Gods and Swindlers (City of Eldrich Book 3) (40 page)

Terry was nowhere in sight.

Before she could move, before she could think, the gray figures materialized before her.

“Give us the baby,” one of them screeched at her.

“Fuck you,” Meaghan answered.

Beside her, John fell to his knees, sobbing.

“No,” Hank rumbled. “I’m a free troll. No.” The words were slushy and garbled like he couldn’t move his tongue. “Ag—” was all he managed to say before he stiffened like a statue. His eyes rolled wildly in his face, but nothing else moved.

“Hank,” Aggie grunted, before she too froze, Sam still in her arms.

Meaghan whirled around. The monks—Todd, Clint, and Dustin—stared in awe at the air about two feet above the fair folks’ heads. “They’re real,” Clint squeaked. “I knew it. Real elves. So beautiful.”

“Fucking hell,” Meaghan said. “They’re still three feet tall and ugly,” she shouted over her shoulder. “Ignore what your eyes tell you. It’s not real.”

But it was no good. Everyone was either weeping, ecstatic with awe, or unconscious.

Except Sam. He groaned in Aggie’s arms and stirred.

“Meaghan,” he squeaked.

The elves stepped forward.

Time for the bullshit
. Meaghan hadn’t gotten her chance to put on the grand performance in the basement.
Got to stall them until Terry gets his shit together.

Meaghan buried her face in her hands and began to make loud sobbing sounds.

Marnie, where are you?

With Kady.

Is the baby safe?

For now, but I can’t shield him and help you at the same time. The witches are unconscious. It’s only me. And the elves are too strong.

Can they hear us?

I don’t think so.

Keep everybody else in the house if you can.

The front door slammed shut with a bang.

“Please don’t take the baby,” Meaghan said between sobs. “My father is gone. Anything that’s left of him can’t hurt you now. Please, he’s only a baby.”

The elves screeched with laughter.

Meaghan took a quick look around her.

Sam was awake and carefully freeing himself from Aggie’s frozen grasp.

Meaghan looked back at the elves. They were so busy gloating they didn’t notice Sam.

She took a deep breath and wailed out some more sobs. “Please don’t hurt us. Take the smith but leave the baby.”
Where the hell is Terry?

Meadow,
Marnie answered.
Trying to get his focus back.

Hell of a time for performance anxiety.
She howled some more, hoping the elves were still focused on her. “Please don’t hurt me. I’ll never bother you again. Don’t let the dragon burn me.” For a moment, the sobs were real.
Not burning. Anything but that.

More screeching laughter rolled over her.

She turned away from the elves, as if in fear, and peeked through her fingers.

Sam swung from Aggie’s frozen arm and dropped into the snow, something in his hand.

“The beast is hungry for impervious meat,” one of the elves screeched. It waved its skinny arm toward the dragon.

The dragon yelped in pain and cowered away.

That’s how they control it.
Even though the dragon had already tried to kill her, she felt a flash of rage at the fair folk. The dragon had attacked her out of instinct, not cruelty like the elves.

Meaghan now truly understood Terry’s regret at having to kill it. She knew she didn’t have a choice. It was either the dragon or everybody she loved, but she’d take no joy in killing this creature.

She glanced up. The dragon’s tail was extended now, rather than curled tightly around its body. Behind the fair folk, Sam ran in a low crouch toward the end of the dragon’s tail, carrying the Ulfberht sword in his hands. He stopped, hands raised to strike, the sword nearly as long as he was tall, and stared at Meaghan.

It flames when you piss it off
 
.
 
.
 
.
Marnie!
She sent Marnie a mental snapshot of the scene and a moment later, a golden shimmer appeared in the air between the fair folk and everyone else.

“Sam, now!”

Sam swung the sword.

Enraged, the dragon threw back its head with a roar and took a deep breath.

Meaghan buried her head in her arms, too scared to watch.

A moment later, the screaming began.

Chapter Forty-Nine

E
VEN AS MUCH
as she hated the fair folk, Meaghan felt a stab of horrified pity at the twisted flaming bodies. Steph had been right. Nobody, not even the fair folk, deserved to die that way.

Marnie’s barrier had turned into a wall of flame.

I can’t hold this much longer.

Meaghan could feel in Marnie’s thoughts the effort it took to maintain the barrier.

And not only was Meaghan on the other side of it, but everyone Meaghan loved.

The dragon will follow my scent. Sam said it will follow my scent.

Before Marnie could respond, Meaghan was on her feet and running through the heavy snow away from her house. She scrambled onto the nearest car—her Audi, parked in Terry and Steph’s driveway—and stood on top of it, waving her hands.

“Over here! I’m over you, you bastard. Come and get me!”

The dragon, its flame depleted, turned its head and grinned at her—at least it looked like a grin. It shifted its massive bulk and took a deep breath. At the same moment, the golden barrier vanished.

“Oh, shit,” Meaghan squeaked, as she slid off the car and ran. She dove over one of the low steel guardrails that marked the end of Holly Lane, into the unbroken snow.

The dragon flamed for a moment, then unfurled its wings and flew out over the meadow.

Meaghan peeked over the guardrail and whimpered at the sight of the burning Audi. “Not again.”

She felt the lightning—she’d lost her hat somewhere and now all her hair stood on end—before the thunder crack. She jammed her fingers in her ears.

Bang
.

Meaghan looked out into the meadow.

Terry stood in the snow, shooting lightning bolts into the sky as the dragon circled him. Any time the dragon got near stunning distance, Terry zapped it.

Enraged by Terry, the dragon appeared to have forgotten about Meaghan for the moment, but she knew she couldn’t stay huddled by the guardrail.

The steel guardrail . . .

Sam ran toward her. “We must go. It will be back. We must go.”

