A Local Habitation Read online

  “Or what?”

  He was quiet for a moment. Then, flatly, he said, “I’ll think of something.”

  There was nothing to be said after that. I made my good-byes and hung up, shoving Colin’s skin into the bag before leaving the room. Quentin was waiting in the lobby with his backpack over one shoulder, leaning against the wall by the elevators.

  “What took you so long?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “Come on. We need to find you something to hit people with.”

  “What, we’re going to go steal me a brick?”

  “It’s an idea.” I started for the door. The desk clerk winced as we passed; apparently, our appearance wasn’t improved by the addition of an aluminum baseball bat. I was just glad my knife was covered—he’d have had an aneurysm. I offered a genial nod, and he smiled tremulously. I was suddenly glad that we weren’t checking out. His nerves weren’t up to the strain of actually talking to us.

  Getting to the car meant going through the garage, where the flickering overhead lights made too many shadows. I hurried us to the car. Quentin moved to the passenger side, and I caught his eyes as we peered through our respective rear-door windows. We shared a brief, wry smile. There are worse things I could do than infect the kid with a healthy sense of paranoia—for one thing, I could leave him thinking nothing in the world was ever going to hurt him.

  The car was clean. I unlocked my door, leaning over to open the passenger side before tossing my things into the back. Quentin clambered in, settling his backpack between his knees.

  “Any idea where we can get you a meat cleaver or something?”

  “Grocery store?” he offered.

  “You’re on.”

  We pulled out and headed for the city’s main drag. If anything was open, it would be there. I glanced at Quentin as I drove; he was staring pensively out the window. Shaking my head, I turned back to the road.

  The hero’s journey has suffered in modern years. Once we could’ve gotten a knight in shining armor riding to the rescue, pennants flying. These days you’re lucky to get a battered changeling and her underage, half-trained assistant, and the princesses are confused technological wizards in towers of silicon and steel. Standards aren’t what they used to be.

  THIRTEEN

  IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT when we reached ALH. Quentin slid his bargain-bin carving knife back into its cardboard sheath, watching the streets scrolling by outside the window. I hadn’t told him I was sending him back to Shadowed Hills. I couldn’t figure out how.

  “It’s so dark,” he said.

  “Everyone’s gone home.”

  This time, the gate didn’t open at our approach. I rolled down the window and leaned out, calling, “It’s Toby and Quentin. Come on, let us in.” There was no answer. I was about to get out of the car and try enchanting the controls again when the gate began cranking upward.

  “Maybe it’s still confused from the power outage?” said Quentin.

  “I guess so.” I started the car again.

  We were halfway through the gate when the portcullis froze above us, making a horrible grinding sound.

  “Toby, what’s it . . . ?”

  It creaked. And then it fell.

  It’s funny, but they never mention the incredibly offensive design of the portcullis in those old movies about knights and castles and kings. That suddenly seemed like a glaring omission, because those spikes were sharp, heavy, and headed straight for us.

  “Toby!”

  “Hang on!”

  Too much of the car was through the gate for me to back up; we’d get impaled if I tried. I took the only option left, slamming my foot down on the gas so hard that something snapped. There wasn’t time to find out whether it was my ankle or the car. My little car did its best, the engine screaming a mechanical battle cry as it leaped forward. On a good day, it could have raced the wind.

  The portcullis was faster.

  The spikes at the bottom pierced the roof behind our heads, slowing us to a crawl. Quentin screamed. The portcullis was still descending, peeling back the roof as it went. It was going to lodge in the back seat, slamming up against the rear end, and we were going to wind up pinned.

  The rear end. “Unfasten your belt,” I snapped, taking my hands off the wheel.

  “But—”

  “Do it!” The gas tank of the old-style Volkswagen Bug is in the back of the car, not the front. I’m not a mechanic, but I’m not stupid; I know rupturing your gas tank isn’t a good idea.

  Quentin’s eyes widened as he fumbled with his belt. I pulled mine off and tried the door—jammed.

