Othersphere (30 page)

After using Ximon's body to step through the veil and escape back at the lodge, Orgoli must have stepped back through the veil here at the NIF, still inside it. He'd used Ximon's fingers to set up the lasers, to fire them, and open the doorway. But in stepping back through the door to his home world, he'd shed Ximon like a skin, and left him here while he gathered his army, romping back to the NIF in tiger form while Ximon cowered in the smallest cubbyhole he could find.

How dare you?
I snarled at Orgoli. Tiger to tiger, communication was easy.
This is our world, not yours.

It will be mine soon, little cub,
he replied, his huge tongue scraping some of the red from his whiskers.
For too long your world has drawn power from mine while we sheltered your outcasts
.

Are you saying our world draws power from yours?
I was incredulous.
But you created that unnatural hole in the veil. You are the violator.

You began it hundreds of years ago,
he answered.
It wasn't enough to draw your healing and your animal forms from us, but you had to invent technology that bled through the veil. Your bombs have wilted forests all over my world. This ugly place has begun to choke the life out of the great ocean. If it were just your own oceans, your own creatures, your own moon which you destroyed, I would not waste my time with you. But your world is too connected to ours. I must destroy your technology, and the brains behind it, or my world will continue to slowly die.

I remembered the dead seashore I'd seen as we approached the doorway and the blighted section of the swamp we'd spotted as we crossed it. Orgoli was telling the truth. Othersphere had taken our threatened species and given them homes safe from human slaughter and incursion. In return, our human technology was slowly eating its way through the veil, killing off their pristine ecosystems.

There's got to be some way both worlds can survive,
I told Orgoli.

This world will survive,
he said
. But your precious humans will not.

It's too late, Orgoli,
I told him
. Your army has fled. You cannot defeat this whole world without them. You're alone.

So.
He lashed his tail, molten eyes slits of heat on me
. Then it is time for me to eat you at last, little cub. Your blood will make me strong enough to destroy all your friends, the shifters, and my brother, too. One way or another, my world and I will have revenge.

I didn't wait for him to finish. My friends were coming down the hallway, and I was the distraction. I slinked to one side, as if about to run away. As Orgoli dodged to one side to stop my retreat, the fake-out gave a clear view of his throat, and I sprang. He lifted a paw to bat me away, a millisecond too late.

I dug my claws into his fur and skin. The heady smell of power streamed up through his skin as I sank my teeth into his throat.

He roared, choking, and shook his head, trying to dislodge me. I knew I wouldn't have long, so I bit deeper, feeling the sinews and muscles taut beneath my jaws, seeking his jugular. A gush of hot blood spurted into my mouth and down my throat. I gulped and guzzled. As I did, my body grew, my muscles flexed with new strength, enabling me to chomp down even more ferociously on Orgoli's throat.

Life sang through me with the blood, and ecstasy took me. My body lengthened until my back feet touched the ground. In seconds I'd grown to twice my original size, big enough to torque my spine and use my paws for leverage. I shoved at Orgoli, wrestling, trying to get him onto his side. If he was down, then perhaps I could finish him. Finish him and drink him all.

Somewhere out there in the periphery of my vision, Lazar and Arnaldo were running up to the smoking computers and setting up a laptop. The dire wolves leapt fearlessly onto Orgoli's back, biting at the thick fur near his spine, unable to get a hold. London shifted to her wolf form.

November nearly stumbled over Ximon huddled in his corner, and she recoiled in horror. “Lazar!” she called out. “It's your horrible father!”

I needed to get Orgoli out of the area so that Lazar and Arnaldo could set up the laser and close the doorway. He swatted at me, but I pushed myself away and raced down the hallway, back to the main room.

Giant paws padded after me. I glanced back as I rounded the corner in front of the laser array, and saw that not only was I larger, but Orgoli had shrunk a little during our fight. But he still towered over me, reaching one paw out like a cat batting at a mouse. I sidestepped the blow and scampered down the short hallway toward the open door to Othersphere.