“My scent,” Meaghan said. “What carries my scent best? What will the dragon focus on?”

“Blood and sweat,” Sam said. “And urine.”

Meaghan had been so focused on the dragon, she’d forgotten the bloody scalp wound from the plow crash. It had dripped down the side of her face and neck, a small discomfort in a sea of chaos.

One shoulder of Steph’s short welding jacket was wet with blood, as was the wool sweater underneath it. Meaghan stripped them off and draped them across the fence.

Another flash of light and a boom. Terry dropped to one knee, then got back to his feet, but his fatigue was obvious. He couldn’t do this much longer.

“Hurry,” Meaghan said, handing Sam the jacket and sweater. “Wrap them around the railing.”

With shaking hands, he took the clothing. He pulled a rag from his gray tunic and handed it to Meaghan. “Here, wipe off the blood on your skin. More scent.”

“Got a better idea.” Meaghan shoved the rag in the pocket of the aluminized apron, unbuckled the aluminized chaps, and then unbuttoned her jeans. She squatted above the railing and peed on it, the urine steaming where it dripped on the snow.

The dragon circled Terry, like a sheepdog wearing down a wayward ewe. Terry stumbled again and, this time, he didn’t get back to his feet.

Meaghan pulled her pants back up. She stuck her fingers in her mouth and whistled as loud as she could. “Asshole, over here!” She kicked the guardrail. “Help me make noise.”

Sam banged on the railing with the sword and screeched in his native language.

The dragon turned its head in their direction.

“Go,” Meaghan said, pushing Sam over the railing and then climbing after him. “Run.”

“Where?”

“Away,” she shouted as she ran down the middle of Holly Lane. “Away from me!”

The dragon soared away from Terry and landed near the guardrail. It sniffed once, then with a graceful dip of its head, bit down on the wad of bloody clothing.

Marnie, tell him now. Tell Terry now!

The dragon roared, but no thunder followed.

Meaghan glanced back, but couldn’t spot Terry. The dragon lifted its head and sniffed the air.

With no plan, no destination, Meaghan ran for her life. The plowed road was easier to run on than the heavy snow, but slicker. She fell once and pulled herself to her feet, with no thought but to get as far away as possible. She’d made it all the way to Edna’s house, when she stepped on something hard and round that rolled out from under her foot.

Meaghan fell through the air, hands out to catch herself. She felt something snap—
wrist?—
as she hit the ground and skidded another yard. Panicked breath wheezing in her chest, she tried to push herself to her feet.

The agony flared in her wrist like white-hot flame. Normally stoic about pain, Meaghan squealed and burst into tears, as her vision grew yellow around the edges. She felt consciousness starting to fade and flailed out convulsively with her other hand.

It landed on something hard and round.

A glass jar.

A jar of the Miller’s moonshine.

A memory of Marnie, naked and possessed by the Power, pouring moonshine over her head as accelerant, flashed across Meaghan’s terrified mind.

From behind, something nudged at her leg.

A hot foul-smelling wind blew across her.

Not wind
, she thought,
breath.

She screamed, all rational thought driven from her mind.

But the dragon didn’t flame or bite. Instead, the dragon yelped in pain.

“Get away from her,” she heard Sam shout.

She rolled over.

Sam stood a few feet away, the dragon’s open mouth wheezing and drooling inches above his head. He was holding something . . .

The picture clicked into focus.

Sam had jammed the Ulfberht sword into the roof of the dragon’s mouth.

It couldn’t flame.

The dragon shook its head hard, and Sam went flying, empty-handed.

The dragon whimpered, pawing at its snout.

The sword’s still in there.

Meaghan stared at the jar of moonshine in her hand.

Molotov cocktail.

She pushed herself to feet with one hand, trying not pass out from the fire in her wrist. She wedged the jar under her left arm and used her good right hand to pull the rag Sam had given her out of her apron pocket. Wheezing with pain and exhaustion, she tried to open the lid of the jar but couldn’t manage to do it with only one functional hand.

Gobs of dragon drool steamed and fizzed on the ground where Sam had stood. Meaghan swabbed it up with the rag and, with her good hand, armpit, and teeth managed to tie the sodden rag around the jar, leaving enough hanging on one end to use as a fuse.

Need a match.

Across the street, the MacDougall house burned. Behind her, Edna’s house burned. “Dummy,” she said out loud, as the hysterical laughter bubbled up. Edna’s rosebushes were on fire, too. Meaghan hobbled toward the nearest one, and lit the rag. It sputtered for a moment and then ignited.

“Hey, Puff,” Meaghan said. “Want a treat?”

The dragon wheeled its graceful head in the direction of her voice.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I truly am sorry.” With her right arm, she tossed the flaming jar underhanded toward the dragon’s mouth.

The dragon snapped it out of the air.

Meaghan heard the glass jar crunch between the dragon’s teeth.

The explosion rocked the street. Meaghan was thrown off her feet and landed on her broken wrist. Her vision yellowed again as she howled in pain, then the endorphins kicked in and the pain receded enough to let her stay conscious.

A wet plop landed in the snow beside her and began to steam.

It’s raining dragon.

The plop was followed by a solid thunk. The Ulfberht landed beside the steaming pile.

Meaghan glanced upward. The now headless dragon swayed above her.

“Oh, crap.” Using the sword like a cane, Meaghan got to her feet and tried to run, but the best she could do was hobble. The dragon swayed for a moment longer, and then fell, gracefully, along the length of Holly Lane, and landed with a crash that shook the ground beneath her.

“This isn’t over,” a voice hissed behind her. She turned and saw the elf from the basement.

“No,” Meaghan said in a soft voice. “It isn’t.” Still holding the sword, she pointed it at the elf. “You fuckers are next.”

The elf hissed one last time and vanished into the air.

Chapter Fifty