Wayward Son Read online

  “My papers?”

  Bunce speaks up. “Our passports?”

  The serving wench leans forward, practically depositing her breasts in Simon’s arms. “Ye look a little green around the ears, I hazard.”

  “Crowley, Snow,” I say. “She sounds like Ebb.”

  “I’m twenty,” Simon tells her. “It’s fine.”

  “I admire thine accent and thine courage, lad, but I must obey the king’s law. Mayhap thou wouldst enjoy a tankard of Coca-Cola instead?”

  “Sure…” Simon says.

  “Really though,” the woman whispers. “Great accents.”

  We get our food and walk away from the shack right into a parade. “Hear ye, hear ye!” a man in homemade chain mail is calling. “Make way for the queen!” I start to bow my head, and I notice Bunce begin to curtsy (which is absurd on both our parts, but there you are). A horse, carrying a woman dressed as Elizabeth I, trots by.

  “Pardon me, chap.” Another woman, dressed as Sherlock, pushes past us.

  Bunce waves her turkey leg at the whole preposterous scene. “Is the theme British?” she asks, suddenly indignant. “Is it just weird and British?”

  “If so, Bunce, you’ve got the best costume.”

  “But there are also Vikings,” Simon says. “And people dressed up like big furry animals.”

  “And handsome young men with dragon wings,” I add, earning another rare smile from him.

  “That shop over there sells magic wands!” Penny says. “It’s like they’re mocking us, specifically.”

  “They’re just having fun,” Simon says. “Let’s find a table.”

  “The young master hath a fine idea,” I say. “He is fair in aspect and sharp in mind.”

  “How’d you do that?” Simon asks. “Did you flip a switch?”

  “I’m just pretending to be in a Shakespeare play. Lay on, my boy.”

  “I’m not your boy,” he says, laughing, but also laying on.

  “‘He’s gone,’” I lament. “‘I am abused, and my relief must be to loathe him.’”

  “Othello,” Bunce says. “Very nice, Basilton.”

  I twirl my turkey leg and bow.

  “You’re having fun,” Simon accuses.

  “Fie!”

  21

  SIMON

  Renaissance Faires are brilliant.

  I had a turkey leg and a big sticky Coke and then something called funnel cake, which is just a mess of fried dough with powdered sugar, and is A-plus-plus in my book. The woman who sold it to me gave me free chocolate sauce. “Angels get upgrades,” she said.

  Everyone here is so friendly. I don’t know if that’s a Nebraska thing or just a part of their Olde English act.

  Penelope has decided to take umbrage at all the bad English accents. (And bad Scottish accents and bad Irish accents and some that sound like very bad Australian accents.) But Baz has taken to it like a fish to water. He can out-thine the best of them.

  I beg them both to walk around for a bit. “You’re not supposed to stay in the car the whole time on a road trip,” I say. “You’re supposed to get out and see things, meet strange people—lotus-eaters and sirens.”

  “That’s not a road trip,” Baz says, “that’s the Odyssey. When did you read the Odyssey, Snow?”

  “The Mage made me read it—I think he wanted it to rub off on me—and it is so a road trip!”

  Baz smiles at me. Like he hasn’t in a while. Like he almost never has, in public—like it’s easy. “You’re right, Snow. Better tie you to the mast.”

  He’s wearing a shirt with a whole field of flowers on it. I didn’t know how to dress once we didn’t have to wear uniforms every day, but Baz was apparently spoiling for it. He almost never wears the same thing, the same way, twice.

  He’s coming into himself. And I’m coming apart.

  But not today. Today I’m someone else entirely. Today I’m just a bloke with fake red wings.

  There’s a shop selling crystals and magickal artefacts down the way. Penny wants to stop and make sure nothing actually magickal has snuck in. Across the path is a sword shop—so many people are selling swords here!

  Baz follows me into the sword tent. (LONG & BROAD, the sign says.) “You can’t pick up every sword, Snow.”

  “I can’t hear you,” I say, trying out a poorly balanced sabre.

  “Pray, my lord, my light—thy cannot test every blade in the kingdom.”

