to follow. Girlfriends and models came and went, but Hoshi was one of the few constants in his life. The cat was always glad to see him, unlike his present company.
Seth resented every step dictated to him since Lelani entered his life. He had lost himself in the past forty- eight hours and couldn’t remember the individual he was only yesterday. His friends had abandoned him, his home was a cinder, dog-men were shooting arrows at him, and his only companions were a mystical horse-girl, a moody fascist cop, and his humorless wife. His past had nothing to do with the present. One day he earned a living photographing and fornicating with beautiful desperate girls, and the next he was running for his life on the yellow brick road. A massive disconnect had occurred-an alignment of stars against him. And strange as it was, this felt more real than the past thirteen years of his life.
Cal signaled the all clear.
The tree line encircled a pristine meadow; in the center stood a grand old tree. Unlike its counterparts in the woods, this tree had all of its leaves, green as on a moist August day. Around the tree was a small zone of healthy green grass, untouched by the weather. A few yards away sat a small white RV trailer hitched to empty air. Smoke wafted from a pipe on the roof. No tracks led to or from. Either no one was in or no one had left home recently.
Seth walked a few steps and felt a snap underfoot that didn’t feel like wood. The snow was spotted pink. He retrieved what had cracked. A bone. A slimy bone. Some animal, he thought. It was picked clean, notched with tooth marks and stray clinging ligament. He realized that there were bones all around him. He spotted a paw; a five-fingered paw-with opposable thumb.
“Uh, guys,” he said.
Cal hushed him.
“Shush yourself, man. There are pieces of some dude all around me.” That got their attention.
Lelani examined the bones.
“There are two people here,” she said.
“Fuck,” Seth said. “This place gives me the heebie-jeebies. Maybe the other sentries are worse than dog- boy.”
Cal examined the scene also.
Lelani discovered shreds of scaled clothes, a spear, and some netting.
“These are the other guards,” she said. “These items are from Aandor. One of them was a skilyte.”
“A what?” Cat asked.
“Swamp dwellers,” Cal said. “Not friends of Aandor.”
“Perhaps we have an ally?” Lelani said. “Rosencrantz?”
“No.” Cal picked up a thighbone and studied the nicks and scratches that covered it. “The gnoll got hungry.” Cal handed the bone to Lelani for confirmation.
“It ate its partners?” Seth asked incredulously.
“Gnolls are terrible allies.”
“Wouldn’t their leader know this?” Cat asked.
“Dorn probably ordered the gnoll not to harm them,” Lelani answered.
“And he didn’t realize it wouldn’t obey?”
“No. Treason and insubordination are rare in the Kingdom of Farrenheil. Dorn’s uncle enjoys putting people on trial for the most minor infractions. Execution is the family hobby. Thinks it sends a good message to the masses. Sometimes they even coax children to divulge their parents’ beliefs, then they arrest the parents and place the children in military orphanages. That’s how they maintain such a large army.” She threw the bone down with disgust. “What arrogance! They believe their whims can subvert nature. Their alliances with these base creatures will be everyone’s undoing, including their own.”
“Right now, that’s a blessing,” Cal said. “Two less sentries we need to deal with.” He studied the trailer. “I assume that’s where the mojo is?”
“Yes,” Lelani said.
“And odds are, Rosencrantz is in that trailer.”
“I’d take that bet,” she answered.
“I’ll go first,” Cal offered.
“No,” Cat responded. “We’ll go together. How much safer can it be in a forest with man-eating gnolls?”
Seth chuckled. Maybe not completely humorless, he thought.
He helped Cat stand and volunteered to be her crutch as he’d done often since they’d dispatched the gnoll. The other two needed to be unencumbered in case something sprang up. It made sense to everyone, and it helped alleviate the sour mood that sprang between them after he had refused Cal’s order to outflank the gnoll. It seemed like a team-player thing to do. Seth had a more practical motive for helping Cat. In the woods, you don’t have to be able to outrun a bear to survive an attack. You just have to be faster than the person you’re with.
They cut a path through the snow. The clearing reminded Seth of the Roman colosseum; the trees surrounding the clearing, bristling in the wind, were a thousand cheering spectators. This didn’t bode well for the four of them, who were on stage. Seth felt vulnerable. Cloistered in the canyons of Manhattan, a person can’t appreciate the reality of open ground. A tactical disadvantage when being hunted.
The trailer was about fifteen feet long and in need of a wash. Dents and dings decorated the pleated aluminum skin. Cinder blocks lifted the hitched end off the ground. Cal reached it first and was about to knock, when-
“Wait!” Seth said.
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“I…”
“Are we just going to stand out here?” Lelani asked.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Cat said. She hobbled up and rapped on the door.
The vapors from their breath ceased in unison. Everything was silent. Then they heard clanging and banging within. The trailer rocked as the footsteps grew louder. The door creaked open and stopped at the limit of a chain, just enough space for a mouse to slip through. A single eye in the darkness took stock of them from the crack.
“No trespassing,” it said in a low raspy voice.
“We’re looking for Rosencrantz,” Cal said.
The eye considered them, shifting from one to the other.
“Wizards are a temperamental lot. They’re not like Jedi Masters-feed you soup and teach you tricks because you crash in on them. More likely to turn you into mice and feed you to their snakes. Go home… while you still can.”
“I’m well aware of the temperament of wizards, sir,” Lelani said. “My own master, Magnus Proust, has turned a few assistants’ heads prematurely white.”
The eye pondered this. “Magnus Proust?”
The door shut. A chain rattled, then the door opened wide. He was a short, stocky man, bald on top with graying sides, red bulbous cheeks, and a little gray mustache. His skin was tanned, as though he recently returned from a cruise. He wore red-and-brown plaid pajama pants, slippers, and a black T-shirt that said, What Is Good? in stark white letters.
“Don’t try nothing funny, or I’ll cut ya,” he said. There wasn’t a knife in sight.
“We’re not here to hurt anyone,” Cat replied.
The man took a long look at Cat and smiled. “You know, you’re the first people to show up around here that didn’t give me the creeps. You ought to see the things popping up lately. There’s a fucking gnoll in those woods. Kid you not. That damn thing howls at the moon and keeps us up all night. Sends shivers to my corns.”
“Not anymore,” Lelani said.
“You don’t say? Well, hot damn. That’s just great. The missus will be thrilled. Anything I can do to repay you folks?”
“Yeah,” Seth said. “Blast the evildoers, find the kid, get me my job and apartment back, and send everyone else home.”
“Uh… yeah,” the man said. “I was thinking more like snacks, maybe some Tang or hot chocolate.”
