Elf Raised (Northern Creatures Book 3)

by Kris Austen Radcliffe

  “Can we learn rehabbing?” Akeyla asked. “I want to learn how to help at the Sanctuary, Ms. Benta.”

  Jax’s frown deepened. The poor kid really seemed to want to visit the cats.

  Benta looked up at me and I suspect she read my response on my face. She sniffed and looked away. “I’ll think about it,” she said.

  I opened my mouth, but out on the driveway, Maura dropped a suitcase onto the gravel. I pointed. “Back in a second,” I said, and walked outside.

  I’d talk to Benta about her no-wolf policy later.

  Birds chirped and squirrels ran tree trunks. Maura inhaled deeply and slammed the truck’s tailgate.

  She smirked and held out the keys. “Special delivery.”

  Today, Maura wore her standard “Akeyla’s Mom” glamour—brown ponytail, smooth though supposedly middle-aged face, blue eyes, large-ish breasts with matching hips. She looked like three quarters of the mundane women in Alfheim.

  The truck also matched the mundanes. “When did you get a new truck?” I asked.

  Maura rolled her eyes. “It’s for you, silly.” She shook her head. “A gift from Magnus to say thank you for saving his horses.”

  The vampires had totaled my old truck and I was, at the moment, relying on Benta for transportation. I took the keys. “He saved his horses, not me.”

  Magnus had woven the sigils that cleansed Bloodyhoof and the two Percherons of their low-demon possessions.

  Maura chuckled. “I told him you’d say that. He now owes me twenty bucks.”

  I frowned.

  “What?” she asked, then shook her head again.

  The truck looked to be a newer model of the same vehicle I’d driven before the vamps destroyed it.

  Maura nodded toward the cab. “Magnus says it has all the bells and whistles. It sure drives nice.”

  Magnus gave me a truck? Part of me wondered what he wanted in exchange. But Magnus wasn’t that kind of elf, and had many times over the years been generous with townspeople in need.

  Maura squeezed my arm. “Several elder elves were in Dad’s den this morning.” She glanced at the house. “They were yelling, which is why we came early. The kids don’t need that.”

  No, they didn’t. No one needed whatever political fight the elder elves were in the process of hatching.

  “They want Benta to come in as soon as possible.” She looked up at me. “And you.”

  Was the truck Magnus buttering me up for a new fight?

  Maura ran her hand across the top of the truck’s bed. “Magnus wants to thank you, though I do think he’s binding one of Alfheim’s greatest warriors to the kingdom.” She rubbed her neck. “If it’s conscious or not, I don’t know.”

  “What were they yelling about?” Because if a new fight was coming, I’d like to know what it was.

  She looked up at my face again. “Someone flew into The Cities last night. Magnus sent a plane down to bring them north.” She looked away. “There was talk of a Conclave.”

  Oh, no, I thought. The last time the elves called a Conclave, they deposed one of the Kings.

  Arne was vulnerable.

  Maura looked down at the gravel. “It hasn’t even been a full twenty-four hours since they closed up Vampland.”

  “Vampland?” They gave the pocket borderland a name?

  Maura chuckled. “You can thank your niece for that one.”

  “Arne let Akeyla name the vampire’s pocket land?”

  “What else are we going to call it?” She shrugged. “Land of the Evil Librarians?”

  She had a point.

  “I’ll come in.” Arne needed to know what happened in Vampland, especially if he had to defend his actions to the other Kings. Not that I wanted to tell that tale, but I was the one who’d had the pipe in my chest, so it was up to me to give him the details. “Benta will when she’s ready.”

  Maura nodded toward the house. “Are we interrupting?” she asked. “Moving back in today?”

  “No,” I said, probably faster than Maura expected. Benta would not be spending a lot of nights. I learned that the last time we were semi-together, though I don’t think my negative response came from her attitude, but more from her being here in the first place.

  I looked back at the door. The kids were leading her toward the kitchen. Though Jax still frowned, neither of them seemed upset about finding her here, so why did I feel uncomfortable?

