Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge - eARC (27 page)

“Like read a
six hundred page contract
?” she shrilled. God, that voice! That incessant whining loathsome voice! It haunts my dreams to this day!

“You are a such a total loser. Only a total loser would like read a six hundred page contract! I don’t even like to like read the ingredients in like my
shampoo
! That’s like what
servants
are for!”

“Okay,” I said. “Then sign the signature pages. Basically boils down to you have to work mostly within human legal limits. No casting curses just because some human is a dork face. Stuff like that. And you have to remain as Princess of Seattle for the rest of your sentence. You’re not stuck there, you can travel if you want, but you have to be the grand fey of Seattle for twenty years. If there’s a serious threat of bodily harm you can jump out, obviously, but you have to defend the territory to the best of your ability. My company, in turn, agrees to provide mundane human security support against outer realm forces again to the best of our ability. There’s a codicil that if you so desire, it is not required, you can provide members of your court as combat support to members of my company. That way they can make money.”

“Money?” she said. “How?”

“We get paid by the human government to take out supernatural things that harm humans,” I said.

“So you’re like a witch hunter?”

“Like that,” I said. “More modern. But we get paid, and pretty well, to take out supernatural problems. Problem being with the territory open in Seattle there’ve been too many. Putting an outer faction entity in Seattle should balance that.”

“I’d like need a real court to like be able to hold the territory. Which, like, I don’t
have
!”

“You don’t think there are fey who would like to join such a sweet and lovely princess?” I asked. Maybe flattery would get me somewhere.

“Well, duh,” Shallala said. “I’m like totally popular!”

“Then you get your court. And they can help you defend the territory. We’ll help as well when we can. That’s what the contract states. The rest is really boiler-plate. But you can’t go casting spells at any human just because they’re a dork face or a dumb butt.”

“That’s totally bogus,” Shallala said. “What am I supposed to do with them, then?”

“There are these things called ‘bouncers,’” I said, sighing. This was going to take a while.

“Fine, fine, what-ever!” she said. “There. Signed.”

“Okay,” I said. “There are five signature pages. Did you sign them all?”

“Like all the places where the little red thingies are? And like the initial places too. I was totally signing it while you were talking like forever! Now, there had better be decent food!”

“I know a good bento place,” I said. “You like bento?”

“Oh, I could totally go for a California roll with avocado! I like totally invented that!”

The PUFF on a Grand Fey was astronomical. She never came closer to dying.

“Your wish is my command, Princess,” I said. “I’ll be back in a jiff.”

CHAPTER 20

There was a gibbous moon under a sky of fleeting clouds on the kite hill of Warren G. Magnuson park when the ground behind me opened up and vomited the Great Hunt in all its horror and fury.

We’d gotten Princess Shallala up to Seattle, bitching the whole way. The Evian was the wrong kind of Evian. Why couldn’t we get any good food on the road? What was this stuff? A burger? She didn’t eat burgers! She was like vegetarian! Except, you know, steak. And chicken. And Dungeness crab. Could she like get Dungeness in Seattle? And like salmon. But only fresh-caught, none of this like sea farmed for the Princess. Was it like totally all organic? Like, this is totally grody! Can we like stop by Napa? There’s like this totally bomb winery up there…

I nearly strangled her a half a dozen times. From time to time I’d get so tired of it, I’d get in the trailer and ride inside, just to get her to Shut. UP. When anyone was in her presence she was invisible, in stasis and had no concept of the passage of time. She also wasn’t smart enough to read a clock. No skin off my nose. Besides, it was a comfortable place to ride. Technically illegal to ride in the back of a container but we’d kidnapped an underage fey princess from her mother’s time out. It doesn’t get much more illegal than that.

The preparations had taken most of the day and much of Phil’s ingenuity. He thought it was a very bad idea. So did I. It was just the best of a series of worse choices.

Then we rolled the barrel containing the fortunately quiescent princess up to the top of the hill, got her out, arranged the horrible feynikin body and Phil made the final preparations. Then everyone but me beat feet.

It only took the Hunt, zooming in on the location of their missing princess and heir, about ten minutes to disgorge from the crack in the ground through a portal. And they were there.

I was standing stock still behind the feynikin of Shallala holding a .357, cocked, to her head. I was wearing finely wrought chain-mail from head to toe. Not a single inch of skin was uncovered by steel. It was actually a faraday suit like high power lineman wear. Good luck getting fey magic through
that
. I hoped.

“Make a move and the princess dies,” I said. “This weapon is loaded with iron cored ammunition. There are human technological traps near us that will kill you all as well as myself and the princess. In front of me is a table. You will ride
well
around in a circle until you are
beyond
the table. If you come
closer
than that in
any
direction, we all die. When you are in front of me, we will negotiate.”

“We do not negotiate with mortals,” a voice hissed behind me.

The hiss sent shivers down my spine. It was a supremely visceral reaction. Pure animal. My instinct was to cut and run.

