Talaith didn’t respond right away, and the rain slackened, but didn’t let up entirely.
I sense you’re telling the truth. And in that case letting you go would be the sensible thing. But I don’t want to be sensible; I want revenge.
The rain picked up, coming down so hard now that visibility was near zero, but Lazlo didn’t let up on the gas. The lightning and thunder were constant now. I wondered how close we were to the Bridge of Lost Souls. Not close enough, I feared.
Instead of destroying you, perhaps I’ll try to merely incapacitate you. That way you’ll get to see your friends perish, and afterward I can bring you to Woodhome and have the pleasure of watching you rot away to nothing. Yes, that sounds quite lovely.
I had one last card up my sleeve. It wasn’t an ace…hell, it wasn’t even a deuce, but it was all I had, so I played it.
What would you say if I reminded you about the Accord that states travelers on the Obsidian Way aren’t to be interfered with?
I’d say, “What Accord?”
And then I felt Talaith’s foul presence depart my mind. If I could have, I would’ve taken my brain out and given it a good scrubbing to get rid of the mental aftertaste of the Witch Queen’s thoughts.
“Uh, guys, we have a problem.”
“No shit we have a problem!” Lazlo shouted over the riotous thunder. “I can barely see two feet in front of us, and these so-called roads are rapidly turning into mud!”
I filled them in on my mental tete-a-tete with the mistress of the Arcane.
“An augury!” Lazlo said in surprise. “Those went out with evil eyes and love potions!”
“This is no time to discuss fashion trends in magic,” I said. “We have to figure a way out of this!”
“We better figure fast, then.” Lazlo pointed at the sky beyond the windshield. There, highlighted against black clouds, was the figure of an angel with wings of lightning. But this was a dark angel with wild raven hair, hate-filled eyes, and lips twisted in cruel laughter that boomed louder than thunder. Talaith, or at least a reasonable facsimile, getting ready to swoop down for the kill.
I looked out the windshield. Talaith’s avatar had left her position in the sky and was swooping down toward us, dark glee and anticipation blazing on her face.
Talaith’s avatar closed on our cab. She plucked a bolt of lightning from her wings and it shaped itself into a sword crackling with electricity. As she neared, she shrieked like a banshee experiencing labor pains, lifted the glowing yellow-white sword, and, as she reached the cab, swung.
But Lazlo was ready for her. Just as she brought the sword around, he jerked the steering wheel to the left and hit the gas. A sizzling sound filled the interior of the cab and then we were spinning out of control. I grabbed Devona because I hoped my zombie body might absorb some of the impact-neither of us were wearing seatbelts because Lazlo’s cab doesn’t have them. He tore them out because, as he once explained to me, they “show a real lack of confidence in the driver”-and together we bounced around the back seat as Lazlo swore mightily and struggled to regain control over his machine.
But it was no good; the car tipped, bounced, and rolled five times before finally crunching to a stop. The cab-what was left of it-was resting on its hood in the middle of a rain-soaked field. I still had hold of Devona.
“You okay?” I shouted above the still rollicking storm.
“I think so. Plenty of aches, but I don’t think any-thing’s broken.”
“Lazlo?”
He moaned and I thought he’d been hurt. But then he said, “My cab! What did that bitch do to my beautiful cab?”
If any of us had been human, or in Devona’s case all the way human, we most likely would’ve been killed. As it was, it looked like we were going to survive long enough for Talaith to kill us in person.
I kicked out the safety glass of the shattered rear window, which wasn’t easy since my left leg didn’t work quite right anymore, and pushed Devona through the opening. I yelled for Lazlo to get out of the car, and then crawled after Devona.
Getting up wasn’t easy with my latest injury, but once I was up, I could stand okay. Devona pointed to the cab’s passenger-side tires: they were nothing but melted globs on the rims.
So Talaith’s avatar had gotten in a shot after all. I suppose the air was filled with the greasy-oily stink of burning rubber, though my dead zombie nose couldn’t detect it. The rest of the cab didn’t look much better than the tires.
The driver’s door burst off and flew into the field as Lazlo forced his way out. The demon’s a lot stronger than he appears. As soon as he got a good look at what Talaith had done to his beloved cab, he began sobbing. The vehicle’s hood had been torn off, exposing its inner mouth. Numerous teeth had been broken off, the cab’s long tongue lolled onto the ground, and a pool of dark liquid that might or might not have been oil was spreading beneath the vehicle. Devona hurried over to console Lazlo, and I looked to the sky, expecting to see Talaith’s avatar gazing down at us and laughing with dark delight. But there was no sign of the Witch Queen, and a moment later the rain ceased and the clouds began to clear.
“What’s happening?” Devona said as I walked over to join her and Lazlo next to the demon’s dearly departed death-machine.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe Talaith used up the magic power she borrowed from her people and couldn’t maintain her avatar any longer.”
Bright white light flared into existence around us, revealing a dozen men and women carrying wooden staffs with glowing lux crystals attached to the ends. Most of them wore tunics, but three-two men and a woman-wore loose-fitting hooded robes. I didn’t have to guess who was in charge.
One of the robed men, a portly fellow with a gray mustache and goatee stepped forward.
“Or maybe,” he said with a sinister smile, “instead of wasting more power, our Lady sent us to retrieve you.”
“That’s another possibility,” I said.
“You sure know how to show a girl a good time, Matt.”
“How long have you been waiting to use that line?” I said.
“A few hours,” Devona admitted.
“You two are a riot,” Lazlo said. “Are you guys always this funny or only when you’re tied to stakes and surrounded by pissed-off witches and warlocks?”
Our Glamere welcoming committee had brought us-by force, naturally-to the village of Merrowvale. They’d hustled us into the village square and then tied us to three large wooden stakes atop a stone dais. The three robed Arcane, who I took to be the village Elders, then ordered children to begin piling firewood around Devona and Lazlo’s feet. But not, I noticed, around mine.
The entire square was filled with villagers, young and old, all decked out in medieval dress. It looked like a renaissance fair, only without the funnel cakes and ATM machines labeled Queen’s Treasury. Only about half of them carried magic staffs with lit lux crystals, but that didn’t mean the other half were harmless. Even the smallest child here was capable of casting at least some rudimentary spells. Both Devona and Lazlo were strong enough to break free from the ropes binding them if they wished, but they knew they couldn’t hope to escape from this many Arcane, and so they simply remained where they were while the children stacked the fuel for a good old-fashioned stake-burning at their feet.
The Elders stood at the base of the dais, and I caught the portly one’s eye.
“Why don’t I get any wood? You people have something against the smell of burning zombies?”
“Don’t answer him, Zorian,” said the Elder standing to the portly man’s right, a tall middle-aged woman with her graying brunette hair tied up in a bun. “He’s not worth the breath it would take to speak to him.”
I almost fired off a witty comeback, but I noticed something odd about the woman’s face. I looked at her more closely, and it didn’t take me long to figure out what was bothering me about her. I examined her fellow Elders, and then I turned my head as far as I could-given that I was tied to a stake-and gazed upon asmany of the good folk of Merrowvale as I could. And when I was finished, I smiled to myself. These people had a secret, and they weren’t hiding it very well. But I decided to keep that to myself for the moment.
“Hush, Gizane,” said the third Elder, a tall beefy man with a neatly trimmed brown beard who looked as if he would have made a hell of a quarterback on Earth. “Let Zorian have some fun. After all, it is Descension Day.” He
