Lost Ones-Veil 3 (14 page)

Hunyadi scowled. “Ty’Lis is quite the puppeteer.”

“It is not merely Ty’Lis,” Smith replied. “He answers to the High Council. He’s little more than a puppet himself.”

“How can you be sure of all of this? Are we certain that Prince Tzajin is under their control? It may be that he is in league with Atlantis. I have little faith to put in anyone of late, I fear.”

For the first time, Wayland Smith seemed less than sure of himself. “The High Council must be commanding Ty’Lis, or they wouldn’t have struck this alliance. They wouldn’t be sending an invasion force. As to the prince, why would he turn on his father? Mahacuhta was not a young man. If Tzajin wanted power, he only had to wait for the old man to die.”

“Youth can be so impatient,” Hunyadi replied.

Smith lowered his head, the brim of his hat obscuring his face.

“Perhaps it is time you paid a visit to Atlantis,” said the king. “I know you’d rather not involve yourself any more than you have to, Mister Smith, but with Atlantis revealing themselves and declaring open war, knowledge of what the High Council is planning may be the difference between the destruction of the Two Kingdoms and survival. And if Atlantis prevails, the Veil will be sealed forever. You know that is their intention.”

The Wayfarer knitted his brows. He stared at the ground and then met the king’s gaze with much consternation.

“I am not a soldier, John. I am not in your service.”

“No. But you are a friend and ally, Smith,” Hunyadi replied. “If nothing else, we need to know if Prince Tzajin is collaborating with Atlantis, or if he is held against his will. The answer might well be the way to trump the High Council. If Yucatazca could be turned against Atlantis…”

He did not have to finish the thought.

“Understood,” Wayland Smith said. “I will return.”

Hunyadi watched him leave the tent, cane in hand. A moment later, he followed, but the Wayfarer was gone, as though he had never been there at all.

Oliver woke to the warmth of Julianna’s body pressed against him. For several moments, her nearness was all he knew. Then, in a rush, other stimuli crowded into his mind. His neck itched. The air was warm and close, and filled with the smells of hay and horseshit and leather. A horse snorted and he opened his eyes.

He found himself spooned against Julianna in a nest of hay they’d found before dawn. For hours they had slipped from one hiding place to another, moving through alleys and hiding under wagons and underneath the tables on taverna patios to avoid being seen. Ty’Lis might not have many soldiers still in Palenque, but there were enough. They would be hunting the escapees. And if the Lost Ones in the city hadn’t heard yet, they would learn as soon as morning arrived.

With dawn approaching, they had made it perhaps half the distance to the edge of the city. They had to find a place to hide out for the day where they might have a chance of going undiscovered. Homes and shops would not do. As the sky began to lighten, Oliver and Julianna even considered a dark alley where a carriage had been abandoned, thinking to hide underneath it. But then, not far away, they had come upon a large building that combined a stable and tack shop. The rear windows of the stable had been open to let in fresh air, and it had been a simple enough thing to sneak inside.

Exhausted and filthy, they had climbed into the loft and laid down together. There had been some talk about taking turns staying awake, and Oliver had taken first watch. But lying there with Julianna snuggled up against him—perhaps the most sublime moment of his life—had been too seductive.

Now sunlight streamed in the windows below. He shifted slightly and saw bits of dust and hay dancing in the shafts of light. Oliver nuzzled the back of Julianna’s neck and kissed her ear. They had survived. From the angle of the light, he guessed it was late morning. The days lasted longer on this side of the Veil, so it was possible they’d had as much as five hours’ sleep. That would have to do. They couldn’t leave here until dark, but they needed to be vigilant, now.

He kissed Julianna’s neck. With her in his arms, he felt hopeful, even peaceful, for the first time in so long. He wished for a shower and clean clothes and a soft bed upon which to make love to his fiancée. But all of those things would come, in time. First, they had a war to fight. Whatever this power was that he and Collette had, the legend said it came with a destiny. But at the moment that was the least of his concerns.

