious.
“Why don't you let me try my key first, Ry.” With his long sleeves down, I'd forgotten all about the SilverBranch he had on his left arm, a Fae master key for most of their artifices. He put his left hand on the depressed area and his sleeve slid back enough for part of the Branch to show, which began to glow a neon green with his Treeblood magic as he moved it around.
“I forgot you had that thing, to be honest. I still wonder what you had to slip into somebody's drink to get them to implant that thing, and on an Anansi, no less.” That's a species thing, Anansikin have impulse control issues, comes from their trickster progenitor.
He finally stopped moving the hand and the green glow intensified, spreading out root-like tendrils into a monolithic slab 20 feet high. “Crap. There's a block, I can't get through.”
“Push the Stream through his connection, Ry. Water's channeled by Wood,” Prometheus chimed in, reiterating basic Elemental magic practice.
“Thought about that already, but thanks.”
“You want some help?” I asked out loud.
“Give it a go, just be careful,” he replied. I laid hands on his shoulders and opened to the Stream, gently. I hadn't tried to funnel Ocean-magic through Wood since I was Journeyman level, but I remembered the guidelines. Where Stone can take the full force of the Stream right from the get-go, with the Wood you have to work up to it slowly, waiting for the organic construct to stretch and grow to accommodate the force. Connected as I was now, I could perceive the Treeblood worming its way through the lockspells the Court had laid, and just like the Ocean it was trying to find cracks and seams in the lock, expanding the ones it found and continuing on to the next. Finally, the whole surface was nearly opaque and the Branch was visible all the way to Ranson's shoulder, when the whole thing went kaboom in a flash of light. When I could see again, we were in what looked like a castle's courtyard, or at least a really high circular wall made out of gray stone with a matching floor. The only incongruous note was the glowing spell designs all over every surface, and when I tried to move out of the central empty space, a glowing discharge went off and kept me in place.
“Well, that's just great.”
“Not helpful,” I sing-sang/thought at him.
“What the fuck?”
Avani had pulled a stake and stabbed at the floor spells, but instead of sinking in or making a mark it just slid aside, a few microns above the surface. “Somebody not Fae set this trap, iron should cut through it like butter.”
Before either Ranson or I could so much as say anything, a figure appeared to my right in a clear area I could only assume was there for just this occasion.
“This looks like the beginning of a bad joke, a Dragon, a werespider, and a Godblood walk into an enemy's keep,” the figure said. I'd label it male or female, but the archvillain-style hooded cloak and voice-blurring spell prevented that.
“Almost as trite as Fae stealing kids,” Ranson projected scorn and irritation better than Cicero could have. “What's the matter, Faery ovaries and testes not giving up the goodies, or were you just bored?”
“Strong words, from a bookworm like you. And bringing a Reeve and a Dragonspawn? Tch, tch.”
“Have you been reading too many comic books or something? Taunting prisoners, really?” I asked.
“You have to admit there's a certain style to it,” the blurred one replied. “After all, what's the point of coming up with a masterful plan if nobody knows enough about it to be either horrified or impressed?”
“Enough already,” Avani griped. “Start talking or get killing, I'm tired of wasting time,” she said, pulling weapons with all of her hands. “Fair warning, I'm ready to take anyone that tries to the Underworld with me.”
“There's no other way out of this style of trap from the inside, you're going to have to Unbind the whole structure.”
“Give me a damn break, that's just a poetic title Tiamat slapped on me.” I paused infinitesimally. “Isn't it?”
“Not on your life, you {untranslatable Titanspeak slur}! Stop hiding and Dive inside yourself, unless you're looking forward to whatever these {untranslatable Titanspeak adjective} have planned for uninvited guests!” he shouted.
Not having any other options I opened myself to the mini-Ocean of my Power reserves, since the real thing wasn't available, and directed a current of it into my sense of self, a confusing doublethink exercise since the reserve is in me and of me, but isn't the whole of me. It showed to the Sight as layered swirls of blues, blacks, and greens, some as thick as an arm, others the size of threads, all of them in motion, mixing one into the other and then separating out again into a dynamic fluid system that somehow stayed similar moment to moment while encompassing changes, moods, the gravitational pull of the moon, and all things that ebb and flow.
