Sara shook her head, then turned her back on him, grateful for the falling rain. Ted Halliwell’s little girl didn’t cry. At least not where anyone could see her.
Jackson said her name again. She heard him take a couple of steps toward her, then other footsteps, softer.
“I’m sorry, Miss Halliwell,” Robiquet said, his words gentle as the rain. “There are other Doors, but I fear that whatever is happening on the other side of the Veil, they will all be blocked, now. If you need me, for anything, you’ll find me at the Bascombe house. I never should have left. I owed them more than that. There’s a great deal of business to be dealt with at the house and with Max’s law firm. I need to protect Oliver and Collette’s interests for when they come home.”
Sara frowned deeply. Cold rain ran down the back of her neck, under her collar. She could feel Jackson and Robiquet there behind her but decided not to worry about her tears. The rain would hide them.
“You really think they’re coming home?” she asked, almost afraid of the answer. How could she lose faith if the fussy little goblin still believed?
She turned to find that, somehow, Robiquet was gone.
Sara and Sheriff Norris stared at the place where he’d been standing a moment before as rain spattered the bridge.
After a moment, Jackson led her back to the car. In silence, she climbed in beside him, wishing she had somewhere to go besides her father’s house. Wishing she had someone to go home to.
It was time. Tonight, she would call her mother, and then the airport. She had left a life behind her in Atlanta, way back in December. She only hoped it was still there, waiting.
The first horn blew just as the burning corona of the sun peeked above the eastern horizon. Immediately it was joined by a chorus of others as the army of Euphrasia sent a signal through the ranks, from one battalion to the next, that the enemy approached.
King Hunyadi stepped from his tent, already clad in the leather armor that had been fashioned for his grandfather in times long forgotten. His father’s sword hung at his hip. As a young warrior, he’d had another sword, a gift from the man who’d taught him combat, but he had given it over years ago as a symbol of his trust in a man named David Koenig, who in turn had eventually passed it to Oliver Bascombe.
The sword had been used to kill the king of Yucatazca. Whose hand grasped it now was a question Hunyadi did not wish to entertain.
His army rose up in a wave. Shouts carried up the hill. The thunder of hooves filled the air as the cavalry mounted their horses. In the strange light of sunrise, Hunyadi saw flaming arrows arcing high into the air above the front lines where Commander Alborg’s third battalion was dug in.
The fiery arrows struck octopuses that floated over the trenches and the flames began to spread. An eerie, inhuman scream traveled all the way up the hill to where the king stood.
Thomas, a page who’d served him throughout this campaign, ran to him, eyes wide with fear.
“My mount, boy. Fetch the horse!” Hunyadi snapped.
All apologies, Thomas ran to do as he’d been bid.
Hunyadi saw a dark shape slinking across the sky and looked up. Alarmed, he drew his sword and ran downhill toward the place where an awning had been set up as a field hospital in preparation for wounded. The king shouted for them to take cover.
The air shark slid down as though it had been hunting for him. Which, of course, was precisely what the creature had been doing. The Atlanteans had sent the monster to kill him, and others would be coming as well.
Hunyadi barely noticed the little blue bird that darted across the morning sky until it changed. High overhead, the bird changed shape. With a flap of its wings it metamorphosed into a man, dancing and whirling in the air. Beneath Blue Jay’s arms there remained the blur of mystical wings.
“Welcome back,” the king whispered, even as Blue Jay spun, fifty feet off the ground, and cut the shark in half with a single slice of his razor-sharp wings.
The page, Thomas, ran toward the king, holding the bridle of his horse.
Blue Jay descended, turning and stepping on the air as though in the midst of some kind of ritual, until he alighted upon the ground. His expression was grim but his eyes were bright with mischief.
The trickster bowed. “At your service, Majesty.”
“Cutting it a little close, aren’t you, my friend?” Hunyadi asked.
Blue Jay nodded. “Not by choice. The important thing is, we’re here. I’ve got reinforcements for you, John. Gods and monsters and Borderkind as well. And Oliver Bascombe.”
Hunyadi clapped him on the shoulder. “I knew you’d do it, Jay. Go, my friend, and bring them here. Right away. We’ve a war to fight.”
The king turned to the page. “You, boy, run as fast as you’re able. Bring Frost of the Borderkind here to me, and the Wayfarer as well.” He paused and glanced at Blue Jay. “Send a runner to Commander Beck. I’ll want her here. And summon the Legend-Born to me at once. Go, now!”
Grinning, the boy ran.
“Legend-Born?” Blue Jay asked. “Frost and Collette are here with you?”
Hunyadi nodded. “Oh, we’ve a hell of an army now, Jay. Atlantis has no idea what it’s begun.”
CHAPTER 18
It didn’t sound like any war Oliver could imagine. From time to time he heard the pop of a gunshot, but guns were so rare in the legendary world that those sounds were few and far between. The rest was thunder. Axes and swords and fists and the pounding of booted feet. Crackling noises and the rush of air blotted out other sounds from time to time, but those came from the spells of sorcerers, not cannons or rocket launchers.
All his life he’d wished for magic, but never for this.
With Julianna at his side, Oliver hurried up the hill amidst tents now abandoned by the soldiers who had camped there. Aides and runners and a handful of officers and advisors still rushed around, but the army had risen as one and gone to battle. Riders on horseback carried messages back and forth to the front lines. Legends flew overhead-some perhaps Borderkind, others surely not-but they drew no line between themselves and the Lost Ones of Euphrasia. The war involved them all.
Blue Jay climbed the hill ahead of them, effortlessly moving upward as though what he really wanted was to fly. The feathers in his hair danced as he moved.
“What about the others?” Julianna asked him. “The Harvest gods, and the ones who came with Kitsune?”
“Kit and Konigen are working that out. But none of us is going anywhere until we get orders from the king,” the trickster said.
Oliver saw the irony. “I never thought of you as much for taking orders.”
Blue Jay glanced over his shoulder, tall grass parting as he passed. “Another thing I owe the Atlanteans for. When it’s all over, I’ll make plenty of mischief. For now…”
The sounds of war carried to them up the hill, the area around the head of the Isthmus a natural theater. The acoustics sent a chill through Oliver. Their view of the ocean unnerved him. Normally the sight soothed him and it seemed somehow abominable to have a war on the shore. The ocean ought to have meant peace and tranquility.
“This is creeping me out,” Julianna said.
“Hell, yeah,” Oliver said, glancing at her as they labored up the hill. “Of course it is.”
“I don’t just mean the war. It’s being up here, after they’ve all taken off. Like we’ve been left behind on purpose, cheese baiting the trap.”
Oliver frowned. “This isn’t-”
“I know.” She waved his protest away. “But I’d feel safer down there with all the people who have weapons.”
Even as she said it, they came around a tent and saw a larger one. Six riders sat atop their horses around the tent and a couple of dozen others were spread out at the top of the hill. Two massive ogres with twisted features and carrying war hammers stood on either side of the tent’s entrance. In the air, robed in dark green, a trio of Mazikeen floated over the tent.