Gods and Swindlers (City of Eldrich Book 3) (29 page)

Even as the thought crossed her mind, she knew she didn’t believe it, but she also knew Luka wouldn’t listen. Either way, the dragon was still on the menu.

“Fine, you win,” Meaghan said. “Do the elves know how to control dragons?”

“Not well,” Owen said, “but better than anybody else. Nobody knows why.”

Luka smiled at her indulgently, and Meaghan resisted the urge to kick him like he’d kicked Owen.

She took a deep breath.
It’s his risk to take. You can’t win this.
“The fair folk can control the dragon enough to make it burn down the archive?”

“The burning part is easy,” Owen said. “Jab it somewhere sensitive and it’ll flame.”

Meaghan started to feel the panic rise. “But how are they keeping it calm until then?”

“You can contain it with powerful enough magic, but you can’t really control it,” Owen said. “We know that much.”

“Then why can’t we contain it?” Meaghan looked around. “Easier than killing it, right?”

“Because that kind of magic takes weeks to set up,” Luka said. “And we only have a few hours.”

“Well, shit,” Meaghan said.
I still have to kill this dragon. Me. And a saucepan and a stapler won’t get it done, no matter how motivated I am.

“You wanted the dragon out of the archive, right?” Luka gave her a patronizing smile. “They’ll bring it right to us. I’ll have already manipulated their greed by offering them more power. Acting like I assume they have the magic to control dragons will manipulate their egos. Greed and vanity. Sprinkle with stupidity and you have the perfect mark.”

“A fat goose ready to be plucked,” Owen said.

Yeah, but who’s plucking whom?

Terry snorted. “And then all we gotta do is kill a dragon. Easy-peasy.”

“It won’t be as powerful here,” Luka said. “Less background magic. And you’ll have plenty of help.”

No, no, he won’t. Only me.

“Besides . . .” Luka grinned at Meaghan. “Meg’s the one who’s supposed to kill the dragon, remember? With a magic sword.”

“Yeah, ha ha,” Meaghan said in a tight voice. “About that. Not gonna happen.”

Luka sighed and the smug look left his face. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t joke about that.” He held out his hand to her. “Still friends?”

He’s trying to mend fences. Let him.
Meaghan took his hand and squeezed it briefly. “Still friends.”

Luka smiled at her, then looked at Terry. “You’re our biggest gun.”

“Which is apt to misfire,” Terry said.

“That thing you did with the holly bush a little while ago . . . I’ve never seen you have that level of control.” Luka paused. “Except for when you were making the crucible steel. After—”

“Luka,” Terry growled. “Drop it.”

“No,” Luka said. “We’ve been dropping it for a thousand years. You had control once. For almost two centuries.”

“When you were sober,” Owen added.

“I wasn’t sober,” Terry said through gritted teeth. “I just wasn’t drinking. Big difference. And I was an utter bastard if you care to recall. So much so that none of you wanted anything to do with me, thank you very much. You only came back when I started boozing again.”

Luka shifted in his chair, looking uncomfortable. “Not something I’m proud of.”

“You let them have me,” Terry said in a low voice. “You let the fair folk have me. Best work I’ve ever done and I did it all in hell with those fuckers grinding away at me every day. By the end I thought I was back in . . .” He took a deep breath. “Back there. All the same feelings: the pain, the rage, the fear. A great big banquet of misery they—”

Something stirred in Meaghan’s memory. In Fahraya, the Power, speaking with the voice of John’s brother. “A bloody banquet.”

Terry stared at her in confusion. “What?”

“The Power. In Fahraya. Bragging about how it had taken V’hren. Think about it. The fair folk don’t eat pain and rage, at least not as the main course. They wouldn’t want you alone and miserable with the lightning under control. They’d want you out in the world, boozing it up and dodging lightning bolts so people would believe in Thor.”

Luka nodded. “Terry was the Judas goat who led all the lambs to slaughter. The elves didn’t feed on him, but on the faith and fear and awe of the people who believed in him.”