“Real nice, very poetic, now stop having a psychic circlejerk with yourself and DIVE!”
I ignored the lightshow and all the training I'd ever been given, concentrated my attention to as narrow a point as I could, and pushed down into the black depths. There's always a sense of pressure when I touch the Ocean, it's one of the gauges I used to see how far into the Stream I've gone, but I was rapidly shooting past the levels I normally use, the pressure building up behind my eyes, in my sinuses and ears, and even down to the fillings in my teeth. This was dangerous, and not just because I could give myself the metaphysical equivalent of a neutering, I could Dive to a level whose pressure I couldn't cope with and get pushed to the Unknown Shore. I spiralled down further and further into the blackness, until the pressure got so high I thought my eyeballs were going to burst, and I think my nose started bleeding.
“Further down, partner, you're almost there.” Prometheus' encouragement would have meant more if a) I wasn't doing something this crazy due to rushing in, and b) if he gave encouragement anytime other than when our backs are against a wall, but I just took the confirmation and stretched myself down further, slower this time. I have no idea how long it took me in objective time, but it seemed like a week later when the blackness of my Sight was lit up with a white flash and my head felt like it was about to explode. After a couple of heartbeats the Sight cleared, and hanging in front of me was an entwined pair of sigils, and ones I recognized; one was the Dragonspeak symbol for Tiamat the Creatrix, mother of our race, and the other was the Titanspeech glyph of Oranos Spacelord. The Oranos-glyph's angles and dots were overlaid with the Dragonspeak glyph, like the latter had been worked through the former, but as I stared closer, I also saw the fractal-based sigil of Gaia Earthmother underlying them both, like the false-color afterimages you get after staring at bright lights.
“There it is,” Sparky confirmed, and I felt him actively merging with my Stream-probe. “Grandmother said you'd been manipulated by Oranos, and here's the proof.” His mind works faster and on more levels than mine, and what little splashed over our connection extended the sigils into a mathematical description matrix of fundamental forces, spiritual energies, and psychic frequencies that would have given MC Escher a headache. He was almost humming as he analyzed the matrix, the lunatic.
“Why haven't you bothered looking at this thing before?”
“It's not something I can access on my own, and you've been dodging,” he said distractedly. “Got it. The whole structure's linked through your Lastborn heritage, and I think I can activate it. Forewarning, though, you're going to feel incredibly.. hungry.” His tone was dodgy, but we weren't exactly flush with free time at the moment.
“Fine, I'll get the munchies, just do it!” I shouted.
I felt a surge of Power come up from within me, a completely alien sensation, and it was almost like the synesthesiac rush I used to get with the Sight, it felt like white-hot velvet that smelled like copper and tasted of B-flat, and it felt so good I started to get an erection. I also got hungry, that kind of craving that only one thing in the world will satisfy, everything else tastes like cardboard. I let the Sight fade away and my perceptions turned outward; only a couple of seconds had passed while I was communing with whatever it was in my soul, and it looked like they'd kept Hoodie busy, since we were all still in one piece.
“Water gestates and erodes, Tam. It flows, dissolves, and creates; yours is dominion over erosion, to wear away even the hardest stone and ultimately return form to formlessness; embrace it”, he urged.
