Shadowlands (41 page)

“I am no Solitary, that you should address me in this manner,” Alejandro said.

“Ah, but you’re old all right.” The other’s grin sent a tingle of frost up Alejandro’s spine as the face seemed to lengthen and then shorten again.
Hound
, he thought. Not a Rider after all. Alejandro studied the thing’s face. It had been a Moonward Rider once, but that was all that he could be sure of.

“You’re one of the ones who live here, aren’t you? You’re the one with the girl. I can smell her on you. I don’t see it. How she does fit into this chase? No one seems to be able to tell me what’s so special about her?”

Alejandro’s grin was his only answer. The Hound stood and came down two steps. “What if I bite you, Sunward Rider?”

The chill spread from Alejandro’s back around to his chest, seeming to slow his heart. “Then I would die,” he said.

“And your
dra’aj
would be mine, such as it is. It wouldn’t return to the Lands.”

“That has been true all this long while that I have lived in the Shadowlands,” Alejandro said. The chill lessened as he spoke. What he said was true. He had not considered it in those terms before, but his ages-old decision not to return to the Lands, meant exactly that. His
dra’aj
would be forever lost.

So be it.
If nothing else, this knowledge freed him of the paralyzing fear of the Hunt. He took a deep breath and managed to stand a little straighter in his captors’ hands.
They
, at least, were Riders, he felt certain.

“Then I’m right, you follow no one, you aren’t for the High Prince?”

Alejandro would have shrugged, but for the Riders holding him. “What of it?”

The other, the Hound, suddenly thrust his face forward. Only the rigorous training of the bullring, where millimeters might make the difference between life and death, prevented Alejandro from flinching. “Would you do me the great courtesy of standing farther away,” he said. “Your breath smells of rotting meat.”

The grin on the Hound’s face did not fade, but he did move away.

“You’re the closest thing to a neutral party I’m likely to find, aren’t you? I’m Foxblood,” he said. “I’m Pack Leader. I won’t kill you, not this time, if you’ll agree to take a message for me.”

“What message?”

“Tell the High Prince the Hunt has found a refuge in this world. If she leaves it to us, we’ll stop preying on People.”

Alejandro glanced to his right, and to his left. “And does this Hound speak for you? Do you, also, ascribe to this bargain?”

“It suits us well enough.”

“What of those of us who make our home here?”

Foxblood shrugged. “What do I care? If you stay out of our way, we’ll stay out of yours.” He glanced at the two Riders holding Alejandro’s arms and smiled. “Of course, we’d rather you didn’t even have the chance to interfere with us, so perhaps you’ll want to go home.”

I am home,
Alejandro thought. “I am neutral, as you say. How am I to deliver this message?”

Alejandro’s breath caught as the Hound took him by the throat. A grip that would have killed a human was only painful to him.

“Don’t play games with me, Old One. You talk to her followers, you’ve fought next to them, neutral or not. Either
she’ll
listen to you, or
they
will. It doesn’t matter to me which.” The Hound released him, and Alejandro sucked in a lungful of air. “I’ll let you live when you bring back the answer. What happens after that depends on what the answer is, but no guarantees.” He looked once more at Alejandro’s captors and jerked his head. There was displaced air, and he was alone.

When Alejandro returned to it, the departure area was still in
chaos, station and first aid personnel helping the injured, weeping, and hysterical passengers. Alejandro had not noticed him during the fight, but he now saw Nik Polihronidis on his knees in front of a white-haired woman still clutching at her rolling suitcase, holding her free wrist between his fingers as if taking her pulse. Peering through the crowd, he recognized other Outsiders, from the morning they’d trapped the Hound, circulating through the people.

Alejandro began making his way toward Nik when he saw a man signaling him from the edge of the crowd. He was only able to recognize Nighthawk from his coloring and the way that he carried himself, as he now looked entirely differently from a few moments before, a protective maneuver in which they were both well versed. Now the other Rider appeared to be merely another among the crowd who stood idly watching. He even had the same look of curiosity decently covered with concern that showed on the faces of the humans, though Alejandro felt certain Hawk’s concern was more than skin-deep. The old Warden had lived long enough among humans to care about them almost as much as Alejandro himself.

Hawk’s ruddy face broadened in satisfaction when their eyes met, and he edged around the watchers to Alejandro’s side. At that moment Nik straightened from his examination of the elderly woman, and after a quick look around him, circled toward them.

“I thought you might be Faded,” Nighthawk said, as he clapped him on the shoulder.

“What the hell was all this about?” Nik’s voice was quiet, but his words, and the hard planes of his face, left Alejandro in no doubt of his feelings.

“They have gone through the Portal.” Hawk glanced at Alejandro. “I can only assume deliberately, since they were heading here when they were set upon.”

“What of your people?” Alejandro turned to Nik. “Did the Hunt create any new ones?”

Nik shook his head in short jerks, though he seemed to be calmer. “No, we were lucky. The Hounds were busy with you guys. We didn’t really close in until you ran them off.” He blinked and focused on them, as if really seeing them. “We wouldn’t need many more to help us, if they were all like you two.”

“A fine vote of confidence, for which I thank you, but I somehow
gathered the impression that they were not, precisely, trying to kill us.” Alejandro exchanged a look with Hawk.

“What now?” Nik was distracted by a signal from one of his people, a tall woman in blue jeans, sandals, and a man’s white dress shirt.

“I must go after Valory,” Alejandro said. “I must know she is well before I attend to any other matter.”

