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  “This woman shall be protected from these men. Nothing anybody does will hurt her.”

  The pink zap lit up the night sky, then Tyler put his foot down, and the car sped forward again.

  “Hoo doggy,” Gary said. “Wasn’t that a turnout for the books? I feel like one of them old school rebels. Bonnie and Clyde.”

  “I’ll be Clyde,” Wilma quipped back at him, revitalized into her earlier state of cheerfulness. “You be Bonnie.”

  Gary slapped her hand in a high five long before his brow furrowed, clearly working out the order wasn’t quite what he’d hoped.

  “You got GPS stuff on that thing?” Tyler asked, jerking his head at Wilma’s smartphone, recharging on the dash.

  “If we’ve got a signal, then yep.” She pulled it toward her and unlocked the home screen. “We’re good to go. What were the coordinates again?”

  Gary sat up, pulling the notebook that Tyler had entrusted to him out of his jeans pocket. “Let’s see.”

  After the shock of the motel owner’s discovery, they’d retreated back inside and gone at Julius once again. It took a while, and the man’s lips were pretty much bitten through by the end, but he gave up the position for the vital book in the end. One command later, Tyler turned him off, and they decided on the shower.

  “It’s still about half a day’s drive, by the looks of it. We have to backtrack and then work our way forward again.” Wilma cocked an eye at Tyler. “You going to last out that long?”

  The adrenaline rush from fleeing the motel had long departed, leaving him shaky and close to exhaustion. Tyler shook his head.

  “Truth be told, I’m about ready to fall asleep right here and now.” He jerked his head at the phone again. “That thing tell us where we could find a place to spend the night?”

  “According to this, we’re sleeping in the car. There’s nothing between the motel we left and our destination. Looks like the knight knew the proper meaning of off the beaten track.”

  “I need to pull over soon. Anyone else fancy a spot of driving? We could take turns.”

  Gary had to be woken up to respond in the negative, and Wilma’s eyelids were drooping closed.

  “Just find a shelter, so the sun doesn’t hit us too hard.” Instructions issued, Wilma rested her head against the window and promptly fell asleep.

  Soon, Gary’s snores reverberating through the car told Tyler that he’d joined her.

  “Someplace with shelter,” Tyler muttered to himself, peering along the headlamp lit road in front of him. The roadside lights had stopped an hour beforehand, proving that they had finally ventured into an area where the populace came close to nil.

  After driving onward for another ten minutes, Tyler came to the conclusion that a desert isn’t known for an abundance of shelter. The featureless expanse to his right side was mirrored on the left.

  Another five minutes and Tyler had such trouble keeping his eyes opened that he gave up on the search. He pulled the car to the side of the road and turned off the engine.

  Despite the fresh night air, Tyler wound his window down. Since Wilma was right, the sun tomorrow would be a killer, he didn’t want them to be too badly off.

  “If I wake up early, I’ll drive us to shelter then,” he whispered in a promise.

  Tyler looked down at the stone in his hand and thought of the brief moments that he’d been free of it. He flexed his fingers, curling them into a fist and then opening them flat again. They’d grown so used to accommodating the object embedded in his palm that they barely registered it was there.

  He shifted around in his seat and leaned his head against the edge of the hard door. When he closed his eyes, the ache to be free of the stone pulled at him, dragging him back to wakefulness. Tyler opened his eyes again, staring out into the pitch-black night.

  The hollow feeling in his stomach was an insatiable hunger, demanding to be fed. I want a damn beer, his mind screamed at full volume. I want a drink, and I want a toke of weed.

  Power might be attractive to some people, but it didn’t feature high on the list of priorities that Tyler sought. A comfortable life, friends, and a cold beer in his hand. That was the order his wants ran, and the stone had done nothing but upset it.

  Sighing, Tyler put the car into drive and pulled back out onto the road again. Sleep be damned. If he wanted to get rid of this thing sooner rather than later, then it was about time he pulled his finger out and made an effort.