It's never been something I looked that hard at, sure water erodes, but it also nourishes, and as a healer that nourishing aspect has always been more important. He was right, though, if I didn't erode my way out of this circle, we were all going to wish we were dead. I drove my Sight down to the Power matrix of the circle, its flows and pressures shaped into signs and shapes. To make an effect of Power-nullity, the flows of energy had to be diverted around and away from the circle, but they still touched it. Like a braid, they were woven together, each singular flow shaping and shaped by its neighbors. I drove a probe into an orange-tasting twist of currents and Saw what Sparky was going on about; the flows were bound into form with rigid structures of will and spirit, and rigid structures will always at some point in time fall to flux and entropy. I grabbed at the flows running through these channels and directed them away from a single point extending across the whole channel. The flows were bent back on themselves on one side of my point of interest, and on the other the original pressure of the system sucked away Power, creating a space empty of Power before the bent flows surged to reestablish themselves, but I was able to hang on to enough of the emptiness to accomplish my goal; just like a clogged blood vessel's pressure increases as the same amount of material tries to pass through a smaller space, the pressure of Power around the bubble did the same, and the pressure was far outside the ability of the channel to contain, causing it to burst.
“Now look at the unbound Power, and turn your hunger on it.”
I did as he said, I stared at the curving lines of Power and imagined snarfing it down. The hunger twisted in my gut, almost like it was a separate thing and crawling its way up my throat. My jaw opened involuntarily and I inhaled. As I started breathing, the Power making up the circle started to fragment and shred, the whole of it swirling down my lungs in a vortex of every color and taste imaginable and driving me to my knees and then onto my face.
&n
bsp; “What the fuck?” Avani cried out, and similar sentiments echoed from Ranson and Hood. I couldn't answer, the flood of disintegrating magic was still being pulled into me and my muscles were locked, with the exception of my eyes, and I tried to use them to signal Avani to jump Hood, which she did when the inner circle broke enough for her to move.
All of her arms were at the ready when she leapt, two holding weapons and two reaching out to grab Hood, who had simply frozen when the lightshow started. The Reeve jammed a stake into Hood's right shoulder, not a fatal wound even with iron in a Fae, and one of her empty hands ripped the cloak off, revealing that Hood was female, Fae, and almost emaciated she was so thin. Thin black hair, urine yellow eyes, iris and sclera, and discolored patches of skin the color of old ivory on a background of golden brown.
I noted all this while the Power was still flowing into me, but it wasn't hitting my reserves, it was flowing through and out of me, some of it back into the Ocean, but the majority I couldn't track. The hunger was partially satisfied, but the savor wasn't exactly what I was craving, and it seemed like it wanted to get this not-perfect meal over and done with as soon as possible, so the flow increased until it felt like I was trying to take a drink out of a busted open fire hydrant, even if I wasn't choking. The ecstasy kept increasing as well, until I thought I was going to orgasm, and in my opinion the combined sensory inputs don't go together well at all.
“Ry, what're you doing?” Ranson had come over and knelt down next to me, staring alternately at the vortex and into my eyes. All I could do was try and make enough eye contact between rolling waves of pleasure to confirm I was still conscious and aware.
“It's almost done, you don't want to leave a construct this massive to unravel on its own, they tend to explode or corrode the surrounding area.” Sparky's approving tone and rehashing of enchantment theory barely masked worry and amazement, but I wasn't capable of a coherent response, hell I couldn't even groan. Finally, finally, the storm of Power ended, and I was left feeling like I'd had half a snack cake and run a marathon. The courtyard had been completely scrubbed of all the designs and sigils, leaving us in a shady twilight.
Ranson pulled me upright and slung my arm over his shoulder and held me up till I could get my landlegs back. “You ever going to answer the question and tell me what the hell that was? It looked like you were giving head to a hurricane.”
“That's the most disturbing image I've heard in weeks, old man. And your guess is as good as mine,” I hedged. “And I hope you're ready to explain it to me, whackjob. That wasn't what I was expecting from a title like 'Unbinder', it was more like 'Supersucker'.”
He sighed and said, “If you weren't part Lastborn and cross-wired in the bargain, it'd have taken a different form, but your ancestors were engineered to eat Gods, not just rip things to shreds. Sucking down a large Fae spellweaving is much less impressive.”
