The Binding Witch and the Bounty Hunter Read online

  I gulped. At this point, I knew her arrow would get to me before my fireball would get to her, and I couldn’t throw up a shield that fast. But I could still stop her from getting the treasure, which was the deal we made with Ersyt. If that was what would get my friends out of here safe and sound, then that was what I’d do.

  I drew back my right hand and released the fireball orb just as Pinky’s arrow hit me dead center in the sternum, slicing cleanly through my ballistic vest into my flesh and bone with a thump.

  16

  I flew backwards off the treasure chest and onto the ground with a thump that knocked the air out of me. Or was it because the arrow had pierced my lung? I couldn’t get a full breath, and I couldn’t decide if I should try to or if I should take as many tiny breaths as I could.

  Flames crackled and grew somewhere in the direction of where I’d last seen Pinky, and I hoped I’d gotten her. I turned my head to see that my left hand held the remnants of the other fireball, which was slowly being reabsorbed into my palm. Good. At least I hadn’t set myself on fire. That would have been embarrassing.

  Swords clanked in the near distance, and Indira’s rage-scream was still in good form. There were a few hisses and growls from Gringo and grunts from Leo, but those were dying down too. My body must have decided for me that little breaths were the best, because I sounded like a chihuahua after a hard sprint.

  Finally, the battle sounds died with the wind. The field was again calm and the leaves in the trees above me behaved as they should—swaying with the gentle breeze that cleared the clouds and brought blue sky back into view. It was pretty—scenic.

  Indira screamed—this time not in rage, but in desperation. “Kate!”

  “Don’t touch it.” Leo knelt down next to me and put his hand on my cheek. His usually wry face held solemn worry in the lines on his forehead. “Don’t move, Kate.”

  “What, no jokes?” I managed between breaths. At least I was the one who got hurt this time—not my friends.

  “I don’t have jokes for this, little sis,” he said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you.”

  “Me too,” Indira said.

  “Hurts.” I realized it did when I spoke the word. The worst pain I’d ever felt radiated out from my sternum and throbbed with the beat of my heart. It was overwhelming and made me feel like I was trapped in someone else’s body. I just wanted to get out from under it.

  He nodded grimly.

  “We can’t pull it out and we can’t move her like this.” Indira’s gaze darted between Leo and me. “What do we do?”

  A wave of nausea rolled over me at the thought of Leo removing the arrow. I lifted my finger. “I vote we leave it in.”

  “We can pull it out if I perform a spell that will heal the wound.” Leo ignored me. “It’s a risk, but so is staying here like sitting ducks for the next raiding party, who I can guarantee will be more prepared.”

  “Won’t more magic put you over the limit for your bracelet?” Indira said.

  Despite my dissociative state, I heard worry for Leo in Indira’s voice.

  Leo shook his head. “This is healing magic. No karmic impact. Plus, we have sympathetic sibling magic on our side. It will help boost the healing.”

  He took a small packet out of his pocket and shook out several translucent papers about a half-inch square in size. “Open up, Kate. These are going to taste like feet, but they’ll heal you on the inside while I heal you on the outside, and they’ll give you a bit of an anesthesia effect besides.”

  “Okay,” I said. I definitely didn’t want to feel this. My mouth fell open and he placed the papers on my tongue. For a moment nothing happened, but then they began to dissolve into a gooey, gelatinous mess that indeed tasted like feet, if I had to guess what feet tasted like. I tried not to gag when I swallowed the mess. It went down hot and the rest of me grew numb all the way down to my toes. The feeling wasn’t unpleasant, and I settled into it.

  “I’m going to start the spell, Indira,” Leo said. “When I say ‘now,’ I want you to pull that arrow up and out as fast as you can. I don’t want it to heal around the arrow, or it will just create a new wound.”

  Indira straddled my legs, took a deep breath, and took hold of the arrow. “I will do so.”

  “Wait, you’re doing this now?” I said. It was all happening so fast. “We should talk about this more.”

  “Trust me.” Leo’s voice was solid, safe.

  “Oh . . . okay,” I breathed, now too numb to care.

  Leo muttered a phrase over and over—I couldn’t quite catch it but recognized it as Latin.

