Sunshaker's War (37 page)

Another dozen yards—and hope suddenly bloomed in David. He could see daylight ahead, which meant they were almost out of the woods. Light sparkled suddenly on Liz's hair, and he redoubled his efforts. Alec was halfway between Fionchadd and Liz but looking back frequently, and David was hanging back, keeping one eye on the Faery, and the other on the rapidly thinning tree canopy.

Light then: the narrow open strip between the fence and the forest. Liz fell against it, panting and breathless, still clutching the squirming, hissing Calvin.

Alec made it then, and David stumbled up behind. The Faery looked almost coherent now, but as they approached the fence, his face contorted in a terrified scream, and he fell to the ground in a whimpering heap.

“Finno, what…?” David began, then stared at the fence in horror. “Oh, my God!” he exclaimed wretchedly, “the damned thing's steel! How in the world could we have been such fools?”

Fools! Fools! Fools
!—the insidious accusations in his head again.
Fools, a thousand times, to toy with Finvarra!

An exchange of glances with Alec and Liz proved they also had heard. Another glimpse of the sky showed the eagles slowly circling, as if gathering momentum to dive.

“Maybe it'll hold them off too,” Alec suggested, but his face belied his optimism.

“Maybe so,” David panted doubtfully. “But what now? Calvin's out of it, and we've still gotta get Finno over this bloody fence to get to either the house or—”

“What?”

“The car!” David exclaimed, thrusting assorted bits of gear in Alec's direction. “Quick, do what you can for just a second.”

“What?”

“Just do it! Fight 'em with your bare hands if you have to. You've got knives. Just hold on!”

“David, I—” Liz began.

But he was gone: leaping over the fence in one fluid motion, sprinting across the yard as if his cut-offs were on fire.

The beagles came out to bark, but he outran them, so they turned their attention skyward and back, bounding as a body to the fence against which Liz was pressed, while Alec tried to shield Fionchadd with his own body, and the Faery writhed and screamed in helpless anguish, crumpled to a small heap on the grassy ground.

The second fence loomed ahead, and David was over it too, though he heard fabric rip and felt pain lance into his hand where he caught it on a point of rough-cut metal.

The car, now: the Mustang-of-Death—if he had the blessed keys.

The keys! Pockets slapped fore and aft, no luck. Must have fallen out when he'd dressed so quickly back at the clearing.

However…

He popped the hood, snaked a hand under the edge of the fender cap and found his spare set, then slammed the panel closed again.

In an instant he was inside and praying the mother would start. He had to force himself to be calm; no good if he flooded the thing. Two long pats on the gas, then two short ones, clutch in, stick it in gear, turn the key and pray even more fervently to the God he suddenly wanted very much to believe in.

Vrooommmmm!

David could feel himself relax, feel the tension go out of him as one small thing went right. A check through the opposite window showed the eagles still circling, but coming lower.

And with that he used the last fragment of his time.

Gear in reverse, stomp on the gas—and tires shrieked as he slid the car around in the road.

First gear now, feet on clutch and brakes and gas as one to build up the revs, hearing the motor scream—and scream louder in company with his tires as he popped the clutch, floored the gas, and accelerated.

—Straight toward the line of fencing.

A crash laid the gate section flat and sent beagles scurrying. He hoped he wouldn't hit one.

Hand on the horn and he jerked the wheel left, toward a section of fence a little way off from his friends. Faster, then hit it and jam on the brakes and hope this time that he didn't collect a tree.

He didn't, looked right, saw thirty feet of fence tilt at an angle and his friends dodge away as the car came to rest atop the section it had just knocked down.

He leaned over, unlocked the passenger door, shoved the car into neutral, set the brake, and jumped out.

“Quick,” he yelled. “Hurry!”

Alec saw him, understood what he was about. He nudged Liz. She turned, gazed skyward—and ran.

David ran too—toward his friends. He met Liz on the way. “You drive!” he told her in passing and pounded on.

He was at Alec now, and grabbed Fionchadd's other arm. “The Fire!” the boy was screaming. “I can't stand it! Just let me die.”

Let him and
you
die:
a voice in his mind.
Give him to us and live.

“NO!” David shouted back violently, as he and Alec hustled Fionchadd along.

A glance ahead showed him that Liz had reached the car, was in the driver's seat and frantically trying to disentangle the 'possum from her T-shirt.

—And then David saw the eagles dive. Six, in formation, arrowing earthward as one, growing huger as they came until their wings seemed to fill the sky.

David ran faster, dragging Fionchadd with him in spite of his screams, in spite of the fencing they were now traversing. Alec helped as much as he could, but David could see that he was crying.

“Flip the seat!” David yelled, as they got within ten feet.

Liz did, and David put all his flagging energy into one last effort.

Beside him Alec screamed, and then they were to the car.

“Oh, God,” Liz moaned. “No, we can't do this!”

“Huh?” David shouted back, as they crammed the hysterical Fionchadd into the back seat, and David flopped in beside him. Alec slid into the front and slammed the door. Abruptly the mental harassment ended.

A thump on the roof, a dry rustle across the metal, and David heard an avian shriek and caught the odor of burning feathers. Another thump, and then something large and solid slammed into the backlight hard enough to crack the safety glass. A long, narrow gash opened right above his head.

“Gun it!”

Liz did, jamming the car into reverse and flooring the gas as she launched the car backwards across Papa Macintosh's dog lot, once more traumatizing his hounds.

A thump was the other gate, another was the curb. A scream on the roof was one of the eagles being flung loose.