When he mentioned Gods, the hunger rumbled in my guts again, and I had a sinking suspicion I'd just found out what I was craving. Hope I got it under control before I either had to deal with the Aesir or Freyja, dealing with the Gods is difficult enough without wanting to take a bite out of them. I suppressed the sensation and asked, “Where'd the Power go? It's not in me, and that amount would have melted the walls or made an earthquake.”
“I can't tell you, that's can't, not won't. Tiamat handled that part of the design, not me. Ask her, if you've just gotta know.”
“No thanks, my blood pressure's high enough already.” The Mother of Dragons, Monsters, and Gods is one of the more frightening personalities I've ever dealt with, and my nerves could really use a break after the last few months.
Ranson gave me the gimlet eye but let the matter lie, mercifully. He passed me a pocket flask, and I took a quick hit, finding the foul taste of a recovery potion instead of alcohol. I made a face and passed it back with a nod of gratitude. The sludge was chockfull of electrolytes, proteins, and salt, all of which can get tapped out with Power-intensive workings, and in a minute or so I was feeling better.
Avani tried to question Hoodie while Ranson was getting me mobile, but judging by the one sided conversation she wasn't having any luck. To be fair, she was trying to do three things at once, holding the stake in place, ask questions, and scanning for new threats, so she probably wasn't her most persuasive. When her scanning eyes passed over me, she jerked her head towards Hood and Ranson followed me over when I moved.
Up close, the Fae female smelled of sweat-soaked leather and mildew, a nasty combination with the taste of the potion still lingering on my tongue. “Enlil's eyes, you stink, lady.” Her only response was to glare, and her fingers twitched like she wanted to hit me with something.
“Don't waste your time Ry, I can smell a heavy compulsion spell on this walking corpse.”
“Fuck, she's dead?”
“Necromancy on a Fae makes the palomino patches. Let me handle this,” Ranson said with a ghoulish grin, showing all his fangs. I gestured at the prisoner, and he knelt down and bit down on her shoulder. “Don't freak out, and Avani, you might want to look another way,” he said, never taking his eyes off his chew toy. When some private stopwatch ran out, Ranson lunged forward again and sank his fangs near his first strike, but this time there was a nasty slurping sound, and as I watched, Hood started to dessicate further, drying out like a fallen leaf. After a couple minutes of this, and Avani studiously not looking, the final remnants of Hood's body broke apart into a cloud of Power and dust that blew away in a wind I couldn't feel.
“What the hell was that?”
“Anansi the Spider is the Keeper of Stories; his descendants can consume vital fluids and know the life story of the target. I think Vampires have some of the same capacity,” Sparky added, the distracted tone in his voice indicating he was ruminating on something that would probably give me nightmares or a migraine.
Ranson rocked back on his heels and stood up, his appearance shifting back to the human baseline. “Sorry for the horror show, but interrogation's pointless with a corpse.”
“Nice trick,” I said, and Avani gagged and vomited behind me. I condensed down some of the Stream into a globe of material water and passed it to her. She rinsed, spit, gulped and poured the balance onto her pile of puke. “Don't you run the risk of encephelitis or other nastiness?”
“Spiders don't get diseases the same way,” Avani husked. “He's got more chance of picking up AIDS from a toilet seat.” Ranson inclined his head to her in agreement and the twist of his lips was apologetic. “Don't worry about it, you can't exactly help your ancestry,” she said in a pacifying tone.
“No, but I still have to appreciate how it looks, particularly to arachnophobes.”
“Okay, enough playing delicate,” I said around a forced laugh. “Was there a point to that aside from disposing of the corpse?”
“Information.” He stared at the wall to his right and continued. “This is the Redoubt of the Court, and we're in it up to our eyebrows now. Math Mathonwy is the stringpuller here,” he said heavily.
“He must have been after my time, I don't recognize the name.”
“In myth, he's supposed to be the greatest magician among the Tuatha de Daanan, and always insisted on resting his feet in the lap of a virgin girl. Other than that, my well's run dry.” Aloud I asked what else Ranson had gotten, and he pressed fingers to his temples, brow, and the back of his neck and I saw his lips moving silently, probably in some signature spell restricted to Senior Archivists or something. When he'd sorted out the memories, his eyes got wide and gnawed on his lower lip.
