Wolf Who Rules Wen Spencer Read Online

Wolf Who Rules

Book 2 of the Elfhome Series.

Wolf Who Rules finds himself besieged from all sides in this sequel to TINKER. Viceroy and head of the Air current Association, he had been able to guarantee the safety of everyone in his realm, just faced with an oni invasion, he has had to call in royal troops and relinquish his monopoly of Pittsburgh, which is stranded on Elfhome. He at present struggles to keep the peace between the humans, the newly arrived Stone Association, the royal forces, a set of oni dragons, the half-oni children who see themselves as human being, and the tengu trying to escape their oni enslavement.

Meanwhile, Tinker strives to solve the mystery of a growing aperture in Turtle Creek. She'south plagued with inexplicable nightmares that may hold the keys to Pittsburgh'southward future. The only clue from the Queen'southward oracle to assist Tinker is a note with five English language words on it: Follow the Yellow Brick Road. Oni, and dragons and tengu – oh my!

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Excerpt from Chapter One: Ghostlands

At that place were some mistakes that "Oops" just didn't cover.

Tinker stood on the George Westinghouse Bridge. Behind her was Pittsburgh and its sixty-m humans now permanently stranded on Elfhome. Below her, lay the mystery that at 1 time had been Turtle Creek. A blue haze filled the valley; the air shimmered with odd distortions. The state itself was a kaleidoscope of possibilities — elfin forest, oni houses, the Westinghouse Air Brake Plant – fractured pieces of diverse dimensions all jumbled together. And it was all her mistake.

Color had been leached from the valley, except for the faint blue taint, making the features seem insubstantial. Perhaps the area was too unstable to reverberate all spectrums of light – or maybe the total spectra of light weren't able to laissez passer through – the – the – she lacked a name for it. Discontinuity? Tinker decided that was as good a name every bit any.

"What are these Ghostlands?" asked her elfin bodyguard, Pony. He'd spoken in low Elvish. "Ghostlands" had been in English, though, meaning a homo had coined the term. Certainly the phrase fit the ghostly look of the valley.

So possibly Discontinuity wasn't the best name for it.

A foot taller, Pony was a comforting wall of heavily-armed and magically-shielded muscle. His real name in Elvish was Waetata-watarou-tukaenrou-bo-taeli, which meant roughly Galloping Tempest Equus caballus on Air current. His elfin friends and family called him Niggling Horse, or tukaenrou-tiki, which still was a mouthful. He'd given her his English nickname to utilise when they met; it wasn't until recently that she realized it was his first deed of friendship.

"I don't know what's happening hither." Tinker ran a mitt through her short brown hair, grabbed a handful and tugged, temptation to pull it out running loftier. "I set up a resonance between the gate I congenital and the ane in orbit. They were supposed to milkshake each other autonomously. They did."

At least, she was fairly sure that they had. Something had fallen out of the sky that night in a peppery display. Since there were only a handful of small satellites in Elfhome'southward orbit, information technology was fairly condom bet that she somehow yanked the hyperphase gate out Earth's orbit. "This was – unexpected." She meant all of it. The orbital gate reduced to then much space debris and burnt ash on the basis. Turtle Creek turned into Ghostlands. Pittsburgh stuck on Elfhome.

Even "sorry" didn't seem adequate.

And what had happened to the oni army on Onihida, waiting to invade Elfhome through her gate? To the oni disguised as humans that worked on the gate with her? And Riki, the tengu who had betrayed her?

"Is it going to – get better?" Pony asked.

"I think so." Tinker sighed, releasing her hair. "I can't imagine it staying in this unstable state." At least she hoped then. "The 2nd law of thermodynamics and all that."

Pony grunted a slight optimistic sound, every bit if he was full of confidence in her intelligence and trouble solving. Sometimes his trust in her was intimidating.

"I want to get closer." Tinker scanned the neighboring hillsides, looking for a rubber way downwards to the valley's floor. In Pittsburgh, zip was as straightforward equally it appeared. This surface area was mostly abandoned – probably with help from the oni to keep people away from their secret chemical compound. The arcing line of the Rim, marking where Pittsburgh ended and Elfhome proper began, was defused by advancing elfin forest. Ironwood saplings mixed with jagger bushes – elfin trees colliding with earth weed – to form a dumbo impenetrable thicket. "Let'southward find a way down."

"Is that wise, domi?"

"We'll be careful."

She expected more of an argument, but he clicked his tongue in an elfin shrug.