More awake, now, he discovered an ache in his neck and in his lower back. He reached up and wiped the grit of sleep from his eyes. Julianna made a soft moan of complaint, still mostly asleep, and nestled back against him.

Oliver smiled.

With a clank and a long creak, someone opened the door.

His heart raced. He laid his head down, then froze, not wanting to rustle a single piece of hay. Voices carried up to the loft. They had been lucky so far. When he’d woken and realized they had not been discovered, he had begun to think the tack shop was closed for the day. Someone would come to tend to the horses, of course, but the city would be on edge. He had dared to think the fact that they hadn’t been disturbed yet meant they would be all right.

Julianna took a deep breath and let it out. Slowly, her eyes fluttered open.

“Sweetie, listen,” Oliver whispered in her ear, hoping the men’s conversation and the stamping and chuffing of the horses down below would cover his voice. “We’re not alone.”

She stiffened against him, and glanced back to meet his eyes. Together, they lay there and listened. The men spoke in the local language, or some other Yucatazcan tongue. Oliver didn’t understand a word, and he knew Julianna wouldn’t, either. He heard two voices and hoped there were only two men. If they were discovered and had to fight, they might be able to overcome them. If worse came to worst, he could bring down half the barn. But where would that leave them? On the streets of Palenque in broad daylight.

He held his breath, heart pounding in his chest. Hay prickled his neck and arms. The men laughed together and he could hear them moving around below. Something shifted, and from the sounds he realized that the horses were being fed. So they weren’t soldiers. That was one piece of luck, at least. They weren’t Ty’Lis’s warriors, out hunting for the escaped prisoners.

One of the men snapped angrily at the other. Though Oliver didn’t understand the words, he gathered this was a command of some sort, and perhaps an admonishment as well. The other replied with a placating voice…that began moving closer.

Julianna stared up at him, desperation in her eyes. He read the question there, but didn’t have an answer.

Then he heard the creak of wood and saw the top of the ladder that came up into the loft shift slightly as the man began to climb. Oliver took a long, silent breath. It had all been too good to be true. They would have to fight, now, or risk being discovered.

His eyes narrowed and he stared at the top of the ladder. Julianna saw his intentions and she began to move, as slowly and quietly as she could. Oliver did the same. The men had stopped talking to one another and surely any moment the one climbing the ladder would hear them. But nothing could be done. If they tried to bury themselves in hay, he would hear them for sure.

Eight feet away, a pitchfork leaned against a tower of hay bales.

Oliver rose into a crouch.

The ladder shook and creaked.

He saw the top of the man’s head—black hair powdered with gray—and then he bolted for the pitchfork. The man shouted in surprise. Julianna went over the side of the loft, hung by her hands, and dropped. Oliver could not think about what she was doing, only that she was in motion. Their lives depended upon one another.

His hands closed around the pitchfork and he swung it up, its tines pointed at the man who now stood at the top of the ladder. The man’s eyes were wide and frightened, and whatever he said must have been a curse or a prayer. Oliver gestured with the pitchfork and the man leaned against the edge of the loft for balance and raised his hands as though he were being robbed.

“Ixchel!” the other man shouted from below.

Oliver moved closer to the edge. He saw the second man—rotund, with a dramatic mustache—coming out from one of the stalls. Julianna appeared, then, from beneath the loft. Relief washed through Oliver; she was unharmed from her drop. Then he saw the leather bridle in her hand.

The man on the ladder glanced from his friend to Oliver. A stream of words came from his mouth. One of them, Oliver felt sure, was “Bascombe,” and it formed part of a question.

Oliver nodded. For better or worse, he would never again deny his identity. He was his mother’s son, and his father’s as well.

The man smiled, which threw him off.

Down below, his friend began to shout at Julianna. She started to swing the bridle in her hand. Oliver realized what he saw—a tall but thin woman, pretty, no threat to him. And perhaps he was right. Julianna could defend herself, but this was a large man, used to working with his hands.

