cockpit, “Good hunting,
40
IN THE SILENCE, I heard the hiss of a nightjar from the garden.
Cal’s nostrils flared and Dean’s switchblade came out. “We got some uninvited guests,” he said.
“They’re everywhere,” Cal said. “All over the garden. Under the porch …” His eyes went round and milky in the twilight. “Bethina.”
Cal shifted into ghoul on the fly and took off at a four-legged run for the house. I thought that poor Bethina was about to get the shock of her life, if she hadn’t already.
“He had the right idea, doll,” Dean said. “About making tracks for inside, I mean.”
A nightjar crawled away through the apple orchard, and from the roof tiles, a springheel jack snarled at us before leaping from cupola to ground in one fluid motion.
“Definitely the right idea,” Dean said, and we ran.
The creatures were everywhere, crawling over the house itself. “Why are there so many of them?” I shouted to Dean, though I had an idea. Maybe there had always been this many horrors lurking in the shadows of Thorn.
“Figure it out later!” Dean shouted, and that also was a good point. We slammed and locked the kitchen door behind us as something ran into the other side, scrabbling and chittering and making the hinges bow from the impact and the assault of its claws.
I braced the door while Dean grabbed a kitchen chair and stuck it under the knob. When I let go, I nearly fell into the arms of a ghoul.
He didn’t look anything like Cal, Toby or their mother—this was one of the cemetery ghouls, wild matted hair, wilder eyes, and a stench that could fell a war Engine. He snarled at me.
I reeled away from him, until I realized I was backed into a corner. I heard soft whimpering behind me and turned slightly to find Bethina occupying the same space. “Are you all right?” I asked.
She shook her head, eyes wide and pupils vibrating with shock. Cal stood behind her, hand on her shoulder. Thankfully, he’d made himself look human again. We’d have a discussion about his deceiving Bethina, but this was most certainly not the time.
“Don’t worry,” I told her. “I’ve got it under control.”
“How,” Bethina gasped, “in
More ghouls crept into the kitchen, and in the dim light they appeared all eyes and teeth.
I looked at Dean. He was watching each ghoul in turn, an expression I hoped to never see again on his face. Dean looked as hungry for a fight as they did, and his switchblade flicked open. “Who wants the first taste?” He grinned at the ghoul’s leader. “It’s silver-coated. I hear you puppy dogs don’t much care for that.”
Graystone whispered to me frantically, pleaded with me to rid it of its interlopers. The Weird wanted to open itself up, wanted it so badly it made my heart beat out of time.
The Weird had unleashed the ghouls in the first place, brought every awful thing to bear on the Iron Land.
I supposed it was time my Weird did something good. I touched Dean on the arm. “I think you’d be better served by giving us some light, please.”
He looked at me for a long moment and then nodded. “I dig you, princess.”
To Bethina, I murmured, “Cover your eyes.”
Dean gave the kitchen aether globes a nudge, just a shove, with the wicked bit of wild magic that always wrapped around him. A globe cracked, then another, and then in a brilliant flash the aether exploded, contacting the air and sending the scent of burning parchment running through the hallways of the house.
I reached out to every trap and trigger in Graystone with my Weird, brought them to bear on the ghouls as they howled and clawed at their faces, their night-blackened eyes dazzled by the blue fire of the aether.
The house responded to me, with a vengeance. I could hear the howls and cries resounding from top to bottom as the clockwork fed on its Folk intruders, and the ghouls broke for the kitchen doors and windows, fleeing before they became like Tanner.
It was dark again in two and a half seconds, the aether burned out as quickly as one blows out a candle. My dazzled eyes couldn’t see a thing, but Dean found me. “We got them,” he said. “Traps all sprung. Not a living thing in this house besides you and me and Bethina and, er, … the kid.”
Cal held up a sobbing Bethina. “She needs to sit down.”
“Take her to the library,” I said faintly. The Weird hadn’t overwhelmed me this time, hadn’t tried to swallow me alive. Cold comfort after what I’d done.
“Library’s a good idea for all of us,” Dean said. “It’s safe there.”
“At least from the Folk,” I muttered. I wasn’t sure, as I trailed after Dean, about myself.
The danger inside the house was dead, but as we hurried into the library and barred the doors, the howling outside did not cease.
“Something’s stirred my brothers,” Cal said softly so Bethina couldn’t hear. “Stirred everyone. There’s a Wild Hunt. First I’ve ever seen. Thought such things went the way of horse-drawn jitneys.”
Bethina and Cal huddled together while Dean lit the fire in the library grate. I wondered if Cal would ever tell her, or if, like me, he would carry a secret to the grave.
“The queens are awake,” I said. “And I think … I
Dean blew out his lighter and put it back in his leather. “We’re safe for now. They can’t get past the clockwork.”
“Did you not hear me?” I demanded. “I did it, Dean. Magic is walking the world. The gates are down. I did that.”
“Aoife.” Dean came and wrapped my fingers with his. “Don’t think of that.”
“What am I supposed to think of?” I demanded. “How Draven wanted to ensnare me to ensnare my father? How Tremaine wanted to burn me to ash? If I think of anything besides what
I jerked away from him and paced to the window, looking down at the ghouls and springheel jacks roaming through the orchard and the garden.
“I’ve never seen ghouls like this,” Cal said again. “It’s like a war zone out there.”
“That’s what Tremaine said,” I murmured, pressing my forehead against the glass. “He said it was a war. He wanted this to happen.”
“Waking up the queens must’ve sent out some waves,” Dean said. “But wouldn’t they take the throne and have done? I would.”
“The queens have to be awake,” I said. “To keep Thorn alive. But they aren’t in charge. Tremaine is the Regent and he makes the rules. He made that very clear.” The nightjars in my view were turning on one another, having decimated every other living thing in the garden.
A mortal curse in the Folk’s lands. Cast by Draven, who either had been tricked into thinking his campaign against the Folk had just reached its greatest success or was in league with Tremaine.
I didn’t care. What mattered was that I was just as gullible. I’d done exactly as Tremaine had planned for me to do. Conrad and my father had held out, had refused to play into the Folk’s hands. Whereas pliant little Aoife had fallen in line with Tremaine because she felt sorry for him.
The memories unspooled like a needle under the skin. My first encounter with Tremaine. Draven’s smirk. The doctor who’d stared at me with his mossy eyes. The same eyes that looked back at me from the rippled glass now.