Pony leaned out over the bridge'due south railing, the spells tattooed downwards his arms in designs like Celtic knots — done in Wind Clan blueish — rippled as muscle moved under skin. The hot air current played with tendrils of glossy black hair that come loose from his braid. Dressed in his usual wyvern-scaled chest armor, blackness leather pants and gleaming articulatio genus boots, Pony seemed oblivious to the mid-August oestrus. He looked as strong and healthy every bit ever. During their escape, the oni nigh killed him. She took some comfort that he was the i thing that she hadn't totally messed up.

As they recuperated, she'd endured an endless parade of visitors between bouts of drugged sleep, which gave the entire feel a surreal nightmare experience. Everyone had brought gifts and stories of Turtle Creek, until her hospice room and curiosity overflowed. Thank you to her new elfin regenerative abilities, she healed far faster than when she was a man; she awoke this morn feeling skillful enough to explore. Much to her dismay, Pony insisted on bringing 4 more sekasha for a total Hand.

Yeah, yeah, it was wise, considering they had no clue how many oni survived the meltdown of Turtle Creek. She was getting claustrophobic, though, from e'er having hordes of people keeping spotter over her; first the elves, then the oni, and at present back to the elves. When she ran her flake yard – months ago – a lifetime ago — she used to go days without seeing anyone simply her cousin Oilcan.

As Viceroy, her husband Wolf Who Rules Wind, or Windwolf, held twenty sekasha; Pony picked her favorite 4 out of that twenty to make up a hand. The outlandish Stormsong – her insubordinate short pilus currently dyed bluish – was acting as a Shield with Pony. Annoyingly, though, at that place seemed to be some secret sekasha dominion – simply one Shield could have a personality at whatever time. Stormsong stood a few anxiety off, silent and watching, in full bodyguard fashion while Pony talked to Tinker. It would take been easier to pretend that the sekasha weren't guarding over her if they weren't then apparently 'working.'

The bridge secured, the other three sekasha were existence Blades and scouting the expanse. Pony signaled them now using the sekasha'due south mitt gestures chosen blade talk. Rainlily, senior of the Blades, acknowledged – Tinker recognized that much by at present – and signaled something more.

"What did she say?" Tinker really had to get these guys radios. She hated having to ask what was going on; until recently, she always knew more than everyone else.

"They establish something yous should see."

#

The police had strung yellow record across the street in an attempt to cordon off the valley; it rustled ominously in a potent breeze. Ducking under the record, Tinker and her Shields joined the others. The one personality rule extended to the Blades; only Rainlily got to talk. Cloudwalker and Little Egret moved off, searching the area for possible threats.

"Nosotros establish this in the middle of the road," Rainlily held out a bulky white, waterproof envelope. "Forgiveness, nosotros had to check it for traps." The envelope was addressed with all possible renditions of her name: Alexander Graham Bell, 'Tinker' written in English, and finally Elvish runes of 'Tinker of the Wind Clan.' The sekasha had already slit information technology open to examine the contents and replaced them. Tinker tented open up the envelope and peered inside; information technology held an old mp3 role player and a note written in English language.

"I have great remorse for what I did. I'm sorry for pain yous both. I wish at that place had been another way. Riki Shoji."

"Yep, right." Tinker scoffed and crumpled up the note and flung it away. "Like that makes everything okay, you damn crow."

She wanted to throw the mp3 actor as well, only information technology wasn't hers. Oilcan had loaned it to Riki. The month she'd been at Aum Renau, Oilcan and Riki became friends. Or at least, Oilcan thought they were friends, just the same every bit he thought they were both humans. Riki, though, was a lying oni spy, complete with bird-anxiety and magically retractable crow wings. He'd wormed his way into their lives just to kidnap Tinker. She doubted that Oilcan would want the actor back now that he knew the truth; it would be a permanent reminder that Oilcan's trust almost cost Tinker her life. Just it wasn't her right to determine for him.

She jammed the thespian into the deepest pocket of her carpenter's jeans. "Allow's go."

Rage smoldered inside her until they had worked their mode downwardly to the aperture. The mystery of the Ghostlands deepened, drowning out her anger. The edge of the blue seemed uneven at first, only then, as she crouched down to eye it closely, she realized that the effect "pooled" like water, and that the ragged edge was due to the elevation of the land – like the edge of a swimming. Despite the August heat, ice gathered in the shadows. This close, she could hear a weird white noise, not different the gurgle of a river.