“Jules, don’t!” he called. “Keep away from him.”

The man on the ladder—perhaps “Ixchel” had been his name—turned and called down to the other. In the stream of words, he heard his own last name again, more than once. The way he said it, it seemed he thought it would calm the other man, but instead the man spat on the ground and shouted something. Oliver could imagine what it was. “Assassin,” perhaps, or “murderer.” Ty’Lis had all of the Two Kingdoms believing Oliver had killed King Mahacuhta.

“Hey,” he said to the man on the ladder. “I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill him. Atlantis is your enemy, not us.”

With a shout, the rotund man rushed at Julianna. Silently, she sidestepped and whipped him in the face with the bridle. He cried out and reached toward his eyes. She swung it again, slapping his hands away, and then she backpedaled.

Furious, the man kept after her.

On the ladder, Ixchel called to him. Then he glanced at Oliver with regret, and started to hurry down the ladder.

“Hey. Wait! Stop!” Oliver shouted, but the thin, graying stablehand had already dropped out of sight.

“Shit,” he snarled.

Only one thing to do.

“Jules!” he called.

She spared a quick glance over her shoulder. As she did, Oliver dropped the pitchfork. It landed half a dozen feet away from her and Julianna raced for it, snatching it up and turning it on her pursuer.

Oliver went over the side. He dangled for just a second, glancing down to make sure he wouldn’t break a leg, then dropped. The impact jarred him, and he went down hard on his ass. He scrambled to his feet and turned, almost at the same moment that Ixchel reached the bottom of the ladder.

But the stablehand barely looked at him. He started toward his friend, hands in front of him, and an argument began between them. Ixchel, incredibly, seemed to be telling the other man to back off. Both men grew more and more insistent.

“What the hell’s going on?” Julianna asked, glancing back at Oliver.

The fat man lunged at her. In that moment of distraction, he grabbed hold of the pitchfork and tugged it from her hands. Then he started toward them both. Oliver grabbed Julianna by the hand.

“Get ready to run,” he told her.

“What? Don’t do anything stupid.”

“Too late. Just get ready to run. I’ll distract him.”

Only when Oliver saw Ixchel did he realize he’d momentarily lost track of the other man. The stablehand stepped up behind his friend and swung a shovel. The man staggered and went down on his knees, eyes rolling up in his head.

He fell on his face, nearly impaling himself on the pitchfork. A trickle of blood ran down his temple.

Ixchel, regret and worry on his face, knelt at his friend’s side and felt for a pulse. When he stood, he seemed satisfied.

Quickly he ran to the stable doors, cracked them open to glance outside, then closed and barred them. Oliver and Julianna could only watch in amazement, still shocked at what he had done. Then Ixchel turned to look at them.

“Bascombe,” the man said.

Oliver nodded slowly, curiously.

Ixchel smiled. He gestured to Oliver and said a few words in his own language. Then he shook his head in frustration because he knew they didn’t understand.

“You,” he said, finding the word. “Legend-Born.”

CHAPTER
10

T
he gods came out of Perinthia at dawn, just as they had promised.

Kitsune had been sitting on a rock beside the Truce Road, thinking back to the last time she had been here, sneaking into the city with Oliver and Frost after their mad flight on horseback from Bromfield Village with the Myth Hunters in pursuit. Those had been anxious days, but they had been sweet as well. Their intentions had been pure, their understanding of one another uncomplicated.

It had all gone wrong since. Kitsune wished that she could go back. But there was only forward, now, to war—and to whatever life held for her on the other side.

Boredom had forced Coyote to shed his human form and to chase voles across the rough landscape on the outskirts of the city in the hour just before dawn. But as the horizon had begun to lighten and the city of Perinthia began to awaken, the coyote had come and laid down at Kitsune’s feet, gaze locked on the archway that led into the city. The arch connected two watchtowers. Dark figures appeared from time to time atop those towers, but Coyote’s attention was on the arch itself. On the road.

