Dark Swan Bundle (42 page)

“No,” agreed the other paisley one. “But
he
can.”

“He—
ahh!
”

Furry hands reached around from behind me just seconds after Kiyo exclaimed, “Eugenie!”

Kiyo was normally on high alert but had been as cocky as me about dealing with the kobolds. His attention had been on them, and he hadn't sensed the other threat lurking in the basement. Well, that wasn't entirely true. Kiyo had scented this creature, if the odor emanating from its hands and arms was any indication. He just hadn't made the connection.

I still didn't have a good look at my furry-armed captor, seeing as I was still struggling to break free of its grasp. Kiyo was on it in a flash, needing no weapons save his own brute strength. His hands closed around the creature's arms, and he managed to pull them loose enough for me to slip out of its grip. Once free, I was able to get a good look. It was a…

Huh.

I wasn't really sure. It was furry, brown, and tall, with rounded ears like a mouse or bear and hooves like a deer and a whole other assortment of random animal parts. It gave a strangled roar of displeasure, and I braced for it to turn back on me. Usually, that was how it worked. Creatures who came after me usually had one of two goals: either rape me on the spot or kill me to prevent me from fulfilling the prophecy.

But Smokey the Bear, or whatever it was, was going after Kiyo, ignoring me while the kobolds watched gleefully. Kiyo socked the creature hard in the chest, and I noticed a faint ripple of light spread through it that faded quickly. Smokey then returned with a punch that took Kiyo hard in the face and sent him toward the wall. It was hard, too—that punch had been meant to kill. Kiyo's reflexes were too fast, though, and he caught himself before his skull could smash against the solid concrete.

I leapt into the fight then, pulling out my Glock. I'd loaded it with silver bullets earlier and was glad I'd done so. I got off a couple of shots into the monster. Each time, I saw its form ripple, but it still didn't come after me. It was too intent on killing Kiyo. The two grappled further, and I continued firing, knowing I had to be weakening it. Nonetheless, one lucky blow knocked Kiyo off his feet and onto his back. The kobolds cheered when he remained still.

Me, I screamed in rage, taking my wand in my other hand and facing the furry monstrosity head-on. It attempted no killing blows on me and merely kept trying to get a hold of me as I fired and began the banishing words. Suddenly, Kiyo was on his feet again, thrusting himself between us.

“Stay the hell away from her!” he snarled. I saw all the muscles in his body tense and had a feeling he was on the verge of shape-shifting.

Smokey looked angry and turned into full assault mode again. “Get out of the way,” I said. “I've got him.”

“I'm not letting him lay a hand on you,” retorted Kiyo, eyes fixed on his foe. A flash of gold glimmered in Kiyo's eyes. Gold like a fox's.

“He's not trying to kill or rape me,” I argued, as Kiyo dodged another crushing blow. “He wants to subdue me—
you
he wants to kill.”

But Kiyo was dead set on protecting me, and I finally decided he'd be safest if I hurried up and just finished the banishing rather than attempt to protect him. Firmly channeling my power into the wand, I again began opening a gate to the Otherworld. As I did, though, I kept thinking about those ripples I saw when I'd attacked the beast, like it couldn't quite stay together. An idea struck me, and rather than direct the banishing magic into ripping open the fabric of this world, I directed it toward Smokey—or, rather, toward the Otherworldly magic holding Smokey together. Kiyo sprang away from the fight, realizing what I was going to do.

Sure enough. A spiderweb of light suddenly covered the monster, fragmenting his form. With the wand, I destroyed the magical bonds, and suddenly—he exploded.

But not like Aeson had exploded. It was more like he fell apart. Gone was the large, hulking, furry form. Instead, scuttling on the ground was a swarm of woodland creatures: mice, rabbits, a deer, and a couple of ducks. The mice and rabbits immediately scurried into whatever nooks and crannies they could find. The ducks looked confused. The deer ran up the stairs.

With the banishing magic already started, it was easy to complete the actual opening to the Otherworld and send the kobolds through. Just before they vanished, Kiyo leaned toward them—keeping out of the magic's way—and fixed them with a dark, angry expression. The blood on his face from the fight only added to his fearsome appearance.

“Tell whoever sent you here to leave her the hell alone, or I will come after him myself and rip him apart limb by limb. And I'll do the same to you guys while I'm at it.
None
of you are ever going to lay a hand on her again,” he growled.

The kobolds' faces reflected true fear as they disappeared from this world. Silence fell, aside from the quiet and confused quacking of the ducks who still didn't know what to do with themselves.

