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.

33

Miserable was a good word. I started shivering around three o'clock and spent the rest of the night doing my best to stay warm. I didn't dare light a fire, I was afraid that the creature was still around, and a light at night would draw him from miles away. So I laid low, shivered and cursed silently the whole situation.
About four in the morning I heard a rustle in the bushes and tensed. Had it come back? not likely, I wasn't trying to piss myself and whatever that thing was, the fear it generated around itself was impossible to miss. So this was something else. I scrambled up the first tree I could, going as high as the branches would support me. Last thing in this woods I want ed to meet was one of the Black bears that populated the area. They may be a 'small' bear, but they're still bigger than me, so up I went.
I perched precariously on the upper branches and considered the situation. Zik'k was still out there somewhere and hopefully not having as bad a night. “Fern” came the harsh whisper from below me, “come on down.” “Zik'k, dammit, you scared the hell out of me just now.” I answered back with an angry whisper of my own. “Don't worry, I only saw one big bear and one little one together.” he whispered back up. I climbed back down slowly. Going up in the dark is pretty easy in a pine tree, even in the dark, coming down is a tad harder.
I joined Zik'k by the pine and he gave me the short version of his night. “Thing scared the hello out of me. I couldn't stop running after it got so close. All that mattered was gettin' away frub da ting... WAACHOO!... Ub Ferbie, Iba goad ober her abnd tabe a nab. Kib muh ib you iv you hear subding.” He walked a short distance away and curled up next to a pine, and actually drew the needles up and around him like a small nest, and passed out. I stayed awake and a short ways away so he wouldn't start sneezing. Next morning we got going at sunup and found the road by heading north and then orienting on the bridge, which was the tallest thing for that jutted out over the water. It took us another hour to walk into town.
I went over to the first public telephone I could find and dialed Fawn. She answered on the second ring. “Hello?” “Hi Amazon, it's me, can you pick me up at the bus station tomorrow? Something messed up my new car and bus doesn't run until tomorrow morning.” “Oh, gods Fernie, again? Sure, I can ask Larry to get you. Same time as yesterday?” “Yes” I said and hung up before my shakes got real bad. It had been bad and now that I felt safe, my body was reacting again. We managed to book two rooms, the manager was one of those folks that didn't care what you were so long as you paid for the room and didn't try to trash it out.
We caught the bus then next morning and Zik'k rode in the back so that he wouldn't go into paroxysms of sneezing while we rode back to Halifax. Larry met us at the depot and together we drove a suffering Zik'k back to his home, and then Larry and I went back to the house.
“So what is this thing that trashed two cars of yours in the last four days?” Larry asked me as he got me a cup of coffee. “I don't know. All I know is it has wings and that it scares the hell out of me as it gets closer to me. You should have asked Zik'k when you had the chance, he was the one who kept me from getting killed. He told me to run and then drew it's attention.” I shuddered. “I don't know how he handled being so close to that thing.” I told him.
“Troykin have got that touch of outsider to them, they can handle magick a lot better than most people realize. If he took off running like you said, then it was a pretty nasty piece of work sent after you. you're right, I should have talked to him.” He looked at me and favored me with his lopsided smile. “I just couldn't help but feel for him with the two of us in the car with him. Thank god I left the windows open, otherwise he'd have never got his head out in time.” I winced at remembering Zik'k, hanging half out the window and trying to get rind of last night's meal while we drove. Yeah, I had to feel for the guy too.
After buying another car, this time I got a little bigger car, and had spent a small fortune in getting a surplus Hummer. It had the removable roof and canvas replacements, which I threw in the back. The stand-up hatch was in place, and although the swivel had been pulled, it would be easy enough to stand up in and free hold a weapon if need be. I hoped that it was never used, but considering the last two cars, it probably would be.

