Lone Star Magic (19 page)

“No, I don’t.” Still, he advanced towards
her.

She stood her ground, keeping her hands
clasped together to keep from reaching out and touching him.

A loud rumbling seemed to come from the
ground.

Kayo barked.

“What was that?”

“The after-effects of the Warlord’s magic.
Speaking of which, look.” Cursing, Alrick pointed. “Those damn
spiders are getting closer.”

She started, amazed she’d forgotten all about
them.

They moved fast for such little things.

As if thinking the same thing, Kayo took off
running.

Shaking out her shorts, Carly stepped into
them. She did the same with her t-shirt before pulling it over her
head. Beside her, Alrick did the same.

“They won’t give up.” She shuddered. “We’ve
got to get the horses.”

From his position up on the small knoll that
led to her back pasture, Kayo barked, as if to say
me,
too
.

Carly glanced back towards her house. The
wave of nasty, crawly, creepy, spiders surged closer. She looked at
Alrick. He nodded. Together they ran to the round pen.

He opened the gate and went in, with her
right behind him. He handed her Merry’s lead. TM snorted, bumping
Alrick’s hand with his head.

“Yes, you’re next,” Alrick crooned. Gaze
cool, he inclined his head at Carly. “Are you ready to leave
now?

She hesitated. “It’s night. Dark.”

“We have the moonlight.”

The rumbling sound came again.

“Is that…” she swallowed. “The weather?
Reacting to the magic?”

“Probably. Come on, hurry.” Leading the
stallion towards Kayo, he pointed. “We don’t have much time.”

“I don’t know.” Carly felt close to panic.
This was even worse than before, when they’d left in her truck.
True, she had her allergy injection kit, but she had no food, no
water, and her purse and credit cards were all in her bedroom so
she had no way to purchase any.

The rumble sounded louder.

Coolly, as though there weren’t what had to
be a million spiders moving towards them, Alrick regarded her. “I
don’t know this area. You do. Where do you want to go?”

“I don’t know.” She swallowed, looking from
him to the spiders, to Kayo, who panted and watched them both. “It
seems like he always finds us.”

“We’ll be more careful this time. Make it
more difficult for him to find us.”

“You don’t even know how he found us last
time, but he did.”

He said nothing, just looked at her, his
enormous body silhouetted by moonlight. Her protector.

“We have no money. No food.”

He waved at the woods. “I’m Fae. I can find
food.”

She tried again. “We have nowhere to go.”

“I’ve seen the surrounding area. There are
miles of uninhabited forests. A bounty of places in which to
hide.”

She sighed. The Texas Hill Country. To the
outsider, the rolling, tree-covered hills would appear wild. And
being from another dimension, Alrick might not understand the
concept of land ownership. “It only looks that way. All that land
belongs to someone else.”

“Will they know we are there? And if they do,
will they care?”

“Probably not.” But the idea of hiding out in
the woods didn’t thrill her. There were too many other
creepy-crawly things there for the Warlord to send after them.

But with no clothes, no money, and no real
transportation, they had no other choice.

This time, when the earth rumbled, the ground
shook below their feet.

“Alrick?”

A large crack appeared in the dirt between
them, separating them. TM reared, eyes wild. Merry reacted too,
trying to back away. Carly barely held on.

“Earthquake!”He cursed in that
incomprehensible language of his. “We stayed too long.”

Another crack, this one vertical to the
first. If it spread too much, Carly would be left standing on an
island between two deep fissures.

“Come to me, Carly.” He held out his hand.
“You’ll have to jump.”

Terror clogging her throat, Carly looked back
at her mare.

“Merry will follow. Jump!”

As she opened her mouth to speak, the earth
bucked beneath her, pitching her forward towards a certain
death.

ALRICK REACTED instinctively, throwing out a
spell like a net in order to catch her. Though he didn’t know what
effect using magic on top of magic would have, he didn’t have time
to worry about that now. He had to save Carly.

At the same instant, Merry leapt up, with
Carly’s hand still tangled in the lead.

The spell missed by a wide shot, falling in
to the fissure, ricocheting off the sides all the way to the
bottom.

Merry – and Carly – landed safely just as
another, louder rumble came from deep in the earth. Sparks shot
from the crack and thick pillars of black smoke bellowed forth. The
island of land where Carly had stood crumbled and fell.

Dazed, Carly stared, open-mouthed, at the
crack. Alrick grabbed her arm. “Run! It’s going to explode!”

They took off across the meadow, letting the
terrified horses go.

Behind them, the ground erupted in a
fury.

Even as the earth bucked beneath them, they
reached the knoll and relative safety. The horses, rather than
running circles around the pasture, moved in close, sides
heaving.

“Whew.” Carly doubled over, hands on her
legs, trying to catch her breath. “That was a close one.”

“I shouldn’t have used magic. But I needed to
save you. I didn’t see what else I could do.”

“Look at the bright side.” Unbelievably, when
Carly straightened, she was smiling. “The spiders can’t get to us
now. They’ll all fall in that crack.”

At the gate that separated this field from
her back pasture they had two choices. They could take the dirt
road that circled around the front of her house or continue on to
the back pasture and more fields.

“This will work out.” Though his heart still
pounded from nearly losing her, he kept his voice quiet, calm.

“Do you mean our leaving?” Her wide emerald
eyes seemed remarkably free of panic.

“Yes. This way, we’ll keep one step ahead of
him. Once the Warlord has gathered enough strength to travel fully
here and remain, I’d much rather fight him on my terms, out in the
open, rather than be trapped like prey in your house.”

“I guess. But, to tell you the truth, I’d
rather find a safe place.”

“A safe place?” Gloved hand on the gate,
Alrick debated which way to go. “What do you mean?”

“You said modern machines nullify his magic.
I’ve been trying to think of someplace we could go, somewhere we
could hide where his power would be greatly diminished.”

He considered this. “On the surface this
sounds good, but I really don’t know.” He studied the moon-lit
fields, enjoying the connection he felt to nature, now that the
magical aftershocks had passed. “If these machines hamper his
magic, mine would be useless as well. That would be a problem if
there is to be a battle.”

“True.” Carly frowned. Her expression
lightened as she plucked at his arm. “If we had my gun that would
solve that problem. Before we head out into the hills, let’s circle
around to the front of the house.”

“You’re thinking you can retrieve this weapon
of yours? How, when the house is covered in spiders?”

“Maybe we can surprise them. If they’re all
chasing after us, parts of the house will be clear. It’d take me
only a second to grab the rifle. And my purse.”

Alrick took a deep breath. “The spiders will
seek you, wherever you are. Once they realize you’re there, they’ll
attack. You wouldn’t have long inside.”

She lifted her chin in that stubborn gesture
he had begun to know so well. “I’d have long enough to get what I
need. I know exactly where the rifle is. It’ll take me a few
seconds to get in, grab it and my purse, and get back out.”

Alrick stared. The moonlight made her skin
look soft, her lips so red they might have been washed by berries.
An urge to kiss her struck him, so strong he nearly acted without
thinking. Instead, he forced himself to take a step back and think
objectively. “You can try, but there are far too many of them. You
couldn’t get within one hundred paces of your back door before they
swarmed over you.”

“Blech.” She shuddered. “Thanks for the
confidence. That’s a disgusting picture you paint.”

“Nothing but the truth.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” She looked down at her
feet. “But I’d like to at least try.”

“Fine.” He gave her a hard look, glad she was
too preoccupied with her plan to have noticed the brief detour his
thoughts had taken. “But if there is a clear path into the house,
I’m going in, not you. There’s no way we’re risking you.”

Though she didn’t reply, the tight set of her
lips was enough of an answer to make him sigh.

Leading the horses through the gate, they
followed the dirt path to the road, approaching her house from the
front.

Even in the dim moonlight, before they’d gone
twenty feet up her rutted dirt driveway they saw them. Like before,
when the fire ants had taken over, wave after wave of spiders
covered her house. And front and back yard. A moving, living, sea
of eight-legged arachnids.

Letting out a strangled cry, Carly backed up
so suddenly she tripped over her own feet. Alrick caught her,
holding on to her a second longer than was necessary before he let
go.

She didn’t even notice.

“Damn it, you were right.” Scratching at her
arms compulsively, she grimaced. “No gun, no purse. Still, I want
to go on record as saying this is getting ridiculous. What’s he
trying to accomplish?”

“Your death.”

“With spiders? Give me a break.”

“You were allergic to the ants. One bite
could have killed you.”

“Not hardly. I have my allergy kit.”

“And there were snakes,” he reminded her. “If
you’d

climbed into your bed without looking, you’d
be dead.”

She stopped scratching long enough to look at
him. Her green eyes were stormy, her long, red hair streaked with
moonbeam silver. Again, he fought the urge to touch her, to cover
her mouth with his and taste her.

“True. But if he’s such an almighty,
powerful, warlord slash wizard, you’d think he’d come up with
something better.”

“Taunting him, Carly? Be careful what you
wish for. You never know who or what might hear you.”

She stared at him. Around them, crickets
chirped, just as though this were another ordinary, summer night.
Over head, Alrick caught the sharp silhouette of a hawk or buzzard,
against the half-globe of the moon.

“Sorry.” But she sounded anything but. “I’m
tired, fed-up, and in addition to being penniless, I’m
unarmed.”

“We have my magic.”

“No,
you
have your magic. And even
that has limitations, unless you want to cause more weather
disasters. I have nothing. Let’s go. We need to ride.”

Alrick helped Carly on Merry. Then speaking
to TM softly in the old tongue, Alrick swung his leg up and over
the stallion’s back. TM allowed this without protest, standing
completely still while Alrick got situated.

“Damndest thing I’ve ever seen.” Carly shook
her head.

“Are you ready?”

“Yes. Though I don’t know how we’ll see.
There aren’t any lights in the hills.”

“The moon provides more than enough
light.”

“Not with tree branches to block it.”

They started off down the road, away from the
spider-entrenched house. Alrick kept the horses to a brisk walk,
his spirit lighter. Back to nature. The only place in this human
world where he did not feel out of place. He lifted his arm,
enjoying the silver wash of moonlight that colored his skin.

“What are you doing now?” Carly squinted at
him suspiciously. “Not saying another spell, are you?”

“Of course not. I was merely enjoying the
feel of the night air.”

“This feels like fleeing. I hate
retreating.”

“Think of this as going on the
defensive.”

“Whatever.” She glanced over her shoulder, as
though she wanted to catch one last glimpse of her house.

“Don’t worry,” Alrick flashed a grim smile.
“Despite your belief to the contrary, this will all work out.”

“Work out?” She repeated. “All we can do is
hope.”

Alrick felt his smile soften. “Yes, Carly. We
can hope. I’ve vowed to take care of you, and I will.” He touched
his heels lightly to TM’s side. The stallion surged forward
eagerly, as though born to carry a rider.

After a few minutes they came to a crossroad.
With a light touch on TM’s neck, Alrick stopped him. Carly rode up
alongside.

“Which way?”

She pointed. “We can go north or west. Either
way leads deeper into the hills.

“West. That way the sun won’t be in our eyes
as it rises.”

Once they crossed the deserted road, they
rode for half an hour, the clip-clop of the horse’s hooves the only
side. “There, look.” She pointed out a narrow path that, lit by
moonlight, wound up the hill in a silver ribbon, before vanishing
into the dark trees. “Liam and I used to walk up there. Those
couple hundred acres belong to the neighboring ranch.”

He nodded, wondering why each time she
invoked her dead husband’s name it bothered him more and more.
Maybe because she made the man out to be some sort of God. No one,
not even one of the Fae royal family, could possibly be as
wonderful and perfect as Carly made her Liam sound.

Shrugging off the thought, he brought TM to a
halt and

studied the path with interest. “Would that
be a good place for us to hide?”

“Maybe.” She leaned over and stroked Merry’s
neck. “All I’ve ever seen on that land are cattle and an occasional
white tail deer. No one ever goes there, not even during deer
season.”