The Conspiracy of Unicorns

by Michael Angel

The Albess turned and cocked her head at Esteban. “I sensed by the way you watched me during the meal that you might have a question. If you but ask, I shall try my best to sate your need for knowledge.”

  Alanzo surprised me by blushing. I reached under the table and squeezed his hand reassuringly. The Albess could look forbidding – owls were raptors, after all. But Thea was a gentle soul unless one crossed her.

  “I, uh, didn’t mean to stare,” he admitted. “It’s just that…well, I’ve met some of Dayna’s other friends. From Andeluvia, I mean. And they’re really different from you.”

  “Now you have me curious,” I said. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, take Galen, for instance.”

  Shelly chuckled. A dreamy look blossomed in her eyes. “He’s taken already, so far as I’m concerned.”

  “I mean, he transformed himself so that he looked human,” Esteban continued. “You wouldn’t know his nature from looking at him. The only other friends of yours I’ve met are a griffin and a wyvern. Shaw and Nagura are at the other extreme…they’re so outside of anything we have in our world, you can’t help thinking they’re animatronics, some kind of special effect. But Thea…well, you’re in a whole different mental category for me.”

  The Albess set her spoon aside and preened her wing for a moment. Then she said, “Allow me to take up your thought in my talons. I do not look human, true. Yet, neither do I look out-of-place enough to you. What confuses you is that I look…like an owl, is it not?”

  Esteban blushed more deeply this time. “I’m sorry, Albess, I didn’t mean to be rude. But yes, you do look like an Earthly creature. An owl, if a very large one.”

  “Shucks,” Shelly snorted. “We got lots of birds that big in Texas.”

  Thea let out a ‘hoo-hoo’ of owl laughter. “I suppose I shall only get bigger if I keep eating your food, friend Shelly. And I know you mean no offense, Esteban of the Main Squeeze.”

  “You just keep comin’ back to get your supply of avian prednisone. I’ll keep you nice and fat on my cooking.”

  “As long as I can get my medallion magically charged, I shall return.”

  The mention of magic charging wiped the carefree, happy expression from my face. Now it was Esteban’s turn to reach under the table and squeeze my palm for a second. The easy conversation died away, and everyone looked to me.

  At least I was among friends, I thought. Some of them, anyway. I wasn’t completely alone in this anymore.

  “I suppose that I have to be the one who breaks the easy mood,” I said with a sigh. “If everyone’s filled themselves with chili or mouse fruit, then I’d grab something to drink.”

  Shelly and Esteban held up their open bottles of beer in answer. Thea reached down from her perch and picked up a cup of lemon-infused iced tea my friend had made special for her.

  I pushed back a foot or two from the table and started by talking about the warrant I’d received from Regent Magnus. The very warrant that had led me into the passageways of Keshali and Nagura’s royal chambers. I described the underground mosaics and the history of the Old War I’d learned from the wyvern queen.

  At that point, Esteban nudged my elbow and nodded across the table. The Albess had slowly moved to tuck her head under her wing as I related the events of the Old War. Abruptly, I realized that I alone at this table knew how Thea felt about her people’s role in that War.

  “Albess,” I said gently, “Queen Nagura needed to know the truth. That the Hoohan had been on the side of the Creatures of the Dark. But no longer.”

  Shelly looked startled, but she didn’t say anything as Thea spoke. Her gentle voice was muffled by the plumage of her wing.

  “Shame! I feel it as keenly as the cut of a talon. My line trafficked with the darkness.”

  “And your line weaned the Hoohan back to the side of the light,” I pointed out. “I told Queen Nagura this. I explained how the Hoohan became the guardians of civilization.”

  The Albess brought her head back up. Her eyes blinked once, twice before she spoke.

  “Did she accept this?”

  I pursed my lips. “Not at first.”

  “Miss Thea,” Shelly said. “It’s hard for some people to accept that a sin can be washed clean, or that a sinner can come to the light. They need to see it on their own.”

  “And she did,” I insisted, as I patted my chest in emphasis. “She saw it, because I was there. I once told you, Albess, that I saw you as the Hand of Light. You opposed the Darkness when you were the only one who saw its return. Without you, I would not have come to Andeluvia. None of us…”

  I paused, my throat abruptly dry.