  Maura picked up one of her suitcases. “I don’t want to impose,” she said. “Really. I don’t. If you and Benta are back together and need space, we can go back to Mom and Dad’s place.”

  Something thumped in my kitchen. Akeyla laughed. Jax said something I couldn’t hear.

  They were magical, the kids. Yes, in a literal sense that coiled around them, but also in a family way—true family. I wasn’t giving that up.

  I didn’t see Benta taking to my life well, no matter how much of a sensual mother-goddess she was.

  “Come in,” I said. “Benta and I aren’t serious.” No, we weren’t. We couldn’t be. “She wanted to keep an eye on me last night.”

  Maura snorted. “Sure, big brother.” She winked as she carried her suitcase toward the door. “Whatever you say!”

  I picked up my elven sister’s other suitcases and carried her life back into my world.

  Chapter 3

  After lots of promises to take the kids to The Alfheim Wildcat Sanctuary for a tour and some age-appropriate volunteer training—I insisted Benta allow Jax to come—she kissed my cheek, gathered her things, and made her way into town and her elf business. I was to make my way to The Great Hall posthaste in my Magnus-gifted, shiny new truck.

  Maura watched me more than Benta when the elder elf left. My adoptive sister stood in the hallway with her arms crossed and her lips thin. Then she shook her head and returned to herding magical children.

  The kids wouldn’t let me go until we laid out a detailed plan for this evening’s dinner and brownie dessert. I left with a long grocery list and promises to bring back everything the kids needed to make “magic burgers” and “fun fries.” No doubt I’d be running the grill this evening, international elven crisis or not.

  Akeyla and Jax waved as I walked toward Magnus’s gifted behemoth, then they ran around the house to the deck. Maura followed, but took a moment to inspect the damaged wine bottle gate.

  I suspected she’d have it fixed before the end of the week.

  My new truck was a dark, almost-wine shade of red and for a second I considered naming it Bloodyhood, but thought better of it. I suspected one of the kids would also come up with the same name soon enough, anyway.

  I hopped into the bed. She had the nicest bedliner I’d ever seen, with a grippy-yet-clean black finish. The new toolbox gleamed in the bright morning light. The hinge locked when I opened it, but the most impressive addition was a well-organized, already-stocked interior and a section that appeared to be specifically for my elven axe, Sal.

  Someone had stuffed a soft indigo-violet velvet blanket, shimmering with a consistent low-level magic, into the space.

  I’d rather know who had enchanted the blanket before I placed my axe in the toolbox, and I’d already put her on the passenger seat. She seemed fine with my decision, and I got the sense she’d rather be in the open air, anyway.

  “I think you’ll like your spot back here, though,” I said.

  She mentally shrugged. Right now, she liked the idea of riding shotgun.

  “Whatever you want, my friend,” I said.

  The impression my axe threw back at me was That’s right. I laughed and closed the toolbox.

  The impressiveness of the interior matched the exterior—Bloodyhood was a lovely piece of machinery, with soft leather seats, individual temperature controls on the vents, heads-up displays for function and monitor, and at least six cup holders. The vent controls were a bit much, but I expected nothing less from Magnus.

  I drove through downtown to get a look at the site where the vampi
res had yanked me into Vampland. The intersection was still blocked off, and I suspected Ed Martinez, our sheriff, had towed what was left of my old truck to Gullinbursti’s.

  I turned onto the service road fronting The Great Hall. I’d check to see if Ed had left me a message once I parked.

  The Great Hall looked… different. The elves’ cleansing spells reset all glamours, and the “dingy hotel” default still looked dingy, but something had shifted.

  I parked in the real lot across the street, in the back corner where my new truck wouldn’t be in the way, and stared at the hotel façade the elves use to keep mundanes out of their business.

  The building hadn’t changed—it continued to look like a beige-painted concrete box with a party space slapped onto its side. The “parking lot” buffer wasn’t any larger or smaller, and all the unhappy bushes still looked as equally unhappy as they had before.

  But something was different. I picked up Sal, closed the door, and leaned against the truck’s rear fender.

