The Herald of Autumn (Echoes of the Untold Age Book 1) Read online

  Delighted, I allowed my fingers to trace their way underneath her shirt.

  Molly bit her lip as I caressed her and made her sigh.

  “I will, Molly.”

  Under my touch, she whimpered. She moved her mouth to mine again and delicately nibbled at my lips.

  The rest of my words were lost.

  It was as it ever was. For the briefest flash, I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t fated to ever-wander. I was home. I was home, here with Molly, and I belonged. Everything would be well. For that briefest of moments, precious and dear, I was home, was wanted, was needed.

  Burning in the fire of her passion, caught in her eyes, I belonged.

  As it ever was, that moment passed.

  5

  Four hours later, while the silver-clad moon sang and seduced her way through the window, I awoke, alert. The fine hairs of the back of my neck bristled. My dreams had scented something in the wind that left my heart troubled.

  Molly stirred, reaching for me.

  “Timothy?”

  I kissed her cheek. I could still smell our passion in the bed. Carefully, I smoothed her soft hair, shushing her back to her dreams of September nights and October whispers.

  Even as I did, my attention riveted itself elsewhere.

  I listened to the world breathe, searching for what had awakened me. Something whispered to my heart in a lost and raving tongue older than man.

  Something is wrong. Something is rotten.

  I tasted the meaty, punky sweetness, rancid in my mouth.

  Now the hunter, I slipped out of Molly’s huge bed. Bare feet on polished wood, I edged my way to her window where I could see below.

  There.

  The shambling darkness in the silver light resembled a nude man. It was not, but most any mortal eye would see exactly that. Behind the seeming was the empty shambling. Dead in the eyes, ochre-red blood seeped from its every orifice.

  It felt my gaze, felt the chilled heart of golden autumn within me. Its head twisted up toward me, loose, flailing. It roared, screams that echoed in a world only I knew.

  I leapt half-way across the room. Darting to the old wooden door, I remembered the wood scraping loudly, as it sagged against the floor. Molly must not be allowed to wake just now.

  Quiet now, Old Pine. Sleep. Gently I moved it, silently hoping that I wasn’t invoking a boon for such a small kindness. One never knew with my kind.

  As the door swung in silence, I murmured of gratitude, taking care to never actually say “thank you” or imply a debt.

  In four long, graceful jumps, I bolted down the darkened stairs and past the room where most guests stayed. Less than a breath later, I cast about her kitchen for a weapon. Yes, I could call my bow, but I didn’t know if this was worth that risk—not yet.

  Her knife block held two large blades, but unlike the brackets on the bar, the metal stung with cold. Dead. They would never do.

  Fine. No weapon. For now. That was fine.

  Typically, once I needed a weapon, drawing my bow had become worth the risk.

  I peered through the front window.

  The creature jerked forward like a broken marionette. I couldn’t say how it was tracking me, how it felt me—but it did. It sought me with those empty, hungry, lost eyes.

  It would come for me. It would tear through the inn and anything else to get to me.

  Her sweetness lingered on my face and hands, traces that made my heart ache, wanting her. It would drink Molly’s sweetness…

  That thought pounded a cold-iron spike through my chest. I had to act, armed or no.

  For this brief interlude in time, she belonged to me. This broken darkness could not have her.

  That I would not abide.

  I unlatched the door and leapt into the misty gloaming.

  It appeared as a man, an older man with sallow cheeks, blue eyes, and white hair. He was nude, overweight, and pale.

  To my dreaming eye, it was a fetch. I hadn’t seen one in many an autumn, but I was fairly certain. Such abominations mimicked humanity but held none of the poetry that hid within every human’s heart.

  Its broken, hollow, mad screech raged in lapping fire and rusted blood.

  Its fingers ended in talons from another age.

  Its arms, slender gangles, each had two elbows.

  Its empty eyes wept blood and bile.

  Its fetid breath was like a physical thing, a miasma of rot and despair.

  When it swiped at me, its spidery arms wild, I ducked one swing and dodged the other, wind whistling by my face. As it drew close, I felt some whisper of darkness touch my mind.