  “None of us would be where we are right now,” I concluded. “And the Light would have been extinguished.”

  Thea looked a little less ashamed at that. Still, I’d realized in that moment that a lot of ‘bad’ was mixed in with that ‘good’. A lot of people had already paid the ultimate price for my arrival. My actions. Captain Vazura, Hollyhock, Perrin, Maxwell Cohen and Isabel Vega were dead, for starters. Many others had lost friends or family. King Fitzwilliam was still in the hospital.

  What could I say to that?

  Of all things, the chats I’d had with Zenos, probably the most pessimistic of all the visionaries in Andeluvia, came to my mind.

  The future is hard, unflinching, and merciless, he had said. Destiny has as much ‘compassion’ or ‘mercy’ as a thunderstorm, an earthquake, or an ocean tide.

  For a person with luck as rotten as mine, perhaps the tradeoff of losing a dozen people overboard in a storm was worth it if the ship didn’t sink with all hands aboard. The consequences of my actions, my very presence…might be marginally better than if I’d never picked up Galen’s golden medallion in the first place.

  That was all I had to go on. It wasn’t much for a Hero. But it would have to do.

  I continued my story as Thea sipped at her tea and my other two friends took long pulls at their beers. I told them about my last encounter with Archer and McClatchy, right before Internal Affairs had shown up. The threatening package at the OME. The words of the last Ultari, about how what lived in the Scarlet Crypt would end me. My impromptu exorcism of Ronald Clarke. Queen Nagura’s return to ‘Teyana’.

  My voice shook as I spoke of the descent to the cavern that led to Crossbow Consulting’s warehouse, and the thing in the massive ruby crystal. My escape from Harrison’s clutches with Archer’s assistance. And the final attack by Crossbow’s mercenaries that claimed Detective Vega’s life.

  “In a way, the worst part is that I’m left with more questions than answers,” I concluded, as I fought the impulse to rub my temples. “The Ultari said that whatever was in the ‘Ruby Crypt’ would end me. There was something in there, I saw it. And the reason Harrison didn’t kill me earlier was that I was what he called a ‘vertice’. Is that something Andeluvian, Albess?”

  Thea blinked back at me. “I have never heard the term. My aide Xandra might have, as she has spoken to the seers before. However, she remains nest-bound to her newly laid egg. I shall send a courier to the Roost of the Star Child to inquire anew.”

  “I hope she knows more than me,” Esteban admitted. “Because I’ve never heard that word either.”

  “That goes double for me,” Shelly added. “I’m also drawin’ a blank.”

  Esteban rolled the neck of his bottle in between two fingers in thought. “Andeluvia is one thing. But I’m worried about McClatchy, too. What is he up to? Is he going insane?”

  “Your liege might be doing just that,” Thea said softly. “The magic used by the pooka was a powerful, subtle kind of sorcery. My friend Shelly of Richard’s Son had the fabric of her mind stretched. The same force put upon this man’s mind may have torn it asunder.”

  “I’ve tried to talk sense into him,” I said, frustrated. “But I can’t get through.”

  “You are kind, but the effort was wasted. Something may have been warped inside him before his mind was ever t
ouched. Only a wizard can judge a matter such as this.”

  “Then that puts extra urgency into what I’m dealing with now,” I concluded. “Which is finding out what, exactly, is going on with the Deliberation of Andeluvia’s senior wizards. Because they’re not meeting in the halls of the Wizard’s Guild. They’re not even physically present! Instead, they’re hiding behind masks of stone.”

  I quickly filled everyone in on the most recent events. The Albess seemed unsurprised at the resistance I’d encountered at the Archivist Guild. Nor was she surprised at my friends’ abilities to smash through it.

  And, miracle of miracles, nobody commented on my hair being turned green and then a mixture of black and yellow.

  “Just as you found that magical gateway below the palace back to your world,” Thea observed, “you have uncovered another strange connection that leads towards the inner sanctum of the wizards. For, as the Darkness gathers, I have oft wondered about what the Deliberati have been up to.”