32

I walked to the bus depot the next morning and four hors later I was in Halifax, where Fawn picked me up. “Fernie, you okay then?” she asked me as I settled into the passenger seat. “I guess, I'm going to need a new car though. Whatever hit the car tore it in half.” I looked over at her, and she flicked her eyes between me and the road as she drove. I must have looked like a mess. I pulled the sunshade down and opened the mirror and took a look at myself.
Last night there had been no real visible bruises, but I now sported a growing splotch on my cheekbone. It didn't hurt, but it did feel hot and the skin felt taut over the bruise. “I got some bruises, but I don't have any broken bones, so that's something to be thankful for.” “I go with that”, she told me, and I could hear some of the tension in her voice leak away. I smiled at her and put a hand on her forearm. She smiled and relaxed a bit more and we drove in a comfortable silence back to my office.
Once there, I went to my small washroom and had a quick, cold shower, and got a change of clothes. I had thought abut the Anolyn Way for a good while on the trip back from Pictou. I'd looked at the ferry but there was a bridge that used to lead to the Island, but it had been devastated by Anolyn as his first attack at isolating Prince Edward Island. The bridge had been burned and melted all the way to rock. I wanted to go up to the site to look at where the bridge was and test an idea that Cobb's books had given me.
I'd noticed that the book had changed when the magick had been slowly teased out of it, but that some still remained. An echo of the bridge for lack of a better description. Maybe that echo could be strengthened in some way to make a way passable onto the Island. I went back to the Troykin and asked if I could hire Zik'k again for a short while. Again, the opportunity to get some good points with Larry helped me immensely and Zik'k was soon with me heading west towards the remains of the Confederation Bridge.
It had been built between New Brunswick and Port Borden on the Island. Twelve kilometers of concrete and steel. Anolyn had made sure it could never be used again. I was hoping that he had.

#

“Why'd you brig meeb adlong for dhis trib Ms Fatelli?” Zik'k asked me as we got in the car. “Something destroyed my other car and just about killed me if not for some blind luck. You're help in case something unpleasant shows its face.” “Bobdyguad.” He said past his allergies, but I caught the spark of interest in his eye. “Yeah, bodyguard.” “I cab do dhat.” he said and lay the seat all the way and sliding as far into the rear seat as he could to get away from my magick. I felt for him but I felt for me more.
Four hours later Zik'k and I stood on the point where the bridge once leapt over the water towards the Island. The remains of the bridge faced to the northeast. I grabbed my backpack and walked over to the bridge. I searched until I found a piece of concrete that had been cracked loose from the bridge, and put that in the pack. We then ascended the bridge to its ruined end, about twenty meters above the ground. I got out the piece of cement and scratched a circle with it on the roadway and placed the cement on the southwest, inside the circle. I then drew a charcoal ring around the first ring and scribed two runes on the northeast and southwest of the circle, roughly in line with the direction the bridge had extended.
I set up a slow chant like the wizards at the police station used, trying to pull anything up that might still hold a resonance of the bridge. It was really slow work and the sun had started to go down as the spell finally produced a result. A wispy shadowy form could be seen barely with my mage sight. There was an echo left of the magick. I laughed as I realized that there would have been nothing to pull if Anolyn hadn't been so intent on destroying the bridge completely that he'd used magick to create the complete devastation.
There was an echo. Now all I had to do was get a huge amount of luck and maybe we had the Way open. I had a few thoughts about that, and wanted to talk with Larry. Truth be known I was expecting something to try and hurt me again. That nothing had happened made me even a little more paranoid. Anticipation is always worse than the situation I'm convinced.
We got back to the car and the sun had almost set, a glowing hemisphere of brilliant orange-red that painted the sky a spectacular orange, and painting the clouds a bold orange and violet that about took my breath away. I stared for a moment, and caught a motion just on the edge of the sun, and that fear I felt came back. Zik'k had stiffened and looked at me. He'd felt it too.
“Trees. Now. Run.” he told me in a strong voice that took no argument. I bolted for the pines as fast as I could go. I suddenly heard Zik'k bellow and heard a car door open and slam shut, theh I heard the car door open and close again. I didn't look back but hit the trees and kept going in. I was scared almost witless by whatever was coming. There was a metallic tearing crash, and I heard someone's footsteps pounding along the earth. I saw a patch of dense brush and dove straight in, not worrying about any thorns. I huddle deep in the brush and the footsteps pounded by, and receded into the distance.
There was an inhuman scream that came from back up the hill, and I tried to burrow deeper into the brush, and then I stilled again, like a rabbit trying not to be seen. There was a slow, heavy feel to the steps I heard, and a harsh snuffling sound. A roar almost made me bolt from cover, but the desire to freeze overrode it and I stayed put but just barely. The creature roared again and then took flight with a heavy, wet-sounding flapping. As it receded, so did the fear, and after a few minutes, I finally dared move out of the bushes and remember that I had come with someone.
I tried to remember which direction that the footsteps went in. I turned to my right and began walking. After a few minutes I stopped and decided to wait. The sun had gone down and I wasn't sure which way the road was. The panic was so great that all both of us did was run. Things would look better in the morning, I just had to spend a cold night. Out here. In the dark. With something that wants to kill me. Life's a bitch.

