“No, you can’t. You don’t exist. What are you—” Her protestations ended in a cut-off scream as all of the faeries let loose a war cry and dove forward. The pressure in the room grew as the remnants of whatever Zirtha had been pulling in combined with Mungoosey’s elemental faery magic. The moment the faeries’ war sticks all hit Zirtha, everything exploded.
Actually only Zirtha exploded. Tiny pieces of her spread out as the faeries struck, then collapsed back into a small mass. I was extremely grateful at not having been eaten by a giant fanged fluff ball, but I didn’t want to be picking pieces of her out of my furniture for the next few years. Luckily whatever the faeries had used to destroy her pulled the pieces back into one neat pile of dust.
The faeries all circled the area, yelling war screams and thrusting their sticks into the air.
Except three.
Crusty, Garbage, and Leaf all looked quite fierce in their makeup and war feathers, but they were still my girls.
They flew up, then dropped to bow before the small gray queen.
“You have done your people proud.” Mungoosey’s speech was surprisingly clear. “On behalf of my kingdom, we thank you for bringing us this opponent.” Waving her wand, she dubbed all three of my faeries. “You have earned your war blades.” With that she turned back to me and flew very close. “There is much darkness, you will need light. We will watch.” Back to her cryptic self, she flew up and out the tube, the wild faeries whooping and chanting as they followed.
My three faeries flew up into the air and hovered, torn between staying with me and following their queen. Garbage looked to be the most likely to follow, but Crusty drifted back down to my knee. Moments later so did the other two. I did notice that Garbage kept looking up toward the tunnel.
“Is all good, we protect you now.” Garbage finally tore her gaze away from the tunnel long enough to wave her stick under my nose.
“And you did. Your queen was extremely gracious.”
“Yes, she save you.” Garbage gave the smuggest look that would fit on that tiny face, then flew off toward the faeries’ castle.
“Now we never hear end.” Crusty sat forlornly on my knee.
“What did I miss? Aren’t you both happy as well?” Leaf didn’t look any cheerier than Crusty.
“Yes, happy you not eaten,” Leaf said finally. “But it was Garbage’s idea to go find Queen Mungoosey. Now she leader.”
I wiggled my toes to make sure my legs were in working order, then carefully pulled myself up. Crusty didn’t move, just hung on to my pant leg with her free hand as the leg went vertical.
“Hasn’t she always been sort of the leader of you three?” Not that they usually listened to her, but I thought of her as the leader.
“Yes, but now she knows we know.” Crusty let go of my leg, then she and Leaf followed Garbage’s earlier flight path.
I shook my head, I couldn’t figure out faery thinking even when my brains hadn’t been scrambled by a bizarre encounter with a homicidal fuzz ball.
I went into the kitchen to get some much needed drink. When I couldn’t find any booze, I went for lemonade instead. The Dewdrop would be a good idea, but I was more rattled than I thought. My hand kept shaking as I sipped the tart drink.
A pounding on my front door almost sent me into the ceiling beams.
“Damn it! Who is it?” Forcing my hand to set the clenched glass down on the counter I walked over to the door, the death of Zirtha released the spell holding it closed. But I didn’t realize until I was almost bowled over by Alric.
“What the hell has been going on in here?” He was wearing a long black cloak and had the hood pulled up. But there was no way I didn’t know who he was.
The sword I’d seen when we grabbed Sammy was back and pulled half way out of the scabbard. A brace of daggers hung on his other hip, and from various bumps and bulges he had even more weaponry than I could see. Clearly the faeries hadn’t been with him all day.
He’d obviously come hunting something. I just hoped it wasn’t me. From the scowl on his face as he looked me over, I wasn’t sure that it wasn’t.
“What just happened?” He slowly re-sheathed his sword, but I noticed his hand didn’t stray far from the hilt.
Once I decided he wasn’t going to skewer me, I went back to the kitchen and finished my lemonade. Then I answered him. I was getting more than a bit tired of being everyone’s favorite target.
