Pursuit: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 4) (7 page)

“People are looking for you,” she said, narrowing her hazel eyes at me.

“I gathered,” I said.

“I’ll hide you if you like, but you aren’t a prisoner here. You can leave if you want.”

“Oh.” I swallowed. “So you’re trying to keep me safe?”

“Lillim, the only reason people come here is to hide. I don’t make a habit of telling exes when someone is here,” she said with a sigh and pushed past me, disappearing into the hallway. “If you decide to leave, please shut the gate on your way out. I don’t want Grover getting loose.”

“Lillim! Can you hear me? Please come out of there, I need to talk to you!” Joshua yelled, and his voice seemed strained.

I looked back out the peephole to see Joshua glance over his shoulder. His entire body stiffened as several dozen Royal Guards crested the hill. He swallowed, his adam’s apple bobbing up and down as he cast one last wistful glance at the gate and took off running across the dunes. Joshua running away? That didn’t seem like him.

The Royal Guards either didn’t see him or were unconcerned with his flight because none of them gave chase. Which seemed a little odd unless… well Masataka and Joshua were sort of on friendly terms. Were they ordered not to hurt him?

The lead guard reached the gate, and as he extended his hand toward it, a mass of black tentacles exploded from beneath his sleeve, hitting the gate with a sound like a cannon. The gate exploded into light, throwing blue and red sparks into the air as it warped, twisting inside on itself like a soda can stuck in a vacuum.

The Vajra’s tentacles turned bright white, glowing so brightly that it was like staring at the sun. That’s pretty much when the man’s clothing began to burn away, flaking away like bits of burning paper. He turned toward the others and beckoned for them to help.

More guards seized the gate, their Vajras linking together in a sort of mesh-net that swallowed the whole of the gate. So… they were going to use their Vajras to absorb all the magical defenses? I didn’t know what kind of power was in that gate, or if the creatures were even strong enough to do that, but I had a sneaking suspicion I didn’t want to find out.

“Um… Miss?” I called back down the hall. “The Dioscuri are trying to eat your gate. I think you should come have a look.”

She pushed past me, knocking me to the side with a sweep of her arm as she bent down to stare out the peephole. I hadn’t even heard her come up.

“That was sort of rude,” I groaned as I rubbed my arm from where she had pushed me aside. It already looked like it was starting to bruise. Swell.

“Your friend is persistent,” she said, turning to look at me. “What do you want to do?” I must have given her a dumb look because she huffed and continued. “Do you want to stay here or to go?”

“If they are here, they will just keep coming until there’s no way your magic can stop them,” I replied. “I don’t think staying here is an option.”

“I didn’t ask for your justifications. I can walk out there right now and slaughter the lot of them. If they send a million more men, I can kill them all. I can kill all who come looking for you,” she said with a shrug. “You are
safe
with me.”

I stopped, just stopped. I looked at her and knew she was telling the truth, but for some reason instead of reassuring me, it unsettled me. It meant only one thing. More people were going to die because of me. Letting her kill people so that I could hide was a whole new level of yellowbellied. I wasn’t at that level, at least not yet.

“I don’t want you to hurt people because of me, either,” I said, reaching down and running my hands over the hilts of Shirajirashii. Their weight reassured me even though I knew I couldn’t use their magic on the Royal Guards.

“So what do you want me to do?” she asked, and I could see the smile on her face starting to slip. In a second she would be in full blown scowl mode.

“I think I should leave and face my fight. Running won’t change anything,” I said. B
esides, it’s about time I put on my big girl pants and put a stop to this before even more people get hurt.
“Besides,” I added, “While I like the bed, it isn’t really my thing.” I smirked, trying to make light of the situation. She merely glanced from me to the bed and shrugged.

“The cat likes it fine,” she said, stepping to the side and opening the door. “Be gone with you then.”

The moment I stepped out of the door was like stepping into a thousand degree inferno. The air licked the sweat from my skin and chapped my lips. Huge arcs of blue energy burst from the gate and cascaded around the fence in sheets. So many Vajras were latched onto it, that I couldn’t even see the fence anymore. Some of the Royal Guards slumped against the gate, electricity sparking through across their bodies. Evidently, even Vajras had limits. Good to know.