  A rumbling under the wheels jerked Tyler awake. The car was still going forty, it was just the road that had disappeared.

  “Whassup?” Gary asked in back, sitting up in his seat with the puzzlement of sleep clouding his face.

  Tyler looked over to his left and saw the shoulder of the highway. He backed off on the accelerator and steered the car back onto the tarmac.

  Wilma cracked one eyelid open. “I thought you were going to sleep.”

  “I got my second wind,” Tyler said just before a gigantic yawn pried his jaws apart. Gary chortled. “Looks like it abandoned you again.” He leaned on the seat back to peer over Tyler’s shoulder at the dashboard clock. “Do you want me to take over for a while? You can take a turn to sleep in the back.”

  “If anybody is taking over the driving, it’s me,” Wilma protested.

  “Not unless you’re strapping breeze-blocks to your feet, you’re not.”

  “Don’t worry,” Tyler interjected, raising his hand. “I’m awake now. Who could sleep with the racket you two have going on?”

  “Don’t be silly, dude. Get out. I’m switching.”

  Tyler thought about putting up a fight but didn’t have the energy. Wilma had already given in too—her arms were folded across her chest, and she stared resolutely out the window.

  “Thanks,” Tyler said, giving Gary a high five. “Wake me up when we get there or if you need a change.”

  “Will do.”

  Tyler lay down in the back seat with gratitude. The rug covering it smelled odd—the musty smell of Gary’s warthog state tangled with a hint of rotting garbage. Gary had gotten off lightly compared to him, but that was one stench determined to have its say.

  Tyler fell asleep to the sound of Wilma and Gary bickering and woke, hours later, to the same.

  “If you’re not able to handle a clutch, then you shouldn’t have offered to drive.”

  The bunny hops of the vehicle jolted Tyler even further awake.

  “I don’t know why you couldn’t just go for an automatic. Are you determined to make everything in life complicated?”

  “Hey,” Tyler said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. Pieces of grit were lodged in them that felt like he’d been asleep for days. “Are we there yet?”

  “We would be if Gary knew more about how to drive than he learned from the bumper cars when he was little. Jesus!”

  She grabbed the dashboard as another series of jumps rocked the car.

  “Pull over,” Wilma ordered, sticking her finger into Gary’s face. “Now that Tyler’s awake, he can take over. We might actually get there in one piece.”

  Tyler slid in behind the wheel again. “How far do we still have to go?”

  “Not sure exactly.” Wilma shrugged and wiggled the phone free of the car charger, showing him the screen. “The bars disappeared a few miles back. If my first estimate is spot on, then we should be getting close in the next half hour or so.” She glared back over her shoulder. “Unless Gary’s awesome driving skills put us further behind than that.”

  “I drive better than any other warthog you know.”

  “Hard to argue with that.” Tyler planted his foot and let the car gain some speed. “Keep an eye out for…”

  He trailed off, unable to think of what they might see. An old knight protecting a book—what the hell did that look like in actuality?

  “Just keep an eye out.”

  He drove for another five miles, eyes spending more time on the horizon out each side of the car than they did on the road. The
n he saw it. He slammed his foot on the brakes and navigated the vehicle over to the hard shoulder.

  “What is it, mate?”

  Tyler pointed but couldn’t believe that Gary didn’t see the exact spot. Beside him, Wilma was fussing, too.

  “It’s right there,” Tyler said, frustration clouding his voice as he waved his hand across the glorious scene.

  Pink neon lit up the sky, giving the sunlight a good run for its money. In letters that must have been forty yards high, the sign read: The Trials.

  “There’s nothing there,” Wilma and Gary said in unison.

  Tyler looked down at the stone in his hand, bathed in the reflection from the huge sign. An arrow at the side pointed down at a doorway, standing in the middle of the desert.

  The whole thing was like waking up in a dream, except you don’t realize it’s make believe or a hallucination—everything seems real.

  He walked across, took a deep breath, turned the handle and pushed it open.

  Chapter Ten

  Sunlight streamed in through the window, creating a montage of shifting patterns on Tyler’s eyelids—yellows, greens, and reds. He cracked open a lid and felt an instant rush of nausea at the flood of light. Instead of committing to that venture, he rolled over onto his stomach and buried his head deep into the pillows.

  “You okay?” a female voice inquired from under the blankets.

  “Yeah,” Tyler answered. “Go back to sleep.”

  Although the owner of the voice immediately followed his suggestion, evidenced by her gentle snore, for some reason, Tyler couldn’t achieve the same ambition. After a few minutes of pretending to doze, he gave up the effort and sat up, blinking in the morning glare.

  What the fuck? Where am I?

  Although Tyler could have sworn he should be in his trailer, he appeared to be in somebody’s house instead. He shifted aside the blankets long enough to get a glimpse at tousles blond curls, then let them drop back into place. While running a hand over his face to wipe the sleep away, a few memories from the night before pierced into Tyler’s brain.

  He'd been out drinking. Nothing special with that, it was what he ended up doing every night when his life was on track. The pulse of blood through his head was accompanied by a squeezing sensation—the familiar early morning hangover. It didn’t seem too bad at the moment, but Tyler wasn’t a novice. He knew that in a couple of hours he’d barely be able to move his head.

  Unless he chased it off with a little hair of the dog.

  Swinging his legs off the side of the bed, Tyler sat for a while on its edge. The thump in his temples and the unusual warmth in his nose and cheeks made nausea rise.

  He swallowed hard, and his stomach decided to let him win this round of the battle. Unless he could grab himself another beer, or even a chaser of whiskey, then he’d lose the next leg of the fight for sure.

  “Up you get,” Tyler whispered. The words did nothing to promote movement, leaving him sitting precisely in the same place. With a small groan, he clenched his teeth and forced the muscles of his legs to stand. The action felt alien—like he was instructing somebody else’s body.

  The stone hummed in his pocket, demanding attention. Tyler pulled it free and looked at it with a fond smile. The little object had caused him so much trouble, but now, he would finally be free of it. The blond still lying in bed was a relative—not so close that what they’d done the night before was something to be ashamed of, but not so distant that the stone wouldn’t recognize her as being from the family line.

  “Grab hold of a family tree, why don’t you?” Tyler whispered under his breath. Who had said that to him? Julius. The guy in the coffin all those many months ago. Good advice, no matter who gave it to him. Once Tyler had his family tree locked down, finding someone to take on the burden of the stone had been a far more accessible prospect.

  When he followed Candy to the bar the night before, he intended to make the exchange and get out of there. With the stone no longer embedded, as eager for the transfer as Tyler was himself, he’d happily consumed the first drink in far too long.

  Like night followed day, spirits followed beer. At some point during the evening, Tyler had realized that the target he was offloading the stone onto was rather pretty. By midnight, she was beautiful. By one o’clock, he couldn’t tear his eyes away.

  Tyler tossed the stone up into the air and caught it again. Just the freedom to do that was a miracle after the long months of living with it as part of his flesh. His original plan had been to talk with Candy while making the transfer.

  Tyler wanted her to be prepared, unlike his own unfortunate reception. Armed with the knowledge of how to make the stone work for her, Candy would be able to make a much better show of it than Tyler had. Forewarned about the forces of evil that would chase her, she could harness the stone into a protective layer between her and the impending hordes.

  Yup. That had been the plan.

  Now, looking around the cramped cabin that reminded Tyler of his own trailer, he couldn’t envisage that happening. First, he’d have to wake her and get enough coffee down her throat to make sure she understood every word. Given the state of his own head, Tyler couldn’t imagine that Candy would be faring much better.

  Just the thought of all the talking required made Tyler’s throat hurt. There’d be the first-time round explanations where Candy would stare at him quizzically. Then, on prompting, the second recital when he would emphasize all the important stuff again.

  Demonstrations would be needed, and as Tyler wasn’t touching the stone again in that way, Candy would have to be talked into providing them for herself. By that time, it would be nearing afternoon, and the low thump in Tyler’s head would be entering its crescendo.

