Chapter Eleven
The kitchen was overly warm and smelling of chili, the black square of night past the blue-curtained window dark, clear, and frigid. The waning moon had a harsh crystal clarity to it that matched my mood, cold and hard. A waning moon wasn't the best time to be making spells, but I didn't have much choice. That I'd gotten them done before midnight made me feel better.
Bis and Belle were on top of the fridge having an impromptu reading lesson, Jenks was in the garden, and Wayde was upstairs getting some wolfsbane to spike the chili with. With all that, I should've been in a good mood, but the memory of what we'd found under the floor of the museum kept my motions quick and my shoulders tense.
I'd been in the kitchen since getting home from the museum. My feet hurt from being on them all day, but the new set of scattershot amulets was already at the FIB and I.S. Glenn, who had brought us home, had waited for them. I'd also made more batches of sleepy-time charms.
The cookies I'd wanted to bake had turned into flicking the oven on and cracking it to warm the space. Not efficient, I know, but Jenks had been nearly blue with cold by the time we'd gotten back from the museum basement. I wasn't going to risk him getting chilled and possibly slipping into a stupor he might not wake from until spring. His kids had enjoyed the updraft until their papa had warmed up enough to yell at them from the salt and pepper shakers on the back of the stove. I could hear them in the back living room, arguing over a moth one of them had dug out of a crack. Jenks's kids were kind of like cats, playing things to death.
The kitchen was warm, but I was cold as I finished injecting the last of the splat balls with the sleepy-time potion. It wasn't the night seeping in around the kitchen window frame, but the cold from the memory of the woman curled up in the fetal position, twisted and broken, buried under a slab of cement and a demon curse. What they'd done to her was so horrific that they'd tried to bury it - and yet I'd found her.
My jaw clenched, I held the tiny, empty blue ball up to the light as I injected another portion of potion into the specially designed paintballs. Slowly the ball inflated, and I pulled the needle out, being careful not to get any potion on me despite my plastic gloves. Waking up to a bath of saltwater and Jenks laughing at me was not my idea of a good time.
It had been the last, and setting the empty syringe down, I wiped the ball off on a saltwater-soaked rag before I dried it and dropped it with the rest in Ceri's delicate teacup. It was overflowing with little blue balls. Maybe I'd gone overboard, but I wanted to nail these bastards, and thanks to the two would-be assassin elves last year, I now had two splat guns to fill.
Taking off the gloves, I crouched before the open cupboard under the center island counter and pulled out the one I hadn't filled yet. When not in my shoulder bag, I kept my splat guns at ankle height in a set of nested bowls. The smooth, heavy metal filled my hand, and I stood, enjoying the weight in my palm. It was modeled after a Glock, which was why it was cherry red. The coven of moral and ethical standards had worked hard to keep these from needing to be licensed. Sometimes, what humans didn't know saved us a lot of trouble.
"Can I help?" Bis said from behind me and atop the fridge, and I turned from throwing away the old charms still in the hopper.
"No, but thanks," I said, seeing him there with Belle, a sheet of Ivy's paper, and a pencil. The fairy was too embarrassed to tell Jenks she didn't know how to read, so Bis was helping her.
The tight sound of Jenks's wings prompted a flurry of motion, and I watched Bis jam the wad of paper into his mouth and Belle yank a hand of homemade cards from under her leg. Bis suddenly had a hand of cards, too - looking tiny in his craggy fist - and I rolled my eyes when he threw a card down on the pile as Jenks flew in.
"Hey, I got the last of the toad-lily flowers you wanted," Jenks said as he dropped a bundle of them on the counter. "The best of the lot. They're done. Trust me."
"Thanks," I said, tapping the hopper on the counter to get the balls to settle. "Here's hoping I won't need any more before spring."
"The Turn take it, it's colder than Tink's titties out there!" he exclaimed as he made the hop-flight to the stove. "Think we're going to have snow early this year?"
Belle tossed her cards down as if having lost, and Bis began shuffling. "I've never s-seen snow," the fairy hissed dubiously. "Are you sure it's safe? We've always wintered in Mexico."
"It's safe." Jenks strutted to the edge of the oven, and his hair rose in the heat. "My kids even have snowball fights."
I chuckled, remembering it. They'd gone after me, and I'd nearly fried them, thinking they were assassins. It was funny now, but I'd been furious at the time.
The larger fairy frowned as she picked up the cards Bis dealt her. "You're making it up," she said, and Bis shook his head.
"It's true!" he said, his red eyes wide. "You can bring the snow inside and play with it before it melts."