If I moved so much as a muscle, the whole hilltop was going to explode. There were wires attached to my body and laser trips all over the place. There were two hundred claymores pointed right at me, one strapped to Shallala’s alien chest and another strapped to mine. If I was going to go out, I was going to go out with a bang.

“You can negotiate or we all die,” I said not looking around. “And, yes, the weapons that are pointed at you
will
kill you all. They are loaded with cold iron. And myself and the princess.”

“Mortals
fear
death,” the voice hissed.

“I have been to the Green Lands,” I said as calmly as I could. “The God of Angel Armies stands by my side. Whom shall I fear? Go wide around and come to the front of me. If you approach you will trigger the traps. If you attack you will trigger the traps. If you attempt to enspell me you will trigger the traps. The only thing you can do to
not
trigger the traps is
face
me if you dare, Huntsman.”

I heard more than the hissing behind me. A rattle of bridles. Snarls from their mounts. Shifting of riders.

The Hunt moved. Well around me. It was nearly silent, the “horses” of the Huntsmen padding on silent feet. Then they were in sight.

I nearly retched. If Shallala had been hideous, the Hunt was hideous and terrifying.

They were Fey without any sort of glamour. Massive compared to Shallala. Seven or eight feet tall at a guess. Thin, hideous and awful, alien and repugnant. Beneath their cloaks, their armor was in a riot of colors, all grays under the moon. If I’d take a guess at what it was made of I’d say some sort of advanced polymer. It wasn’t metal that was for sure. They were armed with jagged black spears that rippled blue in the moonlight. I could tell they were charged with either some sort of Fey magic or, just as possible, electricity. There was no question in my mind those spears were nothing but pure pain at a single touch.

Their “horses” were anything but. Again, alien in the extreme. They had the general look of horses: long legs, long necks, straight bodies, long muzzles. But their genesis was something entirely different. They were nothing of earth but if I was to pick earthly creatures a hyena crossed with a weasel crossed with a greyhound crossed with a praying mantis. They had not skin but a sort of carapace. Their snouts were very insectile with underjaws that jutted out to catch prey. Their eyes glowed an eerie green in the darkness. They hissed and writhed at their riders’ control, their eyes flaring and damping, passionate to rend the human limb from limb. They smelled of a carnal pit mixed with a toxic chemical dump.

I had never been more terrified in my life. Every instinct was telling me to run and run fast. That they were simply death. Not just death, my soul would be stripped from my body only after they had laughed for centuries as I had begged to die.

I was a Marine. I had a job to do. I set aside the horror.

“We are come to the front of you, mortal,” the Huntsman hissed. “Does our sight
please
?” he laughed and that was even worse.

I suddenly realized I might be talking to Shallala’s father. Technically, if what Stricken’s file said was correct, he had no legal control over her under fey law. But he might have a vested interest in keeping her alive.

“I’m going to lower the weapon,” I said. I decocked the .357 and holstered it. The pistol to the head was just insulting. “That was just to get you to pause. This is the real problem,” I said, holding up the dead-man’s switch in my left hand. “I drop this, I open my hand and this hilltop explodes. Do you understand?”

“I understand.”

“I wish to negotiate with the Queen. I require a one hour grace of no hostilities to myself, any other human or the Princess. I in turn promise no hostilities save that we or any other group associated are attacked.”

“The Queen does not
bow
to a human.”

“The Queen has often
negotiated
with humans. I asked for no capitulation. It’s that or we blow the hilltop. Princess dies. Hunt dies. You die. You cannot escape one hundred and fifty thousand steel musket balls going faster than any musket can fire. Would you have the entire Wild Hunt die as well as one of your rare Princesses?”

He laughed again. “This is not the Wild Hunt. What you see before you is a shadow of the Horned King’s might.”

“My government would pay the cost of a thousand castles for this Hunt alone. I wouldn’t collect but friends would. Your call, Fey.”

“This is a trap to kill my Queen,” the Huntsman said, pulling his steed from side to side. He was as eager as his steed to kill me. No, rend me for a thousand years.
Yeah, that’s a protective daddy reaction. Guess some things transcend species.

“If I killed the Queen, and managed to survive mind you, my own government would flay me alive. The Queen is at peace with humans. She keeps the Fey such as yourself in check. She is a Very Important Person. I mean her no ill-will. In fact, I want to do her a favor. But, please, decide quickly. My hand is going to get tired at a certain point. You really don’t want this,” I said, holding up the dead-man’s switch, “to slip from my weak mortal grasp.”

* * *

The Huntsman was speaking into the mirror. He was speaking High Fey and assuming that no mere mortal could understand it. I’d studied everything I could about the Fey. I made out a couple of words, and even those hurt my brain. I was good at languages before, and I think Pete might have sent me back with the gift of tongues, but it had limits. I think he was telling her it was a trap, and not to come.

I couldn’t catch the reply but it was querying.

I think the Huntsman didn’t want his Queen to put herself in danger.

