by Karlik, Mary
The passage still held the faint odor of the dead, but it was more a reminder of a time and people long gone.
Theo led the group down a series of rough-cut stone steps and through the twists and turns of the tunnel deep beneath the city. To Layla he said, “The building you described was in a cavern, yeah?”
“Aye. And it completely filled the space. There were three levels of windows.”
“I think I know the place. Only when I was a lad, there was no building.”
The path forked into another, narrower space. The floor was uneven and the ceiling was so low that the men had to walk hunched over. “This way is familiar.” Layla swept her light in an arc in front. “It’s not far now.”
Jack groaned. “Good. We’re almost on our knees as it is.”
Layla held her wings flat against her back to keep them from scraping the ceiling. “We’ll come to a hard right and there it will be.”
The turn was farther down the path than she’d remembered. When they reached the corner, she pulled on Theo’s arm to stop him. “I’ll go first. It wouldn’t do for all of us to traipse into a trap.”
She rounded the corner and shot an anti-glamour spell into the cave. Her signature blue color washed over the building, but there was no outward change. She fey-sized and searched the area for signs of a ward or a glamour she’d missed. Nothing. Everything was as it looked.
She returned to the men and human-sized. “It’s clear.”
Ian spoke to his team. “I don’t like this. If they come down that tunnel, we’re trapped. Keep your eyes open. If you see even a flicker of light, alert us. I’ll signal as soon as we have the fairies.”
Layla added, “It could be more subtle than a light. If you feel anything odd, a tickle against the skin, a sparkle in the air, we need to know.”
Jack smiled, “Go, already, before you scare us all.”
Layla led Ian to the door. “Ready?”
“Aye.”
She touched the handle. “It’s sealed by magic, but doesn’t feel like a strong spell.” She squeezed the handle and the lock’s tumblers fell easily into place.
As soon as she stepped inside, a breeze as hot as a dragon’s breath blew from the far end of the building. “Down!” She pulled Ian to the floor just as a fireball zipped over their heads. It slammed against the door and washed down to the floor. They jumped up just as it passed under their feet and disappeared.
Ian moved away from the door. “What was that?”
“A protective ward on the entry. Now that we’re in, we should be okay.”
Wide-eyed, he ran his hand across his mouth. “I don’t mind telling you, I’d feel a bit better if you could make that a guarantee.”
“Aye, but you know I can’t.” She repeated the anti-glamour spell and exposed the cages lined up across the floor.
She ran to the first cage and her stomach clenched at the sight of the fairies piled inside. Their eyes were open and unfocused. But they didn’t have merely the lifeless look of a doll—there was terror behind those frozen eyes. Their skin had changed too. There were no freckles, or moles, or any imperfections. Normal, pliable skin now had the smooth, solid texture of porcelain. They looked like dolls—except for their slow, writhing movements and the tortured expressions on their faces.
On the top of the heap lay a lass wearing a sunflower-colored dress. Her eyes cleared and focused on Layla.
“Fight it,” Layla urged her. “Fight it until I can save you.”
The girl’s face contorted with pain and her eyes dulled as she sank back into the state somewhere between agony and death.
Layla’s chest tightened. “Oh, my fairies.” She must find the way to end their suffering. She examined the cage and felt the magic that emanated from it. But the power was not from the poor fairies trapped inside. It came from the cage itself.
Using her magic, she tried to widen the spaces between the bars, but no matter how hard she concentrated, nothing happened.
“Layla.” Ian tapped her on the shoulder. “You told Theo to look for a shimmer.” He pointed to the far end of the rectangular room. “Is that what you’re referring to?” The stones in the center of the wall had a sheen to them.
She stood and shot an anti-glamour spell at it. Nothing. She walked closer. “It’s not a glamour, but it’s hiding something.”
Ian ran his hands along the stones. “These are new.” He pushed on a protruding stone and the wall swung in, revealing a passage. “Why wouldn’t they use magic?”