She constitute a long stick and prodded at the blue-shaded earth; it slowly gave like thick mud. She moved along the "shore" testing the shattered pieces of three worlds inside attain of her stick. Globe fire hydrant. Onihida building. Elfhome ironwood tree. While they looked solid, everything within the zone of destruction was actually insubstantial, giving under the house poke of her stick.

Pony stiffened with alarm when – after examining the stick for damage done to it and finding information technology every bit audio every bit before – she reached her hand out over the line.

Oddly, there was a resistance in the air over the land – as if Tinker was holding her manus out the window of a moving car. The air grew cooler as she lowered her hand. It was so very creepy that she had to steel herself to really impact the dirt.

It was like plunging her bare mitt into snowfall. Bitterly cold, the clay gave under her fingertips. Within seconds, the chill was painful. She jerked her hand back.

"Domi?" Pony moved closer to her.

"I'one thousand fine." Tinker cupped her left hand around her right. As she stood, blowing warmth onto her cold-reddened fingers, she gazed out onto the ghost lands. She could feel magic on her new domana senses, but normally – like strong electric currents — rut accompanied magic. Was the 'shift' responsible for the cold? The presence of magic, however, would explain why the area was still unstable – sustaining any reaction the gate's destruction created. If her theory was right, once the ambient magic was depleted, the effect would collapse and the surface area would revert back to solid country. The only question was the rate of decay.

Pony picked up a stone and skipped it out across the disturbance. Faint ripples formed where the stone struck. After kissing 'clay' three times, the stone stopped near 30 feet in. For a minute information technology sat on the surface and so, slowly but perceivably, information technology started to sink.

Pony made a small-scale puzzled noise. "Why isn't everything sinking?"

"I think – because they're all in the aforementioned space – which isn't quite here but isn't really someplace else – or maybe they're everywhere at once. The trees are stable, because to them, the world underneath them is every bit stable as they are."

"Similar ice on water?"

"Hmm." The analogy would serve, since she wasn't sure if she was right. They worked their manner around the edge, the hilly terrain making it difficult. At first they establish sections of paved route or cut through abandoned buildings, which fabricated the going easier. Somewhen, though, they'd worked their way out of the transferred Pittsburgh surface area and into Elfhome proper.

On the bank of a creek, frozen solid where it overlapped the affected area, they found a expressionless blackness willow tree, lying on its side, and wide runway of churned dirt were another willow had stalked north.

Pony scanned the dim elfin woods for the carnivorous tree. "We must take care. It is probably still nearby; they don't motion fast."

"I wonder what killed it." Tinker poked at the splayed root legs still partly inside the discontinuity. Frost like freezer burn down dusted the wide, sturdy body. Otherwise information technology seemed undamaged; the soft mud and thick castor of the creek bank had cushioned its fall so none of its branches or tangle arms had been broken. "Lain would love an intact tree." The xenobiologist often complained that the only specimens she e'er could examine were the non-ambulatory seedlings or mature trees blown to pieces to return information technology harmless. "I wish I could become it to her somehow."

The tracks of both trees, Tinker noticed, started in the Ghostlands. Had the willow been clear of the discontinuity at the time of the explosion – or had the tree died afterwards reaching stable ground?

"Permit me borrow one of your knives." Tinker used the pocketknife Pony handed her to score an ironwood sapling. "I want to be able to track the rate of disuse. Maybe there'due south a style I could accelerate it."

"A slash for every one of your feet the sapling stands from the ghost lands?" Pony guessed her system.

"Yeah." She was going to motion on to the next tree but he held out his hand for his pocketknife. "What?"

"I would rather you stay back as much equally possible from the edge." He waited with the grinding power of glaciers for her to hand back his knife. "How do y'all feel, domi?"

Ah, the source of his sudden protectiveness. Information technology was going to be a while before she could live downward overestimating herself the night of the fighting. Instead of going quietly to the hospice, she'd roamed about, made love, and did all sorts of silliness — and of form, savage flat on her face later on. Information technology probably occurred to him that if she nose-dived once more, she would end up in the Ghostlands.

"I'k fine," she reassured him.

"You wait tired." He slashed the next sapling, and she had to acknowledge he actually made cleaner, easier to encounter marks than she did, robbing her of all take a chance to quibble with him.