“Zirtha tried to kill me,” I raised my hand as he started to respond. “Oh wait, it gets better. She wasn’t Nirtha’s cousin or whatever she called herself. And she wasn’t whatever weird breed Nirtha was.”
“A Laxiarian, Nirtha was a Laxiarian. Annoying, but harmless.”
I flashed my best glare at him for cutting me off. “Doesn’t matter. Do Laxiarians have long barbed tongues and fanged teeth? Do they have spells that can suck the life right out of a person without touching them? No? Then I stand on my assumption, Zirtha wasn’t one of those.” I went and poured myself more lemonade, the shaking in my hands was finally leaving. Who knew sugar could almost be as good as ale?
“Where is she?” He flung back his cloak to reveal a very different outfit from the previous night. When he’d gone to meet with Covey, I hadn’t even recognized him. Easily could have passed for another academic. Which obviously was his goal.
But now he was the real Alric, or as close to real as I’d ever seen. Black garbed from his boots to his hair. The only thing breaking it up was the surplus of steel weapons hanging off him. He adjusted a few of those items as he sat on my sofa.
“You’re sitting on her.”
“What?” He jumped to his feet and spun around.
I hid my grin at his reaction behind another sip of lemonade. There really weren’t any parts of her on the furniture, at least I hoped not. Zirtha appeared to have imploded back into herself.
“She’s probably not actually there. I think most of her is in that pile of dust. The one you walked through when you charged in here. She exploded. Well, exploded, then imploded.”
Alric swore and bent down over the scattered dust pile. There really wasn’t much there, even less now that his boots went through it.
Just as he began looking for something to wipe the Zirtha dust off his boots, my faeries came flying back into the room. They’d changed out of the war feathers and had put away their war blades. All three lit up the instant they saw Alric.
“Do you see? We did that!” Garbage buzzed around the closest to his head, something she normally didn’t do. She was clearly relishing her new role of leader.
“Well, it wasn’t just—” I started to clarify when all three faeries started violently shaking their heads behind Alric. Then they buzzed forward and swarmed in front of him.
“It was us, we did that.”
“Just us.”
“No one else.”
I narrowed my eyes as I watched all three. “But—”
“Just us.” Crusty flew right up to my face and stared me in the eye. For some reason they didn’t want Alric to know about the other faeries.
“I’m not sure how they did it, but yeah, the girls destroyed Zirtha.” All three tiny faces broke out into smiles.
His lovely green eyes narrowed and he cocked his head. “Really. These three little things destroyed a full Grimarian troll?”
Luckily I’d finished most of my lemonade. “A what? Those aren’t real, they’re children’s stories they could never really exist.” Children’s nightmares more than stories. The creatures were the most vile, vicious monsters ever created by a literary mind.
He smirked. A real smirk. A tall, far too handsome, man of mystery standing in my living room, smirking.
“What’s so damn funny?” I sloshed more lemonade into my glass, then put the jug back without offering him any.
“It’s not funny really, it’s just that’s the first sign of terror I’ve seen from you. It’s good to know that something scares you.” His smile faded. “And it sho
uld, she should. Grimarian trolls do exist. But they don’t live in Lindor anymore they were all banished centuries ago. And for one to be here, now… Did she ask about the gargoyle?”
I marched past him and flung myself into my favorite chair. I didn’t invite him to sit either. “Not everything revolves around that damn piece of mystery glass. I know you and Covey are enraptured translating those scrolls, but there are other things going on.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“No. To answer your question, no she didn’t ask about the thing. She said she had been paid to keep me out of the ruins. Unfortunately she blew up before I could find out why.”
The old chime clock in the hall rang out its doleful and uneven melody. Reminding me it was six pm and Marcos would be by to pick me up in a few minutes.
I looked at Alric. Standing there looking sexy and dangerous. Crap. Not the person I wanted Marcos to see when he came over.
