A Walk in the Dark Chapter 28 by Maggie Finson

I was still keeping my eyes closed and asking Mom, Dad, and whoever — god-wise — was listening why I had to put up with all this crap when the crashing stopped and feminine voice called out. “Hello! I know this is awkward, but Daddy wanted me to meet you!”

“What?” I opened my eyes, lifted my head so I could see things around me, and saw Averil. The charger looked about like he had last time except he didn’t seem at all embarrassed this time around. He gave me a toss of his head that passed for a nod and went back to doing the usual horse things like looking for something to eat or graze on.

“I’m Evangaline.” His current rider, doing it side saddle and garbed in some really elaborate skirts and bodice gave me a sunny smile. “Glad to meet you, sister.”

“Uhh, you, too.” I answered a little slowly while peering into the forest around us. “So is that nutso paladin planning an ambush here?”

“Oh, Reggie is somewhere else right now.” She laughed and then gave me a contrite look. “I really do need to apologize for the way he acted earlier. He’s such a dunce at times.”

“Okay.” I answered and looked at her, really looked for the first time. She was beautiful, perfectly oval face, eyes set to compliment the rest, mouth that could give a man joys he never expected, and with a shape that would have most exotic dancers jealous. “So just who, exactly, are you, and why are you riding Averil?”

“Long story.” She answered with a shrug.

“I seem to have some time here.” I said while dismounting and waving to the others in my party to do that, too. “So let us make camp and you can tell me all about it. I am way too familiar with long complicated stories. Will you join us?”

Evangaline nodded with a smile that wasn’t all that confident and fastidiously used a cloth to brush off the fallen log she decided to sit on. “Why not? You and I are going to be seeing a lot of each other in the future, so we may as well get used to each other now.”

“Right.” I nodded and looked at the charger. Averil was quite happily munching some clover he’d found, and put my attention back to the girl. “So would you like to tell me why you’re riding Averil and Reggie isn’t around?”

“It’s complicated.” She answered.

“Like anything in my life isn’t right now?” I grimaced. “I can deal with complicated. Just tell me, okay?”

“Well…” She let out a breath and started. “Reginald isn’t here just now because I am.”

“You two don’t get along, or what?” I asked.

“Oh, we wouldn’t.” She told me then lowered her head and closed her eyes for a moment. “If we were different people.”

“What?” I was getting the idea here. Curse, a sister of the idiot Knight riding his horse, who said they weren’t around at the same time…

“Weellll,” she grimaced, “Reggie wasn’t always the blustering idiot you met. Once he was a pretty good guy, smart, reasonable, and all that. Then he ran into a witch named Circeee and she fought him to a standstill. Instead of just killing him, or turning him into some farmyard animal, she decided he should find his feminine side.

“That’s when I showed up.” Evangaline blushed and gave me a sad look. “I got the brains and empathy, Reginald was left with the strength, purpose, and not much else.

“We swap every full moon.” She told me. “Sorry about how our brother was with you earlier. He has no conception of good sense. Dad gave us Averil to watch over him when he’s out and about.”

Averil, hearing his name, looked up from the nice patch of clover he’d found and nodded in what I knew had to be agreement.

“So you are basically the same person Reggie is, just with all the smarts and diplomacy.” I had to close my eyes for a minute there to let my senses catch up with all that. “And you both trade places every month. Does that about cover things?”

“That about covers it.” She agreed with a grin. “But I’m nowhere near as hidebound and determined as our brother is. I’m actually a sorceress, and we tend to kind of ignore rules off and on if what we do works.”

“I can believe that.” I had to shake my head. “I believe you, but is your alter ego going to try and ‘smite’ me next time he comes out?”

“Probably not.” Evangaline shrugged. “He’s with Daddy right now and is probably getting a good ration of shit over your first meeting.”

Okay, the story is outrageous. But look at what happened to me and Sam. Plus, I undeniably have a goddess for a mother in this world, and evidently a god for a father. Like I’m going to tell anyone their story is crazy? Nope. Not going to happen. Plus, she was riding the same horse, who knew me and all that. Crap. Is this world ever going to get to where it seems normal? And if it does will I still be sane enough to notice?