She made a rude racket. Actually, she was exhausted – nightmares had disrupted her sleep for the concluding two days. But she didn't desire to admit that; the sekasha might gang upwards on her and elevate her back to the hospice. That was the problem with bringing five of them – it was much harder to keen them en masse – specially since they were all a foot taller than her. Sometimes she really hated being five foot nothing. Standing with them was like being surrounded by heavily armed trees. Even now Stormsong was eyeing her closely.

"I'm just – thinking." She mimed what she hoped looked like deep thought. "This is very perplexing."

Pony bought it, simply he trusted her, perhaps more than he should. Stormsong seemed unconvinced, just said goose egg. They moved on, marker saplings.

#

With an unknown number of oni scattered through the forest and subconscious bearded amongst the human population of Pittsburgh, Wolf did not want to exist dealing with the invasion of his domi's privacy, but it had to be stopped before the Queen's representative arrived in Pittsburgh. Since all requests through human channels failed, it was fourth dimension to have the thing into his own easily. Wolf stalked through the broken front door of the photographer'southward house, his badgerer growing into anger. Unfortunately, the lensman – paparazzi was the correct English word for him, merely Wolf was non certain how to turn down the word out — in question was determined to make things as difficult as possible.

Over the final two weeks, Wolf's people had worked through a series of false names and addresses to arrive at a narrow row house close to the Rim in Oakland. The houses to either side had been converted into businesses, due to their proximately to the enclaves. While the racial mix of the street was varied, the next door neighbors were Chinese. The owners had watched nervously as Windwolf bankrupt down the photographer's door, only made no move to interfere. Judging past their remarks to each other in Mandarin, neither did they know that Wolf could speak Standard mandarin in addition to English, nor were they surprised past his presence – they seemed to recall the photographer was receiving his due.

Within the house, Wolf was starting to sympathise why.

1 long narrow room took upward most of the start floor beyond the shattered door. Filth dulled the wood floors and smudged the once white walls to an uneven gray. On the correct wall, at odds with the grubby state of the house, was video wallpaper showing recorded images of Wolf's domi, Tinker. The film loop had been taken a calendar month ago, showing a carefree Tinker laughing with the five female sekasha of Wolf's household. The image had been advisedly doctored and scaled so that it gave the illusion that one gazed out a large window overlooking the private garden courtyard of Poppymeadow's enclave. Apparently feeling safe from prying eyes, Tinker lounged in her nightgown, revealing all her natural sexuality.

Wolf had seen the still pictures of Tinker in a digital mag but hadn't realized that there was more than. Judging by the stacks of cardboard boxes, there was much more. He flicked open the nearest box and establish DVDs titled: Princess Gone Wild, Uncensored.

"Where is he?" Wolf growled to his Showtime, Wraith Arrow.

Wraith tilted his head slightly upward to betoken upstairs. "There's more."

At the tiptop of the creaking wooden stairs, there was a large room stark of furniture. A camouflage screen covered the lone window, projecting a blank brick wall to the outside world. A photographic camera on a tripod peered through a slit in the screen, trained down at the enclaves. This room's video wallpaper replayed images captured this forenoon, a somber Tinker sitting alone nether the peach copse, dappled sunlight moving over her.

Wolf moved the camera and device's bogus intelligence shrank Tinker's prototype into one corner and went to live images as the zoom lens played over Poppymeadow's enclave where Wolf'south household was living. Not only did the balcony provide a clear view over the high stone demesne wall, but into the windows of all the buildings, from the main hall to the coach house. 1 of Poppymeadow's staff was changing linen in a guest wing bedroom; the camera automatically recognized the humanoid course and adjusted the focus until she filled the wall. The window was open up, and microphone picked up her humming.

"I haven't done anything illegal," a man was saying in the next room in English language. "I know my rights! I'm protected by the treaty."

Wolf stalked into the final room. His sekasha had broken down the door to become in. The only piece of piece of furniture was an unmade bed that reeked of old sweat and spent sex. His sekasha had a small rat of a human pinned confronting the far wall.

On the wall, images of Wolf'due south domi moved through their sleeping room at Poppymeadow's, languishingly stripping out of her clothes. "You want to do it?" She asked huskily. Wolf could remember the 24-hour interval, had replayed it in his mind again and again equally his terminal memory of her when he idea he had lost her. "Come on, we have time."

She dropped the last piece of clothing on the floor, and the camera zoomed in tighter to play downwards over her trunk. Wolf snarled out the command for the winds and slammed its power into the wall. The wall boomed, the firm shuddering at the affect, and the wallpaper went black. Tinker'due south voice, however, continued with a soft moan of delight.

