Stoneskin's Revenge (20 page)

It hurt like hell, though; far more than it should, and for a long moment Calvin thought he was going to get hung up between forms. Evidently whatever reaction went on between the blood and the scale was dispersed throughout the body by the bloodstream, and if the magic couldn't
get
to the bloodstream, well… Blood spat upon the scale was evidently enough to get it going, but not to finish it. Already Calvin could feel the
change
slowing, and he made one final gamble. Although it had not worked before, he was far more desperate now, so once again he concentrated on altering only one part of himself: his hand. If he could return
that
to human, he could grab the scale and complete the transformation.

Fighting back the agony that wracked him as his very cells tried to respond to conflicting orders, he wished with all his might for a human right hand. Nothing happened for a moment, but then he felt the hoof shift, draw up, his fingers fly apart, and the instant he could he grabbed for the scale and felt blessed relief as the edges sliced into his flesh.

The pain of transformation was quickly over, and then relief flooded through him as his human shape returned. He crouched beneath the limbs, shivering more from fear than cold, but did not dress lest he'd have to shift again in a hurry. Instead, he kept his hand clamped firmly around the scale and tried to lay out the facts in some kind of logical order. It had been real interesting, he mused. Seemed like everytime he
changed,
he learned something. Trouble was, it also looked like he had to be in desperate straits for anything much to happen. Maybe that was part of it, though; maybe the process needed adrenaline to trigger it, or at least to speed it along. And what about this wound business? He'd bit his tongue enough to bleed, and though it was still sore, it certainly didn't hurt as much as it should. As for his other injuries—the bruises, the bullet scrape, and the pounded jaw from that afternoon—not a trace of them remained. He supposed it was possible that when you
changed
back to your right shape, your cells were simply remembering what you were supposed to be like—and in effect, rebuilt a perfect you.

But that was not dealing with the matter at hand—though he now had a partial answer to that too: one he had known as soon as the transformation was complete; one word from the myths of his people, one
name
that had haunted his darkest dreams since childhood.

Utlunta!

Literally it meant “she has it sharp,” but to him it conjured a far darker and more specific image:
Spearfinger!

It all fit. Calvin thought back over what he knew of the myth, which he'd both heard as a child and encountered again recently in Mooney's
Myths of the Cherokee.

As far as he could remember, Spearfinger had no real origin, she simply
was.
Typically she'd appear as an old squaw wandering alone in the woods. She was usually singing some strange little song which translated as “Liver I eat!”

That was a reference to one of her several bad habits, because if she came up on you alone, she was likely to stab you with a long spearlike finger and then chow down on your liver. Sometimes it didn't even kill you, sometimes you went home as if nothing had happened, but began to wither and pine, and eventually you died, and sometimes folks found out then that the deceased had no liver, because Spearfinger had taken it.

She was also a shapechanger, and that made her doubly dangerous, because she could kill a person and then take their form and impersonate them when they went home and so be in a prime position to wipe out the rest of the family. Well, she might
be
a skinchanger, but so, by God, was he.

There was another peculiarity about Spearfinger too, though most folks forgot about it on account of her evocative name and bad eating habits. And that was that she was sometimes called
Nunyunuwi,
which more or less meant “dressed in stone.” Actually, though, it was a reference to the fact that Spearfinger supposedly had skin like stone and had mastery over it—which would neatly explain how there happened to be sandstone boulders on the edge of a south Georgia swamp, not to mention how articulated dolls could be made out of pebbles.

“That's a pretty wild conclusion to jump to, though,” Calvin confided aloud to the half-grown raccoon that had wandered into his sanctum and was now eyeing him with beady little eyes.

The most perplexing question was what such a being was doing in this World at all when by rights she should have been terrorizing Galunlati. She'd even followed Dave for a while, the first time they'd gone there. Dave had told Calvin all about it—how Yanu, the bear who was his guide at the time, had casually mentioned that Spearfinger had come close the previous night.

Dave!

Another part of the puzzle clicked into place.

Spearfinger had pursued Dave at least once, and Dave had obviously eluded her. That meant that there was a reasonable possibility that she might have become angry—or maybe curious to match wits with a different kind of quarry than she was used to. And then that prey had slipped through her fingers and returned to another World…

But if this whole shaky theory was correct, how in hell had she got into
this
World—and conveniently found her way to the exact spot where one of Dave's friends was camping?

And then Calvin knew.

He could see it all so clearly: a scrap of dirt road in a private woods in Jackson County, a towering oak tree, the moonlight shining down on a certain red Mustang parked nearby, Dave and Alec and Liz laid out in sleeping bags…

It was the night before the ritual they had used to open the gate to the Otherworld that held Fionchadd captive. But in order to facilitate that ritual, they needed the blood of a large animal.

Calvin, rather too eager to try his hand at some of the charms Uki had been teaching him, had decided to circumvent the numerous POSTED signs that dotted the wood by summoning Awi-Usdi, the Little Deer, to aid him. And in order to facilitate Awi-Usdi's passage from Galunlati, Calvin had raised his first-ever fog, for it blurred the distinctions between the Worlds, and Awi-Usdi had obligingly come.

And apparently the premier evil of Galunlati as well.

Calvin could have kicked himself. How could he have been so stupid? No reason at
all
that Awi-Usdi had to be the
only
thing to answer the call; probably anything with Power in Galunlati would have heard him if the Little Deer had; and certainly a being as powerful as Spearfinger, who had doubtlessly seen—and heard—him already. Given that, there was no reason why, having heard him, she couldn't have decided to investigate—especially when she had a score to settle with upstart prey that had escaped her before. And if Spearfinger had entered the human World when Calvin had raised that fog, she would certainly have sensed Dave nearby.