I finished filling the hopper, replaced it in the gun, removed the air canister, and took up a firing position, my feet spread wide and my elbows locked. Holding the gun up as if I was going to shoot, I aimed it into the dark hall. Maybe someday we'd actually get lights put in. I glanced at Jenks doing warm-up exercises with his feet an inch off the warm porcelain. Maybe not.
A sudden soft scuffing in the hall turned into Wayde, and he stopped short as he saw the gun pointed at him, his eyes wide as he put his hands up in mock surrender. "All right, all right. I'll tone the chili down!"
My arms dropped, and he smiled. "Sorry," I said, then held up the empty air cartridge in explanation. "No propellant."
He made a growl of a response, shuffling in and edging to the bubbling pot of chili. A fragrant wash of steam rose when he took the cover off and sprinkled in some wolfsbane. He was still grumpy because I'd gone down into the museum basement, but he, Ivy, and Jenks had since had a private conversation, and we seemed okay again, especially now that I was taking him seriously.
"You know that stuff is toxic, right?" I said.
Wayde snorted, looking comfortable in my kitchen. "I know what I'm doing."
My gaze slid to Jenks, at the sink getting the mud off his boots, and I confined my answer to a slow "Uh-huh." Wayde had been raised in a band tour bus by his older sister. I didn't want to know where he'd gotten his empirical knowledge of toxic drugs.
"Not that spoon!" I exclaimed when he took a ceramic one from the counter, but it was too late, and he'd already dunked it in his chili and given it a quick stir. "I've been spelling with that one," I said as I took it from him and dropped it in the sink. Jeez, I'd have to wash it twice, first to get the grease off it, then any residual charm.
"It looked clean to me," Wayde said as he took the wooden one I gave him.
"You haven't been using that one, have you?" I asked.
"Uh, no?" he said, telling me he had, and I sighed, my eyes closing in a long blink as I looked out the kitchen window at the night, vowing that he was going to taste it before anyone else. The worst it would do to him would make him go to sleep. Maybe.
I opened my eyes when Jenks flew to the fridge. "Whatcha playing?"
"Pixy sticks," Belle said, then slammed her hand down on the pile and yelled, "Squish!"
"Aw, pigeon poop!" Bis said, throwing his cards down. "Are you cheating?"
"If I was-s, I wouldn't tell you."
Wayde was smiling. It had been his idea for Bis to teach her how to read, and he knew the game was just a subterfuge to hide what they were really doing. "Any word yet on the amulets you sent out?"
I watched him blow on a spoonful of chili, and when he didn't fall down after tasting it, I pushed myself from the counter and started cleaning up my mess. "No. Nothing from either the FIB or the I.S." I looked at the clock on the stove behind him, then moved a dirty pot to the sink. It hit with a clang, and Wayde jumped.
"Why are you doing this?" he asked suddenly. "You're going in angry, and you shouldn't be going in at all."
"Dude!" Jenks exclaimed from the fridge, a hand of cards half his size in his awkward grip. "We talked about this!"
Wayde was standing before the oven, that spoon in his hand like it was a baton. "No," he said. "I think I'm within my rights here. I want to hear from Rachel why she thinks the I.S. and FIB can't do this without her. She made the charms. Enough already." He dropped the spoon back in the pot and turned to face me, his stance awkward and belligerent. "It's as if you're taking this personally. It's not your mother out there."
Taking a deep breath, I leaned my elbows against the counter, almost the entire length of the kitchen between us, glancing at Jenks to tell him that it was okay and to chill. "No, it's not my mother. But she was someone's daughter. She had hooves, Wayde. And fur." Pushing up from the counter, I ran a hand over it to brush the fir needles into my palm. Calm. Cool. Collected.
Faced with my nonchalance, Wayde lost some of his bluster, and he replaced the lid with hardly a sound. "It's dangerous going in already vulnerable."
"You should have seen Hot Stuff a year ago," Jenks said. "At least now she takes the time to plan things out."
A soft tapping of boots in the corridor, then Ivy breezed in with a clipboard of several color-coded pages. "Any word yet?" she said as she sat before her computer. She took a deep breath, read the tension in the air, and looked at me, her eyes starting to go black and her posture suddenly very still.
"Or at least she lets Ivy plan it," Jenks said snidely.
"Splat!" Belle shouted, and Bis slammed his hand down, barely beating her.
"You guys keep changing the rules!" Jenks exclaimed. Dropping his cards, he flew to Ivy, circling her in an annoying pattern until she flicked a long finger at him.