  Maybe the magic looked different. I squinted. The glamour around The Hall had a wave of colors to it—a kind of water-like flow—that wasn’t clearly visible on this side, but sometimes I could pick it out.

  “What do you think?” I asked my axe.

  She mentally inhaled as if breathing in fresh air.

  I chuckled. “It does seem cleaner, doesn’t it?”

  The currents of magical energy around the glamour moved faster, as if the reset had cleared out years’ worth of debris from its magical riverbed. Swirls of blue appeared more circular. Woven lines of reds and oranges appeared more evenly braided.

  Sal tossed me a distinct sense of nearby wolf.

  I glanced around. A few of the older wolves could blend into the surroundings so well even I missed them if I wasn’t looking. It wasn’t magic. They were so good at being wolves that even in human form, they could stalk and ambush prey.

  In some ways, the werewolves were more like Benta’s cougars than real wolves.

  Remy Geroux leaned against the passenger side of his own truck, deep in a shadow and framed more by the lot’s bordering stand of trees than his vehicle. He waved and walked over when I noticed him.

  “Don’t teach your nephew to do that,” I said. We didn’t need Jax getting into his head that sneaking in and out of Akeyla’s room was a good idea.

  Remy laughed and slapped my arm. “He’ll learn anyway.”

  “True,” I said. Not a lot any of us could do about it.

  Remy was slightly smaller than his brother, and stood about the same height as Maura. He was the classic “Special Ops” body type that handled turning werewolf well—lean, fast, and mobile, with a surprising amount of physical strength. Remy, like his brother, could flip a car if he needed to, and it wasn’t just his wolf, either. They’d both been stronger than usual before they were bitten centuries ago.

  Remy watched the world through hazel, honey-colored irises, which, like his strength, were his and not a byproduct of his wolf, though his eyes did shout “magical creature.” I’d long wondered if of the two Geroux brothers, Remy had been the one truly destined for wolf-dom, and not Gerard.

  But he wasn’t the pack’s lead Alpha. His brother and sister-in-law governed better. It never seemed to bother Remy.

  “Hello to your axe,” he said, and nodded toward Sal’s blade.

  Sal didn’t respond. Either she chose to ignore him, or something about wolf magic didn’t blend with her magic, much like the Odin’s Gallows dagger and Rose’s notebook.

  Remy shrugged. “She is not the only elven weapon to ignore me.”

  “Don’t feel bad,” I said. “She won’t talk to half the elves, either.”

  He pointed at the glamour. “Something feels different,” he said. “For the life of me I cannot pick it out.”

  “The energy flow around the edges is smoother, and more… geometrically sound.” I twirled my finger though the air. “The natural magic there…” I pointed again. “… and there…” Another point. “… looks truer to its spellwork shape.”

  “I do wish I had your magic-seeing ability,” he said.

  “The circles and lines that make up the sigils appear more circular and straight.”

  He nodded. “So they defragged the system?”

  I hadn’t thought of it that way. “Yeah.”

  He patted my truck. “I’m here to report on outliers.” He nodded toward the town. “We have Mark Ellis in isolation just to be sure. He seems good. No residual vampire enthrallings. Axlam is more concerned about psychological trauma.”

  The poor kid would be as scarred by the vampires as I was. At least I hadn’t been possessed.

  Remy leaned closer. “Turns out the two families in town I’ve long suspected were touched are, in fact, touched.”

  Arne had been correct—with seven thousand mundanes in the area, someone was likely carrying residual magic the cleansing spells would upset.

  “They’re okay?”

  “Arne will talk to them.” Remy walked toward the glamour. “He is the All-Father, after all.” He walked to the edge of the lot and the location of the outer gate into The Hall—and stopped. “Shouldn’t you be sleeping off the whole mess?”

  On my shoulder, Sal humphed.

  Remy shrugged, then waved his hand. Nothing happened. He waved again.

  “I think the reset removed the outer gate,” I said.

  Remy stuck his hands into his back pocket. “Better for wolves to enter through the doors, anyway.” He walked toward the hotel’s “entrance.”