“As well as the dogmatism of those who came later who wanted to burn his believers as heretics,” Owen added. “But he wasn’t doing the god thing then. He was flying totally under the radar.”

Terry shook his head. “Then they must have decided to do something new, because something was chewing on me. It was like a hole I couldn’t climb out of. Every bad thing I’d ever done playing on a loop in my mind. I wanted to kill myself, but the voices in my head said I didn’t deserve to be at peace.”

Meaghan nodded. “Jamie said something very similar when the sigils were controlling him. That he’d tried to kill himself and whatever was controlling him wouldn’t let him.”

Owen exchanged a long look with Meaghan. “That thing again?”

Meaghan nodded. “Sounds like the Power, doesn’t it? Which means Cooper and the squid.”

“But this was like two centuries before Cooper,” Terry said. “If he was still a regular human when we dealt with him, then he hadn’t even been born yet.”

“What ended the misery?” Meaghan asked.

Terry’s face softened and he smiled. It was like watching the sun come out after a storm. “Steph came back to me.”

“And you started drinking again?”

“Not right away.” His smile turned sad. “There were about fifty years there when it was good. Better than good. Great. As good as it ever was until the last sixty years.”

“What happened?”

Terry sighed. “I got complacent. Decided I could have a drink without it being a problem, but I was wrong.”

“And then I came along and dragged him back into the magic sword business,” Luka said. “He’d gone straight. Made more legitimate money as Ulfberht than he ever did as a grifter.”

“Ulfberht?” Meaghan asked.

“The name I was using back then. I was a high-end sword maker,” Terry said. “Ulfberht swords were the Ferraris of medieval weaponry. Much higher quality than anything being made in Europe at the time. Still baffles the experts.” He smiled for a moment. “It was the steel I learned how to make in India that made them so good.”

“You went to India?” Meaghan looked around the table. “You guys got that far?”

“Only me,” Terry said. “I’ll tell you the whole story if we survive.”

“Is India where you got into the Buddhist thing?” Owen asked. “I always wondered about that.”

“You’re a Buddhist?” Meaghan stared at Terry. “You?”

“Yeah, but not a very good one,” Terry said. “It helped me quit drinking—in a good way at first—but then I trotted back to Europe and used my newfound serenity to make weapons, so I probably should have stayed in India a little longer.”

Thor’s a Buddhist.
Meaghan’s mind filled with a picture of Terry, in full Viking regalia, sitting cross-legged and saying
Om
in his deep voice. She began to giggle and then she began to laugh.

And then she began to cry and laugh at the same time.

“John,” she heard Terry shout. “Get in here.”

Meaghan was distantly aware of the sound of running feet.

Thor’s a Buddhist and I have to kill a dragon.

Meaghan began to sob.

Her heart raced, banging in her chest so hard she could almost hear it. She broke into violent shivering even as she felt the sweat dripping down her back under her thermal underwear.

I have to kill a dragon.

John put his arms around her and held her close. “What did you say to her?”

“Terry’s a Buddhist,” Meaghan managed to gasp out between sobs. The tears and laughter had merged into something closer to choking. “But not a very good one.”

“She’s hyperventilating.” Luka grabbed her hand and put something into it. “Here, breathe into this.”

Meaghan realized she was holding a brown paper bag. Luka guided her hand to her mouth and nose. She took several frantic breaths.

“Is she all right?” John stroked her hair, a frantic edge to his voice.

Luka gently tugged the bag from her mouth. “Okay, now try to take a couple of normal breaths. She’ll be fine. Panic attack, I think.”

“After the last couple of days, who can blame her.” Owen said.

“Now breathe into the bag some more,” Luka said, gently nudging her hand toward her face.

Meaghan’s felt her heart slow. She pulled the bag away from her mouth and took a couple of almost-normal breaths. “Better. Sorry.”

Luka smiled at her. “No apology necessary. If you’re up to it, let’s go out to the living room and brief the troops.”

What she wanted to do was run outside, fire up the snowplow, and drive as far away as she could by dawn, but instead Meaghan nodded.

