Unsuspecting Trouble (The Inscrutable Paris Beaufont Book 3)

by Sarah Noffke

  “What things?” Paris looked the father of time over. As before, he was in elf form and wearing hippie-type clothes—frayed jean shorts and a t-shirt that said, “If we all had a bong, we’d all get along.”

  “Things,” Papa Creola repeated. “Captain Morgan is fine, although she’s complaining incessantly about how the humidity is messing up her hair.”

  “Oh, I would be complaining too,” Rudolf stated. “Where is she being held?”

  Papa Creola shrugged. “I have no clue. It’s your job to track down your daughter, now isn’t it?”

  “You know that Captain Morgan is okay, but you don’t know where she is?” Paris questioned.

  “You know how to put on your shoes, but I bet you don’t know how to make them,” Papa Creola countered. “There are always holes in knowledge. I can only see so much. Besides, part of this is you all figuring out where the halfling is .”

  “Then we go and rescue her,” Paris added.

  Papa Creola shook his head. “No, that’s exactly what the Deathly Shadow wants. He abducted Captain Morgan knowing there was a certain someone who would feel responsible for this and come to her rescue.”

  “Well, it is my fault,” Paris argued. “The Deathly Shadow wants me. He’s trying to draw me out and wouldn’t have taken Captain Morgan if not for me.”

  “Sounds like you should off yourself and make everyone’s life easier,” Subner offered, indicating the many cases filled with swords and knives. “I can pick out a weapon for the job.”

  Papa Creola ignored his assistant. “I believe that the Deathly Shadow thinks you’ll come after Captain Morgan. By allowing her to send that text message, he’s made it possible for you to find him. At first, I thought he was rusty, but now it all makes sense. He’s orchestrated this whole thing to trap you. The Deathly Shadow is betting on you, Paris, coming after Captain Morgan. That’s when he’ll make his final move. We must turn the tables on him and do things on our terms, or once again he’ll have the upper hand and probably succeed this time.”

  “So you don’t want us to go after Captain Morgan?” Paris asked.

  “I don’t want you to,” Papa Creola answered. “She is her father’s responsibility.”

  King Rudolf drew in a breath, looking defeated. “I don’t know how to find her. I mean, if Saks Fifth Avenue isn’t releasing this season’s designer bags, I have no idea how to locate my daughter.”

  “Maybe the solution is to kill myself,” Subner muttered, looking around at the wall of weapons as if searching for the right one.

  “You know that you can’t be killed.” Papa Creola sighed.

  Something suddenly occurred to Paris and she turned to King Rudolf. “The text message that Captain Morgan sent. It should give us a rough idea of her location if we reverse the magitech in your phone.”

  The fae retrieved the phone from his pocket and eyed it. “Can I find that option in the app store?”

  Paris shook her head. “Take the phone to Uncle John at FLEA down the street. He should be able to find the information for you.”

  Papa Creola nodded. “That should get you an approximate location, but from there you’ll have to do more investigating to find the Captain’s exact location.”

  “Then I go after her,” King Rudolf stated victoriously.

  “No, then you have to wait,” Papa Creola declared.

  “But she has a spray tan appointment tomorrow,” King Rudolf argued. “When that fades, well, she looks as white as a seagull and squawks loudly about it like one.”

  Father Time gave Paris a sturdy expression. “The timing of this has to be right. You can’t face the Deathly Shadow until everything is in place.”

  “What do I need to do?” Paris asked.

  “You’ll need to lure him away from his location,” Papa Creola explained. “He’s picked it because it offers an advantage, so we have to turn the tables.”

  “Like when he tricked my parents into going through the vortex,” Paris guessed.

  “That’s right,” he affirmed. “The way to destroy the Deathly Shadow isn’t complicated. It’s the exact thing inside you that you’ll have to use to overpower him. That’s why ironically, the one he’s wanted to recover is the only one who has ever had the chance of ending his reign.”

  “That all sounds very abstract.” Paris suddenly felt defeated. “How do I use my inner strength to overpower him?”

