Shattered Pentacle

by Starscribe

Chapter 16

When Lyra stepped out into the impossible clearing, it wasn't naked and muddy or wearing fur. Now she felt like she was dressed for war—a thin, flexible top of metal links, with a skirt to match. Somehow it fit her perfectly without adjustment, or even much struggle to get over her damp skin.

It was magic, obviously—the strange, new kind of magic that surrounded her, or rested on her ears as a little wreath.

She was still a plain, ordinary human—but the locals didn't stare and point anymore. Most didn't look away from their work, busy at their forges or gathered around tables with tankards of mead. Curiosity stirred in her, a powerful need to understand more about these creatures and their world.

Many looked inhuman, but all seemed driven by entirely familiar drives. They laughed and sang and worked. They didn't watch her with desperate hunger, with fangs emerging from under perfect lips.

Then they reached the mirror. It towered over everyone, at least twelve feet of metal and glass, perfect and unbroken. True to his word, King Theodore waited there, lounging on a stump and reviewing something on his... tablet.

Even this strange place had technology, it seemed.

Theodore stood as they approached, looking from Isabelle to Lyra and back again. “Interesting choice. Is the Willworker going to war?”

“Yes,” Lyra answered, before her student could say anything. “Unfortunately. People have been fighting monsters so long they can't tell when someone is on their side.”

The king gestured with one hand. “Go, Isabelle. Make yourself comfortable in the Hollow. Returning you to the mortal world requires greater consideration. Write a letter to your family, I will see it delivered.”

She curtseyed to him, squeezed Lyra's hand, then scampered away into the camp without a backward glance.

“Where are we, anyway?” Lyra asked. “I thought it was the Shadow, but the longer I'm here the more I realize that's wrong. I haven't seen a single spirit since I got here.”

“It's called the Hedge,” Theodore said. “The dream that separates your world from a nightmare you can't comprehend. It is exceptionally dangerous for your kind to travel here. You should never seek it, or walk its doors alone.”

She nodded. Not that she would make any more promises—but Theodore sounded like he told the truth. Like trusting Capper, it was usually best to believe the ones who had the information, until they did something to make her doubt their word. “You can send me home?”

“Not to where we came from. Spring would never do that to a friend. But somewhere safe, yes. With more time, we could return you to a specific place. But if I had to dispatch an agent, that would spend some of what we owe. All actions in service weigh, until our accounts are balanced.”

“Unless I want to stay friends,” she said, looking all the way up into those strange eyes. “Not because I want to be owed anything, but—because the world is full of monsters. When good people find each other, we should stick together. Work together towards common goals. Look out for each other.”

Her eyes lingered on his antlers, and the crown hovering overhead. That kind of display was something the Kindred might use, if they were capable. But monsters like them only knew false life, stolen from others.

“You think that wise?”

She shrugged. “I think you make stuff grow, like I do. Anyone who brings life has to be good.”

He laughed—like Capper, with a mocking bitterness that came from long years and much sadness. “I warn you, Willworker. You are dangerously naive. Darkness looms over all, drooling and ready to devour. It wears many cloaks, and speaks many promises. If you listen and believe, you will soon find yourself sworn to a dozen evils. My court welcomes your desires. Others would wield you like a cudgel, or leave you lifeless in the thorns for the danger you present. All you see are refugees and survivors, Willworker. Consider what we fled.”

He ran one hand along the mirror, brushing the glass as though reaching down into a pool. The glass rippled and split, and her reflection vanished through it. On the other side, she saw—trees, and the walls of a domed greenhouse.

She knew that place. “The... Canterlot Botanical Gardens?”

He nodded. “You will be safe. It is the property of my court, its guards will permit you to pass without question. Someone is waiting for you. She may already be known to you—I'm not sure. Perhaps she can answer your questions about us in a way that makes more sense to you. She still owes me.” He gestured to the glass, a little more insistent. “Thank you for your help, Willworker. I hope you will prove a friend to Spring.”