“Look, thanks for rescuing me and all. But as you see, the faeries already did it. I’ll fill you in tomorrow night at Covey’s if I remember anything else.” I tried shoving him toward the door, but he was as solid as I recalled.
“Why are you trying to get rid of me? You were just attacked by a creature that is banned from setting foot anywhere in this kingdom. It’s not something to brush off. What could possibly be more—?”
“I have a date.”
“What?” He pulled back as if I’d slapped him.
“A date. Tonight. In a few minutes he’s going to show up. And by damn I’m going out and having a nice time. He startles easily, so you really need not to be here.”
Alric pinched the bridge of his nose. “You have a date.”
“Yep, thought that was clear. Nothing to see here, everyone is fine, nothing new on your gargoyle. Will fill you in tomorrow night. Bye now.” I had succeeded in moving him slightly, mostly because he was letting me, and we were almost to the door when I heard footsteps up the walk. Booted footsteps.
“Change of plans.” I spun Alric around and shoved him toward the kitchen. “You hide here until we’re gone, then you leave.”
I stuck my head out the door without opening it fully. Not the best first impression for my date, but I desperately needed a fast shower. And equally desperately I didn’t want him to see Alric or the mess in the living room.
“I am so sorry. I had a …conflict with my landlady and we just got things resolved.” I flashed Marcos my best forgive-me grin. Damn he looked tasty tonight. His dark hair was down and loose for once, his clothing just tight enough to remind me how well he was put together.
“I just need five minutes to shower. But I can’t let you in right now the faeries got drunk and made a mess. There’s even a special cleaning crew coming in.” I really hoped Alric heard me and took the hint. There wasn’t much of Zirtha left in the living room, but the least he could do was get rid of it.
“Ah, but, lovely one, I don’t mind a little mess—”
“And they have been singing.”
His face paled and he took a step backward. I knew that would work. “I will just wait out here if you don’t mind.” He stepped back again and leaned against the hall. “But do not take too long I don’t want to be apart any more than absolutely necessary tonight.”
“I’ll be right back, I promise.” Locking the door I ran to my room. I didn’t see Alric, but hopefully he was crouching down in my kitchen like a good mysterious stranger.
I showered, changed into my nicest dress, and ran out the door.
Chapter 29
The restaurant was lovely, but Marcos seemed distracted the whole way there.
He’d been fine at my place when I’d first opened the door, but was subdued by the time I’d finished my shower.
The host tried to take us to the furthest table he could find, then doubled back and parked us near the kitchen. I shrugged. I was on a dinner date with a gorgeous man at a high-end restaurant. I didn’t care where we sat. And at least there was a window nearby.
A window that my dinner partner seemed entranced with.
“Are you waiting for someone?” I tried to keep my tone civil, but this wasn’t going the way I’d hoped.
Marcos pulled back as if he’d just seen me.
“I am so sorry, my flower. I have been a rude bore have I not? It is the jinns. They have something of mine, and I need it back. I am waiting for one of them to come by.”
He must have been planning on meeting them on the way to the restaurant, there would be no way those three could afford a place like this.
“Are they—?”
“What will you be ordering?” The waiter who cut me off was a short round dreg, skinny enough for that race to only be twice as wide as Marcos and I combined. He also stood a good foot away from us and managed to appear as if he wasn’t really talking to us.
“We haven’t seen any menus yet.” I knew this place would be snobby, I just figured they would still want our money enough to acknowledge us.
“If you tell me what you would like, I can have them make it.” Obviously he feared we would steal any menus they had.
“I don’t think—”
“We will both have Algarian steaks with fresh pears. Please.” Marcos answered quickly. He kept dividing his attention between the waiter and the window. But it was clear that he didn’t want the waiter there any more than the waiter wanted to be there.
“I don’t know if…” I let my complaint drop as Marcos turned his charm completely on me. It was the first time since he’d picked me up that I saw something I wanted to go home with.
