Chapter 40:

Book Two, Chapter Fourteen

I Applied for a Delivery Job and Got Turned Into a Flying Reindeer?!


Chapter Fourteen

Justin froze. His mouth opened to call for help, but the sound lodged itself in his throat. Mari Lwyd's skull was sitting on top of the queen sized bed before him, and as soon as he entered the room, two pinpricks of dark light appeared in its eye sockets.

“It smells like a deer but looks like a boy,” she hissed “Oh, Lord Krampus, you’ve given me a new toy!”

Justin couldn't move, only stare as it rose up off the bed, smoke billowing out of its neck hole. Those eyes…that paradoxically dark light…he could see him in it. Krampus. Terror rooted his feet to the floor. He was a deer in the headlights, and Mari Lwyd was the semi-truck speeding down the highway toward—

“Get down!”

Lena’s arms wrapped around his waist, throwing them both to the floor. A split second later, a beam of emerald light pierced the darkness. It roared through the air above Justin's head, spearing straight through Mari Lwyd’s incorporeal body to crash into the bedroom wall behind her. At first Justin didn’t think it had caused any damage, like stabbing a cloud with a knife, but Mari Lwyd let out a shriek as a large portion of her smoke evaporated from the contact.

“I know that light!” she screamed, her voice a thousand nails on a thousand chalkboards. “That cursed blight!”

“I'm glad you remember me, monster!” Vixen shouted, wheeling herself into the room, antlers ablaze with light. “Because I never forgot you either!”

The dark light in Mari Lwyd's eyes grew brighter—darker?—when she saw the reindeer in the wheelchair, and she threw her skull back.

“VIXXXXEEEEENNNNN!” she screamed. Her voice reverberated through the entire house, and Justin could faintly hear windows and mirrors all around them being shattered.

“You should never have come back!” Vixen roared, her voice quieter but no less powerful. “I cast you into the void once, and I’ll do it again!”

Fresh smoke billowed out of Mari Lwyd’s skull, plunging the room into pitch darkness. The only light came from Vixen’s antlers, but they didn’t seem to illuminate anything around them. Mari Lwyd’s eyes glittered, a pair of dots that were even darker than the shadows around them.

I have to help! Justin realized. Vixen can’t do it on her own, but…

His heart fell into his stomach.

Can I do it at all?

He had to try. Closing his eyes—he could scarcely tell the difference from having them open—Justin reached into himself the way Vixen had taught him during their training sessions. His light was at the very core of his being, always there but usually out of reach. If he could make contact, he would be able to stoke it, similar to how breathing on a spark could turn it into a roaring bonfire.

He could do this, had done this, needed to do this. He just had to focus. But with all the shrieking and wailing Mari Lwyd was doing, focus was the last thing that was going to happen right now.

Another burst of green light shot from Vixen’s nose, carving a scorch mark into the wall and ceiling behind Mari Lwyd as she tried to aim it at the bobbing, weaving skull. The room brightened a bit as more of the smoke was evaporated, but it was pouring so heavily from Mari Lwyd’s skull that it was pitch black again within seconds.

Justin stumbled to his feet, still desperately reaching for his light. He could feel it. It was there! But every time he tried to take hold of it, it seemed to shy a few more inches away, eternally just out of his reach.

In front of him, he saw Mari Lwyd’s eyes draw back—and then come barreling toward Vixen!

He moved without thinking, throwing himself to the side and colliding with Vixen’s chair. The old doe let out a quick cry of surprise, and then the two of them went rolling across the floor together, the wheelchair discarded behind them. Half a second later, Mari Lwyd’s skull rushed past where Vixen had just been sitting, her jaws slamming together with an ear-splitting CRACK!

“Justin, what are you doing?” Vixen demanded. “Get off of—”

“DIIIEEEEEE!” Mari Lwyd screamed, turning to face them again. She rose, opening her mouth so wide that her bottom jaw disconnected entirely from her skull. But before she could strike, Lena’s staff came out of nowhere, a streak of vibrant white that collided with Mari Lwyd’s skull hard enough to send her lurching flying across the room. She crashed into the wall before rounding on Lena just as Moryta came charging in from the hallway, her daggers gleaming in the dim light. She jumped, running along the wall for a few seconds before lashing out. Her blades didn’t pierce the skull, but a couple bone chips went flying into the darkness. Mari Lwyd shrieked and retreated into the corner, turning her attention onto the second elf.

Come on! Justin screamed inside his head. They need my help!

The room brightened, and for a second Justin’s heart leaped, only to fall again when he realized there was no more light shining in here than before. The darkness was…congealing…into one spot just beneath her skull. A pair of long skeletal arms took form, tipped with dagger-like claws. Long enough to reach all the way across the room, one lashed out at Lena, and the other at Moryta. Both elves dodged with unnatural dexterity, but dread filled Justin’s heart when he saw the shadowy claws shred the wooden walls as easily as tissue paper.

Please! he begged the elusive light. Please, don’t do this to me! Let me help them!