  There is a boy, just a boy, yet the boy is a wielder of darkness dire. He summons flames that live, white flames that whisper and sing—

  I lurched away from the creature, and the dream withdrew from my mind.

  What had that been?

  It made a strange cackling noise, dragging terror up from my gullet.

  I forced myself to slow down, to think.

  Even if I could kill the creature, those who lived here must never know the truth. This poor soul had been devoured, likely some time ago. The hollow fetch was his only reality now, and it was broken and mad. Killing it—

  It shambled forward, quick-quick.

  I stepped away just in time, struggling to think so soon after my awakening.

  Killing it would only leave a corpse, one all-too familiar to those living here. The first day of autumn would bring a dead body while a strange out-of-towner stayed at Molly’s. That was too coincidental for the children of men.

  It lurched toward me again, quicker than I anticipated. A whistling swing struck me this time but barely. One of those strange talons left a path of stinging beads across my cheek.

  I had to lure it far from Molly, out somewhere in the yellow wood, my only option. If I somehow destroyed it there, I might have a few days before it was found.

  No weapon. No plan. No clothing.

  Staying just out of the creature’s reach, I led it to the center of the street.

  Hungering for my glamour, it issued a strange sucking noise as it ambled after me.

  Good. It definitely wanted me. If my luck held, it had starved for glamour for so long that I made an irresistible lure.

  I tasted cold fear. The creature was so much faster than I had thought, while I was still a touch stone-footed. The first golden dawn of autumn hadn’t come yet, after all. I wouldn’t yet be fully myself for days still. I swallowed my fear and led it onward.

  The creature roared again, that strange sound vibrating only in the world behind the world. As it lunged, I spun on one bare foot and leapt. I slipped slightly in the sand on the asphalt lane but landed true. I had no time to waste with the shamble-thing. Carelessness would be fatal. Racing to the trees, I poured every whisper of myself into running, as if the Hunter himself chased me.

  Perhaps he was. Hollow emptiness followed me on legs of sinew and shadow.

  So it was, once again, I was naked in that yellow autumn wood. Dappled shadows danced across my body as I ran; silver shifting with shrouded darkness. Underneath my feet, the earth remained cool and smooth. Never did I step upon a thorn or snag on a root. I was a hunter, and the ground gave way before me.

  Despite my fear, I forced myself to slow enough to allow the empty thing to keep pace with me. I had seen how quick it could be, but when chasing me, it moved in more of an uneven, relentless lope. If I had truly been fleeing the thing, I probably could have been far and away. However, caution paid double. I was not yet as quick-footed as I would be only weeks hence, but I found myself all too easily forgetting I had awakened early.

  I ran through the forest. Like casting stones into a still pond, every step I took rippled with summer’s passing. I saw a raccoon duck behind an old log and knew that some part of its dreaming mind had shifted. Autumn was coming; the time for sleep would be soon. An owl, on the other hand, was intent on my passing, her eyes singing with the moon. Such birds of prey of
ten ghosted behind the Great Hunt. She leapt to the sky as I passed, a whisper through the trees. The wind sighed as I ran, and the owl shadowed me in the night.

  It might not yet be dawn, but the Herald of Autumn walked the land.

  I usually enjoyed feeling the change overtaking the animals of the forest, but tonight it offered no pleasure. I could still hear the fetch, feel its screams echoing through me. I needed to remain focused. Even though I ran from it, I remained the hunter. I just had to figure out how to take the creature.

  I couldn’t say how long or how far I had run; every thought and every step led the shadowed thing away from Mount Chase. I had a sizeable lead now, although I could still hear it behind me, still feel it cast its shadowed pall across the wood.

  Beginning to wonder how far I would run, I felt the whisper of a Dreaming.

  Go back. It struck me square in the face. Less words than feelings, I realized I had left something precious behind, something I might lose for all time.

  The Dreaming spun an eldritch web of silver gossamer thrown around my heart. Woven from longing for the ordinary solace found in the safety of home, the net cast a powerful desire for the warmth I had never known, not for long, anyway. I slowed, letting it surge through my mind, over the untended places in my heart.

