34

I went back over to the Troykin section of Dayning again, and found Zik'k. “Hey Fernie, who's rich uncle did you catch being naughty?” He smiled, and walked over to the Hummer. “Needin' body guarding again?” “Not this time, I want to ask you about that creature that trashed the car. I hadn't done that when I had the chance earlier, and I want to know more about it.”
“That thing? I've never seen something like that, and I sure as hell don't want to have to again. It tore your car apart like tissue paper. The only reason it didn't catch me I think is that its pretty stupid. It tore the car into tiny chunks looking for me in it, and the fear it generated kept me running for an hour at least.” He got a serious look on his face. “That thing was definitely an outsider, I could feel it in my blood. I think it could feel me too, bub onbce ib los me ib coubn't find me again, so i don't think it can scent anyone.”
“Well, the biggest question is what did it look like? Maybe Larry and I can put our heads together and figure out what it is so we can do something about it next time it shows.” “I hobe you cab, I dob not want to fabe ib at all, but if Ib hab to, I want sobeting ob my sibe” Zik'k said. He sneezed and stepped back a ways to clear the zone of magic that was around me. “That's better” he sighed. “What it looked like was a flying zombie. Flesh was falling off of it, and it's wings looked like large flaps of wet skin. I don't remember much more as I was too busy running away to care.”
That sounded pretty descriptive to me. I thought we might be able to figure out what it was with that information. I know I never wanted to face it straight up. Now the thing I needed to figure out was how much my idea was feasible.

#

“You want the good news or the bad news first Fernie?” Larry asked me after I'd outlined my idea. “Just skip the good news bad news shtick and spell it out.” Larry gave me a irritated look, then sighed and explained it to me. “First off it's a good idea. Sympathetic magic makes things like making the tunnel along the bridge route feasible, the downside is the huge amount of magic needed to do it. You cast that spell, and everything within five hundred miles will know something BIG is happening. Anolyn would be certain to know where it was happening, you can't hide that.”
Larry plowed on before I could break in. “That doesn't mean it can't be done. We may be able to do the spell a little at a time, and with some manual labor, we could do the job.” “But what about that creature, both times I was up at along the strait, it came right at me. You think Anolyn knows somehow about the Way maybe re-opening?” Fawn snorted. “How could that overgrown lizard know anything? He's kept that island isolated and the curatin is death to anything trying to cross....wait....you said that thing Zik'k saw looked like a flying zombie?”
“Yeah, that's how he described it. A flying zombie.” I replied. “Okay, assume he knows something is going on and sent a dead thing through the barrier.” “Not so fast”, Larry said quickly. “That barrier clobbers anything going through it, and zombies would de-animate when they hit the barrier, so it has to be something someone conjured up on this side of the barrier.” “Or”, said Fawn, “maybe Anolyn has a secret way through his barrier?”
Larry stopped and stared at his wife. “Fawn, baby, I think you may have something there. Trouble is, that barrier is huge, and finding the hole in it would be like a search in a haystack for a needle. We could spend years looking.” “I don't think the service is supposed to take years. Anyhow, we need a better answer. Even if we found Anolyn's secret way, he'd have that guarded. Best thing to do is make our own”, Larry finished.
“So back to the question, how do we do that?” I said grumpily. “I mean the shortest distance is the bridge, and making a walkway would re-open the way the quickest. And making it and the people on it invisible would keep them from being discovered easily. It's the best all-round solution.” I finished speaking, and in that moment of quiet, we all heard a heavy, wet flapping sound, and I just about crawled out of my skin I was so very frightened. Larry and Fawn looked at me oddly and then a moment later, both of them felt the fear, and Larry grabbed Fawn and dashed into his work room. I followed hot on their heels.
Larry got Fawn into a silver circle that he used for his experiments there, and muttered a quick activating spell. I felt the spell go up just as the front door was ripped loose from the frame. That same unearthly roar that I'd heard before blasted through the house and the sound seemed to press on the barrier physically. Then there was a pulse of light and we felt heat waft over us and a scream came from the front room. I heard a familiar voice, Cobb, chant harshly and another waft of heat and light sprang to life with a roar in the front room, eliciting another roar of pain from the creature.
There was a heavy flapping, and silence fell around us. I heard a footstep crunch some glass, I think, and then we heard “Ms Fatelli? Is anyone here?” Cobb. Cobb had shown up here? “Hang on Fernie”, Larry whispered, “we don't know, wait.” We heard a shuffling in the front room and then the steps became louder, and Cobb stepped into the work room. He startled at seeing us, bringing his hands up and Larry chanted strengthening the barrier as he watched Cobb.