  “Albess,” I said, “what I heard from Lead Archivist Fiona troubled me. It sounded like humans with magic talent have been discouraged from developing their talents. At least in the fields that could have helped us in our struggles against the Dark.”

  Thea nodded sagely. “Then you must continue forward, Dame Chrissie. You have stumbled onto something murkier than I thought existed. A conspiracy. One that has helped to strip our world of its last line of defense.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The rest of dinner passed pleasantly enough, but with a serious undertone that acted as a drag on everyone’s mood. At the very end, Shelly bundled up a cloth tie bag filled with prednisone tablets and spare kiwi fruit. She let out a little ‘oh!’ as the Albess spread her wings and gently embraced her in thanks.

  Thea said her goodbyes to each of us before taking the bag in one set of talons. Then she touched the tip of her beak to the medallion where it dangled below her neck. The Albess vanished in a near-soundless white flash.

  “Hey, I’ll help you clean up,” I volunteered. Shelly shook her head as she dabbed away a tear with a corner of her sleeve.

  “No, I’ve got it all covered,” she demurred. “Why don’t you two go out back and enjoy the twilight for a bit? It’s nice enough out, and my garden’s in bloom.”

  I looked to Alanzo, who grinned and gave me a ‘why not?’ shrug. We picked up our half-finished drinks and headed out the back. The sounds of Shelly stacking plates and glasses faded away as we closed the door.

  Outside, the sky had turned a brilliant shade of lavender. Cirrus clouds traced feathery swatches of pink high above. The evening star gleamed above the horizon as sharply as a white-hot spear point. The scent of night-blooming jasmine perfumed the air.

  “Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” I said, as my eyes adjusted to the dim light.

  Shelly had set out a white wicker loveseat, one just barely big enough for two to share. My friend had made no secret of trying to get me paired up with a boyfriend for some time now. And ever since she’d decided that Esteban was okay, the attempts were getting more blatant. For example, the loveseat’s cushions sported big fabric hearts and the chair’s arms were shaped like Cupid’s bow.

  “She means well,” Esteban said, as he let out a sigh. “It’s a nice change of pace from the people we’ve been dealing with lately.”

  “I can’t argue that,” I agreed.

  Esteban took a seat, beckoning me to join him. As I’d thought, the ‘double’ seat made for a tight fit. I practically had to drape my legs over his to get comfortable. Of course, that didn’t really bother me, so I decided to do just that.

  “Here’s to Shelly,” he said, raising his beer. “May she never run out of romance novels to crib ideas from.”

  “Or medicine to keep our owl friends in top shape,” I added, which got a hearty male chuckle in reply. We clinked our bottles, and each took a sip. “And you’re right. It’s nice to have someone who’s looking out for us. You and me. As well as my friends in Andeluvia.”

  “It’s hard for me to imagine what they’ve been going through,” Esteban mused. “Seeing the Albess here tonight…it puts another face to the names I’ve heard about. She’s the one who was kidnapped and tortured at the hands of her own people, right? Raisah and those two owl goons of hers?”

  “Those were the ones,” I said. I tilted my drink, letting the last drops of liquid course across my tongue, and then leaned to one side to put the empty bottle on the ground. “They were preparing to ritually slaughter her by the time I arrived. And those monsters in owl form…they’d already murdered her successor. Thea’s old, but she can’t step down as Albess now. Maybe not until she dies as well.”

  Esteban fell silent, staring off at the evening star as it shimmered above the warm haze thrown up by the city. When he spoke, I had to lean in to hear his voice.

  “So much death, over so little time. The owls. Galen’s people, the centaurs. Shaw’s daughter, at the griffin aerie. Perrin, the owlet you told me about.”

  I let out a breath. “You’re not the only one.”

  “I think I understand a little more. About how you must have felt when you lost them. Your mind goes stumbling back to the last time you saw them.” He put aside his drink and spoke a little louder, a little faster, as if he’d finally found words to things that needed saying. “I’ve had partners wounded in the line of fire before, but what happened with Isabel…I keep going back to where I’m crouched behind that bumper with you. Trying to figure out what else I could have done to help her. I keep asking myself that, going around in circles, until I’m exhausted and half-mad.”

