by Amy Sumida
“ID checks?” Killian asked.
Sullivan shook his head. “He doesn't seem interested in that. I think he has the names collected only so he can keep track of who stays and who leaves.”
“What happened after your spy was processed?” I asked.
“Extinguisher Teagan”—Sullivan motioned to a man standing with the outer group and he stepped forward—“was taken down a long corridor to a reception hall that he describes as a throne room. It's a big, empty space with a dais at the far end. Our target sits in a chair on the dais and his visitors are lined up before him. There's a woman who stands at his side with a clipboard. She tells him who each visitor is and what ails them. Then they go up to the dais and get healed.”
“All of them?” Raza asked. “Does he turn anyone away?”
“Not that I saw, Your Majesty,” Teagan said. “But not everyone goes to be healed. Many just want to touch his hands or some shit like that. Which worked out well for me. I posed as one of those people, then left afterward. No one found that odd or gave me much notice.”
“What about the Pearl Thief?” I asked Teagan. “What's your impression of him?”
Teagan made a side nod kind of like a shrug. “I'm not a psychiatrist but I'd label him a narcissist. He wears these shiny robes and sits on a throne like a king. When I went up to fawn over him, he held his hand out to me as if he were the damn Pope. He frowned a little when I only shook his hand so I had to do some brown-nosing. Once I buttered him up, he went back to smiling at me in this creepy way. Then he gave me his blessing and waved me away. It was bizarre.”
“What is brown-nosing?” Raza whispered to me.
“Flattery,” I whispered back.
“I don't see the connection.”
I grimaced. “I'll explain it later.” No, I wouldn't.
“How many people were in the room?” Killian asked Teagan.
“Hundreds,” Teagan reported grimly. “But the good news is that there are only a handful of people in the palace once he stops seeing visitors for the day. He likes his privacy. If we can get inside the palace at night, we can grab him, no problem.”
“What about the female assistant; is she intimately involved with him?” I asked.
“Could be.” Sullivan shrugged. “We haven't been able to get intel on his private rooms or who accompanies him into them. In public, they don't appear to be affectionate. I mean, she kisses his ass like everyone else but she doesn't actually kiss him. I'm sorry, this is all we've got.”
“It's okay. This is more than we need. We have the most powerful people on Earth and Fairy here.” Killian looked around pointedly. “Now, let's figure out how to use that power to catch a thief.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
As night fell, the groups of extinguishers, hunters, and witches gathered before the main tent. On the ridge, a unit of Flight Witches and hunters waited for the order to fly down to the walls and disable the human guards. We would try to save as many humans as possible but if we had to, we'd defend ourselves. For that reason, the extinguishers were armed with guns in addition to their iron weapons. All extinguishers are issued a gun but they don't usually carry them since bullets don't work well against the Fey. That is, unless the bullets are made of iron, which is expensive to do and unreliable to use since iron is both too light and too hard to make good bullets. Then there's the whole combustion things: a fairy can turn a firearm against its wielder in seconds flat.
I wanted to go in with the flight team but my husbands put their collective foot down. I argued that I could dust the humans like a plane does crops but they countered that the risk was too high. I needed to be part of the team that made it to the palace so I gave in and instead of launching myself off the hill, I marched to the gate with the others.
You'd think a straight forward attack coming from the front would be the worst tactic but with the Flight Witches and hunters taking out the guards, there was no one left to man the gates and we entered the complex with a just few waves of a Fey hand. Lord Nevarien led the charge after opening the gate, though it was a furtive charge. There had been very little noise made when the wall guards were dispatched so no one came running to intercept us immediately. However, there were still guards roaming the grounds and we stopped several times to deal with them.
All in all, it was a relatively quick and quiet trip to the palace. But as we approached it, the gates suddenly slammed shut behind us, and floodlights atop every building came on. Humans swarmed out of doorways to surround us and a blond man strode out of the palace and onto the steps. I met his stare, then flinched. This wasn't the same man I'd first seen, though his appearance was unchanged. Something was different about him. Something was wrong.
“Here they are, just as I told you!” The Pearl Thief shouted in English. “They've come to murder me. They represent the wealthy of this world, people who would oppress you. Help me as I have helped you. Defend me against these evil-doers!”
“Evil-doers?” Killian asked. “Seriously.”
“Stand down or you will die!” Raza roared at the humans as he shifted into his sragon form.
A Dragon-Djinn's transformation into dragon is always an awe-inspiring thing to behold. But Raza made a show of it this time, erupting into his massive shape as if the transformation itself were a type of attack. His clothes disintegrated as his body grew larger than most of the buildings around him in only a few seconds. Claws as long as I was tall dug channels into the earth and a tail the length of a firetruck bashed one of the buildings, sending a good section of it crumbling down upon the human soldiers.
Our group drew back to give Raza room while the humans started to scream. The Pearl Thief even jerked away in shock and his reaction made me pause. I watched his eyes round as Raza spread his wings, lifted his head to the night sky, presented his scaled chest, and roared again. This man had never seen a dragon before. Even for a fairy, that wasn't too unusual. At least not for the Fey who live on Earth. Dragon-Djinn are on the verge of extinction; there are only four in existence, including my daughter. So, a certain amount of surprise was justified but this wasn't merely surprise. It was the expression of a man who didn't even believe in dragons.