"Hey! Hey!" the man cried in English. "Do y'all have any idea how expensive that is? You can't just smash in here and break my stuff. I have rights."

"You had rights. They've been revoked." Wolf returned to the balcony and knocked the photographic camera from its tripod. The wallpaper showed a somersault of confusion as the camera flipped stop over end. When it struck pavement, it shattered into small unrecognizable pieces, and the wallpaper flickered dorsum to the previously recorded loop of Tinker sitting in the garden.

"Evacuate the surface area," Wolf ordered in low Elvish. "I'm razing these buildings."

Manifestly the human understood Elvish, considering he yelped out, "What? You can't do that! I've called the law! You lot can't practice this! This is Pittsburgh! I have rights!"

Equally if summoned by his words, a commotion downstairs appear the arrival of the Pittsburgh Police.

"Police, freeze." A male voice barked in English language. "Put down the weapons."

Wolf felt the sekasha downstairs activate their shields, blooms of magic against his awareness. Bladebite was saying something depression and fast in High Elvish.

"Naekanain," Someone cried in badly absolute Elvish — I do not sympathize – while the first speaker repeated in English language, "Put downwards the weapons!"

Wolf cursed. Apparently the police officers didn't speak Elvish and his sekasha didn't speak English. Wolf called the winds and wrapped them virtually him before going to the summit of the stairs.

In that location were 2 night blue uniformed policemen crouched in the front door, keeping pistols leveled at the sekasha who had their ejae fatigued. The officers looked human but with oni, appearances could exist deceiving. Both were tall plenty to be oni warriors. The disguised warriors favored red hair while one policeman was pale blonde and the other dark chocolate-brown. The blonde motioned with his left mitt, as if trying to keep both his partner and the elves from acting.

""Naekanain," The blonde repeated, and then added. "Pavuyau Ruve. Czernowski, just arctic. They're the viceroy's personal guard."

"I know who the fuck they are, Bowman."

"If you know that," Wolf said, "Then you know that they have a correct to go where I want them to go, and do what I want them to practice."

Bowman flicked a await upwardly at him and so returned his focus on the sekasha. "Viceroy, have them put down their weapons."

"They will only when yous do," Wolf said. "If you lot have not forgotten, we are at war."

"Simply not with us," Bowman growled.

Czernowski scoffed, and it saddened Wolf that he was closer to the mark.

"The oni accept been living in Pittsburgh as bearded humans for years," Wolf said. "Until we're sure you're non oni, nosotros must care for yous as if you were. Lower your weapons."

Bowman considered the request for a minute, eyeing the sekasha as if he was considering how likely it was that he and his partner could overwhelm Wolf'southward baby-sit. Wolf wasn't sure if Bowman's hesitation was born from over estimating his own abilities, or total ignorance of the sekasha's.

Finally, Bowman made a bear witness of cautiously holstering his pistol. "Come on, Czernowski. Put it away."

The other policeman seemed familiar, although Wolf wasn't sure how; he rarely interacted with the Pittsburgh Police force. Wolf studied the two men. Unlike elves, where 1 could commonly guess a person'southward clan, humans needed badges and patches to tell themselves apart. The officers' dark bluish uniforms had shoulder patches and gold badges identifying them every bit Pittsburgh Police. Bowman's brass nameplate read: B. Pedersen. Czernowski's nameplate was unhelpful, giving only a first initial of "N."

"I know you lot," Wolf said to Czernowski.

"I would hope then," The officer said. "You took the woman that was going to be my wife away from me. You ripped her correct out of her species. You might think you've won, but I'm getting her back."

Wolf recognized him then — this was Tinker'southward Nathan, who bristled at him when Wolf nerveless his domi from the Faire. The uniform had thrown Wolf; he hadn't realized the man was a police officer. At the Faire, Czernowski had acted like a domestic dog guarding a bone. Even though Tinker had stated over and over again that she was leaving with Wolf, Czernowski had clung to her, refusing to let her go out.

"Tinker is not a thing to be stolen away," Wolf told the man. "I did not take her. She chose me, non you lot. She is my domi at present."

"I've seen the video tape," Nathan indicated the open box of DVDs. "I know what she is, but I don't care. I all the same dearest her, and I'm going to become her back."

"Who gives a fuck?" The thrice damned lensman shouted behind Wolf. "It doesn't give these pointed ear royalist freaks the correct to break downwards my door and trash my stuff. I'm a tax paying American! They can't–"

There was a loud thud as he was slammed upward against his broken wall to silence him.