Layla stepped onto a metal landing atop stairs leading deeper into the earth. “Maybe they need a human to enter here.”
Ian slid his gun from his shoulder holster. “I don’t like this.”
“Shh. Come on.” She nocked an arrow and stepped onto the first step.
The bottom of the stairs opened into a small room filled with rows of empty glass globes on wooden shelves. Layla’s throat tightened as she scanned the globes. She pictured the Sunflower fey stuffed into one of them. And Esme. Oh, Esme.
Ian whispered over her shoulder, “Look, just there.”
A light shone from another room. Layla moved to the side of the opening and swallowed a gasp as she peered in.
This room was twice as large as the one they were in. A gray-haired hag sat at a table facing the adjacent wall. Next to her was a stack of globes on a wooden shelf about half the size of the ones in the storeroom. A cart stood on the other side of her and a cage was positioned on the floor by her feet.
Ian whispered. “I know her.”
The woman reached through the top of the cage as if there were no bars, grabbed a fey, and laid her on the table. The hag placed a rose stem in front of the fey and forced her up on tiptoe. She hunched the fairy over the bud as if she were sniffing it. She used a small dowel rod to open the fey’s hands and cupped them around the flower. Then she brushed her hair and spread her wings behind her. When the hag was satisfied with the pose, she put her in the globe and filled it with liquid through an opening in the top.
Layla’s gut twisted right through her chest and into her throat. How could somebody do that to another living creature? She raised her bow and took aim.
Ian caught her arm before she could draw her bowstring back. “We don’t know what we’re dealing with and we might not have an escape if you take that shot.”
He was right.
She lowered her weapon, leaned her cheek against the cool stone of the archway, and continued to watch in horror as the old woman placed a locket into the opening in the top of the globe. The fey’s skin turned from alabaster to slightly pink and a light sparked in her eyes. Then the hag dangled the globe from the chain attached to the locket. The fey was frozen in the position in which the woman had fashioned her.
The awfulness of what she’d witnessed sucked the strength from Layla’s muscles. Black dots swirled in her vision and she felt her blood drop to her feet. She was on the verge of collapse. She squatted and pressed her back against the wall. For all those fey, for Esme and Isla, she had to fight this. She had to stay strong.
When the dizziness passed, she stood and peered into the room in time to see the woman filling the cart. It was loaded with fey globes. Some fairies were posed by themselves, others were with a flower, but they were all mixed up. A Rose fairy might be posed with a violet, a Lily with a carnation. Layla shook her head. What difference did that make? They were trapped in those balls.
“Are they alive?” Ian whispered. The horrified look on his face reflected what Layla felt.
“Barely.” But for how long? How could they survive in that liquid?
Layla couldn’t watch the fairies being tortured any longer. She’d seen how they had been removed from the cage—now it was time for her to rescue them. As for the fey in the globes, they’d have to come back and wage another rescue.
Layla tried to get Ian’s attention without alerting the hag, but his eyes were narrowed on the old woman as though he was working through something.
When at last the cart was filled, the woman pushed it toward them. The right front wheel squealed as it neared them. Ian stood half in the archway and whispered again, “I know her.” If the hag looked up, she’d see him.
Tension wound tighter in Layla’s gut as the squeak of the wheel echoed through the space. Ian moved forward as if he were going to enter the room. Layla’s breath caught in her throat as she grabbed Ian’s upper arm and pulled him back against the wall deep in the shadow of the storage room.
Wide-eyed, he mouthed, Thank you.
She held her breath and waited for the cart to come through the doorway. But it didn’t. It stopped on the other side of the wall.
Ian sighed. “There must be another storage room next to this one.”
Layla nodded. “Let’s get out of here.”
They eased up the stairs. When they reached the top, Ian cracked the door and scanned the room. He opened the door wider and turned to Layla. “All clear.”
