For a moment she thought the hound-in-hiding wasn’t going to take the juicy bait she offered.It stayed stubbornly stuck to Big Betty.So, Cha darted across several lanes, causing a ruckus, though most of the other drivers had paid attention to her warning, and were alert for her antics.Still, the dullards not monitoring their channels helped with the show.They howled and skidded, Katu fishtailing as he crossed several ley speeds in succession, which made for a nice show.Dy had also slowed Big Betty to a sedate, sub-par pace.
Finally, the zebra bobbled, then shot out from behind Betty in a direct intercept for Cha.
That was more like it.With the predator now on their tail, Cha synced with Katu, concentrating on that delicious white streak.They shot ahead, Katu growling in triumph at finally getting to stretch his legs.
“They’re gaining,” Azul said.“Shall I dissuade them?”
“No,” Cha barked.“We want them close enough to smell our farts.Don’t worry, sunshine—I won’t let them catch us.”
She poured on the speed, zooming up the Black Thirteen, the zebra right behind.No lights from them, but a magically enhanced voice boomed out for them to pull over immediately.
“They want you to pull over,” Azul said, as if she might not have heard.
“Too bad I’m deaf in this ear,” Cha commented, flicking an eye at the rear view.They were awfully close, the occupants of the closed sedan obscured by the window shading and probably whatever glamour kept them concealed.“You’re royalty—do you do everything you’re told?”
“I wouldn’t know.You’re the first person to give me orders.”
“Except your family.”
“Well, they—” He broke off.Sighed.“That’s different.”
“I can just imagine.I don’t suppose your powers extend to moving or creating ley lines?”
“Not at all.Is that a problem?You should have asked that sooner, if—”
“Not a problem, boy-o.Just would’ve been convenient.Goldilocks is on the job.Any moment now,” she added.The zebra carriage, still barking out increasingly loud instructions to obey, was close enough that if she slowed in the slightest, they’d plow into the back of Katu.“Come on, Dy,” she muttered under her breath.“Anytime now.”
“You could call her.”
“Too distracting.She’s working her sorcery to—Aha!”
The new ley line appeared off to the side, so abruptly that it required a tighter than sixty degree turn to make it.Fortunately, Katu was light and responsive—and accustomed to sensing Dy’s magic.They wrenched hard onto the ley, a bright, dazzling white.Bless Dy and all that bottled-up sorcery.Shooting off the Black Thirteen, they plunged across what looked to be a field of volcanic rock.Matte black, frozen in swirling flows, with occasional twisted bits of plant life struggling toward the sky, the bleak landscape looked like what most people imagined when they thought of the land of the Obsidian fae.When they weren’t imagining a magical party land where they could play fae and pretend nothing was going to mutate them.
“Shit.”Cha took several quick glances at the rear view, splitting her concentration between that and guiding Katu over the unfamiliar, twisting landscape via a brand-new, high-velocity white ley line that wasn’t supposed to be there.“I think we lost them.”
Azul, giving every impression of a man afraid for his life and clinging to his last thread of hope, gritted out, “Isn’t that a desirable outcome?”
“No!Wewantthem to follow us, to draw them off Big Betty.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t make it so bloody difficult for them.”
“We don’t want them to catch us either.”
“A conundrum, to be sure.”
“Yeah, a fine line to ride,” she replied, ignoring the sarcasm.“So is this ley line.Fine, I mean.Not ideal, but Dy has been out of practice and she made this one with little warning.I just hope that she didn’t—oof.”The windwhoompedout of her lungs as they juddered to a slow down so abrupt it felt like hitting a wall, even though they were still moving.
Azul had already braced a hand on Katu’s dash, so he wasn’t thrown as hard as Cha, but he looked severely pained anyway.Or maybe that was just his normal, pampered-prince-forced-to-suffer-ignominious-peasant-life pained expression.“What now?”
“Dy did,” Cha answered, maneuvering Katu around on the ley line they’d just been spat onto.It was high-quality slick black, like one would expect of a line on this side of the border, and fast enough by most measures, but after being temporarily spoiled by that lovely white, well… this felt like molasses.She also wasn’t sure exactly where they were headed now.Squinting at the map, she flicked it with a finger, seeing if it showed their new trajectory.The globe spun wildly for a moment then, with an internal blizzard of magical black snow, then returned to exactly the same as it had been before, not showing their current location.Uh oh.
“Did what?”Azul asked with exaggerated patience.
Cha spared him a glance.“What?Oh—Dy.When she made us the escape line, she bridged it to an existing line—not unusual, and definitely easier for her, but a problem right now because I don’t know this area and this fae back ley could be going anywhere and not fast.The map also seems to be on the fizzle—probably all the black pixie dust interfering—which means I don’t know how to get back to the Black Thirteen.”
“Can’t we just turn around?”
“Might have to because I don’t know where we’re heading and wherever that is could be really bad for us and—Shit!”