  I reached back and grabbed my baseball bat, shouting, “Duck!” Quentin ducked. I swung the bat, hitting the windshield as hard as I could. It cracked but didn’t break. Safety glass. It’s a great idea, until it’s keeping you in a car that’s about to get shish- kabobbed by the world’s biggest cooking fork. Swearing, I fumbled the glove compartment open, pulling out a spray bottle of marsh water mixed with antifreeze. I’d used it for a case two weeks earlier that required a little breaking and entering, along with the usual assortment of small misdemeanors. Fortunately for me, Barrow Wights aren’t really in much of a position to press charges.

  “Toby, what are you—”

  “Quiet!” I squinted my eyes closed, chanting, “Apples-oranges-pudding-and-pie! Can’t find the door and nobody knows why!” I pulled the top off the spray bottle, flinging the liquid across the glass. The smell of antifreeze filled the car, overwhelming the sudden copper and cut grass flare of my magic. The windshield trembled, going milky with fractures before it imploded and showered us with shards. I threw the bat out the window, twisting around to face Quentin.

  He was straightening, wide-eyed, fragments of glass glittering in his hair. “What—” he began, words dissolving in a startled squawk as I grabbed his shirt and tossed him onto the hood of the car. He landed on his shoulder, rolling out of sight. I braced my hands against the steering wheel, boosting myself up and diving after him.

  Hitting the ground hurt more than I thought possible. I rolled with it, trying to ignore the glass shards cutting my back and sides. The hilt of my knife was digging into my waist, but at least the blade was staying in place—bruises would be much easier to deal with than accidentally gutting myself.

  Dimly, I hoped someone had taught Quentin how to fall.

  Inertia pulled me to a stop. I raised my head, tensing to run. The car was pinned about eight feet behind me. The engine was still screaming, but now it sounded strained and strange, and there was a sharp, almost pensive ticking running underneath it. I’d never heard a car sound like that before.

  That wasn’t the worst of my problems. Quentin was sprawled on the ground a full body length back, facedown, not moving. His newly purchased knife was next to him, blade bent nearly double from the force of the fall. It hadn’t defended him after all.

  There’s nothing wrong with my reflexes. I scrambled to my feet, ignoring the glass cutting my hands, and sprinted toward him. “Quentin!” When he didn’t react, I grabbed his upper arms, dragging him upright and slinging him over my shoulders in a fireman’s carry. My back and knees screamed with pain, but I didn’t slow down. I needed to get some distance between us and the car.

  Cars don’t catch fire easily: that’s a device used for dramatic effect in the movies and on television. I know that. But I also know that security systems, even ones built using the “medieval wonderland” blueprints, don’t usually attack visitors. Knowing something is or isn’t true doesn’t change what actually happens.

  I made it about ten yards before the ticking stopped. They say that when the music stops the rest is silence. That’s true. What they don’t tell you is that the silence is probably going to be painful. I kept running, stumbling as a charge raced through the air, sending a warning screaming through my bones. I know magic when I feel it. I tried to reach for the spell’s source, looking for the person behind it, but it was already too late; the charge ground
ed itself in a spray of half-visible sparks, obliterating the caster’s magical signature.

  The car exploded.

  The wave of heat came first, racing ahead of the shrapnel and knocking us both to the ground. Quentin was jolted out of my hold, landing about four feet away. I let forward momentum carry me into a roll, ignoring the pain reawakening in my shoulders, back, and knees. I had more pressing problems, like the question of whether or not my hair was on fire. A chunk of the hood embedded itself in the ground a foot from my head, and I amended that idea; burning hair wasn’t nearly as much of a problem as being decapitated by the flying remains of my car.

  Momentum gave out and I rolled to a stop, tucking my head under my body and listening to the debris raining down around me. There were a few soft thuds, then silence. The air stank of gasoline, smoke, and melted tar, but no one was screaming; I decided to take that as a good sign. Even so, it was several minutes before I raised my head.

  The remains of my car were smoldering in the gate, pinned by the portcullis. The vegetation on all sides was charred and broken, but the gateway itself wasn’t even scratched, and the stones were clean. Whatever spells they’d built into that thing were holding.

  “If this was part of the alarm system, I’m going to kill them,” I muttered.

  Quentin was where I’d dropped him, head resting on his arm. None of the debris seemed to have hit him; that was a small blessing. I walked over and bent to check his pulse, noting the scrapes scoring his arms and neck. He looked like he’d taken less damage than I had. His pulse was fast, pushed up by panic and adrenaline, but it was there, and it was strong.

  “You’re lucky as hell, kid,” I said, brushing the glass away and rolling him onto his back. My hands left bloody prints on his shoulders and upper arms. I straightened, despite the protests from my back and knees, and turned to face the parking lot. And I waited.

  I didn’t have to wait long. People are pulled to explosions by an instinctive desire to see something forbidden, and that goes double for the fae. Only a few minutes passed before I heard running footsteps and Jan shouting, “That’s Toby’s car!”

  “Well, it was,” I said, even though none of them were close enough to hear me. My hands were starting to seriously hurt. That would have to wait. There’d be time to worry about how badly I was or wasn’t injured later, if I was lucky—time was turning into a limited commodity, and if Quentin and I were targets, it was running out.

  Jan crested the rise separating us from the parking lot, Terrie running close behind her. Terrie was panting, one hand pressed against her chest, gaping at the wreckage.

  “Oh, my . . .”

  “Yes. The car exploded. Can someone pick up Quentin? I’d do it myself, but my knees are killing me.” My desire to get Quentin to safety was warring with the need to collapse into hysterical laughter, and I didn’t think that was a good idea. At least not before I got the two of us inside.

  “What happened?”

  “Your security system tried to kill us.” I paused, remembering the charge that raced through the air just before the explosion occurred. “Or somebody else did.”

  “Are you all right?” Jan ran across the debris-strewn driveway, skidding to a stop a few feet in front of me. Her eyes were enormously wide behind her glasses, making her look more like an overgrown child than the Countess of her own fiefdom.

  “I’m better than Quentin. At least I’m awake.” Something was running down the side of my face. I raised my hand to my cheek, touching the dampness. My fingertips came away slick with a mixture of blood, ash, and broken glass. I can’t stand the sight of my own blood. I added the urge to vomit to my already long list of suppressed reactions. “Oh, yeah, I’m fine,” I said, wiping my hand across my lips. “I do this every day.”

  Jan moved to take my arm. “Let’s get you inside.”

  I licked my lips, grimacing at the taste of blood. “We have to take care of Quentin.”

  “Terrie’s got him. It’s all right.”

  The taste of my own blood—which was nowhere near empty—seemed to be focusing my thoughts. I frowned, pulling away from Jan, and said, “No. I’ll take care of him.”

  “No, you won’t,” said Jan, reclaiming my arm. “You’re barely upright. Let Terrie.”

  Grudgingly, I allowed her to guide me, shooting a poisonous look back toward Terrie. “I know how badly he’s hurt. If he’s any worse, we’re going to have words. Understand?”

  She looked stunned, but nodded, moving to scoop Quentin off the ground. I watched until I was sure she had him, then turned to Jan, asking, “Has this happened before? This kind of reaction from the security system?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “The gate’s Coblynau design. It’s perfectly weighted. This can’t have happened.”

  I looked at her flatly, asking, “Just like the lights can’t go out?”

  “Yes! Just like . . .” She stopped, staring at me. “You can’t be serious.”

  “I can. I’ve said as much to Alex. Whatever’s doing this isn’t a what—it’s a who, because this has to be an inside job.” I gestured to the gate, trying to ignore the blood drying on my cheeks. “No monster did that. Monsters aren’t that subtle. This was a trap.”

  “Oh.” Jan closed her eyes. “Oh, oak and ash.”

  “Yeah.”