  “You’ll figure it out,” Papa Creola said matter-of-factly.

  Paris slumped, realizing that she should have expected this answer but wishing that he had offered something—anything that helped.

  “I can tell you that you’re going to need something special to contain the Deathly Shadow,” Papa Creola continued. “Unfortunately, because of what he did to himself, he can’t really die. So your job will be to overpower him finally and put him in something that locks him away for eternity.”

  “What is this container?” Paris asked.

  King Rudolf sighed. “I don’t know, but when you find out, let’s put the 1980s in there. That fashion and music don’t ever need to come back.”

  “Only one person can make this container,” Papa Creola explained.

  Paris nodded and rolled her eyes. “That seems about right. Let me guess, they won’t want to help me, and I’ll have to defeat some monster to get them to do it?”

  Subner started suddenly, looking like he’d awoken from a nightmare. He glanced around and sighed. “Oh, for a moment I thought Liv was here. Turns out that it’s her daughter and she’s inherited her tendency toward sarcasm.”

  “Actually,” Papa Creola began, his focus still on Paris. “They’ll want to help because they were one of your mother’s closest friends.”

  King Rudolf pressed his hands to his chest. “I’m the one who has to make the container.”

  Papa Creola shook his head. “No, it’s Rory Laurens.”

  “Rory Laurens, as in he might be related to Bermuda Laurens?” Paris asked. “I was going to seek her out for something.”

  Papa Creola pointed at Paris’ pocket where her phone was. “The timing might seem perfect since Sophia messaged you about a meeting she set up for you with the author of Magical Creatures.”

  “Spoiler alert,” Subner muttered. “He planned the timing.”

  Paris retrieved her phone from her pocket and saw a message from Sophia about a meeting she’d set up. “So I meet with Bermuda, and she’ll help me find Rory?”

  “Or I hand you a crossbow and we all leave you to do the right thing,” Subner offered.

  “If I were going to kill myself in your shop, I’d do it as messy as I could and get blood everywhere,” Paris teased.

  The elf shrugged. “I need to get new carpet anyway.”

  “Once Rory has made the container, then we can proceed to the showdown,” Papa Creola explained. “In the meantime, King Rudolf, find your daughter’s location. I’ll work on finding the right place for the confrontation. That will be important. We must figure out how to draw the Deathly Shadow to us. More important than any of that is we need something that uses the container and the power of the Deathly Shadow to reopen the vortex he created fifteen years ago. He’s the only one who can, and we’ll only have one chance.”

  Paris thought for a moment. “Well, we’d use the Deathly Shadow’s energy to pin down the right location of the other dimension. Then we need something to anchor onto that and open a vortex. It seems as though there’s some magitech that we could use for such things.”

  “Good.” Papa Creola sighed. “I hoped it wouldn’t take you long to figure that out.”

  Paris laughed at this. “Or you could have simply told me.”

  “I can’t,” he argued.

  “Because like Mama Jamba you’re trying to empower me,” Paris guessed.

  He shook his head. “I’m not wired to be overly helpful. It gives me hives.”

  Another chuckle fell from her mouth. “You gods are so strange.”

  “Ok
ay, we all know what to do.” Papa Creola created a shimmering blue and green portal in front of Paris. “This will lead you to Bermuda Laurens, who is waiting for you. Be careful. Get everything ready as quickly as you can. This is finally our chance to defeat the Deathly Shadow, but we have to prepare perfectly.”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  The portal spat Paris out onto a beautiful green plain with rolling hills and trees every so often. It unmistakably smelled like a farm.

  Paris glanced down at her boots to ensure she wasn’t standing in the middle of a patty of cow waste. Thankfully she wasn’t, but the odor was still all around her.

  After nearly being trampled by a horse recently, Paris tensed when a large creature thundered in her direction from across the grassy hills. Well, it didn’t thunder like a stallion. Instead, the wide animal with long hair trotted toward her, swaying from side to side. What was stranger than the beast that looked ready to slowly mow Paris down was the tower of giraffes that ambled toward her behind the creature.