The gathered animal army which had clustered there was gone. Instead, hunkered down behind low gray dunes, thirty feet back from the door lurked ten or twelve Amba. They had come as they'd promised, and were all in tiger form, tails low to stay hidden, but with the ends twitching in anticipation, their eyes narrowed with the focus of the hunt.

They'd asked me to give them Orgoli in a weakened state. If I ran through the doorway I could only hope he'd follow. I was nearly there, five feet from the threshold, when Orgoli hurtled forward and grabbed me by the shoulders with front paws bigger than mattresses.

He latched on, claws knifing through my skin, and pulled me into him, his great head lowering, fangs stabbing for my throat.

I would not survive the bite. His teeth were like swords, his muzzle big as an oncoming train. I struggled with my last ounces of strength, bringing my back legs up to kick and rake, seeking purchase on his arms, his belly, anything, to draw blood, to disable or maim.

But Orgoli calmly used one back paw to step down on my two back legs and laid his great belly and chest right down on top of me, driving all the air from my lungs. I was pinned, suffocating, unable even to cry out. With one paw he daggered his claws deep into the bone of my shoulder blade, and with the other he deliberately severed a tendon in my left front leg. Red streaks of agony blurred my vision. I was going to die, and with my blood inside him, Orgoli would grow strong again.

The great teeth neared as I pushed, shoved, wiggled, trying to fend them off. Events lurched forward in distorted chunks as time slowed.

A beloved voice was calling my name.

I wished that I had told him I loved him today. I wouldn't get another chance.

The voice called again, ordering me to do something. But the point of Orgoli's incisor began to impale my skin, cutting through the thick muscles around my spine and throat.

“Dez!” Caleb's voice cut deeper than Orgoli's claws. “Not a tiger! A house cat! I call upon you—get smaller!”

I would have laughed if I had any breath. The answer was so simple. And it wasn't to become stronger, larger, or more powerful.

I closed my eyes and obeyed the call.

Instantly, my wounds healed. The teeth pressing into my throat slid up and away. The great paws flexed, empty. The giant, smothering body no longer pressed down. I was small, compact, and lithe.

Far above me now, Orgoli's eyes were wide in bewilderment. He focused down on me as if not quite taking in what he saw. He dabbed a paw at me, testing to see if I was really there.

I darted between his paws just as I had slithered between the writhing stems of the bloodthirsty thorn bushes of Othersphere. While Orgoli blinked down at where I'd been, I zipped along the hallway toward a tall figure in a long black coat. Like climbing a tree, I scrambled up Caleb's leg and into his arms.

His warm lips brushed the top of my head. “Well done.”

Nearby, Lazar led a more focused-seeming Ximon with November right beside them, a strange glint in her eye.

London and her wolves were there, too. Behind them, Arnaldo was gesturing up at Morfael, who descended the metal stairs, holding his great wooden staff in his hand. The lasers must be ready to fire again.

Orgoli was pawing at the floor, looking around, confused. His huge head turned, to look over his shoulder, about to catch sight of us.

A blur of movement surged out of Othersphere, and he tensed, roaring. The Amba were coming.

I climbed onto Caleb's shoulder, craning my head to look over Orgoli's huge body. Six Amba, not much smaller than Orgoli, leapt right through the doorway. He disappeared under a maelstrom of slashing claws and bared teeth.

The earth heaved upwards, a vast beast awakening beneath us. The tunnel of tubing around us shuddered and screeched. Dust and small pieces of the ceiling hurtled down around Morfael. Arnaldo, hand over his head, dashed into the mouth of the tunnel, but Morfael ignored the tremor, moving in a stately manner toward us.

The shaking had not dislodged the Amba. They were caterwauling, biting and shoving Orgoli toward the doorway. Blood splattered the sides of the tunnel and coated the metal walkway with sticky redness. Orgoli fought, fiercely, desperately, but I had drained him. Every time he threw off one of the Amba, another jumped in to take its place, to harry him some more. The scene in the shiny tunnel of tubes was like a pile of angry striped snakes, twisting and thrashing and slipping in their own blood.

