SWNOVELS Chapter Chapter Forty-Two
For what seemed ages Nick sat stooped over on his knees, ignoring the pine needles pricking his joints and trying to ignore the agony in his shoulder and the throbbing ache in the right side of his face. Blood dripped and stained his clothes. He reached up, wrapped a hand around the bone-grip of the knife poking out of his shoulder, and yanked.
“Ahhheee,” he gasped and lurched forward onto his palms.
The blade was coated in his blood—and now a fresh application of mud. Considering the way this night was going, Nick was disinclined to discard the athame; he wiped it on a section of clean shirt and slid into its scabbard on his belt. Then he put pressure on the shoulder wound.
Behind him came the brush-crushing sounds of someone crashing through the forest.
He didn’t have much time. Either the trolls had sniffed him out, or the warlocks had seen him fleeing this way. Neither option provided reason to linger.
While attempting to close off the parts of his mind attuned to the pain, Nick dug into his pouch, and came up with the lock of green hair he’d stolen from that leprechaun back at Agravaine’s place. Using a stick, he swiftly drew a Circle in the dirt, trisected it with the appropriate sigils (thank you Bruno for making me study so hard in Symbols and Sigils), and then laid both hands in the designated areas, imbuing it with a portion of his energy and will. When this was done Nick struggled to a standing position, glanced back at the sound of a branch cracking, and cast the hair into the Circle. The incantation was of his own devising; that was one of the benefits of combining the Law of Evocation with the Law of Attraction: If you put out the appropriate energy and visualized precisely what you wished to evoke, you were free to use the Words that suited you best.
Another branch snapped. Whoever was on his tail was getting closer.
“I call forth Lint the leprechaun!” Nick mouthed, eyes closed, Sight extended.
A pop as the air pressure suddenly shifted. The leprechaun spun around within the Circle until its eyes landed on Nick.
“You!” it accused.
With his senses hyper-attuned to the world around him, Nick perceived the threat a bare moment before the warlock struck. He ducked, drew his blade, and swiped it through the air. It caught, snagged on boiled leather. Nick reared back, yanking the blade free and avoiding a flying fist. He twisted right, ducked left, thrust forward with his good arm. The blade penetrated leather. A satisfying shout of pain ensued and Nick backtracked several feet.
Only then did he open his eyes.
“Arthur?” Nick said, agog. “What are you doing here?” He tried not to notice the blood trickling out from between the young warlock’s fingers as the boy clutched at his arm.
“They said they were going to take you, dead or alive,” Arthur said in a moan. He was on the ground now, though his wound did not look life threatening. “So when we got outside and the trolls attacked us, I noticed you running this way. I figured if I got to you first, maybe I could subdue you and help you. Nick, tell me you had good reason to do what you did.”
“I had good reason,” Nick said, not entirely sure how good his reason was anymore. He looked at Lint, still stuck in the Circle, and staring with arms crossed at the two wizards. Nick walked over to the leprechaun. Twice he nearly fell on his face from loss of blood.
“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” Arthur realized.
Nick stopped beside the Circle, looked over at his peer. “There’s someone I need to meet.” He took out the wand.
“Hey,” Arthur said. “Is it fun?” he asked, grinning stupidly at the Wizarding Anti-Nemesis Device in Nick’s hand.
Nick looked down at it. A smile crept over his face, despite his best intentions. “Oh yeah.”
He then stepped into the magic Circle beside Lint. Without bothering to lower his voice or hide his destination, he said, “Take me to Thirteen, Twenty-First Street, in Philicity.”
“Are you barmy?” Lint scowled. “I can’t just go trekking across a new land I never done been to. We might end up in a tree or some shite!”
“There aren’t many trees in Philicity,” Nick assured him. “Just do it. I trust you.” He cast one last glance over at Arthur Penrose. The young warlock now knew where Nick was headed. But it didn’t matter; by the time they reached him, he’d either be gone, or dead.
“Let go my hand, bloody spellslinger,” Lint snapped, shaking Nick’s grip. “I ain’t taking yer bucky arse, so forget it.”
Movement from down the hill. Nick could see the smaller trees shaking, limbs snapping and leaves flying as someone or something charged through them. Could the warlocks have vanquished the horde? Without the wand it didn’t seem likely.
“Take us there now,” Nick ordered the leprechaun.
“No!” Lint fought to escape, but he couldn’t leave the Circle except by trekking, and he couldn’t trek without taking Nick with him, as the boy had him by the arm.
The approaching trouble was getting louder. It seemed unlikely a warlock would make such a ruckus—
An arm circled his throat from behind, large and powerful and disgustingly hairy.
“You still have much to learn, boy,” Harlan hissed in Nick’s ear.
