The cloak was thrown back. Whisper Who Dares the Word of Words in Darkness wore heavy boots, a thigh-length black coat of wool and leather set with steel rings. Bones hung from the rings on thin leather thongs; small ones, carpals and phalanges. A human radius swung from his waist.
Whisper's milk-white face was flattened and scarred. Something dangled from his earlobe that coiled and twisted.
Whisper and Cloud spoke to each other in Elvish, too low and quick for Doc to follow. They crossed swords. The air sang.
Doc realized they were paying no attention to him. He had no more part of this than in the war between wind and mountains.
Cloudhunter cut, and cut, and cut, and some of Whisper's bones clattered to the floor. Whisper didn't seem to have touched Cloud. Doc took a step away, wanting to go for someone else, McCain, Patrise, Rico and Linn, any kind of backup, yet not wanting to leave Cloud. He took another step back, and collided with something rubbery and cold and wet. His guts turned over. He turned.
There was nothing there: just air like gelatin. It distorted the hallway; somewhere down there were Patrise and the others.
Steel scraped. "Doc!" Cloud shouted. Doc turned. Whisper and Cloud stood a little apart, swords leveled. W r hisper had a hand to his throat, as if he had been wounded there. Then his arm snapped straight toward Doc. Doc tried to dodge, but the gluey air held him.
Cloud moved. His sword swept down. The creature that had been at W 7 hisper's ear struck the floor in two scratching and writhing pieces.
Whisper lunged at Cloud's back. Cloud stepped aside easily, swung again, severing Whisper's sword in the middle of the blade.
The swordhilt vanished into Whisper's cloak. Whisper took a step to the side, toward Doc. Cloud blocked him. Step, block. Step, block. Whisper snarled something in Elvish; Doc caught the word "dishonor," but he knew that the word had infinite shadings; it could not be understood out of context.
Cloudhunter cut again. The long bone on Whisper's clothing leaped and clubbed it aside. Whisper spun a butterfly knife into his hand, sliced at Cloud's arm, connecting. Cloud spat a few words, swept an arm, and knocked the knife away. He forced Whisper back with his sword. Whisper said something with "death" in it.
Cloud replied; "dishonor" was in it twice.
Whisper folded his cloak about himself, seemed to lose a foot of height. He backed away rapidly. Cloudhunter stood his ground. When Whisper was a dozen yards away, Cloud turned. "Doc," he said, "tell the others-"
Whisper had drawn a shotgun from beneath his cloak. Before Doc could speak, he fired. The blast ripped into Cloud's flank. He turned around. Whisper fired again, into Cloud's chest, and again.
Cloudhunter stayed on his feet. He raised his sword, pointed it at Whisper Who Dares, spoke a phrase in something that wasn't Ellytha; whatever the words meant, the voice pulled and tore like a dull razor over the skin.
Whisper fled.
The air was suddenly thin again, and Doc stumbled. Cloudhunter turned, and fell. Doc gathered balance and ran to him. He shouted "Patrise/" as loud as he possibly could, and knelt by Cloud, opening his bag, spreading Cloud's jacket. The wounds were awfuclass="underline" a load of tight-choked shot and two solid slugs, son of a goddamn bitch. Sponges, he thought. Pressure bandages. He had one unit of IV D-five in his bag, a couple more in the car.
Cloud's silver eyes were wide, staring straight up. His hands went blindly to his throat, unwound the blue Nancy-silk scarf. "Calm down. Cloud," Doc said, "don't move."
Cloud hung the scarf around Doc's neck. His arms dropped away.
Doc was aware that other people had come in. Without looking up, he said, "Can anybody here start an IV?"
Patrise's voice said, "Where is Whisper?"
Doc gestured with his head. "That way." More pressure. Clamp the bleeder. Tape.
Patrise said, "Lincoln. Katherine. See if you can follow the trail. No friendly casualties, understand?" He leaned on his stick, lowered himself to his knees. "What can we do. Hallow?"
"You got a trauma team in your pocket?" Doc said. "How about an intensive care unit?"
"We can get them."
Tie off. Bleeders every damn where. "Do it quick," Doc said, and then realized what he was laying. More pain, more cruelty, wasn't going to help anything. What they needed was-then it clicked. "Katie!"
The woman stopped on her way down the hall, gun and knife out. McCain turned as well.
Doc said, "You told me your father was a bloodstopper. That he showed you."
"Yeah, but I never…"
"You gotta try."
Mr. Patrise said, "Come here, Katherine. Lincoln, do not go on alone. Get Rudy. Or the two detectives, if they're not busy. " McCain nodded. Patrise said to Doc, quietly, "What is a bloodstopper?"
"Folklore," Doc said, breathing hard. He tried to explain, as he kept up the pressure on Cloudhunter's wounds.
Katie set her gun down, bent over Cloud. "I just don't know."
Mr. Patrise said, "I believe you can, Katherine."
She closed her eyes, tensed. "Seisote vert" she said, "Seisote verir
Cloudhunter heaved, gave a sigh that pulled tears into Doc's eyes. The hemorrhaging stopped as if a valve had been turned. Doc sponged again, groped in his bag for the IV set, knowing it was still hopeless.
No. Not hopeless. Not hopeless. If they can crawl to Elfland — "I can't do anything more here. If I can get him up to Division, maybe-"
Stagger said, "They'll never let you through."
Patrise said, "Try."
Stagger and Katie helped load Cloud into the Triumph. He made no sound. Doc unstoppered a vial of fairy dust, scattered it on the wounds, touched it to Cloud's lips. Cloud breathed it in. His face grew luminous, relaxed a bit. Doc pulled out of the alley and turned north. Away toward the lake, there was a hint of false dawn.
Pedal to the floor, Doc drove toward Division. He ran out of gears and kept pushing: he could always mend the engine, or Jesse could, or there would be other engines, other cars. He drove until the buildings to either side squeezed up and bent over before him, until the light turned purple ahead and red behind and the clocks ticked slow, and still Division stayed ahead. He thought he was seeing the same windows and doors and traffic lights pass again and again, like a chase in a cartoon; and then suddenly the road was broad and black and glossy, like the marble floor of his bathroom back halfway to the World. Ahead there was a vast Gothic gateway flanked by stone griffins. Elves stood all around it. Through the gateway was-nothing. Xot darkness, not any kind of door or wall. just a dully luminous grayness, the color of a fainting spell.
Doc pointed the car at it. She hummed, skidded just a little; Doc doubled her down, gripped the wheel and Cloudhunter's wrist And stopped, without sound, effort, or inertia; the car was simply standing still, engine idling cool, five yards in front of the gateway.
Cloudhunter breathed in audibly. That was all. His eyes were open but seemed to see nothing. Or maybe silver eyes could see through the blind spot.
Doc blasted the horn of the Triumph at the gates of Elfland.
Most of the elves seemed to be ignoring them. A few were looking on and the fuckers were smirking.
Doc opened his door, yelled at the nearest elf. "Let me through, dammit! I've got one of your people here, and he's dyingV"
"The mortal knows he may not pass," one of the elves said, "or else the mortal is a fool." The timbre was metallic; it scraped Doc's nerves. This is how they talk, he thought, when they're not talking to us.
"Then take him through! He's not stable here-dying, do you understand that?" Do you fucking know what that is? he thought.
"Gwaed gwir takes this risk beyond homelands," the inhuman voice said. "It is a risk honorably borne, honorably lost."
Another elf voice, a little milder than the first, said, "If the Trueblood wishes to pass through, then aye he may."