Gods and Swindlers (City of Eldrich Book 3) (25 page)

“
What?
How did—” Kady threw back her head and howled.

“Kady?”

“Who the hell else would it be?” she shouted. “I’m the one having this goddamn baby, who’s grounded for the rest of his life if he doesn’t give me my body back.”

Jeff ran into the room, a panicked look on his face.

“Another contraction,” Kady said. “Time it.”

Jeff punched the new time into his phone, then rushed to the bed. He pushed the hair from Kady’s face. “What do you need? What can I do?”

“I need to get this goddamn baby out of me.” She glared at him. “What do you think I need?”

Jeff gave Meaghan another panicked look. “We need Gretchen.”

So much for talking to Dad.
Meaghan nodded and headed for the door.

Gretchen got there first. “Here’s your coffee, kiddo. Another contraction?”

Kady took a deep breath and visibly calmed at the sound of Gretchen’s voice. “Yeah. A really big one.”

“Hah.” Gretchen handed her a mug. “Not even close, sweetie.” She took Jeff by the hand. “She being mean? That’s gonna get worse, too. When she starts threatening to cut your pecker off, that’s when you know the baby’s close.”

“Give me something,” Kady said, bursting into tears. “Magic, drugs, I don’t care.”

“No,” Matthew said. “You agreed to let me talk to my daughter.”

Kady flashed Meaghan a venomous look.

“I’m scared, too,” Matthew said, “but I’m on my way and I need you to let me talk to Meg. I’ll be your baby again soon, I promise. You can do this.”

“Jeff, honey,” Kady said. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to cut your pecker off.”

“Yet,” Gretchen said.

“Your bedside manner sucks,” Meaghan said with a scowl. “Stop it. Dad, we need to give them a minute.” She gave Gretchen a stern look. “Gretchen and I are going to the kitchen for more coffee. Now.”

Gretchen rolled her eyes and followed Meaghan out of the room.

But Meaghan never made it the kitchen. Marnie was sitting in the living room.

“You girls need to talk,” Gretchen said as she gave Meaghan a gentle shove toward the sofa. “I’ll be in the kitchen.”

Meaghan felt the dread pool in her gut.

The bitch needs to learn her place.

Marnie gave Meaghan an appraising look. “They hurt you, too. Tell me what happened.”

“What?” Meaghan stared at Marnie in shock.
How does she know?”

“I can read it on your face and in my bones,” Marnie said, her voice calm and measured. “When they took my magic, something else woke up. You know what I’m talking about. It happened to you in Fahraya.” She patted the sofa. “Sit with me.”

On legs that felt like wood, Meaghan tottered to the sofa. She looked at Marnie, really looked, for the first time in months. Marnie’s hair had grown back, almost to the length it had been when the Order had brutally scraped it from her scalp with a knife. No longer coal black, it was a warm brown, the sharp bob replaced by softer layers.

“Where’s Brian?” Meaghan asked.

“Across the street with John. Don’t change the subject.”

“You don’t look fragile anymore,” Meaghan said in a small voice.

Marnie smiled. “Because I’m not.”

Meaghan sat next to her, unsure what to say.

“But you do,” Marnie said. “Look fragile, I mean. If you hold it in, it festers and gets bigger. You having bad dreams?”

Meaghan, trying to hold back her tears, nodded. In a whisper, she asked, “Can you help me?”

“You mean like what Jhoro did for me?”

Immediately following Marnie’s escape from the Order, Jhoro had used his psychic abilities, his shamanic thing, to make what she’d suffered less immediate. According to Marnie, it had given her the mental clarity to move on and not remain mired in trauma.

Meaghan nodded, the tears now escaping and running down her cheeks.

Marnie took her hand. “Not that way, and he didn’t fix me, he just gave me enough distance to keep breathing. There’s a therapist here in town who helps me. You should call her.”

“They didn’t . . . it didn’t.” Meaghan pulled her hand away and got to her feet. “Nothing happened. I’m being an idiot over something that didn’t happen.”

