Wolf Who Rules

Chapter 12: Tears On Stone

At first glance, Turtle Creek seemed the same to Tinker. Sunlight shafted through the discontinuity in rays of blue. Mist rising off the chill gathered into banks of blue haze and then drifted out of the valley, existing momentarily as white clouds, before burning away in the summer heat. True, royal troops showed up as splashes of Fire Clan red — thus the lifting of the ban on Turtle Creek — but otherwise nothing seemed to have changed. It remained one big hole in reality.

Tinker led her Hand down into the valley to where they’d marked the trees. The first sapling they found had nine slashes into its bark — which should have meant it would be nine feet from the edge of the discontinuity.

“That looks only five feet to me.” Tinker fingered the mark, wondering if someone might have added slashes after they left.

“Barely five.” Pony pointed at the next tree along the edge of the blue.

The tree was marked with seven slashes but the blue came almost to its roots.

“This is bad.” Tinker murmured.

“Domi.” Pony had moved on ahead and pointed now at a tree inside the effect.

She joined him at the edge of the blue; there were four slashes in bark of the ghostly tree. “Shit, the discontinuity has grown. How is that possible?” She motioned to the sekasha that they were leaving.

“Now what?” Stormsong asked.

“I’m going to need some equipment, then we’re coming back.”

Tinker scanned her camera with an infrared attachment over the valley, watching the screen on her workpad instead of looking through the eyepiece. In one window, the video feed showed the thermal picture, and in other windows, programs reduced the images into mathematical models. At the center of the Ghostlands, she spotted a familiar circle.

“Something wrong, domi?” Pony asked.

She realized that she had gasped at her discovery. “Oh — this here — this looks like our gate. See, here is the ironwood ring and here is the ramp over the threshold.”

“It is lying on its side?”

“Yes. The current probably toppled it, though I’m not sure what is causing the current. It might be simple” — her Elvish failed her. Did they have a word for convection? “Heat rises and cold falls. Basic science. It’s what makes the winds blow. I think this is the same thing on a micro-scale — like a pot boiling.”

“Why not like a pond freezing?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps because there’s a pool of magic below this, heating the bottom, but it’s losing massive amounts of energy before it hits the surface — thus the reason for the cold.”

“Ah.” Pony nodded like he understood.

“Do you see this point here? Right where the gate is lying. Can you shoot this arrow to that point?”

“With the line and weight attached?”

“Yes.”

Pony considered for a moment. “Stormsong would be better.”

Among the sekasha, Pony was considered the better archer. Her surprise must have shown as Pony waved over Stormsong and explained what Tinker wanted.

“When I have to make a shot, I do it with my eyes closed,” Stormsong said. “I see where the arrow needs to be.”

“Ooookay.” Tinker handed her the end of the line.

Stormsong attached the line to an arrow, nocked it in her compound bow, pulled taut the string and closed her eyes. For a moment she stood there, aiming blind, and then let loose the bowstring. The arrow soared straight and true as if it had nothing weighing it down, nor trailing behind. The reel whizzed as the line snaked out after the arrow, the numbers on the meter blurring as they counted up the feet. Near the point Tinker wanted, but not exactly, the arrow shot into the ghost ground of the discontinuity. It appeared on Tinker’s screen as a dot of red heat compared to the artic cold of the land, too far to the right. The reel fell quiet and the line ran taut out into the discontinuity.

Tinker sighed. “Close enough for horseshoes and discontinuities.”

“It’s where it has to be,” Stormsong defended her shot.

“I’m trying to see how deep the discontinuity runs. I figure it is deepest at the gate — it’s close enough for that.”

Tinker clicked on her mouse and meter fed its number into the computer: 100 yards. Already the arrow chilled to blue, blending into the rest of chilled landscape.

“Why does it matter how deep it is?” Pony asked as the reel started to click out as the arrow sank.

Tinker shrugged. “Because I don’t know what else to do at the moment. I’m just fiddling around, poking at it until something comes to me.”

“Will not the current effect this measurement?” Pony asked.

“Oh, damn.” She muttered in English, and then dropped back to low Elvish. “Yes, it will.” He was right. There was no way to know what was drift and what was the weighted end sinking. “I’ll have to measure the drift and correct the measurements.”

