The Elves of Cintra (43 page)

Delloreen hated the Klee, calling it an animal and disdaining it as an unthinking monster that knew nothing but killing. She wasn’t wrong, but she missed the point. It was because the Klee was all this that Findo Gask found it useful.

Once, it had been a man, a long time ago before he had encountered it in the ruins of a town amid so many dead that he could scarcely believe a single creature had killed them all. Once, it had been human. What had changed it was anybody’s guess. The Klee never talked. It barely listened, and it listened mostly to Findo Gask.

The huge demon slogged out of the quicksand and mud to stand close to him, bent forward expectantly. It knew he had come for a reason, and he knew that the reason involved what it craved most.

“I want you to find somebody for me,” Findo Gask said. “A Faerie creature, but it will have another form. I will give you a sense of what it will feel like, and you will be able to unmask it from that.”

The Klee shifted from one foot to the other, a slow ponderous movement that signaled its understanding. From somewhere deep within its chest, a strange wheezing sound rumbled.

Findo Gask smiled. That was the Klee’s expression of satisfaction.

He reached out and touched the demon boldly on the chest with one finger. “Find this Faerie creature, and when you do, kill it,” he said.

TWENTY-SIX

R
EUNITED FOLLOWING
Candle’s kidnapping by the boy with the ruined face and Logan Tom’s search for plague medicine through the dark streets of Tacoma, the Ghosts continued their slow journey south. Departing their camp outside the city while it was still night and there was a reasonable chance that the Senator hadn’t yet discovered the loss of his “property,” they rolled south on the AV and attached hay wagon in the manner of their namesakes, shadows sliding through darkness. Catalya showed them the way, taking them off the freeway and through backstreets that bypassed the Senator’s stronghold and the places where he was likely to have stationed sentries to warn him of trespassers. By dawn, they were well outside the city and moving steadily away.

Owl, riding inside the Lightning with River and Fixit, gave her charges strong doses of the serum that Cat had brought with her from her secret stash, covered both children with blankets, bathed them with cool cloths, and talked them through their feverish dreams in her soft, reassuring voice. Both began showing improvement almost immediately, their temperatures dropping and their restless discomfort turning to a deep sleep. Within twenty-four hours, their purple splotches began to fade, as well, and it became apparent that both would recover.

Logan could tell himself with some conviction that things were progressing well enough that he no longer needed to consider leaving the Ghosts behind while he continued his search for Hawk. His fears over the possibility that shepherding a bunch of street kids would slow him down and burden him with unnecessary responsibilities had faded after the previous night’s events. It seemed to him now, in the light of the new day, that the kids could shoulder responsibility for themselves sufficiently that he needn’t feel that he must do so for them, and while that seemingly should have given him further reason to go on alone, it had quite the opposite effect. Given the freedom to leave, he found he no longer wanted to. The idea of abandoning the Ghosts had grown increasingly distasteful to him, and he found that he was more comfortable having things continue on the way they were.

Which wasn’t to say he might not change his mind later. Events might one day dictate that he do so; you could never tell. But for now, at least, he could let the matter alone and simply concentrate on the journey ahead.

The only problem was Cat. As he had feared, and she had suspected, she was not universally accepted by the other kids. Panther, not surprisingly, was the most vociferous, calling her Freak to her face and making it clear to all that he did not think she belonged with them, no matter what she had done to earn the privilege. Chalk took the same stance and, surprisingly, Sparrow. Perhaps the latter’s near-death encounter with the Croaks while they were fleeing Seattle had helped shape her thinking. Perhaps it was something she wasn’t telling them. But while keeping mostly silent on the matter, she nodded often enough while Panther was holding forth that Logan Tom had no doubt about where she stood. She, too, had no use for the girl who was neither one thing nor the other.

The rest were more welcoming. Owl embraced Cat immediately and told her they were happy to have her travel with them, ignoring the groans and looks offered in counterpoint by Panther. Candle took her hand and walked with her during their first day on the road, a small gesture that made Logan proud of her.

