Elfhome

“Get the children out!” Tinker yelled at the still-standing laedin to get them out of the way.

She snapped up her shield and shifted to protect laedin’s retreat with the children. Pony nodded to her as she stopped into the doorway, blocking the only way out of the casting room. He and Stormsong closed on Chloe, ejae drawn, their sekasha shields glimmering Wind Clan blue.

It was like they had spent weeks choreographing the fight. Her Hand attacked, swinging furiously, only avoiding each other because of their years of practice together. Chloe ducked and whirled and spun, dodging every blow.

Think, Tinker, think. All you have to do is out-smart this bitch, and you know you can.

There was a closer roar of destruction that boomed through the timbers of the old building.

“Lobby door, breached.” Pixel reported.

She was running out of time to be brilliant. She’d have to settle for just devious.

“Blue!” she called.

“Tink?” The brave little idiot was right behind her.

“Get this thing off me.” She tugged at the bandage that strapped her arm.

There was a lifesaving ring on the wall beside her. Tinker shifted forward slightly and jerked it off the wall. Kneeling in place, she sketched a spell quickly on stiff foam. She dropped her shield and flung the ring. Pain flared up her arm as the motion tortured the fragile knits in her bones.

Chloe laughed as she ducked. “Wake up princess, even your half-breed can’t hit me!”

The lifesaver skidded across the room and careened into the pool supplies.

Tinker snapped up her shield between her Hand and shouted the command word.

The lifesaver exploded right on top of the algaecide. A moment later the chemical exploded with a massive fireball.

Thank god, Chloe apparently failed chemistry.

44: Iron Mace

Oilcan watched as Neville Island erupted. Flame and smoke billowed upwards. In that one thunderous moment, the oni army descending on his childhood home vanished.

Tinker!

Beside him, Tommy breathed a curse. “You know, for someone so small, your cousin is freaking destructive.”

Oilcan forced himself to nod. The smoke parted and the hotel was still standing. “Yeah, she is.” Godzilla-like.

The sound of gunfire continued from inside the hotel. There was a flare of magic on Grand Avenue, and Oilcan realized that a Stone Clan domana was wading into the fight. He scanned down the street until he spotted Iron Mace heading for the hotel, left hand holding a shield while flicking oni out of his way with his right. In the distance was a black cloud of tengu winging their way to Neville Island but they couldn’t take on the domana.

“Damn him.” Oilcan turned his hoverbike toward the steep cliff. “No time to follow the roads.”

Tommy eyed the steep drop-off and muttered a curse.

They dropped down the cliff, nearly in free-fall, skipping off projections to slow their descent, and then raced flat out across the steel catwalk above the sluicegates of Emsworth’s dam. Jump fish leapt in their wake, reacting too late to their darting shadows.

“You sure your cousin doesn’t have more bombs planted?” Tommy shouted as they gunned down Grand Avenue in Iron Mace’s wake.

“She doesn’t have the patience for planning more than one level of backup defenses. She’s all or nothing.”

“Yeah, that sounds like her.”

Which meant she probably hadn’t held back anything to deal with Iron Mace. With a broken arm, there was no way she could take the male. As they raced toward the hotel, he could feel Tinker and the bright motes of her sekasha desperately fighting something at close quarters in the casting room. Iron Mace blasted open the lobby doors, now less than a hundred feet from Tinker.

Oilcan gunned his hoverbike, darted along side of the hotel to smashed through the window into the ballroom. Momentum slid him across muddy marble floor to door less opening. Leaping from his bike, he stepped out into the dim hallway and snapped up a shield between him and Iron Mace.

“You!” Iron Mace rocked back in surprise. “I killed you.”

“ Like you killed Amaranth?”

Iron Mace sneered, all pretense of being a grieving brother abandoned. “My baby sister had the decency to stay dead. I understand your mother knew the trick. If I’m lucky, it’s a female trait.”

Oilcan squared off behind his shield. “I’m not going to let you hurt my cousin.”

Iron Mace laughed. “Go ahead and bark, little mutt puppy. What Forge taught you doesn’t mean you can bite.”

“I already could bite!” Oilcan took out the floor supports in the hotel’s nice deep basement and dropped four stories of hotel on top of him. Half a lifetime of good memories — and one surprised domana—thundered down into the sudden hole. Oilcan knew it wouldn’t hurt Iron Mace, but he figured it piss him off enough to forget about Tinker. He took off running, keeping his shield up as he ran.