“Oh.” I said after her last statement. “Dad was nice to me when I met him.”

“Guys adore their little girls.” Evangaline grinned. “What else can I say?”

“Good point.” I had to give her that having seen otherwise very grounded males giving in to ridiculous requests from their daughters in the past. “Now what?”

“It’s getting dark, everyone is dismounted, the Dhro’aaa aren’t going to bother you and yours, so make camp, build a fire, have dinner, and get some sleep.” She answered.

“Good idea.” I agreed and waved to my companions to get that done. “You know, I kind of like you already. But if Reggie shows up and tries to ‘smite’ me again, I may not forgive you for that.”

“He won’t.” She assured me with a grin. “I am him in a way, and I like you. Just be careful about where you point him when he’s around and you’ll both do fine.”

“Yeah, right.” I sighed, and retreated to the area Sam had set up for us.

Evangaline just smirked and turned back to the fire.

Oh, she vamped my girls, too. I had the impression she would enthusiastically go both ways in that regard, and Sam was MINE. So she had to work on the girls there.

“This place just keeps getting stranger and stranger then it goes on a sudden left turn and moves into just plain weird.” I grumbled to Sam once we had settled into our little corner of the campsite and I’d released Sirrin to feed and perform guard duty.

“I heard.” He chuckled then let out a sigh while pulling me against his chest. “I think you better get used to having oddball relatives, Dahlia my darling. With your parents in this world I don’t think any of your siblings, aunts, uncles or whatever are going to be close to what even the people here think of as normal.”

“You really do know how to make a girl feel better about things, you know that?” I sarcastically said while snuggling into his warmth. “But again, you’re most likely right. The most normal one I’ve met so far insists that I call him Daddy, after all.”

“At least most of them haven’t actively tried to kill you yet.” He grinned while adding. “Except for Reginald the Mentally Challenged and now we know there is a reason for that. If you believe Evangaline, that is.”

“Oh, I believe her.” I answered tiredly. “Averil, that charger is something special and wouldn’t let just anyone mount, let alone ride him. From what I’ve seen of him so far it leads me at times into thinking he’s smarter than I am.”

“Look on the bright side of things here.” He said. “You’ve at least solved our problems with the local Dhro’aaa, and some of the humans around here don’t run from us or try to fight us on sight.”

“Two whole villages.” I grumbled. “That town I first went to still has wanted posters out on me and the authorities there are offering a pretty decent reward for anyone delivering me, preferable dead, to them.”

“One thing at a time, love.” He soothed.

“I guess so.” I grinned. “Given everything that’s happened to us so far, I guess we haven’t done all that bad, have we?”

“Nope, not bad at all.”

“I’ll take what I can get for now,” I muttered, “and work towards the really complicated stuff as it comes up, I guess.”

After that we settled down for some badly needed sleep.

What is it about this world that makes sure I never get a decent night’s sleep?

I was awakened by Evangaline shouting, “AWAKE! We are under attack!”

The was a shrilling that I automatically knew was Sirrin’s battle cry, while Ilsa and Lissara added their voices to the mayhem.

Sam was up, in his armor, with weapons drawn by the time I managed to take in the chaos around us. All my girls were up, armed and fighting. Evangaline was dodging, throwing spells and making things difficult for our attackers. Averil picked and chose, bumping into his targets, then finishing them with a sharp shoed hoof, and it was clear that we were outnumbered in this fracas.

By then I had my short sword out and a throwing dagger in my off hand. Which was probably a good thing given what happened next.

Two armored, and very big guys came at me from left and right. One of them bellowed. “Die Hell Spawn!”

Why do people waste their breath in a fight by talking to their opponents? I never have figured that one out. My throwing dagger found one’s throat and I shifted to the side as the other’s sword (a really big one, by the way) whooshed through the spot I’d been in. I got that one taken care of while he was recovering his balance by simply inserting my own (smaller, but very sharp) blade between his ribs and twisting it around to do as much damage I could in a short time.