She stepped through, and her feet found familiar soil. A huge greenhouse, with trees of various kinds growing in their specific ground. Only the moonlight lit it now, leaving her to stumble awkwardly through the space towards the door.

Someone was waiting just outside, with a flashlight in one hand and a crowbar in the other. Lyra tensed, raising both arms reflexively to defend herself—but she let them down just as quickly, a feeble smile spreading across her face.

“Starlight? What are you doing here?”

She couldn't call the girl a “friend” yet exactly, not while she only knew her by her shadow name. Maybe they were getting there—or maybe Starlight was the one who slipped her catnip during her first attempt with transformation. Lyra still needed to figure out who had done that.

Starlight lowered the flashlight from her face, resting the rusty crowbar on her shoulder. “You didn't get caught? We thought they dragged you in with Rarity. You escaped into the Hedge?”

At least King Theodore had told her a little useful information during her brief visit. “I guess so. Do you have a phone? I need to talk to Akiko—” She reached for Starlight's purse, then brought her hand up short. “Wait, what did you say about Tabitha?”

Starlight slid the crowbar into a heavy loop in her belt, then took Lyra's wrist, tugging her along the path towards the road. “She's not the only one. I think it was mostly about her sister. Izzy was a...” She trailed off, eyeing her. “And you knew. Look at you, marching out of there like a Summer knight. That's how you figured out shapeshifting so fast! Theo tutored you, didn't he?”

Lyra was out of energy for slack jawed staring. Maybe if they were all still alive tomorrow night, she would manage it. “I did not know anything until right now. I still don't feel like I know very much. I don't remember you mentioning you knew the king.”

“Spring King,” she corrected, without missing a beat. “And I can't usually talk about it. Maybe we should... work through all these details another time. Changelings aren't the ones attacking us.”

Lyra nodded her agreement. It was enough to know she had a friend who could help answer hard questions. When the battles were over, she could work on filling in the gaps in her understanding. “Fine. You all got my warning—is everyone hiding now?”

“Whatever good it does,” Starlight said. “Tea shop is compromised, probably the Sanctum there too. A few other places across the orders. Nobody can exactly tell who is being hit or why—seems pretty random. How did you know about it?”

She looked away. Better not to answer than give a lie, if she could help it. “I learned right when I sent the message. But I thought the worst of it was coming tomorrow, not tonight. This is a warm up.”

Starlight whistled. “Well that's fantastic. Free Council is going to ground, heads down. Other orders will probably call us cowards for it. The Arrow wants to hurt them so bad they know not to pull shit like this again. Guardians will be poking around every Sanctum in the city to find the source of the breach. But we have to live through it all first. Come on.” She broke into a jog.

Soon they reached the parking lot, and a tiny car concealed in shadow. Starlight drove a car so small it was downright comical, one of those toy-looking smart cars. She could probably have fit a second one in the spot next to it.

Lyra scrambled into the passenger seat. “Are we sure it's safe to drive?”

“For you? No. Me—yes. I'm feeling lucky.”

She turned the engine, and it caught instantly, purring to quiet life. She left the headlights off, pulling down the parking lot. She waited there a second, motionless.

Several cars roared down the road in front of them, sirens blaring and lights flashing. Then as quickly as they'd come, the peaceful quiet of the night returned. Starlight pulled onto the road, then picked a direction seemingly at random.

“Sunset has a place the Order doesn't know about—project she was working on with Twilight, to replace the old Sanctum. Kinda sucks in there, but we need somewhere. Hope you like horses.”

Lyra shrugged. “Anywhere is fine, so long as people will listen to me. Are we going to pull Tabitha out?”

“Don't think so. Sunset's scrying her, but I think they're almost finished with the interrogation. All their questions are about Izzy. They wanted to see if she was complicit in murdering the real Isabelle.”

Lyra gasped. Her heart slowed, fingers suddenly numb. “I mended the real Isabelle's pattern a few hours ago. She's not dead.”