Duchaine appeared behind Arthur. He’d bandaged his knee and found a crutch, but had a number a fresh cuts, gashes and bruises. The stang in his hand was coated with troll gak. The big man shook his head sadly, looking at Nick as if he didn’t even know him.
Harlan tightened his grip when Nick tried to wriggle away. “Ah-ah, boy, you ain’t going nowhere—except to the dungeons, where sorcerers belong.”
“I hope you have room down there for all of you, too,” Nick said, his voice sounding strangled due to the arm pressing on his windpipe. “Because if you do manage to make more wands, you’ll need sorcery to use them.”
“Bull crap!”
“You don’t believe me?” Nick gasped. “Just ask Duchaine, he knows.”
“What’s he talking about?” Harlan snarled at the bigger warlock.
As Nick had hoped, in his distraction Harlan loosened his grip, affording Nick the opportunity to use a Command. He peered down into Lint’s dark eyes. “Take us there now!”
Unable to resist, the leprechaun scowled, waved his free hand before him and, together with both Nick and Harlan, vanished.
The world dissipated in frantic impressions as they were bombarded with new colors, sights, sounds, and different air pressure. They’d trekked to the gate at the edge of the Preserve, Lint being unable to cross the ward. In his disorientation, Harlan relinquished his hold on Nick. Without hesitation Nick disarmed the guardian Mages here, opened the gate, and dragged Lint along to the other side of the ward as fast as he could.
“Now, take us to Philicity,” Nick Commanded.
Just as Lint was performing the leprechaun ritual to trek (grumbling and cursing the while), Harlan leapt forward and latched onto Nick. Together the three of them vanished.
Philicity was several hundred feet lower in sea level. The sudden increase in pressure nearly knocked Nick out; as it was he plummeted from the air a few feet, landing awkwardly on hands and knees. Leprechauns possess an incredible sense of location, but even so, moving from the heights of the Adirondack Mountains to the basin of western New York had apparently discombobulated the little guy.
Harlan was slow getting to his feet. Nick, though injured and fatigued and disoriented, had been expecting the trek, so he recovered quicker than the older warlock. He slammed the pommel of his athame against the man’s head when Harlan was wiping sick from his mouth.
Like a bag of rocks the man dropped.
It was dark here on 21st Street, but the arc lamps provided more light than the forest they’d just come from. Nick surveyed their surroundings. As far as he could tell no one was peeking through their windows.
“Okay,” Nick said, still panting. “Take him away from here and then come back. I don’t care where you drop him off, just make sure it’s far away—” He stopped. A complete three-sixty search revealed the uncomfortable fact that Lint had already trekked away.
Nick glanced down at the body in the street. He threw his hands in the air and then dropped them. “Nice kerfuffle you’ve gotten yourself into here, Nick. Now what are you going to do, genius?”
It seemed they were in a cul-de-sac, and from here, during flashes of heat lightning, Nick could see the central towers piercing the skyline. The weather phenomenon was bizarre this time of year, but as a New Yorker, Nick was not entirely surprised. At least the rain had not yet hit the city. Of the houses in this cul-de-sac, only one had its porch light on: number 13.
After looking down at Harlan one final time to make sure he was breathing, Nick trudged up the driveway. It would all be over soon enough anyhow. No reason to worry about Harlan; by the time someone noticed him and called the police, Nick’s Plan would be complete.
He made his slow way up the driveway, alternately clutching his throbbing shoulder and massaging his aching face. It was strange, almost, to see the lights of the city after so many months of living in a brutch. Almost like looking at a different world.
The porch stairs were constructed of concrete, and so they didn’t make a sound as he climbed them to the columned porch. He marched up to the large red door.
Nothing.
Nick had been half expecting to encounter a ward, or maybe a trap door to give way beneath his feet. Peering closer, he observed faint sigils and glyphs carved into the oak surface of the door. He didn’t recognize a single one.
One last look out at the night, at the man lying on the street, at his past, saying bye-bye sucka, and then he pounded three times on the door.
Blood smeared on the surface of the wood, coating one of the glyphs.
Nick didn’t bother wiping it off—
“It’s open,” a voice, old and perfectly clear, said.
Bloody hand grabbed the doorknob. It turned. Nick shoved and the door swung open, revealing an airy foyer and a spindle-railed set of stairs to the left leading to the second floor. Straight ahead the polished wood floor shone smooth and solid; probably no trap door there.
Nick took one cautious step inside, then another. As he crossed the threshold, the world twitched; colors modified themselves ever so slightly; smells changed, and even gravity itself felt, somehow, different. As soon as he was clear, the door slammed shut, startling him.
Over the sound of his heart pounding in his ears, Nick heard the voice again, coming—it seemed—from inside his head: “It’s good to see you again, Nick Hammond. I’ve been expecting you.”