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Idris searched my face. “Are you sure?”
I swiped at a few pesky tears. “I wasn’t before she got shot. But . . .” Gooseflesh rippled over my skin. I’d watched her die once before. That was enough.
“I get it,” he said quietly.
A sick ache spread through my chest as the full import of my decision hit home. She’d been with me for the better part of a year, watching my back and perching on my damn roof and decorating my house with outrageous enthusiasm for every holiday. “She won’t want to go,” I told him. “You’re going to have to catch her off guard.”
He exhaled. “Right.”
I returned to Eilahn and sat beside her on the stair. A fluffy yellow towel with embroidered roses swathed her thigh. “How is it?”
“It is a mere flesh wound,” she said. Pellini let out a cough that sounded like laughter though I had no idea why.
“I hate seeing you hurt.” I wrapped my arms around her.
She smiled and leaned her head against mine. “I am not certain I would associate with you if you enjoyed it.”
I laughed, but it felt strange and weak. “This was a flesh wound,” I said, “but what if the bullet had hit something more vital?” I let out a shuddering breath. Stop it, Kara. I didn’t need to convince her or myself. Eilahn opened her mouth to reply, but I cut her off. “I love you. You are very dear to me.” Releasing her, I stood and backed away as grief surged up to drown me. “I’m sorry,” I gasped. “I have to do this.”
Eilahn’s forehead wrinkled in confusion but only for a second. Through the open kitchen door, Idris worked the dismissal, formed and readied in this last minute I’d spent with her.
Heedless of her injury, she shot to her feet as the flows wrapped around her. “Dahn. Dahn!” She flung a hand out toward me, pleading and furious. A stench of rotten eggs filled the air, and an unseen wind whipped around us. “Jhivral, dahn!” Please, no!
I stepped back, tears streaming. “I’m sorry!” I cried out. “I’ll send Fuzzykins and the kittens as soon as I can. I promise!”
Eilahn let out an inhuman screech as a rent of blinding white light opened in the fabric of the universe behind her. A sharp crack rattled the house, and she and the light vanished.
Chapter 35
We got out of there as fast as possible. I didn’t trust McDunn—or Tessa, for that matter—not to call the cops on us once they were clear, but we made it to Pellini’s truck with no issues.
“Eilahn’s motorcycle.” I scanned the area in dismay. “We need to get it back to the house, and I don’t know how to ride one.” I finally spied it further down the street, tucked between two cars.
“On the truck?” Idris suggested.
“Would be tough to get it loaded up without a ramp,” Pellini said. “Plus, we’d need straps to keep it from falling over.” But then he shrugged. “I can ride it. Always wanted to try out a Ducati.”
“Perfect!” I said and decided not to ask how skilled he was. At this point it didn’t matter since he couldn
’t be worse than Idris or me. Pellini was turning out to have one hell of an eclectic skill set. I handed him the spare key from my key ring while he gave me the truck’s.
“It’s too bad you can’t take the bike home, Kara,” Idris said with a grimace. “That way Pellini and I could go symmetrize the node in the Kreeger River.”
“I’ll tag along with y’all,” I said. “That’s an hour wasted if you take me home first.” The itchy crawly feel of my un-showered skin ramped up a notch, but I plastered on an accommodating smile. “Y’all can put up with my stench.”
Pellini let out a bark of laughter. “Nah, Idris can put up with it. I’ll be on the bike.”
“You owe me one,” Idris said to Pellini with a hint of a smile. “You up for talking me through another symmetrization?”
“Sure, but if anyone has to dangle from a rope this time, it sure as hell ain’t gonna be me.”
• • •
Pellini hadn’t lied about knowing how to ride a bike. He crammed Eilahn’s helmet onto his head then zoomed off with damn near as much panache as the syraza. After a block he slowed to let us catch up then led the way out of town. To add to Pellini’s streak of being handy in a variety of ways, he also knew a place not far from the bridge where we could rent a boat, which scratched the need for anyone to dangle from the bridge. After anchoring near the node, Idris and Pellini symmetrized while I leaned back, closed my eyes, and thought as little as possible. I especially didn’t think about how I’d lost both my aunt and a dear friend less than an hour earlier. Nope, not one bit.
Despite the added challenge of working with a valve node in a river, Pellini and Idris managed to finish up in under thirty minutes. As we motored back to the boat rental place I considered how good it would feel to jump into the water and rinse off the surface grime. However, the sight of a water moccasin as thick as my forearm slithering into the river put a hard stop to that line of thinking. We’d be home in under an hour, and my shower was blissfully free of snakes—venomous or otherwise.
Pellini mounted the Ducati and fell in behind us for the drive home. Idris was broody and quiet, which I understood, but just could not handle right now. In an effort to save what was left of my sanity, I launched into the tale of Angry Chick, Young Thing, Rich Bitch, and the rest of my inmate experience. Much more fun to relate now that it wasn’t an immediate threat, and Idris appeared to enjoy hearing it. He needed the mental break as much as I did. In return he told me about the hijinks that ensued when he and Bryce retrieved the camera from the tree near the Katashi base and ran afoul of a furious squirrel. I wasn’t sure how much of it was true, but it made me laugh, which I sorely needed.