“They're talking about the fetch,” Starlight said, as though that was supposed to mean something. “But she didn't kill it. She worked something out with the fake—I'm not sure exactly what. But the fetch is gone, and someone noticed the difference. Someone who doesn't have a clue what they're hunting.”

Neither do I, Lyra thought, bitter.

Something finally answered. “Lyra, you're alive! I thought the Wild Hunt would take you all the way to Arcadia!”

Lyra grinned, relief overpowering annoyance at the fresh assault of concepts she didn't understand. “Capper! Where are you?”

So the cat wasn't omniscient after all. He sounded genuinely relieved. He hadn't noticed her return until she sent her thoughts to him willingly. “You're asking me? I never left this plane of existence! You're the one who decided to mingle with fairies! You have no idea how much danger you were in!”

He was right about one thing, at least.

Starlight didn't seem to notice her distraction, focused on her driving. They wandered through the city in a meandering, random route, dodging past roadblocks and watching police with what she could only describe as inhuman good fortune. Starlight had no list of checkpoints or scanner radio, she just randomly changed direction, and always happened to drive where they needed.

“We're headed out of the city,” she thought. “Reagan has a secret place. I don't know where yet, but horses are involved. Can you get to me?”

Laughter answered, a sensation as welcome as it was familiar. “It will take time. But now that you're back in the Material, I'll find you. Stay out of trouble.”

Maybe now she actually had a chance to do just that. They passed city limits, then took a random backroad among a dozen others, driving past isolated homesteads until they came to one identical driveway, with a “No Trespassing” sign and a crooked mailbox.

Starlight parked beside it, then gestured for Lyra to open the gate. “The girls are all here. Probably the safest place we could go until it's over.”

“I... know somewhere safer,” she said. “If we want to use it. Please tell me Akiko doesn't still plan on charging up her artifact.”

Starlight sighed, with the same weight of exhaustion that Lyra felt. “I wish I could tell you that. But if you know Twilight, you know she has no survival instinct. She'll keep pushing her luck forever, until it snaps. Taking the rest of us with her, when it all comes crumbling down.”

Lyra opened the gate, then closed it again behind their car. Soon enough they were up the winding drive to the relatively uninteresting home at the end. She'd seen its like many times, a 1970s style oversized farmhouse, with flat bricks and metal roof instead of shingles. The land around it was overgrown with wild grass, with only the portion directly in front of the house mowed and maintained. There was also a large barn nearby, bigger and nicer than the house itself.

“Reagan owns a place like this?” Lyra asked, as they finally pulled to a stop. Several other cars already waited here—Akiko's, Reagan's, and one other she couldn't identify. “I didn't think her sushi job paid this well.”

“It doesn't,” Starlight said, slipping out the door. “Ask her about how she got it if you care. I'm the wrong girl to complain about past mistakes.”

They didn't walk into the house, with its windows dark and interior quiet. Instead, Starlight led them into the barn.

There were horses inside, though thankfully they wouldn’t be remaining in that section for long. Lyra would have to resist the urge to try and talk to them—this time. Past the animals was a staircase leading down, then old equipment and a tunnel of rusting metal, until they came to a hidden workshop.

Compared to the Sanctum they’d left behind, this place was laughable—naked cable ran along the floor of rough stone, with little more than rubber mats for protection. The walls had no fine art, only arcane glyphs cut into them, pulsing with their own power. Wards—powerful ones, if how they felt was any guide. They were so complex that a glance told her nothing about what she was seeing.

She found her friends gathered around a folding table and some camp chairs, surrounded by hard plastic boxes. One of them sat open, revealing industrial quantities of firearms within, in scary-looking black metal.

“Lyra, you made it!” Akiko appeared, giving her a brief, tight hug. “Sounded like you were going over to see Tabitha, then...”

“I did.” She explained what had happened, at least until the moment she ended up with Isabelle in another world. She had made promises about that, and breaking them would probably be an exceptionally bad idea.

“She got away,” she finished lamely. “I’m not sure where she is anymore, exactly. But she’s safe. I think Starlight can vouch for it.”

