by Julie Kawaga
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Operation Scepter
The woman stared at me over the gold rim of her glasses, lips pursed in a disdainful expression. She wore a black business suit that clung to her body, and her hair was pulled into a tight yet elegant bun, giving her a stern demeanor. Her makeup was perfect, and the towering black heels made her seem taller and even more imposing.
“What do you think, darling?” Leanansidhe asked, sounding pleased. “The glasses might be a bit much, but we don’t want to take any chances today.”
I stuck out my tongue at the woman, who did the same in the mirror’s reflection. “It’s perfect,” I said, amazed. “I don’t even recognize myself. I look like a lawyer or something.”
“Hopefully enough to get you into SciCorp this afternoon,” Leanansidhe murmured, and all the dread and fear I’d managed to suppress all morning rose up like a black tide. I swallowed hard to keep the nausea down, wishing I hadn’t eaten that box of powdered doughnuts Kimi brought in for breakfast. I wouldn’t look very professional if I puked all over my expensive shoes.
Puck, Kimi, Nelson and Ironhorse were in the foyer, huddled around a blueprint when we came in, me wobbling behind Leanansidhe in my flimsy heels. Grimalkin dozed on the top of the piano, his tail brushing the keys, ignoring us all. I saw Leanansidhe glance his way and wince, as if imagining scratch marks on the polished wood.
Puck glanced up at me and smiled. He held out a hand, and I tottered up to him, grabbing his arm for support. My toes throbbed, and I leaned into him, trying to take the weight off my feet. How did women do it, walking around in these things every day without snapping their ankles?
“How’s that walking thing coming?” Puck murmured so that only I could hear.
“Shut up.” I smacked his arm. “I’m still learning, okay? This is like walking around on toothpicks.” He snickered, and I shifted my attention to the map spread out between them. “What are we looking at?”
“The plan,” Kimi answered, standing on tiptoes to bend over the table. “This is the SciCorp entrance,” the half-phouka continued, pointing to an obscure line near the bottom of the paper. I squinted, but I couldn’t make it out from all the other lines spread over the blueprint. “According to Warren,” Kimi went on, tracing a finger up to another line, “the scepter is being held here, between floors twenty-nine and thirty.”
“I still don’t know how that’s possible,” I muttered. “How can a building have a floor between floors?”
“The same way I can have a mansion between the mortal world and the Nevernever, darling,” Leanansidhe answered, looking at Grimalkin as if she really wanted to shoo him off the piano. “The Iron fey have their horrible glamour, just as we have ours. We turn into rabbits, they eat bank accounts. Grim, darling, do you have to sleep there?”
“You, Puck and Ironhorse will come in here,” Kimi continued, tapping the bottom of the blueprint. “Past the doors will be the security checkpoint, which will scan your ID card. Puck and Ironhorse will be invisible to mortal eyes, so we don’t have to worry about them being seen.”
“What if there are Iron fey on the first floor?” Puck asked.
“There aren’t,” Kimi replied, glancing at him. “Nelson and I checked it out. If the Iron fey are going into the building, they’re not using the front doors.”
That sounded ominous, like the Iron fey could have hidden doors or trods we didn’t know about, but there was nothing for it now.
“Once you’re past the checkpoint, the elevators are here,” Kimi went on, tracing the path with her finger before giving us a grave look. “And this is where things get dicey. I don’t know how you’re getting up to floor twenty-nine and a half. They might have a certain button only those with Sight can see, or there might be a password, or you might have to press buttons in a certain sequence. I have no idea. Alternatively, you can take the stairs, here, but that will mean climbing up thirty floors from ground level, with no guarantee there will be an entrance to floor twenty-nine and a half.”
“We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it,” Puck said, waving it away. “So, what about the floor with the scepter? What can we expect?”
“Wait a minute,” I warned, putting a hand on his chest. “This sounds awfully risky. We don’t know if we can even get up to the twenty-ninth floor? How is this good planning?”
