“Prince of Sarcasm,” he corrected.
“Yes, well, Your Highness, all the sarcasm in the world won’t help us when we hit bottom and we’re quarry who are tragically trapped in, well, a quarry.Give me my magic wand.”Despite everything, it was kind of fun to say that.She held out an imperious hand and he laid the wand in it.
“What do you plan to do with that?”he inquired politely.
“Magic.”She tried to sound important and mysterious as she uttered the word, but who was she kidding?She had no fucking clue.“Maybe I can vanish the Obsidian fae carriage like I did the iron demon.”
“Good luck with that.”He said it the way people did when they didn’t wish you good luck at all but figured it was a lost cause telling you that you were fucked in the head if you thought your plan would work out.
“Why?”She remembered as the bottom of the canyon rushed toward them, more of that lovely spun-sugar equipment at the bottom, swarming with ant-like Obsidian fae miners, growing larger with every switchback.Hey, she was busy and could be forgiven for forgetting a few newly learned facts.“Oh, because the wand is Moonstone and Ruby magic, and these are Obsidian fae.”
“Give the woman a cookie.”
“But wait, don’t Moonstone and Ruby both trump Obsidian?So it should work.”
“It might, if you knew what you were doing, which you don’t.”
She flipped the wand in her hand, thrusting it at him handle first.“Then you do it, Sorcerer Azul.”
At least he took the wand, but he looked a little lost.The Obsidian fae miners had grown to bunny size, and had noticed the carriage chase down their road, several pointing, horned heads swiveling to watch.“What do you want me to do?”he asked, almost plaintively.
“I really don’t care,” she answered, trying not to snap at him.“Anything that gets us turned around and headed back to the Black Thirteen with skin intact, preferably with no more law hounds, well, hounding us.”
“The ley line continues up the other side,” he said, pointing helpfully at what she’d already noted.
“Yeah, and what are the odds it terminates in the glass castle of refining?”
“Pretty high,” he admitted.
“Turning around it is.”The bottom neared, the Obsidian fae the size of hip-high elflings now.“When I hit bottom—hopefully only literally and not figuratively this time—I’m going to spin Katu to face our pursuers.That will be your moment.”
“My moment.”
“To do your thang.”She clapped him on his lean thigh, squeezing fast and removing her hand quickly before he could do it for her.“Dazzle me, my helpless and attractive bit of baggage.”
By the time they hit bottom—literally and not figuratively, though the metaphorical variety might not be far behind—the Obsidian fae miners had grown to normal size.Half-again as tall as even Cha, who was no slouch in the height department, they were all charging towards Katu, brandishing various implements of volcanic-glass destruction.
As Cha had hoped, the ley line opened into a flat, wide area chock full of nicely charged pixie dust.The fae had none of the issues humans did with walking around on the stuff, and having it embedded in the very ground of the quarry likely helped the miners move stuff around.A number of enchanted vehicles of various kinds indeed scurried about, carrying loads of glistening black rock to bins or along the ley line that wound up the hill on the other side of the canyon.
Though the area teemed with equipment of all types, Cha knew her stuff and had just enough space to throw Katu into the promised one-eighty spin.As soon as he gained traction on the ley, he leapt forward with a predatory growl, heading straight for the unmarked carriage pursuing them.
Azul yipped, then shouted, “What are you doing?”
“Putting them off balance.Think fast.”
They zoomed toward the still-descending law-hound carriage, accelerating despite the slope.Gotta love that pure dust for prime velocity.The fae carriage came around that last, hairpin switchback, and spotted Katu racing for them.A cloud of black pixie dust billowed up as they braked, and Cha cackled in glee, imagining their panicked expressions.“Eat me, you fae fuckers!”she yelled, goosing Katu faster.
Azul was making a high keening noise and—for a split second—she second-guessed giving him the wand.But he got ahold of himself, stood and aimed the wand at them, singing something in an astonishingly beautiful tenor voice, in a language she’d never heard.Pink glitter bloomed in the air around them, swirled menacingly in a way pink glitter never should, gathered itself, and arrowed at the oncoming carriage.
For a moment, nothing seemed to happen and Cha braced for a head-on collision.No way would she play the chicken and dive off the side.Only a courageous end for her.Then the glitter glommed onto the fae carriage, obscuring it in pink, then contracting.It narrowed to a pinpoint, then exploded into candy-pink vapor.It immediately cleared again, revealing a terrified zebra and two stunned Obsidian fae in the middle of the ley.
Well shit.
She didn’t care about running over the fae, but the zebra was an innocent.It stood there frozen, legs splayed, muzzle down, staring with wide, shining black eyes at its onrushing demise.The fae had no such issues, scrambling over the side of the cliff and abandoning their poor, terrified beast, which only fueled her hate.
“Hang on,” she told Azul, who groaned, sliding back into his seat.
“I’m beginning to hate that phrase, too.”
