Gremlin Night Read online

  A faint flicker of a smile crossed her face. “Director Farlance will provide the details and instruction, but suffice to say it will be a cause assignment.”

  A “cause assignment” was R.U.NE.-speak for figuring out what had caused an arcane manifestation to appear. After targeting Burt, it was a step down. It mostly meant working with the local sentinel and trying to figure out where and why a manifestation had appeared.

  But, there was no way in Hades I was complaining. I would still be working in the field, and that was what mattered.

  We both stood.

  Wu gestured at the teleportal. “The travel word is Rip City,” she told me.

  Apparently, I wasn’t the only sorcerer in R.U.N.E. who was a Portland Trail Blazers fan. The Blazers were the one thing I missed about Portland. Travel words were used when you had to teleportal to a different city, especially over great distances. You didn’t want the door to misfire and send you to the wrong location.

  “Oh, I need to see about reloading my spells,” I said. I’d pretty much depleted everything back in Peoria taking down Burt and his minions.

  Wu frowned. “If you hadn’t broken orders you’d still have them at the ready for the current assignment.”

  I pursed my lips. She had me dead to rights there. I’d managed to drop off the two borrowed artifacts before taking the teleportal. With luck, she’d never learn about those.

  Wu shook her head. “You know that reissuing spells takes a lot of mana and a few spells in its own right. It is only done in the most extenuating of circumstances, and this is definitely not one of them.”

  Denied. But she wasn’t finished.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Don’t ever think of taking artifacts again from stores without authorization. The same goes for R.U.N.E. creatures. Do I make myself clear?”

  I swallowed. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Excellent. Otherwise you will be reassigned to the Library.”

  I shuddered. “Got it.”

  “Time for you to leave,” Wu said.

  I couldn’t have agreed more. Cradling the fly-by-night’s chrysalis in my left arm, I went to the teleportal. The silver dragon scales flashed in the light. The dragon door knocker had sapphire eyes.

  It was warm to my touch. I knocked it against the pine, three times. “Rip City,” I said after the third knock. A distant boom echoed.

  I turned the handle. A midnight black corridor stretched before me, a Portland street, someplace in the Industrial district from the looks of it, shimmering at the far end. Why couldn’t the teleportal connect to Broadway street, say next to the Schnitzer Auditorium and the Newmark theater, with all those glittering lights? I shook my head, stepping into the doorway.

  A twisting sensation shot through me. Technically the teleportal wasn’t a dragon—it was created by dragon artificers, but it still felt like a dragon. Filled with power and impossible strength. I finished stepping through the doorway.

  I gasped. I wasn’t standing on a Portland street.

  I was two hundred feet in the air above a Portland street.

  3

  Time slows down when you’re faced with looming death. Two hundred feet above the pavement isn’t far, just ask gravity. Only a handful of seconds before the ground smacked me out of this life once and for all. A scream hung in my throat, ready to explode from my open mouth.

  I fell earthward, the teleportal already above me, assuming it was still there. I didn’t want to die, ever, but I especially didn’t want to die from a glitch.

  I fought to keep my arms from windmilling as I plunged in what seemed like slow motion. Another half second gone.

  No magical creatures to help me.

  I was a dead woman.

  Let me out, the fly-by-night said in my head.

  Save me and it’s a deal! I thought back.

  The ground rushed closer.

  “You’re released, forthwith!” I screamed. “Fly!”

  The chrysalis dissolved in my hand. Huge black moth wings unfolded, tinged with phosphorescent blue. The fly-by-night’s body was human-shaped, topped by a black panther’s head. I fell away from it as the wings caught the air.

  Sometimes the rules of magic fail you, I thought. The last thought I’d ever have.

  Strong hands grabbed me under my arms, held me.

  The fly-by-night’s wings beat the air furiously. My stomach lurched at the sudden stop. The streetlights strobed like floor lights at a dance club, flashing on and off. Beneath a power pole shedding sparks, a figure in a hooded sweatshirt stared up.