“They took my power,” Marnie said. “The physical pain from what they did was bad, but the worst part was being so helpless, feeling so weak. They took my power, all of it, not only the magic. I’d never felt that helpless before. Never. I always thought I could defend myself, but I couldn’t. There was—”

“Nothing I could do,” Meaghan said. “Nothing.”

Marnie nodded. “And that’s what haunts you, isn’t it? That was the real assault. So, yeah, something did happen.” Marnie slipped a business card into Meaghan’s shaking hand. “Call her.”

Meaghan nodded, but slipped the card into her pocket without looking at it. “I have to figure out how to kill a dragon first.”

Marnie smiled. “As excuses go, that’s not a bad one. But I’m not going to drop this. Stop letting them hurt you. Take your power back.”

Meaghan nodded again, and then fled to the kitchen.

Look on the bright side
.
If the dragon kills you,
she told herself,
you won’t have to call the therapist.

Chapter Thirty-One

M
EAGHAN POURED HERSELF
a cup of coffee and stared at Russ. “You need to come upstairs with me and talk to Dad.”

Russ frowned. “That’s Kady upstairs.”

“Yeah, and she’s channeling Dad.”

“Did he ask for me?” Russ refused to meet Meaghan’s eye. In a stiff voice, he said, “Seems like you’re the favorite kid these days.”

Wow. Is that what I sound like?

“Don’t be like that.” She took a deep breath. “Don’t be me. He’s already got one peevish ungrateful child. You’re the good one, remember?
Here I go again, talking crazy shit.
“And he’s about to be born. Which has to suck, when you think about it. Cut him some slack, please?”

Russ sighed. “You asking me that may be even more surreal than him talking from Kady’s womb.” He threw down the dishtowel he was holding. “Fine. Let’s get this over with.”

“You’re seriously weirded out by this, aren’t you?”

“Well, yeah,” Russ said, following her upstairs. “I watched him die. I picked out the suit he was buried in. You’re the one who’s had all the post-life contact.”

“Technically, it’s now pre-life contact,” Meaghan said, as they stood outside the closed bedroom door.

Russ gave her a sour look. “Now you’re an expert on reincarnation?”

Meaghan glared back. “Will you stopping acting like—”

“You?”

Meaghan rolled her eyes. “Yeah.” She knocked on the door. “Kady?” she called. “Jeff? It’s Meaghan and Russ. Can we come in?”

Jeff opened the door. His eyes were red and shiny, but he was smiling. “It’s good. We’re good. Come talk to your dad.”

“Before he’s your son?” Russ asked.

Jeff nodded. “We got a little time, I think. The contractions are still far apart and she still likes me so . . . is that chili still on the stove?”

Russ nodded. “Chicken noodle, too.”

“You mind me poking around and making her some supper?”

“I thought women in labor aren’t supposed to eat,” Russ said.

Jeff shook his head. “In childbirth class they said it was fine.”

“You’re the expert, I guess. Have at it,” Russ said. “There’s bread in the pantry and ham in the fridge if you want to make a sandwich.”

Jeff headed downstairs, and Meaghan and Russ entered the bedroom.

Kady was curled on her side. When she saw Russ, she smiled. “Hey, kiddo. I’m sorry I didn’t check in with you when I got here. There was a lot going on.”

Russ stared at Kady, his mouth open. In a choked voice, he said, “Dad, is that really you in there?”

Kady nodded. “Sure is. Not for long though.”

Russ burst into tears.

Kady patted the edge of the bed. “Russ, don’t. It’s okay. Get over here.”

“That’s Kady,” Meaghan said. “She speaks a little faster.”

“Sorry I got so bitchy,” Kady said.

Meaghan shook her head. “No apology needed. You’re doing great.”

“I’m not going to be able to help you move into the new office,” Kady said.

“We’ll figure it out,” Meaghan said. “Let us talk to Dad, okay?”

Kady nodded. “Shutting up now.”

Meaghan prodded Russ in the back. “Sit down.”

Kady, now Matthew, sighed. “She’s a real trouper. Give her a raise when this is all over, okay?”

“I’ll do what I can.” Meaghan sat on the other side of the bed. “What do you need to tell us?”

“The fair folk . . . they have a—”

“Dragon,” Meaghan said. “Yeah, we already know about that.”