And Bear, big and steady and mostly quiet, stepped between Panther and Cat at one point when the former was making an unmistakable attempt at intimidation, forcing his fellow Ghost to back away and finally to turn aside. Panther, who normally wouldn’t have allowed anyone to do this to him, seemed genuinely confused.

“She’s just a Freak, man,” he mumbled over his shoulder at Bear. But after that, he pretty much left the girl alone.

Their destination was already settled, and they were quick to resume their journey. They were at least a week from reaching the Columbia River and their promised meeting with Hawk, so there was good reason to press ahead. Logan was wondering anew how they were supposed to find the boy, but knew that it was the boy who must find them. The gypsy morph that was concealed within the human skin would have surfaced by now, and the wild magic taken hold. This was what must happen, Logan realized, if the boy was to be their savior.

Their travels took them out of the city and into the countryside. Buildings disappeared behind them, lost in a haze of smoke and ash that even the sun could not burn through. The corpses of vehicles that littered the highway dwindled, and the bitter metallic taste of the air took on a woodsy flavor. The land stretched away around them in a sprawl of wintry fields and stands of dying trees, of drainage and fouled ponds, of broken fences and collapsing farms. There was almost no sign of life—a bird here and there, the quick movement of a small animal passing through the weeds, a burrowing rodent sticking its head from its hole momentarily, and a pair of stick-thin figures running from an old house far off in the distance.

The end of everything,
Logan thought more than once.
The way it will be everywhere before long.
He tried to imagine it and failed. The world was too vast for such a thing. The prospect of it rendered empty and lifeless was too bleak to consider.

Even though he knew it was coming.

Even though it had been foretold.

They drove south for three days, bypassing a handful of small towns that sat off to the side of the freeway, silent and empty. Once, they passed another city. Logan didn’t know their names, nor did Cat or any of the Ghosts. The signs that had once identified them were gone, leaving broken-off metal supports with twisted, jagged ends. The days were hazy with bad air and weak sunlight, and the landscape had the look of a mirage. The highway wound through oceans of liquid light that shimmered and contorted. In the junk heaps of ruined vehicles and scattered debris, in the clusters of falling-down walls and roofs, and in the barren fields and empty horizons, the world was a tomb.

As midafternoon of the third day approached, they came in sight of a fresh cluster of buildings, their roofs just visible above a grouping of hills in rough country that was chilly and stark, a graveyard marked by the bones of dead trees.

Logan was sitting in the front passenger’s seat of the Lightning, looking back over his shoulder while he talked with Owl. River and Fixit were on either side of her, sufficiently recovered that they could sit upright, but not yet strong enough to walk any distance. The rest of the Ghosts were riding on the hay wagon with Rabbit and Cat.

Panther was driving.

It had taken awhile for the boy to come around to the idea, but when Logan casually mentioned earlier in the day that it might be time for him to try, Panther had just as casually declared that it couldn’t hurt. He had been driving ever since.

“I don’t understand why Cat was out on the streets alone at night like that,” Owl was saying. “That seems so dangerous.”

“I thought so, too,” he agreed.

“And she didn’t have any weapons?”

“None that I could see.” He paused. “But I think she might be more capable than she appears. She seemed at home out there. She made a point of asking me what I was doing coming into the city by myself. It felt like she thought she knew better than I did how to take care of herself.”

That’s ’cause she’s a Freak,
Panther said to himself, his mood darkening as he thought anew about having to put up with Lizard girl. Sometimes he wished Hawk were back in charge. Even he knew better than to try to bring a Freak into the family.

“Hey, what’s that?” he broke in, suddenly catching sight of something in the road ahead.

Logan turned to look, seeing what appeared to be a tangle of vehicles blocking their way. “Stop the AV,” he told Panther at once.

When the boy had done so, Logan got out of the car and walked forward a few paces, searching the road ahead and then the countryside around. Nothing was moving. But it didn’t feel right. He glanced back at the kids and then ahead again. The road was straight and undeviating; there were no crossroads visible beyond the tangle. There was nowhere to go unless they drove off into the fields and hills, and he didn’t think the hay wagon could handle the rough terrain.