“This bastard's clever enough to use Titan relics, Ry. He slit Bor's throat, stole his research and materials, and he's gotten his hands on more since then. He got magically crippled in one of the Fae's Clanwars, and started this little sidebusiness to keep himself in the green, Power-wise. He uses corpses as catspaws in a collective intelligence network, and the last thing that went through Hood's head was shock and surprise at your little
hurricane trick, so he's off balance, and if we hurry we might be able to use that to our advantage.”
“Don't suppose you got the keys to getting us out of this cul-de-sac,” Avani muttered.
“There aren't any. All the security's focused on the exterior. Follow me,” he said, getting off his duff and heading straight for one of the walls, which obliged by letting his hand through, followed by the rest of him. Avani and I looked at each other and shrugged, so I went first and she followed, after picking up her stake. On the other side, we were in a hall of the same gray stone lit by wall sconces filled with Elemental Flame. Ranson waved a hand forward, and we set off in silence.
After twenty minutes of walking, we exited into a throne room whose centerpiece was a testament to old-school upholstery; a mound of antlers was arranged in an artistic spiral extending almost to the ceiling, and at floor level the prongs were covered by a piece of leather that could have come from a cow the size of an elephant. The silver spirals covering it extended onto the flesh of the throne's occupant, the whole of it moving and changing in some incomprehensible pattern. The Fae male on it was as pretty as all the Fae are, looking less like a product of nature and more like one of Michelangelo's sculptures, high cheekbones, prominent chin, and a protruding nose. Even his feet, resting in the lap of a tweenage girl, were pretty, and several of his toes were ringed with silver.
“Welcome to the Court of Dreams, travelers.” His voice was a medium baritone, and I could hear the susurrus of the Ocean in it. “Enjoy the hospitality of Math, Ancient of Days, FomoriSlayer, Bane of the Fir Bolg, and Lord of the Land.”
“Not to mention child stealer, betrayer of Arianrhod and Blothuweth, and enslaver of the dead,” Ranson sneered.
“So much for a diplomatic solution,” I said to myself.
“That kind of rudeness to one's host demands a wergild, storystealer.” Math's tone was only vaguely threatening, like he expected Ranson to just give over or he didn't care about any possible response.
“Where have you anchored the dreams of the children, you thieving parasite?” Avani's shout could have made a demon take up arms, but the Ancient One just ignored it and kept his focus on Ranson.
“And what price do you give to the ones whose dreams you steal, Mathonwy?”
“They are reparations to me, I am due, and I collect when I please,” he said with a grin.
“You were wounded more than 2000 years ago and your Court was condemned and declared outcast 280 years ago,” Ranson said with a sneer. “And no deal was struck, you just decided you were due, and took what you wanted.”
“I was owed,” Math thundered, shifting like he was about to stand up before reconsidering.
“Not as much as you're in debt now,” I heard Avani mutter, pulling a throwing knife out of her belt and chucking it. Much to my surprise, it hit an unseen shield and bounced off.
“Guess he's gotten around the iron thing,” Sparky commented. “Probably has something to do with the human Power he's siphoning off.”
“That's great, you have any ideas aside from me going Electrolux again?”
“Not yet, and I'd hold off – wait a sec, I've got something. His virginity fetish isn't mystical or spiritual, it's engineering. There's no way he could siphon from unwilling humans on his own, but another human can act as his proxy. He's got to have her oathbound to him, and not being mature, she's as mystically unencumbered and unentangled as it gets, there's a negligible diversion of Power to anything other than him! Pierce her with iron, not him!” He's a genius and all, but he's so talkative when he gets worked up I'm glad these conversations happen in a picosecond, especially when my back's against the wall.
I looked with the Sight, but I saw a complex Craft ward around Math and the girl, much more difficult for me to erode through than an Art-shield, and I doubted Math would keep talking long enough for me to even try. “I don't see any other option than sucking down the ward, do you?”