  A glut of bile worked up his throat, and Tyler bent forward, waiting to see if that was the end of it or the beginning. After a minute, his stomach settled, and he stood up, responding to a pressing need to leave.

  He lay the stone down near Candy’s head, by one stray clump of blond hair. She’d roll over onto it soon enough. Would pick it up to see what it was, and then it would commit itself to her hand.

  It wasn’t as though I have a raging horde of gunmen on my trail. Not like when the stone was tossed so casually to me.

  The scene set itself in Tyler’s head for a moment. The seat out by the grill, waiting for Gary to finish up their steaks so they could eat. Even now, thinking back, his shoulders relaxed at the memory. The wonderful feeling of knowing that food was on the way, and he had a fridge stocked full of beer.

  Every cell in Tyler’s body strained for that to be the way again. He picked the stone up and placed it into Candy’s hand, waiting for the glow to show him it had become fixed.

  “Mommy?”

  Fear shot a spike of adrenaline into Tyler’s heart. He turned with the awkward movements of the long-term drunk, staggering one step to the side as he waited for his eyes to catch up to what was in front of him.

  A small boy. Nothing to be frightened of. The child rubbed his eyes with tiny fists, wiping the night full of sleep away.

  “Who are you?” The boy’s voice was full of curiosity but no fear. Perhaps strange men in his home weren’t a novelty. Either that or the boy had a lot more chutzpah than Tyler had possessed at that same age.

  “My name’s Tyler. What’s yours?”

  “Andy.” The boy rubbed his eyes again, then reached behind him for a stuffed toy. Somewhere between a monkey and a bear, the boy hugged it to him and snuggled into its matted fur. Judging by the wear and tear, Tyler guessed whatever creature, it was well-loved.

  “Can you make my breakfast?”

  The old surge of bile made a brief reappearance, and Tyler smiled grimly while he fought it back down. Phew. Tyler one, hangover zero.

  “What do you usually have for breakfast?” Please god, not a cooked meal. I can’t handle the smell of bacon and eggs this early!

  “Cereal. It’s in the box with the pirate on it.”
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br />   The boy pointed at a cabinet mounted above the sink. Tyler opened it cautiously in case it wanted to rain dry food choices down upon his head. To his relief, everything inside was stable and stacked in neat rows. “This one?” Tyler held up a blue box, and the boy nodded.

  “Milk?”

  “No. I don’t like it when its slimy.”

  Fair enough. Tyler didn’t think he could handle that at the moment, either. He poured the dry cereal into a bowl that he took from the next cupboard along. Andy was tall enough to reach the cutlery drawer on his own and had his spoon clutch ready in his fist by the time Tyler placed the bowl in front of him.

  “You need to put it away, too,” Andy said, pointing. Tyler nodded and popped the box back on the high shelf. “Aren’t you going to have any?”

  “I had a huge meal last night,” Tyler said, rubbing his stomach gently. Yeah, at least a dozen beers and then the shot glasses, where you really lost count. “Don’t you have school today?”

  Tyler looked at Andy, trying to judge his age. He didn’t hang around kids enough to be accurate. Somewhere before puberty and after toddlerhood was the best he could manage.

  “I don’t go to school on Saturdays.”

  “It’s Saturday?” Tyler looked at his watch as though that would help him. The old-style face showed the time, and that was it. Thanks to the trendiness of the designer, it didn’t even come with the benefit of numbers.

  Andy gave him a look that Tyler would have thought was judgmental if it came on an adult face. He turned to look out the window, seeing the mist clouds burning off the dew from the night before. It was going to be a scorcher.

  “What do you do on Saturdays, then?”

  “I eat breakfast, and then I play out on the swings.” Andy pointed in the opposite direction to where Tyler was facing, necessitating a movement that didn’t agree with his head at all.

  “Brian said that he did a full loop on them last summer,” Andy said.

  Tyler gave a grin at the childish assumption that he would just know all about Brian.