“Twenty-nine point five,” Puck corrected me. “And it’s not. Good planning, I mean. But, look at it this way.” He grinned. “We either go with our gut, or we don’t go at all. Not a lot of choices, Princess. But, don’t worry.” He put an arm around my shoulders and squeezed. “You don’t need a plan. You have the Puck with you, remember? I’m an expert at this. And I’ve never needed an elaborate plan to pull anything off.”
There was a loud clank from the piano, as Leanansidhe finally convinced Grimalkin to sleep elsewhere. Annoyed, the cat had slid from his perch and landed with his full weight on the keys, then leaped to the bench. “Worry not, human,” the cat sighed, giving himself a thorough shake. “I am going with you as well. With Goodfellow’s exemplary planning, someone has to make sure you go through the right door.”
“Huh.” Puck snorted and glared at the feline. “That’s awfully helpful of you, cat. What’s in it for you?”
“Grimalkin and I worked something out, darling, don’t worry about it.” Leanansidhe gave the blueprint a cursory glance over Puck’s shoulder before dismissing it with a sniff. “Remember, pets, when you get to the floor where the scepter is being held, you must be prepared for anything. Robin, it will be up to you and the iron thing to protect the princess. I’m quite sure they won’t have the scepter lying around where anyone can snatch it. There will most likely be guards, wards, nasty things like that.”
“I WILL PROTECT THE PRINCESS WITH MY LIFE,” Ironhorse boomed, making Puck grimace and Kimi pin back her ears. “I SWEAR, WHILE I STILL LIVE AND BREATHE, NO HARM WILL BEFALL HER. WE WILL RETRIEVE THE SCEPTER, OR WE WILL DIE TRYING.”
“And personally, I’d like not to do the dying thing,” Puck added.
I was about to agree, when there was a commotion in the hall, and a moment later a human rushed into the room. It was Charles, the crazy piano player, looking as wild and panicked as I’d ever seen, even more than when we’d faced the redcaps. His anguished brown eyes met mine and he lurched forward, only to be stopped by Ironhorse stepping in front of me with a warning growl.
“She…she’s leaving?” Charles looked utterly despondent, wringing his hands and biting his bottom lip. “No no no. Can’t leave again. Can’t disappear. Stay.”
“Charles.” Leanansidhe’s voice made the air tremble, and the poor man gave her a terrified look. “What are you doing here? Go back to your room.”
“It’s all right, Charles,” I said quickly, as he looked on the verge of tears. “I’m not leaving for good. I’m coming back, don’t worry.”
He stopped wringing his hands, straightened, and looked at me dead on. And for just a moment, I saw him without the crazy light to his eyes. The way he must have been…before. Young. Tall. Handsome, with laugh lines around his mouth and jaw. A kind yet weary face. One that was vaguely familiar.
“You’ll come back?” he murmured. “Promise?”
I nodded. “Promise.”
Then Leanansidhe clapped her hands, the sharp rap making us jump. “Charles, darling,” she said, and was it my imagination, or did she sound a bit nervous? “You heard the girl. She’ll be back. Now, why don’t you find the other Charles and find something to play tonight? Go on, now. Shoo.” She waved her hand, and Charles, with one last look at me, stumbled from the room.
I frowned at Leanansidhe. “Other Charles? There’s more than one?”
“I call them all Charles, darling.” Leanansidhe shrugged. “I’m horrible with names, as you’ve no doubt seen, and human males look virtually the same to me. So they’re all Charles, for simplicity’s sake.”
Grimalkin sighed and leaped from the bench
. “We are wasting time,” he announced, bottlebrush tail held straight up as he trotted past. “If we are going to get this circus started, we should leave now.”
“Good luck, darlings,” Leanansidhe called as we followed Grim out of the room. “When you return, you must tell me all about it. Meghan, dove, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
KIMI AND NELSON LED the way back to the outside world. We followed them through several rooms, where groups of fey and humans watched us leave, down a red carpeted hallway, then up a long spiral staircase that finally stopped at a trapdoor in the ceiling. The trapdoor was oddly shaped: round, gray and heavy looking. I peered closer and saw that it was the bottom of a manhole cover. When Nelson pushed it up to peek through, bright sunlight spilled through the crack, and the smell of asphalt, tar and exhaust fumes assaulted my nose. While the half-troll scanned the road overhead, waiting for a clear spot, Kimi turned to me.