At least it gave her an excuse to reel in the arrow and try again to thread it through the heart of the gate. She flipped on the winch. The slack reeled in quickly but then the line went taut, and the winch slowed.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Tinker said.

“What is it, domi?” Pony asked.

“The arrow hit something.”

“The arrow went where it was needed.” Stormsong repeated.

There was times Tinker really hated Elfhome — magic screwed with everything. “I didn’t think anything would be solid enough to catch on the line.”

“The line is solid.”

“Yes, it is.” She gasped as implications dawned on her. “Pony, you’re a genius. The line is solid.”

“I can not be that smart, domi, because I do not understand why that excites you.”

“Well, it is an important observation. An object from this reality stays in this reality even after sinking into the discontinuity.”

“How is this important?”

“I do not know, but it is something I did not know before.”

“Ah. I see.”

The object appeared on the thermal scan, an oddly shaped mass of slightly lighter blue. By the naked eye, she could make out a boil of disturbance beyond the where the line cut into the earth, creating a sharp v-shaped wake.

“It is big, whatever it is,” Tinker said.

Pony unsheathed his sword.

“I doubt if it is anything living.” Tinker backed up regardless. Gods knows what she was dragging in from between realities. “It is at — at…” she had to teach Pony English or learn more Elvish. What was Elvish for absolute zero? “It is frozen.”

The thing hit shore. For a moment she thought it was a large turtle, and then line kept reeling, rolling it. Long fingered webbed hands and a vaguely human-looking face heaved out of the earth, rimmed with frost.

“Oh gods!” Tinker leapt back and the other sekasha drew their swords. The reel protested the sudden heavy load as the frozen body hit solid earth, the line vibrating. She killed the power before the line could snap. “Don’t touch it!”

“I think it is dead.” Pony had his sword at its throat just in case.

“The cold itself is dangerous. Don’t touch it directly, but get it out.”

Tinker kept her distance. The sekasha looped straps carefully around the outstretched limbs and hauled the thing out of the liquid earth. The creature was half Tinker’s height, had turtle shell but long scaly limbs, webbed feet and hands. Long straight black hair fringed a bare, depressed spot on a human-like head, and its face was a weird cross of a chubby monkey and a turtle. It wore a harness of leather with various pointy things that could be weapons attached to it.

Pony pricked the creature with his sword, eyed the wound. “It does not bleed. It is indeed frozen.”

“Ooookay,” Tinker said. “It is probably safe to assume that it will stay dead, even if it thaws out.”

“An elf would.” Pony sheathed his sword.

“What do you think it is?” Tinker asked.

“It’s a kappa.” A voice called from above them.

Tinker and her Hand turned, looking upwards. Riki perched on branches of an ironwood, high overhead. He ducked back, behind the trunk, as the sekasha pulled out their pistols.

“Wait, don’t fire.” Tinker ordered. “Riki! Riki! What the hell is this?”

“I told you.” He peered out around the trunk. “It’s a kappa. Ugly little brats aren’t they? In Japan, it’s believed that they get their great strength from water in that brain depression and if you can trick them into bowing and spilling out the water, they have to return to the water realm to regain their strength.”

Stormsong signed ‘kill him?’ in blade talk. Tinker signed back ‘wait.’

“It’s an oni?” Tinker asked. “Or an animal?”

“That’s a blurred line with the oni,” Riki said. “I think you would call it oni — they’re fairly clever in a homicidal way. The greater bloods made them by mixing animals with lesser bloods, just like Tomtom did with Chiyo. Legend has it that they used monkeys and turtles — a pretty sick mix if you ask me.”

“I didn’t see any while we were making the gate.”

“There aren’t any in Pittsburgh. They’re clever, but not enough to pass as a human.”

“So you’re saying it came through the gate?”

“The oni use them for special ops; they’re strong swimmers and wrestlers.”

Tinker looked back into the discontinuity, the slow drift of blue mist. What were the oni up to? Were they just testing these strange waters to see where they led — or were they trying to salvage the gate?

Then again, was Riki telling the truth that there were no kappa in Pittsburgh?

“What are you doing here, Riki?”

“I need to talk to you.”

“Talk? Talk about what? How can I even trust anything that comes out of that lying mouth of yours?”

“I’m sorry, Tinker, about everything that happened. I’m really am. I know you’re pissed the hell at me, but I need to talk to you about the dragon.”

