Chapter 8 #2
Lorne scoffed. “You have no idea how to speak to Corvus because you never pledged all that you are in service to the land and protection of the rift,” Lorne reminded him, putting down his mug and crossing his arms as he regarded Giles.
“You may be a Corey, but I’m more of a steward than you will ever be. ”
“I—”
“Giles!” Ilara yelled as she returned.
“Where were you? How long does it take to check one bathroom?”
“Are you insane?” she shrieked at him, gesturing behind her. “Everything is changed. Nothing in that room is how it should be. It’s completely undone.”
“I want to see,” I said to Lorne, who nodded.
“You will not move,” Giles shouted, turning on Ilara. “I don’t understand.”
“You told me you grasped all there was to know about Corvus and all…this,” she said angrily, gesturing around her. “But it seems that this mansion, especially, is changing every moment.” She pointed at the marble floor, or what had been marble seconds before but was now ancient wood.
“Giles changed Corvus,” I informed her. “He messed with time and left all this in free fall without a safety net. But that’s the outside, the land. Inside your mansion, the changes happening now, Lorne is the one responsible for those.”
“Oh, do explain,” Ilara goaded me.
“I think Giles wanted to exert his power over a man he feels inferior to.”
“I am a hedge-rider, you worthless, mewling little—”
“Yeah, but Lorne tossed you off our porch,” I said flatly.
He went mute and stared at me.
“You were pissed, so after you thought you killed me, you decided to keep Lorne, lock him up, let Ilara play little cat-and-mouse games with him, and then waited to see how long it would take him to break down and go mad.”
Both of them were now focused on me.
“But what you missed, Giles, because you forgot, because you shouldn’t even still be here, because Corvus is not at all charging your battery anymore, is that Lorne can make his own sanctuary in this mansion.”
“That’s not even remotely—”
“It is,” I insisted, “because underneath all this mortar and marble and all the gilded paintings you’ve put on the walls, it’s still his cottage, just with some extra bells and whistles.”
“You’re mad,” Ilara said.
“No. The cottage, this cottage,” I said, indicating everything, “likes me fine. Always has. It will protect me, shelter me, all of that, I have no concerns. But the person this home is devoted to is Lorne.”
“Is that so,” Giles retorted before throwing something, fire, perhaps, a blast of it like a flamethrower or a bolt of lightning.
What happened was, he made a motion as though hurling something, like a mime or an actor in front of a green screen.
There was a lot of movement, and I had no doubt he’d expected to burn Lorne to death, make him explode, something.
He would smite him, eviscerate him…this was what was supposed to occur.
But nothing happened. Nothing at all, and all the gesticulating made him appear ridiculous.
“Giles,” Ilara demanded. “We’ve heard enough of this. Kill MacBain now.”
He tried again, lifting both hands, trying to shoot something at Lorne, who was still standing there, waiting, arms crossed, legs braced apart, ready to fight if needed.
“You can’t hurt him inside the mansion,” I told Giles. “It loves him too much.”
“How can a building love? That’s absurd.”
“It became sentient from thousands of years of soaking up the magic of guardians that lived within its walls,” Lorne answered matter-of-factly. “And when Xan and I met, the cottage knew I was the best thing for him. For the guardian of Corvus.”
“This is all nonsense,” Giles barked at him.
“Oh, thank you,” Lorne rumbled suddenly, and we all felt the warm breeze blow through the room and out toward the now open atrium. The walls were gone; it was a giant gallery now, lots of corridors with supporting columns, but the individual rooms, bathrooms, sitting rooms—all gone.
“What is happening…” Giles trailed off.
“What did you thank the cottage for?” I asked Lorne. “Oh,” I said with a shrug. “You look much more comfortable.”
Lorne now stood there in cargo pants, his heavy snow boots, a fisherman sweater that Amanda had knitted for him, and his parka. “I think my girl sees us going outside fairly soon.”
There was a hard, heavy slam then, like a slab of concrete or stone hitting another as plaster dust, and then larger pieces, began to rain from the ceiling in the atrium down three stories to the floor below.
“What’s going on?” I asked him.
“The cottage is collapsing down to its true size,” Lorne stated, moving fast, grabbing my hand and calling for Argos, who came flying from the corridor as the bedroom was gone, only a wall remaining. “My bet is that the fourth floor is gone and this one is next.”
With Argos leading the way, Lorne ran with me toward the stairs as the room where we had just been fell away, dropping to the second floor.
