Shadowlands (13 page)

“Who are you?” he asked. “
What
are you?”

[The rough heat of a lion’s breath, the slash of a scaled tail. A Chimera. A gray-eyed woman, whom he loves, and fears—though not as much as he fears himself. Guilt, old and new; and anger; and fear.]

The images crashed against me—[flash of bright metal; swing of
claw] thick, choking, like waves crashing against rocks. I struggled—not physically, though I was sure I was doing that, too—to hold my head, my
self
, up, away from the blanketing tide. [Place after place, beach, hillside, trees, pond, snow, lightning, stonewallrainsunshinesandrocktidewater; I AM
HERE!
] I’d felt this before, with Alejandro, I knew what it was. But Alejandro, that first time, had shaken my hand and let me go, and this guy, this Rider, this
STORM
was holding me tight.

I focused on that, I focused on the physical, as if I were really drowning. On the arm tight around my body, and the hand against my mouth. On the hard body pressed tight against mine. On the warm cinnamon smell. I squirmed in his grip. A
very
hard body.

The tide started to recede, the white noise of the city rising up to cushion me. I should have felt too warm standing this close to him, but I didn’t. It felt
just right
. When it occurred to me I shouldn’t be thinking about baby bear’s bed at that moment, I knew my psyche was mine again.

The terror of the moment when he touched me faded, helped somehow by his voice. There was music somewhere in it, as if he was reciting verse, or as if he’d just left off singing, and his voice still rang with it. I’d known at once that he was a Rider [I AM HERE!], but maybe at one time he’d been an actor, the way Alejandro had been a soldier and a matador. There was nothing frightening in the warmth and strength of his body, or even in the way his psyche brushed against mine. [His shoes/jeans/T-shirt/jacket were really boots/trousers/mail shirt/tunic.] It was only that the suddenness, the grabbing, the hand over my mouth, had startled me. It didn’t, as you might think, remind the little girl inside me of the man who took me.
That
had happened in my sleep.

I stopped squirming. There
was
a hot fury in this Rider, but it wasn’t directed at me, it was pointed somewhere else, perhaps at the gray-eyed woman who was so important to him, perhaps at himself. [Umbrella hooked to his belt really a sword.] The lion part of the Chimera was very close to the surface in him, very strong, very hot, but if I just waited for a minute, he would calm down and listen.

My heart still hammering, I tried to relax, drew air in through my nose, willing him to figure out that I couldn’t answer his questions while his hand was over my mouth. He was confused [Riders; the
trail; the scent; he was worried about his brother], wondering who I was and why I smelled like a Rider, but so faint, so very faint, like a trail almost cold. He’d been sent to find Riders, to give them good news. He was pleased about it [the news], but somehow saddened by it [the sending] at the same time. His hand relaxed.

I was just about to ask him who he was when a bright light flashed in the corner of my vision and sharp bangs exploded all around us. I was shoved roughly from behind, two hands against my shoulder blades [a rescue! Knock the Hound on the ground; save her!]. Before I could speak to clarify things, there was a CRACK! of displaced air, much louder than the bangs of the firecrackers, and suddenly we weren’t in the square anymore.

Alejandro could see Valory as he ran into the square. The Outsiders were with her and he started to relax, until he saw she was being held by a dark-haired man—the man in sunglasses!—and the others were trying to get her away from him. Just as he reached the outskirts of the group, he heard—and felt—the shift of air as the dark-haired stranger Moved, and he and Valory were gone.

Nik Polihronidis ran from the back entrance of the train station just as Alejandro raised his sword. “That supposed to help?” The Outsider leader turned his back on Alejandro.

“What happened here? Where’s Valory?”

“It took her, the Hound took her.”

“I killed the Hound,” Alejandro said. “You see its blood on my blade.” The blood dripped, falling toward the ground, but never reaching it.

“Oh, like there’s only ever one Hound.” This from a tall man with a faint French accent.

“Yeah, they’re called the Hunt for a reason, you know. They range in packs,” said the young girl who had looked at him as he stood in the alcove.

Like Riders
. There was something in that thought that bothered him, reminded him of something, but Alejandro pushed it aside, impatient that his mind could go wandering at a time like this.

“Where is she, then?”

“Like I said, it took her. The other Hound.” The girl slapped her hands together in a sharp crack. “Like that.”

Alejandro shook his head. “The Hunt cannot Move.” He looked at Nik, but there was no answer in the other man’s face. Riders. Hounds. The one following Valory had looked like a Rider at first, and then again at the end. What did it mean?

“I knew this was a bad idea, I should never have listened to you.
Riders
.” Nik spat the word like a curse. “As if you ever gave a damn about humans.”

“Do you dare? She is my
fara’ip
. She is blood of my blood, bone of my bone. Who harms her, harms me.”

“Really? ’Cause you look fine to me.” The French-sounding one was standing close enough that Alejandro could see his beard forming close under his skin.

“Let me remind you that it was you came to me for help,” Alejandro said, his voice as quiet and cold as his
gra’if
.”

A family—mother, father, and two preteen children—came out of the train station entrance. They were each wearing a sunhat, and their backpacks all had a bottle of water in the outside pocket. The parents glanced over, and without other reaction began to herd the children faster toward the entrance to the Air Canada Centre. The kids were talking about what they would get at the official NBA store, and did not seem to notice the gang of armed individuals standing in the open square.

