The mist around the man twisted into smoky spears and sprang at them. Each misty spear drove into a carriage wheel, disintegrating into a shards of metal and wood. Without wheels, the carriage careened back and forth with the horses being thrown helplessly around. Grand gritted with clenched fists.
"Hold steady!" Grand commanded, but the horses were at the mercy of a wheelless carriage skidding nearly off the cliff face.
Impossibly, they finally came to a stop only a few feet from Sheriff Silas.
On seeing the man, Nick, in the mind of Yeri, felt his blood turn cold. Sheriff Silas was wrapped completely from head to toe in a thin rubber suit with iron cuffs at the ankles and wrists. A black velvet cowl covered his head and velvet gloves his hands. He wore goggle-shaped glasses. The only exposed parts of his body were two black eyes and lips as shriveled as dried mushrooms. Everywhere he traveled, a gray-blue mist poured from his hands.
Climbing from the cliffside were thousands of eyes peering through the mist.
"There is a new order for the city of Huron," Sheriff Silas sneered, his voice crackling through spotted and broken teeth.
"Shut up, you sad man," Lir spat. "the Gorringe family is all the same. Base and vile."
"And under my rule," He pointed a finger of judgement toward Lir. "I will cleanse Huron of its filth, starting with you stinking Merrows. And these will be my agents of purity." Sheriff Silas pointed to the thousand points of red eyes.
The hisses rose into a malevolent chorus as they they crept closer to the wrecked stagecoach.
Lir looked at around, realization spreading across his face. "What have you done, Silas?"
"Oh. I think you know, merman," Silas chuckled wickedly. "You know all too well, Lir Anu Pallwes."
Grand curled his fists. "I should have cast you out of your office long ago, sheriff."
"When will you give up these tiresome positions, Mr. Lyons? For once embrace the inevitable. I am the new power of Huron. The Merfolk are the foul enemies of my people, the Dujinnin. Therefore we will cleanse them all like the plague they are."
Grand retorted, "As ruler of the city of Huron, you will not lay one hand on the Merfolk. They are citizens of Huron, thus I am sworn to protect them from now until the end of time."
"The end of time?" Sheriff Silas laughed. But he pointed his guffaws at the gorgons slowly creeping toward them. "Well, Mr. Lyons. It seems the opportunity to prove such a bold statement is now upon you."
Silas raised several shiny black balls. They began floating while the air shimmered around them.
Yeri gasped. While he might have been a humble stagecoach driver, he knew exactly what those things were. "Time bombs!"
Grand seemed to be less quick to process this until he was struck by one of the black balls. It covered him in a tarry substance. He opened his mouth and cried, "Curse you, Sher—!"
He squeezed into nothingness. Yeri let out a squeak and tried to scramble off the bench. A second ball wheezed past him and he heard Lir gasp. He looked back in time to see the merman blink into nothing. Two more balls zipped into the carriage and there came the sound of babies crying, but then suddenly stopped.
Yeri flung himself off the coach and yanked the door open.
With a frightened gaze, Nia quivered through sobs, "Where are the babies, driver? What happened to Nikolas? Tim?"
Yeri's lip shook. "My dear lady. The sheriff. He—he. Time bombs …your husband …"
"Where's my husband!" Nia demanded as if Yeri could somehow reverse the effects of time-magic.
"He's gone. Lir and the rest of them. They've been banished through time."
"And now," Sheriff Silas stepped toward the coach, his boots crunching louder and louder. "Only had four time bombs. Was able to rid myself of that tiresome Lyons and his merman. So what to do with his foul merwife and her driver?"
The Sheriff raised his smoking hands and shot them toward the carriage. Nick heard the merwoman give a guttural scream and Yeri's view faded to black.