Into the Woods: Tales from the Hollows and Beyond(93)
Author: Kim Harrison

"No. I can’t outrun him. I need a good place for an ambush," Trent said absently. He looked up, startled to find Jenks hovering backward as he walked forward, staring at him in what appeared to be apprehension. "Ah, thank you, Jenks. I appreciate you taking care of the one man. My chances have improved dramatically."

Jenks squinted at him, then frowned. "Sure. What can I do to help with this last one? He uses magic like it’s his first language. The broken lines here don’t bother him at all."

Concerned, Trent felt the bumps in his belt pack. He had only three sleepy-time potions he wanted to keep for the compound. Everything else he had was ley line based and potentially lethal-and with the fractured state of the ley lines this close to the faults, it wouldn’t be a fast implementation. He’d need a distraction if he was to even have a chance. He didn’t want to end up trapping himself in a bubble of protection and lose because he ran out of time, pinned down by one of the Withons’ guards until they came for him and then killed him as a trespasser. I am so weary of ultimate resolutions . . .

"I’ve got an idea," he said as he jogged through a stand of young trees, ducking some of the larger branches as he moved through them. "Is he still on his bike?"

"Tink loves a duck, you’re improvising. I’ll go check," Jenks said dryly, and he darted back down the way they had come.

Heart thumping, Trent continued to run up the path before slipping off it and doubling back amid the short grass and ferns. Cursing the insects he stirred up, he worked back to the thicket of young trees. Being careful not to crush more vegetation than necessary, he pulled a sapling back like a bow, ready to smack the next thing that came down the path. It was hard to see, and he tucked his sunglasses aside, squinting as his eyes adjusted.

A mosquito landed on his arm, then another. Three found the tiny slip of skin showing between his black biking tights and his socks. Slowly the forest reclaimed the silence, and the sound of insects and wind became obvious. Grimacing, Trent reached out his awareness and tapped a line.

Silver-flecked energy tasting of green and broken rock flowed into him, heady but intermittent. The "amperage" was adequate, but the flow was erratic and might cause a breakage in his charm that the wise practitioner could exploit. If his familiar had been closer, he could have drawn a clean line through him, but the auratic bond between him and his horse didn’t work past the curve of the earth.

The soft hum of Jenks’s wings grew loud, and Trent winced as the pixy stopped dead in the path in a spot of sun, right where the tree was going to swing. His wings blurred to invisibility and the sun caught his silver dust to make him a primordial vision-until the pixy swore, darting sideways when a blue jay dove at him. A blue feather drifted down, and the jay screamed.

"Jenks!" Trent whispered, thinking Rachel would joyfully kill him if he came back without the pixy. She’d never believe he was taken by a blue jay.

Brightening, Jenks darted over. "Tink blasted birds," he said loudly as he stabbed the mosquitoes on Trent’s arm with his sword and they exploded in little drops of blood. "There are obviously no pixies around here."

Trent continued to gather the energy to him, hoping that by holding it in his chi, he might give it some semblance of order. He held his breath, listening for the sound of a bike, unable to hear over the low hum of Jenks’s wings. "Will you settle somewhere?" he asked, and the pixy alighted on the bent-back tree. "Not there!" he hissed, but it was too late. The soft rattle of a street bike pretending to be a dirt cycle became obvious. In a flash of sun, a man in blue riding tights shimmied up the path, the man standing on the pedals to make progress.

Eyes flicking over the man’s thick legs and wide shoulders, Trent grimaced. He was stocky for an elf, and his straw-blond hair poking from under his helmet and his heavy build said he had a large portion of human in him. He’d been behind Trent at the start of the race, and he had thought it odd that someone so athletic would put himself in the middle of the start instead of the front where he could break from the casual racers sooner and have a better time.

If Trent was lucky, the man would have enough human in him to slow his magic down, a prospect that seemed unlikely when the man looked up and met his eyes. Intelligence glittered, followed by anticipation of dealing out pain, then alarm as he saw the bent tree and realized what was about to happen.

"Now!" Jenks shouted, and Trent let go of the tree.

The bent branch sprang forward, Jenks rising up so it moved harmlessly under him, sighing with its passage. Dirt sprayed as the man skidded to a halt, turning sideways to avoid a full strike, but unbalanced, he fell. Heart pounding, Trent launched himself at the man still disentangling himself from the bike.

The thump of impact rocked them both, the man pinned under his bike dazed but reactive. Reaching out, Trent grasped the man’s arm, ignoring the pinch of pain in his foot.

"Ta na veno!" Trent shouted, gasping as the words triggered a memory flash and line energy jagged through him. The twenty minutes it took to prepare the wild-magic charm unrolled in his mind faster than thought itself, reliving it in an instant and harnessing the energy now flowing through his hands. He had to touch the man for it to work. The charm could not puncture the assassin’s aura on his own. Wild magic needed every ounce of direction he could muster.

Trent’s eyes widened as he felt the spell peel from his soul like new skin. It raced through his body, following his neural pathways, condensing, becoming more powerful the farther it got from his chi and the fewer pathways it had to take. It would explode like a bomb once it reached the man under him, acting like mental shrapnel to burn the assassin’s own neural network to render his magic useless and put them on equal footing.

"Son of a bitch!" the man shouted, and with a grunt, he shoved his bike up. Trent’s grip on the man was torn away, and in a panic he scrambled for anything as his magic crested, hesitated, and then not finding anything to fall into, collapsed back into Trent.

Agony arched through him. His jaw clenched as his muscles violently contracted. He fell back, his head hitting the soft earth and his breath whooshing out. His heart spasmed once, fighting to find a rhythm as the charm exploded. He couldn’t think as images of the people he knew, alive or dead, flashed like strobes in his thoughts as the magic randomly jolted the neurons in his brain, burning through him, shredding his aura . . . leaving him helpless.

Someone was groaning, and he bit his tongue when he realized it was him.

"Not bad," the man said, and Trent blearily looked up at the metallic thump of the straw-blond man shoving the bike off himself and standing. "I don’t know that one. Your witch is right, though. You should leave the magic to those who know what they’re doing."