“This is as far as we go, I’m afraid.” The little half-phouka looked disappointed as she handed me a plastic ID card on a string.
“You’re not coming?”
She gave me an apologetic smile, nodding to Puck and Ironhorse. “Nah, you have your champions. Those two are pure-bloods. They’ll be invisible to humans just by virtue of being fey. Nelson and I can’t work glamour as well, and it would look suspicious if you were seen with a couple of streetrats in tow. Don’t worry, though. We’re really close to SciCorp, and from here you can take a taxi or something. Here.” She handed me a slip of paper, scrawled on with bright green ink. “That’s the address you’re looking for. The trod back will be on Fourteenth and Maple, and you want the second manhole from the left. Got it?”
I nodded, as my stomach fluttered nervously. “Got it.”
“Clear,” Nelson grunted, and shoved the manhole cover out of the way. Puck scrambled out first, then pulled me up after him. As Ironhorse and Grimalkin crawled out, I gazed around the middle of a busy street, A horn blared, and a bright red Mustang screeched to a stop a few feet away. “Get out of the road, you crazy bitch!” the driver yelled from the window, and I scrambled to the edge of the curb. The driver roared off, oblivious to the massive Iron faery who swung a huge fist at the hood, barely missing.
“You ran a light anyway, dickhead!” I yelled after him, as Puck and Ironhorse joined me on the sidewalk. People stared at me, shaking their heads or chuckling under their breath. I scowled, trying to calm my racing heart. They wouldn’t laugh if they could see Ironhorse looming over me like a protective bodyguard, glaring at anyone who got too close.
“Are you all right?” Puck asked anxiously, standing so close that his breath tickled my cheek. I nodded, and he kissed the top of my head, making butterflies swarm through my stomach. “Don’t scare me like that, Princess.”
“Well, that was amusing.” Grimalkin hopped lightly onto the sidewalk, making a show of taking his sweet time. “Are we quite ready to go, now? Human, you know where we are headed, correct?”
I looked down at the paper, still clutched in my hand. It trembled only a little. “You guys okay with taking a taxi?”
Puck made a face. “Now see, anyone else would have a few qualms about riding in a big metal box, but I’ve learned to deal.” He smirked. “All those years I took the bus with you was good practice. Still, keep the windows open, Princess.”
We found a pay phone, and I called for a taxi. Ten minutes later, a bright yellow cab pulled up, driven by a bearded man chewing a thick cigar. He kept glancing at me in the rearview window and smiling, oblivious to the two faeries pressed on either side of me, one glaring, one hanging his head out the window. I sat squashed between Puck and Ironhorse, with Grim on my lap and both windows rolled down, as we tore through the city streets. The smoke from the cabby’s cigar stung my nose and made my eyes water, and Puck looked positively green.
At last, we pulled up in front of a gleaming tower, the sunlight reflecting off the mirrored walls as they rose into the sky. I paid the cab fare, and we piled out of the car. As soon as we were free of the cab, Puck started coughing. He looked pale and sweaty, and my heart lurched, remembering Ash in the wasteland of the Iron fey. Ironhorse watched him curiously, as though fascinated, and Grimalkin sat down to wash his tail.
“Ugh, that was unpleasant,” Puck muttered when the harsh explosions finally stopped. He spit on the sidewalk and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I don’t know what was worse, the cab or the stench coming from the guy’s cigar.”
“Will you be all right?” I gave him a worried look, but he just grinned.
“Never better, Princess. So, here we are.” He craned his neck, gazing up at the looming expanse of SciCorp towers. His eyes gleamed with familiar mischief. “Let’s get this party started.”
MY HEART BEHAVED ITSELF until we passed through the large glass doors. Then it started beating my ribs so forcefully I thought they would break.
“Oh, wow,” I whispered, stopping to gape at the enormous lobby. A great vaulted ceiling soared above us, maybe eight or ten stories, with strange metallic designs dangling from wires, glittering in the sun. People in expensive suits rushed by us, designer shoes clicking over the sterile gray floor. I saw cameras in every corner, armed guards hovering by a turnstile security gate, and I locked my knees together to keep them from shaking.