  That makes me laugh, and him, too. I toss him the sabre, and he catches it.

  “I don’t know anything about swords,” he says.

  “More’s the pity,” I say. “We could spar.” I look back at the racks. “We could have, I mean.” I suppose I don’t have a sword of my own anymore. The Sword of Mages used to hang at my hip, there whenever I called it. I can’t call it now. I can’t say the spell to summon it. Or—I can say it, but nothing happens.

  Baz tried once—held his wand over my left hip and said the incantation: “In justice. In courage. In defence of the weak. In the face of the mighty. Through magic and wisdom and good.”

  It didn’t appear.

  “I suppose it only works for the Mage’s Heir,” he’d said.

  “That’s nobody anymore,” I said back.

  Baz throws another sword at me. I scramble to catch it. It’s lighter than I expect, made of foam. He’s holding up one just like it. “This is more my speed,” he says.

  “That’s the Master Sword,” I say.

  “Perfect for me then.”

  “From The Legend of Zelda?”

  He still doesn’t get it. Baz isn’t into games. He holds out the foam blade. “En garde, you knave. You reprobate scapegrace.”

  I tap his blade with mine. He tries to parry. He’s terrible at this.

  I can’t think of anything else Baz is terrible at. He’s someone else here, too.

  “You breaketh, you buyeth!” a man shouts at us.

  We ignore him, banging our swords and shuffling out into the road. I’m going easy on Baz. Just batting him back. He’s trying to look fierce, but he keeps laughing.

  He breaks through my cover just once to tap my leg. “You’re losing it, Snow! Is this how you defeated the hobgoblin horde?”

  “You’re more distracting than a hobgoblin,” I say. “Your hair is shinier.”

  “‘You have witchcraft in your lips,’” Baz says.

  “Is that more Shakespeare?”

  “Yeah, sorry. I know you prefer Homer.”

  He’s pushing me back into a wooden post. I’m totally letting him. I hold my foam sword up in front of my chest. His is pressed against it. “Check. Mate,” he says.

  “That’s completely wrong,” I say.

  “I win.”

  “I’m letting you win.”

  “That’s still a win, Snow. That might even be a more conclusive win.”

  Baz’s grey eyes are shining. He smells like sunblock. I’m trying to think of an insult. I’m wondering if I could kiss him. If the other person I am today could kiss the other person he is. Is that legal in Nebraska? Is it allowed at the Faire?

  Baz hisses, turning his head and body away from me, like he smells blood.

  I turn after him. “What…”

  He’s staring at a pack of people coming our way—six or seven of them dressed like vampires, plus a few of the busty women in corsets that you see everywhere. (I still haven’t sorted whether I’m still attracted to women or whether I ever was, or whether I’m some kind of Baz-only-sexual. But the cleavage at this place is abundant, and I’m not mad about it.)

  “Look,” I say, trying to draw his attention away from the fake vampires, “I know this is—whatever Penny called it, appropriation—but don’t let it get your back up.”

  Baz’s lip is curled. The band of vampires swaggers closer. They’re dressed like various bloodsucking stereotypes. A couple of them have capes. One’s a girl, dressed like Captain Hook or something. There’s fake blood splattered all over their costumes. Only their mirrored sunglasses are ruining the effect.

  Whatever they’re selling, the wenches are buying it. One of the vampires has already got a girl in his arms, her legs wrapped around his hips. He must be wicked strong. Baz turns away, just as the guy nearest us pulls down his sunglasses to look at me. His skin is pale as ash, and his cheeks look too full. He winks.

  I shudder. “Baz.”

  “I know.” Baz’s fangs are popped. He’s turned back to watch them again.

  “They’re—”

  “Simon, I know.”

  “Where’s Penny?”

  “We’ll find her when we’re done.”

  “Done what?”

  He takes a determined breath. “Slaying these vampires.”

  “We can’t just kill them,” I say. (I can’t, anyway. I’m not the sort of person who picks fights with monsters anymore.)

  “We bloody well can. As long as we get the drop.”

  “But they haven’t done anything wrong!” (Now I’m the sort of person who gives vampires the benefit of the doubt.)