“Well,” I gasped. “That was one of the more convoluted schemes I've seen yet.” Would-be rapists often did attempt to distract me with a seemingly ordinary banishing and then would swoop in unexpectedly. This person had sent the kobolds to lure me out and then that woodland conglomeration to actually subdue me and bring me back as a war prize. Kiyo, as an obstacle to that plan, had had to be eliminated first. I took in his ripped shirt and blood. “Are you okay?”

“Fine, fine,” he said, wiping his face. “It's superficial. What the hell was that?”

“Some monster that a gentry put together with magic. Bound all those animals into one stronger form and ordered it after me.”

“Will it come back together?”

“No. I broke the bonds, and they're all spreading apart anyway.”

“Um, Eugenie?” Wil's voice suddenly rang down the stairs. “Is everything okay down there? A deer just ran through the living room….”

Kiyo and I both decided later that it was a good thing Smokey had disbanded like he had. Otherwise, if they'd seen his full form, Trisha and Wil would have had enough Bigfoot material for their forums to last until the next century. Goodness only knew what kind of threads and rumors this event alone would start.

Trisha paid me in cash once we frisked the deer out of the house, and I told her she was on her own for the other animals in the basement. As we were leaving, Wil briefly caught me alone, his goofy, paranoid expression replaced by a much grimmer one. “Have you found Jasmine yet?” he asked in a very soft voice.

I bit my lip. No matter how absurd I thought Wil was, whenever I saw how much Jasmine's disappearance grieved him, it broke my heart. I'd never told him the truth of her heritage. The only information I'd given him was that she was on the run and hadn't been kidnapped. I thought he'd take comfort in knowing she wasn't being held against her will, but it hurt him to think she didn't want to be with him. He truly loved his sister, no matter how much she despised the human world. It was really quite sad.

“No, I'm sorry. I really am.”

His face fell further, and he gave a weak nod. “Yeah. I figured. I know you'll keep looking, though. And you'll let me know if you find her?”

I tried to give him a reassuring smile. “Sure.”

The truth was, I didn't know if I would tell him. It all depended on what state I found her in. If I found her pregnant and bent on conquering the worlds…well, I wasn't entirely sure what I'd do then, but one thing I felt certain of was that there was no way I was ever going to let her return to this world.

Kiyo always healed quickly, and when we got home that night, he was in fine condition to see who could put on the highest-quality performance in bed. Consequently, he woke in a very cheerful mood the next day, though he still couldn't help a little grumbling about following along yet again. I knew it was all gruffness, though. He liked knowing I was safe, and that warmed something up inside of me.

“You tricked me,” he remarked once we'd crossed over to the Otherworld that morning. I was hoping these bandits would be as easy to dispatch as the kobolds, unnatural hybrids of small animals aside. “After that thing you did in bed…” He sighed happily at the memory of a particularly skillful feat my mouth had performed last night. “Well, you know I'd agree to do anything now.”

“Come on,” I said, still feeling a bit proud. “It has nothing to do with that. Don't you want to see justice served to those who dare torment my subjects?”

“Careful there. People might think you're acting like a real queen.”

I glanced down at my torn jeans and Poison T-shirt. “Well, let's not get carried away. Maybe it'd help if I got a crown like Dorian said.”

To my astonishment, Kiyo's teasing expression immediately hardened. “No. That's the last thing you should do.”

I stared in surprise. “Why not? Too Miss America?”

“It'll make you seem more…official.”

I gestured around at the tapestry-draped castle room we'd appeared in. “We're in a fucking castle, Kiyo. I don't really see how it can get any more official.”

“You don't understand. I mean, you're a queen, yeah, and they all know it…but a lot just see you as this warrior stand-in. Like a regent. Get a crown…start appearing before lots of people in it, and I don't know. It makes you legitimate. It makes it real. It'll be harder for you to get out of this than it already is.”

I thought about how often I'd wished I hadn't been saddled with this land and how often I'd tried to avoid it—yet still kept coming back. “I don't think it can get any harder.”

We found Shaya before heading out on our raid. I'd brought some things that I hoped would help with the Thorn Land's drought and famine. When I gave the first one to her, she could only stare in silence for several moments.

“Your majesty…what is this?”

“It's a children's place mat I got from Joe's Tex-Mex restaurant.” Along with Joe's kid's menu, the place mat also depicted a map of Arizona that kids could color while waiting for their food. I pointed to the assorted symbols on the map. “See, this shows Arizona's natural resources. The stuff that grows and can be found there. Cotton. Copper.”

