Landslayer's Law (24 page)

Or maybe they were all deferring to him, waiting for him to begin. Though Myra, as Scott’s lady, seemed to have taken temporary charge, he was their implicit leader, if for no other reason than because he knew the most about this particular situation.

What he
didn’t
know, however, was where Scott fit into the pattern. And so, like the rest, he listened—and waited.

“So why didn’t you call?” Myra demanded, when Scott reached the point where Mims had suggested a day-trip to Enotah County.

Scott looked chagrined. “Thought it didn’t matter. Mims was in a Godawful hurry, see—was after breakfast, anyway—so I basically had to shop on the fly and wing it. I thought we’d be back in time for me to go Trackin’ with you guys. Shoot, I
thought
I’d get to show up and spring the good news: surprise bombshell, and all. I thought,” he admitted sheepishly, peering at Myra askance, “you might actually be proud of me.”

Myra’s face clouded; she gnawed her lip. “I don’t know,” she murmured. “We’ll see. I’m not sure
what
all this means yet.”

Scott regarded her curiously. “I presume
this
refers to your, uh, precipitous arrival?”

“Tracking kinda got the best of us,” Myra acknowledged. “But we’d better not get into that yet.” She cast a furtive glance around the darkened valley.

Just hills and fields and mountains,
David tallied, as he followed her gaze.
Hills and fields and mountains I figured I could count on staying here.

Scott studied Myra a moment longer, then squared his shoulders and resumed his narrative. “Anyway…we made it to the cove, and Mims gave me the nickel tour. We were just fixin’ to leave when he got a call on his cell phone. Big meetin’ over in MacTyrie. Money folks had decided to get together at some fancy new restaurant there. I could come if I wanted, but he could tell I wasn’t crazy about the idea. ‘No big deal,’ he says—but it might take a while. I told him I had to get back to Athens. He asked why, and I couldn’t give him a reason that didn’t sound silly against an offer of a for-real good-payin’ job—I was tryin’ to do the good impression thing, see. Anyway, we compromised. I’d camp here—I wanted to get off by myself anyway, so I could really puzzle this thing out; I kinda felt like I’d been carried off on a whirlwind or something—and while I did that, he’d do his meetin’, then run me back to Athens in the mornin’. In the meantime, we raided a sportin’ goods store—God, but that man throws around cash—and here I am.”

“And here we are, too,” David echoed, pointing toward the file of ragged cedars that fronted a dark, decrepit-looking turn-of-the century farmhouse, parts of which were quickly falling to ruin. A newish house trailer perched on a low hill beside it, pale behind a long wooden deck David hadn’t seen before. Lights burned in the nearer end, promising someone still up and stirring in the living room.

“Every time I see this place, I think about
that
night,” Liz confided, drawing close.

“Don’t remind me,” Alec grumbled through a shiver that was not entirely born of another sudden blast of cool air. “That’s the worst night I ever spent. We nearly lost Dave, and…that’s when I found out about Aife.”

“Oh Christ,” Aikin groaned, smacking himself in the forehead. “Where
is
she?”

“Shit!” Alec moaned in turn. “Good question. She was in the water. But the cage….”

“Too much iron, I bet,” David mused. “Magic has trouble with that stuff.” He patted his pockets in quest of his knife, and found no sign of it.

“We’ll find ’er,” Aikin assured Alec. “Soon as we dry off, we’ll go back to the lake and look.”

David expected Alec to protest, but he simply shrugged. “Whatever. I just don’t have enough energy to care right now.”

David inspected the environs. “For those of you who haven’t been here before, this is my Uncle Dale’s place. Not the house,” he amended, nodding toward the ruined dwelling, “the trailer. I, uh, kinda messed up his old place, so we had to get him a new one. Might be a little crowded in there, too. My folks live on up the road, by the way, but…let’s just say we’re a lot better off here. Uncle Dale’s cool.”

“He’d better be,” Liz chuckled, though her face was grim. “He’s about to have a lot more on his mind than Jay Leno.”

David took a deep breath. “No offense, folks, and I guarantee there’ll be no problem, but I’d better go up solo—break the news gently, and all. You guys can hang out at the old place. I’ll retrieve you soon as the coast is clear.”

* * *

The coast cleared soon enough, but David’s favorite uncle (who, blessedly, had asked no questions—yet) quickly determined that the trailer was far too small for so expansive a gathering, so their impromptu council reconvened in the living room of his former dwelling. While Dale strove to get a fire going in the fieldstone hearth, David distributed the blankets, towels, and odd lots of clothing they’d scavenged from assorted trunks, chests, and closets of both the old man’s residences. Guys dried off in one decaying bedroom, women in its slightly more intact twin. At least the walls kept the wind out, the roof was relatively solid, and there was glass in most of the windows. When David returned to the main room a short while later, it was to find a merry blaze popping and crackling, and Dale already contriving a pot of his patented coffee-an’-’shine.

He couldn’t help smiling at the comfortable familiarity of that tableau. Dale Sullivan was in his eighties, thin and brittle-looking, with long white hair tied back in a tail. But he was ageless too, and, in a great many ways, as young as anyone present. Certainly he retained a progressive outlook and, more important at the moment, an open mind. David was desperately glad he was here; couldn’t imagine the world without him, in fact.

But he couldn’t imagine a world without Sullivan Cove, either, and that could be underwater a month from now— or worse. It was funny, really, how he’d always pictured Dale going on forever; outlasting them all, as he’d outlasted one wife and a much-beloved nephew he’d all but raised. And now, it seemed, he’d even outlast his birthplace.

If displacement didn’t kill him, as it had effectively claimed David’s great-grandpa, when the lake had drowned the original family farm.

Where had the Sidhe been then? he wondered. Probably up in their castle cheering on the TVA, since the lake meant even more protection than glamour—for them.

At which point a thought surfaced, on which he knew he had to act promptly or it’d gnaw at him the rest of the night. And since he already had too many things gnawing on him, one less would help a lot. “Back in a flash,” he told Dale and Liz, who were wiping the dust from a kitchen’s worth of abandoned coffee mugs. “Don’t say anything important without me.”

And with that he dashed outside and jogged up the ragged bit of yard to the trailer. It was unlocked—always was—and he zipped inside. It was the first time he’d been alone in what seemed like centuries, and the silence embraced him like a lover. It was warm in there, too, and homey, and things had vibrant colors, not moonlight-eerie blue/black-gold/silver hues. If he let himself go, he could fall asleep in an instant. And maybe when he awoke he’d discover this had all been a dream.

Ha!

What he was seeking up here was proof, even the tiniest bit, that what he’d experienced tonight had actually occurred. And more to the point, that there were still options—and resources—available beyond the ones he knew. Forcing himself to resist the siren call of Uncle Dale’s worn plaid rocker, he found the phone. A check of his sodden wallet produced an even more sodden address list. Fortunately, the one he needed was still legible. Snugging the receiver between his head and shoulder he dialed a number in Clayton, Georgia.

The phone rang. Once. Twice. Four times.

Someone picked up. No, dammit, it was an answering machine; David could hear the soft electric whir.

“You have reached John Devlin’s residence,”
the recording intoned, in a soft north Georgia drawl.
“I can’t come to the phone right now, but if you’ll leave your name and number, I’ll get back to you when I remember to check this thing.”

David waited a whole minute longer to be sure, then hung up in disgust. It had been a long shot anyway, and he truly didn’t know what he’d have told the man if he’d got him. Maybe just sought confirmation that the person he’d glimpsed at Lugh’s council really had been there; that the “convenient illusion” theory, at least, was inviable. Of course that would also be proof that everything else Lugh had said was true—most of it, anyway.

As for Devlin’s absence—likely he was abed in Tir-Nan-Og.

Or—the thought struck David like a blow—dead! There’d been one attack, after all; no reason there couldn’t have been others. Maybe Lugh’s palace had been alive with assassins tonight. Or maybe they hadn’t
been
assassins; maybe they were in Lugh’s employ. Or maybe, even now, Nuada was turning other surprised sleepy humans into fish, and waters all over the country were vomiting up shell-shocked, soaking wet people.

A knock on the door startled him. He glared at it even as it opened. It was Gary. “Just lookin’ for you, man,” he ventured with a lopsided smile. “Dale said to corral you so we could get this show on the road.”

David nodded wearily and joined his friend. Gary flopped an arm around his shoulders and left it there as the two of them trudged across Dale’s new deck and back down the hill. “Don’t tell a soul I said this,” Gary confided, “but I’m scared shitless by all this stuff.”

“Me too,” David confessed. And by then they’d reached the cabin.