  It spoke of tranquil sunlight, sweet whispers in my ear.

  Cry off. Molly is waiting. Molly and warmth.

  Wait a moment. This Dreaming had to be coming from something, some talis hidden in the area. I tuned out the undulating calls of the fetch, slowly casting about my eyes.

  I, of course, scanned for what was not there, for places where my eyes would slide away.

  No. Nothing. Simply detritus of the forest floor.

  The whispers grew urgent, pleading.

  Leave. She awaits you yet. She is probably awake now, awake and feeling you gone. She yearns, Tommy.

  I shook my head, trying to focus. Wasn’t there—?

  You always leave, Tommy. You don’t have to, though. It can be different. You can have a home—

  There.

  Close to the ground, to my left, my gaze slipped over where nothing appeared to be. My eyes jumped, my focus shifted about two steps.

  Something was there.

  As I got closer, its whispers came fiercer.

  Aren’t you tired, Tommy? Tired of always being alone? You have no true friends, nothing like family. You can have that, all that, if you simply return to her. You don’t have to abandon her, to break her heart and let her fade—

  My hand found what my eyes could not, a talis, a Dreaming fetish entwined with the living warmth of a woman, the smell of baking bread, the laughter of a child. As soon as I grasped it, all became clear. I could see a small pouch of leather and sinew tied to a sapling. When I broke the cord, the whispering immediately stopped.

  Now, who had the glam for a toy such as this? More than a fetish, it was the perfect snare to use against me, a wanderer who knew no home.

  The screeching roar behind me resonated with the crunch and grind of chewing glass shards.

  My thoughts scattered and broke as the emaciated horror tore its way into the clearing, ripping a small ash from the earth as it did so. Here, in the moonlight, its true form was the monstrosity. The man became a faint shadow, somehow existing within and behind the creature.

  Its keening cry grew louder, more real. When I turned to flee, it hurled the uprooted ash at me with strength I could scarcely believe.

  Stunned, I blinked up from the ground.

  Strange, darkling dreams reached into my mind.

  They seem human but are not. Behind their guise, they are monstrous creatures, alien to behold. Yet the city is in their grasp, the people little more than playthings—

  I wrenched my head, pulling it away from the image that clung like tar in my mind.

  The keening cry came again, and it lumbered close, seeming certain. I could smell the blight on its breath as it leaned in, as it had in Mount Chase before I fled.

  It breathed in, a wet, hollow, drawing sound. From some lost passage in my heart, despair whimpered softly.

  And then, pain.

  Art, memory, and glamour tore its way from my mouth and nose, drawn by the abominations’ sucking breath. It tasted my golden autumn, maple sweetness. It tasted the Hunt and stories around a blazing fire. It tasted one thousand nights and one thousand beginnings.

  It dragged memory itself from my deepest well, clawing and screaming as it was taken. Parts of me, so inherent that I couldn’t imagine being without them, somehow were drank from the vaults of my mind and heart.

  That day I lost baubles, forgotten stories that hadn’t been told since my kind first came to these western lands. It took the names of women loved and the glories of battle and the Hunt.

  Lost.

  The creature had begun devouring everything I had ever been.

  Panicked, I wrenched myself away, half-rolling, half-stumbling.

  My bow. I scarcely had time to reach for it before I felt those warped talons open the skin of my back.

  I screamed, flooded with pain like nothing I had ever known.

  I could no longer dally with the thing. I no longer cared about leading it anywhere. All that mattered, foremost in my world, was escape. I didn’t know what would happen if the thing kept feeding from me, and I had no intention of finding out.

  All I had to do was reach for my bow. I was faster than the empty thing. It would be nothing for me to remain out of range… or so I hoped.

  If I were wrong, however, my bow would bring me a step closer toward the Great Hunt. The Hunter was far beyond my control. If I accidentally called him from fear or anger, he could sweep through Mount Chase, dragging every man, woman, and child with him on his mad, frenzied Hunt. People would die without question.

