He climbed onto the ice and pulled me out. I shivered and pressed myself against his warmer body. "Come on. Let's go home."
CHAPTER 16
Orion helped me to the car and started the engine. I pointed the heater vents at me and soaked in the hot air as my clothes dripped freezing water onto the seats and floor. We backed out of the parking lot and drove down the road.
I slumped down in my seat and groaned. "Remind me to take more swimming lessons, but after the ice has thawed."
Orion glanced at me. "What made you scream and back up like that?"
I frowned at him. "What do you mean what made me back up? Didn't you see that ugly thing?"
He shook his head. "I didn't see anything. You just screamed and backed up."
I shuddered and wrapped my arms around me. "There was this zombie face inches from mine. It had these glowing orbs instead of eyes, and there was just something about them that made me want to run away."
Orion pursed his lips. "That must have been what that boy saw when Mom was young."
I furrowed my brow. "There seems to be a lot of amnesia going around, and it all happens when that ship shows up."
A small smile slipped onto Orion's lips. "Could it be-"
"Don't you say it's a coincidence," I snapped.
He shrugged. "I'm just saying. Apple Hollow can be a pretty traumatizing place to live in."
Another cold chill swept through me. My goose bumps evolved into albatross pimples. "Tell me about it. I'll be lucky if I'm not traumatized into pneumonia."
"At least we know we can't get on board," he pointed out.
I glared at him. "Believe me, that isn't a good way to get aboard."
He frowned. "Because of that face you saw?"
"Because I know I'll see that face again if we get on that way," I corrected him.
Orion raised an eyebrow. "How do you know that?"
I stared at the dashboard and shrugged. "I don't know. I just know that's what's going to happen, so we can't go that way."
"All right, we won't go that way." He pursed his lips and shook his head. "At leave we have twenty-three hours to think of another way in."
I slid down my seat and closed my eyes. "I plan on sleeping most of that away. . ." I murmured.
We reached home a few minutes later. I climbed out of the car into the frosty weather and slammed my door shut. Orion creaked out of his seat the same way and I saw him grimace.
"Should we call it a day or a year?" I asked him.
"Both," he suggested. He glanced past me and his face fell. "But it's not over yet."
"My goodness!"
I spun around to face the house next door. Though it was close to one in the morning the lights were on and the shriveled form of Widow Snoopy hurried across the joined lawns toward us. Behind her straggled her new house mate, Mel.
"What in the world happened to you?" she asked us.
I glared at her. "None of your-"
"We were going for a walk," Orion spoke up as he scurried around the car. He stretched his arm over my shoulders and smiled at his aunt. "You know, for exercise."
She arched an eyebrow. "In the river?"
Orion's smile grew strained. "We ran into a deep ditch of wet snow, but there's nothing to worry about. Anyway, what are you doing up at this hour, Auntie?"
She straightened and smiled. "I was waiting for a special young man to come back from his own nightly walk. You two might learn a thing or two from him about staying out of ditches." She grasped Mel's arms and pulled him so he stood in the middle of our little group. "You have met my handsome new boarder, haven't you?"
Mel smiled and bowed his head to us. "It's nice to see you again."
I nodded. "Yeah, we met."
Snoopy patted him on the shoulders. "He's such a nice young man, but he does keep strange hours. Sleeping all day and up-"
"Where is Toughs?" Mel interrupted her. He glanced at our legs. "She is well, isn't she?"
"She's away right-ow!" I had jabbed my elbow into Orion's gut.
"She's already in the house fast asleep," I finished for him.
Mel smiled and nodded. "I see. Well, it is pretty late."
I grabbed Orion's shoulders and pushed him toward the house. "Yeah, we should be getting to bed, too. We'll be seeing you."
I shoved Orion into the house where he spun around and rubbed his ribs. "What was that for?"
"If you can't tell the full truth than a whole lie is better," I scolded him as I pulled off my coat.
"So was that for Snoopy's benefit or his?" he wondered.
"Both," I replied as I tossed the coat into the closet.