“Nope. Especially when there's only another half hour or so till the DreamSmoke gives out, and there's no way he'll overlook Avani trying to score a bullseye.”
Decision made, I swiped a stake from the Reeve's bandolier as I sprinted past and got as close to the girl as I could get and slapping a hand on it.
“What are you doing?” Math screamed, but I didn't bother answering, I just let the hunger loose again and focused on the ward. My mouth dropped open again, the construct whipped itself into a knotted mass and shot down my gullet. I managed to close my mouth, but the hunger wouldn't let me suppress it, after the ward had fallen Math's Power-level wasn't concealed any more, and it wasn't just high, it smelled absolutely delicious. I couldn't stop myself, I jumped at the throne, and I got my hands on the self-entitled bastard, and with my hands around his throat I chowed down on his Power. The sense of rightness and satiety was incredible, an addition to the senses-mixing rush that drove me to inhale harder, and at some point I wasn't just consuming Power, I was getting some of Math's memories, specifically the ones with the greatest emotional charge.
-oh Gods, what happened to me? I look down and I see my flesh ripped and bleeding vital fluids and the Power – I reach for the Sea, but I can't connect, and panic creeps in, without magic I could die here on this forsaken beach, the last things I see and smell the carcasses of those stinking Fomori-
-I stand in the court of Flames before the assembled Clanheads of Faery, and there are none that will succor me in my new state as a cripple, without the Power I can't even exchange a binding oath to help a Clanlord constrain their Element. Every person present turns their face aside as I walk in silence from the Gathering Hall, my twisted leg scraping across the floor-
-as my new apprentice slices his hand and mixes his blood with my own, for the first time in a century I feel the Power seep into me, not as great a quantity as I used to draw on my own, but still there, and as my dried and scarred flesh drinks it in it heals and repairs itself, I laugh at the humor of the Fates-
-the newest footholder is a treasure, I just wish I could extend their lives further than a couple of centuries, it's such an annoyance to have to go scouring the Earth for a new one, especially with the proliferation of steel, iron, and the disbelief of this rational age. Thistle's a joy, she didn't just resign herself to her role, she actively participates, and even makes suggestions. I could easily care for this one as more than a tool, but that's ridiculous-
-Necromancy's a smelly practice, but its technical difficulty appeals to my patience, and its possibilities thrill me. No other among the Fae has mastered it, and certainly none that would think to practice it for my ends-
-Failure, and I will keep to my word and not attempt any further workings. She made me promise to find something else to focus on after two centuries, and even though it was never spellbound, my word to her is something I will never break-
-raiding the timestuck battlefields of the Fomori War gives me all the raw materials I need to revitalize the Court, and I laugh at my choice of words, considering I'm filling the Court with reanimated corpses after my living allies were killed or converted by the Clanlords.
-how did that young one destroy my protections? If it could be done at all it should have taken hours or days, and this..child just opened his mouth and sucked down the courtyard defenses like it was food-
Seeing myself from the viewpoint of Math's puppeteered corpse snapped me out of trance, and my eyes refocused on the Ancient One; he was unconscious from the shock of having most of his essence ripped away, so I loosened my grip and turned to the footholder, who I'd knocked over in my rush.
The kid's eyes were vacant, and I noticed something; the buzz in the blood that announces us Drakine to each other. Her brown hair and eyes said she wasn't of the Eastern Clans like me, but that buzz is impossible to ignore or forge.
“You stole a female of the Clans?” I screamed at him. The Sharp rose up in me, so I swiped the iron stake up from the floor where I'd dropped it, pricked the kid's index finger
tip, and the binding between her and Math snapped with a near-audible feedback. I cleansed her blood from the stake with a thought and flash of Stream-force to prevent another binding, pulled one of his hands from the throne, and I drove the stake through it. This bastard couldn't be allowed to so much as think about touching the Power again, and the Sharp suggested a cruel way to do it and also give him what he'd always wanted.