  Most of the wolves left their clothes in the “lobby” before entering The Great Hall. It cut down on naked exits.

  I followed Remy toward the doors. “What are you going to do if the coatroom’s gone?”

  He turned around, threw his arms into the air … and walked backward into the first set of sliding glass doors leading into the hotel lobby.

  He turned around. They still did not open.

  I walked up. They wouldn’t open for me, either. The Great Hall would not allow us in.

  “Okay, then,” Remy said.

  I peered through the glass as if the image inside was truly what we’d walk into if the doors would let us. No unorganized magic. No strangeness. Just a “set to factory default” glamour of the standard interior doors and the lobby beyond.

  “How unfriendly.” Remy rubbed the side of his nose. “Arne’s probably in there getting his ears in a twist because his pack and his paladin haven’t yet come to his side.”

  “They have to know we’re locked out,” I said. We couldn’t call. The Hall didn’t have cell coverage. We’d have to wait for an elf to come out.

  Remy shook his head. “The last time they reset the glamour, they remembered to key us in.”

  What would distract Arne Odinsson enough that he would forget to allow the non-elf magicals—and me—into The Hall?

  Or what would stop him from allowing us in?

  “Remy,” I said. “Magnus sent a plane down to The Cities, didn’t he?”

  He shook his head. “I haven’t heard.”

  The doors parted and a gust of “hotel airlock air” rolled out over the concrete entrance walkway were Remy and I stood. Hotel music followed. The reset had upped the quality of the interior glamour.

  Two elves I did not recognize walked side by side through the inside set of sliding doors. They glamoured as they passed over the first threshold into two unassuming, if tall, men.

  I looked at Remy. He looked at me.

  The two elves walked through the outer doors and stopped just outside the entrance. Both took up guard positions.

  They were either actual twins, or had figured out how to duplicate their glamours. They were tall even for elves and no more than four or so inches shorter than me. Both glamoured up short-cut nondescript brown hair. Both wore black leather bomber jackets and black sunglasses, and stood like off-duty police or a security detail.

  They even carried earpieces. />
  The one on the left barked what had to be an order. The one on the right echoed his companion.

  Traditional elven customs said that when visiting an enclave, one should speak the host’s language.

  These two weren’t speaking English. No, they were speaking the last language I wanted to hear from any elf—Russian.

  “You two are Siberians, aren’t you?” I asked.

  Neither answered.

  Remy pointed his thumb at the two elves. “I guess our friends here answer your question about who flew in last night.”

  I would have expected Icelandic elves—which these two might still be, even though they spoke Russian. The Siberians did farm out their elves as bodyguards.

  I shifted Sal to my other shoulder. “We need to speak to either Arne Odinsson or Dagrun Tyrsdottir,” I said.

  The two elves looked at each other. The one on the left barked out more commands, though they seemed to have slipped from Russian into Icelandic, or perhaps Old Norse.

  The two elves stepped together and completely blocked the entrance.

  Sal blasted off a wave of not impressed and the elf on the right twisted his head slightly as if listening. The one on the left did not.

  “My axe wishes to converse with Alfheim’s elder elves,” I said.

  The two shook their heads in unison.

  Remy pointed at Sal. “He is the chosen carrier of an elven weapon. Let us in.”

  They shook their heads again.

  Remy pinched the bridge of his nose. He pulled out his phone. After a moment, he spoke into the receiver. “It’s Remy. Frank and I stopped by but the two Taken wannabees out front won’t let us in.”

  The elf on the right’s lip twitched.

  “So I’m leaving you this message instead.” He hung up. “Arne will call when he has a chance,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  “I was there.” I stepped forward and stood directly in front of the two elves. “I was in the center of the vampires’ spells. I suffered the twisting of my protection enchantments and a blood-draining pike through my heart.” I thumped my chest. “What happened was not Arne Odinsson’s fault, nor was it the fault of any of Alfheim’s elves.” I made of point of looking down at the two elves. “Allow us to pass.”