“My flower, I know you will love this dish, yes?” He kissed my hand.
The waiter gave a rude snort. “I’ll see to it.” Without waiting for us to answer, he turned on his heel.
Marcos was just starting to respond to me like I’d wanted, when the waiter came back. “There is a …jinn…at the door for you. For obvious reasons we do not allow their kind in here.” The look on his face said he hoped both Marcos and I would leave along with the jinn at the door. However, he did dart forward quick enough to deposit our plates.
“Thank you.” Marcos leapt to his feet. “Please begin eating without me I will be right back.” With more energy than he’d shown most of the evening, he fled the dinner room.
Leaving me under the glare of the snobby dreg waiter. “I suppose you have the funds to pay if he fails to return.” It wasn’t a question and he didn’t wait for a response before he turned and marched off.
The food wasn’t bad, and I couldn’t tell if any discernable damage had been done to it. No blatant dropped-on-the-floor marks at least.
However I’d only gotten a few bites in when a shouting match erupted outside. Two men came into view, Marcos and Abhijeet.
Of all the jinns for Marcos to be meeting, it had to be Abhijeet? He was unstable and prone to violence. I thought about stepping outside, but one glare from the watchful waiter told me I was only doing that if I paid first.
My issue was resolved when both men stepped out of view. A moment later the shouting stopped and two moments later Marcos came back into the dining room.
Before the yelling match, Marcos had actually been attentive. But after he’d come back from that argument with Abhijeet he had gone back to being distracted. I was surprised that someone with, shall we say, Marcos’s delicate sensibilities would actually fight with a jinn. Granted, the twins weren’t really known for their magic skill level. Rumor was that the magic of one jinn had been spread across the three of them. Leading to three mediocre or worse magic users, who were pretty much outcasts from their own people.
That being what it was, Abhijeet was really the only one that was dangerous, yet Marcos had picked a fight with him and come back victorious. Well, at least he had come back intact and undamaged and Abhijeet was nowhere in sight.
“So you were telling me about your dig today?”
He wasn’t but I needed to do something to get his attention back from the window h
e was back to staring out of.
“What?” He slipped forward with a start, almost knocking his wine glass off the table. “I’m sorry, I just need to check something.” He stared at something only he could see in the window, then rose to his feet. “I’ll be right back.”
He took off as if I was a snake. Or a dead body. Looking around, I made sure that we hadn’t found one of those in the restaurant. He really didn’t react well to them.
The snooty waiter made his way back to the table. Why was it the only time the man came by was when Marcos was gone? Once the food had been thrown at us, he’d done a great job of avoiding us.
“Has the young gentleman left for good this time?”
I looked at the door, then at the plate of half-eaten food at his now empty place. I really hoped he hadn’t. If I had to pay for both of our meals it was going to wipe out any money I’d earned this week. Not to mention I’d be really pissed.
“No. The young gentleman has not left. He had an urgent issue.”
“With a jinn again, no doubt.” The tone of his voice was one level below the one used when telling someone about the dog poo they’d had to scrap off their favorite boots. “I see. Well, we do close in an hour. Please see that you have finished and paid by then.” With a huff so loud he practically shook the windows, he minced off. He was too snooty to even stomp properly.
The outer door swung open again, and Marcos sauntered back in. I had no idea what he’d been doing, and he’d only been gone a few minutes, but he came back a changed man. Not only was the charming gregarious man who had shown up at my house an hour ago back, he’d put some extra swagger in his step.
“Ah, my lovely flower, I am so sorry I had to abandon you for so long.” He picked up my hand and trickled kisses down my palm.
“You were just gone a few minutes.” He was incredibly cheesy, but too damn cute to let it bother me.
“But it seemed to be so much more.” He took one look at the plate he’d previously been wolfing down, and shoved it away. “I am hungry for other things. Do you think the cleaning crew has finished your home?’
The Glass Gargoyle (The Lost Ancients Book 1) Page 23