“Avani, come over here, please,” I shouted while gathering Ocean-force together. The Reeve rushed over and stared at me silently, her eyes as big as plates. “You're a Stonetoucher, right?” She nodded. “Slice this thing off close enough that he can close his hand, would you?”
“What-”
“Show beats tell,” I said with an evil grin.
She obliged me and ran a finger around the circumference of the stake on both sides of Math's hand, the excess dropping to the floor with a metallic clang. I nodded thanks and picked up the sharper end. I shaped water into a globe around it and cast a dissolving spell on the stake, leaving me with a globe of suspended iron particles. Next I bindspelled the water around the individual particles of metal and Math's blood, locking one to the other in a reverse of the iron detox the Reeves use on Earthside Fae. I sensitized the water-binding to 'float' on top of Math's being, like oil over water, and lastly I held the spelled globe over the open wound in his hand and guided its substance into Math's veins.
“{Untranslatable Titanspeak profanity}, Tam, that's just vicious.” His tone of amazed distaste was a good indicator that I'd gotten close to my aim.
“Appropriately Fae punishment, kind and cruel,” I opined. With the way I'd spellbound the iron, and all future inclusions of the material, Math would be as immune to iron as a human, but he'd never be free of it, ever. Any attempt to pull the iron free would disrupt the insulating spells first, and with the dissolved half-stake he was already well past the fatal threshold for a Fae. Even attempting to slide in more Watermagic to insulate his flesh instead of the iron would disrupt the iron-spells, since I'd constructed the thing on a hair trigger. As a final reminder, I wrapped a matching spell around the piece of iron in his hand, and healed the damage. “And every time he looks at his hand, he'll remember what floats in his body, as will anyone that sees him.”
“Killing him would have been cleaner.”
“Yes, but that's too easy. Plus, he's always wanted sympathy and someone to take care of him. I can give him that, keep him from more troublemaking, the Windhorses get a potential resource to help build up their Clan, and Pegasus gains face by taking responsibility for one abandoned by his Clan.”
“Vicious, beautiful, elegant, and cruel. We've got to keep you out of Faery for a while, it brings out the less pleasant parts of you.”
I grimaced internally and looked at my partners in crime; Ranson was staring at me like he was reevaluating his previous assumptions of my character, and Avani was gripping one of her sheathed blades like I was a potential threat. I understood both reactions, at least intellectually, but emotionally I was a little hurt at the idea she thought I might attack her.
“I'd apologize, but I don't regret that in the least,” I said, flicking a hand at the still-unresponsive Ancient.
“I knew Drakine were territorial, but I expected you to tear him to shreds,” the Reeve said, flexing her grip on her blade. “What exactly did you do, aside from giving him the world's biggest iron hand piercing?”
I laid out my explanations, making her shudder and the Anansikin rub his chin and nod.
“The Lords and Ladies will be embarrassed by this, you realize,” he said, stepping closer to Math and looking closer at his hand.
“Ask me if I care, this son of a whoring bitch stole a female,” I emphasized.
“Not trying to minimize, but would you have reacted differently if he'd taken a boy?”
“Maybe.”
“I know your Clans are matriarchal, but Kali's tears,why didn't you just kill him?” By her tone she was totally unnerved, so I tried to explain.
“That would have been too easy for the Fae to chalk up to rage; by simultaneously pulling his claws, letting him live on as a cripple, and destroying his base of operations, I've done three things at once. I've show up the Lords and Ladies by succeeding where they failed in destroying the Court of Dreams, I'm letting him live out the necessity that made him form the Court in the first place, and I've made a statement that anyone that screws with one of me or mine will be fortunate if I let them die.”
“And you had all that planned out, did you?” Ranson's mouth twisted in disbelief.
“Not in the least, but that's how the Fae'll take it, won't they?”
He nodded slightly and said, “And they'll respect you more for it, as twisted as that is.”
“She's waking up,” Avani warned, dropping down and helping the girl sit upright.