Monsters Freed by Alexa Piper

Author:Alexa Piper [Piper, Alexa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: BIN 010267-03334
Publisher: Changeling Press LLC
Published: 2022-03-06T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Six

They left the interstate before noon, and a few turns after that, wide-open skies, fields, and forests filled more of the view from the car than houses, towns, or shopping malls. The constant rain of Westchester was also behind them, and it was sunny out, a nice day. The road grew less busy by early afternoon until Emilia spotted a roadblock up ahead. Isodore slowed the car until they were going only at walking speed.

“If it’s an illusion, I can’t actually tell,” Isodore said.

“It is,” Janus said from the back. “You can drive through it.”

“Well, can we also drive back out again if we have to?” Emilia asked, turning in her seat.

“Only if you break the illusion,” Janus said. “Hikers get caught in this one sometimes, and last year, a group of hunters came to investigate. They never made it out.”

Emilia turned back around. “Ugh. I don’t even want to ask.”

Isodore, meanwhile, had driven all the way to the roadblock, engine idling. “Are we all going in?”

Radovan looked at Emilia, pulled her as close as her seatbelt allowed. “I’d rather not split up, but maybe --”

“We’re not splitting up,” she said. “Unless you think you can’t actually destroy the illusion and might need backup?”

Radovan’s amethyst eyes shimmered in the sun, which was still high in the near cloudless sky, now that Westchester’s constant rain cover lay behind them. “I can break a spell, my sweet. But it might not be easy, and it might be dangerous.”

“We should have gone into the ocean and never looked back,” Lir mumbled. “You’d all be tasting of salt by now.”

“Pheus?” Arden said.

“Oh, I’ll be fine. I’ll stick to Janus here, and I’m sure he wouldn’t want to be trapped.”

The words were thick with sarcasm that made Pheus’s distrust evident.

“Well, in we go, then,” Isodore said, and slowly accelerated.

The roadblock never wavered, but the car’s hood passed clear through it. To Emilia, it looked like special effects that you only saw in movies. She’d thought nothing could weird her out anymore, but this just did it, made a cold shiver run down her spine and her skin break out in gooseflesh. Radovan, of course, took her hand and held it, ever aware of her discomfort.

Once they had driven on farther, the air turned funny, like sparkling heat birthed a mirage inside the car, but it lasted only moments. Then, they were through, and ahead of them, to the right of the road, there was a sign, announcing Willow Falls in just two more miles.

Isodore wordlessly sped up the car. They reached the town a few minutes later.

“Wow,” Emilia said when the first few pedestrians came into view, the women peroxide blonde or flawlessly coiffed brunettes with tidy chignons and hair bands, their skirt dresses flared and colorful, their heels and headbands coordinated with their sunglasses and gloves matching their handbags. The men’s outfits were equally late fifties, early sixties with thin ties or bowties in suits or casual khakis, side parts evident in the gelled hair.

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