  “Yet, Snow. They’re probably opening those harlots like cans of lager while we argue about it.”

  “We should get Penelope,” I say. “We’re outnumbered.”

  “They’re outnumbered. Two magicians to none.”

  “Like I said—we should get Penelope.”

  “Where’d they go?”

  I look. The vampires have disappeared.

  “Damn it.” Baz is already following their trail.

  “Baz—”

  “Simon. They’re going to murder those girls!”

  “Not immediately. Not in broad daylight.”

  “Do you think there’s a Vampire Code of Conduct?”

  The sword seller yells at Baz. “Hey! Cometh back and payeth for that!”

  “We’ll be right back,” I say, dropping my Master Sword on a table. Then I decide to grab a broadsword. “Right back!”

  I catch up with Baz as he ducks between two shacks. “Do you see them?”

  “I smell them,” he whispers. “Quiet.”

  This part of the festival is set up along a stand of shade trees. There’s no business happening behind the sheds and tents; it’s like being backstage.

  I hear giggling. It takes a second before I see them, hidden in the trees: The vampires have surrounded the women, and they’re all … making out, it seems like.

  “Christ, you people are perverts.”

  “These are not my people,” Baz says. “And be quiet. Vampire ears.”

  “They still haven’t done anything wrong. We can’t kill them for copping off.”

  Then one of the women shrieks. And not in a copping-off way. In an “I’m dying” way. Another woman joins her.

  Baz snarls—just as Penelope shouts, “Burn, baby, burn!”

  One of the vampire’s legs is suddenly on fire. He tries to stamp it out, but … vampires are very flammable. The other six jump back and take off after Penny. Baz and I take off after them.

  The vampires are unbelievably fast. But then, so is Baz. I run after them all for a minute before I remember I can fly. I flap up over the tents, looking for Penny. The vampires are chasing her through the crowd. She’s got her ring hand out, but no clear shot at them.

  I settle down near her. People make room for me, clapping—which lets the vampires through as well. Penny takes aim. “Off with your head!” she shouts at one of them, and isn’t that just what happens. (Penelope’s never been one to pull punches.) His head rolls backwards, and his body falls forward—and his mates rush towards us, enraged.

  I charge one of them, swinging my sword. My extremely shit sword. Which buckles over the bastard’s shoulder.

  I shuffle back, directly into another sword stall. (Which doesn’t take as much luck as you’d think; at least half of these shops sell weaponry.) I grab a claymore and swing. The blade hits the vampire, then separates from its hilt.

  This vamp’s got shaggy blond hair and a Count Chocula cape with a big collar. I grab another sword and hold him back for a moment, before he pulls it out of my hands by the blade. I hook my tail around his leg and yank him to the ground—which gives me a second to grab a scimitar with my left hand and a battle axe with my right.

  He’s already recovered. I step back, onto the main thoroughfare. All the fairgoers have lined the dirt pathway like they’re watching a parade. I can’t see Penny. She won’t have enough magic left in her for another decapitation. But she’s clever, I tell myself. And Baz is an even match for any three of these creeps. I hope.

  The vampire lunges towards me—and I bash the scimitar into his chest. It breaks like a matchstick, and the vampire gets hold of my hand. This is very bad news. He could bite me like this. Or break me in two. If I still had magic, I’d be trying and failing to think of a good vampire spell about now. (Imagine how much I’d miss magic if I’d ever properly mastered it.)

  I try to fly up and away from the vampire, but he holds on tight. I’ve still got a battle axe in my other hand, so I take one last desperate swing at him—

  The head of the axe snaps off when it hits his neck.

  22

  BAZ

  Penelope Bunce has decapitated one vampire and set two more on fire. She’s my mother’s daughter.

  Where is Simon?

  I keep looking for a way to contain the vampires. (Contain them, for what? For who? The authorities? Does America even have magickal authorities?)

  Where are you, Snow?

  He’s not with Bunce. She’s still fighting one of the vampires.

  I’m keeping two more at bay: a guy in a polyester cape and a woman dressed like Tom Cruise’s Lestat. (Of course I’ve read Anne Rice. I was a 15-year-old closet case whose parents pretended they didn’t notice when the family dog disappeared.)