For a moment it seemed that Nik might argue with him, but his face softened, and he nodded. “Sure, but we’ll meet up later, okay? Call or text me as soon as you get back.”

Alejandro drew Hawk away from the center of the concourse into one of the side lounges where they could wait until the main concourse cleared. “I was lured away on purpose,” he told the other Rider as soon as they were alone. “But not to kill me. The Leader of the Hunt spoke with me, saying that he spoke for the Basilisk Warriors as well.”

“What did he want with you?” Hawk’s brow furrowed.

“With me, nothing. But as a long-term resident here, he sees me as neutral, and he had a proposal, one which he wishes taken to the High Prince.”

Hawk drew himself up, his eyebrows as high as they could go. “The
Hunt
has a proposal?
The Hunt
wishes to negotiate?” He shook his head. “It is unheard of.”

“Stable Hounds are unheard of. Hounds who can Move are unheard of. Whether it is the human
dra’aj
or no, this is no longer the Hunt of our Singers’ histories. Perhaps it is time for us to redefine what we know of them.”

“And what, then, is their proposal?” Hawk leaned forward with his forearms on his knees.

“They want the Shadowlands. They say they will stop preying upon the People, if they are given this world as their own.”

Hawk was shaking his head. “That did not look like negotiating they were doing with Wolf. And what of that? That was Walks Under the Moon I saw with him.”

Alejandro spread his hands. “Perhaps she, also, came to persuade him to return? In any case, the crowd is dispersing.” He got to his feet. “The Portal is clear.”

Hawk looked at him with narrowed eyes full of questions. “You will carry the Hunt’s proposal then?”

Alejandro took a deep breath in through his nose. “You may do so, if you wish. I made no promises, whatever the Hound may think. I follow my
fara’ip
.”

“Well, at the least you are not Hounds, nor do you bring any.”

Alejandro had automatically raised his hands to shoulder height at the sight of the armed guards who greeted them on their emergence from the Portal, but lowered them again when he saw that Hawk had not raised his. Evidently, his long stay among humans had had more impact on him than he had realized.

There were five guards in the circle surrounding them, all with weapons at the ready. Two of them were Wild Riders, their
gra’if
showing as a glove here, a torque there, bright against the worn leather of their clothing. The Starward Rider who had spoken was smiling, but as Alejandro had long before noticed, weapons cannot smile.

Hawk spoke. “Star at Midnight, you know me. You have been my escort before. I am Nighthawk, my mother is Flyer in the Dusk, and the Dragon guides me. This is my friend and companion, Graycloud at Moonrise.”

It took a moment for them all to exchange formal greetings—afterward it was only Star at Midnight’s mother, Northern Light, and his Guidebeast, the Basilisk, that Alejandro remembered.

“Do you say a Hound came through here—” Alejandro asked as soon as he decently could.

“Do not be concerned,” Star at Midnight, his
gra’if
sword now sheathed, had pushed his helm back from his forehead. “We dispatched the Hound, and the two Riders who brought it—spawn of the Basilisk Prince, as was evident from the company they kept.” Star made a flicking motion with his fingers that Alejandro suddenly remembered was the Rider equivalent of spitting in disgust. “As surprised as we were, there are still three of us here with
gra’if
, and as soon as their prey cleared out of the way, we dealt with them.”

“This ‘prey?’ Two other Riders? Walks Under the Moon, and Stormwolf? And a human girl with Sunward coloring? They are safe?” Alejandro looked around him, but the mountain meadow in which the Portal was set on this side was empty except for the three of them, the guards, and their Cloud Horses.

“I thought that was Lady Moon,” Star said. “As soon as they were clear of their pursuers, they Moved again.”

“A good thing, too,” said one of the other Riders, this one a Moonward in flame-colored clothing. “Left us a clear field to kill the Hound.”

“So the Basilisk’s spawn is allying with the Hunt in the Shadowlands? It explains why so many are trying to use the Portals,” Star at Midnight said, flaxen braid swinging with the movement of his head.

“We have news of this and other matters to take to the High Prince,” Hawk said.

“I would find the human girl. Valory Martin is her name, and she is friend to the High Prince. Do you know where she was taken?”

“Were you not listening, my friend? They were here and gone before we could even be sure who they were. Perhaps they will return, when they realize the danger is past.”

“Perhaps.” But would they? Could he risk waiting? Would Valory be worse on her second exposure to the Lands?

“Alejandro.” Hawk had taken him by the arm. “They are likely gone to the High Prince. Moon to her sister, Stormwolf to his benefactor. Valory will be with them, and as safe as she can be here in the Lands.”

Alejandro nodded. He knew Hawk must be right. And yet the knowledge sat like a stone in his belly.

Cassandra raised her hand and knew that the Riders with her stopped when she did, even though she was not looking at them, her eyes being attuned completely to the tapestry that was the
dra’aj
of the Lands. A new thread had appeared.
Two.
One she knew immediately for her sister, Walks Under the Moon, and the other she knew perfectly, from having Healed it. Stormwolf. And between them a thread so faint, so fine, that even Cassandra could not be certain it existed.

But Moon and Wolf were definitely in the Lands.

F
OX STRODE ALONG the crowded sidewalk, heading north on Yonge Street, and feeling a small pleasure from the way the prey moved out of his way without even noticing they were doing it. They were passing through the milling crowd of shoppers and commuters at Dundas Square when he reached out and grabbed a dark-skinned man by the upper arm. At first the man hunched his shoulders and began to turn toward him, but the aggressive look faded from his face even before he stopped turning and looked down, puzzled.