“Steady, Princess.” As I stood there, gawking like an idiot, Puck’s firm hands came to rest on my shoulders. “You can do this. Keep your head up, your back straight, and it wouldn’t hurt to sneer at anyone who makes eye contact.” He squeezed my shoulders and bent close, his breath warm on my ear. “We’re right behind you.”
I gave my head a jerky bob. Puck squeezed my shoulders one last time and released me. Raising my chin, I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders and marched toward the security desk.
A guard in a slate-gray uniform eyed me with disinterest as I approached, looking the way I felt in algebra class, eyes glazed over and bored. The man in front of me muttered a quick, “Mornin’, Ed,” before passing his ID card under a scanner. The red light blipped to green, and the man swept through the turnstile.
My turn. Adopting what I hoped was an imperious expression, I sauntered up to the gate. “Good morning, Edward,” I greeted, slipping Rosalyn Smith’s badge under the flickering red scanner light. The guard bobbed his head with a polite smile, not even looking at me. Ha, I thought, triumphant. That was easy. We’re home free.
Then the scanner let out a shrill warning beep, and my heart stood still.
Ed stood up, frowning. “Sorry, miss,” he said, as ice water began creeping up my spine. “But I’ll have to see your badge.”
Puck, Grim and Ironhorse, already on the other side of the gate, looked back fearfully. I swallowed my terror, wondering if we should abandon the plan now and get the hell out. The guard held out his hand, waiting, and I forced myself to be calm.
“Of course.” Thankfully, my voice didn’t crack as I looped the badge from my neck and held it out. The guard took it and held it up to his face, squinting his eyes. I felt a dozen gazes on the back of my neck, and crossed my arms, trying to appear bored and irritated.
“Sorry, Ms. Smith.” Ed finally looked up at me. “But did you know your card expired yesterday? You’ll have to get a new one before tomorrow.”
“Oh.” Relief bloomed through my stomach. Maybe I could pull this off after all. “Of course,” I muttered, trying to sound embarrassed. “I’ve been meaning to renew it, but you know how busy it’s been lately. I just haven’t had the time. I’ll take care of it before I leave today. Thank you.”
“No problem, Ms. Smith.” Ed handed me the badge and tipped his hat. “You have a good morning.” He pressed a button and waved me through.
I hurried around a corner and collapsed against the wall before I started hyperventilating.
“None of that, Princess,” Puck said, pulling me to my feet just as a group of businessmen turned the corner, talking about reports and staff meetings and firing
a junior executive. I avoided eye contact as they swept by, but they paid me no attention.
“By the way, you did great back there,” Puck went on as we made our way down the brightly lit corridor. “I thought you would lose it, but you kept it together. Nice job, Princess.”
I grinned.
“First hurdle cleared,” Puck continued cheerfully. “Now, all we have to do is find floor twenty-nine point five, grab the scepter, and get out again. We’re halfway home.”
Easy for him to say. My heart had gone into overdrive, and a cold sweat was still dripping down the backs of my knees. I was just about to say so, when I noticed we had another problem. “Um, where’s Grimalkin?”
We glanced around hastily, but the cat had disappeared. Maybe his faith in the plan had been shaken by the little scene at the gate, or maybe he’d just decided “the hell with this,” and had taken off. It wouldn’t be the first time.
“WHY WOULD HE ABANDON US?” Ironhorse questioned, making me wince as his voice echoed down the hall. Thank goodness humans couldn’t hear faeries, either. “I THOUGHT THE CAITH SITH HAD HONORABLE INTENTIONS. I WOULD NOT HAVE PEGGED HIM A COWARD.”
Puck snorted. “You don’t know Grimalkin very well, then,” he commented, but I wasn’t sure I agreed. Grimalkin had always come through for us, even when he disappeared with no explanation. Though Ironhorse looked stunned, I wasn’t worried; Grimalkin would most assuredly pop up again when least expected.