  The manifestation released me inches above the ground. The toes of my boots scraped against the pavement, and I stumbled. In the time I recovered my balance and looked up, the figure was gone. I must have imagined it in the crazy strobing light.

  The fly-by-night’s eyes glowed redly. “Agreement fulfilled,” it said, voice a low hiss. “I am off.” It rose, wings flapping.

  My heart threatened to burst from my chest. I doubled over, inhaled deeply, trying to slow my pounding heart. Thank the Gods fly-by-nights were telepathic.

  Straightening, I wiped sweat from my forehead. The ghostly outlines of mana shimmered purple for an instant around the fly-by-night before it disappeared in the darkness.

  I’d managed to let loose a paroled manifestation in under a minute after arriving in Portland. That had to be some kind of record. Then again, being killed in less than thirty seconds after arriving in Bridgetown would have been a new record, too.

  I tilted my head up and drew in another lungful of night air, my heart still jackhammering in my chest. Two hundred feet above me the teleportal slammed shut. That didn’t help my heart slow down any.

  Teleportals didn’t do that. They weren’t crafted to open above the ground. They were connections to other doors, normal doors, overlays if you will on the normal run-of-the-mill portal.

  Something had gone horribly wrong.

  The lighting strobed faster. I drew my wand. Sparks showered down on me, then the street lamp above me exploded like a flash bulb.

  I ducked. A burnt wiring stink filled the air, and my nose crinkled.

  A chittering, monkey-laugh erupted behind me and I whirled around to face the noise. A manifestation the size of a rhesus monkey scampered into view, outlined by other street lights that still strobed madly.

  That was no monkey.

  Its skull came to a point, and its flaring ears came to sharp tips, like a classic demon. The chin narrowed to a point matching the one at the top of the skull.

  A gremlin.

  The leathery face split into a grin filled with a forest of needle-sized teeth, and its black-pit eyes sparkled maliciously.

  I pointed my wand at it. “I evoke the Law of the Compact, and bind you to my will,” I said in English. At least that was what I tried to say around suddenly numb lips

  It came out, “I provoke the Craw of the Impact, and grind goo to my spill.” I narrowed my eyes, raised the wand again. Geeze.

  I tried the same command in French, ending my gesture with the best crisp flourish I could muster on short notice.

  My wand slipped from my fingers and clattered on the sidewalk.

  I dove after it, but missed, banging my hands on the pavement. Ouch. I pulled myself up, drawing my binding dagger.

  “Shackle,” I tried to say as I made a pass with the blade, its edges shimmering bluely. Simple spells lacked power but were quick. “Tackle,” I heard myself say.

  “Hee-hee!” The gremlin’s laughter exploded in a drawn-out hiss. It charged me, little legs pumping madly, and cannonballed off my chest. I staggered backwards, and fell on my butt.

  The gremlin raced to the end of the block and scampered up a crossing signpost.

  I pulled myself off the sidewalk and began chanting a binding spell in Latin, my words low. After the flop I’d taken trying to cast the last spell, I needed to take my time. I held the blade up, made a slashing motion to my right, then one to my left, and then one at the a
ir in front of me.

  Faint threads of golden light appeared from the point of my dagger, stretching around the gremlin, who had been watching me with a cat-swallowing grin the whole time.

  “Hee-hee!” Its laughter echoed off the buildings. The golden threads snarled and fell away, disappearing just above the ground.

  Brimstone and bonfires, I swore silently. The binding spell should have worked. This was a gremlin manifestation, and like most gremlin manifestations, looked to be a recent one. It had to be a Class II—recently arrived. But, the amount of magic power it possessed to make the world go haywire was far higher than a Class II. More like a Class V. But gremlins were new manifestations in the overall scheme of things

  That was when I noticed we weren’t alone.

  A Portland police cruiser pulled up to the curb and an officer stepped out. His face was wary. Great. Now I had to deal with mundane law enforcement, on top of a magical mischief maker.

  “Are you all right, ma’am?” the officer asked. He stood warily, feet braced, one hand near his holstered pistol. The name on his uniform I.D. was “J. Kyle.”

  I still held the binding dagger.