Mari Lwyd turned to give Lena her full attention. One of her hands swung toward her, and with a graceful spin Lena was able to deflect it—but she never saw the other hand closing in on her from behind.

“Lena, look out!” Justin yelled, launching into flight without a plan. He shot across the room in the blink of an eye, grabbing his Rider and carrying her out of the way. Mari Lwyd’s claws came so close that he felt them shave a few strands of his fur off. Then he spun, taking the brunt of the impact when they collided with the wall.

“Ow,” Lena groaned. “Thanks, but ow!”

“Hold still!” Mari Lwyd sang. “Let me kill!”

She raised her claws again, but before she could strike, another shape came streaking through the bedroom door. Willow flipped over in midair, flying feet-first into Mari Lwyd’s skull hard enough to temporarily disconnect her from the cloud of smoke. Together, they flew across the room, embedding Mari Lwyd into the far wall. Her arms evaporated, but even more smoke began to pour from her skull an instant later, immediately forming a new pair of arms as Willow braced her legs against the wall and backflipped away from her.

“Help me!” Vixen yelled.

Justin spun to look at her, still lying prone on the floor, her antlers glowing as brightly as the sun.

“I can’t reach her from here!” she said. “Help me up, hurry!”

Mari Lwyd had her arms pressed against the wall, and the wood groaned as she pried herself free. Justin hurried across the room, reaching his flight leader at the same time Willow did. Together, they hooked their arms under hers and lifted her up off the floor. The magic spread from Vixen’s antlers to her nose, and…

Mari Lwyd freed herself just as the pillar of energy blasted across the room, hitting the wall hard enough to punch a hole straight through it. The light died, and Vixen sagged in Justin and Willow’s arms, exhausted. Sunlight poured in through the newly made window, and Mari Lwyd screeched when it caused her smoke to evaporate. She spun to face them, and Justin found himself once again face to face with pure evil. He almost felt like he could read her thoughts. She was weakened, but still deadly. The Val Luminarans were skilled, but with Vixen too tired to use her magic again, they had lost their greatest weapon. Justin clenched his teeth, feeling Willow tense up beside him. Things could go either way at this point. If Mari Lwyd pressed the attack, there was no telling how it would end.

Finally, she let out one last shriek and fled through the hole in the wall. Her smoke billowed behind her like a serpent’s tail retreating into its burrow, and then…

Light shone through the hole again, and Mari Lwyd was gone.

Justin let out the breath he had been holding. Suddenly, Vixen’s weight on his shoulders felt nearly unbearable.

“Here,” Lena said, hurrying over to set her chair upright again. They sat her in it, and Vixen raised her head with a groan.

“Are you all right?” Willow asked, kneeling by the old doe’s side.

“I hit my head on the floor when Justin knocked me over, but I’ll be fine,” she grumbled. “Mari Lwyd. Is she…”

“She got away.”

Vixen said a word that caused the others to gasp in shock.

“I’m sorry,” Justin said. Vixen looked at him, but he couldn’t meet her eyes. “If I hadn’t knocked you over like that, you’d have been able to finish her off when—”

“Don’t give me that angsty woe-is-me nonsense!” the Elder snapped. “She would have bitten my head off if you hadn’t gotten me out of the way. It’s frustrating that we had her in our grasp and lost her, but the important thing is that everyone’s alive.”

“Hey, look at this!”

Everyone turned to look at Moryta. Willow’s Rider had climbed onto the bed and was fishing something out of the covers right where Mari Lwyd had been laying.

A picture frame.

Everyone hurried to gather around and look at it. The picture was of a little girl, only six or seven years old, standing in what must have been her front yard in a pink polka dot dress and ribbon. Justin guessed the picture must have been taken on the Fourth of July, because she was waving a sparkler while the sun set behind her.

“That’s one of Frank’s grandchildren,” Willow said. “I recognize her from the other pictures in the living room!”

“And look,” Justin said, pointing. “The mailbox…and the street sign behind it!”

“Oh, fruit cake,” Lena whispered.

The house itself wasn’t visible in the photo, but its number was clearly visible on the side of the mailbox. And in the background, a street sign stood next to the road. Justin had to lean in and squint to see it, but…

“Seventy Two Faulkner Road,” he said. “That must be where she’s going next!”

“Which makes that little girl his target,” Willow whispered.

“Then that’s where we’ll be when the sun sets,” Vixen said, her voice as hard as stone. “And this time she won’t get away!”

Everyone nodded their agreement. Justin clenched his fist. It was bad enough that people were dying because of this, but to target a child…that made it personal.

“But the sun won’t go down until five o’clock,” said Moryta. “What are we going to do now?”

Vixen thought for a moment. “What time is it?”

Justin glanced at the dresser. Everything on it was in disarray after the battle, but the digital clock had somehow managed to stay plugged in through it all.

“Two fifteen,” he said.

A quiet smirk appeared on her lips. “After what we just went through, I think we all deserve a nice meal, don’t you?”