Orion pulled off his coat and winced. "We need a better form of communication than you jabbing me in the gut."
"It's effective, isn't it?" I pointed out as I spread myself on the couch. Every muscle in me felt stretched to the snapping point and all my bones must have been broken, they just didn't know it yet. I lay my arm over my shut eyes and groaned. "I'm too old for this shit."
"That's a question I've been meaning to ask you," Orion commented as he plopped his cute rear on the cushion beneath my feet.
I opened my eyes a crack and frowned at him. "That's the last question I want to answer right now."
Orion was saved from my wrath by a bell, or rather, his phone's ringing. He fumbled to pull it out of his pocket.
"Throw it in the river or tell them we're dead," I suggested.
He glanced at the screen and frowned. "It's my mom." He pressed a button and answered it. A chorus of barking dogs floated to my ears. "Yeah, Mom?" Orion wondered. My pulse quickened as his face darkened. He pursed his lips and nodded. "That's okay. We'll be there as soon as we can. Yeah. Oh, and thanks, Mom." He rolled his eyes. "Yeah, this is your son. I'll be up there in a bit. Bye." He hung up and turned to me. "It seems Toughs spiritual guardians are back."
"Death's Messengers?" I guessed.
He nodded. "Yeah. They can't get into the house, but they're making a racket trying to find a crack in the basement. Mom's not too worried, but she'd feel better if we would drive them off for her. She doesn't think she can get out to deal with them without letting one of them inside."
I sighed and maneuvered my legs so I could sit up. "All right, but first we change our clothes. Unless these things can catch their death of cold from us, that is."
He shook his head. "Nope."
I eased myself onto my feet. "Then we change, and try to speed-dry my coat. It's the only one I've got."
We changed while my coat when through a quick-dry in the dryer. In ten minutes we stepped out onto the porch. I glanced at Aunt Snoopy's house. The lights were all off, but I swore I felt someone watching us as we got into the car.
Orion pulled us out of the driveway and onto the road. A short, snowy drive awaited us as I watched the white world fly by.
My stomach grumbled, reminding me that I hadn't eaten that well. I reached into my pocket and fumbled for that cookie Mel Gave to me. It would be soggy, but that was better than nothing.
My fingers came up empty. I looked to Orion. "Did you see if I dropped that cookie Mel gave me?"
He frowned and shook his head. "No, why do-" He stiffened and his eyes widened.
My eyebrows crashed down. "I don't like that look. That look means complications."
Orion pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes. "Do you remember the episode in the council room?"
I snorted. "How could I forget? It was probably the fastest most of those guys have moved in a century."
"The wizards lifted the tablecloth where the mouse was hidden and only found crumbs," he reminded me.
I frowned at him and tapped my finger against my jeans. "Will you get to your point?"
"My point is you were probably right about the bad feeling from Mel," he revealed.
I arched an eyebrow. "A guy admitting a girl was right? Are you sure you're not suffering from pneumonia already?"
Orion shook his head. "No, but it's t
he only way that makes sense."
"How does it make sense that a cookie from a guy we barely know changes into a mouse and change back?" I asked him.
"A black sorcerer could," Orion pointed out as we passed the lit entrance to the junk yard. "He could enchant a cookie to change into a familiar, especially a mouse, and have it be his eyes and ears. He messed up when someone saw the mouse and it was destroyed."
I folded my arms and furrowed my brow. "You're missing one very important point."
"What?"
"What's his motivation? Why would he want to play a prank like that on us?"
Orion pursed his lips and shook his head. "I don't know, but I know you're going to agree with me that his coming around the time the ship came isn't a-"
"Coincidence," I finished for him. I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. "Can this get any weirder?"
Orion glanced in the rear view mirror. A dark expression crossed his face. "I think it can."
"Do we have robed company?" I guessed as I twisted around in my seat for a good view through the back window.
Turns out I was wrong. A huge fog bank hid the road behind us. That wasn't unusual, but what was unusual was the wall of white was moving with us. It kept a perfect distance of thirty feet between itself and the bumper of the car. A scent of sea-salt air invaded my nostrils like it had along the river.