Alejandro made an effort to calm his breathing. All was not yet lost. It had been a Rider who had taken Valory, not a Hound. “This is not the place to take council,” he said. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped off his blade very meticulously and thoroughly before sliding it back into the wooden body of his walking stick.

“Any ideas on what we should do now?” The tone in Nik Polihronidis’ voice was like a lash on Alejandro’s back.

Alejandro looked at the cloth with distaste, before glancing at the human, right eyebrow raised. “Has anyone a match?” At his simple question, some of the tension began to ease from the air.

The young girl standing behind Nik handed Alejandro a pink plastic lighter. He burned the cloth, making sure that there was nothing but ash left. This gave them all further time to calm themselves.

“So where were you, then?” Nik said.

“I was killing the Hound,” Alejandro said again. His tone was even, but he felt the heat underneath it. “You saw the blood on my sword. If you know so much, you know what blood it was.” Alejandro narrowed his gaze. “That was no Hound that took my Valory.” There was heat in his voice. “That was a Rider.
Hounds do not Move
.”

Nik swallowed. “Okay,” he said, and Alejandro understood that it was, in its way, an apology. “Okay. So what now?”

It was an honest question this time, and not a provocation, but Alejandro felt no better.

His mobile rang. There were only two people who could have the number. Backing away from them, Alejandro pulled the vibrating phone out of his jacket pocket and looked at the display.

Valory.

It was Dogfang who came to report, changing repeatedly as he approached, unable to keep his Rider form long enough to speak. Excitement, Foxblood wondered, or was he badly in need of
dra’aj
? Strange how quickly they were all becoming accustomed to their stable shapes.

“Go, eat something,” he said. “And make it quick. Send me someone who can speak.” The other scampered off, first on two legs, then four, then three. Fox looked down at his own hands, as they (flicker) became hairless paws, the claws thick and twisted (flicker) talons dull with age, (flicker) pincers, leathery and cracked (flicker) hands, the fingers long and perfect.

A change in the air, and Hook came in.

“Pack Leader,” she said. Her Rider form flickered for an instant, almost like a tic, and then settled down again.

“Where’s Claw? Why doesn’t he bring the report?”

“He’s gone, he is.” This came out in a long hiss, and Fox frowned. Hook should be able to control herself better than this. He stood suddenly, taking her by the throat, lifting her into the air and giving her a shake before he threw her to the ground.

“Do you think that’s an answer?” he said, letting the growl come out in his own throat. The other (flicker) became something long and scaly, and (flicker) was a Rider again. She stayed on her knees, though, one hand to her throat.

“He’s Faded, Pack Leader. The old Rider, the Sunward one who keeps the girl, came with a
gra’if
blade and took him. But not without being marked, Claw—” she grinned, and her teeth were sharp. “He clawed him, for sure.”

The first thought that blasted its way through the haze of rage that followed this news was “more for me” but Foxblood did his best to shake it off. That wasn’t a useful thought, no matter how true it might be. There was so much
dra’aj
here for the taking that the Hunt would never need to fight and turn on each other for it ever again.

Right now one less meant fewer warriors, not more
dra’a
j.

A thought flashed clearly in his brain. Would they still be Hounds, if their hunger was always fed?

“There’s more, Pack Leader.”

Fox blinked. He’d almost forgotten Hook was still there. “You know where the girl is?”

“No, not yet,” the other Hound said. “But another Rider turned up in the dark last night.”

“Sure it wasn’t the same one?” At this Hook bristled, and Foxblood grinned. Like any of them could be fooled when smell told them so much.

“He’s a Moonward,” Hook asserted. “Not the Sunward who keeps the girl. But he’s familiar somehow. Like as if we’d smelled him already.”

“Another of the Basilisk’s ass sniffers?” Fox’s hand strayed to his upper lip. If it was in the same condition as Longshadow, okay, but if it wasn’t? Maybe this one could tell him what had happened to his brother.

But Hook was shaking her head. “No. Not one of those. Maybe you should look at him yourself, see if you know him.”

Fox sat down again. Who could the strange Rider be, with his familiar but unknown scent?

“W
HAT ARE YOU,” the strange Rider asked me again.

“I’m human.” I grimaced at the squeak in my voice and tried to swallow. My lips felt bruised and my jaw stiff. “I have a Rider ancestor, but a long way back. That’s what you smell.” I wondered what more to tell him. He
had
been following what he thought of as my trail, but he’d never seen me before today, so he wasn’t the one I’d seen in the subway car, and he wasn’t the one Nik and the Outsiders had noticed. It was then I started to wonder where Alejandro was.

The Rider’s grip loosened enough that I could turn in his arms to face him, though he kept hold of my upper arms. My heart was beating fast, and I could feel myself blushing, but I wasn’t at all afraid. He had pale, perfect skin. Pale as almond. Hair black as sloes, eyes gray as ash and still retaining heat. A Moonward Rider, I realized, though I had never seen one. I knew there were three Wards, Star, Moon, and Sun, but so far I’d only seen Alejandro.

The room was so much darker than the sun-filled square we’d Moved from that it took a minute for my eyes to adjust. Now I could
see there was scarring around this Rider’s right eye [bird claws] that was matched elsewhere on his body. I swallowed. I couldn’t remember ever being this aware of anyone physically before, and I was hoping he couldn’t hear my heart. He was studying me as closely as I was studying him. I started to breathe faster.