Sam, bless him, took out the one coming up from behind me and then dispatched two more who were within his reach.

I returned the favor with a throwing knife that lodged into the right eye of another guy trying to take Sam from behind.

It was all over with in less time than I just spent telling about it, and no, I am NOT going to describe any more of that mess. Other than to say it was loud, frantic, and generally passed in a blur.

Once we were all sure it was over with, the survivors of the attack were either running for their lives, or were disarmed and tied up in the center of our camp, I retrieved my throwing knives, checked to make sure no one on my side was seriously injured, and approached our prisoners while shaking my head.

“All right.” I glared at them and asked as nicely as I was able. “Just what the Hell was this about? You obviously aren’t bandits, you’re too well equipped and your weapons are similar enough that they must be general issue kinds of things.”

They only glared at me in response.

“look, guys.” I sat down and gave Sirrin, who was watching things closely, a pat. “I’ve had a tough few days here which you and your friends haven’t helped at all. So is it the bounty on my head? Did someone send you to disturb my beauty sleep? What? If I don’t start getting answers, I’m going to have to work on prying them out of you, and you won’t like that at all. Trust me.”

I didn’t mention that I wouldn’t like it much, either. But saying something like that would have been kind of counterproductive under the circumstances.

“The Temple Elders sent us to kill you.” One of them finally answered.

“Progress!” I nodded then asked. “Which temple?”

“The Temple of Jupiter in Irris.” The man answered me as if I was an idiot while reverently touching the lightning bolt insignia on his tunic. “Everyone knows of The Temple.”

“Right.” I was getting another bad feeling about all this, but beat that one back down to join the others in the corral until I had time to really look at them. “Let’s just say that I’m new around here, and leave it at that for now.

“So, why exactly, are your temple elders so set on having me dead?” I questioned. “I haven’t done anything to offend them have I?”

“Your existence offends all that is good and right, daughter of Llolth.” He shot back.

“Oh, well now that we’ve cleared that part of things up,” I shook my head and grinned. “I think I’ll send you guys home with a message, if you’ll deliver it for me?”

From the collective looks of surprise I got from that one, I figured they’d expected me skin them alive or order someone else to do something equally messy and disgusting to them.

“Well?” I stood up and was showing obvious impatience as they tried to assimilate the idea that I wasn’t going to painfully kill them out of hand.

“Message?” Their spokesman questioned carefully.

“Words, on paper if you need that.” I answered. “No heads in a basket, or soldier’s skins flapping in the breeze. All I want you tell your leaders is that things are changing and if I have to fight them, I will, but am not diametrically opposed to them at the moment. Even if this evening has kind of put them on my bad side for the time being.

“So will you deliver that for me?” I smiled at them and they all cringed back but nodded vigorously. I guess that being faced with a nasty, messy, slow death only to discover that you could get out of it by running home with a note for mommy or daddy wasn’t something they’d quite expected.

“We will do that.” The only one who had spoken answered.

“One more thing.” I thoughtfully added. “Tell them if they send more troops to kill me that I will be sending back heads and other unpleasant things. Think you can do that?”

“Yes, I can do that.”

“Good.” I nodded. “Oh, if you or your friends try to attack us again, once I let you go, you should know that I will come up with some very unpleasant things to do to you, all of you, in response. Got that?”

“Of course, you have my word that we will not renew the attack on you and your party.”

“Not to mention that most of you are already dead, right?” I gave him a nasty grin and nodded to Osethhe who had been hovering in their area with a drawn dagger. “Cut them loose, Setthe. You know what to do if they get belligerent once that happens.”

Once the survivors had gone we got together and pieced enough information into a coherent whole to decide there had been about thirty of them in the initial attack. We’d counted twenty dead, and had captured five. Which left five of them unaccounted for but all of us decided those were still either running or hiding.

Nevertheless, we packed up and started our journey back to the Citadel early.

And now I had another god, or his representatives, trying to kill me.

Why, oh why, couldn’t I have a simple, boring life? I suppose that’s just too much to ask.

Grrrrr.