I turned my head to Orion. "I'm going to regret asking this, but how much danger can a fog bank be?"
His eyes flickered to the mirror and he pursed his lips. "That much."
I whipped my head around and was in time to watch a pack of astral hounds escape from the fog. Their muscular bodies were a bluish color and illuminated by an unholy white light. Their eyes were a deep red that glowed like the pits of hell. They flew two feet above the ground and dashed down the road at a speed that would make a cheetah jealous.
The leader, a large mastiff-like dog the size of a small mountain lion, lifted its head and let loose a long, loud, echoing howl. That got the other ones going so the sound reverberated through the car.
I winced and glanced at Orion. "You don't happen to have any hell-hound-be-gone in that coat of yours, do you?"
He gave me his sly smile and shook his head. "Nope. Left it in my other coat."
I looked back at our followers. They were gaining. "I can't tell if you're joking, but I wish you'd take this more seriously."
He shrugged. "There's nothing to worry about."
I stared at him with an arched eyebrow and pointed at the rear window. The hounds were close enough they fogged the glass with their breath. "That's nothing to worry about?"
One of the dogs sidled up to the car and scratched its sharp claws down the rear passenger door. Orion winced. "Okay, maybe we need to worry about the paint job."
I lunged for the wheel. "We need evasive maneuvers! Now!"
CHAPTER 17
I latched onto the wheel even as Orion tried to shove his shoulder in my path. "I've got this!" he assured me.
One of the rear windows broke out. A hell hound stuck its head through the shattered glass and snarled at us.
Orion sheepishly smiled at me as I glared at him. "I'll have this when we get to my mom's house."
"Then you'd better figure out a Plan B because we just passed the driveway," I informed him.
He grinned. "My plan is to do this."
Orion jerked the wheel to the left. The wheels of the car lost their traction and we spun around in like a top across the snowy road. I was flung backward against my car door and the hell hounds dodged the car and scattered.
Orion grabbed the parking brake and put it on. The car skidded to a stop facing the opposite direction. The fog bank engulfed the vehicle and us. I heard gnashing of teeth and looked out the window. The leader of the hell hounds snarled at me. Its large nose fogged up my window.
"Your owner better be willing to pay damages," I warned it.
Orion punched on the gas and the car flew forward. We broke from the fog bank and I looked over my shoulder. The depth of the wall of white was only about ten feet. The hell hounds broke through and charged after us.
Orion turned sharply onto the plowed driveway. The side of the car slammed into the mountain of snow along one edge, but we kept going. Hard claws scraped the top of the trunk. I glanced back in time to watch one of the hounds climb into the rear seat.
I leapt at Orion and fumbled in his coat. The car swerved left and right, slamming off the snow piles like a disoriented pinball. The front windshield cracked and cold air blew through the car from the front to the back.
"Stop that! I'm ticklish!" he yelped.
I got hold of the bag of silver, grabbed a handful and raised my hand as I looked over my shoulder at the hound. The dog's eyes widened as I held up my fist and grinned. "Here's a treat for you, doggy."
I opened my palm. The chill wind blew the little bit of silver into the face of the hound. Its translucent flesh caught fire. The dog bounced and leapt everywhere. Everywhere, that is, but out of the car. We must have made a sight going down that narrow snowy road. Two humans in a wrecked vehicle with a blazing hell hound in the back seat.
The farmhouse loomed up on us. The sound of baying hounds reached my ears, but the noises didn't come from behind us. They came from in front, and so did the sources. Abby's pack of dogs sped down the narrow driveway straight for us. Orion didn't slow down.
I pointed at the pack. "You're going to-" The lead dog leapt into the air and landed on the hood of the car.
The rest followed or sidetracked into the deep snow. I watched them spring over the car and drop back to the ground. They hardly slowed down as they clashed with the hounds from foggy hell. Orion slammed on the brakes so one of the dogs could drag our flaming foe out the rear window.