Kady—
Matthew
, Meaghan corrected herself again—looked surprised. “You know about the prophecy?”

Meaghan snorted.

“She doesn’t believe in it,” Russ said.

“Good.” Matthew nodded. “Have you read it?”

Meaghan scowled. “Hell, no.”

“Even better. All it would do is make you second-guess yourself.”

“They’re telling me it says I’m supposed to kill the dragon.” She felt her anxiety begin to climb.

“With a magic sword,” Russ added.

Matthew shook Kady’s head. “Has Terry filled you in on those?”

“Yeah,” Meaghan said. “Total bullshit, he says.”

“The prophecy talks about a special blade that will slay the beast,” Matthew said. “Which may or may not be this dragon.”

Meaghan rolled her eyes. “Typical.”

“That’s my girl. Skeptical even in the face of magic.”

Meaghan smiled. “You can sprinkle bullshit with fairy dust, but it’s still bullshit.”

Russ, who was holding Kady’s hand, let out a watery laugh. The tears had slowed, but he still looked overwhelmed.

Matthew laughed with him a moment, then grew serious. “The prophecy may be nonsense, but the dragon is very real. And magic won’t kill it. You have to take its head off and you need iron or steel to get through its hide.”

“Like a sword?” Meaghan felt her anxiety crank up another notch.

“What about Terry’s lightning?” Russ asked. “Won’t that work?”

Matthew shrugged. “Maybe, provided he can control it and call it at will. But he’d need a precise strike to sever the head. A blade up close would work better although that has its own set of challenges.”

“Like getting barbecued,” Meaghan said. “I’m not impervious to fire, am I?”

“No. But you are immune to being stunned.”

“Stunned?”

“A dragon exudes a powerful magical field, sort of like magical pheromones, that makes prey docile. But, provided you can avoid the flame, you can get up close to it.”

“Whoa, wait a minute.” Meaghan raised her hand. “Back up to the stunning thing.” The anxiety kicked up yet another notch. “You’re saying I’m the only one who get can near the damn thing and still put up a fight? If Terry can’t take it out from a distance, it has to be me?”

“I’m afraid so,” Matthew said. “The trolls can help you up to a certain point, the Millers more than Buzz. They have more troll blood. But even they won’t be able to resist the spell.”

“What about the witches?” Her voice sounded thin and breathy in her ears. “What about Natalie?”

Matthew sighed. “They can’t help you at all. They’ll be out cold. Something about their magical skill makes them even more susceptible. Dragon sleep, they call it, and it only affects human witches and wizards.”

“Hang on a sec.” Meaghan hopped off the bed. She grabbed the trashcan Gretchen had set next to the bed and vomited.

They really expect me to kill a fucking dragon. Me. Killing a dragon.

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Russ, would you take this to the bathroom and dump it out for me? I need to talk to Dad alone for a bit.”

Russ rolled his eyes, grabbed the can without a word, and stomped from the room.

Meaghan shut the door behind him and sat at the foot of the bed. “I don’t think I can do this.”

“I don’t see that you have any choice,” Matthew said in a grim voice.

For a moment, Meaghan saw a flash of horrified concern she knew was Kady, then Matthew reasserted himself. “That’s why I had to talk to you now,” he said. “Why Kady’s in labor early. This was the only window I had.”

“Do the others know about this? They’re all assuming Terry will do it.”

Matthew shook his head. “Nobody knows about it. If you go under the stunning effect and somehow survive, all you remember is being frozen with fear. But very few people have ever survived a dragon attack.”

“How come the fair folk aren’t stunned?”

“They’re less affected by it for some reason. Enough that they can feel it happen to themselves and take countermeasures.”

“Couldn’t we do that? Amulets or something?”

“Nobody knows the magic required. The fair folk guard it carefully, as you can imagine.”

“I could tell people if I see it happening to them.”

Matthew shook his head. “Humans can’t feel it happen, and by the time you noticed someone acting oddly it would be late. The best you can do is keep them out of the way.”

Meaghan slumped back on the bed, and ran her shaking hands through her hair. “Terry can’t even help me then.”