“What's this?” she asked, pointing to something that resembled a glass of liquid.

I frowned. It certainly wasn't water, that was for damned sure. “I think it's some kind of citrus product. Orange. Grapefruit.” I shrugged. “I think you can grow either in this weather. And that's the point. This land mirrors Tucson, so all the things there should be the same here. There should be copper deposits that you guys can find. That's valuable in trade, right?” Copper was one of the few metals gentry could handle. Iron was right out, being the harbinger of technology. That's what made it one of my most lethal weapons. “And the rest should grow here, if you can find seeds. Someone must have them somewhere, even in this world.”

“They still need water,” she pointed out.

“Right. That's what this is for.” I handed her my next prize: a book. “It's a history of the engineering of wells and aqueducts from ancient and medieval Europe. It should help in moving water around.” She still looked stunned, so I tried to think of something comforting. “I'll help find more water sources too.” I then handed her another book about Southwest architecture, adobe and stucco homes.

She took the books and flipped through them, taking in the dense chapters and diagrams. “I don't think I'm the right person to do this. I don't have the mind for it.”

“Maybe not. But I'm sure you can delegate to someone who can.” I patted her encouragingly on the arm. The truth was, I was as baffled by the book as she was. I could put together jigsaw puzzles in record time. Reading engineering diagrams? Not so much. “Just be careful with them—those are library books.”

I had to go then and felt a little bad about leaving her. Yet, despite her confusion now, I knew she would find people and ways to implement this. She was just that competent. Maybe I should have had more of a hand in this, but hey, I'd been the one who had to choke down Joe's crap Tex-Mex food in order to score the place mat. That had to count for something.

If I'd had my way, I would have just taken Kiyo and gone out to hunt down these bandits ourselves. I had to imagine they were just riffraff and not much of an obstacle to us. Kiyo was a pretty fierce fighter, as last night had shown, and between my weapons and magic, I was his equal. Rurik had protested this plan, however, insisting that he and almost two dozen guards come along. I didn't think this gave us much in the way of stealth, but he'd told me we'd dismount and go on foot once we reached the passes the bandits lived in.

Before we left, I decided we might as well add one more person to our entourage. I stepped into a darkened corner, far from the light of candles in the room, and took out my wand. Immediately, the guards moved away from me. They knew what I was going to do and didn't like it. When something magical made gentry uneasy, you knew it was bad.

I spoke the words of summoning and felt magic move through me. It wasn't the storm magic I'd inherited, the pull to water and air. This was a learned human magic, a way of reaching out to the worlds beyond. The temperature in the room dropped, a sudden shock compared to the dry heat we'd just been in. Then, the cold lifted, and Volusian stood before me.

Volusian was my minion, for lack of a better word. He was a damned soul, cursed to wander without rest for all eternity after committing atrocious acts in life. I'd fought and bound him to me, forcing him to serve me. Volusian wasn't very happy about this and frequently liked to remind me of how he would destroy me if he ever broke free of my control. After hearing stuff like that over and over, it almost took on a familiar feel, kind of like how a pop song heard often enough will work its way into your heart. While Otherworldly spirits often had insubstantial forms in the human world, the shape Volusian had now looked exactly the same as it would if I summoned him back home: a short, imp-like creature with black skin, pointed ears, and red eyes.

“My mistress calls,” he said in a flat voice. “And I answer. Regretfully.”

“Oh, Volusian,” I said cheerfully. “Always a joy to have you around. You're such a ray of sunshine on a dreary day.”

Volusian merely stared.

I turned to the others, hoping I sounded queenly and authoritative. “Alright. Let's go kick some outlaws out of town.”

 

I still wasn't used to having an entourage of guards. So much of my life had been solitary, so much of it spent fighting on my own…well, I didn't really know what to do with so many people at my back. As we headed toward our destination, I found it was a lot easier to deal with the guards if I just focused on Kiyo and pretended we were alone.

“I can't believe you gave Shaya a place mat and now expect her to revolutionize this place's total infrastructure,” he noted.

“What else am I supposed to do?” I asked. “You were just complaining about me getting too involved in this place. Handing off a place mat is about as uninvolved as I can get—unless you're saying I
should
take a more active role now?”

“No,” he answered swiftly, face darkening a little. “Believe me, if there were an easy way for you to give up this place, I'd make you do it.”

I cut him a glance. “You'd make me, huh?”

“Encourage,” he amended. “Unfortunately, it's a moot point. The only way to lose a kingdom is if your power drops or…well, if you're killed.”