“He's human,” I whispered in revelation as shock rocked through me. A vision burst into my mind—the Pearl Thief on fire—and I knew what had to be done. “He's not Fey!” I shouted as I launched my Firethorns. “Raza, burn that motherfucker!”
Raza took a deep breath and the Pearl Thief—the human Pearl Thief—flinched back in horror. But then he lifted a hand and in it, he held the Cintamani.
“Hurry!” I screeched as I called on my Firethorns. “He's going to escape!”
Thick, glossy, ebony vines manifested around the thief. The vines bore vicious thorns and the Pearl Thief screamed in agony and anger as they tightened around him. But before I could set the vines on fire, a blast of light shot from the Cintamani and my Firethorns exploded into tiny pieces. While I gaped at their destruction, everyone else launched their attacks. Extinguishers, who had been prepared to use their psychic abilities against a Fey thief, pulled their guns instead while the hunters and witches let loose with an array of magic.
The Pearl Thief's followers were fleeing, not even the most devout human had enough faith to face down a dragon. Hell, they were probably losing their damn minds right about now. But they never made it to the gates. Instead of escaping, the Pearl Thief decided to make a stand. Perhaps he liked Mexico. Perhaps he liked his palace. Perhaps he was just tired of running. Whatever the case, he chose to fight us.
And he fought dirty.
I saw the Pearl Thief's lips moving as I rallied and called more Firethorns into existence. A stream of dragon breath shot over my manifesting thorns as they caught fire and reached for the thief. I was focused solely on the blond with the pearl, intent on wrapping him in enough vines that even the Cintamani couldn't free him. So when a barricade of bodies formed before the Pearl Thief like a curtain, I couldn't process it
at first. I just blinked as people burned, a few bound within my Firethorns. Their bodies turned black as their mouths opened on silent screams, then they broke into pieces and crumbled to the ground.
“What the fuck just happened?” Killian whispered.
Everyone had gone still. Extinguishers with guns in hand, hunters with eyes full of magic, and witches wrapped in the elements. Oh, yeah, and most of the Royals of Fairy with their mouths hanging open. It was a collection of power that should have brought a single man to his knees, especially a human man. But he still stood and we were left staring at the debris before him. Piles of blackened bones that had once been people.
“Why do you pursue me?” The Pearl Thief shouted over the macabre remains. “I'm helping people. Saving people! I am God made flesh! I am magic and mercy! You should be kneeling to me and praising my name!”
“Oh, yeah, this guy's lost his marbles,” Karmen muttered as he aimed his gun at the thief's head.
The Cintamani glowed softly as the Pearl Thief began to whisper to it once more. The human followers—standing paralyzed around us—started to rise into the air. Even their terrified expressions were frozen on their faces as something moved them like flakes in a snow globe. The thief couldn't change free will or wish for death, but he could move things about, even if those things were alive. He'd found a loophole.
Human bodies spun through the air around us, circling our group and hemming us in. None of us knew what to do. We didn't want to hurt these people and so far, they were only being used as shields. So, we just stood there, gawking at the display like a bunch of children at the circus. Then the humans started to tumble out of their rotation and fly toward us like missiles. Magic flared to life—gusts of wind, bursts of water, explosions of earth, fists of shadows, and every other mór that could be used to knock aside the humans without killing them was used. The humans went flying back to hit the spinning mass of their fellows and the sound of cracking bones and painful moans added to the eerie whirring of the living vortex.
“We're hurting them!” I shouted. “Stop!”
“We're doing the best we can, Your Majesty,” Nevarien said crisply as he flung out his hand and cast another human away.
Raza's claw appeared before me to catch a body before it hit me. He set it down carefully. The human—a dark-skinned woman—just laid there, staring up at him in shock. But Raza couldn't catch them all nor could our magic deflect every one of them. Our people started to go down like bowling pins and their magic went astray. Friendly fire took on new meaning; luckily, none of it literal. All of us with fire-based mórs, including Killian and I, had limited ourselves to our beags. But Killian doesn't like limitations. He stripped to his underwear and shifted into his giant snake form. Kill slithered around one side of our group, blocking us with his body. With Raza opposite him, we had nearly a complete circle of reptilian protection. The human cannonballs bounced off scaly hides.
“Stand down or I will destroy you!” the Pearl Thief's voice pierced through the sound of magic and mayhem.
“You are hurting the world!” I shouted back, using my Air beag to carry my voice to him. “Everything you've done has caused an imbalance. The Cintamani is forced to restore that balance and it has destroyed all the good you've done. Animals have fled this realm, people have lost their livelihoods, the crops you grew were washed away by floods, peaceful people have become killers, and now, here, you have brought a plague to Mexico.”
The bodies slowed, then alighted gently on the ground.
The Pearl Thief stared at me with narrowed eyes. “Who do you think you are to oppose me? How dare you bring your lies here and accuse me of such things!”
