home, a basement access to a business.
She collapsed into a heap, so completely drained she wouldn’t be able to move for hours.
She hadn’t been smart.
And she was naked.
And a shadleech separated itself from a brick building and fluttered close.
The gray magical being-scrap bent itself. Jenni’s human sight saw a large crow tilting its head and hopping toward her. Its claws scritched on the stairwell’s concrete. The thing came close enough that she smelled old bubblegum. She shuddered. It would take only a wisp of thought for that dark thing to call others…and the great Dark one, who would feast on her.
If she got a second chance, she would work on anger management. Work on growing beyond grief and guilt.
Another hop and the shadleech’s sharp beak pierced her wrist. Hurt! Like a nail had been driven into her, pinning her. Then she felt an awful tug, as if it drew magic from the very threads of her muscles, the marrow of her bones. She thrashed in pain, but still heard the thing’s clicking noise as if disappointed in the thin trickle of her magic.
She was cold, colder than she’d been in Cloudsylph’s office. Snow and ice coated her back and butt and legs…. Focus! Use the fear, the short adrenaline rush. She reached to the earth below the concrete, to the air, for any magic. Earth energy, air, water from the ice. It began to snow.
Slowly magic coalesced inside her. The shadleech gurgled in pleasure. A race now. Could she use the magic before the shadleech drained it? She sent heat sizzling down her nerves, zapping the thing off, flung herself up to sit, stand, zombie-lurch to the stairs.
There was a door close, but no one in the basement. Another back business door was at the top of the stairs. People behind it.
“You filthy thing!” Hartha’s voice, thick with fury and loathing.
Jenni pitched forward, noodlelike arms barely breaking her fall. She cranked her head sideways, saw the brownie whipping the shadleech with her apron. It cringed, wisped to nothingness under the onslaught of earth magic, died.
“Humph.” Hartha dropped the apron, stamped on the very end of the string and the shadleech disintegrated. Snow fell faster. The browniefem flicked her fingers and glitter imbued the flakes falling on the apron with cleansing magic. Nothing would take harm from the once-cloth or the vanished shadleech.
Hartha turned and Jenni saw the survey of herself—her state of nakedness, skinned hands and knees, more-than-pale magically drained skin.
The brownie tsked, shook her head. “Translocated, did you? Those royal Lightfolk can rile a body fast.” The small woman hopped forward and grabbed Jenni’s thumbs. Then her head tilted back and her nostrils flared as she sniffed the air. Her eyes widened to huge orbs and her ears rolled against her head. “Must go. Something big and bad and Dark coming. We be safe in Mystic Circle.”
The great Dark one. Jenni hunched.
There was a brief moment of gritty blackness, then Jenni was falling down onto her very own bed in her pretty and warm coral-colored room. She flailed and flopped over onto her back. An instant later Hartha had pulled a gold silk comforter over her…covering even her head. Chinook hopped on the bed, found Jenni’s stomach and curled her substantial self on her. The blessing of the cat’s heat and energy made Jenni moan.
She’d nearly died—mostly due to her own temper, but a Dark one was on her already and the mission hadn’t even begun.
“I will bring a strengthening tonic,” Hartha said in a no-nonsense tone.
Jenni huddled, fatalistically knowing that in this moment the power in the household had shifted to Hartha. Jenni was now a person on a deadly quest and Hartha was the stable person.
A busy-mind thought to keep Jenni from actually thinking hard about what she’d done—her out-of-control temper—and the consequences of her actions, both to herself and to Rothly. No one could save him from the interdimension but
She collapsed into a heap, so completely drained she wouldn’t be able to move for hours.
She hadn’t been smart.
And she was naked.
And a shadleech separated itself from a brick building and fluttered close.
The gray magical being-scrap bent itself. Jenni’s human sight saw a large crow tilting its head and hopping toward her. Its claws scritched on the stairwell’s concrete. The thing came close enough that she smelled old bubblegum. She shuddered. It would take only a wisp of thought for that dark thing to call others…and the great Dark one, who would feast on her.
If she got a second chance, she would work on anger management. Work on growing beyond grief and guilt.
Another hop and the shadleech’s sharp beak pierced her wrist. Hurt! Like a nail had been driven into her, pinning her. Then she felt an awful tug, as if it drew magic from the very threads of her muscles, the marrow of her bones. She thrashed in pain, but still heard the thing’s clicking noise as if disappointed in the thin trickle of her magic.
She was cold, colder than she’d been in Cloudsylph’s office. Snow and ice coated her back and butt and legs…. Focus! Use the fear, the short adrenaline rush. She reached to the earth below the concrete, to the air, for any magic. Earth energy, air, water from the ice. It began to snow.
Slowly magic coalesced inside her. The shadleech gurgled in pleasure. A race now. Could she use the magic before the shadleech drained it? She sent heat sizzling down her nerves, zapping the thing off, flung herself up to sit, stand, zombie-lurch to the stairs.
There was a door close, but no one in the basement. Another back business door was at the top of the stairs. People behind it.
“You filthy thing!” Hartha’s voice, thick with fury and loathing.
Jenni pitched forward, noodlelike arms barely breaking her fall. She cranked her head sideways, saw the brownie whipping the shadleech with her apron. It cringed, wisped to nothingness under the onslaught of earth magic, died.
“Humph.” Hartha dropped the apron, stamped on the very end of the string and the shadleech disintegrated. Snow fell faster. The browniefem flicked her fingers and glitter imbued the flakes falling on the apron with cleansing magic. Nothing would take harm from the once-cloth or the vanished shadleech.
Hartha turned and Jenni saw the survey of herself—her state of nakedness, skinned hands and knees, more-than-pale magically drained skin.
The brownie tsked, shook her head. “Translocated, did you? Those royal Lightfolk can rile a body fast.” The small woman hopped forward and grabbed Jenni’s thumbs. Then her head tilted back and her nostrils flared as she sniffed the air. Her eyes widened to huge orbs and her ears rolled against her head. “Must go. Something big and bad and Dark coming. We be safe in Mystic Circle.”
The great Dark one. Jenni hunched.
There was a brief moment of gritty blackness, then Jenni was falling down onto her very own bed in her pretty and warm coral-colored room. She flailed and flopped over onto her back. An instant later Hartha had pulled a gold silk comforter over her…covering even her head. Chinook hopped on the bed, found Jenni’s stomach and curled her substantial self on her. The blessing of the cat’s heat and energy made Jenni moan.
She’d nearly died—mostly due to her own temper, but a Dark one was on her already and the mission hadn’t even begun.
“I will bring a strengthening tonic,” Hartha said in a no-nonsense tone.
Jenni huddled, fatalistically knowing that in this moment the power in the household had shifted to Hartha. Jenni was now a person on a deadly quest and Hartha was the stable person.
A busy-mind thought to keep Jenni from actually thinking hard about what she’d done—her out-of-control temper—and the consequences of her actions, both to herself and to Rothly. No one could save him from the interdimension but
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