  “Please put the knife down,” he said.

  The traffic lights began blinking purple and orange. The walk signs suddenly showed a lit silhouette of a man with his arms over his head. I had to get that gremlin, but without the binding knife, doing so was going to be hard.

  “It’s a ceremonial knife,” I said.

  “Please lay it down, ma’am.” His hand inched closer to his sidearm.

  I laid the knife down. If only I had a persuader sprite on me. This hadn’t quite gotten to the point where my life was in jeopardy, not counting nearly splattering on the sidewalk a few minutes ago, but a sprite, despite its silver tongue, couldn’t change physics. Then again, if I’d had a sprite on me, the unbelievably powerful gremlin would probably have twisted it.

  I raised my hands. “What seems to be the problem, Officer Kyle?” I asked, putting on my best supportive civilian voice.

  Kyle looked about my age, mid-twenties. His eyes were wide, and sweat rimmed his face.

  I looked over his shoulder. Not only was the traffic light here acting bizarre, but the traffic lights the next three blocks were flashing manically in every color but the standard ones. A huge spray of water three blocks away glimmered in the flickering street lights. A big semi-trailer blocked the street, hazard lights blinking rapidly. Too fast for normal. That explained the lack of traffic. I had managed to drop into a wild arcane party.

  Kyle shook himself. “Do you know what’s happening?” he asked. “Gremlins are here! Real, actual gremlins. Granddad didn’t lie about them after all.”

  This was bad. Very bad. He shouldn’t have any idea about gremlins being here. Your non-arcane human should be blissfully ignorant about manifestations. The supernatural should just be superstition to them.

  “Gremlin? What gremlin?” I asked. The key to keeping the average person from starting to see the Hidden arcane is to introduce doubt.

  “The ones that have wrecked the area,” Kyle said, his voice rising. His gun was out and waving in my general direction.

  “Listen, there’s no such thing as a gremlin,” I said. “I heard some monkeys escaped from the primate center in Aloha and hitched a ride on the MAX, and then caught the street car to come here. Rubber-necking drivers caused that accident that knocked over the fire hydrant two blocks away. Remember?”

  My mouth had taken on a life of its own as it desperately tried to save me by spinning a counter story. It was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever said. But, to the police officer’s conscious, analytical mind, supernatural creatures would seem ridiculous, too. Errant monkeys were way more likely than gremlin manifestations making the industrial district go haywire.

  At the very least, it would divert his attention from using his firearm.

  Only it didn’t.

  Kyle shook his head. “Those aren’t monkeys. They’re gremlins. My granddad was in the Air Force back in the Sixties. He told me about gremlins.” His eyes had a glassy, faraway look.

  Gremlins. As in more than one. He’d said gremlins a minute earlier, but I’d still been thinking of the single pest above us.

  Kyle’s expression suddenly snapped into focus. He raised his gun. I half ducked but he was pointing up at the traffic light. The gremlin squatted on top of the middle light, beating it like a bongo drum, and grinning at us the whole time.

  I frowned. Cheeky little jerk. Even for a gremlin, he was bold. I glanced down and scanned the ground, trying to find my wand. No luck. It must have really gone for distance when it hit the ground.

  “Stop!” Kyle shouted. Near panic filled his voice. “Stop now!”

  He held his automatic in both hands, in the classic shooter pose, and aimed at the gremlin. The little annoyance stopped his bongo-like drumming and cocked his head, staring intently at the officer.

  Then the gremlin started pounding on the street light again, faster this time. The frame shook, and the turn signal flashed all three colors at once.

  “I said stop!” Kyle’s voice cracked. The gremlin ignored him.

  Bullets could hurt a Class III or higher manifestation, but a Class II like this little pain in the rear was another matter.

  My mouth was suddenly dry. “Don’t,” I pleaded, but the officer ignored me. I winced and prepared to drop to the ground. Gremlins could wreck ballistics like nobody’s business. No telling where the bullet would fly.

  Kyle pulled the trigger. I braced for the bang of a gunshot, but nothing happened. His eyes widened. He pulled the trigger again.