I expected a quick loss, and got what I expected, but not the side I predicted. The normal dogs bit down on the hell hounds and smoke rose from the unnatural fiends. Sometimes flames burst from the chomped area. The hell hounds turned tail and ran into the wall of fog that kept its distance.
I looked to Orion and jerked my head at the massacre. "What kind of dog food does your mom give them?"
He grinned. "Whenever a dog needed a tooth pulled, Mom had the vet replace it with a silver one."
I snorted and shook my head. "So your plan was to get here so your mom's dogs could take a bite out of evil?"
Orion thought about it for a moment before he nodded. "Yep."
I slid down my seat and sighed. "I think I've had enough excitement for one day."
Orion pursed his lips and drove the car forward. "It's not over yet. Remember why we came here?"
I grimaced and straightened. "Yeah." I paused and frowned. "But shouldn't the dogs have taken care of-" I got my answer when we drove into the lot.
The clean snow was a mess of hard packed snow and spots of blood. The straight lines of the plowed perimeter were jagged with dog footprints and wisps of cloak hems.
Abby stepped onto the porch as we drove up. Orion stepped out and looked around before he stopped his searching at his mom. "What happened?"
She smiled and gestured to the tracks. "The dogs took care of them."
Orion frowned and slammed his door shut. "Damn it, Mom. You wanted us to come out here for what? So you could show off your dogs?"
Abby put her hands on her hips and glared at her son. "Don't use that language with me, young man. Those dogs are getting pretty old, and most of them don't hear such quiet things too well. I wasn't sure if they'd hear my whistle or not, so I called you first."
"Then why didn't you call me when you learned they could?" he growled.
She frowned and wagged a finger at him. "I knew you'd be driving here quick, and you shouldn't talk and drive at the same time. Especially on these roads."
I stepped between them. "You guys are forgetting our enemies are fond of hell hounds and black cloaks."
Abby blinked at me and glanced down the road. "Hell hounds? Is that
what the dogs were after?"
I followed her gaze and watched her dogs trot home. Some of them limped, and little dribbles of blood followed them and others.
"Peter!" Abby cried out. She rushed to the dogs and knelt in front of the leader. Some of them jogged up to her. Others weren't so nimble.
I walked up behind her as she inspected them one after the other. "They okay?" I asked her.
She pursed her lips and shook her head. "No. Some of them had a rough time with those Messengers, and what followed you didn't help."
I looked back at Orion who still stood near the car. "They saved our tails back there. The least we could do is bandage theirs."
Orion's shoulders slumped, but he nodded. "All right. Let's get them into the barn and get some bandages on them."
We did our duty to our canine friends and led them into the barn. Soft, fresh hay was strewn about the empty stalls, and the dogs pranced around Orion and me as Abby searched the house for the medical supplies.
I knelt in front of a gray-muzzled lab with a bloodied ear and gave him a scratch behind his good one. "So are you going to give me the exclusive on your mom and these dogs?" I asked Orion. I glanced into the soft eyes of the happy dog. "Or does everyone get along with their totem animal?"
He sat down on a bale of hay and petted a dingo. A tiny smile slipped onto his lips. "I told you my mom was special. She's always had a knack for dogs, and when she changed into one by the Tree she worked hard to keep her friendship with them. It wasn't easy, at least that's what Aunt Snoopy tells me and the scars I've seen on Mom's arms."
I finished my petting with a pat on the head and took a seat beside Orion. "Speaking of canines, whoever or whatever is after us has a thing for things from hell."
Orion frowned at me. "You still don't believe me when I say it's that Mel guy?"
I shook my head. "Nope, and that's because you haven't given me a motive for his actions."
"Johnny! Trixie!" came the frantic voice of Abby. Orion and I jumped to our feet just as Abby hurried into the barn. We met her halfway and she half-turned and pointed over her shoulder. "It's Toughs! She's gone!"
Orion grasped her shoulders and looked her in the eyes. "Kidnapped?"
Abby shook her head. "I don't think so. It was only her scent that led out the window and down the gutter to the ground."
"When'd you see her last?" I spoke up.
"Right before you came. I was sitting with her when I heard the dogs bark," she told us.