“I'm sure Volusian would love to help with that.”

My minion walked near me, needing no horse to move swiftly. Upon hearing his name, he said, “I would perform the deed with great relish and much suffering on your part, mistress.”

“You can't put a price on that kind of loyalty,” I told Kiyo solemnly. “No crown even required.”

Kiyo grunted noncommittally. There was a lot of tension between him and Dorian, but the one thing they both agreed on was that Volusian was trouble. Both had encouraged me to get rid of him. I didn't have the power to completely banish him to the Underworld, but it probably could be managed with another magic user. Still, dangerous or no, I continued to retain the spirit's services.

“Are you going to stick around when we're done here?” I asked. That was my subtle way of asking if Kiyo was going to see Maiwenn.

His dark eyes were on the road ahead, thoughtful. “No. I was hoping to go back to Tucson and see if I could get this hot chick I know to go out with me. I hear she's in demand, though. She keeps putting me off each time I try to plan something romantic.”

“Yeah, well, maybe if you come up with a good itinerary, you could lure her out.”

“I was thinking dinner at Joe's.”

I made a face. “If that's the case, maybe you'd better brace yourself for rejection.”

“Red Pepper Bistro?”

“Okay. Now you're in the zone.”

“Followed by a long massage in the sauna.”

“That's pretty good too.”

“And then indecent things in the sauna.”

“I hope you mean you'll be doing the indecent things—because I more than did my share last night.”

Kiyo glanced over at me with a mischievous grin. “Who says I'm talking about you?”

I would have swatted him if he'd been in reach. Instead, I grinned back, my mood happy and light. Bantering with him like this was just like the old days, back before Maiwenn and this baby business was an issue. I felt like his girlfriend again. And despite just having had sex last night, I couldn't deny the truth. Thinking about having sex with him in the sauna was doing uncomfortable—pleasantly uncomfortable—things to my body, particularly with my legs spread like they were. Our gazes met, and I felt an answering heat in his eyes. I remembered how fierce he'd been while throwing himself in front of me last night and could perfectly envision that same fierceness translated into passion in bed. The lines and muscles of his body suddenly seemed that much stronger, and I could imagine his hands all over me….

Rurik trotted up beside me and interrupted my pornographic thoughts. “We need to go on foot now. We're getting close.”

We stopped on the edge of a “forest” comprised of saguaro cactuses and scraggly trees. They spread on ahead of us, up toward some sharp rises in the land that turned into sandy red cliffs studded with rocks. While tethering the horses, Kiyo decided he'd go ahead and scout in fox form.

“If you can't change back, that's going to seriously interfere with our date,” I told him.

He ran a hand along my bare arm, making every part of me tingle. “Nah, nothing's interfering with that. I'll go in small fox form—they'll never see me.”

He slowly shape-shifted, his large, muscled frame growing smaller, then elongating into a red fox about as big as a medium-sized dog. He brushed against my leg and then disappeared into the vegetation ahead. I watched him go. Some part of me would always worry about those I loved, but overall, I had confidence in Kiyo when it came to dangerous situations.

The rest of us milled about in the midday heat, passing water around. About twenty minutes later, Kiyo returned. With each approaching step, he transformed from a cuddly furry critter into the man I loved. Not that I didn't love him as a fox too.

“They're over there, just like we thought,” Kiyo said. There was kind of a lope as he walked, a leftover from the fox form. It was both cute and sexy at the same time. “Looks like they're camped out and resting for the day.”

“Any lookouts?” asked Rurik.

Kiyo grinned. “Not anymore.”

I rolled my eyes. “Did you see any girls?”

His smile faded. “No. Just the bandits. They've got a few less people than we do.”

“Well, that's good,” I said, frowning. No girls. What did that mean? Had the couple in the village been wrong? Maybe their daughter really had run off with her boyfriend. Still, if this group was harassing people, getting rid of them would certainly be a good deed.

Kiyo and Rurik plotted strategy on how to sneak up on the camp, and our group set off, planning to fan out around the brigands. With no lookouts, the gang had no one to warn them of our approach and seemed totally unaware when we got our first glimpse of them. They were mostly men, with a few women. The women clearly weren't captured girls, though. They were older and hardened from harsh living. The whole group looked like it had seen hard times, actually. There was a toughness about them that suggested they'd fight tooth and nail.

Based on an earlier discussion, I'd thought our whole group would just swoop down at once. Instead, one of my guards suddenly stepped out and shouted, “Surrender in the name of the queen!”