They stepped among the cages. Layla sank to her knees and hope and happiness burst from within. She was going to rescue them. Tears filled her eyes as she drew in a deep breath. This was the moment. She was going to save her people from agony and death. Leaning close, she stuck her hand through the cage just as the woman had done.
But as soon as her hand passed through the bars, the cage released its magic and held on to her. She should have known that it would detect the fey part of her.
Ian peered out the window with his back to Layla. She tried to call for help, but her voice wouldn’t come. Then, she fell flat on the ground with her hand lodged in the cage.
Her arrows scattered across the floor as the magic marched up her arm until it reached her core and then spread like a virus.
A suffocating bleak emptiness floated within the confines of her body. Every muscle ached. Her nerves fired a constant burning through her system and her pulse pounded pain into her head. If she’d just die, her soul could escape from this pain and misery. But she knew in her essence that the magic of the cage wouldn’t let her die. Its purpose was to keep her in that place of torture.
And then a new kind of torment filled her—her body was being pulled apart.
No. Not her body. Her arm was being wrenched from her shoulder.
Awareness began to awaken from somewhere deep.
Ian’s trying to save me. I’ll probably die. And so will Esme, Isla, and the rest of the fey. Maybe the whole race. All because I was stupid enough to stick my hand into a magic trap.
Magic trap.
The cràdh within her rose to the surface of her soul. Not to feed on her negative emotions, but because it had a strong sense of survival and knew that if Layla died, it would as well. The entity swelled to its full expanse and shouted in Layla’s mind, Unmagic the magic trap!
The tugging grew stronger and pain jolted up her arm, scattering all thoughts except for the cràdh’s words howling in her mind.
Unmagic the magic trap!
But how? The invading magic caused a such a pounding in her skull she couldn’t form logical thought. And when she fought to think, the magic intensified the banging in her brain until her eyes rattled from back to front.
The cràdh whispered, Hide your thoughts within the rhythm.
She let her mind slip into sync with the pounding rhythm as she thought the words of the cràdh.
Unmagic the magic trap.
Over and over she thought the phrase until the words were little more than a series of sounds hidden in the cadence. And beyond those thoughts, her mind cleared, and she knew what she had to do.
Slowly, she pooled her magic to her core. When she was in control of her power she quieted the hammering and envisioned the rotten magic flowing from her shoulder to fingertips and then seeping back into the trap.
And the nasty magic obeyed. It stretched her skin, muscles, and nerves as if her arm was being turned inside out as it moved toward her fingertips. When the last of the magic left, relief from the pain was swift, but it left her body a mass of wobbly muscles.
Ian pulled her from the cage and helped her sit up. “Can you stand?”
Unable to speak, she flopped her head left, then right.
He lifted her into his arms. She thought about shifting fey-size to ease his burden, but even if she’d had the energy, she wasn’t sure she had enough magic left. She couldn’t risk a botched shift. Re-sizing her body unevenly would be catastrophic.
She tried to hang on to consciousness in case her magic was needed, but as soon as they cleared the doorway, she was out.
Chapter Twelve
Ian folded Layla over his shoulder and with his free hand, scooped up her scattered bow and arrows. Then he bolted from the doorway toward the tunnel.
Buzzard met him halfway. “What happened?”
“The cages have magic. She couldn’t get the fairies.” Ian angled his left side toward Buzzard. “Take her bow and arrows.”
Buzzard took the weapons and they entered the tunnel.
They made their way up the narrow passage single file. Ian had to squat to keep from dragging Layla’s back along the ceiling. It was a slow, awkward process and it didn’t take long for his thighs to begin to burn or his ankles to scream under the burden. Stopping to catch his breath, he pressed his arse against the wall to relieve the load on his legs while the inner sarcastic side of him thought about similar drills they’d done in the military. He would never in a million years have guessed that the only time he’d really use it would be to carry a mythical creature.
When at last they reached the part of the tunnel that was made for people of normal height, he stopped and spoke between breaths. “Take the fairy.”
