No Dominion The Walker Papers - By CE Murphy Page 0,26
disappointed when one made its way through the trees, rather than a critter with a spiral horn on its forehead. It wasn’t like Cernunnos’s horse, power pared down to bare lines. This one felt more human, more normal, if a grey mare coming through a misty alien forest could be normal. She walked right up to me and lowered her head, so I put my forehead against hers. She whuffed a green-smelling breath, an’ I rubbed my hand under her forelock. She liked that, pressing against me, an’ I had to brace to keep my feet. “You real, sweetheart, or are you like one of Jo’s spirit quest animals?”
She snorted another breath, this time leavin’ me wet with grass drool. I chuckled and rubbed her forehead again. “All right, then. If you’re real I’ll have to give you a name. How’s Imelda?”
Imelda lifted her head to look at me with one big brown eye, then the other. I guessed that meant the name would do. Me and her walked outta the forest together, her pickin’ her feet up high and placing them down delicate again, and carryin’ her neck in a show horse’s arch. She was a pretty girl, and I never knew a pretty girl who didn’t like to be praised for it, so I kept my hand under her mane, rubbing and patting.
Cernunnos’s riders were spread up and down the beach when we got back, most of ‘em hardly more than shadows in the mist. Horns himself was waitin’ on us, as was the kid, sittin’ on a hunk of deadwood that shoulda been bleached of color, but was rich red like a living sycamore. He held Jo’s rapier across his knees. Cernunnos glared at it, then at me. “There you are. That was—”
The kid gave him a look, and the god’s mouth puckered up like he was suckin’ lemons. “That was more quickly done than I might have imagined,” he admitted grudgingly. “The land senses the magic you are touched with. She will serve you well. So will this.”
He tossed me a tangle of leather. For a couple seconds it didn’t mean anything, but then it resolved into pieces I recognized: a double-looped belt, one loop with a long slim sheath and the other with a smaller one. Cernunnos’s expression tightened up even more when I looked at him. “The shaman took my sword,” he said prissily. “She failed to take its sheath and belt.”
“Or the main gauche.” I waggled the smaller sheathe, which was as empty as the long one. “Where’d it go?”
“The sword has never had one to match. I wore it in hopes.”
“And then you lost the rapier, so no way would Nuada ever make you the knife to go with.” I wanted to grin but I wasn’t sure the boy’s stern looks would keep Cernunnos in line if I did. Instead I said, “Thanks.”
Cernunnos nodded, still scowling. “You would do well to wear armor as well.”
“You don’t. They don’t.” I nodded at the others.
“I am a god, and they have stepped beyond such mortal considerations. Dead men cannot die a second time. You, however, are vulnerable.”
“Only armor I know anything about is Army helmets and flak jackets, Horns. Nobody ever meant Kevlar to stop a sword, and anything else is just gonna weigh me down.”
“Find him suitable armor,” Cernunnos said to the boy. “I will not explain his loss to Joanne over a matter so simply arranged. You will hardly know you wear it,” he said to me, “and you will return it when this battle is done. I do not mean to make a gift of it to you as I have made a gift of that sword to Joanne Walker.”
I still had a tingle at the back of my mind, one that kept sayin’ this soft green land was home. Feelin’ that, I muttered, “No problem, buddy. I don’t need any more gifts from you right now.”
Cernunnos’s eyes narrowed. “Clever,” he said. “Clever, that you choose not to refuse all gifts, but only those offered now.”
“I’m an old dog, Horns. Most old dogs got a few tricks.” I untangled the sword belt and put it on. It was made for Cernunnos, who was a fair bit narrower in the hip and waist than an old ex-linebacker, but the belt fit anyway. I chalked it up to magic, sheathed the sword, and took a few steps, getting used to the feel of it. Not bad, for a guy who’d never really worn