"Sir, tin can yous footstep aside?" Bowman started cautiously upstairs before Wolf answered.

Wolf stepped dorsum to make manner for the two policemen.

The policemen took in the open window, the recording of Tinker in the garden, the smashed down door, the broken wallpaper at present stained with claret, and the cleaved-nosed paparazzi in Night Harvest's hold.

"It's about fourth dimension," the photographer cried. "Go these goons off me!"

"Please footstep away from him." Bowman told Harvest, his hand dropping down to remainder on his pistol. He repeated the social club in bad Elvish. "Naeba Kiyau."

"He's to be detained." Wolf wanted information technology clear what was to exist done with the photographer before relinquishing control of him. "And these buildings evacuated then I can demolish them."

"You tin can't exercise that." Bowman pulled out a pair of handcuffs. "According to the treaty…"

"The treaty is at present null and void. I am at present the constabulary in Pittsburgh, and I say that this man is to be detained indefinitely and these buildings will be demolished."

"The fuck you are," Czernowski spat the words. "In Pittsburgh nosotros're the law and you're guilty of breaking and inbound, assault and battery, and I'chiliad sure I can think of a few more."

Czernowski reached for Wolf'south arm and instantly had three swords at his throat.

"No." Wolf shouted to keep the police from being killed.

Into the silence that suddenly filled the house, Tinker'south recorded vocalisation groaned, "Oh gods, yes, right there, oh, that's so skilful."

Bowman caught Czernowski every bit the policeman started to surge forward with a growl. "Czernowski!" Bowman slammed him against the wall. "Merely bargain with it! He's rich and powerful and she's fucking him. What role of this does not make sense to you? He drives a Rolls Royce and all the elves in Pittsburgh grovel at his feet. You think any bitch would pick a stupid Pole like yous when she could have him?"

"He could have had anyone. She was mine."

"The fuck she was." Bowman growled. "If you'd scored one time with her, all the bookies in Pittsburgh would know. You were always a long shot in the betting pool, Nathan. You were besides stupid for her – and too dumb to realize that."

Czernowski glared at his partner, face darkening, but he stopped struggling to stand up panting with his anger.

Bowman watched his partner for a minute before request, "Are we skillful now?"

Czernowski nodded and flinched as Tinker'due south recorded voice gave a soft wordless moan of delight.

Bowman crossed to a section of the cleaved wall and pressed something and the sound stopped. "Viceroy, none of us similar this any more than you exercise, but nether international law, as of five years ago, this scumbag is inside his rights to make this video."

"He'southward under elfin law at present, and what he has done is unforgivable."

"Your people don't have technology capable of this." Bowman waved a hand at the wallpaper. "And then you don't accept laws to govern capturing digital images."

Wolf scoffed at the typical human sidestepping. "Why do humans nitpick justice to pieces? Tin't you see that you've frayed it apart until it doesn't hold anything? At that place is right and then at that place is incorrect. This is wrong."

"This isn't my identify to decide, Viceroy. I'm just a cop. I but know human being police, and as far equally I concluding heard, homo police however applies."

"The treaty says that any homo left on Elfhome during Shutdown falls under elfin rule. The gate in orbit has failed – it is currently and always volition be – Shutdown."

Bowman wiped the expression off his confront. "Until my superiors confirm this, I accept to go along to role with standard protocol and I can't abort this homo."

"So I'll accept him executed."

"I tin can put him in protective custody," Bowman said.

"Equally long as protective custody means a small prison cell without a window, I'll agree to that," Wolf said.

"We'll see what we can practice." Bowman moved to handcuff the photographer.

Wolf felt a sudden deep nonetheless oddly distanced vibration, as if a bowstring had been drawn and released to thrum against his awareness. He recognized it – someone nearby was borer the power of the Wind Clan Spell Stone. Wolf thought that he and Tinker were the only Current of air Clan domana in Pittsburgh – and he hadn't taught Tinker even the virtually basic spells…

As the vibration connected, an endless drawing of ability from the stones, cold certainty filled him. Information technology could only be Tinker.

#

Tinker and her sekasha had neared the far side of the Ghostlands, crossing once again into Pittsburgh but on the contrary side of the valley. The road climbed the steep loma in a series of sharp curves. As they crossed the cracked pavement, Stormsong laughed and pointed out a yellow alarm street sign. It depicted a truck near to tip over as information technology made the precipitous turn – a common sight in Pittsburgh – but someone had added words to the pictograph.

