Black Lament
Page 20

“Do you want to get back home to the TV and the popcorn?” I asked.
“Fine, fine,” Beezle said. “Have it your way.”
“Look—they’re staying above the trees for now. So let’s try to get as far as we can under the canopy. They make so much noise they should be easy to hear if they approach,” I said.
Nathaniel nodded and Beezle squeezed my shoulder with his claws.
“I take it that you’re riding?” I asked Beezle.
“I’m not built for evasive maneuvers,” Beezle said.
“You left yourself wide-open there, but I’m not going to take advantage on account of the fact that we’re in mortal peril,” I said.
Nathaniel and I flew quickly and quietly toward the path. The branches of the trees arched over the path and left plenty of room beneath to fly between the two sides. The trolls were still above, roaring at one another.
“We’re always in mortal peril, so if you’re going to have scruples about things like that, you’re not going to be able to keep up with me,” Beezle said.
“If that’s the case,” I started, but I never had the chance to finish.
Something wrapped around my waist and yanked me backward, out of the air.
Beezle cried out as the impact caused him to lose his grip on my shoulder.
A moment later I slammed against the bark of a tree, and looked down to realize that one of the tree’s branches had wound around me. Another branch quickly wrapped around my ankles. Across the path, Nathaniel had also been captured by the trees. The trees began to shake, almost like they were trying to communicate with the trolls.
“Oh, no,” I said, annoyed. “I know what to do with you.”
My hands were bound tight against my sides by the branch, but I could still wiggle my fingers. Which meant that I could send a blast of fire scorching down the bark of the tree.
The tree loosened its grip on me for a moment. I laid both my hands against the branch and gave it a good solid blast until it ignited.
It let me go and I plummeted toward the ground for a moment until I could get my bearings and start flying again. The air quickly filled with smoke.
“Why don’t you just wave at the trolls and say, ‘Hey, I’m over here’?” Beezle said conversationally as he reattached himself to my shoulder.
“Should I have let the tree crush me to death?” I asked, flying toward Nathaniel.
He’d blasted his tree with fire as well. That meant that we were both free. For the moment, anyway. The trees were looking very ominous all of a sudden. The two trees that had caught fire were waving their branches around in distress.
“I don’t think we should stay under the cover of the trees anymore,” Beezle said.
“I concur,” Nathaniel said.
“If we go up, we’re going to get chased by trolls,” I said.
“There are only two trolls and a whole lot of trees,” Beezle said. “Let’s take our chances.”
Up above the monsters paused, their giant wings flapping. One of the creatures shouted at the other, which headed away toward the direction of the hill.
“Maybe it went to get water to put out the trees,” I said.
“Maybe it went to get the rest of its family,” Beezle said.
“Okay,” I said, and we went up through the canopy.
The trees slashed and grabbed at us, but I kept a steady stream of fire coming so that they couldn’t get a good hold. A few moments later we were through the top.
The troll was waiting for us, of course.
I blasted it full in the face with nightfire, and the spell bounced off the troll’s skin and careened into the trees, setting some more leaves on fire.
“Oh, yeah, I forgot about that,” Beezle said. “Trolls are immune to magic spells.”
“Are you kidding me?” I shouted. “You couldn’t have remembered this earlier?”
“We will have to try to outrun it,” Nathaniel said grimly.
The troll swooped toward us, its mouth open. It looked ready to scoop us out of the air with its tongue and swallow us whole.
I waited until it was so close that I could smell the stink of its breath, and then I dropped rapidly, straight down. Nathaniel chose to go up, and the troll stopped for a moment, seemingly unsure of what had just happened.
I shot straight up again, sword drawn, aiming for the troll’s belly. The blade struck true, piercing the creature’s abdomen. A gush of fluid poured from the wound, coating Beezle and me. I ignored Beezle’s howls and kept a secure grip on the sword, flying toward the creature’s back legs. All the while I pulled the sword through, until I’d run a nice neat line through the center of the monster.
More goop poured out, and some large gray things that might have been organs. I yanked the sword out and got out of the way just in time.
The troll plummeted toward the burning forest, crashing into the trees, tearing branches as it fell to earth.