Starlight had a plastic water bottle from somewhere, turning it over in her hands. She cracked the seal in two fingers, then nodded weakly. “We don’t need to worry about Isabelle. She’s in a safehouse the humans can’t find.”

“I’m more interested in how you knew everything was about to unravel,” Reagan said. She didn’t look up from her work, attention fixed on something in front of her. A gun, along with a set of tools to go with it. She worked the weapon over with the kind of loving attention one of the Kindred would give to their prized possessions. “Are you getting visionary dreams now? That’s usually a Fate thing.”

Visionary dreams? Maybe she could get them to believe that, and preserve the true source of her information. The less anyone looked into Bonnie, the better off she would be.

Any lie strengthens the Lie.

Her familiar didn’t even have to whisper anymore. She’d been trained into his way of thinking.

Infuriatingly, Capper was right. “I don’t know specifics. But I know some things. People hunting us—hunting the Seers of the Throne, and sometimes catching us in the net instead. But they usually didn’t know the difference. They’re planning something huge tomorrow night. So big they shut down the freeway, closed public transport, and called in the National Guard.”

“Tomorrow?” Akiko asked, panic visible on her face. “Their big move wasn’t tonight?”

“I don’t think so. This source wouldn’t lie to me. I was supposed to stay home, locked in where I was safe. But that would mean abandoning you, which wasn’t happening.”

“Tabitha is in an interrogator’s chair in a monastery eight miles from here. If she slipped, we might have to rescue her at any second. Who captured her?”

“They’re the... Order of St. George,” Lyra answered. “Witchfinders. Like I said, they’re here hunting the Seers of the Throne. But they don’t actually know that—they just know there’s magic here. They aren’t very good at telling friends from enemies.”

“And you know about them,” Starlight said. “You knew what they were planning and when. Why?”

Now or never. She looked around the circle—at Akiko, focused on her artifact. At Starlight, pacing back and forth, and Reagan with her gun. They deserved an explanation. “Because when I was a teenager, vampires made me a ghoul. When hunters showed up to wipe them out, they kept me alive. Nursed me back to health... kept me from crawling back to the Kindred when the cravings almost killed me.”

Akiko set down her tools, then rested one hand on Lyra’s shoulder. “You... I had no idea, Lyra. When you dropped out—”

She nodded. “Yeah. That was... when it started. Anyway, I’m still close with that hunter. We... sleep together, actually. I love her more than anything. When I got home today, she’d turned our house into a fortress, and locked me inside. Obviously I got out anyway, warned you all. That’s why we can’t charge your artifact, Akiko. I know how scary tonight was—it’s gonna get worse.”

“Does she know about you?” Reagan asked, without missing a beat. “And the Pentacle? And us?”

Lyra shook her head emphatically. “No idea. All this time I’ve known her, she’s talked about hunting things. She didn’t tell me because she thought I would pass the message on to friendly mages—I don’t think she even believes we could be friendly. She told me because she doesn’t want me on the streets getting killed. Which is exactly where I was, and exactly what almost happened. And if we go through with your plan, Akiko—we’ll walk right into the middle of it.”

Comments

[Diamondized]

Bonnie's gonna be mad. The conflict of interest alone would tear her apart, but Lyra sneaking around behind her back will make it so, so much worse.

[Elsaack]

11852192
Yeah, these kinds of conflicts of interests, paranormal life vs mortal life, are the bread and butter of World of Darkness games.

[FanOfMostEverything]

Heh. One way or another, horses were going to get involved.

In any case, the truth (well, a truth) is out. What the coven does with it remains to be seen. And odds are Lyra won’t be home by the time Bonnie gets back, which will lead to its own collection of problems.

There’s also the not-inconsiderable matter of rescuing Tabitha… though it’s possible Izzy may call in some favors there. We’ll see how this all shakes out soon enough, to say nothing of Bonnie trying to reconcile “my girlfriend who I rescued from leeches” with “dangerous wizard.”