  The pistol literally went to pieces, in a sudden rush of parts falling with a clatter on the sidewalk. The bullet that had been in the firing chamber clinked on the cement and rolled away, off the curb and across the pavement.

  “My god,” Kyle wailed. “What’s happening?”

  “Hee-hee-hee!” The gremlin’s triumphant laugh grated on my nerves. He balanced on the support arm of the traffic array, like a wire walker.

  I finally spied my wand wedged against the base of a nearby parking kiosk and snatched it up.

  I’d try a command spell this time. It would hurt both of us, since I didn’t have a proper binding in place. Simple brute force. Not subtle at all, but that was the advantage of a command.

  I pointed my wand at the gremlin.

  “Drop!” I said in Coptic.

  The Gremlin pivoted, stepped off the support arm and plunged fifteen feet to the street. Being a Class II still temporary manifestation, he didn’t so much smack the pavement as pillow into it. He bounced up, and then landed on his feet, facing me.

  “Be still!” I thundered, still using Coptic.

  The gremlin did its best impersonation of a statue.

  I let out my breath, and hazarded a look at the officer.

  He stared at me wild-eyed, face confused.

  “What are you?” he asked in a desperate falsetto squeak.

  I sighed.

  Now the fun part began. I couldn’t tell him the truth, but he’d seen the truth, so I was stuck. It would have been so handy to have a way to wipe his memory, like in a movie or TV show where some hapless soul uncovers the secret conspiracy. Nor would we do something as evil as killing ordinary folk who stumbled upon the truth.

  R.U.N.E. didn’t kill humans, unless it was self-defense. And even the hardest cases among us wouldn’t consider keeping the supernatural secret to be self-defense, not in the most direct sense of self-defense.

  No, I was going to have to bring him in on the truth. I frantically tried to remember the name of the Portland Police embed—the contact that the Hidden could work with. The Hidden, that’s what we call manifestations, magic, sorcerers, the whole arcane ball of wax.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but before I could begin, a strong voice called out, from the direction of the stalled semi-trailer.

  “Agent Marquez, there you are!” The voi
ce was calm, welcoming, with a confident tone that made me want to find out more about the man behind the voice.

  A stunningly handsome, blond, white man strolled toward us. He was tall and his dragon-topped ash walking stick tapped the pavement as he approached. He wore a high-class coat over tailored slacks and what looked like a silk shirt.

  Skyler Farlance.

  4

  Farlance gave me a relaxed smile, and an assured, in-charge-but-I-don’t-need-to-be heavy-handed look.

  The black man beside him was even taller, and quite handsome in an easy, athletic way. He wore a brown full-length leather coat over a muscle shirt and jeans. His shaved head gleamed softly in the traffic light glow.

  Behind them trailed a half-dozen shorter no-nonsense types. Four of them were dressed in business suits, looking like they were office workers. The other two, a man and a woman, wore red coats with matching red gloves, each carrying battered and worn-looking briefcases. They wore what looked like wrap-around sunglasses, but definitely weren’t. There was too much of a multi-faceted bug eye aspect to them. Because the sunglasses were actually living artifacts, pulsing with magical energy.

  The pair looked like they belonged in a Devo video from my mother’s youth.

  Burners. You could spot them from a mile away.

  “Director Farlance.” I nodded. I glanced at the cop. “This is Officer Kyle.”

  Farlance reached out to shake Kyle’s hand. “Tough situation, Office Kyle,” he said.

  The tall black man stood quietly beside Farlance and regarded me with an appraising look. I didn’t know him but it was obvious he knew me. I couldn’t tell from his lack of expression what he thought of me or the current situation I’d literally landed in.

  Oh, crap, I’d forgotten all about the fly-by-night. Not that it mattered. That manifestation had flown the proverbial coop.

  “What’s going on here?” Kyle asked Farlance. “Who are you people? What are they doing?” This last question was directed at the burners, who had snapped open their briefcases and pulled out their tools of the trade. Iron tongs and a little iron cauldron, that, like their sunglasses, was actually an artifact.