I hung in the air for a moment, panting from exertion. Nathaniel approached us, a look of concern on his face, and then he stopped when he got close. I couldn’t blame him. We smelled like troll guts.
“That was utterly disgusting,” Beezle said, wiping at his eyes with his little fists. “You couldn’t find a less gooey way to kill the thing?”
“You were the one who said it was impervious to magic,” I said. “Let’s get out of here before the other one comes back.”
The forest below us swayed, and the angry clatter of branches told us that heading back to the ground wasn’t an option. Some more trees had ignited, and it seemed like the whole place was on the verge of a full-on conflagration.
“We will have to fly to the edge of the forest,” Nathaniel said.
All three of us looked ahead. The trees appeared to stretch on forever.
“It’s got to end sometime,” I said with a hope I didn’t feel.
We started off, flying as quickly as possible, always checking behind us for signs of the other troll.
I don’t know how long we flew, but there was no break in the endless expanse of treetops. After a while Beezle started complaining.
“I’m hungry,” he said.
“How can you even think about food when you smell like that?” I asked.
“My beak has gone numb, and it’s been hours since I’ve eaten anything,” he said.
“That’s not true,” I said. “You had your face in a bag of chips while I was out trying to find Jayne Wiskowski’s soul, and you just ate the world’s biggest ice cream bar.”
“But it’s been a really long time since then,” Beezle whined.
“How long has it been?” I asked Nathaniel. I’d left the house without my cell phone, and I didn’t own a watch.
“It’s difficult to say. I know it only seemed like a few moments that we traveled with Lord Lucifer, but it could have been hours. Time moves differently for him,” Nathaniel said.
“Well, we can’t eat anything here,” I said to Beezle. “So you’re just going to have to suck it up.”
My own stomach growled uncomfortably, and I desperately wanted a shower. But neither of those things would be forthcoming until we got out of this stupid country, and it seemed like we would never get to Titania and Oberon’s court.
Then I looked down and saw the edge of the tree line and, about half a mile beyond, a little cabin beside a lake.
“Thank the Morningstar,” I said, and started to descend toward the ground.
I was exhausted. I didn’t often do a lot of long-distance flying, and the unfamiliar exercise plus the constant fatigue of pregnancy had worn me down.
“Wait,” Nathaniel said, grabbing my shoulder. “We don’t know if there are friends or foes in that place.”
“I don’t care,” I said. “I need to set down for a while or I’ll never make it.”
“Yeah, and I’m going to jump in that lake and wash all over,” Beezle said.
“Let me investigate first,” Nathaniel urged.
I could see the wisdom of this, so I nodded, hanging in the air while he went to the ground to check things out.
Nathaniel covered himself with a veil, and disappeared from sight.
I couldn’t see what he was doing, but no alarm was raised by his actions, and after a few moments he reappeared in front of the cabin, waving us to the ground.
“Bath time!” Beezle shouted, and dove for the lake.
I followed more slowly. By the time I’d reached the ground Beezle had cannonballed into the pool of water and was happily splashing around like a puppy.
“Any sign of who might live here?” I asked Nathaniel.
He shook his head. “The cabin is empty.”
I went to the window and peeked inside. There was a fire roaring in the fireplace, a pile of soft-looking furs on the floor before it. Steam rose from a silver bathtub in the corner of the room.
“Did you set all that up?” I asked Nathaniel.
He blinked. “Set what up?”
“The bath and the fire and all that,” I said.
“There is no bath or fire,” he said. “The cabin is bare of furniture or any sign that anyone might have ever lived here.”
I looked back in the window. The tub and the fire and rug were still there.
“Either I’m hallucinating or there’s something screwy going on here,” I said. “You don’t see anything inside there at all?”
Nathaniel shook his head, a line forming between his eyebrows. “If you do, then there must be some magic here to lure you, and we should leave.”
The cabin looked comfortable and inviting, as I’m sure it was meant to do. Especially if one was covered in dried troll slime and totally wiped out from a long-distance flight.
“Let’s ask Beezle to take a look,” I said. “Beezle!”
Beezle was floating on his back near the shore of the lake, his round belly pointed toward the sun. “What?”
“Come over here and look at something for me,” I said.