For her part, Kitsune tried her best not to look at the arch, superstitious that if she stared in that direction, the gods might never come. But when Coyote made a soft growl in his throat and rose from his haunches, then transformed fluidly from animal to man, standing almost at attention despite his usual slouch, she knew that they would not march alone.

The war goddess, Bellona, came first through the arch, one hand upon the pommel of her sword, chin high with salvaged dignity. Only steps behind her came a god all in black. The ebon armored chest plate he wore gleamed in the dawn’s light, as did the helm upon his head. His eyes were hidden in shadow, but Kitsune could see the thin line of his mouth and she shuddered. Never had she seen a being so grim.

“Ares,” Coyote muttered.

Kitsune shot him a look.

“It must be,” he whispered.

The fox-woman agreed. The god of war had come. How could he have resisted?

Salacia and Hesperos followed, but Kitsune’s lingering gaze was broken by a blur that swept past Hesperos and Salacia, darted around Ares and Bellona, and raced toward her with such speed that she barely had time to raise her hands in self-defense before he came to a stop in front of her. His narrow face and thin limbs trembled as though with terrible age, and there were lines upon his face. Yet despite the wisps of white hair, she knew this could only be Mercury.

His eyes were alight with youth and power, with speed.

Then he vanished in a blur, racing off along the Truce Road toward the south—toward Bromfield and the Atlantic Bridge and toward war.

“Where the hell’s he going?” Coyote said.

“To scout ahead,” Bellona replied.

Kitsune turned. The golden gleam of the morning sun made the gods seem almost like figments of her imagination. But the rust on Bellona’s chest plate and the dents in her helm were not illusions.

Ares walked past Kitsune and Coyote without a word, not even pausing to be introduced.

Another god came along behind Hesperos and Salacia, a fair-haired male in a pale blue robe who floated several inches above the ground, a small wind swirling up a dust devil underfoot.

“Thank you for coming,” Kitsune said.

“Where are the others?” Coyote asked.

“Most of the old gods are tired,” Bellona said, glaring at Coyote. “But there are those of us who refuse to be forgotten.”

Kitsune shot Coyote a hard look.

“And we’re very grateful,” she told Bellona.

Placated, the war goddess gestured around her. “Mercury and Ares have gone on ahead. Salacia and Hesperos you know.” She put a hand on Kitsune’s shoulder. “Notus, this is Kitsune of the Borderkind and her cousin, the trickster Coyote,” Bellona said, and nodded toward the floating god. “And this is Notus, the south wind.”

Kitsune bowed her head. “We are honored to have you with us.”

A gentle wind caressed her face, perhaps whispered something in her ear, and then was gone. Notus smiled at her, then continued along the road.

Kitsune glanced at Coyote, but saw that her cousin was not watching Notus, nor was he gazing at either of the beautiful goddesses who had joined them. His eyes were locked upon the watchtowers at the city’s edge and at the archway between them.

Head bowed, a giant lumbered through the arch, the road buckling beneath the heels of his leather boots. With his shaggy beard and dusty clothes, he looked like one of the carnivorous giants who lived along the Sorrowful River, eating wayward children and crushing their parents underfoot.

Frantic, she glanced around for cover. Not all of the Myth Hunters, it seemed, had gone to war.

But Bellona laughed softly and both Hesperos and Salacia turned to smile lovingly at the giant.

“Have no fear,” the war goddess said.

“It is only Cronus,” Hesperos added.

Kitsune shook her head in confusion. “Cronus?”

Salacia stepped up beside her, looking almost sickly in the morning sun despite her beauty. Her green-hued skin had an almost Atlantean caste, but the dawn light gave her a kind of jaundiced, cadaverous appearance.

“A Titan. They were forerunners of the gods. Cronus is the father of Zeus. His mind is not what it was, once, but he is fearless and savage in battle.”