“I am Queen Seren Firethorn of Fairy!” I declared. “You have no idea what that means because you're human, not a god. That pearl you hold is a Fey relic, created for the Buddha, the only human who could properly use it. It was protected by the Naga because they knew that even good wishes can turn bad when you command the Cintamani. You will destroy the world if you continue. And a real god, Anu of Earth, has called upon me to stop you.”
“A fairy queen, eh? Sent by a god?” He sneered at me. “You don't look like a queen, much less a fairy queen.”
He spoke to the pearl again, and I braced for his next trick. But it hit closer than I'd expected. The clothes on my body started to shiver, then writhe. I looked down in shock as my jeans, shirt, and boots shifted into a costume straight out of World of Warcraft. My T-shirt became a bra—purple silk triangles formed into blossoming petals by a gold frame. More gold formed a sculptural waist piece that connected the bra to the strips of my skirt—a skirt formed of rectangular pieces that hung only at my center front and back, leaving the sides of my legs bare. Oh, but not to worry, leather straps crossed over my hips to keep the skirt from flashing my lady bits, the straps held in place by gold medallions at the top of my thighs. Golden chains hung between those medallions and trailed down my arms, draped between slim armbands. From those armbands, lengths of silk hung in great swaths—silk that would have been put to better use covering my body. Oh, and I was wearing a fucking tiara.
“That was one of my favorite shirts!” I snarled as I lifted my hand. “Now, I'm really going to kick your ass!”
My hair—now free of its sensible braid, thanks to the Pearl Thief—blew upward in the backlash breeze of my magic. Around me, hunters and witches launched their magic at the Pearl Thief while the extinguishers started firing their guns. Those poor, paralyzed humans lurched off the ground and flew through the air faster than the bullets, whizzing into place in front of the thief. Bullets and magic tore them apart before we could stop. I'd been watching the Pearl Thief and he hadn't made a wish. He must have made a blanket wish for power to move the humans. Which meant that we needed to find a way around it. Find a way around them.
“Tiernan, do you think you could part the human shield with your magic, then seal us in with the Pearl Thief?” I asked.
“It may take more than my magic,” he said grimly. Then he shouted to the hunters—the Lord Hunters, “Follow my lead!”
Tiernan shot a spear of shadows between two bodies, directing it with his hands pressed together as if in prayer. As soon as the shadow spear was through, he spread his palms apart and the shadows thinned into walls, pushing the humans away. The dark walls began to buckle as the Pearl Thief pushed back with the bodies, but the hunters and witches added their magic to Tiernan's and the walls held. The shadows, now joined by a multitude of magic, began to swirl with glowing teal, vibrant pink, and golden-green like an oil slick. That magical oil spread forward and back, pushing humans away while slipping around the thief. It rose, then slammed down, closing us inside a glossy dome with the Thief while leaving the humans safely outside.
The Pearl Thief snarled and bashed bodies into the new barrier but our people held firm. He gave up with another snarl, bodies sliding off our shield to crumple into heaps around it.
“Fine. You want to fight me, let's fight.” The Pearl Thief launched himself at me, the Cintamani held before him like a cross against a vampire.
Something flashed in the corner of my eye but I was focused on the thief; he looked as if he were going to punch me with the pearl. I gathered the Firethorns in my palm and drew back, preparing to hurl the burning ball in his smug face. Before I could release it, the flash in the edge of my vision revealed itself to be a sword. The blade came down in a dramatic arch, severing the thief's hand from his body—the hand holding the Cintamani.
Chapter Fifty
The Pearl Thief screamed as his hand fell to the ground and released the Cintamani. It rolled to my feet. I scooped it up, but I knew it wouldn't matter; the pearl belonged to him until he died. Sure enough, within seconds, it vanished from my palm and reappeared on the ground before the thief.
But he was still screaming and it wasn't merely with pain.
“What have I done?!” The Pearl Thief cried as he clutched his bleeding wrist and stared at the Cintamani i
n horror. “Oh, dear God, what have I done?”
Images sped through my mind. The visions Anu had given me. The Pearl Thief stood at the edge of a patch of excavated land. A grid of rope had been staked over the earth and people crouched within their designated squares, brushing away the dirt carefully. The view panned back and I followed the thief's gaze to a group of people who stood nearby, leaning on shovels. Indian people. They looked weary and thin but grateful to be there. The image shifted and the Pearl Thief stood in the center of a Delhi slum, tears rolling down his cheeks. The men who had held the shovels waved goodbye to him and returned to their families. The images continued like this, flashing through Zimbabwe, Peru, Brazil, and Mexico. Showing me the things the Pearl Thief had witnessed while working in each country. Showing me his horror and deep sadness. He hadn't chosen those places randomly, he'd chosen them because he had a connection to the people there.
A stone slab appeared before me, carved with ancient writing I couldn't read and an image of a man holding an orb. My vision panned back to reveal the Pearl Thief holding the stone as he stood, once again, at the edge of that dig site in India. The expression on his face said it all—hope, wonder, and determination. This was how he had found the Cintamani. By pure chance. A story carved into a stone buried with the dead. A story that led him straight to the Naga. He wasn't a fairy bent on destroying the world or even a human who wanted to be a god. All this man had wanted to do was help people.