  “Now!” he barked.

  My chest arched with the force of the arrow’s removal, which made a sucking sound when it left me, and I dropped back to the ground.

  “Hold her hands!” Leo shouted.

  Indira pinned my hands to the ground.

  I screamed as an unbearable itching formed over the wound site, which I took to be Leo’s healing spell knitting over the hole. Inside, it felt like ants crawling all over. Not exactly painful, but not something I wanted to feel forever. I writhed and tried my best to buck Indira off me, but she stayed on until the feeling subsided and my breathing returned to deep, even breaths.

  Indira leaned over my face. “Are you okay, Kate?”

  I sent out my senses to locate all my body parts. They responded with some reluctance as sensation returned from the numbing effects of the feet-flavored paper. “Yes, I’m here. I think. Yeah.”

  “Try sitting,” Leo said, giving me his hand.

  I rolled to my side and used Leo’s hand as leverage to come to a seated position, took a deep breath, and nodded. “Better.”

  “Can you stand?” Indira’s eyes scanned the far side of the meadow as she stood and gripped her knives. “The trees are doing that strange not-tree thing again.”

  “Then I really don’t have a choice in the matter.” I followed her eyes and took Leo’s hand again to stand. Indeed, the trees stood still as the wind picked up. Sounds, smells, and colors came back in sharp focus, and I was hyper-aware that we were in great danger.

  Leo released my hand once I gained equilibrium, and he slung the treasure chest onto his back.

  His face paled with the effort. In my post-anesthesia state, I wondered if he was just weary from performing the healing spell on me, but then again, someone of his ability shouldn’t have tired that easily. It was possible he’d lied about the effect his performing the spell had on his bracelet. Maybe someone who’d done so much evil had to pay for every bit of magic he performed, regardless of intent. I filed that away to ask him about later as we walked quickly to the doorway.

  Once again, humanoid Fae rose up between us and our way home.

  But this time, they had an ogre.

  It was a monstrous smashed-nose creature whose skin barely contained its mass. He (or she, it wasn’t obvious under all those fat rolls) made the ground thunder with each step he took. Upon seeing us skid to a stop, he roared in a sound that was both elephant trumpet and lion roar. Either way, it was pretty obvious why Leo said he didn’t want to go up against one—this mountain could smash us with one of his compact-car-sized hands.

  I hadn’t wanted to go up against an ogre either, but that was before I got shot with an arrow. That had made me grumpy. I needed to add “grumpy” to my list of emotional keys for accessing my magic.

  The Fae trumpet sounded, and a volley of arrows flew at us. With the greatest ease yet, I flicked up a half-shield in front of our group with my left hand, and with my right, I lobbed a fully-formed fireball right at the troll.

  My missile exploded against the massive Fae and knocked him down, along with a dozen or so of his humanoid friends, but more were coming.

  I threw another firebomb with cold accuracy, and then another, creating a wall of fire between us and the Fae, and suddenly we had a clear path to the doorway. Indira took point with Gringo and went through first. I shoved Leo in after them so I could hold t
he shield up behind us.

  I’m sure the Fae were plenty talented at fighting wildfires, but it was awfully satisfying to take one last look over my shoulder to see the Elsereach burning before I stepped through the portal to go home.

  17

  I jumped through the portal and stumbled, almost falling onto Indira’s knives. She was facing the portal in a defensive stance.

  Oh, and she was screaming. Leo was screaming too, and even Gringo was howling.

  I looked around and saw no immediate threat, so I screamed too: “What are you screaming about?”

  “I’m trying to tell her to stand down!” Leo said, dropping the treasure chest to the ground and leaning on it. “The Fae—at least those Fae—can’t come through. Only the really, really old ones can leave the Elsereach, and those were pretty young.”

  “Oh.” Indira lowered her knives. “You could have said that.”

  “I tried!” Leo wiped his sweaty forehead. “Of all the women I had to meet, it had to be a stubborn one.”

  “Takes stubborn to know stubborn, Mr. Vidra,” Indira said with a smirk.

  Gringo swiped at her leg and hissed.