“What dragon?”

“The one that attacked you. The one I pulled off you. The one that might have killed you and all your people if I hadn’t called it.”

“So it was a dragon?”

“Not an Elfhome dragon, but yes, a dragon.”

“An Onihida dragon?”

“What does it matter where it’s from? It’s a freaking dragon. Can we just move on?”

“Just answer the fucking question!” She shouted at Riki. “It’s rather simple. Was it an Onihida dragon?”

Riki paced the limb like an agitated crow. “For a long, long time dragons were worshipped as gods, both on Earth and Onihida. They lived in ‘the heavens’ and had great powers that they often used to help humans and tengu alike. All the legends about dragons go on about the heavens and traveling from to Onihida or Earth and back. What that mystical shit might have actually been talking about is travel between universes. So dragons may be native to Onihida — or might be from someplace else. I don’t know.”

If Riki had told her the truth about his childhood, he was raised on Earth and probably was less in tune with the mystical than she was. Not that she was particularly “in tune.”

“The dragon cast an oni shield spell.” She pointed out the flaw in Riki’s “not from Onihida” logic.

“No, that’s not oni magic, its dragon magic. The oni true bloods figured out how to enslave dragons and stole it from them.”

So he said — but how could she know if he was telling the truth. “Dragon magic? Oni magic? What’s the difference?”

“Originally oni magic was only bio-engineering, just like the elves.”

“So the solid hologram stuff? Like your wings?”

“That’s dragon magic.”

“And the tengu? They’re both oni and dragon magic?”

Riki did an angry little hop. “Tinker! I just want to ask you one simple question, not give you a history lesson.”

“What do you want, Riki?”

“The dragon — when it attacked you — did it mark you with a symbol or tattoo or something like that?”

“Strange that you ask, but yeah, it put one right here.” She half-turned and patted her butt cheek. “It says ‘kiss my ass.’”

Stormsong snickered.

“I know how pissed you must be, Tinker. Believe me, if this wasn’t important, I wouldn’t come anywhere near you.”

She scoffed at that. “What does this mark do?”

“So it marked you?” Judging by the excitement in his voice, it was very important to him.

Stormsong shoved Tinker suddenly behind her and activated her shields with a shout. At the movement, Riki jerked back out of sight. A second later, a bullet struck the tree truck where Riki had been standing, ricocheted, and struck Stormsong’s shield.

“Shields, domi.” Pony triggered his own and pulled his sword.

Tinker felt a kick of magic from the west. She forced herself to find her center and cast the trigger spell. Her heart was pounding as the distorted into her shield.

Sekasha emerged from the forest shadows; their wyvern armor and tattoos were the black of the Stone Clan. Five in all — a full Hand, the back two acting as blades, which meant they had someone to guard. They halted some twenty feet off, tense and watchful.

“Lower your weapons,” a female shouted in High Elvish.

“Lower yours! This is Wind Clan holding!” Tinker shouted angrily.

“It’s a royal holding,” The stone clan’s domi came out from behind one of the ironwoods. “And you’re conversing with the enemy.”

The domi was short for an elf, several inches shorter than her sekasha, but willowy graceful as any other high caste female Tinker had ever seen. She wore an emerald green underdress and an overdress with a forest of wildly branching trees over it. Her hair was gathered into elaborate braids, dark and rich as otter fur, twined with emerald ribbons and white flowers. Two small gleaming orbs circled around her, like tiny planets caught in her gravity.

“Yeah, I was talking to him,” Tinker almost dropped her shield but then she realized that her sekasha hadn’t put away their swords. “It’s a good way to find out things you don’t know. Like who are you?”

“Hmm, short and vulgar — you must be Wolf Who Rules’ domi. What was your name again? Something unpronounceable.”

“This is one of my issues from court.” Stormsong murmured in English. “Lowest ranking introduces themselves first; it’s a matter of honor. You outrank her, so she should go first. She’s trying to provoke you since she can’t call insult; you are still under the Queen’s protection.”

“Fuck that. Who the hell is she?”

“Her name is Jewel Tears on Stone. She and the rest of the Stone Clan arrived this morning.”

“Is she right about this being a royal holding now?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“Shit!”