Coyote stepped close to Kitsune. “I don’t doubt it.”

Kitsune watched the Titan as he lumbered toward her. His head was still bowed and she looked at his eyes, expecting them to be cruel but finding only lost innocence there.

Cronus smiled at her. “Pretty fox,” the Titan said.

Bellona stood straighter, hand gripping the pommel of her sword.

“Shall we go?” the goddess asked.

Kitsune bowed with a flourish of her copper-red fur cloak. “By all means.”

The morning had been gray and bitter, but as the lunchtime crowd began to make the pilgrimage back to their offices, the sky allowed a tantalizing glimpse of spring. In the passenger seat of Jackson Norris’s new Jeep—his personal vehicle, since it wouldn’t be very subtle to sit there in a car emblazoned with the logo of the Wessex County Sheriff’s Department—Sara Halliwell gazed up at the blue sky peeking through the clouds above and thought about the hope that spring inspired. Spring, she had told more than one girlfriend, was what made people believe in God and the afterlife. The seasons followed the arc of human life, and when men and women hit autumn, they began to fear the snowfall. Come winter, brittle and white and cold, people were desperate to believe in spring.

Sara didn’t know if she believed in an afterlife—in a spring after human winter—but she had no doubt that when she reached her own autumn, she would wish for a little faith.

“Doesn’t this guy ever eat lunch?” Sheriff Norris said.

Slouched in the driver’s seat, he stared over the top of the steering wheel at the façade of Bullfinch’s, a small used book shop two blocks out of the center of Chesterton, Connecticut. They had been there since shortly after ten
A.M.
, and Sara had to pee, but mentioning this to Sheriff Norris seemed like a bad idea. This was supposed to be a stakeout. But the man they were waiting for would have to leave the bookshop at some point to eat lunch.

Wouldn’t he?

A terrible thought struck her, and she couldn’t stop herself from giving voice to it. “What if he brought his lunch to work?”

The sheriff sighed and glanced at her. “I’ve been trying not to think about that. I really don’t want to have to sit here all day. My butt’s already asleep and before long I’m going to need the bathroom.”

Sara grinned. “Thank God. Me too.”

Jackson looked through the windshield again. “Let’s give him half an hour. If he doesn’t come out, we’ll take turns for bathroom breaks.”

“Deal.” Sara nodded. Then she glanced at him. “Are you sure you don’t want to just go in there and talk to him?”

“For a dinky little bookstore, they’ve got some healthy traffic. Seems like there’s nearly always someone in there,” the sheriff replied. As if to punctuate his words, a pair of fortyish women came along the sidewalk carrying cups of coffee—office workers still on break—and entered the store. “I really don’t want to be interrupted.”

Sara felt a twinge of sadness for Marc Friedle. “We’re just going to ask him some questions. You talk like he’s the one who killed all of those kids.”

A furrow wrinkled the sheriff’s brow. “Nothing like that. But the more I think about it, the more I’m sure Friedle knows something that he didn’t tell us. Kind of pisses me off. I wonder what we would have done differently if he’d been forthcoming with us from the outset. I wonder if your father would still be around, bitching to me about some policy change or other.”

Just like that, she didn’t feel sad for Friedle anymore. She laid her head against the cold glass of her window and watched the door of Bullfinch’s Books, willing the man to emerge. Sara had known Jackson Norris most of her life, but she had never envisioned spending long hours in a car with him. They had exhausted topics of conversation two-thirds of the way into their trip to Connecticut and she had no idea what they would talk about on the way back. But for now, silence was just fine.

Chesterton had a certain appeal. Forty minutes south of Hartford, it wasn’t quite close enough to the ocean to be considered seaside, and was neither large enough to be a city, nor small enough to be called a village. Yet Chesterton was clean and upscale enough to almost be considered gentrified. The locals cared about their town. A banner that hung over the street announced that the Spring Fling Festival would be held the first weekend of May.