"What are we talking about?" the sultry vamp said as she leaned back and stuck the end of a pen between her teeth. I was pretty sure she'd sated her hunger yesterday, but the crime scene had probably put her on edge.
Jenks landed on the top of her monitor, and I turned my back on them to rinse out my rag. "Rachel taking an active part in this run," the pixy said. "Going in angry."
"It's how the woman rolls," she said, and I tried to ignore the ribbing as I wiped the counter down. "She shouldn't be going in at all, but she is. We'll adapt."
"Yeah, the angrier she gets, the more the bad guys suffer," Jenks said, his pride obvious. "And they are going to suffer this time, baby!"
I frowned, unable to meet Wayde's disapproving eyes as I tucked Jenks's toad-lily flowers in a cupboard to dry. I wasn't proud of that part of my personality - especially since I didn't have much magic anymore to back up what came out of my mouth. "I'm not angry," I said, shutting the cupboard with a thump.
"Yes, you are."
"I am not angry!" I shouted.
Bis made a small noise from the fridge, and Ivy looked up from her computer. Her eyes going to Jenks, she clicked her security back on, stood, and stretched. "Excuse me," she said, and left. Bis followed, clinging to the ceiling like a chagrined bat, Belle in a crook of his tail.
"Jenks!" Ivy shouted from the hall.
"What?" he shouted, hands on his hips. "She says she's not angry!"
Damn it, I hadn't meant to push Ivy's buttons. "Look," I said as I brought my attention up to find Wayde waiting. "You haven't really given this much thought, have you?" I said softly. "What's really going on here."
"Now you're in for it," Jenks said, hovering backward, enjoying this.
Wayde's posture shifted, and somewhat uneasy, he said, "I saw the man at the park. You need to back off and let someone else do this."
More tired than angry, I shook my head. Weres were not known for looking at the big picture, focused more on the here and now. They made great bodyguards and crime scene techs, but not so much so when it came to extrapolating. "HAPA is trying to make a source of demon blood so they can have their own magic. What do you think will happen if they're successful and humans can do demon magic at will? With a cost they don't believe in and a risk they can't see?"
Wayde made a "so what" face at me, but I could see him thinking, and when he seemed to sober, I backed off, satisfied.
"Who is going to control them if they're successful?" I said, tossing the rag into the soapy water to make it splash. "Who's going to keep them from wiping us out species by species? Not me. We aren't prepared for a new demographic of magic-using humans who are sadistic, power hungry, don't like Inderlanders, and see genocide as an acceptable form of communication." My head hurt, and I put a damp hand to it, smelling the fresh scent of soap. "At least demons have some sense of fair play."
I couldn't believe the words coming out of my mouth, but it was true. Their morals might not match ours, but demons did have them. Demons had them . . . These humans did not. What is wrong with this picture?
"Demons enslave people," Wayde said. He was taking bowls out of an adjacent cupboard, but hungry was the last thing I was.
"Not as many as you think. And they don't snatch innocents, only people who have made themselves available." My head hurt, and I opened my charm cupboard for a pain amulet. "I need to call Trent."
Jenks flew over from Ivy's monitor, and his sparkles seemed to make my headache worse. "Why? You think he might side with you?"
My headache eased as my fingers touched the amulet, and I shut the cabinet, Jenks darting out of the way with time to spare. "Yes, I do, actually," I said calmly as I tucked the amulet underneath my shirt. Trent played in the genetic pool like a lifeguard. He might be able to shed a little light on the situation, maybe give me an idea as to how close HAPA might be. Besides, I wanted to know if he was missing any equipment and if he had an antimemory charm.
Wayde shoved a bowl of chili at me, his eyes down and his back hunched. "Here," he said as I fumbled to take it. "If you're going to fight bad guys, you might want to eat."
I looked down at the bowl, then up at him, reading his distress. He wasn't happy about me working this run - hell, I wasn't happy about working this run - but he'd help me now instead of hindering me. "Chili? On a stakeout? I'm going to smell like - "
"The back side of a fairy's outhouse?" Jenks supplied, and I shifted my fingers on the warm porcelain so I could take the spoon Wayde was handing me.
"Thanks," I said, grateful that Wayde finally understood.
He shrugged, and I wrangled the phone into the hand already holding the spoon. Chili in the other, I crossed the dark hallway to the dimly lit, pixy-noisy living room. Ivy had decorated it, apart from the holes in the couch from Belle's family trying to kill me last summer. The entire room was in soothing shades of gray and slate, the occasional splash of color keeping it from being bland and depressing. Someone had lit the fire and it was pleasant, even with the shredded pieces of toilet paper drifting down like snow.