  And I’m trying to find Simon. He’s usually impossible to ignore in a fight.

  None of my spells are doing much damage. I try “Guts for garters!” but it just seems to irritate them. Then I try “Sod off!” That should push them back a few feet and at least give me time to think. It doesn’t. It doesn’t do anything. Which means I must be being too English again. What a time to realize I should have been watching more Friends reruns.

  “Bugger off!” I shout, fruitlessly, dodging behind a tree. “Push off! Naff off!” Nothing, nothing, nothing. (I would try “Fuck off,” but the magickal effect of swear words is unpredictable; it depends entirely on the audience.)

  “Buzz off!” someone in the crowd shouts at me—a young black man in granny glasses. I’ve jumped into the tree. The cloaked vampire is tearing at the branches below me. “Buzz off!” the man in the crowd shouts again.

  I point my wand at the vampire. “Buzz off!”

  It works. He jumps back like he’s been shocked.

  I cast it at Lestat de Lioncourt, too. “Kindly buzz off!” The adverb doesn’t give the spell the extra zing I’m hoping for. But it still works: She falls back.

  I drop out of the tree. What’s my plan here.… (And where is Simon?)

  And why am I holding back? I’m casting playground spells at coldblooded murderers—at no-blooded murderers.

  When I first realized what they were, I told myself I had to act. That I had to do something. My mother’s murderer might be gone, but her death isn’t avenged. That’s what my aunt is doing now. Hunting vampires. Repaying them for my mother’s death, one by one.

  We saw these vampires attack those girls. If we let them go now, they’ll kill more people. That’s what vampires do.

  There’s no point in trying to be covert. They’ve already chased us into the middle of a crowd. We’re all going to be Internet famous after today. The Mage himself wouldn’t be able to clean up this mess.

  And there’s no point trying to be humane. Penny’s on the right track: We can’t lock them up, and we can’t let them go. And it’s not like I have an opportunity to convert them to rat-drinking. “Have you heard the good news about small mammals?”

  I can’t just keep pushing these two back. I’ve been trying to keep my distance from them, casting instead of punching. (I couldn’t take them both in a fistfight.) But Lestat has her eye on my ivory wand—she’ll grab it as soon as she’s close enough.

  I hear a familiar bellow and spin around.

  He’s at the other side of the square, swashbuckling out of a sword shop like the illegitimate grandson of Indiana Jones and Robin Hood.

  There you are, Simon Snow.

  With a blade in each hand and a fair-haired vampire on his tail.

  Simon’s beautiful in battle: He never stops. You never see him plan his next move. He doesn’t plan, he just moves.

  But he’s running out of options. His sword has already cracked in half. He’s got an axe in the other hand, and—it breaks against the vampire’s rock-hard neck. Crowley, no. Simon’s no match for him now, not without magic.

  “Snow!” I shout, forgetting my two opponents—

  Just as Simon takes the broken axe handle and stakes the vampire right through the heart.

  SIMON

  I hear Baz call my name. When I look up, two vampires have grabbed him by the arms.

  The vampire impaled on my axe handle has already started to wither. Like it was the magic in his heart holding him together. I pull back the stake, and he falls—a man-shaped pile of blood and boots and ashes.

  I’m already in the air, flying towards Baz as fast as I can manage. The vampires have pushed him to the ground—bollocks! One of them has his wand!

  I beat her over the back with my axe handle; I’m at the wrong angle to stake her. She turns on me, waving Baz’s ivory wand as if a spell is just going to fall out of it.

  Baz uses the distraction to get back on his feet and throw a punch at the other vampire, the guy. It’s a messy punch. Baz has never learned to fight with his body, even though he’s made of steel. But the vampire he’s fighting is the same—all power, no skill. They’re trading hits like clumsy steam engines.

  I hook my tail around the girl vampire’s leg, but the trick doesn’t work this time. She holds her ground, then jerks her leg back, pulling me into her arms. Then she goes for my face with the wand—she’s given up on casting spells and is just going to stab me with it—but I wrap a wing around her, holding her so close she can’t move.