  I needed another weapon, another option. I needed something else I could use to end the creature.

  I would only draw my bow as a last resort.

  My feet pounded the soft earth, secret terror hurling me away from the shadowed monster. I ran blindly, panicked, I made the nearby rise in three leaps, fleeing like prey. Then, I slid toward the gully before I fully realized what had happened. I scrabbled along the ground as I slipped down, trying to slow. The mud-slicked earth, however, slid me full force into an ancient spruce tree.

  The abomination’s keening chased behind me. It was relentless. It did not tire.

  I needed help. I needed—

  Spruce tree.

  That was a slender chance.

  I wove my way into the tangled morass of boughs and needles, pushing my way next to the trunk through the tight fit of branches woven densely into each other. I hugged myself to the trunk, feeling rough bark and sticky tree tears against my naked skin.

  Please.

  I could use some help here, old friend.

  Faint. She felt so faint. I had no idea of how long she had slept; it could have been years.

  She might never awaken again.

  I didn’t have time to be gentle, unfortunately. The fetch had crested the hill and would have me in moments.

  I had her Name; I knew it from when we lived across the dark ocean. I hoped she wouldn’t hate me for using it.

  I pressed my hand to the trunk.

  “Jillian Greenspruce!” The world trembled as the name tore through me like a wind from beneath the earth. I beckoned her with every whisper of what I was, beseeching. It mattered little how long she had slept. It was almost impossible to ignore a beckoning that one’s Name evoked.

  The creature’s keening howl grew closer. It sounded triumphant, certain.

  You dare much, Tommy Maple. Her thoughts were cold, distant. I could feel her petulance, and the underlying anger we all felt when accosted with our Name.

  My need is great, sister. She wasn’t kith or kin, but I truly found no other word. Because I knew her true Name, I became closer than any lover or any bond of blood. Only you could answer so formidable a need.r />
  Her smirk laced her reply.

  Your honey-tongue doesn’t snare me, O Great Herald. She wouldn’t awaken fully, yet even so, she became more present, more real.

  I glanced up the rise at the shambling thing, only now coming down the ridge. It leered, hungrily.

  I have not long for honeyed words, sister. I am hunted, stalked by darkness dire. I need a boon, else there will be a new Herald of Autumn.

  I don’t know how much I can do, Tommy. You must stop poking at the things in the darkness.

  I know you feel it, dear sister. I need to kill it. It won’t stop hunting me.

  She considered for a moment, weighing unbroken years of life and wisdom. Spruce and I had always been on friendly terms, a fortunate happenstance.

  No minor boon, this, Tommy. Not for crying my Name to the ends of the world. Not for dragging me from my bower of cold. Such is the nature of my people. Murder stood less than four strides from me, and she bargained for a greater boon.

  Agreed. I tried not to hurry her as my terror grew.

  A boon for a weapon?

  Exactly what I had thought. Agreed twice! A boon, struck square. Just give me something, anything, I can use to kill this—!

  Above you.

  Just over my head was a thick, dead bough. Stouter than my wrist, it was certainly strong enough to support my weight. I doubted I could break it. Jillian would not deal me crooked, however.

  Thrice agreed. Bargain made. I jumped straight up, catching it with both hands. Breaking it struck me as impossible, and yet it did, a perfect break that left a wicked point in my hands.

  A mere branch is not a greater boon, Tommy. I must give more. You wouldn’t rob me, would you?

  Upon me now, the fetch attempted to wend its way into the tree’s bower, hindered by the stout branches.

  I clung close to the sap-covered trunk as the magnificent tree thwarted the fetch. No matter how the shamble-man tried, it couldn’t pass her thick boughs. I was safe—for the moment.

  I’ve learned many-a-thing on this hill, Tommy. Once, in a twilight long forgotten, a fire-fae whispered to me that one with need would come. I felt her strength, even if she weren’t yet entirely present. The old spruce acted as a window for her, and she cast the threads of her Telling through it. Care for a story of how that limb died? Care to know from whence came yon spear?