But why hadn't she attacked him then? For that matter, why not attack them all and leave no witnesses?

All the pieces were laid out now, but a few still hadn't found their proper places.

Like his dad's death.

Except… If Spearfinger
was
after Dave, she obviously hadn't got hold of him as of Tuesday noon, because Calvin had been with him almost constantly until then. In fact, she would probably have had a hard time keeping track of him at all during the past few days, what with him zipping out of the World at least twice, with only about fifteen minutes between, and that at the coast, hundreds of miles from where she'd first entered the World—assuming she'd come through in Jackson County. That could have caused her
real
trouble, especially if she was trying to follow Dave's actual route, since his trail would have led her first to Stone Mountain—where she'd then have lost him completely, because Dave hadn't been in this World for nearly a day after that. Maybe she'd hung around there for a while, though,
trying
to locate him, during which interval she'd found occasion to snack on Calvin's unfortunate old man. Yeah, that made sense, 'cause when Dave returned from Galunlati at the coast Monday night Calvin doubted he'd have been there long enough for Spearfinger to sense him—especially if she didn't know where she should be looking. And after that Dave had been moving so quickly (usually in a car, which could have confused her as well, if it didn't mask his trail entirely) there was no way anyone not used to dealing with technology could have kept up with him by conventional tracking methods. The longest time Dave had been in one place was at the seafood restaurant, so if Spearfinger
had
finally sensed him, there was a good possibility it would have been then, and she'd have headed that way next.

But if Dave had returned Tuesday
morning
and Calvin's dad had died Tuesday
evening,
why had Spearfinger waited so long to leave Stone Mountain?

Maybe he was wrong. Maybe Spearfinger
couldn't
detect Dave this far away—until the magic Calvin had fooled with Tuesday night in his vain attempt at contacting Uki had given her a lead.

Yet if that was true, how had she got here so
fast
?

“Too many questions,” Calvin told the 'coon, shaking his head. “But,” he added with a grin, “if it really
is
Spearfinger committing these murders while she's goin' after my friend, I know how to defeat her!”

He did, too. For the same mythology book that had given him the lowdown on Spearfinger had also spelled out the manner of her demise.

What had the myth said? Something about a group of hunters that had trapped Utlunta in a pit and shot her full of arrows that wouldn't pierce her stony skin—until finally Tsikilili the Chickadee had told them to aim for the palm of her left hand…because she kept her heart there?

Calvin didn't know about the heart, but the rest made as much sense as any other conclusions, and more than anything the law would likely have considered.

That she had already been killed once yet evidently lived again did not concern him; he had pretty much come to accept the fact that beings from Galunlati never stayed dead very long.

The next step, then, was to retrieve his bow, check on Robyn and Brock, and prepare to seek his quarry.

PART III

Fear and

Trembling

Chapter XIV: Chance Encounter

(east of Whidden, Georgia—twoish)

So much to do and so little time to do it in, Calvin reflected, as he jogged through the woods toward Brock and Robyn's camp. He had decided to remain in man-shape, though he knew he ran considerable risk in retaining that form. Still, he thought he was far enough from the murder scene to venture it; and besides, he was becoming leery of constantly changing skin. That kind of thing had to be a shock to the system, and he didn't know how long he could keep it up. For that matter,
was
there a limit? Did it get easier all the time (as it sometimes appeared to be doing, though it still hurt like hell), or did your body eventually wear out and simply stop cooperating? And what about your mind? Did sharing two consciousnesses cause any sort of lasting mental harm?

And what of the scale bouncing up and down against his chest? It was the source of the
change,
but could
it
wear out? Was the magic it contained also finite—especially here in this World, cut off from the source of its Power?

He fervently hoped not.

Spearfinger was in this very county, and he was almost certain she was looking for Dave. Now more than ever Calvin needed to call his friend and tell him to be on guard. The
smart
thing, though, would be to try to contact Uki first, on the odd chance Calvin could breach the Barriers Between this time; that way he could give Dave maximum information. Yet to attempt
any
of those things right now would not only leave his new friends unprotected, but risk his own capture as well—which would leave him unable to aid anyone at all.

He slowed for a moment, flopped sweating against a tree, and tried to think clearly. Did he
really
have to go after Spearfinger tonight? But if he didn't, she'd be free to work more mischief, and he couldn't stand the thought of another life being lost because of him. There were two on his conscience already, and very likely at least one more. Robyn and Brock would not join that company—not if he had anything to do with it.

Unless—a
sudden chill shook him—they already had. Was his warding strong enough? When he had set it he had not considered that it might have to hold against one of the great evil powers of Galunlati.

No, he
had
to stop Spearfinger as quickly as possible. Every second wasted was a second in which she could kill. This, he realized dully, was what the omens had all been pointing to.

He started off again, though he did not feel at all rested, and bent his trail to the left, hoping to come on the camp from the north side. The forest was not so thick there, and he made good time, loping along like a wolf, with the wind whistling gently past his ears, and every footfall striking light upon the earth. The thrumming had stopped, he noted absently, but just as he began to wonder why, he heard something crashing noisily through the woods. The footfalls sounded vaguely human, and Calvin was instantly on guard, for fear someone was already on his trail—or worse, Spearfinger herself. But when a particularly sharp crack was followed by sudden silence and then an angry “Son-of-a-bitch!” he knew otherwise.