Page 24 of Time's Fool

But I had it now, and the thing didn’t have a brain. It didn’t know whose commands to follow—the one who had enchanted it, or the one who was in possession of it. So, instead of going anywhere, we were bucking and spinning and slowly rising, because I had started reaching upward as hard as I could.

The vamp caught on and did the same, and our two votes overrode her one. The little thing headed up, albeit while kicking like an out-of-control horse. But we held on, and finally reached the concourse again—

Only to have the broom shot out from under us by a spell.

It went flying into a building, where it stayed, sticking out of the plaster and quivering with spell-light. And I hit the stone walkway, hard enough to bruise, before rolling to a stop. Right at the feet of the witch who had attacked us.

And guess which one that was.

“Ring,” the leader said, extending a hand with a wand in it, close enough to almost touch my nose. “Now.”

Chapter Seven

I lay there, trying to think of a way out of this, but the witch’s argument was compelling. Yet I was a dead woman if I didn’t try something, because the vamp could disappear in an instant. He probably already had, blending into the crowd and going dim, and without a passenger thrown over his shoulder to point him out, they’d likely never find him.

I thought about trying to use speed against her again, because I was faster. And the nearest building was just a few yards away. A half-timbered thing with the usual shop on the bottom, it had a window in back overlooking the water that didn’t appear to be glazed.

Jump the counter, I thought, then run through to the other side, the house providing partial cover for a moment while I did so, followed by a leap through the window and into the river. It was likely to be a hellish trip, as not only would I have to contend with a sixty-foot drop, but this was the wrong side of the bridge. I’d almost certainly be swept through the arches and into the rapids they caused, making drowning a real possibility, especially if I managed to break a bone or two on the way through.

Yet at the moment, it seemed like my best play.

But the witch had backup in the form of a line of steely eyed women, all of whom had wands out, too. And at the first twitch, their wands jerked and she all but growled at me. “Don’t try it. Or your lover will have to find another little friend.”

“We aren’t lovers,” the vampire’s voice came from somewhere behind me.

“Then why are you still here?” the witch demanded, echoing my thoughts.

“I don’t abandon my people.”

“Then we have something in common, vampire. Give me the ring and you may have her back. For what purpose is up to you.”

“Tell me why it is so important to you, and perhaps I will.”

“This is not a conversation,” she snapped. “Give it to me or the girl dies!”

“Or you do,” someone else said, in a ringing voice that caused her to flinch and her wand to flare. And my eyes to cross while staring death in the face.

“Let her go, Morgan,” another voice said, younger, quieter, but with a calm assurance that I really envied right now.

I couldn’t look around to see who had spoken, but both voices were female, and the witch all but hissed at the sight of them, which gave me some hope.

“Aye, let her go, Morgan,” the older woman said. “And come back with us, while you still can.”

“Or what?” the dark-haired witch—Morgan, I assumed—spat. “You can’t hurt me and you know it. A pathetic old woman and an ignorant child! Send the real Pythia after me, and we’ll talk. Although I’ll tell her the same as you in the end.”

“She’d have your guts for garters by now!” the older woman said. “Be glad you’re dealing with us!”

“I’m not dealing with you,” she said contemptuously. “I’m dealing with him.”

Her eyes refocused where they’d been before, I assumed on Mircea. But he wasn’t the one who answered. A bolt of spell fire, so bright that it carved a searing line across my vision, blasted from the roof of a nearby building and slammed into the witch.

She froze like a statue, stock still with hate on her face and in her eyes. The folds of her gown ruffled in the wind, as did her long, unbound hair. But the pupils in those startlingly blue eyes didn’t contract, her body didn’t twitch, and her chest didn’t rise and fall any more than a statue’s would have; she may as well have been carved out of marble.

And like a sculpture without a plinth, she almost immediately toppled onto her face.

I thought she was dead, and I guessed the witches did, too. But instead of scattering as I’d expected, they stood their ground. And screamed their fury at what looked like hundreds of war mages jumping from the surrounding buildings and flooding down the road.

“God damn it!” Someone said, almost in my ear, and I turned to see two women hitting the ground beside me.

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