"Okay, everyone out!" I said loudly over the pixy shrieks. "Take your fake snow and go! I've got to make a call."
They were good kids, and one of Jenks's eldest girls corralled the youngest, ushering them out the door. I set the bowl of chili down and plopped morosely into the overstuffed chair. Vampire incense and bits of toilet paper snowflakes rose up. A pixy buck darted in, gathered them up before they could move more than an inch . . . and was gone.
"You going with her?" I heard Jenks say from the kitchen, and I put my heels up on the coffee table and made myself comfortable.
"As far as the parking lot," Wayde said. "They won't let me accompany her on an official action, though I might sneak in. You want some of this?"
"Does Tink wear little red panties?"
I smiled at Jenks's enthusiasm, and I wasn't surprised when a streaming flood of pixy kids flowed past the living room and into the kitchen at Jenks's wing whistle. Punching in Trent's number, I listened to it ring as I ate a bite of chili. "Oh God, this is good!" I shouted around my full mouth, then swallowed when someone picked up the other line.
"Hello, Rachel," Trent's voice eased out, sounding both professional and annoyed.
I could hear the sound of babies in the background, and a high-pitched, angry wailing. They were still awake? It was almost midnight. Elves napped around midnight and noon.
"Trent?" I said, surprised. "Since when do you answer your own phone?"
"Since we got a new switchboard," he said tiredly, and I think he almost dropped the phone. "It recognizes your number and shunts you to whatever phone I cleared you for."
"Really?" I sat up straighter, surprised again. Trent irritated me like no other person on either side of the ley lines, but I trusted him - most days. Seeing him casual like this meant a lot to me. It was so rare he showed anyone anything other than a professional veneer. Two baby girls in his house were doing him worlds of good.
There was an expectant pause, and Trent said in a bored, formal voice, "You ready to take the bracelet off?"
"And have Al take off my head three seconds later? No." Though truthfully, I was more worried about Al forcing me to stay in the ever-after than anything physical he might do to me. In the background, someone started to cry. "Did I get you at a bad time? I'm sorry, but this is important. Ah, is this a secure line?"
Immediately I felt his entire mood shift, even through the phone line.
"Ceri," I heard him say over the receiver. "Could you . . . thank you. It's Rachel. She's fine, amazingly enough. At least I think she is."
I brought my knees to my chin, enjoying the little bit of his home life coming over the line. It seemed weird that Trent was a dad. Clearly he was taking his duties seriously, but after seeing the love in his eyes for his daughter, I wasn't surprised.
"You are okay?" Trent asked, repeating off the phone that I was when I said yes.
There was another moment of rustling and baby complaints, and then it grew quiet. "So what's not making the news?" Trent asked. "My usual sources are not saying anything."
Interesting, I thought as I tucked the phone between my ear and shoulder. "We found another body hidden at the Underground Railroad Museum," I said. "She was even worse than the one at the park. Lasted an hour maybe." The chili wasn't sitting well, and I set the bowl on the table at my feet, my knees bent. "She looked halfway to what I think the demons might have originally looked like," I added, and Trent made a small noise. "Glenn tells me that all the victims were carriers for the Rosewood syndrome."
Trent made another deep-thought sound. "They have some rare computers down there."
"Not anymore, they don't. The curator almost had kittens. Trent, the victim's hair at the park pinged on the body at the museum with a scattershot detection charm. They had it hidden under a demon curse I could see through because I'm disconnected from the lines."
The phone at my ear beeped, and I jerked my attention from the band of silver around my wrist, glinting in the firelight. "Ah, I've got another call coming in."
"Don't switch over," Trent said, his voice rushed. "You'll compromise the security. Your amulet pinged on a body unrelated to the one you took the sample from?"
"Yes," I said, feeling uneasy. "That's what worries me. I think they layered the woman's modified genetic structure over the man to change him down to his genetic level, enough so that a charm designed to detect minute amounts of a person found her. She was a mess," I said, unable to keep the distress from my voice. "If the genetic mutilations didn't kill her, she might have died from Rosewood. She lasted only a few hours by the look of it, but the men so far have lasted nearly a week. I think HAPA is trying to make demon blood."
There. I'd said it again, and it still made me queasy. "I thought you ought to know."
"This isn't good," he finally said, having followed my thoughts to the ugly conclusion faster than Wayde had, and I laughed mirthlessly.
"You think?"
"Two of my more sensitive machines went missing last week." Trent's words were clipped and short. "Apparently they're more portable than I thought."