Out in the living room, Luka outlined the plan. He and Owen would be the first ones down the stairs. Luka would do his magical switcheroo with the witches, who would all collapse and pretend to be stunned. As Owen reacted in surprise, Luka would stab Owen with the fake dagger.

“We’ll need blood,” Owen pointed out.

“Can’t the witches magic that up?” Meaghan asked.

Luka shrugged. “They could, but a good, old-fashioned bag of fake blood under your shirt works better. Less to go wrong.”

“Russ can make that,” Meaghan said.

Luka nodded. “We’ll need about a pint.”

After Luka had stabbed Owen, he’d begin his pitch to the elf. Brian would come downstairs when summoned by Luka and pretend to be under his control.

“Marnie, this is where you come in. Will you able to know when it’s time?”

She nodded.

“Don’t oversell it,” Luka said to Brian. “Just do what I tell you.”

“I was a soldier. I know how to take orders,” Brian said.

Owen glowered at Brian, jealousy clouding his features.

Meaghan, standing next to him, swatted his arm and leaned toward his ear. “She’s with you,” Meaghan whispered to him. “And he’s with Marnie. Behave.”

Owen glared up at her, then gave a jerky nod.

“Marnie, when I signal you, send Meaghan down.” Luka smiled at her. “I hear you’re good at goading information out of egotistical assholes.”

“Cooper, you mean,” Meaghan said. “Not sure I’ll get another bite out of that apple. Even he’s got to have me figured out by now.”

“Yeah, but the elf won’t,” Luka said. “I need you to put on the grand performance. Let’s see what we can pry out of it. But first, before Meg comes downstairs, Brian will stab Natalie.”

Brian’s eyes widened as he gripped Marnie’s hand tighter. “Do I have to?”

“Afraid so,” Luka said. Meaghan saw him give Owen a warning look.

Brian nodded.

“Then Meg, after you react to seeing Natalie and Owen, Brian will rough you up a little, and you can cry and wail, and see what our little friend tells us.”

“And then I come downstairs,” Terry said.

Luka shook his head. “You need to stay out of this. John is right. I can’t do that to you. Not this time. If I’d stayed away back then, maybe you wouldn’t have started drinking again.”

Terry snorted. “I started drinking again because I’m a drunk. Nobody did that to me. I did it to myself. Exclude me if I don’t add anything to the con, but not because you think I’m too fragile to do it. If they know about the lightning, then they need to think the boozing came back with it.”

Luka sighed. “I’ll tell Marnie to send you down if I think we need you.”

“Which you will,” Terry said, “because by then, the elf will definitely know about the lightning. We need get everyone over to Meg’s house while we still can and I need to go practice if you expect me to fry Puff the Magic Dragon.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

“A
RE THEY GONNA
burn down our house?” Russ poured another ingredient into the bowl of red gloop he was trying to turn into realistic blood.

“You got any corn syrup?” Gretchen asked, looking over his shoulder. “Or red food coloring?”

Russ gave her a horrified look. “Corn syrup?”

“Oh, right, look who I’m asking,” Gretchen said. “You got a key to Edna’s house? I bet she has corn syrup and food coloring. You ever taste her red velvet cake?”

Russ shuddered. “Meg, are they gonna burn down our house?”

Meaghan stared back at him. “How the hell should I know?”

She felt the panic begin to bubble again, and placed her hand on the paper bag that Luka had given her. The rough paper was soothing under her fingers, like a security blanket.

Too bad it’s not big enough for me to crawl inside and hide.

“You know more about dragons than I do,” Russ said.

“No,” Meaghan said in a shrill voice. “No, I don’t.”

“They’re big fuckers, I know that much,” Gretchen said. “What about maraschino cherries? They got plenty of red dye in them.”

“Why would I have maraschino cherries?” Russ snapped at her. “I don’t have garbage like that in my kitchen.”

“Right,” Gretchen said, rolling her eyes. “Only healthy fake blood will do.”

“Are you sure our little guest can’t hear us?” Meaghan pointed at the floor.