“You are talking to me, not her.” Jewel Tear picked her way gracefully toward Tinker. Despite the sweltering heat and her long gown, there was no sweat on her creamy white skin. “You are Wolf Who Rules’ domi? Tinkle? Thinker?”

Screw this. “Can you introduce us, Stormsong?”

“Me doing it would be a breach of etiquette and be considered extremely rude.”

“Good. Do it.”

Stormsong executed an elegant bow and said. “Jewel Tears on Stone, this is our Beloved Tinker of Wind.”

Amazing how they all reacted as if she slapped Jewel Tears. All the Stone Clan sekasha moved forward as if to attack.

“Hold.” Jewel Tears snapped. She glared at Tinker for a moment, but murmuring, “You are such a rude little beast. I don’t know if I should be flattered or horrified that Wolf Who Rules chose you after I cut him loose.”

Tinker glanced to Stormhorse, who nodded slightly, confirming that yes this was an old girlfriend of Windwolf’s. Well, if it was a battle of wits that this bitch wanted, she came to the right place. “That proves what they say.”

“Which is?”

“Only an idiot would turn down Wolf Who Rules.”

“Your arrogance is only matched by your ignorance.”

“I’d rather be unlearned than moronic — since it’s so much easier to cure.”

“When Prince True Flame learns of your treason, he will cure that arrogance too.”

“I might have been talking to the tengu — but you let him get away.” Tinker pointed out.

Jewel Tears spoke a spell and made a motion and magic pulsed underfoot, pushing up through the ground, the low ferns and then the trees to the every ends of the leaves. Tinker felt the ten sekasha standing around them, even Rainlily standing behind her. She and Jewel Tears echoed differently — their domana shields creating the change, or maybe their innate magical talents. Around them there were birds and animals unseen but now sensed.

She didn’t, however, feel Riki — and by her angry look — neither did Jewel Tears.

“Horse piss!” Jewel Tears hissed quietly.

“I was trying to get as much information out of the tengu as I could.” Tinker rubbed Jewel Tears’ nose in it. Interestingly, the female didn’t take it gracefully.

“The oni subverted you when they held you prisoner.”

“No, they did not.” Pony answered the charge. “I stand as witness to my domi — by my blood and my blade — she never bowed her will to them.”

There was noise of something coming through the woods toward them. Jewel Tears triggered her sonar spell again and the forest was alive with sekasha moving toward them, and at least two other domana. Tinker was going to have to learn that spell.

“True Flame is coming. We’ll see what he has to say.”

A wave of red washed around them as Wyverns surrounded them, and then, comfortingly, a tight knot of blue as True Flame and Windwolf entered the clearing. Jewel Tears dropped her shields, so Tinker followed suit.

True Flame glanced at the kappa all but forgotten on the ground, and then to Tinker and Jewel Tears. “What is going on here? Where did that kappa come from?”

“I pulled that out of the Ghostlands.” Tinker stepped forward and gave it a slight kick to demonstrate it was frozen solid. “The Ghostlands must have instantly sucked the body heat out of it.”

“She was talking with a tengu.” Jewel Tears indicated the empty treetops.

“Yes, I was.” Tinker saw no point to deny it. “We have history together. He betrayed me to the oni and I beat the snot out of him for it. He found me and started the conversation.”

“What did you speak about?” True Flame asked.

“I’m not sure what he wanted — they nearly killed me shooting at him.”

Windwolf had moved between Jewel Tears and Tinker just as a sekasha would, his shields still up so he seemed to shimmer with anger. With Tinker’s explanation, he took a step toward Jewel Tears. “How dare you?”

Jewel Tears jerked up her chin. “That was an unfortunate and unforeseeable accident. Forgiveness, Tinker ze domi.”

Tinker nodded but Windwolf shook his head.

“If you harm my domi,” Windwolf growled. “It will not be to the Fire Clan that you’ll be answering to.”

“Wolf Who Rules.” True Flame snapped.

“I will not suffer future ‘unfortunate’ accidents. There will no forgiveness.”

True Flame studied Windwolf for a moment and then nodded. “That is your right.”

Windwolf caught Tinker’s hand. “Come.” And he pulled her out of the clearing.

“Wait, my stuff.”

“Leave it.”

“No!” She jerked her hand free. “I’m not done here.”

“You are for right now.”