He walked back and leaned down to Panther. “I’m going to walk ahead. Stay behind me. Keep your eyes open.”

The boy’s face clouded. “Just looks like some junk,” he said. “We could turn around, I guess, find another way.”

Logan shook his head. “Not much of anything out here to suggest there is another way. Let’s have a closer look.”

He moved away. Panther reached down to touch the Parkhan Spray shoved down between the door and the seat, and then eased the Lightning ahead at a crawl, letting a sizable gap open between the Knight of the Word and the AV. Everyone had quit talking and begun looking around, searching the countryside. Logan, walking ahead, didn’t see anything, but it bothered him that these vehicles blocking the roadway were so far out in the middle of nowhere. The blockade could have been the result of a long-ago crash; it looked as if it was. But it made him uneasy nevertheless.

He was within yards of the tangle when his nerves suddenly turned sharp-edged and raw, the magic sparked at his fingertips, and he decided this was a mistake. He couldn’t have said why, but he had learned to trust his instincts. He stopped where he was, one hand lifting to signal Panther.

“Don’t move,” said a voice from one side.

Without changing position, Logan turned his head and looked over in the direction of the speaker. A gaunt man with a shock of black hair had stepped out from behind one of the wrecked vehicles. He was unarmed, his hands empty, and his arms hanging loosely at his sides.

Logan turned toward him, the runes of his staff glowing brightly as the magic readied itself.

“If you’re thinking about using that staff on me, you might want to think again,” the man said calmly. “My friends are all around you and they have their weapons trained on the kids. You might save yourself, but you probably won’t save them.”

The Knight of the Word glanced about quickly. Dark figures surrounded them, more than a dozen, come seemingly out of nowhere. They must have been hiding in ditches alongside the road. Or maybe they had burrowed in and waited. They were as ragged and thin as the speaker, and they carried weapons of all sorts, all of them pointed toward the AV and the hay wagon.

A wave of helplessness washed through him. “What do you want?”

The speaker smiled. “We want you to come with us to see someone. It shouldn’t take long. The kids can wait here until you come back. Then you can all go on your way.”

“Come with you where?”

“Just over the hill there.” He pointed east, toward the mountains. “We saw you coming, you know. This isn’t a chance meeting. It was planned. We know who you are. We know why you carry the staff and what it does. We know all about the Knights of the Word. That’s why Krilka Koos wants to meet with you.”

“Maybe he should have just asked me instead of sending men with guns to threaten these kids.”

“Maybe that was his way of making sure you didn’t say no.”

Logan understood two things right away. First, the man was lying. He might tell them that no harm would come to them and that they would be allowed to go on their way, but it wasn’t necessarily so. Release or safe passage of any sort would be a matter of expediency, not honor. Second, whatever this was, it was something personal.

“Why don’t you just let the kids go on without me? I can still come with you and meet with…what was his name?”

“Krilka Koos. No, that won’t work.”

“Why not?”

“If we let the kids go, there’s nothing to keep you here. We know we can’t hold you if you don’t want to be held. We know you won’t give up the staff, either. All we have to bargain with is the kids. If they don’t mean anything to you, then we’re in trouble. I’m betting, though, that they do.”

Logan nodded. “They won’t be touched?”

The speaker shook his head. “Not one hair on their heads.”

“Who is Krilka Koos?”

The speaker smiled. “You’ll see. How about it? Are you coming?”

Logan hesitated, and then turned back toward the AV.

“No, no, none of that,” the speaker said quickly, freezing him in place. “Hard to tell what you might feel you need to talk about. You might say the wrong thing.”

Logan looked at him. “Maybe they need to know what’s going to happen.”

“Maybe they can figure it out on their own.” The man shrugged. “A few of my friends will stay with them to make sure they don’t figure it out wrong.”

Logan stood staring at him a moment, the weight of the situation pressing down on him. He had stepped right into this mess, letting himself be trapped despite all his experience and knowledge. He hadn’t even considered that his enemies might use the children against him, might take advantage of his sense of responsibility toward them to break down his defenses. What a fool he was.