  “Hey,” Leo said, pointing at Gringo. “Keep your claws to yourself.”

  Gringo flicked his tail and walked away to a tree and pawed the ground, preparing it for his offering.

  I rolled my eyes. “Guys, calm down. We’re okay. We’re safe.”

  “You’re one to talk.” Indira took a deep breath and looked me in the eyes. “You almost died, Kate.”

  “But I’m fine now.” I held my arms out, showcasing my mobility.

  “In fact, you would have died if it weren’t for Leo,” she said. “And your shirt has a bloody hole in the middle of it.”

  I looked down. “Oh, yeah.” Mental note: ballistic vests weren’t good against Fae arrows.

  Leo fell off the treasure chest and hit the ground with a thud.

  Indira ran to Leo’s side. “Leo! Leo, what’s wrong?”

  I ran to his side, sick with knowing. “You did. You did use up your last charm on me.” I picked up his wrist, and sure enough his bracelet and all the charms had turned black—and the black was seeping into his skin.

  Indira looked from Leo and me and back again. “Is that true? Did you sacrifice yourself for Kate? Did her spell make you want to do that?”

  I held up my hands. “I didn’t do that. As a matter of fact, I don’t think any spell could have let Leo keep his sparkling personality and still obey and protect me. Isn’t that right, Leo?”

  He paled and clutched his chest, his words coming out in a harsh whisper. “What she says is right, Indira. Kate didn’t do this to me. All magic I do now shows up on this charm bracelet—not just the bad stuff—because I chose evil over good many years ago. But I chose to help Kate once her spell wore off, just after she let me into her trailer.”

  Gringo crept up and sniffed Leo.

  “But why?” I asked, even though I was afraid of the answer. “It makes no sense. We might be related, but you barely know me. Why would you take a risk like this? What if we can’t get to my mother in time? What if she won’t help you? What if she can’t?”

  “He said this would be a tough job, but I took it anyway. I was curious about you.” Leo’s gaze found mine and he blinked away a tear. “You’re more than I am. And I’m tired, Kate.”

  “More what?” I said.

  “Explain yourself, Leo Vidra.” Indira’s fists were hitched to her hips, knives pointed backwards. Her dark eyes narrowed.

  “Kate has more magic and her will is stronger.” His breath came in short gasps now. “You might be able to . . . thrive where I could not. I can’t keep doing his bidding. It hasn’t been a good life . . . but I’m happy to do good now and give it for you.”

  “Who are you talking about, Leo?” I said.

  “The one that took your mother,” he said. “Our father, the demon.”

  I rocked back and sat down hard on my heels. I didn’t know what I’d expected, but it wasn’t that.

  Indira hissed and sprang away from Leo, her knives drawn. She gave me a once-over with narrowed eyes. “Kate, your father is a demon?”

  I shook my head, staring at Leo. “No, my father is—was—human. That’s what my mother always told me. It’s not possible that he could be anything other than human. I’m half human and half witch—that’s why my powers came so late.”

  Leo’s lips pressed together and he groaned. “You’re like me—half witch and half demon . . . we’re such a rarity that it’s amazing we survived birth. We always get our powers late, but it’s a crap shoot as to what we’ll get. Some, like me, get very little. But some . . . some are quite gifted and strong, capable of some surprising things that lie at the intersection of witch and demon power. Dad’s been watching you for signs your power would develop ever since he found out my mom’s genetic contribution wasn’t enough. We fought before I came back to you—I didn’t want to finish the job of bringing you in.”

  I shook my head again. For this to be true, everything my mother had told me about my father had to be a lie. If that was true, then that called into question everything she’d ever told me.

  “No.” Indira stumbled back. “All this time . . . your mother knew my hatred for demons. And here her daughter is one!”

  “Indira, wait.” I held up my hand. “Leo, come on. This is pretty out there. What proof do you have?”

  “Ask your mother.” Leo’s voice was fading. “She’s with him right now, likely trying to negotiate . . . a treaty to keep you clear of his sphere of influence. I hope . . . for your sake, she wins.”