Definite tone. Orders. Long statement. You could tell who wore the pants in the relationship. And what exactly was the relationship with her husband? Never mind. Alien relationships do not equate to human.

“Human,” the Huntsman said. “My Queen agrees to negotiate. One hour grace on her word. We shall withdraw. She brings her Knights. If this is a trap, we have your smell. We know your people. We know your family. My Hunt shall be free to course upon them.”

“Feel free to course upon my mother. But I get the picture. And it’s why I don’t want to injure the Queen. Not to save my friends and loved-ones but you wouldn’t just course upon
them
, would you? I will not harm your Queen, Huntsman. You have my word as a Marine. If you are unaware, this is a knight of my lands. Our oath is ‘Semper Fidelis.’ We are always faithful to our oaths. Bring no harm to this place nor my friends and we will negotiate with honor. If the negotiations fail utterly, I assume you’ll come for me. And then, Huntsman, we shall do battle.”

“Farewell, knight,” the Huntsman said as the ground opened up at its feet. “We
shall
meet again.”
Oooh, daddy was
pissssed!

“Really looking forward to
that
,” I muttered.

I rotated my shoulders. I’d held swords for hours. But the horror of The Great Hunt was one of those things that makes you want to open your hands to drop whatever you’re carrying and run. I really didn’t want to open my left hand.

Finally, I just put the pin in the dead-man’s switch as I waited for the Queen to arrive.

The ground opened up again. There was a glimmer of purple light and first one then another then dozens of massive Fey in full battle armor erupted from it. They were covered from head to toe in the weird armor of their kind. It, too, looked alien but it was better than actually seeing them. Armor is, after all, armor.

The main difference between them and the Hunt, besides armor, was size. Most of them outmassed an ogre. But based on how they were moving, were also faster and more nimble.

Fighting one with anything short of a LAW would suck. Fighting the whole crew? You’d better be able to call in an arc light strike.

I pulled the pin again.

“Come no closer than the table,” I shouted. “There are traps all about that will kill even you, Knights.”

I wasn’t sure if that was the truth. Depended on how robust that armor was. Claymores are powerful but they don’t have much in the way of armor penetration. I think they’d have done for the Hunt, certainly the mounts, but maybe not the Knights.

The Knights formed a protective circle around the slit in the ground. Then the Faerie Queen came forth.

I don’t know what I expected. Something that looked like Great Cthulhu, I guess. Maybe a giant beetle or like the Queen in
Aliens
.

What I didn’t expect was a forty something woman, slender, in shape, red hair cut in a tight bob, in a designer business suit. I knew it was a glamour but the fact that she was using a glamour and the nature of it was interesting.

“Absent this truly being in my favor I assure you you are going to suffer for longer than most mortal lifetimes,” the Queen said, calmly. “I will extend yours just to prolong the suffering.”

“This is the primary detonation device,” I said, holding up the dead man’s switch. “If I release it, absent putting it on what we call safe, the entire hilltop explodes. There are others. If those are triggered, hilltop explodes. You will not escape. However, I do not wish you harm. I do not wish the Princess harm. Do I have your oath that no hostilities will take place on your part for one hour?”

“You have my word,” the Queen said.

“Why do I suspect you can weasel out of that?” I said. But I placed the dead-man’s switch on safe and hooked it to my belt. Carefully.

“Because I can quite easily.”

“There are various other traps and methods to prevent you from attacking me. Please let us not be silly in this regard. I do not fear death. But I have a duty to perform and dying now would not make that possible.”

“I don’t intend to be. You wished to negotiate.”

“On the table are two documents. The first is a detailed contract. Shallala has already signed it. The contract, broadly, states that Shallala will be given some rights as an adult and become the Fey Princess of this Principality. As Princess of this Principality she shall have all rights and duties thereof including the collection of fees from all Fey entities which recognize your sovereign domain. There are details on who gets what and what course can be used for any redress. The primary course being suit in Federal Court, not unseleighe battle. She, in turn, agrees to hold these demesnes as friendly to human kind. She shall work to ensure that no hostile fey nor outer factions take residence thereof. In the event of a serious threat of bodily harm to her you may respond as you see fit. But such threat must be real and present. Not she’s out on a limb and you’re worried about losing your heir. Furthermore, I and my associates agree to also watch over her to prevent threats of bodily harm to her to the extent we may given our other duties. To enact this you must, of course, first remove from her all curses and bindings. Please don’t do that right now ’cause if she so much as twitches, whole hilltop goes up.”

“Oh, that’s all?”

“The second document is a letter of intent. You agree to have one week to analyze the contract and to return to this place after that week to sign it. I, in turn, agree upon that night to take the Harper’s Challenge in expiation of having caused you mental grief and suffering in the removal of the Princess from your imprisonment as well as this somewhat hostile negotiation. Should I pass the Harper’s Challenge you must sign the document. Should I not, you get me and Shallala back. I’ve already signed the letter of intent.”