Suddenly it was there before them, on the road, big as a man, and half-changed into one.

Liz stuffed the car into first, floored it again, and David saw the creature leap out of the way at the last possible instant as she tore off down the road.

Suddenly the only sound was the wailing of Ford horsepower and the wild shrieks coming from Fionchadd.

“Finno, what…?” And then David knew—
iron!
The car was iron—steel, anyway, which was just as bad—proof against folk of Faerie when in the flesh of that World, and thus also some proof against their pursuers. But likewise bane to Fionchadd. David could have kicked himself for making the same mistake twice in as many minutes. Of course in his more recent extended adventures with the Faery boy, Finno
had
worn the substance of man's world, which did allow him to touch the dreaded metal. Even in Faery shape he could endure a little, as a man could quench a candle with his fingers and not be burned. But not when he was in pain and half unconscious.

“This won't work,” David groaned. “We're gonna kill Finno if we don't get him out of here right now!” And as he looked, he saw the Faery boy's face start to blister.

“Oh, Christ, no!” from Alec, who was trying to keep tabs on the 'possum by stuffing it into one of the knapsacks.

“Stop, Liz,
now
!”

“What? And give him up? No way?”

“You'll
kill
him, girl, I said
stop
!”

“No, not yet, not till we get somewhere safe. If he can hang on just a little longer, we'll be to the strip. No way those folks'll come at us there.”

“Unless they put on men's shape and men's substance, which they can do.”

“I'm driving, David! Just hang on—and trust me!”

“Wait,” Alec interrupted. “I've got an idea. Look, Calvin's not changed back, so he's probably stuck in that shape. Finno can't stay in here much longer—just look at him—and you've gotta get him to the coast. We obviously can't go in the car, with or without those nice folks after us, so I think you guys should get the hell to Galunlati, and me and Liz…well, we'll take care of ourselves.”

“Right,” Liz chimed in.

David stared at the Faery. Fionchadd's whole face was red, and there were huge running blisters on his cheeks and brow. The unmistakable smell of burning was beginning to fill the car.

“We've still gotta stop to do the ritual.”

“No we don't,” Alec shot back smugly. And with that he grabbed a handful of the paper that littered the Mustang's carpet, crumpled it up, and stuck it on the flat rear part of the pot-metal console. An instant later, he'd pushed in the car's cigarette lighter, and when it popped out, thrust it into the wad.

“We'll have to act fast,” he told them. “Soon as it flames, in go the scales; soon as you're gone, out it goes.”

“But…”

“Here!” Alec cried, thrusting the startled 'possum into David's lap. “Hang onto this—you got your scales?”

David managed to fumble out the last three from Calvin's stash and resecured the pack while Alec fanned the smoldering flame. Liz rolled down her window—and as soon as she did, the shriek of the eagles came to them, that and the insidious threats:
no good, no good, no good.

“Hey, why don't we all go?” David asked suddenly. “Just stop the car and we'll all go.”

“'Fraid not,” Alec replied heavily, stuffing Calvin's knapsack into the space beside the 'possum. “We, uh…well, they were in your backpack, and…well, I'm afraid we left it back at the clearing. Not enough scales to get everybody where we need to go and back again, anyway. Besides
—you
guys are the ones the folks're after. Liz and I can always go back and get 'em if we get a chance.”

And then there was no more time for discussion. Smoke filled the car, making them cough. They rolled down the rest of the windows—which had the fortunate effect of fanning the creeping brown edges of the slowly heating paper.

The parcel erupted.

“Now!”
Alec shouted.

David took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and somehow thrust in three scales.

As the car filled with light, he hugged the 'possum to his chest with one hand, and clasped Fionchadd around the waist with the other.
“
Hyuntikwala Uguti—
” he started to shout, and then the car swerved, light and pain filled the world, and he could not finish.

Chapter XX: Running on Empty

(Stone Mountain, Georgia—Monday, June 16—mid-morning)

For one horrifying moment, Liz was certain she was about to commit the ultimate sin, at least as far as David was concerned: she was going to wreck his car. The Cadillac simply appeared out of nowhere: an aging Fleetwood Brougham driven by a little old lady who could barely see above the steering wheel. One second there were two clear lanes ahead, the next there were fenders everywhere. Liz had only an instant to stab the brakes, to swerve, and to floor the gas, and she was somehow around. She heard tires scream and metal scrape but did not look back, because she was crossways in front of three lanes of oncoming traffic, there were monster eagles clawing at her roof, she thought she'd just run a red-light—and the car was full of smoke from the pile of paper Alec had just ignited. And that didn't even count the fact that her main man had just vanished in a puff of that same smoke, or that Alec had that minute gone half hysterical. No, all she could think of was that if she bent David's car he'd never speak to her again.

Horns blew, she swore loudly and proficiently enough to make Alec look up; gave the woman the finger—and sped on, catching the car on its second tail-wag and stuffing it neatly into the right hand lane between a Toyota Camry and a Dodge minivan full of Borzoi. There was only one thing she knew to do: stay where people were, stay in traffic, and hope the eagles grew tired of the chase and went away. Surely with all this iron, all the confusion of civilization, they wouldn't risk betraying themselves further. She didn't know all the rules of Faerie, not by a long shot. But she did know that the Sidhe didn't like to reveal themselves in public—and there was almost nothing in the world more public than Atlanta rush hour.

“Shit! Damn! Hell,” Alec was shouting in staccato bursts as he tried to grab the flaming paper and fling it out the window. He succeeded on the fourth try, and Liz saw the fragment flop into the sidewalk, where it remained.