Legacies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,92

some demons we’re going to plan things better, she thought wildly. Only there won’t be a next time! I’m sorry—I’m sorry—I’m sorry—I wasn’t good enough to do what you needed me to do—I’m sorry—

The only place she could think of to hide was behind the tree where Loch had propped the leaf blower. She clung to it and rested her forehead against the trunk, trying to slow her breathing and stop crying. When Loch got the Lord of the Wild Hunt into the spell-trap, she was supposed to say the spell she was supposed to have memorized. And she couldn’t remember the words!

A moment later Burke came running past her, staggering with weariness. She wanted to call out to him, to ask him where Loch was. But I know where Loch is. He told me where he’d be. He’s still out there luring that . . . thing . . . in here. That’s why the others haven’t just run for home. It would just follow their magic the way it’s following Loch’s.

But it can’t see me at all.

They’d only been guessing about that. She could only hope they’d guessed right.

It was quiet. It was too quiet. It was taking too long. It got him. The certainty of it settled on her like lead. Everything they had planned had fallen apart. Everything they had done was for nothing. Loch was dead—that thing had gotten him, and it was going to come and take the rest of them because the whole plan depended on her and she couldn’t do what she was supposed to do. She blinked back tears. It was so cold out here they were freezing on her eyelashes.

It was so cold . . . .

Suddenly Loch came stumbling and staggering into the clearing. He grabbed the leaf blower and slung the carrying strap over his shoulder. He scrabbled for the starter cord, but he couldn’t grip it in his heavy gloves. He pulled them off and flung them aside, then yanked at the starter cord over and over.

But nothing happened.

Spirit looked back the way they’d come. The Lord of the Hunt was only a few yards away from the edge of the stand of pines now, walking toward them with a slow measured tread. With each step he took, his appearance changed. Tattered hunting clothes became a long fur cloak over armor. Battered work boots became high black boots with jeweled spurs. A bill cap and deer horns became a helmet with stag’s antlers. Only the glowing red eyes were the same. She was shaking so hard with fear and shame that if she hadn’t been holding onto the tree, Spirit would simply have fallen to the ground. All for nothing. It’s all been for nothing. . . .

As the Hunt Lord walked into the grove, the temperature dropped so sharply that Spirit heard the trees crack and groan as they froze. Loch was still working with single-minded determination at the little engine of the leaf blower as the demon lord silently paced toward him.

And—finally—the little engine caught.

The demon was so close Spirit ached with cold. So close every breath she took was like breathing liquid fire. It was too cold for anyone to be able to smell anything, but despite knowing that, Spirit had the relentless sense that she could smell some horrible combination of sun-heated decaying garbage and burnt rubber and rotten eggs. And though she knew the only sounds in the pine grove were the sounds of the wind in the branches and of the leaf blower’s two-stroke engine, she had the conviction she could hear screaming—as if the sound of something in terrible pain was stuck in her head like one of those earworm songs you just couldn’t shake.

And there was one more thing she knew: When the demon Huntsman touched Loch, Loch would be dead. She knew Loch knew it, too, but Loch didn’t move. He just stood there like some maniac groundskeeper as the demon stepped closer, and closer . . .

And then, just as it reached out its hand to touch him, Loch swept the leaf blower down toward the ground.

Pine needles blew upward, skirling everywhere, and beneath them, Spirit could see the ground had been scraped down to bare earth, and then carved, carefully and elaborately, with the lines of the spell-trap, and the lines of the carving filled in with a mixture of charcoal and sulfur and saltpeter. She knew that was what Loch had used, because those were