“No, no, no. I’m sick of this. Come here, go there, do this. My grandfather died five years ago, thank you, and I was happy making my own decisions for myself.”

“This is royal holdings now.” Windwolf swept a hand to take in the whole valley. “I can not make her leave.”

“So you’re making me?” Tinker cried.

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Beloved. I do not trust her. I can not stay here and watch over you now and I can not make her leave.”

As always, he seemed to cover all the options — leaving her no good choice but to do what he wanted.

This time she shook her head. “No. Again and again, you don’t tell me enough to form my own options. All I know are your options and I’m not playing that anymore.”

“Be reasonable.”

“Reasonable? What is reasonable about taking the smartest person in this city and making them deaf and blind? I’m supposed to walk away from my work, leaving behind my currently irreplaceable equipment, because some female from the other side of the world is not playing nice in my backyard?”

“I told you that I can not stay and I can not make her leave.”

“And those are the only options because they’re the only ones you have thought of? You know, if I had a level playing field I could come up with options of my own.”

“I do not have time to explain it all.”

“Of course not. You never have time.”

“Beloved…”

“Don’t ‘Beloved’ me. Did you know — until Pony told me it — I didn’t know the name of your mother? That I didn’t know that you — and I — could use Fire Clan Spell Stones? I don’t even know when I’m going to have a period! I’m stuck in this stranger’s body and no one tells me diddly. And when did I agree to be called Beloved Tinker? I think I should at least be able to pick out my own name.”

Windwolf looked stunned at her outburst and after a moment, said quietly, “Your name is… short.”

“Tinker isn’t my real name. My real name is Alexander Graham Bell.”

“It is? I did not know that.”

“Score one for me.”

“Beloved — Tinker — Alexan..der?” He floundered for a moment. “Isn’t that considered a male name?”

“I can hold my own with Jewel Tears. I’m not done here, and I’m not leaving my stuff.”

“No, you can not hold your own.” Windwolf caught her by her shoulders. “Do not ever think that you can. Only you can sense her magic — so it possible for her to attack you without your sekasha knowing it. She could make a tree fall, the ground give way, dozens of little ways that you do not know.”

“You really think she would try to kill me?”

“Yes.”

“Any one of us,” Stormsong added in English, “Can make a bullet ricochet and hit a target. The tengu was a convenient excuse.”

Tinker turned to her and saw in her eyes that none of her sekasha took the event as an accident. They hadn’t relaxed until Windwolf and True Flame appeared.

“But why?” she asked.

“Because the Stone Clan stands to gain much if you are dead and I’m distracted. Because she is a self-centered, ambitious bitch.”

That was unnerving. She kicked at the dirt, not wanting to leave, hating that once again she was bowing to his limited options. “Can we can get True Flame to order her out of the area?”

“No, we must let her try and fix this valley.”

Tinker laughed. “With what?”

“Magic.”

She doubted that greatly, but she was up against the wall of her own ignorance. “I’m the one that made this mess. I’ll be the one that fixes it.”

“That is quite possible. Stone Clan, however, has assured True Flame that they can quickly fix the Ghostlands, while you said you needed to study it further. Everyone knows that you were being realistic — but True Flame had to believe the Stone Clan or it would be an insult to them.”

“God forbid he insults them.” Tinker growled and looked back toward the discontinuity’s edge and her abandoned equipment.

“Domi, I will bring your things.” Stormsong offered. “I am not totally ignorant of these computer things.”

Since Stormsong could manage the Rolls Royce and the walkie-talkie, she should be able to disconnect the equipment and carry it back to the enclave unharmed. Tinker sighed and nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”

Windwolf signaled that Cloudwalker would accompany Stormsong, and the two sekasha moved off.

“There is so much I need to know,” Tinker said to him. “And if we’re really going to be husband and wife — you need to take the time for me. How do you expect me to trust you when you keep throwing me in the pool to sink or swim?”

He sighed deeply and scrubbed his hands over his face. “I want to be there for you — protect you — but I can’t. It’s killing me that you’re in the water and floundering — but the only other option I have is to lock you away someplace safe — and that would only kill you faster. The only thing that kept me sane so far is knowing that you’re actually very good at finding your own way out of the water.”

