Into the Woods: Tales from the Hollows and Beyond(95)
Author: Kim Harrison

"We leave him here," Trent said softly. "This is an arranged madness. There will be no inquiry, no backlash killing." His gaze landed on Jenks. The pixy hadn’t flown since being hit, and silver dust was still leaking from him. "Can you fly?"

Jenks rose up, his wings unusually noisy. "Some, but it hurts like hell. Can I ride for a while? We got what, another half mile?"

Trent nodded, and Jenks landed on his shoulder, making him shiver as something seemed to sift down through him like Jenks’s dust. Still shaken, he turned and started up the path, his pace slower. He could have done something else. Maybe cut his hamstrings and tied him to a tree. Knocked him out. Used one of those sleepy-time charms he had tucked away. It wouldn’t last long this close to the ocean, but it would have been enough to slip away. Anything other than letting his reactions get the best of him. He’d slit the man’s Goddess-blessed throat.

The cool shadow of the trees took him as he stepped off the path and struck out to the north, and Trent stomped ahead without breaking a single twig, crushing a solitary stem. Head down, he unconsciously wove between the trees, taking the path of least resistance as Jenks became quieter and quieter. "Ah, are you sure you’re okay?" Jenks said, and Trent jerked, having forgotten he was with him. "Your aura looks like it took a hit."

Trent slapped at a mosquito, then rubbed another one out of existence. "It did." He’d forgotten pixies could see auras all the time. His now damaged aura was a direct result of burning his neural net and was probably why Jenks’s dust was making his skin tingle. "I can’t tap a line."

Jenks’s high-pitched noise went right through Trent’s head. "Wait up. You just lost your magic? All of it? And we’re still headed for the fortress of doom?"

Trent craned his neck to look at the sheer cliff face facing them. He couldn’t see the monastery from this angle, but the opening to the monk escape was close. Where’s the creek? "Yes. Everything that is not invoked and in my belt pack is out. I’m going to have to improvise."

Jenks was silent. The birds had found them, and jays screamed at them from the canopy until they were out of their territory. "This just got a lot more complicated," the pixy said, and Trent paused to listen for the sound of water.

"Rachel catches offenders without magic," Trent said. But Rachel knew what she was doing. And when she didn’t, she could improvise on the fly, coming up with options that left a lot of collateral damage but usually only hurt herself, not the people around her. It was one of the things he would never admit that he admired about her. The more he tried not to be his father, the more he saw his father’s face in the mirror.

"Yeah," Jenks said, and Trent continued along the base of the cliff. "But Rachel is a professional," he said, making Trent wince. "You, on the other hand, are a well-prepared, wealthy elf with too much time on his hands and a grudge for having been stood up at the altar. And you just became less well-prepared, cookie maker."

Steeling his face into a bland mask, Trent trudged forward, slipping through the sunlit shadows without stirring a leaf. "You can stay here if you want. It will take me a couple of hours to get to a phone and send someone for you."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! I said I was with you, and I am. I just don’t want you to go in with a damaged battle plan. Rachel does that, and it drives me batty."

Somewhat reassured, Trent’s pace smoothed. "My plan will work without magic. I’ll just have to be more aggressive." Again his mood darkened, and both he and the pixy went silent as he remembered the man’s shock and surprise in the sun. It had been fast, but not fast enough. What the hell was wrong with him, and how could someone like him take care of a baby? How could Lucy ever love him?

Angry, Trent pushed at a branch, almost snapping it.

"You sure you’re okay?" Jenks asked.

"Fine." Trent took a slow breath as he stopped, listening again. "There should be a stream here. We need to get on the other side of it. The tunnel is halfway up a cliff at its base."

"No." Jenks persisted, his wings clattering as he made the short flight to a leafless lower branch and sat in a drop of sun that made it through the canopy. "What’s eating at you? I know you don’t care about that man you just offed except that you wish you’d done something less permanent."

Startled, Trent dropped his gaze from the cliff top. "Excuse me?"

Jenks reached back to run a hand over his damaged wing, reminding Trent of a tiny cat. "You’re distracted. It’s making you slow, not to mention my job twice as hard. Spill it. You need all your focus if you’re going to survive this, and by Tink’s panties, you are going to survive it. Rachel needs your help."

Trent held his breath, trying to decide what to say. The faint sound of water came faint on the wind as it gusted, and he leaned into motion. "Nothing is bothering me."

The harsh sound of Jenks’s wings made him squint, and the pixy landed on his shoulder to find his balance by gripping his ear. "Damn it, you did it again," the pixy grumbled.

"Did what?"

"You lied to me," Jenks said, and Trent frowned. "Pixies can tell when people lie. That’s why Rachel and I get along so well."

Trent tried to see him as he stepped over a moss-covered log, but he was too close. "Rachel doesn’t lie?"

"Oh, hell, she lies all the time, but she knows it. You’re lying to yourself, not just me. What gives, Trent? Let’s have it now so we can get on with our lives, short as they might be."

The smugness in Jenks’s voice scraped over Trent’s frayed nerves. The last person who had pointed out his flaws like this had found himself down the camp’s well for three days. "It’s none of your business," he said with a false lightness, not wanting to admit to a pixy that he was worried he was turning into a psychopath to save his species. How could anyone, much less a little girl, love that? His daughter deserved the best, and his soul felt like it was dying. "Can you hear water running?"

Jenks was silent for a long moment, then he said, "Yep. You’re headed right for it."

The earth fell away in front of him, and he slowed as the scent and sound of running water rose up like a balm. Cautioning Jenks to hold on, Trent slid down the mossy, rocky side, his thoughts churning. He hadn’t expected children for another twenty years. Ellasbeth, at least, had had nine months to realign her thinking. He had had three.

A branch he had his foot propped against gave way, and he slid, effortlessly catching himself on a rock. Money didn’t make a child happy, only spoiled. And if he was going to raise a child, he wanted to do it right-without relying on Ceri. All he had was the distance his father had shown him and brief snatches of motherly affections taken in glimpses, hardly remembered. He didn’t want Lucy to grow up feeling alone, surrounded by everything and having nothing.