"What does it say?" Pony asked.

"Watch for Acrobatic Trucks." Stormsong translated the English language words to Elvish.

The others laughed and moved on, scanning the mixed wood.

"You speak English language?" Tinker barbarous into step with Stormsong.

"Fuckin' A!" Stormsong said with the correct scornful tone that such a stupid question would exist posed.

Tinker tripped and nearly barbarous in surprise. Stormsong caught Tinker past the arm and warned her to be careful with a look. Most of Tinker's time with Windwolf'due south sekasha had been spent practicing her High Elvish, a stunningly polite language. Stormsong had just dropped a mask woven out of words.

"For the last twenty-some years, I pulled every shift I could to stay in Pittsburgh—" Stormsong continued. "–even if information technology meant bowing to that that stuck-up bowwow, Sparrow."

"Why?" Tinker was still reeling. Many elves showtime learned English in England when Shakespeare notwithstanding lived and kept the lilting emphasis even if they modernized their sentence structure and word choice. Stormsong spoke true Pitsupavute, sounding like a native.

"I like humans." Stormsong stepped over a fallen tree in one long stride and paused to offer a mitt to Tinker – the automatic politeness now seemed jarringly out of place. "They don't give a fuck what everyone else thinks. If they want something that'south right for them, they don't worry well-nigh what the rest of the fucking globe thinks."

The warrior'south bitterness surprised Tinker. "What do you desire?"

"I had doubts about being a sekasha." She shrugged like a human, lifting ane shoulder, instead of clicking her tongue like an elf would. "Not any more. Windwolf gave me a year to go my head screwed on right. I like existence sekasha. I practise have – as the humans say – issues."

That explained the short blue hair and the slight rebel air almost her.

Stormsong suddenly spun to the left, pushing Tinker behind her even as she shouted the guttural command to actuate her magical shields. Magic surged through the bluish tattoos on her arms and flared into a shimmering bluish that encompassed her body. Stormsong drew her ironwood sword and crouched into readiness.

Instantly other sekasha activated their shields and drew their swords equally they pulled in tight around Tinker. They scanned the surface area merely at that place was nothing to see.

They were in the no-man'due south land of the Rim, where alpine young Ironwoods mixed with World woods and jagger bushes in a thick, nearly impassable tangle. They stood on a deer trail, a path only 1 person wide, meandering through the dense underbrush. For a moment no one moved or spoke. Tinker realized that the birds had gone silent; even they didn't desire to draw the attention of whatever spooked Stormsong. Pony made a gesture with his left hand in blade talk.

"Something is going to attack," Stormsong whispered in Elvish, once again becoming the sekasha. "Something big. I'm not sure how soon."

"Yatanyai?" Pony whispered a word that Tinker didn't recognize.

Stormsong nodded.

"What does she see?" Tinker whispered.

"What will be," Pony indicated that they should start back the fashion they had come. "We're in a position of weakness. Nosotros should retreat to –"

Something huge and sinuous as a snake flashed out of the shadows. Tinker got the impression of scales, a wedge-shaped head, and a mouth total of teeth earlier Pony leaped between her and the monster. The fauna struck Pony with a blow that smashed him aside, his shields flashing as they absorbed the brunt of the damage. It whipped toward Tinker, but Stormsong was already in the fashion.

"Oh, no, you don't!" The female sekasha blocked a fell seize with teeth at Tinker. "Go back, domi – you're alluring it!"

A blur of motion, the animal knocked Stormsong down, biting at her leg, her shield gleaming brilliant blue between its teeth. The Blades swung their swords, shouting to distract the beast. Releasing Stormsong, the creature leapt to perch high up the trunk of an oak. Every bit it paused there, Tinker saw it fully for the first time.

It was long and lean, twelve feet from nose to tip of whipping tail. Despite a shaggy mane, its hide looked like blood red serpent scales. Long necked and short legged, it was weirdly proportioned; its head seemed most likewise big for its body, with a heavy jawed mouth filled with endless jagged teeth. Clinging to the side of the tree with massive claws, information technology hissed at them, showing the teeth. Its mane lifted like a dog's hackles, and a haze shimmered to life over the creature, like heat waves coming off hot cobblestone. Tinker could experience the presence of magic on her domana senses, like static electricity prickling confronting the peel. The 2nd bract, Cloudwalker, fired his pistol. The bullets struck the haze – making it flare at the point of impact – and dropped to the ground, inert. Tinker felt the magic strengthen as the kinetic energy of the bullet fed into the spell, fueling it.