After seeing his domi safely back to Poppymeadow’s, Wolf went in search of Earth Son to lodge his complaint. He found Earth Son at the palace clearing, pacing it out as if he planned to claim the piece of land for himself. Apparently the Stone Clan domana had expected the aumani as soon as they arrived in Pittsburgh; Earth Son wore a full tunic of rich green silk and a gold burnt velvet duster with a stone horse pattern. Like Jewel, he had a spell orb keeping him cool in the muggy Pittsburgh summer.

Wolf closed the distance between them. “Earth Son, I will have a word with you.”

Earth Son had inherited his father’s height, so he was slightly taller than Wolf. He tried to use it to look down on Wolf, but then ruined the effect by doing a sketchy bow. “Wolf Who Rules.”

Wolf was too angry to acknowledge the veiled insult of Earth Son’s greeting. “Has the Stone Clan all run mad? We do not know the number of the oni forces, and the way between our worlds is not fully shut, and you’re already asking for a clan war.”

“Us?” Earth Son feigned confusion.

“I may be young, but I spent my doubles at court. I recognize power maneuvering when I see it.”

“You are seeing things that are not there — like your so-called oni.” Earth Son’s First, Thorne Scratch, tried to silence her domou with a hand on his shoulder. Earth Son flicked the female sekasha’s hand away. “I have been out for hours doing scrys.” He waved toward the forest beyond the clearing. “And found nothing remotely resembling an oni. ‘I can see the shadows of the oni on the wall,’ is that not what you said at Court? Apparently that’s all that you’ve seen — shadows! You’re jumping at phantoms if you ask me.”

Wolf didn’t even bother with magic. He stepped forward and caught Earth Son by the throat. “Listen you little turd, my domi is under the Queen’s Protection which means you are not to attack her. But if you can’t get that through that rock skull of yours, then understand this — if she is hurt in any way — I will hunt you down and tear out your throat.”

“You would not dare.” Earth Son managed to whisper.

“I started with nothing here. I can do it again. If my domi is killed, I will let the crown strip me bare to have my revenge. Do not think our royal cousin will protect you either — after you shit all over the queen’s commands, True Flame will not stop me.”

“I can not be held accountable for what that the others—”

“You are clan head for this area and I will hold you responsible.”

“Forest Moss is mad!”

“If you didn’t want the disadvantages that the mad one brings with him, you shouldn’t have chosen him.”

“I didn’t choose him.”

Earth Stone’s Hand looked relieved as the clearing filled with Wyverns.

“Wolf,” True Flame followed on the wash of red. “Let him go.”

Wolf released Earth Son, turning over this new piece of information. He knew that Earth Son did not have considerable standing in the Stone Clan, but he thought that Earth Son would have at least been party to picking out the clan domana that would be under him. Now that Wolf had talked with Forest Moss and Jewel Tears, learned their situations, their inclusion seemed less an personal attack on the Wind Clan, and more a statement of the Stone Clan’s assessment of Pittsburgh. They had sent two of their most disposable domana. Or was the count three?

In the clans, birth did not guarantee rank. It was acknowledged, though, that children of the clan leaders learned much observing their parent. Genetically, too, the leaders were the best that the clans had to offer. True, barring accident or assassination, it was unlikely clan head would ever change — but as his mother’s only child, Earth Son was a likely future leader. Then again, he had arrived with only one Hand. Was he escort for the other two, or fellow exile? If the later, what had Earth Son done to be sent to Pittsburgh?

“I did nearly a hundred scrys,” Earth Son reported to True Flame while he rubbed his throat. “There’s no oni here.”

“The oni are savage but not stupid,” Wolf snapped. “Acting quickly is not to their advantage. They are hiding themselves well and waiting for the best time to strike.”

Earth Son scoffed at this. “If that was the case, they should have struck while you were here alone, with even your voice turned against you.”

“They tried. They failed.” Wolf did not mention how near the assassination had came to succeeding. The brutal attack killed one of his sekasha, damaged one of his hands, and stranded him deep in Pittsburgh’s territory just as it returned to Earth. If not for Tinker, the plot would have succeeded. “If the Ghostlands can be used to their advantage, they will wait for reinforcements.”

“Wolf is right,” True Flame said. “That they managed to stay hidden for nearly thirty years shows that they have patience. No matter what happens, we need you to ferret them out.”