Honeyed Words (47 page)

Once we had Anezka settled in the spare room, Bub ate the food. Then he told us how the moment he’d taken her from the house, she’d just collapsed like a rag doll.

“Where do you go?” I asked. “Where did you take her?”

“Sideways,” he said with a shrug. “Not the most pleasant place, but it’s not here.”

“Maybe you can take me sometime,” I said, patting him on the claw.

He looked at me, his eyes narrowed. I pulled my hand back and laughed. “Only if it’s okay with you.”

He ate the plate before I could stop him, but then he agreed to stick with regular food after that.

We arranged for him to stay here, sleeping in Anezka’s room for the time being. Melanie would arrange a nurse to come out and stay with them while she came around.

“We’ll evaluate things then,” she said. “But I’m keeping her sedated for a day or so. She needs sleep as much as anything. Her numbers are good. Can’t vouch for her mental state, though.”

“I got it,” Jimmy said. “She won’t hurt herself or anyone else.”

“We should call Gunther,” I said. “He’ll want to be here when she wakes up.”

Jimmy raised his eyebrows, sharing a look with Deidre. “That’s interesting.”

“She likes him, is all. Maybe she’d consider him a friendly face, not a stranger.”

“And how’s your friend Bub feel about him?”

“He’s an honorable man,” Bub said from the hallway. “I would not begrudge his company, as long as he has her best interest at heart.”

“Well, there you go,” Deidre said, smiling.

“I’ve never thought of Gunther having a girl,” Katie said. “This could be life changing.”

“Can you stay the night?” Jimmy asked.

“I need to work tomorrow,” Katie said. “Kids need a teacher. They won’t understand all this.”

“Can’t you get a sub?” Jimmy asked.

She shook her head. “I need something normal.”

I totally understood what she meant.

“Sarah,” Katie said, pulling me out onto the porch. “Don’t go home. Stay with me tonight. Come to my place.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said, hugging her to me. “But I need to make a stop. I’ll follow on the bike. You head home.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“No. Not this.”

She kissed me and went back into the house to say her good-byes. I grabbed my cell phone, helmet, and keys, and headed out.

Sixty-five

Once I crossed over onto 522, I pulled over to the breakdown lane and turned off the bike.

I pulled out my cell phone and cycled through the numbers. There was one I’d only called once, back in the spring, but it was critical.

It rang three times, and a young woman answered. “This is a private line. Who is this?”

I explained who I was, got directions, and headed back onto the highway. There was something I needed to do, and I had to do it in person.

After a twenty-minute ride, I pulled up to the gate and flipped up my faceplate. A guard stepped from the little shack and asked to see my ID. I showed my license, and he opened the gate.

The bike ticked in the cold as I walked up the steps and knocked on the door.

A young child, no more than six or seven, answered, bowing at me without saying a word, and turned to walk away.

I followed quickly, making sure to shut the door. The place was huge. It had a giant marbled foyer with dark-paneled walls with paintings and statues every few feet. Great plants sat in the corners, and three women hurried away, their heads bowed.

The waif escorted me to the end of the great entryway and stopped in front of two ornately carved doors. She knocked once, and then pushed the left door open, stepping inside.

I followed.

The room was dimly lit, not dank or dark, but quiet and calm.

In one corner three women sat doing needlework, and a boy stood by a door that led to a veranda. An old woman sat in a rocker against the far wall. The room was larger than Jimmy’s house. Large enough for a dragon.

“I know you,” the old woman said, her voice weak and shaky.

I bowed. “Yes. We’ve spoken on the phone.”

“Sit, child killer. What brings you to my home?”

I could feel the power emanating from her. Despite her age, this was a formidable woman, a power to be reckoned with on many levels.

“I bring you news,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. Inside, my brain was screaming
DRAGON! RUN!
but I kept it together.

“You are either very foolish or very desperate to come here,” Nidhogg said. “Which is it?

“Heartsick,” I said. “I bear you news of Qindra.”