"It'southward a shield!" Tinker cried out in warning. "Hit it will but brand it stronger."

Stormsong got to her feet, biting dorsum a cry of pain. "Go, run, I'll hold information technology!"

Pony defenseless Tinker past her upper arm, and half carried her, half dragged her through the thicket.

"No!" Tinker cried, knowing that if it weren't for her safe, the others wouldn't abandon i of their ain.

"Domi," Pony urging her to run faster. "If we tin can not hit it, then we accept no hope of killing it."

Tinker thought furiously. How do you injure something you can't hit just could seize with teeth you? Expect – maybe that was it! She snatched the pistol from the holster at Pony's side and jerked out of his hold. Hither, under the alpine ironwoods, the jagger brushes had grown high, and animals had made low tunnel-like trails through them. Ducking down, Tinker ran down a path, the gun seeming huge in her easily, heading back toward the wounded sekasha. The thorns tore at her bare arms and pilus.

"Tinker domi!" Pony cried behind her.

"Its shield doesn't cover its oral cavity!" she shouted back.

She burst into the clear to find Stormsong backed to a tree, desperately parrying the animal's teeth and claws. It smashed aside her sword and leapt, oral fissure open.

Tinker shouted for its attention, and pulled the gun's trigger. She hadn't aimed at all, and the bullet whined into the underbrush, missing everything.

As beast turned to face her, and Stormsong shouted warning — a wordless cry of anger, hurting and dismay — Tinker realized the flaw in her programme. She would need to shove the pistol into the creature'south oral fissure earlier shooting. "Oh fuck."

It was similar being hit by a freight train. I moment the creature was running at her and then everything become a wild tumble of darkness and light, dead leaves, sharp teeth and blood. Everything stopped moving with the creature pinning her to the ground with one massive hook. And then information technology pulled — not on her skin or muscle, but something deeper inside her, something intangible, that she didn't even know existed. Magic flooded through her – hot and powerful every bit electricity – a seemingly endless torrent from someplace unknown to the monster — and she was but the hapless conduit.

She had lost the gun in the wild tumble. She punched at its head, trying to go information technology off her as the magic poured through her. The massive jaws snapped downwards on her fist – and all of a sudden the creature froze — teeth property business firm her hand, non notwithstanding breaking skin. Its optics widened, as if surprised to see her under it, her hand in its rima oris. She panted, scared now beyond words, as the magic continued to thrum through her bones and peel. Her hand seemed then very small inside the mouth of teeth.

A sword blade appeared over her, the tip pressing up against the creature's shields, aimed at its correct eye. The tip slid forward slowly as if it was beingness pressed through physical.

"Get off her," Pony growled, leaning his full weight onto his sword, footling past footling driving the bespeak through the shields. "At present!"

For a moment, they seemed stuck in bister – the monster, Pony, her – caught in place and motionless. There came a loftier thrilling whistle from manner upwards high, bursting the amber. The creature released her hand and leapt backwards. She scrambled wildly the other direction. Pony caught hold of her, hugging her tight with his free hand, his shields spilling down over her, encompassing her.

"Got her!" he cried, and backed away, the others endmost ranks around them.

The whistle blew once more, so abrupt and piercing a sound that fifty-fifty the monster checked to looked upwardly.

Someone stood on the Westinghouse Span that spanned the valley, doll-small by the distance. Against the summer blueish heaven, the person was only a dark silhouette – as well far way to encounter if he was man, elf or oni. The whistle thrilled, and focused on the sound, Tinker realized that it was ii notes, close together, a shrill discord.

The monster shook its head as if the sound hurt and bounded away, heading for the bridge, and then fast it seemed it nearly teleported from place to identify.

The whistler spread out great black wings, resolving all question of race. A tengu. The oni spies created by blending oni with crows. Tinker could estimate which one – Riki. What she couldn't guess was why he had just saved them, or how.

"Domi." Pony eclipsed the escaping tengu and his monstrous purser. He peering attentively at her easily and then tugged at her clothing, examining her closely. "You lot are hurt."

"I am?"

"Yes." He produced a white linen handkerchief that he pressed to a painful area of her head. "You should sit."

She started to enquire why, merely sudden blackness rushed in, and she started to fall.

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Source: http://www.wenspencer.com/wolf-who-rules/