  Someone tried to kill us; the gate proved it. Even if the fences were under a “no damage” enchantment, they should have been dirtied when the car blew up—should have, but weren’t. There was no reason to put that sort of spell on a building fixture. A normal accident would have attracted the police and been covered by their insurance. Mine wasn’t normal, and I was willing to bet that if the police were called by one of the neighboring businesses, they’d be quietly sent away. This was a duck hunt, and neither Quentin nor I was the one holding the rifle.

  “Looks like someone didn’t bother filing for their hunting license,” I muttered.

  “What?” Jan flashed me a pained look.

  “Never mind.” I know how it feels to realize that someone in your family is a killer. Devin and I were family once. “Family” really means “the ones that can hurt you the most. ” So yeah, I understood; I would even have pitied her, if I’d had the time. There’s never time for sympathy when you need it the most.

  “Your car . . .”

  “It’s not important,” I said, with a small shake of my head. Terrie and Quentin were long since out of sight. “I’m going to be fine. Let’s just get inside before Quentin wakes up and thinks he’s been kidnapped.”

  Exhaustion was rolling over me in a wave. I just wanted to crawl into a bed—any bed—and stay there until this was all over. Maybe I’d get lucky and somebody else would show up to take care of everything. If I was lucky, I wouldn’t have to lift a finger to bring us to a simple, happy ending. Unfortunately, the sinking feeling in my stomach said my luck had finally run out.

  FOURTEEN

  “STOP SQUIRMING,” GORDAN SNAPPED, dabbing at my cheek with a cotton swab. She was holding a pair of stainless steel tweezers in her other hand. I eyed them warily. “You’ve got glass ground pretty deep in here. Do you want me to get it out, or do you want to spend the rest of your life looking like an order of meatloaf surprise?”

  I glared at her, struggling to hold still. It was turning into a pitched battle between my nerves and the pain. The pain was winning. “That hurts.”

  “Suck it up,” Quentin said. Gordan had already treated him, snickering about how much fun it was to watch a pretty boy mop the road with his face. It didn’t seem to have affected her work; she’d sterilized and bound his wounds quickly, even while she was mocking him. He was sitting on the counter, a cup of soup in his hands and a swath of gauze taped across his forehead, pushing his bangs up in a jagged line. He looked like he was recovering from his first bar fight.

  I didn’t care; I was just glad he was awake. “Don’t make me come over there.”

  “Gordan wouldn’t let you.” />
  “He’s right for once; I wouldn’t.” She smiled, showing the points of her teeth. “And you should be glad this hurts. The only way it wouldn’t hurt is if you were already dead.”

  “Just be careful,” I said, hunching my shoulders. I still suspected her; I had no logical reason not to, save for the fact that I couldn’t figure out why she’d have killed her own best friend.

  “I am,” she said. She put down the tweezers, selecting a strip of gauze. Her fingers were gentle as she bandaged my cheek, avoiding the spots where the skin was torn. For all her hostility, she knew what she was doing. “You’ll heal, but I don’t recommend sliding down any more driveways on your face.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said, dryly.

  “Good. This was fun and all, but I don’t want to do it again.” She started to pack the kit with neat, rapid motions, tucking away gauze, ointment, and those awful sharp-edged tweezers. “Get some coffee or something. You look like the dead.”

  “The soup’s good,” Quentin said, hefting his mug.

  “You’re that worried about my welfare all of a sudden?” I looked at Gordan.

  “Stuff it,” she said, not unkindly. “I just don’t want you upsetting Jan even more.”

  “Right,” I said, standing and crossing to the coffeemaker. The pot was half- full; good. I didn’t want to bother brewing more. The bandages on my hands were light enough that I could handle it easily—I hadn’t lost any manual dexterity, and that was even better.

  We were alone in the cafeteria, and the doors were locked with a warding charm of Jan’s design. I’d tried to open the door once, just out of curiosity, and found myself pushed gently but firmly back into the room. The seal was good. After dropping us off with Gordan, Jan and Terrie had disappeared to find Elliot and take care of the mess blocking the front gate.

  “Toby?”

  “Yeah?” The coffee was hot enough to be worth drinking. I took a long swallow and topped the cup off again. I was sure to need the caffeine.