Free No Dominion (The Walker Papers: A Garrison Report) by CE Murphy Page A

pollution, no air pollution, no nothin’, just us and the stars and the grey-green forest way below. For half a heartbeat I thought it’d be okay to stay here, deep in the back end of forever, but I knew I’d never do it. Jo expected me to come home on the other end of time.
    The kid I rode with had a voice as clear and sharp as the stars, loud enough to be heard over howling dogs and cawing rooks and clattering hooves: “Father, this will not do. Not if we ride to battle. The mare cannot abide, so burdened.”
    “I ain’t that much of a burden!”
    “You are if we must fight,” the boy said sourly. “Father.” He didn’t wait for Cernunnos to pay attention, just wheeled off, upward, toward the star path stretched across the sky. The dogs came our way, and then the birds, and finally the other riders. Cernunnos came after, and sent the kid a dagger glare as he took his place at the front of the ride again. I couldn’t help remembering what Jo had said, back in those first days when we’d first met and had first dealt with Horns: “And a child shall lead them.” Looked to me like Cernunnos might be lord of the hunt, but the kid was the boss of Pop. “Where we goin’?”
    The boy said, “Home,” in his clear strong voice. I caught a glimpse of longing on Cernunnos’s face. Then he was ahead of us, riding fast for the stars, and the air got damned cold before I started wonderin’ whether I was gonna survive going where a god called home .
    The answer was no, a’course I wasn’t, because the air got too thin an’ the stars got too close, but the Wild Hunt didn’t have to worry about things like that ‘cause they were magic. It turned out, as we burst through the stars and crashed into a blank empty space in the sky, that for here and now, so was I. It wasn’t just the Sight Jo had granted me, but also riding with the Hunt and being under the god’s protection. I’d ridden with him once before, just for a couple minutes, but that was him givin’ us a lift. This was real, and it went into my bones until I belonged with the Hunt. Until I felt the cold place between worlds edging under my skin, getting its hooks in. Until a pounding started in my heart, more than a heartbeat, more of a life pulse, the life of another world. I remembered that world, its misty forests and dew-damp meadows. I remembered the sharp smell of the sea in the air, and how the muted night colors of the ancient Ireland we’d just left behind reminded me of home. I remembered the loamy earth grabbin’ at me, holding me close as I sank into it, and I remembered how laughter carried through the air like crystal, a song of its own.
    I remembered all of it, an’ when we burst through the walls between worlds to splash into shallow seas and ride for a silver shore, everything in my bones said I was home.
    I grabbed the mare’s reins and hauled up. She reared, then stomped in a circle, shaking an angry head as the rest of the Hunt swung around us, swirlin’ and moving like fog. The boy took the reins back and stilled the mare while Cernunnos came out of the fog and met my eye. “What the hell are you doin’ to me?”
    “You are not Joanne, to demand answers from me, old man.”
    “Nah, I’m just her best buddy, and here to do you a favor.”
    He went tight around the eyes just like anybody might do, ‘cept with him it did something uncanny to the horns distortin’ his temples. They hadn’t burst through the skin yet. Wouldn’t, I reckoned, for half a year or so, but they were still there, thick and visible and making him look more dangerous than your average Joe.
    The thought made me grin. Maybe more dangerous than your average Joe, but I wasn’t so sure about more dangerous than my average Jo. “Knock it off,” I said. “We’re in this thing together, and we’re both doing it for Joanne, right? So no sense in tryin’ ta out-alpha each other. You got the magic mojo all over me anyway, and I know it, so lemme try again: