Elysian Fields

by Suzanne Johnson

  An overwhelming need to touch him set my fingers twitching. Not in a sensual way, but because I knew something wasn’t right. It was that bonding crap.

  Mentally cursing Rand and his entire troublesome species, I walked up behind him and tugged the hem of his sweater up to his shoulder blades, hissing in a breath as he stilled. Deep marks scoured his back, fresh cuts in a regular grid, a couple still seeping blood. He’d been whipped, and badly.

  He’d said the Synod would punish him for defying them, but I couldn’t take any pleasure in his pain. Not this. “Take off your sweater and sit down.”

  I didn’t wait for an answer, just headed upstairs to my library and pulled out aloe, hawthorn, ground hibiscus—all magic-infused—and mixed them in a base of holy water. I’d used my healing potion on wizards and mers, but had no idea if it would heal an elf. All my premade potions had gone up in a fiery explosion this afternoon.

  After carrying the potion back downstairs, I stopped at the kitchen door, speechless. Rand had taken off the sweater. Purple and turquoise bruises bloomed across his abdomen, and a burn mark in the shape of lightning bolt had turned the skin over his right pec a bright red.

  The brutality of it shocked me. No wonder he wasn’t moving well. “What in God’s name have they done to you?”

  He looked down at the wreckage. “It’s our way. When the Synod feels it has been wronged, each clan exacts its punishment. Our mental magic doesn’t work reliably on each other, so it’s usually physical.”

  “This is because you bonded with me?” He might be taking it like a good elven soldier, but I was outraged. “It’s barbaric.”

  He shrugged, wincing as his shoulders rose and fell. “They don’t know about the bonding yet, except my mother. This is for taking you out of Elf heim before they were finished with the regression. I knew it was coming and decided to get it over with this morning. It’s our way,” he repeated. As if that explained everything.

  If they’d done this because he disrupted their regression, what would they do when they found out about the bonding? I set the jar of healing essence on the table. “Sit down. Let me see what I can do.”

  He pulled out a kitchen chair, straddled it, and sat with his back to me. “I’m not sure what you can do, but I can’t reach it to treat it and my mother isn’t allowed to help me.”

  That just pissed me off even more. I hated freaking elves. “Who did this? It looks like you’ve been whipped.”

  “Mace. It’s his favorite punishment—I think he gets off on the sound of the cane whistling in the air before it hits skin.” His voice held more than a trace of fury. This kind of punishment might be “their way,” but he wasn’t as passive about it as he’d first sounded.

  I pulled the band out of my own ponytail and snapped it around his thick blond hair to get it out of my way. Dipping my fingers in the tincture, I willed a bit more magic into it and began to ease it across the stripes of raw skin. Rand sat still except for a couple of flinches. I’d have been crying like a girl and cursing Mace Banyan with every breath.

  “He’s done this to others?”

  “He usually doesn’t take it this far, but he wanted to make sure he left scars.” Rand’s voice took on a bitter edge.

  I smiled as I watched the cuts begin to close within seconds of the tincture being applied. My wizard’s healing magic worked perfectly on elves. “Then next time you see him, make sure you aren’t wearing a shirt. Because your lack of scars is gonna piss him off.”

  “Really?” Rand tried to look over his shoulder.

  I fetched a hand mirror from the guest bathroom and held it at an angle so he could see his unmarked back. “It’s going to be red and sore for a few hours, but it won’t scar. Turn around and let me see what else they’ve done to you.”

  He stood up, turned, and sat in the chair facing me. I couldn’t help the fleeting thought that at least they hadn’t touched his beautiful face, and would bet if Mace Banyan thought he could get away with marring Rand in that way, he would have. He still had a bruised cheek and a black eye, thanks to Alex, but he’d deserved those.

  I focused on the burn first. “It looks like you’ve been branded. But your clan is the fire elves. Your mother did this?”

  “Yeah. Don’t heal that one. I want the scar. It’s the mark of our clan chief, and my mother pissed Mace off royally by giving it to me as my so-called punishment. We were going to do it soon anyway.”

  “You said earlier that your mother was dying. Do you mind if I ask what’s wrong with her? Is she sick?”

  “Yes.” Rand leaned back in the chair. “My father was Synod, but he was killed during a power-grab after Hurricane Katrina, when things were in such flux in the Beyond— and here too, of course. She ascended to his seat, but she’s lost the will to continue. She wants to follow him into our Place of Ancestors.”

  I wasn’t sure what the proper elf etiquette would be for such a thing, so I kept my mouth shut. A potted aloe plant sat in my kitchen window, a testament to my proclivity to burn myself when I made a rare attempt at cooking. I broke off a piece and squeezed the clear, thick juice over the burn. “This will at least take some of the pain while it heals.”

  Next stop, his stomach. Bruise city. “There’s nothing I can do to help that—who did it?”

  “Betony—earth clan. He likes to spar. Of course, it’s better when you can fight back. The offender is restrained when it’s a punishment.”

  Better and better. “I thought elves were supposed to be refined and gentle and nature-loving and all that.” I’d obviously read too much Tolkien. Something else occurred to me. “Wait, that’s only three. You left out Lily—what did she do?”

  I hoped it wasn’t too gross and didn’t involve parts of Rand I didn’t want to see but would feel an obligation to heal.

  He laughed softly. “Oh yes, Lily. Hers was best of all. She had her guards throw me in the water elves’ ceremonial lake and watched while I kept myself afloat as long as I could— which wasn’t long with my hands tied behind my back. Then she watched me drown. At some point—probably the last-possible second—she resuscitated me. She did it twice.” His eyes hardened into blue granite. “She crossed a line.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that, either. All of them had crossed a line, including Rand. “Did you know it was going to be this bad?”

  He stood up, moving the chair back to the table. “Yes, and I’d do it again, except maybe for the drowning part. Let’s eat.”

  CHAPTER 27

  I spent Saturday morning at home with my security wards firmly in place and Rand under orders to never again enter my house without permission. Like that would work.

  First, I replicated the basic charms and potions I’d lost in my backpack. Camouflage. Healing. Replenishing. Translation (because Jean Lafitte spoke four languages fluently—only one of which I fully understood—and sometimes I wanted to know what he was up to). Plus a few that weren’t specifically outlawed but were considered a tad dark by the Elders: sleep charms, freezing charms, and one of my favorites, a confusion charm.

  Next, I did more research on necromancers. There were geographic limitations—the necromancer could be no more than a mile from the person he was controlling. Which didn’t prove the necromancer had been in the dark sedan at Six Flags, but supported it.

  My transportation problem wasn’t as easily taken care of. I couldn’t exactly call the insurance company and tell them I accidentally blew up my Pathfinder with a shot from an elven staff. I hadn’t reported it to the cops. Adrian was due back in town today, so maybe he could get me one through the Elders. They should give me a car to compensate for extreme hazard duty.

  Alex had two vehicles but he hadn’t offered to let me drive the Mercedes, and I’d be damned if I was going to ask him. Rand would probably let me use the Plantasy Island van or his little boxy car, but I’d be damned if I’d ask him, either.

  Instead, I called a cab to take me to a car rental place on Canal Street. I was
perfecting self-pity and martyrdom to an art.

  A half hour later, I puttered toward home in the cheapest car available, a domestic model built from an old soup can that I had to pay extra for because it was the weekend before Thanksgiving. When my cell rang, I saw Alex’s name on the screen and waited a couple of rings before answering so I could get my professional self in charge. He wanted time, and I was determined not to push him until he was ready to talk. Maybe he was ready.

  “Hey, what’s up?” I was the soul of professionalism.

  He paused before answering, and I wondered if he’d expected me to be either crying or angry. “Can you meet me for lunch? Liuzza’s? We need to talk about the Axeman case and decide what to do next.”

  “Half hour?” I was already near Mid-City, so no point in putting it off. We needed to talk about the case before the Axeman came after me again. I promised myself we’d only get into relationship stuff if he brought it up.

  When I pulled into the tiny, crowded parking lot at Liuzza’s, I was disappointed to see Ken’s sensible tan sedan in the lot instead of Alex’s car or SUV. This wasn’t going to be lunch for two, but I could be patient. Alexander Warin couldn’t hide behind Ken forever.

  Liuzza’s had been up to its aging rafters in floodwater after Katrina, but had rebounded with fresh paint, glass tiles, and wood paneling that still managed to make it look retro and wellloved. As I squeezed through the crowds milling around the door, I spotted Ken and Alex at a table in the far corner of the front room.

  A few fried green tomatoes with shrimp remoulade later, we’d had a perfectly professional conversation. Ken had found only three places renting sedans with dark-tinted windows, including one in Baton Rouge, so he was going to each of them this afternoon to chat with managers and employees and look at rental records.

  We needed something more proactive, though. “The Axeman will have to lead us to the necromancer—it’s the only way we’ll ever catch him.” I pushed a shrimp around my plate. “And the only way we can get the Axeman to do that is draw him out, and either catch the person who drops him off or follow his trail back to his summoner. I’m looking for a spell or charm I can use to do that.”

  Alex nodded. “Agreed. We just have to figure out how to draw him out since we don’t know where he’s going to be until he shows up.”

  I pointed at him with my cocktail fork. “Wrong. We don’t have to know where he is. We just have to make sure he knows where I am. I’m the bait.”

  “Oh, no you aren’t.” Alex set his spoon down with a clatter. “We’re not setting you up as a lure. We’ll find another way.”

  Ken cleared his throat. “She’s right, Alex.” He nodded at me. “The only way of controlling this guy is to be a step ahead of him, not a step—or two—behind. I don’t like it either, but DJ’s the one he’s after, so she’s the only one who can draw him out. We just gotta set the trap and be smart about it.”

  Alex tapped the table with his fingers. “You get in enough shit on your own without us creating more trouble for you to get into.”

  This was business, not personal, and he should know better than to mix them. “I’m in more danger not knowing when he’s going to jump out from behind a bush and split my head open with a Home Depot special.” I struggled to keep the anger out of my voice. “I’m the sentinel, I’m the target, and it’s my call. You don’t get to decide.”

  “We don’t know how long it will be before he can come back.” Alex’s face looked as stony as Abe Lincoln on Mount Rushmore. “And even if we knew he was coming back tomorrow, how do you plan to get word to his summoner—post your schedule on the front page of the Times-Picayune?”

  I probably wouldn’t have to. “I’ve thought about how the Axeman could have known I was at Six Flags yesterday. Either the necromancer followed me or he knew my schedule with Adrian. Chances are, as long as I let a few people know where I’ll be and then be there, he’s going to show up.”

  Alex frowned, but he didn’t argue.

  “Did you find out how soon he can come back?” Ken asked.

  I paused while the waitress delivered three steaming bowls of gumbo. “If this were a normal case, it would take the Axeman a couple of weeks to build up enough strength to return—maybe more. But the necromancer is a wild card. The necromantic magic could compel the Axeman to return immediately. He doesn’t need the strength to cross the metaphysical borders since he’s not coming in under his own power.”

  Ken picked a crab claw out of his gumbo and held it up with raised eyebrows. Alex grabbed it.

  “Once we get a rough timetable and plan the trap, who will you share your whereabouts with?” Ken picked out a couple of shrimp with a fork and scraped them into Alex’s bowl. Why the man ordered seafood gumbo and then picked out the seafood was beyond me.

  I thought about necromancers and the people who might know them. “Etienne Boulard and Jonas Adamson, of course. Adrian Hoffman. And I’ll get Rand to spread the word among the Synod.” That pretty much covered my least-trustworthy list, and Adrian was only there because he’d proven he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. He was the only one who could have told Lily about my abilities in hydromancy.

  Ken leaned back in his chair. “You really think there’s a chance the elves are involved in this?” Then he shook his head. “Man, I cannot believe I just asked that question. The words that have been coming out of my mouth this week. Damn.”

  I grinned at him. It had been so long since I smiled it felt unnatural. “You’ve had a steep learning curve.”

  “Tell me about it.” He hunched over his gumbo, but paused with the spoon halfway between bowl and mouth. “Seriously, though. You think the elves could be behind the Axeman?”

  A day ago I’d have said no, that they were more into mental than physical violence. The sight of what they’d done to Rand, one of their own, had changed my opinion. “They’re not necromancers.” My anger bubbled to the surface again, just thinking of Lily letting Rand drown and of Mace wielding his cane. “But the elves are beasts, and they know how to hire black-market magic. We’d be nuts to not consider them.”

  “Does that include Quince Randolph?” Alex’s question was asked in a tone that caressed like velvet, but his expression hinted of razor blades and gunpowder.

  We glared at each other until Ken cleared his throat and pushed back his chair. “I gotta . . . make a call, or answer the call of nature. Or see a man about a call.”

  I waited until he got out of earshot, then leaned close to Alex. “Okay, look. You know damn well I didn’t”—I made quote marks with my fingers—“marry Quince Randolph. I wanted out from under the loup-garou curse. I didn’t want to give up this job I’ve worked so hard for. I didn’t want to give up my magic, which would happen if I moved into the Beyond. I didn’t want to give you up. You were a big part of my decision.”

  Alex slumped in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “I’m sorry. Damn it, I know you didn’t really have a choice. But Randolph’s like your buddy Jean Lafitte—another example of the chaos that surrounds you. It swirls around you like a dust cloud.”

  Alex took a sip of his iced tea and avoided making eye contact. “As much as I want to be with you I don’t know if I can handle everything, and everybody, that comes with it. And I don’t like admitting there are things I can’t handle.”

  “That’s . . .” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. This had been the problem all along. He’d just finally verbalized it, and I didn’t have any answers.

  “Alex, I want to be with you too, but you’re the only one who can decide what you can live with,” I said, finally. “You’re an adrenaline junkie with a control fetish, and maybe I’m a chaos junkie who doesn’t want to be controlled. I’d like to tell you I could change, but most of the crazy crap in my life is not stuff I go out looking for.”

  Yet chaos always found me, and I was Gerry St. Simon’s daughter. I’d come to accept that I would always have a streak of rogue in me.

  I’d been o
bsessively flipping a cardboard coaster as I talked. Alex reached out and rested his hand over mine. “Let’s slow down and see where it goes.”

  Which was probably manspeak for let’s go back to being friends. Maybe it was for the best. The highs of being together were amazing, but the lows hurt. Right now, it hurt a lot.

  I nodded, pulled my hand away, dug my wallet out of my purse, and tucked a twenty under the edge of my plate. “Ken wanted to visit L’Amour Sauvage tonight and see some vampires. You want to go?”

  Alex shook his head. “I have a meeting with the head of the enforcers, to fill him in on how Ken’s doing. I’m hoping he doesn’t ask about Jake.”

  God, Jake. I’d gotten so caught up in my own drama I’d forgotten him. I needed to get word to him, maybe through Jean Lafitte or Louis Armstrong, that even though I wasn’t going to shift it wasn’t safe for him to return. Not until the elves played their hand.

  ***

  The lines stretching from the door of L’Amour Sauvage were especially long on a Saturday night, even the Saturday before Thanksgiving. I stood off to the side until I caught the eye of the bouncer, and he motioned me to the front. The grumbling masses would have to get over it.

  I weaved my way through the well-dressed crowd. I’d made more of a stab at blending in tonight, or at least at sucking up to Etienne by respecting his dress code. I’d slithered into a curvehugging red dress with a low back and high hemline, wore my hair down, and gave up my boots for a pair of ridiculous red heels.

  Heels I almost fell out of when I rounded the end of the bar and came upon Adrian Hoffman in a cozy clutch with Etienne’s leggy red-haired assistant, Terri. I’m not sure whose eyes widened the most.

  “You’re back,” I finally coughed out.

  Terri gave me a disconcerting, fangy grin. She wasn’t supposed to flash those things in public. “Adrian couldn’t stay away from New Orleans too long.” She pronounced the city’s name like a tourist—New Or- leens—but who was I to correct a woman with oversized canines?