  I leaned more into him, luxuriating in the hard muscle of his side against mine.

  “That’s part of why I went to speak to Zenos. The old man who runs the Soothsayer’s Guild. He once told me that people only wanted to know about prophecy because they wanted words of comfort. To know that they were ultimately doing the right thing.”

  “The man knows his business.”

  “It’s why he runs their guild. I wanted something similar, I guess. It still worries me that I’ve made decisions which have brought terrible things to light. But Zenos did help me see something a little more clearly.”

  “What was that?”

  “That no matter the cost, I stood up to the Darkness. I made a difference. You did too. So did Vega.”

  I felt more than saw Alanzo’s smile. “I think she’d have liked that.”

  We watched the evening star rise as the sky began to shade from purple towards black. Crickets chirped, blotting out the faint, ever-present sound of automobiles in the distance. The smell of night jasmine intertwined with that of moonflower and wisteria.

  I felt a swirl in the air. It was nice, but a chill thrummed its way down my spine as I noticed something. The air hung over Shelly’s garden in a dead calm. Not a leaf stirred, not a branch moved. I slid my legs off Alanzo’s and got up, peering into the fading light.

  Esteban frowned and stood next to me. “What’s the matter?”

  “Something’s coming,” I said, as my mind raced through the possibilities.

  It can’t be Harrison, my brain noted. Or one of the Ultari. You put up Galen’s wards, they’ll keep out anything demonic!

  The air swirled again, this time with more force. The leaf litter from Shelly’s garden twisted into a spiral above her backyard lawn. Indentations appeared one at a time in the thick Bermuda grass as a dark form shimmered into existence. Bright, glowing eyes shone from beneath hair that looked as if it had been woven from the night itself.

  “Hijo de perra!” Esteban swore, as he dropped into his shooter’s stance, firearm up and at the ready. “Dayna, get out of here! I don’t know if I can hold this thing off!”

  I didn’t run. I wasn’t frozen in fear, but surprise. Amazement too, if I had to be specific.

  A deep, equine chortle reverberated inside my mind.

  “Ma chére,” a deep voice said, in a familiar French
accent. “Your friend looks like he has a bad case of the frights, non?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  The indistinct form in Shelly’s backyard finally coalesced into the shape of a big black horse. That is, a horse with citrine-bright eyes that lacked pupils. And one sporting a mane that wouldn’t have been out of place in a punk rock band.

  Esteban didn’t lower his gun. In fact, he sighted down the barrel to steady his aim.

  “Dayna, unless you know that thing out there, I’m going to blow a hole the size of a soccer ball in it.”

  The target Esteban had in his sights let out an amused snort and swished his tail from side to side.

  “I do know him,” I said quickly. “Put your gun down, you can’t hurt him anyway. At least not when he’s in his ethereal form.”

  “His ethe-what form?”

  “Just put the gun away,” I reassured him. He moved reluctantly, but did as I asked. I gestured between the two males as I introduced them. “Esteban, this is Destarius de Revasser of the pouquelaye. You can just call him ‘Destry’. Destry, this is Detective Alanzo Esteban. I’m sure you caught me dreaming something naughty about him once or twice.”

  Another French-accented chuckle tickled my ear. “Bonsoir, Monsieur Esteban.”

  Esteban whirled around. Then, remembering the scary black creature in the yard, he whirled back, his eyes wide.

  “Did I just…hear you inside my head?”

  Destry bobbed his head. “Mais oui. It is the only way we pooka can speak properly.”

  “Besides, how else would a dream-horse talk?” I pointed out. I turned to Destry as I spoke again. “Since that’s been cleared up, can you turn corporeal for a moment?”

  A barely-there swish of wind, and Destry’s form became opaque. In his corporeal form, he’d made sure that his blank eyes included normal looking pupils. It tempered his otherworldly look.

  I took a few steps forward and threw my arms around his neck. He felt as solid as a hunk of black marble. As always, his body was warm to the touch, though without a trace of the horsey scents I associated with equine hair and skin.