“Hey yo,” I called as I whipped out the twin blades that made up my swords. “How are things?”

“They are well,” said the modulated voice of the first Royal Guard, but I could tell he was in pain. I hated the sound of the modulator they used when they talked. I knew it was to help disguise their identity, but still… I mean it made them sound like some kind of robot.

“Good to hear,” I said with a shrug. “If you back off, I’ll come out and you can leave this nice lady’s gate alone.”

“Very well,” said the Royal Guard with a hint of relief as he pulled his hand back with a loud pop. Electricity arced between his hand and the gate like one of those tesla coils before dying away. “I
am
trusting you, Lillim Callina.”

“Hey, I’m good for it,” I replied with a shrug. I got the impression he was smiling at me as the rest of them removed their hands. As soon as the last one had relinquished his hold on the gate, it began to fade in color, losing that neon glow of energy that had warped and twisted its shape. It slowly bent back into its normal, white picket form as though it had never been touched at all.

“I really need something like that back at home,” I said with a smirk as I pushed on the gate. It opened easily on squeaky hinges, pushing out toward them. Well that was odd, hadn’t it swung inward last time?

“Don’t gates normally swing into a yard?” asked the guard.

“That’s just what I was thinking,” I said as I stared at it. I moved to take a step out, and as I did so, I felt the magical energy of the place sucking at me, trying to keep me inside. I shut my eyes for a second and concentrated on taking a few steps forward. The moment I crossed the border, I felt it like waking from a deep sleep.

I shook my head groggily and opened my eyes. Royal Guards surrounded me from every angle. There were so many. It seemed hard to believe that there were this many of them. One of them made a move to grab my arm, and without thinking, I lashed out with my wakazashi. The flat of the blade caught him across the chest, knocking him backward against his friends. They seemed to stand there unmoving for a moment before reacting to my attack. Well… that was odd.

“You know what’s strange?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at the lead guard. “That there’s so many of you. There probably aren’t this many Dioscuri in the whole of Lot right now, and even if there were, I doubt that there’d be this many Royal Guards.” I smirked and took a step forward, pointing my katana at the leader.

The leader looked down at my katana and snorted. The sound coming out of his voice modulator reminded me of a struggling computer. “Lower your weapon Lillim Callina, you are under arrest,” he said, raising one hand toward my blade to push it away.

“Yeah, that’s not happening,” I replied as I leapt forward. I hit the leader in the chest with my knees, driving him backward under the full force of my weight and riding him down to the ground. His head struck the sand with a wet-sounding thunk.

I was able to stand and dust myself off before the other guards even reacted to my presence. They came at me all at once, movements jerky like wind-up toy soldiers. I dove to the left, passing through the ring of guards with ease and smirked.

“Okay Charlie Thompson, I know you’re out here, just stop before I figure out which one of these duplicates you actually are and feed you to Grover,” I said, jerking my thumb toward the open gate.

“How did you know it was me?” called a lone voice from the back. Despite the modulation, it cracked half-way through with that characteristic screech of a teenage boy.

“Um… how many other Dioscuri have the ability to duplicate themselves?” I asked with a shrug.

“Well… none,” came a reply a moment later.

“Exactly,” I said.

The images around me faded out one by one, disappearing in a rush of steam. Soon, I was standing there looking at one Royal Guard. So they’d sent all of two people to come find me. Neat trick, I’d have been scared otherwise.

“Lillim, I still need to take you in,” he said walking up to me, his weapon in hand. It was still bespelled with glamour so it looked like a non-descript axe. “If I don’t, Masataka will be very upset with me.”

“Charlie, I’m…” I swallowed and shook my head. It was time to face my fight. “I’m going to go with you, but not as a prisoner.” I shrugged, sheathing my weapons as I sauntered over to the fallen Royal Guard and moved to remove his cowl. “Now let’s see if your friend is okay.”

“Don’t!” Charlie screamed as I yanked the fabric away.

There was an explosion of light and sound as I was flung backward. I hit the sand hard on my back, my breath whooshing out of me as I clutched my burning hand to my chest. The spot where the Guard had been was now a smoking crater. No trace of the Dioscuri remained.