Everyone in the room froze. I didn’t move my head but glanced around as far as I could see without moving. They were terrified. Would she rage like Jean-Paul had, killing his own troops? I had a feeling it had happened here before.

“What do you know of my wayward servant?” Nidhogg asked. She was a paragon of calm, but I avoided looking into her eyes. That way lay madness.

“She is alive,” I said quietly.

As one, those in the room released their breath.

“But in grave peril.”

I spent the next hour answering questions, telling her the truth of the matter. I couldn’t lie to her. As soon as I opened my mouth, I knew she could smell deception. Besides, I’d come here to relay this news.

“I see,” she said when I’d finished. She rocked for several long minutes; the only sound in the room was the clicking of knitting needles. My fingers itched, thinking of the rhythm. The young girl who had led me here sat at Nidhogg’s left, knitting. It reminded me of Unun, who waited for her grandson to return home.

“And what do you propose?” Nidhogg asked.

Here was a test. One that would let me walk away, or die at her feet.

“I give you my word,” I said quietly, looking up into her face for the first time. “I will find a way to free her.”

Nidhogg captured my eyes in her own and looked into me. I saw ancient sorrow there, pain and frustration. She was unfathomably ancient, yet a searing intelligence burned in her. And there were tears. Tears for Qindra.

“I accept,” she said, nodding once. “Your life for hers. If you bring her home to me, I will consider your debt to me assuaged. If you fail, you and yours are forfeit unto me.”

I bowed my head. “So mote it be.”

Without another word, the young girl laid her knitting aside and led me back out of the house. I breathed the night air gratefully, as one does when the act had been given up as a lost cause.

I climbed on the bike and drove through the opened gate.

Maybe I’d stop and buy a bottle of mead. Something to celebrate with. Katie would love it.

As I drove across the floating bridge to the eastside, I thought of what I wanted in life. How those quiet moments of talking to one another were the best moments, how we accomplished so much more with words than with swords.

The dwarves had sent forth four bottles of mead. One lay trapped in the house with Qindra. Another went to Frederick. And the last two had gone to Dublin and Memphis. Why did I have a feeling they would come back to haunt me?

That was a puzzle for another time. My heart was full of pain, and all I wanted was to get home to Katie and fall into bed.

Tomorrow, maybe, I’d call my mother. If she had one tenth the sorrow I’d seen in Nidhogg, it would take a lifetime of work to assuage it all.

That felt right. Mending those rifts. Gave me hope that I’d be a grown-up someday. And, if I was going to grow all the way up, I’d have to accept some other things.

I’d give up my apartment. Julie could take over the lease until she got on her feet. Katie and I could find our own place. Someplace that was neither hers nor mine, but ours.

And that seemed like the best thing in the world.

Tor Books by J. A. Pitts

Black Blade Blues

Praise for J. A. Pitts’s Previous Novel,

Black Blade Blues

“A hip, urban take on dragons and dwarves packed with great one-liners like “Troll at two o’clock.” Add to that a sexy blacksmith in Doc Martens. It’s about time we had a fantasy heroine like Sarah Beauhall!”

—Kay Kenyon, author of
City Without End

“There’s entertainment and romantic tension aplenty here.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Endlessly entertaining. A colliding mix of action and ancient myth—yet sexy, with a dash of tongue-in-cheek humor. Not to be missed!”

—Barb and J. C. Hendee, authors of the Noble Dead saga

“
Black Blade Blues
will delight readers seeking the thrill of fantasy amid the everyday reality of overdue bills, bad traffic, and ancient plots to overthrow the order of the world.”

—Jay Lake, author of
Green

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

HONEYED WORDS

Copyright © 2011 by John A. Pitts

All rights reserved.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Pitts, J. A.

Honeyed words / J. A. Pitts.—1st ed.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-0-7653-2468-9 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-0-7653-2907-3 (trade paperback)

I.  Title.

PS3616.I917H66 2011

813'.6—dc22

2011013443

First Edition: July 2011

eISBN 978-1-4299-7605-3

First Tor eBook Edition: July 2011