There were many places Sara had been that she’d felt could be summed up with that classic bon mot, “It’s a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.” Chesterton seemed like it would be a wonderful place to live, but visitors would be bored out of their skulls.

“Here he is,” Jackson said.

Sara’s eyes popped open and she drew in a long breath, realizing she had begun to drift off to sleep. It took her a second or two to interpret the words. Sheriff Norris stared out through the windshield and Sara followed his line of sight to discover a small, almost dainty-looking man standing in front of Bullfinch’s Books with a ring of keys, locking the door. Doubtless when he stepped away, there would be a “Back in thirty minutes” sign or something similar on the glass.

Friedle started along the sidewalk toward them. Sara reached for the door handle.

“Wait,” Sheriff Norris said, one hand on her arm. “Not until he passes.”

So they watched him go by. Sara studied him out of the corner of her eye. He had thinning hair and a vaguely European look, but his distant gaze and despondent air diffused some of her antagonism toward him.

When Jackson opened his door, Sara did the same. She stepped out onto the sidewalk, her muscles throbbing at the change in position. They closed their doors simultaneously and the sheriff moved swiftly around the back of the Jeep. Sara fell in beside him and the two of them quickened their pace, catching up to the neat little man.

“Mister Friedle?” Jackson said.

Sara thought it odd that, instead of stopping, Friedle walked on a couple of paces, then slowed, halting with his back still to them. He seemed to deflate.

“I wondered when you would come for us,” the man said, his voice a strange rasp.

Then he turned toward them. Sara flinched back, horrified. His face had changed. The pale, somewhat effete countenance had become a twisted, ugly thing with leathery furrows and jagged, broken teeth. She stifled a small cry and then blinked—

And the illusion had passed.

Illusion?
That didn’t feel right, but how could it have been anything else? She glanced at Sheriff Norris, but he didn’t seem fazed at all. If he had caught a glimpse of that ugly, inhuman face, he gave away nothing.

“Us? Who do you mean by ‘us,’ Mister Friedle?” Jackson asked.

Now, though, more than one mask had come up to cover Friedle’s features. A caul of suspicion pulled tight across his face as he studied the two of them.

“I’m sorry. I thought you were someone else.”

Jackson pulled out his identification wallet. As he took a step nearer to Friedle, he glanced around to make sure no one was paying attention.

“We’ve never met, Mister Friedle, but you probably know my name. I’m Jackson Norris, the sheriff from up in Wessex County.”

The man blinked, and a different kind of sadness seemed to burden him than had troubled him when he’d strode past the car.

“I know the name, Sheriff. Mister Bascombe spoke highly of you.”

“And of you, Marc. Which is why I’m confused about a few things.”

Friedle’s eyes narrowed. “What things might those be?”

“Is there somewhere we could talk?” Jackson asked.

The man arched an eyebrow and looked at Sara. She realized that it was the first time he had focused on her since she and the sheriff had walked up behind Friedle together. A shudder went through her. Already the details of that face had begun to fade from her mind. She had caught only a momentary glimpse and it had disappeared in an eye blink. Sara had to consider that it had only been her imagination, the stress of the past few months, and her inner conviction that Friedle was some kind of monster.

But she’d never had hallucinations before, nor seen visions, so she couldn’t brush it off so easily.

“I had just been going to the café for a sandwich and coffee. You’re welcome to join me, and I’ll answer whatever questions you’ve come so far to ask. But, first, who is your lovely companion?” the man asked, and his accent became stronger. Where did you get an accent like that? Switzerland? Denmark?

“This is Sara Halliwell,” the sheriff said. “Her father was—is—my best detective. He’s gone missing, just like Oliver and Collette Bascombe.”

Friedle gave her a sympathetic look. “Ah, yes. He’d gone to England with Julianna. I’m very sorry. It appears that I must add your name to the list of people I have failed.”