"What did they take?" He didn't say anything, and I stared at the wall, waiting. "What did they take, Trent?"
"Two machines my father programmed for a branch of genetic research that has been outlawed. This is the second time I've been broken into in less than a year. Damn."
I could count on one hand the number of times I'd heard him swear. In the background, Ceri called faintly for Trent. "She's okay," Trent said, his voice muffled. "I'll tell you in a moment." When he came back to me, concern was heavy in his voice. "Rachel, maybe you should sit this one out," he said, and I flopped my head back against the top of the chair. "Let the I.S. and FIB handle it."
"Not you too," I almost moaned. "I thought you of all people would understand why I have to stop these guys!"
"If they're trying to duplicate demon blood, where is the sense in putting yourself within their reach? Let me put Quen on it. Actually, I'm going to do that anyway, so . . . wait, will you?"
I exhaled, tired, then jumped when my cell phone began humming from my back pocket. "Good. If anyone can help, it's Quen," I said as I twisted, trying to reach my cell. "But I can't sit here when Nina has promised to make me the scapegoat. We both know the FIB is in over their heads. I have to be there. Me, Ivy, and Jenks."
"You'd be more effective without that band of silver around your wrist," he said, and my lips pressed. I hated it when he was right.
"I'm the only person this side of the ley lines who knows anything about demon magic," I said as I put my feet on the floor and used two fingers to wiggle out my cell phone. My eyes went to the screen and my shoulders tightened. "Crap on toast. Trent? Glenn is on my cell."
"Rachel, we need to talk."
I couldn't wait anymore, and I flipped my cell phone up. "Glenn?" I said before it went to voice mail. "Hey, can you hold on a sec? I'm on the phone with Trent."
Glenn made a choking cough. "Mr. Kalamack? Rachel, leave the man alone. He's not responsible for HAPA's activities."
"I know!" I said, trying to talk to both men at the same time. "Can you hold on a sec?"
From my other ear, Trent cleared his throat. "As entertaining as this is, Ceri and I would like you to come to tea tomorrow," he said dryly. "I'd like to talk further with you about the safeguards I've developed to make taking that charmed silver off your wrist safer."
I took a breath to say no, then exhaled, rubbing my forehead. "You think we can overpower Al? Find a way to keep him from taking me to the ever-after? Trent, I can't live there. I can't!"
"And I know Ceri would love to see you. The girls as well," he continued as if I hadn't said anything, but I'd rescued him from the hell of the ever-after, and he of all people would understand my fear.
"Rachel!" Glenn shouted into my other ear. "This is important."
"Tomorrow, say three?" Trent asked. "They'll be fresh from their naps."
It was more likely that he'd have the charms he wanted to contain Al prepped by then. I stifled a shudder. Maybe together we could keep Al off us long enough to explain, but caging him would only piss the demon off even more. "Tomorrow at three. I'd like to talk to you about a block for memory charms, too. And, Trent? I'm sorry about the park."
He grumbled softly. "Don't worry about it. Watch yourself in the meantime. Everyone knows who you are."
I couldn't help my smile. I might almost think he cared. "See you then," I said, and I clicked off the phone.
"Glenn?" I said, setting the landline phone down and shifting the cell phone to my ear. "Why didn't you call Ivy on her cell?"
"You are unbelievable," the man said, his irritation obvious. "Get your good boots on. I don't want to see you in garden shoes and grubby jeans anymore. Now Nina thinks we don't pay you enough. The amulets you gave me pinged. We've found their current base."
I sat up, adrenaline flowing. "Ivy! Jenks!" I shouted, then turned back to Glenn. "Where are you?"
"Five minutes from the church," he said, and I heard a background of radio chatter. "We have them triangulated at an abandoned industrial park. FIB and I.S. We're waiting for you."
They were waiting for me. I almost friggin' cried.
Jenks darted in. "We're on?" he asked, a bright silver dust slipping from him.
I eyed him, worried. He was flying well, and his winter clothes from last year were over his arm. "We're on. You'll need those. And anything else Belle has come up with for the cold."
"Tink's little pink dildo!" the pixy shouted, and he darted out, as excited as I was.
"We'll be ready," I said into the phone. "Thanks, Glenn."
"Don't thank me until it's over," he muttered. "You're staying in the car."
I snapped my phone shut and sank back into the cushions. Car? I doubt it. My eyes touched upon my band of charmed silver, and a flash of worry went through me. "That's why I've got the sleepy-time charms," I whispered as I stood. I was going to kick some serious ass, and I didn't need demon magic to do it.