“Well… I guess that’s one way to keep your identities secret,” I murmured as I willed power into my hand and tried to shut out the pain throbbing through it. Good thing most of the blast had been centered inward on the Royal Guard.

“If we try to remove our uniforms in the field, our Vajra’s detonate. It’s to keep them from falling into the wrong hands,” Charlie said as he knelt down by the blackened scar in the sand. “Why’d you go and do that?”

“Um… it seemed like a good idea at the time?” I ventured.

“You didn’t have to kill him,” Charlie said, turning his head toward me. “He was my friend…” and the moment the words left his lips I felt my heart break for him because he’d trusted me, and I’d killed his friend. Even though it was an accident.

“What was his name?” I asked and Charlie stared at me for a long time, saying nothing. “You don’t even know his name, do you?”

“Well, no,” Charlie said with a sigh. “I always called him Rudy in my head.”

“You’re making me feel bad,” I said, walking up to him and patting his shoulder awkwardly.

“You should feel bad. You just killed him!” Charlie shouted, standing up and throwing off my hand. “We were just following orders, and you killed him!”

“Look, I said I was sorry,” I replied, taking a step back and glaring at him.

“No you didn’t,” Charlie snapped.

“Oh…” I said sheepishly and stared at my feet for a second. “Well… I’m sorry.”

“I don’t believe you,” he said, cocking his head at me. “I don’t believe you’re sorry at all.” Which, sadly, was kind of true. I didn’t even know who the guy was, only that he’d been there to bring me back to Masataka and certain doom. It wasn’t enough to endear me to him, fellow Dioscuri or not.

“Charlie…” I said, reaching out to hug him because regardless of whether I liked the dead guy or not, I did like Charlie. “I’m sorry, really. I wasn’t trying to kill anyone.”

He let me put my arms around him and pull him close, which was hard because he was a head taller than me. Slowly, he wrapped his arms around me, crushing me against his body. He leaned his head on my shoulder, and I felt his warm breath on my neck. It brought back memories of him breathing on me from class. How long ago was that? Four years ago? Had it been that long since I’d seen him last?

“You really need to stop breathing on me,” I said. “You know I don’t like it.”

He chuckled into my neck, the sound of it rough with modulation. “Yeah, I remember,” he said. He released me and took a step back. “It’s good to see you, Lillim. I wish the circum—”

Chapter 8

Joshua stood behind Charlie’s body as it slumped the ground, knocked unconscious in mid-sentence. We both looked at the fallen Royal Guard before looking back at each other. Joshua quirked his lips into a grin as he stepped toward me, arms at his side.

“Do I get a hug too?” he asked, standing there unsure of what to do.

“No,” I replied, and he seemed to deflate a little, shoulders slumping in defeat. “I only hug people I like,” I added because I was feeling particularly snotty.

“Look Lillim, I’m sorry about the dragon thing,” he said, glancing past me and staring at some fixed point in the distance to the left of my head.

“You can’t even say that without looking away like a liar. And besides, you just knocked out Charlie. He was harmless,” I snapped.

“He was here to take you back to Masataka,” Joshua said, an incredulous look plastered across his face.

“For reasons,” I said, waving off his comment. “You ran away from him. How do you expect me to believe you’re here to save me when you ran away at the first sign of trouble?”

Joshua shut his eyes and clenched his hands into fists for a moment before very slowly opening his eyes. “Look, we don’t have time for this. Anyone keeping tabs on these two buffoons will have seen that Vajra explode. If I’m right, Masataka will be on his way here right now. We need to leave,” he said, reaching out and seizing my wrist in his hand. His flesh was cool and clammy against my skin as he tried to tug me forward.

“So how did you find me?” I asked, resisting for a moment before allowing him to pull me away from Charlie’s unconscious body.

“I’m a demon. You’re in the demon home-world. This is like the one place I
would
be able to find you,” he responded with a shrug.

“Okay… Let’s say I buy that, which I don’t, but let’s say I do. That doesn’t explain how he found me,” I said, pointing at Charlie.

“The fates pinpointed your location. As soon as they couldn’t find you
anywhere
it correlated you last known position with that of Ordain’s and posited you could be here.”