  “Please wait, just wait.” I scrambled close to him, my mind reeling. I needed to know more, but Leo—big, strong, mountain-of-a-man Leo—was dying. For me. My eyes filled with tears watching him take slow, wheezing breaths from the weight of all his past magic crushing him.

  “Whit dae we hae 'ere, then?” came a voice thick with accent. Alick and his band of merry forest gnomes inexplicably slipped out from behind trees that were too thin to hide their thick bodies.

  I jumped to my feet.

  18

  Gringo shot away from us into the trees.

  Well, that figured, the little coward.

  The tug of my connection with Luna hit me in my heart. Big sobs escaped me, and tears streamed down my face. My emotions were all confused—happiness at being near Luna again, betrayal because of my mother, confusion at the sudden information that my father might be in fact alive, but a demon, and tenderness and gratitude towards my savior—a man who, until a few moments ago, I thought was just a ruthless bounty hunter bound to my will through a spell. I wiped my face with the back of my hand and sniffed. “Alick.”

  “In the flesh!” He held out his arms. “How come a' th' tears? Ye git th' treasure, ah see. Ye should be happy!”

  That the tiny man looked truly confused made me grin at the ridiculousness of it all. Couldn’t he see that I was in the middle of an emotional crisis here? I turned and hissed at Leo, “You’re my brother and you’re not dying. Stop it.”

  He grimaced a smile.

  Indira moved closer to me, putting herself between Alick and me, a gesture that further choked me with emotion.

  “Well, we got attacked by Fae—twice, mind you,” she said, “Kate got shot with an arrow in the chest and Leo saved her, but now he is dying because he used up the last of his magic, and it turns out that he and Kate are both half-demons and siblings. Is that about it, Kate?”

  “Yeah.” I coughed to keep attention away from Indira’s movements. “That about sums it up.”

  “So you should give us Kate’s bird and just take the treasure and go,” she said. “Leave us to deal with this.”

  Alick’s eyes narrowed. “This smells lik' a trick. We don’t lik' tricks.” He approached the treasure chest and heaved it away from Leo, who slumped to the ground without the support of the chest against his back. Alick threw the chest with surprising st
rength to the center of his crew.

  “Don’t open it!” I shouted. “Not here!”

  “There could be other eyes you do not want to see your treasure.” Indira shot me a glance as she spoke slowly.

  “I’ll juist tak' that chance,” Alick said. “Open th' chest.”

  Indira and I backed away slowly and gathered around Leo, who was still breathing, barely.

  I flinched and closed my eyes at the sound of the squeaky chest hinges opening, but nothing happened.

  “Weel, see? Ah tellt ye she cuid dae it,” Alick said, accompanied by the sound of tinkling gold pieces being scooped up and dropped. “All the gold, safe ’n’ sound.”

  Murmurs of agreement rippled through his crew. “Right good girl!” and “Ne'er hud a doubt!”

  Alick waddled over to me and produced Luna, alive and in good shape.

  My heart bloomed. “Luna!” I gathered her in my arms.

  She snuggled into me and spoke using our mental link. “It is very good to see you again, Kate. I’m glad you came when you did. Time was getting close.”

  My breath caught in my throat at all the timelines I was juggling. I glanced at Leo and back at Alick. “Are we done here, gnome?”

  “That we are, little witchy,” he said. “Our dealings are concluded, all sides are happy?”

  I glared at him. “Go away now, Alick, before I get angry. I bested a dragon to get this treasure. What do you think I could do to you?”

  Alick’s face paled. “Let’s go and leave the little witchy to her business.”

  His troop converged on the chest, flipped the lid closed, and swarmed under it to lift the thing with the strength of ants who could lift hundreds of times their own body weight. They vanished into the woods.

  “Good riddance,” Indira said.

  “Do you think it was a bad idea to let Ersyt loose on Earth? There haven’t been dragons here in hundreds of years.” I shuddered in amazement that we were able to hold up our end of the bargain with the dragon—our lives in exchange for safe passage for Ersyt through the Elsereach. Apparently dragon magic was a big part of what fueled the existence of the Elsereach, and the Fae had kept dragons like her prisoners in their caves for a long, long time. They weren’t just trying to kill us—they were trying to keep Ersyt in the Elsereach.