  Paris didn’t feel that she was in any immediate danger of getting trampled until she turned to look over her shoulder and saw the biggest person she’d ever seen. Paris had seen many giants on Roya Lane. They had the worst tempers and thought they could bully easily due to their size. The giantess who strode across the green grass in Paris’ direction was larger than the others, making them look like dwarfs of the species.

  The giants on Roya Lane were usually about six-and-a-half feet tall. The rumor was that they were halflings of sorts because real giants would never live in actual society. The “real giants” all lived on the Isle of Man apparently, and they were huge. The one approaching had to be at least seven feet tall, and although she wore an olive green safari suit and hat, she didn’t appear to be a welcoming tour guide based on the scowl on her face.

  Paris glanced over her shoulder to find that the giraffes and the yak in the lead had paused. She glanced back to see the giantess had halted a few paces from Paris.

  “You look like your mother, Guinevere,” the woman said after measuring Paris up. “Let’s hope for both our sakes that you don’t act like her.”

  Chapter Forty

  “You’re Bermuda Laurens?” Paris studied the giantess. She appeared both approachable and menacing. It was a weird combination. Paris expected her to try and eat her and bake her an apple pie at the same time.

  “The one and only.” She glanced over Paris’ head to the tower of giraffes and the strange yak trotting along. “You’re Guinevere Beaufont, the halfling who is both unique and rare in her combination and also desirability.”

  “I prefer to go by Paris,” she muttered dryly.

  “Then you accept this fate that you’ve received?”

  “You mean the whole being rare and therefore hunted?” Paris shrugged. “Yeah, sure. Does that mean the rumors are true, and I’m the only fairy and magician ever to be born?”

  “As far as I’m aware, you’re the only creature with two magical species to ever exist,” Bermuda stated stoically. “Mortals have been able to breed with giants, gnomes, and many others. It isn’t easy, the more advanced the magical creature, like fae but—”

  Paris laughed. “Fae advanced? Do you mean in abilities to make me want to kill them?”

  “You are like your mother,” Bermuda said flatly. “Although fae can be considered quite irritating in their behavior, they’re also very powerful and one of the longest-living magical creatures on the planet. So yes, they’re considered advanced.”

  “I’m the only halfling with two magical species?” Paris asked. “That’s so bizarre.”

  “Well, you’re not a result of science, as you know,” Bermuda stated.

  “No, I’m the result of a genie’s sick joke,” Paris muttered.

  “Regardless, you exist, and you’re unique.” The giantess regarded her with new interest. “Really, you’d be quite fascinating to study. When analyzing a problem, do you consider how you feel about it or how you think about it first?”

  “I don’t know,” Paris said honestly.

  “When you have a decision, do you prefer the easy option even if it’s less desirable or the harder one that will be more advantageous?” Bermuda asked.

  “Strangely enough, I haven’t done a lot of self-reflection in that regard,” Paris answered. “I’m still getting used to the idea that I’m a halfling.”

  “Self-awareness is the first step to discovery.”

  “Right.” Paris drew out the word. “I was here because—”

  Something nibbling on her shoulder cut Paris off. She looked up and started to find the yak chewing on her jacket. She spun and was further surprised to see the tower of giraffes all gathered there, staring down at her with mild interest.

  “It’s not a surprise that Nevin came to you,” Bermuda said.

  “Nevin?” Paris asked. “Who is Nevin?”

  “He’s the yak.” Bermuda leaned forward, closer to Paris. “He thinks he’s a giraffe and isn’t ready to face the truth, so don’t tell him.”

  “Did you just tell him?” Paris looked between the yak and the giraffes, noting the obvious differences. “Can’t he simply see that he’s different?”

  “He can’t speak English.”

  “Well, I won’t tell him since I can’t speak yak.” Paris stepped to the side, out of Nevin’s reach.

  “You might be able to. Have you tried?” Bermuda asked.