“I hate these kinds of movies,” I announced with conviction.
“Oh, c’mon, disaster movies are the best,” he shouted back so I could hear him over screams and yelling and the jarring, terrifying sound of a crumbling mansion.
Interestingly, lots of people were frantically running with us down the stairs, yet no one was being crushed under anything. The cottage was waiting, making its intentions known, while at the same time, the quaking and cracking was done in segments so people could get out.
Lorne scrambled to the side of the stairs with me, next to an overhang that would not last long, to make sure he was at my back.
“You’re afraid I’m gonna get pushed down and trampled,” I suggested.
“No. I’m afraid I’m gonna get pushed down and trampled saving you or the cat,” he replied, scooping up Argos and tucking him against his chest. “I see the cottage changed your clothes too.”
I was dressed much like Lorne, but in my favorite duck boots, jeans, a heavy cable-knit sweater, barn coat, and when I felt for it, my sherpa beanie that Amanda had brought me from Nepal. “You were right about the cottage. She is very motherly.”
He sighed. “I’ve been saying that since I moved in.”
I glanced around. “I don’t see Giles or Ilara.”
“Well, it’s not like they’re gonna leave without a fight, so don’t get your hopes up.”
“Don’t you get excited either,” I apprised him. “Corvus is broken, and I have no idea how to undo what he’s done. The cottage being whole when this is over will be a blessing, but if the land dies, we’ll lose our home as well.”
“The land and the cottage are both our home,” he reminded me, “and you’ll figure it out. You always do.”
I could barely breathe, his faith in me overwhelming.
“Okay, now, love, shake it off. We’ve gotta move because this ceiling is coming down.”
He was always so calm in terrifying, life-and-death situations. It really was one of his greatest qualities and one of the many reasons the universe chose him for me. I was a bird; he was a rock.
When he yanked me after him, I concentrated on keeping up with him, all my focus on his back, not the chaos around me, the fear I could smell, or the terror churning in my gut. I needed to stay with Lorne; there was nothing more important.
I lost track of time. It wasn’t a surprise.
The mansion crumbled, and once Lorne and I were outside, on the road, after a few moments, he passed me Argos and ran back inside.
Of course he did. No one who knew him would be remotely surprised.
I followed, but he rounded on me, took my chin in his hand and made me swear on his life and Amanda’s children that I would stay right there and wait for him so he’d know exactly where I would be when he came back.
“Please come back,” I rasped.
“I’m basically going into my home,” he reminded me. “Me being there is the only thing that will keep anyone left inside safe. The sole purpose of me going, specifically, is for that person who fell, twisted an ankle, or is wondering how long they’ll survive under tons of rubble.”
I grabbed his parka tight. “Come back to me. I can’t have you leave me.”
“Never leaving you,” he grumbled like that was stupid, then bolted away like the hero he was.
“He’ll be crushed,” someone yelled, which was completely unhelpful.
“Where is he going?” another asked.
I closed my eyes and asked my grandparents to watch over him, realizing that just as I had given Constance an amulet for protection, it was time to find one for my husband.
I was thinking about that, a rune for Lorne, perhaps a bind rune, two pieces working together, when Argos squirmed in my arms and bolted after Lorne, toward the mansion that was a pile of stone now.
The blade at my back was not a surprise.
“Ilara,” I said, deducing it was her because Giles would have shoved the knife in, ending my life because I was nothing to him. She, I was certain, wanted something from me.
“Walk with me,” she ordered.
When I turned, I saw she was dressed head to toe in fur. My bet would be fox and mink. I never understood people who chose fur now, when there were so many better alternatives to keep you warm.
Moving me away from the crowd, we left the road and began down a small muddy path toward the woods. Her suede snow boots with fur around the tops were going to get trashed.
“Why don’t you let me go,” I suggested, hoping to get her talking.
“You ruined everything, Xander. Why would I do that?”
“Ruined what?”
“Giles and I, we could have been happy here. He told me the land was strong enough to sustain him, and because of that, he could train me and give me some of his power.”
“Because you’re a witch, but you want to be a hedge-rider, and not a normal one, but one just like he is.”
Taking hold of my arm to stop me, she spun me around to face her. Her deep brown eyes met mine, holding my gaze.
“He’s not here,” I reminded her. “He won’t hear, and I certainly won’t tell him.”
Her sigh was long. “How did you know I was a practitioner of the dark arts?”