Jack shifted her over his shoulder.
Ian straightened and stretched his arms over his head. “I’m getting too old for this.”
“Too old? You’re not even thirty.” Jack smiled. “But you take your time, old man—we’ll get her out of here.”
“Just keep moving.” He pushed to the front of the pack and set a faster pace.
Theo directed them back through the maze of tunnels until they reached the door leading to the tourists’ passage. Ian looked back at his team and noticed that Buzzard now carried Layla. He looked at Jack. “And you called me old man?”
Jack shrugged. “Sharing the wealth, boss.”
Theo cracked the door and closed it again. “Not good. It’s full of tourists.”
“Didn’t you say there is a way out without going through Mary King’s Close?” Ian looked around as though an opening would magically appear.
“Aye, there is, but we’d have to backtrack a fair way down the tunnel to reach it.”
“I don’t like that idea. We need to get Layla to safety.” Ian pulled the blue cube from his pocket and held it up. “We could evacuate the tunnel.”
Theo stared at the cube. “We’d have to walk through the smell too.”
Jack put a hand on his gut. “Aye. I’m not keen on the idea, but it’s better than waiting here until they leave.”
Buzzard shifted Layla. “Do you know how to use that thing?”
Ian shook his head. “Theo, open the door.”
When there was a gap between the tour groups, Ian spiked the cube against the floor just inside the main tunnel. It tumbled across a stone and fell into the groove made by the grout. And then… nothing.
The men stared at the cube through the half-open door.
Theo said, “It must take magic to open.”
Jack looked at the fairy. “Too bad she doesn’t have a wand we could use.”
Buzzard shoved in front of the group, held out her limp hand, and shook it. “Come on, wee fairy, let go of some of that beautiful magic of yours.”
Ian grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back. “You can’t just shake the magic out of her.”
Theo looked up the path. “We had better figure out something fast. Another tour is coming. They’ll stand in front of this door and give a history of the pl
ace.”
Ian stepped onto the path and nailed the cube with his boot heel. The force of the cube breaking knocked him against the far wall as a blue funnel rose into the tunnel and mushroomed. It hung in the air for a few seconds before exploding in white flash and releasing the putrid smell.
Screams filled the tunnel as people ran toward the exit covering their faces. Some vomited as they ran. Amidst the chaos, Ian took Layla from Buzzard and the team mixed with the frightened crowd. By the time they exited the tunnel, the uniform police were already starting to arrive.
“Close ranks,” he ordered, and the team surrounded him. They made it all the way to the street before a policeman stopped them.
“You there. What’s happened to the girl?”
Ian shifted Layla to dig his identification from his pocket, but Buzzard had already handed the officer his credentials.
Buzzard explained, “She’s undercover and was caught in the blast. We need to get her out of here.”
The officer stood in front of Ian. “I’ll call an ambulance. You need to get her to A&E.”
“We’re heading there now. The last thing we need is to expose her to the likes of flashing lights and sirens.” He moved past the officer and across the street.
He’d barely reached the van when his mobile rang. It was Assistant Chief Constable McIntyre. Ian ignored the call. He could get his arse chewed in an hour just as easily as now. His goal was to get Layla to safety and figure out their next move.
Jack and Theo stretched her out along the bench in the back of the van as Ian assessed her. The color had returned to her face, her pulse raced, but was strong. But then, maybe that was normal for fairies. How would he know? Her breaths were even and unlabored and he assumed that was good. In fact everything about her, as far as he knew, seemed completely normal. If he hadn’t seen what had happened to her when she stuck her hand in that cage, if he hadn’t wrenched her arm out of it, he’d have thought she was napping on the bench.
He sat on the floor with his back against the opposite wall of the van and reviewed the incident. A sick feeling stuck in his gut. He didn’t understand magic and couldn’t have predicted what had happened. Still, as team leader, he felt responsible.