  Paris shook her head, wondering if all her mother’s friends were strange. She had a feeling that they were.

  Bermuda blinked at her, annoyance in her gaze. “No, Nevin can’t see the differences between him and the giraffes. Could you see how different you were from fairies before you knew you weren’t one completely?”

  “I am one,” Paris argued. “I’m half.”

  “You’re technically a magician because both your parents were,” Bermuda stated. “But due to magic, you are half-fairy.”

  “Technicalities rule the world,” Paris joked, not earning a reaction from Bermuda.

  “Nevin thinks he’s a giraffe,” Bermuda explained. “He hangs with them instead of his own, like you. Even if he were to look in a mirror, he’d see himself as a giraffe, picking out those qualities he shares rather than his differences.”

  “Like the ears?” Paris teased, not finding any similarities between the large and fat gray beast and the tall brown and white giraffes.

  “Like the personalities,” Bermuda corrected. “There’s a lot more to appearances than the way things look.”

  “Here I’ve had it wrong my entire life,” Paris quipped.

  “You didn’t come here to study safari animals, I’m guessing,” Bermuda snapped her fingers, and a large bag of feed materialized in one of her arms and a couple of containers in her other hand. She pushed one of the cups into Paris’ hand. “I’m guessing that you’ve come to take knowledge from me like your mother. Magicians are always after information.”

  “An unruly bunch we are,” Paris joked and sighed, looking at the empty cup.

  Bermuda shook her head, not at all impressed. “Well, if you’re going to learn anything from me, you’ll do it while earning your keep.”

  “You’re feeding me to the lions then?”

  The giantess shook her head. “You’re going to feed the animals.”

  Chapter Forty-One

  Bermuda Laurens plunged the second cup into the bag and held it out for Paris to take. She did, exchanging it for the empty one.

  Immediately, the closest giraffe was her best friend sticking its mouth into the cup and nibbling on the pellets of food. It ate in quite the civilized manner, not at all forceful.

  “They’re so peaceful,” Paris observed, never having been this close to such large animals and surprised that they didn’t intimidate her. The giraffes lined up for their food and patiently waited their turn. She had expected to feel as if she was about to be trampled by the tallest animals in the world, as with the stallion at Happily Eve
r After College, but she didn’t.

  “That’s because they aren’t normal giraffes.” Bermuda tossed out the food for the others to eat off the ground. “They’re magical and known as peace giraffes.”

  “Because they make those around them calm,” Paris guessed, definitely feeling relaxed and in a very noticeable way from before.

  “Exactly,” Bermuda affirmed. “They’re great to have at mental hospitals and other places where stress and anxiety can be high.”

  “How can I get a support peace giraffe?” Paris asked.

  “Do you have a million dollars?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t have a hundred dollars.”

  “Then you’re not getting one.” Bermuda tossed out more food. “The price of the animal isn’t the only challenge. They also eat about seventy-five pounds of food a day.”

  Paris glanced at the large bag of feed, which was already half-empty from the giantess spreading it over the grass. “I hope you brought more food.”

  “I’ll conjure more when we walk over to the other animals,” Bermuda stated.

  Paris refilled her cup, holding it out for Nevin.

  “He won’t eat from someone’s hand,” Bermuda explained. “You’re better off throwing it out for him.”

  “What’s his magical power?” Paris asked.

  “He thinks he’s a giraffe,” Bermuda muttered.

  “So an identity crisis is a magical power now, is it?”

  “Of course. Believing you’re something that you’re not takes extraordinary abilities.”

  Paris shook her head, realizing that she had a lot to learn. The giraffes and Nevin had made quick work of the bag of feed, and when it was empty, they immediately became less interested in Paris, trotting off in the opposite direction.

  Bermuda summoned another couple of bags that she set at her feet. Not seeing any animals nearby, Paris squinted into the distance where there were rows of trees, all of their low branches trimmed by the tall giraffes. She felt as though she was on the African plains and definitely could have been since Papa Creola had created the portal that brought her there.