“I could run faster than this,” he said with even greater urgency.
“Yeah, but could you run faster thanthem?”She jerked her head at the onrushing imps, gaining with unnatural speed.
“You have a point.”
“So do you,” she conceded, eyeing the chittering mass of toothy demons in the rear view and using her expert eye to gauge the time to the faster black and their getaway.“We’re not going to make it.Use the wand.”
“Won’t work,” he gritted out, hands on the dash as if he could push Katu faster.“Ginger imps are Cinnabar magic.”
She didn’t ask how he knew—though in the rear view she supposed she could make out a distinctive burnt-orange glow to the creatures.Katu snarled, unhappy, clawing up the slow black, the fast black glowing so tantalizingly close, much too far to help them.“I thought Ruby trumps Cinnabar.”
“Not when it’s mitigated by Moonstone,” he replied tersely, straining in his seat.
Cha had a brief moment of wrestling herself, though it didn’t take much, even if her lustful self had somehow escaped her prison and had edged up beside her responsible self again, whispering naughty suggestions in her ear.They agreed on at least this one decision, uncharacteristically self-sacrificing though it may be.“I won’t blame you if you want to run,” she said, restraining a sigh, hoping he’d nobly refuse to leave her.
No such luck.He levered out of the seat, vibrating in cobalt agitation to run.Then paused.
“Come with me.”He held out a hand to her.“I can get us both away.”
She didn’t ask the how on that, either.She believed him.She longed to take that hand.
She shook her head.“I can’t leave Katu.”
He nodded, unsurprised.“I’ll draw them off, you should be fine.”
“Wait—how will you get to your own BX?”
“I can find a way from here.Do I have to tell you to keep this safe?”He handed her the wand.
“I handled myself before you came along.I can handle things from here.”
“Just, be careful, over there,” he said, jerking his head in the direction of Moonstone.
“My middle name.Good luck resolving your marital woes.”
Hesitating a long extra second, his blue gaze bored into hers.“Goodbye Arantxa.”
And he was gone.
*
It wasn’t thelingering, romantic—or at least frustrated-lust-filled—farewell that Cha might’ve envisioned in her more idealistic moments.But it was probably for the best.Sharp and quick, like pulling the dagger out of your back.
Besides, they’d had no time for anything more.
Prince Charming had left her as if the demon spawn of the seven hells were on his heels—which, in this case, was almost literally true.True to his promise, the horde of ginger imps diverted, running in a smoldering red-orange river after him.Unfortunately, a few of the less bright imps leapt onto Katu anyway.They were mostly big mouths on spindly, claw-tipped limbs, and they chomped down with rows of serrated teeth on the first soft surface they could find.
Katu yowled in pain and protest, the carriage shimmering unsteadily as he instinctively tried to shift into his native form to fight back.
“Hold steady, baby cat,” Cha urged, trying to sound soothing.The enchantment should hold Katu in carriage form, but sometimes the animal instinct overrode even fae magic.The last thing she needed was for them to take a spill on the verge of fast black.“I’m here for you,” she added, as she pushed to her feet in the driver’s seat.She didn’t need a magic wand; she had her trusty sword.As it should be: Katu and her, a forever loyal pair.She wouldn’t forget her priorities again.
She impaled a growling, munching, now squealing imp.The sword went right through it and the imp reached for her with weirdly long limbs, burnt-orange claws flexing as it shrieked and flailed on the sword.With distaste, Cha used a booted foot to slide it to the end, then whipped the sword like a slingshot to hurl the creature onto the fast black, where a ponderous rhino promptly ran it over, mashing it into the sifting pixie dust.Too bad that wouldn’t be enough to fry the nasty imp, but it should work to slow it down.Hopefully long enough for Katu to be far away before it extracted itself.
She dealt the same treatment to the other three imps, counting her blessings that they hadn’t been smart enough to turn on heren masse.She’d had enough of being chewed on for the next little while.By the time she’d dispatched her lot, Katu—calm again and focused on the task—had crawled up to the Black Thirteen, idling in wait for her go ahead.She slid back into her seat, and jabbed the gold channel into life.“Bandit here.Who’s riding the rhino train by the ambrosia station on the Black Thirteen?”She hoped that would be enough detail.How many rhino trains in receiving distance could there be?
“Ho there, Bandit, this is Wailing Jenny.That you hurling toothy comets at us?”
“Apologies for that.I’ll make it up to you.Can you give me a gap to get on and get going?”