31

The last one really was an extension on our fact number 6.
6a. Dragons prefer magickal intelligent prey, as like certain creatures, dragons can absorb the magick that the creature holds and add it to their own, increasing their own reserve of magickal power. Dragons are known to actively hunt intelligent prey because of the magick inherent in them. I had a HUGE mass of magick attached to me from Ahiah. I would be a mother-lode for a dragon. This was definitely not something that was fun to know. Don't get me wrong, I'm really, really glad I knew it, I just didn't like that I had to know it.
I spent the rest of the week bringing books to the police station, and those three wizards, bless them, never complained about the job at all. Fawn told me later that it was a break from their normal routine and they had really got into working the job. I wasn't sure what I could do to thank them properly, but Fawn smiled and told me not to worry about that until after I'd gotten the way open and avoided begin dragon hor' douerves.
Which brought up the next order of business. How the heck to open the way in the first place. Anolyn had made the barrier not so much as impregnable as absolute death to cross. You could go through it any time you wanted, you just were dead when you got through it, regardless of what you went through in. Anolyn had set the barrier to kill anything that wasn't the rock the barrier rested on. That was why the clamshell rock boat had worked, it was made of the same rock the spell was on.
The knowledge of the clamshell rock boat and it's last resting place were lost to us, so that meant starting from scratch. I really don't like re-inventing anything, especially when it has a chance to so seriously kill me if I screw it up. The next thing to do would be to look at the barrier.
I drove to the coast town of Pictou, which had been at one time the Nova Scotia terminus for the ferry that ran between it and Wood Islands on Prince Edward Island before it had been walled in by Anolyn. The barrier could be seen, a whitish curtain that went up and arced back over the island, creating an irregular dome over the whole of the island. Nothing went in alive. Nothing came out alive. It got me to wondering why would such a creature like Anolyn want such protection?
I thought about that for a moment and threw it away. My job was to re-open the Anolyn way and beyond that, I had no reason to think of anything else. If I got this done, and if I lived, then I had things to think about. That's me, just little sweet sunshine.

#

Things were progressing quietly well, which considering my “real” job as a “sting” provider and a private investigator of some ill repute. Those tended to be quiet to a point then usually all hell would bust out as, well, I'm sure it's the magick Fawn and I both carry. A late friend pointed out that both of us had all this magick, and that magick itself saw that as a kind of imbalance, so to 'balance' things, weird stuff kept happening around us.
I really hated that explanation, but it made sense. I had to other acquaintances in the business, and neither of those two women ever had to contend with all the weird stuff that went on in my jobs. You'd think that with that kind of reputation, I'd have gone broke long ago because people generally are scared off by weird and unusual. Not the case with me. I always had a backlog, of better-off-than-average clients. Blame that on the magick too I guess.
I was driving back to Halifax when the attack happened. It was so fast and powerful that I didn't recognize it for an attack until I had a moment or two to think. I was on a gentle curve when a deer flashed in front of me. I instinctively swerved the car to miss the deer. I think that's what saved my life. There was a blow to the car that lifted it off the road and threw it into some pine. I felt a cold draft hit me and a tearing sound from behind the driver's eat somewhere. I had my seat belt on and so I wasn't thrown from the wreckage, but ended up being thrown about like a rag doll in the car before it fell through the trees and hit and rolled down next to a stream.
The car stopped in mid-stream, hitting a rock and coming to a sudden rest. I sat in the car for a long time, I'm not sure just how long. Something told me that I needed to stay absolutely still, and for a wonder, I did actually listen to my instinct. Fear helped a lot. You don't know what you can do until something scares you bad enough or threatens you badly enough that you act. My act was to play dead.
Later, when my fear went away, I pulled myself out of the car and looked at it before walking to the road. The rear half of the car had been torn off by something big, and was back up the hill a ways. The front end looked like a metallic ball that something chewed up and spit out. In all that metallic carnage, I did not sustain a single scratch. A hell of a lot of bruises though, and I ached on the walk back to Pictou to call Fawn and Larry and ask them if they could pick me up at the bus station the next day.