London launched herself at the wriggling pile of Amba, her dire wolves following. But they didn't bite or attack; they shoved, pushing Orgoli toward the doorway. Once he was there, Arnaldo and Lazar could use Morfael's staff as a focal point for the lasers and shut it forever.

“To hell with it!” November shouted, and ran up, arms out, to also shove at Orgoli's back end. His hind legs were braced against the floor, scrabbling desperately.

“Yes.” It was Ximon's voice, a quavering shadow of what it had once been. His eyes were bright and feverish. “Yes, be gone foul demon!” He slipped away from Lazar, and walked up behind November and the Amba as they propelled Orgoli forward.

November whirled on him, her face a mask of hatred and disgust. “You're the demon, you sick old man,” she said. “You're worse than he is. You killed Siku.”

Ximon's face fell, his watery eyes staring at her. “You're not wrong, little fiend. You're not wrong at all.”

Morfael entered the tunnel and extended his staff to Arnaldo.

But Arnaldo was shaking his head. “I've been trying to tell you. I don't think it'll work. Given my calculations based on the material November gave me, your staff is less dense than Orgoli's because it's wood, not stone. We need more material from Othersphere for it to work.”

The brawling ball of Amba was squirming over the threshold of the doorway. A few Amba had been hanging back, with no room to enter the fray, and now they surged forward. The wolves backed off and November grabbed Ximon by the back of his shirt to shuffle him back. The Amba leaned into Orgoli from behind and pulled at him from the front with one last, all-out effort.

Then, like a tooth being pulled, he slid out of our world into Othersphere.

Arnaldo ran forward, gingerly holding Morfael's staff in one hand, shaking his head. “I'm telling you, guys, it won't be enough. We need something else from Othersphere.”

“Well, let me just pull out my handy slab of Othersphere and give it to you,” November said, running her hands nervously through her hair, making it stand up even straighter. “Come on! Just try it.”

On the other side of the doorway, Orgoli had one of the Amba by the throat. I could see he was growing bigger as the blood ran down his gullet. A small winged creature flitted above them and shifted.

Khutulun, bigger than all of them in her tiger form, stared through the doorway at me. As the other Amba piled on top of Orgoli to hold him down, she dipped her great tiger head and sank her teeth into the back of Orgoli's neck. He jerked in surprise and pain.

I felt vaguely sick. Was that what I had wanted to do? Was that who I was becoming? More than anything, I wanted the doorway closed now.

Lazar was at Caleb's side. “We need to shut that door.”

Caleb was patting his pockets. “I know. If Orgoli doesn't threaten us, then she might. But I don't have anything from Othersphere.”

Orgoli let go of the Amba and flailed in Khutulun's grip. I dug my needlelike claws into the worn cloth of Caleb's coat. It was like witnessing a slow execution. Khutulun closed her jaws around Orgoli's throat for one more time. He kicked weakly, paws trembling. Then the great golden eyes rolled over, and he lay still.

Khutulun raised her bloody snout and licked her whiskers with relish.
Come, little cub. Join us.

I knew what I had to do. I jumped down from Caleb's shoulder and shifted into human form, wearing nothing but the Shadow Blade.

“Dez?” Caleb was automatically pulling his coat off and wrapping it around me from behind.

I unbuckled the shell clasp on the leather belt around my waist and held the Shadow Blade and its scabbard out to Arnaldo. “This is from Othersphere,” I said. “Take it.”

“Are you sure?” Arnaldo reached out hesitantly.

Caleb grabbed my shoulders, turning me partway around to face him. “Dez, that's the part of you that's connected to Othersphere. If you give it to Arnaldo, it'll be destroyed.”

“And I'll lose my bond with Othersphere,” I said.

I looked back at Morfael. His moonstone eyes were shining, his narrow lips pulled back in his strange version of a smile. “I won't be able to walk through the veil whenever I want. I'll be just another tiger-shifter.” I couldn't help smiling. Joy sang in my heart as I looked at the faces of my friends. “Here in this world, with all of you.”

“Fine.” November snatched the Blade from my hand and shoved it at Arnaldo. “Hurry up.”