Hexed

camouflage, it wasn’t a spell that depended on my current power level to be maintained. It would stay bound to me until I dispelled the binding, so Eric was about to lose a fight with an inanimate object. He was so surprised by it pulling away from him the first time that he dropped it. He tried again, and dropped it again.
    » What the hell is going on? Are you doing that? « he asked.
    » Doing what, Officer? I’m facedown in the parking lot with my hands cuffed behind my back. What kind of bullets do you use? «
    » Shut up. Full metal jacket. «
    » Please tell me they’re copper jackets. «
    » I said shut up. They’re steel. «
    » I was afraid of that. «
    » Shut up. «
    Eric was about to pick up my sword again, but he was distracted by the sound of shots being fired in the club. Nine of them, out of those modern guns the police carry, at a Bacchant with immunity to iron. And then we heard a man screaming horribly over the techno thrum.
    » Frank! « Eric cried.
    » Don’t go. Wait for your backup, « I said.
    » Shut up, damn it! That’s my partner in there! «
    Not anymore. His partner was already in pieces. » Well, use your baton, then! Your gun won’t work! «
    » Just shut up and stay there! I’ll be right back. «
    I sighed. No, he wouldn’t. There weren’t any more people coming out of the building. The clubbers were all scrambling for their cars and trying to get the hell out of there, honking horns and telling everyone else to get out of their way. I struggled to my feet and staggered to the back of the parking lot, hoping I wouldn’t get run over by a turbocharged Audi. Fragarach obediently trailed five feet behind me, since I couldn’t pick it up.
    More shots rang out from the club, but Eric didn’t get as many off as Frank did before his screaming began, then ended. Sirens wailed in the night, all converging on the club, and I knew I didn’t have much time to make myself scarce.
    There was a thin strip of landscaping between the sidewalk and the parking lot, where a couple of palo verdes grew alongside some blue agave plants. As soon as I reached it, I drew power to dampen the throbbing pain in my fingers and start knitting the bones back together. Then I cast camouflage again and started to recharge my bear charm. The handcuffs were next. Concentrating on the molecular bonds in two of the links between the cuffs, I weakened them until I could pull the cuffs apart, grateful that they were still made of natural ores from the earth. The parking lot was quickly emptying and the sirens were getting louder. Laksha was nowhere in sight; her end of the bargain finished, she was probably on her way to the airport in a taxi.
    As I slung Fragarach across my back once again, I saw the last of the Bacchants emerge from Satyrn. Her white sheath was stained almost completely red with the blood of the police officers and who knew how many other victims, and she carried her thyrsus in her right hand. I had no practical weapon to use against her except my sheathed sword, so it would have to be hand-to-hand martial arts, with one of mine already broken.
    She wasn’t interested in fighting, though. She walked straight toward me after taking a deep breath of the night air. I smelled another storm coming, but she apparently smelled me, and accurately enough that I might as well have not been wearing camouflage. She stopped about ten yards away as I crouched into a defensive stance.
    » What are you? « she hissed. » I know you are there. I smell magic. Are you a witch? One of the Polish ones? « She was taller than the other Bacchants and built for pleasure. When she wasn’t covered in gore, I’m sure she was quite fetching—as long as she didn’t show her pointy teeth.
    » Nope, « I said. » Two more guesses. «
    » Are you the vampire Helgarson? « Now, that was an interesting guess. Besides revealing that she knew who Leif was, she must have thought him capable of something approaching invisibility and capable of caring whether some Bacchants partied in Scottsdale or not.
    » Nope. I can still walk in the sunshine. «
    » Then you are the Druid O’Sullivan. «
    She could have knocked me over with a marshmallow, I was so surprised. But I couldn’t let her know that.
    » Pleased to meet you, « I said politely, then ruined it by saying, » But not really. «
    » Lord Bacchus must hear of this, « she muttered, and then she turned and sprinted inhumanly fast toward the club. She didn’t go