Dale met him at the door and thrust a steaming, chipped-china mug into his hands. David almost dropped it, it was so hot, but after all the cold he’d endured lately, that was actually a relief in a way. Certainly the pain perked him up a bit, and the scent was heavenly. Dale always bought the best coffee money could buy, and the moonshine he ran off in a still whose location even David didn’t know was the best in a dozen counties. Both aromas merged in the heady steam, and David could already feel his mind clearing, even as the alcohol calmed his nerves—conditioning, he knew; he’d not even sipped the potion, though he remedied that at once.

At which point he noticed that every eye in the room was fixed on him. He grimaced and slumped down on the hearth. A skeletal sofa was the only furniture worthy of the name still in place, but a pair of mattresses had been recruited from the adjoining bedrooms, as well as a collection of cobwebby cushions. Dale cleared his throat in anticipation, and Scott looked like he was doing his best not to fidget.

“Well, Uncle Dale,” David began, “you too, Scotto— Actually, I’m not sure where all this started, but the best I can figure, it was like this….”

His cup was empty when he concluded—which surprised him, given that he scarcely recalled more than that first blessed taste. Not all of his companions had completed the story with him, however, and Gary and Darrell were all but snoring. Sandy likewise looked tired and kept jerking herself awake, where she sat neatly in a corner, resting her head on one hand.
Longer day than you figured, my girl,
David reckoned.
Bloody whole lot longer!

He took a deep breath, followed by a bogus swallow, then surveyed the assembly expectantly. “So…now that we’re all back on a level playin’ field, what do we do?”

“We—” Liz commenced, then faltered. “We see who that is on the porch,” she finished sourly, rising and padding toward it, closer than the rest.

David intercepted her—amazing, given how tired he was.

She whirled on him. “Davy, why—?”

“’Cause it could be one of them,” he snapped. “They’ve come into this World before, no reason they can’t again, good guys or bad guys, either. But they can’t get inside unless we let ’em. Screens on the door—iron screens. And—”

“Actually,” a tired voice called from without, “it is more that we are conditioned by our own hospitality.”

“Finno!” David cried, as much to Liz as to the slight figure who, now that he’d wrenched the door open, was sure enough lurking on the shattered front porch. “Come
in
,”
he appended, when the Faery hesitated.

Fionchadd actually looked…old as he slumped into the room, and his plain gray tunic bore more than its share of suspicious stains. But before David could register more than that, the Faery unfolded his arms. Something leapt from them to the dusty floor.

A cat. A very
soggy
cat, that made a beeline for Alec.

“Aife?” Alec yawned, having dozed off, to awaken to a lapful of dripping fur. “Sorry, old gal! I— Shit, I thought I’d lost you, but I was just too tired—” He stopped in mid-apology and looked around, blushing. “Sorry,” he informed his companions. “Too much goin’ on too fast; I’m not handling this very well.”

“Nobody is,” Myra assured him. “And I’d bet money Finno’s got another tale.”

David raised a quizzical brow, then, when the Faery didn’t move, motioned him to a seat on the hearth and thrust a cup of coffee into his hands as he sank down beside him.

“Hell’s broken loose in the palace,” Fionchadd announced after a long, deep swallow. “That is how you would put it, is it not?” He took another draught. “Nuada sent me,” he went on. “He said for me to protect you. He said some of our folk might come into this World and try to kill you, and for me to guard you with my life.”

David regarded him warily. “You really are
you,
right?” Fionchadd first stared, then glared at him. “Who else would I be? What right—?”

“No,” Liz cautioned. “Don’t mind him. He’s tired. We all are. We’ve had a long day and an awful night, and it’s still a long way from over. We’re glad to have you here. But you’ll have to excuse us if we’re a little bit paranoid.”

“Sorry,” David apologized, slapping the Faery on one high-booted knee. “We could spend the next hour provin’ you’re who you say you are, or we could spend it learnin’ something useful, and then figurin’ out what to do.”

Fionchadd managed a tired smile. “I know less myself than I would like. What I do know is this: I left you at your chambers and sought my own, Lugh having warned me not to linger with you until you had had time to consider among yourselves what he had revealed. I sought diversion. And then Nuada found me, told me what had transpired in your suite, and sent me here. I was opposed. There were attacks on other of Lugh’s guests. At least one succeeded. Beyond that—I know Lugh would make every effort to protect his counselors, though I doubt many humans awakened in the palace at their leisure.”